The cigarette smoke in the hotel lounge bathed the dim overhead colored lights and scattered indistinct, multicolored halos around the room. Marissa’s third glass of white wine on a mostly empty stomach also made the faces of the fifteen or so occupants featureless. Humph, just like her life at this moment. Her relationship with Marshall had become especially featureless. The time with him today only served to churn emotions and get her off balance and interject confusion into an already misfiring brain. Her mental state was more akin to a bucking, stalling car trying to get to nowhere in a hurry. She wasn’t sure if all the lethargy that had infected their relationship was from the intense campaign demands or the lack of intensity in the relationship which would set demands on their affections.

     When she felt this way, the hotel lounge became a favorite getaway. She’d come here to this very lounge the night when the divorce with Peyton was final. And when she moved out of Tony’s apartment to end her live-in arrangement, it was a five wine night here.

     Why was it freedom always seemed to bring her so much misery?

     She held the wine glass up between her and one of the overhead bar lights and fingerspelled and signed to it. “Bacchus. Thank you. Friendly Roman god of wine. Friendly spirits.”

     Gees, I’m drunker than I thought. I’m talking to a wine glass.

     She put the glass to her lips and drank the last of the wine. She jumped with a tap on her left shoulder, but slowly the realization came that it could have been at least the fourth or fifth tap. Getting to a response in her drugged brain was about as slow as the input. Her eyelids closed and raised in slow motion. The gaze was upward, into a black shadow that had form but no distinctness, except that the shadow was broad shouldered and medium height. She shaded her eyes and the outline of a face took form. Hmm, about the same age as she. Light hair, well-groomed. Lively tie on a yellow shirt and a maroon sport jacket. Light bathed full lips that smiled. A friendly smile, that introduced a somewhat handsome face. Hmm, built like an athlete. She twisted slightly but couldn’t get a good look . . . she’d have to check out the shape of his behind later.

     “Bacchus?” He fingerspelled.

     His movements were smooth and had the fluidity of someone well practiced in fingerspelling . . . also, someone far more sober than she. He began signing with his free hand and hardly swirled the drink in the other hand.
      “You lonely with only spirits talk with.”

     She smiled and kept eye contact with him, but didn’t feel she could quickly form a response on uncoordinated hands and fingers.

    “Share another nectar of the gods with me?” he signed.

    She shrugged.

    “Sit? All right?” he signed.

    She set the empty wine glass down twice before it finally found a solid surface. She gave a brief nod, her forehead coming within inches of the rim of the wine glass.

     He snapped his fingers and signaled to the circulating barmaid and sat.

     He turned to Marissa and pointed, “Deaf?”

     She nodded.

     The barmaid approached their table. Marissa watched as the man gave the order for another round of drinks. She sit up straight. He had voiced to the woman . . . must be hearing. But signs too good, too smooth to be hearing man. Ahh, CODA. Usually only hearing children of deaf adults are this skilled in sign language and hearing as well. 
    “Cory,” he fingerspelled, pointed to himself, then made a C with his right hand and put it above his right eye. He waited.

     “Marissa.” Her fingerspelled name flowed somewhat smoothly from her hand despite the less than coordinated state she was in. Then she made an M with the three middle fingers of her right hand and held it near the middle of her forehead.

     “Hmm. Sign name on forehead. Man name sign. You must be intelligent and wise woman.”

     Her wine and his drink came. He paid for the order.

     She had to find out if the man was who she thought he was. “Cory, you know any members in CODA in Washington?” she signed.

     Gees, how blunt.     She had come right out and practically asked the man if he was CODA. Well, she figured, in her present state he was damn lucky she just didn’t blurt out a whole questionnaire on his eligibility, availability . . . and, of course, his behind.

     “Let’s see. Not been to Children-Of-Deaf-Adults meeting, maybe six months ago.”

 Marissa dipped her finger in the wine glass and swirled it. Then she put the finger in her mouth and drew it out slowly. She stared at him over the edge of her glass as she took a drink.

     “You big ‘D’ Deaf or little ‘d’?” he asked.

     She made the sign for big D.

     He stroked his chin and nodded.

     Marissa smiled and signed, “Maybe, both. Grew up deaf culture, but live in enormous, rich, powerful hearing world.”

     “Good. Listen, I’m with American Sign Language all the time. Can we go to Signed English?”

     “Sure. Fine.”

     “What do you do?” he signed.

     “I keep the narrow straight. Or is it, keep the straight narrow?”

     “Policeman? Minister?” He looked around the lounge and snickered.

     “Policewoman, thank you. No, a lawyer. You?”

    ”Psychologist. Specialize in serving the deaf.”

     “Okay. What is wrong with me, Mister Psychologist?”

     “Cory,” he signed. “Let us not joke about our professions.”

     “Okay . . . Cory. What now? Is this a pickup?”

     “My, you are to the point. But much too beautiful, and too much of a together women to be insulted with the usual hit-on tactics.”

     “Nice,” she signed. “A psychologist’s approach to hitting. Does this high level strategy get very many women in your verbal power net?”

     “Guilty.” He smiled. “Let’s start over and do the respect thing this time.”

     “Marissa Doppler, attorney at law.” She held out her hand even though it waved slightly from side to side.

     He took the hand in his and shook it a little longer than necessary. “Cory Middleton. Friendly wine spirit, and mender of minds.”

     “Not hearts?” She took her hand away.

     “Hearts cannot be mended. One can only sew up the injuries with silver threads of self-forgiveness and self-indulgence and just contain hurt that will always be there somewhere underneath the threads.”

     “Hmm. Do I detect true feelings underneath the too well practiced I-really-understand-you demeanor?”

     He nodded, smiled and hunched his shoulders as if he got a low squeal from the rim of the wine glass when he swirled his finger across it.

     “A man with a little poetry in his soul. Good.”

     “Poetry is for friends and scholars. I deal with only what one can see, feel, taste . . . or touch. Well . . . and for my hearing world customers, I have a bargain on Wednesday on what I hear.”

     “Spoken like a true psychologist. So we are back to feelings?”

     His face became serious. “Yes, feelings that would like to get to know yours better.”

     “I like talking with you, Mender of Minds. Sower of Good Will. I can truthfully say I have made two or three stitches tonight.”

     “Only two or three? Good that gives us a lot of time, because it looks like we have a lot of mending to do with you.”

     Marissa put her wine glass to her lips and tipped it until all the wine was gone. She put down the empty glass on its edge, righted it, and signed, “Well, Mister Shadow in the Night. When I get like this way, I get a room upstairs and sleep it off.” She stood, gathered her purse, and jacket.

     He stood. “Okay, then whose — ”

     “Please, no your-room-or-mine humor. We’ve got a decent beginning here. Let us not ruin it.” She put out her hand. It wasn’t any steadier than before. The hand began to wave and bob more this time and she realized it came from the curious trembling that began as a stampede of butterflies trying to exit through her navel.

      He took her hand, shook it and pointed to where they just sat. “Same time, different day?”

     “Let us just allow destiny to have her say.”

     “Too bad, so sad,” he signed.

     She drew back and smiled then walked toward the front desk. He followed close beside her.

    “Please, I said — ”

     He pulled a electronic plastic key from his shirt pocket and shook it. “I am staying here as well. Have a big meeting downtown early in the morning and didn’t want to fight the traffic from Alexandria.”   

 

     In her room, Marissa began taking off all her clothes and visited the warm feeling of the night. Yes, there was something pleasant about tonight . . . no, more than that. Something more than the wine brought on. More pleasurable than she had allowed herself for a long time. Maybe ever. The contrast between this brief encounter with the man in the bar and recent times with Marshall was stark. Very little comparison really . . . yet, some unrewarding loyalty wouldn’t let her completely release all feelings for Marshall.

     She pulled down the blankets and slipped into the crisp, clean white sheets. They felt so good against her bareness. She turned off the lamps by the bedside and began letting the darkness of the room invade whatever sensibilities were leftover from guarding against Mr. Minder of Minds . . . or was it hearts? She must be careful about this one. He had the keys. She must not let him find the locks . . . not too quickly anyway. She allowed the darkness to win over the struggle for sensibility.

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