Who You Know (12 page)

RETTE

T
here was Ben and Jerry's Chubby Hubby in the house. How was I supposed to do sit-ups or read a book or apply for jobs or concentrate on anything when that chocolately good menace was in the house?

Welcome to my eating disorder. There's not a name for it like anorexia or bulimia, but it's very real and very destructive. Symptoms include being haunted by any fattening food product in the house; I was unable to do anything without feeling its presence, without constantly being hyperaware that yummy food was nearby and waiting to be eaten. A siren luring me to danger.

There were others like me. We just didn't have a clinical name for our illness as of yet. The Food Haunted perhaps. The Chubby-Hubby Challenged.

Some people might be tempted to call my ailment a mere lack of discipline and willpower. Not so. I was strong enough not to buy the Ben and Jerry's in the first place, but when skinny Greg unthinkingly brought it into the house, how could I start a diet until it had been devoured?

Every time I went to the grocery store, I'd have to do damage assessments of each and every item of food I bought. I would have to look at the amount of calories that I would intake if I ate the entire thing in one sitting. Tiny pizzas that totaled less than 500 calories were okay, but the ones that said there were three servings of 300 calories a piece—I mean really, does anyone eat merely one-third of a frozen pizza?—were a no-go. Any kind of ice cream or macaroni product also couldn't come into my home. Clearly no cookies, chocolate, or chips of any kind could be tossed into the cart.

Even if I resigned myself to being overweight, I couldn't eat whatever I wanted because even eating just a little too much meant that every year I'd gain another ten or so pounds until I became so fat I wouldn't be able to get out of bed. I'd need to have my groceries delivered to my home and I'd have to hoist myself out of bed with a specially made device just to lumber to the bathroom or, of course, the refrigerator.

I had reason to believe this was an ailment peculiar to women. Males could have a box of cookies in the cupboard, eat just one or two at a time, and leave the open box there for days while they went about their lives unfettered by visions of chocolate chip cookies.

I explained to Greg long ago that he was not allowed to keep treats in the house. He was required to hide them in some secret place where I couldn't find them. Though sometimes, as with the current Chubby Hubby crisis, he forgot, most of the time he managed to hide his stash. Thus, the back of his truck had become a treasure trove of half-eaten candy bars (
half
eaten!) and bags of chips. His desk drawer was littered with Pop Tart wrappers and stale Chips Ahoy.

No matter how valiantly I tried, I could not push visions of Chubby Hubby out of my head. I went to the kitchen table and began flipping through the classifieds. I looked under “marketing” and “public relations.” Who knew, maybe the business world wasn't so bad. I thought teaching was such a noble profession, but I'd had to kiss administrative ass, plus I'd had to placate parents and students. There was artifice and superficiality and politics and bullshit in any career.

The phone rang.

The problem with a cordless phone was that, like a remote control, it got left in obscure places. It rang and I began a frantic hunt for it. I only had three rings before the voice mail picked it up.

Finally I found it beneath the coffee table.

“Hello,” I said, out of breath from my phone safari.

“Hello, may I speak to Margarette Olsen?”

“This is she.”

“Hi, Margarette, this is Eleanore Neuman, the managing editor at McKenna Marketing. How are you?”

“I'm wonderful, thank you.” Holyfuckingshitholy-fuckingshit.

“Margarette, we would like to offer you the job of editorial assistant.”

“Oh?” I tried to be suave. She detailed the pay ($32,000 a year, she said in a tone that suggested the pay was not negotiable) and the benefits and asked me if I would be interested. I waited for a long moment, pretending to weigh my many career options, and said that the position did seem like a good match. She said that was great; when could I start?

“Does Monday sound okay?” I offered.

“That would be great. We'll see you at eight o'clock Monday morning.”

I hung up the phone and waited to feel euphoric. Or at least relieved.

I flopped on the couch, stared at the ceiling, and waited for the news to sink in.

Instead of feeling happy, the first thing I thought was, am I settling? Could I find something better? What if there were another, better job for me? I had taken the first job I'd been offered; no one else had even called for an interview. At least the horror of a job search was over. Writing all those cover letters, amending my résumé slightly for different jobs, dealing with my prehistoric printer that printed out my résumé crooked two times out of three and took about fourteen years to print a single page, spending three dollars at Kinko's every time I faxed a résumé, the godawful interviews and depressing newspaper ads—it was too much.

A job. Finally. Maybe it wasn't ideal, but I'd get some good experience for my résumé. At least my new life was no longer on hold. This was it. Real life.

I called Mom and Dad and left a message. I called Avery at work and got her voice mail. I couldn't tell Greg till he got home from school that night. I had to share the news with someone. I called Jen at her office.

“This is Jen Olsen,” she answered.

“I got the job at McKenna!”

“Great! Is it salaried?”

“Yep.” Uh-oh.

“Can I ask how much it pays?”

Shit. I should have known. I didn't want to tell her. She made $38,000 a year plus bonuses, which amounted to another few thousand.

“About forty thousand.” If you factored in health and other benefits, that was close enough.

“Wow, that's a lot better than teaching! When do you start?”

“Monday.”

“Let's get together to celebrate, and you can give me the details.”

“Yeah, I'd like that.”

“I'm really happy for you,” she said.

“Thanks.”

“I should get back to work.”

“Sure. Talk to you this weekend.”

“Later.”

Saturday night Jen took me to a sports bar. It was the kind of place she loved and I hated. All the guys there wore turtle necks, J. Crew flannel shirts, and clean baseball caps on top of their neat, short hair, and the women looked like they tried much too hard to look casually pretty. I'd asked Avery if she could come, but she was going to a play in Denver with some friends. I was disappointed she couldn't make it. Jen could always keep the conversation going with fluffy anecdotes and amusing observations, but I liked the occasional intelligent exchange mixed in with tales of Jen's sexual escapades.

We got there early, about nine, so there were still a couple of booths open.

“I'm having such a bad hair day,” Jen said.

I cringed inwardly but gave her a little smile and nod. Jen's hair looked stunning as usual. Her long hair was, as always, curled in gentle waves like a model's hair in a shampoo advertisement.

“I just got my hair cut and it's in that awkward first week of a haircut stage, you know?” Jen said. “It's so unfair. Your hair is awkward for the first two weeks of a haircut, it looks okay for about two weeks, and then it looks shaggy and in need of another haircut!”

“It's practically tragic.”

“Not
tragic
. Just annoying. I tried a new hairdresser. I don't know if I'll go back to her. I mean she was nice and stuff? But she had dyed her hair black, and she had like an inch of light brown roots. You know I have such
issues
with roots. It's like, my god, look in the
mirror.”

“Mmm.”

“So, how's the wedding coming?”

I shrugged.

“You don't want to go there, huh? I understand. You need to think about something else tonight.”

We sat in silence for several moments. Jen let out a dramatic yawn. “Oh my god, I'm so tired. Last night Dave went out to the strip club with his buddies and he came to my place in the middle of the night all drunk and horny and stuff and he woke me up to have sex and I could
not
fall back to sleep for the longest time. He was going on and on about how sexy one of the dancers was, and I was like, I do
not
need to hear this.”

“Dave? I thought you two had broken up?”

“We are broken up. I did not mean to let him in last night, but he'd already woken me up so I figured, why not shag? Neither of us are in serious relationships, so what's the harm?”

I nodded as if she made sense.

“So. McKenna Marketing.” Jen held her glass of beer aloft. “I'm not sure if I should say congratulations or condolences. Regardless, to being employed.”

“To being employed.” We clinked our beers together. I wished I could toast with unrestrained joy that wasn't mixed with apprehension, so I tried to push my doubts to the back of my mind and focus on the beer.

“So, tell me the deep dark secrets of McKenna Marketing,” I said.

“McKenna has got the usual bullshit,” she began. “You'll be working for Eleanore who, as you know, is quite a character. I don't know Eleanore very well, but at least she's not Sharon, my satanic boss. Honestly, they've been hiring so many people there lately, it's crazy. I can't keep track of all the new faces. We're staffing up so we can handle the Expert Appliance account. It's a really big account for us.”

“How long is the project going to last?”

“At least several months.”

“What happens when the project is over? I mean, won't there be too many people?”

“Well, the idea is that we'll be so successful we'll be able to get a ton of new projects and keep busy.”

“What if we don't do a good job with Expert?”

“Well, there'll probably be some layoffs.”

“Oh great, and I'll have to go through the job hunt all over again.”

“Are you kidding? We should be able to get some pretty decent severance packages. It'll be great. I'll give you the following tip: create a filter for Lydia's e-mails. She was the pregnant nurse at Avery's party? She forwards the most unfunny e-mails you will ever waste your time on. I have my Lydia e-mails filtered directly into their own folder so that when I'm unbelievably bored and I have nothing better to do, I can go through them.”

“Filter?” I asked.

“I'll show you how to filter e-mails. Or I can have Tom, the love of my life, show you.”

“Love of your life? What happened to Dave?”

“Dave was a tricycle. Tom is L-O-V-E in more of a Harley Davidson motorcycle sort of way.”

“Tom is cute. So you two are like a thing now?”

“Well, he hasn't called. He's just sort of friendly to me at the office. He said his ex cheated on him and he's kind of wary of women right now, but I can wait till he's ready. Well, I mean, I'll covertly help things along. I may date other guys, and if they happen to send me flowers at the office, well, I can't help that, and if they don't, well, I can help that, too. I'll just send them to myself and make him die of jealousy.”

“Clever.”

Soon I was on the lovely precipice between buzzed and drunk, a beautiful place in which life didn't feel quite so stressful and scary, but I wasn't yet feeling ashamed of myself, when two fraternity types asked if they could sit with us. Jen smiled and graciously slid down the booth. The GQ-looking guy sat down beside her. I moved over, too; I had no choice. The skinny one sat down on the very edge of the booth, as far away from me as possible.

“This place is kind of weak,” Mr. GQ said.

“No cigars,” Skinny Boy said.

“I really want a big old stogy tonight,” Mr. GQ said. “You like cigars?”

“Sure, every now and then. Not too often,” Jen said. What? Jen? Smoke a cigar? This from someone who said kissing a smoker was like cleaning a toilet bowl with your tongue?

“Have you ever been to Enotekas?” GQ asked.

“Oh, my god, that rabidly yuppie place?” I said. The three of them looked at me as though I had suggested we remove our genitals with a penknife.

“I like that place, ” Jen said, which was news to me because when we'd gone there together, I thought we'd agreed it was overpriced and pretentious.

“That place has pretty good cigars. You can't smoke them too often,” GQ said. “Your taste buds get kind of screwy for a few days.”

“Exactly,” cooed Jen. “Food tastes a little different for a couple days afterward. But every now and then it's okay.”

“Where are you two from originally?” GQ again.

“Minnesota. Just outside Minneapolis. I came out here for school and Margarette followed me.”

“Actually, I followed my fiancé.”

“Me and Randy grew up right here in Denver,” GQ said.

“Really! Colorado natives!” Jen gushed.

“It looks like our friends finally got here,” GQ said, looking toward the door. “It was great talking to you. I'll see you around.”

GQ and Skinny Boy gave us overly enthusiastic politician handshakes and bolted away.

Jen deflated. “They were nice, huh?”

“I guess.”

“Ooh, he's cute,” she said, wasting no time. Jen looked at the world like Arnold Schwarzenegger's Terminator, who could scan a room and immediately compute all important data. For Jen, the data she calculated included the presence or absence of wedding rings, approximate income brackets, age, and attractiveness.