Chatterbox

by John Dutton

It’s a cliché to say that a handsome man has chiseled features. Allardyce’s face was assembled using a melon scoop. And there was nothing he could do about it.

For many men this would have been a problem with dating, but not for Allardyce. Because he had a bigger problem. He wouldn’t shut up.

Now, sitting at a furtive corner table in the Clover Leaf with Clarice, the problem was bigger than ever.

“It’s not that his movies are unrealistic, which is the first criticism Westerners have about them, they just have a different cultural mythology on which their esthetic is based, and I expect that if someone from Shanghai saw Monster, which I guess they can these days, they might find it unrealistic even though for us it’s an extremely realistic movie. Maybe that’s a bad example, but you know what I mean – sometimes we can’t apply our rules, and in fact, they aren’t really rules but sets of…”

“Just…

“…preconceived cultural…”

“…hold on.”

“Sorry.”

“I have to pee.”

“Sorry. Okay. Jeez, we’ve already been here for…”

“I gotta go.”

“Sorry.”

Allardyce watched Clarice as she shimmied past the waiter. He loved her, was madly in love with her, and was so nervous about being alone with her for the first time that his motormouth had been in overdrive for the last hour.

He didn’t know what she saw in him. All he could imagine was that he was somehow the exact opposite of her husband. James probably had a normal face. Staring in the direction of the washroom, Allardyce wondered whether his lumpy features had scared her away, and that she’d never return from her ‘pee’.

Drinking in a roadside bar on a sultry August night with a married woman was by far the coolest thing he’d ever done. When Clarice had first served him at the Bamboo back in May, he’d joked that they were both oddities: a black waitress in a Chinese restaurant and the only black computer geek at the computer geek company he worked for. She’d smiled and answered that ‘uncommon’ and ‘special’ were the same thing.

Lunchtimes at the Bamboo were perfect occasions for Allardyce to flirt with Clarice, because she was always too busy to let him talk for long. But yesterday she’d told him, in response to a concerned query, that she was having a bad day and that her marriage sucked. He impulsively asked if she’d like to go out and tell him about it, and now here she was, returning from the Clover Leaf bathroom, fanning herself with her hand against the oppressive humidity.

She retook her seat. He opened his mouth.

“So anyway, it’s really a shame that James is putting in those hours. I mean it’s good, I guess, for his business, and you must benefit in some way, though of course I’m not asking you to reveal anything about your financial agreement as a couple or…”

A huge clap of thunder. Clarice jumped. Allardyce held his breath, then let it out with a laugh. She laughed too. He carried on talking:

“It’s a good thing really, because we really need a storm. Oh, it’s raining. I don’t have a coat but, oh, it doesn’t matter, I mean, it’s hot anyway, and it’s…”

The lights went out. En masse, the Clover Leaf’s customers made the noise a group of people always make when there’s a power cut. An emergency light came on in the entrance behind him, too far from their table to illuminate his face.

Allardyce was speechless. He felt his stomach muscles relax. She couldn’t see his face. He could see hers, vaguely, and she was more beautiful than ever. Bedroom beautiful. But she couldn’t see his.

“That’s a sign,” she laughed.

“What do you mean?”

“Someone wants this to be hidden.”

“What to be hidden?”

She leaned over the table and kissed him on the lips. His brain disconnected in shock and his hormones took the lead. A thirty-second eternity passed. She moved away.

“Thank you. I needed that,” she said.

“You’re, um, welcome.” He stared at her in silence and she stared at him. This was his greatest moment. He was The Man.

The lights came back on. Steve Earl picked up again in mid-chorus. En masse, the Clover Leaf’s customers made the noise a group of people always make when the power returns.

Clarice was still staring at him. Allardyce started to feel his stomach muscles tense up. She looked away. Small beads of sweat started to form on his forehead like pearls of betrayal.

He opened his mouth.