That Missing 25 Percent

@copyright 2020/Mike Consol 

Lucy shared a townhouse with Nell. The townhouse was owned by Nell’s parents and Lucy paid her fair share of the rent, even though she basically lived in just one room — her bedroom. Yes, there were some common areas such as the bathroom and the kitchen to which she also availed herself, but Lucy was known to Nell’s friends as the woman who lived in a bedroom and was playfully derided behind her back as Lucy of Boudoir. 

The bedroom was spacious and there was a large-screen TV in there, and her smartphone, and her books, and a lot of functional and decorative pillows to make herself comfortable. Dual windows with plantation shutters offered some natural light. You would have thought by that description that Lucy was an artless, soulless woman, but that was not the case at all. There was nothing lonely about her. The rare people who spent any time around Lucy (usually Nell’s friends, of which there were many) were inevitably surprised by how social she could be around those she liked; the problem being there very few people Lucy cared for. Fortunately, Nell was an exception and a couple of Nell’s friends, most pointedly an older married couple who traded by the names Victor and Melanie, and who would accept Nell’s invitation to come by the townhouse to watch episodes of The Bachelor or The Bachelorette, programs also appreciated and attended by Lucy. Victor and Melanie were particularly to Lucy’s liking, and Nell told the couple what a rare compliment it was to find themselves on Lucy’s shortlist of good graces. 

When in the company of people she liked, Lucy filled the air with rowdy laughter — guffawing easily at her own comments, as well as the comments of others — making it all the more strange that she lived most of her life as a recluse in her carefully appointed bedroom. She could be a bit racy too. 

“I want to see some areolas!” she would shout at the group of bikini-clad single women vying for the attention of The Bachelor on some idyllic overseas beach, followed by a round of contagious laughter. 

It was remarks like that, and her secluded lifestyle, that led some to speculate Lucy had lesbian or bi-sexual tendencies. Several observations hinted at those conclusions. She wasn’t a girly-girl, wearing the bare minimum of eye makeup, and then compounded suspicions with a short, blunt-cut hairstyle that was, curiously, treated with an obscure hair additive that left her hair appearing perpetually wet, as though she had just stepped out of a shower. Lucy openly and cheerfully complained she had not had sex since the Global Financial Crisis and had sat out the entire eleven-year bull market on Wall Street. 

It’s also worth keeping in mind that Lucy ate significantly more calories than she burned, casting herself as a full-figured woman you would never catch in a cocktail dress. Here are two others thing you would never catch her doing: dieting or even talking about dropping some weight, further stacking the odds against romantic success. And yet, she was young enough to carry all that extra flesh pretty well. She was tightly packed. She moved easily, almost athletically. She was in her mid-thirties and, for the time being, was a happy Buddha. 

All of this distressed the relatively young woman’s parents. They worried she was on an irrevocable path to spinsterhood or, worse yet, a lesbianism, something they could never adequately accept or explain to their friends at the Methodist Church. Children would be out of the question, and so would most family gatherings. They told Lucy the solo lifestyle would become more difficult as she aged, and it was time to find a husband. Lucy found that laughable because her life wasn’t difficult at all because she was scrupulous about keeping it uncomplicated. No dependents or entangling alliances. 

The parents were encouraged many years before when Lucy got a full-time job at a manufacturing plant, though even there she spent most of her time alone in an office doing a lot of back-office bookwork, as in accounts payable and accounts receivable. There were some accounting duties as well. The job didn’t pay particularly well, though the benefits — health, dental and vision — were generous. Most importantly, the working conditions matched nicely with Lucy’s penchant for solitude. Under the circumstances, Lucy would probably never leave this job, as long as the manufacture of auto parts was needed, which would probably be forever. Unfortunately, there were no compelling male figures at the factory, at least not that she was attracted to. 

After her workday, after Lucy returned home, after a cursory “hello” to Nell, and after the two women sidestepped one another in the kitchen for a bite to eat, Lucy would return to her bedroom. 

The occasional discourse between Lucy and Nell got snippy at times. “What are you doing in there all night, meditating or masturbating,” Nell asked stuffily. 

“You know small talk bores me, and that’s all most people have in them,” she shot back, arching the eyebrow of indictment. “Don’t mistake my aloofness for disengagement.” Lucy cherished the richness of the English language and chose her words carefully. That’s another thing Lucy didn’t care for, people without verbal skills. What could be any more basic than knowing one’s own language and being able to express oneself wisely and thoroughly? 

“I’m not running a monastery here,” Nell said. “You’re free to leave your room.” 

Lucy’s eyes went squinty. “It takes confidence to spend time alone. Some of us have that confidence. We don’t need the validation of others. It’s superfluous.” Superfluous put an exclamation point on the remarks, just as Lucy had intended. 

“Besides,” Lucy continued, “the best things in life happen to you when you’re alone.” She then credited the statement to the late abstract painter Agnes Martin. 

“All that alone time and no painting,” Nell enunciated slowly and cattily, after which Lucy retreated to the friendlier climes of her bedroom. 

 

 

 

 

Lucy wanted a male relationship, but a marriage, if there ever was to be one, would come with many strings attached. She envisioned seeing her husband — or boyfriend, for that matter — only once every week or two. Anything more often than that would cut into her alone time in the bedroom. A male companion of any type would have to have a full and separate life from hers, coming together only for the occasion physical contact, conversation and a meal. 

“That sounds like a booty call,” Nell told her. 

Lucy let out a horse laugh. “Naw,” she said, “He would be my boy-toy.” 

On a couple of instances Nell shared Lucy’s requirements with some friends. It was Victor who predicted Lucy would inevitably end up having an affair, that no man would agree to such terms unless they regarded her simply as a sideline player in his life. A cheating husband would be an ideal mate, Victor insisted, because the situation would ensure Lucy had the space and privacy she craved, and the husband would be afforded the secrecy he needed. Lucy might not even know she was having an affair, he said, considering that the number of men who lied about being single or divorced while maintaining a girlfriend on the side numbered in the millions. 

Nell immediately slapped that notion to the living room carpet. Lucy was too moral to go down such a path, she argued, and further pointed out that her morality had nothing to do with fear of post-death punishment or expectations of post-death rewards (Lucy didn’t have a religious artery in her body). She simply had an innate sense of right and wrong. And that was that. 

 

 

 

 

Lucy started going to the cheese counter at Bedrossian’s, a high-end grocery store specializing in gourmet items with high price tags. The exorbitant prices were okay by Lucy because she liked her cheeses, and nobody beat Bedrossian’s when it came to quality and selection. The man behind the cheese counter on most days in a white apron and white deli cap was a young man named Bryan, whom Lucy reckoned to be roughly her age, and to whom Lucy took an instant liking. 

She asked questions and he answered them. They talked easily and at length during each of her visits and began conversing about any number of topics. Lucy smiled or laughed boisterously at everything Bryan had to say, and he appreciated the warmth. Bryan was tall, lean, friendly and clean-cut. He also had a wedding band around his finger. The wedding band would have normally been an imagination-killer for Lucy, but not in this case. She would leave Bedrossian’s and go back to her room to be alone, entertained by a merry-go-round of thoughts exploring the possibilities. 

Bryan was toying with his own thoughts of Lucy. After she spent the summer tanning her skin, she took on the appeal of a moist rotisserie chicken to Bryan, and he loved rotisserie chicken, golden brown. 

When Lucy first started talking about Bryan from the cheese counter with Nell, it was assumed that, like any other appealing guy she might have met, Lucy simply enjoyed his handsome looks and conviviality. She would come home at least once per week and tell Nell with great effusiveness some of the things Bryan had to say. 

“Too bad he’s married,” Lucy said forlornly, pegging back to her room. 

 

 

 

 

Lucy gradually started going to the market later in the day. One early evening she saw Bryan sitting on a bench on the side of the building leaning forward, his elbows on his knees staring unflinchingly at the walkway. She approached and called his name. When Bryan looked up and saw it was Lucy, he almost smiled. 

“What’s wrong? You don’t look like your normal, cheerful self.” 

Bryan started talking slowly and carefully in coded language that Lucy interpreted to mean things were not well on the home front, that he and the wife were not getting along so well, and the disputes were becoming more frequent and tending to revolve around finances and children, of which there was too little of one and none of the other. Lucy consoled as best she could. 

A few days later, on one of her cheese-runs to the market, Lucy surprised even herself by impetuously asking Bryan what time he was scheduled to get off work. She was equally surprised when he immediately replied, “Seven o’clock. Why? Did you want to grab a glass of wine?” 

And so, the flirtation began. They took walks together behind the market and the conversations got increasingly personal. Bryan’s relationship with his wife improved as his frustrations about being misunderstood subsided during his interactions with Lucy, as she had a way of chilling Bryan, and he took those cooler temperaments right home and into his marriage. 

 

 

 

 

When weeks elapsed without Lucy so much as mentioning Bryan to Nell, the roommate finally asked, “What do you hear from Bryan? You haven’t mentioned him in a long time.” 

“Oh, what’s there to say? We still chat. At this point our conversations are just a rehash of things we’ve chatted about before, so I don’t really have anything new to tell you.” 

Nell had been living with Lucy for five-and-a-half years and was keen to the slightest change coloration on Lucy’s face, the vaguest alteration in her vocal tone, and this little exchange had put Nell on alert. Something different was afoot. She wasn’t sure what it was, and she wasn’t about to make that giant leap into the dreaded “A” word, but something has clearly amiss. 

Whatever is what it was making Nell tingle with reconsideration of exactly which boundaries Lucy was capable and incapable of crossing. 

 

 

 

 

One day, without any prompting, Bryan told Lucy he would never leave his wife, despite some insoluble issues. 

“Insoluble?” Lucy queried, suspecting Bryan might have selected the wrong word. 

“Yes,” he said. “Have you ever been in a long-term relationship?” 

Lucy shook her head. 

“You become like roommates or siblings. Too familiar.” 

Lucy frowned to express her sympathy. 

“I was talking to a fraternity brother a few months ago and he insisted that no wife could fulfill more than 85 percent of a husband’s needs,” Bryan said. “Any man needs a second woman who supplies the missing 25 percent and completes the circle.” 

“And what about your wife,” Lucy said, “and the 25 percent she’s missing?” 

“No sure that really happens for women,” he said. 

Lucy puffed her chest. It was the first time she had indicated defiance toward Bryan. He diffused the situation by saying, “I’m just speaking from my own observations.” 

Lucy’s body was restored to its normal outline. 

Despite that brief conversational wrinkle, Lucy entered into a waking dream state, during the ensuing days and weeks, her orbital path — so repetitive for so long — had a new trajectory, and she was tilting toward something that had long eluded. 

 

 

 

 

It turned out the dual windows and plantation shutters leading to Lucy’s bedroom were good for more than bringing forth natural light, they also made a handy port-of-entry for Bryan’s illicit visitations. Into the vaulted bedroom and into Lucy’s arms and lap he slipped, just once a week at most, so they could fully express their affection for one another. Lucy and Bryan found their bodies were designed to interlock as neatly and constructively as a couple of Legos. They completed their acts quietly, Lucy huffing and puffing as she neared The Blue Lagoon, and Bryan screaming into a pillow when the spasms commenced. He found Lucy to be smooth as baked brie on the inside, and Lucy likened Bryan offering to a round loaf of provolone. 

Lucy’s post 9/11 dry spell had finally been broken. 

Bryan kept things to whisper, during their post-coital pillow talk. Raucous laughter from Lucy was just fine because Nell would surely assume she was binge watching a Nextflix or Prime Video series. 

Their attempts at subterfuge made no difference because Nell had a well-developed Sixth Sense and it told her an interloper was on the premises, and knew what was going on, that Lucy’s sacred space, a space ultimately owned by her parents, had been breached. She was too discrete and respectful to ever broach the subject with her roommate, and her roommate knew the secret, the unspoken secret, was safe with Nell. Lucky also knew Nell would never to cross the threshold of her bedroom, that she would always knock before entering, and never enter or start calling out Lucy’s name without a reply. Those were house rules. Those were Lucy’s rules and they had been established long ago. 

Lucy was comforted by the knowledge that Bryan would never leave his wife, because it would have ruined Lucy’s dynamic with Bryan. A man without a wife would have too much time on his hands, and that would have been more responsibility than Lucy wanted to bear. 

 

 

 

 

Lucy and Bryan never made a conscious decision to turn the relationship carnal. It just happened. All thoughts to the contrary were flatlined, it was one minor trespass after another, and over time their severity increased. Ethical boundaries were traversed. Taboos broken. Any thoughts of contrition were anesthetized before they could take a discernible shape. No impediments stood between them. There were too many positive forces arrayed in their favor. They were too busy figuring out one another. 

Even Lucy didn’t have the vocabulary for what happened. She grew her hair longer and started using different product. One piece of crotchless apparel was purchased. 

Bryan made shifty arrivals and departures from Lucy’s townhouse unit, the bill of his baseball cap pulled low for anonymity’s sake. Bryan kept going to Sunday church services with his wife; Lucy continued avoiding all religious affiliations and practices. 

Nell couldn’t miss the extra verve in Lucy’s step. She had been to Bedrossian’s and knew this Bryan guy, though only by sight, out of curiosity, never approaching the cheese counter. She felt the creep of jealousy, knowing that Lucy now shared her innermost thoughts, first and foremost, with Bryan rather than her. At home, Lucy’s life had burrowed further underground. 

 

 

 

 

Lucy and Bryan’s friendship and happiness bloomed, and so did the quality of Bryan’s marriage, as Lucy alleviated the young man’s marital alienation. Lucy was always excited to see him and still laughed at comments, still coming by the cheese counter to visit him each week. These were appetizers, these were the visitations that stirred the gastric juices and built momentum for their weekly or biweekly collision course. 

Lucy always returned to her bedroom and rolled around in that special place. Alone with her media devices. Alone with her thoughts. And, occasionally, alone with her provolone. 

@copyright 2020/Mike Consol