Wednesday, February 06, 2008

Cruel Numbers

Lee studied himself in the mirror. Shoes—basketball, with an improbable shine—just so, pants sagging just so, knit cap hugging his brain just so. Looking good. He was new enough at this job to still care about the swath he cut through his coworkers. "Okay, babe, I'm off."

"Gimme a kiss." Lee walked into the dining room where Jen sat hunched over her $14-million-dollar sewing machine, the one the size of a pitbull and bristling with knobs and geegaws covered in multi-colored hieroglyphics.

Smooch, right on top of her head. She reached up to give him a pat goodbye on his ass, turned around and looked up with her hand still on the fabric of his jersey. "You're wearing that? Today?"

"Yeah!"

"But why a Barry Sanders jersey?"

"I like Barry Sanders. Besides, nobody I like is playing, so why not?"

"True...but you could wear your Jerry Rice and show some hometown pride?" She smiled.

Oh, he loved it when she smiled. His friends often thought Jen was a bitch, but she almost never smiled for them. Fools. "Jerry? Nah, I don't want people to think I'm rubbing it in."

"But everyone is going to think that's a Deion jersey."

"WHAT? No. No they will not."

"They might."

"This clearly is not a 21. It's a 20."

She was still smiling. "Hon, not everybody loves football that much." She jiggled him playfully by the belt. "Look, I'll give you twenty bucks for every time today someone says something about your Barry Sanders jersey, and you give me twenty every time you get a comment about your Deion Sanders shirt. What do you think?"

Lee kissed her again, headed for the door. "You're on!"

Lee ended up buying Jen a $420 snowboarding parka two days later.

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