Jenny’s Really Bad Day
How simple it would have been to just give in. He wanted her to, and she wanted to herself. But there was that fire in her belly that took more than simple giving-in to squelch.
The day was horribly hot, a pre-summer May, sweltering and unbreathable. She walked home from the bus stop in a funk, unhappy because everything had gone wrong that could go wrong. And now she was more miserable than ever. Her clothes were hot, the sun was hot, her hair was hot with the sun’s desperate heat beating down on her head. Everything had gone wrong that could go wrong.
Branson, the bastard hated her presentation that she’d worked hours to prefect—yes, it was unique, but he just didn’t understand her artistic vision; then best friend, Liv, spilled cappuccino on the brand new $90 lime green dress; and Hilary, her hairdresser, screwed up her last haircut and perm until it was now a frizzy mess.
She was in funk. But worse yet, she let Jordan down, failing to show for their morning coffee date, which he demanded, just because he knew she needed a little settling before she went into an important meeting. Perhaps that was the beginning of her bad day. Perhaps if she’d not failed to keep that appointment, her day would have worked out better. Perhaps.
Her body felt as if it had been beaten with clubs, ravaged by hungry wolves, her psyche torn apart by those who would never understand her, least of all Jordan—the perfect—who did everything in his life right, she sarcastically mused. Same time, she had to believe in Jordan, he, more than any one could put her back together after a horrible day like this one.
A half hour later, after dragging her weary ass in off street, she lay over Jordan’s lap, his fist, ladened with a kitchen spoon, poised above her naked ass.
Smack!
Ah! What pain!
Smack!
The second blow landed like the first, right on the middle of a plump ass cheek.
It had taken one hell of an argument to get her there; he’d been so patient at first. Kind. Almost loving. Yes, it was loving, the way he affectionately tried to nurture her with kindness. But she wouldn’t be nurtured. No. Not today. Never! She pulled out of his loving arms in a huff, too angry with herself to be loved.
She wanted confrontation, conflagration, incineration…heat, anger, righteous indignation, her pissed-offedness venting out in a hiss of crude, nasty language, meant for the world, life, humanity, every last fucking soul, good or bad. The world was her obstacle, her foe, her vague, inconstant enemy.
Unfortunately, Jenny vented it all, everything, every last nasty invective toward the one man who loved and understood her, the one sole human being who might have been an exception to her broad-sweeping judgment of the whole of humankind.
“I’m a miserable designer!” she shouted in desperation. “I know nothing! I never will! They hate me! They hate my work! I’m quitting tomorrow, if they don’t fire me first.” She thought a moment. No. They won’t fire me—I’m putting in my resignation! That was after she had Jordan’s attention by throwing everything she was holding in her arms—purse, coat, briefcase, not to mention the spear-like golf umbrella she’d needed in the morning to save her hair from a sudden thunderstorm. “I’ll quit, I swear I will!”
She stomped around the apartment pissed off, watching, waiting for Jordan to say something, anything to stop her.
And sure enough, he did, once he’d finally heard it all. He’d had enough.
So calm, so cool. “My, you’re certainly asking for it, Jen,” was all he had to say to set her
