>I don’t know how to pronounce a word like that, Cookie!
He was staring like he does at her scrunched up knees, they looking like a kid’s drawing of a pathetic and eyeless pensioner sucking a bright fresh lemon.
Cookie, make it plain. Plain-American. Don’t say it like you’re sucking your rotten teeth like some faggy Frenchman. You gotta push, push, push the sinewy, smooth, sashaying, sexy smoke out past your upturned nose.
For the first time all afternoon, the bowl of melted vanilla ice cream, our thirty-something hero Calvin Thrust scrambles his nerves for just long enough to allow his plain brown eyes to float to the surface and graze Cookie’s line of sight.
You know, if I have to think about it I don’t want to buy it. More than likely I’ll keep my wallet in my pocket and save my coin for the kiddies’ college fund. I want action, Cookie. Lay the fucking egg and get the fuck out.
Calvin, still mostly eye-locked below Cookie’s bedazzled belt sweeps his manicured hand, one manicured pointer finger extended, down the east wall left across the floor and up the west wall to the ceiling.
I’m done. Fuck, Cookie. Okay. Listen. You drain me sometimes. It used to be a treat sharing this space with you, but listen. Pretend there’s a long thick piece of that buff-colored masking tape bisecting the office; you stay all the way over there, I’ll stay over here.
He repeats the same sweeping motion, now stealing glances at the bridge of Cookie’s nose. Having the ungroomed quality of a pubescent boy’s yellowish underarms, the vast speckled diamond of sallow real estate between her vacant eyes becomes a target. He aims. Fires.
You do your work, I’ll do mine. Capice? And that’s it. Got it?
Calvin clears his throat.
Got it.