by Diane Barnes
A metallic taste fills my mouth.
“Clothing is optional in these shots,” Branigan says.
“The less clothing, the better,” says Smyth.
I’m going to be sick, right here in Ben’s cube. My eyes roam the small space, looking for his garbage can.
“And Nico has high standards,” Smyth says. “His ex, Jillian, is a good-looking girl. What would you say she is, a seven? An eight?”
“An eight when she puts in some effort,” Branigan answers.
Puts in some effort? What does that mean?
“I don’t think you can do better, Nico. Why did you dump her?” Smyth asks.
Yeah, Nico, why did you dump me? And for the love of God, why are you talking about it on your show?
“Not good in the sack?” Branigan asks.
Ben raises an eyebrow. I give him the finger.
“No, no,” Nico says. “Nothing like that.” His whiny voice makes my ears hurt. I snap the radio off but can still hear the show coming from radios in the next aisles. Great. The entire office is listening.
“Are you okay?” Ben asks.
No, I’m not okay! I look at him without answering.
He stares back; the expression on his face is more appropriate for the receiving line at a wake than the office.
Don’t cry. Don’t cry. I chant it to myself. A blast of heat pours out of the vent embedded in the ceiling tiles.
Renee touches my arm. “Why didn’t you tell us, sweetie?”
“I was going to tell you today.” I should have told them sooner. To have them find out like this is beyond humiliating. How could Nico do this to me? I swallow the lump in my throat. Do. Not. Cry. I blink back a tear. I would rather die than cry at work.
The people sitting a few rows away erupt in laughter. I wonder if they’re the same ones listening to the show.
Ben and Renee watch me without speaking. I can’t stand the pity on their faces. They think I’m pathetic. I am pathetic. Outside, a plane leaves a trail of vapor in the blue sky. I don’t care where the jet is going. I want to be on it.
I bolt out of Ben’s cube. He calls after me, but I ignore him and head for the restroom, where I study myself in the mirror. My complexion is gray and the whites of my eyes are bright red. Worse, there are two nasty pimples on my chin and one on my forehead. Almost thirty-five and acne. I can’t catch a break. First-world problems, I imagine Nico saying. Every muscle in my body tightens. I hate him. I really do.
I hear someone coming and duck into a stall because I don’t want to make small talk with anyone.
“Jillian, are you in here?” Ellie calls out in her husky voice.
I swing the stall door open and step out.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asks.
“Was everyone in sales listening?”
“Ryan’s radio was loud.” She studies me quietly. “What happened?” she finally asks.
“Nothing happened. He just said he didn’t want to get married.” Not having a good answer to her question makes the entire thing even harder than it should be. I’d be able to understand it if he met someone else, but he decided he’d rather be by himself than be with me. Am I that unbearable? I take a deep breath and step toward the sink, wanting to wash my hands because I touched the stall door. I place my hands under the automatic soap dispenser. It squirts out a third of its contents, leaving a foamy mess on the counter.
I try to turn on the water, but nothing happens when I wave my hands under the automated faucet. My waving becomes frantic, but the sink remains dry. “Why the hell can’t they just have a normal sink in here?” I whine.
Ellie reaches into the bowl and wiggles her fingers. The faucet comes to life. Of course she has the magic touch.
I scrub my hands together so hard they burn. “What am I going to do, El?
“You’re going to be strong, and you’re going to move on,” she says.
“I’m not sure I can do that.”
“Of course you can.” She pauses. “This is Nico’s loss, and he will regret it.”
She might be giving me a sales pitch, but I need to believe it.
“Whatever you need to get through this,” she says, “I’m here for you. We’re all here for you. Ben and Renee were really worried about you when I just stopped by your row.”
* * *
Later, as Ben, Renee, and I walk down the hall for lunch, I can hear the din of conversation coming from the cafeteria. I slow my pace. There will be a mob in there, many of whom listened to BS Morning Sports Talk today. I’m not sure I’m up to facing them. As we get closer, a group of employees from IT holding takeout containers approaches us from the opposite direction. The smell of fried food drifts toward us. As they walk by, one of the men elbows another. “That’s her,” he says, tilting his head in my direction.
I freeze. Renee and Ben are several steps in front of me before they realize I’ve stopped. They look back at me. “I’m going to have cereal at my desk,” I say.
“What happened?” Ben asks.
I point to the IT guys. “People are going to be talking about me.”
Ben strides toward me. Renee follows. “Did they say something?” he asks.
I explain what happened. He shoves his hands in his pockets and glares down the hallway. “People will talk. You have to ignore them.”
Renee wraps an arm around my shoulder. “People break up all the time, honey.” We resume walking to the lunchroom. Renee keeps a protective hold on me. “Think of it as a blessing that things ended before and not after the wedding,” she says.
Never married at age thirty-five or divorced by thirty-six. I think I would choose door number two. Divorcees are more accepted by society than spinsters. If you’re a divorcee, people assume the problem was with the ex, but if you’ve never been married, they wonder what’s wrong with you.
When we enter the cafeteria, I keep my head down. Ben and I take our place at the end of the long deli line while Renee elbows her way into the crowd hovering by the salad bar. As we wait, I cross my arms and then uncross them, rest my weight on my left leg, shift it to the right, and then balance it evenly on both. At the same time, my eyes dart around the room, searching for anyone who might be pointing at me.
“Relax, Jillian,” Ben says, putting his hand on my wrist. “You’re drawing attention to yourself.”
“I can’t help it.”
“Deep breaths,” he says, taking one himself, presumably to show me how.
Ryan and Tyler step into line behind us. “What happened with you and Nico?” Tyler says. “I liked that guy.”
I knew I should have stayed at my desk.
“On the radio, they said he sacked you,” Ryan says. He has a loud voice. It echoes through the crowded cafeteria.
Conversations around us stop. The room becomes quiet. At least it seems that way.
“It makes no sense,” Tyler says. “Didn’t you just get engaged a few weeks ago?”
“It’s like fumbling on the goal line,” Ryan booms.
A few people standing near us laugh.
“Knock it off,” Ben warns.
“I’m sorry, Jillian,” Tyler says.
“Unless he met someone else,” Ryan continues. “Then it’s an interception.” He looks around the room, smiling and nodding, like a comedian on stage looking for approval.
Ben steps closer to him. “I said knock it off.”
I grab Ben’s arm. “I’m going back to my desk.”
“Come on. We’re just having a little fun with you,” Ryan calls as I make my way out of the crowded cafeteria.
* * *
Back at my desk, I navigate to BS Morning Sports Talk’s website. A headline runs across the top of the page that reads “Win a Date with Our Producer.” Under it is a picture of Nico wearing a green T-shirt I’ve never seen before. He’s clean shaven, and his hair is about a half inch longer than the last time I saw him. I fantasize about ripping it out strand by strand.
The
text beside his picture reads, “Our producer recently dumped his fiancée and is looking for a new girlfriend. He’s successful, smart, sexy, and sensitive.”
Sensitive! What a pile of rubbish!
“Send a picture (clothing optional) with a description of your perfect date, and you could be the lucky woman who wins a night, and maybe more, with our handsome Nico.”
I look at the picture again and fight the strong urge to punch my fist through the computer screen. I click on the link to enter the “contest” and begin a profanity-laced email. I feel someone looking over my shoulder and click away from the page. “You don’t want to send that,” Ben warns.
I whip my chair around to face him. “Don’t tell me what I want to do.”
He places a plastic container with a sandwich and chips in it on my desk. “Look, I know how you’re feeling. I’ve—”
“Really, your fiancé went on the radio telling everyone how he dumped you while his idiot bosses rated your looks and then all your coworkers made fun of you.”
“Ryan is a weasel. Everyone knows it.”
“It’s not just Ryan,” I say. “It’s the guys in IT.” I bury my head in my hands. “Do you know how popular that stupid show is?”
“They’re not going to talk about you anymore,” Ben says. “They’ll have their fun with the contest this week and then they’ll get back to sports.”
I keep my head down on my desk, fighting back tears. Ben rests his hand on my shoulder. “It’s going to be okay,” he whispers.
Die before you cry at work. I chant it to myself. When I feel I have myself under control, I sit upright again. “I know.” I open the food he dropped off and take a bite. It’s a chicken salad sandwich with roasted peppers mixed in, on toasted sourdough bread. Nico used to make my lunch so I hardly ever buy food in the cafeteria, but when I do, it’s exactly what I order, right down to the salt and vinegar potato chips.
Ben picks up a picture on my desk of me and Nico. “You can do much better than this jamoke. The guy has a unibrow, for crying out loud,” he says. “And what’s up with his beady little eyes?”
I take the photograph from him. He’s right about Nico’s eyebrows. I tried to convince him to have them waxed, but he wanted no part of that. Ben’s wrong about Nico’s eyes though. They are definitely not beady. They’re almond shaped. He always appears to be squinting. It’s extremely sexy. I throw the picture in my desk drawer.
“You’re better off without him,” Ben says.
Without him, I’m alone. I’m most definitely not better off alone.
As if he knows what I’m thinking, Ben adds, “You’ll meet someone else. No worries.”
But I am worried. Where is a single woman in her midthirties supposed to meet a normal single man?
* * *
Rachel calls me on my drive home. “I heard what happened on Nico’s show today,” she says. “I’m so sorry.”
I’ve been in bumper-to-bumper traffic since getting on the highway, but now my lane comes to a complete standstill.
“What a stupid idea for a contest. I bet no one enters,” Rachel continues. “Like a date with Nico is any great shakes. Please.”
She’s trying to make me feel better, but she’s criticizing the man I’ve spent the last six years of my life with, the person I wanted to be with forever.
“Come over after I put the kids to bed,” she suggests. “We’ll have drinks and talk about what a schmuck Nico is.”
“Thanks, but I’m really beat.” The cars in front of me are moving again. I turn around a bend in the road. A billboard for BS Morning Sports Talk comes into view. I tighten my grip on the steering wheel as I look at Branigan’s and Smyth’s faces. Branigan’s short red hair is receding, and his forehead is large enough to house the billboard. Angry red pockmarks scar Smyth’s chubby face. Of course no one criticizes their appearance while the two of them rip females in the sports broadcasting profession—or any woman, really.
I’m so busy staring at their pictures that I don’t notice traffic has stopped again. I slam on my brakes and just avoid crashing into the Volvo in front of me. That’s all I need.
By the time I pull into my driveway, a feeling of doom blankets me. Rachel doesn’t listen to sports radio. How did she find out about the contest? Is everybody talking about it? Do my parents know? Does my brother? Sure, they’re all the way in Atlanta, but sometimes they tune in to BS Morning Sports Talk over the Internet. Even if they weren’t listening today, they’re sure to find out at some point. I can’t put it off anymore. I have to tell them that Nico and I broke up. I stride into the house determined to break the news to them.
A few minutes later, I’m settled on the couch with a big glass of wine and dialing my parents’ number. It rings five times and then Molly picks up. “We’re eating at Grandma’s,” she announces. Glad to know they’re having a nice family dinner while I’m here in our home state, alone and miserable.
I was all hyped up to tell my parents the news, but I can’t ruin their happy family dinner, can I? Maybe I should, because it will make them feel guilty for leaving.
“Auntie, do I get to be a flower girl at your wedding?” Molly asks.
The sofa is old and offers little support. I sink deep into its soft leather.
“I hope you’re not going to pick Sophie instead of me because you see her more.”
“Of course I’m not going to pick Sophie instead of you,” I say, trying unsuccessfully to get comfortable.
“Maybe you could pick both of us,” Molly suggests.
“Sure,” I say because I’m certainly not going to break the news that Nico and I have split to my five-year-old niece. Then again, it might be easier for my mother if she hears about it from her beloved granddaughter rather than her spinster daughter.
“Mommy, Auntie said I could be a flower girl at her wedding.” Her voice is farther away, but I can still hear the excitement in it.
I squirm on the worn cushions.
“Hey, Jillian,” my sister-in-law, Susannah, says. She pronounces my name Jill Ann, like I’m a Southern belle she grew up with instead of a native New Englander. “Molly’s really excited about your big day.”
Tell her now before this gets even more out of control. “Listen Sus—”
“Hey, Sis.” My brother must have grabbed the phone from his wife. “Still can’t believe Nico manned up. When’s the big day? Better get it done ASAP before he changes his mind.”
Before he changes his mind? Once, when we were younger, Christian and I were racing across the yard. I tripped over a log and landed so hard on my stomach that the wind was knocked out of me. His comments today have the exact same effect. Was it that obvious to everyone else that Nico would change his mind?
“We’re still trying to figure it out,” I lie, because my brother is the last person I would break the news to. He’d make me feel worse than I already do.
“Not getting cold feet, is he?”
“Maybe I’m the one who’s getting cold feet,” I say, bringing myself to a standing position.
My brother laughs. “Right. You’ve been trying to wear him down for six years and now that you’ve succeeded, you’re going to back out. Fat chance.”
I’m pacing the hallway again, trying to make sense of my brother’s comment. Wearing Nico down? Is that what I’ve been doing?
My sister-in-law says something in the background.
“Hey, we got to run. Dinner is on the table,” Christian says. He hangs up without letting me talk to my mother.
The tears that I’ve been fighting back all day fall freely now, but they’re not for Nico. I want to be sitting at the supper table with my parents, having a home-cooked meal. I bet my mom made pot roast with potatoes and carrots that have been simmering in a Crock-Pot all day. My dad probably contributed to the meal by making Pillsbury Poppin’ Fresh rolls. Dessert is definitely some type of homemade pie. Before my family all bolted south, we used to have supper together at least once a week
at my parents’. I miss those dinners. Damn Christian and his Georgia peach of a wife.
Chapter 7
“How long are you staying?” Ben’s voice startles me, causing me to jump in my chair. “Didn’t mean to scare you,” he says, zipping his jacket.
At just after six thirty, we are the only two left on the floor. “I want to finish writing this.” I’ve been working on the new brochure all week, but every word I write triggers a memory of Nico, sending me into a sinkhole.
Ben stares at the blinking cursor on the mostly empty screen in front of me. “Looks like it’s going to be a long night then.”
“Maybe.” I’ve worked until nine every day this week, mainly because I don’t want to go home to my empty apartment, where there’s nothing to do but think about Nico and listen to Mr. O’Brien coughing on the other side of the wall. It’s unusual for Ben to be here after five though. “Why are you still here?”
“I had to finish the mock-up of the home page. Stacy wants to see it tomorrow.” He stands behind me, fiddling with his key fob. “Why don’t you wrap things up so we can walk out together.”
His suggestion is tempting because crossing the pedestrian bridge from the office building to the parking garage is creepy this time of night. The lights that are supposed to illuminate the path are all buried in snow. Each time the maintenance crew digs them out, we get another storm, and they have to shovel them out all over again, so they finally gave up.
“I’ll be fine.”
“You sure?”
I nod, and Ben reluctantly says good night.
Instead of going back to writing the brochure, I visit the radio station’s website to check on the number of entries in the win-a-date-with-Nico contest. There’s a running tally by the button where contestants submit their photographs and description of their ideal date. Right now the total is up to 67,504. Last time I looked, which was about five minutes before Ben came to say goodbye, the total was 67,501. Even though my level of angst increases along with the number of respondents, I can’t make myself stop checking. I wish I could. In all, I must have checked more than a hundred times since Branigan announced the stupid contest. For a split second it even crossed my mind to enter, submit a fake picture and write an entry so good that they have to choose me. On the night of the date, when Nico finds out that I’m the contest winner, he’ll smile and say I was hoping it was you. I guess I’ve seen You’ve Got Mail too many times.
