A favorite tie

He had purchased the tie one foggy night in Chicago, walking with a co-worker and wondering about his suit and his originally selected necktie.  Passing a Louis Vuitton store he decided to duck in and peruse the selections...he found one attractive, frowned at the $200.00 price tag but eventually bought it.  It stayed in its bag for a long time.

The first time he wore it was for her.  Sort of.  He had a meeting with a client, had flown to a city and knew he would run into her.  It was going to be a very brief encounter, the kind he hated...there was a tremendous amount of history and for them to be polite like strangers and quietly demure to the calmness and small talk was offensive...beneath the skin there was hot blood...cravings...so when she placed one hand slightly on his chest and tugged at his pocket square with the other he swallowed slowly...feeling the soft weight of her...smelling the perfume...feeling the slight squeeze of the tie around his neck like a submission.  To her.

The tie became a part of the way he felt around her.

He wore it to a funeral, no pocket square, the dark suit somber and his heart sagging.  As he was tying the tie knot in the mirror he briefly remembered the last time he saw her and it made him smile...and when he rode over in the limo he tightened the knot by pulling up on it towards his collar and he remembered her again.

An embrace.

She fell into him exceptionally well, fitting him like a tailor crafted her perfectly, her height against his, the clutch of her and the closeness...it was instantly recognizable.  And when absent...he felt weightless.

When he hung the tie up he kept it separate from the others, it was visible each time he opened the closet door...it wasn't quite like a picture of her but rather it was like remembering a feeling...or maybe it was like putting on a cape...he felt different when wearing it.

He would've worn it to meet her family.

He would've worn it her promotion party, shaking hands with strangers, glancing occasionally towards her, where she would be radiant, drawing in the other employees anxious to congratulate her. He would've stayed to the side, holding a plastic cup of bad champagne and whenever he caught her eye he would've slightly raised the cup...to you he would mouth.  Holding the bubbly liquid in front of him, he would've been the best dressed but only because he wanted her to know that was how proud of her he was.

Later....

How could he ever imagine then, as he slipped the tie off his neck, the loop still intact, and he circled it around her wrists, her naked body lingering beneath him, her architecture and landscapes against the sheets, and he cinched it delicately so that her hands were almost in a prayer, the tie around them then secured to the top frame of the bed...she smiled a wickedly warm smile that was more of an invitation than a greeting...and they collided and clutched and soon the tie was on the floor, a reminder of an embrace.

Later...

Wearing it in a new suit he felt empowered and vulnerable and the memories of her spread well beyond his collar and he walked briskly in a chance to hurry up to finally see her again.