The Opposite of Me

by Sarah Pekkanen

  “The wife’s on the other side of the table,” Matt said. “She can’t see what’s going on under the table. Plus, she’s looking into her hand mirror.”

  “Oh, shit,” I said. I covered my eyes with my hand and sank deeper into my chair. “Fenstermaker’s wife is doing their pilot; I read about it on ‘Page Six’ when I was researching them. It was supposed to be a blind item, but it was obvious. Fuckity, fuckity, fuckity.”

  “Fuckity?” Matt said. “Seriously?”

  I leapt up again and started to pace while I shot questions at Matt like he was on the witness stand.

  “How does Fenstermaker look?” I asked.

  “He doesn’t look unhappy, let’s put it like that,” Matt said diplomatically.

  “What’s the wife doing now?”

  “Eating a grape,” Matt said. “One grape. Actually she hasn’t eaten it yet. She’s examining it like it’s a diamond.”

  “Look up from the grape!” I willed Mrs. Fenstermaker the message.

  Matt snorted, and I glared at him.

  “Sorry,” he said.

  “This is so unprofessional,” I hissed. “So . . . so . . .”

  “So Cheryl,” Matt finished for me.

  My headache was back with a vengeance; I should’ve known Cheryl would’ve fought dirty. A few years after I came to Richards, Dunne & Krantz, when she and I were competing for a dishwashing liquid account, we went to Kentucky to do focus groups with stay-at-home moms. My campaign focused on speed—moms were too busy these days to scrub pots and pans, so our soap would get the job done in half the time. Cheryl went for a “same great product, new look” approach by redesigning the bottle. We sat there together, chatting up four different groups of moms, writing down their comments and thoughts and recommendations, and it was clear my campaign was the winner. Except when we got back to New York, hers was the one the client chose. I chalked it up to bad luck. Maybe the client had a thing for phallic-shaped bottles. Maybe he liked the new bigger, firmer bottle because of something missing in his own life (again, no bitterness).

  Then, six months after the campaign aired, I learned Cheryl had switched the group’s comments before submitting them to the client. It wasn’t anything I could prove, just a whispered accusation from Cheryl’s assistant as she left for a new job.

  “She’s bending over in front of Fenstermaker,” Matt said. “I think she’s pretending to drop something.”

  “What’s Fenstermaker doing?” I asked.

  “Watching her pick it up,” Matt said. “Either that or putting a dollar in her G-string.”

  “She’s so pathetic,” I sputtered. “She’s actually a very smart woman. She does good work. Why does she always pull this crap?”

  “Because she’s Cheryl,” Matt said. “Hey, she must be wrapping up. Mason just stood up.”

  “What’s Fenstermaker doing?” I asked.

  “He’s getting up, too,” Mason said. “Whoops—he’s following Cheryl into the bathroom for a quickie.”

  “What?” I squealed.

  “Kidding,” Matt said. “He just shook Mason’s hand and they’re all heading for the elevator. Hang on a sec. I’ll go take a walk past them and eavesdrop.”

  Matt stepped out of his office while I let out all the air in my lungs with a whoosh and dropped back into my seat. I felt as weak and dizzy as if I’d run a marathon. Had I eaten dinner last night? No, I remembered, unless you counted the frozen burrito I’d microwaved when I finally stumbled home. It had tasted like the cardboard tray it came with so I’d tossed it in the trash after one bite and gobbled down enough Cherry Garcia to hit the food pyramid’s recommended fruit allowance for the day. I needed to pick up some vitamins. Maalox, too; my stomach felt like someone was twisting it in knots and setting it on fire. It was probably the ulcers my doctor had warned me were in my future. By now it felt like I had a family of ulcers living in my stomach, who were all biting their nails.

  What the hell could be going on in the hallway, anyway? Had Fenstermaker made a decision yet? I twisted around and peered out Matt’s door just as he walked back in.

  “No verdict,” Matt reported. “But I heard Fenstermaker tell Mason he’d call soon.”

  “Soon?” I demanded. “In an hour? Next week? Next month? What the hell does soon mean?”

  “Lindsey, knock it off,” Matt said. “I told you, no matter what happens today, it’s in the bag.”

  “You’re just saying that because you’re my shrink,” I said, but I couldn’t help smiling.

  I stood up from my chair slowly, every bone in my body suddenly aching. It had to be postpresentation letdown; I couldn’t be getting sick. At 6:00 a.m. tomorrow I was flying to Seattle to lead focus groups for a brand of sneakers whose sales were inexplicably lagging in the West. I needed to identify the problem and restructure the campaign quickly, before we blew any more money on our old ads. From there I was flying directly to Tokyo for thirty-six hours to oversee the shooting of a cologne commercial featuring a B-list celebrity. It was going to be a nightmare; like most washed-up former sitcom actors, he gobbled Ativan like popcorn, so I’d have to babysit him during the entire shoot. In between all this, assuming I won the Gloss account, I’d need to finalize details for our TV and magazine shoots and buy ad space and oversee the production.

  “I’ve got a ton of work,” I told Matt. “I’d better get back to my office.”

  “Hey, Linds?” Matt said.

  I turned around.

  “You never answered my question.”

  “Can we talk about it later?” I said, massaging my neck again.

  By now I couldn’t even remember what Matt’s question was. There was so much to do before tonight, which was good. I needed the distraction so I didn’t go crazy worrying about the announcement. Dozens of emails were waiting for me to sift through on my computer, plus I needed to review the point-of-sale displays and store promotion samples my team had put together for a new line of wine coolers and make sure we were on the same page as the client, who made Donald Trump look calm and humble.

  I’d already proposed five different campaigns, all of which the wine cooler mogul had impatiently shaken his head at while he shouted into the cell phone that was permanently affixed to the side of his face, “I don’t give a shit how expensive it is to harvest grapes! Tell him if he raises the price again I’ll harvest his fucking nuts!”

  I needed to light a fire under my team so we’d come up with something spectacular to appease him. I also had to ask Donna to book my flights. I made a mental note to remind her not to put me on a red-eye; the flight attendants always turned off the lights, and it was impossible to get anything done. Didn’t they realize the cocoon of an airplane was the best place for uninterrupted work? Oh, plus I had to shake some sense into Oprah, stat.

  I’d wanted so much to seal up the Gloss account before tonight’s announcement, but I had to be patient. No matter what Matt and everyone else said, I wouldn’t feel confident I’d won the promotion until I heard Mason announce my name. Not knowing whether I’d won was a loose end.

  Loose ends made me nervous.

  Skipping a Beat

  What would you do if your husband suddenly wanted to rewrite the rules of your relationship?

  Julia and Michael meet in high school in their small, poverty-stricken West Virginia hometown. Now thirty-somethings, they are living a rarefied life in their multimillion-dollar Washington, D.C., home. But one day Michael stands up at the head of the table in his company’s boardroom—then silently crashes to the floor. Though a portable defibrillator manages to jump-start his heart, what happened to Michael during those lost minutes forever changes him. Money has become meaningless to him—and he wants to give all of theirs away to charity. Julia is now faced with a choice: does she walk away from the man whom she once adored but who, to tell the truth, had became a stranger to her long before his near-death experience—or does she give in to her husband’s pleas for a second chance and the promise of a
poorer but happier life?

  Read on for a look at Sarah Pekkanen’s

  Skipping a Beat

  Currently available from Washington Square Press

  Excerpt from Skipping a Beat copyright © 2011 by Sarah Pekkanen

  1

  WHEN MY HUSBAND, Michael, died for the first time, I was walking across a freshly waxed marble floor in three-inch Stuart Weitzman heels, balancing a tray of cupcakes in my shaking hands.

  Shaking because I’d overdosed on sugar—someone had to heroically step up and taste-test the cupcakes, after all—and not because I was worried about slipping and dropping the tray, even though these weren’t your run-of-the-mill Betty Crockers. These were molten chocolate and cayenne-pepper masterpieces, and each one was topped with a name scripted in edible gold leaf.

  Decadent cupcakes as place cards for the round tables encircling the ballroom—it was the kind of touch that kept me in brisk business as a party planner. Tonight, we’d raise half a million for the Washington, D.C., Opera Company. Maybe more, if the waiters kept topping off those wine and champagne glasses like I’d instructed them.

  “Julia!”

  I carefully set down the tray, then spun around to see the fretful face of the assistant florist who’d called my name.

  “The caterer wants to lower our centerpieces,” he wailed, agony practically oozing from his pores. I didn’t blame him. His boss, the head florist—a gruff little woman with more than a hint of a mustache—secretly scared me, too.

  “No one touches the flowers,” I said, trying to sound as tough as Clint Eastwood would, should he ever become ensconced in a brawl over the proper length of calla lilies.

  My cell phone rang and I reached for it, absently glancing at the caller ID. It was my husband, Michael. He’d texted me earlier to announce he was going on a business trip and would miss the birthday dinner my best friend was throwing for me later in the month. If Michael had a long-term mistress, it might be easier to compete, but his company gyrated and beckoned in his mind more enticingly than any strategically oiled Victoria’s Secret model. I’d long ago resigned myself to the fact that work had replaced me as Michael’s true love. I ignored the call and dropped the phone back into my pocket.

  Later, of course, I’d realize it wasn’t Michael phoning but his personal assistant, Kate. By then, my husband had stood up from the head of the table in his company’s boardroom, opened his mouth to speak, and crashed to the carpeted floor. All in the same amount of time it took me to walk across a ballroom floor just a few miles away.

  The assistant florist raced off and was instantly replaced by a white-haired, grandfatherly looking security guard from the Little Jewelry Box.

  “Miss?” he said politely.

  I silently thanked my oxygen facials and caramel highlights for his decision not to call me ma’am. I was about to turn thirty-five, which meant I wouldn’t be able to hide from the liver-spotted hands of ma’am-dom forever, but I’d valiantly dodge their bony grasp for as long as possible.

  “Where would you like these?” the guard asked, indicating the dozen or so rectangular boxes he was carrying on a tray draped in black velvet. The boxes were wrapped in a shade of silver that exactly matched the gun nestled against his ample hip.

  “On the display table just inside the front door, please,” I instructed him. “People need to see them as soon as they walk in.” People would bid tens of thousands of dollars to win a surprise bauble, if only to show everyone else that they could. The guard was probably a retired policeman, trying to earn money to supplement his pension, and I knew he’d been ordered to keep those boxes in his sight all night long.

  “Can I get you anything? Maybe some coffee?” I offered.

  “Better not,” he said with a wry smile. The poor guy probably wasn’t drinking anything because the jewelry store wouldn’t even let him take a bathroom break. I made a mental note to pack up a few dinners for him to bring home.

  My BlackBerry vibrated just as I began placing the cupcakes around the head table and mentally debating the sticky problem of the video game guru who looked and acted like a thirteen-year-old overdue for his next dose of Ritalin. I’d sandwich him between a female U.S. senator and a co-owner of the Washington Blazes professional basketball team, I decided. They were both tall; they could talk over the techie’s head.

  At that moment, a dozen executives were leaping up from their leather chairs to cluster around Michael’s limp body. They were all shouting at each other to call 911—this crowd was used to giving orders, not taking them—and demanding that someone perform CPR.

  As I stood in the middle of the ballroom, smoothing out a crease on a white linen napkin and inhaling the sweet scent of lilies, the worst news I could possibly imagine was being delivered by a baby-faced representative from the D.C. Opera Company.

  “Melanie has a sore throat,” he announced somberly.

  I sank into a chair with a sigh and wiggled my tired feet out of my shoes. Perfect. Melanie was the star soprano who was scheduled to sing a selection from Orfeo ed Euridice tonight. If those overflowing wineglasses didn’t get checkbooks whipped out of pockets, Melanie’s soaring, lyrical voice definitely would. I desperately needed Melanie tonight.

  “Where is she?” I demanded.

  “In a room at the Mayflower Hotel,” the opera rep said.

  “Oh, crap! Who booked her a room?”

  “Um . . . me,” he said. “Is that a prob—”

  “Get her a suite,” I interrupted. “The biggest one they have.”

  “Why?” he asked, his snub nose wrinkling in confusion. “How will that help her get better?”

  “What was your name again?” I asked.

  “Patrick Riley.”

  Figures; put a four-leaf clover in his lapel and he could’ve been the poster boy for Welcome to Ireland!

  “And Patrick, how long have you been working for the opera company?” I asked gently.

  “Three weeks,” he admitted.

  “Just trust me on this.” Melanie required drama the way the rest of us needed water. If I hydrated her with a big scene now, Melanie might miraculously rally and forgo a big scene tonight.

  “Send over a warm-mist humidifier,” I continued as Patrick whipped out a notebook and scribbled away, diligent as a cub reporter chasing his big break. “No, two! Get her lozenges, chamomile tea with honey, whatever you can think of. Buy out CVS. If Melanie wants a lymphatic massage, have the hotel concierge arrange it immediately. Here—” I pulled out my BlackBerry and scrolled down to the name of my private doctor. “Call Dr. Rushman. If he can’t make it over there, have him send someone who can.”

  Dr. Rushman would make it, I was sure. He’d drop whatever he was doing if he knew I needed him. He was the personal physician for the Washington Blazes basketball team.

  My husband, Michael, was another one of the team’s co-owners.

  “Got it,” Patrick said. He glanced down at my feet, turned bright red, and scampered away. Must’ve been my toe cleavage; it tends to have that effect on men.

  I finished placing the final cupcake before checking my messages. By the time I read the frantic e-mails from Kate, who was trying to find out if Michael had any recently diagnosed illnesses like epilepsy or diabetes that we’d been keeping secret, it was already over.

  While Armani-clad executives clustered around my husband, Bob the mail-room guy took one look at the scene and sped down the hallway, white envelopes scattering like confetti behind him. He sprinted to the receptionist’s desk and found the portable defibrillator my husband’s company had purchased just six months earlier. Then he raced back, ripped open Michael’s shirt, put his ear to Michael’s chest to confirm that my husband’s heart had stopped beating, and applied the sticky patches to Michael’s chest. “Analyzing . . . ,” said the machine’s electronic voice. “Shock advisable.”

  The Italian opera Orfeo ed Euridice is a love story. In it, Euridice dies and her grieving husband travels to the Unde
rworld to try to bring her back to life. Melanie the soprano was scheduled to sing the heartbreaking aria that comes as Euridice is suspended between the twin worlds of Death and Life.

  Maybe it shouldn’t have surprised me that Euridice’s aria was playing in my head as Bob the mail-room guy bent over my husband’s body, shocking Michael’s heart until it finally began beating again. Because sometimes, it seems to me as if all of the big moments in my life can be traced back to the gorgeous, timeworn stories of opera.

  Four minutes and eight seconds. That’s how long my husband, Michael Dunhill, was dead.

  Four minutes and eight seconds. That’s how long it took for my husband to become a complete stranger to me.

  2

  MICHAEL AND I probably wouldn’t ever have fallen in love if it hadn’t been for a violent man who’d just been released from prison, a little girl in a wheelchair, and the fact that Michael was constantly—almost savagely—hungry.

  As a teenager, Michael could wolf down a gallon of ice cream like a pre-dinner hors d’oeuvre, and his slim-cut Lee jeans still bagged around his waist. I know a lot of women in D.C. who’d trade their summer homes for a chance to revel in that spectacular metabolism.

  I’d always known who Michael was, of course. In the small town in West Virginia where we both grew up, it was impossible for anyone to be a stranger. By the way, my husband and I aren’t first cousins, and we’ve both got full sets of teeth. I’ve heard all the West Virginia jokes by now, but I still toss back my head and laugh harder than anyone else at them. If I don’t, people think I’m grumpy and a hick, even if I’m draped from head to toe in Chanel and I’ve just had my eyebrows professionally shaped. Which I now do, every three weeks, even though I can’t believe I’m spending as much to bully a few hairs into submission as my mother used to for an entire year’s worth of perms and trims at Brenda’s Cut and Curl.