Mamzelle Makes a Decision

Mamzelle stared at herself in the mirror. She picked through her lipsticks. None of them felt ‘right'. Even her lipsticks were fraught with memories and memories had no place in the here and now, in the yet to come. The easy solution would be to just get a new lipstick. Isn't that what women have done, always done? Start a new chapter, start a new relationship, start a new life and symbolize it with new lipstick or new polish? Something new and unsullied on the lips and fingertips so as not to taint the yet unformed?

So much anticipation, so much to consider. Big step and she was unsure. She frowned. Many of her past choices, most of her past choices, had not been wise, had worked against her. She acted from passion, from the moment and her long term thinking was slim to nil. Even when she thought it was all worked out, when it seemed everything was just so, all the little duckies lined up, it only served to make it easier to gun them down. Rat-a-tat-tat, rat-a-tat-tat, as they fell, one, two, three, more than three. Any number greater than three was insegrievious and might as well be infinity. Mamzelle sighed, licked her lips.

She was afraid. There were levels, aspects to this relationship that she had never experienced before. Last night, he had laid his cards on the table, his dreams for the future. What Mr C wanted from her, the type of pressure he was bringing to bear, the type of commitment he wanted was unlike any in her oeuvre. And he was not backing down.

He was patient, but even he had his limits. After watching her, witnessing her madcap life, waiting for her to finish with and dispose of her series of boytoys and arm candy, he had made his move. Chess master, he'd plotted, planned long and detailed before even approaching her with his wish to change their relationship from casual to... to what? To something more personal, something more intimate, something permanent. Her current situation did not bother him.

"That is all fact and therefore trivial. Yes legalities are what we do, Mamzelle. I can't help being what I am, nor can you stop being what you are. I am concerned with your heart and you, not with your filing status. I want you. You'll find your way through the labyrinth. I'll help you, I'll support you. And I will be at the center when you find your way there. Just no more games. I don't think I could take any more games. I watch you, see how you hurt yourself and it hurts me. I can't do that, see you hurt."

"Yes, Mr C, you are what you are. Law is in your blood, it is your raison d'etre. It is not just an occupation, it is what you live and breathe. Yes, we know my feelings about the legal profession as a whole, but about you? You remind my of my father. To you the law is higher than any happenstance of litigation. And I appreciate that, respect that, as I appreciate your concern."

He reminded her of her father. The way his mind worked, the leaps and connections it made were a fascination to her. His genius was even more appealing than his person.

She knew. If she brushed him off again, pretended not to understand, made blithe jokes, it would end before it started.. The cracks had widened, her insides were seeping out. They would hid the sidewalk and fry. Well, perhaps in summer, in this weather, they would get washed down the sewer drain, she thought as she picked up yet another lipstick.

He wanted her. He'd made that plain often enough in the last few weeks. He knew her. He knew things about her, saw things in her, understood the machinations of her mind and heart It had been so long since she'd been able to talk to someone about the world at large, about the impact each person leaves and how the individual has an obligation to leave the world a better place. Small people discuss things, average people discuss people and great people discuss ideas. Their discussions verged on the great. The bits and pieces that various persons in her world had insight to, he put all those pieces together and, to him, her sum was so much greater than her collective parts. Mr C joked how even her evil was beautiful to him, that her mean streak was so tinged with guilt it had its own charm. And her kind? Her soft? He was truly puzzled how anyone could give that up. He wanted her good, bad and ugly. He wanted to see her impact.

It was a responsibility. If you save a life you are responsible for it, for what the person does with that life. He wanted to save her and be saved in the process. If she accepted this troth, yes Mamzelle, call it what it is, a troth, a contract, not a tryst, oh no, Mr C had no interest in mere trysts or encounters, where would this go? Is making a commitment to a person the same as being committed? Both were crazy, the one filled with hope and the other with despair. If she stopped looking at the despair and let herself feel hope, a new cladogram opened. The alternate pathways were infinite and wonderful. And she knew that the dark would not be so black with someone there.

Three days. She still had three days. And she shivered.