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"Hi Telly!" Wendy chirped cheerfully as she breezed by. Wendy was like that, and all the guys loved her for it. That, and her figure.
Telly sighed as she disappeared around the corner. Then he noticed Gary smirking at him.
"You're a married man," Gary reminded him with a chuckle.
"Yea," Telly said with a grin, "but she lets me look, and Wendy's my favorite."
"She makes my heart beat faster, too," Gary agreed, stealing a quick glance at Sharon, a young woman of unconventional beauty sitting nearby. "She is babelicious, but there's more to a woman than how she looks."
"Looks are important," Telly replied, "and the older I get, the more important that becomes."
Gary didn't respond right away, his brow furrowed in thought.
Telly cocked his head. "Don't you think?"
"Let me tell you about some beautiful women I've known," he replied.
"Like your sister?"
Gary looked at the picture on his desk, taken of the whole family Christmas before last. Even though she was over 40, guys in their twenties still stopped to ask Gary if she was single. "Yes, she is exceptional, but so is her heart." Pushing away from his desk, Gary stood up and stretched, then braced himself against the cabinet as he planted a foot on the desk for balance.
"A few years ago a woman moved into the complex where I live. Although I had never seen her, I knew she was a woman because the rim of the license plate rack on her Tercel had a slogan that read, 'I've got PMS and a gun under my seat.' Made me think she must be one of those man-hating types."
"A hairy-pitted lesbian." Telly nodded.
"I know a lot of very feminine, not to mention nice lesbians," Gary snorted, "but after a few weeks I finally saw her and she turned out to be a heart-breaker from the Club."
"Really! Blonde and..." Telly held his hands out in a way that suggested a full figure.
"I am in the presence of a big boob," Gary intoned with a pained expression.
Telly laughed.
"Tall, brunette, graceful and lithe, athletic and..."
"...flat-chested with a big butt," Telly interjected, taking delight in teasing his friend.
"She smells good," Gary grunted indignantly, but his eyes twinkled. "Flat-chested? Not really. Anyway, I remember watching her once while she was talking with another guy at the club. She always spoke so earnestly I had to wonder if the slogan on her car really reflected her feelings, or was it just a joke."
Telly rubbed one eye then scratched his chin. "A joke, probably."
"These days, a guy can't be too careful. There's a lot of women out there with no greater ambition than to join the growing ranks of single psycho moms."
"Aw, I think you're just paranoid. Paranoid or shy."
"Maybe," Gary sighed, "but there she was talking to this guy when she did a little two-step. I had to leave the room right then and there before Mr. Happy got me into trouble."
"So she has a big butt."
"Whatever. She also had that thing on her car, which was the same color and looked a lot like my car. That scared me. And anyway, I had a crush on this other girl."
"Was she built like a bulldozer in back, too?"
"Telly!"
"Just tryin' to keep my facts straight."
"No, she was not built like a bulldozer, and she wasn't really your type, either, but she gushed with joy and her laugh tickled."
"So she was a fat girl?"
"More like a fat girl in an athletic body. And that's a whole other thing - if a woman is healthy and athletic, so what if she could never pass for one of those breasts-on-a-stick models so ubiquitous in women's magazines?"
"Yea, I know," Telly replied as he patted his own expansive but solid girth. "So you were saying you had a crush,..."
"Turns out she was just a tease and it wasn't until she got pregnant and the guy who did the foul deed flew the coop she got serious."
Telly nodded. "I've known a few of them."
"Before she got in the family way, though, I already lost interest - flirting is one thing, flirting is fun, but a tease, male or female, is rank." Putting his foot down, Gary leaned closer and dropped his voice. "But after she had her baby, that's when things really started getting weird."
"How's that?"
"By then I'd gotten a different car, something a little more fun. This other gal, she goes out and gets a car that's almost the same. Bigger engine, later model, but just like before a lot like mine. Then she all of a sudden starts talking to me. 'Where's this coming from?' I wondered."
"Maybe she was interested in you. Or," Telly cocked his head sideways, "maybe she just wanted to talk to you." he said with a wry expression.
"Yea, well, maybe, but two cars like that?"
"Yea, that's kinda weird, all right."
"At first I thought she was interested, but thinking about the cars, the slogan, all the years she ignored me, now all of a sudden this; that made me seriously suspicious."
"What happened?"
"Just as quick she went back to ignoring me, cold as ice. Next thing I know, she's got a boyfriend."
"So for this you suspect all beautiful women?"
"Not all, and that's neither my point nor the end of the story."
"Okay, so then what?"
"A few months later, no more boyfriend, she's all depressed and hanging out with this other gal at the club. I come home one day, she's parked there with this other gal and they're both looking at me real intent-like. It hits me, maybe she was interested after all."
"Maybe she is, so go after her."
"I did, sort of. The idea a woman like her would look at a guy like me was such a joyous thought I started leaving flowers on her car."
"She had to like that."
"Yea, right," his tone sarcastic. "She left a note that in not so few words said, 'I'm flattered, now go to hell.'"
"That had to hurt."
"Hurt? No, I'm too old, too cynical and too..."
"...much of a butthead?"
"Hey!"
Telly chuckled.
"But this demonstrates my point."
"What, that you don't trust beautiful women? We already know that."
"No, there are women I know, some we both know, who are babelicious through-and-through; but there's more to beauty than meets the eye, and the more beautiful they are the less their looks should matter and the more carefully we should look past the pretty picture."
Telly grinned. "I'm a happily married man."
"That's what I keep telling you."
What do you think? - Do we really pay too much attention to physical beauty? Have we lost sight of what's most important about the people in our lives?
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