by Doxer, Debra
Bryn stops fidgeting with her straw and eyes me over her drink. “It’s not just the terrible fix-ups.”
“What is it then?” I ask, curious about her suddenly serious expression.
She shakes her head at me, her dark bob shimmying across her round face, and glances at her watch. “It’s nothing. I’ve got to get back soon.”
I decide to let it go. She’ll tell me eventually. “Well, I guess I won’t have a chance to tell you about the guy who picked me up at Café Blue last night.”
That stops her cold. “What?” She eyes me with new interest. “What happened?”
I shrug with casual disinterest. “I got to Café Blue early and thought I’d get a drink. This guy at the bar came right up to me and offered to buy me one.”
“You wore the strappy sandals, didn’t you?” Bryn had talked me into buying them.
I smile and nod.
“See?” She pats my arm. “Dressing like a girl sometimes doesn’t hurt. Are you going out with him?”
“I don’t know. When we started talking I got a phone call I had to take, and then Katie showed up and we didn’t really get a chance to chat. But later he had the waiter give me his card, and he asked me to call him.”
“You’re going to, right?”
“I don’t know.” I shrug.
“Uh-huh.” Bryn murmurs with obvious disapproval. She looks at her watch again and begins clearing her napkin and straw wrapper off the table.
“What?” I ask.
“You won’t call him. And even if you did, you’d find something wrong with him.” She stands up and I follow, disconcerted that she seems angry with me.
“I don’t find things wrong that aren’t there,” I argue to her back.
Bryn stops on the sidewalk and turns to me. “No one is perfect.”
“Don’t try telling me that I’m too picky. Anger-management issues are deal-breakers, as are alcohol issues and unemployment. I’m discriminating. Why would I want to saddle myself with someone who has all kinds of problems?”
“You wouldn’t. But you don’t know that this guy has any issues, and you still won’t call him. Will you?”
I open my mouth to argue, but I know she’s right. “I’m tired,” I finally say, my shoulders slumping.
She nods sympathetically. “I know. Me, too. But we can’t give up.”
I could have mentioned that she was doing nothing on the dating front these days. Nothing she’d told me about, at least. It was the one part of Bryn’s life that hadn’t been stagnant, before now. But I kept that thought to myself. I couldn’t figure Bryn out lately. When Katie first introduced us over a year ago, I thought Bryn was a perfect partner-in-crime. She was another single friend to spend time with, and those numbers were dwindling. She was far more outgoing than I was, so going out with her provided unexpected adventures. It was her idea to head to the Bahamas this past winter. But since we’d been back, she’d been acting differently. She hardly ever called me to go out. I could call her, I supposed, but she generally initiated our outings to new restaurants and clubs. Mostly, she had to drag me with her. But in the end, I always enjoyed myself.
I sigh. “Okay. I’ll call him.”
“You could sound more enthusiastic. But at least you’re agreeing.”
“Is everything okay with you?” I finally decide to ask. “You haven’t seemed like yourself lately.”
“I’m fine. And if my boss could meet with a terrible accident, I’d be even better.” She turns to go, but hesitates. “Oh Andy, if you decide to go out with this guy, take your cell phone with you and tell someone where you’re going. You know, in case he’s a serial killer.” She smiles sweetly and heads off back to work.
“Very funny,” I yell at her retreating back.
three
I’m inching my way into the right turn. I hate this corner. There’s only a flashing red light and two lanes of traffic trying to turn onto a major roadway, one lane trying to turn left and the other lane trying to turn right. There always seems to be an SUV taking the left turn as I’m attempting to take the right. I can’t see a thing. I have to inch forward as the SUV does, trying to see if there’s oncoming traffic, attempting to take my right turn.
After my frappuccino break with Bryn, my afternoon was not very productive. Karthik never responded to my email, and every time I ventured up to his cubicle on the fifth floor he wasn’t there. There was plenty of evidence of his recent departure, an M.I.T. sweatshirt thrown over his chair, a half eaten sandwich discarded on his desk, but no Karthik.
I’ve also decided to call Jason Randall tonight. I’m nervous about it, but I have nothing to lose. Nothing but time and hope, that is. Athough hope may have already departed. I also have to call my sister back. If I leave that for too much longer she’ll be angry at me for not getting back to her in a timely manner.
The hulking SUV continues to block my view of the road, and I ease off the brake--slowly inching forward again--craning my neck to see, getting dangerously close to being in the middle of the oncoming traffic lane. Suddenly, my car is jolted forward.
I slam on the brake to keep from being pushed into the road while my eyes shoot up to the rearview mirror. I see a guy in the car behind me shaking his head and running a hand over his face and up through his hair.
Another accident, damn.
The SUV zooms into its left turn, and I can now see that the roadway is clear. I turn right and pull over to the side, checking the mirror to make sure the other car has followed me.
“Are you okay?” I hear as I step out and walk around to the back for a damage inspection. He’s driving a black VW Passat. The license plate on his front bumper has left a variety of small dents and nasty scratches on my silver back bumper. His car seems to have no damage.
A pair of scuffed sneakers appear on the curb across from me. I look up at him. He’s surveying the damage, too, or lack thereof in his case. He appears to be somewhere in his early thirties, with wavy dark hair disheveled from running his hands through it, which he’s now doing again. “I’m really sorry,” he says staring at my bumper. “I thought you were turning.”
I’m impressed with his initial concern and now with his admitted guilt. You never know how people are going to react during this first encounter after a car accident, but admitting fault and apologizing are rare.
“I’m fine,” I finally say. “Are you okay?”
He looks at me and nods. I notice that his eyes are bloodshot and his clothes, a red tennis shirt and faded jeans, are hopelessly wrinkled. “Get an estimate and I’ll pay for it,” he says. “You’re okay though?” He checks again.
“I’m fine. We should exchange insurance information. I’ll get a pen.” I go back to my car and fish around in my bag, finally coming up with a pen and a wrinkled yellow sticky note that reminds me to buy cat food. He’s bent over the passenger seat of his car, appearing to be looking for something. I write down his license plate number and the make and model of his car. From my vast accident experience, I now know that all I need is his license plate number for my insurance company to find him and his insurance company.
I watch as he locates what he’s looking for, a small notebook and a pen. He’s writing in the notebook as he comes toward me again, balancing it on his hand. He rips the notepage off and hands the paper with frayed edges to me. “You can do whatever you like, but I’m hoping you’ll let me pay you directly for the damage. I’ll pay for a rental car, too, if you need one while your car is being repaired.”
I glance at the paper in my hand. He’s written down a name, Ryan Miller--his name, I assume--and a telephone number. I look up at him. “You do have insurance, don’t you?”
He runs his fingers through his hair again. Dark cowlicks wave in all directions.“I have insurance, but this is obviously my fault, and I’d prefer not to have my rates raised.”
I study him closer. His hair and clothes are a mess, and he is a bad driver--or at least a distracted one--but benea
th it all, I realize he’s a very good-looking guy. He has high cheekbones, a straight aquiline nose, and a shadow of a beard. His tired eyes are an odd golden shade of brown beneath dark slashes of brow. He appears exhausted and annoyed with himself, but earnest enough. “We can try it your way,” I offer, knowing it’s easy to contact his insurance company if he’s being less than honest.
“Good. Thanks,” he says, looking relieved.
“Are your insurance rates high from being in a lot of accidents?” I inquire.
He laughs and shakes his head. “Not yet. Although the way things are going, that’s a real possibility.”
I eye him inquisitively.
“I’m pretty sleep-deprived these days,” he explains. “Some friends and I have been trying to get a business off the ground and, well, it’s a lot of long hours.” He shrugs as his voice trails off.
“Maybe you should stay off the roads until you can get a good night’s sleep?” I suggest. “You might find yourself in more than a fender bender next time.”
“Other drivers sharing the road with me would certainly be better off.” He grins. “Well, I’d better let you be on your way. I’ll stay a few hundred yards back this time. In fact, I’ll give you a five-minute head start.”
“I’d appreciate that,” I say, feeling a smile forming.
“I’m glad you’re okay. I’ll wait to hear from you.” He starts to turn away and stops. “Wait, what’s your name?”
I hesitate, remembering Bryn’s serial killer comment from earlier. Then I figure offering my first name probably isn’t too risky. “Andrea.”
“I’ll look forward to hearing from you, Andrea.”
“He said ‘I’ll look forward to hearing from you’?” my sister Laura asks me later on the telephone.
“Strange thing to say when I’m going to be calling to get money for the accident he caused.”
“Maybe he likes you,” she offers.
“Maybe he had no idea what he was saying. He looked like he hadn’t slept in a week. I was tempted to offer him a ride so he wouldn’t get back behind the wheel.”
“I can’t believe you were in another accident. You’ve got some bad car karma going on.”
I’m sitting on the floor in my living room--the telephone tucked between my neck and shoulder--surrounded by papers, attempting to organize my software feature data for work. Perhaps if I were more organized, I would be less confused by the conflicting information with which I had to work. This endeavor is made even more challenging by Tiger, who is leaping onto the scattered papers, enjoying the crunching sounds he’s producing. I grab him off the papers and pull him onto my lap. His green eyes peer up at me in adoration as his purring reflex kicks in. But then he remembers the papers and squirms out of my lap. Crunch, crunch, crunch….
“What is that noise?” Laura asks.
“Tiger is helping me finish some work.” I try to gather up the now wrinkled papers.
“Has Tiger decided to try his paw at marketing?”
“I wish. It really is time for him to go out and get a job. Something that doesn’t require opposable thumbs.”
Laura laughs. “So tell me--what happened with Derek?”
I groan into the phone.
“Was it that bad?”
“It was beyond bad.” Then I proceed to describe our afternoon together.
“Ooo that’s disgusting!” she squeals. “And he made a move on you in the middle of all that. How could he be so clueless?”
Thinking about that smell and those bugs again makes me just want to change the subject. I interrupt her commiseration with a question. “When is the tasting?” News of my car accident had sidetracked our conversation.
“It’s this Saturday. Can you make it?” She wants me to join her and my mother at the bakery they have chosen to make the wedding cake. They are to sample different flavor combinations. Normally, I’d be all over free cake. But since the wedding planning began, being with my sister and mother is as close as I’ll ever come to being in a war zone, I hope. Of course, Jonathan, my soon-to-be brother-in-law, can’t make it. He’s working again, trying to make partner at his law firm. They met in law school. Laura is a lawyer, as well, but she works in real estate law where she is actually able to get weekends off. Trying to build law careers and plan a wedding at the same time are not making for a blissful nuptial planning period.
“Are you going to make every attempt to avoid antagonizing her?” I ask.
“I don’t do anything. She’s the one who makes me crazy--quilting me into going with her to make all these decisions. She asks me what I want, and when I tell her she disagrees and just does what she wants anyway. There’s no point in my even being there, especially when she makes me take time off during the week to go through this ridiculous charade.”
“Well, thanks for the full disclosure,” I say. “You couldn’t pay me to go with you on Saturday.”
“Come on, Andy. I need you there as a buffer. Please?”
“Fine,” I agree, rolling my eyes even though she can’t see me. Eating cake for an hour in the afternoon does add some incentive to my acceptance.
“Thank you. Maybe it will even be fun with you there.”
“Yeah, sure. What time is fun?” I ask.
“Not anytime soon.” Laura laughs.
Laura is my junior by four years. She’s an attorney and she’s engaged, but I still think of her as my little sister. What she has never learned is that it’s simply easier to agree with everything Mom says when you’re in her presence. Tell her what she wants to hear, and then go ahead and do whatever you like. There is no point in arguing with her. She has superhuman stamina for arguments. She thinks I am a most agreeable daughter. But what she doesn’t know can’t hurt me.
I sign off after making arrangements to meet them at the bakery on Saturday. The next telephone call is to Mr. Frameless Glasses. I look at his neat block writing on the business card and dial. After four rings, his voicemail answers. “You’ve reached Jason,” his smooth, deep voice begins, “Leave a message.” Beeeeep.
I take a breath and try to speak in a calm and casual voice. “Hi, Jason. This is Andrea. We met at Café Blue the other night. You had the waiter give me your card.” And this is when Tiger decides to come barreling at me and the stack of papers I’ve collected on my lap. He flies at the stack, hitting it head-on and sending papers flying. He lands on my lap while continuing to bat at the airborne sheets. “Dammit Tiger,” I mutter, as the phone falls from my shoulder where I’ve been balancing it. I grab it up quickly. “Umm,” I continue into the telephone, trying to remember what I was saying. “I was sorry we didn’t have more time to chat, too. You can reach me back at…” I leave the number to my cell phone and hang up, wondering if his voicemail caught the brief commotion. I had planned to say something clever about his disappearing act, but Tiger threw me off, and I figured brief was better.
“Well, Tiger,” I say looking down at him. He has rolled onto his back, offering his tummy up for a rub. “I’d say you got the drop on those papers, my friend. They never saw you coming.”
four
The nice gentleman at the Honda collision office knows me by name. This is certainly not a good thing. “Back again, Ms. Whitman,” he says, stepping out of the garage into the bright morning sun. I can’t recall his name, but he is an older man dressed in the same beige polyester pants and Red Sox T-shirt he’s worn the last two times I’ve seen him.
“It’s not too bad,” I say leading him around to the back of the car.
He puts his hands on his hips as he bends down to peer at the bumper. “Someone hit you again, huh?” He shakes his head at me. “You’re one unlucky lady.”
“Actually, you could say I’m lucky. Three accidents within a year, and I’m still unscathed.” I realize that this is probably not smart to say out loud. It’s kind of like throwing down the gauntlet to the driving universe.
“Can’t say the same for your car. Have you got the insur
ance estimate?”
“Actually, the other driver offered to pay for the damages. I just need an official estimate from you.”
“Okay, give me a second.”
I head to work with an estimated repair cost of three-hundred and ninety-eight dollars and an extra thirty dollars a day for the two days in which I will need a rental car while my bumper is being smoothed out and painted. I would consider keeping the money and not fixing the car, but I really like my car. I want it to look like new, despite the traumas it has suffered under my care.
“Running late this morning,” Joan says.
I buzz by her. I’m on a mission today. I’m going to find Karthik once and for all. I dump my bags on my desk and take the stairs up two flights. When I get there, I can’t believe it. Karthik is sitting in his chair, hunched over his keyboard and monitor.
“Hi there.” I decide to take the friendly approach rather than attacking him with accusations for ignoring my emails.
He swivels around in his chair to face me. He is wearing his M.I.T. sweatshirt and he appears as freezing cold as I usually am. Karthik’s cubicle is the same cramped, mustard-colored box we all are issued, but his looks as though he hasn’t cleaned or organized it ever. He has a handful of computer towers scattered around, some in use, others retired to paperweight status. Empty soda cans balance upon paper piles of differing heights. Each surface looks as though one more paper, or one more soda can, or even one more breath released too strongly would cause an avalanche, burying Karthik under his own disorganization.
Karthik’s clipped dark hair is graying at the temples. I can’t recall the grey being there when I first met him three years ago. He eyes me expectantly, his hands still poised in the air, ready to swivel back to his keyboard and pick up where he left off.
“I need to talk to you about the feature descriptions for the marketing white papers,” I say, as though I haven’t already sent him a handful of emails on the subject.