“I don’t usually ask for someone’s number…”
“What?” Lisa snapped out of her reverie. “Oh sure, no problem.” She fished a scrap of paper from her wallet and quickly scribbled down her number, taking Riley’s in exchange.
Before she knew it, they had reached their cars. She took a deep breath, ready to say goodbye, when Riley took two small steps forward.
“You know, in the Dutch culture the greeting for hello is the same as goodbye.”
Lisa had to laugh. “Really, I didn’t know that.”
Riley took another step forward. “Yeah, especially with friends.”
The overhead streetlamp hummed, but Lisa didn’t notice. All she could hear was her pulse racing. “So, are you saying we’re friends now?”
“I would hope so.” Riley fidgeted from one foot to the other.
Lisa felt her voice catch in her throat and swallowed. “Well in that case, who am I to argue with culture?”
Riley took one final step, quickly leaned in and kissed her first on the right cheek, then on left cheek, and finally once again on the right cheek. “Goodbye, Lisa.” With that, she scurried to her truck and climbed in.
Lisa stood there, holding her hand over her right cheek, stunned as she watched Riley drive off. When her tail lights winked around the corner she laughed and turned to her car. There was no denying it, Riley was different—nice, but different.
Chapter Three
“Hey, there she is.” Susan poked her head into Riley’s lab. “What’s up?”
Riley spun around, glad for the reprieve from the cold case she was working on, a Jane Doe who had been killed in the Manistee National Forest sometime in the late eighties. She had been a resident of the Forensic Anthropology Lab ever since with approximately thirty other skeletal remains, some as recent as a few months and others dating back centuries. Riley had been expecting a visit from Susan all week and being as it was now Thursday, she had about given up hope. “Where have you been? I’m surprised you didn’t call me up first thing Sunday morning.”
“Caroline wouldn’t let me.” Susan stepped in and pulled up a stool beside the examination table. “Besides, I didn’t have to. From the looks of it, you and Lisa really hit it off. Man, if I hadn’t booted you out, I bet the two of you would’ve talked all night.”
The same thought had occurred to Riley. “I was just as shocked as you. I really did have a great time.”
“See, I told you so. I knew you’d have a good time if you just let yourself. And to think, you didn’t want to come.”
“Okay, you were right, I was wrong.”
“Oh my God, I don’t believe it.” Susan’s mouth dropped wide open and she cupped her hand around her ear. “Doth my ears deceive me or did I just hear the great Dr. Kate Riley admit that she was wrong?”
“Yeah, yeah.” Riley rolled her eyes. Susan wouldn’t let her live this down.
“So, have you talked since?”
“No, not yet.”
“You got her number, right?”
“Of course I did. What do you think I am, completely inept?”
The look on Susan’s face suggested that was exactly her thought.
Riley went on, ignoring the look of smug self-righteousness. “Anyhow, I was thinking of maybe calling her this weekend or something.”
“Riley, Riley, Riley. What am I going to do with you, girl? You like her, right? You should’ve called her Sunday or even Monday and told her what a good time you had. You know, make plans to see each other again. You don’t want her thinking you didn’t have a good time.”
“It’s not a big deal, Susan. Besides, I hardly know her. It’s not as if it were a date or anything.”
“That may be but it’s a fine line between friends and friendlier. Just look at Caroline and me. We were only friends for how long—a year? And then one day we just realized we were much more than friends. It could happen to you too, you know.”
“I’ll settle for just a friend for now, thank you very much.” She had to applaud Susan’s effort, as misguided as it might be. “Remember, I’m not good at pair bonding.”
“Oh God, Riley. It’s not pair bonding were talking about, it’s romance, it’s love. Someday you might realize the difference.” Susan glanced at her watch and stood. “Look, I’ve got to get back. One of my grad students is arguing that he should be able to waive his thesis on philosophical grounds. He actually makes a pretty good argument.”
“Is he going to win?” Riley walked with Susan to the door.
“Not a chance. But I’ve got to give him credit for trying.” Susan rolled her head back and laughed. “Still, I have to have a meeting with him to make it official. If only he would put as much effort into writing his thesis as he did in constructing an argument against it.” Just as she disappeared out the door, she took one step backwards, poking her head back into Riley’s lab. “Oh, and Riley, give Lisa a call. Trust me, you’ll thank me.” She mimed dialing a phone and with that was gone.
Riley walked slowly back across her lab and stared down at the pile of old bones on the table, not really seeing them. She may have told Susan that she had been thinking all week of calling Lisa, but that wasn’t entirely true. She had gotten within one digit of dialing Lisa’s phone number twice before she lost her nerve and hung up. What would she say anyway? When it came to this type of social interaction she really didn’t have a clue. Give her a college function, a lecture or even a dreaded dinner party like Susan and Caroline’s, she could deal with it but a one-on-one encounter—just the thought of it made her shudder. Still, there was something about Lisa that she wouldn’t mind seeing again.
* * *
Lisa grabbed her cell phone and quickly dialed Riley’s number before she could chicken out. All week long she had been running every aspect of the night they met back and forth, every word, every thread of the conversation, every minute gesture, expression or glance. She couldn’t remember meeting someone so intense yet so intriguing. Even saying goodbye, a small trivia lesson on Dutch culture to justify a triple-cheeked kiss, although not romantic, had been sweet. Okay, it had been a little romantic, but she didn’t want romance. A fun intriguing new friend, yes—romance, no.
When the phone picked up on the other end, her throat seized shut. This was as bad as high school. Maybe she should just send Riley a note that said, “Do you want to be my friend? Check yes or no.” She chuckled at the thought.
“Riley speaking.” Plain, simple, to the point. Lisa didn’t expect anything else.
“Hey, Riley, Lisa here.” What else could she say? As dry as her throat was, she was surprised she even got that out.
“Talk about coincidences, Lisa, I was just about to call you.” Her voice picked up, much less businesslike.
“Wow, really?”
“Yeah, I swear. Or maybe it’s like what Sophocles was pointing out in Oedipus Rex, the Gods still have a divine influence over the Greeks, meaning everything happens for a reason.”
Lisa couldn’t help but laugh—Riley had shifted into professor mode, something she seemed to do whenever she was nervous and didn’t know what to say. Jessie had been the same way. Although some might find it annoyingly patronizing, she found it endearing. “Or maybe it’s like what Master Oogway in Kung Fu Panda says about coincidences—there are no accidents.”
“Kung Fu Panda, huh? I don’t believe I’ve ever seen that.”
“Oh man, Riley, you’re missing out. It’s one of my favorite movies and it teaches a great lesson. Sometime I’ll have to have you over and we can watch it, that is if you don’t mind seeing something that isn’t about the cultural practices in Zimbabwe or Timbuktu. Or maybe we could watch the movie Ants.” Lisa held her breath, waiting for Riley to respond.
“Ants? Ants? I can’t believe you just went there. You’re going to pay for that one next time I see you, Ms. Smartass.”
From the sound of Riley’s laughter, she figured that was pretty much an empty threat. “Actually, tha
t’s why I was calling. Would you by chance be free on Saturday?”
“Saturday, huh? I don’t know…I might be busy in the lab…training all those ants.”
Lisa was glad to hear Riley dishing it right back at her. Life was too short not to have a sense a humor. That was something she had learned from Jessie. “Trust me, this is better. I have tickets to State’s football game at home against Western on Saturday.”
Riley paused on the other end long enough for Lisa to begin to worry. Maybe she had been stupid to offer the invitation. Maybe Riley had something against football. Riley finally cleared her throat.
“Geez Lisa, I don’t know the first thing about football. I’ve never even been to a game.”
Lisa felt her mouth drop wide open. “Riley, how can you teach at Michigan State University and never have attended a football game? That’s just…that’s just…un-American.”
“I guess I just haven’t gotten around to it. Besides, I’ve never really been into sports.”
“Oh Riley, you’re killing me here. It’s high time you experience a football game. Think of it as an anthropological study on ritualized combat in the modern post-industrial world.”
“Now that’s something I can get into.”
She figured as much. All she had to do was put it in terms that Riley could appreciate. “Great, I’ll pick you up at noon on Saturday.”
With that she quickly jotted down the directions to Riley’s house and hung up, kicking back in her recliner. Her heart was still trip-hammering in her chest. It had taken all her courage to call but now she was glad she had. Then again, why was she getting all worked up about it? It wasn’t a date. She had merely asked a friend to go with her to a football game. Simple. Friends did that all the time. But as much as she told herself that, her heart refused to return to normal completely.
* * *
When Lisa pulled up in front of Riley’s on Saturday in her bright competition-yellow Ford Focus ST, she stared out the window and blew out a small whistle between her teeth. The house, a three-story, fully-restored Victorian with wrap-around porch, cried history and culture. The truck parked in the driveway had a bumper sticker that read, “I dig dead people.” Lisa shook her head and chortled.
Before she could open her car door, Riley came flying out and bounding down the steps, dressed in hiking boots, khaki shorts and surprise of all surprises, a Michigan State football jersey. Lisa was completely taken aback. Of course she was wearing her favorite Michigan State sweatshirt to show her team spirit, but she hadn’t expected to see Riley sporting the Spartan colors.
Riley yanked the door open and flopped down beside Lisa, who was looking as excited as she was. She whirled around, a smile ear to ear. “Thanks again for inviting me. I can’t wait to study this ‘ritualized combat in the modern post-industrial world’.” She smoothed her hands over her shirt. “This is okay to wear, isn’t it?”
Lisa tried her best to hold a straight face as she reached over the center console and patted Riley’s bare leg. “Believe me, it’s perfect.” Unable to hide her amusement any longer, she laughingly pulled away from the curb.
Riley glanced about, taking in the interior of her car. “Wow, Lisa, nice car.”
Lisa patted the steering wheel as she pulled out. “Thanks, Riley. It was number eight on my list.”
“What list is that?” Riley leaned over, her eyes wide.
Lisa bit her lip and paused for a moment. How much should she actually share with Riley? The List, as she had come to think of it, was very personal to her, something that Jessie had left her. Would sharing it with Riley somehow betray Jessie or worse yet, would Riley think that it was silly or stupid? But as she glanced over at Riley, the honest curiosity lighting up her face, she figured she didn’t really have anything to worry about. Finally, she took a deep breath. “I don’t know if Susan or Caroline told you but a little over a year ago I lost Jessie, my partner of ten years, to cervical cancer.”
Riley slowly nodded her head. “Yeah, they mentioned that. I’m really sorry.”
She would have to thank Susan and Caroline later. She hadn’t known for sure but she figured her protective friends had probably filled Riley in. She paused again, searching for what to say. “Before Jessie died”—she swallowed the hard lump in her throat—“she made up this list of a hundred things that she wanted me to do after she was gone. She called it Lisa’s Anti-Bucket List.”
Lisa smiled at the thought. She hadn’t found it until after the funeral. She had come home after the graveside service and wake to a cold, quiet, lonely house. It was that, more so than seeing Jessie laid out at the funeral home, more so than any condolences from her family and friends, more so even than the finality of the minister’s words beside her freshly-dug grave, that gave her the greatest sense of loss. She had just collapsed there in the middle of the living room floor and howled.
Breslin had curled up in her lap, doing his best, but she couldn’t help but think that he was missing Jessie too. Who wouldn’t? Jessie had been so full of life that it was hard to fathom that she was gone. It was then that she looked up and noticed the paper sticking out of the bookshelf right between her favorite book, Little Women, and Jessie’s favorite book, Wuthering Heights. She didn’t know when it had been put there. She didn’t remember seeing it in the weeks leading up to the end, not that she remembered much of anything. It was all just a blur. But Jessie must’ve somehow slipped it between those two books where she knew she would find it eventually. She got to her feet, taking Breslin with her, and pulled the folded sheets of paper from between the books. There, written right across the top of the front page in Jessie’s neat, flowing script, was “Lisa’s Anti-Bucket List”. That was so much like Jessie too—to leave her something, just a little reminder, of how much she loved her.
Lisa could feel her eyes well up. Maybe it hadn’t been such a good idea to bring it up after all. She fought hard to hold back the tears. How would that look if she just suddenly broke down in front of Riley, a new friend? But Riley came to the rescue.
“Anti-Bucket list? I’ve heard of a bucket list but never an anti-bucket list.”
“Well, that’s kind of hard to explain. Of course, you’ve heard of a bucket list—things you’d like to check off before you die. Jessie didn’t like that. She always said that if you are too focused on the end, you’ll forget to live along the way, and that’s what she thought a bucket list was—too much about the end. Life’s a journey not a destination and all that stuff. That’s where the Anti-Bucket list comes in. It’s more of a life-affirming, focus on the journey sort of thing. For example, number one was carpe diem.”
“Ah, carpe diem quam minimum credula postero—‘seize the day, putting as little trust as possible in the next’ from Horace. I like that, to live completely in the moment and not worry about the future but trust that it will work itself out.”
“Exactly. That’s why Jessie called it an Anti-Bucket list.”
“That’s very sweet. Your partner must have been a very special person.”
“Jessie really was, Riley. I think you would have really liked her.”
“I’m sure I would have.” Riley offered her a warm smile before reaching over and patting her arm twice. She then scrunched up her nose. “I have to ask, though—how is your car number eight on the list?”
Lisa began to laugh. “Number eight was find a car that makes you feel alive to drive and I must say, this car does just that.” She clicked on her blinker and pulled onto the on-ramp to I-96 heading toward Lansing and accelerated hard, running through the gears. “See?”
Riley grabbed onto the center console with one hand and the armrest with the other, her eyes agog. “Holy crap, Lisa. This thing’s got quite a bit of zip.”
“That’s two hundred and fifty-two horses of turbocharged fun right there.” She was grinning like a fool as she merged onto the freeway. The car certainly fit the bill of making her feel alive to drive. Compared to the old beater she had been
driving, this car made her feel as if she were running the Indianapolis 500 when only going for groceries.
She finally shifted into sixth and punched the cruise in at a conservative seventy-five. Even though she was running five over, traffic was whizzing by in the passing lane. “I don’t know how you can drive this every day, Riley. It would drive me nuts.”
“You think this is bad? You ought to see it at seven in the morning. People are just insane.” She pointed at a car that blew by doing at least eighty-five.
Lisa kept her eyes on the road, both hands on the wheel. “Why do you live in Grand Rapids then? That’s a good hour plus drive each way. Wouldn’t it be easier to live closer to campus, especially in the winter with the snow and crappy roads? That’s why I live here—my school’s only a few minutes away. ”
Riley tapped her finger to her chin. “You’re probably right but I kind of need the distance between work and home. That way I can leave it all there and try to put it out of my mind.” She lowered her eyes sheepishly. “Besides, it gives me time to enjoy my one guilty pleasure.”
Lisa could feel her cheeks beginning to blush. She couldn’t possibly imagine what Riley could be talking about. And by the sheepish look, she figured it couldn’t be good but curiosity was killing her. She had to know. “I’m almost afraid to ask, Riley, but what would that be?”
Riley now began to laugh. “I’m addicted to audiobooks.”
“Oh my God, Riley, audiobooks? That’s what it was? Audiobooks? And here I thought it was going to be something bad.” She reached out and nudged Riley in the ribs.
“Nope, just audiobooks.”
“So, what are you listening to now—a study on early human migration patterns?”
Riley rubbed her forehead, hiding her eyes behind her hand. “Um…not exactly.”
“Oh please tell me. It’s not some sappy romance, is it?”
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