“I’m worried about you.”

She appeared at my office instead of worrying over the phone. I knew something was different when I buzzed her up.

“Are you trying to cajole me into a date? Or are you here in case I need to dictate a letter?”

She frowned. Despite her personality, she was not unlike something beautiful. “It’s been a year since we had dates. Two since I worked for you. For all your bravado, we both know you haven’t worked a case in weeks.” Her eyes paused on an empty Scotch bottle. “Maybe months.”

She knew me well. Stubbornness took over and I tried to regain command of the conversation. “For your information, I had a major break in a case today.”

“Uh-huh. You know, for a spy, you are not imbued with a talent for lying,” she chortled. “Some girls would call that a positive thing.”

We stared at each other for a few moments, serenaded by the cacophony of evening traffic.

“I’m moving to California.”

That was one hell of a segue. Words leapt up from my insides and got lodged in my esophagus. All that broke through was, “What? Why?”

“You’ll always be fettered to that desk, and I’ll always come second!”

“Don’t feed me that female propaganda.”

“Propaganda? It’s love!” She stood. “At least, it used to be.” She made for the door.

I collapsed into my desk chair as the sun sank toward the horizon. I opened a new bottle of Scotch and watched through the margins of my blinds as she hailed a cab and rode out of my life.

Tags: creative writing, writing contest, writing contest finalist

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