by J. L. Salter
“What about the ones you haven’t read yet?”
“If you can’t wait, Louis, you read them. I’ll be there Monday. Bye!”
After she folded her phone, she wondered if she’d even have her job by Monday. Hairy hell!
Monday would be the 24th, which meant six more work days before September 1st. If she could keep Louis out of her office for that period and wrangle even one hour of clerical help for each of those shifts, Amanda could still pull this grant cycle together. Possibly. Hobbling around on broken toes certainly wouldn’t help things, but she could survive.
Amanda was, if anything, a survivor.
And, now that Jason had clearly exited her life, she was also solitary again — no distractions at home. Well, except noisy kids and a yodeling neighbor.
Amanda realized she was looking in the direction of the television but not actually watching the program. Her mind had wandered. How could she have let things go that far? Why hadn’t she just asserted herself more vigorously at the beginning and chased Jason away with a broom handle?
Would the repercussions of a physical ejection have been any worse than the fix she was in presently? Couldn’t be. At worst, Jason would have sulked for a couple of weeks and then one of them (or both) would have looked for opportunity and means to make up.
Why had she let it go so far?
It hadn’t been just the manic overconfidence of her domineering friend — though surely that remained a driving force. It had not been merely curiosity at how long Jason would endure the deprivation — though she had been captivated by that question.
While not aware of this during Jason’s stay, Amanda was now convinced of an element distinct from all these others. She realized she’d been given a unique opportunity to learn more about her lover. At his nadir, to be sure, but information to weigh when considering if Jason was a viable long-term mate. It sounded rather clinical as she reflected on it now.
The January episode had been difficult and exhausting, of course, but it had lacked the intense work pressure of Amanda’s annual crunch at the office. Plus, that had been only about ten weeks after they’d first become lovers, so there had still been something of a honeymoon aura.
In January, she’d thought his saggy, rumpled pajamas were kind of cute. In August, they’d just looked sloppy and rank. What a difference those few months had made!
Did such awareness signal that — if eventually married — their relationship would continually slide downhill away from love and attraction? She didn’t know. But surely this recent crisis was a test of all that “richer / poorer… sickness / health” mumbo-jumbo.
Amanda watched the Lifetime Channel with one eye and listened to incessant yodeling practice with one ear. Incredibly, she was still able to nap briefly on the couch. Love those pain meds.
———
Though unsteady and slow, Amanda was up at about 6:30 p.m. when her doorbell rang. It took nearly five minutes to hobble to the entrance on her too-short crutches. Though aware she looked awful, she had no inclination to check a mirror, so she just sighed heavily and opened the door. Jason’s mom. “Hi, Margaret, come on in. The place is a mess.” Amanda moved aside clumsily.
“I’m sure it’s typical of a place where a sick man has held forth for a week and a half and an injured woman has just come home.”
It was. “I was about to scratch around for supper. You’re welcome to join me.”
Margaret smiled. “Well, let me see what you’re offering. If it’s any of the dishes detailed on Christine’s blog, I think I’ll pass.”
“No, this is fairly ordinary stuff as best I can recall. I haven’t even opened the bag Christine brought back.” Amanda pointed toward it.
“Let me give you a hand.” Margaret hoisted the sack onto the table and began removing things. Suddenly she stopped and looked around the dining area. “Where’s your tablecloth?”
“Your son was wearing it when he vamoosed. Bright floral design… should be easy to find him.”
“Florals aren’t usually his colors.” Margaret sorted items as she unloaded the bag. “Looks like soup is the best possibility of this array. Would you like me to heat it?”
“Please.” Amanda sat at the table and leaned her crutches against the next chair. “When was the last time we talked? Saturday?”
Margaret nodded. “You stopped by to ask if you were being too harsh on my Jason. I didn’t think so at the time, but under the present circumstances, I guess you were.” A slight pause while she located a saucepan and opened the soup can. “How’s the foot?”
“Toes. They hurt… throb.”
“Your head is better? The concussion, I mean?”
“Yeah. Did Christine fill you in?”
Margaret nodded as she stirred the soup. “She called this afternoon.”
“Well, my wrist also hurts, especially when I have to hold those crutches. But what really hurts… is in here.” Amanda pointed to her chest and choked up again. “I’m sorry. I’ve been doing a lot of that for the past two days.”
———
Margaret kept tending the soup. “It’s okay, Amanda. It’s natural for your feelings to kind of flood out right now.”
“One reason I feel this bad is that I was so awful to him. I mean, I told him I couldn’t handle any company and I made several direct suggestions that he leave, like ‘Maybe you should go to your own apartment, Jason.’ And I gave him plenty of other hints.”
“Too vague, for a man,” Margaret interrupted.
“Probably.” Amanda nodded. “But mostly, for the time he was here, I just kept making snide and sarcastic remarks.” She shook her head. “Does Jason not get sarcasm?”
Briefly silent, Margaret smiled softly. “I used that with Henry, too — for years — with little measurable result. Finally, one evening in the middle of an awful argument — no idea what it was about — I just flat-out lost it. I said, ‘Don’t you know when I’m being sarcastic?’ He had this shocked expression on his face and then he said, slowly, ‘No, I don’t.’ So I said, ‘Well, what the blazes did you think all these years when I’ve made comments like that to get you on the same page with me?’ And he said, ‘I just thought you were in a bad mood.’ That cured me of sarcasm. I realized he’d managed to ignore some 90 per cent of what I thought I had clearly communicated… by attributing it to my supposed moodiness.” She stirred again, leaned closely to gauge the steam, and took the soup pan off the stovetop.
“I’ve heard Jason say something about moods, too.”
Margaret looked in three cupboards before locating two bowls. “If you just want to zing him while impressing yourself with your own cleverness, then keep up the sarcasm.”
“Ouch, that hurts.”
“It was meant to. I learned… and now you.” Then Margaret softened. “But if you’re trying to communicate some nugget of information or thought, or attempting to explain what you’re feeling about something… just say it plain. Straight and simple. Men aren’t stupid — well, some are.” She smiled slightly and selected two spoons from the second drawer she opened. “Okay, most men are pretty darn dumb. But some are perceptive enough to get the simple things. If what you say is likely to be dismissed as moodiness without any substance, then you haven’t accomplished much besides hurt his feelings with the nastiness behind the sarcasm.” Margaret thought for a moment to determine if she’d left anything out. “Plain, straight, and simple. Add loving, if you can muster it under the circumstances of the moment.”
Amanda’s eyes clouded. “I feel rotten — being so nasty to him, on top of everything that I let Christine do. Poor Jason.”
Margaret ladled soup into the bowls. “Don’t beat yourself up, Amanda. I read a lot of the blog before it went down this morning. Sure, some of your friend’s ideas were pretty harsh, but sometimes a grown man does need a whipping, so to speak. If I’d had Christine’s imagination back when my Henry went through this phase, it might have been easier to cure him of his colds.”<
br />
“You mean besides the broken water heater gambit.” Amanda tried to taste the soup but it was obviously still too hot, so she just stared into her bowl.
Margaret recognized a stalemate: neither one of the ex-lovebirds wanted to make the first move. She was only about 70 per cent sure Jason was still interested in salvaging the relationship. But she was now certain Amanda really wanted things to mend, so Margaret would nudge a bit. “Something else is bothering you.” Not a question.
Amanda’s eyes clouded. “I’m afraid Jason won’t… won’t ever come back. That I’ve really wrecked things and I’ll never see him again.”
Margaret took the already-opened sleeve of saltine crackers, partly stale, from the table and crumpled half a dozen into her soup. “Now, settle down. Men are prideful and can’t stand people laughing at them. With Christine’s blog, Jason’s heard a lot of laughter. That hurts, sure.”
“I know. They were ridiculing me, too.”
Margaret nodded. “Look, Jason’s a stubborn man. Nearly as mule-headed as his daddy. But I was always able to smooth Henry’s feathers. Because he had just a tad more love for me than he had stubborn pride for himself. So he always came around, eventually.” Margaret gingerly tasted her soup. “If Jason loves you as much as I think he does, he’ll come to his senses. You might need to gild the lily, so to speak, to help patch things up. But he’ll come back.”
“Gild what lily?”
“You know, cook his favorite meal, bake him some brownies…”
“I don’t bake.” Amanda blurted it out quickly. “And his favorite meal is the entire steakhouse buffet. I’ll have to gild something else.”
“You didn’t let me finish. I was starting to explain that you can smooth over about ten times as many ruffled feathers on a man if you just give him special attention.”
“Attention? Like holding the lug thingies while he changes a tire? Watching him play golf? What?” Amanda must have been so distraught that her mind was on a completely different track.
Margaret eyed her closely. Surely Jason’s girlfriend wasn’t that dense. “In the bedroom, for Heaven’s sake!” Margaret sighed heavily. “Good grief. Do I have to write it down?”
“Oh, that kind of special attention.” Amanda rolled her eyes. “Well, I can think of several possibilities.”
“Thank goodness. For a minute, I thought I was dealing with an idiot.” Margaret resumed eating her soup.
Amanda only fiddled with her spoon and then sighed with a lot of shoulder movement. “It’s probably just as well that we’re broken up right now, because of all my work stuff. But I don’t want to lose Jason forever. I’d like to get him back after September 1st.”
Margaret started to speak, but took another breath and waited a moment. “Amanda, a good relationship has to be able to survive the bad weeks as well as the rest of the year. You can’t just put a husband, or boyfriend, on hold for two weeks when work is at crunch time. If the relationship has any substance, it doesn’t go on hiatus when external pressures are high. You can establish temporary boundaries, of course, but real love continues through the crisis phases.” Margaret went on to clarify that everything she said also applied to the male involved.
———
Amanda felt distinctly rotten. Those were things she already knew, but she’d allowed herself to forget them. It made her seem shallow and self-absorbed. “I don’t know what’s next, Margaret.”
“You succeeded in running him out, though it wasn’t the way you’d envisioned. The blog magnified everything. He responded to the public ridicule by breaking up with you. So, the ball’s in your court.” Margaret watched the patient’s face briefly and then looked toward the window. “I need to leave soon… don’t like to drive after dusk.” She finished her soup quickly, rinsed the bowl and spoon, and put them inside the dishwasher. “Amanda, loving partners can’t completely avoid critical periods, but you can’t suspend the relationship during a crisis. If you and Jason had anything more than a fling, it needs to harness enough steam to get through the crunch times.”
Margaret left before Amanda could formulate a reply. She’d still only consumed a third of her soup.
Later, after she finished eating, Amanda picked up her phone. Jason was on speed dial number two. She pressed it. The phone rang six times and went to voicemail.
“Hi, Jason. It’s Amanda. It’s seven-something on Thursday night. I’d like to talk… about everything. Give me a call back if you’d like to talk, too.”
It wasn’t exactly the apology opportunity she’d envisioned if she had reached him live. But hopefully he’d be interested enough to call her back.
When Amanda last checked her phone around 11:00 p.m., there were still no return calls from Jason. Maybe his battery’s too low.
On the borrowed laptop, Amanda logged on to e-mail. Perhaps a different medium would get through to him. Her text was succinct:
.
Lots of mistakes in the last 10 days or so.
I’d like to talk it over.
Please acknowledge.
.
She sent it with a read receipt requested. If Jason opened it but didn’t respond, at least she’d know he’d seen her message.
Chapter 19
August 21 (Friday)
Since Jason had already told Ms. Grunion he wouldn’t be at work that day, there was no need to rise early and phone in. This was the final day of his two-week sick leave vacation. A very strange time — absolutely nothing had gone as he’d hoped.
Now, his entire balance of paid sick days had been wasted and his relationship with Amanda was busted. Destroyed… wrecked… whatever. Whose fault? Mostly Amanda’s. Sure, Jason sent the e-mail formalizing their breakup, but she was the one who’d trashed their whatever.
They’d been steady lovers for nearly ten months — a very odd time, as Jason looked back on it. Amanda had always been the one setting parameters and he’d agreeably let her do so. She’d seemed to need an analysis of their togetherness. Jason had just wanted to share in their time together. He hadn’t wanted to think so much — just to enjoy it.
And he had enjoyed those ten months… mostly. There had been that awkward experience around the beginning of June, another example of Christine’s explosively meddlesome involvement. But once that confusion had settled down, Jason had resumed his normal default setting: hang out together, make love with Amanda, and chase off the other guys who’d be only too happy to take her away from him. Well, they can have her now.
Since he’d listened to Amanda’s voicemail yesterday afternoon, Jason knew she’d received his break-up e-mail from Tuesday evening. But he had no intention of responding to her call. He would have already taken Amanda’s number off his speed dial if he knew how to program his phone.
Jason surfed his 98 cable channels for about an hour. Though he’d never stopped to figure the exact percentage, he only liked about a third of them. Of course, he had to click through all the others to get to the ones he liked. So, two-thirds of his brief stops were on channels he didn’t want and the rest of that hour was distributed among the 30-plus channels he appreciated enough to pause upon. His time on each varied with the content: if a commercial was on, he zipped away immediately. But if it was regular programming on those good channels, he might spend as much as a full minute assessing each before moving on to the greener pastures up or down the numbering sequence.
Amanda had acted like his television M.O. was irritating. What about her watching pattern? Park on one of three channels for hours and watch chick flick after chick flick with no variety? What a waste of thirty other good channels.
Jason put down the remote and logged on to e-mail. Kevin had sent another conquest story from a recent happy hour — an adventurous school teacher from Missouri. True to that state’s motto, she had insisted that Kevin “show me”… so he did. Ha! Kevin was hopeless, but he surely had a lot of female enjoyment without all the confusing hassles.
The other e-mails we
re not nearly as inspiring. Three spams: delete, delete, delete. L.L.Bean wanted Jason to buy a jacket. Nice, but too pricey. Something from his middle brother: blah, blah.
E-mail from Amanda! What else does she have to say? He opened it. More of the same from her previous phone message… she wanted to talk. They’d had plenty of potential time to talk during his ten days of neglect, deprivation, and Internet ridicule. But on those awful days, Amanda had spent considerably more time with Christine than she had with him.
Now she wanted to talk. Fat chance. Delete. That e-mail was history, their relationship was history, and now… so was Amanda.
A very strange history indeed.
* * * *
Christine intuitively realized she and Jason’s mom needed to get their heads together, but Margaret beat her to it.
Earlier that morning, Margaret had phoned and instructed Christine to meet her at the new coffee shop on the I-40 frontage road, north side. Normally, Christine was more accustomed to giving instruction than following, but she deferred to Margaret, one of the few women Christine allowed that tribute.
Each arrived within three minutes of 10:30 a.m. They were seated quickly since the breakfast rush had already cleared out.
“Jason’s pants are out in my car. He left word with Amanda to get them to you. His keys are in one of the pockets.”
“I’ll get them as we leave.” Margaret smiled slightly. “Sometimes it’s useful to have a man’s trousers.”
When the waitress ambled over, they ordered.
Christine was accustomed to being in the driver’s seat. Since she was not certain of Margaret’s specific reason for this called meeting, she was intensely curious for it to begin. So Christine broke the ice. “You know, I feel so responsible for this breakup.”
“I agree, you are.”
Christine had hoped for sympathetic reassurance that she wasn’t really at fault. But clearly, Margaret didn’t play such games. “You shoot pretty straight, don’t you, Margaret?”
