Kitty's Saga Chapter Twelve: Indistinguishable Losses from Gains

Kitty's community college graduation had been a minor ceremony, but everyone she cared about had been there to cheer for her.

Her university graduation was different.

Kitty wanted to walk across the stage. She had worked for years for that moment, surviving summer courses, impossible schedules, student loans, and more lonely nights than she cared to count. Yet when the time came, she couldn't bring herself to participate. She imagined herself crossing the stage in her cap and gown, accepting her degree, and looking out into an audience where not a single person had come for her.

She would rather not walk at all than look for someone who wasn't there.

Every attempt to resurrect a social life in Chicago seemed to work against her. By her senior year, the closest thing she had to regular human interaction outside the university was her internship at an economy hotel in the city. Most days she shadowed the manager, though when he fell behind, he allowed her to function as his assistant.

He mistook Kitty's enthusiasm with guests for a passion for customer service.

In reality, Kitty was simply happy to have someone to talk to.

She didn't care if the person standing in front of her was making impossible demands, complaining about the amenities, or furious because the ice machine on the fourth floor wasn't working. They were speaking to her. They looked her in the eye. They expected an answer.

Kitty became very good at giving them one.

Her manager was sufficiently impressed that, upon graduation, Kitty was offered a position as a junior concierge. For once, the plan had worked exactly as she'd intended. She had gone to school for hospitality management, completed her degree, and walked directly into the industry.

Professionally, Kitty was becoming the woman she had imagined.

Personally, her life was awash.

Although her job could eventually take her almost anywhere, Kitty chose to remain in Chicago. She rented a neat little studio in a high-rise close enough to the hotel that she could walk to work. It wasn't luxurious, but it was hers. She furnished it carefully with whatever she could afford, including a secondhand pastel-green sofa that became the centerpiece of her tiny living room.

Still, she had fallen out of contact with nearly everyone from school.

Sometimes, unexpectedly, she missed Marnie.

Writing to Pam wasn't enough. Their correspondence continued, but Kitty found herself censoring more and more of her life. Too much good news seemed cruel. Too much talk about Chicago emphasized the distance between them. Career accomplishments were reduced to a sentence or two. Kitty worried that every success of hers might feel to Pam like evidence of everything she had been denied.

And so Kitty became lonely enough that eventually her manager reprimanded her for taking too many shifts.

She had been using work to fill the hours.

Forced to find other occupations, Kitty accumulated hobbies. She took crafting classes. She tried yoga. She studied etiquette and refinement because she believed both would make her better at her job.

The etiquette lessons were particularly humbling.

Kitty had never realized how rough around the edges she was until an instructor positioned her in front of a mirror in a formal dining room and made her watch herself attack a steak.

Kitty stared at her reflection.

The instructor stared at her.

Kitty slowly put down the fork.

There was apparently quite a bit of work to do.

She threw herself into that too.

Her paychecks increasingly went toward her appearance. Better clothes. Better shoes. Better cosmetics. Better haircuts. Kitty told herself these things were professional investments, and to some degree they were. But another calculation existed beneath the surface.

She did not intend to spend the rest of her life attracting layabouts and moochers.

Charlie had cured her of that.

For all the positive changes in her life, Kitty never seemed capable of enjoying any accomplishment for long. The moment she reached one destination, she selected another. The three-star hotel where she worked became insufficient almost as soon as she had established herself there. Next would be a four-star hotel. After that, perhaps something better.

To get there, she would need another language. More training. More knowledge of the intricacies of the hospitality industry. Better connections. Better credentials.

There was always something else to become.

Kitty had discovered that ambition was an excellent anesthetic.

As long as she was moving toward something, she didn't have to think too hard about what was missing.

Most of the time, anyway.

One evening, Kitty left work after another long shift and began the familiar walk back to her apartment. Her feet throbbed inside her patent-leather black heels, and the bun pulled so tightly against her scalp that parts of her head had gone numb.

Even off the clock, Kitty maintained her professional appearance.

She possessed a secret, irrational fear that someday she would encounter a hotel guest on the street while looking disheveled and somehow the incident would make its way back to management. So the heels stayed on. The bun stayed tight. Her coat stayed neat.

Her walk, however, remained the brisk stride she'd had since she was young.

Only the posture had changed.

Kitty no longer walked with her head lowered and her shoulders slumped inward as though apologizing for occupying space. These days, she looked straight ahead. Her shoulders remained square and pulled back, lending authority to the height nature had denied her.

That night, her ambitions were considerably smaller than usual.

She wanted to get home, collapse onto her thrift-store green sofa, kick off her shoes, and watch a rerun of Project Runway.

She was nearly there when she passed a pale man standing outside a restaurant. He looked slightly older than her and wore a gray suit. Kitty barely registered him.

"Wait. What's your hurry? You almost knocked right into me."

Kitty stopped.

She knew perfectly well that she hadn't come close to touching him, but another thought immediately overrode that certainty.

What if he's a guest?

She turned around.

"Pardon me, sir. I'm truly sorry. I apologize."

The man laughed at the excessive sincerity of her response, then jogged a few steps to position himself in front of her.

"Kitty. I like that. Your name is Kitty?"

Kitty glanced down.

Her trench coat had fallen open enough to expose her hotel name tag.

"Yes, it is. It's not short for anything. My parents were just free-spirited." She offered a practiced smile. "Well, good evening, sir."

She stepped around him.

"Wait. You didn't get my name."

Kitty stopped again.

"How rude of me. Whom do I have the pleasure of speaking with?"

Her hotel voice had emerged completely now.

"My name is Gavin. Gavin Alton."

He lifted his chin slightly when he said it.

"It was lovely to meet you, Mr. Alton. Good evening to you, sir."

Kitty attempted another beeline toward home.

"You don't have to call me sir. Just Gavin."

Kitty blinked.

Apparently, he had not yet realized she was trying to leave.

"I'll be sure to remember that, Gavin. Can I help you with anything?"

"No. I'm trying to figure you out."

That was enough.

Kitty's customer-service instincts had limits.

"Not to be too brief, but I'm on my way to an engagement. If you'll excuse me, please."

This time, she walked away without stopping.

Unfortunately, she spent the rest of the evening wondering whether she'd been rude.

She replayed the conversation while changing clothes. She replayed it while eating. She replayed it during Project Runway. By bedtime, Kitty had analyzed her tone, facial expression, posture, vocabulary, and walking speed.

Perhaps she had been too abrupt.

Perhaps he really had only been trying to be friendly.

Perhaps she had embarrassed him.

By morning, she had nearly convinced herself that she owed a stranger an apology.

The following day was too busy for further consideration. Two housekeepers had switched their holiday availability, another had quit without notice, and Kitty spent part of her shift reconstructing the housekeeping schedule. She submitted the changes to her manager for approval and left for home along her usual route.

The night was chilly and clear. A full moon hung over the city.

When Kitty approached the same restaurant, she saw him.

Gavin Alton.

He was standing outside again, alone, dressed in a gray suit similar to the one he'd worn the night before.

This time, Kitty noticed him immediately.

He was facing the sidewalk.

And watching her approach.

Still worrying that she'd been unnecessarily rude during their first encounter, Kitty decided to acknowledge him.

"Hello, Mr. Alton."

He fell into step beside her.

"Hello, Kitty. How was your day? Are you off to another 'engagement'?"

Something in the way he emphasized the word told Kitty that he knew she'd lied.

She searched for a polite way to discourage him without creating an enemy who might someday appear at her workplace.

"Not tonight. I'm on my way home."

The instant the words left her mouth, she regretted them.

She didn't want him following her to her building.

"I see." Gavin smiled. "You know, I waited for you tonight. I want to ask you out on a date."

Kitty looked at him properly.

At least he appeared to have a job.

The thought embarrassed her almost as soon as she had it.

Gavin wasn't really her type. He had a wiry frame, and Kitty found the entire concept of waiting on a sidewalk to pick up a woman he'd met the night before somewhat strange.

But what exactly was her type?

Charlie?

Certainly not.

Stafford?

God forbid.

She hadn't seriously dated anyone since graduation, aside from a few encounters that had gone nowhere. And whatever else could be said about Gavin, he was well dressed, articulate, and apparently interested.

Opportunities for companionship weren't exactly pounding on Kitty's door.

She manufactured enthusiasm.

"I have time for coffee this weekend."

Gavin suggested a coffee shop near Buckingham Fountain, somewhere Kitty knew well. They exchanged numbers and parted ways.

Kitty made it home in time for her rerun.

On the day of their date, Kitty stepped off the train near Millennium Park already wondering whether she'd made a mistake.

She tugged nervously at her twofer dress and cardigan as she approached the coffee shop.

Gavin was waiting.

He looked like a productive person.

Kitty approved of that.

She disagreed with his haircut, which she thought could stand to be shorter, but by ordinary social standards there was nothing objectionable about him. If anything, he was precisely the sort of man Kitty had been telling herself she ought to meet.

Over coffee, she learned that Gavin had attended Northwestern University and now worked in the investment division of a corporate bank.

Kitty carefully glossed over her family history. She admitted to beginning at community college before completing her hospitality management degree at Roosevelt University, presenting the trajectory as casually as possible.

Gavin joked that she must see all kinds of ridiculous things working in hotels.

Kitty laughed politely, although she couldn't decide whether he'd insulted her profession.

They spent much of the afternoon walking around the city.

Gavin talked.

Kitty listened.

Kitty talked.

Gavin seemed interested.

Nothing was obviously wrong.

That was the problem.

Nothing was particularly right either.

Eventually, when her feet began to hurt and she had exhausted her conversational reserves, Kitty announced that she needed to get home to give her cat ear medicine.

She did not own a cat.

Gavin offered to drive her home.

Kitty declined.

"I need to pick up a few things at the grocery store anyway."

That was also a lie.

Before they separated, Gavin leaned toward her for a kiss. Kitty returned it with a brief peck.

She wanted to like him.

She truly did.

But there was nothing there.

No spark. No excitement. No instinct to turn around and look at him after walking away.

Gavin apparently experienced the afternoon differently.

He called twice before Kitty even made it home and left a voicemail about arranging their next date.

That night, Kitty lay alone in bed thinking about Victoria Truffle and wondering whether she should acquire an actual cat.

If things continued with Gavin, eventually she would either have to produce the fictitious animal or invent an appropriately tragic explanation for its disappearance.

The absurdity made her smile.

Then the smile faded.

What was wrong with her?

Gavin was educated. Employed. Presentable. Interested in her. By every criterion Kitty had consciously constructed after Charlie, he should have been exactly the sort of man she wanted.

And she felt nothing.

Worse, she distrusted him.

Stafford crept into her thoughts again.

Kitty found it strange how frequently she still thought about a man who had been absent from her life for years. Stafford had left behind a suspicion that unpleasant things were often concealed beneath ordinary surfaces. Kitty wondered whether Gavin had some secret waiting to reveal itself.

Perhaps he was married.

Perhaps he was a criminal.

Perhaps he had a girlfriend hidden somewhere.

Perhaps he collected human teeth in jars.

Kitty recognized that she was drifting into conspiracy and forced herself to stop.

There was no evidence that Gavin was anything other than what he claimed to be.

But lying in the darkness, Kitty found herself trapped between two equally unpleasant thoughts.

The first was that if she continued rejecting perfectly acceptable men because they failed to produce some mysterious feeling inside her, she might spend the rest of her life alone.

The second was worse.

Dating Gavin would mean settling for him until someone better came along.

She had done something similar with Charlie.

She didn't like what that realization said about her.

Kitty rolled onto her side and stared into the darkness.

For years, she had treated life as a series of problems that could be solved through sufficient effort. Poverty could be escaped. Ignorance could be educated away. Rough manners could be polished. A career could be constructed one promotion at a time.

There were courses for languages.

Lessons for etiquette.

Schedules for advancement.

But nobody had ever explained to Kitty how to stop being lonely.

When morning came, she reached for her phone.

Gavin's number waited among her missed calls.

Kitty stared at it.

Then she pressed Call.