As did many POstables I found the dinner at Montaldo's in One In A Million (OIAM) heart wrenching. Shane returns to work Monday and makes the best of things. However, her comportment at Dudley's party especially struck me. She orders the cake with no real hope of returning to Montaldo's. Once again she is thinking of Oliver. She wears her hair just as she did the night of their dinner - with the addition of the rose. Once again to reassure and to make amends with Oliver. She finds Oliver with Dale. She does not interrupt or interfere but sits and smiles and makes conversation with others deferring to whomever Oliver may desire. How did she come to this point? What happened after she left the restaurant? In this piece I seek to explore some possible answers. As always Martha Williamson is the real owner and inspiration for this story.
The Encourager
She sits across from him, her head slightly tilted as she watches the artistry before her. Her heart is in her misty eyes. She loses herself in the exacting beauty of it all: the music - pleading and affecting; the dance - sensual and elegant. It is painfully but exquisitely true. For thirty-six measures the melody and motion cloud her vision and she no longer sees the reality in front of her. She imagines only him - dancing in his arms – being led by his steps – closing with a kiss. It is where her heart has been yearning to go long before this night. The painful honesty of longing brings tears.
The music stops. The dancers freeze. The performance and the night end.
She politely claps her hands. Glancing at her dinner partner she tries to give him a look that reveals nothing. After all she served her heart to him on a platter already.
But he knows. He saw. He fidgets with his flatware. He cannot bear to look into her eyes - eyes that just a moment earlier could not help but allow a tear to escape. He nods for the waiter to bring the check.
Calmly excusing herself, she forces a smile and goes to the ladies' room. Standing in front of the mirror she washes her hands and is taunted by her own words from a conversation in the Mailbox Grille. "… you just end up crying in the ladies' room." She shakes her head. "I will not cry," she tells herself and she does not. She just swallows the lump in her throat.
When she returns to the table the check is paid. "Shall we go?" he asks. "Yes," she answers. He never touched his dessert.
The hostess notified by the waitstaff of their leaving brings her coat from the cloakroom. The restaurant owner helps her put it on and says something about hoping the lovely lady will return. She smiles and nods as if their return is guaranteed all the while feeling sadly certain this will be her last dinner at this romantic establishment. In the middle of this moment she isn't sure that she could possibly muster the courage to try again. She puts her hands in her coat pockets. She does not take his arm. He doesn't offer it anyway. The valet opens her car door making for one less close encounter with him.
Every red light catches them on the way to her house. She thinks that she will never get home. Neither says a word.
Stuck on red once again, Oliver points at the street sign displayed in front of them and breaks the uneasy silence.
"One may wish to take note that we are currently stopped at the intersection of Broad and Cherry Street."
"And?" she replies, not bothering to look.
"It's just that Denver also has a Cherry Lane."
"Fascinating," replies Shane, dripping with sarcasm and irked by the use of "one." "I have gone from just a friend to 'one' now," she thinks to herself. "At least I was Ms. McInerney."
Deducing that more information is needed for her to appreciate the situation the undaunted dinner partner continues. "However, Cherry Lane is located in one of the northern suburbs."
No verbal acknowledgement is made of this wealth of geographic information.
"Hence resulting in different postal codes."
Silence.
"Some careless letter writers miss this distinction resulting in the errant letter arriving in our office."
"I'll keep that in mind," she says with the exact same inflection that she used to remember "no rosehips."
"Given that you are not actually from Denver I thought you may find this helpful." he mutters, looking out the window to his left. She misses his look of nervous desperation.
He goes on and on for the rest of the drive about zip codes and how they were determined in Denver.
"I wish I was in a different zip code right about now," she thinks.
He is operating on automatic and so is she. Speak of nothing personal. Speak of nothing at all. After all - they are - just friends.
She rummages in her purse for her house key. She wants it in her hand as soon as the car stops in front of her house. No more delays. With key in hand, she walks up the steps in front of him and unlocks the door.
"Good night, thank you again for – dinner," she courteously says.
He freezes with one foot on the porch and one foot on the top step. He never attempts to go further. "I will see you on Monday," he says with eyes full of hurt and his own disappointment. At this point she isn't fully certain if this is a statement or a question.
"See you Monday," she replies. Maintain some semblance of dignity. After all, you are friends. She slowly closes the door behind her and very quietly locks it back. The clock displays 9:42 p.m. "I had high school dates that lasted longer than this. Uhm, well that's because this wasn't a date. This was an I-don't-know," she says, drawing out the last three words.
She hangs her coat in the small entrance way closet and heads for her bedroom. Sitting at the dressing table she begins to remove her jewelry. The evening is on replay in her mind.
"So what was tonight? Was it a date or just our long-promised dinner?" She asks.
"I don't know. It was supposed to a quiet dinner with good company and good conversation and I did want it to be some place special and I wanted to dance."
The bewilderment she felt in that moment has followed her home and keeps her company now.
"Oh Oliver, what the Sam Hill," she wonders as she removes the 1000 bobby pins it took to hold her hair in place. With that mission accomplished she shakes the curls loose and stands to remove the dress that she thought she looked particularly nice wearing.
"You've got to be kidding me," she says in sheer frustration. The zipper is stuck. Of course it is. It is that sort of evening. Finally, with moves to make a contortionist proud, she feels the zipper give way and she escapes at least what she wore. What she can't escape is the revolving argument in her heart and the lyrics of that last song.
If I loved you,
Time and again I would try to say
All I'd want you to know.
If I loved you,
Words wouldn't come in an easy way
Round in circles I'd go!
"We have certainly done our fair share of going around in circles," she states stepping out of the dress.
"I quit. You come after me," she says as she hangs up her dress.
"You ask me to be your dance partner. You dump me." She puts away her shoes.
"I dance with another man. You behave like a jealous schoolboy." She is close to a rant as she slips her stockings and lace garter into her dresser.
"I see someone from my past to help with a case and you get all "old flame" mad at me," she fumes as she grabs her pajamas.
"I had dinner with 2 men – 2 - one was an idiot and one I – I left because I met YOU – and you get all – all…oh, oh, whoa." There she goes – stumbling and fumbling as she tries to put on her lounge pants. She faceplants right on the mattress.
"Oh good grief."
Everything is a struggle tonight. With a wiggle and an exhale, she is finally dressed. Sitting on the edge of the bed her tirade turns to tender mercies – moments of grace – of porch swings and rose cuttings, of fragility and of compassion.
"Your marriage ends. You come to me."
"You need moral support. You call me."
"My home is gone and you redeem it for me."
"You finally ask me to dinner and…..Round and round in circles we go," she whispers.
Her pondering and longing crawl in bed with her.
"Rita says we have chemistry. Do we have chemistry? Or is this just a chemistry experiment gone wrong?"
Tossing back the down comforter and fluffing the pillows she knows even after the disaster that was dinner that this dance of longing cannot be denied. She thinks of times they are alone together in the DLO. He is especially kind or attentive and his gaze lingers on her longer than necessary. Sometimes she feels him looking at her for no reason at all and they share a brief smile. It is those simple undefined times she thinks perhaps, maybe, possibly there is something more between them.
His blue eyes can temporarily cause her to forget why she is searching the internet at all. He helps her with her coat and their eyes meet and she forgets to breathe. He brushes her hand with his hand simply reaching for a letter opener and it is electric. Does the current only run in one direction?
Sometimes when she is alone at night, she thinks of him and wonders if he ever gets lonely. Some ordinary days she dresses for bed and wishes there was some excuse that he would call just to hear his voice once before she goes to sleep. She feels like a silly school girl thinking like this. He never calls. Tonight, she wonders if he is thinking of her now – regretting his actions or his inactions
With Valentine's Day approaching she told herself that long awaited dinner was never happening and she needed to give up, face the music. She tells herself to stop, stop this nonsense of hope.
Stop? Who is she kidding? If she were a moth, he is the flame that she just can't stop hovering around. There is nothing like Valentine's Day to draw a woman closer to the flame.
Valentine's day is the hope of romance - a card or dinner or flowers or some silly stuffed bear. Some guy asks you to the most romantic restaurant in all of Denver and you wear your prettiest dress and he tells you that you are beautiful and kisses you good night preferably under a full moon with absolutely no clouds. A crescent moon will not do. Ah yes. Romance.
Valentine's Day came and it certainly delivered. It delivered disappointment, misunderstanding, and false assumptions; it delivered no card, no flowers, no dinner, not even a silly stuffed bear. Rita and Norman have this beautifully blooming relationship and she has - she has a colleague who calls her – Ms. McInerney.
But that is fine. That is why online shopping and delivery pizza exist. It's all good she tells herself.
But it isn't all good. He is angry and she has no idea why. He basically accuses her of lying and in spite of confessing that she did not have a date she was completely honest about not receiving a Valentine, not even from her mother. He doesn't believe her. She knows it but knows not why.
A providential conversation with Norman reveals the truth and the invitation is found. Norman saw her tears; he saw her heart on her face when she read it. It was a longing so deep that neither pride nor prejudice would hide her pleasure. The long-awaited invitation came in the form of a homemade Valentine complete with a heart on the front. Oliver O'Toole asked her to dinner at the most romantic restaurant in Denver at the most romantic time of year.
She is excited and hopeful. They are going to enjoy a delicious meal, share conversation, and dance. Maybe - just maybe he would kiss her goodnight.
She doesn't buy a new dress there really is no time but she does schedule a manicure, pedicure and hair appointment. And when the doorbell rings she looks beautiful - more beautiful than he has ever seen her. But if he notices she can't tell.
Frankly, the evening could have been declared an unnatural disaster. It might as well have rained. Their not-a-date was waste of a good moon. The dance partner who once dipped her and looked into her eyes as if he could lose himself there became stiff and stumbled with his steps and with his words.
As to conversation which began rather pleasant, even leaning toward intimate, it exploded like a tank of helium scattering her hopes all over the dining room. There she sat - friend zoned. A woman doesn't go to that much trouble getting ready for dinner with - a friend. Perhaps what made her the angriest was that she didn't think he really meant it. She wanted him to stop this merry-go-round. At that moment she wanted to yell, "Oliver O'Toole, What The Sam Hill!"
She tosses and turns in the darkness. Why is it that doubt creeps into one's heart most cleverly at night? Images of a red headed soprano who knew him long before she came into his life tease her as the final verse plays out in her mind. She starts to feel overwhelmed by every tiny moment that in the shadows seem so monstrous.
Soon you'd leave me,
Off you would go in the mist of day,
Never, never to know how I loved you
If I love you.
A single tear falls on her pillow case. She turns on her side and surrenders the night to sleep.