Husband Material

by Emily Belden

  fifteen seconds. Knowing I’ve got the Voyager dinner tomor-

  row, I can’t exactly afford to stay at home for a week straight, despite the fact that a box of soup-ready matzo is probably

  already on its way. So, I rinse fast and grab some paper tow-

  els—but not before overhearing a bit of their conversation.

  “Did you hear? Charlotte is going to the dinner,” one says.

  “That’s not fair. Marigold should be going.”

  “Thank you,” Marigold says. “I agree.”

  “Yeah, you’re way more personable. And stylish. I can’t

  stand that giant purse Charlotte carries everywhere,” another

  responds through the stalls.

  I’m not going to go so far as to say that I thought these girls liked me, but I definitely didn’t think they had it out for me.

  Nor did I realize my bag was such a controversy. I want to not

  care what they say about me, and normally I wouldn’t. But the

  truth is, I came to work today thinking this was a safe place.

  Clearly, it’s not. And worse, I can’t stop listening.

  “At least it’s a Birkin,” someone else defends.

  “No, it’s a FIRKIN. You know, a fake Birkin,” Marigold chimes in.

  (Audible gasps.)

  Marigold is correct in her assessment of authentication. But

  it’s not my fault. This is LA and the purse you carry dictates

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  how your server will attend to your table, how much whip

  you’ll get on your latte, and so much more. I wasn’t about to

  drop fifteen grand on a bag, so I went down to—

  “Chinatown sells them. Vendors carry knock-offs like hers

  on every corner I’ve seen that exact one a million times.”

  I storm out of the bathroom before the girls can see with

  their own eyes that the subject of their catty conversation was just feet away the whole time. Sure, that’d be vindicating, but I don’t want vindication right now, I want privacy.

  I settle back down in my desk chair and it feels like I’m

  floating on a raft in the middle of the sea. I’m safe enough

  on this thing, for now, but I don’t know what to do next. I

  don’t know whether I’m supposed to wait to be rescued, or

  if I’m supposed to save myself in this situation. I’ve never felt like this since taking this job. My to-do list has always been

  a great neutralizer, but it’s not showing up as the lighthouse I need it to be right now.

  Marigold sits back down across from me, wakes up her

  monitor, and lets out a huff as she reads an email.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask, thinking something bad has just

  bombed Monica’s inbox.

  “I left my Louis Vuitton in our hotel in Punta Cana last

  week. And now the manager just wrote that the housekeep-

  ers never saw it. That purse was like, three thousand dollars.

  I loved that purse.”

  Marigold starts crying and leaves her desk for the intern

  pod, where she will undoubtedly be comforted by others who

  actually believe a missing Louis Vuitton purse is the most im-

  possible loss one can experience.

  Decker has been gone so long. I’m used to life without him

  by now. But regardless of how much time passes, this morn-

  ing it feels like the walls I’ve managed to build up over the

  years are crumbling.

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  7

  In the privacy of my car, I put my Apple Watch up to my

  mouth to tell it to make a call, but I get stage fright and nothing comes out. So I fish for my phone and do things the old

  fashioned way. I scroll to the contacts listed under the letter D.

  Debbie Austin comes up first. I click her name and the

  phone gives me the option to call, text, or FaceTime. Before

  pulling out of my TIF parking spot, I brief ly contemplate

  if calling to say I’m coming over is even necessary. Perhaps

  Decker’s return is something I can just type in a lengthy but

  eloquent text message? I even begin to compose one. But then

  I think back to Decker’s face in my dream. I know it was just

  that, a dream, but the way he looked at me when he asked

  me to tell his mom he’s back and he’s okay tells me this is not meant for an iMessage. If this really is a death do-over, per

  Casey, then I have some responsibility to woman-up and do

  the hard things I couldn’t before. I can’t let him down. So I

  take a deep breath and hit the little phone icon.

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  It rings once. Maybe she’s gardening and doesn’t have her

  phone handy.

  It rings twice. Maybe this isn’t even her number anymore.

  It rings three times. Maybe she will pick up and this will

  go shockingly well.

  It rings a fourth time. And right when I think it’s going to

  go to voice mail, she answers.

  “Well, well, well. It’s not every day I see Charlotte Rosen pop up on my phone. How are you, dear?”

  To anyone else, that might be a cordial, warm hello. To

  me, it’s Debbie Austin subtly reminding me that after Decker

  died, she immediately edited me back to my maiden name in

  her contacts list. Even though I had yet to legally change it

  back, I simply wasn’t considered an Austin anymore.

  “I’m doing good. I mean, well. How about you, Debbie?”

  I say, trying my hand at being proper and polite to a woman

  I know hates me. A woman I haven’t spoken to on the phone

  in years.

  “We’re lovely. Kurt and I just returned from a long week-

  end in Laguna,” she starts off. “I know Orange County can

  be a little seedy these days thanks to that trashy reality show on Bravo, but I still think the beaches there are the best on

  the coast.”

  Does she not realize she could easily star on that trashy re-

  ality show on Bravo? I digress.

  “Now Kurt’s jetted off again,” she continues. “Attending

  some big dental conference in Tokyo. He’s gone for ten days.

  I was going to go with him, but I’m expecting a shipment of

  blue roses any day now. Have you heard of those? They are

  the rarest of all roses; the scent is spectacular. I’ve been on the waitlist for three years now. I can’t believe it’s finally my turn.”

  Something about the tone of her voice tells me I’ve inter-

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  by her pool. I need to get on with this call because hearing

  about luxury roses is not what I have in mind right now. Soon

  she will realize that there is another shipment to discuss.

  “Wow, a blue rose? Very cool. You’ll have to Instagram

  those.” I pull the phone away from my ear and mouth a what?

  to my own self. Did I really just say that?

  “Look, I know you said Kurt is out of town, but are you

  home by chance? Can I pop by real quick? I wanted to chat

  with you about something and it’s probably best we speak

  in person.” Before she can needle me, I clarify: “It’s about


  Decker.”

  My words feel like they are coming out in chunks, like a

  clogged-up pasta maker spewing out ill-shaped rigatoni noo-

  dles.

  “If this is about his alumni fraternity event coming up, we

  will not be attending this year. But we will pledge a generous donation in Decker’s name. Might you consider doing

  the same?”

  “No, that’s not actually it,” I say, wishing our affairs were

  about something as simple as a frat event. “So, is it okay if I come by over my lunch and we talk?”

  She takes her sweet time answering, and all I can think is if

  this woman comes back with a response that in turn strong-

  arms me into telling her over the phone that her son’s ashes

  have been returned, I will officially be scheduling an MRI

  because I apparently have no backbone.

  She lets out a breathy, “I suppose that’s fine. However, I

  do have guests coming over at 2:30 so we’ll need to keep our

  engagement rather limited.”

  “That works for me,” I say, noting that keeping the conver-

  sation short and sweet is about the first thing we have agreed

  on in five years. “I’m already on my way. I’ll be there in fif-

  teen minutes.”

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  * * *

  I have actually not been inside the Austins’ mansion since

  before Decker passed away. Even when I would try to bring

  over flowers or a Tupperware of fudge brownies in the weeks

  and months that followed, I only got as far as the front door.

  Debbie and Kurt had never done a particularly good job of

  making me feel like “their house was my house” during our

  shared time of grief. Even the memorial service was held at the Beverly Hilton instead of their home, which makes me believe

  they didn’t want the girl who was easiest to blame their son’s

  death on standing under their roof for the foreseeable future.

  All that is okay though, because the only thing that mat-

  ters now is that they haven’t updated their keyless entry code, which I memorized when Decker and I lived here for the

  month between our apartment lease ending and the closing

  of our house purchase. So instead of ringing the doorbell and

  painfully waiting for Debbie to let me in today, my fingers

  robotically enter 9-8-9-8. It’s not very cryptic, but it is very Decker. Nine was always his lacrosse jersey number, even since

  he was a little kid. And eight is the day in March he was born.

  The glass door makes a quiet buzzing sound as it unlatches

  automatically. If she’s offended that I’ve let myself in, so be it. This will be the last time I come over. I head straight toward the kitchen where I know I will find either Debbie or

  her housekeeper, Sandra, who will undoubtedly take me to

  Debbie, wherever she may be. As I turn the corner from the

  foyer into the open kitchen-living area, I am greeted by the

  matriarch herself without so much as a hi, hello, how are you.

  “I saw you coming up the driveway,” Debbie says, man-

  ning the stovetop while looking at a hi-def security moni-

  tor that’s framed into the nearby refrigerator. She pinches the screen with her thumb and her index finger to zoom in on

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  my car. “And I also see that Decker’s BMW is still running.

  That’s good. Is that a scratch on the bumper?”

  At that, I remember just how obsessed the Austins were

  with not just keeping up with the Joneses, but being the Jone-

  ses. This house has always been wired to the nines with all

  sorts of leading technology and still is. I wonder if she saw

  me adjust my underwear under my skirt as I headed up their

  brick walkway.

  On the counter, two floral teacups are set out to accept the

  tea Debbie is pouring from a futuristic-looking teapot.

  “Thanks for having me over so last minute,” I say as pleas-

  antly as possible, although I’m sure she can hear the waves of

  nervousness in my voice.

  “It’s certainly a good thing this pot can boil water in thirty

  seconds or else I would have been ill-prepared for your surprise visit.” She gestures toward the space-age electronic tea kettle.

  “You look…healthy. Dressed nice today, at least.”

  “Thanks,” I say with a brow so furrowed, I’m going to need

  to look up a Groupon for Botox later. It’s a backhanded com-

  pliment. Granted, the last time she saw me I looked like a ver-

  sion of myself that was battling West Nile, but it sounds now

  like she can’t believe there’s come a day that I’ve stopped exclusively wearing sweatpants and actually started washing my hair.

  “Alexa,” Debbie announces. Who’s that? Did she fire San-

  dra? “Set a reminder to change the front door key code.”

  “Okay, Debbie. Reminder set,” her in-home robot says back.

  Oh, that Alexa. While I would need Casey to confirm, this certainly feels like an episode of Black Mirror.

  “Let’s take a seat in the living room, shall we?” Debbie

  blows on her cup of tea and leads the way. I follow her to

  a velvet sofa and find a place across from her in a matching

  tufted wingback chair. We are separated by a marble coffee

  table that I’m sure cost ten times my monthly rent.

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  The Sharon Stone lookalike takes a sip of her tea and just

  stares at me, a relaxed smirk on her face. She’s always so irritatingly composed, but I try not to let that distract me. I take a deep breath, ensure that my legs are crossed in a way that won’t betray my lady-parts, and lean in toward her as a gesture of

  warmth. At least that’s what it said to do in the book Lean In.

  “So?” she says. I guess that’s my cue to begin.

  “I’m not sure if you heard on the news or what, but there

  was a wildfire in Pala recently and the mausoleum was in the

  path of destruction.”

  “What?!” Her eyes widen and she sets her teacup on the

  table with a clank. “I did not hear such a thing. Why didn’t

  their Death Concierge contact me? They’re supposed to con-

  tact me should anything come up regarding the urn.”

  Death Concierge?

  “Relax, relax. The urn is in good shape. It was sent back

  to me this weekend with a note from the insurance company

  who is handling the damage claim filed by the mausoleum.

  It’s totally fine.”

  “Oh my god,” she exclaims as she draws her palm to her

  mouth like it’s magnetized to her lip. “How…when did you

  get it?”

  “It was delivered to me Saturday night.”

  “That must have been a mistake. You weren’t supposed to

  get that.”

  I’m pretty sure I was.

  “My name was on the package. Just my name,” I clarify.

  “And you’re only telling me now? Why didn’t you call me immediately?”

  It’s been less than forty-eight hours. I want to ask what’s the big deal, but I have a feeling it will be met with contention.

  So I take the high road.

>   “I’m sorry, I was trying to process the fact that his remains

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  just appeared at my door seemingly out of nowhere. But now

  I’m slowly coming to terms with the shock of it all and I will

  figure this whole thing out, I promise. I just wanted to come

  by and let you know, in person, that—” my words snag like a

  hangnail on a chenille sweater. I blank on how to finish this

  sentence. But then, the dream I had of Decker flashes into my

  mind and I choose his words over anything I could come up

  with. “—that he’s back and he’s okay.”

  “No need to figure anything out. I will take this off your

  plate, Charlotte. Where is he? Your apartment? I’ll send San-

  dra right now to pick him up. You can get back to things at

  the studio.”

  “I don’t work at the studio anymore. I’m a software devel-

  oper at The Influencer Firm.”

  I get specific about my employment because out of the cor-

  ner of my eye, I spot a copy of the most recent Forbes on the top of a stack of magazines. Though I’m sure the subscription belongs to Kurt, should anyone happen to flip it open

  to the table of contents, they’ll see the shout-out Forbes gave TIF. Debbie was always vocal with her disdain toward people

  who migrated to LA for a “career in showbiz.” Maybe know-

  ing her former daughter-in-law now has a legit job at the lat-

  est and greatest “Company to Watch” will give me a bit of a

  long-overdue edge.

  “MY SON,” she says, using her baritone voice, “who I

  thought was peacefully resting in Pala this whole time, has

  been—I don’t know—rolling around in your trunk? Tossed

  into your purse? I mean, where are you even keeping him?”

  So much for the edge.

  “In my apartment,” I quick-fire back.

  “With that freak roommate of yours? She’s probably

  going to turn his ashes into a circus exhibit when you’re not

  looking.”

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  I try not to linger on that hurtful remark. I may not hang

  with Casey all the time (or really at all before the urn came

  back to be precise), but she definitely doesn’t deserve to be

  the target of Debbie Austin’s rage right now.

  “He was on my nightstand all night, Debbie. He’s been right