You Are My Sunshine

Dani strolled down Broadway as other pedestrians surged past her. She had a few minutes to kill before arriving at work, and she wanted to be in a good frame of mind for her presentation.

She stopped at a store window to admire a sleeveless silk wrap blouse with a sash. She liked the style and rich color, not quite gold and not quite copper, a refreshing change from the typical russet or lemon yellow. I could wear that to the office with a skirt, or with some flared pants when I go out.

She was still pondering the blouse when she registered a hint of teakwood and felt a looming presence nearby. She turned to see a wavy haired man clad in a nubby blue silk blend jacket, his chocolate brown eyes studying her.

“That’s very stylish, but maybe a blue shade would suit you better?” His voice was rich and warm, almost comforting.

“I like this color,” said Dani, with just a hint of defiance.

The man chuckled, shrugging. “You’re buying it for your tastes, not for mine. It’s going to look quite flattering on you in any case.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence.” Dani immediately regretted her snippy tone, but he brushed it off.

“You’re welcome,” he said with a hint of amusement. He appraised her without being lewd or obvious. “I enjoy a woman who has a subtle sense of style and chooses rich colors.” He glanced at his fitness watch. “I’d love to chat some more but unfortunately I have a meeting in 15 minutes. Have an excellent day.” He nodded to her and started down the block.

Dani checked the time; she had her own presentation to give soon. The man had left her in a good mood, subtle in his appreciation of her without leering or making crude remarks. He didn’t even ask for her number, which she thought a bit odd. He definitely hadn’t tripped her gaydar. Maybe her tone had been too snippy, but she was a New Yorker. Being direct was her nature.

At the next stoplight she was surprised to find him in the knot of people waiting at the curb. As she looked him over she had to admit, he looked good in that jacket. Dani was curious now. She took a deep breath and moved next to him. “It would be a crazy coincidence if your meeting was in the Nomad Tower.”

His laughter rumbled, as rich as his baritone voice. “It would be crazy. But maybe it’s our day for one of those crazy coincidences.”

“It would be even crazier if your name happens to be Zachary Wellesley, and you’re with Pierce Stratford.”

His smile broadened as he turned to look at her. “But my friends call me Zack.”

Her eyebrows arched. “Are we friends now?”

“We are, or soon will be, if I have anything to say about it.”

The light changed and he moved to flank her on the curb side, matching her pace as they headed for the Nomad Tower. Dani sensed him glancing at her as they walked. They moved to the revolving door and she felt him pushing it to lighten her effort.

Zack turned to her as they headed for the elevators. “I specifically asked for Ms. Danielle Newman to be part of the project management team for our new contract. She came highly recommended by a colleague whose judgement I trust.” His grin was sly. “Do you happen to know her?”

She looked up at him, her gaze steady, her green eyes fixed on his. “In fact I do know her, quite well. But her friends call her Dani.”

Zack laughed again, the rich tones pealing in Dani’s ears. “Touché, Danielle.”

She smirked at him. “But Zack, I thought we were already friends.”

He smiled again. “Oh, I think we are getting there quickly - Dani.”

The elevator chimed its arrival and Zack paused to let Dani enter first.

Dani looked around the faces in the conference room. She knew that she had done well from the pleased expressions. “That concludes the formal presentation. Does anyone have any questions? Mr. Wellesley?”

Zack looked at her and lowered his pen. James was right about her. She was good, damned good. “I only have one question. The schedule you have laid out presumes that custom tooling can be produced within four weeks. Any delay there would impact the entire production schedule, with limited opportunity to recover. What assurance do we have that the tooling can be produced on time?”

Zack had homed in on what looked like the weakest link in the project front end. But he had another motive in asking Dani this question directly. She wasn’t in production, she was the project manager. He was curious whether she would hand off the question to the production team manager or handle it herself.

She straightened her shoulders and looked straight at Zack, making sure to project her voice. “That’s an excellent question. In order to keep the project budget within bounds, it was not possible to craft contingencies for every single step. But for the tooling production, it seemed essential. Therefore we have contracted two independent firms to provide the tooling.”

She paused, registering that Zack was absorbing every word. “That approach both minimizes the risk of schedule impact up front, and also provides us with a complete set of backup tooling in case of breakage or tolerance issues. We could even use that spare tooling to increase production at a later date if that’s warranted.”

Zack nodded his approval. “Excellent, I have no further questions.” Damned good, and confident.

The presentation session wound down, and the attendees broke off into informal conversations or went to use the restroom. A few of the suits came over to invite Zack to lunch. He politely declined, saying that he would take a rain check until their next meeting in New York. Then he scanned the room, but he couldn’t spot Dani.

Zack slipped outside the conference room and approached the receptionist. She looked up with a smile. “Yes, Mr. Wellesley, can I help you?”

“I’m looking for Danielle Newman, my new project manager. We just concluded her presentation and I had hoped to discuss some details of the project with her.”

The receptionist nodded. “Dani asked me to make sure that you didn’t leave. I believe she’s in the ladies’ room, you can have a seat right over there.”

“Awesome, thank you, Angela.” He smiled at her, noting her nameplate. Zack had learned that staying on the good side of receptionists and admins made corporate life much easier. He took a seat in the cushioned chair and checked emails on his phone.

“There you are.” He looked up to see Dani’s face wreathed in a smile. “I was hoping that you hadn’t left.”

Zack returned her smile. “I wouldn’t leave without touching base with you. But I was hoping for something else, namely that you have time to join me for lunch. It seems that setting foot in Manhattan has resulted in a severe pastrami craving.”

Dani’s eyes twinkled. “I always have time for pastrami. We can go to Katz’s, it’s just a short subway ride and a bit of a walk.”

“I’ve heard of it but have never been there. I’m pleased that I’ll have you to guide me through the menu.”

Zack dropped his visitor’s badge off with the receptionist and signed out. They took the elevator down, then he and Dani went through the lobby door and headed to the subway station.

As they emerged from the subway to walk down Houston Street, some construction workers in hardhats were ogling and catcalling passing women. One of them chose Dani as his next target. “Hey baby, come over here and check out a real man.”

Zack took Dani’s hand in his and stared daggers at the loudmouth. “For future reference, that’s not how a real man speaks to a classy woman. I thought you were supposed to have a hardhat, but it seems more like you have a hard head.”

Dani tried not to crack a smile as the other workers razzed the dude over Zack’s roast. Zack seemed to shrug off his momentary anger as they continued down the street. She had to work a bit to keep up with his stride. “I thought you hadn’t been to Katz’s before?”

“I looked up the address on my phone.” He had a cheeky grin now. “I didn’t want to slow you down.”

“You seem to know your way around Manhattan. But you’re from Chicago, right?“

“I live in Chicago, but I’ve been here quite a number of times. I can’t quite do the ‘New Yawk’ accent though.”

She laughed. He had not let go of her hand; it felt natural and comforting. She began to feel a bit giddy.

Zack added, “I should have mentioned earlier that you did a first class job with the presentation. There, now we’ve got the business chatter out of the way.”

Dani cocked her head at him. “Thanks? But I thought...”

Zack waved at the sign ahead. “Ah, there it is.”

Her head swiveled up toward his. “Let me guess, you looked up a picture of it online too.”

He laughed. “This is why I asked for you to be on the team. You manage to get from point A to point B without any lollygagging.”

She couldn’t help giggling. Something about him just stripped away her usual professional filters. “I wonder how many people from the Midwest say ‘lollygagging.’”

He shrugged. “I have no idea, but that’s why you have a research department. All you need to do is figure out if that’s an important enough question to turn over to them.” He glanced at her.

Dani was still turning that over in her mind as he guided her into the deli. Was he joking?

They were standing in line for their lunch. Dani suggested they each get the half pastrami sandwich with matzoh ball soup. “The whole sandwich will have you snoring away this afternoon, if you manage to finish it. It’s nearly a pound of meat. And the soup is to die for.”

“We can’t have any snoring in the office,” said Zack, his eyebrows arched. “I need to act like a professional.”

Something in his expression caused Dani to crack up. He gazed at her with a warm grin.

“You’re really beautiful when you laugh like that.”

Dani looked into his brown eyes, a flush creeping up her cheeks. Her mouth crinkled.

Dani savored a bite of the peppery pastrami, then frowned as a chunk of the spicy meat slipped out of her sandwich to land on the plate. She retrieved it with her fingers. As she chewed the rogue piece she looked into Zack’s amused eyes.

“Not exactly the optimal first date food, is it?” He chuckled.

Dani swallowed and met his gaze. “Is this a date? I thought we were having a business lunch.”

Zach wiped his mouth and leaned forward a bit. “I purposely avoided having a boring business lunch with all those suits. You warned the receptionist to keep an eye out for me so I wouldn’t run off. So you tell me, Dani, is this a business lunch or a date? Or should our first date be when I take you to dinner tonight?”

Dani took a sip of her Dr. Brown’s cream soda. “I can’t do dinner tonight, I’m meeting my sister.” She pursed her lips. “When do you fly back?”

Zack shrugged. “I can fly back when you get tired of me.”

Dani shook her head with a grin. “Okay, I’ll admit that this is a lunch date. But Zack, sometimes it’s hard to tell when you’re just joking around and when you’re being serious.”

He nodded, wincing a bit. “I know. Humor is my go-to defense mechanism. My therapist would say that I’m deflecting with jokes so that I don’t have to face the stress of asking you whether or not you like me.”

She nodded back. “My therapist would say that me calling this a business lunch would simply be avoidance of the fact that I would really like to be on a date with you.” She smirked and waved her hand. “That’s kind of fucked up, isn’t it? Why do we have these stupid issues? Why can’t we just say what we’re feeling?”

“I agree with you, and I vote that we should reboot this conversation. Dani, professionally I admire you. But in this context I most definitely like you, very much.”

Her eyes crinkled. “That’s much better. I like you too, especially when you call me beautiful and hold my hand. And I need to be honest with myself, I knew all along this was a date. You asked me to go for pastrami with you, not to discuss the finer points of the production schedule.”

He nodded. “Now we’re getting somewhere. This is the sort of open conversation that would make our therapists proud!”

1. Image by saranpol on freepik.com
2. Image from Nut-Free New York blog