Daddy By Design? & Her Perfect Wife

by Cheryl Anne Porter

  After a moment’s hesitation, Jack let the answer out in a rush. “I want to do what Deb’s doing—get married, quit work and stay home.”

  Sherry’s eyes bugged out. “You can’t be serious! Have you flipped?”

  “Oh, don’t get the wrong idea, Downe,” Jack assured her. “I’m not looking for brain-blasting, from-here-to-eternity love.”

  That earned a fervent nod of agreement. They both thought love was a four-letter word.

  “It’s just…ever since my brother-in-law cashed out with cancer…well, I’ve been thinking about my life.”

  “What about it?” Sherry asked, totally dumb-founded.

  “What about—? I want one!” Jack exclaimed. “I’m burned-out, Sher. I’m tired of seventy-hour weeks. I want to go to the movies in the afternoon once in a while. I want to eat real food, not microwaved boxes and fast-fat concoctions.”

  “Who doesn’t?” Sherry retorted, playing devil’s advocate as usual. “If only we didn’t have all those stupid bills to pay.”

  Jack ignored her lame attempt at humor. “Look, I want to open my own investment counseling firm, set my own hours. Actually help people. I’ve finally completed the education program, now I’ve got to take the Certified Financial Planner Certification Examination. But there are still some topics I’m weak on—like insurance and trust law. If I was a stay-at-home wife, I’d have plenty of time to review all that stuff. And I could nail the test on the first try.”

  Sherry shook her head. “B-but you can’t just…just get married and quit your job!”

  A blare of disco music nearly drowned his response. “Why not?”

  “Well…because you’re a stockbroker!”

  Halloran snorted. “So’s Deb. If she can give it up to sit home being a wife, why can’t I?”

  His redheaded friend waved a hand in frustration. “What kind of wife would you make? Aren’t they supposed to at least be able to cook and clean?”

  “Can Deb?”

  Sherry conceded the point. “She can’t even make popcorn. She blew up the microwave in the break room last month, didn’t she?”

  Jack jabbed the air with a finger. “Exactly. So if it’s okay for her to stay home when she can’t do anything useful there, why can’t I?”

  “Because you’re as straight as a West Texas highway, Jack! And I don’t know too many women in the market for a wife.”

  “All I need is one,” he pointed out.

  “It’s Jensen, isn’t it?” Without waiting for his answer, Sherry said, “So transfer to the Richardson office.”

  Jack shook his head. While their boss was a bozo, he wasn’t the problem. His best friend and fellow stockbroker, Sherry Downe still had all the driving ambition they’d shared when they swept out of college and plunged into work at Loeb-Weinstein.

  His own interest in the job, on the other hand, had dried up like the Texas Panhandle in the eleventh year of a ten-year drought. Every day was a battle now. He could barely dial up enough enthusiasm to make himself show up, let alone function.

  Investment counseling, where you got to draw up a comprehensive, personalized plan and help someone carry it out…That sounded so much more interesting than hunting down today’s hot stock for the Beemer set. His brother-in-law’s death had convinced Jack that life was too short to dread each morning’s sunrise.

  “Take a vacation,” Sherry suggested. “Ross and Kilmer are going fishing in the Gulf next week. Go with ’em.”

  “No way.” A week with those margin-trading maniacs and he’d go postal for sure. “What I need is a break so I can bone up on all the ins and outs of insurance and trust law and taxation scenarios.” No lie. He had to have some saturation review time. The Certification Exam for CFPs covered a hell of a lot more than the equity instruments he’d worked with the past ten years.

  “Well, then—sit by the pool at your apartment for a couple of weeks.”

  “It’ll take longer than that,” Jack admitted gloomily. Studying aside, he needed some serious downtime. Enough to clear his head so he could map a real future for himself. One that appealed rather than appalled.

  “Quit, then,” Sherry snapped. “Walk away. You’ve got some bucks stashed, don’t you?”

  “Not enough,” Jack said with a grimace. “Besides—remember that ski trip we took a couple of years ago?”

  Puzzled, Sherry nodded.

  “And the little, ah, problem I encountered the second day.”

  “I think they called it a pine tree.”

  Jack threw her a disgusted look. “Ha, ha, Downe. Well, that put me in the high-risk health insurance pool.”

  “But they fixed your bulging disk! You ran a 10K last week.”

  “Doesn’t matter. I’m in, period. Only zillionaires can afford those premiums.” He raked fingers through his hair in disgust. “Hell, I can’t afford even to pay for COBRA if I leave Loeb-Weinstein. And if I don’t keep up continuous coverage, nobody will insure me in the future. They don’t have to—and they won’t. I checked.

  “Which makes Deb’s trick the best solution to all my problems. Get married, get spousal coverage, stay home and study.”

  Jack’s jaw jutted out. “Besides, if it’s okay for her to do it, why isn’t it okay for me? Because I’m a guy? That’s sex discrimination.”

  Raising her hands in surrender, Sherry stood and smoothed down her dress. “Okay, Halloran, chill. I know that tone when I hear it. Spare me the crusade speech. Please. I’ll go get us some more champagne,” she went on. “And if I run into a female looking for a stay-at-home wife with marginal homemaking skills, I’ll give her your number.”

  Jack Halloran spied one last meatball on his plate. He picked it up by its toothpick. “You do that, Sher.” He waved the meat-capped stick in the air. “I’d be as good a ‘wife’ as ol’ Deb’s gonna be,” he declared. “At least I can microwave popcorn.”

  As his friend disappeared into the reception throng, Jack stared moodily at the scene before him. How many of these shindigs had he and Sherry attended—or, worse, participated in—over the past ten years? Fifty? A hundred? Two hundred?

  “I am so tired of this,” he muttered, drumming the fingers of his free hand on the table. And he didn’t only mean these stupid weddings.

  At thirty-one, he felt ninety-one. Drained. Burned-out. All the time.

  For months now, he’d longed to escape from the grind of tracking IPOs and global hedge funds dawn to dusk, minute by minute.

  He’d noticed the same desire in many of his coworkers.

  And that the only ones who escaped with their sanity were people who became independent financial advisors—and women who married their way out of the rat race.

  So why couldn’t he use the same tactics? One to get to the other.

  Because men aren’t supposed to? Jack bit into the meatball. What a crock.

  A stay-at-home “wife” would have a shipload of time to review all those arcane things he needed to know to pass the CFP test.

  And it wasn’t as if he needed to delay marriage until he fell in love. He wasn’t going there, not after seeing the wreckage it could cause. His sister’s husband had died almost a year ago; Tess was still so devastated she could hardly function.

  Jack’s fingers tightened, snapping the little stick he held. Tess… That was another reason he needed a life away from that fast-lane, high-pressure brokerage job: he had to get Tess out of her apartment and back into the land of the living. Pete had been a great guy, but he was gone. It was time for his sister to move on—only she apparently wasn’t going to do it without help.

  And since he was the oldest Halloran sib and the only other one currently living in Dallas, Jack had appointed himself to provide it.

  AT HIS INSISTENCE, they left the wedding early, reclaiming Sherry’s car from the parking valet.

  This being Jack’s turn as designated driver, Sherry kicked off her shoes as she slid into the passenger seat.

  Jack loosened his tie before mane
uvering the vehicle out of the country-club parking lot and through the surrounding maze of dark streets until he found the highway. Once on the interstate going north, he put on the cruise control.

  After fifteen minutes of the kind of comfortable silence only two very old friends can enjoy, Sherry shifted sideways on the seat.

  Jack lifted an eyebrow, but kept his eyes on the road. “What?”

  “That wife stuff you were ranting about earlier—you weren’t serious, were you?”

  Jack sighed. “Look, Sher, I know how you feel about marriage.” Hell, if he’d grown up in her family, he’d feel the same way.

  And aside from love being a generally baaad idea, who in his right mind would sign up for the traditional husband role: slaving away at a cutthroat career just to support a wife and kids you never spent any time with?

  Being a wife, on the other hand…man, what a deal. Read the mail, buy a few groceries and you’re done. Take the rest of the day off.

  He exited the highway and made the turn into Sherry’s apartment complex. “I’m wiped, Sher. I want to slow down for a while,” he said. “Housewifery would sure as hell be more relaxing, more enjoyable than churning accounts to make Jensen happy.”

  Sherry snorted. “You think laundry’s relaxing? Dusting’s enjoyable? You are nuts.”

  Jack snorted right back. Those simple housekeeping tasks sounded like heaven after ten years of chasing the Dow, the S&P, the NASDAQ and assorted overseas bloodbaths, but he didn’t expect Sherry to understand.

  She still had the market in her blood. He didn’t. Maybe he’d have to wipe out his 401(k) after all to buy medical coverage.

  “Trust me. The way I feel these days—anything’s better than paving Jugular Jensen’s path to the top,” Jack insisted, slotting her car into its assigned space. He followed her out of the vehicle and tossed her the keys before climbing into his Jeep, parked nearby.

  “You want to do brunch at Smitty’s tomorrow?” he asked as he cranked the engine.

  “Can’t,” Sherry said, tucking her shoes under her arm as she searched the ring for her house key. “I have to meet a new client at noon.”

  “On Sunday?” Jack shook his head. See? That’s exactly what he wanted to bail on.

  “Her aunt—who’s been a client of mine for years—is giving her some stock to fund a retirement account. And Sunday’s the only time she can meet with me to go over it.

  “Don’t worry.” Sherry smiled wryly as her best friend put the Jeep into gear. “If she looks like she needs a wife, I’ll give her your name.”

  “SORRY…SORRY…EXCUSE ME…SORRY…” Melinda muttered the apologies automatically as she followed the stiff-backed maître d’ through a sea of linen-draped tables to a booth along the far wall.

  Her glasses slipped down her nose, creating two maître d’s. Impatiently Mel pushed the center of the frame back up on the bridge of her nose. The arm movement caught her lab coat on the back of a chair. As she yanked it loose with another apology, her pocket crackled. The notice from the city’s code compliance division. Frustration rolled through her.

  Failure to mow, for God’s sake! How had things gotten so out of control?

  And how the heck was she going to get them back under it? Frustration morphed into desperation. She had to regain manageability—somehow!

  “Your party, madam.” Monsieur Snobby waggled his fingers toward the booth, then flounced away.

  “Ms. Downe?” Melinda extended her hand to the woman seated in the booth, who was properly outfitted for the occasion in a tailored silk outfit and polite smile. Unlike me, Mel groused to herself. Wearing one of Mom’s old dresses because nothing I own is clean. “Melinda Burke. Sorry I’m late—we had to stop some bleeding in a three-year-old.”

  “Medical emergencies come first,” the stockbroker agreed, shaking hands, then indicating the banquette opposite her. “Please. Have a seat. And call me Sherry.”

  “And I’m Melinda or Mel or ‘Hey, Burke!”’ Melinda said half-jokingly, remembering to smile as she slid into the booth and accepted a leather-bound menu.

  “I went ahead and ordered,” Sherry said. “I hope you don’t mind.”

  “That’s fine. I’ll have whatever she’s having,” Mel told the waiter who’d materialized beside the booth.

  With a murmur that might have been “Very good, madam,” he plucked the menu from her hands and disappeared again.

  As Melinda shifted on the padded bench, the notice in her pocket crackled again. “Creating a public health menace.” Another wave of panicked fury broke over her.

  Darn it, for the first time in her adult life, she was at a loss. And that alone had her freaking. She’d just spent twenty minutes stitching up a toddler’s artery, for crying out loud, but this daily-living stuff—not being able to just resolve these ridiculous situations and move on was driving her nuts!

  The woman across from her, ah, Sherry, pulled a stack of brochures from the briefcase at her side. “We can eat first, if you like,” she said pleasantly, “but I brought you some fund materials to look over.”

  Mel could feel her blood pressure jump. Then, without warning, tears started streaming down her face. She pressed her napkin against the stupid things. “Sorry,” she said as she immediately brought herself under control. Ridiculous! “I just—”

  “—hate financial reports,” Sherry finished for her. “I understand.”

  “Oh, no. I’m sure they’re…fascinating,” Melinda finally managed, which only made the other woman grin knowingly.

  Melinda found herself smiling back. “Okay, they might put me to sleep,” she admitted as the waiter brought salads, offered to grind pepper, then whisked himself away. “If I had time to read them.”

  Sherry looked at her through narrowed eyes. “You’re too busy to plan for your future?”

  That notice from the city crackled in her pocket again as Melinda replaced her napkin in her lap and picked up her fork. “I’m too busy to go to the bathroom,” she declared, frustration and fatigue lowering her guard. Normally she handled everything the way surgeons were taught: don’t complain, fix.

  But these days, there was too much to fix. “If the discount store near the hospital wasn’t open 24/7, I wouldn’t be wearing clean underwear,” she confessed, “because I can’t get to the Laundromat to drop off for wash-and-fold service. I’ve tried for a month now.”

  Putting down her fork, Mel jerked the final straw from her lab coat. “In fact, my work demands are so overwhelming right now that I’m about to be arrested for criminal lawn neglect!”

  During Mel’s outburst, Sherry had laid her fork on her salad plate, placed her elbow on the table, bent her arm and cupped her chin in her palm. Now she stared at Melinda as if fascinated. “Do tell,” she said softly.

  Mel pushed the confounded glasses back up the bridge of her nose. She’d abandoned her contacts weeks ago due to lack of sleep.

  Unfolding the official notice, she tossed it onto the table. “Last night, about midnight, I managed to look through a week’s worth of mail. Included was this—it’s a notice from the city citing my parents’ lawn as a public health hazard.”

  Sherry freed her chin to spread her hands wide, palms up. “What does that have to do with you?” she asked.

  “I’m supposed to be taking care of the place for them while they’re in Oman,” Mel explained. “Dad’s working on an oil project over there.” Pushing aside her barely touched salad, she thrust her fingers into her hair. “I’ve tried, really I have, but…” She swore under her breath. “I’m in a pediatric-surgery fellowship program at Southwestern Medical Center. Intense is an understatement. The program head, Dr. Bowen, is one of the top surgeons in the field. He’s completely focused on his work and he expects us to be the same.

  “I’ve worked my whole life for this,” Mel continued, “and I will meet his expectations.” Meet, hell. She’d surpass them.

  Since the age of ten, she’d devoted all her time and energy, her
whole life, to becoming a pediatric surgeon. To save other families the pain hers had endured when her little brother had died needlessly. And she was so close!

  “I’m guessing you have a lot of demands on your time,” Sherry said, her head tipped to one side.

  “Too many,” Melinda grumbled. “I was holding my own in my apartment. Then my parents handed over the keys to their three-thousand-foot house—with its felonious yard. And a pool, for God’s sake.”

  Mel shoved the perpetually sliding glasses back up in frustration. “My folks always supported my drive to be a doctor. They’ve never asked me for anything until now.” More stupid tears threatened; Mel dashed them away with the back of her hand. “I feel like I’m letting them down, but I—I just can’t keep up with everything!”

  “Besides laundry and sleep, you mean?” Sherry asked, leaning forward.

  “Ha!” Mel began ticking off items on fingertips. “The pool hasn’t been cleaned since they left six weeks ago. I haven’t deposited my last two paychecks. I’ve got a stack of unpaid bills because I cannot find the time to sit down and write out the checks! The water company’s pretty frosted about that—they’re threatening to turn off service. And now this—” She indicated the code-compliance notice, then swore under her breath again as she buried her head in her hands. “I need help, but I don’t even have time to contact all the different services I need!”

  “You’re not talking about a permanent arrangement, are you?” Sherry wanted to know.

  “No, just till my folks get back. Six months, max.”

  The waiter suddenly manifested in corporeal form, replaced the salads with entrées, then dematerialized.

  Melinda eyed the cross-hatched chicken breast. “I think I’d kill for a home-cooked meal,” she said sorrowfully. “And clean laundry.”

  “How about dust?” Sherry asked with an odd little smile. “That a problem, too?”

  “Bah. The dust is so thick, I write notes to myself in it.” Melinda reached for her fork. “I guess I need a time management course. Or—”