Coming home for Timothy was no reprieve from his tedious, dreary work life. Timothy would come home every night to a tiny efficiency apartment. Furnished with sparse second-hand furniture, he had carved out a meek and humble existence. He would take out a frozen TV dinner, pop it in the old microwave oven he had, and then sit down to eat his dinner in front of the only real luxury he possessed, a small color TV. The only one he had to share his pedestrian life with was his pet goldfish, Sylvia, who lived in her own little fishbowl.
This was Timothy's life. Every day the same thing except on Sunday, his only day off of work. On that day, he usually treated himself to a walk in the park and feeding the pigeons some birdseed he would buy from a man selling little bags of it from a cart in the park. He enjoyed his time in the park, even though the fresh air would often make him cough for a bit until he got used to it. And so it went, day in and day out, week after dreary week. He had been with the corporation for six long and uneventful years and was too timid and broken down to do anything to change things.
Then one day fate was to step in and set him on another path. It was a dull gray March afternoon, the kind of weather that mirrored his mood perfectly. The day had started out bright and sunny and he almost wished he could just stay home and enjoy it. But he didn't, and now that his workday had ended, the weather had changed for the worse. He was walking home from work when the sky suddenly opened up and it began to rain hard. Since the weather had been so nice earlier, he hadn't brought his umbrella or even an overcoat. He was going to get soaked. Fortunately, he was only steps away from a small coffee shop, so he quickly ducked inside to get out of the rain.
The coffee shop was crowded, both because it was a good place and because of the foul weather. He found one of the last remaining tables and sat down to wait out the rain. He didn't have any real good reason to hurry home anyway. He ordered a cappuccino and settled in. It looked like the rain might last for a couple hours.
He had been there for awhile, nursing his cappuccino when the door creaked open. Timothy, whose back was to the door, turned to see who had come in and there she was!
She walked into the coffee shop and stopped just past the doorway. She was soaked and looked as if she had walked a fair distance in the downpour. She also didn't have an umbrella or overcoat - she obviously wasn't prepared for the change in weather either.
Timothy couldn't take his eyes off of her as she made her way through the crowded coffee shop to the ladies room. He waited for her to come back out, and then called the waitress over. He whispered something in her ear, and she went over to the woman and talked to her. The woman came over to where Timothy was sitting. He stood up as she approached.
"It's pretty crowded in here right now, would you like to sit with me at my table?" he said, timidly. He knew she would probably turn him down, but he was a gentleman and it wouldn't hurt to at least be polite.
"Thank you, yes I would. My name is Elizabeth," she said, extending a hand. He took her hand in a light handshake and then pulled the chair out for her to sit down with him.
"Ooh, how gallant! Thank you," she said, smiling as she sat down. He took a seat across the table from her and signaled for the waitress.
"My name is Timothy, but you can call me Tim. Now, let's get you something hot to warm you up, you must be freezing!" he said.
"I am a bit chilled; I would welcome a cup of hot coffee if you don't mind," Elizabeth said.
When the waitress came over, Timothy put in their drink order. "Can we get a couple cups of hot coffee, one black with sugar and one... I'm sorry, how do you take your coffee?" he asked Elizabeth.
"Two creams and two sugars please," Elizabeth told the waitress. The waitress then left to get their coffees.
"That is quite a rainstorm out there," Timothy said.
"Yes it is and I didn't bring an umbrella or anything! I must look a fright!" Elizabeth said.
"Actually no, I don't think so at all. I think you are quite pretty to be honest," Timothy said.
"Aren't you a dear man! But if you wouldn't mind, I'm just going to go to the ladies room and see if I can fix all this a bit!" she said. As she stood up, he stood as well, and she smiled once more. "I'll be right back."
Timothy watched her walk towards the ladies room. "She looks as good going as she does coming!" he thought to himself, as he sat back down. He waited there at the table for several minutes and the waitress brought the coffees while Elizabeth was still in the ladies room. Timothy was starting to get a little concerned and thought maybe she had slipped out on him when he saw her re-appear.
This time when she came back, her long brunette hair was dried and her makeup was perfection. She looked spectacular, and Timothy couldn't help but stare at her, his mouth half open in disbelief.
"You... you look... amazing!" he said, not believing a creature like this existed, much less was sitting at his table talking with him.
"Thank you, Tim. I feel a whole lot better now that I am dry! I was coming home from work and didn't bring my umbrella. I should have known better, it is March after all. But it looked so pretty out this morning!" she said, sitting down.
"The same thing happened to me. I was just lucky I was only steps away from here when the rain started. So what do you do for work?" he asked.
"Oh I'm a model. I was coming back from the agency. I have a photo shoot coming up and I wanted to make sure all the arrangements were made properly," she said.
"I can completely see you as a model! I was thinking you had to have some kind of job like that... you are just not the regular secretary type," he said.
"Actually I was a secretary at one time. But an agent saw me at a concert once and suggested I look into modelling, and the next thing you know here I am," she explained.
"Well, I think it was a wise move. You would have wasted all that behind a desk. And as beautiful as you are, that would have been a terrible shame," Tim said.
"You are a sweetheart," she said, with a shy smile.
"So where is your next photoshoot going to be?" Tim asked.
"Well they want me to go to Rio de Janeiro for a photoshoot for the holiday Carnival. They want me to dress in one of those feathered samba costumes and do a whole photo shoot with some other girls as samba dancers as well. Some kind of advertisement for the travel brochures for Rio Carnival," she said.
"That sounds exciting," Tim said.
"Well I hope this shoot goes better than the last one I was on!" she said.
"Oh?"
"Yeah, the last time I went out of the country on a photo shoot, they lost my makeup bag, my hotel reservation was messed up, and the entire shoot had to be postponed because of a hurricane that skirted the island we were shooting on. The whole trip was a disaster!" Elizabeth said.
"Wow! Well I hope this trip will go better," Tim said, "When will you be leaving?"
"I'm scheduled to leave here in three weeks. We start shooting on the first of next month. I'll be gone for four weeks, as of right now," she said.
"Sounds like it will be a very interesting and exciting trip, Elizabeth."
"Well, we'll see. Now I've been talking all about me - it's your turn. Tell me about you. What do you do for a living?" Elizabeth asked.
"Certainly nothing as glamorous as being a fashion model! I work as a mailroom clerk for Picard Chemicals Corporation," he said, looking down.
"You mean that huge black building downtown on 33rd Street, the one all those mirrored windows?" she asked.
"Yeah, the one everyone complains about when it's time to drive home. The afternoon sun hits those windows and makes it hard for the drivers headed west to see! But the mailroom is in the basement of the building. I don't have any windows in the mailroom," he said.
"None at all? How do you get fresh air? And daylight?" Elizabeth asked.
"Well, the building has central air conditioning so that's how we get fresh air, although it isn't all that fresh by the time it gets to us. And we don't get daylight... our lighting is all fluorescent lighting in the ceiling fixtures."
"Oh my, Tim! I don't know if I could work like that! I need to see the sun, or on days like today, the rain."
"Yeah..." Tim said. He knew just what she meant. There had been far too many days of being cooped up in the basement mailroom when he wished they could have some kind of view of the outside world, just to make the place seem less like a dungeon. But envelope jockeys like him were at the bottom of the totem pole. The only people from the mailroom that got to see the sunshine were the guys that pushed the mail-carts around delivering the mail. They got to go up above ground level and at least see out the windows of the offices they delivered mail to. Tim was a mail sorter, and his job was to take the bins of incoming mail, sort it, and put it into the individual cubbies so that the cart handlers could deliver it to the proper offices. His job kept him in the basement, even at lunch and his coffee breaks. The heads of the corporation didn't want him wandering too far from his post in case there was some kind of bottleneck or problem with the mail delivery.
"Looks like this rain isn't going to let up much and it's getting late," Elizabeth said finally.
"Yeah it is sure coming down. I haven't seen it rain this hard in some time," Tim agreed.
"And I didn't get to the market to get anything for dinner," Elizabeth complained.
Tim knew he had his usual TV dinner waiting at his apartment, but he wasn't really looking forward to going home to it. Then he had an idea.
"Would you like to go to dinner with me?" Tim asked, not really expecting much to come from it.
"I'd like that," Elizabeth said, smiling.
"Really?" Tim said, not quite sure he heard her right.
"Sure, why not? I've had a nice time talking with you. Haven't you?" she asked.
"Of course. This is the nicest time I have had in a very long time. I just thought... you know..."
"What?" she asked.
"Well you are a beautiful model, Elizabeth... and I am just a, well I'm just a mailroom clerk."
"Tim, you are more than your job. You are a very nice man and a gentleman. You don't know how refreshing it is to find a man with proper manners. Most the guys I have dated have all been out to... well let's just say bagging a model makes for a good trophy and good bragging rights!"
"Oh, Elizabeth, I would never do something like that! First off, I have no one to brag to or show off for. And even if I did, I'm not the type to do that anyway. It isn't good manners and it shows disrespect for your reputation. So you needn't worry about that from me," he said.
"I know that. You don't seem like that kind of guy to me either. I like that you have such respect for me and are a gentleman. I appreciate that about you," she said, giving him a kiss on the cheek.
The pair finished their coffees and prepared to go. Just as they were ready to go, a thought came to Tim.
"Wait right here for a moment, I'll be right back," he said. He picked up a paper from the newspaper vending box and used it to cover his head. He went down the street a few doors to a small clothing store he knew of, and soon he was back at the coffee shop.
"Where did you go?" Elizabeth asked as he came back.
"Oh, I just went to get this," he said, showing her the umbrella he just bought for her. "You just got dry... I don't want you to get soaked again!"
"Tim! Oh, how thoughtful of you!" she said, smiling broadly. So the pair went out to hail a cab, protected from the rain by the umbrella.
After a couple unsuccessful attempts at catching a cab, they finally got one and it took them to a small restaurant that Elizabeth knew had good food. They looked over the menu and decided what they wanted and when the waitress came over, he ordered for the both of them. As they waited for their dinner to arrive, the two of them talked and got to know each other a bit better.
Actually, Tim got to know Elizabeth better. He let her do most of the talking, asking her about her job, and her life. He listened intently as she talked too, fascinated by this beautiful woman in front of him. They talked and laughed, enjoying each other's company until their dinner came.
After dinner, they took a cab back to her place. Elizabeth at first objected, but when Tim explained that he wouldn't be much of a gentleman if he didn't see her to her door, she smiled and consented. So they rode to her place and he walked her up to her door. The rain had quit by this time, so he left the umbrella in the cab while it waited for his return. Standing at the door to her apartment building, he fidgeted a bit. This was the part of the date that he always got especially nervous at. He never knew what he should do - should he try to kiss her, should he wait for her to make the first move? He was always nervous on dates as it was, but this was his chance... either he would leave her with a good impression, or he would go down like the Titanic.
"I had a nice time Tim," Elizabeth said. Tim silently heaved a sigh of relief - the pressure was off him now, he knew she had enjoyed herself!
"I had a nice time too, Elizabeth. It was sure better than what I had planned for the evening before I met you!" he said.
"Oh? What did you have planned for tonight?" she asked, curious now.
"I was just going home to a frozen TV dinner and an evening of TV watching. Not real exciting!"
"Well it's a good thing I came into the coffee shop tonight, soaked as I was!" she said.
"A very good thing," he said, agreeing with her. Elizabeth smiled and moved in closer to him. She took the lead, putting her arms around his neck and pulling his mouth to hers. She kissed him long and deep as he put his arms around her waist. They kissed there at the door for a couple minutes and then he had to go. But before he left, Elizabeth wrote her phone number down in a piece of paper from her purse and gave it to him.
"Give me a call, Tim... I'd like to go out with you again before I leave for Rio," she said.
''Oh, I'm pretty sure that can be arranged!" he said, with a playful grin. He waited as she unlocked the door and went inside before he turned and went back to the taxicab and headed for home himself.
The next day, Tim called her when he got home from work.
"Hello?" she said as she answered the phone.
"Hi Elizabeth, it's Tim," he said. "I just wanted to call and see how your day went."
"Hi Tim, awww that's so sweet. My day went well. At least it didn't rain today!" she laughed.
"Yeah, that was some shower yesterday. But it brought us together so I'm not complaining. If it hadn't been for that sudden storm, we may never have met," he said.
"That's true. That was the one good thing that came from that storm," she agreed.
