Million Dollar Date

by Susan Hatler

  “Are we too late?” Reagan asked between gulps of air.

  As if in answer, the door to the conference room opened and a woman leaned her head out. “Abigail Apple, you’re up,” the woman said.

  I winked at Reagan. “You’re right on time.”

  When I entered the conference room, the woman whispered, “The laptop is set up for you with the projector. You just have to put in your USB flash drive and you’re good to go.”

  I smiled and nodded. But when I got to the front of the room and stood before the thirteen people on the committee and the interested public seated behind them, I clicked off the projector.

  From the side of the room, the woman waved her hands. “No, you need to keep that on so you can use it for the presentation.”

  I leaned toward her. “I’m going to do something dramatic here instead. Don’t worry.”

  She held up her hands as if to say, “Do what you want but don’t say I didn’t warn you.” I turned to my audience and caught Cooper looking at me.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” I started, standing with my hands folded in front of me. “I had a presentation prepared for you today because I wanted to convince your minds that Rescue at the Barn is where the charity drive funds should be donated.”

  I waved to Reagan, who was waiting at the door to the conference room.

  “But I was reminded by someone very dear to me, that the heart is just as important. So here goes . . .”

  And for the next thirty minutes I shared my personal experience with Reagan’s Rescue at the Barn while the dogs sat on the laps of committee members, curled up beneath their chairs, and sitting beside them occasionally getting an ear scratch or a belly rub. I spoke openly and honestly about the impact volunteering there had made on my life. I pointed out Banana and the joy he’d brought me as he licked at Cooper’s ear. And I explained the need for pet rescues.

  I let the dogs do the rest of the convincing.

  At the end of my presentation, I helped Reagan and Krista and Hannah and a few kind audience members wrangle up the dogs and then we passed out lint rollers to all of the committee members so they could remove the dog hair from their business suits.

  As head of the committee, Cooper stood up at the front of the conference room and announced that since I was the last to present they would now deliberate and later return to announce a winner of the hundred thousand dollars. As he filed out with the other twelve members, he caught my eye amongst the chaos of twenty hungry puppies and winked.

  I knew I had done it.

  I knew Rescue at the Barn was safe.

  I knew how the committee would vote.

  So after ten minutes of relieving dog bladders and corralling the dogs into the park behind City Hall, I returned to the conference room with confidence in my heart. When the committee filed back in and took their seats, I didn’t feel nervous or anxious or worried in the slightest. And as Cooper stood up—holding a giant check turned backwards to hide the winner’s name—I had nothing to fear, because I already knew the words that were going to come from his perfect mouth that I found myself wanting to kiss.

  “This was a very difficult decision,” Cooper started.

  I nodded, thinking that of course he had to say that.

  “Trust me when we say that we wish we could give the hundred-thousand-dollar donation to each and every one of the charities which presented today. They are all deserving and this just shows us how much more work we have to do as a city.”

  I nodded again, ready for him to say what I already knew.

  “But we had to choose just one charity for this donation and we are very happy to announce . . .” He paused, but I was already moving toward the front of the room when he said, “The charity which will be receiving the donation from the city of Sacramento is . . .” This was it. This was the moment! “. . . Founding Friendships.”

  I stopped mid-stride and blinked. Wait. What?

  Then I watched Jill Parnell, Director of Founding Friendships, a homeless outreach non-profit organization, stand and stride toward Cooper in her designer suit and high heels as the audience applauded. I tried to catch Cooper’s eye, but he faced the director as he shook her hand and passed over the giant check that Reagan’s sweet dogs so desperately needed. I squinted to read the name on the check, hoping that would clear things up.

  Surely, the check must say Rescue at the Barn but Cooper must’ve gotten nervous and announced the wrong charity. Hey, if it can happen at the Oscars then it can happen at Sacramento City Hall. I squinted and squinted, but no matter how much I squinted, the check still read the same: Founding Friendships.

  Founding Friendships, not Rescue at the Barn.

  My stomach roiled and my purse buzzed, so I fished out my cell phone and tried not to hurl. My cell screen displayed a text message from Reagan who was still outside with Krista and Hannah taking care of the dogs: We heard the cheering. Did we win? Are the dogs saved?

  My heart sank. How could I tell her that I’d failed her? How could I write back that the dogs would have nowhere to go when her rescue shut down? How could I possibly say how sorry I was?

  This wasn’t supposed to happen. Everyone around me was happy and I didn’t understand why. This wasn’t right. This wasn’t right at all.

  Didn’t they wonder where the dogs at Rescue at the Barn were going to go when it closed down? Did they wonder how the dogs were going to get their next meal, their next grooming, and their next walk? Didn’t they care that the dogs stay alive?

  The people in the room must’ve had answers that I didn’t, because from where I was standing there was no reason at all to be happy.

  ****

  “We want to thank everyone for coming out today,” the Mayor said from the podium as everyone quieted for him. “We are very proud of the work this committee has done and especially its dedicated, hard working committee head, Officer Cooper Hill.”

  I clapped numbly, unsure of what else to do. It felt like my body was not my own. I was supposed to be holding a check for Rescue at the Barn right now. And since I wasn’t, I hardly knew what to do with myself. It was all I could do not to break down and cry.

  “From my understanding, the vote came down to a tie breaker,” the Mayor continued. “So great job to all of the charities for helping the community. We’ll see you next year!”

  A tiebreaker? I spotted Cooper in the crowd. He was still speaking with the director of Founding Friendships, who was talking animatedly to him. Just like everyone else in the room, he looked happy. My head crooked to the side as I stared at him. A tiebreaker. . .

  The pieces were all there, but my mind was unwilling to put them all together. The picture from the scattered puzzle was so clear, so obvious, so unavoidable, and yet I didn’t want to see it. Because that would mean Cooper had been the deciding vote. It would mean that Cooper, my Cooper, was the one who had voted for Founding Friendships over Rescue at the Barn.

  It meant that Cooper had lied to me when he’d said those dogs wouldn’t lose their home.

  At that moment, he turned toward me catching my gaze. Then his smile dropped. I felt tears sting my eyes and then I ran as fast as I could from the room. Down the stairs I flew, anxious to get out of there, to get far away from City Hall, and away from him. People stared in concern as I hurried past them, swiping at my eyes, but I just kept running in my bare feet.

  I shoved the doors to City Hall open and was halfway down the stairs when I heard Cooper call my name. I ignored him.

  “Abigail!” he called again.

  I would have kept hurrying away, but he caught up to me and put a gentle hand on my arm. He turned me around, even as I tried to hide my tears.

  “Abigail, please just—”

  “Were you the one involved in the tiebreaker?” I asked, anger quickly replacing my hurt. It turned out the tears kept coming regardless of which emotion took lead. “Were you the deciding vote in the committee?” I asked.

  I waited, hoping against ho
pe that he had an explanation. I wanted him to say that he’d voted for Rescue at the Barn. I willed him to say that there was some misunderstanding, some silly miscommunication. I waited and I hoped, but deep down I knew the answer.

  He sighed and reached for my hand.

  I pulled it away and crossed my arms. “Just tell me.”

  He raked his fingers through his hair. “Yes . . . I voted for Founding Friendships.”

  Well, there it was . . . unavoidable and heartbreaking.

  “You said you were going to vote for Rescue at the Barn,” I said, trying to hide the desperation in my voice. “You said all I had to do was be myself.”

  “That’s not what I meant,” he said, his brow wrinkling. “Just listen for two seconds and I’ll explain, okay?”

  “What’s to explain?” I asked, bringing my fist to my chest. I wanted to be mad. I’d rather be mad than focus on how badly I’d been hurt and betrayed. I felt stupid, so incredibly stupid for believing him.

  “Abigail, I never said I would vote for Rescue at the—”

  “I can’t believe I thought you were different!” I said, throwing my hands in the air.

  He paused and then narrowed his eyes. “What does that mean?”

  Emotion boiled inside me and I couldn’t stand still anymore. Instead, I paced back and forth on the landing as he came down the last step and stood in front of me.

  “I thought you had changed,” I said, my voice in danger of reaching a level only Reagan’s dogs behind City Hall could hear. “I thought you’d realized you can’t always think with your head and that you had a heart. I thought you were more than just a robot.”

  He flinched at the words, which clearly had stung a deeper part of him than I’d intended. I was hurt, but I didn’t want to hurt him in return. I opened my mouth to apologize when I heard Banana’s distinct playful bark. He was with Reagan and the other dogs in the small park behind City Hall. I heard it again and the pain flooded over me as I thought about what would happen to the very friends he was playing with right now. What if that were Banana?

  I imagined the furry little love of my life in a cold, metal cage on a concrete floor. I pictured him shivering and alone and stuck inside all day. I saw him in an alternate life where Reagan’s Rescue at the Barn didn’t exist and there was no farm and no rolling hills and no warm sunshine and cool shade and fresh water from the creek.

  Banana was safe with me. He would always be safe with me. But the other dogs? That alternate life I pictured would soon be their lives. That alternate life was now their reality. And when I looked up at Cooper and thought about how easily he could have changed their fate, I couldn’t find the strength in my heart to apologize.

  “Founding Friendships wouldn’t have closed without that donation,” I said, my voice defeated and sad. “Rescue at the Barn will have to, though. But you don’t care about that, even after being there with all of those dogs. You still don’t care enough.”

  “Abigail—”

  “No,” I interrupted, holding my palm up. “Please, don’t say anything else. I can’t hear anymore about this. It’s done. It’s over.”

  He opened his mouth, but then stopped. “What’s over?”

  “I don’t think we can be together anymore,” I said, feeling my heart crack for the second time today. I crossed my hand over my chest. “I know I think with my heart and I know that it gets me into trouble sometimes. I know it can make me hold onto things too tightly and love too strongly and fight too stubbornly. I know it means my emotions run wild.”

  I sucked in a deep breath as he waited, watching me with those blue eyes. A salty tang invaded my mouth, as I tasted one of my own tears. They were falling freely and I was pretty sure my nose was running, too.

  “But feeling everything so strongly also means I want to connect with someone heart to heart,” I continued, sucking in a shaky breath. “I want to share my heart with someone, who is able to share their heart with me.”

  His face paled and he stood like a statue. But I knew he’d heard me.

  “And after today, well . . .” I sighed, shaking my head. “I don’t think you’re capable of that. I’m sorry, but I have to go now.”

  Without another word, I turned and continued down the stairs and exited City Hall. I was still barefoot after throwing away my heels, but I didn’t care. Down the sidewalk I walked, ignoring the often confused, often concerned stares of pedestrians passing me by on the sidewalk. I had somewhere to go and I just didn’t care who saw me like this.

  When I entered the office, it was busy, of course it was. I knew it would be. But I grabbed a ticket, sat down, and then waited and waited and waited. I breathed in the musty smell and kept on waiting. Today had not gone the way I wanted. It most certainly did not go the way I’d expected. I’d expected to be drinking a celebratory Piña Colada with Reagan, Krista and Hannah. And Cooper, too. I’d expected to be walking to the bank with that ridiculously large check, hoping a gust of wind didn’t carry me away. I’d expected to go with Reagan to her landlord and hand over the money she needed for a down payment on the farm.

  I’d expected Cooper to go there with us.

  I’d expected happiness and joy and laughter this evening. But most of all I’d expected happiness and joy and laughter with Cooper. That didn’t happen.

  But there was one thing I gained from today: I knew who I was and who I wanted to be. Yes, it hurt sometimes to feel so deeply, to care so much, to think with your beating, aching heart. But I never wanted to stop being me because it was hard. I never wanted to be the old Abigail, just passing through life. I wanted to be Abigail Apple.

  Finally, my number was called and I made my way through the waiting crowd to the desk.

  “How can I help you?” the man asked.

  I slid my driver’s license across the desk.

  “I need to update my last name, please.”

  Chapter Nine

  Three weeks later, I still cried when I thought about Rescue at the Barn closing. I spent more money on tissue boxes than I had in years. I looked like I’d just completed a thousand-mile dog sled race in the Arctic. Seriously.

  Poor Banana. Every time I cried he curled up beside me and licked my tears and that much salt just can’t be healthy for such a little dog. How was he supposed to fit into his cute little sweaters for fall if he was so bloated?

  But a hole still remained in my heart. And I wasn’t entirely sure that it was solely because of the closing of Reagan’s dog rescue. Something else was missing. Someone else was missing.

  Not that I would admit it.

  Today wasn’t about a broken heart, though. I just needed to grab coffee before driving out to Reagan’s Rescue at the Barn—well, not that it would be Reagan’s dog rescue any longer, since the property had been sold and she needed my help to pack everything up. The dogs would soon be stuffed into my backseat to be driven to the Sacramento SPCA.

  “Today is the day,” Courtney called out to me as I walked along the downtown sidewalk toward her coffee cart.

  “Hi, Courtney,” I said, managing the closest thing to a smile I could muster under the circumstances as she prepared my go-to drink order, a cinnamon-dolce.

  “Today is the day,” she repeated, raising her finger in the air with a wink. “I’ve got the name that would’ve been fabulous. No bad prom date reminders this time. You’re going to love it.”

  I knew pondering kid names she would’ve liked if she’d had a child before it was too late was some kind of therapy for Courtney, but the fact that she’d had love and lost it made me extra sad today. Although her Hawaiian shirt covered with cartoon-looking surfers perked me up little despite how determined my heart was to be miserable.

  “Let me hear it, Courtney,” I said.

  “You sure you’re ready for it?”

  I threw her a half-hearted thumbs-up. This caused Courtney to pause and the end of the whipped cream pile died with a half-hearted sputter.

  “Abigail Apple,�
� she said, her eyebrows lifting as she set down the drink. “You’re not yourself. Talk to me.”

  I rubbed my palm over Banana’s head, holding off the threatening recurrence of tears.

  “I’m on my way to help Reagan shut down Rescue at the Barn,” I said, my throat tightening. “I can’t stop thinking about how unfair it is. I thought Cooper would vote to donate the money to her rescue but he didn’t. And those dogs needed him.” I dropped my head, staring at my rhinestone flip-flops as if asking for toes to save me from the awfulness of it all. The scrooch scrooch sounds of the whipped cream container squirting made me lift my head.

  Courtney’s forehead wrinkled in concentration as she focused on putting as much whipped cream on my drink as was humanly possible. Double what she normally gave me. But not even whipped cream could perk me up right now.

  “Take this and listen,” she said, handing over the drink. “You need something sweet while I give you some cold, hard reality.”

  “Why do I feel scared?” I asked, licking at the whipped cream and staring at her past the white mountain of cream. I’d never heard her speak in such a serious tone. She normally seemed to be pure Piña Colada, so the serious and stern set of her jaw confused me.

  “I’m going to tell you about my friend, Beth.” Her brow crinkled as she rubbed a cloth over the small bit of counter space under the espresso machine. “I met Beth a couple years back when I was still practicing law.”

  “It’s so hard to picture you as a lawyer,” I said, eyeing those cartoon-looking surfers again and wondering if they were glow in the dark material.

  “You don’t know how many times I’ve heard that,” she said, letting out a heavy sigh. “This kind of happiness only comes from no longer being a lawyer. Ugh, the long hours. The late nights. The constant conflicts. I was determined to win at that game and I did quite well, but I woke up one day and my law firm was all I had.”