Loves Me, Loves Me Not Page 15

  “You might want to look into a career-development seminar or something,” he says, waving his fork at me. “You can sometimes make good contacts that way. Networking. It’s all about networking.”

  I can’t imagine making good contacts with other people looking for jobs unless he means contact in the physical sense. A group hug, perhaps? But I nod seriously as if Fred is giving me pearls of wisdom and I better take notes, while I’m trying very, very hard not to think of him naked.

  You see, Fred and I have been on thin ice since he got home from his business trip Tuesday. First, he’s not crazy about Trixie. He practically kicks her out of the house if he happens to spot her nosing into any room he’s occupying. And she scratched a chair leg one night. So it was an antique chair. So it had sentimental value. So it was his favorite aunt’s favorite chair.

  Then there was the little naked incident just yesterday when I happened in on Fred and Gina—I can hardly think about it now—doing it.

  With no kids around they must be used to having the house to themselves. I had stayed late at the shop last night so I could meet Wendy afterward for drinks, but Wendy was a no-show and I came home early.

  At first, all I heard was a man’s voice saying, “Oh, yeah, that’s right.” I just thought Gina had on some HGTV home-repair show. Too late—I realized it was Fred’s voice. Too late because I’d already wandered into the den and there was Gina on top of Fred. Fred saw me first and said “Shit!” then Gina turned and grabbed an afghan while shrieking, “Oh, no,” and when she moved off him, I saw him naked.

  Whatever Fred’s faults are, I now know why Gina thinks so highly of him.

  It’s an image burned into my retinas. But we pretend it didn’t happen. At least Gina and I pretend. Fred, on the other hand, is a simmering mass of resentment that manifests itself in him telling me to be more mindful of my appearance or to get him the inventory records of the flower shop or even to be careful who I mention the sale of the building to.

  The sale is back on since the Japanese bailed on the Squires Financial property. I think Fred is now convinced that I leaked the information to Squires. Initially, this made me indignant. Then I realized he was right. I had leaked it to Henry.

  All of this is a long way of saying I have to move. I don’t want to inhibit Gina’s chance of having a baby, and I suspect Fred is a little sex-shy with me in the house since I caught him with his pants down.

  Besides, Fred annoys me and I annoy him. He’s been on my case this morning and now this evening because he knows I’ve been goofing off while looking for a job. He’s given me a couple of lectures disguised as well-meaning advice that I think are really just more payback for seeing him naked. That mark will take a long time to erase and the best way to wipe the slate clean is to get out of Dodge.

  Even Gina realizes it’s time for me to vamoose. After Fred’s most recent lecture on attending career-development seminars, I thank Fred, clear my throat and say I’m thinking of moving. Gina doesn’t protest, which normally would be her automatic reaction, sincere or not—“Don’t go, Ame, we’re having so much fun!”

  Instead, she says, “Where would you move to?”

  “Wendy’s,” I blurt out.

  “The food place?” Fred asks incredulously.

  “No, her friend Wendy,” Gina says, looking at Fred as if he’s crazy. She doesn’t get to do that very often. I’m glad I was here to witness it. “She lives downtown. Not that far from the shop, right?”

  “Uh-huh,” I say with a mouth full of rice and pork.

  Fred thinks about this and decides it’s a good thing. A really good thing. “Living downtown might look appealing on your résumé.”

  I nearly spit out my food. That has to be the most obvious line of bullshit I’ve heard since some guy in a bar tried to get me into the sack by telling me he was entering the seminary the next day. BS or not, the writing is on the wall. Gina might love me, but she’d love me more if I left her and Fred alone in their baby-making factory.

  After helping Gina clean up I retreat with the cordless to my soon-to-be-former bedroom and call Wendy. She answers on the second ring and it’s clear she’s been crying.

  “Hey, what’s the matter?”

  “The usual,” she says morosely.

  “I’ll come see you. Hang on.” Okay, so I have an ulterior motive. I’m going to ask her if I can move in with her. But this will kill several birds once again with that multipurpose stone. I move in, get out of Gina and Fred’s hair, and act as a control on Wendy’s Sam urges. And she, meanwhile, can act on my Henry urges.

  I’ve kept myself from calling Henry all week, but it’s been a struggle. Sure, I could have just given him a breezy ring at his office, a “how are things” kind of call that leads to a “thought I’d update you on my crazy life” conversation where he’s chuckling and happy and I’m joking and happy. But if I make that call, a line is crossed. I’m assuming things. I’m assuming we’re past the “keeping track” stage of a relationship where the time of the call, the initiator of the call, the reason for the call and the tone of the call are all tallied up in a “contact assessment” calculation that tells each participant who cares more.

  We’re still in the stage where phone calls have meaning, where they are as significant as the first tentative cables from foreign emissaries after years of tension. One misstep and the future, as we hope to know it, is lost.

  So I don’t call.

  And here it is Thursday and not once did he ring me up. The fact that he’d mentioned possibly getting together for lunch this week just makes it worse. I’d started looking forward to it. Now the weekend looms and I’m both disappointed and annoyed. He’s waiting awfully late to make a date with me. Is he trying other babes first? Am I just his backup? What happened to wanting to have dinner with Gina and Fred? Maybe I should have Gina extend that invitation now. It would give me an excuse to call him.

  Gina’s watching the news with Fred, so I whisper that I’ll be borrowing her car and that I’ll call before heading back. That’s just in case they want to go at it again while I’m gone.

  The car is another reason I have to leave. Now that Fred is back from his business trip, Gina and I share the Volvo. She tries too hard to be generous and I always feel I’m putting her out when I take the car. Even tonight. If she had a previous engagement, she wouldn’t let me know. Then again, maybe she likes getting rid of me.

  I mosey into town and find a parking spot near Wendy’s apartment, which I take as my karma starting to kick in. Surely I’ll find a job tomorrow.

  But the karma shatters like a Ming vase in the hands of a two-year-old when Wendy lets me in. She is crying so hard she’s practically hysterical. Wadded-up tissues litter her sofa in the living room at the end of the hall off the front foyer. And her curtains are closed, shutting out light and the view of the city from her wide picture window.

  “Let me get you some water,” I say, and put my purse down. I go into her small kitchenette that separates the foyer from the living room and pour her some water, and therein lies the tale. As I run the spigot, my gaze falls on a ripped bag from a local drugstore. The receipt is attached to the bag with a staple. Wendy bought three items today—a candy bar, a toothbrush and a pregnancy test.

  “Here,” I say, giving her the glass in the living room, struggling to keep my hand from shaking. I pat her on the shoulder as she huddles at the end of the sofa with the water and a tissue. “I’ll be right back. Need to use your bathroom.”

  To the right of her living room is a short hallway with the bedroom on one side and the bath on the other. I slip in and don’t even bother to close the door. There, on the edge of the sink, is the evidence. EPT with its unambiguous sign that Wendy is “with child.” Crap. That shit Sam.

  Taking a deep breath, reminding myself this is about Wendy and not about my anger, I step back into the living room and sit on the floor in front of her.

  “Does Sam know?” I ask. But I already know th
e answer. She just confirms it when she nods her head yes. Do I even need to ask her what his reaction was? The tissues tell me. They are the crumpled pieces of her heart leftover from the explosion.

  “And he wants you to do something about it?” I ask. She nods again. Standing up, I lean over and give her a big bear hug. And dammit, I start to cry, too. Gone is my professional nurse’s attitude. Gone is my strong and mature approach. I’m mad and sad and pissed and want to kick pigeons. Especially ones that look like Sam and men like him.

  “That’s why you want to go to your parents,” I say at last, sitting on a chair diagonally across from her. “To tell them.”

  “No,” she says. She blows her nose and wipes a strand of hair from her face. “I don’t want to tell them. I do want to ask them for some money.”

  Wendy never asks her parents for money. In fact, it’s a point of pride that Wendy lives by her own means instead of palming funds off Mom and Dad. She’s afraid if she takes their help, they’ll want to control her life. Lots of strings attached, the kind that don’t break easily, like fishing wire.

  “Money for what?” I swallow hard. Okay, okay, I know women are supposed to be in charge of their own bodies and have choices and control their destinies. And yes, I’ve always thought of abortion as an option if I found myself in Wendy’s position. But the reality is it’s a really bad way to fix a mistake, and I hope to God she doesn’t want to fix this mistake this way. I think of Gina wanting a baby. I think of an unbelievable scenario—Gina adopting this child. I think of me adopting this child—I could raise it to despise college English professors. But I can’t, for some reason, imagine Wendy “getting rid of it.”

  “Money to go away,” she says, and I exhale. “And think. And…I don’t know. I don’t know.” She shakes her head back and forth convincingly as if she doesn’t know, so I put my arm around her and do the comfort thing again, hoping I’m giving her at least some of the warmth she gave me when I was the one who needed help. When she has control, she takes a deep breath.

  “I thought I was pregnant once. As a teenager. By Donald Westcott. Class president of Choate.” She smiles but there’s no happiness in it. “And I thought if I was, I’d just run away to the beach and live there during the pregnancy and have the baby and raise it all by myself if I had to.” She laughs and there’s only cynicism in it. “Boy, was I ever stupid.”

  “Is that what you want to do—go to the beach?”

  “Maybe. At least to get my head together. Will you go with me?” She looks at me with desperate eyes obscured by tears.

  Even though I’m genuinely sorry for Wendy and want to help her, I have to admit that my selfish thoughts return—that is, if I go away with Wendy to help her get her head together, maybe I’ll get mine together at the same time. I see myself diving into some beach hotel’s pool, lying on the sand, staring at the waves, and feeling time stop while I work things out. Things like whatever happened to the pre-Rick Amy and how do I get her back. Things like how to loosen up and just have fun. Things like how to learn to trust again. Maybe there’s an old manual of some kind buried in the sand. Since it’s early in the season, the beach would not be crowded and I could find it.

  “Sure. I would just need to make some arrangements.” Like find another place to live and work. Simple, right?

  Wendy calms down and wipes her eyes with a new tissue. She manages a weak laugh, a real one this time, a laugh at herself. “I’ll probably call in sick tomorrow. I haven’t been feeling well.”

  “Morning sickness?”

  “Morning, noon and night sickness,” she says, rubbing her stomach.

  “Have you eaten anything?”

  “No.”

  “What did you have for lunch?”

  “Just some crackers.”

  I stand. “I’ll fix you something. Let me see what you have.” But in her kitchen a second later the only thing I can find safe to fix is a can of beef barley soup. I heat it up for her and make some tea, and serve her at her tiny table pressed up against the kitchen wall in the living room. Mothering is what Wendy needs, and some semblance of a good mood, or at least a calmer one, begins to return. It feels good to wait on her after all the nursing she did on my behalf.

  “Have you seen a doctor yet?” I ask.

  “Next week,” she says. Daintily, she wipes some soup from her mouth. I can’t imagine Rosa Moroni doing anything daintily.

  “You need someone to take care of you.” Okay, go ahead and cringe. You know where I’m headed with this. I want to move in with Wendy, which I can do and it’ll still be a good deed, right? In fact, I am thinking of helping her, even if it does mean I get a place to stay in the deal. I’m not heartless.

  “I wanted to talk to you, Wen, about possibly crashing here for a while. I could help you. Make sure you eat, take care of things.”

  “Did you have a fight with Fred?” she asks.

  “No. It’s just they need their privacy. They want to…” They want to have a baby! Stop! Do not say that! “They want to redecorate and I’d be in the way.” Lying is too damn easy. No wonder you’re taught not to do it at an early age. Once you figure out how painless it is, you’re hooked.

  “Sure. You can crash here.” She smiles at me and pushes away her bowl. She’s eaten only about half of it, and it wasn’t a huge serving to begin with.

  To prove my worth I start to clean up immediately. I wash the dishes, I gather all the tissues into the trash, I even change the sheets on her bed and wipe down her bathroom. By this time, she’s dozing on her couch so I pull an afghan around her shoulders and grab the cordless phone from the wall.

  When I call Gina, she sounds a little breathless and I wonder if I managed to interrupt her again.

  “I probably won’t come home tonight,” I say.

  “Henry caught up with you?”

  “What?”

  “Henry called here. I just assumed…” She assumes I’m at his place.

  “No, I’m still at Wendy’s. She’s not feeling well. So I thought I’d stay over and kind of help her out.” I’m dying to confide in my sister and tell her that Wendy is pregnant, but I don’t. Not because I’m afraid of violating Wendy’s trust. No, I don’t tell Gina because the contrast will make Gina feel bad. Unmarried woman pregnant by schmucko married boyfriend vs. married woman who wants to get pregnant by decent husband.

  “Oh. Do you need to come home and get some stuff?”

  “No.” Then I remember. “I have your car!”

  “If you come home to pack a bag, I’ll run you back into town,” she offers. Little did I realize just how eager she is to get rid of me.

  “All right. I’ll be there in about fifteen minutes.” After hanging up the phone, I nudge Wendy awake and tell her I’m just going to pick up some things at home. Home. Gina’s place had become home. When had that happened? So many things just creep up on me.

  I take Wendy’s key to let myself back in. Before I go, I tell her that I promise to take care of her.

  Gina is practically waiting at the door with my bags packed. Sure, she seems genuinely wistful about all the great sisterly bonding we were able to do, but it’s clear that those special moments are best appreciated in retrospect than in real time.

  “Fred and I were thinking of going to a movie,” she says, explaining her rush to throw clothes in a suitcase and head to Wendy’s. Fred, however, is nowhere to be seen, and my guess is he’s lying naked on their bed as we speak. Can’t seem to get that naked image out of my mind.

  In the car, I hug Trixie to my chest, feeling somehow strangely protected as we drive past Tess Wintergarten’s apartment. Cats have their own secret powers, you know.

  Although Gina offers to come up with me, there are no parking spots nearby so I grapple with my suitcase and the cat and wish Gina a quick goodbye, which she points out is not really a goodbye since we’re still in the same city, still going to see each other, and by the way, when am I going to invite Henry over to meet Fred?
>
  Henry. I still need to return his call. Man, do I feel triumphant having so many things get in the way of Henry.

  When I let myself into Wendy’s apartment, she’s no longer on the couch, so I tiptoe into her bedroom to make sure she is all right. She’s sleeping soundly, so I go back to the living room and settle on the sofa for a relaxing conversation with Henry, my reward for being kicked out of my sister’s house and comforting an abandoned, pregnant friend.

  I don’t realize how much I want to talk to him until I actually hear his voice. I’d been expecting to get his voice mail, thinking he probably gave up and went out. Henry isn’t the waiting kind.

  “I’m at Wendy’s,” I tell him. Then I tell him about her pregnancy. Yeah, I know—I shouldn’t have. It’s private. But I can’t help it. I want to talk with someone, to have the Rant of Rants about Sam, to soak up the sympathy from Henry that Wendy really deserves.

  The only problem is, you really can’t rant about men with men the same way you can with women. Men have this irritating habit of taking up for their species. While Henry clearly feels sorry for Wendy, he also asks a few pointed questions—like had they been having unprotected sex, and why did she stay with him if she knew he was married? Call me crazy, but I suspect Henry thinks that Wendy is partly to blame here. Imagine that, a woman being in control of her own body means, well, a woman being in control of her own body. His comments deflate my all-consuming bubble of outrage against Sam. Outrage is sometimes my favorite emotion so I’m doubly disappointed.

  “Is she going to be okay?” he asks at the end of another spiel about what a schmuck Sam is.

  “She goes to the doctor next week.”

  “Then what?”

  “I don’t know. She might raise it on her own. Or put it up for adoption.” It seems funny to call a baby “it.”

  “I’m glad to hear she’s having it,” he says, a surprising admission, and one I’d reached on my own just hours ago. So Henry likes babies. Very interesting.