“Thank you.”
“You’ll be fine,” said Jamie.
“I will?”
“Oh yes, you’ll be just fine.” Then he wandered over to check out the Tower of London.
In an upstairs gallery, Sam got a text from Meredith that read, “You’re busted. I looked down during the morning meeting this a.m. and saw that I was wearing one navy shoe and one black shoe.”
“How is that my fault?” wrote Sam.
“Absence makes you insane,” wrote Meredith.
It was about like that for the rest of the trip. Conference in the morning. Bumming around London in the afternoon with Jamie. Waiting for Meredith to wake up back home and call/text/chat/e-mail/otherwise reassure him that she was alive and well and thinking of him too. She was sending him a running list of ways she was being made insane by his absence.
3) Accidentally called the barista “Mom.”
4) Neglected to bring baggies to the dog park and had to pick up dog poop with a leaf.
5) Picked up dog poop with a leaf even though no one was watching and it wasn’t like it was the middle of the sidewalk or anything, and really people should just be a little careful where they walk and save all those plastic bags from filling up landfills though okay, yes, mine are biodegradable, not that that helps when I leave them at home.
6) Failed utterly to write up the user specs for May/June or finish the storyboard for the Wilson-Abbot thing or meet with Erin re: the kickoff next month or convincingly pay attention during morning meeting so as not to get scolded (!) (as if I am his four-year-old!) by Edmondson but rather thought of you, thought of you, thought of you, and … thought of you.
7) Failed utterly to keep #6 to myself and thereby play it cool and chill and nonchalant and take-it-or-leave-it and interested but not overly and just a little bit hard to get. In. Sane.
Sam’s remaining lung absconded. He couldn’t wait to get home.
Finally, the last session of the last meeting of the last day of the conference was wrapping up. Sam was breathing a sigh of relief that no more tech would malfunction and no more meetings would demand his attention and no more events would require his attendance, and in nineteen hours, he’d be on a plane on his way back to the rest of his life. He met Jamie back at the gastropub. Aside from Meredith, that pint had been the other thing his mind returned to again and again all week long.
Jamie arrived late, wet, and exasperated. He slid down across the table from Sam with a pint in each hand.
“I’ve barely touched mine yet.” Sam nodded toward his mostly still full glass. He was savoring it.
“They’re both for me,” said Jamie. And then, “You want the good news or the bad news?”
In Sam’s work experience, the good news never outweighed the bad news. It never came close. If it did, it didn’t begin this way.
“The good news,” said Jamie, “is that BB is just thrilled with how the whole conference has gone. The tech has been smooth. Our events have looked glitch-free. You blew away everyone in the room with the algorithm and your presentation. The company looks great. The investors are thrilled. We’ve made BB a very rich man.”
“Exactly my goal,” said Sam. “What’s the bad news?”
Jamie made a face. “The bad news is he’s making me fire you.”
Sam thought he must be joking. “You must be joking,” he said.
“Nope.”
“Why?”
“Your algorithm is costing them a fortune. It’s brilliant, Sam. You should win a prize or something. BB thinks you’re a genius. But it works way too well.”
“How can it work too well?”
“Turns out fixing people up is not how we make money. It’s failing to fix people up while still giving them hope that soon we might. It works too quickly. Revenue from sign-up fees is through the roof, but revenue from monthly fees is in the toilet. It’s costing BB a fortune.”
“You just said we made him very rich,” said Sam.
“He wants to be more rich. That’s why he’s the BB.”
“You just said he was really pleased with how well everything’s gone over here.”
“That’s why he didn’t fire you until it was over.”
This was Sam’s point about the good news never outweighing the bad. BB’s getting rich was not really enough of a silver lining.
He called Meredith as soon as he got back to the hotel even though he knew she wasn’t up yet.
“Is this payback?” she answered sleepily.
“You want the good news or the bad news?” said Sam.
“Uh-oh.”
“I got fired.”
“What?! Why?”
“Jamie says I’m costing BB too much money.”
“That algorithm is genius. You’re a genius.”
“He agrees. But evidently it’s hard on business. The publicity isn’t enough in the long run. In the long run, he says, everyone wishes I’d never invented it.”
“Not me,” said Meredith.
“That’s because you’re insane,” said Sam.
“I’ll quit too.”
“You’d better not.”
“I’ll lead a mutiny. The whole marketing department will walk out. Let’s see him run this company without us.”
“It’s okay.”
“It’s not fair. He should promote you, not fire you.”
“I could use some time off.”
“Oh Sam, I’m so sorry. What can I do?”
“Pick me up at the airport tomorrow afternoon?”
LIVVIE
She wasn’t waiting for him at the airport, which was weird. She wasn’t there when he came out of security, and she wasn’t in baggage claim, and she didn’t call him desperately from a backup on I-5 full of apology and saying she’d be there any minute. He was considering whether to be worried, hurt, or annoyed when he got a text that said, “Sorry and sorry. Meet me at my house, and I’ll explain.” Sam got on the light rail and wondered about lack of tone in texts. No way to know if she was getting cold feet or preferred to date the employed or realized that absence did make the heart grow fonder, fonder than it actually felt in his actual presence. Or maybe she’d greet him naked at the door. There was only one way to tell, and though it wasn’t by rereading the text thirty-five times, that was the approach Sam tried anyway.
Meredith answered the door in sweatpants, a sweatshirt, a scarf, a hat, mittens, and what looked like several layers of socks. So the opposite of naked. She hugged him, and he felt the return of his lungs, and he held her for a little bit, just savoring, before he whispered into her hair, “It’s August. It’s seventy-five degrees out. Why are you dressed for January?”
“I can’t get warm,” she said. “I can’t stop shivering.”
“Are you sick?”
She shook her head but wouldn’t look at him. “I’m sorry I forgot to come get you.”
“It’s okay.” He was puzzled, waiting.
“Absence really does make you insane, I guess.”
“But I’m back,” he said brightly.
“Not yours,” she said. “My grandmother died.”
They’d not found her until several days later, which was maybe the worst part. Meredith’s grandmother Olivia—Livvie—spent winters in Florida, as any sane and able retired Seattleite would, but she spent summers at home, near her daughter, her granddaughter, a whole lifetime of friends and memories and favorite places. She had an apartment in a high-rise on First Hill where she’d lived for fifty years, where Meredith’s mother and uncle had grown up, where Meredith herself had spent the best parts of her childhood. Meredith’s own parents had decamped to Orcas Island to be—and live like—artists, and Meredith had grown up with a potter’s studio and a homestead garden, windswept beaches and old fir forests, but her heart belonged in her grandmother’s old-world urban penthouse, a retreat as far as Meredith was concerned. She moved to the city first chance she got. She and her grandmother were basically neighbors.
Meredith would go over for dinner at least one night a week, but she also often stopped by for breakfast on her way to work or met Livvie for lunch downtown or dropped in to get a skirt hemmed or deliver half a batch of whatever she’d baked or leave Livvie some soup or some cherries or a box of cookies she’d bought from somebody’s kid’s Girl Scout troop. It wasn’t that Livvie was old or infirm or too tired to manage; they just enjoyed each other’s company. But it was also not unusual for Meredith not to hear from her grandmother for a little while. They didn’t talk and visit every day. Livvie had a lot of friends, an active social life, much to do. And she was healthy but for the half pack a day. Her argument was, “It’s been sixty years. If it hasn’t killed me yet, maybe it’s good for me.”
It wasn’t. Meredith saw her Wednesday for dinner and all was well, and they’d made plans for brunch over the weekend. She called her grandmother Friday evening and left a message that she wanted to drop off half the enormous box of tomatoes her neighbor had brought over from his garden. It didn’t occur to her until Saturday afternoon that she hadn’t heard back and they hadn’t figured out brunch for the morning—not entirely unusual but a bit unsettling still; Livvie was a busy woman, but she had a cell phone. Meredith called again, left another message and another, but by then it was late Saturday night. She finally let herself into her grandmother’s apartment on Sunday morning.
Livvie was sitting on the sofa, reading glasses on, book in her lap, water on the coffee table undisturbed. But that was about the only aspect of the scene that was undisturbing. Meredith knew with one glance at her grandmother, knew before that even, when she opened the door to the apartment and heard no ball game on the radio, smelled no coffee or Sunday bagels, found blinds drawn and windows shut, knew before that probably, in her heart, because her grandmother was a phone call returner and a Meredith lover and a woman of her word, especially where brunch was concerned.
An ambulance came, just to be sure. Massive heart attack, they guessed. So massive she never felt it coming. So massive she didn’t take off her glasses or stumble off the couch or collapse in pain or try to call for help or even feel a little thirsty, for her water glass was still full. Too quick to have been painful, they assured her. Not too long ago, they assured her. Nothing you could have done anyway, they assured her.
At the funeral, Sam held Meredith’s hand and met her parents and other relatives and all of Livvie’s friends. Meredith introduced each deliberately and generously, for their benefit as well as Sam’s. “This is Naomi. She and her husband used to go dancing with my grandparents in the fifties. She and my grandmother go to the theater together a lot. Naomi is quite the dancer.” And, “This is Ralph and Ella Mae. They’re my grandmother’s favorite dinner-and-a-movie companions.” And, “This is Penny. She lives downstairs. She’s my grandmother’s best friend. She just lost her husband, so Grandma’s probably hanging out with Albert even as we speak.” And then Meredith and Penny hugged and cried and rocked back and forth, and Sam waited awkwardly, hands plunged in pockets, for some way he could be helpful.
Meredith’s parents, meanwhile, looked almost as uncomfortable and out of place as Sam. Julia rubbed damp eyes with too-long sleeves pulled all the way over her clenched fists and tucked phantom strands of hair behind her ears. She looked grateful for her daughter’s social graces on this unspeakable occasion, but every time she acknowledged an introduction or tried to smile, she started crying again. Kyle sized things up and decided Meredith was holding it together better than Julia and so stayed by his wife’s side like they were a wedding cake topper. This proved to be true of Meredith’s parents though even when all was well. Kyle and Julia were Kyle-and-Julia-against-the-world. They were Pacific Northwest islanders and liked it that way. They owned a rainy, weathered ceramics studio, ran a shop out front, lived upstairs, ate from the garden they kept all around the place. They spent their days making pots and talking about art, taking wet, meandering walks along the beaches holding hands, exploring endless coves by kayak. It took a long ferry ride followed by a long drive to get them to Seattle, to which they referred unironically as the “Big City.” They weren’t stoners or off-gridders or even vegan or unshowered. They made beautiful art and a pretty good living besides. But they cultivated detachment, separation—from the world, from real life, from their loved ones even. They had few friends and didn’t talk to Meredith unless she called and didn’t talk to Livvie unless she called either. They loved their only child absolutely, of course. But they loved their twoness too.
In stark, stark contrast, there was Meredith’s cousin.
“Dashiell Bentlively.” He offered Sam his hand and toothpaste-ad smile.
“But not really?” Sam smiled tentatively, not wanting to offend but pretty sure that couldn’t be anyone’s real name.
“Nope, not really”—Dashiell winked—“but that’s the one I use. Even Mom admits it’s a better fit than the one she chose.”
“I hadn’t met him yet when I picked the original,” Meredith’s aunt Maddie shrugged.
Dashiell was Julia’s brother Jeff’s son. He and Meredith were born on the same day, so they considered themselves twins though in fact they had little in common but a birthday and a grandmother. Dashiell lived in L.A., sometimes gay, sometimes straight, making money hand over hand over hand over fist somehow near Hollywood but not actually in the film industry. Meredith didn’t understand or pretend to understand or ask too many questions, but they were close anyway.
“I guess I’m the matriarch of the family now,” he said after the funeral.
“What about me?” said Julia.
“You don’t have the legs for it,” said Dash. He was making a good show of it, but he was a bit of a mess.
After the funeral, after everyone finally went home, Meredith’s parents crashed at her place. Uncle Jeff and Aunt Maddie went to a fancy hotel downtown, Aunt Maddie’s argument being roughly, “When life gets you down, order room service.” Dashiell stayed at Livvie’s. So Meredith went home with Sam who, finally, had her all to himself, had her in his arms, had the reunion he’d flown half round the world dreaming about. It wasn’t quite the one he imagined, and he was at something of a loss—so ecstatic to be with her again, so sorry she was so sad—but he whispered love against her sea-smelling skin and made do.
“I’m hungry,” she said suddenly.
“Really?”
“Yeah. Weird, right?”
“There’s nothing in the house. I’ve been away for two weeks.”
“I remember,” she said, smiling, and then, awed, “I forgot.”
Sam found a couple cans of soup to heat up and some crackers. He tried to stay sad, but he couldn’t keep the happy down, so overjoyed was he to be back with her.
“I missed you,” Sam admitted, an understatement and a subject change.
“I remember,” she said, smiling. And then, awed, “I forgot.” And then, giggling in spite of everything, “You better remind me.”
WHAT LIVVIE WOULD SAY
It was a hard week. Meredith and Dash both took the week off, and together with their parents, they went about packing up a life. Sam tried to be elsewhere, to give everyone space, but he was unemployed, and here, finally, was a way for him to be helpful. On Monday, Sam wrapped wineglasses in newspaper. He wrapped plates and mugs and vases and bowls and cordials and goblets. He wrapped lamps and a porcelain statue of two dancers from Livvie’s honeymoon in Paris and a ceramic duck Meredith made in the second grade. Sam became gradually covered in newsprint. He put each carefully wrapped item in a box.
Julia came into the kitchen. “What on earth are you thinking?”
“I’m wrapping breakables?”
“And putting them all in a box?”
“Yeah?”
“No, everything needs to go in separate boxes, double-boxed, carefully labeled. Maybe I should do this. I move ceramics for a living.”
“Grandma wouldn’t care,” Meredith yelled from the living room.
&n
bsp; “We’ll never find anything again if we just throw things willy-nilly into boxes,” said Julia.
“Grandma would say it’s nice to be surprised when you open up the boxes,” Meredith shouted back.
“I don’t know when I’m ever going to open up these boxes,” Julia muttered. “I’ll never use this stuff.”
“Grandma would say this is everyday ware. Grandma would say no point in saving the good china for a special occasion because special occasions don’t happen often enough.”
On Tuesday, they did clothes.
“Grandma would say toss it all,” said Dash, hands on hips, looking skeptically into her closet.
“We should at least donate it somewhere,” said Meredith.
“To the Old Ladies’ Salvation Army?”
Julia squeezed between them and took a much worn orange cardigan off a hook on the back of the door, slipped it on, and walked away.
On Wednesday, they did paperwork.
“Grandma would say toss it all,” Dash said again, but instead Sam made sandwiches and popcorn while everyone else sat around on the floor and sorted a million pieces of paper into a semblance of organization: personal letters versus business correspondence, old bills versus outstanding ones, accounting records, trash.
“It’ll be so different when we go,” said Meredith. “No one writes me letters on paper. I don’t get paper bills or bank statements or tax records. My grandkids can just highlight my whole e-mail account and press delete, and that’ll be the end of it.”
She came across a green flyer she folded up and stashed in her pocket. Later, she came across a blue one and a pink one and stashed those, too. In the kitchen with Sam, she surreptitiously stuffed them in the recycling bin.
“What are those?” Sam asked.
“Flyers for a ceramics guy at my grandmother’s farmers’ market in Florida. She was always on my mom to build a website like Peter the Potter and take custom orders like Peter the Potter and make garden gnomes like Peter the Potter. She thought he must be rich because there was always a huge line of old people waiting to buy his stuff. My mom thinks he’s a hack. It drove her nuts. I just thought I’d spare her the annoyance.”
Goodbye for Now Page 3
