condition.
Her status update read: Jimmy Choo shoes and a handsome Valentine, sigh...what I would do to have my cake and eat it too!
A moment later she glanced back down at her laptop screen and noticed that someone had 'liked' her status. A gentleman by the name of Edward Bell, a name which sounded vaguely familiar but she could not put her finger on who he was. Barbara had over 500 friends on Facebook, many of whom were friends back in high school.
Being an inquisitive person, Barbara decided to check out Edward's Facebook page. She smiled as she realised that he must have been an old high school buddy, as his About Me stated that he went to the same College in North Hempstead, New York. He was also the same age.
Clicking on Edward's photos, she was pleased with what she saw. A handsome man, well groomed with a goatee, blowout burgundy hair and champagne eyes that seemed to sparkle. He also appeared to have a strong affection towards dogs, seven of them in fact, all Wire Fox terriers.
"How cute!" she said out loud, her reference to the dogs but in the back of her mind, she was also thinking about the man standing proudly beside his beloved animals.
Barbara also loved dogs, owning two of them, both Beagles. She would walk them together but often wished she had a companion there to assist her, especially when her female Beagle Daisy would make a mess on a neighbour's lawn and she didn't have the spare hands, nor the resources, to clean up the mess.
It was a strange thought, wanting someone who could be there to walk the dogs, but it was more than that, much more. She wanted someone to take her out to dinner, to the cinema, someone to talk to when she cooked meals in her kitchen. She also yearned for someone to compliment her on her fashionable dress sense that wasn't her boss!
Later that cold afternoon in January, Barbara left for work, dressed to kill. She wore a lacy ruche body constructed mini tank dress with adjustable spaghetti straps and a stretchy zigzag lattice on the back. She wasn't dressed for the weather, but rather to be sexy. She wanted to be noticed and knew that no man in the office could avoid her when she was dressed so provocatively.
The boss certainly didn't. He looked across at her from his office, noticing her leafy green eyes full of confidence and her walk more like a big and beautiful model strutting her stuff on a catwalk. He had entertained the idea of inviting her out on a date, but he knew that business and pleasure should not mix. He kept his affections for her hidden, locked away in his mind.
Just as Barbara sat down at her desk, a beautifully wrapped pink parcel was delivered to her from reception. How strange, she thought to herself. It wasn't her birthday and by the look of the wrapping, this contained something expensive. She unwrapped the parcel, to find a box with the writing Jimmy Choo on it. A grin crept onto her face as she realised somebody had bought her an $800 pair of lavender Jimmy Choo high heels!
A note accompanied the box. She read it carefully: Put these on and meet me for lunch at Antonino's Restaurant on Northern Boulevard at 1pm sharp. A rush of blood swept through Barbara's body as she realised that whoever had sent her this gift was doing so in response to her Facebook status. She glanced around the room to ensure nobody was monitoring her computer and logged onto Facebook to see how many people had clicked 'like' on her status.
There were four likes, the first from Edward Bell, her old school friend who she barely remembered, two from her girlfriends Tina and Rosie and a fourth from a work colleague named Joe, a man old enough to be her father. Surely not, she thought to herself, glancing over to see Joe waving at her as her eyes met with his across the open office.
Barbara kicked off her heels, replacing them with her new Jimmy Choo shoes. They fit perfectly and she wondered how this secret admirer knew her feet size. She could barely concentrate on work that