Finding It (24 page)

Fanny takes a jagged breath and begins filling me in on her situation—the real sitch, not the fake-upbeat-because-we-only-have-a-few-minutes-to-talk bullshit she’s been giving me. She tells me the real deal about her new job as a Division Manager for Christian Dior Boutiques—how she had to fire a popular boutique manager for failing to uphold the company’s exacting standards and put another manager on probation because she didn’t “possess a strong enough knowledge of the luxury industry.”

Fanny has been obsessed with Christian Dior—even repeating the couturier’s quotes like mantras—since she was five years old, when her well-intentioned but hopelessly inept father gave her a diamond Dior flower brooch; so it is shocking to hear her dream job is turning out to be disillusioning.

“I spend a preponderance of my time assigning monthly sales goals, motivating my team to reach said goals, and disciplining boutique managers who fail to reach said goals.” Fanny scratches the lichen with her fingernail. “My boutique managers hate me. They say I am too driven, that I am more concerned with sales goals than sales girls. One even told me I have a cash register where my heart should be.”

“What an assjack!” I hop off down off my boulder and go to sit beside my best friend. “That’s just bullshit. Don’t let a couple of bitter burnt-out people steal your sunshine, girlfriend. You worked damned hard to get hired at Dior, and now you feel like you have to work doubly-hard to prove you’re worthy of the shot. I get it.”

“I guess.”

She sniffs and quickly wipes her eyes before a tear falls.

“It’s not true, Fanny.” I wrap my arm around her shoulder and give her a good squeeze. “You don’t have a cash register inside your chest; you have a big, generous, loving heart. You’re the most generous person I know.”

“Pfft.”

“Don’t you ‘pfft’ me!” I give her shoulders another squeeze. “Who called every single one of my wedding guests after Nathan ended our engagement? Who talked me into taking my honeymoon anyway? Who held my hair back when I was vomiting up a bad burrito and a pitcher of pineapple mango margaritas?”

“Me.”

“And who just flew halfway around the world to help her best friend shovel sheep shit?”

“Me.”

“Abso-bloody-lutely!”

“Okay, that word has to go”—Fanny laughs and wipes her cheek again—“along with boffing, freaking, and discombobulate.”

“Oh, no, you didn’t!” I snap my fingers and bob my head. “You can criticize my Prada knock-off; you can criticize my abysmal bike riding skills, but don’t you dare diss my lingo. Freaking and discombobulate are sacrosanct, yo?”

“Yo? This new urban, street thug Vivia is freaking me out.”

“Ah-ha!” I snap my fingers again and point. “You see? Keep it real, sistah. You know you like throwing down a freaking every now and then.”

Fanny laughs but the shadows in her eyes remain.

“What else?”

Fanny inhales deeply, holds the breath for several seconds, and lets it go in a slow, measured exhalation. When she finally speaks again, it is in a soft paper-thin voice.

“I feel like I am lost at sea, adrift with no rudder or sail. I feel…like I have no purpose, no direction.” She picks at the lichen with her fingernail again, avoiding eye contact. “You have this awesome job that lets you travel the world. You rub elbows with royalty and celebrities, make friends everywhere you go, have romantic trysts with your hopelessly devoted boyfriend. Meanwhile, I am selling over-priced handbags to blue-haired society matrons and then going home to my empty apartment to eat take-out sushi while standing over the sink.”

I let my best friend drain her festering wound.

“I sound jealous, don’t I?”

“Ach, aye.” I try to mimic Angus’s thick brogue in an attempt to lighten her mood. “Maybe a wee bit, woman.”

Fanny just smiles at me, a sad smile that twists my heart into painful knots. I hate it when someone I love is in pain or struggling. I want to fix it, put a Band-Aid over it, make it better with a joke, but some pains go deep and require more to heal than a laugh.

I hug Fanny and tell her that she’s not out on that ocean alone, that I am sailing right beside her.

“I won’t let you drift too far for too long.” I hop down off the boulder. “If you don’t like the path you’ve charted, chart a new one. I’ll help you.”

“Thanks, Vivian.”

“It ain’t nothin’ but a thang, girl. You know what I’m sayin’? I got your six, ’cuz you’re my Hype Girl.”

“Yeah, I have no idea what you just said, and it’s not because English is my second language.”

“Basically, I said I will always be here for you because you are my best friend.”

“So Hype Girl means best friend?”

“It means you are the Ethel to my Lucy, the Woodstock to my Snoopy, the Tonto to my Lone Ranger.”

“Okay,” Fanny laughs. “I don’t know who any of those people are, Vivian.”

“It doesn’t matter,” I say, walking back in the direction of the cottage. “It just means I am glad you’ve decided to ride shotgun on this wild ride that is my life.”

* * * *

We are on our way back down the hill to the cabin when we find an obese sheep lying on his back, skinny legs up in the air, tongue lolling out of its mouth.

“Ohmygod!” I stop walking and stare at the sheep writhing around. “I think that’s one of Fiona’s expensive black faced breeding sheep.”

The sheep rolls to one side, jerks its legs, rolls back.

“Why is it doing that?”

“I don’t know. Maybe it is having a seizure.”

“Or maybe that’s just the way sheep sleep.” Fanny keeps walking. “Come on, let’s just go.”

“I don’t think so…” I step closer to the poor beast. “His eyes are rolled back in his head and his tongue is purplish. I think he’s dying.”

“I don’t think he is dying, Vivian.”

“Yes!” I cry, jumping up and down and shaking my hands. “He’s dying! Oh my God, Fanny, he’s dying. We have to do something.”

“What? Sheep CPR?”

“I can’t just stand here and let this sheep die.”

Before I even realize I’ve formed a plan, I am running down the side of the hill as fast as my Wellies will take me, arms waving like a demented person.

“Angus! Angus!”

I step on a squishy, boggy patch of grass, twist my ankle, and fall flat on my face. I hop right back up, ignoring the stabbing pain in my ankle, and continue racing down the hill.

“Ang-guuuuuus!”

Angus and the Magic Mike crew come out of the barn and stare up the hill at me.

“Angus,” I cry, waving my arms again. “Help! Your sheep is dyyyyyyying.”

The Scots don’t move. They stand with their brawny arms crossed over their brawny chests.

What is the matter with them? There is a life-threatening emergency going on and they’re just gawking like those people who slow down when they are passing an accident on the road.

When I finally reach the barnyard, I am covered in mud and sheep shit, dripping bog water, and wheezing like an accordion. I press my hand to my side and bend over.

“Breathe, woman!”

I stand up again, but continue to hold my aching side. By now, the entire group of Chick Trippers has assembled around us.

“Your sheep,” I gasp and point wildly up the hill. “I think it’s having a seizure.”

The brawny Scots don’t flinch. Their expressions remain as flat as lichen-covered standing stones…in fact, the hulking Scots look like a circle of standing stones.

“What sheep?” Angus asks.

“One of your big black-faced rams,” I say, grabbing his arm and attempting to pull him up the hill. “He’s on his back, writhing in agony. His tongue is out and his eyes have rolled back in his head. I think he’s dying.”

“Is he in a ditch by an auld shed?”

“Yes.”

“Ach! That’s just auld Torcach.”

The Scots slap Angus on the back, the way men do when they mean to convey deep sympathy to one of their brethren, and walk back to the barn, chuckling and murmuring in Gaelic.

“What does that mean?” I remember what old Torcach looked like with his fat tongue hanging out of his mouth and I begin to cry. “He’s old so you are just going to let him die up there?”

“That’s just cruel,” Lisa murmurs.

“Ageist,” Kathy cries.

“Lassies, please.” Angus raises his hands. “He’s nae dying.”

“Why is he on his back then?”

“The mangy beast falls, and he’s so fat he cannae get up.”

I suddenly see the old Life Alert commercial with the elderly woman sprawled out on the floor, calling out for help. “I’ve fallen and I can’t get up.”

“Maybe you need to get him a Life Alert bracelet.”

“What?”

“Nothing.”

Angus scowls before turning to go back into the barn.

“Wait.” I grab his arm again. “Aren’t you going to do something?”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know.” I shrug, looking helplessly at my female compatriots for support. “Something.”

“Flip him back over,” Lisa suggests.

“Or, I don’t know,” Tava cracks. “Maybe fill in the hole so he doesn’t keep falling into it?”

“Or just let him die because he’s old and no longer useful.” Kathy mutters. “Ageist.”

“Please, Angus.” I tug on his arm again. “Please.”

“Dinna fash yourself, Vivia, auld Torcach will put himself to rights, or he’ll fall asleep.”

“That’s cruel!” I imagine the old ram being torn apart limb from twitching limb by a pack of rabid coyotes. “Please, Angus. Please don’t leave him up there, alone and vulnerable. It’s going to be dark soon. What if another animal comes along and attacks him?”

Angus scowls, but the twinkle in his eye tells me the bluster is for show, so he doesn’t lose any of his gruff Scot street cred.

“Fine.”

The Chick Trippers applaud as Angus stomps off to assist his old, half-blind, obese sheep. He passes Fanny on his way up the hill.

Ka-ching! You hear that? I just deposited another coin in my Karma Bank, and it’s about time I get a little something-something back.

Hitting It Hard

I return to our cottage as high as Wiz Khalifa, which, I assume, is a natural side-effect of flying down a mountain like a superhero to rescue a sheep in distress. I don’t care what Angus said—
dinnea fash yourself, lassie
—poor, old Torcach would have died up on that mountain if not for my intervention.

“You saved that sheep,” Fanny says.

“Boo-yah!” I punch the air over my head with my fist. “Yes, I did!”

“Easy, Wondergirl” Fanny laughs. “You’re flinging mud all around the kitchen.”

I plop down on the wooden bench by the kitchen door, shrug out of my wet rain slicker, and kick my Wellies off. Clumps of mud fall onto the slate floor.

“I am going to take a shower”—I stand and drop my pink wooly cap onto my rain slicker—“and when I am done, do you want to go into town and hit that chocolate store Fiona mentioned?”

“Chocolate? After our hike?”

“Shyeah! We’ve got to add a little weight on the calorie scale—just to keep things balanced.”

“It doesn’t work that way, Vivian.” Fanny crosses her arms and tilts her head, looking at me from behind a thick veil of mahogany hair. “Do you know how many calories are in a Lindt chocolate truffle ball?”

“No, but I’ll bet you do.”

“Seventy-nine.”

“Oh, the humanity!” I cover my eyes with my hands and rock back and forth. “Seventy-nine calories in a single truffle ball? Sweet baby Jesus, what evil is afoot in that factory?”

“You laugh, but that’s thirty minutes of walking at three miles per hour to burn off the calories in a single chocolate truffle.” Fanny uncrosses her arms. “But if you want to visit the chocolate shop, I’ll go with you.”

“Hit it.”

“Excuse me?”

“Hit the chocolate shop. We are going to hit it. Hit. It. Hard.”

I walk out of the kitchen and down the hall to the bathroom, knowing full-well that my best friend will be planking and squatting her little heart out while I am scrubbing off the evidence of my heroics. You’ve probably already figured this out, but Fanny has some pretty big issues about food. Sometimes, it crimps my style, but that doesn’t bother me nearly as much as watching my beautiful best friend twist herself up over something that should be simple. If you’re hungry, eat. If you have extra energy, exercise. Instead, she frets over every calorie consumed, mentally calculating the time she will need to spend on the treadmill or taking a Boot Camp class to work off a kale milkshake.

I take a hot shower, slather my body with L’Occitane Sweet Almond Oil, and slip on my fluffy pink robe. I am heading back to my room when my iPhone starts ringing. I make a mad dash for the kitchen, unzip the pocket on my rain slicker, and pull out my phone, but I am too late. The Caller ID reads UNKNOWN.

I hate missed calls from strange numbers because I obsess about them for hours. Who was it? What did they want? What if an anvil falls on UNKNOWN’S head, and they get amnesia and forget to call me back? Am I just supposed to spend the rest of my life in a state of suspense?

Was UNKNOWN a misdialer, a telemarketer named Dashika hoping to sell me a new Dell computer, or Luc? Maybe Luc was calling from a hotel. Maybe he has a new mobile number. Maybe that’s why it registered UNKNOWN.

Maybe. Maybe. I don’t do well with uncertainties.

Maybe I should just call Jean-Luc and ask him if he phoned me. Maybe he will say “no” and hang up on me. Maybe he will send my call to voicemail again. Too many damned maybes.

All right Bank of Karma, I’ve deposited some serious cash over the last few days and now I want to make a withdrawal. If I call Luc, you better show me some love.

I go back to my room, dial Luc’s number, and hold my breath while the call connects.

One ring. My heart is beating like a drum. Boom dabaoom daboom. Two rings. I press my hand to my chest as if it will somehow slow my pulse.

“
Allo
.”

My heart stops beating when I hear the utterly unfamiliar, utterly female French hello.

“Hello?”

“
Oui, qui est-ce
?”

Who is this? Who the hell are you and why are you answering my boyfriend’s phone?

“May I please speak with Luc?”