The Crisis

Dinner at a nearby fancy Italian place would have been exquisitely memorable, if only Sophia could take her mind off that moment in the elevator. Now as she forks a sumptuous morsel of steak—the "finest in town" says the sign on the door—and places it absent-mindedly in her mouth, she recalls Brad's lips—the wetness and warmth of it, and how it hungrily nibbled her own.

"And the big party is this Sunday," Derek says out of the fog. "We're all freaking out."

"Huh?"

"What do you mean 'huh'?" Derek impatiently waves cutlery. "It's make or break. The littlest thing they don't like about our proposal, they could reject it again, and this time, heads will roll, and one of them will be mine."

Sophia says nothing. She understands nothing. She dutifully nods and pats Derek's hand across the table and smiles and says, "I'm sure it will be okay."

"We tried to make sure the egg's in the basket," Derek says. "Oh, God, we tried. But Silverstone's as stubborn as they all say he is."

Sophia nearly shoots wine through her nose. "Silverstone? Brad Silverstone?"

"What? No, the elder Silverstone." Derek makes a gesture that could be mistaken as a curtsy in some countries. "'God' himself.'"

"Oh."

"He always finds something wrong with what we present to him." Derek almost spits into the shaved Parmesan. "We're already falling under our own weight, and he's still all 'I don't like the placement of this comma here' or 'can you elucidate, in ten more pages, what you mean by "mutual benefit?" He's driving us all nuts!"

Sophia sighs. She realizes that even now she hasn't met Brad's father. Does he look like him at all? She assumes he's infinitely smarter than the kid, and probably a lot less pleasant to be with. But here's an idea that started germinating since Derek mentioned "Silverstone": what if father and son share the same taste in women? What if the elder Silverstone finds her attractive, and might behave like putty in her hands? It's a long shot, but she could help. But even before she could speak, "Chumbawamba" trills from Derek's phone, and he's all, "Yes, Sir. I'm on it, Sir."

Derek has to return to the office for some "vital paperwork" or another. Sophia assures him it's all right, that she'll wait for him. But truly, her mind's in a limbo—the Silverstones—one the immaculate Brad, the other older but faceless—run across the landscape of her mind, fluid and light and somehow pleasant. Thirty minutes later Derek phones to tell her the "small correction" turns out to be the tip of some legal iceberg that might take up another hour, and this bit of news makes something inside Sophia collapse like a flimsy house of cards. "I'll make up for this when I get home," Derek says, the effort to cheer her up coming through the phone as tinny, superficial, and ultimately unsatisfying.

"Sure." Sophia pays the check and slips out the restaurant with not so much as a glance to the hopeful server. The restaurant is on a street right behind the main entrance to Derek's building, and she has to walk all the way around it to find her car. She's groping for the key in her purse when a group of men—in an excited and loud animated discussion—barge out of the building.

Sophia looks up and sees Brad staring down at her, his mouth half-curled in an uncertain smile.

"Oh, hey!" Sophia panics. "You're here!"

The others—three older men in suits—have stopped talking and seem to be waiting for Brad. They stand there just staring at her, an impromptu audience.

"Um, yeah, I am," Brad mumbles. "Erm, just came out of that—" Brad points at the building, quite unnecessarily.

"Yes. Uh, Okay, I'm going inside this—" Sophia points at her car, quite unnecessarily.

"Okay," Brad says, and makes a little wave with his hand. From the corner of her eye Sophia could make out Brad's companions exchanging glances.

What was that? Sophia screams in her mind, speeding away from the Ground Zero of Awkwardness. "'I'm going inside this'?" I actually pointed at the car like a big idiot!

But Brad was beet-red, too—he was blushing! She finds it too funny that later in the evening, when it's almost midnight and Derek is still not home, she's giggling even while she's pounding her pussy with a dildo, watching Diane Lane's 'Unfaithful' on HBO.