With a Little Luck: A Novel (15 page)

“This is fascinating,” she says.

“So he did this to get back at me. Which is like taking it five thousand steps too far. I didn’t make a public mockery out of the fact that he can’t get a date. Mainly because I’m sure he can get a date.”

“Okay, a) he’s flirting with you,” she says. “And b) you could get a date if you wanted one. But let’s focus on
a.”

“You think he’s flirting?” I say incredulously. “That’s how you
flirt? You pimp the person out to the first person who can sound like Richard Harris howling his way through one of history’s most overblown pop songs? No.”

“I’m thinking they’ll go for the Donna Summer disco cover version. She hits that ‘again’ note much better. But we’ll agree to disagree on this one.”

“We’ll agree to nothing,” I say. “That’s not flirting. It’s tormenting.”

“It’s totally flirting,” Natalie says. “It’s like boys who dunk girls’ pigtails in inkwells when they’re kids.”

“Really, Nat?” I say. “Inkwells? Were there inkwells when you were a kid?”

“You’re the one who went right past Donna Summer to Richard Harris.”

“Did you walk uphill in the snow both ways carrying your inkwell to school every day? You never tripped and stabbed yourself on your quill, did you? That’s gotta smart.”

“Wow,” she says. “You are really not happy.”

“Ya think?”

“Okay, there’s no even having fun with you right now, so I’m just gonna go.”

“Yeah, not feeling super-fun right now,” I agree. “Call you later.”

I hang up, feeling like all I’m good for is “dish” about something I’d rather forget. A blind date. Involving a helicopter, which is simply terrifying, with a person who listens to Dr. Love on a regular basis—a male person, no less. It’s so incredibly ridiculous that I can’t even believe it’s happening. And being forced on me with potential job loss as a repercussion for not partaking. How do you sit in the far back of a helicopter? There is no back! It’s all front. And all of this practically in front of an audience. Have I died and gone to hell? No and yes.

Sudafed is a bastard. A tiny red pill of evil. And I tell my dad as much when I go to his apartment to bring him chicken noodle soup and find him, jacked up on pseudoephedrine, frantically writing out his will.

“Dad,” I say. “I promise you’re going to be fine. Calm down.” Other than the occasional cold or flu, my dad is in perfect health. Well, physically.

“I feel like my head is going to explode and my heart is going to jump out of my chest and start punching me in the face.”

“Sudafed is the devil,” I say. “I’ve had more bad reactions to
Sudafed than to the burritos at Los Tacos, and that’s saying something.”

This gets a smile, and I feel relieved that he’s calming down. I’m pretty sure the only actual ingredients in that stuff are speed and venom and sadness.

“Thanks for the soup, baby,” he says.

“It’s what I’m here for.”

“No, I’m supposed to take care of you.”

“Nah,” I say. “Not once I’m over eighteen.”

“That’s going to be a great birthday, you know.” He winks. “You’re still a baby to me. You’ll always be my baby.”

“Eat your soup and let me clean up a bit here.”

“My girl …” he says. “Why am I so lucky? Wait—I already know the answer. Because I have you: my lucky charm.”

My dad does as he’s told and sits at the small card table that doubles as his dining room. This is no way to live out your impending golden years. It’s his choice, I guess, but it’s not the man I knew when I was little. I look around and feel tremendous sadness. There are slips from racetrack bets, tallies of owed money scribbled on random pieces of paper, empty take-out food containers.… It doesn’t exactly scream “good living.” I start by organizing his betting receipts. I don’t even know what is or isn’t okay to throw out—although I’d like to throw it all away and pretend it never happened. I make three small piles of paper and wipe the table down with Windex until I can see my reflection. Once I’ve peered into my nostrils—not a bad look for me, I tell myself, immediately resolving to feel more self-confident around short men—I move to the kitchen.

Since Dad doesn’t actually cook, the kitchen’s not really in a bad state, although there appears to be what I think may have at one time been a banana but is now a black fossilized entity. I open his
refrigerator, and he has an onion that has somehow grown into a plant, a carton of expired milk, and some moldy bread. I hold my breath and grab all three items to toss. For a moment I think I want to go shopping so he has food, but then I wonder if he’d just let it wither and die in here like everything else.

“Dad,” I say. “If I went shopping and bought you some healthy food, would you eat it?”

“Don’t go shopping for me, baby. You do too much.”

“If you’ll actually eat it, I want to.” I hold up the banana. “But if this is going to happen, then …”

“I call that the ‘Banana Experiment,’ ” he says.

“Yes,” I say. “You also had an onion experiment in your refrigerator.”

“I know!” he says, coming to life like a kid. “It kept growing. The little onion that could!”

“I think it can’t, I think it can’t. I think it can’t stay here another second.”

“Judge not lest ye be judged.”

He has a point. I continue to tidy up the place while I listen to my dad slurp his soup. I’ve always known that everything comes full circle. Our parents take care of us when we’re children, and then ultimately we take care of them—but that usually happens later, when they regress back into a childlike state. Or when they physically can’t take care of themselves. This situation isn’t that. I’m reminded of my mom warning me to let him go a little. But he has a bad cold. He needed soup.

“Good evening, boys and girls. First things first—you should know that Ryan Riley is kind of an ass,” I say into my mic the moment I turn it on. “And that little contest he created out of nowhere was
sort of a practical joke gone wrong. So to clarify, I will go on this date because … well, my boss is making me, but you need to all know that this was an incredibly immature act perpetrated by the same person you guys call for love advice.”

My red light flashes. Great.

I start “More Than a Feeling” by Boston and pick up the phone.

“There’s a problem,” Bill says.

“What’s the problem?”

“Your contest winner is fifteen years old.”

“Of course he is,” I say. Because in my alternate universe the winner would be tall, dark, and handsome, with a kick-ass sense of humor, solid morals, and a great job, and he’d fall in love with me at first sight. So, yes, it only makes sense that my date would be a fifteen-year-old boy. Assuming it is a boy. Knowing my luck, this will just get more and more complicated.

Bill tries—and, as usual, fails—to sound reassuring. “We’re figuring out what to do.”

“Gee, I don’t know, how about you cancel it?” I practically screech at him. “I mean, it was foisted on me, anyway. It was a joke. But now the joke’s on him. Can I discuss this on-air?”

I can hear Bill thinking about it. Weighing the all-in-good-fun potential rivalry in his head.

“Sure,” he says. “Have fun with it.”

“Always,” I say, and hang up the phone.

When the song ends, I put my headphones back on and get comfortable.

“So get this, friends. The winner of the KKRL contest is all of fifteen years old, and therefore is unable to attend our date. Awwww. I’m so disappointed. Let’s see if we can get Ryan on the phone.”

I look up the direct line for Ryan’s show and dial up the KKRL station.

“Ryan Riley,” he says.

“Hi, Ryan,” I say. “This is Berry Lambert, and you’re live right now on KKCR.”

“Well, hello, Berry Lambert.”

“Hello,” I say. “I was so disappointed to hear that my date turned out to be a teenager, but then it all made sense, because, well … what grown man would be taking dating advice from—no offense—you?”

“Oh,” he says, and laughs. “No offense taken.”

“Good, good,” I say.

“The truth is everyone else who was willing to date you has already been tried as an adult.”

I laugh audibly. He got me there. “Nice one, Ryan. Touché.”

“We have a caller who wants to chime in,” says Frank, Ryan’s producer. They connect him.

“Hey,” says the male caller. “Why don’t you two go on the date? You’re obviously into each other. Anyone can hear that.”

“You couldn’t be further from the truth,” I say. “We barely even know each other.”

“I’m hearing a lot of sexual tension,” says the caller.

“What’s your name, caller?” Ryan asks.

“It’s Craig,” he says.

“Well, Craaaig,” Ryan says mockingly, adding an extra syllable to the guy’s name. “That’s a neat idea, but I don’t know if I can do that. There’s a difference between sexual tension and taking pity on the sexually frustrated.”

No. He. Didn’t. My entire body breaks out in a cold sweat.
Low blow, Ryan Riley. Below the belt, even. Ahem
. “Excuse me?” I chime in. “Who says I’m sexually frustrated?”

“Word on the street is the pizza boy refuses to go to your door without backup.”

“Funny,” I say.

“No tip will make up for that kind of terror,” says Ryan.

“Wow,” I say. “You hear that, caller? Is that what you call ‘sexual tension’?”

“Yes,” the caller answers. “You two have it bad for each other.”

“I’m charming,” Ryan says. “I sound like that with everyone.”

“You’re not as charming as you think you are,” I say.

“Nobody is as charming as I think I am,” Ryan says.

“No argument here.”

“
If we
do this,” Ryan says, “and you pay for dinner, don’t think it entitles you to … anything. I’m not that kind of guy.”

I can’t tell if he’s just playing this up for my benefit or if he’s really this cocky. Oddly enough, I’m not sure it matters.

“So wait,” I say. “A contest that you concocted in your tiny, tiny brain, a contest that was supposedly courtesy of the station, is now a dinner that I am somehow paying for?”

“Keep up with that attitude and I’m ordering the lobster.”

I laugh again and find I’m genuinely smiling. “You’re delusional.”

“You mean adorably quirky?”

“You should get a dictionary,” I say. “ ‘Delusional’ means detached from reality, which is what you are if you think I am taking you to dinner.”

“You are going to wear something nice, right? This is dinner, not poetry night at the Perpetually Single Café.”

“You’re hilarious.”

“And I think you should wear a skirt. Your legs are not just for walking you to the grocery store to buy TV dinners for one.”

This time he actually cackles, and Frank begins stomping his feet in the background. I take advantage.

“Dr. Love, huh? ‘Dr. Love.’ Wow. How did you get this job, anyway?
Callers, what you’ve just listened to is exactly what
not
to do when wooing a person—take note.”

“Wooing?” Ryan says. “Wooing? Did people use that term the last time you had a date?”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” I say. “What I meant was when you are desperately gushing over a lovely female co-worker.”

“Technically you’re not a co-worker,” he says. “You are sort of on a rival station. The old people’s station.”

“Good point,” I say. “And speaking of that, I’m going to get back to my show and let you get back to giving extraordinarily misguided advice to poor unsuspecting souls. Remember, folks, those who can’t do …”

“Nice to hear from you, Berry!” he says. “Call back anytime!”

I slam the phone down dramatically. But I can’t stop grinning.

Bill runs into my office moments after I go off-air, and I’m sure that I’m about to get in trouble for going too far.

“KKRL is not a rival station,” he says. “Both of us are owned by ClearWaves.”

“I know,” I say. “Sorry. He just got me so riled up.”