God In The Kitchen (14 page)

            I found myself tossing and turning all night with the vision of two women in my head. It was not a problem I had ever had before and I was quite certain I did not want to wrestle with the issue much longer. I had been so sure that Abigail was the one I would choose. But then Chloe had told me she had feelings for me and she had looked at me in just that certain tender way.

            I did my best to turn my mind off, but in reality, once it got going on Chloe, it automatically turned over to Ian and then I knew I was doomed. I had an idea and I couldn’t get rid of it. The fact that it was the middle of the night and I really needed rest, not to mention the fact that there was nothing I could do on the idea until the next day didn’t seem to matter.

            I found myself pacing back and forth in my kitchen, almost willing Evan to appear. After one lap past the fridge, I glanced at the empty chair that he normally occupied. Even though he had never really told me what I should do, I knew his presence would at least make me feel at peace. Maybe then I could get some sleep. Apparently Evan liked to surprise me, though, because he did not appear that night, even after an hour of pacing and hoping.

            I fell into bed with exhaustion just 30 minutes before my alarm went off, at which time I trudged back to the kitchen and turned the coffee maker on, attempting to add water and beans with my eyes half shut. I didn’t want to be awake, but since I was, all I wanted was for half of the day to be over so the station manager would be in and I could finally get my idea out of my head and into the air, in front of someone who could actually make it happen.

            I turned the shower on cold and let the chill wash over me as my body woke up limb by limb. The first slug of black coffee helped more and I felt my eyes opening wider and wider. I would make it through the morning show. I always did. Time was the only thing between me and the idea that had kept me tossing and turning all night long.

            The morning show went seamlessly and I was able to act as I always did, like the guy without a care in the world who wanted to have a good time and entertain as many people as possible.

            The second the show was over, I trudged into the station manager’s office without knocking and cleared my throat.

            Tom Schwab had been the manager for as long as I had been at the station and he was good at what he did. He was not good, however, at typing. He sat at his desk, attacking his computer, one key at a time. If I hadn’t been looking right at him, I would have thought he was stabbing it violently with a pen. Every time I saw him type, I had a new appreciation for his emails. They must have taken him a year to type out.

            “Got a second?” I said, after I realized he did not hear my entrance or my throat clearing over his keyboard violations.

            “Jared!” Tom said, looking glad to have a reason to end his fight with the keyboard. “Any time! Come in!”

            Tom had a jovial way about him, but he could also be very serious and to the point. I knew I would be able to read his thoughts based on his body language alone and I hoped I could fine-tune the idea as I put it into words so that he would appreciate what I had come up with so far.

            “I wanted to run something past you,” I said, sitting on the edge of the uncomfortable chair that sat haphazardly in front of Tom’s desk. “An idea I have for the station. Sort of a…promotion, you could say.”

            “Let’s hear it,” Tom said, direct and to the point.

            “It’s sort of a fundraiser type thing,” I began and I noticed the sparkle in Tom’s eyes brighten a bit. The station did several big fundraisers over the years. We called them promo drives. They weren’t my favorite part of the job, but I endured them because they only came up a couple of times a year. We would raise money for the local homeless shelter or we would gather donations to build wells in Africa or some other noble cause. The problem I had with them was that the station also made money from the promo drives. In Tom’s view, it was a mutually beneficial event. The organization would get publicity and funds and the station would be seen as charitable while also making money. I always felt the station should do the promo drives for free with the simple knowledge that it was doing a good thing. But in the end, it wasn’t the way the business worked.

            Seeing Tom’s eyes light up meant that I had him on the hook, but I had also misled him a bit and I didn’t want to give him the wrong impression. “I met this mom recently,” I said, “and her son needs surgery.”

            “A heart strings story,” Tom said as he nodded, the sparkle in his eye still there, but his body leaned back in his chair, not quite as engaged.

            “For sure,” I said, acknowledging the fact that if we put Chloe’s story on the air, it would certainly tug at the heartstrings of any listener who happened to tune in that day.

            “Anyways, her family can’t afford the surgery and I thought some version of a promo drive to benefit them would really help.”

            I could see the spark in Tom’s eyes fade as what I was saying was starting to sink in. He quickly realized the station would not make money from the event since the single mom in question was not an organization with power to buy ad space.

            “You mean, give away air time to raise money for this woman?” he asked, giving me the benefit of the doubt.

            I knew I had to come up with something fast or I would lose him. He needed to somehow differentiate this fundraiser with the others. In the normal promo drives, we would simply go on the air, tell stories, make pleas for the cause at hand, and take phone calls. During the normal promo drives, we would also make money ourselves. This had to come off as a whole different event or Tom was going to turn it down flat.

            “Have you heard about the little girl in Georgia whose mom had cancer?” I asked, turning his attention to a recent national news story.

            Tom nodded, leaning towards me a bit as he placed his elbows on his desk. “She had a lemonade stand, right? Raised thousands.”

            It was my turn to nod. “Apparently her mom’s insurance maxed out and the family was left thousands of dollars in debt. The little girl just wanted to help so she had a lemonade stand to raise money. Normal lemonade stands make, what, 5, 10 bucks?”

            “But that little girl made thousands,” Tom said, finishing my thought.

            “And you know why?” I asked, baiting him even further.

            “Because the local media caught on to the event…” Tom said as he trailed off, his eyes sparkling once again.

            “Right,” I said, gaining speed and leaning my own elbows on the opposite side of Tom’s desk. “What if we were the only media outlet to know about such an event? What if we raised thousands for this little boy who needs surgery? What if his lemonade stand is such a success that the station made the national news itself?”

            Tom tapped his fingers alongside his jaw. “You think you could make that happen?” he asked, his interest definitely there.

            “I know I could,” I replied, unsure of how I would go about doing it, but certain that I would give it my all.

            “I do have a concern,” Tom said and I held my breath as I waited. “How do we prevent any Tom Dick and Harry from expecting us to do the same thing for them?”

            I was stumped. “I can see why you would ask that,” I said, trying to fill the dead space that hung in the air and stall Tom at the same time so I could think. Even though I had been up half the night, I still hadn’t thought through all of the logistics. “What if we didn’t?” I started, thinking as I looked at a spot just above Tom’s head on the filing cabinet that sat behind him. “What if we made it an annual event? We could spend the whole year looking for a worthy cause and then we could support that cause through one of these drives.”

            “You mean, have a lemonade stand every year?” Tom asked, the uncertainty returning to his voice.

            “Not necessarily,” I said. “We could do something different every year. A spaghetti dinner. A benefit dance. A parade. It would never be the same, but it would always be for a good cause. Something local. Something with a face.”

            “Something with a face,” Tom muttered, his eyes moving back and forth across my own face. “I like that, Jones.” Tom nodded again, leaning so far across his desk he could have almost touched my face with his beefy hands. “Jared,” Tom said, and I knew what was coming, but I still couldn’t wait to hear it. “You make this happen. Let me know what you need.”

            I stood, knowing I wasn’t going to get anything better than that. “You got it, sir,” I said. “I’ll update you on how everything’s going on a regular basis. You won’t be sorry.”

            “Something with a face,” Tom muttered again as he turned away from me and began to stab at his computer again, a slight smile on his face.

            I left Tom’s office with a new lease on life…a new hope for Ian…and the biggest smile I had ever had on my face.

            “Yo, Jones!” called Ricky Radio, the afternoon guy who usually didn’t show his face at the studios until well after 2. “What you smiling about?” he taunted. “Girl number one or girl number two?” His booming voice was resonating down the hall and I knew there were going to be whispers about me later in the day. We were in the communications business. That’s what people in the office did…communicate. Though much of the communicating going on was really more along the lines of gossip.

            “Neither, my man,” I answered as I approached Ricky’s cubicle, which sat the farthest away from any of the other offices for a reason. “Neither. I’m heading out to see a boy about some lemonade.”

            I kept walking, enjoying the puzzled look that I knew I was getting from Ricky as I left the offices, headed down the hall, and hit the button to call the elevator. I had plenty of work left to do, but there was really nothing more I could do until I talked to Chloe. I had to see what she thought of my breakthrough idea and what it could do for her life and, more importantly, for Ian.

The drive to Chloe’s apartment at Summerfield flew by. Not only because it wasn’t very far away, but also because my excitement got me there faster than normal. I flew up the flights of stairs and landed at her doorstep only moments later, though my knocks went unanswered.

            I didn’t let the lack of answer deter me. I had another place to look. It was the middle of the day, after all. She was likely at work. I could have called her first, but I really wanted to see the look on her face in person when I told her the news.

            The drive to Cal’s Diner took a little longer and gave my nerves a chance to catch up with me. What if she didn’t like the idea? What if she felt it was yet another hand out and simply refused to participate? She told me several times she planned to pay me back for what I had done with her car as it was.

            There was only one way to find out. I parked haphazardly in the sparse diner parking lot. The lunch crowd had not yet rolled in and I hoped I would have the opportunity to talk to Chloe before things got too busy for her to break away.

            “Jared!” Cal called as soon as I walked in the door. “The usual?”

            “Hey Cal,” I said, giving him a friendly wave. “Just stopped in to see if Chloe was working. I have some…news for her.”

            “Chloe, huh?” Cal said with a wink. Was it just me or was everyone trying to fix me up? “She’s in back getting some sugar packets. You can head on back. It’ll be a nice surprise for her.”

            I nodded and practically danced around the counter, past Cal and into the backroom. I saw the small break room Chloe and I had chatted in before as I searched for the storage area, which wasn’t hard to find given all of the stacked boxes and the waitress kneeling next to them searching through one of them.