Quelle Horreur

It was bound to happen. After over 3 years of avoiding shared air space, "Bruno" returns, looking as smug and superfluous as ever.

Karl and I had decided to take Wednesday off and just be tourists for the day. We went to the National Zoo, did a little shopping, had a leisurely lunch at Open City, a place which normally has tons of people spilling out into the streets waiting for tables. The day was ours to claim!

After lunch, we decided to take one of those double-decker Hop On Hop Off buses that we always see careening down P Street in Georgetown. It just so happened, there was a stop right in front of Open City and the Chinese take-out restaurant just next door sold tickets. We had just missed a bus, so we waited at one of the restaurant's outdoor tables for the next one to swing by. After a few minutes relaxing in the sun, combined with the huge steak and cheese Stromboli that was now in his belly, Karl fell asleep. Which was a very good thing.

Because, all of a sudden, who comes strolling down the street in a shiny blue Argentina soccer shirt and silky running shorts? He himself. Bruno. I quickly alternated between making sure Karl's eyes were still closed and trying to figure out where to direct my gaze once he passed by. Because he was walking like he had all the time in the world, I had a moment to take a few deep breaths. I was already holding onto Karl's arm (which in my mind would tell Bruno - I'm still with the same guy, loser!) and was semi-facing a big sandwich board proclaiming the benefits of the Old Town Trolley versus the Hop On Hop Off bus. All of a sudden, this sandwich board became the most fascinating reading material (even though I had already read, at least 3 times, that Old Town Trolley employs only Americans - like xenophobia is a virtue!)

I just kept my gaze focused on the sign in front of me and didn't notice Bruno again until he had passed by. Karl (who had a Bruno sighting years ago when he picked me up at work for lunch and saw Bruno, eating his lunch al fresco, with a cloth napkin spread grandly across his lap. "Only an idiot like Bruno would think he was at liberty to take such an extended time away from his desk," he had noted), luckily, was still dozing.

Seeing Bruno again reminded me that he was not just a character in my book. Someone I could hold up for ridicule (my own as well) and examination on the silent page. He was still alive and breathing and still a menacing character in my off-the-page life. In just a short span of a few seconds, I had worm holed back to the days when Bruno still made me feel anxious and unloveable.

I was momentarily cheered, though. Just seeing him in his shorts at 3 PM on a weekday told me that he still wasn't gainfully employed (he was, um, "let go" from my company shortly after I resigned). But then I thought, maybe he was thinking the same thing about seeing me in my shorts at 3 PM on a weekday. And seeing my husband, too. "What a couple of Spanish-word-for-losers," he might have clucked to himself. "Both of them without jobs."

But that was just a fleeting thought. Because I'm guessing he's still the same self-satisfied, out-of-touch jerk he was 3 years ago when I last shared air space with him, in an office, surrounded by his superiors, explaining (without much coherency) why he found it so difficult to work with me.

I was never part of the problem, you see. It was the work that got in his way of his working. But now, judging by his get up, he has all the time in the world to work that problem out.