My forbidden fruit  

As a teenager, I worked as an advertising officer.
One day, my boss told me to deliver a package to the other branch of the company.

When I got there, I saw the most alluring creature ever. She looked like she had stepped off the cover of Vogue magazine and onto my pedestal.

Her thick black hair framed a picture-perfect face as I looked into her eyes to find sapphire skies reflected off a crystal ocean as the two of us walked hand-in-hand on a yellow shoreline.

Then, suddenly, both her hands were outstretched.
So I leaned down for a hug, but got a rude awakening instead!
“What are you doing?” she asked with a scream, her arms withdrawn.
I quickly snapped out of my day-dream and realised that her arms had been outstretched to receive the package and not my love.
Somehow my fantasy and her reality had come into single focus.

Thereupon, I gave her the package and a thousand apologies. She rolled her eyes and took the package. And then she asked, “Well? Anything more?”
I just stood there limply like a flower wilting on the vine.
As the silence between us became a din, she lowered her eyes and got back to work.
That was my cue to leave.
Back in office, my mind was focused on her as my hormones raged with racy thoughts of her.

I was a fool in love, no less.
From then on, I made sure that my boss sent me on those errands. And each time, the receptionist was unfailingly civil when I’d show up. But she never asked for my name and so I felt like just another item in her in-tray. To make matters worse, I was tongue-tied in her presence.

All told, even when I tucked in my shirt, and big stomach, trimmed my unruly hair and shined my shoes enough for them to feature in a Kiwi shine TV advert, I still said nothing.
Then one day, things changed.
One Sunday, I went to an all-night house party with friends of mine who were living up their high school vacation. I drank my body weight in booze and then trundled into office on Monday morning; still high.

I drank a lot of water to kill the buzz.
Still, I found myself laughing at nothing as I drummed the office desk with my fingers. Then, suddenly, I started singing loudly Celine Dion’s hit song, ‘Power of Love’: “Because I am your Lady…and you are my Man…”
At that point, my work colleagues looked at me quizzically.
Then the photocopier guy, who was rumoured to be gay, winked at me saucily.

Luckily, the boss sent me to make another delivery. I thus grabbed the package like it was a baton in an Olympic relay and hit the beaten track.
When I saw the receptionist, I bobbed my head and bounced to the inner music of my heart.
I then stopped at the counter, and lent against it.
Then, I pulled out a bouquet of flowers from behind my back. And said in a deeply resonant voice, “Good morning, Beautiful”.
Her brow folded, she placed her pen down and cradled her chin with her left hand. Then she asked, “And who are these flowers for?”

“You…my dearest flower…they are for you,” I replied. 
“Oh how sweeeet,” she said, still looking at the flowers but not touching them.
“I was thinking that you and I could go out sometime…” I said.
“Awww…how old are you? Sixteen?” she responded.
“I’m 16 going on 24 …because my youth turns on the number of hours of the day that I think of you,” I said. 
She laughed.

Then she said, “So what are you some kind of baby Romeo? Really…”
Before she could finish, I chimed in some more:
“My love for you would turn Romeo into Juliet…because he could never be man enough for the feelings that I have for you.”
Suddenly, she sat up and her eyes became big balls of anticipation. But strangely, her eyes were directed into the middle distance to a place beyond my shoulder.

So I turned around to see what she was looking at.
Then some tall light-skinned guy stepped forward from the margins of my nightmare and went behind the counter to scoop up the receptionist with a hug.
The two held each other as I looked on with flowers in my right hand while my left hand was arrested in a gesture of surprise.
When they had finished hugging, the receptionist turned to me with a huge grin. Then she said, “Meet my fiancé…what did you say your name was again?”

“Me? I was just passing by to deliver these flowers to you from…er…from my boss,” I lied. Then I quickly left. 
Emotionally, I was dogged by the feeling that my forbidden love had gone terribly wrong.
Still, it was worse for my boss.
That’s because a rumour started from that day that he used me as an errand boy in his ‘plans’ to chat up the beautiful receptionist.

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