Handsome Quiet Man.

As I was driving home from Quiet Man’s office, as I often do, I drove past where my mother was killed at the top of the crest of a hill. She died on a main road that I cannot realistically avoid.

I wonder if she is watching what I am doing with my life and who I am with? I do not know the answer to this, but it is what I was thinking on the drive home.

Entering my house, I found a Christmas gift bag for Binnie’s wine, which I hoped was a good one. I cannot imagine that it was not, since Quiet Man and Fred do not like cheap. Or so I was hoping for in the category of white wine.

I plunged the bottle into the bag and topped it with red tissue paper that I pulled out of my Sephora bag when I last bought some makeup that I really do not need, but wanted.

Now, how to dress myself. I was getting antsy and angry with myself for having stayed so long with Quiet Man that I was unable to shower. I would not have had to shower had I not plopped myself in his office and kept talking and smoking cigars that had taken temporary residence in my hair.

As I brushed my locks and rolled each section onto a hot roller, I was secretly hoping the smoke would be blasted out by the heat of the roller. If not, I planned to perfume my hair before going to Binnie’s.

As usual, I pulled many outfits. I thought a cocktail dress would be too formal, and a suit would be too drab and business like. I settled on a BCBG knit skirt with a ruffle on the hem and a long sleeved thin wool sweater that had ruffles on the edges and it’s sleeves that fanned out at my wrist. Thank goodness for this sweater. Originally I had bought it because it had not a line of buttons to close at the front, but one. The one button meets in the middle of my stomach so the ruffles meet while cascading down the semi circles that compose the front of the garment, and glide lightly on the top of my hips. From the top of the button, I can either fan the ruffles to expose a healthy decollate or fan them in to frame my face.

Framing my face was the wisest choice, for I thought Binnie is not one for exposure, but I am sure her husband Farrell is, regardless. So not wanting to appear for a house party as a tart, those ruffles worked wonders.

I chose a demure makeup for the evening, with my eye watching the clock. I was already late, damned Quiet Man. I am not sure he likes Binnie much.

Binnie and I had a girlfriend’s night out at her house, a mansion like dwelling, that makes you bug eyed. Binnie is a interior decorator and her house shows off her talent.

I had met Binnie at Fred’s house party. She started to talk to me after she heard me introduce myself to someone nearby. She told me she drove past my office many times and wondered who I was and always wanted to meet me. How odd and so funny I found that. I also met Farrell, her husband, that night, who is a natural flirt.

So, since we met, she looked up my number and called me at my office to ask me to come to her house. So I did.

While feasting, literally on the gigantic spread she put out for two people in this glorious and glamorous kitchen in that gigantic house, we were drinking the carafes of wine she had breathing. She then asks me how I knew Fred? She told me one of her girlfriends told her he was a big flirt, which he is, I confirmed. She then asked me, who was that man who was following Fred around all night at his party?

“Someone was following him around?” I asked.

Hmm, I thought for a minute as to who might have done that. Fred was running around like Ricardo Moltaban that night, solo from what I saw.

“Binnie, I never saw anyone shadowing Fred. What did he look like?”

“He was tall; a very handsome man.”

I was perusing the index of my mind from that night, wondering to whom she was referring.

“What color hair?” I asked.

“Black.”

Most of the men there had dark hair, what a clue.

“He was so good looking Muse!” she blurted out giggling like a smitten school girl.

OMG, she was talking about Quiet Man, who was not shadowing Fred. Usually he does, but not that night.

“Oh Binnie, that is Quiet Man! He is not Fred’s bodyguard, but that is what most people think because he does not care what any one thinks.”

“Well,” she thought out loud, “he is so attractive!”

All I could do was laugh and tell Binnie, Ms. Religious, married woman, that Quiet Man was also married.

“Quiet Man,” I said in a teasing voice, “do you know what Binnie said about you?”

The three of us where talking in Fred’s store after I first visited Binnie. I almost did not go after we all had hashed out that Marsha would probably tell Binnie about the night we all went to the go go club. Quiet Man was insistent that I go and not care about Marsha. Fred could care less 99% of the time what Marsha thinks or does.

“What she say Muse?” said Quiet Man as he stared at me.

“She say something Muse?” said Fred, his attention caught, probably shocked that Binnie did not say anything about him, the important one.

“Yes, she did!” I said while trying not to laugh.

Quiet Man was still looking at me but was now smiling. Fred had his ears pinned to not miss any of what I was about to say.

“Fred, Binnie asked me who was following you around all night at your house party,” I started.

“No one was following me, Muse, you know that,” said Fred, “ Binnie enjoy my party, right Muse?”

“Yes, Fred, yes. Well, she thought this person was so handsome!” I blurted.

Because it is always about Fred, he guessed it was Berman, but then reasoned Berman was not handsome.

He then asked Quiet Man who he thought it was, since, you know, Fred had to know who was more handsome than he, that is how Fred thinks.

Quiet Man had a definitive answer, “Freddy, it was So and So, who came from Boston.”

“EEH, wrong!” I said, “No, So and So was not of the correct background.”

They both looked at me.

“It was Quiet Man! Binnie thinks you are so handsome! Can you believe she remembered you, how funny!”

Fred, extremely disappointed to begin with that the handsome man was not he, did not seem to take any interest when the handsome compliments are paid to his best friend Quiet Man.

We all laughed hysterically anyway and Fred began to tease Quiet Man about how he should take Binnie out. Why Fred thinks that married men can go out on real dates, is beyond me, but it’s a cultural thing for sure.

So, since the story about Quiet Man’s handsomeness, he has had a dislike for Binnie for some reason.

And this was what probably prompted him to keep me longer that needed to make me late for Binnie’s party. While we were wasting away time at his office, he called Fred to see if he was going to Binnie’s. Yes, and so was Marsha. Poor Fred, he sounded so uninterested.

So, I grabbed my gifted bottle of wine, doused myself in scent, and arrived more than 30 minutes late for Binnie.