ThisTimeNextDoor

by Gretchen Galway

  Rose pointed at her car right outside the front door. “Is that the right place?”

  “Oh, absolutely. You can park wherever you want.”

  “How does that work? It doesn’t look like there are a lot of spaces around here,” Rose said.

  “But you don’t have to worry about that. Now that I know which car is yours, you can just park in the visitor spots.” She lowered her voice. “I’m the one who gets people ticketed. Or if they really piss me off, towed.”

  “I’ll be sure to stay on your good side, then.”

  She drew back, shook her head. “Not you, of course.” She gestured down a carpeted hallway. “Please forget I said anything. Sylly’s waiting for you.”

  Luckily, Mark had already told her about the big boss’s nickname. She hadn’t expected to meet him so soon, however. “Does the CEO always greet the new people first?”

  “God, no,” Bridget said. “Though he does like to meet them eventually.”

  More confused than ever, Rose followed Bridget through the colorless work space, past cubicles, the bathroom, a full kitchen, and conference rooms, to an office just like the others on the right side of the building.

  “You must be Rose,” the man inside said, coming over with his hand out. “Thanks for making sure she made it, Bridget.”

  “No problem,” Bridget said, smiling at him as she closed the door.

  Sylly was a good-looking man of medium height and indeterminate ethnicity. His name and warm complexion suggested he was Latino, but the shape of his brown eyes was Asian, possibly Indian. Or Chinese. African?

  She gave up guessing. She imagined he’d put up with a lot of nosy questions during his lifetime and she wasn’t going to add to them, especially since she was looking for a job and didn’t want to annoy him. “Thank you so much for…” she stopped herself. Having her? It made her sound like a houseguest. They were acting so odd, though, not like an employee or job supplicant at all. “Thank you for offering me a job. I can’t wait to find out what it is.”

  He flashed a set of perfect teeth, but she noticed his eyes were sharp, checking her out, sizing her up. “Have a seat. I’ve got your résumé here. Mark was right, you’re perfect for WellyNelly. I’m sure we’ll find a way to make each other happy.”

  Her alarm bells, quiet buzzing at the front door, rose to a steady wah wah wah in her head. Whatever was going on here, job or no, she had to understand it all.

  She sat down and looked at him.“Why?”

  This time she noticed he tried to stifle his smile. “I beg your pardon?” He continued his journey to a mini-fridge behind him, bent down with his back to her, popped back up with a bottle in his hand. “Mineral water?”

  “What did Mark say to you guys to make you so happy to see me? Because I’d hate to start on the wrong foot.” A suspicion struck her. “This isn’t all a joke, right?”

  “No, I promise. No joke.” He handed her the bottle.

  “It didn’t sound like Mark, but I don’t know him very well.”

  His charming smile disappeared. “Really?”

  Whoops. Mark had vouched for her; she shouldn’t undermine him. “Not as well as I’d like to.” Crap, that wasn’t much better. Now Sylly thought she was barking up Mark’s nerdy tree.

  Eyes smiling, Sylly opened his mouth, closed it, then regarded her with his lips pinched together. After a moment, he said, “We like Mark a lot around here. If he says we should hire you, we get excited. We’re growing so fast we can’t find enough good people. You were pre-med, he said. Ivy League.”

  “Yes, but that isn’t very unusual.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “Sure it is,” he said. “Why didn’t you go to med school?”

  That was the question she dreaded most. Admitting she’d simply changed her mind suggested she was fickle, indecisive, fun-loving, unreliable, lazy. It wouldn’t be so bad if she’d jumped into another field and applied herself. For instance, if she’d gone to law school and clerked for the Supreme Court instead. Or if her undergrad years in bio-nanotechnology led to a stint on the International Space Station. That would be okay to talk about.

  Too bad she’d promised not to make shit up.

  Why hadn’t she gone to med school? She was still trying to figure that out herself. That first year after graduation was a recovery period. She’d been working so hard since she was ten she didn’t know who she was anymore. The fantasy of having no person or institution to please, only herself, had driven her to graduate with honors before her twentieth birthday.

  And then… five years of aimless wandering. Retail. Selling used books on Amazon, garage sale finds on eBay, crafts on Etsy. Teaching SAT prep at the youth center. Learning German, Spanish, a little Thai.

  Dating. A lot of dating. A lot of sex. John was only the last in a string of short-term flings she’d enjoyed since moving back home with her mother. That was a secondary advantage of having the occasional boyfriend: somewhere else to sleep.

  Facing the sharp, successful man on the other side of that desk, answering for her unfulfilled life, was a nightmare that kept her up at night.

  Why didn’t you go to med school?

  She settled for the simple truth. “I didn’t want to be a doctor,” she replied.

  Beaming, he punched the air with his fist. “Awesome. Me neither.” He held out his hand in a high-five. “I was pre-med at Stanford. I didn’t even graduate.”

  Fear dissipating, she reached up and slapped his palm.

  “Mark’s right. You’re perfect for WellyNelly. The place is full of excellent people who rejected the easy, well-traveled path. You’re going to love it here.” Without getting up, he rolled his Aeron chair around to her side, reaching out to rotate the monitor as he moved. “Let’s look at Welly in action. Then we’ll talk about where you can help us out.”

  * * *

  Forehead pressed to his bedroom window, Mark watched the house next door, wondering if Rose was back yet. The living room lights were on, but that could be Blair.

  Sylly had sent him an email around two: “Your 5K is on its way. See you in the morning, sucker. XOXO.”

  So they’d hired her. That was great. She’d help them relaunch their women’s health site, sadly neglected until now. Forums, drug and diagnoses encyclopedia, resource links, emotional support. Right now WellyNelly had a very male, utilitarian look, lots of navy and white, every page branded the same way.

  Because that’s how he’d designed it when he was sixteen. The technology couldn’t handle much back then, not while maintaining its performance. Sick people didn’t have time to wait for the computer to load a photograph of flowers, animated babies, smiling healthy people. People wanted to find the best doctor, the best treatment, the best shoulder to cry on. As quickly as possible.

  For themselves or somebody they loved. His dad never sat down and used WellyNelly himself, barely acknowledged it, but his mom had. Hours she’d spent, talking to other cancer patients and their families, survivors, and then, widows.

  Mark remembered the day he created the Widow Forum. The last time he’d worn a suit, the day he buried his father.

  Until recently, that was the last work he ever did on the WellyNelly software. At college he vowed to do something wildly different from what everyone expected from the wunderkind: teach. Not at the college level, which would have required grad school, but earlier than that, with younger kids who didn’t like math and science because they’d never had an enthusiastic introduction. Surely, he thought, if they could see how cool it all was, they’d be as excited as he’d always been.

  Well, no. A better teacher could’ve done it, maybe, with some of the kids. Not him. Within five years he was as jaded as the alcoholic sixty-something precalculus teacher he’d had when he was in high school—but not as good.

  And he was lonely. A girlfriend from Wisconsin had led him to Milwaukee for his accreditation and first job, but she hadn’t lasted.

  He pushed away from the window and strode over
to the closet. Sucker. He had to find something to wear for tomorrow and every day of the week and every week after that, something that didn’t have holes or smell bad or make him look like a crazed loser.

  Because Sylly had named his price for hiring Rose. And he’d agreed.

  At least he’d get to see her every day.

  Chapter 9

  HE WAS POURING HIMSELF A cup of coffee in the WellyNelly kitchen when Rose rushed over, smiling wildly, and squeezed his arm.

  After a quick glance over her shoulder, she said quietly, eyes twinkling, “Howdy, neighbor.”

  No matter what she wore, even in black and gray work clothes and only a few necklaces, she blinded him. Blue eyes, pink cheeks, golden hair, all at once, pulsing with life.

  “How’s it going?” he asked, stirring cream into his mug. She even smelled good. No, not the word. Tasty. She smelled tasty.

  Then again, maybe it was just the banana bread on the counter.

  “Fantastic, thank you very much.” She leaned across him to get a mug for herself out of the cabinet.

  No, it was her. He inhaled, gritted his teeth.

  “How am I going to pay you back for getting me this job?” she whispered. For once, she seemed oblivious to the joke potential. Innocent, happy, unguarded. “I still owe you a decent dinner. Maybe you and your mom could come over this week, before John comes back? Not Friday, since I’ll want time to make something really good. Saturday?”

  The coffee burned his tongue but he swallowed it anyway. A hot woman asked him out… and included his mother. Didn’t that just capture everything that was wrong with his life?

  “I’m sure she’d love that. Just tell us when,” he said, stepping away from her. She seemed to assume he wasn’t affected by her like other men, touching his arm, bumping his hip, smelling good around him.

  “Are you really working in the office from now on?”

  “A little,” he said, meaning Monday through Friday, eight until six. “Trying to get out of the house more, remember?”

  Another pat. This time her palm flattened against his back. He could feel her fingers splay out, press gently into muscle, electrify his spinal column.

  “Good for you. If I weren’t moving into my own apartment, I’d suggest we carpool.”

  “Maybe until then,” he said.

  She looked away. “Not yet, okay? It’s obvious they hired me because of you, and I’d really like to establish myself on my own, you know?”

  “I totally understand.”

  “But later. In a few months. Who knows? I’m looking at apartments in Berkeley. Maybe I’ll be on your way. Of course, then I wouldn’t be able to give you a ride, living way up in the hills.”

  “I wouldn’t mind picking you up,” he said.

  She smiled, shook her head. “You’re such a nice guy.” For a moment she visibly struggled with something and then, suddenly, she went up on tiptoes and pressed her lips to his cheek.

  Just as quickly, she was gone, out the door in a sweet-scented breeze.

  Somewhere, Mark knew, he’d gone terribly wrong.

  If only he knew where.

  * * *

  “This time I’m doing it all ahead of time. No forgotten chickens,” Rose said to Blair as they sprawled on the back deck in shorts and tank tops, enjoying their first weekend as employed people since they’d moved to California. The high temperature for the day was supposed to hit ninety-two, a record for the last day of September. Mark and his mother were coming over for dinner that evening.

  “Did you know some people actually cook fish in their dishwashers?” Blair asked.

  “Lord,” Rose said, turning her head to the other side. “You could cook one right here next to me here on this deck in a goldfish bowl. Like sun tea.”

  “I can’t believe it’s September. I could get used to living like this.”

  “I hope it’s not too hot for lasagna,” Rose said. “Should we make something colder?”

  “I’ll make ice cream!” Blair declared, all smiles. Now that Rose had a job, Blair let herself express how happy she was to have John back in her life. “I’ve been wanting to buy an ice cream maker. This is a great excuse.”

  “Sure, that’s a practical purchase.” Rose sipped her iced tea, rolled onto her back. She was glad Blair was happy, but skeptical John would live up to her hopes. “Forget the baby stroller. Get the dessert appliances first.”

  “Be quiet. Pregnant women get whatever they want.”

  “God, I’m so glad I’m moving out,” Rose said. “You’re going to be impossible.”

  Blair poked her in the ribs. “I’ll make strawberry.”

  Blair’s homemade strawberry ice cream had halted more than one nervous breakdown over the years. “You don’t have to make anything. I’ll get it all at the store. Let’s just keep it simple so we don’t have to stress about anything.”

  “Why would having Mark and his mother come over be stressful?” Blair asked in a singsong, eyelid-batting way that made Rose clamber up to her feet.

  “It’s too damn hot out here. I’m going to the grocery store.”

  “He watches the house, you know,” Blair said. “I’ve seen him.”

  “It’s not me he’s watching, babe.” Rose stepped inside and slid the door shut.

  The house was stuffy and warm, but not as hot as it would be when the sun set in the west, filling all the picture windows with late summer rays.

  Maybe she’d make a Greek salad. Gazpacho. Shrimp cocktails. She’d hate to sit there sweating like a pig over the dinner table, dark circles under her armpits.

  Not that Mark would notice. Like she’d said, he’d be too busy staring at Blair, trying not to swallow his own tongue.

  The doorbell rang. Rose wiped the sweat off her forehead and laughed to herself. Mark. He was probably going to try to get out of dinner again, just like last time. Being in the office together all week had given him enough of her. Enough of humanity. He was probably eager to crawl into his cave for the weekend to recover.

  She strode over, savoring how she’d tell him there was no way in hell he was getting out of dinner. He’d saved her ass with a fantastic job. If he tried to cancel, Rose would threaten to invite him—and his mother—every Saturday for a year.

  Smiling, half-naked in her bikini top and cutoffs, she reached out just as the door opened by itself.

  Standing on the front step was John, his mother, and a suitcase.

  Three suitcases. As well as a duffel bag big enough to engulf the Toyota.

  “Hi,” John said, seeing Rose. His look was apologetic but determined. “Blair! I’m home!”

  Ellen, John's mother, strode into the house, frowning at Rose’s generously bare midriff and exposed legs. Her gaze lingered on the navel ring, then the blue butterfly tattoo on her upper left thigh, before rising up to her face. “Catch you at a bad time?”

  Damn it, the bitch was going to see her blush. And she had a lot of blushable skin, most of it on show at the moment, all of it rapidly turning pink.

  John made himself busy hauling in the suitcases, piling them in the foyer, avoiding eye contact.

  They’d only met once, but Ellen obviously disliked her. Somehow, months earlier, she’d interpreted her son’s accelerated relationship with a big blonde weightlifter as evidence of the big blonde’s loose character. No matter it had been John who seduced her in the gym parking lot, John who showed up at her apartment at all hours, unannounced, John who cheated.

  Sticking her chest out and sucking in her gut (a little), Rose gave her a huge smile. “Hot, isn’t it?” To John, smile glued in place, she added, “Blair is out on the deck.” No way was Rose going to let on that any of this made her uncomfortable.

  “I’ll go tell her I’m here,” John said, walking away. Coward.

  “I thought John had told Blair he was moving in,” Ellen said.

  “He also told Blair he didn’t want anything to do with her or the baby, yet amazingly, here he is,” Rose
replied. Her cheeks were starting to cramp from smiling. “It’s so hot. Can I get you something to drink?”

  “Why are you here?”

  Rose dropped the act. “Why are you?”

  “I’ll get my own drink.” Ellen strode into the house like she owned it, which she almost did, while Rose clenched her hands into fists and went out to the deck.

  Oh, please. Blair and John were making out on the towel like it was From Here to Eternity and the waves were crashing in. “Blair, can I talk to you for a minute?” she said loudly.

  They broke apart and looked up at her in unison.

  Then John turned back to Blair nestled in his arms. “Sorry, but my mother’s here, too. Hide out here while I get you another drink and try to get rid of her.” After a quick kiss on her forehead he got to his feet and walked into the house. Just as he passed Rose, he stopped, met her gaze. “She didn’t know I was coming this morning. So don’t blame her.”

  “I wasn’t going to,” Rose said through her teeth. “She’s not the sneaky type.”

  His jaw twitching, he went inside.

  Rose looked at Blair. “You are wearing makeup today. I thought you were just in a good mood.”

  Blair sat up taller. “I am in a good mood.”

  Rose closed the door to the house, squatted down next to her. “Did you know he was coming?” she asked in a low voice.

  Blair drew back, eyes wide, hurt. “Of course not.”

  “Sorry. Of course not.” Rose got up, feeling sweat pool between her breasts. “Better get packing.” At least the hotel would be air-conditioned.

  Blair climbed to her feet, grasped her wrist. “Don’t go. We’ll figure something out.”

  “As much as I’m sure he’d love a little hot three-way action, no.” She wiped her forehead.

  “Four if you count the baby,” Blair said, then slapped a hand over her mouth.

  Rose gaped at her, then burst out laughing.

  Better than crying.

  * * *

  Enjoying his Saturday after a week of dragging himself into the office, Mark didn’t pull open his closet to get dressed until after two.

  Frowning, he looked down at the floor where he usually threw his jeans.