I’d always loved coming to work. There was something about the old house on a side street of Orlando, in among other original buildings, that made me feel comfortable and at home. Mr. Clanton, who’d been the founder, owner and editor-in-chief as long as I could remember, worked hard to give the Sunbeam a family atmosphere. His office door was always open, and he’d encouraged us to take chances and try new ideas. He’d been so excited about my residency, agreeing to my leave of absence request on the condition that I wrote a multi-part piece about the experience when I got home.
As I walked up the front path on that sunny Monday, I comforted myself that this would be my true welcome home, the reaction I’d been expecting and yet hadn’t received from my parents or from Jeremy. Oh, sure, my dad had been excited to see me the day before when I’d stopped at their hotel—my mother had taken to calling it their hometel, making Aunt Gail and me cringe. Daddy had greeted me with a warm hug, telling me he couldn’t wait to hear all about my adventures. And then, before I could get out the first syllable, he’d launched into a description of how he’d felt when he’d been awarded the Kripke Grant and the tentative route he’d planned for their trip. Of course, I was happy for him—for both of them. But I hadn’t exactly felt welcomed back.
Even when I’d stopped at my old apartment after that to retrieve my car from the storage garage and to see Teddi, I’d been disappointed to find that she’d been on her way out with Shane. My best friend and former roommate had squealed and given me a hug before she’d explained that Shane’s grandparents were in town, and they were heading to a big family party. She’d promised that we’d catch up soon, which we probably would. But I’d hoped for at least a short visit that day.
Here, though, my co-workers would be thrilled to see me back, and Mr. Clanton would probably ask me to tell them all about my experiences over lunch. Maybe he’d order in a spread for the staff, as he sometimes did. Maybe they’d even already put together some kind of welcome back brunch for me, and I was about to walk in to shouts of “Surprise!”.
I took a deep breath as I put my hand on the knob and opened the door, bracing myself for the onslaught of welcome.
But there was nothing. Nothing, as in the front room, the whole huge great room that had served as our press office, with our desks set up every which way, was empty, except for one table against the wall at the far side of the room, near the door to Mr. Clanton’s office. A woman I didn’t recognize sat there typing at a computer. She glanced up at me as I shut the door behind me.
“Hi, can I help you?”
“Um.” I was dizzy. For one moment, I wondered if I’d walked into the wrong house by mistake. But no . . . I recognized the spot on the ceiling, above the stand where the microwave had been, where my tomato soup had exploded one day last year. I was in the right place. But maybe it was the wrong time. I must’ve stumbled through some sort of time portal into the future.
But before I could open my mouth to explain this, a man stuck his head out of Mr. Clanton’s office. He spotted me, and for a nanosecond, I saw the panicked expression of someone who’d just remembered something he’d forgotten before. But that was quickly covered up by a smooth and completely phony smile.
“Heyyyyy, Vivian! Look at you! Back in the Sunshine State, huh? So how was your trip?”
“Karl.” I nodded, my lips tightening into a straight line. “Yeah, I’m back. What the hell is going on here?”
He laughed, leaning against the doorjamb. “I guess you’ve been out of the loop, huh? This is a little bit of a surprise for you? Come on into my office, and I’ll get you up to speed.”
The woman at the desk lost interest as I walked past her, but I happened to catch a glimpse of her computer screen. The site she was on had a large, brightly-colored banner at the top which proclaimed The SUNBEAM—Central Florida’s One Stop for Fun in the Sun!
“Have a seat.” Karl pulled out the chair across from his desk before sitting down in his own.
“Karl, seriously. What the hell? When I left here three months ago, you were the assisting features editor. Where’s Mr. Clanton? Come to think of it, where’s everyone else?”
He chuckled. “You know, Viv, I’d actually forgotten that you were gone when everything went down here. Well, it happened pretty fast. One day, it was all business as usual, and then the next, we were bought out by National Press, Incorporated. Mr. Clanton retired, moved to Boca, and the new management brought me on to run the show.”
“Did you fire everyone?” I was still in shock. How could this have happened without me having even an inkling?
“No, of course not.” Karl appeared faintly insulted. “But now that we’ve moved to an entirely digital platform, it’s more cost-effective if the staff works from home. Those who chose to stay on have done just that. Matter of fact, we’ll be closing up this office within the next few weeks. The building’s already been sold.”
My heart was breaking. I could feel it. What Jeremy and his off-handed treatment of our relationship hadn’t done to me, this news had accomplished. Tears gathered in my eyes, and a lump rose in my throat.
“What about me? Didn’t anyone think to let me know that I’m now working from home, too? Did I miss a memo?”
Karl’s eyes widened. “Oh, Viv . . . hey, I’m sorry about that, but . . . you didn’t expect to have a job here, did you? As I understood it, you quit when you took the train job, right?”
“I didn’t quit.” I stood up and leaned over the desk. “I didn’t take another job. It was a three-month residency. Mr. Clanton gave me a leave of absence. He promised my position would be here when I got back, and he asked me to write about my experience on the train.”
“He didn’t mention anything to me, and there’s nothing on the books that shows that.” Karl shrugged. “Sorry. To tell you the truth, even if there was some kind of notation, I don’t think it would make a difference. We’ve changed the direction of the Sunbeam. We’re not targeting audiences like families or established Florida residents anymore. We’re looking to serve the younger generation, the millennials. Our new site focuses on topics of interest to that crowd, and I’m not sure you’d be a good fit.”
“What the fuck, Karl?” I was shouting now, and I didn’t even care. Who was around to hear me but the stupid secretary in the front? “I am a millennial. I’m fifteen years younger than you! Maybe I’m more qualified to be the boss here than you are. You wouldn’t know that something was cool if it came up and bit you on the ass.”
“That’s enough, Vivian.” Karl’s voice had shifted from the convivial, conciliatory aw-gee tone to an I’m-in-charge-and-don’t-you-forget-it vibe. “Listen, I get that this is a shock and that you’re upset. But it’s not my fault. You chose to take that job out of state—”
“It wasn’t a job. It was a residency. A temporary residency.”
“—and things changed while you were gone. This is just the way it is. Now I’d be happy to write you a glowing referral when you’re ready to look for a new position. I always thought you and I got along pretty well.”
“Hmph.” He was delusional. Maybe Karl had been okay with me, but I’d always thought he was an obsequious little weenie.
“And listen. I’m a reasonable guy. I’m willing to consider you for a freelance position if you think you have material that would work with our new site.”
I was on the verge of shooting him a rude gesture just to make sure Karl knew exactly what I thought of his offer, but before I could, he held up both of his hands. “Think about it, Viv. You’re right that you’re part of our target group. Why not consider coming up with a concept that would work for both of us?”
I wanted to sneer at his suggestion. I wanted to spit in his face, kick him in the balls and storm out, with my dignity intact. But I also wanted to be able to move out of Aunt Gail’s house at some point, and I wanted to be able to eat. So instead, I nodded.
“I’ll think about it.”
“You do that.” He dug into
his pocket and pulled out a business card. “Here’s my new contact info, in case you don’t have my number anymore. Text me and we’ll see what we can do.”
I didn’t trust myself to say anything else. I turned around and got out of there as fast as I could before something else could happen that might bring down my crumbling world.
“I never should have taken the residency.” I picked up my frappuccino and took a long, comforting drink. “If I’d stayed here, I’d be living with Jeremy, I’d still have a job, and . . .” I cast a long, dark look my mother’s way. “It wouldn’t matter that my parents are abandoning me.”
“Vivian, for heaven’s sake.” Mom took a long noisy sip of her iced green tea. “Daddy and I aren’t abandoning you. You’re twenty-six years old. You’ve been on your own for a while. We’re simply living our own lives, like any normal empty-nest adults would be.”
“And I thought we all agreed that the Jeremy debacle had ended up being a good thing,” Aunt Gail put in. She dunked her biscotti into her black coffee. “The job . . . yes, that’s disheartening.”
“I can’t believe neither of you knew about the Sunbeam being sold.” I shook my head. “How could you miss that?”
Aunt Gail wrinkled her nose, her eyes guilty. “I gave up my subscription a few years back. It was just too much paper in my house every week.”
“And Daddy and I were so busy with his grant and getting ready to sell the house that we didn’t have time to pay attention to anything else. I’m sorry, honey. Do you have any ideas about what you might do next?”
I shrugged. “I’ll start looking for a job tomorrow, I guess. Maybe I could find something online. I could do proofreading, too, if I could get hooked up with some people at the college.” I paused, swirling my straw through the icy drink. “Karl did say something about me doing freelance work at the Sunbeam. I was so furious that I didn’t really take him seriously, but maybe I should try to come up with an interesting concept.”
“How about ‘My parents sold my childhood home, but I’m okay with that because I’m an adult and happy for them’?” My mother shot me a saccharine smile.
I stuck out my tongue at her.
“Or ‘How much tequila does it take to forget a loser boyfriend?’” Aunt Gail waggled her eyebrows at me.
“Ha!” I smirked at her. “Or maybe ‘How many frogs do I have to kiss before I find my prince?’” I snorted, and then . . . suddenly and without warning, I got the tingle. It was the same tingle I’d gotten whenever I came up with a new story idea that I just knew was going to gel perfectly, or when I’d finally figured out the proposal that won me the Amerails residency. It was the tingle that told me I was onto something big, something that would work . . . something that could be life-changing.
“That’s it.” Aunt Gail’s eyes lit up, and a smile spread over her face. “You need to write about kissing frogs.”
“What?” My mother, lost and confused, looked from her friend to me. “Who’s kissing frogs?”
“I am.” I rested my elbows on the table and gnawed at my bottom lip. “How many frogs do I have to kiss before I find my prince?”
“It needs to be shorter. The title has to be attention-grabbing and pithy.” Aunt Gail cast her gaze upward. “Kissing frogs?”
“No.” I pointed at her. “You gave me a number. Fifty. I’m going to call it Fifty Frogs, and it’s going to be about the realities of dating in the twenty-first century.”
She laughed, clapping her hands. “Perfect! I love it.”
“I don’t get the frogs part, but the idea sounds intriguing.” My mom tilted her head. “What’s your angle?”
I thought for a few minutes. “I’m going to have to kiss some frogs. I mean, I’ll have to go on dates. That’ll be the plan: a series of first dates only, and I kiss the guy at the end of each first date. The report will be about what it’s really like to be a single girl looking for love in this day and age.”
“Are you really going to try to go on fifty first dates?” Aunt Gail asked. “That could be a challenge.”
“Yeah, you’re right. No, I think what you said the other night is true. It’s not the number, it’s the idea. I think it’s more realistic to look at a time frame instead of a number of dates.” I nodded. “It took three months for everything in my previous life to implode, right? So that’s what I’ll give this project. Three months of dates, and then I’ll have enough material for a series of articles.”
“I love this.” Aunt Gail rubbed her hands together. “It’s going to be so much fun to watch.”
“Are you okay with me staying with you while I work on this?” I asked Aunt Gail. “I’ll look for a part-time job so that I can pay you something in rent, but I doubt I can get anything right away that would be enough to let me move into my own place. And I’d feel better about going on these dates if I know someone’s at home waiting for me.”
“I second that,” my mother put in. “If you’re going to be out with strangers, it’s good to have someone who knows if you don’t make it home.”
I rolled my eyes to Aunt Gail. “So you can give the police a description of my date and his car, and they’ll be able to find my mangled body.”
“That’s a lovely image, Vivian. Thanks for that.” Mom shook her cup, which was mostly ice just now. “All right, girls. This has been lovely, but I need to get back to the hotel. Daddy and I have dinner plans.”
“Of course, you do,” I muttered under my breath. Aunt Gail poked me in the ribs as we deposited our empty cups in the trash and made our way to my mom’s car. She’d stopped by to visit right as I’d arrived home from my disastrous first day back at work . . . that hadn’t been. When she’d seen my face and heard the beginning of my story, my mother had stopped me and announced that this could not be discussed on an empty stomach. We’d driven over to Rosabella’s, our favorite coffee shop in town.
“I have a question, Vivian.” Mom glanced at me over her shoulder. Some things never changed; when I rode in the car as the third adult, I still got stuck in the backseat. “How do you propose to arrange all these dates you’re going to go on?”
“Well . . .” I stalled. I hadn’t actually thought this part through yet. “I guess I’ll just put myself out there and hope for the best.”
“Put yourself out where?”
Rolling my eyes, I slumped a little in my seat. “It’s a figure of speech, Mom. You know . . . putting myself out there. Making myself accessible to people who might find me attractive.”
“Ah. And how’s that been working out for you so far?” There was more than a little snarkiness in my mother’s voice.
“How should I know? I’ve been with Jeremy for the last year, so I haven’t been putting myself out there. I’ve been clearly marked as taken. Not single. Not available.”
“Hmmm.” She sounded unconvinced as she turned the car into Aunt Gail’s subdivision. “What are you going to do? Hit the bars? Try some online dating sites?”
“I’ll put out the word to Teddi and my other friends, so they can let me know if there’s anyone who might be a good prospect.” That was a good start, anyway.
“Isn’t that how you met Jeremy? Through mutual friends?” Mom sounded innocent, as though she were just asking a simple question.
“Yes, Mom, that is how we met, but I don’t think—”
“Karen, stop!”
My mother slammed on the brakes in response to Aunt Gail’s screech of warning. I lurched forward, catching myself on the seat in front of me. “What the hell?”
“There’s a turtle in the middle of the road.” Aunt Gail reached for the door handle. “Karen, put the car in park, please. I don’t want you to accidentally run me over while I’m trying to save this big guy.”
She hopped out of the car, leaving her door open as she rounded to the front, where she bent over and disappeared from my view. The turtle apparently had mixed feelings about being moved from his spot in the middle of the road, because he was resistant t
o being picked up. I heard Aunt Gail muttering at him.
Movement on the opposite side of the street caught my eye. A tall guy wearing shorts and a light green T-shirt dropped the rake he’d been holding and began walking toward us. My mother rolled down her window, waving as he approached.
“Hey, is everything okay? You need some help?” His voice was deep, without any hint of a local accent. As he came closer, I took in his light brown hair, a little longer than what I usually found attractive in a man, and the muscles that roped his long legs. The T-shirt hugged his chest in a way that made me want to skim my hands over it.
“There’s a turtle in the road.” Mom pointed as though this guy couldn’t figure out where it might be.
Aunt Gail appeared at the front fender. “I was trying to pick him up so we could move him to the sidewalk, but the damn thing went under the car again.”
“Huh.” Our new friend leaned his hand on the hood and bent over, putting his very fine ass . . . uh, assets on display. Oh, baby.
Straightening, he glanced at my mother. “He’s right in the middle, not near your wheels. If you drive forward—take it slow—I should be able to grab the turtle when you clear him.”
“Okay, Karen, ease forward just a little,” Aunt Gail called. “I’ll tell you when you can stop.”
Mom shifted into drive and let the car roll a few feet. Next to us, tall, fair and hunky dropped to his haunches and peered under the vehicle.
“Can you see him? Is he still between the wheels?” Mom craned her head out the window.
“Son of a—uh, gun, the crazy turtle’s moving as fast as the car. He’s running along to stay under there.”
“Oh, geez.” My mother waited until the guy dropped flat to the asphalt to check the turtle’s status before she twisted in her seat, her eyes huge. “Vivian, he’s so cute! Roll down your window! Or get out of the car. Introduce yourself.”
Fifty Frogs Page 5