by Moondi, Romi
I took the bottle of vodka out of my bag and set it on the counter of the tiny kitchen. “I need Red Bull,” I said to myself. I opened the fridge and there it was. Jackpot.
“You’re ‘vodka and Red Bulling’ tonight?” Eleanor said. “That’s intense dude.”
“No it’s not. I need the vodka to get a buzz, and I need the Red Bull because I’m exhausted!” I cracked open the can of Red Bull and shook my head. “You know what I did today? I woke up at nine a.m, and spent half the day helping my mom wash every floor in the house!” I paused. “Wow, that sounds lame, doesn’t it?”
“It does,” said Eleanor.
“Well who else is gonna help her with my sister gone?” I was mixing the drink now and adding more vodka than I’d originally planned. “My mom has two bad knees so I’m not just gonna ditch her. Not yet anyway…”
“All that matters for right now is NOW,” said Eleanor firmly. “So just focus on tonight and how we’re gonna get smashed!”
“Ohhh no,” I said. “I drink two of these before we go, switch to water by midnight, and then I coast!”
“Since when do you stop drinking at midnight?”
“Since I threw up in New York like a loser. I can’t drink like I used to.” I sighed. “I think I’m getting too old for this.”
“Well you don’t look too old.”
I smiled. “Thanks. I hope these Indian genes keep working for a few years longer. In the meantime, sitting in cafés and writing seems more exhilarating than going to clubs. What have I become?!” I grabbed my drink and joined her on the couch.
“You’ve become…the person you were always meant to become.” She smiled. “Cheers.”
We clinked our glasses and I took a long sip.
A minute later Amy leapt out of her room. “Tada!”
She spun around to show us her gold halter top, tight black skirt and red heels. Her short brown hair was straightened to perfection.
“Are you trying to get laid tonight?” I said.
She ignored me, and in a high-heel wobble made her way to the kitchen. “Oooh...vodka.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “I have a feeling tonight’s gonna be...interesting.”
***
The music was loud in this hybrid of a bar and night club. The rickety wooden floors, tables and high chairs reminded me of a casual bar, but the packed dance floor beyond screamed “makeout like no one’s watching” night club.
I bobbed my head to the music as I sipped from a bottle of water. I’d stayed true to my “no drinking after midnight” plan, but the shots from five minutes before the cut-off were making my stomach rumble.
Eleanor and Amy returned from the bar with more drinks. They were pretty hammered already, but white girls could drink like tanks so I wasn’t worried.
“See those guys over there?” said Eleanor.
I looked over to see three guys about our age, standing around a nearby table. One had a supermodel’s face and a spectacular head of dark wavy hair, though his large upper body made me think he’d gone too crazy doing bench presses. His other two friends were…alright. I could see that my wingman task for the night was upon me, so I nodded and clapped my hands.
“So let me guess El, you want the guy who looks like a model.”
She flipped her hair to one side. “I don’t WANT anyone…they want me.”
She makes it look so easy.
Amy and I followed Eleanor to a table that was next to our targeted guys. We pretended they weren’t even there and started talking. Eleanor was facing the guys which was the money-shot move, while Amy and I laughed loudly for no reason, as we faked ourselves having the most interesting conversation.
It took about…less than sixty seconds to be approached. Right on time. Supermodel-face didn’t make any introductions, since he was the prize bird just like our Eleanor. One of his friends who had cropped brown hair and a firm build offered me a smile. “Having a good night?” he asked.
This guy wasn’t bad looking, but he also didn’t have any traits that would make me writhe in ecstasy. Like eyeglasses. Whatever. “Why aren’t you dancing?” I said to him. “You guys should all be dancing in a man-circle out there.”
He laughed. “I don’t come to clubs to dance in man-circles. I’m Dylan by the way. And you are?”
“Romi.”
“Romi? That’s an interesting name.”
I was so extremely bored by that comment after hearing it a million times, that I was one step away from changing my name to Rachel.
But tonight I was a wingman.
I smiled sweetly. “Thanks, sometimes I get self-conscious about my name.” I batted my long eyelashes, which if done correctly could result in the hypnosis of my subject.
It worked.
He chugged the rest of his drink and swallowed hard. “Do you wanna dance?”
I really had no interest in someone putting “the moves” on me, but I knew I had to get him off of Eleanor’s hands. Like a good wingman would. Amy meanwhile was having a laugh-a-thon fest with the hot guy’s other friend, a short and slight Hispanic guy all dressed in black.
As Amy dragged her guy to the dance floor I dragged mine too, which left Eleanor alone with the supermodel-face.
Best wingmen ever.
***
Twenty minutes later I was sweating like a pig and dancing my face off to some wicked beats. It wasn’t just an expression; I was literally dancing my face off, with my makeup melting away by the second.
Dylan turned out to be a pretty good dancer, with all kinds of spins and twirls. Others were even giving us some room on the dance floor; we owned it. Despite the dance-a-thon chemistry, I wasn’t attracted to him at all. It wasn’t really his fault, it was just that all the dancing reminded me of a male cheerleader or a gay BFF. Before I could properly configure my “gay-dar,” he slid his hands down my ass like it was going out of style. A second later I become an official citizen of “Ass-Rub City.” Population: two.
I craned my neck in search of Eleanor, and when I spotted her she was still at the table, still talking to the supermodel-face. It seemed to be going okay, but there wasn’t any laughter or flirty physical contact. I’ll give it a couple more minutes.
Dylan, who was now busy squeezing one of my ass cheeks at a time, lowered his eyes and smiled at me seductively. Or at least he thought it was seductive. To me he looked like a deranged clown. “Wanna get out of here?” he said.
Sure! Just not with you.
I smiled and spun around so I didn’t have to answer, finally unhinging his hands from me in the process.
When I looked over at Eleanor I could see her type a number into her phone, then supermodel-face did the same.
The exchange!
With my wingman duties complete, I told Dylan I had to use the bathroom, with no intention of ever coming back. It was harsh, but as I’d learned in my “year of the chick” nights out the year before, it was a harsh world.
As I left him I could still feel his handprints embedded on my butt. Gross. I realized that if local guys meant an imprinted ass, and if long-distance guys meant mysterious ghosts or guys with girlfriends, then maybe I was better off alone for a while.
Just me and my cat...
Chapter Ten
September was now upon us, and my book was officially on the market.
In the first ten days since the release, I’d received overwhelming support from both friends and acquaintances. In stark contrast, I avoided jumping for joy about the book in front of my parents.
Writing is a waste of time, so they say.
Right now I only wanted to make myself a cup of tea, and bring it up to my room without any trouble. My parents’ heads were buried deep in their Indian newspapers. Perfect.
I balanced the cup of tea in my hands and scurried out of the kitchen.
“What happened to your book?” my mother suddenly asked, her head still buried in the paper. Dammit.
I stopped in my tracks and sig
hed. “It’s still a new release,” I said.
My father poked his head out of the “World News” section. “But popular books sell thousands and thousands of copies in the first week. Don’t you always hear that on the news?”
I clenched my teeth and eyed the stairwell, my escape so close I could taste it. “I did everything on my own,” I said. “So first I have to do the marketing, and find the readers, and then I WILL have good sales.”
“Such a waste of time,” my mother said, adding a disapproving click of the tongue. That seemed like a good closing statement, so I dashed up the stairs trying hard not to spill my tea.
I was used to my parents’ skepticism by now, about anything that didn’t involve big job titles and raises. Whatever. I shrugged it off and settled in bed, with one hand on my cup and the other on my laptop keys.
I’d scheduled a few paid promotions, and the first one today had already led to fifteen book sales, which I could check on my book’s account every time I hit “refresh.” Not that I’m obsessed. I wondered how many of those readers would hate my book. There were bound to be some haters (just like James had reminded me), and there was nothing I could do to control it. My best defence was remembering my favourite books of all time, and how they all had scathing reviews. It was part of the gig, or a part of any gig in the arts. This was both acceptable to me and annoying to me, because only in those fields where you expressed yourself artistically, were people allowed to ridicule you publicly. This made me think of rude waitresses, terrible doctors, dumb cell phone customer service representatives...how come they didn’t have a listing on Amazon.com where I could publicly berate them?
I slapped myself on the head and remembered to focus on the good. I had two nice reviews so far, and forty sales in the first ten days (even though half of those sales were from friends). I also had a blog tour coming up, where I’d be reviewed and get the chance to guest-post on twelve blogs. This online thing would be a bit like a virtual book tour, only I didn’t get to shake any hands or sign any books. There was also the chance that no one would leave a comment or even give a damn.
Welcome to “independent author” land.
I glanced at my e-mail, but still hadn’t finished my latest response to James. Our notes back and forth were never urgent anymore, but it was comforting to have him as a virtual ear. Even so, that feeling of nostalgia would often creep up, the one where I wished he could be more.
My daydream went on pause when I heard the familiar buzz of my phone. I grabbed it from my bedside table and found a message from Laura: Remember Erik? Well he asked me for your e-mail address. Weird, huh?
For the first time in a while, my heart started thumping in my ears.
Erik? The only person I know who read “Shantaram”?...
***
We’re just friends and we both like reading.
That’s what I kept telling myself two days later at work, as I stared at my e-mail from Erik. When Laura told me he was going to contact me, the wildest of fantasies popped up in my head. In this unlikely scene he’d realized he couldn’t live without me, broken up with his girlfriend in Denmark, and decided to stay in New York forever. All so we could build a love-nest.
Yes, the insane part of my brain which had practically taken over when I’d first starting talking to James---but which I’d muted to an almost-whisper in my now more mature grown-up days---was for a moment re-awakened. I quickly shut it down when I remembered I was at the office.
In reality there wasn’t any need to go nuts, as Erik had only wanted to congratulate me on the book release. Big frickin’ deal. It seemed we both enjoyed books like a couple of nerds, which was hardly the dramatic outcome I’d been imagining. I decided this was a casual “once in a while” type of contact, so maybe in that way he was ghost number-two behind James. “Two Ghosts and a Lady.” Now THAT would make a very good movie.
Keeping in mind a casual approach, I acknowledged this latest ghost in a friendly reply.
----------------------------
Hey Erik,
I’m warning you before you read my book, it’s basically chick-lit with some awkward family moments thrown in.
Maybe you should try “Every Man Dies Alone” by Hans Fallada. It’s about the Nazi era from the perspective of two Germans, as they try to topple the regime from inside Berlin. Only not with violence…but with words. .You would like it.
Seriously, try that instead of my book.
:-)
Romi
--------------------------
I sent the e-mail and closed all Internet-related things from my computer. I longed for the days when I would work for two hours and screw around for six. Those were the glory days of planning weekly promotions for Canada’s biggest retailer, at a time when I could actually procrastinate and get everything done! It was all a distant memory now, since I was six months into a promotion with a totally absentee boss.
His name was Shawn and he was the most hands-off mofo you would ever meet. He didn’t know anything about anything, and it seemed he liked to keep it that way. Ignorance was his bliss, since it allowed him to forward everyone’s problems to me. I could manage, but I found it odd making presentations to senior management without ever getting any back-up. Shawn would just sit in the corner of the boardroom and nod in agreement at everything I said, almost like a bobble-head toy. But if the VPs disagreed with me? Well then he would bobble-head in their direction too, thereby throwing me under the bus. He also wasn’t here half the time, which at first made me think he had a mistress, but now I knew for sure that he was lazy.
I started to answer an e-mail about a pricing problem Shawn was clueless to, when I heard his distinct footsteps approach my cubicle. There was a clacking to those steps, which could only mean the man-heels that he wore were coming close. His need to “heighten” wasn’t surprising, since he was borderline elf and I myself had started wearing high heels (as part of my enhanced corporate image). Even two-inch heels would bring me right to five-foot-nine, which would’ve made things awkward if he didn’t have “lifts.”
The man-heels slid to a stop outside my cubicle. My laptop faced the window so I was blind to his clickety-clack presence.
“Hey Romi.”
I turned around to face the forty-something troll-like freckled man and his orange goatee. “Hey Shawn.”
“So...are you ready for today’s presentation?”
I was confused. “No I think that’s YOUR presentation. The one with the senior VP.”
He bobble-headed a bit before he continued. “That’s true, but it would probably be better if you led it. Then I can just talk when I have a question.”
“Why would you have a question about your own presentation?”
“I mean if THEY have a question.” He laughed.
“But I don’t even have a presentation deck for that,” I said. “It’s the one about a long-weekend promotion next May, right?”
He smiled. “Yup, that’s the one.”
“Right...but I haven’t done any slides for that. It’s all in the spreadsheets right now.”
“Oh don’t worry about that. I’ll send you the slides I’ve already done. They’re almost finished, but it’d be great if you added in the numbers.”
He gave me the “thumbs up” and clicked away.
I’d thought my days of being someone else’s bitch were over with this promotion, but I quickly realized that as long as you were working in a corporation, you were always somebody’s bitch.
***
Thirty minutes later, as I was tidying up some numbers for this random presentation only an hour away, an e-mail popped in from Shawn, containing all the slides he had already worked on.
I opened up the file, and with each click my jaw dropped further.
He’d finished the title slide (with HIS name on it, of course), a basic agenda file, but all the other slides just had titles and were otherwise blank. Latest Results, Analysis, Competitive Activity, Recommendations
, Projected Sales Growth…
And I was supposed to do this in an hour?!
Screwed by the boss in platform man-heels...
***
Shawn’s presentation and my own the next day had actually gone pretty well, which meant today I could browse some competitive analysis and take calming sips of tea. Ahh...
In the midst of my casual read, my cell phone buzzed with a new instant message from Erik. I really hadn’t planned on ever giving him my phone number, but with free instant-messaging apps that were practically in real time...it was simply more efficient than e-mail.
Sure.
I grabbed the phone to read his message:”My favourite quote from your book so far:”His Internet picture is definitely a fake…he’s probably an eighty-year-old serial killer”…hahaha, so, was he an eighty-year-old? And what happens next?”
I started laughing, even though I wanted to scowl. Now that I’d read the message, Erik could see I was online. Should I reply right away or make him suffer? I’ll save the suffering for later. My message back was as direct as an Aries could get: “BE QUIET and get back to work...or I’ll make sure you get fired and immediately deported.”
I tossed my phone into my bag and returned to my competitive reading. I had to stay sharp with an idiot-boss after all…
***
With Shawn constantly breaking new records for hardly ever being at work, I thought I would get some revenge by leaving early.
