Recent excellent tales here have inspired me to revisit and write about the most memorable relationship of my own life.
Names, facts, and timelines have been subtly modified to ensure privacy. However, the underlying tale is true.
This comes to you in installments. Please up my points if you like it. No flaming or deductions please!
Here goes:
Background
Circa 1999 (i.e. not so long ago) in an office building in Raffles Place (or is it Suntec City?)…
I had just switch banking jobs, and, at 29, was suitably pleased at having climbed a further step in the corporate pecking order and salary scale.
While I found that most of my new colleagues were very welcoming and friendly, there was one – Monica – who particularly stood out as being stuck-up and unapproachable. Jack, a colleague, gave me the low-down on her over drinks one day. Apparently, Monica, was pretty much unfriendly to everyone. He succinctly summarized her with one simple equation:
“Brains + Good Looks + Pampered Lifestyle = One Mega Attitude Problem”
I couldn’t have put it better myself…
And to be fair, she did have it all. 43 years-old (looked 35), Director at a US bank, 160cm, athletically slim, mission school English with a slight American twang, all wrapped up in Armani skirt-suits and a 4-carat solitaire diamond on her left hand. Her husband was said to be an equally high-flier who had recently been promoted to regional head at a competing bank.
Anyway for the first three months, our paths rarely crossed. Our office was open-plan layout with everyone seated in cubicles with waist-high partitions. Monica sat 7 cubicles away and I would occasionally overhear snippets of her lilted American accent discussing bond yields with clients, or instructing her maid what to prepare for dinner. Perhaps once, she said a cold hello in the elevator…
Thinking back, did I entertain early fantasies of Monica? Well of course I did, just as any healthy virile male would! But to be honest, there was sufficient supply of far younger and superior eye-candy in the office to ogle, such as Mandy, Jess and Yumiko (our 22 year-old management trainee. More on Yumiko in another post!). But I digress…
One day I began prospecting a major new account for the bank. As per procedure, I compiled the client’s background info and went to brief my boss.
“I’d like you to bring Monica along to meet the Mr. Teo (the client). She’s friends with his wife, so I think you two could work together to get his business a lot more effectively. If that’s ok with you, of course?”
Of course. You don’t counter a new boss, even if he’s ‘asking’. But I certainly wasn’t thrilled about having to work with Miss Congeniality herself…
So the next morning, I popped by Monica’s cubicle.
“Hi Monica,” I said, putting on my forced-yet-seemingly-100%-genuine smile, “guess you saw Andrew’s e-mail asking us to work together on the Steven Teo account?”
To my surprise, or maybe she’s just as good at forced-smiling, her response was warm, bordering on effusive. “Yes Ian, thanks so much for agreeing to have me work with you on this one! I’ve been wanting to pitch for his business for a long time but never got the right opportunity.”
So we spent the next hour or so in the meeting room discussing our client acquisition strategy.
But what REALLY happened was we got talking, slowly earned each other’s respect, and set in motion events that would bring me to:
(1) my most exciting ‘taboo’ pursuit of a female quarry,
(2) June 22, 1999, aka the “Pinnacle”: without a doubt THE sexual moment of both our lives, one reason I’m glad I was born, and,
(3) perhaps, perhaps the great love of my life…
Ok here’s installment 2.
But we’re getting ahead of ourselves here. Back in the office that day, we emerged from the meeting room as colleagues, warmed to each other, and eager to get down to business.
Two days later, Steven Teo’s secretary called to say that he would meet us the following day. However, due to his tight schedule, it would have to be late, at 9pm, and we should meet at the Ritz Carlton.
A little bit about Steven Teo. Today he’s a good friend and longstanding client. We play golf at least once a month, and my wife (no her name isn’t Monica) and I holiday with the Teo’s in Europe each year. Back then, though, Steven Teo was recent acquaintance with a reputation of being extremely hard on bankers prospecting his $150 million account.
So in the run-up to our 9pm meeting, Monica and I were understandably on-edge. We ran through the Powerpoint presentation too many times, fuelled ourselves with Spinelli’s coffee, and somehow forgot to grab dinner. I won’t bore you with the presentation itself, but when it was all over at around 10.30pm, Steven seemed reasonably impressed, and we were exhausted.
After Steven left, I said, “I’m starving. Wanna grab a bite here and we can review the meeting?”
“Actually no, let’s not review the meeting please? I’m too tired. But don’t worry about it. It went well. Trust this old lady on that!”
“Ok…”, I said with a grin and raised eyebrow.
Time to remind one-and-all of the context here, ok?
Me: 29, VP, single; She: 43, Director, 2 kids and that 4-carat rock on her hand.
“But I will join you for a pasta and a few martinis…”
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Toyota Honda
Erm.. you single or married.. 29 become VP.. Not bad.. Way to go bro… am not even near you… slowly.. slowly….
dude… i was single THEN… married NOW…
guys there seems to be a pretty long time delay between posting and actually appearing on the board. is this normal?
ok, strange… 2 of earlier my posts haven’t shown up, but my 3rd did…
installment #3
First ‘Date’
I remember that evening like it was yesterday.
I remember observing how the expensive auburn highlights of her shoulder-length hair framed her perfectly-proportioned, squared-jawed face. Her big, piercing, intelligent eyes. Minimal make-up, just thinly-drawn eyebrows. Her 40-something skin, lightly-tanned, loosening ever so slightly but so well maintained.
I remember how midway through dinner she finally slid off that black, pinstriped business jacket and I caught my first glimpse of her lace bra between the buttons of her white blouse.
I remember her talking about missing living in America… About the best restaurants in Sydney… About how SQ girls are always nicer to male passengers… About a million things in common.
I remember the $300 food and bar tab, promptly consigned to our expense account. And how at 1 a.m. we reluctantly called it a night.
Our cars were parked alongside in the now almost empty carpark of the Ritz Carlton. Getting into her black BMW 523i, she said, “I won’t be in the office tomorrow. It’s my husband’s birthday so we’re going to Bali for the long weekend. See you Monday, ok?”
There’s a small chance she said that perfectly innocently, but I don’t think so. I think that even at that early stage, she knew and I both knew ‘something’ was likely to happen. The danger and taboo was just our added aphrodisiac, and she had taken it out to play.
installment #4
In fact, nothing much happened for a couple of weeks. Steven Teo went off on a month-long business trip to China, so that lead went quiet. In the office, we went on with our separate business, not forgetting that Monica was still a generally unfriendly person in the office. Alas, that’s simply her innate personality.
Referring to her Bali weekend when we met in the pantry, she did tell me that the Amankila was “spectacular”, but coyly failed to elaborate. On another occasion, she came by my cubicle to ask my opinion on a hot tech IPO (remember the dot.com days?), and I gave her my two cents worth.
I was almost beginning to wonder if the whole Ritz Carlton evening hadn’t actually happened and we had in fact both just gone straight home after the client meeting. Besides, I was also getting other distractions. Yumiko (our management trainee, remember?) was about to be rotated out to the middle office, so a bunch of us had gone out for drinks. This culminated in a spontaneous and very drunken stand in her company-sponsored service apartment later that evening.
Then one Sunday morning at about 11 a.m., I was surprised, pleasantly, to see Monica’s name flash on my caller ID. In a flustered voice, she explained that she was standing by a roadside in Bukit Timah with a broken down car, that her husband was in New York, and asked if I could possibly help since I lived the corner?
Of course!
If you’re thinking that the damsel in distress story is all a bit cliché, and, besides, BMWs don’t break down just like that, I can only counter by saying that this is really what happened. And that when I got there, I found her standing by a paralysed 1978 Porsche 911, which was apparently her husband’s weekend play car…
“I hate this noisy, old thing!!” Monica swore when I drove up. “My husband insisted that I had to start it up, so drove it to church this morning. Now this is what I get!”
I couldn’t help but snigger inside…
45 minutes later, the offending Porsche was dispatched by tow-truck to a workshop, and Monica, dressed in three-quarter pants and a now-sweaty pink polo climbs into my passenger seat. After a few minutes in the air-conditioning, she finally calmed down enough to touch my arm and thank me for coming down. Our first (small) physical contact.
more installments tomorrow readers.
but would really appreciate some up points for the story so far…
I’m really heading out for dinner & drinks now. But thanks to Bro blue_swatch’s 3 points, here’s another installment!
-———
“Please come in. I’ll make you lunch.” Monica said as we drove up to her big ultra-modern bungalow off Holland Road.
“Nah, you’ve had a bad morning already. Besides, don’t you have a family to see to?” I responded.
“No, after dragging you out like that, I insist. My kids are on holiday in Spain with their grandparents, and the maid has the whole day off. Unless you have plans?”
No, I most certainly did not!
Watching Monica prepare lunch in her sunny kitchen, hair tied back and dressed in her Sunday church-going clothes, I swear the temptation to walk up behind her, run my hands over her flat stomach and 33B chest, and kiss the back of her neck was almost unbearable.
Yet the ‘Chase’ was still young. And as much as I love the ‘Quarry’, I equally love the ‘Chase’. So I held my ground. Instead I just ogled that bare neck, those delicate hands, those visible bra and panty lines, pretending to make small talk, and sipped a Heineken as blood rushed through my rock-hard shaft.
Our conversation effectively took right off from the evening at the Ritz Carlton some weeks back. It would sound mundane to describe it all, but we were simply two people, albeit 14 years apart in age, with everything in the world to talk about.
After finishing lunch, Monica and I grabbed our half-drunk bottle of burgandy and moved towards the living room. This was somewhat unsettling at first. In the corridor, there was a large sideboard filled with photographs of a clearly happy family. Husband, wife, daughter, son. From the corner of my eye, I saw Monica sneak a glance at the photos too, turn away and momentarily bite her lower lip.
In the living room (thankfully free of family photos), we sat together on a large, Chinese-style opium day-bed. The conversation and laughter just flowed, as did the wine. Sometime around 4pm, on our third bottle and slurring slightly from the alcohol, Monica suddenly said, “I’m so tired and we have to go back to work tomorrow! Right, I’m calling the foot masseuse over now.” and she reached for the phone.
Not wanting our little private world of two to be invaded, I quickly responded. “Forget that! I’ll massage you. I’m told that I’m pretty good…”
“Oh really??” Monica’s eyes narrowed. “Let’s see then!” And her feet plopped onto my lap.
Ten minutes later, she was convinced. Believe me, there are few better tools with women than good massage hands. Monica, my formerly cold, unapproachable (and married) banking colleague was quite literally becoming putty in my hands…
next installment…
-———–
“Aiya, feet only ahh?” Monica asked, in slurred faux-Singlish, soon after.
“Ok, get into the right position then.” I responded.
With that, Monica gleefully swung her feet away, turned onto her tummy, and lay her left cheek midway up my thigh. As she did so, there is no way she did not feel and see the sudden jolt as my man-shaft grew from already 100% to 120%!
“But you’ll have to lose the bra. It’s getting in the way, sorry.” I then deadpanned, as I ran my thumbs down her spine.
Monica looked up and gave me the ‘yeah right, buddy’ face. And for that split-second, I actually thought I’d crossed the line. But what she did next more than assuaged those fears!
She stood, then turned her back to me. Instead of doing that weird acrobatic thing that women (typically steady girlfriends) do to remove their bras with their top in place, Monica took off her pink polo-T, bent forward and placed it on the coffee table. She then reached back, unclasped her bra, and tossed it aside. Then she reached forward, topless and allowing me a partial side view of her breasts and pointed pink nipples, picked up the polo-T, slipped it back on, and lay back down again with her head on my lap. If this sounds like slow motion, I remember it in slow motion!
Ok that was the highlight of that afternoon. Without a doubt, we could so easily have proceeded to screw each others’ brains out on that day bed, but prolonging our growing lust for each other became my objective.
A while later, after a suitable period of ‘Mmms’ and ‘Aahhs’ from my massaging, I bent forward and whispered to her ear that I should go.
Our eyes locked, and all I could see was tenderness and lust. “Ok…” she whispered back, smiling. We both knew we were simply prolonging the inevitable, heightening the eventual release.
then came the wait….
-———–
During the next week, our lust was barely containable, particularly with us in such close proximity in the office.
I couldn’t work, period. I found myself walking past her cubicle several times each hour just to get a scent of her perfume. I thought of following her into the ladies and consummating it all right there and then. This required frequent splashes of cold water to the face. Reality check: No, I wasn’t about to lose my job over an office scandal with my married colleague 14 years my senior!
But I could tell that she was having trouble keeping in together too. Her poor assistant bore the brunt of it! Already unfriendly in general, she became a tyrant – totally demanding and unreasonable. By the later part of the week, Daphne, Monica’s assistant was on MC!
Months later during pillowtalk, Monica told me that every lunchtime that whole week, she had driven home to pleasure herself thinking of what was about to happen…