Jill Smolinski - The Next Thing on My List

‘ Technically it is,’ Kip said. ‘ But would you ever want to go up against Maria Garcia Alvarez?’

I shuddered. ‘ Not without boxing gloves and body armor.’

‘ THE WORST PART,’ I said to my mom, tugging on what I hoped was a weed, ‘ is that she wants to do the sensible thing.’

‘ Poor girl. I’ m sure she’ s under so much pressure. Is she going to stay in school?’

‘ She doesn’ t know what she’ s going to do. I suspect she’ s still in shock.’

I’ d stopped at my parents on Sunday to help my mom with the gardening. They had a big party coming up-also the reason my dad needed that frozen shrimp. When I first arrived, I’ d handed him my offering of five bags. He’ d accepted them gratefully and then retreated to the living room to fall asleep in front of a golf tournament on TV.

My mom clipped the leaves off the rosebushes as she asked, ‘ Have you ever been pregnant?’ She said it so nonchalantly, it took me a second to grasp what she’ d said.

‘ Um& don’ t you think you might have noticed?’

‘ I’ m not so naive. You could have gotten an abortion.’

‘ Oh. Well, no,’ I answered. ‘ I’ ve never been pregnant.’

She nodded. ‘ Just curious.’

Now wasn’ t that a touching mother-daughter moment! I was glad she wasn’ t curious whether I’ d ever thought I was pregnant, because then I would have had to say, ‘ Sure, plenty of times.’

Not that I made a habit of having unprotected sex or anything. But even with being single 150 percent more often than with a boyfriend, there were still times when the condom broke. Or I forgot the diaphragm on a camping weekend and decided millions of Catholics couldn’ t be wrong about that rhythm method. Or my period was late for no reason at all, but it was late. The last time I peed on a stick, ‘ yes’ or ‘ no’ on the strip was the latest in technology. And it had been ‘ no,’ as always. Yet leading up to the moment when I knew for sure, I had the opportunity to wonder. What if? Sure, I’ ve always hoped to go about things in the traditional order, and mostly I felt relief. But there was a small part of me that would have been happy. Things would be uncertain: Would we get married? Would I be a single mom? But either way I’ d have a baby& somebody to whom I was the most special person in the world. And all I’ d had to do to put my life on an entirely new trajectory was lie back, spread my legs, and let it happen.

‘ Life is ironic, isn’ t it?’ my mom said, handing me a pile of leaves to stuff in a sack. ‘ Your brother and Charlotte have been trying for years to have a baby and can’ t. This girl has sex once, and poof! She’ s going to be a mother.’

I stopped with my leaf stuffing. That was it! ‘ I can’ t believe this didn’ t occur to me before!’ I exclaimed. ‘ They can adopt Deedee’ s baby! Oh, it’ s perfect. They’ re not strangers, which I know is impor-’

‘ Hate to burst your bubble,’ my mom broke in. ‘ But they’ re not interested. Believe me, I’ ve talked to them plenty about it. They want to have their own. In fact, Charlotte’ s doing those hormone shots right now.’

‘ Darn,’ I said, deflated.

‘ They’ re awful, too, those shots. They make you moody and put on weight. She’ s certainly going about it the hard way.’

‘ Especially that part where she has to have sex with Bob,’ I said, and gave an exaggerated shudder. And isn’ t that just like my brother? I thought. Putting his wife through so much misery so he could pass on his lineage.

‘ Sometimes,’ my mom said, setting down her clippers and using the back of a gloved hand to wipe her hair off her forehead, ‘ I have to wonder what God’ s up to.’

WEDNESDAY LATE AFTERNOON I was making a few last ditch calls to drum up interest in the gas giveaway scheduled for the next day. Phyllis called me from Bigwood’ s office. ‘ What would it mean to you if I said I could guarantee TV coverage for you tomorrow?’ she asked in her fifty-pack-a-day voice.

‘ I’ m not sure I follow,’ I said. ‘ You have media contacts?’

(And if so, I thought bitterly, could you not have coughed them up during the afternoon staff meeting? I’ d tried my best to beef up the ‘ maybes’ I’ d gotten from various news crews, but Lizbeth had simply given a tinkly laugh and said, ‘ When they say maybe, it means no. I suppose I’ ll stop by anyway, just in case.’ )

Phyllis cleared her throat. ‘ I can make things happen.’ Suddenly I understood how Woodward and Bernstein must have felt.

I tried not to get too excited, but TV cameras would be quite the coup. It would show Bigwood that I could pull together a successful promotion. And even though it was certain Lizbeth would hog any opportunity to be in front of the camera, I could at least wander by in the background to fulfill #9 on my list: Get on TV.

‘ That would be great,’ I said, wondering why Phyllis was being so mysterious about the whole thing. ‘ What do you need from me?’

‘ A favor. You’ re a writer, and I’ m not much with words. I need help with a letter.’

‘ Sure. I’ ll come up there right now and-’

‘ Not here.’

Ah. That kind of letter. Somebody was searching for a new job. ‘ How soon do you need it?’

‘ I was hoping you could stop by my house after work tonight. I’ m in Culver City-shouldn’ t be too far out of your way.’

‘ Deal.’

‘ You help me out,’ she added before hanging up, ‘ and I’ ll get you all the TV coverage you can stand.’

I REACHED PHYLLIS’ S house a few minutes before six o’ clock and parked on the street. Her car was already there-pulled into her driveway behind a Harley so massive that it more resembled a motor home than a motorcycle. Maybe those Hell’ s Angels rumors were true. I stopped to read the stickers on it to see if it’ d give me any hints, but they were mostly for seemingly ordinary riding clubs. No skulls and crossbones.

Phyllis came up behind me. ‘ Anything on that list of yours about riding a motorcycle?’ she asked.

I turned to give her a wave of greeting and then said, ‘ You know about the list?’

‘ Everybody knows about the list.’

I sighed. ‘ That’ s not on it.’

‘ You ride?’ I shook my head, and she said, ‘ Never?’ as if I’ d admitted I was the world’ s oldest living virgin. ‘ Wait here.’ She disappeared into the garage and came back a minute later with two helmets and a leather jacket, which she tossed to me. ‘ So you don’ t get road rash if we wipe out.’

Road rash? Oh no-I agreed to write, not ride. ‘ Thanks, but we need to get to the letter. I’ m in a bit of a hurry.’

‘ Hogwash,’ she said. ‘ But if you’ re that worried about time, we’ ll talk while we ride.’

Partly because of my newfound spirit of adventure, but more because I was afraid of Phyllis, I obediently straddled the seat behind her. It was like sitting in a La-Z-Boy; it even had a back bar and cushy armrests. The seat beneath me rumbled, and as Phyllis pulled out of her drive, I thought this was how it would feel to ride a speeding rhino, both thrilling and terrifying. When Phyllis yelled, ‘ How is it?’ that’ s what I told her.

‘ Most people say it’ s like an orgasm, but whatever floats your boat.’

‘ So what’ s the deal?’ I hollered over the growl of the engine when we stopped at a red light. ‘ You looking for a new job?’

‘ It’ s not about work. I want to write a letter to my daughter.’

‘ Your daughter?’

The light changed, and she roared forward again. We cruised past the movie studios located there and through old residential neighborhoods that were quaint by L.A. standards-brick-and-adobe houses and leafy trees. Over the course of the ride, Phyllis gave me the full story, letting the intimate details of her life scatter along the streets of the city like candy tossed at a parade. The story wasn’ t anything I hadn’ t seen a dozen times on the Lifetime Channel: Mom and live-in biker boyfriend have baby. They name baby Sunshine. If that alone isn’ t enough to piss her off for life, they proceed to drink too much and do far too many drugs and leave her with friends and relatives and foster care from the time she could barely toddle. Eventually Mom goes into rehab, and biker boyfriend goes God knows where, and the daughter, who by that time prefers to go by the name Sally, has put herself through college and has a nice job as an office manager and maybe a husband and kids, but we’ re not sure, wants to establish a relationship as much as she wants her toenail ripped off at the root, even though Mom has been clean and sober for ten years.