Inside, the hallway smelled of cigarette smoke and spicy cooking. The doors to the apartments were made of cheap brown press board. I took the stairs as fast as possible, grateful for the Yellow Cab waiting outside. I’d drop off the fern, then I’d get the hell out of here.
The fern was heavy as lead, and by the third landing, I was huffing like I’d just run the Chicago Marathon. I knocked tentatively on the door for 3A.
It was opened immediately by a girl of about nine or ten with black curly hair and dark, saucerlike eyes. She smiled at me shyly.
“Is Alexa here?” I asked, trying to catch my breath and shift the fern to my other hip.
She looked behind her, then gazed up at me again.
I repeated myself.
Again, no response, just a bashful grin. Behind her, I saw a living room, its stained brown carpeting littered with toys. An ancient couch in a gray plaid fabric sat before an old TV with rabbit-ear antennae.
Just then, someone stepped into the living room. Alexa. “Who is it, Lucia?”
She saw me, and her face grew cold. Her eyes narrowed. “What are you doing here?”
I stood frozen in the doorway. This was no hip loft condo, and Alexa wasn’t wearing cashmere. Instead, she had on tight blue workout pants, frayed at the hem, and a faded, black-and-white striped T-shirt that looked about ten years old. Was this her place? Was the girl her daughter?
“What are you doing here?” she repeated, her voice growing somewhat louder.
I thrust the fern forward. “This is for you.”
Now I couldn’t see her. All I knew was that she wasn’t taking the fern. My arms began to quiver. I set it on the floor. “I wanted to see how you were,” I said.
“Little late for that.” She crossed her arms.
The girl giggled. A woman of about forty-five crossed the room, carrying a smaller child. She stopped and glanced at me, then said something in Spanish.
“No one,” Alexa answered in English, never taking her gaze from me.
I cleared my throat. “Alexa, look…”
Just then another woman came into the living room. She looked remarkably like a tired, older Alexa, with white streaks through her long black hair.
“Hola,” she said to me.
“Hello.”
She turned to Alexa and they spoke in rapid Spanish, but still Alexa didn’t take her eyes from me.
There came a pounding on the stairs. I turned to see two boys in their early teens charging up the stairway. I moved, just in time for them to push past me into the apartment, barely giving me a look.
“I suppose you’re looking for this,” Alexa said, striding across the room and lifting a white sheaf of papers from the counter. The severance agreement.
“Well, ah…it would be nice if I could get that.”
Alexa crossed the room again, her walk slow and purposeful, until she was in the doorway near me. “Let’s go outside.”
We descended the stairs in silence. I was relieved beyond belief to see the cab still waiting. I gave him a cheery wave, hoping to convince him to stay a little longer. Two men watched us from a stoop to our right.
“You got a pen?” Alexa said, not looking me in the face. There was a proud raise to her chin, but her eyes looked almost misty. That expression broke my heart.
“You know what, Alexa,” I said. “Just forget it. It’s too small a severance, and I’m sorry for that. I’m sorry for everything. And if you want to file suit against the company you should do that.” I could hear the entire HR department screaming Stop! in my head. I ignored them and continued on. “I also wanted to see if I could help you get another job.”
She scoffed. “You fired me, and now you’re here to help me?”
I had to admit, it sounded ridiculous.
“I’m not going to sue Harper, and I am going to sign this,” she said, shaking the agreement. “You know why? Because I support that family in there. And even though this is a pathetic severance, I need the money now.”
“Was that your little girl?”
She crossed her arms. A breeze blew a stray hair from her face, and despite myself, I noticed how beautiful she was. “She’s my niece,” Alexa said. “There’s another niece and nephew in there, too, as well as my stepsister and brother.”
“And was one of those women your mom?” The thought of Alexa still living with her mother was inconceivable.
She nodded. “And my aunt.” She turned to me again. “I’m the breadwinner for this family. For all these people. That is, until you fired me.”
“So you’re not from Kenilworth?” I asked in a jokey tone. As soon as I said it, I wanted to ask the guys on the stoop for their handgun and shoot myself.
Alexa sighed and shook her head.
“Well, seriously, what about those black cashmere sweaters?” I said.
“What about them?”
“How do you afford all of them if you’re supporting everyone here?”
“I bought three of them at TJ Maxx. I rotate.” She dipped her head, as if embarrassed by this, but it was me who felt like a monumental ass.
“Oh,” I said.
“Are you going to give me a pen?” Alexa gestured to my purse.
“Sure. Yeah, okay.” Flustered, I rummaged through it, scrabbling my fingers until I came up with an old Bic.
Alexa snatched it, signed the agreement and handed it to me. “Show’s over,” she said. “Time for you to go.”
As if on cue, the cabbie honked.
“Alexa, look,” I said. “I am truly sorry. If there’s anything I can do…”
She looked up the street. Her gaze was tired and sad. She moved to the front door and opened it with a key. “I think you’ve done enough,” she said. She stepped inside and slammed the door.
chapter eight
W hen Chris got home from work that night, I was sitting in his big chair, only a small lamp illuminating the room. I was distraught about Alexa.
“Honey, what are you doing?” Chris said. His voice was cheerful.
“Nothing.”
He switched on the overhead light, making me blink.
“What’s up?” He sat on the arm of the chair.
I looked at him, not sure where to start.
“What is it? Talk to me.”
Those words almost made me weep with relief. For the past two years, as Chris and I had grown steadily apart, I’d handled my emotional troubles on my own, wrestling in my mind in the dark of our bedroom, coming to my own decisions. But now here was my husband, attentive and wanting to talk. I didn’t care what had happened to suddenly bring him back. I didn’t care whether it was the frog or some freak shift in the universe. I was just happy he was there.
I reached out and touched his hand. “It’s Alexa.”
“I thought you got rid of her.”
“I did.” Now, I felt like weeping for a different reason. “I’ve destituted her whole family.”
“Is destituted a word?”
“Chris!”
“Sorry, hon, but this is silly. You didn’t harm her family.”
“I think I did.”
“What happened?”
I told Chris about the severance agreement and my visit to her apartment. “I thought she was from money,” I said. “She always acted so superior and dressed the part. But according to her, she supports all these people, in this tiny apartment.” I looked around our place and thought of all the relative riches we had-granite countertops, marble bathroom, enough space to avoid each other for years if we wanted.
“But Billy, it doesn’t matter if she’s rich or poor, you fired her for legitimate reasons.”
I sniffled. “That’s just the thing. I didn’t like her, but I don’t know that she needed to be fired. I think I just liked the power trip I got from being a VP. It was a convenience to get rid of her.”
“That’s not true,” Chris said. I grimaced at how good and honorable he apparently thought I was. It made me ashamed.
&nb
sp; “I rationalized the decision,” I said. “I wanted her out, and so I came up with reasons why she should go. And because she’d gotten in a bit of trouble before it was easy to convince everyone. But I didn’t do the right thing. I certainly wasn’t thinking of the company. I was thinking of me.” I dropped my head in my hands.
“Move over,” Chris said, nudging me gently with his knee. He slid onto the big chair, pulling me onto his lap, embracing me. I squeezed my eyes shut and felt the serene comfort of him. This was what I’d missed.
“All right,” Chris said. “Now let’s figure out what you can do about it.”
We talked for an hour. And despite how badly I felt about Alexa, I felt wonderful with Chris. This was what a husband and wife should be like. This was what I’d assumed we would be like when we were married. Why there had been so precious little of this, I couldn’t say, but I loved the closeness now. I loved him.
We decided I would speak to Roslyn the next day. I would admit I’d made a mistake and try to get Alexa her job back. By the time Chris led me to bed, I was exhausted, but I was calm with my decision. I murmured thanks and fell asleep.
“Absolutely not,” Roslyn said.
My calm from last night evaporated as if the air had been sucked from the room.
We were sitting in Roslyn’s office, a cool space decorated with black and white prints of chilly winter landscapes.
“Why?” I said, trying to stop my legs from jiggling up and down. “Why can’t we rehire her, if I admit I made a mistake?”
Roslyn shook her head and gazed at me, clearly disappointed. “Remember when you brought up the topic of letting Alexa go, and I told you it had to be your responsibility?”
I nodded and chewed anxiously on the inside of my lip.
“Well, that remains true. Once you’re in management, you have to make some tough decisions, and you have to stick by them.”
“Of course. I know that, and I agree, but I think just this once-”
“Can’t do it, Billy.”
“But why?” My anxiety was replaced by desperation. If I couldn’t somehow reverse what I’d done, Alexa’s family would suffer. I wouldn’t be able to shake the thought of that bleak apartment from my mind.
“When you let Alexa go, did you read the HR manual?” Roslyn asked.
I nodded, although I’d really only skimmed it, too set on sacking Alexa ASAP.
“So then you’ll probably recall,” Roslyn said, leaning forward on her desk, “that once someone is terminated, they cannot be rehired. Laid off, yes, we might be able to bring them back, but not if they were terminated for cause.”
I sagged in the chair. I had rushed forward to something I wanted-getting Alexa out of my little world-without knowing or paying attention to the consequences. “There’s nothing I can do?”
She shook her head. Then her face brightened. “But on a better topic, how’s the budget going for Odette’s book?”
I held back a sigh. Budgets, budgets, budgets. The new staple of my work life. How I hated them. “Just fine,” I said.
“Great!” Rosalyn was chipper now that we’d dealt with the unpleasantries. “Well, see if you can get the numbers up. We’ve got to make some money off of her. And don’t forget we’ve got an officers’ meeting this afternoon.”
That made me sit a little taller. I wasn’t sure what went on in such meetings, yet they sounded official, exciting. Evan had told me otherwise, but I always believed he’d made them sound painful because he knew how badly I wanted to attend. And now I would. My first officers’ meeting.
“I’ll be there,” I said.
Having your toenails pulled out with tweezers.
Listening to a Ted Nugent song for eternity.
Bleeding from the eyes.
Being run over by a lawn mower.
Watching a four-day Three Stooges marathon.
I sat in the boardroom making a list of things that might be more painful than the meeting itself.
Evan hadn’t been patronizing me or trying to make me feel better when he’d said officers’ meetings were boring. In fact, the word “boring” itself was a rip-roaring riotous party compared to what this meeting really was-monotonous and brainless.
We were on the topic of whether to have carbonated mineral water put in the pop machine. Lester, a VP from accounting, pointed out in a speech as long as a state of the union address, that the pop machine was really just for soda and we’d already compromised that sacred concept by adding regular water. Another man, clearly Lester’s nemesis, argued that Lester was promoting a prejudiced attitude toward water, and that surely water of all kinds should be allowed the same rights as soda and permitted to mingle in the same areas.
“And you’re missing a big point,” the nemesis said. “We make money on that machine. The sparkling water will sell as fast as hotcakes.”
Lester huffed and puffed about the importance of tradition and doing things the way they’ve always been done. I scribbled on my pad, Sell as fast as hotcakes. What did that mean anyway? What were hotcakes, and did they really sell so quickly? Maybe we should put those in the machine.
Lost in tedium, I began to write other sayings that didn’t make sense.
Colder than a witch’s tit. A witch was a mammal, wasn’t she? And therefore, why would her breast be colder than anyone else’s?
Snug as a bug in a rug. Never understood this. Is the bug supposed to be rolled up in a rug, or just happy to be lolling in carpet fibers?
Clean as a whistle. Whistles were coated with saliva with every use, and therefore wouldn’t exactly qualify as clean.
I felt someone’s eyes on me and looked over to see Evan staring at my legs. I’d worn a light blue, pleated skirt that was rather schoolgirl and saucy. Apparently, Evan agreed. He raised his eyebrows and gave me a salacious smile. Feeling bored and bold, I crossed my legs, and the skirt rode a little higher. Evan’s mouth fell slightly open, his gaze never leaving me. That gaze carried with it a certain power, wholly different from the power I’d felt when I fired Alexa. This power was sexual, ragged-the intensity thrilled me, yet scared me too. This power was great enough to carry me away with it, right when my marriage had gotten back to the place I wanted.
“Excuse me for a moment,” I said, standing up.
Everyone in the boardroom looked at me with surprise. I thought I saw Evan grinning.
“Ladies’ room,” I said.
More stunned looks. Evidently, no one in the history of Harper Frankwell had ever left an officers’ meeting to use the restroom. I considered sinking back into my seat fast, but between the boredom and Evan’s eyes, I had to escape.
“Ladies’ room,” I said again, before I scooted toward the door.
By the time the meeting ended two goddamned hours later, no one seemed to remember my departure from the room or the way I’d snuck back in. I barely had time to do any work before I had to leave to meet my mom, but with my excitement to see her I couldn’t have cared less. I headed for the parking lot.
As I steered my car onto the highway, my cell phone bleated from inside my purse. I reached over to the passenger seat and answered it.
“How’s traffic?” Chris said.
“Same as five minutes ago. What’s with you?” I had talked to Chris three times at work today, and once since I’d pulled out of the lot.
“I just wish I could go with you.”
I laughed. “Since when?” Chris had never had such a keen interest in seeing my mom.
“I want to be with you.” There was a plaintive note in his voice.
“Chris, you were with me last night and the night before that, and this morning.”
“I want to be with you all the time.”
Internally, I repeated, since when? Why, exactly, had Chris come back to me so quickly, when for years he’d distanced himself? I hadn’t wanted to ponder that question-I just wanted to be happy with the new closeness we’d found-but Chris’s near desperation baffled me. Even in our happ
iest days, we’d never been the couple who lived hand-in-hand.
“I’ll see you when I get home,” I said.
“Baby doll!” My mother swept into the bar at Milrose Brewery and pulled me into a hug.
I squeezed her tight, inhaling a new light, floral perfume. Over her shoulder, I could see other patrons at the bar checking her out. And for good reason. Her black hair was pulled elegantly into a chignon, and she had on huge dark sunglasses and a tangerine wrap around her shoulders that made her look more Parisian-urban than Barrington-suburban.
“Are we eating?” She pulled away and glanced around, as if the maitre d’ might materialize and whisk her to a corner table.
“I’ll tell them we’re ready.”
A few minutes later, my mother and I were tucked away in the loft section of the barnlike restaurant. “Mmm,” my mother said, perusing the menu. “What to get, what to get.”
“Tell me about Italy,” I said.
“Oh, it was divine. You’ve been telling me for years that I should go, that I shouldn’t be afraid to do things on my own, and you were right! I made so many friends.” From her bag, which looked suspiciously Prada-esque, she whipped a small, red leather album. “Here’s Claudia.” She pointed to a photo of a stylish woman around fifty with ash-blond hair swept off her face. “Here’s her husband, Thomas. What a dear.”
For the next twenty minutes, I heard about Claudia and Thomas, and their Milanese friends, Paola and Stefano, and every fashion show and party they’d attended the last two weeks. I was delighted for my mom. To see her so vivacious again, so lustful for her life, was heartwarming. But my own heart needed warming of the maternal kind. I wanted her to say, now tell me about you, baby doll.
When our entrées were delivered-rigatoni and chicken for me, halibut for my mother-I jumped in. “I got the vice presidency,” I said, blurting it out.
“What?” My mother clapped her hands. “Fantastic!” She waved the waiter over and ordered champagne, while I preened under her attention.
But I was barely into my story, when my mother interrupted. “You’ll be needing some different clothes now that you’ve been promoted, am I right?” she asked.
The Night I got Lucky Page 9