My Life as a Doormat (in Three Acts)

by Rene Gutteridge

  First of all, Jodie would never use a word like nonsensical, but I let it pass. Jodie was coming from the perspective of a nonromantic, so her views were going to be slightly skewed. Of course I was happy for my sister, and of all people, I know opposites attract. Jodie was getting ready to learn that herself, because in about three pages, she was going to be introduced to Timothy.

  I stood and marched over to my computer. That was one way to get Jodie to shut up . . . just give her some catchy lines in the play.

  It took an hour to reach the scene where Jodie would meet Timothy for the first time. I’d been looking forward to this scene ever since I began. Jodie had lost a bet with a friend, and she had to pay up by letting her friend set her up on a blind date with anyone her friend wanted. The friend had chosen the most romantic restaurant in town, and here Jodie Bellarusa waited, drumming her fingers against a tablecloth more expensive than her entire outfit, staring at a centerpiece of five plump, dewy roses, complete with thorns.

  I rubbed my hands together and cackled. J. R. wanted conflict? This was going to be conflict like she’d never seen before. I typed out the setting and then had Timothy enter from stage right.

  Now, what in the world would Jodie say out loud that she shouldn’t when she first lays eyes on the man who could only be described as “dashing”?

  “You must be Jodie.”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m Timothy.”

  I rubbed my hands together again. This was going to be good. Yesirree, brilliant. I watched the blinking cursor, waiting for that lightbulb moment. Don’t rush it, I told myself. Don’t panic. It will come. Clever, conflict-ridden dialogue doesn’t always just flow down the mountain of literary genius like hot, bubbly lava. No, sometimes it spews. And spewing, while not as graceful, still gets the magma out of the earth.

  A shiver of doubt swept through my body. Was I only capable of using National Geographic metaphors?

  Maybe you’ve missed your calling.

  “Jodie, why don’t you use your energy to come up with a clever line for the play.”

  Huh. I’d talked back to Jodie. That was weird.

  I think I had rubbed my hands together for the eighth time when it began to occur to me that I would be lucky to spew. In fact, I would be lucky to sputter.

  I think I yelped. Some curse had come upon me! No thanks to Elisabeth. I stared at the screen and muttered to myself, “I am not a prophet. Nothing I have written or will write is going to come true. It’s all a coincidence.”

  I carefully laid my hands across the keyboard and typed out:

  “I’ve never been to dinner with a metrosexual.”

  The sigh of relief that rushed from my mouth could’ve blown out the Olympic torch. But as I studied the line, it wasn’t really that funny. Too obvious. Timothy was a metrosexual, but stating it up front was overkill. I deleted it, but reminded myself that it was a start. At least I’d typed something.

  “Come ON!” I yelled at the screen. I need wit! I need a clever diatribe. I need snappy one-liners!

  For forty minutes I wandered around my apartment, hoping that elusive burst of brilliance would send me racing back to my computer. Then a thought struck me. Maybe, just maybe, I was trying too hard to create a scene that wasn’t supposed to happen. Maybe to Jodie Bellarusa’s everlasting surprise, they hit it off. Maybe that’s why she couldn’t come up with anything cleverly condescending.

  “Aha!” I actually jabbed a finger toward the ceiling. As long as that clichéd gesture didn’t make its way onto the page, I was going to be fine. “And before you say anything, Jodie, you should realize that sometimes you have to shake things up. I’m the playwright, and I know exactly what I’m doing.” Jodie remained silent, thankfully.

  Some writers put a body in a trunk. Some kill off a main character. It’s called a plot twist, and more often than not, it’s discovered by the writer after he or she has written him- or herself into a corner. There comes the belief in every story, with every writer, that it is the worst story ever written. This is not true, of course, and once a person other than the writer reads the story, a confirmation usually comes that the story is, in fact, good. But at the halfway point the writer will usually think the work is, as they say in the scientific world, “dormant.”

  After examining the many pages and pages of writing, she will come to the conclusion that the story is more boring than any other story that has ever been written in the history of the world. This thought causes even the most confident of writers to curl into a fetal position and suck the proverbial thumb.

  But then days later, possibly on a dark and stormy night, after personal hygiene has become a distant memory and all hope is lost, the writer has a small, easily-described-as-crazy thought roll through her foggy mind. At first, she laughs it off as insane. But then, something convinces her that it’s not so crazy after all, and if she reworks this and reworks that, she can sell it.

  She rushes to her computer, and after several hours of nonstop typing, she realizes that all her story needed was a shake-up, and that one shake-up can carry the writer all the way to the end of her masterpiece.

  “That’s what everyone is expecting,” I said. “They’re expecting these two opposites to hate each other at first. That is what we, in the writing world, call preee-diiiictability.” I rubbed my hands together for the ninth and final time and then wrote out a scene so shockingly unpredictable that it only took me fifteen minutes to create.

  I smiled, laughed, and did a little dance that no one should ever see. Then I promptly sent the new scene to J. R.

  I did the little dance again, but this time, I ended up with an audience, because my front door flew open and Elisabeth caught me just as I thrust my hip toward the kitchen and threw my hands in the air.

  “Leah!” she screamed and rushed to my side.

  My hands flopped to my sides. “What?”

  “Are you okay?”

  “Why?”

  “You’re okay?”

  “Yes, I’m fine.”

  Elisabeth looked confused. “I thought you were having a seizure.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I’m dancing.”

  “You don’t dance.”

  “I do too.”

  “Leah, no offense, but you’re not the dancing type.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I’ve known you for years. You’ve never danced.”

  “I dance all the time. Around here.”

  Elisabeth suppressed a smile. “That doesn’t surprise me.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Leah, you already know this about yourself. You’re just not really one to let loose, you know? You don’t even throw caution to a soft, gentle breeze, much less the wind.”

  I wasn’t going to let Elisabeth spoil my fun, so I did a little jig toward the kitchen, proving I could dance in front of other people. I did notice, however, that all that moved were my elbows as they sliced back and forth across my rib cage. “So, what brings you by?”

  “You don’t know?” she asked.

  I thought for a moment. Creyton. That was the last time we’d spoken, and she’d nearly left upset. I’d managed to apologize, but we’d left up in the air what she was going to do about her life.

  “Have you made any decisions?” I asked.

  “Yeah. That’s what I came over here to tell you.” Her finger traced around the toast crumbs on my counter. “I’m going to take it to the next level.”

  “An affair?” I blurted.

  “Call it what you want. I’ll never know if I don’t do this.”

  “You’re willing to risk your family?”

  “Henry won’t know, Leah. He’s never around to know. And I don’t know if he would care anyway.”

  Here was another chance for me to tell her what I thought, but I wasn’t sure what I could say. Last time I’d spoken up, Elisabeth had interpreted it as me taking Henry’s side.

  “You’re quiet,” she observed. “
You think I’m making a mistake.”

  “I . . . think you should take more time to think about this. Obviously Henry isn’t fulfilling your needs, but—”

  “You’re right. And he’s not even trying.” She took my hand. “I want you to meet him.”

  “Who? Creyton?”

  “Of course Creyton.”

  “But . . . but why?”

  “Why? You’re my best friend. I want you two to know each other. He’s home right now. You could come by and—”

  “Elisabeth, I don’t think that’s a good—”

  “You’d really like him, Leah, if you just gave him a chance.”

  I glanced at the microwave clock. “I’d love to meet him, really, I would, but I can’t right now. I’m . . . I’m running late, actually.”

  “Late? You don’t do anything on Tuesday nights.”

  I never thought the conflict resolution class would come in handy. But it was starting to provide a good excuse for a lot of things I didn’t want to do.

  Chapter 13

  [She tries to stare out the window.]

  You’re here,” Cinco said when I stepped out of the elevator. I simply nodded. I didn’t want to have to explain my identity crisis to a man who didn’t seem to need any help defining anything. I wanted to believe I came as an excuse not to have to meet Creyton. But in reality, part of me, deep down inside, knew there was a possibility I could use an overhaul . . . of some sort.

  “Last time I saw you, you weren’t doing so well.”

  “I’m fine,” I said. “Turns out the woman I hit was somebody really important to my . . . brother. The dean’s wife.”

  Cinco grimaced. “I thought you handled yourself nicely. Maybe this conflict resolution class is coming in handy after all.” He smiled. “So what brought you back?”

  “I didn’t want to hurt my brother’s feelings. He’s . . . the overly sensitive type.”

  “And telling him you didn’t want to attend would cause unneeded conflict.” Luckily his radio-program listeners couldn’t see the smug expression he often liked to wear. But I could.

  “Marilyn’s calling the group,” I said, passing by him and heading directly for Carol. Carol greeted me by squeezing my arm and saying something that I couldn’t quite understand. But I smiled and told her I was glad to see her. Surprisingly, even those who weren’t ordered by the court had returned to class, and everyone was in attendance from the week before.

  Nobody looked in the mood for casual greetings, though. I sat as still as possible and waited for everyone’s full attention to shift to Marilyn.

  “Good evening, class,” she said. “Tonight we’re going to be doing some unusual things, things that I don’t think anyone in the class is going to like very much. But rest assured, passing this test will bring you closer to achieving your goal of being able to handle conflict.”

  My hand crept up to my neck, which was safely guarded by a summer-weight sleeveless turtleneck. I had one in every color.

  “But first, I would like to go around the room and ask everyone to tell me who you would most hate being in conflict with and why. And people, let’s be honest, okay? I know this is uncomfortable for many of you, but let me assure you, this will pale in comparison to what we’ll be doing later on.”

  She laughed, then nodded for Glenda to begin.

  “That’s easy. Robert. Why? For fear he’d beat the living daylights out of me.”

  Everyone looked at Robert. Robert indeed looked like he wanted to beat the living daylights out of her. If ever there was an antagonist, Glenda was it.

  Ernest was next. He thought for a minute and then said, “Stuart McDonald. He’s the chairman of the committee at my church.”

  “And why him, Ernest?” Marilyn asked.

  “Because every time we disagree, he threatens either to cut the budget, or my salary, or both. He doesn’t say it directly, but he makes it clear in no uncertain terms that he’s the one in control. And the fact of the matter is, that’s true.”

  “Thanks, Ernest. Cinco?”

  “My dad. No matter what, he always gets the upper hand in any argument. I’ve yet to win an argument with him. He’s really good.” Cinco said this with both frustration and delight.

  “Thanks, Cinco. Robert?”

  “Captain Huff. She’s the meanest five-foot-two woman I’ve ever known.”

  I tried to imagine Robert arguing with a tiny lady. It made me laugh a little. Then it was my turn.

  This was difficult because there were so many people in my life I hated being in conflict with. Edward was the easy choice, but I didn’t want to complicate matters by trying to explain this in the context of his being a sibling. My sister was an easy one too, as we’d spent most of our lives in conflict. But with her new turnaround, I was holding out hope that those days were past. Mother was not an easy one to explain. Our relationship was plagued with plenty of unmentionable conflict, where words had alternative meanings and we were just one badly construed sentence away from total estrangement. Elisabeth was a good one, but since I was sort of in the middle of a conflict with her already, I didn’t really want to be scrutinized by the group. So I said, “My dad.”

  “Why your dad?” Marilyn asked.

  “I guess because . . .” I hadn’t really thought of it before. I paused to try to find the reason. “I don’t want to disappoint him.”

  “Thank you. Carol, you’re last.”

  I leaned in so I could hear Carol. When she was finished, everyone looked to me as her official interpreter. “Carol said her daughter, because she’s afraid she might say something that will cause her never to talk to her again.”

  Marilyn slapped her hands together like she was a football coach. “All right, gang. It’s time for our second task. Grab your things. We’re going on a field trip.”

  Marilyn drove a passenger van filled with quiet participants.

  Cinco had moved to the back, where I sat next to my ever-dependably-quiet friend Carol. He sat in the same seat as me, one row in front. Robert sat next to him and finished blocking my view. But then again, I wasn’t sure I wanted to know where we were going.

  “So,” Cinco said to me, striking up conversation in the silence, “we both have issues with our fathers.”

  “For very different reasons,” I pointed out.

  “Maybe not. Sounds like we both respect our dads.”

  I nodded. I didn’t really want to talk about this while everyone was listening.

  “Your father must be very successful, in one way or the other,” Cinco said.

  “He is.” I offered no further explanation.

  “By the way you’re not talking about him, am I to correctly guess he’s a CIA covert operative?”

  “Did you get your sense of humor from your dad?”

  “As a matter of fact, yes I did.”

  “And what does he do?”

  “He’s in journalism.”

  “I would’ve thought you’d have followed in his footsteps.”“I did. I’m a journalist too. Just on the radio.”

  Oops. Unintended zinger. Oh well. One for the quiet team.

  “So, Leah, I have to ask, I find it hard to imagine why a very attractive woman like you is so unsure of herself.”

  The van’s occupants grew very still, and even the van’s engine seemed to quiet down. While being mortified at the fact that he’d asked that question, I was at the same time distracted by the “very attractive” part.

  “Why do you think I’m unsure of myself?” I said, cursing the fact that my voice chose to quiver at that very moment.

  Cinco smiled. “I’m interested in people. What makes them tick.”

  That’s why he hides behind a radio microphone. He can say what he wants, but he never has to say it to people’s faces.

  Jodie had a point.

  C’mon, Leah! Zing him one!

  “What makes them ticked off, from what I hear,” Glenda piped in from the front row.

  Cinco laughed. �
��Fair enough.”

  “How do you do it all day long?” I asked. “Engage in combat and enjoy it?”

  “I don’t always enjoy it. Sometimes we’re tackling really tough issues that people are very passionate about.”

  “Besides, nice and sensitive radio doesn’t make people want to listen. People want to hear people yelling and screaming at each other,” Robert said. “My brother is addicted to your show, even though he almost always disagrees with you.”

  “I don’t ever yell or scream, but guests and callers have been known to,” Cinco said.

  Glenda turned around in her seat. “Oh, give me a break. I’ve heard you raise your voice a time or two. I just think you’re a pompous, arrogant, egotistical, self-centered jerk.” Cinco must have been genuinely surprised by the attack, considering that he couldn’t form a comeback. Glenda looked pleased.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, it’s a human thesaurus,” Robert said.

  I tugged at my turtleneck, which had gone from shielding my neck to strangling it.

  I had to hand it to Glenda. She was as bold as they came. Of all the people to enter into verbal combat with, Cinco would be the one you’d want to avoid. He did this for a living. But apparently Glenda did it for a pastime.

  “Tuesday, January 18, 2004,” Glenda said.

  Cinco shook his head, shrugged.

  “The topic was the Big Dig,” Glenda said, referring to the famously disastrous underground tunnel project in Boston.

  “Okay,” Cinco said. “Still not following.”

  “You made a fool of me on the air, but it turns out I was right, wasn’t I? It’s become one of the biggest financial disasters of our city.”