Woman of Substance (16 page)

Nadine frowned, then leaned closer. “Robbie Smith, is that you?”

Robbie nodded as she draped her coat onto the back of the chair. Her mauve turtleneck T-shirt discreetly formed against the suit. While her four-pocket purple jeans hugged her belly and thighs. She raised her eyebrows. “So, how do I look?”

“Great. Really great.” Nadine still shook her head.

“I have to thank you. The shops you suggested were great. It’s strange but I feel like me on the outside and inside whether I’m in disguise or not.”

“What did you do to your voice?”

“It’s not so much my voice but the wax that I place on the inside of my mouth next to my gums and then of course this neck apparatus keeps my chin in a slightly different position.” Robbie lifted the fold of the turtleneck sweater away from her neck and tipped her chin where a slight gap was noticeable on close inspection.

Nadine leaned forward. “I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it for myself.”

“That’s enough about me. Tell me, what is your big news?” Robbie sipped her coffee.

Nadine placed her hand on the table. A princess cut ruby surrounded with tiny diamonds winked at Robbie.

She checked Nadine’s left hand. “Oh, Nadine, does this mean what I think it means?”

Nadine grinned. “It does. Ken proposed to me.”

Robbie jumped up and hugged her friend. “Congratulations.”

Nadine was laughing and snorting back tears. “I wanted you to be one of the first to know because I spoke my wish out loud to you first. You encouraged me to be real in the relationship.”

Robbie handed Nadine a serviette. “When’s the big day?”

“Next year. Ken will have a sabbatical and we’ll go on a Caribbean cruise.”

“Wow.”

They sipped their coffee in silence. Robbie cleared her throat. Then they giggled.

Nadine talked about Ken and all his fine qualities. Where they’ve been and their future travel plans.

“I’m so happy for you.” Robbie glanced at the clock. “I have to go. Clifton booked my defense for Tuesday. I have to study hard. I can’t believe it will be so soon, but my external examiner has limited dates available.”

“I heard. I appreciate you joining me on such short notice. You’ll be fine during your defense, I’m sure of it. Are you going to be a woman of substance during your presentation?”

“I don’t think so. I don’t want to cheese anyone off, especially Clifton.”

“A few weeks ago, I didn’t believe you could pull it off, but you do. She should see this, it really works,” Nadine said.

“Thanks, you’ve been one of my role models whenever I’ve felt as if I didn’t know how to be, as you say, a woman of substance.”

“Robbie, you always had substance. It just wasn’t as noticeable before.” Nadine laughed.

Robbie put on her coat. “Thanks. I’ll see you in the office. Tell Ken he loves a wonderful woman.”

Robbie drove home and thought about love. Her parents passed their silver anniversary, Frank and Mable had had a long life of love, and Nadine was beginning one. Jake hadn’t found anyone yet and she didn’t have a special someone in her life. Well, unless she counted Frank, of course.

She parked her car in the garage. No blinking lights on her message manager. Up in her bedroom, she hung the wig on the mannequin, rolled the wax from her gums and threw the wad into the garbage, then slipped the neck that suggested a double chin off and placed it on the holder, followed by the torso and finally her leggings. She no longer felt uncomfortable with the body parts around her bedroom. The foam and padding were a part of her now.

After she hung up the disguise and showered, she sat down with the marked-up print copy of her thesis. A sunbeam came through her window and played across her face. About an hour passed and she felt her eyelids drooping. She jerked herself awake before placing her head down in the middle of her chapter about insurance and obesity statistics. Just five minutes. That’s all she needed and then she’d be refreshed and continue her review. All of her answers to the questions the defense committee posed would be delivered with knowledge and confidence. She would convince the committee that she was not denying the reality of obesity but that the cause of the apparent epidemic could not simply be only a lack of willpower and laziness.

A shiver ran over her body. The room was bathed in darkness. She fumbled for her lamp, and saw that now wet drool marks dotted her pages with the coffee cup circles, doodles, and notes in the margins. When she glanced at the clock, she knew her refreshing break had been much more than five minutes.

Tonight she’d be walking with Jake at his request.
Was that a kind of date?
No, it’s a friend being with a friend in need, thing.
Changing to meet him in the park shouldn’t take a lot of time. It would be dark and he wouldn’t be able to see her clearly. She felt a warm pull in her core when she thought about the controlled academic professor who was devoted to his grandfather and the man who was also in flux over the rest of his life.

While she guided her arms into the body suit, she imagined Jake strolling through villages and observing the different traditions. He was probably familiar with a pick and shovel, and possibly dug wells and cultivated fields with the residents. He would have sat with the elders and listened to their concerns. She couldn’t imagine him identifying too closely with the people he studied and not maintaining his role as the researcher. He was a learned professor who stood at a lectern or podium and shared his passion for his work. He had more experience and wouldn’t be accused that his biases affected his research.

She remembered Jake’s sensual curve to his mouth when he grinned, and the rumble of his belly laugh at some of Frank’s more outrageous remarks, and the way his eyebrows raised briefly and then dropped again when they met. The way his pupils were a bead of a dark lava rock when he was being impersonal or how they turned into dark pools surrounded by warm, inviting liquid chocolate when he was excited, concerned, or aroused. Most of all, she liked the texture and strength of his palm and the light reflecting off the fine hairs on his fingers that enfolded her hand both when she was fat or thin. When their fingers were entwined, he seemed anchored. And whether she was Robbie or Robin, she felt at home with Jake. A flicker of hope settled in her chest. Maybe he’d forgive her deception.

Jake held the door open for his last student appointment of the day. His life was different than he’d planned just months ago. He thought that his days would be filled with presenting concrete data about the habitats of the foragers in the desert. While he reviewed his notes, he read his observations about the young mothers with their babies and the elders more than he did about the hunters. He had become curious about the female role in the communities and families. He wrote about a twinge of emptiness that had surprised him when he returned a newborn boy to his mother’s arms, and he wrote that he was reminded of his grandfather, when he sat in the community center listening to the elders. Many subtle little details and accidental similarities of Bushmen’s family life had entwined with his memories of home.

Ever since Jean had suggested that Robbie cared more for others than she did for herself, he wondered what she did to sustain herself.
Some anthropologist I am, I haven’t even asked.
Tonight, while they walked, perhaps she’d tell him some details of her life, if he showed some real interest. Even though it had been a huge jump from his first impression, he trusted her completely with his grandfather during this precious time. She was candid and fun-loving with Frank but her guard remained up with him.

When she implied by her actions that she needed him to play along with the game to impress the young salesclerk in the grocery store, he’d felt that he offered her something other than money. He’d given her a part of himself as a personal favor. And when they held hands, he’d felt connected to community, to home.

A memory of his grandmother when he was twelve surfaced. His grandparents had received an invitation to attend the symphony with the Prince of Wales. They had danced around the living room like two teenagers with coveted tickets to a concert. Grandmother had had a dress made. Jake had even told her she looked beautiful. His grandfather embarrassed him with some smart remark or other about breasts. Jake couldn’t think about his grandma that way. Yuck. Grandma had shushed Frank. Then she had opened her arms to hug Jake but he had run to the garage and hid in the Mustang until the limousine had driven them away.

As Jake drove to Care Manor he wondered if he was still hiding in the Mustang. What did a Mustang mean anyway but a small wild horse? He certainly was not small and he’d never been wild. Tempted, of course, but his grandparents would have been disappointed. He’d grown up instead.

He parked on the street because the parking lot was filled to capacity. The sights and sounds of the home were familiar to him. He greeted the residents who sat in wheelchairs outside their doorways or those walking the halls.

At Frank’s bedside, Jake held a flexible straw to his grandfather’s lips and watched him try to pull the liquid into his mouth. Frank pushed Jake’s hand away. “It’s time to go when you can’t suck,” he said.

Jake couldn’t help but smile. That’s the way home life had always been, his grandparents’ humor interjected into a serious situation. As a child, he’d felt left out. Then when he’d understood some of it, he’d repeat the jokes at school, and then, when he understood more of the nuances, he became embarrassed by it. “At least you can still blow,” Jake said, instead of stating the obvious that perhaps the nutritional shake was too thick.

His grandfather chuckled. “I’m glad you’re back. We’re family. Grandma was wrong.” He laid back.

“How’s that?”

“Said that’s why you didn’t come home. Early damage from living with us. Couldn’t be a normal kid.”

“Normal is an ambiguous value. Love can’t damage.” Jake placed the glass on the bedside table.

Had it hurt him to grow up faster than his classmates? “I should have been here when Grandmother was dying. You cared for her all alone.”

“She missed you. But she understood.”

“She shouldn’t have. She should have called me on it. Or you could have called me sooner, told me to crawl out of myself because you needed me.”

“Woe, boy. We knew you’d come to it in your own time. There are some things you just can’t hurry. We old people learned that from experience, you know.”

Jake ran his fingers through his hair. “She knew how grateful I’ve felt all these years that you kept me after mom died. I don’t think I ever understood how that must have felt for both of you to lose a child. I was so young and Grandma just stepped in. She was my mother.”

“Yes, it was hard watching our daughter fight for life. She had you and she wanted to live. It’s hard to understand why certain people die early and then there are those of us who hang around longer than necessary.”

“I should have thought about this before now. Maybe I am damaged.”

“That’s crap, and you know it.”

“I do know that I had all the love and support a kid and man could ever want.”

“Thanks, son.”

Jake swallowed hard and thumbed the corners of his eyes. “Have you got everything you need?”

“I do now,” Frank said.

Jake knew by memory the form that Frank had signed. No cardiopulmonary resuscitation. No intensive care unit. No respirator. No feeding tube. No monitors. Oxygen as needed for comfort. It wasn’t easy for Jake to kick aside the life support that would have been minimal in most endings. But this wasn’t his life or his wishes. Frank’s other request was pain medication for comfort.

As Frank took a short nap, Jake felt his head bob while he read his research notes. He closed the file and gave in to sleep.

A nurse tapped him on the shoulder when visiting hours were over. “You can go home now. He’s well cared for.”

“You have my cell number and the hotel number?”

“Yes, everything is right here on his chart.”

He was meeting Robin at nine after visiting hours were over. He laughed to himself when he remembered her relief when the pyramid of cereal didn’t topple. His adult brain told him that their silly laughter had probably been stress relief for both of them. He fumbled his knitted hat from his pocket and held onto his gloves like a kid in a hurry to get out the door and play with his best friend.

After checking on Frank one last time, Jake found Robin sitting on Frank’s bench. Her eyes seemed to be focused on some far off point across the frozen lake until his feet crunching on the snow caused her to turn in his direction. He settled on the seat beside her and squinted against the light from her flashlight.

The air around her seemed warmer as she inhaled and exhaled. “It must be hard to be you right now,” she said.

Were those tears glistening in her eyes? His hand reached for her mittened palm. “Yes, but I’m glad I’m here.”

The snow swirled her feet. “I’m an only child, too. I understand.”

The needles on the pine trees rattled.

“Let’s walk. The wind’s picking up and soon the wind chill will make it seem colder,” she said.

He gripped his collar tighter around his neck. “We don’t have to do this. We can go for coffee.” He put the knit hat on his head. There wasn’t any other way to stay warm. No one looked good in a knitted hat.

“Yes, we do. I skipped half of my normal workout because we’d be walking.”

“So you do exercise?” He cringed at his surprised tone. Grandma had exercised, too, just not in the conventional sense. She’d made dinner, done the laundry, took care of the house. Her size had just made it difficult to do more.

“I work out almost every day. You seem surprised.”

“Well, you have to admit . . .” Nothing he could say at this point would be good.

She stepped in front of him and stopped, her arms on her hips. “What do I have to admit?”

“That you don’t look as if you do,” he finished, and felt his stomach churn with remorse.

“You don’t appear to be a jackass but sometimes you act like one,” she said. She moved away from him and picked up the pace.

Jake closed the distance with a few quick strides and nudged her over so that he could walk beside her. “I’m sorry.”