She held his gaze for a long time. After a few moments, the corners of her thin lips turned up slightly and her eyes glittered. She was poised in front of the dartboard, her feet facing the target but her torso facing him, two darts in her left hand and one between the fingers of her right hand, horizontal, chin high. She turned back to the dartboard and said, "You'd better be careful what you wish for," and threw the first dart: thunk. "You just might get it," thunk...thunk. She approached the machine, taking long strides, gratuitously swinging her hips. She tapped the red button and used her fists to remove the darts, shifting her weight from one leg to the other for his benefit. She rotated around on one foot and walked back to where he stood. She passed him the darts, her fingers lingering on his for an instant, her eyes on his, wearing a barely perceptible smirk.

He stepped up to the line to throw without speaking. His mind was racing away from the dartboard and the smoky bar. He was thinking of her skirt and her hair. She wore an elastic mini, black and white hound's tooth, far too short and far too tight for her appreciable figure. Her coarse hair, the color of red autumn leaves, curled and tumbled to her waist, tied with a black ribbon between her shoulder blades. He was scared. He threw his darts without aiming, then collected them and handed them back, his wedding band heavy on his left hand, and picked up his beer. He raised the glass to his mouth and said, "Well, it is my birthday," took a quick swallow and held the glass in front of his chest. He looked into her eyes, then glanced down to the top button of her black rayon blouse, then back to her eyes.

As she watched him she was aware of their coworkers watching the exchange from the sidelines. They couldn't hear what was being said over the noise of the juke box. She lit a slender cigarette with a red lighter, studying his gold rimless glasses, blue oxford shirt, olive khakis and black sneakers. She inhaled deeply and blew out a cloud of smoke, pressed the cigarette into a glass ashtray, took the darts from him and placed her right toe on the line. She twisted in her skirt to face him and asked, "Have you decided what you want to play for?" She knew that in the dim light her tinted contacts and pasty makeup looked real enough.

"Yeah." Ever since the baby was born he had felt neglected. His wife was always weary and shabby, nursing and changing and cooking and cleaning and asleep by nine o'clock. The girls in the office were always done up, wearing tight skirts and filmy blouses, dyed hair and lots of jewelry. It was fun to flirt with them, coming close as they sat at their computers while speaking softly over their shoulder and smelling mixed hair spray, perfume and cigarettes. He had always felt safe being married, a sort of diplomatic immunity in an office with of a dozen trashy working girls and himself. Today they offered to take him out for cocktails after work, and he accepted knowing full well that his family was expecting him. He craved the attention. So when she asked him what he wanted for his birthday, he had not expected his sexist comment to be taken seriously, but she was new and exotic and the conversation went from harmless to adulterous in a heartbeat. "Winner's on top."

She turned back to the board, smiled to herself and threw three darts into the wall.

© 1996 Pat Hahn

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