Do or Di (2 page)

Colin and I gave each other brief nods as I pulled on my headphones. He was wearing another one of his cashmere sweater and wool pants combos. He likes to dress like he’s channeling Clark Gable. He’s got the whole dark, smarmy Rhett Butler look going on or maybe a low-rent George Clooney knock-off.

“You know the format?” Colin asked. “We typically discuss an issue, sort of banter back and forth, and then take some calls.”

“I think I can handle it.” Colin passed me the story off the newswire he planned to discuss that morning. It was about a wife who killed her husband with a claw hammer for failing to buy toilet paper. Sure, it was an extreme reaction, but I could somewhat understand where she was coming from. There are only so many times a woman can reach for a new roll, only to find out her deadbeat husband has once again let her down, leaving her to pat dry using the cardboard tube. Eventually she’s going to snap. Avita counted us down and then the live light winked red on the control board.

“Good afternoon and welcome to the Male Men. We’re shaking it up today, doing something a bit different; we’re calling it He Said, She Said. You are with me, Colin Stewart, and my esteemed colleague for the day”—he paused to read my name off the card Avita slipped him—“Erin Callighan, and we’ve got quite the story for you.” He launched right into the gory details of the murder.

Not surprisingly, we saw the issue from different perspectives. He thought the woman as crackers; I sympathized with her as a fed up housewife, although the claw hammer might have been going a bit far. Anyone who has blotted off with a tube would understand. We debated back and forth and responded to the callers.

All too soon as far as I was concerned, Avita’s voice cut into the air.

“You’ve been listening to He Said, She Said on KYTZ, the voice of Seattle. We’ll be right back after this break with weather and sports ” She slid the fade bar, starting a commercial. “And we’re out. Nice show today, you two. The callboard’s lit up like a Christmas tree. I’ve never seen it this busy.”

“Not too bad,” Colin said, sliding his headphones off his head and taking a drink from his water bottle.

“Not bad? I listen to this show and this was awesome.” I let myself take my first deep breath in hours. It had gone well. I’d been quick with responses, but had managed to avoid cursing out either Colin, or any of the chauvinistic pigs who called in.

Avita came in and gave me a hug. “I knew you’d be great.”

I smiled. “Thanks so much for telling Wayne to give me this chance.”

She waved off my comment. “The chance was no big deal, what mattered is what you did with it. You rocked the show. You were a natural.”

I flushed. Now that the show was over I could feel adrenaline rushing through my system. “I was nervous at first, but then I could feel myself get into the groove and everything just flowed.”

Colin cleared his throat. “You know, last time I checked you didn’t do the show alone.”

I rolled my eyes.

“All I’m saying is that give a guy some credit, when it’s due.” He raised a finger before I could say anything. “Don’t get me wrong. For your first time you were pretty good.”

I felt my eyebrow rise. For the first time? Could he be more condescending? He practically patted me on the head. “Wow. Thanks for that lavish praise,” I said in a flat voice.

“Colin, be nice,” Avita admonished him.

He touched his chest. “Me? I’m the very definition of nice. I said she did well, that’s nice.”

I snorted. Avita punched him lightly in the arm. “You’re a good guy, even if you don’t want anyone to know it.” She turned to me. “He heard about how I had to do the numbers and would miss Darsh’s party, so he volunteered to do it tonight for me.”

I felt like pointing out they were numbers for his show, it wasn’t like he was feeding orphans or anything.

Wayne burst into the studio making all of us jump. “You guys knocked it out of the park! Call volume was four times the average.” Wayne looked as happy as a kid who had just been told he had a lifetime pass to Disney. He held his hand out to me. “Looks like you’ve found yourself the on-air opportunity you wanted. I’ve already talked to your supervisor, from today forward you’re out of sales and officially part of our on-air talent team.”

Colin looked as appalled as I felt. I wanted to be on-air, but not this show. “While I appreciate the opportunity, I don’t want to step on any toes,” I said.

“Whose toes? Kevin is in rehab for at least sixty days.” Wayne threw his arms around the both of us. “I was hoping for a quick fix, but it looks like I found Seattle’s best new couple.”

This is why I hate dressing up. I fidgeted to try and stop my pantyhose from dropping any lower without anyone else in the ballroom noticing. One of the benefits of working in radio is that you aren’t supposed to have to worry about how you look; what they don’t tell you is that you’re expected to show up at all sorts of fundraising events sponsored by the station. It’s like overtime without the extra pay plus bad hotel buffet food. KYTZ is one of the sponsors for Positive Partnerships, a program that matches at-risk kids with a mentor in the community. The theory is that by having at least one positive relationship, the kids will avoid growing up to steal cars or mug the elderly. Tonight was the new mentor kick off event. And here I was, twisting in my pantyhose.

Wayne sent out an e-mail encouraging staff to volunteer. It sounded as if the program was desperate for new mentors. I could see no reason why Wayne would think the misfits who work at the station would make good role models. My finger had hovered over the delete key, but it occurred to me this might be just the thing I needed. I’d been doing the show with Colin for a couple of weeks and it was going well, but if I really wanted to convince Wayne I was worth my own show, volunteering for his pet project couldn’t hurt. Besides, I could use the karma points.

I liked the idea of doing something nice, giving back to the community. In general, I like to think of myself as a good person. I remember my friends’ birthdays, give change to the Salvation Army kettle brigade, never kick puppies, and avoid littering. I’ve even gotten more serious about recycling. Lately I’d felt the need to go a bit above and beyond, and blood donation always makes me pass out so that wasn’t an option. A mentorship sounded perfect. I had a mental image of a slightly scruffy, wide-eyed little girl. She would initially be shy and unsure, but would be won over by my charm and straight talk. She would be like the kid sister I always wanted. I would teach her about post-feminist perspectives and that life is more than makeup and having a man. We would spend after-school hours at the mall bookstore or discovering vintage finds at the thrift store.

On the weekends, she would come by my apartment and we would have bowls of popcorn while watching movies. She would tell me everything and I would offer sage advice about worrying less about boys and focusing on what she could control, like her career. When she would later go on to achieve something great, say a Nobel Peace Prize or an Oscar, her speech would be an homage to me and how I turned her life around. The camera would then pan over to me, sitting stylishly in the audience, a few proud tears on my face.

So imagine my disappointment with how things were turning out now that I was at the mentorship kick-off event. There was a distinct lack of kids who met my ideal. There was a group of surly teenagers who were lurking by the door muttering snarky insults about whomever walked in or out. I didn’t want to mentor any of them; I wanted to have them arrested.

I snagged Colin when he came close to the buffet. “Do you know where the organizer of this thing is?”

He gave a non-committal shrug and went back to feasting off the buffet as if we were facing a worldwide cracker and melon ball shortage.

I tapped my foot while I watched him graze. “The food is supposed to be for the poor kids,” I pointed out.

“Give me a break, Erin. I didn’t get lunch. It wouldn’t hurt you to eat a cracker or two. Your low blood sugar level might explain your mood.” He looked me up and down. “Did you ever wonder if your growth was stunted from a poor diet? Did your parents provide you with enough protein?”

This was a cheap shot directed at my height, or lack thereof. I prefer the term petite, but the ugly truth is I’m short. I suffer from little-sister syndrome. I remind everyone of their cute little sister. No matter how I cut my hair or how much product I add, it just hangs there, flat and blond. I look like Alice in Wonderland after she ate the cookie that made her small.

“Which one is yours?” I motioned over to the group of kids lurking at the dessert table with a toss of my hair, trying to stand a bit straighter. With my luck, I was going to be confused with one of the kids.

“The little guy on the end. The one with his hand jammed in his pants.” Colin pointed out a boy around six years old who looked like he’d walked out of a casting call for a Dickensian orphanage: big eyes, floppy hair, and a sweater fraying at the sleeves. If he could cure himself of the pocket pool he would be a charmer.

“See, that’s exactly what I’m talking about. I want a do-over.”

“You don’t like your match?”

“I haven’t met her yet, but look at the information sheet.” I held out the folder they had given the mentors, background information on their match, and a tip sheet on how to bond. “She’s fourteen. I didn’t bargain on a teenager, I was thinking it would be a kid.”

“So? What’s the problem?”

“Teenage girls scare me. They travel in packs like jackals. It says she has to be in the program because of her lousy attendance at school. How much do you want to bet she has her tongue pierced? That clacking sound it makes when it smacks their teeth freaks me out.”

“Maybe she’s nice.”

“Trust me, I was a teenage girl. It isn’t in their nature to be nice.”

“Ms. Callighan?” The organizer appeared at my side. “I understand you were looking for me and that there’s a problem.”

“Not a problem really, more of a small favor. Can I trade my kid in and pick another?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“I was assigned to mentor a teenager, but I think I would do a lot better with a younger girl.”

“We don’t have a returns counter for human beings, Ms. Callighan. How do you think the girl is going to feel when she hears that you don’t want to be her mentor without even meeting her? These children have already dealt with a lot of rejection and failure. Why don’t you meet her before you make any decision?”

Colin stood at her side, nodding wisely, as if he understood child development. I stared down at my shoes and wondered how I managed to screw up and do the wrong thing even while trying to do the right thing. The organizer looked around the room.

“There she is now. Diane? Come over here and meet your mentor.”

I looked up to see a tall, willowy girl weave her way through the crowd. Some
little
sister, she was already taller than me. So much for my mental picture of black leather and metal bits sticking out of her here and there. She was wearing jeans and a blue sweater. Her blond hair was cut short and shoved behind her ears. For a kid who was supposed to be at risk she looked remarkably together. The only sign of problems were her fingernails, which were chewed down to bloody, ragged ends. She bit on her lower lip and looked at me through her eyelashes. Of course she had to look down; she was a giant. She had to be close to six feet tall.

“I’ll leave you two to get to know each other.” The organizer took Colin’s elbow and led him away from the buffet, leaving the two of us alone. We stood staring silently at each other for a minute.

“So…Diana, how do you like school?” As soon as the words were out of my mouth I felt like crawling under the table. That was the lamest question I could have asked. I sounded like someone’s Great Aunt Edith. Next I would be telling her how when I was in school, candy cost a penny and we had to walk uphill both ways, through the snow.