Lauren Takes Leave

by Gerstenblatt, Julie

Martha grabs me in an awkward embrace, my torso bending toward her while my butt hovers over my wooden chair, hands pinned to my sides. When she lets go, I sort of fall right into my seat.

  “Well!” I say. “That was a bit unexpected.”

  “Yes,” she agrees. “It’s odd for me to admit, even to myself, but it seems that I am happy to see you alive.” She smiles sadly.

  “Gee, thanks.”

  “The thing is…” she begins, and then, thinking better of it, stops herself.

  I am intrigued; I want to know where this is heading. “Please, continue.”

  “I…I get the sense that you despise me. Don’t shake your head at me, Lauren, and try to deny it. I see it in your eyes, have always seen flashes of hatred there. And I just want to know why.” She rubs her hand against her forehead, as if she’s in pain from all this thinking, and instantly I know: Botox! That’s why she looks so much younger today, and that’s why she was at Dr. Grossman’s on Tuesday.

  The world truly is full of surprises.

  Then I remind myself: Focus, Lauren. Tell her why you hate her.

  And then, Why do you hate her?

  If there is one thing I have learned this week, it’s to cut through the bullshit and be honest, with myself first, and then (mostly) with others, even if that means I’m not going to come out looking perfect. I’m thinking of Lenny. I’m thinking of Kat, and Jodi, and, for the most part, of Doug. “I hate you because you hate me!”

  There. That was easier than I thought.

  Though now that I hear it out loud, it sounds really stupid and childish.

  Like we’re middle schoolers.

  “This is about the department chair position, isn’t it?” Martha twitches.

  A week ago, my answer would have been a quick yes. But now, with everything that I’ve experienced and reflected on this week, I have to stall for a moment, to consider my response.

  I tear off a corner of the scone and try to chew. It’s stale and dry and I end up coughing bits of pastry into the space between us. Cool, Lauren, keep it cool. I imagine myself at the Clevelander with Tim Cubix, crying together over the way life is messy and, therefore, beautiful. I sip from the coffee cup and answer. “At some point I guess it was about that job. But now, it’s about so much more than that, you can’t even imagine.”

  I tell her just enough about my trip to Miami to make it sound more like a soul-searching weekend at a retreat in India than the complete and utter pleasure bender that it was.

  “I can’t imagine wanting to escape, hmm?” she says, her hands folded tightly over the pocketbook in her lap. “Lauren, do you even know anything about me?”

  Only that you were fashioned in a mad scientist’s lab, put together from parts of an old Buick LeSabre and several defunct administrators, then sent to my school to try and ruin my good time.

  She blinks. “That’s what I thought. Nothing.”

  And so, I look at her more closely and begin to wonder. Is she married? There’s no ring. Does she have children? Or cats or dogs, a backyard, a foot fetish? Where does she live?

  I don’t even know how she takes her coffee, and I don’t even care that I don’t know. I never asked.

  Who’s the hater, now, Lauren?

  “Mrs. Worthing—” she begins, and I think, Great, we’re back to that. “I thought you were being abused.”

  “Well, in a way, I was!” I say, trying to explain my point of view, to have her really understand me for once.

  She is not amused. “I thought the recent changes in your behavior had to do with signs of personal distress.”

  “But they were! I was distressed!” I counter.

  She shakes her head and keeps speaking over me. “I observed you, I asked around. And then, when your husband covered up for you like that, I thought you were in trouble with him, like I had been, once, with my husband. I called the police because of genuine concern for your well-being. Someone once did the same for me and it saved my life.”

  Well, piss on my leg and tell me it’s raining. I try to imagine her being afraid, being hurt, being in danger. I try to see beneath her cool surface, to the origin of the twitch, to the crack beneath. It’s hard to fathom. “Really?”

  “I don’t make a habit of lying.”

  Yes, bad habit.

  “I’m so…” I begin, about to say “sorry,” but then I look up from my awful scone and see that she has emotion on her face.

  I think of her cyborg-like manner, the distance she has always kept from me and everyone else at school. And for the first time, I realize that living that way must be very lonely, and possibly, very sad.

  “I’m so glad you told me, Martha,” I say, reaching across the sticky wooden table to take her hand.

  She smiles sadly, wiping a few stray tears on the back of her brown sleeve. “You’re still not getting that promotion, you know,” she says. “Even if you are being nice to me.”

  “Look at you, cracking the jokes.”

  “Except that I’m being serious.”

  I have to remember who I’m dealing with here.

  “That’s fine,” I say, taking my hand back, relieved that we are at least talking about it. “I was more embarrassed than anything when you passed me over. In truth, I don’t think administrivia is really my thing.”

  Martha stands to alert me that our meeting is coming to a conclusion. I do the same. What I want her to say is, Oh, I think you’d make a fine administrator, but I just couldn’t afford to lose you as a classroom teacher since you show so much brilliance there.

  Instead, her cool formality is back, as firmly in place as her hair. Martha dumps the untouched coffee and scone into the garbage bin and adjusts her pocketbook awkwardly on her shoulder. Then she turns to me and smiles. “I agree, Lauren. Administration is not your thing.”

  We walk together toward the front of the coffee shop, me licking my wounds and Martha lost in thought. I push open the glass door and hear the bell chime overhead. The dewy spring air smells like rain.

  “Oh, and another thing, Mrs. Worthing.”

  I roll my eyes and face Martha. “Call me Lauren, please,” I beg.

  She nods curtly. “Another thing, Lauren. You will write up and then sign a report detailing how you spent your week’s leave. This will be shared with the superintendent and placed in your permanent personnel file. Should you ever disappear on us again, you will be terminated.”

  I swallow, and look at the ground, concentrating on the flecks of glass shining in the pavement. Now that I hear my job truly is in jeopardy, all I want to do is keep it safe from harm.

  I think.

  I picture Martin and his antics, and the never-ending parade of essays and homework just waiting for me to collect, grade, and return.

  Doug needs me to work. Maybe even I need me to work. But do I want it to be there, at the same middle school where I began my career?

  I think of my tiny notebook with just one promising research idea scribbled inside.

  I really need to put in a call to Georgie.

  “And you will be docked for three days’ pay. Monday and Tuesday, as we know, were actually spent on jury duty. The other days will not be covered by the district.”

  I wonder if Martha is a fan of Tim and Ruby. Now there’s a plan: I could just go around town handing out autographed pictures in lieu of taking responsibility or managing any fallout from the week’s adventures.

  Instead, I shake Martha’s hand. “Of course. Consider it done.”

  Even with all of the reprimands and punitive actions taken, I walk away feeling completely relieved. Why? Because Martha doesn’t seem to know anything about Kat’s role as my accomplice.

  Chapter 30

  I pick up my children from their activities and bring them home to rest and play. Doug and I challenge them to a huge Wii Sport competition in the basement, girls against boys.

  “Mom, you suck at golf,” Ben says merrily, as he watches me sink the ball into the water four times in
a row. “Just forfeit.”

  “Never!” I say. “I will never give up. And use the word ‘stink’ instead, please.”

  “Sorry,” he says, quickly and with sincerity.

  I smile back and give him the thumbs-up while holding the Wii remote, thereby sending another golf ball off a cliff and into the water.

  “You’re better than me, Mommy,” Becca says. Which is true. We’re so going to lose this game.

  “Let’s switch to shooting those ducks and balloons out of the sky,” Doug suggests. “Mom’s really good at that one.”

  We play silently for a few minutes, each of us concentrating on racking up as many points as possible for our team.

  Then Ben turns to me. “I missed you,” he says.

  “I’m glad you came back,” Becca adds. Her particular choice of phrasing makes me wonder if she was worried I might not return.

  “Oh, Bec, the best thing about going away is coming back.” I put down the remote and pull both children to me, and inhale the warm, slightly puppy-dog smells trapped in their hair. “I’m sorry I had to go away in the first place.”

  I look at Doug while saying it.

  “I think we need to set some new house rules about how we talk to each other and how we treat one another, okay, guys? So that everyone stays here and stays happy,” Doug says. “We’ll have a family meeting tomorrow night at dinner, when Mommy and I have more time.”

  “Okay,” I say along with Ben and Becca. I know that not every minute with my family will be as warm and tender as this one. But it’s nice to have this one, right here and now.

  “Who wants to come with me to pick up the new babysitter and a pizza?” he asks, looking at his watch.

  Temple Beth El is aglow with spotlights as Doug and I pull in to the parking lot. It’s clear that there is an event here tonight, and that it’s going to be huge, like the opening of a new Target in a strip mall.

  Doug hands the car keys to a valet wearing a robe and fake beard.

  “Jesus, they are taking this fundraising effort really seriously, aren’t they?” Doug asks as we walk up the steps of the midcentury-modern temple, a red carpet cascading under our feet.

  “Moses, you mean.”

  “The party’s theme tonight is Dancing with the Stars,” I tell Doug. “Jodi’s pretending she’s not that into it, but I think it’s her dream come true.” At the top of the stairs, we stop, greeted by life-size cutouts of each of tonight’s Beth El “stars.” Six members of the temple’s congregation pose and smile with cardboard stiffness. I put my arm around “Jodi”—tight black dress, high heels, auburn highlights, hand placed defiantly on one curved hip—and Doug snaps a picture of us with his phone.

  And that’s when I see her. Well, not the real her, but her likeness, right next to Jodi’s frozen self. I can almost hear her calling me a bitchwhoreasshole through clenched teeth.

  Even in cardboard, Leslie scares the crap out of me.

  I grab Doug by the arm and try to lead him out of the building. “We have to leave. Go. Home. Now.”

  “What is it, her gift? Just bring it to her another time,” he says. “I’m not driving back fifteen minutes for something you forgot.”

  Thing is, seeing Leslie, I realize that I forgot my balls.

  I try another tactic. “Might vomit. Very ill. Chills. Legionnaire’s disease.”

  “You mean, like, from a cruise?” Doug is studying me hard.

  “Ballots here!” a voice calls from a table set up nearby. “Buy some extra ballots for tonight’s fundraiser.”

  Despite my desire for immediate flight from the building, Doug and I walk over to the table and give the volunteer our names. She hands us an envelope containing our tickets for entry to the ballroom and two pink ballots. “You can buy extras if you’d like,” the woman explains. “They are two for ten or four for c-c-chai.” She spits the Hebrew word for eighteen with a good deal of throaty phlegm.

  “Ah, there you are! I’ve been looking all over for you!” Jodi calls, grabbing me by the arm and pulling me inside. “Doug, go find Lee and help him with the cameras. I need Lauren’s help getting ready.”

  I fake-smile and wave good-bye to Doug as Jodi drags me into the peachy, plush interior of the Beth El ladies’ room.

  And just like that, I’m trapped. Trapped in temple.

  “Jo,” I say, collapsing into an overstuffed armchair and trying not to panic, “do you know Leslie Koch?”

  “Yeah, sure. She’s one of the crazy bitches who’s dancing with me tonight.” She leans into the glass and applies more makeup to her already flawless look. “I don’t know her all that well, really. But the word is, she had some sort of accident the other night and now her face is all fucked—” She stops midcurse and turns, lip gloss wand extended toward me as an accusation.

  “Up,” I say. “Fucked up. What did Kat say? Six stitches?”

  “That was Leslie Koch’s sex-toy birthday party? With the kissing of girls and dancing round poles?”

  “And the gashing of hostesses…yes, Jo!”

  “That means…your dominatrix is the president of our sisterhood!”

  “Small world,” a chilly voice from behind a bathroom stall says. A flush follows.

  Jodi mouths the word “Leslie” to me, and I mouth the word “Duh” to her. I have my hand on the door handle and am about one second away from freedom when Leslie’s words stop me.

  “Always running from the scene of the crime, aren’t you, Lauren?”

  I let go of the door and turn to face what’s left of Leslie’s face.

  Her entire right check is covered in gauze held in place with surgical tape. The rest of her face is masked in huge sunglasses. She slides them up to her hairline and lets them rest there, so that Jodi and I can have a good, long look at the full horror.

  And look we do.

  It’s really so much worse than anything I could have imagined. Her eyes are rimmed in purplish green and the whole top half of her face is puffy. “Did I…did I also break your nose?” I whisper-ask.

  She merely nods.

  Then she reaches up and removes the gauze from her check, displaying a gnarly, jagged line of stitches caked over in dried blood.

  “Yikes,” Jodi says.

  That’s when I notice the bandages on Leslie’s hands. “What happened there?” I ask, gesturing to the Band-Aids covering both palms.

  “When you knocked me to the living room floor, I broke my nose against the coffee table and then cut my hands on some shards of glass from a broken, priceless Baccarat vase that you will have to pay for.”

  I try to remember that scene from Wednesday night, and shake my head. “I’m really sorry about hurting you with the heel of my shoe, Leslie. Really, I regret it more than words can say, and I’m hoping I can find some way to make it up to you. But the rest I didn’t do. The coffee table had been moved out of the way, to make room for the pole dancing.”

  “According to who?” she asks, moving in so close that I can smell the kosher hors d’oeuvres on her warm breath. “It’s your word against mine, Worthing, isn’t it? Everyone at my party saw you gash my face. Everyone saw you and Kat run for the door, and everyone—”

  “That’s because you were calling me a—” I cut in, in my defense.

  “I was a wonderful hostess through and through, and you shat on me!” She steps away from me and toward the sink, where she calmly dispenses soap into her hands and begins to scrub between the bandages. She looks at us reflected behind her in the mirrored wall. “Who do you think a jury would believe?”

  Jodi and I stand there, mouths open, trying to take in the fact that I’m being fucked sideways.

  Yes, who would a jury believe?

  “But—” I begin. “But—you said you had the whole thing caught on tape! From a nanny cam!” Not that this would help my case exactly, but at this point I think it must be better to have proof of the terrible acts I really did do, rather than being framed for the awful things I didn’t.<
br />
  Leslie smiles with half her mouth, like that character from The Dark Knight after his face melts and he turns all evil. “Maybe I have it, and maybe I lost it.”

  “’Shat’ is such a weird word, isn’t it?” Kat says. “I never like how it sounds.” We all turn toward her voice.

  “I slipped in unnoticed at some point during her tirade,” she explains. Turning to Leslie, she adds, “Quite a performance. I only hope you can be as convincing out there in the ballroom tonight.”

  Leslie stays cool. “Well, if it isn’t Lauren’s little garden gnome.”

  “A short joke! How original,” Kat says. “Jodi, don’t you have to get out there now? I think you’re on first.” Jodi and I move toward the door like lost sheep finally collected by our loving shepherd.

  We are out in the hallway when we hear Leslie’s parting words. “Oh, Kat? Make sure to slip Jodi some tongue when you kiss her good luck tonight. I know how much you like the pretty ones!”

  Which can only mean one thing: she’s seen the videos.

  “Wow, she’s got a dark side I never saw at Sharing Shabbat,” Jodi says, shuddering. “Not to mention, she did that Keratin treatment on her hair this week, and now she looks like a drowned rat.”

  “That’s what you noticed about her appearance, Jo?” I ask. “Her newly straightened, processed hair?” Then I turn my attention to Kat. “You okay?”

  She reaches for her phone and begins tap-tapping in a way that’s reminiscent of the gestures that preceded our trip to South Beach. “Oh, I’m just awesome,” she says. “Fan-fucking-tastic.” She turns away from us, her phone glowing ominously.

  “No more trips, Kat!” I joke, but she waves me away, half-listening.

  Then I turn my attention to Jodi. “You going to be okay?” I ask, worried that Jodi might have lost her focus before her Big Night. The three of us walk toward the ballroom together as crowds of people are being ushered to their seats.

  “I’m fine,” she says, taking a deep breath. “My whole family is here to support me, and you guys are here, and I’ve been practicing this for months, and now I get to do it in my grandmother’s honor.” She pauses, tears in her eyes. “It’s going to be a beautiful evening. Nothing can spoil it for me.”