It worked this time too. The anger, the sorrow, all dropped away like a discarded sweatshirt. “Mom! Can I pick it out?”
“Sure. As long as it’s a Ford Escort.”
“A Ford Escort?” His new Adam’s apple worked as he tried to swallow this.
“Okay, a Ford Mustang. Used. I can’t afford a new one.”
“A Mustang. That’s pretty okay.” But as he picked up his pen, he shot a sharp glance at me. “If it’s too expensive, you don’t have to get me a Mustang.”
What was all this sudden interest in our finances? He must be picking up my anxiety. I made my voice cheerful. “We’ll shop around. You look at the want ads, and we’ll check out the car lots too.”
When I returned an hour later, he was gone. The completed notes were stacked on his desk. The last one was tear-stained. I got a pack of envelopes and started addressing.
I was stamping them when Tommy came in. “Hey, Mom, can I spend the night at Jamie’s? He said he found this awesome website, Deals on Wheels, and we’re going to look for a car.”
I could have reminded him it was five months to his birthday. But I couldn’t resist his enthusiasm, any more than I could when he was seven and determined to save up his five dollar a week allowance for a Playstation 2. There was a vestige of childhood in that innocent greed.
“Okay,” I said. “Don’t forget to mow the lawn in the morning, before computer camp.”
“Sure, sure, sure,” he replied in what he thought of as parent-soothing voice, but actually sounded like he was strumming his fingernails on a blackboard. “I’ll remember.”
Then he was out the door. That was how I saw him most these days, his lanky figure going out the door. If he could, I thought sadly, he’d spend every night at a friend’s house, making a circuit around the neighborhood and coming home only to do laundry and eat lunch. Over at a friend’s house, no one was going to tell him to answer condolence letters, and there were no pictures or memories of his father.
Maybe, I thought, if I could go spend the night with a friend, I’d feel better too.
I didn’t get my wish, but I got the next best thing. Vince rapped on the backdoor. “Time to walk. We’ve got to make this quick, because I got plans for us.”
On the way up the big hill, he revealed his agenda. “I’ve got to select wines for the Chamber’s annual dinner. How about telling Barb to get some cheese, and we’ll come over and have us a wine tasting?”
So that’s how we spent the evening: Barb and I giddy with liberation from the kids, Vince and Hal freed from the pressure cooker of their downtown offices, all of us sampling Vince’s bottles of wine. We played the Beatles’ greatest hits and danced in our socks on the varnished plank floor. It was great fun, and it was only when I was taking out the trash bag full of wine bottles and stumbled on the step, landing hard on my knee, that I realized, This is how it must have happened.
Horror, and then relief. Yes, it could have happened that way.
I went back into the house and insisted on walking Vince and Hal back to their house, so they wouldn’t stumble and fall into the river, and took Barb’s keys away and told her she was sleeping in the guest room. And I held tight to the rail as I went upstairs to my room, and held tight to the blanket so I didn’t fall off the bed.
Chapter Seven
I’D ALMOST FORGOTTEN what a hangover felt like. It was enough to make me want to forget it again. But after a couple of aspirin and the lightest of breakfasts, I put a clean Band-Aid on my scraped knee, edged pantyhose past the owie, and girded myself for a hard day’s work.
When Will called before lunch, I had to steel myself to take the call. Not that I’m into killing the messenger, but I have to admit my tone might have been a bit cool as I answered.
But he wasn’t thinking about any of that. “Hey, Meggie, what you said about moving the farmhouse. Tell me more about how it works, and how much it costs, and all that.”
The warmth of his voice went a long way towards assuaging my irritation. And I was about to respond in kind, until I glanced at my watch. I hated to cut off a billionaire, but I had to join a future billionaire for his first encounter with the big monster conglomerate that wanted to lock up his videostream technology patents. “I’ve got a meeting. Can I call you later?”
He mumbled something and hung up. Then, after I’d launched Bilbo Videoware on the world, I decided not to hold Will’s bluntness against him. He was an old friend, and he had asked for help. I postponed the phone call to drop into Barb’s client chair and boast. “Guess who I’m about to call. At his request, no less.”
“Hugh Jackman needs his taxes done? David Beckham’s got an audit?”
“Hugh only calls me when he needs hot lovin’. No, the richest guy in town. Will Bowie.”
Barb was the untrusting type. “You’re kidding, right?”
“Nope. Will and I go way back. I knew him when, and all that.”
“And you never told me? Were you lovers? Did you dump him for Don, thinking that Don was a better prospect? Did he start Netmore to prove you chose wrong?”
That’s the problem with imaginative friends. They’re always disappointed with the truth. “No. He and Joe Radowski were our first tenants. It was all a long time ago.” I explained about the good old days, and the farmhouse that symbolized them, and stood up to head back to my own office. “So I guess I’ll give him the name of the company we used to use for house-moves.”
“No, you won’t.”
I stopped with my hand on the doorknob. “What do you mean?”
“Meggie.” She spoke with exaggerated slowness, as if I were too dense to follow normal speech. “We exist to give advice to businesses. But I don’t mean give in the sense of giving it away. We give it in exchange for payment. You keep forgetting that essential fact.”
To tell you the truth, it had never occurred to me to solicit Will’s business. We worked with startups, young geniuses without any money sense. Will was a whole different matter. “Hey, he’s an old friend. I’m not going to take advantage of him just because he’s rich.”
“You’re not taking advantage of him. You’re going to help him. And he needs help. He’s one of those guys who doesn’t know what to do with his money. So he spends all this on some land without any real plan. You made a suggestion. He jumped on it. So follow up.”
“But we do small-business consulting, not real estate development.”
“Which you did for twenty years. This shouldn’t be difficult, with your experience.”
“I don’t know . . .” I felt like Don had gotten real estate development in the divorce settlement. I got the house; he got the business. And he’d gotten Netmore too. And Will.
“This could be just the beginning. We could get into space management. Helping businesses find and maintain offices. Some of our clients are going to need it pretty quick.”
Her enthusiasm was contagious. But if it all rested on my exploiting my acquaintance with Will . . . I knew that’s how business worked, but it wasn’t how I worked. I liked business that walked in the door, or came by referral. “Barb, I just don’t want to.”
“You don’t want to? Have you seen the receivables lately? Half our clients aren’t paying their bills. And I know you think this isn’t that big a deal, because you own your house and your kid will go to college. But it’s a big deal for me. I sank my savings into this business. Our names are on the incorporation papers. And we’re the ones who will fail if the business fails.”
I looked away from her and thought of asking Will for his business. It just wasn’t me. I didn’t even like soliciting donations for the PTO carnival. But Barb was right. I had less at stake, and it wasn’t fair to let her suffer for my wimpiness. “Okay, I’ll try. You’ll have to write me a script though.”
I minored in theater, you see, and
I’m better when I have a script. And that’s what she did. She wrote out a script, complete with vocal intonation—firm, upbeat, smile confident. So I called Will and said if he’d hire my firm, I’d present him with a proposal within two weeks.
“Great idea! How are you going to bill me?”
I was so surprised at his acquiescence I forgot to look at my script. “Oh, by the hour.” I glanced down. Ooops. “For the initial consultation time. Then we’ll give you a bid on the moving and restoration project. And—” I read the rest verbatim. “—if you’re serious about making it into a museum, we can help.” I mean, we had loads of experience founding museums. “You realize the wiring has to be brought up to code.”
“Fine. Add renovating to your bid. I want it to look like it always did, only better.”
I was about to admit I hadn’t stuck around to renovate the houses we moved, but then I held my tongue. Barb was restoring her Victorian and knew every craftsman in town way too well. “And there’s that lawsuit.” I felt that ethically I had to remind him of that.
“I don’t care. I do what I want. And I want to do this. You sure you can manage it?”
I did the firm-upbeat-smile confident-thing. “No problem, Will.”
Between Barb and me, we hammered out the proposal outline that night, and in the morning, called contractors for preliminary bids. I’d finally set the Will Bowie file aside for other work, when he called back. “Hey, Meg, you want to go out sometime?”
“Sure. We can do lunch this week.”
“I don’t mean lunch. Dinner. I mean, going out. You know.”
I didn’t know. Going out has different meanings depending on the context. When Tommy says he’s going out with Jamie, he means they’re riding their bikes to the mall. When he says that Jamie’s going out with Chloe, however, he means that they’re not really dating, but they hang out together at school and maybe make out a little at a party. When Will, whom I’d known for twenty years or more, said he wanted to go out, I figured he meant, well, not riding our bikes to the mall, but getting together somewhere for food and conversation. Harmless food and conversation.
True, it’s not often that billionaires want food and conversation with me. (Okay, okay, I looked Will up in the Forbes 400 issue, and he was just a half-billionaire. Only filthy rich, not obscenely wealthy.) Still, it was only Will, who used to call at midnight complaining about the lack of power, because, even though he was an electrical engineer, he couldn’t change a fuse; Will, who used to invite us to fancy parties and forget to show up himself; Will, who once wrecked a server he’d just built by spilling my potato soup into the circuitry. I liked Will partly because he wasn’t any more intimidating than a mere millionaire.
“Dinner. Sure.” I could shove some food in Tommy and rent him a new video game. “I could make it tonight, if you can. You want to talk about the farmhouse move?”
“Not a business dinner. I’m talking about, you know, a date.”
“A date?” It came out as a squeak. “You and me?”
“Yeah.” He sounded belligerent. “You do go out on dates, don’t you?”
“Well, yeah, I guess.” I’d had a few dates since the divorce, but they were dreary occasions that made me think that feminists had a point with “A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle.” When I found myself with a blow-dried Bill Blass mannequin in a Holiday Inn lounge, I longed for that bicycle. Not to mention the fish. None of the guys called again, to my relief, though I did check my messages in case one wanted a second chance to impress me. I had to wonder if something was wrong with me, since no one ever gave me that chance.
But this was Will. I knew Will. He wasn’t blow-dried. I’m pretty sure he never wore Bill Blass suits. So why did I react as if he’d handed me a bucket and told me that we were going to go dig some worms?
Because I didn’t believe him. I knew whatever errant impulse had led him to this point would dissipate about ten minutes after the date started. “Yeah, I date.” Out of my mouth floated one of those politely dismissive phrases from my favorite Regency romances, the classy Jane Austen style of blowing a man off. “But we wouldn’t suit, Will. Thanks anyway.”
Apparently, Austen wasn’t on Will’s night-table. “What do you mean, we wouldn’t suit?”
My Brave New Self was supposed to be upfront about what a man could expect, and not expect. At the top of the “couldn’t expect” list was a supermodel. “I’m not your usual date. I’m not twenty-five, and even when I was, no one asked me to do a shoot for a lingerie catalog.”
“You’re saying I’m superficial because I date models.”
“Hey, Will, I don’t blame you for wanting long-legged girls with perfect smiles. Most men do. Only natural. Socio-biological imperative, and all that.”
“You think that’s all I’m interested in? Legs?”
This was getting surreal. “All I know is, I don’t want to get into that competing with younger women thing. I just lost that war, and I’m not up for a rematch.”
Will sounded huffy. “What’s funny, Meg, is I’ve been sitting here comparing you to the type you call my type, and you’re winning. Like the other day, when I said come on over, you came. You didn’t say you never get your face on till noon. Or that you never go out with a man who doesn’t make a reservation a week in advance. Or that lunch is fine, but it has to be at the River Club.”
“You were doing me a favor.”
“That’s what I mean. You didn’t expect a chauffeur or a ride in the Lamborghini.”
Now it was getting depressing. “Yeah, Will, low expectations is my new plan.”
“And I felt okay with you.”
“Wow. What a wild, romantic thing to say.”
“I didn’t mean okay. I meant okay. Like you were being real, and I was being real.”
I knew what he meant. It was one of the best feelings you could have sitting up. And no doubt I was a restful companion after his supermodel-wannabes, the ones who would disappear to the ladies’ room after dinner and reappear looking pale and smelling strongly of mouthwash. For a time, perhaps, someone who remembered when the original Star Wars movie came out would intrigue him. We would have lots to talk about, after all: So how old were you when Nixon resigned? Remember when the Berlin Wall fell?
But the novelty of being the same age would wear off, and he’d be with, well, someone the same age, which was not what a man in midlife crisis wants. You’re OLD! That must mean I’M old!
I was not going to set myself up for that inevitable crash. “Will, that’s a friendship feeling. As soon as you go on a date, you stop being friends.”
“Is that a rule or something?”
“No, but it’s what happens. Everything gets awkward and self-conscious.”
“So if you don’t want to call it a date, let’s say I just want to get together. That’s my premise. You set the parameters.”
He was pursuing me. And it felt good. Too good. I could feel it starting again, that glow of being wanted. I am wanted; therefore I am. I felt the tug of it, that gratification spreading over me like a girlish blush, the exhilaration of almost-being. And I wasn’t even sure I wanted Will. That was the best part of being wanted. It felt so much better than wanting.
But there was danger there, too. If I judged who I was by who wanted me, then someday, probably soon, I wouldn’t be. He’d stop wanting me, and I’d be the me he didn’t want. And then I’d be back where I was last year. Empty, unwanted, unknown.
Invisible.
I couldn’t explain this. It was too entangled with my trite little history, and the last thing I wanted to talk about. “Look, Will, I’m making it a policy to avoid getting into situations where I end up feeling bad for being me. It’s one of those post-divorce resolutions.”
“So maybe I won’t make you feel that way. Ever think
of that?”
“No. I mean, here we are, just talking on the phone, and I’m remembering that the burger I had for lunch has already shown up on my hips. And I’m figuring my hair is a mess, and before you called, I didn’t care. Now all that’s back on my list of things to worry about.”
“I don’t care about what you had for lunch. And your hair looks fine to me.”
I smiled unwillingly. “You can’t even see me.”
“Sure I can. It’s our new secret surveillance technology. The FCC doesn’t know about it yet.”
“Very funny.” He was funny. He entertained me. So why not go out with him?
Because it wouldn’t last. And my self-esteem would get another body slam, just when I’d managed to lumber back onto my feet. I didn’t want to expose more of my insecurities, so I said, “We’ll be doing business together, and it’ll be weird if there’s a personal relationship.”
“Not on my side. I want you to manage the farmhouse move, and that won’t change, even if you break my ’lil heart. So don’t let that be an excuse.” Then, triumphantly, he added, “I know. It’s because of Don. You’re holding it against me that I said he’d jumped.”
That stopped me. Maybe he was right. Maybe I was turning down the best bar-none date prospect I’d ever had because of that stupid obsession with my late ex. Maybe this was more of the past strangling the future. Maybe I should reach out and grab this opportunity.
No. Dating was for teenagers. It wasn’t a rational activity for rational adults.
And besides, I liked Will. But if I really liked him, if he thrilled me to my toes, would I be worrying about business considerations? No, I’d be picking out cozy bed-and-breakfasts for our romantic getaway. Whatever constituted the rational activities of rational adults would be irrelevant. And Will, genial as he was, wasn’t making me feel the least bit irrational.
Until Death Page 10
