Final Exam

by Maggie Barbieri

  I put my hands on the steering wheel, lost in thought. “Anything else?”

  “That’s it.” She dug into her purse and pulled out a lipstick, which she reapplied perfectly without looking in the mirror. “Oh, there was one more thing.”

  I waited but she seemed to have lost her train of thought. “Yes?”

  “The kid had a cut on his head. He had those Band-Aids that you put over stitches. I don’t know what they’re called.”

  “Steri-strips?” Teaching in a college with a large nursing program had its advantages. One of them was being able to name every Band-Aid appropriately.

  “I guess. He said he was in a minor fender bender.”

  “Did you believe him?”

  She shrugged. “Do I care? No,” she said emphatically. “Can we get the hell out of here before I get diarrhea from the stress? I’m getting too old for this.”

  I started the car and began to pull out of the parking lot. I stopped at the exit, looking for an opportunity to merge into the flow of traffic, but since we had arrived, the number of cars had picked up and I didn’t see a safe way to get in. I sat and stared at T&G. “Is Nicholas handsome?” I asked, more out of curiosity than anything else. I was fascinated by serial wedders and anyone who had more than three marriages certainly fit the bill.

  “Sure, if you like muscley, swarthy, Don Juan types with a roving eye.”

  That didn’t tell me anything but I didn’t push it because my attention was diverted by the front door of the limo company opening and Brandon exiting with his father. “That him?” I asked. Brandon was chatting amiably with his father, whom Max had described to a T. She had left out the best part of the description, though, and that was what appeared to be the extremely dapper pin-striped suit he was wearing. I could see the high gloss of his Italian leather shoes from where I sat, too. “You didn’t mention the metrosexual quality,” I said, pointing across the street. I drove into the intersection and managed to find an opening in which to insert the car. I took one last glance across the street, and found myself staring back at Brandon, who did a quick double take as I drove by.

  “Shit,” I muttered.

  “What?”

  “I think we were made,” I said, looking in the rearview mirror.

  “Made what?”

  Brandon was staring after the car as I inched forward toward a light that seemed to change from red to green and back again in the space of ten seconds. After about a minute, plenty of time for him to memorize my plate number, I drove through the intersection and into the night, hoping that the sight of my car—with its New York license plate—didn’t arouse his suspicion and that in the dark, he couldn’t tell that it was me driving the car.

  These sorts of capers always left me extremely paranoid.

  Max snorted, knowing exactly what I was thinking. “There is no way he could tell that that was you.”

  “A narrow, two-lane road separated us from the building. There is definitely a way he could see us.”

  Max considered this but changed the subject, as she is wont to do when she doesn’t want to deal with reality. “We should eat,” she said. “I’m starving.” She looked out the window. “There! There’s a diner.”

  I made a quick right turn into a diner not a mile from T&G. It occurred to me that we should go farther out of town if we were going to eat, but my growling stomach said otherwise. Hunger always trumped caution in situations like this. I unfortunately had to park right in front as all of the other spots were taken; I had wanted to put the car in the back so that it wouldn’t be visible from the street.

  We entered the diner and got a booth in the back. Max opened the menu even though she probably could have recited the entire culinary repertoire to me by heart; Max is a diner aficionado, having eaten at the one by school every Friday (fish night in the dining hall) and Sunday morning (they didn’t serve her favorite breakfast food—hamburgers) the entire time we were at St. Thomas.

  “Why do you even have to look at the menu?” I asked, taking a sip of warm water from the short glass in front of me, still hot from the dishwasher.

  “I have to see if something speaks to me,” she said dramatically. “And right now, the meat-loaf dinner is telling me that I need to eat it right now.”

  Our waitress approached the table and asked for our order. Max did order the meat loaf and a glass of cabernet; I was interested to hear her reaction to the diner’s house wine. I ordered a cheeseburger and a chocolate shake. Max gave me a look after the waitress walked away.

  “A chocolate shake?”

  “Yes,” I said. “And your point is?”

  She looked away. “Nothing. No point.”

  This wasn’t about a cheeseburger and the tension between us had ratcheted up a notch now that we weren’t trying to convince ourselves that our sleuthing was a great idea and would yield crystal clear results. Or a rapprochement. I leaned across the table. “Listen. I eat every meal in the commuter cafeteria. I’ve eaten more salads and Salisbury steak dinners than I care to count in the past week and a half. If I want to have a friggin’ chocolate shake and a cheeseburger, that is my right.” I pulled a napkin out of the holder on the table and wiped my brow, which had become quite sweaty during our drive. “So where are you living right now?” I asked, my tone still testy. I wasn’t going to bring up the red bedroom but I wanted to find out if she had permanently vacated my home.

  “I told you already. I’m back home.”

  “What are you going to do? Are you going to get married for real or just live together?”

  “We are married,” she said in the same voice she would use to speak to a kindergarten student.

  “No you’re not.”

  “We’re just not married in the church,” she said. “But we’re married.”

  I didn’t know how a woman so smart—she runs a cable television station, for criminy’s sake—could be so stupid. “Did Fred tell you that?” It sounded like something he would say just to appease her.

  She put her hand over her heart. “We’re married here, in our hearts, and that’s all that matters.”

  “No it doesn’t. You can’t be married in your hearts. There’s no such thing as being married in your hearts. You have to be married by the state of New York or by the Catholic Church. Or wherever else you worship. You need to be married by someone who can actually marry you,” I explained. I must have raised my voice, because the elderly couple at the next table shot daggers my way. “Sorry,” I said to them, baring my teeth in an unsuccessful attempt at a smile. “You haven’t even been together long enough to have a common-law marriage,” I added dismissively. And that’s when I knew I had gone too far. Her face became a mask of hurt and betrayal.

  “Why can’t you just be happy for us?” she asked, welling up. “Why can’t you be happy that I’m happy?”

  I was saved from having to come up with an immediate response by the delivery of my shake and Max’s cabernet. I took a big draw from the straw in my shake, the cold seeping up my nasal passages and giving me a tremendous pain between my eyes. Serves you right, I thought. First, I had made a nun cry and now I had made my best friend cry. It had been a wonderful week. “I am happy for you, Max. I couldn’t be happier,” I said, which was the truth even if my tone or my body language didn’t convey it properly. I was exhausted, and hungry, tired of living on campus, and afraid to go home to a red bedroom. But really and truly, I was happy if Max and Fred had decided to put their relationship back together. If it made them happy, it made me happy.

  Right?

  We ate our dinners in silence, her not responding when I asked if the house cabernet tasted like old shoe or was actually palatable. I was too hungry to lose my appetite for what turned out to be a giant, juicy, and extremely greasy burger, and I inhaled the whole thing in record time.

  My back was to the door and the height of the booth obscured Max’s line of sight. So, when Brandon slid onto the Naugahyde bench next to me, the two of us were caug
ht completely by surprise.

  I tried to pretend that running into one of my students’ boyfriends in a town far, far away from where I taught and lived was the most natural thing in the world. I swallowed the hunk of greasy burger that got stuck in my throat and greeted him warmly.

  “Hi, Brandon!” I said, with way too much cheer.

  He kept his eyes on Max. “Good to see you again, Ms. Rayburn? Or is it Ms. Raymore?”

  Max studied her meat loaf for a few seconds, shoving a huge piece into her mouth and pointing at her bulging cheeks with her fork.

  “She doesn’t want to talk with her mouth full,” I explained.

  Brandon folded his hands on the table. In profile, I could see the strong resemblance between him and his father. “Shall we cut the crap, ladies?”

  I pushed my plate to the side and turned to face him. “Fine. Her name is Max Rayfield, she’s my best friend, and I just want to know what’s going on at your company, why two thugs beat up Amanda, and what, if anything, anyone there has to do with that. Especially you.” I took in his shocked expression. “Your turn. Go.”

  Brandon blanched a bit at the mention of the beating that Amanda had withstood.

  “Oh, and why you have those stitches,” Max chimed in.

  I looked over at her. “Thanks, Max. I forgot about that.”

  Brandon looked down at his hands. “For starters, there is nothing going on at T&G besides car service, nobody at our company had anything to do with what happened to Amanda, and I don’t know who those guys were. I’m offended that you would even suggest that I knew something about that,” he said evenly, but I could hear the anger simmering beneath the surface of his tone. And I hadn’t suggested that he himself had anything to do with it—at least not outright. I took note of the fact that he had taken my suggestion so personally. “Secondly, I hit my head on a doorjamb at the office. Seven stitches. Nothing to write home about. You can ask my father, the doctor at Newark General who stitched me up, or look at the door, which still has blood on it.” He paused. “Or you can ask my sister, Adriana, who was there when it happened.”

  None of that would be necessary. Just the thought of opening your head on a doorjamb made me weak in the knees. I was happy, though, that Adriana would still have a job the next day, despite the tough time she’d had coming up with Max’s proper alias. It was a family business, and she was in the family.

  “I don’t think I need to follow up on that,” I said, pointing at his head.

  “Fine. We run a very successful, financially viable business, Professor. We pay our taxes, pay our staff well, and keep things on the up-and-up. There is nothing going on at T&G that would concern you or that has anything to do with what happened to my fiancée.” He put his head in his hands. “If you think I had anything to do with what happened to Amanda, you’re crazy. I would never hurt her,” he said, his words muffled because his hands were over his face. “Ever.”

  He was pretty forceful about his declaration of honesty when it came to his company and apparent love for his fiancée. I responded with a weak, “Okay.”

  He picked his head back up and looked at me. The anguish on his face convinced me that he had nothing to do with what happened to Amanda. “Go back to the Bronx, Professor Bergeron. And if you have any questions in the future,” he said, reaching into his back pocket and pulling out two twenties, throwing them on the table, “please feel free to call me directly. I don’t enjoy being lied to.” He got up. “I hope you enjoy your dinner. My uncle Christos owns this place.”

  I had one more thing I wanted to ask him and it didn’t concern nefarious activity at T&G or anywhere else. “Are you and Amanda going to get married?” I asked.

  He smiled sadly. “I hope so.” He put his hands in his pockets, and all of a sudden, he looked more like a lovelorn kid than the slick criminal for which I had had him pegged. “Do you think we’re going to get married? Amanda said she talked to you about this . . .” He didn’t seem to know what to call the situation.

  “Love triangle?” Max offered helpfully.

  Again, the sad smile. “I guess. I’m hoping—”

  Max interrupted him. “Fight for her. If you love her, fight for her.” I kept quiet and wondered if I should let her advise him. Having left her husband for the flimsiest of reasons, I wasn’t sure if she was the right person to offer her uninformed opinions on relationships. “You seem like a nice kid. You’ve got a good job. And you’re easy on the eyes. You can win her back.”

  Brandon was staring at Max, a little glassy-eyed, apparently not knowing whether he should take her counsel to heart. In the space of a half hour, she had gone from being a lying accomplice in my wacky caper to Dear Abby. “Well, thanks,” he said. “Maybe I’ll do that.”

  “Do it!” she said. “I’m telling you, you’re meant to be with that girl.” She had no way of knowing that but she was on a roll and there was no stopping her. “Finding true love these days isn’t easy so you need to be sure you make it work.” She returned to eating her meat loaf and it was clear that this portion of the night’s festivities were over.

  Brandon beat a hasty exit. I leaned around the booth and watched him leave. When I was sure he was gone, I leaned back in and watched Max continue to fill her face with meat loaf and mashed potatoes.

  “Those stitches almost made me lose my appetite,” she said, downing her half glass of house cabernet in one swig. “Wanna go?”

  I looked at the two twenties on the table and decided that we would allow Brandon to pick up our dinners. Because if T&G was doing as well as Brandon claimed it was, he was in a better position to pay for dinner than I was. I got up. This night had been weirder than any I had ever experienced and I had a lot of crazy experiences on which to draw. “I’ll feel better once I’m back in my dorm room,” I said. “And I’m loath to admit that.”

  Thirty-Four

  We weren’t going right past her house but it was close enough so I dropped Max off in Tribeca. I pulled up in front her luxury condominium and turned the car off.

  “I’d love to say that I had a great time, but I didn’t,” she said, putting her hand on the door handle.

  “Sorry.”

  “That was a really stupid idea.”

  “I know.”

  “And we accomplished nothing.”

  “Okay,” I protested. “I get it. Bad idea. Goals not accomplished.”

  She got out of the car and was ready to end our adventure when she changed her mind. She leaned back in. “Something’s off between us.”

  I feigned ignorance, not wanting to get into a whole thing right before leaving her. “What do you mean?”

  “You were kind of mean to me the last time I saw you.” She pouted. “The only reason I came with you today was to try and fix things. Between us,” she added, in case I didn’t know what she was talking about.

  We had journeyed back to the alternate universe that Max seemed to be inhabiting lately. My hands tightened around the steering wheel and I rested my head between them. “I don’t think we should do this right now,” I muttered to the dashboard.

  She sighed. “We should do it soon.”

  I nodded. “Okay. Just not right now. Not in my car while I’m parked in front of a fire hydrant.” We had a lot to talk about but my energy was flagging, and if history was any indication, that meant that I would end up crying uncontrollably, agreeing that I had been “kind of mean” to her, and asking for forgiveness. And I wasn’t going to let that happen. “Thanks for your help. Say hi to Fred.”

  She made a sad face. “He’s kind of mad at you, too,” she said, putting her hand on her hip. She made a face to convey her approval at his anger. A few seconds later her expression changed and she was smiling. “Oh, by the way, how did you like your bedroom?”

  “That’s another thing I really don’t want to talk about.”

  “You didn’t like it?” she asked, genuinely surprised.

  I looked out my window for a second, trying to
figure out how to break it to her that I liked my bedroom the way it was before: dull, boring, bland, and beige. “Remember when I told you that you should do the opposite of whatever it is that you’re thinking?”

  She let out a huge sigh. “Of course.”

  “You should have done that before you had my bedroom painted.”

  “Your room was dull. Boring. Bland.” She let out another sigh. “And beige. You’ve got to spice things up a bit.”

  I banged my hands on the steering wheel. “No I don’t. I like things the way they are. I’m dull. I’m boring. I’m kind of beige. Why are you always trying to change me and everything about me? You’ve been doing that since we first became friends and I’ve put up with it.”

  “You don’t have to be dull and boring, you know,” she said. “And you don’t give yourself enough credit.”

  “You think that if people aren’t exactly like you and living life on the edge every single minute, their lives aren’t worth anything.” This was exactly why I didn’t want to have this conversation; the minute the words were out of my mouth, I could see her face crumble. Obviously I had gone too far. “I don’t want to live like that, Max. I don’t want a red bedroom. I just want to live my boring life.”

  She was silent for a few minutes and I thought the conversation was over. Apparently, it wasn’t. “Well, if you want to live like that, then I guess I have to let you.”

  I could feel my temperature rising. Her own life had been a mess and she had turned to me, Miss Bland and Boring. Now she wanted to spice things up for me. It wasn’t her place to do that and I told her so. “Close the door, Max.” She started talking again and I held my hand up. “Close. The. Door.” I repeated this slowly so that there wouldn’t be any doubt as to what I wanted to do or what my mood was.

  She gave me one last sad look before slamming the door and hurrying across the street to her building. A uniformed doorman came out and held the door for her. Just like St. Thomas, I thought. Except that the only people who wore uniforms were . . .