When he made no move to take the clips, she pressed them into the soil around the cactus. Then she indicated the books. “These…hic…are mine.”
David raised a brow. “Okay.”
Nina turned and marched back to her desk. Grabbing the few remaining personal items, she stowed them in her bag, zipped it shut and snatched her coat and hat. She heard David call out, “Miss Baxter,” but knew she had to get out before she broke down completely or Carolyn returned or both, so she picked up her pace and scurried to the outer doors-which was when she remembered that she was locked in and that Carolyn had the key.
It seemed like a good time to consider which window she could hurl herself from, but then David reached in front of her, slipped his own key into the lock and said, “Should I ask how you got in?”
Wordlessly she shook her head.
“Miss Baxter, I-”
Nina didn't wait. Ignoring the elevators, she hit the stairs running, fleeing like Cinderella from the ball.
For thirteen years, despite numerous challenges, she had maintained a spotless employment record and earned the respect of her co-workers. On Friday the clock had struck midnight. Now, two days later, she knew the party was over for good.
When Nina opened the door to her own apartment, the first thing she noticed was the aroma of chicken soup and something baking.
After telling Carolyn that she'd “run into” David Hanson, but that he didn't know who had let her into the office, she had walked around downtown Chicago for half an hour then bought a Sunday paper, a package of Rolaids and caught the El home. Before her stop, she'd wiped her eyes, blown her nose and applied a little lipstick to offset her red cheeks and bloodshot eyes. She hadn't eaten anything all day, and she still didn't want to, but she was determined to put up a good front for her family.
“I'm home!” she called into the quiet apartment.
As if her announcement had released a herd of gazelle, Nina's two children ran into the living room from opposite ends of the apartment. As always, they managed to sound as if, between them, they had ten pairs of feet rather than two.
Isabella arrived first, wrapping her arms around her mother's waist and craning her head to look up. “I helped Bubby make matzo balls and mandelbrodt!” The exuberant ten-year-old's dark blue eyes sparkled with pride. “And guess what? Bubby says these matzo balls are lighter than air 'cause I have just the right touch!”
Nina smoothed a hand over Isabella's brown hair, gloriously wavy, but not frizzy like her own. “I can't wait to taste these matzo balls,” she told her daughter. “Did you save me any?”
“We haven't eaten lunch yet.” Isabella stepped back, making room for her brother, Isaac-Zach for short-to greet his mother. “I'm going to help Bubby some more.” She loped back to the kitchen, preteen awkwardness and grace rolled into one lean body.
Nina looked at her son. At twelve years of age, Zach was old enough to contain his enthusiasm over seeing his mother a mere two hours after he'd last seen her. He stood back a bit, more interested in the Chicago Sun-Times than in Nina's return.
“Hi, Mom. Can I have the sports section?”
“Sure, honey.” Stepping forward to run a hand over his short-cropped curls-because she wasn't too old to exhibit enthusiasm over seeing her son-Nina asked, “How were you today, Zachie? Any problems?”
Increasingly impatient of late when asked about his health, Zach ducked away from his mother's touch. “I'm fine.” He reached for the paper. “I want the movie section, too. Okay?”
“Just save me-” The classifieds, Nina almost said, but caught herself in the nick of time. She had not yet told her family about the layoffs. She would love not to tell them anything at all until she had a new job lined up.
Even at twelve, Zachary worried too much. Nina figured that came with the territory of being the man of the house before you'd shaved your first whisker. But when he worried, his asthma kicked in…and then she worried.
“Save the rest of the paper for me,” Nina told her son, refraining from asking if he'd had to use his inhaler today.
“Okay. When's lunch?”
“I think it may be ready, so stick around.”
Zach took his paper to the couch and sat down to read, neatly separating sections and placing them aside until he came to the sports. He was so much like her, Nina mused-calm, methodical….Abruptly she amended her thought. No, he was the way she'd been before she'd gone secretary on her boss.
Deciding to leave the classifieds until she had some private time, she deposited her heavy bag by the door and halfheartedly followed the aromas to the kitchen.
Under her great grandmother's watchful eye, Isabella dusted a pan of mandelbrodt with cinnamon sugar.
“Now that smells wonderful.” Nina reached over her daughter's shoulder to sample one of the long cookies.
Bubby's gnarled hand, made quick from years of baking and hand slapping, shot out to admonish her granddaughter. “Not so fast. You'll have soup first.”
Nina exchanged smiles with her daughter. “Well, when you put it that way. Anything I can do?”
“Go sit,” her grandmother directed, and gratefully Nina retreated to a small 1950s-style Formica-topped table that nestled near the window of their third-floor apartment. Feeling immeasurably tired, she watched her daughter and grandmother and thanked God for Bubby, five foot nothing, but with strength that couldn't be measured in inches and a love for family that made her seem mountainously large.
Bubby didn't live with them-she liked to keep her own apartment-but she babysat anytime Nina needed her, and she was a steady, loving influence in her great grandchildren's lives, as she'd always been in Nina's.
“Izzy dolly.” Bubby put a hand on Isabella's shoulder. “This is a special lunch you made. Go change into something nice, very nice, so we can dine like civilized people.”
The opportunity to wear one of her fancy dresses sent Isabella running happily to her room.
Bubby poured two mugs of coffee from the electric pot on the counter and stacked a plate with the warm mandelbrodt. Dressed cozily in dark blue polyester stretch pants and a matching blue sweatshirt that read If You Don't Like It, I Didn't Cook It, she ambled to the table with the skill of a career waitress. Nina knew better than to offend Bubby by offering to help.
“Huh, so I do get cookies before soup?” she asked, then looked down at her own clothing. Faded jeans and a beige cable-knit sweater with floppy sleeves were more suited to moving day than to the “civilized” family lunch Bubby requested. “Don't you want me to change my clothes, too?” Nina eyed the steaming mugs of caffeine and hoped the answer was no.
“Stay put,” Bubby directed, setting everything down, then lowering herself to a chair with an exaggerated groan. “The weather in Chicago is not good for my bones. I should move to Orlando. Me and Mickey Mouse.”
Nina had heard the I'm-moving-to-Florida threat too often to take it seriously. “The Wilkens Senior Center would be lost without your rugelach,” she said, and Bubby nodded.
“True.”
Deciding the cinnamon sugar would settle her stomach, Nina sampled one of the mandelbrodt. “Mmmm.” “What's wrong?”
Dunking the bitten tip of her cookie into the coffee, Nina cocked her head at her grandmother. “Nothing. It's delicious.”
Impatiently, Bubby slapped a hand at the air. “Not the cookie.” She leaned forward, sharp blue eyes narrowing. “You got something to tell me?”
So much for hoping the cinnamon would settle her stomach. Nina took her time pulling a napkin from the Lucite holder on the table and set her cookie neatly on top of the white square. “Well…offhand, I can't think of-”
“Ellie Berkowitz gets the Sunday paper. She likes the coupons. Today she read the business section. I don't know why.” Bubby shrugged. “Maybe she wants to sleep with Morty Rosenfeld. He's a retired CEO, and she was always a floozy.” Bubby took a sip of steaming coffee then waved a hand. “But that's not the point.”
She leaned farther over the table, her aging bosom resting on the Formica. “The point is Ellie called here this morning, because she knew I'd be here, and she asks me, 'Rayzel, why didn't you tell me there were more layoffs at Hanson?'” Bubby jerked back as if struck. “Layoffs at Hanson! Who knew? Not me.” She placed crooked fingers over her chest. “But they couldn't affect my Nina, or she would have told me. Besides, I said to Ellie, Nina is at the office right now to drop off some work she did over the weekend.”
Nina frowned morosely at her coffee, her mind hopping from one barely plausible excuse to another. She needn't have bothered.
“Of course,” Bubby continued, “I said all this before I knew that Ellie Berkowitz's niece, Carla, got a job at a new coffee store downtown-Some Like It Hot. Good for her.”
“What does this have to-”
“I'm getting there. I'm old. Be a little patient, maybe.” Bubby licked her dry lips. She looked her granddaughter in the eye. “Carla's son Anthony goes to school with Isaac-another thing I didn't know, and Carla called Ellie, because she recognized you walking down the street this morning. It looked like you were crying, she said. She was concerned. Some Like It Hot is right near your office.” Bubby sat back in her chair, hands resting atop the table. “Carla read the paper, too.”
Plowing fingers into her thick curls, Nina wagged her head then looked toward the kitchen door to make sure neither of her children was on the way in.
“I didn't want to worry you or the kids,” she said softly. “I thought if I had a few job prospects when I told you, you wouldn't worry so much.”
She must have sounded as miserable as she felt because Bubby turned immediately comforting. “Me worry? Who's worried?” She reached across the table to clutch Nina's hand. They sat in silence for several moments.
“I'm sorry you had to hear the news from Ellie Berkowitz,” Nina murmured.
“Ah, she's such an old gossip.” Leaning back in her chair, she looked around the kitchen. “How much did you say your rent was going up?”
Nina winced at the mere mention of the notice she'd received two weeks before. The older building they were in had been sold. The new owners planned to remodel the exterior and make other upgrades. The rent was going to jump a hundred dollars a month, effective on the first of the month-ten days away.
“It's the timing of this that stinks,” Nina said, propping her head in her hand. “I had a little savings, but then Izzy needed a Girl Scout uniform and Isaac's music teacher said he needed a better violin to practice on.”
Since the kids had been in kindergarten, Nina had been squirreling away just enough money each paycheck to buy a savings bond here, a savings bond there, always in their names and hers. She'd sworn to herself, though, that she would never dip into their savings for the household needs.
“I have some money,” Bubby began, but Nina squeezed her hand to halt the offer.
“You're not touching your Social Security. You'll need it for your own rainy day. No,” she said when Bubby opened her mouth to protest. “We're going to be okay. I have an excellent employment history, and I'm a hard worker. And I haven't looked in the Sunday paper yet. I bet just the right job is going to be in there.” She smiled then raised her thumb to her lips and nibbled unconsciously on the cuticle.
“I thought David Hanson was such a nice man,” Bubby said sadly, wagging her salt-and-pepper head. “He gave Isabella that cute bear.”
“That was ten years ago.” Nina pushed back her chair and leaned her head against the windowpane.
The day she'd had Izzy by C-section had also been the day she'd received her final divorce papers by mail. Nothing, not even flowers, had come from her ex, but a giant stuffed teddy bear had arrived from Hanson Media. When Nina had called to say thank-you, the temporary receptionist had told her that David Hanson himself had gone out on his lunch hour and brought the bear back with him. He'd been off on one of his many trips to the Far East when Nina returned to work, so she'd left a thank you note, which he'd never acknowledged. That had been the end of that, but he'd won a fan in Bubby for life.
“You'd think he could have found you another job in the office,” Bubby insisted. “Maybe if he knew the situation-”
“I've already seen David Hanson,” Nina said to squelch any thought that she might go see him again. “He knows how I feel.” A careful understatement.
Bubby rose to stir her soup. “I suppose you never know about people,” she said sadly. “And he even attends the Special Olympics every year.”
“Yeah. Well.” Nina wasn't entirely sure what that had to do with the layoffs, but she chose not to pursue it.
As she watched Bubby taste the soup and add a pinch of pepper, Nina tapped her unpolished fingernails on the Formica, knowing she was too antsy to sit still for lunch. Regardless of what she'd said about her ability to get a new job, she knew the market was tight and that even a few-week lapse of employment could be devastating given her rent increase. Worse, she would now have to pay for her family's health insurance out of her own pocket.
“Lunch is ready. I'll call the children.” Bubby wiped her hands on her flowered apron.
Nina jumped from the chair. “I'll be right back.”
“Where are you going?”
“To talk to Mr. Goldman.”
Bubby scowled. “What for? He likes my chicken soup all of a sudden?”
Arthur Goldman was the manager of Nina's apartment building, and Bubby had never thought much of the man. He didn't keep the hallway clean enough in her opinion, and he smoked clove cigarettes in a nonsmoking building.
“I don't want him to come to lunch,” Bubby said.
“I'm not asking him to come to lunch.” Nina fished a rubber band out of the “everything” drawer and scraped her hair into a ponytail. “I'm going to explain my situation and ask him to talk to the new owners on our behalf or to give me their number. Then I'm going to remind him that we are stellar tenants, that stellar tenants are not easy to come by, and that I have never once complained about the stench his clove cigarettes leave in the hallway.”
“You'd be better off talking to David Hanson. I bet he sweeps his hallway!” Bubby called as Nina headed toward the door.
“I bet he hires someone to sweep his hallway,” Nina tossed over her shoulder without breaking stride. “I doubt David Hanson would know which end of a broom to put on the floor, and I am absolutely certain he has better things to do than to concern himself with my problems. Or the problems of any of his ex-employees.”
Entering the living room with Bubby at her heels, Nina assured herself that her son was still deeply engrossed in the sports section. She reached for the doorknob. “I'm going to buy myself a little leeway, and then I am going to blow the Hanson dust off my shoes and not look back.” She paused briefly to meet Bubby's doubtful gaze. Despite her grandmother's brave claim, Nina could see worry fading the aging blue eyes.
She took her grandmother by the shoulders. “I've got you and the kids,” she said quietly. “And you've got me. I refuse to worry. I've got smarts and I've got chutzpah.”
Feeling stronger almost instantly with a simple change in attitude, she admonished herself for allowing someone-anyone-else's actions to frighten her. Hadn't she learned better over the years?
Standing as tall as her five-foot-three frame allowed, she opened the door and stepped into the hall. “I don't need anyone to rescue me,” she reassured Bubby, summoning her first genuine smile in the past three days, “least of all a corporate suit who, despite having laid off half his employees, will not miss a single meal at his favorite five-star feedlot, I am sure. Know what I mean?”
“I think I get the picture.”
Nina jumped, literally jumped in the air, as she whirled around.
David Hanson stood in the hallway of her modest apartment building. Dressed in the designer clothes he wore, apparently, even on weekends, he frowned at the purple hat and scarf in his hands.
“You left these on you
r desk, Miss Baxter.” He raised unreadable brown eyes. “As the day is chilly, and I'm about to be responsible for turning off your heat, I thought you might need them.”
Chapter Two
While her family entertained David Hanson in their living room, Nina stood in her bathroom and wondered how long it would take for anyone to discover she'd climbed out the window.
Immediately upon seeing David in the hallway, Bubby had pulled him into the apartment, sat him on the couch next to Zach and shooed Nina toward the bedrooms.
“Go! See what's taking Izzy so long,” her grandmother had said in an overly hearty voice and with an overly cheerful smile. Put on some lipstick, Bubby had mouthed to Nina as she'd shoved her down the hallway.
Turning to gaze into the mirror, Nina shook her head at her sad reflection. She'd been grateful for any excuse to escape David's serious, censorious gaze, but lipstick, she feared, would not cure what ailed her.
Leaning toward the glass her children routinely splattered with toothpaste, she shook her head. Could she have been any more of a doofus today?
Probably not, because according to her calculations, she had just run out of feet to put in her mouth.
Morose but dutiful, she plucked a lipstick from the basket of makeup she kept on the sink. She uncapped the tube and raised it to her lips, then halted. She wore no other makeup. Scooped into a ponytail, her curly hair looked like a profusion of yellow ribbons exploding behind her head. No wonder David Hanson hadn't immediately recognized her in the office.
For work she always, but always, tamed her fly-away kinks into a twist or bun or French braid. And she'd always dressed conservatively, in suits and blouses. Neat. Respectful. Appropriate.
Recapping the lipstick, she dropped it into the basket. Why bother? No matter what Bubby thought, an attractive appearance was not going to help her get her job back. And Shell-Pink Long-Lasting Lipwear would not erase David Hanson's memory of how she had behaved today.
All she could do now was go to the living room, thank Mr. Hanson for very kindly returning her hat and scarf, and bid the man a permanent if not overly fond farewell.
The Boss and Miss Baxter Page 2
