God she looked so amazing. Every curve, every little indent of that perfect body completely sculpted and draped in that red dress. He eyed her from across the bar. She was perfect, her hair was perfect. It swathed in satin across her shoulders, brown and gleaming, like some sort of hair ad. And the way she smiled. She was happy. She was seductive, and she knew it. Every man in the bar had looked at her at least once, and he couldn't look away.She never noticed him, but she always turned up at his bar sooner or later on the weekend in that damn red dress. The dress made his blood boil. The woman was stunning.
One night he couldn't help himself. He sent her a drink. She wouldn't really be interested, he thought, but he sent it to her anyway. How could he get that red dress off... his thoughts continued as he looked into gin. It was lust, pure and simple. She was beautiful, and the weekends were long and lonely - no work, no society. He wanted warm, human girl with him, he wanted her next to him, and in other places. Lust. Lust. He knew it was absolute lust.
She accepted his drink, and actually politely sent one back. He tried to catch her eye, but couldn't quite - she was giggling to a friend who was a girl. Damn. Girlfriends were the worst.
The next weekend she was there again - hair pulled up this time but the dress was the same. He bought her a drink, she returned it again. And then he caught her eye. He had been thinking about her all week. All week. And now, finally, she was laughing into his eyes and drinking his drink, and he hers... it was all a little surreal, but he moved toward her anyway.
She wasn't in any mood to chitchat. She had always left alone from the bar, but tonight - tonight was different. Her hand was brushing his shoulder, his upper arm. When he leaned toward her, their thighs met. He read the signs, he new the numbers. He had never painted by these particular ones before, but he had seen it done. He knew it was his turn to pick up the brush and paint something red. Or rather, unpaint something. That damn dress was fiddling with the anchors of his mind again, and he was imagining unzipping it without even a second thought.
How exactly did these things work out? He thought vaguely, smiling at something she had said as he stared into the depths of his whiskey sour. But he put the thought away, and went home with the woman in the red dress. It was a night of passion - strange passion. Passion with a stranger was different and rather odd, and slightly embarrassing. It was somewhat titillating and very ego-boosting as well. But when he woke up, she wasn't there. There was no note. He felt relieved - he could leave the apartment without any awkwardness. Not that he wouldn't see her again, but that was just really against protocol... wasn't it? He wasn't sure.
When he left the apartment, it was as if nothing had happened, as if the encounter hadn't existed. He wanted it to exist - he needed it to have happened. That was the whole point. He saw the woman in the distance. He needed this to be... something. A scene, a weird awkward silence, some kind of contact. He let out a little breath and walked toward her - she was coming from the direction he had to go in any case. She got closer, and he noticed that she was wearing a dress just like the one last night at the bar - but blue. Gossamer blue, silvery and contented and perfectly normal. Nothing to stare at, nothing to put down. It looked calm and elegant.
"Hi," he said.
"Good morning," she replied, and smiled at him. "Going home?" she asked pleasantly.
"Yes," he replied awkwardly. "Change and shower and stuff for work, you know." And then he realized it was Saturday.
"Oh," she said.
"Yeah... well bye," he finished awkwardly.
"Mhm!" she smiled somewhat tensely, but warmly, and passed him to walk away.
He turned around, but then hesitated and turned back.
The next weekend, she was at the bar again. This time her dress was black - but again, that same cut, that same hemline. Somehow it didn't look so hot this time. It looked solemn, and tired, and sad.
"Hey, Vinh," he called to the bartender, and when the guy came up, nodded to the woman in black. "What's up with her tonight?"
Vinh looked at him measuringly, and then poured another whiskey sour. "Husband died yesterday. He's been in the hospital awhile, I guess."
He gulped, spilled his drink, and walked out, shaken. A little human contact. A little human contact, and a red dress.
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