“In case he’s a serial killer?”
“In case he’s boring.”
“Or I could cancel the date right now, stay single forever and let my four hundred cats keep me company until the day I die.”
“An excellent alternative. I’ll see you tomorrow at eleven.”
Before she hung up Marguerite said, “Iris?”
“What?”
“Any advice? You’ve done a lot more dating than I have.”
“Relax and be yourself.” There was a pause. “And maybe check his picture against the website for America’s most wanted.”
* * *
Alexei and Melissaworked side by side in the food prep area of his Portland food truck. It was peaceful, rhythmic work. Melissa had her earphones in, which he didn’t mind her doing as long as he was around to keep an eye out for customers who might show up at this time of day. Her body swayed slightly to the music and he could hear the tinny echo of Tegan and Sara through her headphones.
Since Melissa wasn’t interested in talking he was able to let his mind float free while his hands went about the familiar tasks of slicing onions into tiny slivers and preparing the lamb and chicken skewers for the next rush of customers.
He reached up onto the shelf for oregano and saw where he’d pinned his recipe for Tomatoes Marguerite. He paused on the scrap of paper wondering when he’d see Marguerite again. She didn’t always bring his produce order herself so he never knew. Marguerite Chance. He had liked her from the first moment they met. At first, she had seemed a little shy around him, but as soon as he got her talking about organic rainbow chard or heirloom squash, her eyes lit up. Her whole person seemed lit up from within. He liked the way her hands moved. They weren’t pretty, manicured hands. They were working hands. The nails were short-tipped and cut bluntly and he knew there’d be calluses on her fingers. She wore a couple of silver rings and they had sparked in the light adding a nice contrast to those very earthy gardener’s hands. Then there was her hair. Maybe it was his Greek heritage but he loved a full head of long curly hair on a woman, and Marguerite’s was rich and gorgeous.
Trouble was, he couldn’t tell if she was interested in him. He was never certain how women really felt about him.
It was, of course, The Curse.
Alexei was enough of a Greek to believe firmly in curses. Most of Greek mythology revolved around all the tricks that fate could play on an unsuspecting mortal. The trick that fate had played on him was giving him the kind of looks that made him attractive to women. His mother had called him Beautiful Boy and his first clear memory was of a woman he didn’t know dropping to her knees in front of him when they were at the park, his chubby hand in his mother’s. She’d pinched both his cheeks and cried out, “What a perfect little Adonis!”
When he’d been a teenager and too stupid to know better, he’d believed he was pretty hot stuff. Girls used to come onto him all the time, older women who should’ve known better, and he could barely go out in public without being approached by casting directors, modeling scouts, or rich women looking for a boy toy.
When he tried to complain, his brothers mocked him. Called him Beautiful Boy just like their mother.
But his physical assets weren’t a blessing so much as a curse.
Was that all women wanted? A pretty face? Frankly, some of the things women had said and done – the verbal come-ons, the way they’d touch him -- would have counted as sexual harassment if he were a woman. Not that he’d ever say anything, because he’d sound like an ass, but it was uncomfortable.
He tried everything to downplay his looks. When he went through a spell of dressing like a slob and stopped shaving, he discovered that lots of women went for the unshaven slob thing. His mother had shaken her head at him. “Beautiful Boy. One day you’ll be old, maybe fat, and you may wish your perfect beauty back again.” But he knew he wouldn’t.
In the end, he decided to dress the way he wanted to dress. He wore clothes that were comfortable, mostly jeans and T-shirts. He kept his black curly hair cropped short because that was more practical and he shaved regularly because he didn’t like feeling like a slob.
Over time, he’d developed a series of scripts that he pulled out according to need. Modeling scouts, casting agents, anybody want to make a profit from his face got a simple “No, thank you.” He refused even to accept business cards. Women who hit on him got a regretful speech about how he was deeply in love with his girlfriend.
The foolish truth was that he hadn’t had a girlfriend in almost a year because the last breakup had been so painful.
There weren’t many women he genuinely trusted in his life. There was his mother, his kitchen helper Melissa, and that was about it.
Then he’d met Marguerite, a woman who didn’t look at him as though she were picturing him naked in some porn scene she was directing. A woman who, in fact, virtually ignored him until the subject of vegetables came up. He smiled in reminiscence. Since he happened to be interested in food also, he’d made that his excuse to ask for her email. If anything, they had become farmer buddies. Pen-pals who swapped ideas about current growing trends, the 100 mile diet, the Paleo diet. She’d challenged him to use more locally sourced produce and he’d accepted her challenge by buying as many of her organic veggies as he could get.
When she came to see him, it wasn’t to ask him out or to flirt with him, it was to bring him glorious fresh bounty. All the women over the years who had made it patently obvious they were available to him, many of whom had outright asked him for dates ranging from coffee to weekends in Paris hadn’t moved him at all. And this one, who appealed to him more than any woman had in a long time, didn’t seem interested at all.
While he was mulling over the irony of fate, he heard himself hailed by name by a voice he knew all too well. He turned to find his brother Matt, grinning at him through the delivery window. Beside him was Portland’s prettiest GP, Dr. Rose Chance. Since his big brother Matt had lost his heart to the sexy doc, he’d become a lot more mellow. Also, since Rose loved his souvlaki platter, his surgeon brother had also become a more frequent customer
“Hey, Bro, what’s up?”
“I put in a couple of stents this morning and rebuilt a heart, but other than that not much. You?”
“I chopped about a bushel of cucumber and marinated a lamb. Rose?”
