“Read this.” She taps out on her phone and shoves a reputable news source in my face. My jaw drops as does the pen from my hand as I scroll downward reading the news.
“City-wide shutdown? Mandatory curfews and staying at home?” My stomach drops hoping this isn’t true, but it’s clear as day. I’m supposed to finally meet my online date, but not if they shut down every bar in the city.
There goes the last three months of carefully crafted emails and text messages since I was too chicken to talk to him on the phone. The guy suggested last week we try a meet up at a cute well-lit bar in a fairly safe section of Manhattan and I finally agreed. Now this whole online date experiment of mine is going down the drain fast. I was cautious and picky, but now I’d never get to meet him at this point.
“Yeah. Talk about a way to ruin my weekend of bar hopping and brunching.” Tess paces the space next to me as more of our co-workers file in. I don’t know how to process the news. I’d been so busy going about my daily routine that I hadn’t given much credence to what was going on around me. My brain hops into planning mode. Did we have enough Tylenol? Enough food and paper products? What would happen to my niece Hannah who was in second grade? Did my sister pick up her asthma medication?
“Alright everyone, the big boss is coming down for a staff meeting. Look busy and sharp!” Teddy our floor manager barks from the stairs while we all stand whispering worries. Donovan Ward walks down from his office flanked by Shelly in HR and his VP Howard Hughes. The guy looks slicker than an oil spill, Howard that is with his hipster suit and overly gelled hair like he crawled out from a dirty garage managing a grunge band. I didn’t have much faith in a guy with two last names that reminded me of a movie with a duck I wasn’t old enough to have seen when it released.
“I hope this isn’t one big pink slip, my credit card is due next week.” Tess fidgets fixing her hair and straightening her top tucked into her skirt as her heels muffle in the carpeted flooring.
Glancing down I fix my crisp white t-shirt I matched with pin stripe slim pants and ankle boots, because it’s still winter in NYC.
“Shh.” I pat Tess on the shoulder, but I’d be lying if I wasn’t thinking the same thing too. All those happy thoughts I had about my date and independent living vanish with the impending doom.
2
Van
I stand on the balcony overlooking my team of fifty or so in-house employees. Shelly to my right swipes through notes she made on her tablet while Howie is doing what he does best and worst. Cost analysis. He’s good at what he does, but it doesn’t mean I particularity like him.
I stretch and groan thinking that this was not how I envisioned today going. I finally had a date with Text girl and I couldn’t wait to get to know her under the guise of real names and faces in an actual location outside the office. I was over the keyboard warrior games to win her affections when she literally worked in my bull pen.
That’s the crazy thing about issuing company phones to associates who need them. I have full access which I shamelessly take advantage of when it comes to her. I know she lives at home and has a dog. She takes a strange amount of pictures of a fat black squirrel that I’m curious to know more about. And flowers. Her camera roll has all these close up shots of flowers in the park. Pink ones I don’t know the name for, violets and dogwood. The only thing I don’t see are enough selfies which makes me wonder because I feel like I know her, and yet I don’t, not really. Over the past few months we’ve exchanged at least three emails a week and a daily text session that leaves me wanting more. I had my IT guy turn off her tracking because I’m not a creep, but I definitely worry about her taking the subway home at night when it’s dark and cold.
Amazing how irony and technology worked like that because if I didn’t get to have my date with her this week which was looking less and less like a reality, I was going to lose my shit in a tantrum undignified for a man of my age.
My grip on the railing tightens as I scan the room for her. The lovely Laurel Murphy. Cute glasses perch on her nose as she winds her hair up in a messy bun. Her casual business attire is neat and simple. She wears smart ankle boots and chews on her pen thoughtfully until Tess smacks it out of her hand making me chuckle under my breath. She typically hangs out with Tess who I surmise is a good friend of hers the way they trade coffee like clothes. I like knowing she has someone. Initially, I worried hiring her right out of school with little experience but she’s proven herself over and over again on projects. She’ll make a great graphic designer in advertising and I hope she’ll stay with the company once she learns who I am. I check my phone quick opening my texts. I contemplate sending her one right now and coming clean. I could demand she comes up to my office and tell her everything, but I don’t. What I do know about Laurel is that she’ll see this as a betrayal and I don’t want to lose her. I’ll continue to hold out as long as I can.
I doubt anyone coming to work today expects to be sent home. While I’d been spending the past two weeks watching intently what was happening on the other side of the world, my home office staff prepared to layoff half my company behind my back. Despite Howie’s numbers that is never happening. I can’t stomach the idea of them not being about to buy food or pay rent. I veto the idea before Howie and Shelly can say anything else and give the staff the rest of the day off with shocked faces promising a video call tomorrow at 9am. Heading back into my office I close the door gathering my thoughts. At least I know payroll already cut checks and Laurel will be paid this week.
My phone rings and I pick up without looking to see who it is. The Imperial March comes through and I know it’s my brother Grant.
“Van have you spoken to mom?” My brother is a get down to business type and doesn’t mince words. Sometimes I have to wonder if we came from the same parents even though we have a striking resemblance that indicates there is no escaping our ties.
“I spoke to her yesterday. She got the delivery order.” In a panic I set my mother up for automatic deliveries and express shipped a month’s worth of paper products, cleaning supplies, pet food, and frozen steaks. There’s a strange helplessness to this situation and the only thing I can do is throw money at the problem even though that doesn’t make it go away. I keep thinking about Laurel who is never far from my mind.
“Good. Listen. I’m thinking that maybe you should close up the home office and head up here. Stay with mom or even crash at my place.” They live within five miles of each other in Kingston, NY. My mother lives in the beautiful Victorian home we grew up in while my brother has a loft studio in one of the converted warehouse buildings he flipped as a real estate guru. Grant’s agitation seeps through the phone, but we both know it’s better we’re not around each other too long.
“That’s not going to work for me. Besides I can’t leave the city with the stay at home order in place.”
Grant huffs, but he knows I won’t change my mind despite his urging. “Drive that fancy car of yours and get up here. It’s not like the National Guard is checking people at the bridge.”
“No thank goodness, but just because I can leave the city doesn’t mean I should leave the city.” I think about Laurel. I couldn’t leave her here. Sure, she lives across town, but if the proximity of boroughs was all I was going to get, I would take it, social distancing and all.