Olive Oil and White Bread

by Georgia Beers

  “Absolutely.” Angie pushed her plate away. “I can’t eat any more. I feel sick about this.”

  That was something about Angie that Jillian loved: her ability to empathize. Coming off like a stoic businesswoman was a lot of work for her because that wasn’t really who she was. Jillian blamed Joe’s Italian genes for Angie’s emotion, and Alice’s English genes for Angie’s attempts to conceal that emotion. It was quite the battle that went on inside her girlfriend, but at times like this, when the emotion was clear-cut and palpable, Jillian felt like she was really seeing Angie’s heart.

  “I want to call Laura, but I don’t,” Angie said. “I want to ask her what the hell is going on, but I’m afraid I wouldn’t be nice about it.”

  “She may end up calling you, you know.”

  “Yeah.” She was quiet for a moment. “Not sure what I’d say.”

  Jillian stood and started clearing the table. Angie joined her. As they were putting the last of the dishes into the dishwasher, Angie said, “We’re there, in that spot where we’ll have to choose sides between our friends.”

  Jillian furrowed her brow. “Why do we have to choose sides? I mean, I don’t like what Laura did, but does that mean we can’t be friends anymore?”

  “It’s what happens, babe. You’ve seen it. What about when we have a party or go out with a group? We can’t invite both of them.”

  “Why not?”

  Angie stopped what she was doing and looked at Jillian. “Honey. Shay has been your friend since you were a kid. Would you really want to put her in the position of having to be in the same room with the ex that broke her heart?”

  “But Laura is your friend. Don’t you feel the same way?”

  “I haven’t known her as long as you’ve known Shay. And . . .” Her voice drifted off, and she simply shook her head.

  “You don’t like the way she handled things.”

  Angie looked at her, her eyes flashing. “I hate the way she handled things.”

  Jillian inclined her head. “Me too.”

  Nineteen

  The New Year’s Eve party at Tinny’s was in full swing, and at full volume. The stereo was blasting—appropriately—Prince’s 1999. There were plenty of guests talking, laughing, and in varying states of intoxication, some having been there for much of the day. A trio of women sat at the dining room table, talking over a bottle of merlot while two women Jillian recognized from her early softball days were competing to see which of them could stand on her head longer while holding a beer, as half a dozen others watched and cheered them on.

  On the television, a muted Dick Clark was pointing out the ridiculous number of people in Times Square waiting for the ball to drop at midnight. Jillian shook her head in awe as she watched. You couldn’t pay me enough to be there, she thought, watching the throngs of people packed up against one another like so many thousands of sardines. Just the thought of being that close to that many strangers made her want to wriggle out of her skin.

  “What happens if you have to pee?” Angie’s voice was soft as she wrapped her arms around Jillian from behind, kissed her temple.

  “I was just wondering that same thing,” Jillian said with a laugh. “I think you either hold it or you wear a diaper.”

  “I’d love to be there for New Year’s Eve.” Angie reached around and pointed to a window on the TV screen, high above the crowd. “But only if I’m in one of these apartments. Warm, dry and near a toilet.”

  “Amen to that.”

  They were interrupted by the ringtone of the office. Jillian rolled her eyes and stepped out of Angie’s arms.

  “Seriously, Angie? It’s New Year’s Eve.”

  With a grimace, Angie fumbled in her pocket for her cell phone. “I know. It’s got to be an overseas supplier. I’m sorry. I’ll get rid of them.” She handed her empty cup to Jillian, moved to a corner and plugged one ear with a finger as she pressed the phone to the other.

  Tinny staggered across the room to Jillian. “Hey!” Tinny’s voice was booming, not surprising since she’d been drinking since early afternoon. “I’m so glad you guys are here.” She leaned heavily against Jillian, and Jillian laughed even as she worked to help her keep her balance. “Jill. We need you this year. Come back to the team.”

  This was not the time to get into it—Jillian was pretty sure Tinny wouldn’t remember this conversation tomorrow, let alone at the beginning of softball season in the spring—but it was something Jillian had been thinking about. With a glance at Angie, still on the phone, she said to Tinny, “I may take you up on that. You never know.”

  “Really?”

  Jillian nodded. “I miss it. And I’ve got the time.” She purposely did not look at Angie as she said that.

  “Excellent. Wait. Why are your cups empty?” Tinny’s stood up straight. “Gimme those.” She snatched the two plastic cups out of Jillian’s hands and disappeared with them, leaving Jillian grinning and shaking her head.

  “What are the chances we get refills before Tinny gets distracted by a conversation and forgets us altogether?” Angie asked as she reappeared by Jillian’s side, the phone tucked away once more.

  “Slim to none,” Jillian answered with a laugh.

  “I’m on it.” Angie followed Tinny into the kitchen where the keg was.

  Across the room, Jillian saw Shay in conversation with a cute redhead, and she studied them. It had taken a ton of convincing to get her to come along to the party with them, but Angie had been very persuasive. Plus, Jillian suspected that seeing nobody socially except herself and Angie was starting to bore poor Shay to tears. The redhead was taller—though that didn’t take much when compared with Shay—and seemed to be absorbed in what Shay was saying, her eye contact remaining steady. Shay looked better than she had over the past few weeks. She was still too thin—Jillian had done her best to invite her to dinner often in an attempt to put back on the twenty or so pounds she’d dropped since the breakup—but her face didn’t look quite so gaunt any more, and she was actually grinning at the redhead. Only in that second did Jillian realize how much she’d missed that smile. As if feeling Jillian’s eyes, Shay turned and caught her gaze, then excused herself and headed in Jillian’s direction.

  “God, I’m so glad the holidays are almost over,” Shay told her.

  “I bet.” She gestured with her eyes toward the redhead. “She’s cute. She doesn’t look familiar.”

  “She’s new in town. Just started working in Tinny’s building a couple months ago. Got roped into coming to this party, but she only knows, like, four people.” Shay sipped her Coke.

  Before they could continue, Tinny’s latest squeeze stopped by with a tray of small, plastic shot glasses, her voice about a hundred decibels louder than necessary. “End of the world Jell-O shots! Have one!”

  Shay declined, but Jillian grabbed a green one. Using her tongue deftly and making Shay laugh in the process, she sucked down the shot just as Angie returned with two cups.

  “Hey! You’re only supposed to do that when I’m here to watch,” she whined. Noticing Shay, she asked, “Do you need a drink?”

  “Nah. It’s better for me to avoid that stuff tonight. Besides, somebody’s got to drive your two drunk asses home.”

  “I am not drunk,” Jillian said. “Quite yet.”

  Cheers rang out from across the room as one of the head-standers fell to the floor, along with her beer.

  “Ah, to be in our twenties again,” Angie said, feigning wistfulness.

  “I don’t miss that,” Jillian replied. “I do miss softball, though.”

  “Tinny hit you up?” Shay asked. “She said she was going to.”

  “Yup, but I’ve been thinking about it anyway. I got away from it once I got a job and a house and a life, and I just never went back. I worry that I’m too old to play now, that I’ll break a hip, but I miss it.”

  “I’ve got some friends starting up a golf league. You should join us.”

  Jillian glanced at Angie. �
��I have no idea how to golf,” Angie said.

  “My dad golfs,” Jillian reminded her. “I bet we could get the basics from him.”

  “Think about it,” Shay told her.

  Guests had been coming and going steadily since Angie, Jillian, and Shay arrived around eight. At 11:30, the doorbell rang and the front door opened. Jillian knew who it was before she looked, simply by the way Shay’s face fell and she muttered, “Fuck.”

  Laura looked good. Better than Jillian wished she did. Her eyes were sparkling, her skin aglow. She looked happy. She was hand in hand with a tall blonde with stunningly blue eyes and a pretty face. Jillian could feel Shay stiffen before she excused herself and left the room. Laura watched her go, even as she greeted Tinny and Margo, smiling and handing over her coat.

  “Should I go get Shay?” Angie asked Jillian in a whisper.

  “Let her be for a minute.” Jillian took a swallow from her cup and almost choked on it as she saw Laura look their way, then head towards them.

  “Shit,” Angie muttered.

  “Just be nice,” Jillian warned. “Don’t make a scene.”

  “Hey, you guys,” Laura said, her grin just a little bit too big and a little bit too forced. “How are you?”

  “Good. We’re good,” Jillian said. “And you?”

  Laura nodded. “I’m good, too.” Turning to the woman whose hand she still held, she said, “This is my girlfriend, Kerry. Kerry, this is Jillian and Angie.”

  Kerry gave a genuine smile and reached out a hand. “I’ve heard so much about you two. It’s nice to finally have faces to go with the names.”

  They all shook hands politely, but the conversation faltered. Laura shifted from one foot to the other, obviously uncertain how to navigate around the elephant in the room. Angie never looked her in the eye, not once. Jillian was at a loss. They all stood there in uncomfortable silence. Finally, Kerry provided the necessary out when she waved to somebody across the room and tugged Laura away with a, “Nice to meet you both” tossed over her shoulder.

  “Okay, that could not have been more awkward,” Angie said, relief obvious in her tone.

  “Oh, my god, I was afraid we’d all just stand there looking at each other forever.”

  Before they could continue, Shay returned. “You guys, I’ve got to get out of here. I’m so sorry, but I can’t do it. I can’t stay here with them being all lovey-dovey. I can’t take it.”

  Jillian and Angie exchanged a glance, then set their drinks down.

  “But, it’s almost midnight,” Tinny whined, loudly, when they told her they had to head out.

  “I know,” Angie soothed. “But Jillian’s got a stomach thing going on, and the last thing she wants to do is puke in your newly remodeled bathroom.”

  On cue, Jillian burped and covered her mouth with her fingers.

  Tinny grimaced. “Oh, all right. But feel better.” She hugged all three of them, the smothering, too-tight bear hug of a large woman who’s had way too much alcohol. “I love you guys.”

  Once tucked into the car, Shay spoke from behind the wheel. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to ruin your New Year’s Eve.”

  Angie was in the passenger’s seat, Jillian in the back, but they held hands over the seat. “You didn’t ruin anything,” she said.

  “I just—I couldn’t do it. Just when I think I’m okay, I get knocked back down a few pegs again.” Shay blew out a frustrated breath.

  “Screw her,” Angie said. “You stay with us tonight.”

  “Oh, no,” Shay protested. “I couldn’t. I’ve already encroached on you two enough for one night.”

  “Well, you are staying with us tonight.” Jillian was surprised when she heard herself. She’d hoped to have a quiet, romantic evening with Angie to ring in the New Year, maybe even an orgasm or two. But her friend needed them, and it’s not like it would be the first time Jillian had hoped to make love with Angie and ended up disappointed. “We’ve got some champagne. The guest bed has fresh sheets on it. Angie’s cooking a fabulous breakfast in the morning. Right, honey?”

  “Absolutely,” Angie said. “Besides, we might need help if all the electronics go kaplooey and the world ends.”

  That was all the convincing Shay needed.

  2001

  Hanging by a Moment

  Twenty

  Angie was cursing at her calculator, unable to figure out how she’d screwed her markup so badly, when the frantic intercom call from Hope yanked her attention away.

  “Angie. Get in here. Keith’s office. Hurry up!”

  Two questions hit her brain as she stood. One: Why did Hope sound so freaked? And two: What the hell was she doing in Keith’s office? She hated him. Angie hurried down the hall, noticing several others heading in the same direction. When she got to Keith’s office, four of them were already standing in the middle of it, eyes glued to the small television he had set up on top of his armoire. Keith was one of those people who needed constant noise—television, radio, whatever—to help him work.

  The television was tuned in to what the bottom of the screen said was breaking news.

  “What’s going on?” she asked, her question echoed by the three others who’d followed her in. Even Mr. Guelli was standing in the group.

  “A plane flew into the World Trade Center,” Keith told her, his eyes never leaving the screen.

  “What?” Angie was incredulous. “How the hell does that happen?”

  “Half hour ago. They’re trying to figure out if it was an accident or a terrorist,” Guelli said.

  Before any more could be said, the TV reporter’s voice raised in pitch, and he became more animated.

  “Oh, my god,” Hope said. “There’s another one!”

  The group watched in horror as a second plane crashed straight into the building, an explosion of flames shooting out into the New York City sky.

  “Holy shit,” Angie said, as her colleagues shrieked. . They watched the news for long moments, everybody trying to absorb the fact that this had definitely been an attack on the United States. Then the unthinkable happened.

  The South Tower began to collapse, each floor caving in on the one below it. Angie covered her mouth with her hands. People around her gasped and cried out.

  “Oh, my god,” she whispered. “All those people. All those people.”

  Nothing could be done. Nobody could do anything but watch, horrified, as the World Trade Center collapsed on itself, taking the lives of thousands in a matter of minutes.

  The group, watched, paralyzed. Finally, Ivan, the graphic artist, spoke up.

  “My college roommate lives in Manhattan. I need to make sure he’s okay.” He left the room without a backward glance, and his words spurred on the rest of them to head for a phone or a computer to check on their loved ones.

  Somebody had attacked the United States.

  It was almost unfathomable. Back in her office, Angie scoured the Internet and gobbled up any reports she could find. Her mother called her cell phone.

  “Ma. You okay?”

  “Oh, Angelina,” her mother said, distraught. Angie could hear the tears in her voice. “How could anybody do something so awful?”

  “I don’t know, Ma. I don’t know.”

  Several more calls came in a similar fashion. Maria. Matt. She tried Jillian’s cell several times, but with no answer. She wondered if she’d even heard, or if she was closed up in her classroom with finger-painting six-year-olds. She left messages.

  Focusing on work was next to impossible. Her intercom crackled with Guelli’s voice.

  “Everybody. Go home. Nobody can concentrate. We shouldn’t bother. Go home. Be with your families. We’re closing early.”

  Angie blinked at her phone. Closing early? That never happened. But this day . . . there was something that linked them all. Angie’d never considered herself any more or less patriotic than the next girl, but this day—they were all Americans and they all needed to stick together.

  She
was packing up her briefcase when her cell rang again.

  “Angie Righetti.”

  “Angie? Did you hear?” It was Jillian, her voice cracking.

  “I did. Baby, are you okay?”

  “We’re sending the kids home early. Everybody’s leaving. It’s so awful.”

  “I’m on my way home, too. I’ll meet you there. Be careful driving. A lot of people are closing early, so traffic will be heavy. Take your time.”

  It was nearly another ninety minutes before they stood in the kitchen, their arms wrapped around one another. Jillian cried in Angie’s arms, then chastised herself for doing so.

  “I don’t know why I’m crying. I don’t know anybody in Manhattan. I didn’t lose anybody.” She swiped at her tears.

  “Oh, honey, we all did. We’ve all lost somebody. We’ve lost some of our peace, our sense of security. We should all be crying.”

  They spent the remainder of that day and well into the evening in front of the television. They held hands, their petty squabbles forgotten and even their difficult issues set aside for the time being. News reports were plentiful. Film of the planes was abundant, and it was played over and over and over again.

  “I don’t want to see it anymore,” Jillian whispered, her head on Angie’s shoulder. “But I feel like I have to. For the sake of everybody who died, I feel like it’s my duty to sit here and watch it happen as many times as they show it to me.”

  Angie wrapped her arms around Jillian and held her tightly.

  “I don’t think the country will ever be the same again,” Jillian said.

  “I know, baby. I know.”

  They sat.

  They watched.

  They ached.

  Angie dialed Jillian’s cell with the phone on speaker. She answered on the second ring.

  “Hi, babe.”

  “Hey,” Angie said. “Are you home?”

  “Where else would I be at dinnertime?”

  Angie tried to ignore what she felt was an implied “the time of day when you’re never here,” and stuffed extra cheerfulness into her voice. “Good. Stay put. I’m almost there.”