Being Anti-Social

by Leigh K. Cunningham

  At various junctures over the years, I have questioned the purpose of friendship—it does not make a lot of sense to bind oneself in this way, obligated forever, when family binding is more than enough of an obligation for anyone. Dionne Warwick says friendship is about having someone on your side in the bad times, forever more, so it seems one must suffer interminably in the name of friendship just to have support in a crisis. I have had two Mace-destroying crises in my life: when Ben left me (because of Joshua) and when Ben died. It is true that my friends propped me up both times, and I would not have survived without them, but since then, I have been crisis-free in relative terms. Sophie has several crises every year, Adam-related mostly, but occasionally a career struggle as well. Kimba has had two crises: the death of her beloved father and the loss of her baby, Poppy. Erin, ironically, has no crises to her name, so she is a friend in a crisis, but makes no demands for herself, although she does cause a lot of angst. Amber has had a number of superficial relationship and work-related crises, but needs little support from us as she bounces back faster than a springboard, and doors are always open and waiting for her long before another one closes behind her. And what she needs from us is not so much support, but people to hang on to her every word as she recounts the crises, as we do. Oscar is right, “Friendship is far more tragic than love. It lasts longer.”

  I picked up Erin’s book and started to read again.

  Chapter Fourteen

  THERE was a new guy on the block—our new Director for Strategy. It seems the CEO could not understand our former Strategy Director either, which is both comforting and endearing.

  The new guy, Thomas, did not start out on a particularly good note as his secretary was ready to quit at the end of his first week. This was the type of work buzz I particularly enjoy—not involving me, but another similarly abrasive, offensive individual. Thomas had a subsequent meeting with our HR Director, after the complaint and resignation was tendered, and in rather direct language, suggested the secretary was an incompetent, useless moron and he would not work with her. The traumatized woman was re-assigned to the word-processing pool, at current salary, and discussion began then on a suitable replacement. I was not so amused with the solution.

  The consensus in HR, and elsewhere, was that the only secretary with the fortitude to cope with a ‘special needs’ director, was mine, Rachel, and so there was a shuffling of offices with Rachel and I relocated to the outposts of finance where our department adjoined the department for corporate planning. Apart from the fact that the new office had a lesser view, the move was a disruption I did not want or need. Thomas and I were in for a torrid occupation of the southern corner.

  Thomas does however have some redeeming qualities. His current telephone is the third since his arrival as he likes to bash it on his desk during or after irritating telephone calls (most of them), which is another reason why I prefer email. HR made it clear that it is the last phone he will receive for the duration of his five-year contract, and nicknamed him Basil Fawlty, although not to his face. I doubt this will curtail him.

  Thomas became synonymous with trouble so many of us were keen to see him perform at the annual corporate planning retreat since this is the pivotal event in the working life of a strategy director. Until then, it was mere speculation whether or not Thomas was worth his trouble and astronomical salary package. From a financial perspective, he would need to have astral-like skills, wisdom and talent to validate his presence in, and destruction of, the adjacent office.

  After the first day at the annual retreat, I was a believer, because yes, Thomas is brilliant at what he does. He is also Jekyll and Hyde for the controlled, charming, professional who coordinated our strategy sessions, in no way resembled the Thomas I had come to know and enjoy.

  Speaking of enjoyment and Thomas, the annual retreat went down a familiar regrettable road, and while there were some similarities with the Joshua incident years before, there were more differences: I was single this time; I was attracted to Thomas in a narcissistic kind of way; and he was rather inept whereas Joshua had been a star when it came to bedroom achievements. I persevered for a second night and was less disappointed, but still underwhelmed. What I can say in favor of Thomas though, is that he has an irreverent sense of humor and can make me laugh, hysterically even, which is no easy task.

  Following the retreat, I found myself looking forward to work. My heart raced ahead in anticipation, and I was out of bed before the alarm. I took more time with my hair and make-up, and even bought a new suit. Work had become almost fun and it was all because of Thomas.

  He would often drop into my office on his return from the café bar to say something derisive and witty about café bar activity then return to his office next door. We abused the corporate instant chat facility, which interrupted my work, and his, and added pressure to deadlines that came perilously close to being missed. I was entertained until each day ended when I was always surprised that Thomas never asked me out to continue our electronic banter in person.

  That was the ambit of our relationship for months until, unexpectedly, mid-week, Thomas finally asked me to dinner. We went back to my townhouse afterwards where once again, Thomas did his average best and fell asleep within minutes.

  It continued in this way for two more weeks until my loyal and devoted secretary, Rachel, rushed into my office bubbling over with excitement at a piece of rather innocuous information—Thomas had a visitor. She urged me to partake of an office drop-in and as it was all rather mysterious, I obliged.

  Thomas introduced me to a demure, petite little woman—his wife! I made a hasty exit, flushed and furious. Rachel had often commented that any woman married to Thomas would be a saint or martyr and it seemed, once again, that she was right—the woman had a certain angelic quality to her.

  “That lying, cheating bastard,” I yelled. Rachel closed my office door and, as was best, left me to stew in silence. I did not go out again until the end of the day when I took the long way around to the exit.

  I called Sophie that night to discuss my predicament because she is in the red on the friendship-ledger and because Amber would be with Jake, and I do not discuss my relationships with Erin, or Kimba for that matter—they would be horrified.

  What became clear after analysis and merlot is that Thomas never said he was single—I assumed this because he did not wear a wedding ring and had not mentioned a wife, or anything else to indicate he was in a relationship and not living alone.

  Needless to say, the southern corner became quite arctic thereafter, and Thomas had just one concern—that I might tell his wife. I was stunned—if only he could know what an abhorrent notion it was given my own experience with the informant, Joshua Steele, and realistically, Thomas should fear more that I might share certain performance issues with Jerome in accounts.

  It is rather ironic that the basis of all four of my relationships with men has been deception. This might be karma or the law of attraction—maybe I am my thoughts. Either way, I am tired of life’s belated lessons. As Oscar says, “It is a pity that in life we only get our lessons when they are of no use to us.”

  I have opted for self-imposed chastity since it is clear to me that relationships are doomed before they begin, and I cannot out-run my past or the universe for that matter.

  Chapter Fifteen

  IS IT NOT extraordinary that a caterpillar can become a butterfly? Caterpillars are greedy, repulsive, destructive, eating machines resistant to some pesticides, yet they morph into a delicate, graceful beauty that feeds on the nectar of flowers. If they can change so dramatically then so can I—I can be likable; I can be sociable.

  To assist with the challenge, I consulted my dear friends. I expected overwhelming support, but my declaration of pending change was met with mirth and jocularity, especially when I mentioned the caterpillar. Even Kimba and Kenneth were amused although Kimba did have some words of encouragement that suggested it was good enough that I wanted to try. Clearly, no on
e believes in me. Amber went so far as to say that if I were to lose the sarcasm, I would no longer be me and much less likeable since this is apparently my best quality. Erin also made a contribution—all I need is a good man to change me. Setting aside everything disturbing about the suggestion itself, if only I could explain—using a most recent example—that I am not able to attract a good man because my past is in pursuit of me to serve a cold platter of karma. Sophie, the betrayer, asked all innocent-like if there were any good men at my work of interest.

  “Of course not,” I snapped.

  So there I was with plans to become a better woman, but with no support from my friends. If I am still inclined towards change on Christmas Day, I might raise the challenge with mother. She is sure to want buy-in for such a mission.

  In the meantime, I will do my very best or at least what is possible given that I am a middle child—we are not over-achievers, and rarely stay focused on anything long enough to finish what we start.

  I began with random acts of kindness (RAOK). I also planned an attempt at forgiveness of the rotten sod in the office next to mine since it is not entirely his fault (99% only) because I failed to ask pertinent questions, and one should never assume anything about anyone. I can only feel compassion for his poor wife as she would be one awesomely frustrated individual, not to mention that she is married to a cretin with a fierce temper.

  My secretary, Rachel was first on my RAOK recipients because she is long-suffering and someone I actually like. I like her because she is not sensitive and finds humor in most things I do and say, no matter how irreverent, unlike others who tend to take offence. There are not enough desensitized people in the world today, which is why there are so many wars.

  I called mother for her rum ball recipe and she asked, “What is wrong?” (so infrequent are such occurrences). I would send her emails if she knew how to work the computer. I told her I was going to cook rum balls for my secretary for a Christmas gift, and she laughed. “You don’t cook rum balls,” she said. This was good news as a mere rolling of balls meant I would not have to learn how to operate my as-new oven. Still, I do believe she was impressed.

  Rachel looked up at me with a suspicious smile. “What’s this?” she asked.

  “A gift,” I said. “All homemade I might add.”

  Rachel laughed like a crazy woman.

  “No, seriously, what is it?”

  “Let me speak slowly so that you might understand plain English—”. I stopped and took a deep breath. “Rachel. This is a gift from me to you because I appreciate you. I made them myself.”

  She lifted the lid on the box I had bought at the newsagent downstairs.

  “How much rum did you put in these?” she asked throwing her head back.

  “The recipe said two tablespoons.”

  “How much?”

  “A bit more than that. It didn’t seem enough.”

  “Thanks,” she said. “I’ll save them for later when I don’t need to operate heavy machinery.”

  “You might offer one to Thomas the Tank Engine,” I suggested. “It might help his mood and maybe he won’t throw his stapler at you today.”

  “Thanks, Mace,” she said. “It’s really nice that you made these for me.”

  I nodded then glanced up to see Thomas on approach down the corridor. I scurried into my office.

  I had not done much work on the ‘do-good’ list for I was waiting to review the rum ball venture. They were a hit, in more ways than one, so I made plans to buy more rum and make more balls as gifts for my dear friends.

  “I can smell smoke,” I yelled out to Rachel. “He had better not be smoking in there!”

  Rachel appeared in my doorway. “I can’t smell smoke,” she said, sniffing the air.

  “I have a supersonic sensitivity to cigarette smoke,” I reminded her. “Go in there and check.”

  “And what if he is?”

  “It’s a health and safety issue,” I said. “I can’t show a flagrant disrespect for the rules.”

  “You usually do,” she replied.

  “I’m changing,” I said. “Like the caterpillar.”

  Rachel laughed heartily. “I’ll go find you some leaves. Would you like coffee with that? Decaf or real today?”

  “Never mind,” I said, and strutted past Rachel towards the adjacent door to barge in without knocking.

  “Are you smoking in here?” I demanded.

  “No,” Thomas said and smoke spewed forth from his lying lips.

  I shook my head. “You’ll set off the fire alarms you idiot.” I glanced up at the smoke detector, covered now with an A3 sheet of paper and fixed to the ceiling with masking tape.

  “You can’t smoke in here.”

  “I need to, Mace. My wife won’t let me smoke at home and I’m too busy to go outside. I can’t cope without them—I’m too stressed.”

  “Your wife won’t let you smoke at home?” I asked, picking up the recent adornment to his desk. “You mean this sweet little girl in the photo?”

  “Don’t be fooled by the face of an angel, Mace. She’s a tyrant, and she has my balls in a jar.”

  “Let’s hope she can get them working again,” I said, and marched back to my office. “He’s smoking in there,” I barked at Rachel. “Make sure it stops.”

  I returned to my list and crossed off Forgive Thomas since he is so pathetic I could not maintain a grievance against him even if I wanted to. Next on my list was Erin and her book. It had been six weeks since No Stone Unturned turned up in my life, and hassles were coming from three sources: Erin, Amber and Sophie who threatened to read “the whole damn thing” just to stop Erin’s constant calls. I could not let my friends down since I was a changed woman so I scheduled the task for Saturday morning after rum-ball making.

  Armed with a packet of multi-colored highlighter pens, I sat down with a coffee and Erin’s manuscript. I started with the forbidden word, the first ‘got’, and charged through each page to color every offence with neon transforming the document into a rainbow. The old Mace would have used an ugly red pen with dramatic circles.

  Next was the story itself, which shocked me on page seven with a rather graphic sex scene. It is always the quiet ones, I thought. I hoped the Bobmeister was not the architect of the acts that had inspired the writing—that would change everything between us as I prefer to know my dear friend as a rather un-sexual being. However, the rampant and sometimes gratuitous sex scenes did not detract from the greater shock—the story was good, really good. I read it over the following two days then shared my assessment with Amber and Sophie who thought I was being sarcastic; no one trusts the wolf in sheepskin.

  Erin had inspired me. I started work, again, on my ‘anti-wedding ritual’ book and planned a complimentary piece of work on modern-day matchmaking since I have a lot to offer with several failed relationships to my name.

  My week of reformation had progressed well, and I was enjoying the new Mace Evans. Oscar says, “Only the shallow know themselves.” Maybe he is wrong.

  Chapter Sixteen

  I ABANDONED plans to have a new Mace by Christmas—Colleagues were connecting with me, calling me instead of the preferred email, and asking about my Christmas, family and friends. Oscar is right, “We are born in an age when only the dull are treated seriously and I live in terror of not being misunderstood.”

  Christmas Day for the Evans family begins early and ends late with mother covering me in a blanket on the sofa as I snore in drunken peace and harmony. This is the only time of the year that I do a sleepover; I prefer my own bed and preferably with no one else in it.

  At an ungodly 7AM, we gather each Christmas at the family home in Ivanhoe to receive gifts, and to watch as over-indulged children open an obscene number of presents. While watching Mount Present implode into a mass of red and green Santa-filled shreds, I take a moment to remember a little boy. I do not want to remember him like I do, but he is there in my tormented hippocampus, and comes to me every yea
r at Christmas or whenever I am at K-Mart.

  While waiting in a drawn out K-Mart Christmas queue with toys for the nephews and nieces, I observed the little boy in front of me who was tossing a foam baseball in his hands with much melancholy. He asked his father if he could also have the bat, which was an additional five dollars, but was told he could only have one or the other. I wanted to buy him the bat, but as I stared at his tattooed father with my mouth open ready for the words, nothing happened. Then he said, “What are you looking at?” and I feared he might beat me to a pulp with said bat. The boy would have endured ten more Christmases since then—he would be sixteen at least by now, but still he comes to me every year as a little boy to remind me of my cowardice.

  In spite of the magnitude of the unwrapping, it is all over before my second coffee because no control is exercised over the process—it is a free-for-all. When we were kids, there were three presents each—that was it, and it did not occur to us to feel deprived or neglected, and we opened our presents one at a time, one child at a time, so that each of us participated in every present. No one could touch a present until the previous recipient was done. It was civilized because mother was in charge. It surprises me therefore, that she tolerates and even enjoys the pandemonium of the new era. When the urchins are done, it is the adults who gather up the remnants for the recycling bin, which is also another irregularity.

  We then sit down together at a decorated table for ham and eggs. By mid-morning, Jason and Shannon head off to in-laws for respective lunches, and return late afternoon for the continuation of the Evans family Christmas. In the meantime, it is just Lauren, mother, dad and me, and it is a happy time because Shannon is absent. David is never present during the hiatus as he is always at the hospital for a round or two of patients. Kimba and Kenneth drop by during the day, as does Amber.