30
O
n Monday morning I drag myself to work, still tired, slightly queasy, and annoyed that I let my MetroCard expire. I have to buy a pack of tic tacs from the deli to get enough change for the bus, then worry that the minty burning might not be good for the baby. My baby. I have to start rethinking my moves, unless I'm going to do something I never wanted to do . . .
I scoot into a coveted single seat on the bus and look out the window, not wanting to think about the unthinkable. I've always identified myself as pro-choice, but it isn't a decision I imagined myself making. I focus on the giant snowflake strung over Fifth Avenue, the buildings wrapped like packages in giant ribbons, the wreaths around the necks of the lion statues outside the public library. 'Tis the season to be jolly; save your maudlin thoughts for the January freeze.
At the bank, the branch manager has the employees huddled like Christmas elves around a fake tree in the lobby. Astrid mugs and hangs a decoration from one of her baby dreads as if to say “Merry F-ing Christmas.”
Thai plucks a red velvet bulb from a box and salutes me with it. “Oooh, Emma, whatsa matter with you? You don't look so good.”
“I'm fine,” I say, “but what's all this?”
“We're decorating, of course,” replies Oliver Pluckett, the manager. He hands me an ornament shaped like a snowflake. “Come help us, Ms. Dombrowski. Show your Christmas spirit!”
Oliver Pluckett is the only person in this entire branch who insists on calling me by my last name. “I love Christmas, Mr. Pluckett,” I say, weighing the merit of Oliver's fine intentions against the fact that the people from corporate will have a cow when they see the tree. “But we have to be considerate of all our customers, and some of them don't celebrate Christmas.”
“I tell you dat, Ollie,” Thai says. “I tell you dat, but you don't listen.”
“Northshore Bank has a tree in the lobby,” Oliver argues.
I shrug. “A different corporate policy,” I say, all the while thinking he should apply for a position at Northshore and make my life a hell of a lot easier. I duck into the break room thinking of hot tea but there's no hot water, only brewing coffee, its odor hanging in the air like heat waves off fresh tar.
“Why am I so nauseous?” I whisper to myself. The back of my neck is damp with perspiration and I no longer want tea or any breakfast at all.
Of courseâthe pink cross. Thai enters with her big blue bank mug. “Maybe I should go home,” I say, looking at the wall calendar and trying to remember how many sick days I have left this year.
“No, Emma,” Thai says quietly. “No home.” With a furtive glance at the door, she adds: “Big boss coming today. Coming to see you. Surprise review.”
“Shit.”
“Don't worry, Emma! You good worker! You do fine. If Thai can do it, so can you.”
“I'm not so sure anymore.” I sink down into a chair with the realization that banking and child-rearing are a horrible combination. I am approaching the end of my executive training, a probationary period, and if they find out I'm pregnant. . . ugh. I've heard horror stories of demotions, women passed over for promotions, career dead ends, all illegal but it transpires nonetheless in the Big Boy world of banking. There was a time when I actually enjoyed my job, finding satisfaction in the way numbers always made sense, always added up the same way no matter who tried to finagle things. But the management training program took me far away from numbers, thrusting me into telemarketing and information technologies, corporate investment strategies and human resources. My last rotation, in sales and marketing, had not been a good one. I was off in Aruba with Randy when my boss, Gilbert Holcum, came to review me. Not my fault, I know, but he stuck me with inferior scores on that rotation, checking off “Needs Improvement,” right down the line.
“Needs improvement?” I complained to Randy. “Where are they going to find a more dedicated, more honest employee than me?”
“In Aruba?” he teased.
“It's so unfair, and it's so far from what I want to be doing. I should just quit. Leave them high and dry.”
“You can, you know,” he said. “You're allowed to walk away from something that isn't working for you.”
But we both knew I couldn't. Not Emma Dee. I wasn't a quitter, couldn't stand to walk away and admit defeat. I'd finish the training program and then quit the damned job. And now, in the break room, I moaned as a wave of NEEDS IMPROVEMENTS rolled through my thoughts.
Here I am at the end of the road, finishing the program in the personal banking division, and the wolf is knocking at my door, ready to blow down my house of straw.
“Do you think Ollie get in trouble today?” Thai says, interrupting my lamentations. “Over Christmas tree?”
“Yes,” I answer. “And so will I.” I grab my coat. “I'll be back soon. Cover for me.”
“You golden,” Thai calls as my heels click over the marble floors. I look down at my black Manolo Blahnik power heelsâthe one thing in my favor today. At least I picked a pair of kick-butt shoes that cover toe cleavage.
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When I return with an electric menorah and a sign that says “Season's Greetings,” my executioner awaits me. Gilbert Holcum watches me from his seat in Oliver's cubicle. I don't meet his eyesânot so difficult, since they're hidden behind a shiny wall of spectacles. Instead, I plug in my “All-Purpose” decorations and hope that he finds my attempt at holiday equilibrium acceptable. As I set things up, I hear Thai talking cordially with a customer she calls “Tyler-Mommy.” The woman seems charmed, happy to chat about their children, who seem to be in the same day care, but I realize that Thai is not following bank policy and should be using the woman's last name. That damned “You'll Get a Ten-Dollar Deposit If I Don't Smile and Call You by Name” policy tries my patience. I had to sign pay vouchers three times; three little old ladies who did not hear their names because they declined to wear their hearing aids. And since when is a smile a prerequisite in the work place? Now management is telling us how to emote?
I glance at Holcum, wishing I had ten bucks for every time he didn't smile at me. Like now.
“You're late, Ms. Dombrowski.” Holcum's glasses show my reflectionâflushed face, red hair wild with static electricity.
“I was here earlier,” I say, then decide not to take this one on the chin. “Mr. Pluckett insisted on putting up a tree, and I knew we needed to balance it with more culturally diverse decorations.”
Oliver's head bobs up from his stance at the greeting desk. Well, what do I care? The man refuses to use my first name.
“Is that true, Ollie?” Holcum asks him, holding a finger in the air as if to stop time.
Oliver excuses himself from a customer and joins us, whispers: “It was the first stage of many things I'd planned.” Good old Benedict Ollie.
Holcum's sneering facade is unaltered. “Proceed,” he dismisses me, as if I am blocking his view of the show.
In fact, I am, as Thai is now passing out candy canes to customers waiting in line. One elderly customer declines, saying he's diabetic, and Thai touches his arm with a look of understanding.
“Ooh, I knowâno sugar. That tough, but you better off. Better to give up yum-yums than nookie-nookie.” The customer smiles, but I turn away and head for the break room before Holcum asks for a translation.
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With my executioner watching my every move and scratching notes, the day is painfully long. I keep busy waiting on customers, mostly elderly women who insist on visiting the branch to cash in their Christmas Club accounts in the presence of human tellersâtwo things that most other banks are trying to phase out. I see the vestiges of old banks all over the cityâcorner streetfront spaces that are now 24/7 pharmacies or Starbucks or Japanese restaurants. The banks themselves have been reduced to tiny closets with a handful of ATMs inside, often with ragged-looking people waiting in the doors for handouts. I hope our bank isn't going in that direction, then kick myself for caring so much as I smile wider at Mr. Apostolides, whose name I butcher.
He points to the guaranteed name-and-smile sign. “So, you say my name all wrong . . . Do I get, maybe, five dollars, then?”
“I think you just get extra smiles,” I say pleasantly, feeling Holcum's eyes on me.
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At the end of banking hours, when the tellers count out their drawers, I ease into a chair behind the counter, pretending to keep a watchful eye but mostly trying to get away from Holcum. Thai counts her drawer quickly, her fingers tapping the calculator and spitting off bills and receipts like a machine. She finishes and notices Manuel struggling.
“Manuel, honey, is this your first time closing?” Thai hands me her drawer for verification, then joins him.
“I think I'm getting the hang of it,” he says. “I've got the deposits and withdrawals totaled separately.”
“Good, good!” Thai chimes. “Then you stack your bills and put receipts on topâalways blue deposit slip on top, then pink withdrawal ticket next.”
He nods, quickly adjusts the paperwork.
“No, no . . . Yes! That's it. And here's how you remember blue on top, pink on bottom: Blue go on top because blue is boy, and boy always go on top,” Thai says with a wink.
I feel my throat go dry and suddenly notice Holcum listening intently. Manuel chuckles and thanks Thai for her help, but I imagine red flags pinging up in Holcum's brain. EEOC charges! Sexual harassment complaints! Inappropriate innuendo in the workplace!
“That's a great way to remember,” Manuel says, slightly red.
“Ms. Dombrowski?” Holcum hisses like a snake as he holds one finger in the air. “Have you something to say?”
I know he wants me to correct Thai, make an example of her, remind her of appropriate images in the workplace, but I cannot bear to harm the person who breathes life and humor and humanity into this bank. Thai does a damned good job; she would probably be branch manager if it weren't for the language barrier. I refuse to take her down.
I stand and face the glass wall of Holcum. “Yes, sir,” I say, “if I don't see you before the holidays, have a good one.” And I turn my back on him and bow my head over the cashiers' drawers and lose myself in the calculations until I don't care whether or not Holcum is there anymore. I just want to cash out and know that everything adds up correctly in the world of numbers. The rest of life never adds up properly, but numbers do not fail you.
31
T
hat night on the way home I realize there is no delaying the difficult conversation I need to have with myself. I exit the bus before my stop and walk for a while, wondering when the white sky will let loose with snow. I pass a tree stand with evergreens stacked on the sidewalk like tired soldiers, their scent a visit to dark woods and neighbors' berms and Christmas mornings of my childhood.
Bundled in my scarf against the cold, I walk on and imagine terminating the pregnancy. It seems like the simplest solutionâa trip to a clinic and then a chance to start over the right way. If I'd had my wits about me, if I'd realized just how close I was to ovulation the night Jonathan and I had sex, I would have gone to a clinic for those morning-after pills.
I turn down a side street, a quaint block of brownstones, where two toddlers are climbing down the stairs from the cheerful red door of a little day care center, a flag covered with apples flapping in the wind over their heads. Dad follows, but the children are far ahead, running into the arms of their mother who greets them with hugs and kisses beside a double stroller. As Mom lifts a child into the stroller I feel a swell of maternal instinct; I have always wanted a baby. Why not this baby? Would I resent the little thing because its seed came from Jonathan? I can't imagine resenting a baby. Somehow, I think I would love my baby, no matter who the father is; but how would I know for sure?
As the first flakes of snow begin to fall, I realize I cannot reason this out on my own. I call Jane on her cell, and she says she will meet me at Bellini's.
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“The demon seed of Jonathan Thompson?” Jane pauses, holds her martini midair. “Thank God for
Roe v. Wade
.”
“I don't know.” I flounder, taking a chunk of cheese from the complimentary appetizers to look purposeful. Jane brings clients here all the time, and the waiters can't do enough for her. Richard seemed disappointed that I wouldn't accept a glass of champagne, but I stuck to my cranberry juice. “I'm thinking of keeping it.”
“And why would you do that?” Jane asks.
I roll my shoulders back, searching for the answer. “Because it needs me?” Another question. “Okay, it probably sounds insane since I'm just a few weeks pregnant, but I think I can feel this baby begging for help inside me. Subtle changes in the past few weeks, like being tired all the time? The baby wants me to sleep more. It doesn't like oatmeal for breakfast. It made me switch from coffee to tea in the morning.”
Jane tucks a strand of black hair behind one ear, her eyes intent on me. “When it tells you to start drinking formula, I'll start to worry.”
“Seriously, I want this baby. It may not be the right choice for my life or for Randy, but that's how I feel.”
“So keep the little drooler,” Jane says casually, as if helping me decide which Pradas to purchase. She sips her martini, mulls it over, then breaks into a smile. “Shit, Emma! Are you really going to do this?”
“I guess. Yes.” Suddenly I'm feeling wobbly about the issue of the baby's father. “And I'm not telling Jonathan. I've read a lot about a father's right to know, and I think it's a load of crap.”
Jane lifts her hands, pretends to applaud. “Bravo, my dear. You need to avoid anything that might tie you to a man like Jonathan Thompson.”
“But what do I tell Randy? I mean, if I don't say anything I'm sure he'll take total responsibility, and he'll be a good father. But is that right? Is it fair to him? Or is it immoral?”
“Emma Dee, no one can answer that question but you.” Jane pops an olive in her mouth, waiting for my answer.
“I've always been totally honest in my life. You know I'm a terrible liar. But somehow, honesty doesn't
feel
right in this situation. It would hurt Randy. Do I have to hurt him?”
“Honesty is overrated,” Jane says. “And our ride on this planet is short. Look at that nineteen-year-old rap star who was just gunned down. Nineteen. Christ. But you, Emma, have to decide what you want to do while you're here.”
“Make the world a better place,” I blurt out, then realize how corny it sounds.
Fortunately, Jane doesn't jump on me today. “And does having a child further that mission?”
“I think it does,” I say. “Yes, a new life must be a good thing. Not that I can make that child into a model human being, but I can do my best to help him or her evolve into a decent, kind person.” I pinch the bridge of my nose, shake my head. “Who am I kidding? Raising kids is a crapshoot. But isn't that why we're here on this spinning planet? To roll the dice and celebrate the lucky seven?”
Jane smiles. “Sounds like you're on the right track.”
“I've never been a gambler. I like to play it safe. How did my life get so out of control?”
“Out of control is the reality,” Jane says. “When you think it's in control, that's the illusion.”