HE, WHO KISSES AND RUNS AWAY………

When I first saw and was introduced to Eleanor, I didn’t even notice her.  I didn’t expect any company at this monthly meeting and lunch at Bardellis on O’Farrell Street.  Rudy Miller, my long time accountant and close friend, and I met regularly to talk about business and personal matters, and to eat good food – usually Chicken Jerusalem.  That was a dish that we both liked.

It was cozy and pleasant.  We did this for many years.  The management knew us well.  We had the same corner table, the same waiter, and the arrangement was private and useful.

But this time Rudy brought along a young woman.  She was clearly a good looking, extremely attractive,  shapely  female.  But why was she at our meeting?  She was a stranger, and I paid little attention to her.

Rudy took care of the paper work related to the tax report of my then flourishing business.  He was a good accountant.  He tried to assist me with both the tax and legal work – to be honest in all the reports.  I did not want him to find loopholes, or try to cheat on anything that was due to the Federal or State Government.  I slept well.

I inherited Rudy Miller from the first CPA I used when I started my woodworking shop, but this older man had become tired, and he decided to sell his firm.  Rudy had worked there for about 20 years, starting when he had just graduated from college.  He bought the firm and made it grow.

Rudy was a successful man, married to a gorgeous, highly educated southern woman (southern Europe that is).  They had three young children, a large home in the Marin Heights with a swimming pool.  He always drove new cars, had many friends and clients who he regularly entertained through lavish dinner parties on Sundays; often barbecuing  thick steaks.  In short, they had all the warm comfortable things that go with the good life.

At lunch we ordered our usual vodka martinis.  The young woman ordered a soft drink, and as Rudy and I talked, she took out a notebook and I could see her making  notations.

When Rudy and I talked about transferring some stocks to increase dividends, Eleanor quietly injected her opinion –

"Better to invest in quality real estate now."

She looked straight in my eyes, smiled in a very seductive way, and described her methods of investing.  She let us know that she was doing extremely well.  Although she too was an accountant, she also had a real estate license and worked in another office where she picked up knowledge and experience in property  investments.

She bought commercial real estate, paying down the very minimum, and then leasing the structures to large firms and established business for relatively long time periods.

The leases required that the renters keep up the properties, and she established the rent levels to be high enough to cover not only the mortgage interest and the principal, but still left some remainder by which she was able to accumulate funds to buy additional income properties.

I was amazed at her boldness, her secure way of talking, and I started to notice how pretty she was, and the way she smiled, ate, and talked.  I also noticed how my friend Rudy treated her, and how he obviously took pleasure in everything she said and did.

To my regret, I did not invest in real estate; I bought second mortgages and eventually lost money.

Eleanor did not chastise me, but every time I saw her, and I saw her more and more in the company of Rudy, she gave me that enigmatic, bright smile; that smile that I got to know was her secret weapon.

I noticed the way she smiled and looked at men.  (She cultivated a lot of customers.) She looked  at a man from his head to his shoes, stopping at midpoint at his crotch.  Oh, just for a second, but the men noticed and felt this, and were aroused.  But mostly, I noticed that seductive smile, a look that men felt held a deep secret, a promise of untold mysterious heavenly and earthly pleasures that she would make available only to selected worthy men.

Occasionally she gave me, too, that smile, but I knew that she just sent these vibrations out to prove her strength to herself.  I soon observed, however, the persistent  private and intimate smiles between Eleanor and Rudy.

In the beginning, I tried to ignore this liaison.  Maybe this was only a short office type romance and would soon disappear.  Knowing Rudy’s life, his stand in the community, his beautiful wife with her provocative clothes, the good father that he was – who was I to judge about a small romance?

But it did not go away.  Rudy was being seen with this young lady more and more and people began to talk.

As a close friend, I finally decided to talk to my friend.  Not only didn’t he deny the ongoing situation, he described to me the exciting life he was having with this free spirited younger woman.  He told me how happy she made him, how completely ecstatic he felt when he was with her .  He told me that he was even contemplating making her a partner in his business, but that she wanted more.  She wanted him to divorce his wife and marry her.

I was scandalized.  How can he be so stupid?  He is a good husband and father, a prominent citizen in the city.

"I am a very sexual individual," he explained. 

"I need sex, and after giving birth to three children and being so active with her religion, my wife gave up sex.  Do you know what I went through?  Do you know what I did to get any sex - hours of begging and pleading, and seldom succeeding, just for a few seconds of pleasure?"

"With Eleanor it is pure pleasure.  She is always willing and ready and gives me the attention that I crave."

He started to show her off at many public gatherings.  I warned him again and again to avoid a scandal.  You can’t hide these things for too long.  Inevitably it came to the attention of is wife.  Fights and screams,  and finally admission and lawyers, and at last - divorce.

Rudy’s wife got everything; the home, the children, the cars, all the stocks and money.  Not only did he lose all his wealth, he also had to pay alimony and child support.

Poor, he was left with only his accounting firm.  He moved in with Eleanor.  Rudy wanted to marry his paramour, but now she didn’t want it.  Rudy no longer possessed anything of monetary value.  He began to neglect his appearance.  His business faltered, and he went into a depression.

Eleanor took over.  The firm now grew under her personal supervision.  As most clients were men, she knew how to handle, attend to, and please them.

Rudy was relegated to doing paper work.  Eleanor was being seen in company of a number of men, and taking short trips she called vacations – but she didn’t travel alone.  There was always a man along.

After a few more months of agony, Rudy left what had once been his firm.  He moved into a tiny apartment, opened a small office, and started over again.

A few of his old friends, including me, gave him our support, and he became our accountant again.  He tried to go back to his wife, but she refused to even see him, although magnanimously she didn’t demand the alimony payments due her.

I kept up with my lunches with Rudy, still at Bardellis.  We still had our vodka martinis and chicken Jerusalem, but now I paid every time.  My friend was broke.

From time to time, I ran into Eleanor.  She hadn't changed.  Matter of fact, she looked even more attractive, more radiant, and surer of herself.  Still the same seductive look, the friendly face, the warm handshake, and she always was with a man – usually a well-dressed, obviously financially secure, older man.

We always exchanged a few friendly words, and as we parted she gave me that haunting, sexual look.  Although I pretended not to notice, the look stayed with me.  It began to creep into my sleep.

At that time, I was between my two marriages.  After Bassya, my first wife, died, I was in a few minor relationships.  No great affairs, but pleasant interludes that kept me attuned to life.  I didn’t need or search for involvements.  I wanted to "travel lightly."

Fate had other plans for me.  At a banquet for a prominent male friend of mine, I was placed at the same table where Eleanor was seated.  Her companion was a stately man who was mostly interested in the food served, and so was my companion, a friendly woman who was also taken up with the different courses of the well-prepared cuisine.  They found a lot to talk about between themselves.  There was also an abundance of excellent wine.  I drank a lot, talked a lot, and sitting next to Eleanor, I began to feel a warm tide embracing me.  Without prior thought or preparation, I whispered in her ear, 

"I am completely taken up with you – you are always in my thoughts and desires. I’d love to make love to you, from head to toes – front and back."

She looked straight in my eyes, smiled and answered, 

"Yes, when?  Why not."

I couldn’t catch my breath.  At last I would be able to fulfill all my hidden fantasies about varied sexuality with this younger, experienced, willing, mysterious woman.

Soon the orations started and when it was over the crowd began to part.  Eleanor and I embraced, kissed lightly, but she managed to give me the tip of her tongue.

I had a restless night. In the morning, I phoned expecting to be invited to her home.  I practically shivered with expectation.  The vision of our coupling took over all rationality.  She wasn’t home.  The phone message said to leave my information.  I breathed the words into the phone,

"Please, I can’t function without us meting today." 

I phoned again, and again, and left messages all day.

Finally, in the evening she called me back. 

"Not tonight or tomorrow,  I 'm busy."

"When then?"  I almost cried.

"I will let you know." 

This went on for about a week.  I stayed near a phone.  I couldn’t work, or eat, or see people. 

"I will let you know," the cool voice had said.

And then, 

"Meet me tonight in a restaurant."

"Tonight is impossible," I begged. 

"You know that it’s a holiday and I am always with my family."

"Phone me again," she coolly answered, hanging up her phone.

This scenario went on for a few weeks, and then I realized the way she was playing it out.  It was the game of the fisherman – the fish is caught, but the smart catcher plays with the reel and line – let out a little and pull in a little more.  The poor fish is a goner; he can fight, but over time becomes less able to resist.

I realized that I was the fish, and she was playing with me to make me more and more anxious.  She would be controlling me completely, as she caught and controlled my friend Rudy.

Since I am an impulsive, strong person (I think so) and since I was in a pleasant relationship with another woman, I decided to fight back, and to show my strength.  I called her, leaving a message on her phone.

"I realize that I am very selfish. I  have nothing to offer to you.  I would just use you to my satisfaction, and soon disappear.  You don’t need me.  Good bye and good luck with other more worthy men."

And so it almost ended.  I felt noble and strong, yet I did not entirely forget her.  I still speculated on what I probably missed.

On my next lunch meeting with Rudy, I told him how I was, for a short time, fascinated with the idea of having a fling with his former lady friend.  He sympathized with me, although he mentioned that I was not the only one who had designs on Eleanor.  He congratulated me for avoiding a fate like his.  It made me feel smart and strong.

But it wasn’t over yet.  Thoughts of this sexy woman, her seductive looks, haunted me constantly.  One day, as I passed a flower shop, I sent her a bouquet of flowers and a long note saying that I could not forget her, and that I still wanted her, that I  must have her to play out sexual fantasies, and promised to be her love-slave if she would love me a little.

Weeks passed, there was no answer. Then a card arrived, a commercial greeting card with the words: 

"Of course I love you" on the front, and:

" I love everybody," on the inside, and then, in her own handwriting, 

"He who kisses and runs away, will never wake up with me in the hay."

And this is how it ended.  I have never forgotten her, nor will I ever forget that promising smile of heavenly delights.