Speechless (4 page)

“All right, I will. So when’s your flight?”

“Seven a.m. I’ve already said goodbye to Gavin and—”

“Libby, I’ve been looking for you everywhere!” Margo strikes again. “The Minister needs her handbag.”

“She just freshened!”

“There are photographers everywhere. You’re here to work, remember.”

“Listen, Rox—”

“Never mind, go. And don’t talk back to Margo!”

I emerge from the ladies’ room in the Minister’s wake, reeking of her perfume and in some discomfort because I couldn’t use the toilet myself. There was nowhere I could safely put the Minister’s purse and the flowers—plural now, since two additional bouquets have arrived. The Minister, holding me by the wrist to ensure I don’t disappear, approaches a tall, attractive man and trills, “Why, Tim, how nice to see you!”

“Minister Cleary, the pleasure is all mine!”

I am about to gag when I realize it’s Tim Kennedy, the garter-catcher from Emma’s wedding. He recognizes me immediately and says, “Well, hi there! How’s the forehead?”

The Minister looks momentarily displeased, then slaps on a wide smile for a passing photographer. The smile disappears as quickly as the photographer, and the Minister turns her attention back to Tim. “Oh, so you already know…” she struggles for my name “… Lily?”

“Uh, yes,” Tim says, confused. “We met recently at a wedding.”

“Isn’t that lovely. So tell me, Tim, how is your work going?”

The Minister releases my wrist and steps directly in front of me. This would be a more effective blocking strategy if she were a foot-and-a-half taller, but I take the hint and escape into the crowd.

“Oh, Lily! Lily!” It’s Tim calling me in a singsong voice.

“Shut up.”

“Now, Lily, is that any way to greet an old friend?”

“You’re not funny, old friend.”

“You’re just grouchy because you’ve caught yourself another bouquet.”

“Make that three.”

He’s grinning and I can’t help smiling myself. “So, what’s the deal?” he says. “I asked Clarice whether you are working with her and she said, ‘I believe so.’”

“Well, it’s only been a month, she’ll figure it out.”

“I thought you were writing a book?”

“Uh—yeah.” So he did take me seriously. Well, now is not the time to enlighten him. “That’s right, but I couldn’t turn down this excellent opportunity to—”

“—carry the Minister’s flowers.”

“
And
her purse. The job isn’t as easy as it looks.”

“Knowing Clarice, it wouldn’t be.”

“Actually, I’m supposed to be writing sp—”

“Libby!”

“Oh, hi, Margo. This is Tim Kennedy.”

“We’ve met. So sorry to interrupt, Tim, but the Minister needs Libby urgently.”

I sigh, excuse myself and head to the washroom.

Margo actually offers me cab fare home, but only because she wants me to stop at a retirement home and donate the three bouquets. It’s almost 1:00 a.m. and I suspect the seniors won’t welcome my arrival. Besides, now I really need to pee. So, in my first act of outright defiance, I flout Margo’s orders and take all three bouquets home with me. She’s got me so spooked, however, that I examine them for tracking devices. If she asks where I left them, I’ll tell her I couldn’t read the sign on the senior’s home in the dark.

I load the flowers into juice pitchers and I distribute them around my tiny apartment. The funereal quality suits my mood.

I already have a “sneak” voice mail from Rox when I get up. She was at the airport before dawn and was the first to see the photo of the Minister and me on the front page of the
Toronto Star.

“My dress looks
great
on you,” she says, “but lose the flowers, okay? You’ve got enough trouble with wedding bouquets.”

On my way to work, I stop at my local café to find Jeff, the owner, has pasted the photo above his espresso machine. The Minister is smiling broadly and looks stunning in her beautiful blue gown. I am standing beside her, arms full of flowers and handbags. Thank God one of the bouquets strategically blocks the tightest part of the dress. But wait—there’s a man’s face in profile in the upper right corner of the photo. It’s Tim and he’s smirking. At least it looks like a smirk to me.

I field calls from fans all day. Emma gets through first: “What was Tim doing there?”

“You tell me.”

“Well, he’s a music teacher at the Toronto School for the Performing Arts, but he’s also involved in all kinds of youth causes. This must have been one of his things.”

“Well, he’s annoying and I hope I’ve seen the last of him. Is he still with his girlfriend?”

“Yeah, and last I heard she got some hotshot job with the Vancouver school board. She’s a child psychologist.”

“Not that I care.”

“Of course not.”

“It’s just that I looked like a fool carrying those flowers and the Minister’s purse.”

“He probably thought the designer purse was yours.”

That I doubt, but I feel cheered just the same.

I
n the realm of romance, I peaked at age nineteen. That’s when Scott, the perfect boyfriend, moved to Halifax to attend Dalhousie University. We’d been together for two years, nine months, five days and seven hours. Scott was a ringer for Jason Priestley from
Beverly Hills 90210.
He was also very kind. His pals teased him about my height constantly, and he never let on it bothered him. I only figured it out when I overheard him claiming he was five-nine, when he was really five-six. As a gesture of support, I began claiming that I was five-eleven, although I hit six-two in Grade 10. Despite this agreeable fiction, however, Scott had to stand on the bottom stair of my parents’ front porch to kiss me good-night.

We vowed to stay together while half a country apart. He called every Sunday without fail, but at Christmas he went to Hawaii with his parents and on reading week he went to Fort Lauderdale with his pals. I didn’t realize I’d been dumped until he passed through Toronto en route to the west coast for a summer of tree planting. Roxanne and I bumped into him at a local bar, where he was hovering over his new girlfriend, Kelly, who like her
90210
counterpart, was blond, beautiful and petite.
While Rox distracted Kelly, I asked Scott, “Did it occur to you to mention we broke up?”

“Lib, we haven’t seen each other in almost a year (eight months, 18 days). I thought you
knew.
”

So the bastard wasn’t perfect. Kelly, poor thing, didn’t survive the summer, having been supplanted by the even smaller Marta, a Granola Girl who stunk of patchouli oil and didn’t shave her legs. After that came a succession of girlfriends that diminished in size to the point where the guests at his wedding needed a microscope to find the bride.

Elliot says I “lost courage” after Scott, but I think I was damned brave to go out with the number of men I dated during my twenties. Finally, I met Bruce and it seemed as though I may have found it—
it
being, in Elliot’s view, Scott all over again, but without the good looks. Not that Elliot is really in any position to criticize: his longest relationship lasted six months. Coincidentally, it, too, was with someone who strongly resembled Jason Priestley. Or so he tells me.

When I arrive at the Manhole, Elliot’s favorite bar, he’s holding court at his usual table, which happens to afford an excellent view of both the bar and the door to the men’s room. A waiter is sitting across from him. At first it looks like they’re holding hands, but then I realize Elliot is reading the guy’s palm. Not that I’d have been surprised: Elliot’s charm is legendary and he’s particularly dashing this evening.

“The positive energy is rolling off you in waves!” Elliot greets me with a delighted squeal, sending the waiter scurrying off to get me a beer. “And you look
hot,
too,” he adds, leaning over to kiss my cheek. “Scorching! Too bad it’s totally wasted in my domain.”

“Not at all,” I say, smiling. “I’ve been hit on here before.”

“That’s nothing to brag about, doll,” he says, but he’s laughing, because he enjoys it more than anyone when I’m mistaken for a drag queen.

“Buy me a martini?” Elliot asks. It’s his way of telling me he’s
picking up psychic signals about me and is willing to share them—for a price.

“Do I want to know?” Elliot is not the type of psychic to spare one bad news.

“I’d say so, Flower Girl, but enter at your own risk.”

Elliot’s presence in my life is entirely Lola’s fault. I would never have consulted a psychic myself, but she took to him during a fact-checking phone call five years ago. They clicked over their mutual interest in great food, exotic smokes, and getting laid (not by each other, clearly). Elliot has ranked first in
Toronto Lives
“best of” edition as
the
psychic to see for the past four years—the one “most likely to make you feel great about yourself.”

At first I paid fifty dollars a session and cringed over his carnival-barker–style delivery. Now he gives me the ten-dollar “family” rate if I meet him at a boy bar and buy him a drink. I’ve grown to find his performances hilarious. Although he never makes me feel great about myself, he’s frequently dead-on with his predictions. For example, Elliot said that Bruce and I wouldn’t last two years; we survived only twenty months. Mind you, anyone who saw Bruce and me together might have predicted that. My brother, for example, said, “Pay me five bucks and I’ll predict your future with ‘Bwuce.’”

“Tell me all about the Minister, first,” Elliot says. “Has she mentioned me yet?”

His crush on Clarice Cleary predates my employment. She’s all about appearances and he respects that. Besides, Elliot is an artist as well as a psychic and has been the grateful recipient of several Ministry arts grants.

“She hasn’t even acknowledged
I
exist yet, but I do have some news.” He leans forward with unexpected focus, given the constant parade of handsome men past our table. “She’s been shopping—two Armani suits and an Ungaro ball gown this week alone.”

“Jewelry?” Elliot is practically drooling.

“Not this time, but last week she picked up a stunning tennis bracelet and two new Kate Spade handbags.”

“And you didn’t call me?”

“I wasn’t speaking to you.”

“Oh right, you were still in a snit. Look, it’s not my fault if the universe sends me messages you don’t like. I am merely a medium.”

“Yeah, but would it kill you to keep your mouth shut if you know I won’t like the message?”

“It would.” Elliot is smiling over my left shoulder and I don’t have to be a psychic myself to sense that fresh prey looms on the horizon. “Oh my, the man of tonight’s dreams,” he says, already out of his chair and gliding toward the men’s room.

I have a moment of worry that he’ll be too distracted to give me the good news he’s coaxed out of the cosmos about me, but he’s back presently, with a beautiful, bashful youth in tow.

“Libby, this is Zachary,” he says, “never
Zack.
” It takes another hour and a second martini before I can get him to focus on the reading. “Okay, Libby, if we must talk about you, fine. I intuited something remarkable about you today, which intensified as you walked through the door. Something different from anything I’ve picked up in months…years, even. In fact, since I’ve known you. Zachary, you would not believe Libby’s luck with men.” Zachary smiles in silent sympathy.

“Elliot, get to the point.”

“Don’t interrupt the energy flow.” Which means he wants to put on a show for Zack. “It’s been a long time since Libby’s had sex, if you must know, Zachary.”

“
Must
he know, Elliot?”

“He must.” Elliot’s hand is now resting on Zack’s forearm. “How else will he appreciate the significance of this news? Be
cause, Libby, honey—(pause for dramatic effect)
you are going to get laid.
”

I’m silent for a moment, then,
“Really?”

“Don’t sound so surprised. It has happened before—just not in recent memory.” Zack is giggling and gazing admiringly at Elliot. “But what’s truly amazing, is that it’s going to happen more than once. And with different people.”

I’m staring in stunned disbelief.

“I absolutely feel this in my bones,” Elliot continues, voice rising. “You will have several opportunities in the coming months, some of them quite
unorthodox.
And for a change, I actually see you taking them.”

“Can you sense anything about the men?”

“Who said anything about
men?
” Elliot says, laughing, but then his brow furrows. “I also sense conflict, and on many fronts.”

“What else is new?” I shrug, undaunted. This news was worth a dozen martinis.

Zachary excuses himself and I taunt Elliot about his penchant for youth. “You’re a cougar,” I tell him.

“And you’re jealous,” he responds.

“I don’t know how you do it,” I sigh. “You were gone less than five minutes and returned with Zachary clinging to your arm. What am I doing wrong?”

“I told you, it’s the sign. Take it off.”

“Don’t start with me.”

“Okay, leave the ‘I’m available,’ and strike a line through the ‘Fuck off.’”

“And we’ve been getting along so well…”

“Actually, you need to get along home.”

“Fine,”
I say, becoming huffy in an instant.

“I just want to woo Zachary. You know I’d do the same for you.”

He would, too, but it’s never been necessary. I slip my coat over my raised hackles, reach for my purse and grudgingly kiss
Elliot goodbye. On the way home, I stop at the drugstore and fill my prescription for the pill. Best be prepared for all that sex.

I hear my admirer long before I see him. That’s because he is singing—and quite loudly—in the dreary halls of the Pink Palace. Not the worst item in the catalog of male flaws, but it’s unusual, even by government standards. Every day for two weeks, he’s warbled up the long hall to my cubicle, stopped abruptly, then started again ten feet past me. Since male birds sing to attract a mate, I put two and two together.

No doubt sensing I’d prefer to remain anonymous, Margo hastens to introduce me to my songbird, Joe Connolly, an analyst with the Ministry’s policy branch. After a few days of dropping by with policy papers and arias, he gets the nerve to leave me a note inviting me for a drink. Elliot’s predictions in mind, I pick up the phone. Joe might be a weird opera lover, but he’s the only canary chirping by my cubicle; I can’t afford to send him down the coal mine just yet.

We meet at a pub up the street and I am pleased to find, on closer inspection, that Joe is actually cute in a nerdy sort of way. Unfortunately, it becomes clear with the first pint that we have very little in common. The man loves a debate, and the more heated, the better. I, on the other hand, loathe debating because I exhaust the full extent of my knowledge on any issue within five minutes. Besides, I have a tendency to cry during a heated discussion, which rather undermines me in an argument, even of the recreational variety. When his efforts to engage me on political issues fall flat, he takes another tack.

“So, how do you feel about marriage?”

I inhale a lungful of beer but this doesn’t deter Joe from interrogating me about my wifely qualities. By the time the second pint arrives, I tell him I’m uncomfortable, so he switches to the abstract, as in, “Is a good marriage possible in these difficult times?”

There isn’t a third pint.

I can tell from the expression on Margo’s smug, slappable face that she has something on me and mentally scroll through my sins.

“I saw you with Joe Connolly last night,” she blurts.

Who knew she ever left the building? No matter when I shut down at night, she’s still at her desk, and she beats me in every morning. I’ve assumed she just hangs herself up in the corner like a bat and catches an hour’s sleep at dawn.

“And?”

“And it’s inappropriate to date colleagues.”

“
Dating
isn’t the word, Margo.”

“Well, you were talking about marriage when I walked by, so you can see how I got that impression.”

“We’re not dating.”

“Maybe he thinks so. He came by this morning singing.”

“He’s always singing.”

“It was something from Andrea Bocelli’s
Romanza
and he was carrying a rose.”

“A rose? (gulp) It was probably for the Minister.”

“Not likely (witheringly). He left with it when he saw me.”

“Look, Margo, there’s no rule saying I can’t have a drink with a colleague after work.”

“No, but in this office, we’re governed by special considerations. You’re not in the bureaucracy anymore, Elizabeth. We must avoid the perception of
preference
among the staff. I am sure that Father Connolly understands the nature of your position, but—”

“Father Connolly?”

“He didn’t mention the seminary?” I am speechless. “Well, he may not be a full-fledged priest,” she qualifies, “but he left the seminary just last month. You can see why it would be awkward for us if you got involved. There would be
talk,
and the Minister can’t afford talk. Protocol is everything in our business.”

She smiles and her perfect teeth look like fangs. Then, as I
stand to leave, I notice that Margo appears to have doubled in size: I am diminished. Nonetheless, when my minstrel later appears (without the rose, which probably died in Margo’s presence), I propose dinner. I’m determined to see him again simply to defy Margo. Besides, I’m intrigued by the seminary thing.

At a restaurant far out of reach of the Minister’s Office, I try to bring the discussion around to the priesthood, but he evades my clumsy efforts. I can’t come right out and ask; it just seems so personal. Too bad I’m not more like Margo, who has no trouble shoving her nose in where it doesn’t belong. For example, when I walk into the office the next morning, she casually throws out, “And how was your dinner with Father Connolly last night?”

Unbelievable. She must be consulting with Elliot, too. “Oh, lovely, thanks.”

“Good!”
she replies. Full-fang smile.

Around noon, I hear strains of “Con Te Partiro” in the hall and quail. What’s the point, when I don’t feel any sparks? This must be another of my romantic dead ends. But somehow, when Joe invites me to meet him at his new condo before catching a movie, I find myself agreeing. In the end, it’s the sight of his single bed that emboldens me. It says so much about his hopes for a wild new life outside the monastery walls.

“What’s this I hear about the priesthood?” I ask, standing before a crucifix on the otherwise bare walls.

Joe explains he left the seminary following a “year of grave doubt.” The door is always open for his return, he says, and he’s not sure what the future holds. I’m quite sure of what it holds for us as a couple, so when he walks me to the subway and leans up to kiss me, I present my cheek. Surely he will get the message?

I arrive at the office to find a voice mail from Joe asking me out again. He’s humming as he hangs up. There is nothing for it but to call Elliot.