On the Verge

by Ariella Papa

  “Well, you’re being really quiet. You didn’t go to your Spinning class and here you are watching trash TV.”

  “It’s comfort TV.”

  “Well, why do you need to be comforted?” She doesn’t say anything and has another bite of salmon. “Ro?”

  “My job has to be the most boring ever,” Roseanne spills. “Not like your kind of boring where I can surf the Net or go shopping or talk to my friends. No, there is work to be done—boring work. Every hour lasts an eternity and it’s numbers, numbers, and numbers. Big surprise, that’s what I majored in. My mother is upset that I won’t give her my work number. The reason I won’t is because I don’t want her to call and complain about my father from dusk till dawn, but not for the reason you might think. No. I don’t want her to have my number, because I think the sound of her voice might actually comfort me when I’m hanging out with my numbers. Like these shitty shows. I’m bored with working out. The past two boys I had sex with haven’t called back. Well, I should make that one and a half, because Pete was too drunk to get it up and keep it up, despite my valiant efforts. Of course, he won’t call me back, even though we’ve been friends for like five years or something. I keep thinking I can have enough fun after work with you guys, but honestly, I don’t know if I can make it. I keep telling myself that the summer is coming and I’ll have summer hours and I’ll get to do what I want. But that’s five fucking months away. That’s the other thing. I’m talking like a sailor. I never swore this much before. My parents used to hurl curses at each other and I swore I’d never do it. But, fuck it, now I do!”

  “Wow!” What do you say to that?

  “Eve, don’t. I know you are going to try and say the most sensitive thing. And you will. I mean you always do, you listen to people and you help them. I guess I just want to revel in my own self-pity for a while and then figure it out. I don’t want to bring you down, because I can see you’re happy. I know you already feel bad about spending time with Rob, but don’t worry about it, please. Shucks! I never used to be such a drama queen.”

  The thing that makes it hard to be friends with Roseanne is that when she’s like this she doesn’t turn into a witch and make you hate her for a while before she clues you in on the problem. She knows what’s wrong and she doesn’t ask you to fix it. When my friends have problems, I like to be the one that interprets it for them. The last thing I need is a self-sufficient friend. Then my one skill will be futile.

  “Do you like this guy? Rob?”

  “Maybe. I don’t really want to. I mean we’re not cut from the same cloth. I can’t help feeling like I’m sleeping my way to the top, although I haven’t gotten anywhere and probably won’t. I’m not doing anything wrong, but I feel like I have to keep this hush-hush.”

  “Eve, just do what you want. If he’s cool, go for it.”

  “Pete hasn’t called, huh?” Roseanne just shakes her head. The phone rings. It’s Rob asking me to meet him at the movie theater in an hour. I almost tell him I can’t make it, but I want to see him too badly. I feel like a big shit when I say good-night to Roseanne.

  “Hey it’s only another hour to Letterman,” I say as I’m leaving. She smiles, but it doesn’t seem to reassure her.

  The job listings come out every Tuesday. Now they are available via e-mail. There is never anything good that I am considered qualified for. I once applied for a copyright position in NY By Night marketing. Tabitha told me about it. I could tell that the woman who interviewed me was really impressed. I was proactive about staying on top and keeping myself “fresh in her mind.” I called her once a week, but she never returned my calls. I didn’t want to be a nag, I just wanted to know. Finally, after four weeks of waiting by the phone, she told me that although she thought I would be “great for the department,” I just didn’t have enough experience.

  “Did you see the listings?” Tabitha says almost breathlessly when I answer the phone.

  “No, but, let me guess, executive assistant to some crappy finance guy.”

  “No, a coordinator position for Food and Fun, the travel/restaurant mag. Listen to the responsibilities— ‘Coordinator will be responsible for the attachment of photos to copy and often attend photo shoots to assist in brand conveyance—’ if that’s even a word ‘—for a deadline. Coordinator will be expected to attend creative meetings and assist in magazine development.’ Development is awesome, it’s so flaky, but actually cool. Travel and restaurants. Awesome.”

  “Sounds like a major they offered at my school. Are you going to apply?”

  “No, Eve, are you crazy? I am in the zone here at NY By Night. I am a proverbial rung away from the Big C’s job. I think this would be a great job for you, and sort of a test.”

  “It sounds pretty cool, but what is it a test of?”

  “The strength of your blossoming love.”

  “Tabitha, is this Brazilian supplying you with some crazy South American drug?”

  “It’s more of a love juice, actually.”

  “You are foul.”

  “You’re no nun. Honestly. Rob needs to put his money where his mouth is.”

  “That would make me a literal whore.”

  “Right, but honestly, it’s all who you know. You just know him better than most.”

  “I appreciate your support, but it lacks integrity and ethics.”

  “Mother of God! Eve, you aren’t writing a journalism thesis, you are trying to get a goddamn job. Look at the Big C, where are her ethics?”

  “I don’t know, but I don’t want to put a price tag on it. Who knows if he can even help me get the job?”

  “The way I hear it, he’s got everyone quaking in their boots. I assure you, Rob King can get anything in the company he wants. Including the assistants.”

  “Thanks for the reassurance. I am not going to give him an ultimatum or anything. I’m going to apply fair and square. Okay? My phone is beeping.”

  “If it’s him, you should ask.” I hang up and it is Rob asking me if I want to come have lunch in his office. He’s getting wraps. I order a spinach wrap with portobellos and goat cheese. There is no way I’m going to mention that job. Instead, I e-mail my résumé to the appropriate person.

  I have to wait for Rob in his office. Sherman assures me he is finishing up a meeting. Our wraps and fruit smoothies (a special treat I didn’t know about) are sitting on Rob’s desk, taunting me. I am starving. If only Sherman would stop checking on me.

  I hear the door close behind me and feel Rob kissing my neck. I reach my arms up around him and we start kissing. I can’t believe it, but I notice he has the shades drawn on his windows. He is putting his hands into my sweater. I try to stop him. I’m thinking of poor Sherman.

  “I locked the door,” he whispers, trying to lift me onto the desk.

  “Rob, I don’t think it’s a good idea.” He pulls back panting and goes to sit on his side of the desk. He looks across at me like I might be some other exec.

  “Well, Eve, if that’s the way it has to be, we’re going to have to establish some rules. You can’t cross over to my side. This is my side, this is your side—”

  “Just like Dirty Dancing.”

  “Eve, please, these are important rules.” His sexy eyebrows are arching all over the place. “You may not do anything overtly suggestive, like licking your fingers, tilting your head or lowering your gaze to my unmentionable areas. It may be torture, but remember this is what you wanted, not me. Now. Let’s eat.” My wrap is not what I ordered, it’s lamb and some kind of chutney. Rob catches my grimace. There is nothing I hate more than people who kick a gift lunch in the mouth or however that saying goes. Every time I order food for the people in my department, there is always one person who has to ruin it by complaining about something, “They didn’t send enough plates, I need a separate one for dessert” or “I can’t eat this, this has cilantro in it, I will not stomach cilantro.” So I feel a little guilty that Rob takes my wrap out to Sherman. I can’t hear or see the exc
hange, because the door is closed. When Rob comes back in he is wrapless. I would have eaten the lamb—I like lamb as much as any carnivore (I’ve actually started to like it more since I started working with so many vegetarians), and I was really hungry. He sits back down on his side.

  “Well, looks like we are going to have to sit here staring at each other until your new lunch gets here.”

  “You could eat your wrap.”

  “That would be rude and besides, I prefer to stare at you and think about what might have come from our lunchtime rendezvous.” I guess there is something that would take my mind of my stomach—his stomach.

  “You are filthy.” He nods and drums his fingertips. “Did you lock the door?” I know, I am turning into such a whore. To think I was so staunchly opposed to an office romance and here I am struggling to get my tights off without ripping them. We are getting very caught up in the moment and his wrap, which is open, almost gets all over the back of my sweater (which would suck because it’s Roseanne’s sweater and this might push her over the edge). We almost don’t hear the knock on the door. He mutters a curse and waits for me to untwist my skirt before opening the door to Sherman.

  Sherman, whom I am convinced is on to us, comes in looking cold and red. He places my wrap in my hands and leaves. I can’t believe Rob made him go get it. It’s the middle of January, he must be frozen. Rob thinks that we should pick up right where we left off, but I’m hungry. Besides, it just isn’t right that Sherman had to walk out in the cold so we could be unprofessional in the office. I try to explain this and he doesn’t get it.

  Rob asks me out for a late dinner, but I suspect it’s just because he’s all worked up about the thwarted lunchtime efforts. I decline, for a lot of reasons. I figure it’s a good idea to keep Roseanne company and I’ve been out so late with him this past week, I need some sleep. Besides, if I deny him, I’m still the one in control.

  Roseanne and I rent a movie and I fall asleep half an hour into it.

  When the weekend rolls around, I break my “control,” and spend it with Rob. I am getting a little sick of myself and how cheesily happy I am. I tried to go out drinking with the girls on Friday night, but Tabitha dissed to hang out with Joao. I have to admit that I really wanted to hang out with Rob, but I was glad Tabitha was the one to diss so I wouldn’t get the blame. I suspect Roseanne didn’t see it that way.

  Roseanne and I never let another guy in between us in college. If there is one thing I can’t stand, it’s a girl who doesn’t realize the importance of a friend over a guy. I’m afraid I’m turning into the kind of girl who is putting her boyfriend first. I hate that. What’s worse despite all the nasty fun we’ve been having and the habit he has of arching his eyebrow or curling his lip at the perfect moment, I’m not sure Rob King would consider me his girlfriend.

  By Monday, Isabelle Chambers, the Human Resources Recruiter, has set up an interview with me to discuss the Food and Fun position. Tabitha is convinced that I got such speedy service because of Rob, but I assure her that I haven’t even told him I was interested in the job. She says he has ways of finding out.

  Tabitha helps me pick my outfit. She tells me right away I should wear the Jackie-O suit and insists through each of my twelve outfit changes that Jackie is the way to go. Roseanne puts tea bags on my eyes to bring down the swelling and tells me that I haven’t been getting enough sleep. That’s the thing about Roseanne that can be infuriating. You wish she’d get bitter sometimes, when you feel bad about something, but she doesn’t. She tells me I need to get more sleep because I do, not because she’s getting her digs in. I wish I were a better friend because I know, even though she’s been getting lots of sleep, her eyes are looking as puffy as mine. She won’t talk about her job.

  Roseanne shoots a zillion practice questions at me. After going on all these interviews, she is an expert on the questions they ask. She asks me to tell her what my best and worst qualities are. I have trouble thinking of my worst quality (can you believe?). For my best quality, Tabitha says I can’t use “excellent hand job” at all in the interview. Then, she leaves to go to some Brazilian music concert with Joao.

  “Now, the biggie, the one they all ask, and the one that’s the most ridiculous bull doo is, ‘Where do you see yourself in five years?”’

  “Sitting on the couch watching Springer with my thumb up my ass.”

  “You don’t want to come off too ambitious, Eve. C’mon think about it. Just say something that applies to the magazine position.”

  “I want to be the best coordinator for Food and Fun ever. And I want to travel and have fun, of course, and fight world hunger.”

  “Hey, Eve, I’m going to watch Dateline if you aren’t going to take this seriously.”

  “Okay, in five years, I guess I really would like to do a lot of traveling. I don’t want to be a big stress case, I want to enjoy my job, which, I think I would if I worked for this magazine, because it’s something I like. Ideally, I want to have my own magazine, which might metamorphose from this one and most importantly, I would like to have the respect of those around me, because that is how I will gauge the job I’ve done.”

  “Not bad, but you might want to curb the part about your own magazine. They want you to be theirs. F—your own ambition.”

  I suppose I got sidetracked by Dateline, because I never figure out how I am going to answer the question.

  The interview goes fabulously. I describe my current position in a glowing way. I make myself out to be much more important and a lot less bitter than I actually am. I identify my weakness as being the inability to say “no” to people (not in the dirty sense) and my strengths as the way I can focus on a project and still manage all my other duties. I can see that Isabelle Chambers is eating this all up. I can virtually read her mind and I know she thinks she’s found the one. Isabelle Chambers is getting ready to type “Prospect Identified” in the listing to deter all the other hacks who think they’ve got a chance. Sorry! It’s my game now.

  “So, Eve, where do you see yourself in five years?” Shit! What was I not supposed to say? Isabelle leans in a little, waiting for my next perfect answer. Was I supposed to mention my own magazine or not? Fuck! Then it occurs to me, five years is a long time and what if—oh fuck—what if I’m still sitting in the same desk, surfing the Net and watching the world move around me? What if I run into someone I used to work with on the school paper and they ask me what I do? What will I say as they smirk when they discover all I do is order lunch and talk on the phone. Who am I kidding? My own magazine at twenty-eight? My sister is almost twenty-eight, she doesn’t even know what she wants to be when she grows up. It’s not my fault, it’s my genes, of course, my parents are both very motivated. But it was a different time. No one asked my parents where they wanted to be in five years, because they knew it was a stupid question. Nobody gets where they want to be. They just get somewhere. Is Food and Fun where I want to be? Oh, God, who knows?

  “I realize it’s a tough question, it’s hard to see the future, but I’m asking for your ideal.”

  “Well—” I clear my throat and try (unsuccessfully) not to sound like a ditz. “I really just want to travel and have a lot of fun.” Isabelle Chambers sits back in her chair. I can tell all her hopes for me as the perfect candidate have just crashed, but she is the pro. She smiles at me—she definitely had braces—and thanks me for interviewing. She holds her hand out to shake.

  “I really want this job,” I say with a hint of desperation, “that’s where I see myself, at Food and Fun.”

  “Okay, Eve, thank you. I’ll give you a call in a couple of weeks. Thanks.” She gets up and leads me out. When I get into the elevator lobby, I am slightly in shock. Tabitha is only two floors up. I let about six elevators pass before deciding if I want to go up and talk to her or down and mope at my desk. I go up. Luckily, the Big C is in a meeting. As soon as Tabitha looks up at me, I know I must look like shit.

  “Great suit, Eve, but you’ve got to
start getting some sleep. What time is the interview?”

  “It’s done.” I plop into a chair next to her desk. She must be busy because she keeps looking back to her computer screen. “I don’t want to bother you.”

  “No, Eve, you look icky. Are you all right?”

  “No, I don’t know.” The very last thing I want to do is have a breakdown at Tabitha’s desk. I feel like I’m about to cry so I get up to go. “I’ll call you later.” I notice as I walk past her desk that she was on the Net. It’s a fine feeling when one of your best friends would sooner surf the Net than be your shoulder to cry on.

  “Eve, this is just—” she calls to me as I’m going out into the elevator bank.

  When I get back to my desk, there’s a message from Roseanne. I nip Intern Brian’s incessant annoying chatter in the bud by making him alphabetize the freelance files. I listen politely to Lorraine telling me about her dog’s pregnancy. I want to crawl into a cave and die. I am feeling so low that I stare at the delivery guy in disbelief when he brings a huge bouquet of flowers over to my desk. I rip off the card.

  Just wanted to brighten your day, like you brighten mine.

  I beg Sherman to tell Rob thank you. I wish more than anything I could tell him myself, but he’s in a meeting. I can’t believe the timing. Maybe I will spend the next five years wrapped up in Rob’s loving wonderfully muscled arms. I think I might be in love.

  I decide to tell Rob the next time we are intimate that I’m in love with him. In the past this has usually signaled the end of my relationships. I have actually said in the past “I love you, but you’re a loser. I think we should end it.” You see, the guys I’ve gone out with in the past have been scared of commitment or just drunk most of the time, so it was no big deal. Rob is different. He’s a man, and this could be it. I wouldn’t be such a loser and need to hang out with him nonstop if it wasn’t. Besides, he has this uncanny ability to do the right thing. Those flowers came at the perfect time. Lucky me, so young and I found the one. What a catch. My e-mail dings, new message. It’s from Sherman and titled “Rob King Out of the Office.” What?