Gayle Roper - Caught In The Act

I kept telling myself that I didn’t mind. I was an independent career woman, pressing on with my new life. I didn’t believe myself for an instant. But, I reminded myself before I started weeping on the spot, I was the one with two men!

Not that I needed or wanted two. One would certainly be more than enough since monogamy was my preferred lifestyle. I just had to decide which one.

“Hey!” Jolene said as she came out of a stall. “You’re smiling. Which one are you thinking about?”

“Not telling.” I swung my purse strap back onto my shoulder and slammed the bag itself into the blonde woman walking out of the other stall.

“Oh, I’m sorry!”

She smiled at me, her gray eyes crinkling at the corners. “Don’t worry about it. It’s o—”

Her voice faded to nothing, and her face lost its pleasant smile. She stared past me with a sudden look of great distaste. I blinked and turned to see what she was looking at, and there stood Jolene. Her face had also lost all its charm and warmth.

“Well, well,” Jo said. “Look who’s here.”

“Hello, Jo,” the woman said in a tight, tense voice. “How are you? And how’s Arnie?”

“We’re both fine.” Jolene matched icy politeness for icy politeness. I could get frostbite just standing here.

“Tell him I said hello,” the woman said.

“Like he cares,” Jolene spat the words like little pellets flying from a straw to land stinging blows on the back of an unsuspecting neck.

The woman sighed in disgust. “You haven’t changed a bit, have you?”

Jolene bristled. “Watch it, Airy. I don’t like being in the same room with you any more than you like being in the same room with me.”

My eyes widened. I am Polly Peacemaker, and if I’m caught in conflict, I never know what to do. But it appeared I was the only one uncomfortable here. These two women were obviously sluggers, though Jo was clearly batting champ.

“Believe me,” Airy said, “if I’d known you were going to be here, I’d have avoided Ferretti’s at all costs.”

Jolene, face haughty, sniffed. “My coworker and I were having a business lunch.”

Airy sneered. “Don’t give me that snotty attitude about your job, Jolene. People at your level don’t have business lunches.”

Jolene glared. “You just think you’re so smart.”

I looked at Jolene, disappointed. Certainly she could do better than that worn-out old line.

“Tell me.” Airy’s voice dripped acid. “Which of us graduated valedictorian? Um? It certainly wasn’t you.”

What? At twenty-five years old or so, she was bringing up high school? What was next? Elementary school jealousies?

“Like test grades show intelligence,” Jolene scoffed with a wonderful disregard for the entire educational system. “I’d rather have my social smarts than your boring IQ any day.”

“You used to be nice, you know.” Airy nodded slightly as if agreeing with herself. “Up until about third grade. It’s been downhill ever since.”

Yikes, I thought. Elementary school.

“And you’ve been jealous of me ever since.”

“Oh, pu-lease! I’d kill myself before I ever became like you.”

A woman pushed the ladies’ room door open and froze halfway in, caught by the nastiness of the voices. She locked eyes with me for the briefest of seconds, then withdrew, condemnation in every line of her body.

Not me, I wanted to tell her. I’m an innocent bystander. I know better. I have class.

Jolene and Airy hadn’t even noticed her. They were too busy pouring out a lifetime of vituperation.

Suddenly Jolene turned sly. “By the way, Airy, how’s Sean?”

All color drained from Airy’s face. “Don’t you even mention his name,” she hissed. “Don’t you even think about him.”

Jolene just smiled. If I’d been Airy, I’d have been tempted to sock her one for her arrogance.

“How do you like his new mustache?” Jolene asked innocently. “I think it makes him look quite debonair, don’t you?”

“His new mus—How do you—?” Airy was so angry that she was sputtering. And scared? She shut her eyes and took a deep, calming breath. Then she said in an urgent, passionate voice, “Sean is off-limits to you. Don’t you ever, ever come near him.”

“Oops. You mean I shouldn’t have had lunch with him yesterday?”

Airy looked as if she had turned to stone. She didn’t even appear to draw breath.

Jolene did everything but smack her lips at the reaction she had gotten. “Why don’t you just settle for Arnie? You and he would make a great pair. The leftovers.” And she turned away.

Airy reached out and grabbed Jolene’s arm and spun her around. Jo blinked in surprise. The guppy was taking on the shark.

“I mean it, Jo. Stay away from Sean. You may have taken Arnie away from me once upon a time, but not Sean. Not Sean! He’s mine.”

Jolene raised an eyebrow and looked down her perfect nose. “Only if you can keep him, sweetie.” She shook Airy’s hand from her arm as if she was flicking garbage off a plate and strode out of the room.

I was left staring at my toes, unsure what to do. What did one say to the loser in a catfight? It was one of life’s little lessons that Mom, usually so good at preparing me, had neglected.

I heard a soft sigh and glanced up. Airy looked so sad.

“I’m sorry,” I said, even though I had nothing to do with any of it.

Airy nodded and smiled weakly. “You’d think I’d have learned to deal with her by now, wouldn’t you? I mean, I’ve known her since I was four years old. Princess Jo.”

She pulled a packet of tissues from her purse and wiped ineffectively at her nose.

“Merry Christmas,” she said and walked out without looking back.

When I left the ladies’ room, I looked to see if Airy was still in the restaurant. She wasn’t but Jolene was, standing straight and beautiful and haughty as she waited for me.

It was a silent walk back to The News.

“Merry, come here!” My editor, Mac Carnuccio, cocked a hand at me as soon as I came in from lunch.

Mac was king of our little world. His style was exactly the opposite of our previous editor, the erratic stacks of paper littering his desk being but one instance. Still, in the short two weeks that he’d held the job, he’d put out a paper as good as or better than our former editor.

And he clearly loved being in charge, taking a kid’s pleasure in the subtle perks of power, especially the enormous desk by the enormous window.

“I love sitting here,” he’d told me last week as he leaned back in his new ergonomically correct executive chair. “I feel like I own all of Amhearst.”

I’d looked out on Main Street and agreed it was an impressive sight. “Monarch of all you survey, eh?”

Mac smiled broadly at an iridescent gray pigeon taking its afternoon constitutional on the other side of his window. Then his face sobered.

“I’m not really editor, you know.” He glanced at me. “I’m only acting editor. The rag’s for sale, and who knows who will buy it and what will happen then. Ever since I saw Cary Grant in His Girl Friday, I wanted to be a suave, fast-talking editor. And—” his grin returned “—for now I am.”

Now this suave, fast-talking editor was waving to me, his Rosalind Russell.

As I hurried through the newsroom, I zigged and zagged as necessary to avoid being eaten by the spectacularly healthy plants that Jolene insisted on growing here. The huge grape ivy that sat on the soda machine had been joined by a gigantic red poinsettia, one of several that sat about in case we forgot that Christmas was a mere week away. On the great windowsill of the picture window African violets bloomed pink and purple and variegated in spite of the time of year, and Jolene’s Christmas cactus in a teeth-jarring shade of fuchsia hung nearly to the floor.