The Thin Pink Line

by Lauren Baratz-Logsted

  “Yes,” said Christopher, coming to stand beside us like a minister presiding over a kissing bride and groom. “Tell me, too. What is it you see in her?”

  “I see someone who’s spent most of her life looking for love in spectacularly wrong places,” David said.

  “Perhaps,” said Christopher, “but she’s not very nice to the women she works with, she’s not very nice to her family, and she wasn’t very nice to Trevor.”

  “So?” David shrugged, looking at me, not Christopher. “Did any of them give her reason to be nice?”

  “Well, Dodo,” I conceded.

  “Yes, there is Dodo,” said David, “but I’d say you’ve returned her kindnesses in some way.”

  “Maybe,” I said.

  “Is there anything else you see in her?” Christopher prompted.

  “Yes,” said David. “I see a woman who is more lively and alive than any woman I’ve ever known, flaws and all.”

  “Oh. Well.” Christopher threw his hands up. “You should have explained that all to me sooner. Christ, I’d have loved her, too.”

  “You’re not going to believe this!” Dodo crowed a few days later.

  “Believe what?” I asked, tossing down in mild exasperation some line edits that I hadn’t really wanted to do anyway as Dodo sailed into my office.

  She waved an e-mail printout at me. “It’s from Mona Shakespeare! And you’ll never guess—what I’m holding in my hand explains why she’s been refusing to come to us all these months, no matter how we’ve tried to tempt her!”

  “Well? Are you actually going to tell me?”

  “She’s a bleeding agoraphobic! The reason why our newest whiz kid can’t come to us is because she can’t even make it as far as her own mailbox!”

  Suddenly, the pieces all snapped into place, like the fact that an American had refused an all-expenses-paid open-ended stay at the Connaught and the fact that every communication we’d ever received from Mona Shakespeare, everything, including her 252-page manuscript, had come in the form of an e-mail or a file attached to an e-mail.

  “So what are you going to do about it?” I asked. “After all, you’ve been saying all along that you think the book is a surefire bestseller, but only with some serious hands-on editing, the kind that was given to that Cold Mountain book several years ago. Come to think of it, though, I do seem to remember reading an article in their Times that said that the editing job on that was also done long-distance.”

  “Oh, you know me, Jane. I can never do anything long-distance, no matter if other people have done it with phenomenal success before. No. You know I’m only happy editing if I can be practically peering right over the author’s shoulder while he or she tries to follow my suggestions.”

  “True. So the question remains, if she won’t—or, I guess in all fairness to modern definitions of psychiatric illness, I should say, can’t—come to us, what can you possibly do?”

  That’s when she waved two Virgin Airways tickets in the air, all excitement. Without even being close enough to read the printing on them, I could guess that they were two round-trip tickets to New York.

  I leapt out of my leather swivel chair, oblivious of the way my eight-month belly jumped as I did so. “You can’t be serious!” It was my turn to crow, as I began to do the girl-jumping-on-a-trampoline routine that I’d learned from the girls in the office. “I’ve always wanted to go to New York! I can’t believe this!” I stopped jumping, grabbing on to Dodo’s elbows. “And what I really can’t believe is that someone would be foolish enough to allow herself to become agoraphobic in New York City of all places. What the hell’s the matter with Mona Shakespeare? Is she nuts? Oh, well, it doesn’t matter. Not so long as it serves as an excuse to finally get me there!” Seeing the startled look on Dodo’s face, I immediately sobered up. “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “While it’s true that I’m going to New York next month, you’re not going with me.” She said it as gently as possible. “You can’t go. Your pregnancy’s too far along and I’m sure that even Madame Zanzibar wouldn’t let you fly on an airplane at this point. What would happen if you found yourself at 35,000 feet, somewhere over the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, and suddenly you went into labor?”

  “I’d hold it in until we touched down on the other side!” I cried desperately.

  “That’s not good enough. You might not have as much control over it as you’d like to think. After all, if women could control the onset and duration of their labor, don’t you think that the vast majority of them would opt for about thirty seconds on a rainy Sunday afternoon?”

  “Well, I can control it!” I shouted, ignoring the obvious truth contained in her rhetorical question. “You’d be bloody surprised how much I can control about this pregnancy and delivery!”

  “Yes, I’m sure I would, Jane. You’ve always been one of the most self-determined women I know. Nevertheless, if you went into labor over the Atlantic and if even you couldn’t do anything to control it, what would you do if it turned out that there was no one on the plane equipped to deliver a baby?”

  “I’d deliver it myself!” It was so much a day for exclamation points. “I’d do it myself in the bloody aisle if I had to!”

  “Yes, and I’m sure the rest of the passengers would find that just a treat. No, I’m sorry, Jane. I’m afraid it’s out of the question. Even if you’re willing to risk the health of yourself and the baby, I’m not.” She delicately pried away my fingers, the ones that had been gripping her elbows too tightly. “Besides, I’ve already asked Constance to accompany me and she’s been kind enough to accept.”

  “Constance? That little troll? The tiny little thing with all the different shades of retina to match each outfit, the one we always want to send for coffee, if only we can find her at her bloody desk?”

  “I think you must mean the lens,” said literal Dodo. “The retina is something else entirely. As a matter of fact, I would think that the reason they are called contact lenses in the first place is because—”

  I windmilled my arms in exasperation. “Do I look like I want a bloody science lesson?” Then I let my arms drop in sheer exhaustion. “Why, Dodo, why Constance of all people?”

  Dodo studied her perfectly practical nails as opposed to looking at me. “It may have escaped your notice, Jane, you being so preoccupied with other things, but our Constance has been improving lately. She’s been showing real get-up-and-go.”

  Our Constance? “Fine.” I folded my arms. “Then she can just go if she’s getting so good at it.”

  Dodo chose to ignore me. “And I’ve even taken the liberty of approaching Dexter Schlager about it. He agrees with me, and so, at the next editorial meeting, we’ll be announcing her as my new Assistant Editor.”

  “But I’m your Assistant Editor!”

  “Yes. I know that. But once the baby comes, even though you haven’t committed to an exact time frame yet, I know you’re going to want to take some time off. Of course we’ll keep your job open for you here indefinitely, but while you’re gone I’ll still need someone who can do the things for me that you do so well. And, here’s the good part—” and now it was her excitedly grabbing onto my arm “—Dexter Schlager was having such a good hair day when I spoke with him about it—you know, one of those days where he doesn’t notice that he hasn’t got any—that he also agreed to make you a full Editor upon your return from maternity leave! Well? What do you think? We’ll practically be on equal footing!”

  I sank back down into my chair. What I thought was that this would have been one of my wildest dreams come true, if only I could be around in a few months’ time, or whenever my “maternity leave” was over with, to enjoy it. What I thought was that Constance, who would never be my Constance, was getting to go on the trip that should by all rights have been mine. And now, instead of getting to go, I’d have to spend a large part of my last weeks at Churchill & Stewart training someone I kind of loathed to do a job I kind of loved.

 
Some lifetimes, it just didn’t pay to try to out-trick the world.

  Oh, well, I tried to tell myself as I sucked on my sour grapes, once The Cloth Baby was published and it became a huge international bestseller, translated into more languages than Jean Auel or Karl Marx, I’d be able to afford to hop over to the Big Apple any time I chose. Why, by that time, I probably wouldn’t even care about working as an editor anymore.

  I had decided to drown my sorrows, over not being able to go to New York to meet with an author whom I alone had discovered, with tea at the Ritz Palm Court. Of course it was an impossibly touristy and expensive thing to do—17 pounds, 50p for a snooty waiter, china-cupped tea and an assortment of teeny sandwiches, scones with jam and Devonshire cream, and minuscule pastries that proved better on sight than on tongue—but it was something I had never done before. Sure I had lived in London or its vicinity for my entire life, but like the New Yorker who never bothers to go up in the Statue of Liberty, I’d never been to a lot of places that tourists would be sure to visit if they knew that they were only going to be in London for one week.

  I don’t know what I’d expected from the Ritz, but I certainly hadn’t expected a maitre d’ asking me if I had a reservation.

  “Reservation? No, of course I don’t. I just want a cuppa.”

  “A cuppa?” Clearly we were each having our share of problems understanding the other’s Queen’s English. “No, I’m sorry, madam, but the Ritz is very popular and it is customary to reserve far in advance.”

  “Oh. Fine.” I was exasperated. “I’ll just go to, oh, I don’t know, Claridge’s, I suppose.” I’d never been in Claridge’s either. “They’re always happy to serve me.”

  I moved to step away and let the next person in line be abused by Mr. Surly.

  I guess it’s possible that, before that moment, the little podium that served as the maitre d’s station might have blocked my eight-month belly, because suddenly his attitude lightened. “Madam, are you expecting a baby soon?”

  “Well,” I said, vaguely insulted, patting my protruding belly, which that day was sporting a navy-blue jumper with a decorative red anchor on the front to enhance the nautical theme, “this isn’t exactly a pile of wadded cloth I’ve got under here.”

  I moved to go again, but now he came around the podium, delicately taking me by the arm.

  “But, madam, why didn’t you say something before?”

  “Well, it’s not as though I begin every conversation by saying things like, ‘I’m pregnant, which table would you like me to sit at’ or ‘I’m pregnant, do you carry olives without the pimientos’ or—”

  “Yes, I can appreciate that—” he was leading me to a table now “—but still, had I but known, well, I know how important it is for that unborn baby of yours to get all of the food he or she wants. Oh, I just love babies!” He held a seat out for me, pushing me in so close to the table that my belly became completely tucked underneath, my breasts practically resting on the table itself as though displayed on a ledge. “I’ll send Henri over right away with a trolley of our best delicacies. Now, mind you, don’t forget—” and here he wagged his finger in my face “—you’re not to select any of the teas that have caffeine. Caffeine is very bad for the baby.”

  I think I liked him better when he was Mr. Surly.

  So, no, I hadn’t expected to be attacked for not having made a reservation, but I had expected the marble steps, impressive columns and baroque fountain, all of which I’d seen before on film and none of which was disappointing when viewed up close and in person.

  But there was to be a second thing I hadn’t expected, one that made its presence felt when I was halfway through my first cup of decaffeinated tea and my scone, slathered with jam and clotted cream.

  “Jane?” a voice asked from my side. “Jane Taylor? Is that you?”

  Even though I hadn’t heard it since I’d told him I wouldn’t marry him a couple of months before, I’d have known that voice anywhere.

  “Tolkien!”

  He looked perfect. He looked absolutely the same.

  In my overwhelming excitement at seeing him again, I practically leapt in my seat. This action, in turn, caused me to spill some of the tea in the cup I was still holding onto my jumper, which action, in its turn, caused me to make another chair-leaping action, only this time backward. With this smooth move, I succeeded in revealing my eight-month belly and dripping some of the jam from my scone onto my jumper, all in one go.

  Tolkien, ever the gentleman, was in the process of helping me wipe the jam off of my anchor decoration, all the while saying, “You know, Jane, I can’t tell you how often I’ve thought of calling you these past few months. Every day I look at that phone…” when suddenly he noticed what he was dabbing at. “Good God, Jane. Are you pregnant?”

  I giggled nervously, giving the same answer that I’d given to the maitre d’, the one about me not having a pile of wadded-up cloth under my jumper.

  “But what are you doing here,” I asked, “at the Ritz?”

  “Oh that.” He waved off my question, still stunned at my appearance, and sank into the chair beside me. “I’m doing some undercover surveillance work. They’ve got a pasha who’s been staying here forever and who they’ve become convinced is robbing them blind in silverware. Guess even the Ritz has to think about cutting down on the overhead at some point.”

  “My, how interesting,” I genuinely enthused. “Will you be wearing one of your undercover getups like the one you had on the night I first met you?”

  “Never mind that, Jane.” He sounded a trifle exasperated. “This,” he gestured towards my belly, both palms up, “this baby, you’ve got in there—is it by any chance… mine?”

  I couldn’t be sure, but I thought the wondering look on his face was one of hope.

  “Good God, no! I mean,” I added more gently, covering one of his hands with mine, having seen the crestfallen expression overtake his face, “how could it be? Think about the last time we were together and do the math. If this were your baby, and I was already this big after just something like two or three months, then by the time our baby was born I’d be a shoo-in at Ripley’s.” Of course, I realized then that if I didn’t come up with any further explaining, what I’d just said wouldn’t make much sense either, given my present size. “You see, some women don’t begin to show until fairly late into their pregnancies, so that when we last saw each other even though I was five months along—” which was just a one-month-off lie from what I’d been telling everyone else, but he’d have never believed me if I told him that I’d been six months along the last time we were together “—I hadn’t started to show yet, but then when I did, well, as you can see I pretty quickly made up for all that lost time.”

  But he wasn’t paying any attention to the last part of what I was saying anyhow. “Of course you’re right. I see that now. I mean, not that I think you look inordinately big or anything—as a matter of fact, I don’t think you’ve ever looked more fantastic—it’s just that I see now what you mean about it not being possible for your baby to be mine.” He studied me closely. “Was that it, Jane? Was that why you wouldn’t say yes when I asked you to marry me?”

  Oh, how I wished now that I’d answered him differently before. Now all I could think of to say was, “Well, I couldn’t very well say yes, now, could I? Not knowing what I knew and you didn’t. How could I possibly say yes to your question when you were asking your question without full possession of all the facts?”

  “Oh, Jane. You still have the power to utterly confuse me. I still don’t understand why you behaved as you did. Did you think that if you’d told me that you were pregnant with another man’s child from before you even met me, did you think I’d run out on you, that I’d love you or your child any the less?”

  I could see by the look on his face that would never have been the case. I swallowed hard.

  “Did you mean what you said before,” I asked, “about thinking to call me every day si
nce last we met?”

  “Yes, Jane.” He ran his fingers roughly through his hair. “I think about you all the time. I think about you every day. I think about you when I’m dreaming at night.” He sighed. “I think about you when I don’t even know that I’m thinking about you.”

  God. How much I had lost. How much I had allowed to just walk away.

  But what was there that I could do about it now? If I whipped the cloth baby out from around my belly, shouting, “See! It’s okay now! I was just having the world on,” would it make things any better? Would he still want to marry me if he knew that I was something of a pathological liar, perhaps not dangerous like one of those serial-killer types they manufactured over in America, but capable of dreaming up a whopper of a lie to tell my family and friends just so that I could: first, trap a man; second, get what I thought of as my fair share of TLC; and third, sell a universal bestseller based on my experiences as a wacko? Would he consider it a mitigating circumstance at all, that I had at least been unable to bring myself to say I’d lost the baby when the fake baby became no longer convenient for me?

  I just couldn’t see it.

  Arguably, Tolkien Donald was the best man who had ever lived—he was certainly the best man I had ever met—but I just couldn’t picture him shrugging off the stream of lies I’d trailed behind myself these past several months.

  And so I did the worst thing I’d ever done in my life for the second time: I let him go again.

  Oh sure we talked for a while longer, making small talk about my job, his job, how the holiday season seemed to pop up closer in one’s face each year older one got. But when the chance had been there to say, “I made a mistake, I should have believed in you enough to give you the truth,” I hadn’t taken advantage of it and then that window had closed and the rest was just pain for both of us.

  At one point, he did say, “You haven’t said anything about the father’s involvement in all of this, whether he’s planning to be involved or not or even knows, but I remember that you’d just broken up with some bounder when we first met. Anyway, what I want to say is that if you ever need anything at all, anything that you think would be best for a man to provide or anything that you just need a friend to do for you…”