I don't expect any more or less

The sunlight is locked out of the hallway full of stairs, and the iron railings curl like tenrils of poison ivy up the wall. The door slams shut behind me with a dull thud that, though it is quiet, it has a hard finality to it. The only way is up, either by marble staircase or death-defying elevator. I choose to scrape my flipflops up to the fourth floor, and drag myself huffing and puffing into the office of the job agency.

After several minutes of patiently waiting as agents schlumf by looking busy, I finally grab one by the arm as she passes. "Do you speak english?" I ask, a little desperately. She stares at me and tugs her arm away. "Dees way pleez" she says coldly, and leads me to a chair two feet away. I sit back against the wall until finally a blonde lady comes over to me. "Yes?" she inquires helpfully. "Er, I'm looking for a job, that is to say, I brought a CD...CV I mean, I mean I speak several languages and well I thought, hey are you working here?" The lady manages a terrifically patronising smile and takes the CV, telling me sweetly that they will call, in the meantime since she is so VERY busy, would I mind...?

Before I know it I am outside the door heading down the stairs. My friend has only just made it to the top(she was having a fag outside). "Finished already? How'd it go?" I shake my head and wave vaguely at the steps stretching out in front of us. As I begin to detail my experience I hear a definite "de-dum de-dum DE-DUM DE-DUM" behind me. I turn around and there is a blonde man in a pink shirt hurtling round the corner of the stairwell. He barely registers us in time to stop from bowling us over like a couple of skittles. "Oh!" he exclaims, clearly disconcerted. "I thought you are gone...I am..." He hesitated, trying to put the words in order. Brushing his hair back from his forehead nervously, he announced "You are Irish! I mean you speak English but you are from Ireland". I stare, more out of shock at the near memory he awakens than out of amazement at someone finally getting (part of) my nationality right. "I want you to teach me English," he tells me, gripping my arm, as though it's a matter of life and death. "I will pay you. And teach you Spanish if you like." I nod like the idiot that I am. "You will give me your telephone number," he states. "I mean, you will?" He smiles anxiously and I recount my number, still staring like a white cat. He pats me happily on the arm, smiles, hops back and touches my back lightly. "Well!" he says, and then takes off up the stairs again.

I turn around and my friend is in knots laughing. She knows what I am like. "You should really meet him," she teases. "You never know!"

Of course, I defended my virtue and my integrity and denied any feelings, besides, wasn't Dani coming over? I dutifully met my Uruguayan with the green eyes a handful of times, and truly tried to do a proper language exchange. But one day he commented on the colour of my eyes, and all the barriers came down. I shut up. I closed down. I withdrew inside and locked him out. He probably wondered for a little bit where I had gone, before going off and finding a new interest.

But then a year passed, and despite having diligently deleted his email address, somehow I found myself writing an email to an address I had procured from sheer determination. Hi. Sorry I disappeared. I'd a lot going on, however that's no excuse. If you can forgive me, I'd like to be friends again.

Then yesterday I dreamed a dream where I introduced the man to my family. I don't remember what they thought. Many things have me worried. He is conservative, he is strongly catholic, he is classic Uruguayan, he is handsome, he is a business man, I remind him of his MOTHER!!!(apparently this is a good thing!), he is machisto, I am lonely...but what the hell...I also need fun, I need to practise my spanish, I'd like some male attention, and then...

Then he phoned me when I awoke from my dream...what a lovely pattern of events! What can I do...?