"I don't know. My husband has bronchitis. He coughs all the time."
"Not at the last moment, he doesn't."
She paused, thinking about it. "Well, he certainly does right afterward. He breaks out in a fit of coughing. We always laugh about how he does that."
"Right after is different. But at the moment, right in the intense moment, I'm telling you nobody coughs."
More images flashed through his mind. Her cheeks turn red. Her neck is blotchy, or her upper chest. Nipples no longer hard. They were hard at first, but not now. The eyes get dark, sometimes purple below. Lips swollen. Breathing changes. Sudden surging heat. Shift in the hips, shifting rhythm, tension but something else, something liquid. Forehead frowning. Wincing. Biting. So many different ways, but
"Nobody coughs," he said again.
And then he felt a kind of sudden embarrassment, and pulled his plate back, and took a bite of pasta. He wanted a reason not to say more, because he had the feeling that he had overstepped the rules, that there was still this area, this kind of knowledge, this awareness that everyone pretended didn't exist . . .
Fernandez was staring at him curiously. "Did you read about this somewhere?"
He shook his head, chewing.
"Do men discuss it? Things like this?"
He shook his head, no.
"Women do."
"I know." He swallowed. "But anyway, she coughed, and that was why I stopped. She wasn't involved, and I was very-angry about it, I guess. I mean she was lying there panting and moaning, but she was really uninvolved. And I felt . . ."
"Exploited?"
"Something like that. Manipulated. Sometimes I think maybe if she hadn't coughed right then . . ." Sanders shrugged.
"Maybe I should ask her," Fernandez said, nodding her head in Meredith's direction.
Sanders looked up and saw that she was coming over to their table. "Oh, hell."
"Calmly, calmly. Everything's fine."
Meredith came over, a big smile on her face. "Hello, Louise. Hello, Tom." Sanders started to get up. "Don't get up, Tom, please." She rested her hand on his shoulder, gave it a little squeeze. "I just came by for a moment." She was smiling radiantly. She looked exactly like the confident boss, stopping to say hello to a couple of colleagues. Back at her table, Sanders saw Garvin paying the bill. He wondered if he would come over, too.
"Louise, I just wanted to say no hard feelings," Meredith said. "Everybody had a job to do. I understand that. And I think it served a purpose, clearing the air. I just hope we can go on productively from here."
Meredith was standing behind Sanders's chair as she talked. He had to twist his head and crane his neck to look at her.
Fernandez said, "Don't you want to sit down?"
"Well, maybe for a minute."
Sanders stood to get her a chair. He was thinking that to the Conley people, all this would look exactly right. The boss not wanting to intrude, waiting to be pressed by her co-workers to join them. As he brought the chair, he glanced over and saw that Nichols was looking at them, peering over his glasses. So was young Conley.
Meredith sat down. Sanders pushed the chair in for her. "You want anything?" Fernandez said solicitously.
"I just finished, thanks."
"Coffee? Anything?"
"I'm fine, thanks."
Sanders sat down. Meredith leaned forward. "Bob's been telling me about his plans to take this division public. It's very exciting. It looks like full speed ahead."
Sanders watched her with astonishment.
"Now, Bob has a list of names for the new company. When we spin it off next year. See how these sound to you: SpeedCore, SpeedStar, PrimeCore, Talisan, and Tensor. I think SpeedCore makes racing parts for stock cars. SpeedStar is right on the money but maybe too right on. PrimeCore sounds like a mutual fund. How about Talisan or Tensor?"
"Tensor is a lamp," Fernandez said.
"Okay. But Talisan is pretty good, I think."
"The Apple-IBM joint venture is called Taligent," Sanders said.
"Oh. You're right. Too close. How about MicroDyne? That's not bad. Or ADG, for Advanced Data Graphics? Do either of those work, do you think?"
"MicroDyne is okay."
"I thought so, too. And there was one more . . . AnoDyne."
"That's a painkiller," Fernandez said.
"What is?"
"An anodyne is a painkiller. A narcotic."
"Oh. Forget that. Last one, SynStar."
"Sounds like a drug company."
"Yeah, it does. But we've got a year to come up with a better one. And MicroDyne isn't bad, to start. Sort of combining micro with dynamo. Good images, don't you think?"
Before they could answer, she pushed her chair back. "I've got to go. But I thought you'd like to hear the thinking. Thanks for your input. Good night, Louise. And Tom, I'll see you tomorrow." She shook hands with them both and crossed the room to Garvin. Together she and Garvin went over to the Conley table to say hello.
Sanders stared at her. " `Good images,' " he repeated. "Christ. She's talking about names for a company, but she doesn't even know what the company is."
"It was quite a show."
"Sure," Sanders said. "She's all show. But it had nothing to do with us. It's for them." He nodded toward the Conley-White people, sitting across the restaurant. Garvin was shaking hands all around, and Meredith was talking to Jim Daly. Daly made a joke and she laughed, throwing her head back, showing her long neck.
"The only reason she talked to us was so that when I get fired tomorrow, she won't be seen as having planned it."