BEYOND THE CONTRACT

The Mail.

“Before I went to the head. You said take out an ad. I’m gonna do it. An anonymous personal advertisement. All it’s going to say is Woman wanted. I don't want a girlfriend. They're nothing but a pain in the butt.”

“Then you sure as hell don’t want a wife.” Steve lowered his head and shook it.

Robin grabbed a local paper off the bar, flipping through the pages until he found the personal classifieds section. Digging out his cell phone, he dialed the newspaper’s automated listing office. He would draft the terms tonight: a strictly transactional, temporary female companion. High-paying, completely emotionless, and under a strict veil of secrecy. No strings. No corporate leeches.

After finishing the call and setting up the anonymous routing email, he looked at his buddies. “You’re all drunk. Go home.”

“Did you actually do it?” Kevin asked.

“Said I would, didn’t I?”

“Do what?” Linc mumbled.

“I’ll explain in the cab. Come on, Linc. You got balls, Robin.” Kevin slapped him on the back.

After helping Linc into a cab and waving goodbye, Robin walked to his rusted Camaro. He mentally calculated his blood/alcohol level, it was cutting it close, but he was clear to drive. Crap, shouldn't drink angry, he thought, turning the key in the ignition.

Driving back toward the upper rich side of the city, he parked hidden away from prying eyes and took the private elevator up to his multi-million dollar luxury penthouse apartment. He collapsed across his pristine, massive bed and rubbed his face with a heavy sigh.

A hangover and chairing a hostile board meeting tomorrow, the two things he despised most in the entire universe. But as he closed his eyes, he wondered if his anonymous ad would actually catch the right kind of desperate woman to fulfill his terms.

Andrea burst into her apartment, brushed past her roommate, threw her keys on the coffee table and plopped on her couch. “I hate men.” Hayden looked up. “Me excluded, of course.” “I hate straight men. There, is that better?”

“Well, I can commiserate with that. I hate straight men, too.” She pulled out her hair tie and shook her shoulder length hair free. “I hate my life.” After a deep depressed sigh, she snatched up the newspaper that had been lying on the coffee table.

Hayden put his phone in his pocket. “Now this sounds serious.” “It has been two months and I still can’t find a job.”

“Then why do you hate men?”

“Because some man caused the downturn and made it difficult for people to buy stuff and now I don’t have a job. ”Unsuccessfully tossing the paper across the room, it fluttered to the carpet near her feet”, “And to top it off, Kyle broke up with me. He suddenly woke up and found that he’s in a different place and I don’t belong there with him. What the hell did that means.”

“This is where”

“And, I’m living a stereotype. I’m like in one of those sitcoms. Straight girl lives with gay guy. Hell, I can’t even screw you ‘cause we like the same thing - men! Except, I hate men!”

When her ranting subsided, Taylor tried again. “This is where I get practical and ask, you do have some money saved up, right?”

Andrea shook her head.

“How can you be employed for two years and not have saved anything?”

“Well, I had to pay off my college loan.”

“Not to mention a new pair of shoes every other week. So how much do you have or do I have to start looking for a new rent paying roommate?”

“I’m broke. I was sort of hoping to move in with Kyle while I hunted for something.”

“I love you dearly Andrea, but I can’t afford the rent on my own. And I cannot afford to feed you. Guess I start looking for a paying roommate. Or you could beg a loan off mommy and daddy. What about unemployment?” Andrea sighed. Hayden bent down, picked up the newspaper and tossed it at her. “Keep looking for a job.”

She missed one section of the paper, but managed to catch the second. It was the personal ads. “Here’s a job for me. Woman wanted. Apply to e-box twenty four. I’m a woman. So I’m qualified for that one.”

Heyden’s cell phone went off. He flipped it open and started chatting. Andrea wandered into the kitchen and peered into the cupboards. When nothing suited her fancy, she pulled open the freezer door. One microwave chicken meal sat alone. She grabbed it, tossed it into the microwave and pressed cook.

Entering the kitchen, doing-up the last button on his shirt, Hayden handed Andrea his tie. “I have to go out. Are you going to be alright?”

After running the silk material through her fingers and reveling in the sensation, Andrea flipped it over his neck, adjusted the length and began to tie a Windsor knot. “Hold still. Yea, I’m fine. Just needed to b***h for a moment. I’m not depressed over Kyle. Just annoyed. There.” She patted the knot. “Fashion check.”

Her tall and uber-fashionably dressed roommate then displayed his best runway walk across their tiny kitchen and dramatically posed by the door. “Don’t hate me cause I’m beautiful.” Andrea chuckled. “Yes, you are more beautiful than me. That Scandinavian blond hair of yours I’d kill for. It should be illegal for a man to have eye lashes as long as yours. Your fashion sense makes me look like a bag lady and an extra twenty pounds on that butt wouldn’t make it look fat. Go. Get out of here before I fall into a deeper and darker depression.”

After two quick cheek kisses, Hayden was exited and Andrea returned to watching the numbers count down on the microwave’s timer, knocking the seconds off her miserable failure of a life. She reached for the mail pile on the kitchen table; four unpaid bills, all for her, and not a postcard or a letter from anyone. She pushed the message button on the answering machine, seven messages, all for Hayden. I exist to no one except bill collectors. I suck.

Opening the refrigerator, she pulled out a partially filled bottle of wine. Hey, some white. I’m having chicken. Hayden won’t mind. Turning, she opened a cupboard and grabbed a large coffee mug. Near the toaster was a bottle of red wine with a wine stopper in it. Pre-dinner drink. What a great idea. After pouring the red wine into the coffee mug, she swallowed a few large mouthfuls, topped up her mug and carried both bottles into the living room. Returning to the kitchen, she grabbed her supper, carried the hot plastic tray to her seat on the couch.

Picking up the remote with one hand and the coffee mug with the other, she alternated between surfing channels and sipping wine. She stopped at two naked females passionately exploring each other’s body. Blankly staring at the screen she finished the bottle of red wine, consumed her precooked, fast-frozen meal in a container and had changed to white wine, without noticing the difference. Tossing the empty dish onto the coffee table, the fork bounced off and landed on the newspaper. She bent down to pick it up. The ad she had read to Hayden caught her eye. “What the hell.”

She picked her laptop up off the coffee table, typed in the website then clicked on e-box twenty four.

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