The Bentleys Buy a Buick

by Pamela Morsi

  “Letty, I gotta go,” Erica whispered hurriedly into the phone and then clicked the off button before waiting for a response. She tamped down her embarrassment and spoke in her most professional tone. “Hello, Dr. Glover, may I help you with something?”

  He was not a particularly tall or imposing man; instead he was cute. Cute in the way that teen idols are cute, well proportioned with soft features, perfect teeth and great hair. Yes, Erica decided, Dr. Glover was like a teen idol, all grown up and wearing a white coat.

  He held out his hand. “I don’t think we’ve officially met. I’m Zachary Glover.”

  She shook his hand. “Erica Bentley.”

  “Mrs. Converse said that I should speak to you,” he began, his boyish grin countering the formality of his words. “I’ve been tagged to orient the workshop participants on basic e-script and digital pharmacy operations. Ms. Torreno has been giving me some help on that, but now I understand that’s been handed over to you.”

  “Uh…yes, I suppose it has,” Erica answered. “Although if you’ve been working with Callie and Melody, you probably know more about it than I do.”

  “I’ve only worked with Ms. Torreno,” he corrected. “Apparently I make Ms. Garwin nervous.”

  Dr. Glover added a quizzical eyebrow to the flashing white smile, badly feigning befuddlement. The young pharmacist clearly understood his effect on women and enjoyed it completely.

  “Well, you won’t have that problem with me,” Erica told him. “I’m the mother of a six-year-old backyard daredevil. Nothing makes me nervous anymore.”

  He laughed lightly, appreciating the opportunity for camaraderie. Dr. Glover borrowed a chair from the conference room and took a seat in Erica’s cubicle. They shared notes on what they felt were the key presentation points.

  Dr. Glover’s boyish good looks apparently camouflaged a quick, sharp-thinking brain and the skills of a natural teacher. He gave Erica more ideas than she gave him. Yet she was still able to come up with some insights of her own.

  “A blank form is informational, but doesn’t teach anything,” she said. “A filled form with arrows indicating the sources where the information originated, now that’s a slide you can really use.”

  Dr. Glover nodded in agreement and wrote the idea in the margin of his notes.

  The guy spent close to an hour brainstorming with Erica before taking his leave. Her regular work had piled up in the interim and she doggedly dug into it, trying to complete as much as possible before lunch.

  As it happened, she almost missed lunch completely. Typically, someone would walk by and announce she was headed to the cafeteria and everyone would quickly finish what they were doing and follow. Erica’s stomach grumbled and she checked the clock to see that it was after 12:20 p.m. It was then she noticed how unusually quiet it had become. Puzzled, she stood up and looked around. The entire maze of cubicles were all empty.

  She just stood there for a half minute, staring in disbelief. Only Mrs. Converse, eating a sandwich at her desk in the glass-fronted office was still in the department. Erica shook her head, unlocked her file drawer to retrieve her purse and headed down to the cafeteria.

  By the time she got her lunch and settled in at their regular table, everyone else was nearly finished.

  “I need to get back early,” Darla announced the instant Erica sat down.

  “Me, too,” Callie said.

  They rose, as did Rayliss and Lena. Melody hesitated only a moment or two and she got up and took her tray as well.

  Erica wasn’t sure what was going on, but she shrugged to herself and started on her salad.

  A couple of minutes later Melody returned, furtively glancing around. In an ill-fitting gray pantsuit and sensible shoes, it was almost as if the woman dressed to blend in with the background, like office camouflage. She slipped into the seat at an angle next to Erica’s. The room was noisy, but her words were matter-of-fact.

  “You’re persona non grata today,” she said.

  “Oh, yeah?”

  Melody glanced around again and then nodded. “Callie is furious about you taking over Dr. Glover.”

  For a moment Melody’s words didn’t even translate in Erica’s brain. When they did, she was incredulous. “I didn’t ‘take him over,’ Mrs. Converse sent him to me about the EMR workshops.”

  Melody made a huffing sound, signifying disbelief. “How long could that take? Fifteen minutes? The man was in your cubicle laughing and joking with you for nearly an hour.”

  “I don’t know how long he was there,” Erica admitted. “But all our discussion was about the workshops. We don’t have anything else to talk about.”

  “Callie walked by a half-dozen times, listening. She thought you were flirting,” Melody said.

  Erica was incredulous. “I wasn’t flirting.”

  “Well, maybe he was flirting with you,” Melody said. “Whatever, Callie had her eye on him first. Those two have gotten way too familiar. I had to tell Mrs. Converse. So Callie’s out and now you’re in. I hope you’re not going to make the same mistakes that she did.”

  Erica shook her head. “I have no interest in Dr. Glover. Yes, I spent, maybe, an hour with him. But it was totally about the training. Nothing personal at all. I’m married, remember.”

  Melody allowed her gaze to roam over Erica as if she’d never quite seen her before. “I don’t think that kind of explanation makes any difference with Callie. She’s hurt and she’s offended.”

  “Well, I’m sorry for that,” Erica said. “But nothing happened. I have no interest in Dr. Glover and there is no reason for Callie to be offended or hurt.”

  Melody’s brow furrowed and her brown eyes were serious. “I think, perhaps, you should watch your back. Women, especially women like Callie, can be very petty and vengeful. It’s their nature.”

  Erica chuckled. “You’re overstating it a bit, don’t you think?”

  “Not at all,” Melody said. “I’ve known Callie a lot longer than you. And I know a lot of women like her. If you get between them and the man they want, then you’re on the enemies list and one-hundred percent in trouble.”

  “Enemies list?

  Melody nodded. “Women like her don’t like to be crossed, and when someone does it, they make sure they are sorry.”

  Erica searched Melody’s face for hints of humor or deceit. Surely she couldn’t be serious. Melody’s high opinion of her husband seemed to often contrast vividly with her low opinion of most everyone else. Still, it was worse than Erica thought if the young woman could imagine her coworker as some sort of crazed avenger.

  “I haven’t ‘crossed’ anybody,” Erica told her calmly. “That’s the absolute truth.”

  Melody shrugged. “I don’t think it matters. Even if it’s not true, if Callie thinks that it is, well, that is just as bad.”

  “Melody, you’re giving her a lot more power than she has.”

  “You just don’t know how vindictive women can be,” she replied. “A couple of years ago up in the Admitting office, one employee got under the skin of the coworker at the next desk and ruined the woman’s marriage.”

  “Nobody can ruin somebody else’s marriage,” Erica stated flatly.

  “They can if they target the husband,” Melody said. “And that’s what happened. She stalked the man at his job and he got all flattered and macho and stuff. Before the wife even knew what was happening, her coworker had him on tape talking sex.”

  Erica raised her eyebrows at that. “You’re kidding?”

  Melody’s face remained grave. “I heard all the details right here at this table. It was all over for them. The wife felt like she couldn’t trust him anymore. And once the husband had started thinking about himself as some kind of God’s gift to young gals, he was dissatisfied with what he had at home. Within six months they were divorced.”

  “They may have gotten a divorce,” Erica said. “But the coworker’s part in it sounds like the stuff of rumors.”

  “It�
�s one-hundred-percent true,” Melody assured her. “The evildoer bragged all over the hospital about breaking them up.”

  “Well, even if it did happen just like that, there was something wrong in that marriage to begin with. You can’t exploit problems unless the problems are already there.”

  “A lot of women, like Callie, know how to create problems.”

  It was obvious that Melody and Callie didn’t get along, but Erica didn’t believe that either of them could justifiably be called an “evildoer.”

  “People are not as easily manipulated as you think,” Erica told her. “And if Callie is upset with me today, by tomorrow she’ll realize that I haven’t done anything. It will all blow over.”

  Melody nodded, but her expression suggested she wasn’t convinced. “I just thought it was only fair to let you know,” she said. “A jealous woman can be very dangerous. And right now, Callie is jealous of you.”

  Erica smiled gently at her, hoping to be reassuring. “I appreciate the heads-up. I promise you, it’s going to be all right. By next week, Dr. Glover will walk by her desk and say something nice and Callie will forget all about me and the EMR workshops.”

  “For your sake, I hope so,” Melody answered.

  She walked away stiffly, as if annoyed that her warning had not been taken seriously enough.

  Erica went back to her salad. She liked Melody, but she had to admit the woman was a little weird. Nobody should go through life so sour and certain. Callie might be a pill, but she wasn’t a danger. Erica was sure of that.

  Through the fog of a sleeping dream, Tom saw the Buick. Clara was parked in her spot in the fourth bay of the shop. Tom walked the unexpectedly long distance to the driver’s door, opened it up and slid in.

  Once inside, however, he was not behind the wheel but in the middle of the backseat. He was small again, very small. He could see his feet in canvas sneakers, new white canvas sneakers.

  Those people were there, they were talking and laughing. Tom was laughing, too. It felt good. It felt safe.

  Who were these people? What were they saying? Were they speaking Spanish? Tom wasn’t sure.

  Deliberately he tried to turn his head to look at the person beside him. If he could see them, he was sure he would recognize them. But when he turned his head, beside him sat Erica.

  “What are you doing here?” he asked her.

  She smiled. “I brought you.”

  Tom startled awake. The scene in his head had been vivid. But he was lying comfortably in his own bed. Erica murmured in his arms. His dream had disturbed her sleep as well.

  He lay staring up into the darkness for several minutes. It was not unusual for his work to intrude upon his slumber. And he spent a lot of his waking time these days thinking about the Buick. But there was something about that car, something about that car and the memory it brought back that he couldn’t quite put his finger on. He tried to examine the dream, recall it more completely, but it was just impressions and flashes. How did he know it was this Buick? Most of what he saw in it was his own shoes. And why was bringing it back so pleasant? Maybe for the novelty of it, he thought to himself. In that car he felt different. He tried to examine that idea but it was tough trying to conjure up remembered feelings. Had he felt loved in that car? Or maybe it was just that he felt safe. Safe was not one of the typical words that he’d used to describe his childhood. Was that what it was? He felt safe with those people?

  Tom was fully awake now. A quick glance at the alarm suggested that he had a couple more hours before it would buzz. Still, he was alert, his mind active. He was not likely to capture another forty winks. As quietly as possible he got up and tiptoed out. After a trip to the bathroom, he walked down the hall and peeked in on Quint. His son had kicked off the blanket and was scrunched into a fetal position on top of the sheet. Tom covered him up and tucked him in without causing so much as a catch in his breathing. Quint was a pretty sound sleeper. He and Erica often joked that an explosion could go off in the next room and Quint wouldn’t even wake up. Tom wanted him to get all the rest he could. He’d need it to carry around all those big words he was so fond of. The little guy looked like such an angel; he was tempted to ruffle his hair, but he managed to resist.

  Tom went to the living room and turned on the television at a very low volume. He clicked through the channels, finally settling on what he thought might be the least boring of the bad choices. Then he picked up his laptop and began perusing the internet pages for classic car sales. Anytime he wasn’t actually working, Tom was thinking about the Buick. He’d promised Mrs. Gilfred, Guffy, that he’d find a buyer. And he’d expected to get her an excellent price. But, he didn’t like what he’d been seeing. Despite what Bryce, his banker, had said, prices for classics like the Buick had really taken a hit from the downturn in the economy. The cold truth about these cars was that they were only worth what people were willing to pay for them. And while the wealthy collector was still in the market, the Buick held more appeal to the regular guys and gals. And in this market they were selling off or, at the very least, not buying. That drove prices down. Everybody likes a bargain and lots of vintage dealers could afford to buy low and wait for prices to rebound.

  Normally these kinds of fluctuations wouldn’t bother Tom much. But he felt a responsibility to Guffy. She wanted a certain kind of buyer and she deserved a good price. Tom was afraid that he couldn’t deliver both.

  Erica shuffled in. She was tousled and groggy, wearing a long sexy nightgown of pink satin and lace. The outfit’s dazzling effect was effectively countered by a pair of his white cotton work socks. The sight made him smile.

  “Did you make coffee?” she asked.

  Tom shook his head. “I was trying to pretend it’s still night.”

  She nodded and continued on into the kitchen. Tom heard her rattling dishes as he checked another site. A minute later, she came back in and curled up on the couch beside him.

  “What are you watching?” she asked, indicating the TV.

  Tom glanced up. “Deadliest Warrior,” he answered. “It’s like a hypothetical battle between the Mongols and the Comanches.”

  Erica made a sort of hmm sound as she yawned. “Is that like when Quint wants to know who would win if Superman and Batman fought each other?”

  “Yes, exactly. I think this is the big-boy version,” Tom answered. “And by the way, it would be Superman for sure.”

  She laughed lightly. Tom took one hand off his keyboard and snaked his arm around her shoulders. Pulling her close, he planted a kiss on her brow.

  “I’m sorry I woke you,” he said.

  “It’s okay,” Erica answered. “You couldn’t sleep?”

  “No, I slept fine. I just woke up and I had stuff on my mind, so I got up.”

  Beside him, Erica nodded.

  “Are you worried about something?” she asked. “Is there anything I can do?”

  “Not worried, just thinking,” he answered. “And you already ‘do’ everything. Without you, my life would just be a mess.”

  “Oh yeah, right. You didn’t seem all that messed up when I met you.”

  “I was running on two spark plugs and a grimy air filter,” he assured her. “You’ve tuned me up till I’m purring like an in-line six.”

  Erica laughed at that. “An in-line six, huh?”

  Tom shrugged. “Okay, maybe more like a 350Z.”

  Erica grinned at him and shook her head. “Let me go see if the coffee is ready yet,” she said, getting up from the couch.

  Tom went back to his computer search. He found a very nice Buick, similar in age and model to Clara that had gone for a premium price at auction just two years earlier. It was salmon and white, which had been a much more typical color scheme for that year. And it didn’t have the continental kit on the back. Both those things should have made Mrs. Gilfred’s car more valuable. But a sales chart that Tom had studied indicated that the year the salmon-and-white sold had been the high point of Buick valu
ations. It would go back up there again, Tom was certain. However it was not going to be soon enough for Mrs. Gilfred.

  Erica handed him a cup of steaming hot coffee, black, just the way he liked it. He took a sip and thanked her before setting it on the nearby table. Tom had just found a green-and-white Century hardtop that had sold the previous week. He was reading through the seller’s details as his wife sat down beside him.

  Erica began talking about something that had happened at work. Tom was sort of listening, but he was also reading through the engine specifications. She didn’t sound really upset. It was a pretty matter-of-fact presentation. When she paused, Tom knew that he was expected to comment.

  “So some guy hit on you and made this other crazy woman jealous,” he said.

  “He didn’t hit on me,” Erica corrected him firmly. “Everything we talked about was strictly work related, but apparently Callie didn’t see it that way.”

  Tom discovered that the green-and-white’s undercarriage had been replaced and there was some residual rust in the wheel wells that might indicate spots forming beneath the body paint. That was definitely not good and any experienced collector would have taken that into consideration while bidding.

  “It’s just craziness to assume that when I talk to some guy on the job, it’s got to be some kind of flirty guy/girl thing.”

  Tom found the dead-ringer giveaway. The green and white’s frame had been painted. A sure sign that somebody had been trying to cure corrosion.

  “You’d think that everybody knowing the fact that I’m married and have a six-year-old at home would be enough to keep those gossips from going off the deep end.”

  “Nothing stops gossip,” Tom told her. “And for a lot of people marriage and family doesn’t even slow them down, let alone stop them.”

  He clicked off the green-and-white. It had way too many problems to be comparable to Mrs. Gilfred’s Clara.

  “Still, you’d think somebody there would know me better than that,” Erica said.

  “It takes time to know people and sometimes even when you think you do, they turn out to be a lot different.”