by E. J. Noyes
On our way to the food court, I discovered Brooke also had an insanely good eye for color matching when she ducked into a men’s store and picked a tie for Mitch after what seemed like barely ten seconds of running her finger over rows of silk before holding up a box. “This one.” Then she shuffled over to another display and repeated the act, snagging a patterned pocket square in a slightly lighter but complementary shade.
Pulling the maid-of-honor dress from its bag confirmed it was an exact color match for the tie. “How’d you do that?” I demanded.
“Do what?” She held out the boxes, shaking them when I didn’t take them right away. “Pick a matching square?” She grinned an entirely self-satisfied grin. “I’ve dressed my little brother for events and job interviews.”
“No, well, yes but also how’d you choose the correct color tie right away without the dress for comparison. You looked at the dress for five minutes before, if it was even that long.”
“I’ve got a good color brain.” Her smile was fixed in place and her voice now slightly flat. “I did a fine arts degree as well as architecture, then spent a few years in Paris enjoying the starving artiste gig before coming back to the family business like a good girl.”
“Oh…” So her art thing wasn’t just a hobby. In that case, I really couldn’t understand why someone who apparently enjoyed art as much as she did would study and do art in their free time but not as a job. “Why? Did you come back to the developer business I mean?”
“Architecture is a compromise. The only way I could incorporate an art degree was if I agreed to the whole work-for-Dad thing when I’d, uh, gotten being an artist out of my system.” She gently herded me toward the cashier.
“But, it’s not out of your system.”
“No it’s not, but my dad thinks it’s a waste of time and not an actual career someone can make money from.”
“What do you think?”
“I think…I don’t like arguing with my dad.”
I’d spent enough time with reticent clients and their even more reticent soon-to-be-ex spouses to know when to push and when to back away. So I nodded, and moved the topic to something innocuous. “Ready for something to eat?”
“Yes.” After a beat and a slow smile she added, “I’m hungry.”
Brooke and I hunted and gathered some lunch, then settled into a relatively unoccupied corner of the food court. The theme song to M*A*S*H interrupted as I was milliseconds away from my first bite of sandwich. Sabine’s ringtone. Oh for the love of—
I jumped right in. “Hi. I’ve been remeasured for the dress and nothing’s changed, and I still look amazing so I collected it. Brooke found me a great dress for Mom’s setup and I look amazing in that too. I have Mitch’s tie and a pocket square, which Brooke also found. Please stop harassing me.”
“Whoa. Okay, that’s really great. Thanks for letting me know. But I was just calling to tell you I’m going to cook Tuesday night and check if there was anything you felt like.”
“Oh. No, anything’s fine.”
“Awesome.” A pause. A subtle clearing of her throat. “So…um the dress is really okay?”
“Byyyye, Sabs. Love you.” Smiling, I hung up on her.
Brooke shuffled her fork through her salad, the edge of her mouth turned up. “She’s pretty persistent, isn’t she.”
“Mhmm.” After a quick bite, I added, “I get it, this is important and all that but give me some fucking credit. She’s worse than a helicopter parent at the moment.”
“Understandable. But you looked fabulous in both dresses so I’m sure she’ll settle down once she sees them.”
“I hope so.” I resumed attacking my lunch as a group of teens passed close to our table.
Brooke tensed perceptibly. Head down, she stared at her lunch like she was trying to find the meaning of life in the salad leaves and dressing.
I tapped the table to grab her attention. “You okay?”
Her head snapped up, eyes wide. “Oh, yeah. I, uh, just…I’m not great with a lot of people being close to me.” She indicated with a vague gesture at the now-departed group. “This is kind of moving into anxiety territory for me. Even worse than meeting new people.”
I set down my sandwich. “We can move or go if you want. I’m sorry, I didn’t know this sort of thing made you uncomfortable.” Now some of her reactions made more sense. Before I’d assumed it was just a response to my weirdness, but now I realized she was uncomfortable in the crowded café and lobby, and I felt a pang of sympathy.
“No no,” she insisted. “It’s fine, honestly. Once we start moving around and my brain remembers it can get away from the scary masses whenever it wants to it’ll shut up. Just that being still lets it sit and think about how much it doesn’t like people.”
“People hey? All people?” Distraction sometimes helped Sabs’s anxiety and I hoped it would help Brooke too.
Her shoulders dropped fractionally. “Most people.”
“Mmm. You seemed okay when you first met me.” The statement came out oddly tentative, as though testing the theory and hoping it was true.
“I was, mostly.” Her face relaxed into a smile. “To be fair, our first meeting was less of an actual meeting and more of a precursor to a wrestling match. You didn’t give me much time to feel too nervous or anxious.”
“Noted. To alleviate anxiety, be grumpy and nasty,” I teased.
Her laugh seemed genuine, and I relaxed a little. Still smiling, Brooke shook her head. “You weren’t nasty. Grumpy, yeah but not nasty.” Finally she looked up and caught my eye. “I didn’t mind it.”
Seconds passed and I had the strangest urge to reach out and take her hands, to make some sort of connection with her. Before I could, or even mull over why I wanted that, she indicated my lunch with a tilt of her head. “You should eat that. You look like you’re so hungry you’re about to take a bite out of the next person who walks past.”
It was on the tip of my tongue to ask her again if she was really all right, but when I considered she’d already confirmed it once and that she seemed okay if not slightly on edge, I decided to let it go. “What’re your plans for the rest of the day, now you’re done babysitting me?”
She glanced at her watch. “Meeting my ultimate friends in a few hours for a game. Then it’s probably going to be a beer plus couch plus trashy show reruns kind of night.”
“Ultimate friends? You…rank your friends?”
Brooke’s laugh was loud, amused, and ended in a hilarious snort. “No. They’re friends with whom I play Ultimate, as in Ultimate Frisbee.”
Slow clap for Jana. “Ohhh. Well fuck, don’t I feel dumb right now.”
“Don’t, it was cute.” Her cheeks pinked and she hastily added, “And easily mistaken for friendship levels instead of a sport.”
“Yeah, sorry I’m not huge on different sports. So, uh, when do you guys play?”
“Training Wednesday night, games late Saturday afternoons.” A grin quirked the edge of her mouth. “You could always come and watch. Or keep me company on the field. We’re always looking for extras to sub in when life gets in the way.”
“Oh, yeah, no…I’m good with yoga, a couple of gym classes and sporadic running, thanks. I can just about handle a week of extra spin classes when my skirts get tight, but I’m not great with anything that involves catching or throwing. Whenever I try to do sports stuff, it always lands me on my ass.”
A shadow moved through her eyes and I fancied I could see her holding back an innuendo-laden comment. “Well that sucks. What about hiking or cycling?”
“I’ve never really done any hiking, and my cycling is limited to the stationary kind. I’m terrified of cycling in traffic.”
Brooke brought both elbows up to rest on the table. “Not city cycling but out in nature and shit.”
“I’ve never tried. I’m an indoors exercise kind of gal. Air-conditioning is one of the greatest inventions.”
“Really? Give me outdoors team
sports or hiking or trail running any day.”
“Hmm. Maybe I should try that out some time. Fresh air and all that.”
Brooke picked through her salad. “I’d be happy to take you out whenever you want to try. Or, if you ever change your mind about Ultimate or want to get together for a hike or something, just give me a call.”
“I think I’d like that,” I said, unsurprised that I really meant it.
Chapter Eight
I rubbed my temple, hoping it would help ease the tight tense feeling building behind my eyes. “Yes, I’m aware that you’re upset, you’d been drinking and your friends egged you on. But, Patrick, may I respectfully remind you that your friends, as a whole, did not attend law school, do not spend their life working to achieve the best results for their clients—and succeeding, might I add—and have not been doing the above for almost ten years.”
“But when you consider it, what’s one Facebook post in the scheme of things?” he asked, the question tinged with hope.
Save me from shortsighted clients. Fighting to hold my annoyance in check, I agreed, “Sure, I’ll consider what it means in the scheme of things.” After a beat, I said, “There, consider it considered, and what I realized from my consideration is that posting nasty things about your spouse, even if she’s soon to be your ex-spouse, on Facebook looks really bad. Please delete the post right now and please don’t do it again.”
He went very quiet and eventually uttered a simple, “Oh.”
“Patrick, I understand how you’re feeling right now, really I do. This is a stressful time for you, you’re upset and angry, but please trust and listen to me when I tell you what you should and shouldn’t be doing during this difficult time. My job is to make sure you’re well taken care of and I take that job very seriously.” The speech was second nature by now and I could probably recite it in my sleep. Then I uttered my most cringe-worthy but proven-to-be-stirring sentence. “We’re going to get through this together, okay?” I held my breath, waiting for his response. Come on, come onnnn.
Patrick let out a long breath. “You’re right. I’m sorry, Jana. I just want it to be over, you know?”
“I do know. Trust me, Patrick, I understand completely. I’ll call as soon as I have the paperwork back from Linda’s attorney.” After a few more of my trusty phrases, having assured myself that I’d quashed his latest round of anxiety and that there’d be no more Facebook outbursts to jeopardize our case, we said cordial goodbyes.
Ugh. I needed a computer program that blocked people from putting offensive posts about their estranged spouses on social media. I slumped against the backrest of my chair. I still had twenty minutes until my next meeting, all my prep was done and there wasn’t enough time to work on anything else because I wouldn’t be able to concentrate knowing I’d have to stop again so soon. No time to inhale lunch, a fact my stomach protested with a quiet grumble. Brainless handbag cleaning to clear my mind before my next client it was.
My handbag tended to be a catchall for everything, and I tried to make time every few weeks to sort through it before things got to overflowing volcano of crap stage. In addition to my usual necessary junk like my spare phone charger and cable, emergency granola bars, hairbrush and ties, and a handful of loose just-in-case tampons that’d escaped my toiletries bag, I found a crumpled flyer for an animal rescue fundraiser, an unused straw, two packets of gum, and a squashed and browned yellow rose that Brooke had nabbed for me outside a perfume store during our shopping trip over the weekend.
As I stared at the flower, something niggled at the back of my subconscious. Brooke’s offhanded comment of if you want to get together for something give me a call pushed its way to the forefront. Over our morning coffees I’d decided she was someone I’d like to get to know and the dress outing had strengthened the idea.
Between working at home some nights, I socialized occasionally, went for drinks with Will and our office staff the first Friday of every month for bonding purposes, had a meal with Sabs and Bec at least once a week and made myself go on a minimum of three dates a month. Sometimes even with the same guy.
Though I leaned toward the extrovert end of the scale, I didn’t have close friends—Sabs and Bec excluded. Brooke was smart, funny, and easy to talk to, and someone I could see myself spending more time with. What the hell. One possible friendship coming right up.
I dialed the personal number she’d carefully written on the back of her business card, and she answered with a slightly cautious, “Hello?”
“Brooke? It’s Jana Fleischer. How are you?”
I heard her exhalation and then all the caution disappeared from her voice, replaced by undeniable pleasure. “Oh, hi. I’m good, yourself?”
“I’m great.” Ignoring the strange and unexpected flutter of nerves, I decided a joke was the best way to go. “Listen, sorry to bother you, but I need a pair of ruby red heels and I was wondering if you’ve got anything for me?”
“Ruby red.” She clicked her tongue a few times. “I’m afraid not. In a pinch I could do a kind of candy-apple red?”
“No good, has to be ruby. Ah well, it was a long shot. Frankly, I’m disappointed that you didn’t intuit what I might need.”
“Very sorry to let you down,” she said, laying on the mock-sincerity. Then her voice lowered, became a soft drawl. “Maybe I can make it up to you?”
The flutter of nerves turned into a weird heart stutter-step. “I’m listening.”
“A round of drinks on me after work tomorrow night. I know it’s late notice for a Friday, but if you’re free…”
I was free and didn’t even have to think before I answered. “Deal.”
“Fantastic.” She sounded extremely pleased. “Why don’t you text when you’re done with saving the familial units of D.C. and surrounds, and we’ll go from there.”
“Perfect, and I shouldn’t be too late saving the familial units of D.C. and surrounds. Actually, that has a nice ring to it. Maybe it’s time to look into that superhero outfit thing. So do I need to change or can I come straight from work?” After a few long moments of her silence, I realized that as was often the case, what came out of my mouth was little more than disjointed babble. Probably why she hadn’t answered. “Sorry, my brain is a ping pong ball, and my mouth tends to follow. Did you get all of that?”
She laughed. “I’d already gathered that about you. I like it, and sorry, it just takes me a few seconds to catch up and sort one of your thoughts from the previous one. Whatever you want to wear is fine, even if it’s a superhero costume. I doubt we’ll go anywhere fancy, probably just hold up the bar somewhere nearby for a few hours?”
“Sounds fabulous.”
“Excellent.” She paused, her voice lowering again. “I’m really glad you called.”
So was I.
* * *
Sabs and Bec arrived for a late dinner at eight thirty, still dressed in team uniforms from their weekly game of flag football. “Win or lose?” I asked as soon as we’d distributed hugs.
“Bec won, I lost,” ever-competitive Sabs grumbled as she bent down to unlace her sneakers. She’d joined the same league as Bec a few months ago and had been unable to get a spot on Bec’s team. Now they were competitors, as they had been on occasion back when they worked together in an Army posting in Afghanistan. A fact which resulted in much good-natured teasing.
Bec reached up to caress the back of Sabine’s neck. “But I saw you make some wonderful plays, darling, and at least we weren’t playing each other tonight.”
“Yeah.” Sabs huffed and dropped onto the couch, putting her sock-clad feet up onto my coffee table. She made a vague gesture toward the kitchen. “I’m starving. Whatever you made for dinner smells fucking fantastic. Is it nearly done?”
“Yep, ready when you are, and it’s just chicken pasta primavera. Literally the most boring and easy meal, sorry. Long day.” I could have just ordered in but had craved the relaxation cooking brought after a stressful client-filled day.<
br />
Bec stood beside me, leaning into me and wrapping an arm around my waist. “Don’t be silly, sweetie. Everything you cook is wonderful. Except that time you experimented with carpaccio…” After a grin and a squeeze, she let me go to fetch plates and cutlery.
“Well, raw meat dishes aren’t technically cooking,” I mumbled, rummaging in the fridge. I held up a bottle of Magic Hat #9. “Did you guys want a cold beer?”
“God yes,” Bec said instantly. “Thanks.”
I passed her one but held off grabbing a second. Leaning around the fridge, I caught my sister’s eye. “Sabs, beer? Or water or soda or non-alcoholic beer if you want?”
Sabine’s eyebrows scrunched close together, one of her cheeks sucked in as she chewed and thought. I readied myself to wait while she carefully weighed the pros and cons and ramifications of the enjoyment of having a beer after exercise versus potential effects on her medication. A long moment passed before she nodded. “I’ll take a real beer please.”
I popped the top off a bottle and set it down in her usual spot, then poured water for myself as Bec finished setting the table.
Halfway through her dinner, Sabs exhaled a long contented sigh. “This is really good, Jannie. I needed a mega dose of carbs.” She washed down a mouthful of pasta with a long swig of beer. Then she raised her fork as though to scoop up more pasta but instead, she paused and set her fork down again. Her gaze was on the table, the intense focus suggesting she was having a moment and trying to work through it.
Bec stopped eating, watching Sabine with a calm, yet fiercely protective expression. After a few seconds she quietly asked, “Darling?”
Sabs cleared her throat and held up an I’m okay hand to Bec. Then her laser-sharp focus turned to me. “Jannie, can I please see your maid-of-honor dress now?” The question came out with such desperation that I wondered how she’d managed to hold off asking for this long.
Laughter burst out of my mouth so quickly, I had to cover it to stop myself from spraying the table with water. Once I could breathe and talk, I agreed, “Fine, come on. Our dinner can get cold while we do this very important thing.” There was a time and place for holding out on her just to annoy, but doing it when I knew delaying would genuinely intensify her anxiety was cruel.
