you know anything about the women who had your position before you?” Chase asked, still working to put me at ease.
“Just a few funny details from the boys,” I replied.
“Don’t,” Emmet said, smiling. But Mitch ignored him. Now I saw Emmet’s part in the act; the strong silent one; a man of few words. This was getting interesting.
“Chase, should we go through the list for Annie?” Mitch asked, mischievously raising his eyebrows.
“Second warning,” Emmet said, still smiling. But again, Mitch ignored him.
“They didn’t all leave for the same reason.” He laughed. “It’s more like the Seven Biblical Plagues…each a horrifying story in itself.” Mitch laughed boisterously.
“There was that one that brought fire, famine, and flood to the house within the first week. Remember her Mitch?” Chase asked as he shook grinning from ear to ear.
“Last warning,” Emmet said. I looked at him to get a read on his mood. He wore a slight smile, but had a serious look in his eyes. I didn’t often look Emmet right in the eyes. They were distractingly beautiful, and it was difficult not to get lost in them. The color was crystal clear blue and his eyelashes…beautiful black, long eyelashes outlined by his perfectly arched eyebrows. His eyes caught mine.
“…don’t you think so, Annie?” Mitch asked.
“Ahh…think about what?” I said, feeling another blush of color. “Think we should be able to tell you at least one story,” Chase added. “I rather enjoy my job…so I will plead the fifth,” I said, giving Emmet a wink. We all looked at Emmet.
“Just one,” said Emmet, “but not Angie…we do want Annie to stay.”
“Nicole One then.” Mitch and Chase agreed. Chase opened two beers, handed me one, and we clanked our bottles together. Mitch slugged down half his beer and let out a muffled belch before starting the story. I was definitely wrong about the fun-factor of Emmet’s friends. Their quick wit and charm had drawn me in and I must admit I was seeing an enjoyable side of Emmet. He sat back in his chair smirking and drinking his beer slowly.
Mitch was an incredible storyteller; I actually wondered how much of the story was true. He had to be taking extreme creative license. He was acting out some of it, pulling Chase in when he needed a prop or another participant to his charade. We laughed until our stomachs and faces hurt. I had tears streaming down my cheeks…and Mitch went on. Slyly he tried to connect the end of the Nicole One story to the beginning of the Nicole Two story.
“How many Nicole’s were there?” I laughed.
“Three,” Chase responded. “The third one was the worst…but none of them were as bad as Angie. You see, Angie—“
“Stop! Enough!” Laughed Emmet. “Let’s save that story for another night.”
I was still wiping the tears from my eyes and winding down my laughter from the Nicole One story when the thought hit me. When was the last time I laughed like that? I hadn’t had any friends to speak of for years; I couldn’t remember the last time I laughed that hard with other people. I felt a pain in my heart realizing that Lawrence had managed to keep real laughter from my life. My eyes welled up with tears, unnoticed to the rest. I tried to make them look like residual tears from the laughter.
“Thank you all, I needed that,” I said standing up, again intent upon leaving. “You enjoy the rest of your boy’s night. May I get you anything before I go?”
“Annie, you’re not working tonight. Anything we need, we can get ourselves,” Emmet said completely composed as always.
Chase smiled, looking more at Emmet than me. “Would you consider staying a little longer? Mitch loves having a new audience for his endless stories.”
“Of course she’ll stay!” Mitch bellowed. “Unless we’re keeping you from a hot date?”
“No hot date,” I admitted as I took another step toward the stairs, “but I was—”
“Great,” Mitch snorted and like a caveman he shoved me onto the couch next to Chase, plopping down next to me. “Your choice, Annie; college stories or personal assistants from hell for two hundred,” he said, flopping his arm around me. Mitch had an unrefined charm. He and Chase were practically the antitheses of each other.
We all looked at Emmet for a reaction to Mitch’s game show parallel. “Mitch never lets the truth get in the way of a good story, Annie,” Emmet said. “Whatever you want to hear…except the Angie story.”
“Then I’ll take college stories for two hundred, Mitch.”
“Well doll,” he said giving me a squeeze, “scholarship here could have—”
“Annie doesn’t care about my college choices, Mitch,” Emmet interrupted.
“Alright big guy,” Mitch grinned, jumping off the couch launching into a fraternity party story.
All three men earned their undergraduate degrees at Ball State University here in Indiana. They also played rugby together and were in the same fraternity, so the stories were endless. One story ran into another making it difficult to know where one ended and the other began. There were a few break-ups peppered into his stories, but no jail time any of them admitted to.
We all sat back to catch our breath. After a moment Chase looked at me inquisitively. “Tell us something about you, Annie. What did you do before you came to work for Emmet?”
“Ahhh my life isn’t that…ummm interesting.” Could I be any more inarticulate? You’d never have known I’d been referred to as a court room piranha. I could barely put together a sentence right then. Chase caught me completely off guard. “I’d rather hear the Angie story,” I said, making a dismal attempt to change the subject.
“Not a chance,” Emmet softly interjected with a wink. He wasn’t rescuing me from Chase’s questions. Chase entertained us by peppering me with more questions.
“What do you do to relax; what kind of food do you like; are you a cat or a dog person, rock or jazz; do you like to travel; how long have you lived in Indiana?” Chase took a breath and I threw my hands up like I was giving up.
“I run daily and read fiction to relax; dogs over cats; I like any food I haven’t cooked; old rock definitely—Guns N’ Roses, AC/DC, Stones, Aerosmith, Led Zeppelin—all the good ones; I’m more of a homebody than a traveler, and I grew up all over. What about you?” I wasn’t truly interested in the answers as much as I was trying to divert the conversation to someone else. I could tell Emmet knew what I was doing. The others didn’t seem to notice.
I was heeding Michael’s warning and being prudent with anything I shared. I stood up and stretched a little before any more questions came my way. “Goodnight all. Now I have to get to bed…some of us have to work in the morning.” Quickly I made my escape before the caveman could block my retreat, but halfway up the stairs I stopped and listened, wanting to know what they would say about me.
“I’ll give her two more weeks,” Mitch said. “Not that she’s an Angie or one of the other freak shows you’ve hired, but you’re going to scare her off Emmet. You keep staring at her like that
