Rating an overcautious T only a few naughty words I promise
He knew the answer really. On nights like these there was no way to pretend that your best friend was not a beautiful woman. He had fancied her from the first moment he had laid eyes on her of course. When Leo asked her to join the lab full time, he realised very quickly that if he was going to be able to focus on his work at all, he would have to put his emotions well out of the way. And it had worked like a charm. He blocked out all the messages that told him she was a woman and acted as if she was just one of the lads. She wasn't that well endowed and scrubs did nothing for your curves and before long she was just Nikki. They were a team, they made each other laugh, they watched each others backs and at times they had some good fights.
But there were cracks in the charade. Every so often something would crop up and he found himself staring at her. The bra incident for one. It was very hard to pretend your colleague was not a woman when she was taking off her bra in front of you. Or the times when she was in danger. He was so grateful to have her back, he couldn't think of anything more. Losing her would be like losing a limb to him, not a lover.
Then of course there were the boyfriends. Suddenly she was not just one of the lads anymore, she was Nikki. His Nikki. And the way those men treated her made him so angry. But even worse, was her flirting with the unsuitable morons and letting them treat her that way that put him into a silent fury and turmoil of jealousy. Because although he flirted with her and she laughed at his jokes she never acted towards him in the same way as she did with those scumbags.
You might think that the more intimate times they shared would be what set his heart racing. The hugs, the kiss on the cheek. But no, he imagined it was a bit like kissing your sister. Not that he had a sister but something like that.
No the times when he was nearly knocked off his feet by her, could be mid way through a fight with her eyes shining, her brain racing, countering any of his arguments. She would end up winning then as he would suddenly be paralysed at the sight of her.
Or the sight of her smiling in triumph having just proved by demonstration her theory on a blunt force trauma, complete with blood spattered hair, safety spec.s and baseball bat. Surely that wasn't normal?
And then there were those very rare times when neither of them had their defensive masks on, no jokes, no put downs, no hiding, just barefaced honesty where they seemed to stare into each other souls and dare to believe that rejection would not be found there.
All the flirting and horseplay compensated he thought for the lack of real emotion most of the time. It would only end badly if he tried to take things any further. So he consoled himself by making lewd suggestions in the hope that if he made them sound jokey enough she wouldn't guess how true they really were. And then of course there was that night in the pub, the fact that he spent most of his life convincing himself that she was not an attractive woman was one thing, but her actually believing it about herself. He couldn't bear it. She had everything, brains, looks, sense of humour personality and yet was plagued by self doubt, no doubt that accounted for the string of no hope boyfriends. But now was not the time to go down that path.
And so tonight. New Years Eve, he knew she'd bought a new dress as she'd taken the afternoon off last week to go shopping. She looked very pleased with herself the following day and had told him straight off that she had got it on special and that he wouldn't like it. He hoped that were true, as it would make his evening a whole lot easier. Watching her flirt with every available man in the room was not high on his favourite entertainment list.
It was 8:15 and Harry was growing more morbid by the second, surely she couldn't be taking that long to get ready. And with that thought the door flew open and in stumbled the three of them. They were huddled in coats, faces reddened by the cold wind and gasping at the sudden warm air of the hotel.
"Harry, hi!" Nikki called brightly from across the lobby. "We're really sorry we're late, you wouldn't believe it, our taxi skidded on some ice and bumped another taxi. The two drivers went berserk at each other and we've had to walk from the other side of the park!"
Janet was looking less than impressed by the adventure and taking a quick look at her heels Harry could guess why. Nikki however was thriving on the excitement, her cheeks still flushed pink even in the warm of the lobby. That or she'd already started drinking which he thought with a sigh would make it a long time until midnight.
The trio walked across to the coat check and Leo helped remove Janet's coat and handed it over and then took Nikki's. Nikki was still looking towards Harry and he couldn't be certain but he was sure he saw Leo wince as he took her coat.
Harry however was transfixed. How could Nikki have thought he wouldn't like the dress? It was a cream, shift dress. Plain, cut to just above the knee and with some kind of floaty material over the top that fell in gentle folds or rolls at the neck line. Apart from the length it was not unlike the kind of robe a Greek goddess would wear. It was stylish, simple and he thought with great relief not at all tarty.
He prised himself away from his wall, slightly surprised that he hadn't left an impression in it, as he'd been stood there for so long and went to greet them. He kissed Janet, told her she looked lovely and shook hands with Leo. He put his arm around Nikki's waist and leant in to kiss her on the cheek, he was about to tell her she looked beautiful, when his hand connected not with the back of her dress but with her bare skin. He spun her round to reveal her bare back. The wispy folds of fabric at the front continued over her shoulder and created an inverted arch at the base of her spine. The fabric following the line of her arms, completing a loop that fell just below the dimples at the base of her back and seemingly with only millimetres to spare actually covered her bum.
"I told you, you wouldn't like it." she laughed.
