Brief Interruption

I woke up alone in a bed that smelled like somebody else's shampoo, and for about four seconds I lay there feeling pretty good about myself. Then I rolled over and saw the indent on the other pillow and the empty space where a warm lawyer had been at some point in the night, and the whole thing started to feel less like a win and more like a mistake I'd have to manage. His name was Darrell. He was twenty-eight, he did securities law or something, and he was supposed to be a one-night thing that I'd file away and never think about again. That was the deal I'd made with myself somewhere between his apartment and the taxi home at two in the morning. The deal was already falling apart because I was lying there reconstructing the night instead of getting up.

I'd catered a firm party at Johnstone & Walsh six months ago, back when I was still new to the city and saying yes to every gig the temp agencies threw at me, and he'd been one of a dozen suits hovering by the sandwich trays making small talk. I remembered him being smug. I remembered thinking he had a nice jaw and then immediately telling myself to shut up. So when his firm booked me again this month and he lingered at my station making jokes about the crab puffs, I should have seen it coming. Instead I stayed an hour after the trays were packed up, and by the time we left together I'd already stopped pretending it was about networking.

Anyway. It meant nothing. I told myself that three times while brushing my teeth, which is a rate of about once per cheek, and then once more while I hunted for clean socks. One night, one hookup, one guy I'd probably never see again except professionally, and professionally I could handle. I was twenty-three, I was building a catering business out of a rented kitchen with a broken dishwasher, and I did not have time to catch feelings for a lawyer who probably billed by the minute to think about me.

Benny disagreed, obviously. Benny disagrees with me as a lifestyle. He was in the kitchen when I came out, twenty-four years old and already dressed for his shift at the bike shop, eating the last of my mini quiches off the cooling rack with his fingers, which is a crime in most states.

"Those are for an order," I said.

"So is my friendship, and I'm eating the inventory." He held up my phone, which I'd left charging on the counter like an idiot. "Three texts already. It's not even eight."

"Give me that."

"From Darrell," he said, and he said it in that sing-song voice that makes me want to put him in a headlock. "Morning, hope you got home okay. That was fun. Also you may have left a bruise on me, not complaining, lawyers just like a record, apparently."

"It's eight in the morning, Benny."

"And he's already texting. Peyton, honey, nobody texts at eight in the morning about a bruise unless they want a second appointment." He dodged the dish towel I threw at him and grinned around another stolen quiche. "You catered his firm today, right? The trial lunch thing? So you're going to see him. Today. In like two hours."

"I'm going to deliver pastries, drop an invoice, and leave. That's a professional interaction between a vendor and a client, and it stays professional."

"Sure. And I'm a modest man." He kissed the top of my head on his way out the door, which is the most condescending thing he does, and he does a lot of condescending things. "Wear the tight shirt. For professionalism."

The drive downtown gave me forty minutes to talk myself into a calmer state, and I used about thirty-five of them, which by my standards was progress. The whole way I kept the story simple. He was a client's employee, I was a vendor, last night was a glitch in an otherwise clean professional relationship, and glitches happen. People hook up at weddings and funerals and quarterly planning sessions all the time and nobody makes a federal case out of it. I'd be polite, I'd be brisk, I'd leave before he could corner me, and by the weekend this would be a funny story I told exactly once.

The plan lasted about ninety seconds inside the building, because the second I rolled my cart off the elevator and into the conference room, there he was. Darrell, sitting at the head of a long table covered in legal pads, sleeves rolled up, smirking at me like he'd known exactly what time my delivery was scheduled and dressed for it. Gray parking garage out the window behind him, fluorescent light above him, and that same smug jaw that had gotten me into this mess in the first place.

"Morning," he said, loud enough that two other lawyers at the table looked up. "Pastries are here, people. Try to act professional."

I set up the coffee station and the tray stands with my back to him as much as possible, which is a catering technique I invented about a minute into that room. My hands were steady, I'll give myself that. I straightened napkins that didn't need straightening. I counted croissants twice. Behind me I could hear him making small talk with a woman about a motion or a filing or whatever lawyers do, completely unbothered, like he hadn't texted me about a hickey before sunrise.

I was almost done, actually reaching for my clipboard to get his signature, when he appeared at my elbow at the coffee station, holding an empty cup like a prop. The room had emptied out some, people drifting back to their offices with plates, and suddenly the proximity was a problem.

"So," he said, quietly now, pouring himself coffee he clearly didn't want. "Did you get home okay? You left in kind of a hurry."

"I had a morning delivery." I kept my eyes on the urn. "Which I am currently on."

"Right, the delivery. That's us, isn't it. The lunch order." He leaned a hip against the counter, entirely too comfortable in my personal space. "You know, I've been thinking about the logistics of that bruise all morning. It's in a spot where my collar doesn't quite... I mean, I wear ties for a living, Peyton. I've had to get creative."

"That's your problem to solve. With a scarf or a doctor, I don't care which."

"Mitch is going to see it and ask questions," he went on, and there was real amusement under it, which was somehow worse than if he'd been embarrassed. "And I am going to have to stand in a courtroom this afternoon looking like I lost a fight with a vacuum cleaner, and I'll be thinking about you the whole time, so really this is your fault and I think you owe me."

"I owe you nothing. You signed nothing yet, by the way, so watch it." I flipped the clipboard around at him, the invoice on top, a pen clipped to it, my best don't-mess-with-the-vendor face aimed somewhere around his collarbone because his actual eyes were unsafe. "Sign there. I've got an equipment check to do before the lunch run."

He signed. He took his sweet time signing, drawing it out like a man signing a lease on my composure, and then he slid the clipboard back and smiled at me, slow and awful.

"There. Now we're in a contractual relationship. That's basically dating in my world."

"That is not even close to dating in any world."

"Two more words and it's a merger," he said, and I had to turn around and fuss with the creamer pitcher so he couldn't see my face doing whatever it was doing.

That was when Mitch walked in. Darrell had mentioned him last night too, some senior associate, thirty-one, the kind of guy who looked like he ironed his jeans. He had a folder under one arm and a lanyard and an expression that said he'd been sent to handle this and was not thrilled about it.

"Darrell, leave the caterer alone, we need to go over the lunch order before your