Spooning

by Darri Stephens

  Get over Mr. J. P. Morgan

  Find true love

  Lose twenty pounds (or at least seven)

  Order soda not tonic in mixed drinks

  Research a cheap yoga class

  Cry only due to circumstances like those in Terms of Endearment

  Ascend the corporate ladder at Sunshine & Sensibility

  Take a pottery class (cheaper than psychotherapy)

  Pay off credit cards

  Forgo dry cleaning and take up ironing

  Brew own morning coffee

  Read a classic novel (perhaps Moby-Dick?)

  Cook a scrumptious casserole

  Get over Mr. J. P. Morgan

  Rule the world

  It was all plausible. I crossed Broadway feeling determined. Optimistic.

  The New Year had officially begun.

  Sweet Cinnamon Buns with Tongue-Tickling Icing

  Icing

  12 ounces cream cheese, room temperature

  6 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature

  3 cups confectioner's sugar

  Buns

  2 cups sifted all-purpose flour

  1 tablespoon baking powder

  1 teaspoon salt

  ¼ teaspoon baking soda

  ¼ cup vegetable oil

  ¾ cup buttermilk

  8 tablespoons (1 stick) butter, softened

  ¾ cup granulated sugar

  1 teaspoon cinnamon

  Prepare the icing in advance, as it has to chill for 3 to 4 hours.

  To make the icing, beat the cream cheese on medium-low speed for about 1 minute with an electric beater with paddle attachment. Add the butter and beat for about 2 minutes, until smooth. Add the sugar, beating on low speed until combined. Mix on medium for about 1 minute until smooth and fluffy. Chill the icing in the fridge for about 3 to 4 hours until firm.

  Combine flour, baking powder, salt, and baking soda in bowl. Stir in vegetable oil. Add buttermilk and mix.

  Knead the dough on a floured surface until smooth. Roll dough out with a rolling pin into a 15 × 8-inch rectangle.

  Preheat oven to 400°F. Lightly grease a 9-inch round baking pan.

  Spread the butter over the dough. Combine the sugar and cinnamon, mixing well, and sprinkle over the buttered dough. In a jelly-roll fashion, roll up the rectangle starting from one long side. Pinch the seam to seal.

  Cut the roll into 1½-inch-thick slices and arrange the slices, cut side up, in the baking pan. Bake for about 20 minutes until lightly browned.

  Gently spread the chilled icing over the cinnamon buns while they are hot.

  Serve these sweet cinnamon buns piping hot to your favorite loved one. Save any extra icing to frost your mate with this tongue- tickling delight (wink, wink)!

  I don't care!” She shrieked from inside her office. “This is absolutely atrocious and whoever picked out these hideous red roses does not, I repeat, does not belong on my staff. Do you hear me?”

  “Yes, Jane. You are so right, Jane,” Donna, Sunshine & Sensibility's neurotic executive producer, replied softly, attempting to quell Jane's tirade. Her head was nodding like one of those dashboard bobbles.

  “Don't nod!” Jane snapped. “If you agree, then this should never have happened. Why do I always have to do things myself?!” She sighed with the dramatic flair of a community theater actress.

  “This will never happen again, Jane. I promise,” Donna swore.

  Donna Murphy was in theory the most powerful person next to Jane. Yet time and time again, Jane made sure to emphasize Who (with a capital w) was truly and solely in charge. Case in point: Donna had just been reduced to the role of a six-year-old being scolded. The Diva was in full-on diva form and everyone in the office knew to either duck behind the partitions when she passed or stay hidden in the shadow of the now-damned roses.

  “Roses are unoriginal, Donna!” She ranted on. “They are cliché. They are stale, boring, and insipid. So basic, so bland. Katie loves roses, Kelly loves roses; actually, no, Kelly probably loves daisies. For Christ's sake, you should have known this. Roses are trite. Red roses are thoroughly uninspiring. Most of all, they're pedestrian.” Pedestrian? Who used the word “pedestrian” when referring to anything other than a person on foot?

  “So, what are you doing right now?” Jane demanded.

  “Um, I'm sorry,” Donna stammered, looking confused. “What am I doing? Whatever it is, I can change it.”

  “Donna, what you are doing is wasting my time and you of all people know that I don't tolerate this type of behavior. So get out of my office and fix this. Do you hear me?” And with that, Jane slammed the door behind Donna's shaking behind.

  The entire office had heard the big bitch fest go down and you could just feel the black cloud hovering over the rows of cubicles. I swore I'd heard a clap of thunder erupt and the Wicked Witch of the West laughing from inside her lair. As I peeked over the edge of my cubicle, not a soul was to be found. No one was hovering near the staff lunchroom searching for an errant triple caramel fudge brownie, no one was giggling over wedding Web sites, no one was rearranging the dishes in the studio on Set A. Everyone had assumed his/her high-alert status—hide and hide good.

  Jane's tongue-lashings typically occurred once or twice a week. You would think one would feel sorry for Donna, but she had taken this abuse for three years, and we all figured she had enough zeroes in her salary to compensate for the verbal abuse. To make matters worse, Donna herself would morph from meek to maniacal about five minutes after the initial rant ended: Jane yells at Donna, Donna apologizes, Jane slams the door, Donna turns on someone else. It was pretty much status quo. Compared to the other girls and their jobs, my office dynamics were the most abnormal. Some would call them unbearable and downright cruel, but I kept reminding myself that this was a job hundreds of thousands of people my age would die for. The HR lady hadn't been kidding when she'd warned me it was going to be tough. And the unwritten understanding was that if you didn't like it, you could leave. However, there was a silver lining to Jane's sweatshop: Apparently, if you made it here, you could make it anywhere in the television biz. Rumor had it that Jane was notorious for molding the careers of some of the greatest television minds around. Oprah, Jay, Kelly, Dave, Katie, even Ellen's shows were filled with Jane survivors. And with the typical employee's tenure being about a year to a year and a half, I figured at the rate I was going, I'd be able to move up the ranks pretty quickly.

  Things quieted down after the fight, but I could still hear feet scurrying around the office at a more frantic pace than usual. True, we were often in panic mode, but today it seemed a little different. I glanced at the “official” calendar that was given out at the beginning of each month that listed all the shoots and edits and the days they were scheduled. In bold letters under tomorrow's date it read “Red Says I Love You.” It had been a last-minute change, but everything around here was last minute. It was television, after all. The viewer at home would never know the difference, but the programming board was always getting shuffled around like a deck of playing cards. I just kept thanking God I hadn't planned the segment Jane was bitching about.

  “Did you hear that?” Julie said as she came out of her office.

  “Who didn't?” I said. “God, I feel sorry for the person who's going to suffer the wrath of Donna over that one.”

  “Yeah, to be on Jane's or Donna's shit list is not good, especially the day before a taping day,” she said.

  “Totally. Even I know that Jane hates red and I haven't even been here that long. She made me return the red bathrobe I ordered for the bathroom remodel shoot. Now at least we all know that she hates roses too, because they are just so ‘pedestrian.’ Have you ever heard anyone use that word in that manner?”

  “Nope. Just another diva-ism.” Julie shrugged.

  “Well, back to work on my expensive treehouses. Did you know that we're showcasing none other than singer extraordinaire Willie Nelson's two-story pine tree monstrosity?�
� I asked.

  “And Jane is going to climb trees?”

  “No, Jungle Jane has a fear of heights,” I reassured her.

  “You'd think she'd like to climb higher toward her divine throne.”

  “She never does heights. She won't even climb a stepladder to put plates in plate racks high on the set wall. So, we're going to replicate the treehouses on the ground.”

  “You're kidding!”

  “Nope. The art department has drawn up blueprints, and the wood experts have arranged for specially treated cedar to be flown in from India by next Friday. And Nancy in postproduction is creating some sort of digitally imaged film for the house's windows to replicate the trees we need to have simulated outside. I'm supposed to be researching the shape and shade of poplar leaves.”

  “Oh goodie!” Julie clapped.

  Jane strove to be the first to show or do anything on Sunshine & Sensibility. Her motto was “Create and cultivate.” We (the royal we) were supposed to come up with the “Wow items” that would pique her creative interest during our Wednesday brainstorming meetings. It was a pretty tough feat to accomplish, but if you were successful, there would be no stopping you. I knew that in the end my treehouse segment would not just showcase Willie Nelson's humble abode. No, Jane would find some way to improve upon it. So I'd gotten a jump start on her and come up with a list of “out of the box” ideas. So far I had:

  Humble Projects

  grow organic vegetables in the treehouse's window boxes

  affix retractable eyelet curtains to skylights

  Grand Projects

  add a wraparound sun porch

  install an elevator powered by solar energy

  Mid-brainstorm, I was interrupted. “Charlotte!” Donna screamed as she ran past my cube.

  Now what? It was the bolt of lightning I was dreading. But wait, why did it strike me?

  “Um, what? Yes Donna. I'm right behind you.” Run, Forrest, run! I grabbed pen and pad, my treehouse list, and scurried down the hall after her. I knew that this wasn't going to be good. Donna never wanted to speak to me, at least not directly. Come to think of it, I don't even think she'd ever spoken to me. Little beads of sweat began to collect on my forehead and my mouth suddenly became dry and pasty. What the hell did I do? Okay, just breathe Charlie, breathe.

  As I walked down the corridor to her office, I could sense everyone staring at me. I tried to keep my head low and walk fast to save face, but the whispering soon followed. Was this a good sign? Was this bad? Did my ass have a blaring yellow sign saying, “Kick me and kick me hard?” Apparently so. As I rounded the corner into Donna's office, I could hear her still trying to appease Jane.

  “I understand, Jane, I fully understand,” she said as she hung up her phone. Then she turned to me. “Sit down, Charlotte.” I sat up straight upon hearing her enunciate each syllable of my given name.

  So far, so good. I planted myself in the steel chair (cold metal cleverly disguised with an oh-so-warm brushed silver look) over in the far corner of her office. Distance makes the heart grow fonder, right? I sat there silently while she took notes. After what seemed like five minutes of senseless writing (could her pen move any further down the page?) she looked up and smiled. The grin on her face resembled one of those evil Disney vultures coming in for the kill.

  “Thanks for coming in so quickly, Charlotte,” she said sweetly. “As you may have heard,” her eyes rolled sarcastically, “Jane has a little problem with the flowers you picked for today's segment.” Hold up! Rewind! The list of treehouse ideas wilted in my hand. I looked around the office—had someone else come through the door? I sure as hell hadn't had anything to do with the damned red roses. For God's sake, I wasn't even the flower arranger! Generosa was the one who went to the flower market, picked the stems, brought them back in her company-paid-for SUV, and arranged them for the set. And how exactly was I involved?

  “Now you're new …” Correction. I had been at S&S for five months. A record in my early employment career path.

  “But we can't have such, ah, devastating disasters like the one we had this morning. Jane is quite upset, and with good reason,” she continued. Ah, yes. She's totally right because a hissy fit over red roses is entirely justifiable.

  “So I need you to clean up the mess you made.” This finger pointing was starting to jab me in the all the wrong places. I was seething but I held my tongue.

  “Now Jennifer is arriving on set tomorrow for the Valentine's Day shoot at ten A.M. We obviously won't have time to really rehearse since your mistake has made the planned rehearsal today ineffective. Now Ms. Lopez will be expecting everything to be in place …” Wait a minute! My heart stopped in my chest. Jennifer. Ms. Lopez. Put them together and you've got Ms. Jennifer Lopez! And I didn't even do the New York Times crossword puzzle!

  “Jennifer Lopez is coming here? Here to S&S?”

  “Yes, Charlotte. Now I'd like you to refer to her as Ms. Lopez. You just reminded me, I need to send out an e-mail asking everyone not to say hello to her, not to ask her personal questions, and not to ask her for an autograph. Anyway, I need you to find flowers that will please her—flowers that will evoke Ms. Lopez's independent and fierce spirit.”

  Had she picked the right girl or what!? I knew the answer to every possible J. Lo question. Panic evaporated into excitement. This was going to be my “Wow item,” my tour de force, my magical moment to shine. You could bet that I was going to milk this assignment and come out on top.

  “I'll get on this task right away, Donna. You can count on me.” Why did I have to revert to such cheesy and subservient catch phrases? “But what about Willie Nelson's treehouse shoot?”

  “Treehouses are nothing new. We'll be scrapping that piece,” she scoffed as if we'd been working on that concept for minutes instead of months.

  “But what about the wood from India?” I asked.

  “Cancel it.” Little did she know it was en route on some enormous tanker in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. She looked up at me and held my gaze. “The flowers, Charlotte? Please?” It wasn't a polite please, it was more like a get your ass moving please.

  “No pedestrian flowers for Ms. Lopez,” I recited and caught myself before I actually saluted.

  That night I rallied the troops at the apartment for an emergency meeting of the minds.

  “My job is on the line at S&S,” I explained. “But I think I may also have a chance to become the next shining star. Can you guys take the day off work tomorrow?”

  “I don't even have a vacation day yet, Charlie,” sighed Macie. “Not until the end of year one.”

  I'd known it would be a lot to ask Macie considering that she'd never missed a day of class in college. Come sleet, snow, 105-degree temperature, or hangover, reliable Macie was never absent. She saw “sickness” as a sign of weakness and weak was something she was not. She would have been perfect for the armed forces—she was so disciplined and dependable. That's probably why my mom loved her so much. But right now, she needed to Save Private Charlie.

  “My kids go crazy when I'm not around,” rationalized Wade.

  “I have an important appointment at Brown Sugar about our new Beyoncé Bootylicious Extensions,” whined Syd.

  “I have a Pilates training class every Tuesday morning,” chimed in Sage.

  “Family emergency? I'm in,” cheered Tara.

  I held my hands, Wade-teacher-style, to silence the group, which had now evolved into a chattering mass of explanations and excuses. “Girls, who do we aspire to be? Who do we pray to each night? Who is our coach, our mentor, our idol?”

  “J. Lo!” They exclaimed in perfect sync.

  “And who is going to be on Sunshine & Sensibility tomorrow?” I called in full cheerleader mode. All their mouths dropped open.

  “J. Lo,” whispered Syd in pure disbelief. They all started talking at once, rehashing their Tuesday agendas. There was no way they were going to miss an opportunity to meet Jenny from the Block herself.


  “Wait. It gets better. To make the visit a success, I've been put in charge of coming up with the perfect flower to decorate the set. They'll be a decorative backdrop for when J. Lo concocts her mother's favorite recipe—some cinnamon bun thingy.”

  “You're in charge of flowers? That's all you have to do to score points at work is decorate the set with the right flower?” asked Macie.

  “You have no idea how essential the flower selection is.”

  “Okay, J. Lo loves two flowers,” recited Tara. “She had gardenias at her first wedding and peonies at her second. Who knows what she wanted for the Ben nuptials, but I think she might have had both at her private ceremony with Marc Anthony.”

  “Now would we be bringing up bad memories with those selections?” I asked.

  “That girl changes men like the weatherman changes his mind.”

  “She can be fickle about men, but I bet our lady sticks by her flowers. Can you have both on the set?” Macie theorized.

  “Well, Jane likes simplicity. But I can have both ready to go,” I reasoned. We made plans for the girls to arrive at the office at 7:30 A.M. I planned to stash them in my cubicle and then let them watch the taping from the sidelines. With so many charity auction tours coming in and out of the office, I figured no one would think twice about a small gaggle of girls coming through.

  Tuesday morning was chaotic. Ms. Lopez's limo was late, so the buzz around the studio was that she had hopped into a taxi hoping that the New York cabbie could make up the time. Oh, the lengths our lady would go to—riding in a germ-ridden cab like a commoner! But more important, J. Lo probably knew (or sensed) that Jane despised tardiness. Luckily, the extra minutes bought us some much-needed time, leaving us girls a few seconds to primp. The six of us were hanging out in the receptionist's office when J. Lo arrived, waltzing through with a single bodyguard but sans entourage (they were probably still delayed in the limo). Like monkeys in a tree, our heads turned and watched her saunter down the hallway with every assistant in the building at her heels.