On the Verge (34 page)

“Really?” Is he going to give me my own column? I know nothing about
Breathe
as a brand, either, but I could learn. I’ll learn.

“Yes, there are certain duties that aren’t being filled to my satisfaction. They’re small things, really, but I think you could be integral in helping.” Integral? Did he say integral? “And also it might interest you, because of your desire to write.”

“What is it?”

“Correspondence. You could open the correspondence from our readers. Select the ones that you think are worthy of going into Letters to the Editor and which ones should go into the You Asked Us section. You would separate them by magazine and decide which ones could be used for
Breathe.
Then you would research and write the answers for You Asked Us which, with my approval, would go into the magazine.

“The mail? You want me to do the mail?”

“It’s more than the mail, Eve. It’s a great way to familiarize yourself with the style of writing we want. It’s quite a stepping stone.” Isn’t my shitty job enough of a damn stepping stone? Aren’t I already familiar enough with the magazine?

“That sounds great,” I say as Herb hands me a box from underneath his desk.

“You can see there’s quite a bit of mail. It’s a testament to our popularity. So go through it at your leisure and pick out ten letters you’re thinking of responding to and twenty that are suitable for Letters to the Editor. I’ll review them and we’ll get cracking.”

“Thanks, Herb.” I’m trying to sound as cheerful as possible.

“Oh, Eve, try to get them to me by Wednesday.” What about my leisure?

“Great,” I say, not wanting to look at the hundreds of letters in the box. “I definitely will.”

I
’m eating, sleeping and breathing these shitty letters. You would not believe the kinds of things people write in about. I guess I understand e-mailing, sort of. I mean, that takes a second and if you really have something to say you can just whip it off and be done with it. But to actually write a letter, get a stamp, mail it out? I think that’s a little crazy. Don’t these people have lives?

People either write ridiculous questions about their bodies and nutrition, or try to plan our magazine for us. Like we’re going to listen to these crackpots. The worst are the
Yoga for Life
letters which go on and on about all this enlightenment crap. It’s disgusting.

I think I am going to explode if I read another fucking letter. I can’t call Roseanne, she is in the middle of yet another audit. I’m still not exactly sure what that means, just that she’s busy and cranky and stays at work till way past midnight. I suspect she hasn’t been eating properly. She’s got no time to deal with me.

My mom is getting treatment all this week. I would really like to go home and be with her, but she and my dad insist that there wouldn’t be much for me to do other than hang out in the hospital with my dad and worry. My mom asks me if I’ve talked to Monica lately and I have to lie and say I have. I think it makes her feel better.

“Hi, Eve, what’s going on?” Lacey is hanging over my desk. It’s a little early in the season for the shirt she’s wearing and I know she’s already sporting open toe shoes.

“You know, Lacey, just going through the mail.”

“How fun,” she says, not having heard me. She slips into her English—this-is-my-way-of-trying-to-be-funny-and-friendly, you-serf-in-my-kingdom—accent. She hands me a small shoebox full of receipts. What is this? “Anyway, I was wondering if you could help me organize these.”

“What exactly do you expect me to do with these?”

“Well—” she’s back to her American accent and taking a tone,
as well “—I was under the impression that with this new—” she pulls her spread hands apart “—entity, we, that is the writers, are not going to be dealing with the administration as much. It’s really been impeding my creative process.” I’m going to lose it. I can feel myself losing it. I’m certain she’s had expensive dental work, and I’m going to ruin it. Why am I so violent lately?

“Look, Lacey.” I can take a tone, too. “We are still transitioning. We don’t even know when our new magazine is being launched or what it’s even going to be about. But, I’ll tell you one thing, Lacey, I don’t care what decisions are made. There’s no way in hell I am ever going to do your expense reports. If you take issue with that you can bring it up with Herb and I will bring it up with my human resources representative.”

She is speechless. I’m kind of surprised myself. “I certainly wasn’t trying to insult you. I just thought it was your job.”

“Did you really think cataloging all the ways you’ve sucked off the company was in my job description?”

“I don’t know what you’re trying to say?” But I can tell by her face that she does. She’s sure not slipping into her faux British accent now. “I understand that everyone is a little stressed with this whole thing. I’m sure it will all work itself out.”

The nice thing about this transition is that it’s the perfect excuse for hostility. It’s a get-out-of-jail-free card. In a way, I love it. I turn back to my computer, it’s just my screen saver, but I look at it like it’s the most important document in the world. That makes her go away. I can’t wait to tell Tabitha about this, but she is also too busy for me.

The Big C is on jury duty, which is absolutely killing her because it’s such a bad time with this crazy reorganization thing. She is counting on Tabitha to hold down the fort. They have nightly meetings where Tabitha goes over every detail of the day. The Big C screams and yells about how they are trying to take away all her power and Tabitha supplies her with cigarettes by the carton. Tabitha is thriving from it. The other day she bought me lunch that we ate in the Big C’s office answering phone call after phone call. It’s kind of sick that she’s so busy.

I call Todd. I know he is out of the country right now, though I don’t know where. We haven’t talked since Roseanne’s birthday. I try not to think about his face when I took the cab to Rob’s place. It’s the last thing I need. I get his voice mail, which says he will be out of the office, traveling, but checking his voice mail.
I hate leaving messages, especially because I know he’ll probably roll his eyes when he gets it.

“Hey, it’s me. It’s Eve. Just kind of bored and sick of work. I, um, wanted to see how you were. How are you? You can call me back when you get a chance. Or not. Whatever. Take care.” I hang up. That was stupid.

“Eve, how’s it going?” It’s Herb. He is really getting into this whole YFL thing. He is wearing an Indian print cotton shirt. “Are those letters coming along?”

“Oh, yeah, it’s going great. I’ll definitely have them done by Wednesday.” It’s Monday. I’ve barely gotten through forty. I am so screwed.

“Wonderful, Eve. Terrific. And you’ve been separating them into piles. How’s the
Breathe
pile?”

“Well, it’s a little ambiguous because, you know, we haven’t really nailed down exactly what this
Breathe
thing is.” He nods, thoughtfully.

“But, Eve, I’m sure you’ll do your best.”

“Oh, yeah, as always.”

I call my mom and tell her I am coming home for dinner tonight. I want to check up on her, now that this part of the treatment’s over. She protests for a while, but I won’t give up. I want to see her.

“Okay, honey…but I just want you to realize that I’m losing some of my hair. It’s not awful, but I’m wearing a lot of hats. Just don’t be alarmed.”

“Mom, it’s fine, I don’t care about your hair, just relax and don’t make anything for dinner. I’ll bring home some pizza or Chinese or something.”

“Okay, honey. I don’t have much of an appetite. I’ve been having lots of soup.”

“I’ll pick up some soup on the way home at one of those soup places. They’re really good.” I am trying to sound happy and excited for her, so she won’t worry about me when she’s already got so much else on her mind.

I stop at Macy’s. They’re having a sale so I get a bunch of scarves for my mom.

My dad meets me at the train station in New Jersey. I don’t want to be annoyed at him anymore, but I feel like I can’t let go. He keeps nervously drumming his fingers on the steering wheel. I decide to try, for my mother’s sake, to be civil. “How’s the not smoking coming, Dad?”

“Well, I got the patch, but I miss the habit. You know?”

“Yeah, I know. So, how do you think Mom is?”

“The doctors are still optimistic. The chemotherapy is working well on the cancer. It’s just a shame she can’t feel better, you know, she gets queasy.” I feel a little queasy when we pull into my driveway. My mother is standing in the doorway, like she used to do when I was in high school.

“Hi, honey.” She gives me a big hug. She’s got on a baseball hat, but I can see there is some hair under it. My house smells different, like sickness.

“Hey, Mom. I got four different kinds of soup and here—” I give her the Macy’s bag. “Those are for you, so you can be fashionable, even when you don’t feel so good.” My mom oohs and ahhs over every scarf like it’s Christmas morning.

We all sit around the dining room table and my mom keeps chatting like she usually does. For once, I’m actually into it. I study her for signs of what’s going on. She hardly eats any of her soup. My dad and I both offer her some of ours.

“No, I’m just not very hungry,” she says. She puts her hands up to her head and closes her eyes. I look at my father, who is calmly checking his watch.

“Mom, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing, honey. Just time for my pills.” She tries to smile. My father is up getting her pill bottles. I go to the kitchen and fill up a glass of water. When I return to the table my father is laying out five sets of pills. I watch my mother take each one.

“Make sure you drink lots of water,” my dad says calmly. They are huge horse pills. I go get my mother another glass of water. I stand in the doorway, watching my parents. My mom has her head on my dad’s shoulder. It would be sweet if it wasn’t so sad. At first, they don’t see me, but then my mom does. She smiles at me.

“I think I’m going to go lie down, honey. I’m getting really old.” She tries to make a joke out of it. “Are you staying over?”

“No, Mom, I think I’m going to head back into the city. If Dad can drive me to the bus station. If you can be alone.” My mom laughs.

“I’m not a baby, honey, I can be left alone.”

“Okay, well, at least let me help you to bed.” I don’t really want to. I want to run out of the house, go home and not think about this. I don’t want to come back until my mom is making crappy dinners and my dad is chain-smoking.

I tuck my mom in and give her a kiss on the forehead. She
looks so tired. She closes her eyes right away. My dad and I don’t say too much to each other the whole way to the station. I have to take the bus in at this time. He offers to drive me into the city, but I’d rather sit on the bus alone. “I’m okay, Dad. You should get back to Mom. Just give me a call if anything changes or the doctor’s give you any news. Please.”

My dad nods. “You should talk to your sister.”

“I have.” My dad shakes his head at me. Thankfully, we’re at the station. I give him a kiss goodbye.

I’m super tired by the time I get home and I am just falling asleep when Todd calls. He’s in Sri Lanka. He sounds tired and faraway. There is this weird delay between us, so we keep talking over each other.

“I thought you forgot about me,” I say at the end of his description of the factory.

“No, I was just really busy. I meant to call before.” We are silent for a minute.

“This call is costing you too much money to be quiet,” I say as I hear him telling me that its a good thing his company pays for everything. I picture him in his impersonal hotel room and I think about how we danced.

“What are you doing right now?” He is already telling me that he’s bored just sitting on this bed wondering about what TV is on. At least we are on the same wavelength. I take a deep breath.

“I keep thinking about you,” I say a little too quickly because it just overlaps—

“I met a girl in Atlanta.”

It seems like we both say “Oh” at the same time. I resolve not to say another word until he does.

“Eve.” His voice is so soft and I think about when we fell asleep on the futon and what a coward I am. “I wish…fuck.”

“Well, maybe you should have called the girl in Atlanta then. It’s late and I have to work tomorrow.” I don’t mean that how it comes out. I wish I wasn’t bitter.

“Oh, Eve,” he says, and he sounds so lonely and I feel like the biggest shit in the world. “I’ll let you go.” There is nothing to say to that except goodbye and I try to convey an apology in that word, but I can’t.

Just before he hangs up, I hear him say, “I miss you, too.”

Here’s the part where you think I’m a big baby and even though I hate to blame PMS for things, I must be getting my period. I start to cry and I fall asleep thinking about that stupid rhyme I
learned in kindergarten and would say over and over again. “April showers bring May flowers.”

Mabel comes to visit me the next morning. I’m still bitter about the way she almost pulled me over to the dark side of loving my job. She’s all smiles and concerned looks. YFL just let go of two of its staff. I wish I had her ability to feign sincerity.

“So, Eve, how are you transitioning?”

“Well, Mabel, it isn’t very easy when the person who was the closest thing I had to a mentor was unexpectedly fired and now everyone else is worried. It’s not a happy time here on this floor.” It doesn’t faze her. The thing about Mabel is she doesn’t hear anything she doesn’t want to hear. She nods thoughtfully, then turns it around.

“Well, Eve, you are going to be integral in so many parts of these changes.” She is looking deep into my eyes, she’s smiling. “You are going to be helping us with the interview process.”

“So, let me get this straight, now we’re hiring new people when we just fired a bunch? It doesn’t make any sense.”

“Eve, there are going to be lots of new groundbreaking positions and we are going to begin working creatively, and in many regards, on the cutting edge. This is the time to adapt to these changes or relocate.” She smiles and lets that sink in. “I think you’ll see the benefits to Prescott Nelson as a whole as we move into the future and diversify.”

“What does that mean, Mabel?” She hands me a folder of résumés.

“Eve, can you set up interviews for these people with Herb and Lev? That would be so helpful. Oh, they need to be scheduled by Tuesday.” Great. “Have a terrific day, Eve. Call me if you need any support.” Mother of God! As if on cue, Tabitha calls me.

“The Big C’s trial is recessed until Monday. I can totally tell she’s threatened by how well I’ve been handling everything. I think she wants me out of here. I’ll petty cash a lunch at Carmine’s. Want to make our way through the screaming throngs?”

We order two family-style meals. We’re eating like fiends, like we’ve never eaten before. Tabitha is so excited about her week as an editor that she is talking with her mouth open and spilling little bits of food out of her mouth. It’s kind of gross, but also funny to see how oblivious she is to all the tourists and suits around us. I keep waiting for her to ask about me, but she just goes on, heaping huge portions of chicken parmesan onto her plate. I want
to scream and yell and tell her about my mom and Mabel and Todd, but she’s almost high on this whole thing.

“Eve, this is what we’ve been waiting for. Now, I know I can do it. I don’t need a man, I don’t need anyone. I did it all, I worked it, on my own.” I can’t stand this.

“How’s Blake?” Tabitha laughs and picks up some mozzarella cheese.

“Honey, he had to go.”

“Why, he didn’t fit into the plan?” I don’t know why Tabitha of all people is annoying me so much. She ignores me and launches into the saga. I’d rather hear about this than how awesome she is for single-handedly ruling
NY By Night
for a week.