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Authors: Debra Doxer

Sometime Soon (6 page)

BOOK: Sometime Soon
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“Sam can’t eat chocolate and
neither can your Aunt Claire.”

Sam is our cousin and Claire is his
mother. They are a branch of the family that we never see.

“So, we’re choosing a cake for them
and not for me? It’s my wedding cake,” Laura says in a voice that is
dangerously close to a whine.

This is all too predictable. Laura
will never learn. I want to reach out and conk her on the head.

“Could we sample just some yellow
cake with white frosting?” Mom asks, not responding to Laura.

“We don’t have anything prepared
right now, but I have a nice buttercream frosting you could try,” the bakery
lady adds helpfully. I wonder if she is used to cake choosing conflicts.

I think long and hard before piping
in here. I turn to my mother and say, “I can understand your chocolate and
strawberry concerns, but there must be some kind of cake we can agree on that
has a little pizzazz to it. Don’t you think? Maybe some lemon or peach or
something?”

“Maybe the lemon raspberry one
without the raspberry,” Mom says thoughtfully.

“You have something against
raspberries, too!” Laura shoots back at her.

My mother’s eyes harden. I know
that look. She doesn’t like the tone Laura is using with her. “You know,” she
begins calmly as she straightens creases in her shirt that aren’t there.
 “I don’t have to run around trying to make a nice wedding for you. You’re
certainly old enough to do this yourself. I’ve been to enough events to tell
you that I know what I’m talking about, but if you don’t believe me, or if
you’re just not interested in hearing my opinions, you can make all the
decisions and you can do all the planning without me. I have plenty of other
ways to spend my time.”

Laura’s eyes quickly mist over. She
glances up at the bakery lady as her face reddens with embarrassment. “I’m
sorry,” she whispers. “I just thought I should have a cake that I would want to
eat.”

“I understand that,” Mom answers,
softening a bit. “But you want all your guests to be able to eat it, too.”

In the end, Laura calms down, and
Mom decides on the lemon raspberry cake, hold the raspberries. As we’re
leaving, Laura ducks into bathroom to compose herself.

“Is it me?” Mom asks, looking for
some commiseration once we’re alone.

“I think it’s both of you. She
wants the wedding of her dreams, and you want to be practical. You’re working
at cross-purposes.”

My mother purses her lips. “Maybe,”
she says wearily. “This really is getting out of hand. If she is so set on
having things a certain way, she should just tell me to go jump in a lake.”

I laugh at her. “Like that’s gonna
happen.”  

She chuckles with me before putting
her hand on my arm to make sure she has my full attention. “I have to finalize
the numbers this week. Do you think you might bring someone to the wedding?”

She has already asked me this
question several times. “No,” I reply, my smile evaporating.

“Are you sure?” Her subtext is
Don’t
you think you might be dating someone by then? Please, please
.

“I’m sure.” The wedding is still
nine months away, but I don’t plan to bring anyone. Bryn and Katie think I
should scramble and do everything I can to get a date. They think it will be
embarrassing for me to show up alone. I disagree, and also--I just don’t care.
I’d rather get through the inevitable comments about my single status from
well-meaning relatives with a clench-jawed smile, than have to fake an interest
in someone so I can have a date for the wedding. I’m more mature than that. At
least, I want to be.

My mother knows better than to
question me outright about my dating situation. I erected walls there long ago
to maintain my sanity.

“Well,” she says, patting my arm,
“If you do decide to bring someone at the last minute, I’m sure we could
squeeze one more in.”

As I point my car toward home, my
cell phone rings. I study the caller ID with anticipation as I’ve done since
leaving a message for Mr. Frameless Glasses. But it isn’t him.

“I can’t believe I cried in front
of the bakery lady,” Laura says, preempting my hello.

My shoulders are tight with stress,
and my stomach is queasy from sugar. “You either have to learn how to work with
her or you have to plan your wedding without her,” I say calmly, refusing to be
sucked into the wedding vortex.

“What was so wrong with wanting to
have a wedding cake with chocolate? I have to please everyone else before I
please myself?”

“You know what you have to do if
you want keep the peace. It’s just one day.” I’m now readying myself for a
response like,
But it’s the most important day of my life!
If she says
that, I intend to hang up. But, thankfully, she doesn’t.

“The florist appointment is next
week. I don’t even want to go now,” she says on a sigh.

“You didn’t want to go before.”

She doesn’t reply. I hear the
frustration in her silence.

“Jonathan hasn’t chosen anything
for the wedding, and he doesn’t seem to mind,” I say.

“He doesn’t care about cake and
flowers,” she answers, sounding defeated.

“Because it’s not a big deal,” I
say. “It’s getting married to each other and making a life together that
matters. You’re losing all perspective. Your cake will be terrific, and the
flowers will be beautiful. Mom has great taste. You can’t deny that.”

“There’s nothing wrong with me
wanting things a certain way at my own wedding.”

“Of course not, but that’s not how
she operates. You need to focus on what’s important and let the rest go. She may
be a control freak, but she’s not a bad person. You know she loves you.”

“Hummmph…” is all the response I
hear. “What time is the honeymoon?” she asks.

I smile, knowing she’s feeling a
little better and hoping that I helped.

 

It’s Saturday night, and I’m happy
to have the entire evening to myself. Well, just me and Tiger. I think about
heading to the gym to work off the cake. That might help me feel better or at
least make me too tired to think. There is no sign of Jason Randall, yet.
Perhaps he won’t return my call. I’m of two minds about that. Slightly
annoyed--thinking that he went to the trouble of passing his business card to
me, and I actually called him, and now he’s going to blow me off.
Relieved--thinking that I won’t have to go through the trouble of dating him
and discovering that he’s a jerk. My attitude is atrocious. I know that. To
hear me, you’d think I must have had my heart broken in some terrible way to
cause me to be so cynical. But that’s not the case. I’ve just had so many
little disappointments built up over time, as my expectations of kindness and
consideration have been dashed over and over again.

But as I’m heading out the door the
next day, Jason does call.

“I figured passing my business card
to you was worth a shot,” he says after the initial greetings are out of the
way.

“Where did you disappear to?” I
ask. “One minute you were there, the next you’d vaporized.”

“Sorry about that. I got a call I
had to take. It was business, and I had to step into the hall by the restrooms
to hear. By the time I returned, you were sitting down with your friend. I
didn’t want to interrupt.”

“According to your card, you’re a
financial analyst. That sounds really impressive to me, but in reality, I have
no idea what a financial analyst is.”

He laughs, deep and throaty. I like
the sound. “Basically, I spend my days in meetings or with a phone attached to
my ear. I write a lot of reports on the advisability of investing in companies,
and the people I work for actually think I know what I’m talking about. It’s
all very tedious really.”

I laugh. “I’m sure you know what
you’re doing. They must do some vetting before they hire people.”

“It’s actually a pretty grueling
interview process there. I’m glad I’m way past all that. And what do you do?”

“I work in product marketing for
BTS Systems.” BTS Systems is a large company, traded on the Nasdaq. I generally
assume people have heard of it.

“Product marketing,” he says. “What
does that entail?”

 “Basically, I help sell
products by exaggerating what they can do.”

“Well, that must take skill.”

“You have no idea.” My stomach
starts that familiar fluttering again. I am enjoying talking to him.

“So, would you be up to meeting for
some dinner after work this week?”

“As long it’s not at Café Blue,” I
answer.

“Not a fan?”

I entertain him with my multiple
Café Blue dinner experiences, and he laughs on cue. Then he suggests another
place, in the Back Bay area of the city. I’m assuming that he lives in the city
like most other single folks. Although driving into and parking in the city are
not all that convenient for me, I agree to a place. Dragging him out to the
suburbs after work would only complicate the plans at this point. There are far
more interesting places in town.

 “Just one more thing,” he
says. “Who’s Tiger?”

six

 

A smile blooms across my face as I
recall the conversation. I’m driving to Waltham to get my check for the car
repairs. I explained to Jason that Tiger is a most entertaining kitty. Luckily,
he doesn’t seem to have a
thing
about cats. Cats seem to turn a lot of
men off for some reason. Maybe they think cat ownership is evidence of
dangerous nesting instincts. That thought rankles me, but I can’t discount the
theory.

The Waltham Brew House is a local
neighborhood pub with its own glass enclosed brew-house. Scratched wooden
booths line a windowed wall that looks out onto the sidewalk. The brewing area,
made up of several medium-sized wooden barrels surrounded by snaked silver
piping, is near the entrance.  The bar sits in the middle of the dining area
like an oval-shaped donut. The heat wave broke overnight, and the afternoon is
cool and overcast with a low leaden sky that threatens showers.

I have on shorts and sandals today
despite the chill. I’ve also thrown on my favorite blue sweater, the one that
matches my eyes, and my hair is loose and obedient, so far. I know we’re only
meeting so he can hand me a check, but I’m wondering if maybe he has more in
mind. Standing in the entrance of the Waltham Brew House, I glance around the
sparsely populated place. I’m about five minutes early, and there is no sign of
Ryan “the bumper denter” Miller. I’m actually not sure if I would recognize
him, having only met him briefly, and under a certain amount of duress.

A young, friendly hostess
approaches me, but I tell her that I’m waiting for someone. About fifteen
minutes later, as I’m shifting my weight from one foot to the other and
glancing at my watch for the third or fourth time, through the pub’s windows I
see someone briskly round the corner and head for the entrance. The door opens
behind me, and I turn to see a somewhat familiar figure enter. He looks up and
I notice a flicker of recognition cross his face when he spots me. I recognize
him as well, although he appears quite different. His hair, dark and wavy, is
brushed to the side with some locks disobeying and hanging down over his
forehead. His golden brown eyes have interesting green tinges, and they are
bright and friendly--no longer bloodshot and tired. He appears comfortable and
casual in olive colored shorts and a navy T-shirt.

“Andrea?” he asks, stopping in
front of me.

I’m struck by how handsome he is,
and suddenly I feel uneasy. It’s an unusual response, but history has taught me
that guys like him are not usually very nice. They may seem nice at first, but
dig a little deeper and they’re generally too self-centered to be likable.
“Ryan,” I reply.

He smiles at me. “Sorry, I’m late.”

“No problem.” He is actually just
under the gun of okay on the lateness scale. Tardiness is a pet peeve of mine.

“Well,” he says, “I’m relieved to
see that you’re not wearing a neck brace or showing any other signs of injury.”

“I’m in perfectly good health.”

“Have you had lunch yet?” he asks.

I’m debating how to answer. If this
is a quick check exchange, I can do some grocery shopping and get home to do my
usual Sunday afternoon cleaning. But then I hear my sister yelling at me when I
tell her that I avoided having lunch with Ryan. “No,” I finally reply, hoping I
didn’t hesitate too long.

He sort of squints at me, making me
believe there may have been an awkward pause before my response. But he
recovers quickly. “Let me buy you lunch then,” he offers.

“Oh no, you don’t have to do that.”

“It’s the least I can do after the
inconvenience I’ve caused you. Besides, I was planning on deducting it from the
amount I owe you anyway.”

“Oh?” I reply, raising an eyebrow.

He grins at me. His teeth shine
brightly against the shadow of a beard that darkens his face. “No, not really.”
He glances at the hostess when she approaches again. “Lunch, then?”

I nod and Ryan requests a table for
two. We’re led to one of the wooden booths by the window. As Ryan settles in
across from me he asks, “Have you been here before?”

I sit down and the wood bench is
cool against the summer-bare skin of my legs. “Yes, but it was years ago.”

“Well, if you like beer, I would
recommend the Titan Ale.”

“You come here often then?”

He shrugs. “I only live a few
blocks away, and the office is just down the street. We walk over here for lunch
meetings sometimes.”

“Beer-enhanced lunch meetings?”

He nods.

 “Are they very productive?”

“Probably more productive,” he
answers, laughing.

“You look much more rested today,”
I comment.

“Yeah, you definitely saw me at my
worst. I’d been working for seventy-two hours straight trying to solve a
problem for a customer. I finally solved it that day I ran into you.” He pauses
as he runs a hand across his rough cheek. “And I’m afraid,” he continues, “That
I was thinking about my bed and not about my driving, unfortunately for you.”

BOOK: Sometime Soon
11.48Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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