With a Little Luck: A Novel (18 page)

Ryan walks in with his usual swagger, and I want to roll my eyes at him but my body doesn’t cooperate. Instead, I end up grinning like a moron the second I see him.
Stop it, mouth!

“Hello there, pretty lady,” he says.

Pretty lady? That’s new
. A bit cheesy, but good cheesy. He hasn’t ever flattered me before. Except on the radio when he told people I was cute and they could Google me—which, for the record, never stops sounding dirty to me, but I suppose that’s because I’m actually a twelve-year-old boy. Apparently. Ah, he also said I had nice “chompers.” That one isn’t quite as dirty-sounding, but I’m not sure it counts as flattery.

“Hello,” I say back, flashing my chompers.

“Has your heart rate returned to a normal resting tempo yet?” he asks.

It had. Until he walked in. “Yes,” I say.

“Good,” he says with a wink as he pulls his headphones out of his messenger bag and puts them on.

Maybe I’m not alone in my superstitions. Lots of DJs have their special headphones, and they will never use any others. Even if they’re old, broken, and put back together with duct tape and bobby pins, people are loyal to their headphones—and yes, some of the old-timers do still call them “cans,” which always makes me giggle. I’ve heard of crazy stories—people stealing headphones of rival DJs, people taking their headphones with them out of town, even if they aren’t doing radio, just so they aren’t out of their sight—I mean crazy stories.

“Are those your lucky headphones?” I ask.

“Only because I wear them,” he replies, cool as a cucumber.

“Maybe you should have worn them on our date, then,” I say.

“Mrrrowr!” he growls.

“No,” I blurt. “That didn’t mean you would have ‘gotten lucky’ with me. I meant maybe then we wouldn’t have had Psycho McFlyer as our pilot.”

“Turn on the mic!” Bill’s voice echoes, like the Wizard of Oz’s. “This is gold!”

I look at Ryan and smile, now able to roll my eyes.

“Let’s do this,” he says.

“And we’re live,” I say into the mic. “Good evening, my friends. Welcome to Classic Rock With a Little Talk. I’m Berry Lambert, your barely-still-alive-after-a-disaster-date host, and with me is special guest KKRL’s Ryan Riley—also known as the Man I Will Never Go Out With Again.”

“I beg to differ,” Ryan chimes in.

“Don’t beg, Ryan. It’s just embarrassing.”

We lock eyes, and my heart speeds up a little.
Damn it, heart, relax, would ya?

“So,” Ryan says. “Who gets to start? Because I thought it was a pretty good date, all in all.”

“You would,” I say. “The station paid for it, and you got to live out a videogame.”

“Okay, first of all, I paid.”

“They’ll reimburse you.”

“Second of all … maybe that helicopter ride was a bit atypical, but there were no upside-downs and no guns, so that hardly qualifies as a videogame.”

“Upside-downs?” I tease.

“We went in circles,” he says. “We didn’t do tricks.”

“I know what you meant, you just sounded like a six-year-old boy. And the ‘trick’ was staying alive.”

“Our pilot was going through some stuff,” Ryan says.

“Our pilot was insane,” I clarify. “Clinically. Criminally. And, folks, if you think I’m making this up, think again. He thought his wife was cheating on him, and we were basically stalking his house from a helicopter. At one point he thought he saw ‘movement,’ and I thought we were going to dive-bomb through the roof. It’s a white, heat-reflecting roof, just in case his wife or her enormous stable of boyfriends are listening. Also, he was wearing a shirt that was hands down the most hideous shirt I’ve seen since
Magnum P.I
. was on the air. Boy, I don’t usually wish bad things on people, but I hope his wife is sleeping with the entire USC offensive line. And speaking of ‘offensive’ lines, Ryan, nice planning. Would five minutes of due diligence on the flight crew have been so hard?”

“I got us out alive, did I not?”

“Am I supposed to thank you?”

“It would be the polite thing to do.…”

“I tend to define ‘polite’ as ‘not endangering the life of your date.’ ”

“That doesn’t sound like a thank-you,” he says.

“Thank you, Ryan,” I say. “Thank you for the cardiac arrhythmia I’ll probably have for the rest of my life.”

“See, folks? I made her heart skip a beat.”

“You damn near caused it to stop beating altogether. All thanks to a truly memorable date that I hope to never repeat again.”

“But you’d go out with me again.”

“Says who?” I ask.

“If there was no psychotic aviator involved? You had fun. You had fun at dinner, and even in the helicopter you had fun.”

“I did not have fun in the helicopter.”

“But you did at dinner,” he says. “You can admit it.”

“It was … moderately tolerable. The food was good.”

“So good that you spit it in my eye while laughing at my brilliant banter. Such a crock!” Ryan says.

“You certainly are sure of yourself,” I say.

“I only call it like I see it.”

“Perhaps you need glasses,” I say.

The phone lines are ringing off the hook, and Bill is frantically motioning through the glass for us to take a few calls. I pick up line one.

“This is Berry. You’re live on KKCR.…”

“Hi, Berry! Hi, Ryan!” the caller says. “Sounds like you guys had quite the date. But, Berry, if Ryan asked you out on a real date … no publicity stunt, no debriefing, would you go?”

I’m completely flustered by the question. Before it was just shtick, but now this is sounding real. My real life is personal and none of her business, and Ryan is, of course, leaning in now, waiting for my answer.

“What would you do, Berry?” Ryan asks.

The caller perks up again. “What would Berry do if Ryan asked her out on a real date?”

Really? What would Berry do?

After what feels like an eternity but is probably only about twenty seconds, I finally speak.

“Well, caller,” I say, “that’s extremely hypothetical. Plus, it’s hardly a real date if we’re plotting it on the radio. And, Ryan, I’m sure you don’t normally ask women what they’d say
if
you asked them out, so we’ll just pretend you’re not losing your touch and just got caught up in the moment.”

He leans back in his chair and kicks his feet up on the table, placing his hands behind his head.

“I was just having fun watching you squirm,” he says. “The truth is I already know what your answer would be.

“Let me give all you fellas out there a little tip,” he goes on. “You never ask the question if you don’t already know the answer is yes. That goes triple when proposing. If you don’t know the answer is yes, you don’t ask. Why put yourself through it? Why put the girl through it? We’ve all seen the YouTube video of that poor guy asking his lady to marry him on the Diamond Vision screen at a filled sports stadium, and what happens—she runs off crying. That’s not just a no. That’s a humiliating virtual kick in the crotch. You. Don’t. Do. It. You only ask … when you know the answer is yes. End of story.”

“So what would my answer be?” I say.

“You’d say yes,” he answers.

“There goes that sure-of-yourself thing. Too bad it’s based entirely on delusion.”

“I stand firm on my answer,” he says.

“You mean my answer,” I say. “We’ll just have to cross that bridge if we get to it.”

“Berry?” he says, and my heart starts beating faster. Is he really about to do this? Publicly? The brat in me wants to say no, just to prove him wrong, but then again—we know that he’s Guy Number Three, and since I already know it won’t work out with him, I should say yes just to get him out of the way and make room for Mr. Right. Plus, truth be told, if I did say no after that speech of his, Dr. Love might find himself instantly unemployed and unemployable.

“Yes, Ryan?”

“Would you like to go out on a date with me?”

Was.

Not.

Expecting.

That.

Even with all the windup, I still somehow didn’t think he was really going to do it. “Are you asking me out?” I challenge. “Because that almost sounded like you asking if I’d
like
to go … 
if
you asked me out.”

“I would like to take you out on a real date,” Ryan says. His tone is absolutely earnest and a little unsure. I think I even detect a little quiver in his voice. Surprising. “Will you go out with me?”

“Sure, Ryan,” I say. “I’ll go out with you. Even if only to see what you do when left to your own devices.”

“I don’t usually incorporate devices until later in the relationship. You know, to spice things up.”

“Yeah, that’s not what I meant.”

“Right,” he says with a smile.

“Well,” he says. “I for one am looking forward to our date.”

And I … am looking forward to not having to discuss it on the radio.

I’m struck by the irony of just escaping serious injury in a helicopter mishap only to experience a massive cardiac arrest when the cute guy you’re desperately trying not to fall for asks you out—live, on the radio, of all places. My mom used to say (constantly), “When you least expect it, expect it,” which is probably the closest thing I have to a mantra, even though it basically leaves you expecting the worst nearly one hundred percent of the time. Rule number one in the superstition handbook: Bad luck never sleeps. Okay, I’m not one hundred percent sure which rule that is, but it’s definitely in the top ten.

So after I inhale two Diet Cokes in my office, I gather my things
to meet Nat—very uncharacteristically—for a jog. This we’ve decided is going to be our new routine. Rather than meeting at the diner every night and packing on the pounds, we’re going to take up exercising three nights a week and potentially take off a few.

“You so like him,” she says between heaves of out-of-shape breath.

“False.”

“It’s me, Ber. You can be honest here.”

“I can’t like him,” I say. “He’s the third asshole.”

“That’s gonna be hell when you become incontinent.”

“This is serious.”

“I know it is. Third asshole. Come to think of it, I may have read a novel with that title.”

“My autobiography.”

“Then you can write your own ending,” she says, and then gags. “Wow, that was cheezalicious. Forgive me for saying that.”

“No can do.”

“But really. Maybe you should give this guy a chance?”

“No,” I say, standing firm.

“Then go out with him once more and then dump him. Get it over with, and then Asshole Number Three will be out of the way.”

“That’s the plan.”

“Yeah,” she says. “Just keep in mind what they say about best-laid plans.”

“I forget,” I reply. “Was it something about friends not just being cheesy but also turning into walking clichés?”

“Yes, I think it was,” she says, and makes a face at me. But I’ve made my point.

“So,” I say, trying to change the subject. “What else?”

“I think Victor is stealing food.”

“Victor?”

“The line cook. You know him, Berry, he’s the one who always makes you chicken paillard. He’s always been really good—he’s one of my best. But I’m pretty sure he’s a thief. Which sucks.”

“What’s he stealing?” I ask.

“Does it matter? Stealing is stealing.”

“No, I get it,” I say. “But … there’s a difference between grabbing a handful of grapes at the supermarket when you’re not buying grapes and loading your pockets up with cans of Wolfgang Puck soup.”

“That’s pretty specific, Ber.”

“I’ve never stolen soup,” I clarify. “But … I’ve been known to swipe a grape or three.”

“I get it. You know they’re unwashed, right? Given any thought to where those grapes have been?”

For as much of a slob as she is in her apartment, there’s a difference between being messy and being dirty, and Nat is a total germophobe. She could single-handedly keep the antibacterial-hand-sanitizer companies in business. I stand by my theory that the main ingredient in hand sanitizer is paranoia.

“Okay, Nat,” I say, and sigh. “You’ve just successfully detoured me from my life of fruit crime. Now spill.”

“What?”

“What do you mean ‘what’? I’m dying to know what he’s stealing.”

“You really need a hobby,” she says. “He’s stealing staples.”

“Staples? Staples are cheap. You can get staples for less than a dollar at Office Depot. Or, for that matter, Staples.”

“Not staples staples. Food staples. Pretty much everything. Eggs, milk, pasta, tomatoes, cheese, flour—”

“Flour?”

“Eggs, milk, pasta, tomatoes, and cheese are fine, but you draw the line at flour?”

“No,” I say. “None of it is fine, but you said ‘staples’ first of all. Those other things qualify. But flour … I mean, it’s bulky.… It’s not a staple per se, unless you’re a baker. I don’t know, it just seems odd.”

“Yes,” she says. “Odd, and just as much of a theft as the other items.”

“Have you confronted him?”

“No,” she says.

“That’s unlike you.”

“I know. Because I have even worse things to deal with right now.”

“Like?” I prod. “And why don’t I know about them?”

“Just happened,” she says, and then looks sideways both ways, indicating that this one is big. “It’s bad.”

“Take a breath and spit it out.”

Nat slows to a stop and exhales. She looks at the ground as if the words she’s trying to find are somewhere down there. Finally, she looks back up at me. “You know my dad,” she says. “E.T.”

I nod and smile. Nat’s father’s name is Donald. “E.T.” stands for “Enemy of Technology.” He’s incapable of figuring out the simplest computer issues and constantly bothers Nat to come help him out.

“Yes, I’m familiar. But we do this because we love our parents. You know, we’re probably the last generation that will ever even have this opportunity, because I think kids these days are hardwired at birth to be tech-savvy.”