7-18-1c
Graham Blvd, just beyond Laketon Rd.: a young woman, short black hair, thin straight build, but not boyish, has taken control of a business, as if the office environment spans the street, the houses being offices, the street being a center aisle/open area. I am a quasi-employee, not subject to her authority, and so I can act freely, and speak to her freely, whereas every other employee cannot, out of fear, reveal their true selves. [Being the ego-analysand and, at the same time, the super-ego-self-analyst, I am free to reveal repressed contents to myself, whereas other employees (my more ordinary selves), who interestingly are conspicuously absent, out of fear, may not. This is a stretch.)] She has come in from the outside to troubleshoot, or consult, or reorganize, or whatever. Her authority is near-absolute, and everyone is cautious of her, to the point where no one is around. She examines the operations alone, except for me. We talk, and I get around to telling her about an Italian film I saw, about a woman (very much like herself, but I don't tell her this, but it's the reason I bring it up) who is hired by a company to reorganize it. She says with enthusiasm that she saw that film, and she goes on to talk about it in detail, describing its plot and action. I understand from her behavior that she has based her self-image on that film, and I'm secretly proud of myself for having made the connection. As she goes about her job, I see that she is the woman in the film, i.e., she acts out the role, as if I am watching the film from inside it. [In reality, there is no film; it's a convenience I create. Thus, the film, a meta-symbol, is the dream.] I get close to her as she "works." (She isn't doing anything really, except walking around.) I walk with her. We both observe. She observes the work environment (there is no work being done; there is only the empty residential neighborhood) while I observe her. I stay close to her, as close as possible, even as close as inches away, my face close to hers. I can feel her presence as a subtle physical sensation.
We go to a house in a residential neighborhood some distance away (location unknown, but as if it is somewhere in one of the affluent housing plans beyond Rte 22.) We knock on the door of a nice home. (They're all nice in this neighborhood.) A woman answers the door. A toddler is playing in the living room. We ask for _____. We tell her we're from his work, i.e., she tells her. I am silent. The woman asks us in. ___ comes into the room. He's a good-looking guy, a corporate type, Mr. Conformity, with a sort of George Clooney appearance, but not quite as handsome. He wears a dark knit shirt and dark, light-weight trousers, casual, but dignified. But he is disheveled, as if he has been sick, or sleeping, or emotionally upset. He greets us (her primarily) and without waiting to be asked, he immediately begins to make excuses for his absence from work. He's been sick, he says, but he's greatly improved now. She isn't buying into his "poor-me" act at all. Her non-responsiveness prompts him to go on. [Silence is power, creating expectation.] He escalates his excuses/apology through several levels, telling her he will be back at work soon, and concluding that he will back to work tomorrow, even though he may still be slightly sick. "Make sure that you are," she says, her first real instructions to him. "Be there ready to work." We leave. I stay close to her as we walk to the car. We stand in front of the car and talk about the guy for a very short while. She asks me if I think he'll be there, and I say, "Oh, yes. He'll be there." We get into the car.
fai: She drives down a deserted side street overhung by trees, no houses. She pulls over to the side of the road. Without a word, she looks at me intensely, and then she quickly comes at me and we passionately kiss. She climbs on top of me and we hurriedly undo each others clothes just enough to expose the necessary body parts. We engage quickly. Other than heavy breathing, she doesn't make a sound, and so I hang on as we keep at it. I'm preoccupied with trying to determine if she is satisfied as all the while she is more actively moving, still never revealing her state of pleasure. Finally, I say, "Tell me when." Immediately she says, "Now, now. Yes. Now."
After I'm done, she gets off me quickly and retreats back behind the wheel. Almost breathless, she announces, "We can never do that again."
"Right."
"I mean it."
"I know."
"Let's make a firm rule right now. Never again."
"Okay."
She looks at me as if she doesn't believe me, and then she looks away.
She says, "There can't be any hint of impropriety."
"I know."
She looks at me in the quickest way, with the briefest furtive glance.
"I mean it."
"I know."
She doesn't look at me. She doesn't believe me, I can tell.
She starts the car, puts it in gear, but she doesn't go anywhere.
She looks at me for a longer while, and she takes a deep breath.
"Really. I can't afford it. You can't afford it."
I recognize the implied threat, but I disregard it. I know how to act.
"I know," I say, with no hint of emotion, nothing to give me away.
She doesn't believe me or she doesn't believe herself.
She looks straight ahead again, and then she starts to move the car.
She drives about fifty feet and then she stops, staring straight ahead.
She wants me to say something, to tip my hand, to start the argument.
I do not reveal my intent, my hidden (often even from myself) agenda.
She takes half a breath and holds it.
She says, "I may be in trouble here." She doesn't look at me.
"No. You're not."
"You don't understand."
"Yes. I do."
She looks at me.
I say, "You're not going to do anything. You're fine."
She looks away.
"Okay?" I ask. She stares straight ahead.
"I don't want you looking at me while we're at work."
"I can't not look at you," I say with unaffected false incredulity.
"Yes you can."
"It's impossible."
She looks pleadingly at me.
"You'll be fine," I say.
She moves the car on ahead and turns at the corner. She is obviously upset. I can see it through her stoic facade. Whereas before her appearance revealed a genuine hard core, now it failed to conceal a softening center. Probably, no one but me would ever notice it, but you never know. These things get noticed and acted on unconsciously. Chinks in the armor do not have to be consciously attended to to be penetrated.
I say, "There's an easy solution to this dilemma, you know."
She slows and turns to me.
"See me after work. Then we can be totally isolated from each other otherwise while we do our jobs."
She speeds back up as she says, "I don't think so."
"Why not? It's a perfect solution."
"It won't work."
"Sure it will. It works all the time."
"People get in trouble for doing that."
"Only if it becomes known."
"It always becomes known."
"Only because the woman wants it known. That's a woman's agenda."
"Men talk too."
"Not me. I got thing about that."
"What thing?" She looks at me, and then she looks quickly away.
"I hate it when men talk about women. I never do it."
"Yeah. Right."
I don't respond.
She looks at me, as if to assess whether or not she believes me.
"You mean you think we can date and no one will ever know."
"If that's what you want to call it. No one will know if you don't tell them, or hint at it. Women have unconscious agendas, you know, that let things like this out."
"Not me. And men have them too."
"Not me."
She smiles slightly, for the first time since the sex. She says, "It's a political matter. If it becomes a power problem, you'll reveal it."
"Hey. You got the power. I already know that. As a matter of fact, that's a big part of your attraction for me."
She smiles, more broadly this time. I knew she'd like that.
"We have to have rules."
"Okay. I got two rules for you. Political rules."
I intentionally do not state them, until she asks, "What are they?"
"One: What people don't know they can't act on. Two: Spin everything to your own agenda."
She agrees, without saying a word or indicating agreement in any way. Her non-response is indicative of her agreement. I knew she couldn't resist the argument when put in those terms.
"Okay," she says. "Well try it. But you better be perfect about it, or..."
I didn't have to ask, "Or what?" I already knew. But I knew that she couldn't ultimately, get to me. I didn't care about the job, or any job. She was the only one with anything to lose. She didn't know that, or she never would have agreed. But I know myself fairly well in this regard, and I know I would never act, even unconsciously, to hurt her. I knew I'd even sacrifice myself for her, if need be. But this time I had a feeling that it needn't be. After a pause, it was back to business again, so I knew we'd be okay.
"What did you think of _____?" she asked.
"He's a sleaze."
She laughed.
"How should I handle him? Should I fire him?"
"No. Ride herd over him, get all the work you can out of him, and then fire him, when his usefulness is done."
She smiled. "You're as ruthless as I am."
"I doubt it." She looked at me and smiled again.
It seemed she couldn't stop smiling now.
"And rule number three," she said. "Don't look at me at work."
I agreed, knowing I had every intention of breaking the rule. She'd have to live with that. And I knew there'd be other rules too, as we went along. But as long as the first two rules were not broken, none of the other rules would matter.
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