The Return of the Orange Virgin
by Rob Hunter
"Linda?" Will Lambert from Human Resources stuck his head into Linda
Winkelman's cubicle. Linda minimized her word processor and jumped to her
feet as the latest chapter of her novel—a work in progress—slipped away to
the bottom of the computer screen. "I'm on those proposals, Will. Due
tomorrow."
"It's not about that. There's someone I'd like you to meet." A stunning,
statuesque woman in her early 50’s elbowed Will out of the way and strode up
to Linda, hand outstretched. "Me. And we are going
to be the closest of friends, I'm sure." She was dressed like a woodsy Venus
and braided her strawberry gray hair into a single heavy pigtail.
"Uh, yes. Hello, ahh..." Linda took the hand.
"leFaye. Morgana Jean leFaye." Morgana Jean plopped herself into
the Le Corbusier swivel chair that had set Linda back two weeks' pay. Her
feet went up on Linda's desk, wrinkling a stack of printouts. Linda grumped
but kept any misgivings to herself; in the corporate world getting a
roommate was tantamount to a demotion. She made a show of moving her things
closer to what was now her end of the cubicle.
Will Lambert backed out.
Linda Winkelman, whose work as a
copy writer in the creative department of a major advertising agency's media
and merchandising subsidiary put her in daily contact with all sorts, now
shared a cubicle, a secretary and a word processor with a woman who dressed
in L.L. Bean tweedy getups with hiking boots for work, a writer whose
novel—historical?—was of an unspecified length and theme.
The Woodsy Venus was pleased to tell anybody who would listen that, a survivor
of the 70’s organic exodus, she wintered in her
summer cottage and heated with wood. "I dropped out. Now I have dropped back
in again."
Linda struggled with
a sprawling ficus plant that occupied the space just inside the doorway.
The Woodsy Venus didn't raise a hand to help, just lounged languidly in the
Le Corbusier chair and rolled a cigarette. "No, let the tall timber stand,"
she said. "And don't worry about your
job. I'm a temp. They don't know that yet, of course." She held a finger to
the side of her nose. "That's a secret, just between us girls. You may yet
get a corner office with a window."
When Linda had excavated enough open space, the Woodsy Venus carried in a brace of L.L. Bean
totes. "My book," she explained. "It took ten years, Linda dear. In the winter you're so busy chucking wood
into the stove you hardly have time to do anything else. I do most of my
writing in the summer. Keeping warm is a full-time job―you are stacking
wood, splitting wood, cleaning ashes. And I spent a lot of time screwing a
nice man who had a chain saw and a pickup truck. We counted Canada geese and
listened to the loons together." She rolled a fresh cigarette. Linda
pointedly coughed and waved her fingers under her nose. The Woodsy Venus made her connections,
put on her persona, and flowed through the workday.
Things must be lean in the woods to come back to the city and work as an
office temp, thought Linda. But the WV had made her break for
freedom; what had she, Linda Winkelman, done for herself lately? All she had to do was to do
it, make the break from the rat race. Linda Winkelman wanted "more." More of
just what she was not quite sure, but she was sure there had been a
short-changing somewhere along the line.
When two people log on at the same terminal, they have few secrets.
Although the WV admitted to at least being in her 50s, she was well
turned-out with cover girl skin. Linda was
envious. "Uh, I hope
you don't mind me asking, but―how
old are you? I mean you look like a goddess. Is it your moisturizer?" That
the WV
might be older than she appeared she felt to be
an important bit of information to share with her cubicle neighbor. She was
beautifully maintained and was studiedly aware that her appearance and
anecdotal lifestyle did NOT reflect the norm for an advertising copywriter
at Glasgow/Finn and Westcott.
"You know, you do look like a goddess," said Linda, meaning the Woodsy
Venus' supermodel splendor.
"How perceptive of you, my dear," said the Orange Virgin.
Linda was thereupon suffused with a runner's aerobic high as endorphins flooded her
body. The line separating dream and reality blurred and a cobwebby glaze
covered her eyes. Her knees and elbows felt weak and warm as dream filaments
twined about her feet and she swooned onto an enveloping pile of eiderdown
coverlets where she gently bounced in slow motion, again, and again, and
again. She had found a new religion, and it would not be denied—a faith of
joy and, well... faith. Faith that kindled a small, desperate flame of hope
in the Winkelman bosom.
"Faith. Joy. Warm elbows," promised a voice. "Bounce and forget, bounce and
forget." Linda watched placidly as a flip-card flow of her life was
changed with a nudge here, a suggestion there.
The goddess leaned in close and whispered into Linda's ear. "We live on the
bow wave of perceived time. Time is a comforting figment, a subjective place
humans have dreamed up to give superficial meaning to their paltry lives.
Everything is all there and a glorious moment it was. We can never live it
at once. We are merely writing its catalog as it unfolds. Merrily we roll
along."
"We are going to build credentials of trust and confidence," said the voice
of the Woodsy Venus. "In you, for me. You must give yourself completely and
of your own volition to my service. As my powers fade, which I am afraid
will continue irretrievably, I am going to have to depend on you to look
after yourself and our own shared best interests. I want you to have
positive feelings for me and a predictable, calm, constructive and
circumspect attitude as regards your own personal safety. We are going to
change your mind in just the littlest way imaginable to make you amenable to
reason. I seek a safe place for you. Wake up."
"Uh. Oh, Morgana Jean. Sorry about that, I must have dozed off." The woman
was a head case. In advertising, some eccentricity was de rigueur. She seemed nice and Linda realized if word of her delusions spread
beyond the walls of her cubicle, there would be a rustling of termination
papers.
"Linda, you are a pretty girl, I like you. Forget what you have seen here
today, it is for your own good. But remember me, Morgana Jean. I am an old
friend from work, am I not?"
The goddess got a far away look in her eyes. She searched the middle
distance, a shepherdess seeking lost innocence. This was a stagy effect and
rather melodramatic. Linda recognized the pose—all it needed was the
fainting maiden number, back of the wrist to forehead. Go for it, girl. The
Woodsy Venus did it! Wrist to brow she felt for a fainting couch with her
spare hand. "All events that will or would ever occur in each and every
universe or imaginable universe from the innards of the dust mote to the
googolplex of stars have already happened. All and at once at the moment of
creation."
Morgana Jean leFay reminded Linda of a Sarah Bernhardt poster she had had
over her bed in the dorm for all four of her undergraduate years. Wrist to
brow, the Woodsy Venus felt for a fainting couch with her spare hand. She
leaned backwards, then fell down.
"Shit! There should have been a velvet couch."
A klutzy goddess, thought Linda. "Aren’t you, uhn, voluptuous for,
for…"
"Odd you should ask. You are confusing me with the Virgin Mary. It happens
all the time—all pale and white they keep her out in the yard winter and
summer. They place a pot of flowers—in season and usually dead—at her feet.
You have focused on the nub, Linda dear. They have robbed me of my
attributes. The Little Flower they have demoted to a spirit guide for their
afterlife. She is the Mother. I am a triple goddess—the Mother, the Lover
and the Destroyer."
The answer was about what Linda expected—right in character for a sprouts
and granola back-to-the-woods type. "Uhn, statue. You are—were—a goddess. In
another life?"
"And what a life it was, Lindy-me-love. But don't get me wrong; I'm still
hot stuff."
Linda reached for her phone. "Maybe some of the guys in marketing, creative,
could get a handle on this for you."
"Make tits and ass objects of veneration? Look around you my dear."
"You are a neglected goddess, then."
"The neglected goddess."
"And you need a place to roam."
"Where seldom is heard a discouraging word?"
"I’ve been thinking about religion..."
"...from the Latin—religio, religionis—a moral obligation."
Linda fumbled through the affiliations of her mother's regular
church-shopping sprees. "I was thinking more of the Full Gospel Bible
Fellowship or Our Lady Queen of Martyrs type of religion. Professional help,
like? The Pentecostals or the Catholics most likely will get a better handle
on this than I can. I mean, um—religion is a full-time job."
A chips and nachos conglomerate was introducing Pork-A-Dillos, a low
cholesterol fried pork rind product, the latest scientific breakthrough.
Linda had been named project manager for the new product's test marketing;
if it flew she would be in line to direct the national campaign. At the
brainstorming session with relevant personnel from Creative, the brand
manager reached into a carton plumped onto the table piled with
mechanical art, tore open one of the cellophane bags, 69 cents retail, and
dumped the contents all over a billboard proposal.
"Here's a little something extra the guys in R&D thought you could get a
handle on, Linda." The little Pork-A-Dillos were uniform tiny curls like the
tops of Dairy Queen soft ice cream cones. "Little piggy tails... cute, eh?"
"Curvature of the swine. Very evocative, Sid," Linda said. "This
is bullshit. I quit." If she
handled the account right—and the product was a shoo-in, she couldn't
lose—the next stop was a vice-presidency, then a full partnership. And who
the hell was Morgana Jean leFaye anyway? There was no such person at the agency.
"Oops sorry, my dear. You are becoming agitated; I’ve been letting you drift. The corner office with the window—remember?"
A whispering in her head, must be the stress. Linda brushed at cobwebs in
her eyes.
"Like I said, bullshit." She stood, walked down the hall and
cleaned out her desk. She had blown it all away. Pork-A-Dillos was the step
up she needed. Linda stomped out of the brainstorming and back to
her cubicle.
Giving in to all the spleen she had saved up, she dragged a 30-gallon
Rubbermaid waste container in from the copier bay down the hall. She emptied
her drawers one by one into the garbage and stuffed her attaché case in on
top when she was finished. She held a cup of pencils and paper clips poised
over the attaché case as she stared out the window at the cityscape
unfolding beneath her. Linda Winkelman had over the years, by skill and
attrition, crept ever closer to residence in that coveted corner office on
the forty-third floor. No job, no money—that figured. And no office with a
view. This was the last goodbye. She set the cup on her desk; this was no
time to be sorting paper clips. Now she had nothing but time. And who the
hell am I not to go to the woods and write my little heart out, too?
She should have been elated. Wait a minute! I am elated.
She had lost her job, she and her husband were growing farther apart with
each passing day, and life was grand. The habit of work was ingrained, the
rhythm of her life—security, the paycheck, rent—food, even.
But Tom! How to tell Tom?
Why tell him anything? Tell him good-bye. He is a sponger—a good lay, a
pleasant dinner companion, but a parasite. Dinner and sex are Tom's survival
skills, not mine. Get on with my life. Make the break. Human Resources has
my number.
Linda was staring out her window, her desk clear and empty but for the cup
of pencils and paper clips. The cold, heavy rain had started about 3
o'clock. It must be just about freezing out, Linda figured. Wet enough to
make a mess and cold enough to be snow around the rush hour. She dumped the
cup's contents into the trash and put it in her gym bag with her sweats and
sneakers. She squared her shoulders and shook her head. Must have been
daydreaming. Time to get a move on, there were things to do. There was
another fluttering of the pages of the day. She steadied herself with a grip
on the edge of the desk. The dizziness would pass.
"I am so proud of you, my dear. Things are coming along
swimmingly." It was Morgana Jean, the Woodsy Venus.
There was a crunch, accompanied by shouts from the street. A taxi, avoiding
a delivery truck turning right from the left-hand lane, had climbed the
sidewalk, scattering pedestrians and coming to rest against a light pole.
The world was fraught with hazards for the unwary; there was a potential for
sudden, unforeseen and lethal happenings here in the city.
It was still raining, becoming what would be a wet, heavy snow as Linda
Winkelman cast one final look at the polished brass revolving doors,
shrugged and headed for the trains. The thought of reclining in a hot tub
with a Kahlua and brandy close to hand gave her the strength to carry on.
"Oh, shit, my book. It's on my hard drive." She caught the brass revolving
door while it was still spinning and caught the elevator back to
Glasgow/Finn and Westcott.
The Woodsy Venus must have gone home. The L. L. Bean totes. Ahh, there they were, behind her
door. Linda emptied the totes and neatly squared the loose pages into three
piles on her co-logger-on's desk. She left a note—Emergency, I owe you
dinner. I took the totes. Linda.
She undid the cabling from the computer case and stuffed it into a tote. The
cables and her files of floppies went into the other bag. She picked up a
well-thumbed Webster's Collegiate Dictionary from the mess scattered where
she had missed the trash barrel and chucked it in, too. She latched the door
and it snicked shut behind her. Linda put some effort into acting casual
with the security guard. It was the company's computer.
"'Night again, Ed. Forgot my homework." They shared a chuckle.
The cold blast of wet air in the street came as a relief. She could feel
waves of body heat rising up to her face from her open collar. A barbered,
manicured red-faced man in a camel's hair coat beat her out for a cab; his
silver hair trailed a miasma of cologne. As the door slammed he looked back
apologetically. Definitely executive material. I know; you're in a hurry.
Forget it. I'll just stand around with my shoes full of water and get
soaked. Linda felt the sweat trickling down from her armpits. Her face felt
pink and moist and her sweater was starting to itch through her cotton
sleeves. Her rolled umbrella, trendy with a shoulder strap, was slipping.
She plumped the totes on the street and adjusted the umbrella, thrusting it
under her arm.
Wrestling herself down the stairwell where Gimbel's basement had been in the
years of her childhood, she decided on the IRT Brooklyn local. She reached
the turnstiles and, intercepted by the outstretched palm of one of the
city's homeless, brushed away the alms-seeker.
"Any change?"
Silence, a barrier of practiced denial; the offending party is not there, a
non-person—blonde, with shoulder-length hair that he tried to keep looking
clean. He had bushy blonde eyebrows and a floppy handlebar moustache. He was
homeless and slept in the subway tunnels under Grand Central Station. He had
a key to the dispatcher's signal tower lavatory at an abandoned station.
Linda knew him by sight.
"Hey, be that way. Get cancer. Have a nice day," said the panhandler.
Linda threw him a smile. He smiled back; they belonged. She was drenched with
sweat. Godammit, it must be eighty degrees down here. Linda put her token in
the slot and slapped it through a residue of chewing gum with the flat of
her palm. She advanced, sliding her stuffed totes over the slipway that
covered the turret with its three metal bars. A comforting clunk as she hit
the pipe with her hip. The next bar popped into place, pushing her through.
The machine has found her offering acceptable. There was no going back.
She was trapped. The Woodsy Venus spoke reassuringly in her mind. "Animals
are part of their environment. Remove, damage their dwelling places and they
are extinct."
"Pithy. You think that up all by yourself?"
"No. You heard it on a nature show—TV. What is your environment?
Maybe we could get you back where you belong."
"Huh?"
"The collective human mind. The collective unconscious. I am an archetype.
You made me, I created you. Get it? And so we go on, hand in hand, for all
eternity."
The rumble of her arriving train summoned a burst of speed. Crying, "Hold
the doors! Hold the doors!" Linda looked around defiantly, claiming her
space.
"You are pushing." A large bearded individual stared accusingly at her over a pair of thick, half-frame spectacles.
"So?" Linda turned to look. Her accuser appeared to be an Orthodox something-or-other. A rabbi, clergy at least, and observant. "Uh, sorry."
"You were pushing. Admit it. Not to criticize, just a statement of fact." The large, bearded individual gave a classic shrug as he clapped a handkerchief over her nose. A heavy perfume filled her head. Linda recalled the smell from a childhood operation.
"Ether. But I already had my tonsils out." Linda said, aware how inane that must sound. Here I am being assaulted by a large, smelly person on the subway and that is the best I can come up with.
"Nope, chloroform," said the large bearded person. "Happy dreams."
copyright 1993, 2006 Rob Hunter