Romantically Challenged (17 page)

I deleted again and a third voice came on the line. “Hi Julie, it’s Mark. I’ve been trying to reach Christian but he’s not answering the phone. When you get there, tell him to call me at home. You know the number.”

“Grrrrr! Do you think I have it memorized!”

Christian unlocked the door. “Are you okay? I thought I heard someone scream.”

“I’m fine. Did you find the number?”

“No. I didn’t see any Rolodex. Maybe she keeps it all on her computer.”

I had no alternative. It was my only option. I started to cry.

“Don’t do that,” he said. “Please don’t.”

I let the tears roll down my cheeks unabated.

He sighed and pushed the door open wider. “Come on. We’ll figure something out.”

I played Mark’s voicemail message for Christian. That, and the tears, were enough to get me up to Mark’s office. I searched Mark’s assistant’s workspace myself, but Christian was right. There was no Rolodex. But even people who use electronic phone books keep at least some hard copy backups. Mark’s assistant was too efficient not to have all of his numbers somewhere.

I opened the top drawer of the desk and pulled out a stack of papers. I’d been hoping to find an employee phone list. There wasn’t one. But taped to the bottom of the drawer was an index card with all of Mark’s phone and fax numbers.

“Julie, where are you?” Mark asked when he picked up the line. “I’ve been trying to reach you.”

“I know, I got your message. I’m in your office with Christian. I’m going to put him on.”

Christian nodded a few times and said “okay sir.” Then he handed the phone back to me.

“You’re set,” Mark said. “Thanks for going down there and taking care of this.”

“No problem. Have a good trip.” What else could I say? He was still a client.

Christian unlocked Mark’s office door and it took me all of five seconds to find the check sitting on top of a stack of papers in his in-box. I stuffed it in my purse, thanked Christian, and left. I tried to call my parents and Steve Rogers from the car, but my cell phone battery was now dead.

By the time I got back to my office at 5:30 p.m. I had six new messages on my voicemail. Three were from Steve Rogers. The other three were from my mother. Both of them wanted to know where I was and why I hadn’t called them back.

I called Steve first. He picked up on the first ring.

“Where the hell have you been? I’ve been trying to reach you for two hours.”

“I’m sorry, but I had to drive over to Rosebud’s offices to pick up the check, and the place was locked, and the security guard didn’t want to let me in, and…just trust me, it was a nightmare.”

“But you have the check now, right?”

“Yes. Why don’t you come up to my office now so we can exchange documents and both get the hell out of here.”

“I’ll be right there,” he said.

* * *

Five minutes later Steve Rogers sat down in my guest chair. He handed me two copies of the settlement agreement signed by his client and I handed him two copies signed by Mark, plus the check. “We’re done,” I said.

“Yes,” he replied with obvious relief. “Not that it hasn’t been a pleasure working with you.”

“Same here.” Normally, I hated opposing counsel by the end of a case, but these negotiations had been shorter and less contentious than most. There’d even been moments over the last couple of weeks when I thought Steve Rogers was a nice guy.

“Maybe we can grab a beer some time,” he added. “Exchange war stories.”

“Sure.” I assumed it was one of those “let’s do lunch” lines that people say but never mean.

“Great. How about one night next week? Maybe Friday?”

Hold on a second. Was this a date? I looked at Steve Rogers in his casual Friday outfit—khakis, deck shoes, and a plaid short sleeve shirt with a white T-shirt underneath. Way too preppie for me. And he definitely needed to update those horn-rimmed glasses. But I was too tired to come up with an excuse. What little energy I had left I needed to save for my parents. “Sure, Steve, Friday sounds good.”

“Then I’ll see you next week.” He smiled at me and stood up. “Have a great weekend.”

“You too.” I knew my weekend would be anything but great.

Fun with Mom and Dad

When I was alone again, I called my parents back.

“Well it’s about time,” my mother said. “Where have you been? I’ve been trying to reach you for hours.”

“I was working, Mom. I told you I had to work today.”

“You don’t answer your phone?”

“I had to go to a meeting outside the office which took longer than expected. I just got back.”

“Why didn’t you check your messages? You knew we’d be calling.”

Deep cleansing breaths. “This is the first chance I’ve had, Mom,” I said in a voice I reserved for difficult children and childish adults. “Where are you?”

“We’re parked outside your apartment building. We’ve been here for twenty minutes waiting for you to call us back. Were you planning on coming home soon or should we just fly out tonight?”

Please do. “I’m leaving now but I won’t be home for at least half an hour. Probably longer with traffic. Why don’t you and Dad go to the mall for an hour and come back.” I live in the shopping mecca of the world. Surely she could find something she liked.

“I don’t feel like shopping.”

I counted to five backwards. “Well you could always take a walk. I know you and Dad do a lot of walking at home.”

I could hear her ask my father if he wanted to take a walk and his sleepy no in response. He must’ve been napping in the car. “Your father doesn’t want to take a walk.”

“Fine, then sit in the car and wait.” Now I was the childish one.

“Don’t you have an extra key somewhere?” my mother asked.

“Where Mom? Under the mat? This isn’t Mayberry.”

“Don’t get angry, I’m just trying to be helpful.”

Her standard routine. She pushes me over the edge then tries to pull me back from the abyss. It worked. “I can call my landlady and see if she’s home. Maybe she can let you in.”

* * *

Luckily, Mrs. Klein, my always helpful, seventy-six-year-old landlady answered the phone and agreed to let my parents into my apartment. I’d driven halfway home before I realized that I’d forgotten to warn my mother that my apartment was a mess and I had no food in the refrigerator. I thought of calling her back, but it was already too late. Thank God at least I’d remembered to put Elmo away. My parents just wouldn’t understand.

* * *

When I unlocked my front door, I found my father lying on the couch watching television and my mother making noise in the kitchen. My father stood up long enough to give me a hug, then returned to CNN. My mother came out to the living room and also gave me a hug. She then waited a whole ten seconds before she nodded towards last Sunday’s newspaper strewn across my living room floor and said, “I really like what you’ve done to the place.”

That was a new record, even for her. My father sighed. He knew where we were headed.

“Nice to see you too, Mom,” I said, picking up the newspapers and throwing them in the kitchen trash. I noticed that my dirty spoon and coffee mug were no longer in the sink. My mother must’ve put them in the dishwasher. I would’ve thanked her if she hadn’t made that crack about the newspapers.

“Aren’t you going to thank me?” my mom said standing in the entrance to my galley-style kitchen.

“For what?”

“I cleaned your kitchen.”

I looked around. Except for the empty sink, it looked the same. Okay, maybe the chrome on the faucet was a little bit shinier, but otherwise it really did look exactly the same. The kitchen was the one room in the apartment I always kept clean. I was afraid if I didn’t, I’d get bugs.

“It looks the same, Mom.”

Instead of answering me, she turned around and stomped back into the living room to pout.

My father had no choice but to get involved. “So what do you ladies want for dinner?”

For a few seconds, neither of us answered, then my mother said, “We’ll have to go out somewhere. You know your daughter doesn’t cook.” Now I was
his
daughter.

“I can cook,” my father said. The man barbecues steaks and cooks turkey on Thanksgiving and he thinks he’s a seasoned chef.

“Well then you’ll have to go to the grocery store first,” my mother said, “because she doesn’t have any food either.”

“That’s not true.” I walked into the kitchen and opened my freezer. “I have two Lean Cuisines and a box of popsicles.”

“Gourmet all the way,” my mother said.

“Well some of us have jobs and are too busy to cook.”

Silence. I’d played my trump card. My mother hadn’t worked since the day she found out she was pregnant with my sister. My father had been pushing her to get a job for the last twenty-five years, but without success. She was content staying home, with or without children in the house.

I played this card often, usually when my mother was criticizing my domestic skills. It always worked. But just as inevitably, afterwards I was contrite and would say something to make amends. Total annihilation of the opposition was more fun in court then it was with family.

“If you had come later,” I said to my mother, “when you were supposed to, I would’ve stopped at the grocery store on the way home. I planned on buying you both orange juice and raisin bran. And if I thought you were going to be really nice, I might’ve even bought you skim milk for your coffee instead of the two percent kind that I like.”

“Well why do you always have to leave everything for the last minute?” She couldn’t accept the olive branch without one more dig.

“So the food will be fresh.”

My dad laughed and my mom smiled. “Where do you want to go for dinner?” she asked.

* * *

The next morning over a breakfast of raisin bran, orange juice, and coffee with skim milk, I casually mentioned that I was thinking about buying a new car. It was a fleeting thought, really. I’d spent a considerable amount of time in Kaitlyn’s Mustang convertible lately and I thought it might be nice to have one of my own.

My dad seized on the idea. He’d traded in his ’62 Karman Ghia ragtop when my sister was born and had been driving family-size sedans ever since. He was eager to test-drive all the new models.

After breakfast, I took my father to the nearest Barnes & Nobles to buy the latest
Consumer Reports Car Guide
and some automotive magazines. Then my mom and I left him home reading and making notes, while we went to Beverly Hills for some power shopping. When we returned three hours later and several hundred dollars poorer, my dad had devised a plan of action.

Early Sunday morning, the three of us set out to visit every convertible car dealership in Southern California. We test-drove Fords, Toyotas, Hondas, Mazdas, Audis, and BMWs, and just for fun (they were definitely out of my price range) the Mercedes and Jaguars too. My dad liked the Mazdas, my mom liked the BMWs, and I liked the Audis.

It didn’t matter. I had no intention of actually buying a new car for at least a year. Car shopping was just a good family bonding experience. My motto is, a family that shops together is a family that doesn’t have to talk to each other about controversial subjects that could lead to arguments. In my family, any topic other than food or the weather could potentially to lead to an argument. It worked. For a while at least.

* * *

That night my dad went to bed early and I stayed up with my mom while she packed. She was sitting on top of her suitcase and I was kneeling on the floor next to her trying to close the zipper when she sprang on me. “So can I ask you about your love life?”

“I would prefer that you didn’t.” I’d almost gotten the ends of the zipper together.

“I don’t know why you never tell me anything? After all,” she added as if the statement had some sort of intrinsic meaning, “I am your mother.”

“I don’t recall you telling grandma everything.” My mother and grandmother had had a roller coaster relationship. Over the years, they’d been both best friends and mortal enemies.

“I told grandma plenty. The only time I didn’t was when I knew she would judge me. But I don’t do that to you.”

Could anyone really be that self-deluded? “Since when?”

“I never judge you.”

“Mom, you’ve done nothing but criticize me since you walked in the door.”

“That’s not true! I just thought you should’ve cleaned the house before we came.”

“I cannot believe you’re starting this again. You have no idea what my day was like before you arrived.” I gave her the long version of events, with all the details left in, hoping to elicit some sympathy.

“You know,” she said after I’d finished, “if you put half as much energy into finding a husband as you put into your job, you’d be married by now.”

My future had arrived, only much sooner than I’d expected. “Mother, I cannot believe you would even say that to me. Why are you so desperate for me to get married? How can my being single at age thirty-two possibly be a burden to you?”

“I would just feel better if I knew you were settled.”

“I’ve had the same job and lived in the same apartment for six years. How much more settled could I be?”

At that point, my father piped in from the futon. “Can you two keep it down. I’m trying to sleep.”

My mother followed me into my bedroom and closed the door. “I would just feel better if I knew that someone was taking care of you.”

“I’m taking care of me. Why isn’t that enough?”

“I just think you would be happier if you weren’t alone.”

“I’m not alone.” I was about to say, ‘I have Elmo,’ but caught myself in time. “I have friends,” I said. “I date. I just haven’t met the right guy yet.”

“See,” she said. (I didn’t.)  “I didn’t even know you were dating someone. You never tell me anything.”

“I didn’t say I was dating someone. I just said I was dating.”

“What’s the difference?”

I had to think about that one. Instead of telling her the truth, that dating someone means you’re sleeping together and just dating means you’re interviewing potential sex partners, I said, “Dating someone means you’re exclusive, and just dating means you go out with multiple people at the same time.”