ONCE UPON ANOTHER TIME

by McQuestion, Rosary

  I didn’t see the harm in having him pretend his pet was still alive. It seemed like a good way for him to work through his grief. Not much different from the way I had worked through my grief after Matt died. Not that I pretended he was still alive, but I took comfort in writing letters to him telling him about our son and various stages of our lives, and that I was sorry I wasn’t a better wife and oy vey--the guilt! I needed Matt’s forgiveness.

  So there I was almost seven years later, still writing letters to a man who was six-feet-under. And though I’d dreamed hundreds of times about Matt coming back to me one last time like Sam came back to Molly in my favorite movie “Ghost,” and although it didn’t happen in a romantic scene with a potter’s wheel and passionate hearts, by all accounts Matt had come back to me.

  “Aubrey, c’mon tell me what’s wrong,” Laura said.

  I cleared my throat and raised an eyebrow. “Nothing’s wrong.”

  “Then why are your eyes welling up? The last time I saw you cry was at Matt’s funeral. Something is going on!”

  “I’m not crying,” I scoffed. “I’m having an allergic reaction to my mascara.” I quickly wiped away a fat tear traveling down my cheek. “So much for allergy-free products.”

  “No way,” Laura said waving a finger in the air. “I know you better than that. It’s work, isn’t it? It’s all that pressure from taking on too many cases, right?”

  Just play along.

  “I guess I never could fool you.”

  “Listen,” said Laura, “you give off an air of being indestructible because of your super-lawyer and supermom powers, but there are days when you need to take that big “S” off your chest. If you don’t learn to relax, you’ll drive yourself crazy.”

  “Hmm, maybe I already have,” I said in a morose tone. “Don’t be surprised if men in white jackets come and get me. Promise you’ll visit and bring me cigarettes.”

  “Stop being such a drama queen,” Laura squawked, “I’m serious!”

  “I am too!”

  “Gaahh,” she said, as she turned on her heels and stared into the mirror at me. “Look,” she said, tousling her hair with her fingertips. “You’ll need an excuse for why you left the hearing so abruptly. Tell Fendworth it’s that time of the month and you had an emergency. Broach that subject and guys always turn into squeamish jellyfish. I guarantee that’ll squelch any inquiries from him.”

  “Hmm,” I muttered under my breath.

  “Come on,” she said as she clomped off toward the door.

  “You go ahead. I’ll meet you back in the office.”

  “You sure?” she said, turning to look back at me.

  “Yes. And you’re not getting out of my office until you tell me everything that happened last night.”

  “Okay, but hurry.”

  I nodded and waited until Laura left before searching the restroom for something I could use to fish the fan out of the toilet. By sheer luck, someone had left a coat hanger on the sink. I thought of how naked my ring finger looked, as I reached for the hanger with my left hand. When Matt died, I swore I’d never take off my wedding ring. People always noticed the ring, a platinum band with a small emerald cut diamond, which I tended to twist absentmindedly between my left thumb and forefinger during conversation.

  People would always ask me, “So what does your husband do?”

  I always imagined myself shouting, “Stop asking me that question! I’m a widow, a twenty-eight-year-old pregnant widow!” I wanted to shout this through a bullhorn at anyone who asked, and any random passersby who didn't ask, so I’d never hear that question again.

  Two years later, I relinquished and took off my wedding ring. As the years passed, people would always ask if I had a boyfriend, to which I’d respond, “I think I’m late for an appointment.” Eventually, I grew tired of the never-ending questions. No, I don't have a boyfriend. Yes, once a widow, always a widow. No, I'm not happy about it, but I have a beautiful son and great friends. Could you please pass the salt!

  The automatic flush turned on while I wrestled with the fan. With enough G-force to pull a small elephant down into the city sewer, the fan was stuck, while Lady Gaga’s “The Edge of Glory” shrilled from my cell phone. The caller ID confirmed it was my assistant, Ashley.

  “Aubrey?”

  “Yes,” I said, as I yanked on the hanger and tried to wiggle the fan loose.

  “Mr. Fendworth came looking for you. I think he’s on a rampage. He looked upset.”

  “Did he ask where I was?”

  “No, he just growled and left when he saw you weren’t in your office.”

  “Smarmy office snitches,” I said under my breath.

  “What was that?”

  “Never mind, I’ll be right there.”

  Tugging hard on the hanger, the fan popped from the bowl, and I tossed it along with the hanger into the trash.

  Hurrying down the hall on the fourth floor to take the elevator up to the twelfth, I questioned why my life had always been so odd, which reminded me of the e-mail I had received at home that morning. Just for the heck of it or maybe out of sheer desperation, I’d taken a personality-slash-dating-compatibility test for an online dating service. I was somewhat giddy until I opened the e-mail and realized it was a rejection letter. I could finally relate to the shock those poor clucks feel on The Apprentice when they get the signature kiss-off of “You’re fired,” from The Donald.

  Melanie Hatcher, a paralegal at our law firm who has had so much cosmetic surgery she looked as if she was wearing a Kabuki mask, had encouraged me to sign on with the dating service. I didn’t know how I was going to side step the humiliation.

  Aside from my friends, my own son had been asking me why I didn’t date. He compared me to Sallie, the divorcee who lived next door who God forbid, was never without a date. The woman’s body was like a nightly amusement park. For all I knew her name could have been listed in the city guidebook under “entertainment.”

  While punching the elevator button, the shriveled up ficus plant stuck in a large brass pot sitting on the floor in the corner of a small seating area drew my attention. Metaphorically speaking, at thirty-five years old my love life was reminiscent of that withering tree.

  As I stepped inside the elevator and pushed the button for the twelfth floor, a quake of mortality sounded in my head like the gonging of Big Ben.

  Four

  The elevator chimed. Before the doors were even halfway open, I placed one foot into the lobby and came to an abrupt halt. Not twenty-five feet away, senior partner Henry Fendworth was rounding the corner from the back offices into the lobby-slash-reception area. The bushy-haired forty-two-year old with pellet-sized blue eyes, who wore the constant expression of a man fighting dandelions, ran the office like Patton’s Third Army.

  He walked past the chrome-trimmed black leather sofa and two vintage suede box chairs. The tapping of his steps on the rosewood flooring echoed in the high ceilinged lobby as he approached the receptionist. His robust stature impeccably decked-out in a white shirt, red tie, and gray pinstriped pants with his signature red suspenders. His wife had him on a diet that made him as ornery as a toothy alligator. However, speculation was that Fendworth was having more than just weight-challenging issues with his bossy, controlling wife, who was twenty years his junior. The leggy redhead with a well-toned midriff who got most of her exercise cleaning out her shoe closet had just hired a sexy Latin personal trainer by the name of Rico.

  I’m just saying.

  Fendworth tossed a file folder on the granite-top reception counter. I had enough on my mind without having to deal with my abrupt exit from the arbitration hearing, so I waited in the elevator. His back was to me as he spoke to Kristi, a temp receptionist seated at the desk behind the counter. She was of medium height, bone-thin, and so pale that she made practitioners of the “Goth” lifestyle seem tanned and toned by comparison.

  As Fendworth retreated down the hallway, I blocked the closing of the eleva
tor door with my arm, as it came within inches of closing on my ankle. I skirted past the receptionist, while keeping a good distance behind Fendworth as I followed behind him down the hallway. It was crazy to think I was hurrying back to the boardroom in hopes of rendezvousing with Matt. Not to mention trying to communicate with a ghost without some kind of instruction manual was going to be challenging at best.

  Fendworth stopped short and walked into Neil Masters’ office.

  “Great!” I muttered, while stopping in front of the glass-walled office of Corey Sheldon, a twenty-eight-year-old dweeb with fiery-colored tightly curled, puffy hair that resembled hoodoo headgear.

  The offices were all similar with high ceilings, large windows making them light and airy, each with contemporary mahogany furnishings. The front wall of each office constructed of glass, made me feel as if I were on display whether seated at my desk, or breezing down the corridor. The only place four solid walls existed was the conference room for privacy reasons.

  Sheldon glanced at me while talking on his cell phone. He had no qualms of letting people know he called his mother promptly each day at the same time to schedule weekly game nights with her.

  Buying time while waiting for Fendworth to exit Masters’ office, I pretended to check the e-mails on my phone. To hell with it! I marched down the hall and could see the door was open to Masters’ office as I approached. The glass wall gave full view of Masters loosening the knot in his tie. “I won’t be the fall guy for this,” he said.

  He was either crazy or fearless, maybe both. He was one of those guys you didn’t know whether to love or loathe. Chestnut hair, hazel eyes, charming, and talented he was like the bullfighter of courtroom drama and the iconic bad boy. His womanizing had caused his girlfriend, a beautiful runway model with an angel-like personality, to threaten that she’d stick her head in a gas oven. Outwardly, they were both beautiful, but integrity-wise, they were complete opposites. It was like pairing a Rococo table with one of those white plastic patio chairs.

  Fendworth pointed a stubby finger in Masters’ face. “Neil, this is what you are going to do…” His voice that always sounded as if he had phlegm stuck in his throat, had trailed off.

  I nonchalantly walked by and the closer I got to the boardroom, the sillier I felt. It wasn’t every day that a person sneaks around the office searching for their dead spouse.

  I walked into the boardroom and stood at the doorway scanning the ceiling. Ghosts do float, right? However, ghosts generally haunt Irish castles, pubs, and ships at sea and cemeteries and old vacant mansions, hundred-year-old brothels, but an office filled with lawyers in broad daylight? It didn’t make sense. Not that seeing Matt made any sense, but him appearing to me at home seemed more natural, if you could categorize seeing a ghost in any setting as being natural. I peeked behind both solid wood doors before walking over to the wall of windows.

  Looking down over the city made me think of all the places Matt and I had frequented. Our busy schedules prompted us to create “date night,” a night that would take precedence over all or any work catastrophes. Whether steel girders were crumbling at the construction site of one of Matt’s brilliant architecturally designed buildings or if I had a client whose multi-million-dollar lawsuit was at stake, we made a pact that above all else date nights were sacred.

  As the clouds drifted placidly in the sky, I turned to glance around the room one last time, disappointed that there was no trace of Matt. I walked down the hall toward my office, bewildered, while reminiscing about our old haunts. Not being able to step foot in any of those places again.

  “Aubrey, there you are,” said Ashley as she popped out from an alcove alongside my office where we keep the file cabinets. Barely twenty-four, her personality shimmered as if she’d been fed a steady diet of crushed diamonds and pearls. She was dressed chicly in a short-skirted ice blue suit that matched the color of her eyes. Her silky hair, the color of black sable, circled down her back.

  “Yes, here I am,” I said. Anyone important call for me?”

  “A few clients, nothing urgent. Oh, and Alison from the Historical Society called about that fundraiser you’re in charge of. I asked if she wanted to leave you a voicemail, but she flatly refused.”

  “Doesn’t surprise me,” I said, while scooping up my mail from Ashley’s desk. “Anyone who owns a yacht the size of New Jersey like she and Skip, that investment tycoon husband of hers, need instant gratification. Leaving a message is simply a bother.”

  Without missing a step, I continued walking and shuffling through the stack of mail, while entering my office. I looked up to glance around the room. Everything was in its place. The chrome trim on the black leather chairs gleamed, my desk spotless, the laptop positioned dead center, a photo of my son Nicholas to the right, positioned at a perfect 90-degree angle. I nudged the pyramid-shaped Rhode Island Trial Lawyers Association award with my index finger. “That’s better,” I mumbled as I lined up one side with the square-shaped pencil holder. Family pictures and awards from community volunteer associations shared space with legal books and trade periodicals on the shelving unit. Laid out neatly to one side on the long L-shaped portion of my desk, were four perfectly spaced file folders of cases I was currently working on.

  I placed the handful of mail in my inbox, when a square flash of neon orange caught my eye. Stuck to my computer screen was a sticky note. I sat down at my desk and stared at it.

  SEE ME--H. F.

  I ripped the note from my computer and stuck it to my desk. My reflection in the glass-framed Disneyworld photo of Nicholas with Mickey looked back at me. Don’t respond to Fendworth or you’ll be sorry, it seemed to imply.

  I glanced up just as Laura sauntered into my office. She closed the door behind her and slid into the black leather chair across from my desk.

  “Isn’t David to die for?” she said, while crossing her toned, slender legs.

  It suddenly occurred to me that last night in my inebriated state I might have said something about my mind reading ability or paranormal experiences.

  “Yes, David is very handsome. However, I don’t ever recall you going out with any dogs. Since we’re on the subject of last night, how big a fool did I make of myself?”

  “You really want to know?” Laura laughed.

  “Yes, it would be helpful. This way I can go back and tell my therapist about ‘Eve’ my duel personality who’s been to blame for ruining my relationships.”

  “Oh, you weren’t that bad.”

  “Oh, good,” I said with great relief, and then eyed Laura suspiciously. “It’s silly,” I said with a cavalier sound in my voice, “but I thought I remembered telling everyone something about waiters placing thoughts in my head.”

  “Well, actually,” Laura stammered, “what you told us was that you could probably kill thousands of people with your thoughts.”

  “My God,” I groaned and sunk back in my chair with a hand to my forehead.

  “It doesn’t matter, Jack thought you were cute.”

  I straightened up and leaned over my desk, while staring at her incredulously. “How could he possibly think that after I’d acted like a complete idiot?”

  “Well, at first, I had no idea what was wrong with you, until after you got sick--and well, I already told you about that part. Anyway, you told me you took your anti-anxiety medicine. It made sense you’d be loopy with the amount of alcohol you mixed it with. I figured you were having one of your panic attacks because of first-date-jitters with Jack. So after explaining the situation to Jack, he understood your unusual behavior and told me he was flattered that someone as beautiful as you could actually be nervous about going out with someone like him. I think he’s going to give you a call. He asked for your phone number.”

  “But that wasn’t the reason I took the…” Just shut up, she doesn’t need to know why you took the medicine. Besides, it’s not like you can tell her about Matt. You already tried that once.

  “What was that you were s
aying?” asked Laura.

  “It was nothing. So, on our drive to the restaurant last night, you mentioned something about a Saturday night date you had with David, but Jack interrupted and you got off track?”

  “Oh, yeah, two dates in a row,” she said while edging forward in her seat. “He has this gorgeous new black Porsche, but I was so totally mesmerized by him I barely noticed the car I was riding in until we…”

  I half listened to Laura, as I glared at the neon orange sticky note that seemed to scream YOU’RE FIRED! Maybe that wouldn’t be so bad. I really do need a long vacation. Besides, I’d get a hefty severance and be able to spend quality time with my son. I could trim the hips, tighten the tummy with one of those Malibu Pilate chairs, upload apps to my phone and learn how to set up a Twitter account.

  “So, what do you think?” asked Laura, while giggling.

  I tore my eyes away from the note. “Um, what do I think about what, that you had dinner at Hemenway’s or that you went to David’s penthouse?” I asked indifferently.

  “What made you say that?”

  My eyebrows shot up. “I’m Sorry. I’ve been a little preoccupied. I apologize. Only caught a couple of words of what you said.”

  “I didn’t mention anything about dinner at Hemenway’s and that David took me to his penthouse. I was still talking about the car, so how did you know the rest of what I was going to say?”

  I blinked and feigned sudden interest in my computer screen saver. Staring blankly at the three palm trees on the tiny island surrounded by blue waters I reminded myself that I really had to start getting used to my new ability to hear what people are thinking. Although, I would have preferred to think I was going completely insane.

  “I know you love that restaurant,” I said, as my eyes gazed across the top of my desk and back up at Laura. “As for guessing you went to David’s penthouse? Well, it was inevitable he’d finally bring you there.” I sucked in a deep breath.