The Night I Got Lucky (13 page)

“C’mon, have a few bites.” He handed me a spoon. “I made it for you,” he said with his mouth half ful .

“I know, baby. I real y do appreciate it, but I just can’t.”

“Sure you can.”

“No, I can’t!” My voice shot up a few decibels, surprising both of us.

Chris stared at me with the look of a forlorn child.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“I just want to make you happy,” he said softly.

“You do.”

Chris shook his head.

“You
do,
” I repeated.

God, what was happening here? I’d longed for some attention from my husband, but I’d gotten constant passion and attentiveness. It was too much. A real marriage had to exist somewhere in the middle, didn’t it? But how could I explain this now to Chris, whose eyes were fil ed with pain?

I reached out and squeezed his hand, then I lifted the spoon and broke the hard shel of brûlée.

A
round noon on Wednesday, I cal ed Alexa from my cel phone. I stood outside my office building on Michigan Avenue, surrounded by bored smokers and workers hustling to run errands during lunch.

“Hola,”
a woman’s voice answered.

“Is Alexa there?” I squeezed the phone tight. I half hoped she wasn’t around, since I had no idea what to say or even why I was cal ing, except that I couldn’t shake my guilt.

“Un momento.”

Some scuffling sounds, some Spanish being spoken, and then the phone being picked up. “Alexa Vil a.”

I squeezed the phone tighter. The optimistic, professional tone of Alexa’s voice made me feel worse. She’d obviously been hoping this was a work cal , maybe someone responding to one of her résumés. She pronounced her last name like “vee-ya,” I noticed; while at Harper Frankwel , everyone had said “vil a” like a vil a in France.

“Alexa, it’s Bil y.”

Silence.

“Look, I’m sorry to bother you, it’s just…”
It’s just what?

“What do you want, Bil y?” Her voice had lost the cheery professionalism.

“Could we meet? Maybe for coffee?”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. Because I want to apologize, I guess.”

“You already did that.”

“Please.”

More silence. Final y, she spoke again. “I can meet you in forty-five minutes.”

“Oh.” I was surprised she’d accepted, surprised she’d suggested today.

She snorted. “Don’t worry about it. You have to
work,
right?”

“No, it’s okay. That’s great. Where?”

“Do you know the Bongo Room?”

“Yeah, but—” I was about to point out that the Bongo Room was al the way over on Milwaukee Avenue. I might as wel forget work for the afternoon. But then I remembered the legions of people living in Alexa’s apartment, counting on her. “That’s fine.”

Forty-five minutes later, I was seated in a booth in the restaurant, a funky place with wal s painted purple, orange and green. Alexa arrived, wearing dark jeans, a crisp white blouse and a silver necklace with a pendant shaped like a leaf. Her dark hair tumbled around her shoulders. She looked human, pretty. So different from her office look.

“Hey,” she said, slipping into the seat across from me. Her tone was light, but her expression was hard.

“Hi.”

Now what to do? I looked at the menu.

“Have you eaten here?” she asked.

I shook my head. “Always wanted to.”

“The French toast is delicious.”

The waitress stepped up to our table, and I ordered the French toast, even though I preferred pancakes, and a cup of decaf coffee.

“I’l have the same,” Alexa said, “but make mine regular.”

When the waitress was gone, we stared at each other. “I wanted to apologize,” I said.

She shook her head. “You did that when you came to my house.”

“Just hear me out.” I sipped my water, wishing the coffee would come, something else I could do with my hands. “I do believe you had some—” how to put this lightly? “—
things
you needed to work on in the office.”

Her expression was blank.

“And you and I never got on very wel ,” I continued. “However, I shouldn’t have fired you. I admit that. And I wanted to say I’m sorry. I tried to get you your job back, but—”

“The company has a policy that it doesn’t rehire people terminated for cause.” She said this swiftly and without expression.

“That’s right.” Which made me feel even worse. The girl could quote company policy chapter and verse. “So, I guess I don’t know what else to do, except to once again say I’m sorry.”

She blinked a few times, then her eyes shot to the table. “Wel , I’l admit, I didn’t make it easy for you. I can be such a bitch, especial y when I’m envious of someone.”

“Why would you be envious?”

She shrugged. “You seem so smart and together, and I knew you had a shot at being a VP, even though I tried to piss you off and make you think you didn’t.”

“Wow. I didn’t know that.”

The coffee came then. I eagerly pul ed the cup to me and began doctoring it with drops of cream poured with scientific precision, and a packet of Equal, which I took elaborate pains to shake and snap before pouring every bit into my mug. Alexa sipped hers black.

“I have a favor to ask,” she said.

“What’s that?”

“Help me get another job.”

Alexa reached into her bag and pul ed out a file. Inside, she had lists and graphs and charts, al apparently cross-referencing the PR firms in town, along with their clients and staffing needs. “I’ve done some research.”

“I see that.”

We talked for the next hour, picking apart the French toast, which was, incidental y, topped with an utterly sinful dol op of butter mixed with crushed Heath bars. We discussed the other firms in the city, gossiped about the people Alexa might contact and what we’d heard about them. This was the first time I’d had a real conversation with the girl, and I found that she was smart and strangely funny in a deadpan way.

“I’ve considered suicide,” she said at one point, causing me to cough up a chunk of Heath bar butter. “But,” she continued without glancing at me, “I’ve decided that the only way I’d want to go is death by overdose of Mint Milanos, and have you ever noticed how expensive those cookies are?”

My coughing turned to laughter. But I felt worse and worse, because as we brought the conversation back to other PR firms, I realized that I’d looked into al those firms myself.

“I have to tel you,” I said at last, “I don’t know how many firms are hiring.”

Alexa pushed her plate away. “I know. But I have to try.”

“Of course.”

“You know what I’d real y like to do?” Her face brightened a little. “Open my own firm. One that caters to Hispanic businesses. There isn’t anyone like that in Chicago.”

“That would be amazing!”

She shook her head. “But that takes money. And I don’t have it.”

My guilt seeped further into my bones. “Maybe someday?” I said weakly.

She sat up tal er. Her earlier hardened expression had returned. “Look, thanks for talking. If you hear anything or talk to anyone…”

“I’l let you know,” I finished for her.

She took out her wal et and withdrew a twenty.

“I got it,” I said.

“No.” Al traces of the friendliness I’d seen during our talk vanished. “I don’t take handouts.”

“Okay.” I fumbled around for my own wal et.

She dropped the twenty on the table. “See you,” she said. She turned and left.

I hailed a cab and gave the office address, fil ed once again with guilt about Alexa, but also feeling a low-grade anxiety that seemed to permeate everything these days. I cal ed Tess, but she was on her way to a Mommy & Me yoga class and couldn’t talk. I tried my own mom, but I got the
Ta-ta!
message again. I’d talked with her this morning, but our chat had been overwhelmed by her social calendar—tennis with friends in Barrington, shopping with her sisters, dinners with neighbors. I cal ed Chris at work. He was in a deposition, I was told by his secretary, but she was to interrupt if I cal ed.

“Oh, no, don’t do that,” I said, but it was too late.

A minute later, Chris was on the phone. “Hi there,” he said, “I’m so glad to hear your voice.”

“You, too, but you didn’t have to come out of your dep.”

“Shit, we’ve been in there for four hours already. We needed a break. How’s your day going?”

“Wel , I just had lunch with Alexa.”

“How in hel did that happen?”

I paid the cabbie and slid onto the street. “I cal ed her.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. I’m stil feeling guilty.”

“Bil y, you’ve got to get over that. You had every right to fire her.”

I felt a rush of gratitude for Chris’s blind support of everything Bil y, but I knew he wasn’t correct on this one. And somewhere deep inside, I felt irked at that support. I wondered if I confessed to a fake murder if he would support me so blindly. I had a sneaking suspicion he would.

“I had the right to fire her, given my new position,” I said, “but I stil shouldn’t have done it. I got drunk with power. It wasn’t the proper decision.”

“Of course it was.”

I sighed.

“Wel , let me make you dinner,” Chris said. “That wil make you feel better. And then I’l give you a bubble bath, and we’l talk it al through.”

I smiled a sad smile as I stood on Michigan Avenue in front of my office building. How I loved my husband. But I wanted Chris to be honest with me, the way Tess was. I wanted him to smack me upside the head (metaphorical y, of course) when I fucked up. Instead, he seemed to talk and talk and talk without ever acknowledging that I made a misstep somewhere. It was as if someone had slipped Chris a pil that made him unconditional y supportive—something I’d always wanted
in theory.
In reality, I wanted less intensity and more authenticity.

“I might have to do something for work,” I answered. After taking two hours out of my day to eat at the Bongo Room, I definitely had work awaiting.

“You’re sure? I’m supposed to be here late on this merger, but I can get out early for you.”

“No, no. You do your thing. I’l see you later.”

At seven-thirty, I roamed the hal s of Harper Frankwel in search of coffee and found Evan in the kitchen, pouring his own.

He smiled when he saw me. He held up the pot.

I nodded. It was blissful y quiet in the office right then, with only the hum of nearby computers.

Evan poured coffee into a mug and handed it to me. Our fingers touched briefly. My bel y clenched. We stood silently in the kitchen, drinking our coffee. Neither of us had spoken, and it was so nice to simply coexist at that moment, free of the constant talking and analyzing that had characterized my relationship with Chris lately. Of course, the talking and analysis and sex had been exactly what I wanted, but getting it overnight and without explanation had the effect of shopping for your own birthday present.

At last, Evan spoke. “This coffee sucks. I need a beer.”

“Heading to Wrightwood Tap?”

“Nah. I’ve got a party. Want to come?” He dumped his coffee in the sink.

“A party on a Wednesday night?”

“It’s somebody’s birthday. And this is an interesting crew. They don’t care if it’s Sunday morning.”

“Where is it?”

“Old Town. Wel s Street.”

Close to my condo. “I don’t know. I should probably keep working.” The prospect made me want to cry with boredom.

Evan took a step closer. “Come with me.”

Tess’s warning flew through my head.
Be real careful.
But I could handle myself at a party. There would be other people around, and I could escape and walk home whenever I wanted.

“I’l get my purse,” I said.

The apartment on Wel s Street was fil ed with about twenty people, most of them dressed in black, most of them young and impossibly hip, the type of people who slept until three in the afternoon and hit the clubs after a very late, very light dinner. A number of people had martinis in hand. There was the unmistakable scent of pot in the air.

“Bil y, this is my friend, Carly.” Evan introduced me to a smal woman wearing a black, spaghetti-strap dress. She had straight blond hair, parted in the middle to show the smooth skin of her face and light blue eyes ringed with dark liner.

We shook hands. “How do you two know each other?” I asked.

“Evan and I used to fuck,” Carly said.

“Oh.” I felt a little zing of shock and then envy toward this tiny blond thing. I couldn’t help imagining the two of them together. They must have looked amazing, with their blond hair, their smooth skin close together. I flushed at the thought.

Evan and Carly cracked up at my reaction.

“Sorry to be crude,” Carly said, “but let me explain. When we were together, Evan kept asking me if I’d ever been with a woman.”

I glanced at Evan, who shrugged. “Two women together—that’s hot,” he said. “I just wanted to hear about it.”

“But it backfired on him,” Carly said. “He got me to thinking, and then the thinking got me to doing.”

“And the rest is history,” said a tal woman, entering our circle. She laid a soft arm around Carly’s shoulders. She had black ringletted hair and a voluptuous body.

Carly, Evan and the woman laughed.

“So you, two?” I pointed a finger between Carly and the woman.

“Yep,” the woman said. “It’s been four years.” She leaned down and kissed Carly on the forehead.

“Wow, that’s great.” I said. My spirits buoyed with the thought that Carly was off the market.

“One of these two should have introduced me,” the tal woman said. “I’m Sharon.” We shook hands. “And it looks like you need a drink.”

“Please,” I said.

Soon, Evan and I were in the kitchen holding mandarin martinis. The drink went down my throat in a smooth, tangy rush. The rest of the guests seemed light years ahead of us in terms of intoxication, and I sipped my drink quickly in an effort to catch up. A funky song with a strong bass and violins in the background surged from the overhead speakers. In the room next to the kitchen, people were dancing.

“These things are too sweet,” Evan said, staring at his martini with disdain. “I need a beer.”