by Erin Mallon
“Am I blushing? Ew, is this what blushing feels like? I thought blushing was supposed to be this precious moment when a Jane Austen-type heroine becomes somehow even more beautiful when an extra speckling of pretty pink attaches itself to her already adorable rosy cheeks. So, if this is blushing, then why do I feel like a red-faced Rottweiler?”
“You don’t look like a red-faced Rottweiler. I can assure you of that.”
Thump-bump.
Thump-bump.
Thump-bump.
“You know, I looked closer at my employment contract this morning,” he says softly.
“Ha. So did I.”
“Nothing in there about fraternization.”
“Yeah, I didn’t see anything either.”
“You seemed pretty worried about that last night.”
“I was, yeah.”
“So… I think it’s perfectly okay for us to hang out.”
“Hang out?”
“Sure.”
“Is that all you want, though? To just hang out?”
“Well, yeah. What did you think I wanted… to get married?”
“No! Hell, no! You were just so sweet to me last night, that I—”
“Figured you had to beat me out of your apartment before I fell madly in love with you and derailed all of your plans for scientific excellence and eventual world domination?”
“Sort of. Yeah,” I say a bit shamefully.
“Chill, Callie. I have plans too. We can just… see where things go.”
“See where things go…” I repeat.
“Yeah. Sound good?”
I get brave and look into his eyes for a moment.
“Yeah. Sounds good.”
“Good. So. You always been like this?”
“Like what?”
“How do I say this the right way?”
“Uh-oh.”
“No. No need to uh-oh. Have you always been… so strong and focused on creating the exact life that you want? See, that wasn’t so bad, was it?”
“Ha. Not so bad, no. Have I always been like this…?” I ponder his question out loud. “I think so, yeah. I always knew I wanted to be a paleontologist. Basically from the first time I heard dinosaurs existed. And everything kind of stemmed from that. For whatever reason, little kids always seem to be into dinosaurs, don’t they? So I had a lot of pals in the early days. But then they started to move on to other things. My devotion only got deeper as I got older, though. And friendships didn’t come easy to me anymore. I just wasn’t interested in what the other kids wanted to talk about. I remember thinking, wow, you don’t realize you’re gonna die someday, huh? If you realized you were gonna die someday, you wouldn’t be wasting your time on such frivolous crap.”
“Wait. How old were you when you were having those kinds of thoughts?”
“I dunno, eight? Nine?”
“You were pondering your own mortality at eight years old?”
“Yeah. Weren’t you?”
“Nope.”
“Huh. If you were a dino lover, you would’ve. Once you learn an entire planet of your beloved creatures was wiped out, you’re primed for disaster and death at any and every moment.”
“Geez. You must’ve been a really sad, morbid kid.”
“No way! I was a delight! Soaked up every bit of knowledge I could. I just had no time for schmucks and fools. Still don’t. But back then… Nevermind.”
“No. What?”
“Back then… I was weirdly, embarrassingly romantic too.”
“Really! You?”
“Yes, me!”
“Tell me, how were you embarrassingly romantic?”
“Well, I remember I used to… I would… Ugh. It’s dumb.”
“Tell me.”
I avert my eyes anywhere but at him.
“I used to climb up on top of the jungle gym thing at recess when all of the other kids were playing dodgeball and freeze tag, and I would sort of... Well, I would… All right. I would conjure my future husband.”
“What?” He looks and sounds shocked, and I don’t blame him.
“It’s ridiculous, I know. Residue from my parents, I think, who were always talking about how they were made for each other, meant to be, and someday when you meet your soul mate blah, blah, blah bullshit. But yeah, I would conjure my future husband by closing my eyes and picturing him wherever he was at that very moment. I felt like he was a kid sort of like me, also surrounded by schmucks, somewhere in the world sitting on top of his own jungle gym, thinking about me. Then when I felt like I’d connected to him… I’d stare up at the sky and talk to him. And I could almost swear I heard him talking back.”
“Huh.”
“Uh-oh. Why does your face look like that right now?”
“Like what?”
“Like you swallowed a hairball.”
“I did that too.”
“Did what? Swallowed a hairball?”
“No, I… I conjured and talked to my future wife.”
“You’re shitting me.”
“Well, girlfriend, anyway. As a dorky kid with super divorced parents, that’s as far as I dared to dream. And I wasn’t on a jungle gym. I was at space camp, lying in my bunk bed. But yeah, I did the same thing.”
“Huh.”
“Yeah.”
“Weird.”
“Yeah.”
We stare straight ahead as a group of kids run by and smack the aorta.
“Also… you went to space camp?!”
“Yeah, finally got my mom to ease up on the dance classes and send me to space camp instead. Went five summers in a row.”
“Cool! I never met a real live person who went to space camp. I thought that was just something for kids in PBS commercials and in Highlights magazine ads! How was it?”
“Amazing. And awful. I puked for the entire week. Every single year.”
“But… you still went five years in a row?!”
“I’m not a quitter. Plus, it was my dream to go to space for real, so I was going to do everything I could to get there until I realized that a person with perpetual motion sickness wasn’t going to do so well orbiting the planet in micro-gravity. It turns out, I’m better off studying space from the ground. I think the dream job now would be working for Mission Control. Ya know, helping the astronauts navigate while they’re up there and seeing that they get home safely.”
“Amazing but hold on a second. Are you telling me you were a kid named Ralph who was constantly… ralphing?”
“That is correct. Childhood was not kind to me.”
“Hahaha, oh my God.”
“Yeah, it wasn’t pretty.”
“Is childhood kind to anyone, though?” I ask, still laughing.
“Hell yeah, it is! Just ask Brett Hanratty. From first grade all the way through his senior year of high school, Brett Hanratty was the man.”
“Brett Hanratty is a washed-up, bloated has-been working a job he hates, married to a wife he hates, and generally living a life he hates.”
“Whoa. You know Brett Hanratty?”
“We all know a Brett Hanratty. Gimme the dorks any day. They end up way more interesting, if you ask me.”
He’s quiet for a moment, then says, “You, uh… you said you had a dream about me?”
“Huh?”
“You said you had a dream about me last night?”
“Oh. Yeah. I did.”
“What was I doing in the dream?”
“It was weird as hell,” I warn him.
“Try me.”
“Okay. Well, it was one of those dreams where your teeth are incredibly loose and swinging back and forth in your mouth like mini white doggy doors?”
“Surrrrrrrre,” he says uncertainly.
Yeah, he c
learly has never had that recurring dream.
“So, my teeth are swinging back and forth, back and forth, and I’m walking through this town I’m not familiar with, constantly running into brick walls and needing to change directions. Every time I turn around, I come face-to-face with a different person who wants to talk to me. Every time I see one of them, my mouth fills up with all this… I dunno… flesh? I can’t speak. My mouth is too full of all this… crap. It’s heinous, and it’s scary. But the weird thing is, I’m not really worried about my health in those moments. I’m terrified these people will see me looking all weak and vulnerable with my swinging doggy door teeth and my fleshy filled-up mouth and think I’m… I dunno.
“Anyway, one by one, I wave people off. I find a dirty spoon in a dumpster, then literally scoop out my mouth when they can no longer see me. I do this over and over again, person after person, spoon after spoon… until I see you. When you walk around a brick wall and start walking toward me. I automatically smile, totally forgetting about my teeth and my mouth. Then I remember, and I slam my lips shut and cover my face with my hands. But I realize, when I saw you, and you started walking toward me… everything got better. My teeth are strong again. I can speak freely again. I feel… like me again.”
I turn to look at him, certain he tuned out at some point during that bit of ridiculousness.
He didn’t.
He’s staring right back at me.
His face gets serious. And let me tell you something. Serious Ralph is just as beautiful as smiley Ralph. Maybe even more so because everything gets stripped away, and all I can feel are those honest, soulful eyes gazing into mine, seeing things I’m not so sure I want them to see.
Also, I still can’t believe I’m crushing on a guy named Ralph.
“You’re something else,” he says softly.
Thump-bump.
Thump-bump.
Thump-bump.
I realize that we’re sitting a lot closer to each other than we were a few minutes ago. Did he move? Did I? Maybe we both did? And those heartbeat sounds. They’ve been happening the whole time we’ve been in here, right? So why do they sound so much louder?
I close my eyes, though I’m not entirely sure why. I become aware of the sound of his breathing now. So smooth and steady and…warm. Yup, warm. It breezes faintly against my ear, then brushes my face, giving me goose bumps. A big, warm hand cups my cheek, then gently turns my face so our noses are almost touching.
Thump-bump.
Thump-bump.
Thump-bump.
“Callie?” he rumbles.
“Hmm?”
“Look at me?”
I get brave and open my eyes, expecting him to say something. He doesn’t. Not with words anyway. His eyes, though. His eyes definitely ask me their version of “is this okay?”
I decide to leave words out of the equation too and just nod once, my eyes dipping down to his lips.
And in that last second before those lips inch forward and press softly against mine… I see them smile.
Chapter Twelve
Please don’t fire me, please don’t fire me, please don’t fire me.
Why would she move our advisor meeting up one day?
Oh right, because she’s going to fire me.
I lift my hand to knock on the sturdy oak door in front of me, but before I make contact, I hear a vibrant voice from inside say, “Enter!”
So… I enter, peeking my head through the crack and peering cautiously into Dr. Knowles’ truly… shocking office. Seriously, it’s nothing at all like I expected. Not that I consciously imagined what her space would look like, but if I had? It certainly would not have been the Barbie Dream House cocoon of cozy I’m looking at right now.
Let’s break it down, shall we?
The walls are a deep Pepto pink. The floor has at least… seventy-four ivory shaggy faux lambskin rugs. They have to be faux, right? An animal lover like Dr. Knowles wouldn’t submit to the slaughter of at least seventy-four baby sheep simply so her floor feels like a slumber party, would she? Nah, no way. The furniture is not your typical dark, sleek office furniture. Nope, it’s all white and shabby chic. And there are framed photos on her bookcase featuring… it’s hard to tell from a distance. I really need to get my eyes checked, but they seem to be images of her with a salt-n-pepper-haired man and a golden retriever with a toothy smile. Could this tough-as-nails woman possibly have decorated this girly, whimsical office herself?
“Hi, Dr. Knowles. I appreciate you taking the time to see me this afternoon.”
“You appreciate it?”
My God, the woman’s face is like stone.
“I… do? Yes?”
“Is that a question or a statement?”
“A question. I mean, a statement. A statement. I’m always thrilled when I get to spend time learning from you.”
“Hm. That’s not the reaction I usually get when I summon someone to my office.”
Seriously. Not a single muscle on her entire face moves while she stares me down. And it is definitely not Botox. It’s a decision.
“Would you say you summoned me, though? It felt more like you… invited me.”
“No, I summoned you. Your performance review couldn’t wait another day.”
“It couldn’t?”
“No, it could not.”
She’s silent. Am I supposed to kick off this conversation? How the hell do I do that?
“I’m just curious… How did, um, how did you even, um, how did you know that I had arrived? I didn’t knock or anything. Do you have a door cam or something?”
“Nervous, Calliope?” Her head cocks to the side slightly, mirroring the image of what I presume is her dog in the frame directly behind her.
“Completely fucked in the head and out of my gourd nervous, yes sir. I mean, ma’am. I mean, Doctor. Apologies for the fuck just now. For saying fuck, I mean.”
“It’s understandable. And no, I do not have a door cam. I sensed your presence.”
“Oh. How did you—?”
“I’ve been a woman for quite a few years now, which means I have trained myself to be extremely aware of my surroundings at all times.”
“Oh that’s good, that’s—”
“But we do have cameras set up throughout the entire museum that see everything. Everything, Calliope.”
“Even inside the left ventricle of the giant heart?” I peep. “Because I checked, and I didn’t see one.”
“Excuse me?”
“Nothing, sir. I mean, ma’am. I mean, Doctor. I am incredibly sorry for my lapse in judgment in there. It won’t happen again, I promise. Please, I just really love this job, and I would be so incredibly grateful if we could—”
“Stop talking.”
“Sure!”
“Sit down.”
“Certainly.”
“And please take off your shoes. There are at least seventy-four faux lambskin throw rugs covering this floor, and I won’t have them soiled with the crusty bottoms of my co-workers’ shoes.”
“Wow, do you consider me one of your co-workers?”
“Of course. What else would I consider you?”
“I dunno… an apprentice? A gopher? A peon? No. I’m sorry. I wish I could take that back. Hey, words,” I shout with a laugh as I grasp at the empty air, “get back in my mouth! Hahahaha.”
She doesn’t laugh along with me.
So, I continue. “They say to dress for the job you want, right? Well, I’m also trying to make it a point to speak for the job I want. I don’t want to be an apprentice, a gopher, or a peon, so why would I speak those words out loud, you know? Especially in your presence.”
She continues to stare at me with no reaction whatsoever.
I quiet.
“Shoes?” She glances down at my still
covered feet.
“Of course, yes.” I slip off my pumps and line them up at the alongside her desk. “And gosh, I’m so glad to hear your rugs are faux.”
“Of course they’re faux. Calliope, what kind of a monster do you think I am?”
“Not a monster at all! A bit scary, but I admire that about you!”
“Scary.” She repeats the word and does not seem pleased.
Oh man, I am digging myself a gigantic hole with this woman. “Intimidating is probably a better descriptor. But as I said, I admire that about you! You make people shudder, did you know that? Like they actually physically quake in their literal boots! It’s incredible!”
“Calliope, I brought you in here today for three reasons. One: You have an eyebrow problem.”
Oh my God. Please tell me I did not hear her correctly. Please tell me that this powerful woman I respect so greatly did not just say…
“Did you hear me Miss FitzGerald? You have an eyebrow problem.”
Yup, I heard her correctly. You have to be fucking kidding me.
“Calliope?”
“Yes, Dr. Knowles, I heard you. And frankly, I’m disgusted. I’d expect this kind of sexist crap from a goober of a guy like Bruce, or an old stuffy guy from the establishment, even from a fellow female like featherbrained Mabel because frankly, she doesn’t seem to know any better, but you? You? Frankly… why am I saying frankly so much? Forgive my language, but I respect the hell out of you, so I’m a little heartbroken at this moment that you of all people would stoop to society’s puny little level by judging me for the state of the semi-circles of hair placed above my eyeballs. Why do we do this to women? Who cares how little furry forehead rainbows are shaped? Whether they’re arched or straight? Thin or full? Natural or penciled in? You’re a doctor, a scientist, so surely, you know the function for eyebrows, yes?”
“Calliope—”
“Originally, it was to keep rain and sweat out of our eyes. Also, to provide a bit of a shield from the sun. And while we’ve evolved to the point that most of our body hair has been lost, the eyebrows remain. They have a purpose. And it has nothing to do with being sexy or on fleek. And they certainly should have no influence on our employment.”
Oh dammit. I am a little too juiced right now.
“Thank you for that lesson in evolution, Calliope,” Dr. Knowles says calmly.