FLASH DRIVE

          Bob from Sales booms, “AL-VIN!  Haw, y’all!  Good morning!”

          Arvin Haimisch flinches and withers imperceptibly as he shuffles into the maze of cubicles and cabinets.  Arvin is in charge of Information Technology, IT, for the office.  Ahead in his path is a clowder of women.  They are all purring at the new girl, Gina Marchetti.

          Arvin’s eyes lick irresistibly at Gina’s image.  She stands with a cocky (Is that the right word?  It isn’t ‘pussy’); it is definitely a cocky attitude.  Arvin’s eyes ascend from her bare legs upward, caressing her short skirt, rolling on those undulations over that bone-tight blouse which so softly mounds and steeply descends again to her throat.  Her neck, that neck, is long and her head is round and a little small, but it is like an accent to her physique.  Her nose is pointed and a little long, but it draws so much attention to those full lips.  Those must be such soft lips.  What am I thinking?!  But her eyes are narrow and there is something weary and angry behind those eyes. 

          The women deliberately stand their ground to make Arvin uncomfortable and thus so to see him squirm as he surely will stutter his request to pass.  But while pretending not to see Arvin approach they are surprised askance to notice that Arvin appears to be rising erect, taller somehow, as he shuffles right up to this new girl.

          Oh, god, oh, god she smells like orange blossoms in November.

          Gina is saying, “I don’t know what kind of tattoo I’m going to get.”

          Arvin is stricken by the flash image of a dagger dipped in ink penetrating that radiant skin and he blurts out point-blank, “No!  Don’t do that,” and the women turn their heads and throw their gazes at him like spears.

          Gina is wryly amused and she says down to him, “And you are…?”

          “I, I am Arvin, Arvin Haimisch.”

          The women guffaw in unison, “AL-VIN!”, but this time he penetrates their derision and drives onward, “You, you are so, so beautiful!  Why would you defile such, such beautiful skin?” and then, unbelievably, “That should be my job.”

          Gina’s eyes flash like episcopes in the viewslits of an Italian tank.  Arvin’s surprise blitzkrieg continues to advance, “My, my mother is Italian.”

          Gina suddenly feels vulnerable, beset, and fires a derision in Italian to baffle Alvin’s bravata, “Pretendi Colpo di Fulmine (Are you claiming the Thunderbolt of Love)?

          Arvin replies without hesitation, without thinking, recalling his mother’s words, “Si, come il cacio sui maccheroni (Yes, like cheese on macaroni).”

          Gina’s defenses fall in a burst of laughter.  The other women fall back in disarray.

          Arvin states the terms of surrender, “There is an Italian Baroque concert this weekend, if you would like to accompany me, Gina.”

          Gina submits to the terms which she could not have imagined a minute ago, and to which she long had sworn she never would submit again, “Sure, what the hell, Arvin.  Mi sento come una paglia bambola (I feel like a straw doll).”

          The apparition of their former Arvin Haimisch replies, “Put your straw onto my fire,” and Gina covers her eyes and laughs freely once again, at last.

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