The 90 Day Rule (16 page)

There was no way I was seeing him. Not on his terms.

I wasn’t cheap and I wasn’t easy. I was a ’ho worth fifty large and it was time I started acting like it.

I reset the clock to twenty-nine days, just because it suited.

Take that, Coach Jack, I’m-coming-for-you, Ryan.

…I’m not waiting forever…

Neither am I, Jack, neither am I.

Chapter Thirteen: Score!

The test results were spread out on the counter. High to low, low being a C- and high being a C+, all passing grades.

My heart beat a pitty-pat with pride, the flush of pleasure making my ears tingle. The boys did the expected blow off and shrugging, but I could tell they were happy enough. In any case I planned on being thrilled for all of them.

I announced, “Stombolis and pizza’s on me tonight.” The bimonthly stipend, meager as it was, would do to cover a celebratory dinner and a few pitchers of beer.

Grant and Moses did a sniff test, both grimacing. We’d been going at it hot and heavy all afternoon, taking a well-deserved break from the 3Rs, despite the bitter wind and threat of snow.

Tray suggested we all grab showers and meet down at my place in a couple hours. That sounded good to me so I headed out, power-walking to keep my muscles from seizing in the cold.

The cell buzzed in my pocket, again. Probably for the fifteenth time that day. It wasn’t always Mr. Persistent, just maybe eighty percent of the time.  As luck would have it, I’d had legitimate excuses to avoid the requested visit. As he was my boss, I was bound by contract not to blow him off. Not and keep my teaching assistantship. Tonia’s checkbook might have a long reach, and I might be able to dodge bullets, but if the man had even a teeny vindictive bone in his body he could make it
very
awkward for everyone else around me. That included Coach Bryant and Chazz. Even my boys.

Of course, if that ever happened hell hath no fury like a woman done wrong.

But he’d had admin duties doing mega-dumps on his desk, with a suspected case of cheating, and the talking heads at Old Main and the entire athletic department went into damage control mode. Coach Bryant and I hung back, keeping a low profile. Fortunately it wasn’t one of mine. But it was a red shirt freshman with enough promise that the powers that be managed to overlook certain deficiencies.

Both Jack and Bryant had argued long and hard against putting up with the kid’s shenanigans, to no avail. I pondered the downside to my potential job description, student apologist, as I crossed Beaver Avenue and dove into the apartment building.

On the elevator ride to the third floor curiosity finally won out and I flipped the cell phone open to check the number.

Oh crap, it was Robert. Now what?

As I exited the elevator, I immediately hit redial and he picked up on the second ring.

I apologized immediately, old habits dying hard, “I’m sorry, Robert, I’m just now getting out of class.” Since I was still out of breath, my gasps clearly audible in the speaker, he’d have no reason to doubt me. Besides, it was sort of, mostly true.

Silence.

“Um, what can I do for you?” Still nothing. I checked to see if the connection had been dropped. “Robert, is everything all right?” Now I was worried.

He came back on, or woke up, whatever the term was and mumbled something about having fires to put out. The dinner was cancelled. I didn’t need to come up, in fact my presence was no longer required at the functions, everything was fine, say hi to Loretta, bye.

I stared at dead air space and mouthed,
what in the world was that
?

Loretta was sprawled on her bed, studying. I yelled, “Yo,” to let her know it wasn’t a perv breaking in, then dove into the bathroom for a quick rinse off and some moisturizing to my seriously flaked alligator skin.

When I came out of the bathroom, she was in the kitchen, puttering.

“Did you talk to your father today?”

“Nope. Why?”

“Um, he just called and cancelled for this weekend.”

“Uh-huh.” She didn’t seem terribly concerned. That said not-in-the loop.

“The thing is … he announced that he no longer needs me at any functions.”

That got her attention. She was well aware of the conditions of my enslavement.

“Did you talk to Grams?’

A grimace and violent headshake was my answer to that
not-in-this-lifetime
opportunity.

“Let me see what’s up.” She hit speed dial and I hovered, pretending not to care.

The thing was … if there was a problem—and the odds were very good it had something to do with the election—then it was a problem for
me
. The last thing I needed was an excuse for him to point a finger at me for not upholding my end of the deal. It wasn’t the winning that mattered, because win-lose-or-draw my only commitment had been to making a good faith effort. The rest was up to a fickle electorate in a conservative republican state. Robert represented solid rural Pennsylvania values, a man of the people, a defender of the faith, a champion of legal principles. The only way he was going to lose was…

Uh-oh.

Etty said, “She wants to talk to you,” and held out the phone.

I stared at it, mesmerized. It might as well have been a cobra poised to strike. I muttered, “Put it on speaker phone?” but Etty shook her head and waggled the device.

Weak-kneed, I asked, “Tonia? Do you know…?”

Loretta pulled out the fixings for Bloody Marys, mostly because Chazz had bought the mix on his last foray at the grocery store, somehow mistaking it for tomato juice.  The recipe called for two-to-one mix-to-vodka, sans celery stick. While Tonia spoke in modulated tones, her voice tight and controlled, I tapped an index finger twice on my cheek in a one-to-one semaphore.

Ice chinking into tumblers formed white noise as Tonia finished up the info dump. I glanced at Etty who avoided my eyes, clearly not pleased with the events unfolding like a dam bursting.

“Okay, thanks, I understand. I’ll call you tomorrow and we can look at options.” She hung up and I said bye to thin air.

My daughter handed the glass over and we tipped them in mock salute. I felt violated all over again. Not so much for myself but for Loretta. Here was proof positive that her father was an unrepentant lecher.

Etty asked, “Is it the one from that dinner the other week?”

“Yeah, her. He claims it’s true love. She’s moving in with him.”

I sipped the spicy drink, not sure I wanted to get wasted. I was already numb. For twenty-two years, I hadn’t counted enough to even be a blip on his radar. His career, his needs had always come first. Not even first! They were the
only
things that mattered. I was furniture, maybe less, because I wasn’t functional in his world.

It’s hard enough to deal with a man falling out of love with you. It was a punch in the gut to know he probably never loved me. Never enough to give up an election. Never enough to retire to private life, to rejoin the law firm. Never enough to fight for me.

“It’s not all bad, you know.” Loretta should have been having a hissy fit but instead she looked at me with concern and understanding.

“How so?” I really wasn’t seeing the bright side.

“He’ll want to file for divorce and you have him by the short hairs. If he wants that bimbette so badly it puts
you
in the driver seat.”

I didn’t want to be in the driver seat. What I wanted I couldn’t, shouldn’t have. And there was no way I’d engage in fisticuffs over place settings and silver candlesticks. I’d do what Tonia demanded. File, do it fast, get out and the fifty large was mine, no strings attached.

In truth, I wasn’t sure I wanted it. But I would take it because that money would make for an investment in a young man’s future, a young man who would do right by my girl.

I knew that for a fact because I’d helped him pick out the ring on Wednesday. He wouldn’t tell me when he’d pop the question because … well, keeping secrets wasn’t exactly my strong suit.

“Oh, nuts. What time is it?”

“Seven, why?”

“We’re about to get invaded. Me and the boys are going out to celebrate them not flunking out.”

Etty gave me a thousand megawatt smile. “Well, then, you’ll have something extra to party over.” She held up her glass. “To freedom!”

“To freedom.”

Sort of. Maybe.

I didn’t feel free. Just deflated. Useless and used up. And even resetting the countdown clock still left me with ninety days of stutter steps and negotiations and the minutiae of dissolving a family unit. It didn’t matter that it existed only in my thick skull. It was going to be a long painful bucket list of coulda, woulda, shoulda.

That was my reality and no senseless ditty would make that transition any easier.

The boys showed up only fifteen minutes late. Etty let them in while I rearranged my attitude. There was no reason to spoil our evening just because my life was in the toilet. So the makeup came out—a swipe of mascara, gloss and a pinch of apricot blush—followed by jeans and a tan wool sweater, warm socks and L.L. Bean slides.

Tray gave me a nod of approval and a wink, the other two were hitting on Etty who fielded their sly innuendos with ease.

“Come on, guys. If we don’t hurry there won’t be any tables.”

Friday night was a zoo. Fortunately this wasn’t a football weekend so we did have an ice cube’s chance … but not if we tarried. The hard core would have left for Indiana for the game on Saturday. Across the street the frat houses were gearing up for rowdy, though it was just a prelim for the next night when the festivities would get down and spill into the street.

Moses and Tray flanked me, each of them grabbing a hand. Six-eleven to my left, six-five to my right, six-three behind me. Now I knew what a Munchkin in the Land of Oz felt like.

And if they picked me up and swung me, I was so going to…

Tray laughed out loud.  “Forget it. You ain’t that light, girl.”

Grant was the one who muscled us to a table for two, then performed some feat of magic to make it large enough for male athletes of the jumbo variety. Tray placed the order for four large with everything, no fish and Moses debated the merits of Sam Adams Winter Lager versus Heineken with what looked like half the soccer team parked next to us. The pizzas were appetizers. We’d do the Italian and cheesesteak strombolis next.

The soccer squad had gone with deep fried mozzarella sticks to take the edge off. They handed the plate over for us to share. Pitchers, glasses appeared, then the pizzas. Tray draped an arm over my shoulder and squeezed. With all the raucous noise I couldn’t really catch what he said. It sounded like, “You’re okay.”

It was such a gentle expression of friendship that I nearly burst into tears. I excused myself and headed for the ladies room, mostly just to grab a handful of toilet paper in case my hormones suffered a case of the weepies.

There was no logical order to the tables and chairs. I wound my way through the maze and had almost reached the entrance to the bathrooms when I caught a familiar figure out of the corner of my eye.

Jack. Jack Ryan. In an eye lock with an attractive blonde, late-forties, maybe less. Dressed in business casual that doubled for date night. He leaned in, intent on whatever she was saying with blood red lips, the full bottom lip so luscious even
I
wanted to kiss her.

He had her hand. Stroking it. With his thumb. Slowly.

My heart stopped and all the air vacated my lungs leaving me in the throes of a panic attack. Stumbling backwards, I managed to find the ladies room and dove in. Three stalls, all empty. I had my choice for incarceration. I picked the last one, the one furthest from the man I thought I might have fallen in love with.

The man who said he’d come for me.

The man who said he wouldn’t wait…

When I finally got the courage to face … him, I dabbed at eyes swollen with tears and prayed I could slip past without being noticed. The last thing I needed was a confrontation. The last thing I needed was to be ignored.

As luck would have it, he and the blonde were gone.

In my absence more tables had gone into lockstep, forming two long lines down the center of the restaurant. Grant and Moses had scored with a couple of cheerleaders who I recognized from them using our courts for their practices. Tray had one of the Lady Lion forwards expressing intense interest in whatever he was drawing on a napkin. I slipped him a wad of cash and made my excuses.

Before I got out the door, Moses intercepted me.

“We’re getting up some games tomorrow afternoon. Wanna join us?” He cast a thumb back in the direction of the tables. “Couple of the ladies challenged us to a smackdown.”

“What time?” This I had to see.

“Two.”

“You’re on.”

“Be there or be square.” Moses strutted off, missile-seeking the pompoms.