Life After Coffee (16 page)

Damn it. I missed my opportunity there. I guess discussing offspring isn’t the topic at hand. I’ve been doing business too long in South America. No one down there even thinks of talking shop till everyone’s discussed their families for at least half an hour. Bob proceeds to give me a pretty thorough rundown of what FMC’s been up to recently. It’s kinda interesting. Looks like someone at the top of the food chain has decided it’s time to support overseas farmers rather than grind them into the ground. I wonder what prompted this sea change. Last time I worked with a coffee conglomerate, it was all “gas everything with fungicides and fuck the farmer.”

“We’ve had enormous success in South America, and now we’re expanding the program to Africa. Ethiopia first. That’s where you fit in,” says Jay.

“So I’m curious, what’s with the large-scale turnaround?” I ask. They pause for a second. Maybe I didn’t phrase that quite right.

“Sustainable supply chains. It’s more important than ever with the epidemic. We need to develop and enhance whatever we can,” says Bob. “The program almost doubled the yield in most instances in South America. If we can help farmers boost the quality of their crops, they’ll make more money. We all will. It’s the economically viable thing to do.”

“I can’t argue with that logic,” I say with a smile.

“We were interested in hearing if you’d had any experience helping farmers heighten production, specifically in Ethiopia,” says Jay.
Have
I? I’m about to blow these two middle-aged men’s socks off. I hope they’re prepared to be super impressed because—

“Mommy?”

I freeze. The door has swung open behind me. I turn to see Billy and Violet standing next to a strung-out Thelma. Billy is completely white and has vomit all down the front of his shirt.

“He just threw up all over himself. I’m sorry, I didn’t know what I should do,” says Thelma. All trace of the woman who was happy to talk about pajamas and pink ponies has loooong gone. Good God, it’s only been five minutes. Try five years of it, girlfriend, and
then
you’ve got the right to look that sour about it all.

“Hi! I’m Violet. These are my jammies.” Violet does a funky little turn to show off said jammies. She’s still brandishing that awful muffin. I grab it off her. “Hey!” I open it up. No cheese. She must have switched with Billy.
I know
I gave him the one without cheese in it.

“Good morning, FMC Trading,” says Thelma. We all stare at her. No, she’s not been driven to insanity; she’s talking to someone on her headset. “Putting you straight through, one moment, please.” Then she mouths, “I have to go,” and starts speed walking back to her desk. I’ve got a feeling she’s going to be renewing her NuvaRing after all.

“I’m sorry about this,” I say to Jay and Bob, who are actually looking less horrified than I would have thought. “I had to bring them—my husband normally looks after the kids, but we had a last-minute conflict and none of our sitters could make it, so here we are.”

“We do appreciate that we asked you in here on very short notice. It’s not a problem at all,” says Bob, smiling. He’s
smiling
? Violet slides a stapler off the side of his desk and pulls it open to examine its inner workings.

“Violet, put that down!” Too late.

“Ow!” She drops the stapler to the ground. Jesus Christ, has she stapled herself? I rush over and grab her hand. It’s fine. She just broke the skin. I pull her over to where I slung my purse over the back of my chair and unzip the back pocket. It’s still there, my one solitary, teacher-recommended Band-Aid.

“Here’s a free tip: always have a Band-Aid handy when there’re kids around!” Do I look like Parent of the Year yet?

“Mommy, this is an Angry Birds Band-Aid. I want a normal one.” I ignore her.

“I’m going to get my eldest cleaned up, then I’ll be right back,” I say.
Please don’t end the interview. Please don’t.

“I think all moms deserve a medal,” says Bob. This is promising. “I know my weekends are harder work than my weeks.” Yes! He gets it.

“Yeah, Suzie’s certainly got her work cut out with four all day!” says Jay.

“She sure does. We both do,” says Bob. Okay, so he’s probably overestimating his portion of the “work” there, but I’ll roll with it.

“The bathrooms are just down the hall on the right. We’ll see you in a minute.”

“Thanks.”

“Violet, come on.”

“I want to stay here.”

“Oh, she’s fine for the minute,” says Bob. “I think I’ve got some crayons somewhere in here from when the kids last came in.” I seriously love this man.

“Violet, be good. We’ll be back in two minutes.”

Violet slams her muffin down on the desk and crawls up onto the chair I just vacated.

“So what exactly happens in this office here?” she asks. Oh Lord. Maybe she’ll have wrangled herself a job by the time I get back.

I spirit Billy down the corridor and usher him into the women’s bathroom.

“What happened?” I ask him. “I gave you the muffin without cheese.”

“Violet said it wasn’t cheese. She said it was yellow melted plastic and she didn’t want to eat it. I asked you if it was okay to switch, and you just said ‘one-way system,’ so I ate it. I was hungry.” Okay. If this ever comes up again, note to self: order both muffins with no cheese. In fact, when I get home, I’m going on a dairy purge. No harm can come of it.

I gingerly work his unzipped hoodie off him so it remains clear of vomit. I pull his T-shirt off, bundle the vomit up into the center of it, and throw the whole thing in the trash. Some puke unavoidably gets smeared onto the front of his hair when his T-shirt comes off, but I manage to get the worst of it out with a handful of wipes. (I have fresh wipes in my bag!) I put the cleanish hoodie back on him and zip it up to the chin. In the section of my purse where I’d stashed the Band-Aid, I’ve got a brand-new pack of Lactaid Chewables. I hand him one.

“I need water.”

“There’s a tap. It’s full of water.” He can just about reach the sink, and he manages to gulp down a few mouthfuls while I rinse off his Crocs. Within four minutes he’s more or less cleaned up. There’s a faint scent of McDonald’s-style puke about him, but you can’t have everything. Okay, now to quickly divulge my plans for redeveloping the entire agricultural model for the East African region to Jay and Bob before the inevitable second act starts: diarrhea.

The moment I step back into Bob’s glass office, I can tell that something’s changed. Bob and Jay look up at me guiltily, almost as if they’ve been assessed and found wanting. Somehow Violet looks like she’s just been handing their asses to them. I suddenly get a firm image of her thirty years from now laying it down in a meeting. It’s a bit terrifying. What on earth has gone down here? I pop my head out into reception. Thelma is nowhere to be seen.

“Do you know where Thelma got to?” I ask.

“Not sure. Maybe she’s on a break,” says Bob. A break? A break from what? Billy’s already slunk over to the side of the room and has reattached himself to his iPad. I sit down and Violet clambers up onto my lap, her warm cheek pressed into my chest. Well, it appears we can just continue on like this, then.
See, Bob, I’m a modern working parent just like you.
Nothing like you.
I’m about to jump right in and tell them all the things I’ve done in the past to get African farmers to sort out their soil, when Jay suddenly stands up.

“I’ve actually got to run.” This is not good. Despite Bob leading most of the “interview” so far, Jay’s the guy who’s really going to know what I’m talking about.

“Oh, really?” I say. “Could I just quickly outline some of the agricultural processes I’ve helped farmers to put in place?”

“I’m sor—”

“Organic certification?”

“Another time.”
Another time?
The interview is
now
. “Our CEO just got in a little early from Geneva, and he just called me up so . . .” He swoops forward to shake my hand. “It was great to meet you, Amy, and your family. Take care now.” Something about that sounds very final somehow. I’m officially worried. As soon as he leaves, I turn back to face Bob. I wonder how interested he’s going to be in hearing about my grading scale for fertilizer. I’m going to try it anyhow . . .

“How have you handled the work-life balance so far in your career? With all the travel involved?” he asks.
Your Honor, I object!
Would he be asking a man that question at this stage?

“My husband stays at home with the kids, so the travel’s never been an issue for me.”

“Even so, there’s nothing quite like mommy at home, is there.” Wha . . . ? Is there some kind of hotline number I can call to report this level of sexism?

“They all manage just fine without me when I go away. It’s fine.” I meant to give a slight warning edge to my tone, not a full-on snap. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay. I know these are the tough issues. I just wanted to see how your family was set up to handle the unusual circumstances. Looks like you’ve got it all worked out.” Oh yes. I’ve got it all figured out, just perfectly. Damn you, Unsilent Bob. “I apologize, but I actually have to get going too.” You’ve got to be kidding me! “We ran late with our other candidate, and I’ve got a conference call with Oxfam that we’ve been trying to get on the books for about six weeks now.”

“I understand.” I don’t understand at all. This is just plain rude. I had to feed my kids
McDonald’s
in order to do this interview.

“We’ll get you in again. Perhaps just you next time! Though it was lovely to meet the family.” Violet pops her head up to give him a scowl. Unhelpful.

On the way out I try to thank Thelma, but she’s typing furiously away on the computer and gestures to her headset when I try to say something. I mouth, “Good-bye,” she gives me a half smile, and that’s the end of that.

It takes about four minutes in the car before the true reason behind my early ejection emerges: Violet.

“I didn’t like those guys, Mommy.”

“Why not, honey? Didn’t he give you some crayons to do a drawing?”

“We never got to the crayons. We were too busy talking.”

“About what?” My recently evolved mommy senses are turning the back of my neck icy cold. What did Violet say to Jay and Bob?

“I asked them if they were going to give you a job. They said that’s what we were all there to talk about, and I told them why it was a bad idea.”

“You what?” What was I thinking? This is
all my fault
. Of course she was going to sabotage the whole endeavor. She’s been waiting for this opportunity since she’s had conscious thought.

“I said life was awful with you being away all the time. I told him about how you missed my daisy cupcake tea party I had for my birthday this year. I cried for two whole days and nothing Daddy did could make it better. Not even Strawberry Shortcake ice cream. They said that sounded terrible and then I told them all the other things too, and after that they didn’t say much at all. They just waited for you to come back.”

“What other things?” I may as well know the worst of it. Pandora’s box is well and truly opened now.

“That time Billy had the flu, and he had a temperature of one hundred and three point five. We thought because he was so sick, you’d be able to call your boss and say you had to stay home, and you did, but in the end you still had to get on the plane and go anyway.” How can she remember that? Isn’t everything that happens in the past supposed to be a blur when you’re three years old? Trust me to get the kid with the superpowered retentive memory that she uses solely for the purposes of shaming me in job interviews. Ask her what her favorite thing to eat for dinner is or where she put her only pair of shoes that still fit and she’s all, “I can’t remember.”

“I told them about the time Daddy was sad and didn’t get out of bed for two days and all we ate that week was Lunchables.” What? My God. Is Peter actually depressed as well as crazed? No wonder they called time on the interview. A sad Daddy who can’t get out of bed and Lunchables for a week? I wouldn’t have felt all roasty toasty inside about employing me either. Well, that’s the end of that opportunity. And what am I supposed to do about Violet? Tell her off? It’s not like she’s done anything wrong. It would be like reprimanding the nine o’clock news for going on about the bad stuff in the Middle East all the time.

“We’ll have another tea party for you tomorrow, honey.”

“Really?” she asks, all remnants of sulky—brought on by her own reminders of her “tragic” past—instantly dissipated.

“A daisy cupcake tea party?”

“For sure.”

“Thank you, Mommy!”

“You are welcome.”

You’d better live up those cupcakes, sweetheart, as they’ll be the last item of “fun” food you’ll be getting for a while. I don’t think they let you buy cupcakes with food stamps.

We pull into the driveway. Maybe this is all for the best. Maybe Peter just sold
Draker’s Dark
for tons of money, I’ll never need to work again, and I can focus the next decade on making up for everything I’ve ever missed. Peter has friends who make bundles of money from selling screenplays all the time. Okay, there was that one guy, that one time. Not too long ago, one of his old writing buddies sold a brand-new script for exactly one million dollars! Worst, or perhaps best, of all—the screenplay was from an idea that Peter had given him. If Peter has supplied million-dollar ideas to people who don’t even have half his talent, surely it’s not completely illogical to think that he could sell a script for at least the going rate of fifty grand? I’m not crazy to think that. In fact it’s very possible that this could have just happened. I’ve almost convinced myself that this is what has come to pass by the time I open the door, that the last few months have all just been part of the universe’s funny dance.

“What happened with the script?” I ask breathlessly as we pile through the door.

“Nothing much.” Ambiguous. Maybe he’s about to do one of those Hollywood reversals where he fakes disappointment in order to make the victory allegedly so much sweeter. For example: “Nothing much . . . apart from this check for one million dollars in my back pocket!” It’s about the only thing that’s not going to land him in an elephant shit-ton of trouble right now.