Why I Love Singlehood: (28 page)

She was a great worker, as always, and I compensated her by letting her make her own hours. Thus, she could work for ten minutes or an hour or four hours, or she could hang out and be a customer, although I refused to let her pay for even so much as a paper cup anymore. Basically, she had free reign of the place. She and Norman had developed an older brother–younger sister relationship, and they loved bossing each other around. I was both delighted and entertained to see Minerva reemerging from her grief until one afternoon when Jay came in unexpectedly.

Norman had just swatted Minerva with a towel for calling him “Normie” and, still laughing, she threw Jay a casual “Hey” over her shoulder before ducking into the kitchen for a tray of pita wraps.

Jay looked stricken. When he pulled her aside a few minutes later, I could tell from their gestures that the conversation was tense. I casually made my way toward them as Minerva put up a hand, cutting him off. “That’s great, but I have work to do here.” He opened his mouth to try again. “Jay, I said I’m busy. I’ll see you tonight.” She walked back to the kitchen without saying good-bye.

I fidgeted while he stared at her wake.

“Jay?”

He jumped, seeing me for the first time. I looked at his face—still pinched in frustration—and my shoulders sagged. For all the fun and games, for all her joviality and determination, I knew Minerva was hurting, and we had no choice but to let her hurt. But I hadn’t taken into account until that moment what it was doing to her husband.

Wishing I could come up with something appropriate to say to take the edge off his pain, all I could manage was, “Totally sucks, huh?”

“Yeah,” he said quietly, “it does.” Giving Norman one last venomous look, Jay left, hands shoved into his pockets, nearly bumping into Dean on the way out.

Dean had come in a couple of times but didn’t stick around long enough to talk to anyone. Perhaps he thought we were taking sides against him (although we really didn’t know anything other than what Tracy had told us that day), or maybe he was avoiding the possibility of running into Jan. On his last visit, I had at least persuaded him to check out the progress on the reading room makeover (I painted a sign that said Play Grounds over the entranceway, with a matching Back Grounds sign for the back office, and High Grounds for the café), and further tried to goad him into staying and participating in one of our surveys.

“We’re figuring out who made the best Robin Hood: Errol Flynn, Kevin Costner, the guy who was also in
The Princess Bride
, the fox from the Disney version, or Daffy Duck,” I told him. “So far Daffy Duck is ahead by three votes.” But he shook his head and darted out. Maybe he missed us just as much as we missed him.

The new-and-improved reading room was ready to be officially christened by the end of the month. It looked better than I could’ve imagined: a loveseat/sofa set with coffee table, three upright reading chairs, and a set of end tables, giving it an eclectic living-room-meets-library feel. We painted the walls a warm nutmeg color (daring for nautical Wilmington), and the light streamed through the windows onto the tables, warming it even further. We also threw down an area rug from Target over the painted cement floors, and flanked the couch with two restored bookcases. Finally, we checked all the electrical sockets and bought several surge protectors and extension cords. Using Norman’s laptop, we made sure the WiFi worked in every part of the room. All that was left was hanging artwork; we’d bought several pieces by local artists.

It was beautiful. We decided to coincide the unveiling with a Halloween costume party.

Perhaps the third bad thing had passed without anyone’s noticing. Perhaps someone spilled coffee down the front of their shirt in the middle of a meeting. Perhaps someone made off with a couple of books from the new reading room. But after a while I stopped looking over my shoulder and let the bustle of routine at The Grounds chug along like an old locomotive.

26

Bender

WE WERE EXPECTING
quite a turnout for the Halloween Costume/Reading Room Reopening party: Susanna distributed flyers all over campus, Scott did a podcast, and we plugged it on Facebook. I even mentioned it on WILS, reporting that it would be a singles’ safety zone—no dates required. We promised free vanilla chai and cookie samples, coupons for one free coffee, raffles for free
I spill my beans at The Grounds
merchandise, and an open mic set in the evening.

Norman and I obsessively checked to make sure we had more than enough of everything, and we asked Minerva to work the full day with pay (Susanna could only do her usual four-hour shift because of her class schedule). Even Scott offered to pitch in.

The place was packed to capacity. We not only ran out of the chai reserved solely for the opening, but also our regular reserve. To compensate, Norman made punch. The cookies were devoured right down to the crumbs. People begged for a free T-shirt or cap. Two local authors booked readings for January. Three people asked if they could book private parties. Even a reviewer for the
Wilmington Weekly
came and checked out the place (and you can be damn sure I gave
him
a T-shirt).

I smiled so much my jaws hurt.

The place was decked out in fake webs and swaths of black cloth. Little black cauldrons full of candy corn sat on every table, and a talking skeleton guarded the door. Norman and I dressed up as the Wonder Twins, Susanna was Raggedy Ann, and Minerva and Jay were Dr. Honeydew and Beaker, respectively. Minerva had dug out silver wire-framed glasses and two lab coats, and translated Jay’s
Mee-mee-mee-mee
s all day long. It was the first time I’d seen them playful since the Cici incident. The Originals and Regulars joined the fun. Ed Rush and half of NCLA showed up, faculty and student body combined, some even in costume. I hadn’t seen some of my former colleagues in a while, and it was nice to see them, even though I was dressed in a leotard, skirt, bodysuit with a “J” ironed on, knee-high boots—all purple—and Spock ears. Even Jan and Dean stopped by separately, and I couldn’t help but wonder if they had specifically coordinated times.

When I came back from the kitchen around four o’clock with refills of chai and pumpkin-shaped shortbread cookies, I spotted Shaun circling the reading room. I froze and nearly dropped both pitcher and platter when we saw each other for the first time since my meltdown in front of the Jeanette, who was nowhere in sight this time. Fortunately, Minerva was close by and took the platter from me, eyeing Shaun coolly as she passed him approaching me.

“What are you doing here?” I asked.

“Followed the crowd,” he said.

“So, you actually
would
jump off the Brooklyn Bridge if everyone else was doing it.”

“Headfirst.”

I couldn’t help but chuckle as he smiled.

Shaun looked around. “This is really impressive.”

“Thanks.”

“I never imagined it could be like this. And you did it all by yourself.”

“Don’t let everyone who helped hear you say that.”

“I don’t mean this,” he said, gesturing around the room, “I mean
this
.” He extended his hands as if he were holding twenty-pound weights in them. “All of it. From day one. I could never do all this. It’s so remote from academia.”

“Not really,” I said. “I see most of the same people. There’s just no homework or grading.”

“Don’t you miss it? Ever?”

“Not really, but funny you should mention that. I’m filling in for a prof on maternity leave next semester. My old short story class.”

“That’s fantastic!”

His tone came off as patronizing. Then again, it had been a long day for me in pointy boots.

“Well, I’ve gotta get back to the customers.”

He blinked rapidly for a second, as if someone spritzed him with water. “Of course you do. I’m sorry to keep you.”

“Thanks for coming,” I said, and started to walk away. Just then Scott came over to me, grabbed my face with both hands, and kissed me hard.

“Hey, baby,” he said when he released me. From the corner of my eye, I saw Shaun take in Scott’s costume with a mix of puzzlement and repulsion. He was dressed as Bender, the robot from the animated show
Futurama
, complete with gray long johns and a hoodie under a plastic gray trash bin, a ping-pong ball attached to a spring on his head as the antenna, and scuba goggles. In short, a disaster.

Scott looked at Shaun defiantly, as if to say,
She’s mine,
and extended his hand. “What’s up, dude.” Shaun shook it, and Scott proceeded to put his arm around me while I fumed. I hated being called “baby,” and this display of machismo was too much.

Shaun turned to me and said in blatant sarcasm, “Yeah, so you’re obviously busy. I’ll let you get back to work.”

As soon as he walked away, I gripped Scott’s arm and removed myself from its gray clutch, then turned and looked at him, disgusted.

“What the hell was that?” I asked.

“Me? What the hell was
that
?” he retorted, pointing in Shaun’s direction, glaring from behind his scuba goggles. “What’re you still talking to that loser for?”

“First of all, he is not a loser. Second of all, if you ever call me ‘baby’ again, you’re gonna have to eat your food through a straw for a week, got it?”

“You’re still not over him, are you.”

“Jealousy doesn’t become you, Scott.”

“Whatever, dude.”

“Call me ‘dude’ again and it’ll be
two
weeks.”

He looked like he wanted to hit something.

“I’ll bet if Norman came to your rescue, your eyelashes would be fluttering in admiration.”

“Rescue? What rescue? Don’t think for a second that I needed any help. And leave Norman out of it.”

“Fine. You’re on your own today,” he said. The ping-pong ball antenna thrashed from side to side with every step as he stormed out. I rolled my eyes and resumed my hosting duties.

Within minutes, Minerva sidled up to me. “You OK?”

“Just two more reminders of why I love singlehood, Min,” I said after filling her in on what just happened.

She held the mini paper cup of vanilla chai in a toast. “I’ll drink to that. For you, anyway.” After she gulped the drink, she said, “Is this a bad time to tell you that I’ll never be able to look at Bender the same again?”

“Me neither.”

Norman appeared after Minerva walked away, two mini-cups of punch in hand, and I hoped this wasn’t going to turn into a receiving line of all the Originals asking me if I was OK, if Scott and I just broke up, if I had anything to do with the design and construction of his costume, et cetera.

“How you holdin’ up, kiddo?” Norman asked, handing me a cup. Funny he would call me that considering I was older than he was. I wondered if he knew Olivia used to call me that.

“We lost our free help,” I said.

“No problem. He wasn’t very helpful anyway. Was giving away multiple samples to the same customers. And he was frightening them with those goggles. Poor Bender.”

“No wonder why we’re running low. Knucklehead…” I muttered. Norman threw his head back and laughed out loud. Quite a sight, considering he was wearing Spock ears and a light purple T-shirt with a Z on it over a dark purple long-sleeved tee and blue jeans. (“No way you’re getting me to wear a purple leotard,” he said.) All day the clientele had mistaken him for Sheldon from
The Big Bang Theory
instead of Zan, which was fine by Norman.

“Can you imagine if we’d charged for all this shit today?” he asked in a hushed voice.

“We’d be looking at an empty space,” I said.

“Maybe. Or maybe we could’ve closed the joint and ran off to Fiji together.”

“What is it with you and Fiji?” I asked.

“Pipe dream,” he answered.

“Make it a real one and I just may take you up on it.”

We eyed each other, knowing what was coming, and fist-bumped.
“WONDER TWIN POWERS: ACTIVATE!”
We then clinked cups and downed our punch like shots.

The crowd finally started to thin out after the open mic, about an hour before closing. I leaned over the café counter and rested my head on my arms momentarily. Every muscle in my body was about to give out. Minerva came up from behind and put her hands just where my shoulders met the nape of my neck, kneading them hard. I picked up my head.

“Ow! Geez, Min! What’re you giving me, the Vulcan Neck Pinch or something?”

“It’ll feel good in a minute. I learned it in class.”

“They teach you this in Midwifing 101?”

“Soft tissue manipulation.”

“Which is Vulcan for…”

“Massage.”

“Seriously, they teach you that?”

“It was an elective. It’s good for the mothers when they’re in labor.” She continued with the treatment while I leaned back and closed my eyes.

“I’m glad you were here today, Min. And I can’t thank you enough for helping out. You should sue me for what I’m paying you today.”

“I would’ve done it for free. I don’t know when it happened, but The Grounds became my baby, too.”