What Are You Doing, Quiet Man?

Now whether after or before this conversation with Quiet Man outside of Blockbuster about going to the restaurant, I saw him intermittently. Once when I was with another boyfriend/friend, I was walking towards Fred’s store. Quiet Man was with Fred inside, and all they could do was stare out the plate glass window. Quiet Man was leaning on his elbow on the glass counter looking outward.

As I was talking to Harry, my bf/friend, I waved to Quiet Man and Fred. Fred waves enthusiastically and Quiet Man does a wide half moon wave.

Another time I was Christmas shopping all day at our local mall. Harry was done working, it was a Friday and he wanted to get together.

“OK, I will meet you at your house” I told him.

The plan was to meet at his house so he could change into casual clothes and I could leave my car rather than him picking me up at the mall and leaving my car there.

On the way to Harry’s house, I was annoyed with Harry. He is very bossy. Since he does not like to talk on his cell phone while he is driving, that is his problem. So instead of calling his cell phone to tell him I decided not to meet him at his house, because I had more shopping I needed to do, I called his house. I could not leave a message due to his message box being full. Oh, well.

Eventually Harry calls me.

“Where are you?” he demanded.

“Why are you calling me from your cell phone?”

“Because I decided to do an errand after you did not meet me at home,” he said annoyed I did not take direction that night.

“So, where are you?”

“I am at XYZ Store.”

“How long are you going to be there?” he asked.

“Not long. I am leaving.”

“Meet me at the house?”

“No.”

“Why?”

“Where are you now?”

He was just north of me, traveling south.

“I have to go to TJMAXX, so since you are going to be passing me, why bother going home?”

“Oh,” he realized, ”OK, I will meet you at TJMAXX.”

So I go to TJMAXX. I am wandering around looking at the Christmas things they had out.

As I am roving about, wondering where the hell Harry was, I see Quiet Man in the toiletries section!

OMG, I thought, what the hell is he doing here? He was casually dressed as if he just went to dinner; I knew he saw me before I saw him, because he was looking at the crap they had with feigned interest.

I was standing at the jewelry counter next to the toiletries; he must have been no more than 15 feet from me.

I dialed Harry.

“Where are you?”

“I just hit your car!”

“What! You hit my car?!”

“Heh, no, I was just joking with you. I am in the parking lot. I am coming in.”

“OK, I will be standing in the main aisle where you will come in so you can see me.”

“Okay.”

Now, as I was talking to Harry on the phone, Quiet Man heard my voice, I know he did. He did not turn around, he did not glance, he was fervently looking at all the woman soaps, perfumes, shower gels etc.

Harry comes bouncing into TJMAXX, all happy and giddy.

“Hey, Harry.”

“Hey, Muse.”

“Harry come and look at this jewelry,” I told him as I led him to look at the crap in the case. Quiet Man was still in the toiletries. The only man in the toiletries. And the jewelry was right next to the toiletries.

Harry is one man that loves jewelry. He has given almost each and every previous girlfriend jewelry and engagement rings, and to this day, still has every piece. Can you imagine? He collects it back when they break up.

“They just didn’t love me anymore,” he explains after telling a varied amount of similar stories about wrestling off the rings from their fingers during tender break up moments.

We must have circled that jewelry counter three times. Harry is pretty loud because he loves to entertain the ladies while he is shopping with me.

For example, once I snapped at him for getting on my nerves in the supermarket.

“The Judge told you, you better be nice to me!” he chided me.

And wouldn’t you know it, he had the old bitties turning around staring and whispering about me. And, he played it like a fiddle.

If we go to the dollar store, he follows me around asking me the price of items.

“How much is this?” he inquires.

“It’s a dollar.”

“And this, how much is it?”

“It’s a dollar.”

“What about this right here?”

I answer him, “It’s a dollar!” until I realize what he is doing.

“Oh, Honey, he is precious” one woman told me once. That just eggs him on to annoy me more and more.

Enough about Harry.

Quiet Man could have repeated word for word what Harry and I were talking about since he was more than within earshot.

Nothing; not a peep from him. What the hell was he doing was what I was thinking. It was a Friday night. Did he just come back from dinner alone? He definitely was alone in the store.

Quiet Man slips to the back of the store.

Harry decides he wants to go shopping. I stayed at the jewelry counter. I then went into the toiletries to see what Quiet Man found so interesting.

I was bent at one of the displays looking at something. Quiet Man went by me and I just caught his downward glance to me. What jerk, I thought.

I get into the main aisle.

I have Harry flagging me down from the opposite end of the store. Quiet Man was headed his way.

Harry had found yet another fleece outer top. He swears by them.

“Ok, Harry let’s go.” I told him.

I just wanted to get the hell out of that store.

I could not tell Harry about Quiet Man being there. I was not sure how he would react. When I first told Harry I met him, he was very surly about it all.

While going around the jewelry counter, Harry wanted to know where I wanted to eat that night. I told him I wanted a salad; he had wanted pizza or something like that at his friend’s restaurant. I was not in the mood for iceberg lettuce, what his friend thinks is salad.

So Harry pays for his finds and we go out onto the sidewalk.

“Quite Man was in there, let’s get going,” I told him to try and hurry him up.

“What?” he said.

“Oh, never mind, you heard me.”

He wanted me to ride with him, but I told him I was not going to leave my car. He was annoying about it and I told him, ok, we can go where you want, but I am brining my own car. It was a fair exchange, not leaving my car to eat iceberg lettuce.

Harry takes his time getting into his vehicle. He rolls his window down, and says, “You are going to meet me there, right?”

“Yes! What is wrong with you?” I said. He was annoying me now.

“Ok, see you there.”

I get into my car. I was wondering why I did not notice Quiet Man was in TJMAXX before I went in; maybe he arrived after I did?

As I was making my way out of the plaza, I had to go around the lot and it brought me on my way out in front of the store.

Just as I was going to pass TJMAXX, Quiet Man is walking out, without any purchases. He put his foot onto the pavement, right in front of my car. I stopped.

He comes over to my window, which I was rolling down.

He sticks his hands in to grab mine. He kissed my hands.

“Hello, Muse”

“Hello, Quiet Man. I was just in TJMAXX; I did not see you,” I lied.

He explained he was looking at the prices of perfume, since he claimed that these discount stores where hurting one of Fred’s business.

You have got to be kidding me, I thought. I am not kidding you. And he said it most seriously.

We made small talk about not seeing each other in a while and things like that. He was standing in the middle of the driving lane in front of the store, without a care if he was in the way or not.

I started to get anxious because I knew Harry was probably timing my arrival. I was mulling in my mind while Quiet Man was chattering on to me if I should invite him to eat with Harry and I. I decided no.

“Ah, Quiet Man,” I interrupted him, “I have to meet someone for dinner, who is waiting for me.”

“Oh, Muse, I am so sorry” he said as if he was imposing on me.

“Well, that is ok, I just have to leave. It was nice seeing you,” I told him as I cut the conversation short.

He kissed my hand and stepped back to look at me in my car. I waved goodbye to him and went off on my way.

I barely made it to the pizza restaurant without much time passing. I had sped all the way. Harry was waiting in the parking lot. The restaurant was closed.

I forgot where we went, but after that, Harry insisted that almost every thing we did, such as go to Starbucks and the like, was to be done out of town. He did not want any run-ins with Quiet Man or other similar such persons, as if it was an epidemic.

Geez.