Welcome to Envy Park (11 page)

"You can’t live with your cousin
for a few months?"

"It’s a one-bedroom. It’s the same
one you have. There won’t be any privacy. I don’t want to share it
with a teenager."

"If you want privacy, you go to
the guy’s place. It’s why he has it."

I coughed, taken aback. "Where did
that come from? Maybe I just don’t want to share a bathroom and
refrigerator space anymore, after doing that for five
years."

He shrugged.

Now this I couldn’t just pretend
to tune out. "But is it about the sex then? Is NV Park your
bachelor sex pad now that you’ve dumped your clingy
girlfriend?"

"That’s not what I
meant."

"Oh don’t worry. You’re talking to
me, not a sheltered schoolgirl. I am fully aware of what guys want
to do when they move into a place like this. It’s okay to admit
it."

George flashback:
What do you think happens when we’re not
together, Moira?

I’m sure it’s the exact same thing that happens when
we are. I don’t need the details.

Now
my
appetite was ruined. It was one
thing to be accused of only wanting privacy to fool around with
somebody, and another thing to have been kissed but not invited to
the bachelor sex pad. Only one of those could be true, and yet I
was offended in theory both ways regardless.

How annoying. And pathetic.

"I don’t even talk to anybody else
here," Ethan was saying. "You have more options."

"
Options
? How polite. Because I’m
friendlier? Because I talk to people and let them talk to
me?"

"
I
don’t feel the need to get to know every single
person in this building."

"I’m not going out of my way to
find them. You asked me if my cousin was hot!"

"It was a joke. Fine, obviously
not a good one."

"You see me at lunch with another
person and you think I’m making
options
. But yes I am aware how it
works, Ethan, if I wanted to get laid. It usually doesn’t require
this much talking."

A muscle twitched near Ethan’s
jaw. "You’re confusing me with somebody who treated you like shit.
I’m sorry I brought it up."

"I don’t know. Maybe Rin and I
should be having drinks about this, she’ll probably have a
different opinion."

Oh god. I knew that it was going to set him off, but
I said it anyway. His face and eyes registered what looked to me
was his version of exactly what I was feeling, an anger that had to
be pushed under the surface and held down.

He motioned for the check. "I’ve
told you before, even if it’s none of anyone’s business," he said,
tense, as he fumbled for his wallet and picked out hundreds, "That
mess was my fault, I admit it, but only because I didn’t have the
guts to end it early. She’s great but I never felt that I wanted
her. I stayed for as long as I did because I thought that was the
best that it was ever going to get. Then this transfer, and yes, it
was the perfect time to tell her that she didn’t have to spend the
rest of her life with me. If that reminds you of other dicks you’ve
met then I guess I am one, but I remained faithful the entire time
and all of you can choose to believe it or not, I don’t
care."

Despite the hours of conversation and our mouths
getting well enough acquainted, I still thought of Ethan as someone
I barely knew. Until this, which reminded me of the treatment the
people who barely knew him actually got.

"Look," I said, remembering what
this dinner was about. "I’m grateful that you’re helping me out
here. I do need a job. Can’t we just—can’t we go back to just
talking about stupid random things again?"

"Whatever you want," he said, but
his tone conveyed the exact opposite. "You know where to find
me."

Chapter 14

Was it my face? A sign over my head (apart from the
Project Your Crap Upon Me) that advertised services I wasn’t aware
of? Why did people think of me when this kind of thing
happened?

I woke up early the next day, for once, to prepare
myself mentally for my interview. I knew I needed more time to do
that because of last night, and I already spent my hours of sleep
just running the conversation in my head over and over.

It was my fault. I knew this. I
was a friendly person but didn’t delve too deep into the lives of
new friends, for precisely the reason that could have prevented
last night’s weirdness: People judged. They said one thing but
thought another. And unless you were there for years of their lives
you’d never understand the context of what they did. But you’d
offer your judgment anyway. And they would do the same for
you.

So I was reflecting on this
over
tapsilog
and
coffee when someone showed up and cast a shadow on my
food.

"I don’t know your number but they
told me you’re here."

It was Matilda, obviously, but I felt I had to
squint at her features because there was something different about
her. Her nose was red and there was a smear of blood
underneath.

"What happened to you?" I
squeaked.

"Do you know if there’s a clinic
around?" She looked mildly distraught but not panicky. She grabbed
the paper napkin that came with my pancakes right off my tray and
pressed it against a nostril, waiting for me to get my shit
together.

"Um wait. There’s a clinic over at
the Sola tower, I think..."

I was about to say,
When did I become NV Park tour guide
again?
But I did see the clinic before, it
was near the kebab place, and now was not the time to be arguing
about this.

Three hours before my job interview wasn’t the time
to be helping a neighbor with a medical emergency either.

"Can you walk?" I said, offering
to assist her as we crossed the street.

"Yes I can walk." But she didn’t
refuse the light grip of my hand on her forearm. We were silent
throughout the walk, the escalator flight up, when she filled up
the paperwork to be seen by a doctor. The clinic was a small one,
modern-looking, and probably processed more pre-employment health
checks than actual medical emergencies. People were lined up like
they were at a bank.

"Which doctor do you want to see?"
Matilda was asked.

She put the pen back among the
other pens in the cute can. "Any damn doctor who can see me right
now," she said, calmly, showing her bloodied tissue.

There was a GP who was in the middle of a
consultation, but Matilda was bumped up in the queue and would be
next to see her. We were asked to sit and wait.

"So," Matilda said, turning to me.
"I saw you having dinner with Ethan last night."

"Are you kidding me?"

"You two looked very
close."

"No—I mean,
are you kidding me
. You’re bleeding
and this is what you ask me? What the hell happened to
you?"

"I’m fine," Matilda said. "They’ll
check my cartilage, give me a painkiller, whatever."

"Does this happen to you
often?"

"I’ve hit a door with my face more
than once, yes."

She sort of shrugged and turned to
look at the TV up in the corner of the room, playing a video about
getting the HPV vaccine. It gave me a chance to seethe a little. I
was really concerned, but wasn’t sure about our boundaries—was I a
friend, someone who actually got to say something? Did she really
just need me to point her to the clinic? Should I be taking her to
the hospital?

While considering this I got to actually see her,
the rest of her. She was in a plain white tee, short shorts, and
pink studded flip-flops. It was skimpy but already the most clothed
I’d seen her, since we’d only ever really interacted at the
pool.

But the other odd thing—she had no
bag with her. Just a roll of cash in one hand. That and her
banged-up nose.

This was messed up.

I sighed. "What do you need me to
do, Matilda?"

She snorted a bit, but more of as
a reaction to the woman on the vaccine video, and then turned to
me. "You can tell me about Ethan, Moira. What’s he
like?"

So I was trusted to help in the emergency, but not
enough to know what caused it. Same same.

"Excellent kisser," I
said.

"I knew it," replied
Matilda.

-/\/\/\-

My resume was a mess, but the exercise of editing it
for this interview, and this moment, made me remember something. I
could be really good with people, if I set my mind to it.

There was no way to hide that I
kept hopping from one job to another, a year or so each time, but
at least I found the thread that held everything in place. I worked
well with people. New people, old people, it didn’t matter. I
didn’t have issues anymore about fitting in, who would I be having
lunch with, who’d invite me to drinks that weekend.

Maybe it helped that Kylene, Ethan’s friend from HR
who was interviewing me, reminded me of other people that I got
along with. She was a bit like Roxie, in that she was about my age
and seemed like she was a veteran at this job. Her smile was
professional but not cold, and she even gave me a half-hug when I
came in.

"Ethan speaks highly of you," she
said, as I sat down. "I guess he told you the problem I
have?"

"Problem?" I asked.

"I looked at your resume and it’s
great, all this experience you have. I kind of regret that I’m
interviewing you for this, the events assistant post, because I’m
sure I could place you somewhere more fitting."

It was starting to sound like an
"it’s not you, it’s me" breakup speech and I wanted to prevent that
from happening. "I appreciate Ethan vouching for me for this," I
said. "He knows that it’s something I can do. Whether or not it’s a
‘fit’ you can decide later, but I’m perfectly willing to do
it."

"Are you? Really?" Kylene had a
tablet in front of her and my resume seemed to be on it. "I mean, I
love that you’ve actually worked on a conference with a thousand
participants. Our thing’s going to be peanuts compared to
that."

I focused on the basics—what
exactly did she need to hear? And chucked my plan and issues and
out the door for now. I could do this, it was going to be easy, I
didn’t mind the hours, I didn’t think this was "beneath me." All of
it was true, at least the truths that people said during job
interviews that would become true (they would make sure of it) once
they had the job.

But hmm, Ethan spoke highly of me.
He seemed not to have told her though that I was planning to leave
the country anytime soon—Kylene didn’t express concern about that
or even mention it.

Yeah, that seemed like an Ethan thing to do.

"Fabulous," Kylene said, when all
of her questions had been answered. "I guess you just need to
expect another call."

"Thank you for your time," I
said.

"And here I thought Ethan was
referring a replacement to me," she said, relaxing. "I still don’t
have one to take his place yet. But San Francisco is
totally
breathing down
my neck now."

I went, "I guess he’s one of a
kind," and meant as a joke.

"He’s...a tree," Kylene said, and
then laughed at her own analogy. "He’s been around for a long time
and everyone relies on him. To the point that you don’t really
notice that he’s around anymore. We actually had to fight for him
to get his transfer. You know about his transfer,
right?"

I nodded, and was glad that I found out earlier and
through someone else instead of the HR executive interviewing
me.

"Well it was that or several other
options, but we lobbied to have him qualified for something.
Anything. He never went for the promotions himself. I didn’t want
him to just stay in one place forever. We didn’t want him to
suddenly go to a competitor, all because he never said anything and
we never gave him a chance."

"That’s really nice of you to do,"
I said, still on my guard. She may have gone off interview mode but
I was still on, super on. "Is that the only reason why he’s still
here? Because you haven’t hired a replacement yet?"

"No, he’s still here because
someone in the development team keeps screwing something up. As
soon as that’s over though he’ll be on his way, whether we get a
replacement in time or not. And the tree would be gone."

I said a little thank you to the
screwup who made this all possible, and smiled back at her. "I’m
glad you’re all so supportive here."

"How do you know Ethan?" she
asked.

"I’m his neighbor," I
said.

Another thing that was true, if you weren’t
particular about things.

-/\/\/\-

"
You will
surely enjoy this scrumptious plate of seafood
delights."

"Yeah, that’s what I
said."

I sighed and shook my head. "Not
really. You kind of have to say it like you mean it."

"Why would I ever say something
like that in real life?"