Rowe gave Winnie her choice of lunch venues and she chose The Book Loft, a downtown bookstore housed in a 1940s mansion. It was a winding labyrinth of overstocked and used books that made use of the home’s old servant’s kitchen and grand dining room to serve light sandwiches and tea.
The grand foyer housed coffee table books; the front parlor contained biographies. The cloakroom contained books on philosophy, and so on until one reached the wine cellar, which appropriately housed books on wine, or the attic which contained a massive library of used books.
They meandered through the maze, picking up random books and sharing what they had read.
“Did you read this one?” she asked, holding up Capital by Thomas Picketty.
“I bought it…. when everyone was talking about it and I set it on my end table just so I could look smart.” he admitted.
“That’s okay, I only asked about it because I was trying to sound smart,” she replied with a smirk.
The endless library reminded her of the mountains of ideas that present-day humans climb. Winnie wondered if every idea they shared today had been written by someone else before them. Every insight they had, a mere infinitesimal mutation of previous insights. She wondered how many people had had their exact conversation today, in the history of the world? Did Democritus argue with his wife about the Gods of antiquity 2500 years ago?
Her thoughts were interrupted as they walked down the hallway that connected the east drawing room to the east living room. Books on “sex and relationships” lined the walls on either side, they passed books on the Kama Sutra, sexual intimacy, and “How to Talk Dirty to Your Man.”
“Here we go,” Rowe said from behind her.
She turned to see him holding “What to Do When You Disagree.”
She smiled and picked up a book next to him called “Surviving a Breakup.” “This might be better,” she said.
“Oh, I know the book we need, for real, do you know Robert Wright? “Evolution of God?’”
“I’ve heard of it, Professor Zimmerman mentioned it.”
“I’ll be back,” he raised his finger and turned and went back into the east parlor.
Winnie’s eyes were drawn to the shelf above the doorway he exited that displayed a “Hot Firemen” calendar featuring a shirtless firefighter with a hose over his shoulder on the cover. He was not as cute as Rowe; his body was perhaps slightly bulkier but not nearly as beautiful and well put together. She sighed and remembered Rowe’s reputation among her roommates and the surreal fact that she was spending the day with him.
She was suddenly reminded that he was her very first crush when she came to school. He was no longer the Adonis that worked shirtless in their yard, he had become the man who stumbled over his words as he asked her out. He was the man who thought “Karen” was a sexist term and the man who literally knelt to apologize.
Her eyes scanned the titles in front of her. “Erotic Massage For Couples” featured a fully nude man and woman on a white bed with white sheets in a white room. “Multiple orgasms, the secret to female pleasure” was just a silhouette of a woman dropping her head back. “Tantric Sex: a guide for lovers” featured a woman’s hands grasping a man’s shoulders. She glanced to the left and right, then tentatively picked it up and opened it to a random page with a large chapter heading that read: “Pleasuring the Penis.” The text was superimposed over a photo of a woman’s hand wrapped around a large erection.
She slammed it shut when Rowe surprised her from behind – returning to the opposite end of the hall he had exited.
“I’m gonna buy it for you!” he said in an encouraging tone, referring to the book in his hand entitled “The Evolution of God.”
She took it, her heart racing from being surprised. She normally would have protested, but somehow, there was a lump in her throat. “That’s very sweet of you,” she heard herself say.
“Let’s go eat,” he said with enthusiasm.
He normally would have ushered her in front of him, he was very gentlemanly, Winnie liked that, but this particular hallway was so full of books on either side, there simply wasn’t’ room for them to swap positions, so he led the way.
It gave her the rare pleasure of putting her eyes on him without his ability to do the same to her. Her eyes slid up and down his backside with rather joyful abandon.
She noted his broad shoulders, a strapping back, taught buttocks, and powerful legs. She felt her face heat up as she recalled that prior to labelling him her nemesis, she had actually touched herself while thinking of this man. For so long she had viewed him from afar, or created images of him in her mind, the fact that he was inches away from her in real, heavy flesh was overwhelming. It was like a figment of her imagination came alive. His heart beating, his blood rushing, his muscles rippling with every movement. That vast, impossible gulf between her imagination and reality was vanishing like two planets colliding, and she could feel the cosmic cataclysmic shock wave move through her body.
All these thoughts occurred in a matter of a few seconds, merely the time it took to walk into the dining room.
Once they were seated at the table and studying the menu of finger sandwiches and tea, Winnie felt her face flush with embarrassment that she brought the manliest man she knew here. But he was an excellent sport. He appeared so out of place sitting at the small table with doilies and teacups that he looked like a man having a tea party with his five-year-old daughter. And if the earnestness with which he comported himself here was any indication, then his future daughter would be lucky indeed.
“So, it’s lunch, we’re supposed to debate what is love but we’ve already done it,” she said.
“That is life, it never goes according to plan,” he said.