Whenever You Call (7 page)

W
OULD YOU LIKE TO have lunch today?”

Surprised by Al’s voice, as I was quickly shuffling through a review of the drinks we were to be tested on that morning, I jumped. “Sure.”

He touched my arm, then went to begin class.

Jelly came in and sat down at my table. She said, “Did you study a lot?”

I shook my head. “Not that much. There were a bunch of obscure drinks that I doubt are vital to my success as a bartender.” Glancing down at my papers, I said, “Who ever heard of the ‘3 Wise Men?’”

“Damn—what’s in that again?”

“A third Jim Beam, a third Johnny Walker, a third Jack Daniel's.”

“Is that some kind of a joke?”

“Maybe,” I muttered.

While Al passed out the test papers, I looked around at the others. Ike was picking his nose. Almost picking his nose. He was doing one of those maneuvers where someone
pretends
they’re scratching or something, but in reality, they’re picking their nose. The twins were feverishly turning the pages of their pamphlets as if, in the seconds remaining, they would magically learn the recipes. I had a bad feeling about this class of aspiring bartenders.

I finished my test first, gave it to Al, and went to the bathroom. When I came back, Al was insisting that everyone stop writing. Then he collected the tests, passed them out again so that we each got someone else’s, and we went over the correct answers. I was grading Cathy, who got something wrong in every single recipe, including the one for gin and tonic. She kept spying on me, because she could see that I had her paper, and giving me gruesome looks. Diligent, I marked everything wrong that
was
wrong and figured she would have me killed by this weekend. I’d have to ask Al, as a special favor, not to give me one of her tests tomorrow.

When we got our own tests back, I’d scored 100%, which was terrific except that Ike hadn’t managed to check my answers adequately, so, really, I’d goofed on the Flaming Orgasm. Didn’t take much thought to figure out why. Despite the excitement of both Al and Rabbitfish in my life, I’d fallen asleep the night before without any satisfaction whatsoever. I should probably own up that I had really scored 95%, but I didn’t think it mattered. Al had enough to deal with as everyone fell apart when they saw their failing grades. Yup, every single student, including my personal favorite, Jelly, had failed.

“Listen, folks, just calm down!” Al yelled. “You’ll have another chance tomorrow, with a new set of 25. Study tonight, how about? If you improve as the week goes along, you won’t have any problem being certified by Saturday.”

Right.

Since I’d done so well, and the rest of them had failed, I was now the most unpopular person in the room. They ganged up on me in their shared mutual loathing.

I knew I shouldn’t let it bother me, but as I bustled around, setting up my bar space, I felt slightly teary. I wasn’t used to being unpopular. I was used to popular, as in
very
popular. I wanted to go outside and call Jen, ostensibly to ask whether she and Tom had made love, but mostly so that she could reassure me about my basic good qualities. I mean, what was I supposed to do, fail the test deliberately? As I began to mix drinks, getting into the rhythm and, frankly, having a fine ’ole time, I managed to pretend four people didn’t actually revile me.

We broke for lunch. While the other students went back to the pizza parlor downstairs, Al and I headed for a French cafe just a block away. We studied the menus and I became aware that Al was the center of attention in the restaurant. Women kept tipping their heads to peek at him, and I never saw so much hair being tossed around, as if a strong wind blew right through the cafe, or we were all in some gigantic convertible with the top down. Visually, he was wildly handsome, but I now began to theorize that he also gave off some kind of must or scent. As his vibes meandered through the restaurant, roping in the women, I found myself less attracted to him. Maybe it was just realizing I didn’t stand a chance, or maybe it was because he put down his menu right away and then began an obsequious riff about my writing.

I really should have known. It wasn’t like this hadn’t happened before.

Beautiful bartender Al had written a book and he wanted an agent. My agent, preferably. So, he started his campaign by praising me. Lauding me. If I hadn’t been a levelheaded sort of person, I might have thought I was the best darn writer who’d ever lived, with a Nobel Prize undoubtedly in my future.

When I truly thought I might puke if I heard another word, I took control of the situation by signaling the waiter and ordering a
Nicoise
salad. Al asked for a
croque
monsieur
. As soon as we were alone, I began to speak with my usual, canned response to such requests by asking to hear a description of his book. I was open-minded and I had to admit that his idea sounded clever and cute. He’d written a mystery with a bartender as the “detective.” The bar, where the murder occurs and the bartender who solves the murder works, is called
Tie Me to the Bedpost,
so that was what Al named the book.

“Damn good title,” I said, grinning.

He raised both eyebrows in a flirtatious bid.

My salad and his sandwich arrived. Before taking a bite, I said, “I will sometimes offer to read a person’s writing, if they want me to recommend them to my agent, but only if I honestly feel like their idea has merit. Otherwise, I’d be inundated with material, especially here in Cambridge.”

Al nodded hard, apparently understanding.

“Your idea sounds okay, but it’s rare that a good idea is married to good writing. Chances are I won’t pass your name onto my agent. Can you handle that?”

Triumphant, he said, “Yes!”

I took a bite of salad and chewed. I said, “Your confidence worries me.”

“I’ve been an out-of-work actor for almost 20 years. It’s either confidence or suicide.”

“What made you decide to write a mystery?”

“I’m addicted to them. I read them constantly and it got to the point where I figured I could do just as well.”

My hopes for his book went up, but I didn’t let on. I hadn’t kept track, but I’d recommended only about five writers to my agent over the years. She’d signed three of them, and one had made it big. Much bigger than I’d ever been.

I waved my fork at him. “Listen, I don’t think much of our class of bartenders.”

He shook his head. “You have no idea.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s always this way.”

“That must be depressing.”

“I get paid no matter what. They’ll drop out as the week goes along—” He chewed on his sandwich and then waved his hand around to get my attention. As if I could possibly look anywhere but at him. “I have a great job for you, if you decide you really want to work as a bartender.”

“I
know
I want a job, no question about it.”

“The Harvest is losing one of their regular bartenders. They called me about the job, but it’s not my style and I’m burned out, anyway, just want to concentrate on the teaching and writing the next mystery. You’d be perfect. Elegant, smart, a
real
novelist. I think they’d hire you in a millisecond.”

The Harvest, one of the premiere restaurants in Cambridge established thirty years ago, wasn’t what I’d had in mind when I imagined working as a bartender. I’d been thinking more along the lines of the Oxford Ale House, where I’d hung out dancing and drinking in my twenties, though I could understand that the Oxford Ale House would be looking for hot
young
women, not middle-aged novelists. Judging from Al’s attitude, I ought to be thrilled.

Al said, “I don’t know what your financial situation is, but it’s great money at a place like the Harvest. They’re talking about starting someone during the lunch shift, which isn’t as lucrative, but if you’re good, you’ll get a shot at nights.”

“Thank you,” I said.

It was time to get back and, not surprisingly, Al said he had the manuscript for
Tie Me to the Bedpost
in the classroom.

We started to walk quickly, in that awkward dance along a sidewalk when you really don’t know someone well, but you might like to know them very well, so that you somehow manage to keep bumping into them. To draw attention away from one too many of those bumps, for which I was probably responsible, I said, “I’m not going to get a chance to read your novel until after this class is over, okay? I don’t want you eagerly searching my face every morning and somehow thinking that because I don’t say anything that means I hated it.”

“Gotcha.” He grinned at me and I bumped into him again.

The guy was like a magnet. It reminded me of how I’d been when I’d met Isaac. In true Cambridge fashion, we’d been circling around the Harvard Coop bookstore for almost an hour. I only slowly became aware of him when our circles overlapped for about the fifth time, at which point I laughed and said, “If this keeps up, we’re going to find ourselves in bed by tonight.”

So, yeah, we were in bed together
that
night. The next day, when I called Jen and told her I’d fallen in love with Isaac, a guy I’d picked up and slept with the same night, she called me shameless. I’d thought she was joking, especially since I’d actually married Isaac, but probably she’d meant it. I
was
shameless. Two years since my divorce and I was no longer shameless. Instead, I was lonely and confused. I couldn’t really see how I was gaining ground here.

“Mind if I make a quick phone call?” I said to Al.

“I’ll start without you.” He patted my arm.

I whipped out my cell phone and hit the code for Jen’s office. “What happened?” I whispered.

“Didn’t you get my message?”

Her voice sounded weird. Maybe she
had
been a virgin, after all.

“I had to get to class by nine a.m.”

“Oh, that’s right, I forgot.”

Pause.

Jen said, “We did it.”

“Yeah?”

“It was totally wonderful.”

She trailed off.

“But?”

“Something strange happened.”

“Are we talking about anal sex or something?”

Finally, she laughed. “No, not strange
sexually
.”

“Jen, I don’t mean to rush you, but I’m late for the afternoon class, so I can’t continue this conversation much longer. If you want to tell me—”

She interrupted, “Sorry, sorry, I’m used to you being free all day. Okay, so the strange thing was that I felt like I had both my legs and feet.”

I was so stunned by what she’d said that I went dumb. All desire to return to class left me.

“Told you it was weird.”

“Can you explain a little more what you mean?”

“It’s pretty hard to find the right words, like trying to talk about a dream. But it was as if my legs were
there
. I
felt
them. It was so strong that when we’d finished, I looked down and fully expected to see my feet.”

“This is fascinating.”

“That’s what Tom said.”

“I bet.”

Jen said, “What do you think it means?”

“I’m going to need to think about it. Can we have dinner together tonight?”

“I’m swamped because I took off early yesterday.”

“Early for you.”

She giggled. “And tomorrow night I’m seeing Tom again.”

“You’re doing the terrible girlfriend thing to me!”

“The thing where you let a long and important female friendship get destroyed by favoring a new man?”

“That’s the one!”

“Won’t happen.”

“Anyway, it’s very good that you can’t have dinner tonight
or
tomorrow night because I have a great deal to do, what with memorizing drink recipes and stuff.”

I had worn neither dirndl nor kilt to bar tending school that morning, and instead biked over wearing shorts for the first time that spring. Since my legs were so white when I got dressed, I’d smeared on copious amounts of self-tanning lotion. Now, as I started biking home, I noticed that my legs had turned a gruesome shade of dark brown, streaked with white. I looked like I had a serious skin disease. I decided to go running as soon as I got home and then take a long soaking bath with the hopes of scrubbing some of the brown off.

As I was changing into running clothes, I tried to resist the lure of checking my e-mail. It was very nearly impossible to control myself until I realized that I was showing unhealthy signs of an addiction about hearing from Mr. Rabbitfish. And I had a terrible feeling that there would be nothing from him today, anyway. I ran to the Mt. Auburn Cemetery and along its winding paths, dodging rocks and gravestones at the same time.

I never managed to actually think about anything while I ran except how to keep going despite my lungs heaving and my leg muscles burning. I wasn’t a natural runner, and people would probably argue that I should find some other sport, but I thought that was bullshit. I knew plenty of natural runners who had terrible knees and other runner-related injuries. I figured that since I was so bad at it, I would never overdo it. Brilliant, huh? So far, my theory was working.

I was drenched in sweat by the time I got home. I pulled everything off while standing in my small entrance, then headed downstairs naked. I had a stackable washer/dryer unit hidden in a closet down there, and I immediately started a load of wash, then turned on the water in the bathtub to start filling it up. The good workout gave me confidence, so I checked my e-mail.

No e-mails from Mr. Rabbitfish. I’d already begun to see a pattern in him. I’d receive a flurry of e-mails, or at least one, then nothing for several days. I wasn’t sure what this meant, but then, I wasn’t sure what anything meant when it came to Mr. Rabbitfish. Eventually, soaking in my cavernous tub, I thought consciously about the clue of “rabbitfish.” The most obvious thing was the word “fish,” which was exactly my situation. I was fishing for him. Abruptly, I sat up in the tub, water splashing everywhere but still not managing to overflow onto the floor because the white porcelain sides were so high.

My pride kicked in. Who the hell was this guy to send me on a fishing trip? I scrubbed all over and then, still annoyed, lay back and completely submerged myself under water. I often washed my hair in the bathtub instead of the shower just because the whole bath thing, especially when you got completely wet, had a baptismal quality, and though the idea of baptism was totally bogus for me, I could understand why ancient people got into it. As a metaphor, it worked.