Baggage Check (2 page)

Val looked down at the table for a minute, and slid the rest of her neat Scotch across to Rebecca. “Here, kid. I think you need this a hell of a lot more than I do.”

 

2

The next night, another layover—this one in San Francisco after a full day going up and down the West Coast. By the time their shift ended, and they were once more on a shuttle to an airport hotel, Rebecca was exhausted. There were times when she enjoyed the many locations to which her job carried her, and times when the city didn't matter at all. This could be San Francisco or Boise; tonight she didn't care. Maybe because tomorrow she would finish up on the South Carolina coast, where a beach weekend with her girlfriends awaited her.

Here in San Francisco, however, it was still light out, and the rest of the flight attendants were intent on going out again. There was some “bead shop” they had been talking about all day, and Rebecca had gathered that “bead shop” was a euphemism. Apparently what the shop mainly sold was adult novelties and drug paraphernalia.

“Coming to the Purple Feather with us, Rebecca?” asked Shanna. She had been smug all day because her overnight experience with the guy from the convention had proved far more satisfactory than Lizzie's. Rebecca did not know or need the details.

“I don't think so, thanks.”

“Oh, come on … you of all people should take advantage while we're here. It's a classy place. Very clean.”

Rebecca wrinkled her nose. “I'm sure it is.” No matter how many women or solicitous boyfriends tried to convince her to go to sex toy shops, Rebecca found the idea repulsive. She could only imagine low lighting and oily surfaces, with nasty booths along the wall for men to watch porn behind curtains.

“Well, I think you ought to go, doll,” Valerie said.

“Are you coming, Val?” Shanna asked. “Because that would be awesome!”

“Sure, why not?” Valerie said. “I don't get embarrassed.”

Rebecca had to admit, she did feel more like a fuddy-duddy now that she was the only one not going. But she'd already said no, and she was tired. “I'll go next time, okay?” she said.

“I'm going to get the Tickler 2000 this time,” Shanna said. “I got the petite version last time, but it's sort of lost its appeal.”

“Oh, I don't like those big bulky things,” Lizzie said. “I'm getting the little portable one that goes in your panties. You know, with the remote control?”

“Who are you going to give the remote to?” Shanna asked.

“Just me,” Lizzie said. “It's tiny. You can hold it in your hand, and get a little, er,
pick me up
in the middle of the day and no one would be the wiser.”

“Next time you seem a little too happy to be at work, we'll all know why,” Rebecca said.

“Yeah, that could make turbulence a lot more enjoyable,” Shanna said.

Valerie smiled and shook her head. “You girls have no idea how lucky you are. It's so nice people
talk
about these things now. When I was young, sex was so taboo. People just didn't talk about it, except for all the free-love people. You know, I think one of those vibrator machines might have saved my first marriage.”

“I thought your first husband couldn't change a lightbulb?” Rebecca asked.

“That's right. But maybe I could have looked past that if he knew where to find my cookies!” She said this loudly enough that some businessmen turned to look, and they all four dissolved in laughter.

At the hotel, Rebecca wasted no time showering and getting into her pajamas, hoping to avoid more invitations to the Purple Feather. She had to leave earlier than everyone else—she was splitting off from the group to work the flight to Cincinnati tomorrow, while they were heading for New York. She had traded routes with another girl so she could end up working the evening flight from Atlanta to Charleston. It meant having to do gate duties in South Carolina after the flight instead of getting to go straight to the beach house, but she got paid for the trip and didn't have to do standby. A good trade.

Rebecca watched, bemused, as Valerie put back on her grandma jeans—over the stockings, naturally—white tennis shoes, and a shade too much red lipstick. She resprayed her large helmet of sandy-gray hair, buttoned her white blouse, and was out the door. Rebecca smiled to think of the reception Valerie would get at the sex shop, and whether Shanna and Lizzie would stay with her or leave her to her own devices.
Is this even Valerie's first time going?
She certainly never seemed shy about new experiences when Rebecca was around.
How did I end up with these people for friends?

When the door had clicked closed behind Val, Rebecca called her friend Suzanne to confirm the plans for the weekend and to make sure someone could come pick her up at the airport in Charleston tomorrow night.

“Yes, darling, someone will pick you up. The four of us are all driving out in the morning. Are you
completely
sure you can't join us?”

“Completely. I'm in San Francisco and they need me tomorrow.” She saw no need to mention that she had chosen to fly in with work, rather than endure a five-hour car ride with four women, all of whom were rather disgustingly happy.

“All right, sweetie. It's going to be supercasual, okay? Just girls hanging out at the beach.”

“You got it.”

“For heaven's sake, don't let them put some kind of hideous fake veil on me.”

“I won't.”

“I'm counting on you. I know you hate that tacky stuff as much as I do.”

Rebecca smiled. At one point in her life, she would have given her right arm for Suzanne to include her in this sisterly confidence, to see them as being the same. Rebecca had since given up, at least partially, on this idea. You couldn't replicate Suzanne. She simply had a charmed life. “Don't worry, Suze. I've got your back.”

Next, Rebecca called to check in with Kendall Brighton-Higsby at the Junior League, to review the minutes from last week's gala committee meeting. After years of trying to break out of provisional status and move past duty at the league's thrift store, Rebecca was finally on the committee to plan the Christmas Gala. It was the year's biggest fund-raiser and supported about twenty children's charities. Rebecca suspected Suzanne had pulled some strings to get her on the committee, and it was a bit of a challenge with her flight schedule, but she was too happy to care.

With her calls made, Rebecca pressed her uniform and left it hanging in the bathroom so she could dress and leave in the morning without waking Valerie. She packed and repacked everything else three times: spare uniform, bathing suit, towel, flat sandals, and a sundress that would work for the beach and dinners out over the long weekend. Two tank tops, one pair of wrinkle-resistant white shorts, one pair of jeans, makeup kit, cotton robe, and underwear. Everything perfectly organized, and four pounds under the carry-on weight limit in case she brought something home from the beach.

She left her suitcase half-zipped on the little closet trestle so she could put in her pajamas and toiletries without needing the light. Settled on the bed, she flipped through the channels on the hotel TV twice, and then snapped it off. Her phone was resting on the nightstand, on top of a dog-eared book she'd picked up in an airport bookstore:
Calm Your Mind, Live Your Life
. She knew she should read some affirmations and get a good night's sleep, but she picked up her phone instead.

Rebecca had just signed up for Instagram a few weeks earlier, and already she was coming to the conclusion that it was just another way for the universe to remind her that life was passing her by. Just like Facebook, the feed was full of babies, kids, and wedding photos. Artisan cupcakes for a two-year-old's birthday party. Pregnancy photos. Happy glowing girls, mostly sorority sisters from her class and younger, turned sideways with a hand draped across each of their bellies (a variation on this included the hands of an equally ecstatic partner). Some grinned at the camera, others contemplated the miracle of life in subdued, artsy black-and-white. All positively swelled with happiness and potential.

These torture sessions were something of a necessary evil. Because of her travel schedule, she sometimes needed social media to keep up with even her closer friends—like the girls going to the beach this weekend. Beth was a Facebook junkie—posting everything from her deepest religious beliefs to what she ate for breakfast. Beth and Rebecca had never been particularly close—they had only hung out regularly during their senior year of high school—but since the advent of Facebook, Rebecca knew more about her than ever. Marci posted on both platforms: frequent pictures of Bonnie, shots from nice dinners out with Jake (
delightful
), and a blog about her happy life. It was called “The Care and Feeding of a Suburban Husband,” and was so popular Marci had been offered a book deal based on it.

Suzanne was less active on Facebook these days. She favored the simplicity of Instagram, and having a superfamous fiancé like Dylan Burke meant taking more care with her privacy (and his). But she had not given up her own personal spotlight yet, and she was constantly being tagged in photos from charity events she planned or attended, especially those related to her foundation for the children of slain law-enforcement officers.

Rebecca was also Facebook friends with Dylan's little sister, Kate, who seemed almost as shy in the virtual world as she was in the real world. Her older sisters were pseudo-Kardashians, and their ridiculous behavior had earned them not only constant coverage in the tabloids, but the dubious honor that they would soon be filming their own reality show. Soft-spoken little Kate seemed to be doing her best to keep herself and her baby boy as far from that limelight as possible.

Tonight, Rebecca scrolled through the streams of pictures quickly, too tired to take a strong interest in anything. Baby, kid, baby, cat, kid, anniversary, shoe ad, political rant, sonogram, and finally, a picture of someone's steak dinner and glass of wine.
Really?
she thought.
Can we do nothing alone?

In a heartbeat, a quiet voice answered her own question.
You should know. You do almost everything alone.
She turned on the small lamp over Valerie's bed and the light in the bathroom, and then put on her satin eyeshade and earplugs.

Her head had scarcely hit the pillow when the alarm went off at three thirty and it was time for her to go. Valerie's snores were still loud and regular as she let herself into the hallway, pulling her reliable wheeled case.

BY MARCI THOMPSON STILLWELL

BLOG: THE CARE AND FEEDING OF A SUBURBAN HUSBAND

{ Entry #174: Dirty Diapers and Fairy-Tale Endings }

Thursday, June 16, 2016

Morning, everyone! Just a reminder that the blog will be on hiatus for a few days while I'm on vacation with my girlfriends. I am adding several other great blogs to the list at the left to keep you occupied while I'm gone. Just promise you'll come back, okay?

So. Last time we got a little history lesson about how my sweet Suburban Husband (or SubHub, as longtime readers know him) and I met, became friends, and ended up together … eventually. (You can read the whole story
here
.) Like the stories of Brothers Grimm, our fairy tale was not always smooth sailing. There were problems and dark forests and even a couple of characters who wanted our story to end differently.

SubHub was certainly my knight in shining armor, but there was a dark knight on the scene, too. And another princess, who obviously was not SubHub's true love, but wanted to be rescued from her own tower all the same. After many battles, things worked out, in the end, and we got our happily ever after. Was that because SubHub rescued me? Not exactly. I think what he did was give me a chance to rescue myself.

No one ever explains that part when you're a little girl watching princess movies or listening to fairy tales. We hear about the damsel in distress and the handsome prince. So we spend our lives assuming we're her, and looking for him. But what no one says is that your knight in shining armor might look a lot like an old friend who forgets to take the trash out.

They don't mention, either, that before your knight can rescue you, you must first be able to rescue yourself. And that the process doesn't end at the happy ending, or even “I do.” It's an ongoing thing: you will both be in distress sometimes, sometimes at the same time, and you must find a way to rescue one another. Every day. Once you have kids, if you have kids, the definition of “happy ending” becomes far more loose. Sometimes it's just being the one to get up in the middle of the night to change a dirty diaper. Or, for true gallantry, to clean a sudden projectile poop out of the crib (and off the walls and rug, too). Sometimes it's coming home from work early so your princess can take a shower, or not rolling your eyes when the prince wants a Saturday for golf.

I will admit I'm still working on that last one. But SubHub and I have managed, so far.

I do wonder, sometimes, how the other characters in the fairy tale are doing. In the storybooks, they never talk about what happens to the trolls, the wolves, or the wicked kings after they are “never seen again.” But in real life, the villains don't fall off the face of the earth, and it's not always so clear who the wicked ones really are.

The other princess, for example, is a friend of mine, and I have to admit that even though I was angry when she tried to lure my Prince Charming to her side, I'd still like to see her with her own happily ever after. And what about the dark knight? Did he learn anything from our little adventure? I may never know.

So for us, the happy ending means Cheerios, projectile poop, and compromising on personal hygiene. Each day feels like we are trying to save one another again. For others, the end of one story is just the beginning of their own adventure. So maybe the term “happy ending” is the problem. Because there are no endings. Just moments. And you have to savor every one.