him that Linda showed at times. So they figured that Bill would be making his trembling way back to her soon. None of them replied when Matt said, “My fifty dollars says they’re back together before the end of today. Any takers? Anyone want to part with their money? Here’s my money.” He took out his wallet and waved fifty dollars in the air.
“Do you have time to take my picture?” Bill asked Katie.
“Sure,” she replied. “Where do you want to take it?”
“Go to the terrace on the seventeenth floor,” Claire said, trying to be helpful, although she thought he was wasting his time. “The city skyline will be in the background. That’ll catch women’s attention.”
“And make them think you’re a sugar daddy with a sweet set-up,” Debbie added, embellishing Claire’s idea. “They’ll think you’re the owner of a stunning multi-million-dollar penthouse.”
“Won’t they be disappointed,” remarked Matt.
Debbie’s imagination was ever expanding at the thought of Bill in a penthouse. “Women from around the world will be emailing you. They’ll be begging for a date. Pleading for a response. Swearing they’ll do anything, anything for you. And the most persistent, beautiful, young beggar for your love...”
“Will be dear doctor Linda,” Matt suggested. Debbie, Claire, and he burst into laughter. Katie didn’t join in, but that wasn’t due to any consideration for Bill’s feelings. She was thinking of all the personal emails she had yet to send and wished to do whatever Bill wanted quickly, so he would go away.
“The lobby is a good place,” Bill said to Katie. “The one on this floor.”
“There’s no window there,” she said.
“That doesn’t matter,” he replied.
“OK. Let’s go,” she said. She pulled out a digital camera from a drawer in her desk. Then she left with Bill for the lobby.
“I have to see this,” Claire announced, standing up.
“Me too,” Matt seconded.
Debbie had to finish some writing and her cookies, so she remained in her seat. “I’ll expect a full report when you return at an emergency meeting in the conference room,” she told Claire and Matt.
“It’ll be a laugh storm, not a brainstorm,” Claire promised.
“Who could care for him,” Debbie replied, “unless it’s another sadist?”
“You’re so right,” was Claire’s response, as she hurried with Matt toward the lobby, both eager to watch the photo shoot.
Debbie devoured a cookie, as soon as they were gone. Then she passionately began to type.
Chapter 6
The lobby down the hall from the marketing office and across from the elevators wasn’t a place to impress anyone, at least in a favorable way. Two of the walls were white, and the third was electric blue. Standing in this lobby, visitors felt as if they had been dropped into a slice of frigid ocean between two icebergs. The funky furniture made out of geometric shapes in bright primary colors provided some visual warmth, enlivening the space. But it heightened the sense of displacement visitors experienced, and to a few it suggested global warming and the tasteless consumerism polluting the globe. Crude paintings of nightmarish city landscapes for sale on the walls seemed to confirm that the decorating style was pro-environmental. Those paintings gave the place a threatening aspect. They appeared to be the visual ravings of a psychopathic hermit with apocalyptic opinions, which probably explained why they had been on the walls for a while, without anyone expressing any interest in buying them. Because there were no windows, the two ordinary office plants in separate corners of the lobby were weak and wilting from lack of sunlight. Their appearance seemed to strengthen the message of world destruction that the lobby conveyed. If anyone stayed in that lobby for long, they seemed to wilt, too.
After leaving the office with Katie, Bill had made a trip to the bathroom to comb his hair and check his appearance in the mirror, sprucing up what he could. He arrived in the lobby at the same time as Claire and Matt. While all four were there during the photo shoot, other workers on the floor would pass by from time to time and stare at them, curious at what was going on. Frequently, the other office tenants would smile at what they saw or heard.
“Do you want to sit or stand?” Katie asked Bill.
“I’ll sit,” he said.
“Wouldn’t you look thinner, standing?” Claire wondered.
“His posture isn’t good,” Matt pointed out.
“I’ll sit,” repeated Bill, more firmly than before. He then sat down on the couch where bright red-, blue-, and orange-colored square cushions, connected by white metal tubes, pulsated around