The man who kept a book in his pants came by it honestly. That is to say, Terrance did not simply see a book and think, And into my pants this must go. Prior to keeping a book in his pants, Terrance never travelled with one, nor even read. One day, however, as he walked to work, he saw what he thought was a brown birdhouse with a door. It said, “Take a book, leave a book.” Terrance thought, What’s all this about? and opened the tiny yellow door to see a row of books. He picked up a small, black book. “If you insist,” he said, and without a book to leave, went on his way to work at the auto-insurance provider.
He laid his blazer over the back of his office chair, placed the book on the desk in his small, white cubicle, and started tapping away at his computer.
“What’s all this about then?” Jillian said. Her green eyes were sharp, her brown hair was frizzy, and her role was HR. She was pointing at the book.
“Oh that,” Terrance said. “It’s a book I retrieved from a birdhouse.” He tried to sound casual. The truth was: he had a crush on Jillian.
“It looks dreadful. Just dreadful. What a dreadful title. And brought to work. Also dreadful. Don’t you know? No rubik’s cubes, no puzzles, no crosswords, no internet videos, no books. No time-wasting of any kind. You should know this.”
Indeed, Terrance did know this.
Last week, Jillian had fired three employees for crimes related to time-wasting. Kevin in adjustments, for instance, took a phone call in the morning from his urologist to set up what was rumoured to be a semi-serious appointment, and Jillian loudly fired him in the afternoon, citing, among other things, a lack of respect for work-life balance. “Time theft,” she said. The next day, Jennifer was ten minutes late to work, explaining that her pipes had blown up and she had to call in a plumber. Jillian’s verdict: “Time theft.” Then there was Gerald, who called in sick on Friday. Jillian had apparently driven to his house, banged on the door, and Gerald opened it, wrapped in blankets, his eyes all red. He tried to show her a doctor’s note, but rumour had it that she pulled a thermometer from her pocket, thrust it between his lips, and shook her head when she read the results. On Monday his desk was empty, and Jillian, the sole member of HR, moved into a larger office, and allegedly received a generous bonus.
In truth, Terrance didn’t mind the firings. If his coworkers were willing to test their luck for reasons of health or propriety in such a precarious time, they should have known the risk. And it wasn’t as though the company didn’t have cause: their contracts were clear about their policies. And beyond that, Terrance actually enjoyed hearing about Jillian’s ruthlessness, her implacable desire to separate the chaff from the wheat. He liked that about her, even when he was the target of it. For instance, the week before the firings, she’d walked by his desk, and Terrance had been so engrossed in a video demonstrating the proper way to dice an onion that he didn’t realize his lunch break had ended a minute ago. He had turned from the slicing knife on the screen and seen her seeing him. She’d looked at her wristwatch and narrowed her eyes, but walked away without saying a word. So, yes, Terrance did know.
“I know,” Terrance said, looking at the book. “So goodbye: so please goodbye so I can go back to work right now.” Jillian smiled and walked away.
Two hours later, Terrance felt the urge to pee, and as he pushed back from his desk, his eyes went to the book. Now what is this really all about then, he thought. He peered right, then left down the long hallway and saw no one. He scooted forward in his cubicle, pulled his belted pants forward, and thought, And into my pants this must go, before placing the book therein. He shuffled stiffly to the bathroom, his head shifting back and forth, but no one seemed to pay him any notice.
In the stall, he pulled the book from his pants and read the title: And Love Me And Love Me And Love Me And Love. He brought his hand to his chin. Best not to judge the book by its cover, he thought. But still. Hard not to with a title like that. If he had to describe it with a word, he would use the word dreadful, or one very much like it. He flipped the book open to its first page.
It read: “And love me // and love me // and love me // and love.”
So a book of poems, he thought. That explained it. Poems were dreadful. Or rather, as far as he could tell, poems were supposed to be dreadful. This one was a shining example. But still: best not to judge. Terrance did not read poetry, did not care for poetry, did not profess to understand what function it served, nor how it generally went about achieving said function. He read it again, his finger beneath the letters, whispering the words.
“Just dreadful,” he said to the poem. He wagged his finger at it. “I knew it: dreadful, dreadful, dreadful.” He stood up and considered flushing the book down the toilet. Instead, he walked it to the silver wastebasket, but worried that someone might find it and tell Jillian, who might accuse Terrance of time-wasting in the bathroom. Last week, amidst all the firings, Ana had driven to Burger King for lunch and Jillian hadn’t tracked her coming or going. Terrance had seen Jillian flipping through the wastebasket by the watercooler near the end of the day, ostensibly looking for a receipt with an incriminating time-stamp. Can’t be too careful, Terrance thought, and slid the book back into his pants.
Later in the day, Jillian returned to his desk. “The book is gone,” she said.
He looked at the same empty desk space she was inspecting. “Yes.” He didn’t turn his body for fear she would see the rectangular bulge in his pants, so he craned his neck over his shoulder. “I had work to do so I disposed of the dreadful book.”
She stepped closer and leaned toward him. She whispered, “I’m proud of you.” He felt her warm breath pour over his ear.
“Oh my,” he said. His body tingled. “I mean: yes.”
“Goodbye.”
Terrance’s body kept tingling as Jillian walked away. What was that all about?
This whisper was a lot to consider, and consider it Terrance did. He considered it so much that when he walked home, he didn’t even think to remove the book from his pants and return it the brown birdhouse, didn’t think of the book as he diced an onion the proper way, didn’t think of it as he stirred his pasta sauce with extra fennel that he was workshopping, didn’t think of it as he ate the pasta sauce with gnocchi for dinner in his drab, third-floor apartment on 10th and Dufferin, where he lived, and had always lived, alone.
It wasn’t until he felt the urge to pee that he pulled down his pants and saw the book was still there. “Oh yes,” he said. “The book.” The book he had previously described as dreadful. But even so, Terrance was on the toilet and had to pee, so he saw no harm in reading from it again. He was no expert in poetry, so perhaps he’d missed something unique to the form. “So what’s all this really about then?” he said, flipping to the second poem.
It said, “And love me // and love me // and love me // and love.”
“Hmm.” He read the poem again. “Well maybe not so dreadful then.” When he was done, he placed the book back into his pants and hiked them up. As a crab its shell, Terrance decided the book had found its place, and its place was in his pants. Yes, he thought, there it would remain, and perhaps in time its meaning would accumulate.
The next day, Terrance walked to work with the book inside his pants, past the brown birdhouse and into the auto-insurance provider. He laid his blazer on the back of his chair and clacked away at his computer. Several hours into his work day, Terrance sensed a presence near him and swivelled around.
Jillian stood there, wearing a blue sweater and khakis. Her arms were crossed. “I am checking in on you.” Her eyes went up and down his body and seemed to register, if only for a split-second, the rectangular bulge in his pants.
“Oh,” Terrance said, spinning back toward his computer.
“Oh.”
He twisted his neck toward her. “I have work to do of course.”
“Of course you do.” Jillian looked at the empty space on his desk where the book had once been, then back at Terrance. “And after so assiduously removing all distractions, I should hate to become one myself.”
Terrance’s neck shivered and his ears ran hot. “Yes,” he said. “Goodbye.”
“Goodbye.” Jillian placed one hand on his shoulder before walking away.
Terrance’s body, then, did more than shiver. It had been years since he’d felt this sort of touch, and he’d all but given up on experiencing it again. No need to be sad about it, had been his thought. It was what it was. Some people were called to live like that. For instance, eunuchs and monks.
But now this.
Indeed, Jillian’s breath pouring over his ear and her presence being a potential distraction and her hand landing on his shoulder—this was a lot to consider. He spent the majority of the morning, as he tapped away at his computer, considering it from every angle. For instance, did she notice the rectangular bulge in his pants? Was that it? Or something else?
After lunch, Terrance felt the urge to pee, and so, after peering left, then right, he walked stiffly toward the bathroom, his head shifting back and forth.
In the bathroom stall, Terrance pulled out the book and flipped it open to the third page. It said, “And love me // and love me // and love me // and love.”
He flipped through the book and found that each poem was the same. He sat for some time trying to parse what that might mean. He didn’t know. He deposited the book back into his pants and shuffled to his desk. Terrance tapped away at his computer, but couldn’t take his mind off the book. A book of poems where every poem was the same, he thought. Now what kind of book was that? His favourite band, Kansas, for instance, had written the perfect song, but that didn’t mean their 1976 release, Leftoverture, was comprised of eight identical versions of “Carry On My Wayward Son.” A book of poems featuring one repeated poem. Ridiculous! He must have misread it.
And yet the poems had stirred a feeling in him, so perhaps that was their intended presentation. He wanted, just then, to confirm. He leaned back in his chair and peered left and right down the hallway. He saw no one. He heard only the clack of keys and background sizzle of fluorescent lights. Terrance leaned forward and reached into his pants.
“Terrance,” a voice said.
He jolted upright and yanked his hands from his pants.
“Terrance?” The voice’s tone was neutral. He couldn’t tell, based off it alone, whether the person had seen him with his hands in his pants. He then twisted his neck and saw Jillian. Oh God, he thought. Her green eyes were steady, her expression unreadable. For several moments, they stared at each other.
Finally, she said, “Terrance, I have consulted with HR and to be brief they have given their approval vis-à-vis what I am about to say to you.” She looked at the blank space on his desk, her arms tucked behind her back.
Terrance kept his neck twisted, his body facing his desk, the book and the bulge hidden from sight. “What are you about to say to me about which HR has given their approval?”
She looked back at him. “Terrance I have what some would describe as an attraction to you.” Her voice was low, her words fast.
Terrance’s heart zipped. Neck still twisted, he said, “Oh my.”
“What’s more: the attraction is such that I cannot ignore it, and would therefore like to explore it with you, on the condition you feel an approximately commensurate attraction to me, which might manifest in the following ways: your heart beats faster when you hear my name, you have difficulty looking directly into my eyes, and you have a feeling that, when I am near, everything might be different.”
Terrance’s heart then did a flutter. But wait, he thought. “Aren’t you HR?”
“I take my job very seriously.” Her head was tilted toward him, her voice even lower. Her green eyes were now narrowed, exacting.
“I do,” he said. “I feel what you have described.”
“You do,” she said. “Good. Your place at seven?”
He thought of her breath pouring over his ear, her hand on his shoulder. Before he could consider any of the ramifications, he blurted out, “Yes, dear God yes.”
“A date then,” Jillian said. “Goodbye.” She walked away.
“Yes.”
My God so maybe she does like me, Terrance thought. He clacked away at his computer. But maybe not. Perhaps the date invitation was some sort of ploy she had improvised. Perhaps she had noted the blank space on his desk, the rectangular bulge in his pants, his hands therein, and his trips to the bathroom and was suspicious—was now trying to elicit a confession from Terrance. Perhaps she wanted to fire him as she had fired the others. But no, he thought. No of course not. That was crazy, the thoughts of a man who’d resigned himself to a life alone, who’d prematurely cordoned off the neediest corner of his heart. But still, it nagged at him. Indeed, it nagged at him so much that, when his work day ended, he didn’t look at Jillian before he left, didn’t notice the brown birdhouse, didn’t notice his block nor any of its surroundings. He thought only of his date with Jillian, her imminent presence, her body and his body sharing space. He spent the evening cooking a perfectly workshopped pasta sauce with onions and fennel to be served with pan-fried gnocchi.
At five to seven, he felt the urge to pee, and so after setting the stove to low, he went to the bathroom. He pulled down his pants and he saw the book. “My God,” he said. “The book.” He opened it and read another poem. “Oh,” he said. He read it again. “Oh.” It felt as though the book’s meaning was approaching him, still distant, but inevitable. Now was clearly no time to remove it; a crab didn’t leave its shell while it still fit. And besides, if Jillian was coming over for book-related reasons, hiding it was no use. The woman had torn through a wastebasket in search of a receipt. She was certainly capable of snooping through a bathroom for a book. She was relentless. So relentless. The thought made him a little red.
Right then, the doorbell dinged. The best place for the book, he decided, was in his pants. Beyond the fact of its wisdom accumulating therein, his pants were a safe haven. No way to confirm what was in them unless they came off—and they certainly weren’t coming off. So Terrance placed the book back in his pants and lifted them up.
At the entrance, he opened the door. Jillian was wearing a brown sweater over a white blouse, and her jeans were sky-blue. She held a purse in one hand and an unlit candle in the other. “I’m here for our HR-approved date.”
“Yes.” Terrance kept his hands folded over his crotch.
She strode past him, into the kitchen, leaving a light mango scent in her wake. She put her purse and the candle on the table. “I brought this for romantic ambiance.”
Terrance said, “I’m making a pasta sauce with fennel and will serve it with this pan-fried gnocchi.” He walked to stove. He heart punched his chest, over and over. The room felt hot, he thought, too hot, much hotter than before. He turned to her as she sat at his little table and looked through her purse. So she was, he thought. She was wearing eyeliner. She looked altogether very pretty, even prettier than usual. And she smelled like mangos. God it was hot in here, he thought. He turned back to the pasta sauce and stirred.
“You turned to look at me,” she said. She placed a small box of matches on the table. “Why?”
“Well,” he said, “I find you altogether very pretty, and have thought as much for some time, and wanted, just then, to test that perception.”
“And?” Her eyebrow went up.
He turned back to the pasta sauce. “You are altogether very pretty. Let’s eat.”
Jillian nodded.
As Terrance scooped pan-fried gnocchi onto each plate and ladled the pasta sauce over it, Jillian scraped the match against the box and lit the candle. Terrance set down the steaming plates while Jillian flicked off the light. It smelled earthy and savory, sweet and sweat. The candle murmured into the new dark. “For ambiance,” she reminded him.
“Ambiance is the key in any romantic encounter,” he said, “which is exactly what this is.”
They ate then.
After eating in silence for a few minutes, Jillian said, “Do you like your job?”
Terrance’s heart skipped. “Yes,” he said carefully. “And you?”
“I do,” Jillian said. She opened her mouth as though to add more, but resumed eating instead.
“On account of the large office you have recently moved into?” Terrance said. “And the prodigious raise you are said to have received?”
Terrance expected Jillian to smile, but she did not. She stared at her plate. “If I were beginning to make prodigious sums of money, none of it would be landing in my bank account.” She looked up at Terrance. She was smiling now, but sadly. “My Dalton fractured and dislocated his jaw. The fees, Terrance. My God, the fees: to stabilize my poor boy, get him his feeding tube, the CT scans, and his upcoming surgery. If I had to use a word to describe the fees, I would use the word prodigious. So yes: I am very grateful for this job and the opportunities it presents.”
Terrance looked into her sad, green eyes and nodded thoughtfully. So that’s what it was? Her time-wasting firings had earned her bonuses to help pay for her injured son? That would explain her relentlessness. She was desperate to fund his recovery. Terrance tried to integrate this information into his understanding of their present date. Did that mean he was next to be fired? That she did, indeed, suspect Terrance of ferrying a book in his pants to the bathroom, where he wasted company time? Was she only here to confirm? Also: she had a son? And perhaps, by corollary, a potential partner? He said, “I’m sorry to hear about your injured son and the prodigious fees associated with repairing his jaw.”
“Dalton is my cat,” Jillian said.
“Oh,” Terrance said. “Still I am very sorry.”
“Yes,” Jillian said. “I have had Dalton for many years and am not yet ready to say goodbye. He is, indeed, my truest friend. My only friend.” A moment of silence passed as they stared at each other across the table. Jillian’s mouth then curved into a smile Terrance wasn’t sure about. “Perhaps we should now move the candle to the living room, where we might kiss in its glow.”
“Oh my,” Terrance said. “Yes.”
They walked to the living room, their bodies glazed in the candle’s modest light. Terrance felt hot and red and his pants bulged and he forgot all about the book therein. They sat down on the maroon couch and Jillian set the candle on the coffee table. Her legs brushed his legs, and her scent floated all around him.
“If you lean in,” Jillian said, “and I lean in, we will kiss.”
“Like this?”
They kissed then.
For some time they kissed, their bodies mostly vertical, necks outstretched, but then Jillian brought her arms to Terrance’s shoulders, and pushed him lightly back.
“Oh my,” Terrance murmured to himself as Jillian’s face approached his, her expression hazy, slack but serious. Jillian let her body sink onto Terrance’s and they resumed kissing. Although Jillian’s pelvis was pressed against his, Terrance didn’t think of the book in his pants. He thought only of Jillian’s mango scent, her frizzy brown hair, her body enveloping his. The pleasant pressure.
And then Jillian’s lips left Terrance’s, her body pulled back, and she raised herself over him. She looked shy. “With your consent, I would like to escalate this romantic encounter,” she said, “via the removal of your pants.”
“Oh my,” Terrance said. It had been decades since he’d heard such a request, since he’d been on the precipice of such desire. To be touched and to touch, to be known and to know, to be held and to hold. His body squirmed and burned. “Yes, dear God yes.”
She unclipped his belt, pulled the snaky leather from his pants. Terrance closed his eyes and melted back into the couch as Jillian’s fingers pulled his button free and ran his zipper down.
Right then, just as Jillian brought her hands to the hips of his pants, Terrance felt an additional surging therein, partially blocked by an object. He thought, My God, dear God, there’s a book in my pants!
He opened his eyes as Jillian slid his pants down, and they both saw, standing erect, the book in his pants. Terrance’s eyes rushed to Jillian’s. Her expression was still hazy, opaque. For a second, they both froze, and the book stood just like that—but then it flopped from Terrance’s pants and landed on the carpet, spread open, facing down. It took everything in Terrance not to lunge for the book and return it to its place.
“So it was,” Jillian said, looking at it. “The book was in your pants.”
Terrance said nothing. The new absence in his pants accumulated. He felt emptied and ashamed. He couldn’t bear to look at the book for fear its meaning would now seem far-removed, his progress with its wisdom a mere memory. “You didn’t dispose of the book, but instead kept it in your pants and covertly read from it on company time.” Jillian slid off the couch, kneeled beside the coffee table. She flipped the book as Terrance crumpled onto the carpet. She leaned over the book, and after gathering himself, Terrance did the same, the candle light coating their bodies, the words dark under their shadows.
For many minutes, they remained perched over the book, facing each other.
“Oh,” Jillian eventually said. Terrance looked at her, waited for her green eyes to pour their inscrutable, ineffable truth into his. She looked up at Terrance. Eyes to eyes, nose to nose. Her face glowing. She was smiling in a way he thought he’d seen once, long ago. “Oh my,” she said.
Josiah Nelson holds an MFA from the University of Saskatchewan, where he teaches creative writing. His work has appeared (or is forthcoming) in Contemporary Verse 2, Grain, Hunger Mountain, The Nashwaak Review, Palette Poetry, Queen’s Quarterly, and The Rumpus, among others. He won third place in Fractured Lit’s Monsters, Mystery, and Mayhem Prize, and has been nominated for Best of the Net and the Pushcart Prize. He lives in Saskatoon, Canada.