Odd Mom Out (44 page)
I’m shaking as I drive home, both furious and heartbroken. How could Luke do that to me? How could he pull a power play like that?
Fine, he can be founder of BioMed. He can be a billionaire. But don’t be God and manipulate my jobs and whip up magical contracts to “make things better” for me.
I don’t want a fairy godmother for a boyfriend.
Arriving home, I’m just glad Eva’s in bed. I couldn’t handle trying to act normal in front of her right now.
I spend the next two weeks avoiding all contact with Luke. I don’t return his calls or answer his e-mails or his text messages.
I’m done with him, so done that I delete him from my BlackBerry and go through everything I have and toss anything he might have given to me, anything that might remind me of him, even putting my bike up for sale on Craigslist. It’s not a Freedom bike, it’s a Harley, but I never want to ride a motorcycle again.
Eva knows I’m upset, and she knows it’s about Luke, especially as she doesn’t see him anymore or hear me speak to him on the phone.
It’s not easy, though, for me to erase him that fast. I might have blanked him out of my BlackBerry, but I can’t get him out of my system that fast. I do miss him, far more than I anticipated, far more than I can handle.
But getting rid of the bike will be the first step to really moving on.
The bike has found a buyer. I read the e-mail from an Al Pancetti of Lakewood, Washington. He’ll pay asking price with a cashier’s check, and he’ll be here the day after tomorrow in the afternoon to pick it up.
Wow. That was fast. So that’s it. Bike is gone. Well, almost gone.
I leave my desk and head to the garage, pull back the dropcloth, and, crouching next to my bike, run my hand over the chassis. I feel a twinge of pain as my fingers glide over the chrome and glossy paint.
I need to go for one last ride. Sticking my head in the studio, I shout that I’m taking an early lunch and will be back before one.
I’m already wearing jeans and a sweater, so I layer on a black leather coat and my black combat boots and set off. I head north on 405, passing Bothell and Mill Creek, continuing on to where 405 and 5 merge, up to Mount Vernon, before turning around and heading home again.
I’m on 5 South, passing the University District and getting ready to take the 520 on ramp, when my bike begins to sputter. It’s making a coughing, skipping sound, and from the way the engine starts racing, something’s loose.
Glancing down, I look for the screw in the carburetor, and once I find it, I run my fingers across it. It feels tight. I’m going to need to back it off, but I can’t do it driving.
I pull over to the side of the freeway, hoping I can make the adjustment now without having to go to a gas station. It’s dangerous here on the side of the road, but I work quickly, first tugging off my helmet and then kneeling next to the bike.
I use my fingernail to try to turn the little screw. It doesn’t need a lot, just a small adjustment would work, but the screw doesn’t budge. I try again without success. I’m still kneeling next to the bike when I hear a truck pull up behind me.
“Everything okay?”
I know that voice. Very well. Karma, I think, pushing hair off my face to look up at an unsmiling Luke.
I wipe my cold, stiff hands on my knees and sit back on my haunches. “Hey.”
Luke towers above me. “Break down?”
“The carburetor needs adjusting.”
“Need a hand?”
“I’ve got it. Thanks.”
His scrutiny deepens. “Where are your tools?”
My skin grows hot, and I hate this feeling, so anxious, so nervous, so not in control. “I don’t have any.” The beat of silence is hugely uncomfortable, so I add flatly, “I’m using my fingernail.”
“Your fingernail,” he repeats.
I know it sounds funny, but it’s what I’ve done before and it was fine. “Yes, my fingernail.”
His expression doesn’t change, but I can tell he’s laughing on the inside. “Is it working?”
“It will,” I answer, surprised by the crazy weakness in my knees and thighs as I stand. I’m shocked by the sight of him and hope that my brisk tone communicates that I’m a professional and completely in control.
He doesn’t buy it. “What if it doesn’t? What will you do then?”
It must be a rhetorical question, because he doesn’t even wait for an answer. Instead he heads to his Land Rover, retrieves a toolbox, and returns with a screwdriver.
He steps around me and crouches next to my bike. With a quick twist, he adjusts the screw on the fuel filter, shakes it once to make sure it’s on tight, and then stands up.
“All done,” he says, looking down at me, his expression as cool as the frost on my lawn this morning.
“Thank you,” I answer stiffly.
“You should carry tools,” he adds. “If you’re going to ride—”
“I know,” I cut him off. “I should. But I wasn’t going far, and I didn’t expect any problems.”
He stares down at me, and I can tell he’s just as angry as I am. He’s quiet so long, I don’t think he’s going to answer, and then he gives his head a single shake. “You make so many assumptions, and most of them are so wrong, so wildly off base, that I sometimes wonder what we were doing seeing each other.”
Luke’s words hit hard, each of them a slap, the consonants and vowels like stinging hail. “I wonder who it is you think I am,” he continues, “and why you always think the worst of me.”
I open my mouth to protest, but there’s enough truth in what he says that I can’t defend myself. Instead I stand there, chin lifted, even as my insides fall, icy cold.
“I have ethics, Marta, and I wouldn’t sell out, not even for you. I’m proud of the way I do business. I’m proud of how I conduct myself. Maybe it’s time you looked at the way you conduct yourself.” Finished, he turns and heads back to his truck.
Shaking, I watch him put away his tools and then open his door. “So what did happen with Freedom Bikes?” I call to him. “If you didn’t go in and wave your magic wand, who did?”
The traffic is thick and loud and zooms past, and for a split second I think Luke hasn’t heard me, but then he pivots away from his truck and faces me.
“Frank,” he answers.
I’m not sure I heard him right over the roar of traffic, so I walk toward him. “Frank?” I repeat.
Luke glances at a huge semi truck that has just sounded its horn. “It was Frank’s idea to toss out the other agency and bring you back in.”
“So you didn’t ride roughshod over the executive committee?”
He makes a sound of disgust. “God, no. I wouldn’t be in business today if that’s how I operated. First, I delegate decision making, and second, Frank came to me, telling me he’d made a mistake. He wanted you back. I told him there was nothing I could do, that it was his and the board’s decision.”
Shivering, shaking, I cross my arms over my chest. “But the timing was just too good.”
Luke’s expression hardens all over again. “Sometimes life is good, Marta. Sometimes life is freaking fabulous. Don’t you know that? Life isn’t just bad things. Life can also be wonderful.”
I feel my throat and nose burn. “I’m sorry.”
Luke just shakes his head. “Yeah. Me too.” He takes a breath. “If your bike doesn’t start, call me. Otherwise . . .” He doesn’t finish the thought. He climbs behind the steering wheel and drives off.
Al Pancetti arrives Thursday afternoon at two o’clock with a black truck and trailer to pick up my bike. I stand off to the side and watch him load it into a trailer. My chest feels so hot and tight, I can barely breathe. I cross my arms, squeeze, try to stay calm. This is right, I tell myself, this is smart. I’m being a better mom this way. Becoming more like everybody else.
Yet as Al slams the back of the trailer closed and slides the lock across the back, I nearly cry out,
Don’t take my bike, don’t take it.
I don’t cry out. I just stand there, still, cool, controlled. My dad would be so proud of me.
“I guess that’s it,” Al says, wiping his hands on the back of his jeans before extending one hand to shake mine good-bye.
I shake his hand, nod. “It’s a good bike.”
His warm brown eyes meet mine. “I know it is. You take care now.”
“You too.”
I go inside before he drives away. I have to. Otherwise I’d be bawling like a baby.
The loss of the bike is the final straw. I’m shattered and angry, mostly angry at myself because I didn’t have to sell the bike. I didn’t have to walk out of the meeting. I didn’t have to cut Luke out of my life, either.
Why, oh, why do I do these hard-core, knee-jerk masochistic things? Why do I respond to life this way? All or nothing? Throw the dice, baby, all or nothing . . .
But I don’t want all or nothing.
All or nothing has just about broken me.
I finally call Tiana because she’s single and I hope, pray, she’ll understand what I’m talking about and hope, pray, she can tell me how to get through this.
“I’ve goofed,” I tell her. “I’ve goofed so bad.” My voice is shaking and I’m shaking, and for the first time in a long time, I think I’m really going to crack. “What I did . . . what I said . . . Oh, Tiana, what have I done?”
“What did you do?”
“I walked out of a huge meeting, walked out on a job I wanted more than anything, walked out on Luke. You name it. I did it.”
“Why?”
“I was upset. Confused. And now I find out I had it all wrong. I didn’t understand it, and I thought the worst, and oh, Tiana, I hate myself right now. I feel so bad. I’m so crazy about Luke, and I’ve screwed everything up.”
“I’m coming,” Tiana says crisply. “I have the weekend off and no plans. I’ll be there first thing in the morning.”
Tiana is as good as her word. Eva and I pick her up, and as soon as we get home, Eva has Jill over so Jill can meet her famous “aunt.” Once Jill is done gawking, Eva and Jill disappear into Eva’s room to play.
Tiana drags me into my room to talk. “So what exactly happened,” she demands.
I tell her all, as briefly and concisely as possible. Tiana listens to the whole story and then asks, “So what’s the bottom line, Marta? What do you want right now?”
“Luke.” There’s no hesitation on my part. “I want the bike account. It was my dream job. But it’s just a job. Luke’s . . . Luke’s . . .” I try to smile, yet even trying to smile makes me nearly cry. “Luke’s wonderful, and I don’t know why I did what I did. I don’t know why I didn’t trust him.”
“Oh, Marta, you’ve always had a huge issue with trust, especially after Scott duped you.”
“But this isn’t about Scott, it’s about me.”
“It’s
all
about Scott. He was a bad apple. He started seeing you before he was even divorced—”
“I don’t want to talk about Scott.”
Tiana slams her hand on my dresser. “But we’re going to talk about Scott whether you like it or not. We need to talk about him because he’s messed up your life long enough. You loved him. You wanted to marry him. You wanted to have kids with him, but the bastard already had a wife, a wife he didn’t tell you about—”
“They’d been separated for over a year.”
“But he was still seeing her, wasn’t he? Still going ‘home’ on weekends and just possibly, still sleeping with her.”
I feel as if I can’t breathe, and it’s not the sexy, excited I-can’t-breathe, but the elephant-is-standing-on-my-chest-and-crushing-me kind of feeling. “Tiana.”
She shakes her head. “He was the worst kind of man, Marta, the kind of man that needs so much that he’ll string women along, have girlfriends, mistresses, wives, women who all think they’re the only one when in reality they’re just one of a half dozen he woos and wins, women he needs to support his fragile ego and self-esteem.
“He hurt you,” she continues furiously. “He lied to you. He cheated. He was an ass. A pig. A prick. A jerk. But he’s not all men. And you can’t let one rotten prick haunt you forever. You can’t let that rotten prick keep you from being loved.”
Tiana takes my hands in hers, squeezes them. “For ten years you’ve been afraid of men, afraid of being hurt, afraid of being rejected because of one lousy man. Okay, you thought Luke let you down and you behaved childishly, but have you tried to apologize? Have you really tried to fix things? Or have you just crawled into a hole and played dead?”
It’d be so easy to hate Tiana when she’s in her righteous mode, but Tiana has been through hell and back and she’s a survivor. She knows what it is to love and lose and try again. Shey might be the sister I never had, but Tiana’s the guardian angel. I couldn’t go through what she’s gone through, and I know she’s suffered.
“But I don’t know how to fix this,” I confess. “I think it’s gotten out of hand.”
“Maybe in your mind.” Her eyes search my face. “And maybe it’s uncomfortable, and maybe it’ll hurt your pride, but don’t give up. Don’t throw in the towel. What kind of attitude is that?”
“It’s my inner chicken talking.”
“You’re not a coward at work, why be a coward with men?”
She has a good point there. “I don’t know.”