by Bria Quinlan
“I’m not going to argue with anyone’s wanna-be anything right now.”
“Great. Just don’t let him hang anything in your new place.” She seemed amazingly adamant about that. I kind of wondered what type of art John had been running around town hanging.
So, I just smiled at that, because who was I to judge anyway?
Maybe things were looking up.
4
Things were definitely not looking up.
The next morning, not only was my apartment freezing, but I didn’t have hot water. A few weeks ago it would have been just chilly. But, with summer turning into fall, night was still dead cold.
It figures with only one day to go on my lease the building would have a major fail. I called the building manager and wasn’t surprised when I got his voicemail.
“Micah? It’s Kasey Lane in 304. I’m in my apartment and I have no heat or hot water…Wait.” I glanced at my alarm clock. The small battery icon was on. “I also don’t have electricity. What exactly is going on? Please call me back.”
I wrapped my moss green comforter around me—glad I hadn’t donated it or my bed yet even though it didn’t play matchy-matchy in Jason’s apartment—and headed toward my front door.
The building hallway was nice and toasty…and lit. This was not a good sign.
Beth, the girl across the way, opened her door and caught me standing in the middle of the hall, comforter pulled up around my nose as I tried to get warm.
“No heat or hot water.” Check me out. Stater of Things Obvious.
She leaned around me to look into my apartment as if cold air might look different. “Really? Everything’s fine in here.”
Figures.
Beth gave me a whattayougonnadoaboutit smile and headed out the front door. Also not a surprise. She was the kind of neighbor who stopped by to let you know she was having a big party—but not invite you. Just tell you so you’d know what the noise was.
I hit redial and waited for Micah’s voicemail.
“Seriously, Micah. Why is my apartment the only one that’s arctic? Call me back. I’m just, you know, hanging out in the hallway in my pajamas.”
A door upstairs opened and a heavy footfall crossed over my head toward the stairs. The guy Beth kept calling the cops on for doing P90X after seven on a Saturday turned the corner and stopped on the landing.
“Locked out?” It dawned on me how bad I must look pre-shower, pre-caffeine.
“Nope.”
“Just hanging out?” He grinned.
And why shouldn’t he. I must look ridiculous. “No heat, hot water, or electricity.”
“For real?” He looked at my door as if he could see the problem through the flimsy paneling. “Listen, I’m just running out to get coffee and bagels, but my girlfriend is here for the weekend. Why don’t you grab your stuff and go shower at my place? She won’t care.”
Dan—which was apparently P90X guy’s name—brought me up, introduced me to his girlfriend, and headed for the door.
It showed how low I’d sunk that I didn’t even care I was showering in some strange guy’s apartment. Dan’s girlfriend grabbed me a towel and made sure I had everything I needed.
“Lucky for you he hires a maid service the week before I come to visit. I’m deathly afraid of what you’d find otherwise.”
“Thanks.” I tried to imagine Dan—who always looked amazingly put together—having a filthy bathroom. It just didn’t compute.
But, who was I to try to read someone else’s boyfriend when I hadn’t even been able to read my own?
I hurried through my shower not wanting to cut into the Dan-Girlfriend time. Plus, I had a date with a coffee shop owner who was hopefully finding me a roof to live under. I was not above begging at this point.
I dried my hair as quickly as possible and wrapped it up in a sloppy bun before thanking them both, a little sad to meet the nice neighbor the day before I moved out.
Back in Antarctica, I opened my shades to let the sunshine in before I wrapped a scarf around my neck, pulled on my coat, and hefted my tote. How had I never noticed how heavy it was with the laptop and charger when I was only walking a block to the bus stop?
I may not have a check paying out for today, but it was still a work day. I had a lot of work and even more thinking to do. I might as well get started.
The air was damp, the type of pre-fall weather that made everything feel a bit more crisp. It was a shorter walk than expected. More like three-quarters of a mile. That’s what happened when you stayed in your own neighborhood—you missed out on hidden gems.
I slipped into the café and breathed in that heady coffee-air. Being there again was the first thing that felt good—that felt right—in two days.
I stepped up to the counter, happy to get another one of those to-die-for mochas and oddly unsurprised to find Abby manning the counter again.
She looked at me and shook her head. “This is how you leave the house?”
I looked down at my yoga pants and North Face jacket.
“Yes. This is how I leave the house when I need to walk a mile to sit and sip coffee while working.”
She shook her head again, disgust emanating off her like she’d just discovered I kicked kittens as a hobby.
“If you insist on going out like that, you’re going to stay single.”
“I’ve only been single since last night—you know, when you accused me of being an adulteress.”
“Yup. Welcome to Singleland.” Abby handed me my mocha as if it was above my touch. “You’ll be here a while.”
“Maybe I’d like to be single a while.”
She looked at me over the mist from the steamer. “You don’t seem like someone who likes being single.” With that, she headed down the counter to wipe off some machine.
I stared after her wondering if she was right. Was I that girl who didn’t like to be single? Was I? Was that why I’d stayed with Jason?
I didn’t think so, but there was a lot I was learning about myself this week.
I settled into the same overstuffed chair as the night before and pondered. I was definitely in a pondering place in life.
Once I pushed aside the Singleland pondering, I started considering the real issue at hand. In the back of my mind, I had an idea—one that had lived there for a while trying to work up the courage to pop out. But now, in a mental fight-or-flight situation, it pushed its way to the front and itched at my brain since I’d woken up cold and annoyed.
My own marketing and design business. Promo, websites, banners, ads. Lots of fun designs to do on my own. No big corporate accounts arguing over what such-and-such shade of orange subconsciously says. Just straightforward work for startups, individuals, and small companies.
Affordable but gorgeous work.
I had the skills. I had the drive.
Looking through my contacts, I tried to figure out where I might find a couple clients to kick off my new business once I got it up and running. I wasn’t sure where the ethical line was about contacting former clients. One thing I did know about myself, that wasn’t a line I would cross.
Obviously I’d need something to show them. Something as good as what I’d been able to do with resources, but on a much smaller budget. What could I offer that would make me stand out? That would make me a success? That would allow me to pay the rent?
I Googled designers and started grabbing screenshots. I pulled out my Moleskine and made notes of different things offered, pricing, timelines, color schemes, websites…anything that someone else was doing. I marked examples up. I made notes of what could be done better, different, or just more me.
It was fun. It was exciting. But, it was just the start and when I tried to think beyond that, I got a little freaked out.
After an hour I’d gone through my mocha. Another one was definitely needed to tackle a business plan while I waited for John.
And lucky for me, Abby was still working the counter.
“You know what y
our problem is?” she started before I could even get my order out.
“No, but I’m sure that as my local barista there’s nothing you’d like more than to tell me.”
It’s a sad state of affairs when I didn’t feel odd or guilty verbally sparring with a child.
“Look at you. You’re a mess.”
I glanced down. Probably out of habit. Abby may have started channeling my mother. Was I a mess? Emotionally or physically? She probably meant a little bit of both.
“That’s not good.” She said it as if being a mess was occasionally a good thing and I might be confused. “It’s hard enough being a girl, let alone an average girl. But you’re lowering your own social credit-rating coming in here like this.”
I shouldn’t ask. It was a dumb move and I knew it even as the question slipped past my lips. “Social credit-rating?”
“I call it the Average Girl Theory. It’s the reason you’re single and don’t know what to do about it.”
I knew what to do about it: Nothing.
I’d been single—I glanced at my watch—fourteen hours. I hadn’t dropped dead from lack of a man in my life yet.
I was more than not-dead. I was feeling pretty darn good.
When I’d decided to move in with Jason, my mother hadn’t been happy. Too many milk-cow references to count. My aunts joined in. The happily-marrieds joined forces to try to talk me out of it. No one, not one person just came out and said they didn’t like him. They just thought we should get married instead of moving in together.
Or maybe they didn’t like him.
But this—this underage, self-proclaimed love guru—was too much.
“See, guys are very visual.” Barista Girl Abby nodded as if I wasn’t going to believe her or this was—I don’t know—news. “Everything is about what they can see. They can’t see that you’re smart or funny or whatever your I Am Woman thing is. It’s all about the visual.”
“So you said.” I couldn’t be blamed if that sounded dry even to me.
“Now you come in here looking like that.” She waved her hand vaguely at me from her side of the counter. “Not good.”
“Last night you accused me of being an adulteress.”
I was really beginning to wish I hadn’t given her money. Or that she’d already given me my mocha. Or that my ego wasn’t taking a hit for no apparent reason.
Or…or…or…
Ah, the fabulous life of the newly single girl. The single average girl, apparently.
Of course, I hadn’t dressed up to walk here and work all day. Yoga pants and a fitted t-shirt were as good as it was going to get. I’d already planned to bring my entire business wardrobe to a consignment shop to help make another rent check happen.
Of course, designer clothes and toe-pinching shoes were a corner I didn’t mind cutting.
Now I just needed a rent to pay.
I picked at the small hole starting to fray along the edge of my t-shirt and reminded myself the last thing I needed right now was another guy. I was done being any-type-of-maintenance and was moving on to Independent Business Woman.
Barista Girl caught my eye as I finished inspecting my can-this-shirt-be-saved inspection.
“Maybe a little makeup, too. You know. Just some mascara and gloss.”
“Is my mocha done?” Really. Did she think this was the way to a big tip—annoy the patrons into paying her to leave them alone?
I shook my change purse. It was probably too light to afford that blessing.
“Not yet.” She glanced down at the empty to-go cup in her hand. “So, the theory. Guys. They rate themselves very high while knocking women down easily. So, let’s assume about eighty-five percent of the women fall into that average looks group. Some are rated higher, upper-average—like upper-middle class—and some are ranked lower on the scale. But they all fall into the middle of the bell curve.”
I glanced at her hand, the one with my empty cup, waiting for her to finish so I could get back to work. I had a company to launch.
“Anyway,” she continued, setting my still-empty cup down. “Guys don’t live on the same bell curve. When they see that ten percent of really gorgeous hot girls, seventy percent of guys think that girl is obtainable. That seventy percent is cutting into the equivalent AGQ—Average Girl Quotient—by quite a bit. Think about it. If a guy who ranks as a six thinks he can date a nine, who are the sixes going to date?”
It frightened me that she was actually making sense.
More than frightened. I glanced outside to see if there were any other signs of the apocalypse approaching.
“So, all those upper-average guys think they rate an above-average girl.”
“What about the other thirty percent of men?” What was I thinking? Where had the little voice that lived in my head gone? It should be shouting, Do not engage! Do not engage!
“Well the lowest portion—the below average men—realize where they stand. They’ve accepted they’re in the bottom fifteen percent and have found a girl at their attraction level. Think about it. You see a girl. You know you’re way prettier than she is, but she has a boyfriend. Usually we don’t stop and think, Yeah. But I wouldn’t date him. We just get stuck on the she has a boyfriend and I don’t thing.”
Who sounded bitter now, Barista Girl?
“That still leaves about fifteen percent of guys.” Why was I torturing myself like this?
“Yup.” Barista Girl nodded her head. “You’re absolutely right. And most of them are taken. They were smart. They grabbed a great girl and they’re keeping her. The rest of them are just figuring it out. You better hope you get your act together and stay roughly an eight before you age out.”
Age out?
I was twenty-six. What exactly was I aging out of?
“Can I have my drink?”
The snap in my voice must have finally been obvious because she made a face and started doing whatever it was they did behind the counter to create that mocha magic. I had better enjoy it now. With my new lack of income, these weren’t going to be in the necessities column where they used to reside.
Once Theory Creating Barista Girl finished my frothy goodness, I grabbed a napkin and headed back to my desk—comfy chair and coffee table—in the corner.
“Don’t listen to her.” The voice was soft, kind of lifting on the end. It matched the girl in an odd sort of way. She had to be about my age, with light brown hair framing a glasses-covered pixie face.
“Sorry?”
“Don’t listen to her. She’s wrong.” The girl glanced toward the counter before shifting in her chair to look at me. “Okay, she may not be wrong. The theory probably holds. But she’s like nine years old and you can’t put a number on some things.”
“I’d like to hope that’s true.” Especially since I wasn’t looking so good on paper at this point. There was nothing attractive about homelessness. One more reason I had to get this business up and running.
The whole idea that I had to carry my own weight had ticked me off last night. There was a reason “for better or for worse” was in the marriage vows. But that was in a real relationship. Not one you thought was real but apparently was just a convenience to one party. One more reason Jason and I weren’t married. And now, there’s no way I’d be putting myself out there when I was homeless and unemployed.
Of course, there was no way I’d be putting myself out there for quite a while anyway. I was pretty much declaring the ten foot sphere around me a Guy Free Zone. I might even bring back the giant hoop skirts to enforce this new sanction.
But, she wasn’t done.
“My boyfriend, Ben?” She got this silly grin on her face. “He’s gorgeous. Like, the second most beautiful guy I know. Seriously. Do I look like beautiful guy material?”
I almost shook my head. Not because she wasn’t pretty. She was. In a cute, girl-next-door-who-is-a-bit-too-nerdy way. I was pretty sure guys would be attracted to her just because of all that shininess coming off her. And the glasse
s. I’d never been envious of girls with glasses, but she seemed to pull them off as if they were just part of her look.
Of course, that could just be New Relationship Shine, but I was guessing she was pretty darn adorable sans-Ben.
“I’m Jenna Drake.” She leaned over the coffee table, hand stretched out.
It was such a welcoming gesture. She just wasn’t one of those people you dismissed rudely because you were trying to work. Plus, her name was vaguely familiar as I struggled to place it. I was really, really hoping we hadn’t gone to high school together or something.
That was the last thing I needed. The small town gossip tree was still alive and well. My mother would have me on the phone thirty seconds after she heard my new status, and I’d be getting a lecture on women alone in the world.
Obviously my mother had accidentally time warped to the 1940s.
In her eyes, there was only one thing worse than not being married…being single.
“Kasey Lane.”
“Oh!” She pulled out a little red notebook and scribbled in it. “That’s a great name. I’m totally stealing it.”
Stealing my name? As in identity theft? I wasn’t sure what else she could mean, but she didn’t have any of my information so figured I was fairly safe. I’d just have to remember not to leave my purse alone…or throw my receipt away.
She glanced up and must have caught the horrified look on my face.
“Oh, don’t worry. I’m not stealing anything real. Just your name. It’s a great name,” she said again, this time with a smile as she folded the notebook back into her tote. “I’m a writer and you’d be shocked how hard it gets to come up with new names. I mean, there’s what? Millions of them? And yet, you find yourself drifting toward the same ones over and over again. I have tried to name four different guys James.”
She was a little bundle of energy…really unfocused energy.
“Sorry. I’m trying not to babble. I’m not good with people.”
She seemed to really think that. She’d been nothing but sweet, welcoming and friendly. If this was bad with people I was in a lot of trouble.
And Barista Abby…Well, Abby was five steps past trouble. The Brew Ha Ha might need to be reconsidered as my new hangout.