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“How much do you want to bet that every man in this lobby bought one dozen red roses and a box of chocolates for his wife?” Jimmy says, crumpling up his napkin in one hand. He glances over at Kim who is slowly chewing the last bite of her sandwich and silently scrutinizing every man in the HHM lobby.
The breakroom was overrun with teddy bears, cardboard hearts and gaudy trinkets so the two of them had opted to take a field trip out to the lobby for lunch. The lobby had an assortment of red and pink balloons, but they were tempered by the dead-eyed stares of the receptionists.
He pushes back on the bench until he’s leaning his shoulders up against the beige marble wall, watching her jaw work out of the corner of his eyes. The quiet sound of business shoes scuffling around makes him feel like they’re invisible, quietly camouflaged by the monotony.
“Absolutely not,” she says, dabbing the side of her lips with a clean napkin. “You met most of their wives at the Christmas party. If you think these men aren’t given a very specific set of instructions,” she pauses briefly to toss the napkin in a perfect arch into a nearby trash can. “You are a fool.”
He senses a challenge in her voice and it makes his heart speed up. Straightening his spine so he’s flat against the wall, Jimmy fights back a smile.
“Are you trying to tell me that a dozen roses and a box of chocolates is not the pinnacle of romance? You don’t think Franklin,” he sweeps an arm out, gesturing to a pale, gangly lawyer nervously checking his watch. “is capable of sweeping his wife off her feet without hyper-specific instructions?”
Pursing her lips, Kim slides back on the bench until she’s pressed against the wall too, her warm shoulder pressed gently against his.
“Nope.” she says, seriously.
“Does this mean you also don’t think George ,” he nods his head towards a broad-shouldered fellow slowly shuffling down the stairs. “is able to whip his wife up into a hormonal frenzy without a to-do list?”
They both watch George reach the bottom of the stairs and continue to shuffle his way out the doors. He feels her shoulders move against his as she takes a small breath.
“Correct.” she says, carefully.
Turning to face her, he casually tosses the balled up napkin he was still holding towards the trash can. It bounces off the side and rolls into the reception area, getting immediately flattened by a shoe. She smirks and raises her eyebrows oh so slightly, wordlessly encouraging him to continue.
“Sounds like you know a secret that could save a lot of marriages, Wexler.” he says, somehow teasing her and feeling dead serious at the same time. “Care to share?”
Tapping her fingers against her leg, she glances around the room and then back at him, as if deciding whether or not she can trust him. Her silences used to intimidate the shit out of him, but pretty quickly they became as familiar to him as breathing. As the only two people in the mailroom above the age of twenty-two, he worried initially that she was only hanging out with him because he didn’t flirt with her nervously like some of their more youthful coworkers, but it didn’t take long to realize that if she didn’t want to spend time with him, she simply wouldn’t.
“You’ve worked in sales before, right?” she starts, fingers still tapping gently against her leg. “What’s the most important part of salesmanship?”
He squints at her, suddenly feeling like she might be a little sneakier than he previously thought.
“The outfit,” he says, in a hushed tone, leaning towards her slightly. “People love buying stuff from someone who looks totally fly.”
Her nose scrunches in what he thinks might have been a suppressed laugh. She shakes her head, curled hair shaking gently behind her.
“Sex appeal,” he says, a little louder, wiggling his eyebrows exaggeratedly. “Sex sells, baby!”
She makes a show of scooting away from him on the bench, patting around the empty space beside her for her purse.
“Oh, you wanted a real answer? Okay, weirdo ,” he mutters. She laughs softly and scoots back towards him as he threads his fingers together and folds them under his chin. “Look for a need and convince someone you can fill it.”
Smiling at him a little deviously, she nods, so he continues.
“Plus, people usually give how they’d want to receive themselves. So the key is to look for the thing that they need and the way they’d want to receive it,” he says, trailing off, suddenly feeling like he might have revealed too much, like she might be wary about telling him anything after hearing that. He swallows hard, hoping she isn't just mentally cycling through every rumour she's ever heard about his criminal past.
They both stop momentarily and watch as a delivery man struggles through the revolving door with a sloshing vase overflowing with flowers wrapped in cellophane. The delivery guy plunks the vase down on the front desk with a sigh.
“So?” Kim asks, voice light and friendly. “If you were married to one of these guys, someone who works insane hours and makes a salary so high it should probably be illegal, what would you want?”
His eyes flick back and forth among the suits, then they lock onto the delivery guy who gracefully sidesteps a very zoned-out Howard Hamlin with a small spin.
“Salsa dancing,” he blurts out, building his case as the words spill out of his mouth. “They’re all starved for quality time and romance, plus all of these guys are so stiff.”
“Salsa dancing, huh?” He can hear the smile in her voice and his shoulders relax a fraction. Nervously avoiding her eyes, he spies Howard again across the lobby, pacing rigidly and rifling through a leather briefcase.
“Except Howard’s wife,” he whispers conspiratorially.
“Oh?”
“She just needs new batteries.”
The muffled choking noise she lets out makes him feel warm inside, like someone just pushed his heart into a hot tub and it’s pumping warm blood out to every part of him, then circling back and warming his chest.
“Sounds like you have Valentine’s day all figured out, McGill,” she says, dusting non-existent crumbs off her navy blue pencil skirt. She moves to stand, and he follows.
As they move together towards the elevators, she ducks down and swiftly picks up his discarded napkin that had been kicked towards the elevators. Feeling weirdly ashamed that she’s holding his trash, he holds out a palm to take it. She presses it into his hand with raised eyebrows. Not knowing what to do, he shoves it quickly into his pocket.
Walking in unison, his hands jammed deep in his pockets and hers tucked close to her sides, they walk past the elevators, down the steps into the basement and back towards the mailroom. As they near their lockers, Jimmy suddenly straightens up, clearing his throat.
“See you!” he says, glancing down at his closed fist then quickly dropping the napkin into a garbage can, hustling towards an overflowing metal cart. She frowns slightly at his back, moving to open her locker without looking at it. Something flutters onto the floor, catching her attention as Jimmy shoves the cart through the mailroom side door and disappears from sight.
Bending down, she picks up a small wad of papers that have all been roughly stapled together. It’s a little book of sorts, made of folded up yellow legal paper. On the front is just her last name, scribbled haphazardly in messy print.
Carefully she thumbs the cover aside and her cheeks flush. It’s a book of coupons, all drawn by hand. She flips through them, the small grin on her face growing.
Automatically Win One Argument
Free Toenail Painting
Fun Movie Night Out (Kim’s choice so it can be a weird old one)
Two Hours Of My Silence
After flipping through about fifteen pages of absurdly specific coupons, she turns to the last page which is just a roughly scribbled “Happy V-Day, JM”. Cheeks still flushing, she glances around at the empty mailroom. Tearing out the Fun Movie Night Out coupon, she gently slides it into his locker, making sure it won’t just slide back out, then tucks the little coupon book safely into her locker and closes it firmly.
With one last glance at his closed locker, she moves towards the other metal cart, gripping the cool metal bar with both hands and trying to decide whether or not any of the movies currently airing at the little theater near her apartment would be scary enough to make Jimmy lose sleep.