Jennifer Johnson Is Sick of Being Married (5 page)

The rest is . . . history.

I pass the Cinnabon counter quickly, ignoring the sweet, cinnamon-scented air swirling around me. If I had a nickel for every calorie I consumed at that godforsaken counter, I could buy Keller's Department Store myself.

I nod at the girl behind the counter, who wears a red hat. She's the seat of evil itself.

The Cinnabon girl.

“Hey, Satan,” I say.

“Hey, haven't seen you around for a while.”

“I've been . . . away.”

“Well, looks like you're back.”

A colorful poster catches my eye.

 

JOIN THE

CINNERS CLUB

FOR CINNERS . . . JUST LIKE YOU

 

“What's that?” I ask.

She says it's an all-you-can-eat-Cinnabon club. You just pay one low annual fee and you can have as many Cinnabons as you want. They also deliver. My jaw drops.

All-you-can-eat Cinnabons?

I shudder at what I might look like if I had a membership. I'd become some blobby glutinous mass that oozed out everywhere. I'd look just like a Cinnabon. She tries to hand me a glossy pamphlet, but I don't take it. “I'm doing a gluten-free thing these days,” I tell her. “And no sugar. I feel like a new person basically. I'm running marathons . . .”

She just looks at me and holds up a key chain. “Every membership comes with a free scratch-n-sniff Cinnabon keychain. It smells like a real Cinnabon. It's warm too. There's a watch battery inside.”

“That's . . . that's . . .” I'm too overwhelmed to speak. I pivot on my foot and march away.

She's the devil.

I take a deep breath as I walk through the heavy glass doors of Keller's Department Store. How strange to be back, to walk through the doors as a Keller family member and not just a lowly copy girl in the marketing department. I try to maintain a semblance of dignity as I walk through the store. I walk in a stately manner, like Cleopatra balancing a book on her head.

It's still too early to go up to Brad's office, so I sneak up to the marketing department, where I used to work. Where I spent untold hours writing mediocre crap, reworking old sale copy, recutting used radio scripts, refreshing stale slogans . . . or trying to, constantly resurrecting the same dead marketing ideas that were dead for a reason. God, I hated myself while I was doing that. I would've been better off selling makeup. At least I wouldn't have had to watch my own hands butcher the English language so much.

Walking back into my old office is icky, weird, and hot. Nothing's changed. The ceilings are still too low, the carpet is still worn out, the heat's still on too high, and the same torn motivational poster is still Scotch-taped to the break room door. Two little acorns rest on a bed of moss and it says:
THINGS THAT ARE SMALL NOW CAN BECOME GREAT SOMEDAY.
It might be more inspiring if the acorns didn't look like small brown baby testicles.

It's the perfect time to look around; the whole department is at the weekly roundup meeting. I peek at them through the conference room's glass window. I do not miss that meeting, which is run by Carl, who's still wearing the same upsetting crotch-bulging khakis. I used to terrorize myself in meetings just to stay awake by imagining that for some post-apocalyptic reason, I had to have sex with Carl, because the fate of the planet depended on it.

I see my soul-crushing cubicle, Old Ironsides, where I worked every day, underneath flickering fluorescent lights that eventually would induce seizures. I have no idea who sits in my cubicle now. Ted's still at his old desk; his
Star Wars
action figures are positioned in some sort of group orgy. Ted was my fellow inmate, my friend, and my Bookmark Guy. The guy I always held a place for in my mind if nothing else worked out. He's so nice . . . but he's a redhead, and not in a good way. We both toiled together underneath the thumb of my old boss, Ashley. Ashley was shocked when I started dating Brad, more like horrified actually. She just couldn't believe Brad Keller picked
me
. She certainly didn't think it would last and told me so often. Now, here I am, Ashley, so suck it.

Finally it's time to go. I take the elevators up to Brad's office, where Brad introduces me to the store's new head of finance, Todd Brockman. Todd's a big broad-shouldered guy with a blocky head and blindingly white teeth. He wears a shiny blue suit and has a short frosted crew cut. He looks like your average TV anchor or high-end car salesman. He says I should call him what all his friends do:
The Brock.
I smile and tell him to call me Mrs. Keller.

Brad leaves us to take a call and Todd shows me his new office, which has a bookcase loaded with football trophies. “So, kiddo!” Todd grins. “Welcome back! Hey, I got a question for ya. Big bad Brad and I are working on this spiffy new deal with a foreign investment group, buncha nice guys. Great suits. Anyway, we're trying to raise a little capital-cashola and they're looking to invest in a retail chain. We're hoping to get them on board here at Keller's and the
upshot-a-rino
is . . . we'd like you to throw a little dinner for them.”

“You want
me
to throw a dinner?”

“Heck yeah, you don't want us fellas microwaving frozen fish sticks for 'em! We need a real nice home-cooked meal. They love that crap. Take me to a steak house, but these fellas want a ‘
mi casa es su casa
' scenario. Fine by me, as long as I don't have to cook!”

“But you want
me
to cook.”

“No way! We want a caterer to cook and you to be your super-charming self!”

“Oh. Okay . . . I guess that's—”

“Great! Emily has the deets.
Hey, Em! Grab that Jap-dinner file for Jen!
All righty then, the Brock has to bolt. Emily'll shoot you some intel on that dinner and you call me if you need anything, got it?
Hey, Em!
Grab those files for Jen to sign too! Em's got some papers for you to sign. Just employee file stuff. All righty then, we good?”

“Um . . . we're good.”

“Super-great to meet you, Jen!”

Todd leaves and Emily the executive secretary hurries in, dropping files all over the floor.

“Oh no!” she gasps, kneeling down to retrieve them. “I'm so stupid!” she mutters. “I'm such a klutz!” Then she looks up with tears in her eyes. “Oh! I didn't know you were in here, Mrs. Keller! I'm so sorry . . .” She's all flustered and continues to spill files even as she picks them up. I adore her. She reminds me of when I started working at Keller's. Uncertain of anything except that everything's her fault. Actually, that still sounds like me.

I kneel down and help her.

“I'm so sorry, Mrs. Keller, Mr. Brockman's always telling me to
think
before I do something stupid.”

“Well, that's not very nice.”

“Oh, he's just trying to help me improve.”

“I'll bet.” I ask her if she'd tell
me
to think first if I dropped papers all over the floor, if she thought that would that help
me
carry files better, and her eyes go wide. “No,” she says. “I'd tell you it's no big deal and . . . not to worry about it!”

“Exactly, and that's what this is. No big deal. Right?”

“Right.” She nods, blushing. We get the files picked up and Cute Emily says, “Thank you so much, Mrs. Keller! I'm so glad I met you. Everybody said you were nice!”

“Please.” I smile at her. “Call me Jennifer.”

Emily gives me a pile of papers to sign. Health insurance, employee benefits, tax crap, just basic information, but I'm useless of course; I can't remember our new address or our new telephone number. She pulls out a tax ID form and I write down both my social security numbers. “This is the one I use, but this one pops up from time to time and it's a total pain.”

Emily looks impressed. “How'd you get two?”

“When I was a baby my mom took me to Denmark and left her purse in a cab. Lost all my ID. Then when we got home, the government issued me a new card with a new number. No idea why, maybe because I was a baby, but that stupid first number still pops up from time to time, so just keep an eye out for it. Otherwise things can get confusing.”

“Oh!” Her eyes fly open. “I almost forgot the investor dinner packet! I'm sorry, wait here, I'll be right back. Mr. Brockton will
kill
me if you leave without it.” She brings me a manila envelope and says everything I need should be inside. As I'm leaving she apologizes for dropping the files again. She says she hasn't been sleeping well lately because she's getting married in the spring. “There's so much to do, everything is just spinning!”

“Oh, honey.” I smile gently. “It'll be . . . what it is. The most important thing is you're marrying someone you love, right?”

“Right!” She grins and I think to myself,
Christ, is that the most important thing?

“And, Mrs. Keller,” she says. “I wonder if . . . I might ask you to lunch sometime? For, um . . . wedding advice and that kind of thing?”

“Wedding advice?”

“Oh . . .” She blushes awkwardly. “It's just that my mother died when I was kind of young. I don't have anyone to help me with . . . I don't even know what I need help with! Stuff you already know. Advice for brides, I guess.” Her sweet heart-shaped face has gone pink and I pat her on the shoulder.

“Lunch we shall have, my dear. It would be my pleasure.”

Brad appears in the doorway. It's time for the pep rally and we leave the office together, riding down in the elevator to the first floor. “We first met on an elevator,” I remind him.

“How could I forget?” he snorts. “You threatened to pepper-spray me.”

“Yep. Say what you will, babe, we've always had chemistry.”

The elevator doors open onto the wide white marble lobby, and the smell of roses and gardenia perfume washes over us. I start to feel nervous as we cross the crowded lobby and head for the stage. People make way for us and start smiling. I feel like a contestant on
The Price Is Right
. It's worse when we get up onstage and have to stand there like idiots smiling, waiting for Mr. and Mrs. Keller to arrive. Sarah and Bill are already there, along with a very hyper Trevor, who hops back and forth from one foot to the other while his mother tells him to stop. “Auntie Jen!” Trevor whispers. “I got tap shoes today!”

“Really? Sweet.”

“And where did Mommy say you could use your tap shoes?” Sarah whispers tightly.

“The basement!” Trevor grins.

“That's right.
Only
the basement.”

Suddenly the crowd starts to clap as the Kellers come in. Ed's wearing a dark gray suit with a red tie and Mother Keller's in a complementary slate-gray shantung silk dress with a large gemstone-and-pearl brooch. They join us onstage
smiling, smiling, smiling
. Mother Keller practically beams at me, and I actually look over my shoulder thinking her affectionate face must be for someone behind me.

Ed begins his speech. I stand beside Brad like a wax statue riveted in position, a smile frozen on my face and staring off at an unfixed point in the crowd. I feel like an idiot up here. It hurts to smile this much. And speaking of pain, my no-problem pumps start to feel like bear traps biting into my feet. I feel progressively more awkward with every second that ticks by. Horrible thoughts cloud me.
What if I have spinach in my teeth? What if I pass out suddenly? What if I get a nosebleed? What if I develop Tourette syndrome right here and now, uncontrollably blurting out foul language?
I burst out into a cold sweat. Great. Now I'll have pit stains.
Shit!
Suddenly I hear my name and Mother Keller's hugging me, kissing me on both cheeks. The audience is clapping and someone's handing me a huge bouquet of roses.

What the hell is happening?

“Isn't she great, folks?” Ed beams. “We really hit the jackpot! Welcome to the Keller family, Jennifer! We wouldn't want anyone else for a daughter-in-law! Now . . . we just need to start making some junior Kellers, all right?” The audience laughs and my head starts swimming. Trevor gives me a big drawing he made of the whole family and Sarah kisses my cheek. I can hardly see anything now, because I'm holding a bouquet of red roses so big, it's more like a shrub. Ed thanks everyone for coming and suddenly . . . we're all leaving. It's only as we're leaving the stage that I notice the banner that's been unfurled for who knows how long behind me that says
WELCOME, JENNIFER, TO THE KELLER FAMILY!

I'm thunderstruck.

I can't believe it. This pep rally was to welcome me . . . and I managed to miss almost the whole thing by nonstop speed-worrying. I feel completely ashamed. They were trying to do something nice for me. I get teary as Brad kisses me good-bye and say, “It was just so nice of them to do this for me.” He says they should've thrown me a big dinner. They did that for Bill when he married Sarah. I kiss Brad and tell him I don't want a big dinner. All I want is him.

He has more meetings, so he stays behind at the store while I drive home alone. I promise to pick him up something delicious for dinner. Later that night I take a big bubble bath and pour myself a glass of wine. I put music on so no one can hear me and I let myself have one hell of a cry. Am I happy? Am I sad? Am I worried that I can't pull this whole marriage thing off?

Absolutely. All of it.

I stay in the bathtub for another hour, adding hot water as needed. I dry my eyes and open the manila envelope I got from Cute Emily. Inside the envelope I find a schedule, a contact list, a guest list, and a Xeroxed article titled “How to Throw a Party for Japanese People!”

I call Emily.