The Good Neighbor (5 page)

“I don't think I have a reading public.”

“You had over eight thousand unique hits your first month,” Jade said. “And once you're on Pop Philly, everyone who comes to the site will see your column because we're putting it on the landing page. It will also headline our social-scene page on Mondays and Fridays.”

Jade's lingo was cluttering my clear thinking.

“We want to cater to a new demographic,” Coat Guy said. Everyone nodded but no one introduced him.

“Drew's on point. And that's where you come in,” Holden added.

Coat Guy = Drew. “Darby, tell Izzy what Jade and I explained to you.”

Darby breathed deep. Her nose ring wiggled. Darby. “Singles in their forties are the fastest-growing demographic in the country, so we need to hook them. Then we need to keep them hooked.” She flashed an orthodontic smile toward Drew, who looked old enough to be her father.

“You mean you want me to attract old people?”

Drew laughed. “I'm forty-two. Watch it.”

Coat Guy, Drew, forty-two. He was a Dr. Seuss rhyme.
That
I could remember.

“And considering I'm hitting four-oh just a few months after you, it's definitely not old. Not for anything, least of all dating.” Jade lifted her glass and then sipped from her straw until the glass was empty. “I am going to the bar for a refill.”

Darby held the table edge with two hands. She glanced at Drew, but fixed her gaze on me. Did she have a crush on him? That couldn't be right. “I was going to write this column in addition to my restaurant reviews. It was going to be like a promotion, but then Jade said not to worry about it, she had the perfect person for the job. So, fine. I think I could have totally appealed to an older audience, but she's the boss. And you're at the right age, I guess. And her best friend. So I guess that makes you perfect.”

“Perfect? Who's perfect?” Jade set her new drink on the table.

“Izzy.” Holden looked at Drew, then at Darby, then back at me and winked, which I knew was not flirting. I'd made a friend.

There was my opening. But I was not going to admit to strangers young enough to call me Aunt Izzy that my boyfriend, and just about everything they were praising me for, was fake.

Jade turned to me and shifted back her shoulder. She appeared even taller. “We're doing this. It's an important component for the growth of the brand. So, either it's you or someone else.”

“I'm not forty yet. You want me to lie?” I said it before I could stop myself.

“Oh, that's just details! We need you to keep writing about your dates. You know, like the guy who picked his nose?”

Of course
he
was real.

I'd forgotten Jade and her team were the blogging CIA. I thought of the screen names and avatars of my readers. Would they follow me to Pop Philly or would they feel abandoned? Hadn't I abandoned them already by disappearing for days without explanation? I knew that blogs ran cold, disappeared without notice, and that bloggers dissolved back into their real lives without any thought of their RSS feeds. But I also knew that for some people, these personal gigs came with online social responsibility and a little bit of blogger guilt. I wasn't sure where I fit in. I had just wanted to share stories, commiserate with others—not be the Pied Piper of the over-forty crowd, leading them out of the dregs of singlehood. If I could do it for others, I'd have done it for myself.

“You've got the chance to be a big voice for men and women who are terrified about having to date again. You can help people move past their exes. Or just move forward. I was going to offer you this gig before you needed it. It's kismet, honey. Blogging
beshert
! Totally meant to be! You can make some money—so you don't have to blast Bruce just yet, and you'll help me build my business.”

“Why can't I blog about books or kids or parenting? I'm a counselor, I could really be a resource for your readers.”

“Ho-hum, hon.” Holden patted my hand. “Sorry. We're
Pop
Philly. Not
Snooze
Philly.”

“We want the sincerity of Dear Abby with a splash of Kardashian.” Jade flicked all her fingers in the air as if releasing confetti.

“We like a little glitz with our morning coffee, right?” Darby looked at Drew. “Don't worry, I'll help you get on the right track. Anything for the greater good.”

“Thanks, Darb. I knew this would work!” Jade put her arm around my shoulders again. I shifted under its weight. “You'll give all the advice that's fit to print, so to speak. And you don't have to reveal your identity until you're ready. Guys, I'm going to talk to Izzy about the details. Drew? We'll talk later?”

He nodded.

“I recognize him.” I whispered into Jade's ear. “Who
is
he?”

“I'll tell you later.”

Then with a gentle tug, Jade led me away from the table to a crowded corner of the bar, which seemed to open like the Red Sea when Jade appeared. It was now or never. There was no Mac. The words stuck in my throat. I'm not even over Bruce. Well, not completely. The notions dizzied me. Courting lies and denial was a breeze compared to ramping up to tell the truth.

“You need a little more ‘this' in your life.” Jade pretended she was Vanna White and showcased the Chihuly-esque lighting, the tables full of animated people, and the whimsical food not meant for children. “I know you love being a guidance counselor. I know you have your own social life. But you need something that's just for you and just about you. And I can do that for you, Pea, if you do
this
for us. For me. I really need your help. I need to boost traffic. Please.” Jade cocked her head the way she had done in the days when she wanted me to type her term papers. Then she scribbled onto a cocktail napkin, channeled her inner used-car salesman, and slid the napkin across the bar to me.

“This will be your monthly pay. Enough to pay for day care, right? Plus a little extra? Not only that, but doing this will take up enough space in your head to push out other things.”

Jade was right. The amount was enough to cover Noah's before-and-after-school care, and maybe some of his speech-therapy sessions not covered by insurance. The rationalizations poured through me: I could blog about dating until Bruce got his act together. I'd still be anonymous, so no one would know it was written by me. Except Jade. And Rachel and Holden and Darby and Drew and the others at the table who remained nibbling, sipping blurs. But I could give advice and help people. It's what I did. I was a helper. It's not as if I didn't have common sense, even if I didn't always use it. I liked the idea of a little glitz with my coffee, and I needed to know I could do it. All of it.

I stared at the napkin and folded it into an origami disaster. Mrs. Feldman would not have been impressed.

“I can be anonymous, right?”

“You be whoever you want to be. Anyone with an understanding of reverse analytics and who has a half hour to kill could uncover any anonymous blogger, but they'd have to be looking. Really looking. Just use the Pop Philly interface and you'll be fine.”

All I understood was “you'll be fine.”

“This is not a pity job, Pea, this is a job-job. You're helping both of us. Remember that.” How did she always read my mind except when I needed her to? “This is what bloggers dream about—recognition and money. I'm offering both, and I'm not asking you to give up your privacy. You deserve everything that's about to happen.”

That's what I was afraid of.

 

Chapter 5

Baby in the Air

A
WEEK AFTER
J
ADE
offered me the Pop Philly job, and four days after Bruce left for California for his nonjob, I became a pirate.

“Walk the plank,” Noah said, pointing at me as he bounded down the steps and walked bowlegged, hands on his hips, into the living room.

Noah had declared a moratorium on web slinging by shoving all his blue and red paraphernalia under his bed. I knew it was because Spider-Man made Noah think of his dad. One day, in grown-up, paid-for-by-his-own-health-insurance sessions, his therapist will tell him he wished it were Bruce he was shoving under the bed, or how removing the visual cues to his last time with Bruce made him store away those memories. I ached with Noah's underlying sadness. Bruce's departure was an addendum to our divorce, another way he left and didn't come back. At the moment, he was two for two.

Amateur psychoanalysis aside, it was much easier to be a pirate than Spider-Man. For starters, the costuming offered a little more leeway. I embraced it with a bandanna and a plastic eye patch held on, as Noah's was, with a giant rubber band. I duct-taped a Disney bird to the shoulder of Noah's sweatshirt. He giggled when he looked in the mirror and saw Zazu perched and secure. Then he darted into the kitchen, returning with two paper-towel tubes from the recycle bin. He handed one to me.

“Ha-yah!” Noah leapt into a fight stance, wielding his cardboard sword with contagious delight.

“Ha-yah!” The doorbell rang. “Avast, matey. Let me see who shot off that cannon.”

It was Dreadlocks = Holden, with a backpack, a duffel bag, and Darby.

“Ahoy, matey,” he said.

Darby smirked and closed one eye tight. My eye patch!

“These are friends of Auntie Jade's, Noah. We have some work to do, so you can watch TV.” He looked at me wide-eyed, as if I never allowed him to watch TV.

Noah tore the parrot from his shoulder and galloped into the living room. He never walked. He ran or hopped, skipped or even ambled on all fours, but he never just walked. No matter where Noah was headed, he anticipated joy upon arrival.

Holden glided through the foyer and into the dining room, plopping his backpack on the table without a sound. I swiveled around to thank Darby for coming, but she had followed Noah into the living room.

“You'll be up and running in no time,” Holden said.

“Huh? Oh, right.” I watched Darby. She sat on the floor by Noah's feet. Her legs crossed at her ankles, her back against the sofa, she tipped back her head and talked. I couldn't hear a word, but she was interesting enough for Noah to move his eyes from the TV to the top of her head, or maybe to her eyes, or her nose ring. I couldn't tell. What did he think of the jewelry in Darby's nose? Pirates wore earrings. Noah would probably ask for one later.

“You're going to need to pay attention.” Holden tapped my arm twice. “They're fine. Darby is
okay
.”

“Oh, I know.” Did I? “Sorry, I guess I don't understand why she's here if she's not working with us.”

“She just wanted to come along, I hope that's all right.” Holden emptied his backpack of a silver laptop, a jumble of wires, and a few small, black boxes. It looked to me as if he were going to build a robot. “Darbs said she'd never been to this neighborhood. Plus, we knew the little guy would be here. His dad left, right?”

I shuddered. Why was Holden asking such a personal question? That was out of line, none of his business, and frankly, embarrassing.

“Excuse me?”

“California. You said the little guy's dad went to California.”

“I did?”

“You'd had a lot to drink.”

What else had I said? “Yeah, he is in California. On business. He'll be back as soon as he can be, of course.”

There I was again. Defending Bruce.

“Anyway, Darbs just thought that maybe he'd like some company while you were busy. That's all.” Holden tapped on his laptop, then mine, looking at one while he typed away on the other. “Where did you meet him, anyway?”

“Who?”

“Your boyfriend. Mac. The guy you're writing about. How'd you meet?”

Mac! “How did we
meet
?” Think, Izzy, think. Was it on JDate? “Uh, it's a long story.”

“I'm updating the software on your laptop.” He tapped my keyboard and looked at his watch, oversize and expensive looking. Probably from a street vendor, as were my Rolex, Coach, and Gucci everythings. “We have time.”

“You know, now that I think of it, maybe it's better if I don't write about Mac, or dating at all.”

Holden tapped and held a combination of keys. It looked as if he were playing the piano. He pushed the monitor toward me. “We've already designed the logo, see?”

Philly over Forty
. I saw.

“And if you click on the bio…” A photo flanked by Internet gibberish jumped onto the screen. “The text goes in later. It'll be set up by tonight and ready to go for tomorrow.”

“Who's that?” Red Phillies cap tipped down over a face, fingers clamped on the brim, partial jawline visible. Neck and shoulders visible, too. “Wait, is that supposed to be me?”

“It is you. And it's going up tonight with your bio.”

“It's me?” I turned Holden's laptop toward me. I wanted to lift the cap and see the face. Instead, I just moved my face closer to the screen as if I could peek under it. “Are you sure?”

But I knew. Jade had snapped that picture at the Bank
.
Citizens Bank Park. Bruce's boss had given him Diamond Club seats, and we took Jade and Lyle, her summer love that year, to the Phillies game. I was eight months pregnant, with blotchy skin, my long hair tucked in and through the half-moon above the adjustable strap. The sky was wake-up blue—bright enough to be a crayon in my box of sixty-four. For me, the color, the sky, meant the day was to be perfect, but I'd ended up dehydrated, with swollen ankles, and the designated driver. And the Phillies had lost.

“You don't want to show your face. No face. You're completely incognito.”

I agreed, in theory. Unless you knew me, or what the side of my hand looked like, or had a personal memory of that day with me, you wouldn't recognize me. But I knew. I knew what was under the brim without looking at my face. It wasn't just the sky that was devoid of clouds that day. My life was also clear and bright. Bruce and I had discovered our newlywed mojo: we were expecting a baby, we'd bought our 1930s semidetached in Chestnut Hill, and we'd planted perennials. Nothing said forever like peonies and a DIY kitchen renovation.