The Moment of Annularity

Short Story

1

New York City, August 22, 1998

She spasmed and then relaxed into a ball. The hands that so recently had curled the pillows into knots with their torsion opened like little soap bubbles drifting in the morning breeze through the top of the bedroom window. Her eyes scanned her lover's face in that gently playful way that being alone in this white apartment could do. For now, it was only just them in the streaming glorious sun.

Then, and only then, she murmured: “Jack, how long before we have to be up and about?” She may have addressed the inner man but she looked at his square jaw.

Quickly, he rolled into a sitting position with his torsos weight upon his heels. With this accomplished he checked his dark leather watch and said “It is now 10 AM. That means that by 11 AM we have to be all shiny and happy.”

“The happy part I think has been accomplished but the shiny needs some work.” Brightly and bouncily was rung from her tone of voice. With that, she rolled out underneath set her feet on the rug, and went into the bathroom. As she closed the door, he once again admired the curve that accentuated her waist down to her hips. But it was only there for a second and the door closed quite abruptly.

He said to no one in particular: “There has to be a way to do less work for more play.”

Then he was in action, placing his silk underwear on his torso and draping his silk kimono on his shoulders. And immediately paste out in two the common room and out towards the front door of the apartment to pick up a freshly minted New York Times, which had been lying there for almost 4 hours. But it was Saturday and the world itself did that America was still lazing about in close which would not enter any condition be called business ready.

This was especially true in Manhattan. However, in this particular apartment, the skyline was blasé. The double doors opened on the south and being some floors up commanded a small wink of the Hudson River as it slipped into the Atlantic drain.

He read the headline for August 22, 1998. Nothing was happening that was of concern to him. He closed the door and decided not to decide whether to make a pot of coffee. This was the decision because he decided to let - what was her name again? Oh yes, Joy, to decide whether to eat in or go out. Eating meant doing eggs, that being the intersection of what he had and what he could prepare. Joy was not his actual girlfriend; the real was away in Paris for work. Jack knew that her finger itched for the ring, but he was still decided on that. He had failed to make a decision.

This is why he made very sure that any signs that he was attached were carefully and meticulously hidden. Is girlfriend lived by herself for the next few weeks and he, on his behalf, carefully avoided her mention in his other circles. It was dependent on the meaning of the word “is” is. Avoiding makes it so much easier to flex the meanings of words.

So, there he was needing the front page with the rest of the pages curled up under his arm when Joy came out of the bathroom, with jeans and an off-white halter top and her signature sandals with 2-inch heels. She was delicate in her steps. While her blonde hair was amassed in a towel, she was otherwise able to present herself, as a man would see it, but her girlfriends would point out that she had no makeup or other enhancers.

Then she looked at him in the plain Jane look. “So, tell me, truthfully.”

“Yas?”

“How many am I playing against?”

“I don’t know what you mean.” While his mouth was quizzical his face had not gone from the hardened face.

“I found a long hairlet.” And for proof held it up. It was brown.

There was a pause.

Joy cocked her arm against her upper jeans. “In your bed.”

It was then that Jack had to make a decision: he needed to make a modified limited hangout.

Then he mumbled: “I’m still playing the field.” His mind didn’t find an inception.

“Well, you have my number, give me a ring.”

She left abruptly and he subsided into the Georgian IV chair. He looked over to one of the few souvenirs of his high school days: a bronze football. It was “co-“ meaning second place. And he felt that would be his place in life.

He engrossed himself in the back pages where he learned that there was an annular solar eclipse on the other side of the world.

2

Washington DC, December 14, 2001

You know you are in a hotel when everything is all cozy and synthetic at the same time. The carpet was synthetic, in black, the drapes were synthetic, in white, and at the front the fat speaker while dressed in warm gray plaid in the natural wool, was clearly up for his usual hour and with a great deal of to blunt the intoxication of the previous night’s festivities. She was trying very hard to listen to what he was trying to say, but it was the subtext that was important: the members of a nation wanted to avenge the deepest wound that they had suffered since 1941 and were pulling out all of the stops. The rest is text and therefore unimportant.

She noted that someone had slid next to her, but that would be expected she was also late and occupied for this row far from the speaker. Then she turned to look and recognized the face.

“Jack, I didn’t expect you to be in Washington.”

“I decided to get back to my roots: working for Uncle Sam.”

She looked at her watch. “Will talk after the talk.”

And with that, they waited. And in the milling about they need eyes with each other to get together after all of the schmoozing, which was part of their profession, was done.

This meant it was a good solid hour before they could delouse with a table, without chairs, and finally talk. It was Jack who finally broke the ring around their past.

“I didn’t expect to see you after you have left so quickly.”

“How are you and your girlfriend? fiancé? wife?”

“None of the above. I will admit I was inside a relationship but that ended very soon there afterwards.”

An eyebrow. “Thoughts as to why?”

Jack looked add Joy then lowered his gaze.

“I didn’t know I was going to have a seminar after the lecture.”

Joy smirked.

“The speaker was a closing of the options, so to speak.”

“Yes, he has the options and other people get to close them.”

She looked at him with different eyes.

“You are very different now, aren’t you?”

“When I was in New York I was thinking about taking the offer with a New York law firm that handles bonds. I made a different point of view.”

“So, what do you do now?”

Jack motioned his eyes from right to left, then looked down at his watch.

“I have to go back to the office because I am on the Federal Government’s dime, and he is the reason and he is the rhyme; would you like to do lunch sometime, somewhere?”

“Maybe a rain check, I don’t think we're quite ready to take up the conversation quite yet.”

She left him with feet astride trying to reach inception.

The day was maligned by another Speaker who motioned for the nation's economic stimulus in a difficult moment. He was later declared Hastert the unspeakable with a Cthulhu coat.

On that day an annular eclipse was happening out over the Pacific Ocean. In Washington, it would be just a dent in the winter’s sun.

3

San Francisco, June 11, 2002

Some places are very old. Some places will continue but the concept is very old. Scoma's Seafood Restaurant started with six stools spooning out the freshest of the fresh. Now of course it is a dining experience complete with private parties in various chic-chic rooms available by the wad, legal tender only.

There had the bar, and on a small white table sat Jack, hands ruminating to the head. He stretched his face side to side as if trying to hide the moisture in his eyes… and failing. Then from behind came a delicate touch to his shoulder. He turned inward and half stood up and he saw a face from out of his past: Joy.

Jack tried to speak but Joy was more composed: “I didn’t think I would see you on the left coast.”

“I came out to California to attend the funeral of my mother.”

“That was very blunt. No euphemisms? No delicate way of putting it? Just a single entendre?”

“It hit me quite hard, and in some place other than my wallet or watch.”

“Or other dangling bits?”

He strained his torso and shoulders. “Please sit down.” Then he did something that was out of place for him: he stood up and gestured her into the most comfortable seat.

For her part, Joy copied coquettishly and sat lightly into place. Once settled down she looked into Jack’s face and saw more than just hardlines and square jaw. He looked behind her to the ocean. The seagulls squabbing reminded him of his mother. Then boats ignoring the seagulls reminded him of his father. Then he stopped seeing and started gazing. But the hard breeze snapped him out of it.

“How old was your mother?”

“She was born after the Second World War and therefore was quite young. My father was stoic partially because their marriage had collapsed a long time ago. I went out to the east not to be a party to their internal and eternal spats.”

“Isn’t there anything good about her?”

“A long time ago when I was a child she tried to be nurturing, but it was a lying. But by the time I was nine, she traded being a hypocrite for acid wit.”

Joy giggled.

“What is so funny?”

“You take far too long to get around to the punch line.”

“I think there needs to be a longer moment between inception and closure.”

They talked. She left, putting her number on a napkin. “For old time’s sake, you need a friend.” She then left confidently and checked where she next needed to be. Then she was gone.

He watched as he admired the shape of her waist merging into her hips in her white dress.

He could feel the annulus tightening. His head was lost in the clouds.

He did not call the number. His eager heart was eclipsed by a burning early summer sun.

4

October 3, 2005

Narita Tokyo, October 3, 2005

There is nothing romantic about an airport which is why the passenger try to unload their phantasies by the suitcase. Only to find the bins are full.

He was in an airport seat looking out of the airport window which was four times the size of even his brother's most glorious southern window opened to the blazing sun. he heard a footprint behind him, and he turned around to see a neatly put-together businesswoman. But the face and glorious ringlet hair was still Joy. This time he was ready to greet her: “It is several thousand miles since last we met.”

“I hope the circumstances are better for you?” She sat down with the ubiquitous coffee in hand.

Jack truly looked at her. “I did want to call the number, but my hands would not obey the nerves that connected them.”

“Everything works out in the end. At least I thought so. What brings you to Narita?”

“I left working for the federal government for being a contractor to the federal government.”

“Is this more of the less work for more play?” He blushed because he had not realized she had heard him say that.

“Sometimes one must do the work to realize that the play me has slipped out of your fingers.”

“What do you mean by that? Perhaps play has come back.”

“I told you before that I did not call the number you left last time. And when I was about to buy fell into a relationship of convenience, which was good enough if all I wanted was good enough.”

“And did you?”

“I did but not anymore.”

“Your inception is still a long way from your closure.” She opened her blush to use the mirror. Then look him full in the face. “It is alright I was engaged by then.”

“Congratulations.” A flat tube getting kicked out. “No punchline here, because I realized that I had misled you, mishandled you, and misguided you on what my intentions were.”

“That’s a long time to wait for an apology.”

“I suppose I should say ‘I apologize,’ though it seems like be aperture is closed.”

There was a pause. The Shanghai flight was called.

The air-conditioners started up blowing a refreshing breeze in the white waiting room. They each calmed down.

Jake picked up his bag: “This is a crazy life.”

“How so?” Joy stood looking at him. They were just beyond the crush to get on the escalators.

“You get the world. You see it from tangential moments.”

Then the thought the same inception:

Joy: “They only take away the one thing.”

Jack: “Called home.”

Joy looked at him, moved her face to where only he could hear her and whispered: “I just broke up with my fiancé. This was the farthest I could get from him.”

Another pause. The Shanghai flight called again. He had to make a decision.

“Where are you going to from Narita?”

“Shanghai.”

“So am I, to monitor GE and the torsion it uses. Would you like to start over again?”

“The day begins in the East.” She sipped her coffee and then threw away the cup. And smiled.

-

In Shanghai, he bought an engagement ring and spoke Chinese so that he did get overcharged, too much. His hands relaxed over the money and pushed it over.

And the ring fits, over the annals of time. The great inception glistened as the light finally overcame the dark in the warming autumn sun.