by Nick Trout
“There you go,” says Mary, placing the steaming mug before me. “Let me know if you change your mind.”
I thank her and look up as a bearded man in a lumberjack shirt breezes by on his way to the counter. Five more minutes, that’s all I’ll give her and then this annoying Mrs. Brown can damn well drive over to Bedside Manor and drop off the check at my convenience, not hers.
Fifteen minutes later and I’m looking over my shoulder for Mary, wanting to pay for my coffee, when I notice a domino effect of male heads turning toward the front door. I join in and discover a woman hovering at the entrance—golden hair swept back and expertly pinned in place, meticulously applied makeup (the sort that’s supposed to look like you’re not wearing any), short white double-breasted trench coat, jeans, and knee-length leather boots. If this new arrival is Mrs. Brown, she either works for Vogue magazine or she’s totally overdressed to drop off some money.
Why is she headed my way?
“Mr. Lovelace? Thomas Lovelace?”
“I’m… I beg your pardon?”
“The tie. Too funny. And so much more original than a pink carnation.”
Pink carnation?
“I’m Dr. Winn Honey,” she says, extending her hand for me to shake.
Winn Honey. Dr. Honey. Dr. Honey, the vet from Healthy Paws who hates my guts. Why on earth is this woman greeting me like we’re on a blind date?
Dazed, fish-mouthed, and speechless, I watch as my hand drifts up and completes the greeting.
“Mind if I take a seat?”
She’s already unbuttoning her coat, hanging it on the brass hanger at the end of the booth, and sliding across the seat opposite, the tips of the fingers of her right hand performing a minor adjustment to her coif.
“So sorry I’m late. Work.” I get the whites of her eyes again, a sharp intake of breath. “But let’s not go there just yet. Should I begin or would you prefer to start?”
The only reason I’m not drooling like a total moron is the adrenaline coursing through my body and sapping my saliva. The logic is irrefutable. Given she used the name Tommy Lovelace, the mother of Charlie Brown and Doc Honey must be one and the same person.
It’s the question I’m about to ask when my phone begins buzzing in my pants and I recognize the number of the caller. Amazing. At this precise moment, I can think of no one else in the world I would want to speak to more.
“Would you excuse me for one minute? I have to take this call.”
“Sure. Want a refill?” asks my adversary, pointing to my empty mug.
“Why not,” I reply, hurrying through the front door and out into the night.
I flip open the phone.
“She there yet?”
“Yes, Charlize, she’s here all right. You want me to tell her how you set her up on a blind date with a veterinarian and not a porn star?”
There’s a silence, followed by a sigh, followed by, “It was Gabe’s idea. Okay, Gabe’s and my idea. He figured I could use Marmalade as a way for me to check you out. We wanted to hook you guys up ’cause we both really like you, and Gabe wants to pay you back for being cool about the pot. And I’m sick of the way Mom’s meeting weird men online and bringing them home on a first date like a sex-starved nymphet. It’s embarrassing.”
“You what? No, no, that’s ridiculous and totally inappropriate. I’m sorry, Charlize, you leave me no choice but to—”
“It’s too late. Gabe already set this up through a dating website: Loveatfirstsite.com. But don’t worry, he didn’t use your name or anything to create a profile.”
Any sarcastic “that’s a relief” rebuttal escapes me as the surprises keep coming.
“Mom thinks you’re Mr. Tommy Lovelace. The site sent her an email saying the two of you were compatible and you were eager to see if there were any sparks, any love at first sight.”
Her amorous intonation is not helping her cause as I pace back and forth in front of the entrance to the diner, the fog in my head as thick as the fog from my breath. “Let me get this straight—you guys secretly created a dating profile for me and lured me here to meet your mom and she has no idea?”
“Just listen,” says Charlize. “You can walk away at any time. That’s why we gave you a fake ID and put you together on neutral territory. Mom has no idea who you really are.”
“Clearly,” I say, flashing back to her angry phone call about Sox Sauer. “So your worries about Marmalade’s weight, that was just to set this up?”
“No… not really,” says Charlize, but I detect a shift in her tone, brazen and defiant turning more uncertain, even introspective. “My mom actually did all those tests and she still can’t figure out why Marmalade’s so fat. Maybe you’re smart enough to find out where she went wrong.”
I can’t tell if that’s a challenge or a request. Either way, if the second case I poach from Healthy Paws happens to be Dr. Honey’s own cat, I’ll need an ambulance and then a lawyer.
“Coming clean as a veterinarian from the nearby rival practice might prove a little tricky, don’t you think?”
“Maybe. But based on the type of man she usually ends up with, if you two hit it off, she’ll find a way to forgive you. Can you say low self-esteem?”
For all her scheming and the burden of the shameful and outrageous position she’s put me in, I can’t help but admire her chutzpah.
“Walk away and she’ll be none the wiser. Wouldn’t blame you, especially if she starts blabbing about work and more work.”
And, unintentionally (at least I hope so), this is where Charlie Brown sets the hook.
“Go back a minute,” I say, stopping in front of a bulletin board to the left of the diner’s entrance. “What details did Gabe make up about this Mr. Tommy Lovelace?”
On a bulletin board outside the diner, next to a handwritten notice of someone searching for a runaway teenager, there’s a poster that pulls me away from Charlie’s reply.
Healthy Paws and the Eden Falls Knights of Columbus present
Pet First Aid
A lecture by local Healthy Paws veterinarian, Dr. Winn Honey, VMD.
Refreshments will be served
Freebies for your four-legged friends
Dogs Allowed*
“He kept it vague. Except what you do for a living.”
Dogs allowed. But there’s an asterisk. My eyes dart to the bottom. Where’s the asterisk, where’s the exception?
“Doc, you still there?”
I can’t find it. “Sorry, missed that last bit.”
“Gabe put down your job as movie reviewer for an online magazine. He didn’t know what else to write. If it helps, he did say you love animals.”
Dr. Honey is going to lecture here, in Eden Falls? First they hit up the Gazette to advertise for a free clinic and now they want to do outreach to pet owners on my turf.
“Okay. I’m going to see what happens… but forget about a fairy-tale ending. Your mother may be an attractive woman, but I’m not interested. Right now, I’d love to walk away, but it would be rude and hurtful and unfair to someone who’s been conned by her daughter into thinking a computer program just discovered her soul mate. And don’t think I won’t spill the beans if this gets messy.”
The line falls silent, and for the first time since stepping outside in only a shirt and tie I feel the cold setting in.
“Sorry,” she says, and I don’t need to hear her weeping to know she means it.
“Charlie.”
“What?”
“I’m not going to get paid for that visit today, am I?”
“No,” she says, “not unless the sundae counts.”
Back inside the diner, Dr. Honey has her back to me, sipping a coffee. The fact that she hasn’t stormed off or come looking for me can only mean one thing—Mary the waitress hasn’t blown my cover as Cyrus Mills. How long can that last?
“Very sorry about that,” I say, squeezing back into the booth. “Rude of me, and I apologize.”
“Not a
t all,” says Honey, eyeing me with unnerving scrutiny over the rim of her mug before placing it off to one side. “Do I detect an accent, Tom? Sorry, do you prefer Tom or Tommy or Thomas?”
“Tom’s fine,” I stutter, “and yes… um… I lived in… Mississippi, for a while, slip in a little twang and drawl every now and then.”
Dr. Honey sits up a little straighter, plays with the handle of the mug. “It’s nice. I like it.”
I’m guessing she’s a little older than me, midforties, and I’m rewarded for staring with a big smile of overly whitened teeth. I’m speechless. This is why I’ve never been on a blind date. The only two questions that have popped into my head are “Do you work out?” and “How tall are you?” Both make me sound like a creep who wonders if she’ll fight back or fit inside the tomb under my basement. I’m so not suited for this.
I’m glad I couldn’t get a word in edgewise when she was reaming me out on the phone over Sox Sauer. Clearly she hasn’t recognized my voice.
“Need anything else?” asks Mary, breezing by, glass coffee carafe in hand.
“I think we’re fine,” says Dr. Honey, placing her hand over the top of her mug. I pretend to sip, shake my head, and though Mary keeps going, she’s not fooling me. I know I’m being watched. Amy’s co-worker is obviously curious about the meeting between Dr. Mills and a beautiful stranger of the opposite sex. Suddenly that unpleasant writhing sensation in my guts at the thought of Amy out with another man lessens at the prospect of what Mary imagines she sees and might report back to Amy.
“You were about to go first,” I say as though I’m familiar with the standard blind-dating protocol.
“Ladies first,” says Dr. Honey, folding her hands in front of her on the table. “I like that.” I fear she has her thirty-second elevator pitch down cold. “My name’s Winifred, old-fashioned I know, but friends call me Winn. I’m a veterinarian, so naturally I love animals. I’m a hopeless romantic, but from time to time I like to let my hair down, if you know what I mean. I love good food, good wine, good books, and good movies.”
“Good… good,” I say, slow nodding and feeling anything but. She pretty much covered every base. If I said I was an abstinent illiterate vegan hermit I’m pretty sure I’d still be in with a chance. “You work here in Eden Falls?”
See how I did that? Fake left, go right.
“No, I work over at a Healthy Paws in Patton.”
“You like being a vet?” After a lifetime of being on the other end of this question, I know how this inane line of inquiry goes. “What I mean is… it must be so rewarding, but also so very sad, putting animals to sleep all the time.”
Winn Honey looks down at the table and back at me.
“I promised myself I wouldn’t bore you with tales of woe from work.”
“Don’t be silly,” I say. I can’t believe I’m staring into the sparkling green eyes of the enemy. This is so wrong. At the very least I should get up and walk away. “I’m fascinated with what goes on at a modern animal hospital.” I know, I know, but at least I’m telling the truth. “I always wanted to be a veterinarian when I grew up.” See, so long as I don’t actually lie, this façade doesn’t feel too bad.
“Oh, I don’t know,” she says on a sigh. “My boss is a total dick, pardon my French.”
“Your boss?”
“Sorry, office manager. Today he made me call the animal hospital down the road,” she points over her shoulder, “stood right in front of me while I shouted at their vet for stealing one of our cases. He has some sort of vendetta against them.”
“Wait, this guy stole your case?” As soon as the words leave my mouth I want them back. How would I know the vet is a he?
“It’s complicated, but my boss thinks that if I lose a case I must be doing something wrong. It was enough to get a second written warning in as many days.”
She missed it, so I pounce. “Second?”
“Tuesday night I was on call, but I forgot to turn my phone to vibrate. Ended up missing an emergency.”
Ah, Tallulah, the pot brownie–chewing mastiff.
“One more strike against me and I’m out, fired, time to look for a new job, and, thanks to a noncompete clause, I’d have to move out of the area.”
“Noncompete clause?”
“Forget it,” she says, wafting a hand in front of her face. “All it means is I can’t afford to screw up on Saturday. I’ve got this stupid lecture to give here in Eden Falls at the Knights of Columbus. It’s meant to drum up business, an excuse to show off our place. You should come, if you’re interested.”
“I am,” I say, and then, ignoring the fact that I’d be instantly unmasked as Cyrus Mills, I add, “I will.”
She seems inordinately pleased, as though by making this promise we already have a future together.
“Your turn,” she says, and then, reading the fear contorting my face as nervousness, she reaches across the table to touch my hand. “First blind date?”
I nod, and then it strikes me that it may be possible for me to go forward, to maintain this lie, so long as I stick to the truth.
“Take your time,” she says soothingly. “No rush. Whatever comes into your head.”
“Well… I’m from Eden Falls. Obviously I like watching movies.” My awkward, nervous laugh is genuine.
“Obviously,” she says, showing me her teeth again. It’s like she’s coercing a naughty boy to come clean about his crime.
“Um… well, I would say I have a certain… affinity… to animals.”
“Affinity? Interesting.”
Only ten percent of men and women get a second date if they say they don’t like pets.
“Yes, that I’m intrigued by what’s going on inside them.”
“Really. Like a pet psychic?”
Oh dear. “A little bit,” I say, trying to think of ways to return to the secrets of Healthy Paws.
“Tell me,” she says, trying to bail me out. “What’s your greatest strength?”
I make a show of bringing my thumb and fingers to my chin. Obviously trust goes out the window and so does honesty. Logical and intelligent seem a little self-aggrandizing.
“Good listener,” I reply. Which is code for “I’d love to listen to you gripe some more about your place of work.”
“Greatest weakness?”
It’s painful to watch the sincerity, the hope in her eyes.
“That’s easy. Stubborn. Judgmental. Occasionally impulsive.”
“Impulsive?”
Dr. Honey seems to like the sound of that one a little too much.
“I tend to jump to conclusions,” I add. “Not always the right ones.”
Her head lilts ever so slightly to one side. “Has that gotten you in trouble in past relationships? With your ex-wife…?”
Oh, okay, she’s fishing here.
“Actually I’ve never been married. You?”
She hesitates. Maybe it’s the recollection of what went wrong or the worry of what she must confess. “Guilty.”
Strange word, like she’s committed a crime.
“Maried for nineteen years.”
“Irreconcilable differences?” I ask.
“Irreconcilable hatred,” she snaps back, and I can tell she means it.
“Children?”
For the first time she appears a little flustered.
“Just one—a teenage girl. But she lives with her father. Wanted to stay in the same school system. I see her every so often. Essentially, it’s just me, not forgetting the love of my life, Marmalade.”
Well, well, I’m not the only one telling fibs. Has Winn Honey discovered that having a child seriously limits your dating options? And why was Charlie not referred to by name? Is the daughter caught up in some sort of misplaced anger at her ex? I know what it’s like to play the blame game, changing my last name to my mother’s maiden name and refusing to acknowledge my father’s existence for fifteen years. It took his death and his dying veterinary practice before I rea
lized, too late, what a fool I’d been. I wonder how far this jilted woman will go to compete with the much-maligned Mr. Brown in Wisconsin.
“Marmalade. I’m guessing an orange cat.”
“Very good. Maybe you are psychic after all.” This next smile is coy, not unpleasant, and, I imagine, has proven to be highly effective in the past. “Look, after my day I could really use something stronger than a coffee. You fancy a real drink? We could take this conversation to a bar or, if you prefer, I’ve got a nice Chardonnay chilling at home.”
The recollection of Charlie Brown gagging over her mother’s penchant for one-night stands comes to mind as one of my Bedside Manor clients stomps through the diner’s front door. Ethel Silverman is a crotchety old biddy who makes Doris look positively discreet and compassionate. Her raptor eyes spy me. She bristles but heads straight for the counter. How long before I’m treated to a surly update regarding her husky Kai’s ongoing skin issues?
“Yeah… um… that sounds perfectly… fine, but…” Think, Cyrus, think. “But… I’ll be honest… I wasn’t sure this… encounter, was going to…”
“Let me guess, you prefer brunettes?” she says with a smile that barely masks her vulnerability. I see it, around her eyes, written in the fine wrinkles and lines of her carefully applied foundation, the insecurity, the permanent scar of being abandoned by your husband for another woman.
“No, of course not.”
It’s true, in a general, unprejudiced way, but she appears to catch the fact that my remark is more objective, less emotional.
“So what’s the problem?”
“There is none. I thought this was a way to see if there was anything between us.”
“And is there?”
“More than you can imagine,” I say, reaching into my pocket and laying a twenty-dollar bill on the table. I want to get away before Ethel and Mary rat me out, even though I need change and don’t want to give Dr. Honey the impression I’m trying to impress her with a big tip.