Mourning Becomes Cassandra

by Christina Dudley

  Considering how Nadina had just torn me to pieces, I didn’t have much hope she’d spare Blaise, but I shook my head warningly behind her manager’s back.

  “All right. Sorry, Blaise,” Nadina muttered gruffly to the floor. “See you later, Cass.” I followed Blaise out of the grooming center, relieved to be rescued from my emotional evisceration.

  • • •

  Though I took some time walking around the mall to decompress, it was hard to throw off a general feeling of lowness. Nadina’s boyfriend had a point, though I hated to admit it, since I liked him sight-unseen as little as he liked me: I had volunteered to be a mentor partly to feel better about myself, by trying not to think about myself. Instead I seemed to be thinking about myself more and more, especially when the person I thought I was “helping” seemed so alert to my shortcomings. Was I any help to Nadina? This was the first time I tried to weigh in on her choices; prior to this I only listened and asked questions. But I must have done it badly, to get her so angry and defensive. And if it came down to my opinions or Mike’s, it looked like she was going to go with Mike. And why not? Who was I to her, but some woman she hung out with, once or twice a week for a couple months?

  Not only was I hurt by Nadina and feeling blue, but I was mad at God again, to tell the truth. After all, wasn’t it his fault I was a “lonely, sorry-ass person, with a dead husband and a dead kid”? And then, when I try to obey him and get over myself and help someone, that someone, instead of being grateful, sticks a knife in me? I was being melodramatic, I supposed. And being angry that Nadina wasn’t grateful just went to show that I was in it for myself, after all. Case closed.

  Having worked myself into an even more anxious state, I decided I would email Mark Henneman before I went to bed that night. Let him know of our disastrous conversation and see what he thought I should do, if anything. He had said early on that we were there to love and encourage—and love didn’t sit around letting someone destroy herself, I knew that in my heart of hearts. How could I let Nadina hurt herself without trying to intervene?

  I was in such a dither that I didn’t notice the time passing until it was already past six. Grabbing some random bar of scented soap and lotion for Phyl, I returned home to find all our guests already there and Joanie shooting me questioning looks.

  The evening passed in a blur; unlike the Apostle Paul, I was present in body, though absent in spirit. Phyl had dutifully invited Wayne—who, truth be told, did not make much of a first impression in my present state of mind—along with her sister and some of her close friends. Roy was gone to Atlanta on a training trip, having started Monday at Cingular, but Daniel showed up triply buffered against any lingering adoration on Phyl’s part: Wyatt and Delia Collins came, Daniel’s odious friend Tom who had hit on Phyl long ago and was now officially divorced, and a new girlfriend whose name I can’t remember, and since she didn’t even last the typical two-to-three-weeks, I didn’t have a chance to learn it.

  For some reason, I found Tom next to me much of the evening. I hadn’t even been watching to see if he’d already tried his luck with Phyl’s other friends or sister, but given my distraction, I rather appreciated his indefatigable willingness to talk about himself. I had only to ask a question now and then and nod and say “oh!” and “hmm…” at the right moments, and he was content to take it from there, while I returned to composing my mental email to Mark Henneman or thought of things I should have said to Nadina. Or things I could say, should we ever speak again. In any case, Tom must have mistaken my preoccupation for fascination because, when Joanie sent me to poke around in the pantry for birthday candles, I was startled to find him following me.

  “That’s great that you love backpacking,” he said, leaning an arm nonchalantly on the cereal shelf and blocking my exit out. Backpacking? Me? I thought we’d been talking about him—and the last I recalled, hearing about his recent promotion. I must have really been blanking out. “Maybe you and I should do a little overnight hike on the Peninsula,” he suggested.

  I suppose some women would have found Tom attractive. He was wiry and athletic, with skin that was unnaturally tanned for late October in the Northwest. Could he possibly go to a tanning place? Whatever the source, it made his teeth seem particularly white and his eyes quite blue. Clutching the little pack of twisty birthday candles I took a step back from those teeth. “Backpacking? It’s practically November,” I said nervously.

  “What’s a little rain or even snow, if you’ve got a nice little campfire and a cozy tent?”

  “Did—did your wife like to go backpacking too?”

  He looked bewildered. “My ex? What does she have to do with this?” With a wave of his hand he consigned his wife to oblivion and took another step toward me. I could smell the appletini on his breath. “I thought we were really hitting it off tonight, Cass. I know I’m a little out of practice, but I’m trying to ask you out.” Out of practice indeed, when I knew very well I’d seen him tailing Phyl at our first open house! And could he honestly not tell my mind had been a million miles away during his virtual monologues? I’d have to tell James that I really was quite impressive in the acting department, after all.

  Trying to eke around the side of him I said hastily, “Oh, thank you very much, but no thank you. I—I—my—actually I lost my husband fairly recently, and I’m not dating.”

  His other arm came down like the barrier arm in a parking garage, blocking my escape. “Well, that’s strange,” he said, “considering how you’ve been coming on to me all night.”

  Outraged, my voice rose a little. “‘Coming on to you’? ‘Coming on to you’? Look, Tom, I’ve been sitting and listening to you talk, and that’s about it. Now excuse me—” I pushed on his arm, but it didn’t budge. I pushed harder. Nada. It was indefensible, I know, but being cornered and accused of more bad behavior by a predatory guy I hardly knew was the last straw, after the day I’d had, and to my own horror I dissolved in angry tears. “Let me out, Tom!” I shrieked. “Get out of my way!”

  Before he could even gather his wits to respond to my crazy outburst, a hand reached in and yanked him out of the pantry. “What the hell are you doing, Tom? Leave Cass alone.” Of course, on a day that seemed to go from worse to worse-and-worse, it had to be Daniel. Gasping and sob-hiccuping ridiculously, I tried to wipe off my face before he could see me, but no luck. I heard Tom grunt something apologetic as he left the kitchen, and I expected Daniel to follow him, but he didn’t.

  “You all right?” he asked. I nodded in answer, turning away to blot the last embarrassing tears. When I didn’t say anything, he added lightly, “You could hardly blame Tom, you little tramp, the way you were daydreaming and agreeing with everything he said, while he droned on and on. He’s come to mistake that glazed expression for adoration.”

  Despite all, I giggled a little. “If that’s all it takes, he should see me when I do the laundry.”

  “I couldn’t answer for the consequences.”

  “Hell-o, Cass!” Joanie called. “What the heck is going on with those birthday candles? And where was Tom going in such a hurry? It’s time to do Phyl’s cake.”

  • • •

  It was almost 10:30 when the party finally broke up and I could dash upstairs to email Mark Henneman. After Tom’s ambush I couldn’t remember half my mental composition, so I would have to start over, but when I sat down at my computer, there was a text from Nadina in my inbox. Lobbing more emotional grenades at me? Anxiously I tapped my fingers on the desk, trying to work up the nerve to open it.

  She must have wanted to make sure she would be understood because the message was in English, rather than her usual texting patois.

  Cass,

  Sorry I said those things. I know you weren’t trying to be mean. See you Tuesday?

  Nadina

  My relief was so great I burst into tears again—happy ones this time. Maybe I was going into early menopause. Joanie found me fifteen minutes later, still wet-faced but in good spirits
, typing my response:

  Nadina,

  Thank you for your message. You are my favorite wannabe pet groomer in the whole world!

  Next week it is.

  Cass

  “Cass, what on earth is going on with you?” Joanie demanded. “You acted like such a zombie tonight! I couldn’t believe it when I looked over, and you let that stupid Tom glom on to you and bore your ear off.”

  “Was I so bad?” I sniffled, smiling. “I hope I didn’t put a damper on Phyl’s birthday.”

  “Phyl was trying so hard to act like she didn’t care about my brother that she was probably the only one who didn’t notice. Sheez, your weird behavior even penetrated Daniel’s narcissism; he asked me after you went up if you were okay.” We laughed, and she threw an arm around me. Now that my fight with Nadina was no longer the end of the world, I found I could talk about it and even find some humor in the poor Cocker Spaniel’s ordeal.

  Joanie fired up with indignation when I got to what Nadina said, but after I had—with some difficulty—talked her down, she huffed, “Well, if you’re going to forgive her I guess I have to. You may get over being called a lonely old sorry-ass on emotional crutches, but it’s going to take me a lot longer to forgive being called your ‘goody-goody friend.’”

  Chapter 14: A Bad Year for McKean Marriages

  “Yeah, yeah, this stuff on Scott is great, but what is with your little digs at Amundsen?” Riley demanded, jabbing the paper with his stubby forefinger.

  We were crammed into his cubicle at Free Universe, going over some of my latest revisions for Antarctiquest! Because there wasn’t room for two chairs, I was perched on the end of his work table trying not to wipe out his action-figure diorama with my behind.

  “Does it show?” I asked sheepishly. “It kind of bugs me that Amundsen only beat Scott to the South Pole because he was gunning for that and nothing else. Scott, on the other hand, was thinking science and exploration and responsibility to posterity.”

  “That is crap. That is total girl-think and girl-speak,” declared Riley.

  “Well I’m a girl. So sue me,” I retorted.

  “Yeah, well, you’re gonna have to put on your boy hat, if you wanna work at Free Universe, because 90% of our gamers are boys. Jeri puts on her boy hat every day, don’t you, Jer?” He raised his voice to deliver this zinger, and Jeri leaned around the wall of her cube to flip him off. “Amundsen made it to the goal; he kept his eyes on the prize. Besides, we market our games around the world—or we want to—so you can’t be knocking Amundsen and pissing off everyone in Denmark.”

  “Norway.”

  “Whatever.” He handed me back half my sheaf. “So I’ll take the Scott and Shackleton stuff, but don’t give me Amundsen until you’ve declawed it. Think guy, Cass. More guys are gonna wanna play the Amundsen and Shackleton scenarios than the Scott one—who wants to be the guy who dies like a popsicle?”

  This was maybe my fourth visit to the Free Universe office downtown. Since I did all my writing at home and was in frequent email contact with other team members, I didn’t really need to come in, but the game developer world was proving irresistible. The forty or so employees of Free Universe occupied office space that I would wager was designed for twenty, jammed up next to each other in high-walled cubicles which provided some visual privacy but no sound protection. If anyone really wanted to get something done, they stuffed in their earbuds and cranked up their MP3 players; James even had some of those fancy noise-cancelling headphones for which he’d taken truckloads of flak until other people had tried them on. Riley, however, a Game Designer, thrived on the constant interaction and noise and provided much of it himself, to his immediate neighbors’ irritation. In the few weeks I’d known him, he’d quickly become my new favorite person, from his bald-but-ponytailed head to his ridiculous t-shirts (“Squirrel—the other White Meat”) to his Tevas with socks. But it wasn’t just his looks: I also loved the unapologetically geeky collections that littered his cube, with his petrified candy museum topping the list.

  I dug in my jacket pocket for a minute. “Oh, hey, Riley. I saw you didn’t have one of these—I used to eat tons of these in college because they were made nearby.”

  “A Big Hunk! Yeah, baby!” Riley quickly popped it out of its wrapper and positioned it tenderly on his cube’s fraction of the window sill, the better to be quickly petrified by the forced air running up underneath. Then he carefully smoothed out the wrapper and placed it in his top drawer. Once the candy petrification was complete he would fashion the wrapper into some delicate origami creation and display them together.

  “Aw, Cass, no, don’t encourage him.” James had appeared, his noise-cancelling headphones around his neck. “We finally got him to agree that he can only display ten moldy bits—”

  “Artifacts!” corrected Riley.

  “Ten artifacts at a time,” James agreed. “Ri, are you sure you want that one enough to part with one of the others when it’s done?”

  “Of course I want it. Cass gave me this one—and don’t think I didn’t get your subtle message, babe. A Big Hunk for the big hunk.” He slapped his generous gut with satisfaction.

  I burst out laughing. “I knew I couldn’t slip that by you, Riley. It was between the Big Hunk and a Sugar Daddy.”

  Jeri leaned out again. “I gave him Nerds last Christmas, deluxe size.” She was warming to me, if only slightly, since I showed no signs of wanting to steal her full-time job.

  James cleared his throat. “Cass, if you and Riley have wrapped it up, Murray wants you to drop by Lockdown before you leave.” Obediently I rose, waving my goodbyes.

  Lockdown was Murray’s office. As the Sound Designer at Free Universe, he was the only one in the company who got an actual office with walls and a locking door, thus the nickname. Murray was a pale, skinny guy with long, stringy blond hair to match his overly-long limbs. He wore round little glasses, and altogether he reminded me of an albino grasshopper. Because Murray’s office doubled as the recording studio, the walls were covered with chunks of foam, and countless cords snaked their way across the floor, hooked up to various pieces of mystery music and sound equipment.

  Murray looked up from his little desk in the corner when I came in. “Hi, Cass. Did you get the scripts Jeri sent?”

  I nodded.

  “Everything make sense? You think you’ll be ready to record next Friday?”

  “Sure—I don’t have to memorize, right? I just sit there and read?”

  “You just sit there and read.”

  “And did James tell you that that kid Kyle was going to come after school gets out and observe?” I asked.

  Murray nodded. “If he can keep his mouth shut, he can come.” That wouldn’t be a problem for Kyle, at any rate. For a guy who did sound for a living, Murray had a strange aversion to it, viewing banter and small talk as unnecessary at best—which might explain why he and Riley got on each other’s nerves frequently—and this terse warning signaled the end of the interview.

  I flipped through Jeri’s script on the bus ride home. There wasn’t much to it: one introductory monologue of sufficient corniness and various discrete lines of dialogue and random interjections, including such jewels as “Freeze flame!” and “Die, Varlet!” James was right about not needing an Oscar-winning performance; the real trick would be recording such silliness without giggling. Hence Murray on the job, I supposed. No one in that office made you feel less like laughing than Murray.

  Walking up the hill from the bus stop I was surprised to see a strange man raking leaves in our front yard. Most of the leaves had fallen long ago, and the remaining stragglers were rather blackened and damp, but the man was doggedly scraping them from where they clung to the grass. Something about his movements drew my attention, and then I was running.

  “Perry! Why didn’t you call me?” I demanded. “I was at Free Universe and could’ve gotten here sooner.”

  Slinging an arm around me, he shook his head. “I did call you,
idiot. Your phone must be dead. Come on, let me in and give me the tour.”

  As we did the circuit of the Palace, Perry filled me in on the latest. It turned out he had moved up to Portland at the end of October to start work on Waiters: the Musical. He was sharing some tiny place with a couple other people he’d found on Craig’s List and loving it. “Not that it won’t be great to spend a night up here in your huge spare room. This place is great, Cass!”

  “Is that all you’re staying? The one night?” I prodded when we were at the kitchen table, sharing some of Phyl’s molasses cookies and tea.

  Perry looked shifty. “That’s it this time, but, hey—what are your Thanksgiving plans? Want me to come up and make the best stuffed turkey since Grandma McKean died? Or were you going to go hang out with Troy’s family?”

  I suppressed a shiver. “No way. I’ll probably see them all the weekend before, but I told them I had other plans that day.”

  “And do you?”

  “Well, we have a standing open house on Thursdays, so I guess that counts. Phyl will probably have her sister over, if they don’t take off to see her folks, and I think Joanie and Daniel are around. I’d love to have you.” Perry looked so happy about this that I hated to wreck it, but I had to ask: “So what’s going on with Betsy? Have you heard from her?”

  Sure enough, his face fell. “I’ve heard from her lawyer.” When I gasped, he nodded grimly. “Yep. It’s official this time. Betsy is divorcing me.”

  “You have to talk to her,” I insisted. “She doesn’t mean it. She’s always taken you back. Have you talked to her?”

  “I have, I have.” He held up his long hands defensively. “I even offered to drop it all and get a real job this time, the more boring the better.”