My Life as a Doormat (in Three Acts)

by Rene Gutteridge

  Unbelievable. We’d set a time. We would meet at Mangalos tomorrow night between seven and seven fifteen. I thought that was funny. I’d never had a fifteen-minute window for dinner before.

  “It’s just a celebration for winning . . . winning . . .” Whatever it was we won tonight. I still couldn’t believe I’d actually done it.

  I also realized that I had started talking out loud to myself, which was extremely scary. That was something I never did, because I was completely aware that if I said out loud what was in my head, I would probably be locked up. It wasn’t an insecurity. After all, I’m a writer. My characters are birthed out of fantasy and imagination. But I always knew that whatever the process was, it should be kept inside my head.

  As I unlocked the door to my apartment, I mumbled to myself about what an idiot I was to accept Cinco’s invitation. A ringing phone interrupted me. I raced to the closer phone—in the kitchen—to answer.

  “Hello?” I said, catching my breath. Why was I out of breath? It must’ve been all the mumbling I was doing.

  “Leah?”

  Edward? I checked my watch. It was almost ten. He should be in bed. “Edward, what are you doing up?”

  I could hear him sigh. “I couldn’t sleep. I’m worried.”

  “About what?”

  “You.”

  I set my stuff on the counter and moved into the living room where I clicked on a light and sat down. “Why?”

  “Something’s different about you, Leah. I don’t know what it is. But I’m worried.” Edward sounded genuinely concerned.

  I closed my eyes and tried to concentrate. “I’m fine. Why do you think something’s wrong?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “You’ve just been acting a little differently lately.”

  “How so?”

  “You seem . . . restless.”

  Restless. That was the spice. Restlessness. It made all the other flavors disappear.

  Edward continued. “I just want to make sure you’re okay.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “What about work? How’s the new play going?” It was the first time Edward had even inquired about it with any real seriousness.

  “The play . . . well . . .” Be honest, be truthful. “It has had its ups and downs, but I think we’re up again. I wrote a great scene today. It was a very unexpected scene.” Was that today? It seemed like ages ago.

  “I know you’re feeling a lot of pressure about this play, Leah. Maybe it’s getting to you. And you know what, I don’t think that agent of yours helps matters.”

  Edward had never liked J. R. And granted, most people didn’t like J. R. But I reminded myself that I was fortunate to have her. Most playwrights of my stature didn’t have agents. She picked me up after Twilight T-Zone, and she had a long and distinguished track record of making young playwrights overnight stars. That track record, thanks to me, was in jeopardy.

  “It’s been a struggle,” I said. “But sometimes it is. It doesn’t mean anything. Maybe struggling and wrestling with it makes it better. I don’t know.”

  “That’s probably it,” Edward said. “That explains the funk you’re in.”

  “Edward, what funk are you talking about?” I didn’t want to mention the dress, but I was curious if that’s what he was referring to.

  “Leah,” Edward said, his tone lowering as if he were about to give a classroom lecture, “you can’t tell me that you haven’t seen some changes lately.”

  “Between us?”

  “Okay.”

  “Sure, Edward. I’ve noticed.”

  “So what’s wrong with you? Why, all of a sudden, are things different with you?”

  I bit my lip and stared at the carpet. Was I sure enough about it even to say it out loud? Had the grocery store incident brought about a boldness I would soon regret?

  I paused, hoping Edward would fill in the silence. But he didn’t. So I said, “Look, Edward, maybe I am in a funk, you know? I mean, I’m thirty-four. And yes, I’ve accomplished a lot, but somehow that isn’t filling me up. And if I’m being honest, maybe it’s not the external things in life that are bothering me. Maybe it’s internal. Maybe I’m unhappy with who I’ve become. Maybe nobody really knows me. Edward, sometimes I think I’m two different people, you know? I’m the person everyone knows, and then I’m the person I know, and the person I know isn’t the same person everyone else knows. Maybe I want to be one whole person. That’s what I’m trying to say. I just want to be the same person as I am.”

  I could hear him breathing. I tried to rewind and mentally go through what I’d just said, because the words had escaped like a surprising string of drool.

  “Edward?”

  “I’m here,” he said. Then he didn’t say anything else. I squeezed my eyes shut. What had I done now? Why not slip on the pink dress and go platinum blonde? Piece by piece I seemed to be wrecking my carefully constructed life.

  I started to apologize, but Edward interrupted. “Let’s talk about this over dinner Thursday night,” he said.

  Thursday night? “Sure. That’s fine,” I said. But I hopped out of my chair, knowing that wasn’t fine. Pacing the floor and knocking my knuckles against my forehead, I added, “Actually, I can’t.”

  “You can’t?”

  “I’ve got that . . . that . . . thing.”

  “What thing?”

  He didn’t even remember. Great. I was going to have to say it out loud. “The conflict resolution class you enrolled me in.”

  “Oh.” His voice came alive. “You’re going to that?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I thought you quit.”

  “No.”

  “Huh.” I could actually hear Edward scratching his scalp. “Okay, well, let’s go out tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow?”

  “You don’t have anything on Wednesdays. And I don’t on the fourth week of the month.”

  I closed my eyes and fell back, my couch catching me like I’d just fainted. “That’s not going to work.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m busy.” How could I explain this? Was this even explainable? And why shouldn’t I be able to explain this . . . unless I was feeling guilty.

  “Busy doing what?”

  “It’s the class I’m taking,” I said. “We were split into groups for a challenge, and my group won, so we’re going out to celebrate.” I took a breath. That wasn’t a lie, if you define a group as two or more people. Granted, most people define it as three or more, but I wasn’t going to get into technicalities.

  “I didn’t realize I’d signed you up for Survivor.”

  “You have no idea,” I said, laughing hard enough for two people.

  “Well,” Edward said, “why don’t I just come with you?”

  My collapsing heart begged for mercy from me. It had been through a lot tonight.

  “Oh, how I wish you could,” I said, “but it’s reservations only. It’s some new, hot restaurant. Besides, if we’re going to talk, I don’t want it to be around other people.”

  Then there was silence again.

  “Maybe Friday?” I asked.

  “Restaurants are too crowded on Fridays.”

  “We could make reservations.”

  “No. In general, it’s really not a good idea to go out on Fridays.”

  I closed my eyes. By turning his Wednesday gesture down, I might’ve just missed the only opportunity to see Edward be spontaneous. “Right. Bad idea.”

  “I’ll see you sometime this weekend. We can talk then.”

  What were we doing now? I’d just spilled my guts, and Edward wanted to wait until the weekend to discuss it? I felt myself growing angry.

  “So have you learned anything from this class?” he asked.

  “A few things. It’s pretty boring. A lot of lectures.”

  “Leah, look, you don’t have to go to that thing to make me happy. I thought it might change your life, but if it’s boring, why waste your time?”

 
I wondered to myself how, exactly, Edward wanted my life changed.

  “Anyway,” Edward continued, “I guess I’ll plan on seeing you this weekend. Maybe we can go to the beach or something.”

  “Sounds good,” I said.

  “All right. I’ll call you tomorrow. Oh, what time’s your dinner?”

  “Between seven and seven fifteen.” Why did I feel the need to add the extra detail? “When you’re working with a large group it’s hard to get everyone there at the same time. Real hard.” I wanted to slap myself. This was getting more disgusting by the second.

  “Okay, well, call me when you’re finished, okay?”

  “Okay, sure.”

  Edward said good-bye, and I went to my bedroom, crashing onto the mattress. My body ached with fatigue.

  I wanted to close my eyes and make all the bad things go away. Then my phone rang again. I reached for it on the bedside table, figuring the caller was Edward, and with my new, bold attitude, I answered, “You missed me already?”

  “What? Leah?”

  I gasped. “Mother?”

  “Leah, oh, thank goodness I got a hold of you.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “You must come to the hospital. Now. Hurry.”

  Chapter 15

  [She smiles.]

  On an uncomfortable padded bench stained with years of spilled drinks and who knew what else, Mother and I sat. The hallway leading to the operating room was so white it hurt my eyes. Elevator music played through the intercom so softly that it was more irritating than it was soothing. I had been with her for forty-five minutes.

  The doctor had explained that the surgery on Dad’s heart could take more than four hours. Mother explained in less than a minute when I arrived that he had complained of chest pains but had been too stubborn to go to the hospital. He collapsed at home, and Mother had called the ambulance.

  Here we were, sitting in stunned silence. Mother looked awful. The rosy circles on her cheeks that she took such great care in applying had faded into her now-sallow skin, and her mouth drew downward like two strings were pulling at the edges. It was the first time in my whole life I’d felt sorry for her.

  “It’s going to be okay,” I finally said, reaching over to pat her knee. She startled, as if she hadn’t even noticed I was sitting there. But when she looked at me, tears filled her eyes and she nodded.

  “We brought him here in time,” she said. “The ambulance was passing near our neighborhood when they got the call. That saved him. They were at our house in less than three minutes.”

  “That’s good. And now they’re opening up his arteries to make sure this doesn’t happen again.”

  “It’s hard for me to imagine him lying on the table, his chest open, his heart stopped.” She covered her mouth. “It doesn’t seem real.”

  “You want some coffee?” I asked.

  She nodded, so I went down the hall to try to find a fresh pot, with no luck. I had to go two floors down to the urology floor, but finally found some. When I returned, a nurse was just walking away from Mother. I handed her the cup and asked, “Is there an update?”

  “She said he’s holding his own in there, and there haven’t been any complications thus far. But he does have three out of four arteries blocked.” She glanced at me. “And some reporters caught wind of it. She said a few have gathered downstairs, wanting a comment.”

  “Really?” I couldn’t believe it. Dad was a well-known and loved ex-senator, but he was from the South. They had decided to retire to Boston because Dad loved Massachusetts so much. I wasn’t aware his health was even newsworthy, but then again, with twenty-four–hour cable news, I figured they often needed something to fill in the gaps.

  “I can go talk to them,” I told Mother as we sat back down.

  “No.”

  “No?”

  She shook her head and returned the pat on the knee. “Honey, it’s okay. They’ll leave soon enough.”

  “Mother, they’re probably not going to leave until they get some sort of statement. If I go down and give them a brief one, maybe that will hold them off for a while. I don’t have to give any details. Just enough for them to have something to write down.”

  She pressed her lips together like she was thinking about it, but then she waved her hand. “No offense, Leah, but you’ve never been that good in front of a microphone.”

  “What? What are you talking about?”

  “You probably don’t remember. You were only eight. But a reporter asked how you liked Washington, D.C., and you said something about how gross the homeless people were.”

  How could I forget that? Both Mother and Dad had been completely upset by my answer, and when we returned home, I was sent to my room. Mother had me practicing for weeks after that on how to answer any question posed to me with either a yes or a no. I never really understood what I’d done wrong. I did think the homeless people were gross. And where I came from, there weren’t that many homeless people, at least right there on the street where you had to look at them.

  I leaned my back against the wall, sipping the weakest coffee I’d ever put to my lips, wondering how something I did as an eight-year-old could still haunt me as a thirty-four-year-old. Obviously I was capable of handling a few reporters’ questions. But then again, Mother had never had much confidence in me in general. I’d once stumbled on the steps of the West Wing as we were following the president out. I was around eleven. Mother wouldn’t let me wear even the slightest heel again until I was fourteen.

  And to this day, I prefer flats.

  “So have you and Edward mended things?” Mother asked, setting the coffee aside with a pointedly disgusted look, as if I’d made it myself.

  “We’re, you know, we’re fine.”

  Mother eyed me. “It’s not necessarily a bad thing to fight. Every once in a while. Your father and I certainly had our share of scuffles. Of course, it was always behind closed doors, the only proper place to have a disagreement.” Mother wasn’t usually so generous with personal advice, so I heeded the moment. “What do you think about Edward, Mother? Do you think we’re a good match? Do you think he’s good for me?”

  She looked a little overwhelmed by the questions and grabbed that wretchedly disgusting coffee again. She took a moment to think about the question, and then she said with one of the most sincere faces I’d ever seen on her, “Dear, considering the limited fishing rod you have, I would say he’s a pretty good catch.”

  I returned home just as the sun was waking up the rest of the city. I wasn’t much of a morning person, and as I walked into my apartment, I couldn’t help but notice how beautifully it glowed with soft, hazy light. I made a mental note to myself to start praying to become a morning person. Surely morning people had better self-esteem, for the simple reason that they were able to fight off the beast of sleep with such ease.

  I went straight to my coffeemaker and turned it on, dumping scoops and water in without measuring. I leaned on my counter, holding my head in my hands. Morning light was overrated.

  Dad had come out of surgery at around 4:00 a.m. The surgery took two hours longer than expected, which made Mother a ball of nerves. She elected not to call Kate at that late hour. I knew the real reason was that she didn’t want to call Kate at her house, get the answering machine, and then have to call Dillan’s. Mother and Dad raised us to be churchgoers and, among other rules, not to engage in premarital sex. Mother always had her suspicions, of course, but with her husband in heart surgery, she didn’t need any confirmations.

  She asked me to call Kate in the morning.

  I gulped down one cup of coffee while holding my pounding head. It was 6:00 a.m. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen morning this early. I stumbled to the living room and picked up the phone, trying to focus on the keypad. Blinking through watery eyes, I dialed Kate’s home number and crumpled into my leather chair.

  After four rings, I almost hung up, but then she finally answered. “Hello?” It was
obvious she wasn’t a morning person either.

  “Kate, it’s Leah.”

  “Leah?” I could hear the sheets rustle. She was probably giving Dillan the “hush” sign. “Why are you calling this early?”

  I paused. This was going to be hard to say. “I’ve been at the hospital all night with Mother.”

  “What’s wrong with her?”

  “It’s not her, it’s Dad—”

  “Well, tell me.” Her tone was tense.

  “Just listen. He’s going to be fine. He had a heart attack—”

  “A heart attack?” She was wide awake with panic now.

  “Kate, he’s fine. He went through surgery last night and early this morning. They unblocked three arteries.”

  “Are you saying he had triple bypass surgery?”

  “He’s out now and resting comfortably.”

  “Why didn’t you call me?” I could hear the hurt and anger in her voice. This would take some finesse. Mother had called me, because, as of now, I was still the more reliable sister, though these days Kate was gaining on me.

  “We talked about it,” I lied, “and realized we were going to have to work this thing in shifts. Mother is going to need help. I stayed the night. Mother’s okay now, but she’s going to need you to come up sometime this morning. Can you do that?”

  “Yes, of course!” I could hear her feet padding against the wood floors of her apartment. “I can’t believe this,” she mumbled. “He’s going to be okay?”

  “Looks really good. The surgery took longer than expected, but the doctors said he should make a full recovery.”

  “Okay, okay,” she said, over and over. It sounded like she was trying to pull on some clothes.

  “Kate, you’ve got to calm down. It’s going to be fine. We just need to be there for them.”

  “I know.” She sniffled. “I’d better go. I need to call Dillan before he leaves for work.”

  A single eyebrow popped up on my head. Dillan wasn’t there? That was suspicious. Was she just saying that for my benefit?

  “Right. Call Dillan.” I shook my head. “Want me to call him?” Okay, that was mean. But Kate had shacked up with every boyfriend she’d ever had. I was finding it hard to believe Dillan was any different. “So you can get to the hospital.”