Second First Impressions

She pretends to chew her next mouthful of juice before swallowing.

In my Midona Project dedicated notebook, on the page titled POSSIBLE CAREERS FOR MEL I write Event Planner. “Let’s start with invitations. I usually give four weeks’ notice of the date, so they need to go out this week. Do you have any design skills?”

“I have been temping for ten thousand years. I have every skill.” The thought dims her light. Melanie looks around. “I can’t believe I’m going to say this, and it may be the juice talking, but I’ll be sad to move on from here. I’m tired of new people, new desks. It’d be nice to rest awhile.”

“You’re not scared of old people anymore?”

She blows out a breath. “I was at first. I found your photo album and the funeral programs in your drawer. I’m scared of that aspect of being here. But if we just keep everyone happy and busy, I think everything will be okay. And besides, you’re here.”

Melanie takes a phone call from a resident. When she hangs up, I agree with her. “It’s our job to make their lives as lovely as we can.” I check my in-box. There’s one from Dorothea at PDC marked “Request.” Before I can even read to the bottom of the email, Melanie says, “I sent it to her.”

“Thank you.”

PDC sent a surveyor here yesterday. I walked around the site with him, trying to work out the purpose of his visit. I tried my best to demonstrate the virtues of our lake and hillside. He finally told me: Unless you’re a qualified surveyor, too, I think you’ve helped me enough.

Red with embarrassment, I slunk back to find a message from Rose Prescott on my desk. She made me dig out an asbestos assessment report from 1994 because she obviously hates me. Melanie picked the cobwebs out of my hair after I emerged from the file storage abyss.

It was worth it to hear the grudging approval in Rose’s voice when I called her back.

I will give Melanie some good feedback now. “You’ve been doing a really great job. I couldn’t have gotten through these last few weeks without you.” This gives her a rosy glow. “Using your design skills, could you mock up something that looks like a 1950s-era prom invitation?”

“Cute. I can do that. Might team up with the old Tedster on this one, seeing as though he’s ‘so inspired lately.’” (She uses quotation fingers.) Now she narrows her eyes. “What’s inspiring him so much, do you think?”

It’s me and the safe white page that is my cottage. It’s because Teddy finally knows exactly what he’s doing every night, and it’s cleared the disorganized restlessness out of him. I have never been this peaceful, Ruthie. But I can’t tell her that.

I shrug in answer to her question. “Great idea about the invitations, let’s get him involved. I really hope you’ll come, even though your contract will be over. We’ll give one to Teddy,” I add on lightly. “He won’t be able to make it, but he’ll know he’s always welcome.”

She rolls her eyes. “He’s finally sorted out his tax situation. Get this: He got a refund. He thought he was going to jail but gets a check instead. Was he kissed by a leprechaun at birth? His account is filling up nicely.” She looks up from her party planning checklist. “Nobody ever made saving for a life dream look so effortless. I hate him.”

Teddy tells me everything, but he didn’t tell me that.

“Me too.” We’re both liars who are going to miss him badly. “He’s absolutely unbelievable.”

“So here’s what we’re going with for your dating profile,” Melanie begins, consulting her screen. We are distracted by a black-clad figure at the door. “Oh, go away please, we’re doing some serious stuff.”

“I will not go away,” Teddy says indignantly, sitting in the visitor chair at my desk. “I’m staying until the food comes. Who’s unbelievable?”

“Food.” Melanie is distracted again. Mel says her juice cleanse is to release toxins from her organs; which organs, she will not say. My observation is that the juice is releasing dizzy spells and bouts of random paranoia. With eyes like a wolf, she asks Teddy, “What did they order?”

“Big salads.”

“Salads,” she echoes in grief.

To make conversation I say to him, “I heard you had a tax windfall.”

“Yes. I didn’t expect my next Good Samaritan to be the taxation department. I was going to tell you.” Except he didn’t, because news of his progress makes a very hidden part of me very sad, and he knows it.

Once upon a time, I sank gratefully into my silent candlelit bathroom like a temple. I thought that my routine was sacred and untouchable, but I know that things have changed for me now. Having him sitting on my couch in the evenings, and Melanie across from me during the day, has spoiled me. I’m beginning to worry for myself.

“So what’s going on here?” Teddy asks Melanie in a tired voice.

“I was just about to read out Ruthie’s dating profile and take her photo. Except of course I wasn’t going to do that during office hours,” she adds, in response to whatever my expression is. “I was going to do that at 5:01 P.M., after Ruthie and I cross-reference the water charges on Providence’s account to the payments we’ve made.”

“Guys, I do not care about what you do in here.” Teddy drapes himself back in his chair and pulls the elastic tie out of his hair. He shakes out the beautiful mess with his hands. “Rose is going to turn it into an alpaca ranch just to mess with me. Just enjoy it while it lasts.”

Stroke, slide, his hands sort through his hair until my fingertips burn on the armrests of my chair. It’s not just me affected by it.

“Quit tormenting me,” Melanie says to Teddy with temper. She gets up, runs to the bathroom, and slams the door behind her. The juice has cleansed her at least four times since 9:00 A.M.