She's Just My Coworker

It's finally Friday night and a gaggle of our young and increasingly drunk coworkers are talking over each other. The jokes are fired lightning fast over the bar, overlapping comments both sarcastic and excited, sometimes a bright laugh when something makes it through our heavy cynicism. The roar is growing louder in the dark basement as we trade workplace stories from our law firm and other local gossip.

"Did you see what he said in that TV interview?"

"I bet he's sleeping with her. "

"Can you believe they're pushing her out?"

"No way they win that case, good fucking luck."

I'm in my element now, three, four, no maybe five beers deep and any anxious flutter in my chest is gone. I feel the way people are turning toward me now, their heads inclined and smiles emerging, as my words come out quick and clever. I know they like it when this version of me, the funny, slightly arrogant but charming young man, arrives. They even expect it, on nights like these. I'm on fire now, arguing about something, getting fired up with Matt as we egg each other on. But even as the glow of the beer spreads, as I'm talking faster and louder, I see her walk into the bar. She looks at me and smiles, mouths "Hey," then turns to order her drink.

She's pretty short, maybe 5'5. Her short dark hair is a mess of curls above her ears and her eyes have a green sheen in the right light. Usually I see her in slacks and blazers that make her look boyish, but tonight, unusually, she's got on a black pencil skirt. I try not to look at how the material hugs her ass as she leans over to talk to a paralegal. Lucky him.

A group of us float over to the table in the back, the red walls and a single hanging light like a bad Mafia movie. She's joined us and she keeps smiling in that shit-eating way she seems to have perfected over the years and making little comments for my benefit, until I kick her shin under the table. She looks at me, fake-shocked, grinning. "We know you like it when I'm mean to you," she says quietly, so only I can hear, and I shake my head no. "You look very... legal tonight," I say. "Don't I always?" she asks.

I make my rounds around the room, but a part of me is always conscious of where she is. Sometimes we circle back to each other, some side conversation with a few select friends, all mischief and sly jokes. She always catches exactly what I mean, parsing the subtext and volleying back. It's hard not to enjoy the feeling of it, a near-private exchange among others. Someone who can, for lack of a better phrase, keep up. We've been friends for a long time, but there's always been an undercurrent of... something. Of course, I always denied it strenuously to our colleagues. "No, I don't think she's cute. Not really my type. I think she likes girls anyway."

As the night drags on, we all seem to be talking louder as the roar grows more substantial. I'm yelling to ask the harried bartender for another Stella please, and then close out? Then there she is at my side, a good nine inches shorter than me. "Can you get one more for me too? You know you owe me at least one."

I lean against a wall and rest an elbow on her shoulder, just to gin up some fake annoyance. "I see 'Fun Thomas' is out tonight," she says, mocking me.

"Would you prefer 'Morose Thomas', 'Depressed Thomas'?" I ask, and she snorts. "Definitely not. But I'll know we've arrived at 'Drunk Thomas' when you start begging for a cig."

"So what I'm hearing is, you have cigs?"

"Even better, I went to the dispensary," and she shows me some joints in her coat pocket.

"Well... if you're offering," I say.

"Outside?" she says. "Yes, please." I say, eager to get away from our friends and bosses at last. She pulls the joint from her coat pocket and offers it to me with the lighter. I look at her while I exhale until she breaks eye contact, smiling a little.

We shuffle from foot to foot in the cold air outside, smoke twisting up from our mouths. She coughs a little on her own inhale and I laugh at her. "Hey, shut up," but she's smiling. "What if we went up the street for one more?" she asks, and I can't say no, really no amount of money would make me say no, so I shrug in surrender.

The fancy hotel bar a few blocks away is dimly lit as always. It's so dark that it's hard to read the cocktail menu, but we always get whiskey sours anyway. There's slow, rich music playing and it's not too full. I slide into a back booth and she orders us drinks at the bar. We're talking about her work, my work. Are we rivals? Are we friends? None of the words seem to fit just right. Years of this, a push and pull, always cloaked in plausible deniability. Little bits and jokes. Late nights in the office working on briefs. All our friends suspect something, but few say it to our faces. Three more sours and we're talking about the same things again, little suggestions about sex, the possible sex lives of others, maybe even our own feelings about sex. I think I see her glance down at my jeans, but I can't be sure.

She always manages to notice something that knocks me off balance, something that makes me fumble for the words that are usually right there. Looking up at me from under her lashes, she says, "so, are you going to roll your sleeves up and down again?" and I have to laugh, caught, as I'm pushing the sleeves of my blue button down sleeves up above my forearms.

"You're sitting like, really far away," I say, "can you move over here?" And I gently pat the booth, a suggestion. She gives me that smile again, like she knows what's she's doing. She must know, right? She inches a centimeter closer. "Come on," I say, my best stern look, rolling my eyes. Another bit closer. "You little...."

And she slides next to me, finally, smirks, "is that better for you?" The drinks are tasting like wanting to snake a hand around her back and pull her into me, but I don't. Our thighs are touching, her skirt riding up so I can feel the warmth of her skin.

We keep on talking and she's shifting in her seat, adjusting something at the back of her shirt. The change in position pushes her knee into mine and without thinking about it, I put my hand on her thigh and begin making light circles on her skin. She doesn't acknowledge it but I think I can feel her, nearly imperceptibly, push into my hand. She's telling me a story I can't quite follow about people I don't know, talking fast like she always does when she's drunk. "And that's I told David, it doesn't matter what Lilly thinks is best if the fucking client doesn't agree...."

"This tag is driving me crazy," she suddenly interrupts herself. "Do you have, like, some scissors or a pocket knife or something? Maybe at the bar?" I peer over her, looking down her collar, and put one finger on her neck where her skin is warm and soft.

"I can try to rip it off, but it might be difficult with you wearing it," I say. "Then come to the bathroom with me for a sec," she says, and puts her hand down on mine for just a second, then hesitant, "if that's cool."

"Yeah, sure," I say, sliding out of the booth and standing up. She continues her story and I follow her into the hallway, too brightly lit, then into a single stall bathroom with golden wallpaper.

She turns and locks the door, still talking the whole time, one hand at her collar, looking up at me. "And it's not as if YOU-" she says, some challenge and joke and I reach down and grab her face with both hands and kiss her.

I pull back for half a second, checking, and her pupils are huge and dark, stare daring.

"Took you long enough," she says and leans up toward me.

I push her gently back against the wall, our lips moving, thinking only half- completed thoughts of I want, I want, I want.

Her lips feel so good and I put one hand on her hip, holding her against the wall.

She's pressing her body into mine, then pushes her tongue through my lips, one hand grabbing my hair.

Our bodies are irregular shapes trying to become one hard line, just wanting closer, closer. I kiss her neck, suck it for a moment and she lets out a soft breath, a little groan that I feel instantly makes me hard. "Fuck, fuck," she is whispering softly and then she pulls hard on my hair, kissing me again, more furiously.

The pain feels distant, unimportant, and I run my hand from her hip to her tit, cupping it and pressing hard until I feel her mouth open against mine. I turn us around, my back to the wall and grab her firm ass through her skirt, pulling her into me.

She has one hand on my stomach, moving down and we're pushing into each other like we want to break one another.

We're both breathing heavy, eyes wild. She reaches further down and feels that I'm hard, rubs her hand against me through my jeans. "My God," I mumble.

A pause and she glances toward the sink, eyebrows raised.

"Yeah?" I say, "Okay, yeah." I grab her legs and easily lift her up, where she leans back against the mirror and wraps her legs tightly around me, like a vise. Jesus Christ.

My tongue is going deeper into her mouth like I want to be, just more, more, more. I slide one hand slowly up her thigh, under her skirt, still kissing her, feeling her curve her body into mine. I feel wet lace and bend the back of my fingers against her, pushing against her underwear. She breaks the kiss suddenly, her head back a little and a quick intake of breath. Then kissing her neck, I think I hear her say "please." Goddamn. I need to feel her wet against me, need to be inside her, need it now.

"Yes, yes," I'm saying, in her ear, feeling my way to the edge of her underwear, then crouching down and moving it aside. She feels so warm and slick and as my tongue touches her skin, she arches her whole body into me with a low moan. I grab her hips to hold her tightly against my face, my tongue circling her clit. Her breathing is fast and hard, and the hand she's not using to hold herself on the sink is holding fast to the back of my head. I slide a finger inside her and she pushes herself onto it, holy shit, and then ---- knock, knock, knock, firm banging on the door.

"Hello? Anyone in there?!" A panicked glance and she blurts out, "one sec!" and slides down, we're both looking at each other, embarrassed and not, straightening our clothes into something resembling decent.

We head out together, downcast glances, as an older woman, bejeweled, looks suspiciously at me. In the hallway, our giggles turn into full throated laughter. I grab her hand, trying to be serious.

"Please, can we go somewhere else?" I ask her.

"You mean you've waited five years and you're not going to fuck me now, right here in this hallway?" she says, and I can't resist pushing her against the wall to kiss her again, just to shut her up, not caring who sees.