Odd Mom Out

Allie’s our traditionalist. A graduate of Seattle U, she’s twenty-seven, strong, smart, spiritual, and anxious to be married. She’s dating someone at the moment and praying it’ll end in a trip to the altar followed by a glorious wedding reception for four hundred and then maybe a baby in the next year. I love Allie’s graphic designs but can’t relate to her driving ambition of marriage and motherhood. Motherhood’s all very well, but how is marriage the answer to women’s problems?

“It wasn’t a waste of time. In fact, it was highly educational,” I say, leaning over my drafting table with the poster-size ad of a pert, pretty 1950s housewife in a fitted blue-and-yellow polka-dot dress pouring her smiling husband a delicious cup of Jet City coffee.

The woman’s wearing pearls and fashionable blue pumps. The husband’s sitting at the kitchen table. It’s a scene of perfect domestic tranquillity.

Of course, this ad was Allie’s concept and design.

“There’s an A team at work here,” I conclude, reaching for my drafting stool, “and now I’m thinking that the whole A team concept applies to the children, too.”

“Of course it does,” Chris answers, taking a break from typing. He’s spent much of the week drafting a proposal for a chain of health clubs. “Children learn from their parents. Parents are the ultimate role model.”

“It’s more than that, though,” Allie argues. “All girls want to be popular. All girls want approval and acceptance.”

“But what is popular?” Robert interjects, hands folded behind his head. “And does popular mean good or right?”

I grab a pencil and jab it in Robert’s direction. “Exactly my point. Why are these little fourth-grade girls the popular ones? Is it because their parents have the most money? Is it their clothes? Or is it because there was once a power struggle and these ’popular’ girls won?”

“Everything’s a power struggle,” Chris says bluntly, downing his favorite protein-mix drink. Chris is buff, built, spends a lot of time in the gym, and owns expensive clothes and an expensive car. “Life is about competition. It’s one of the things kids have to learn.”

“But not all girls are competitive,” Allie protests, tucking a blond spiral curl behind her ear. Her hair is naturally curly, and the first time I met her, I thought she reminded me of a young Sarah Jessica Parker. “And I don’t think competitive or ‘bitchy’ girls”—and here she does the word-in-quote thing—“are necessarily popular. I think confident girls are popular, and Eva can be one of those girls. All she needs is more confidence.”

I don’t like the headache I’m developing. I don’t know if it’s from the brunch, the sips of mimosa, or the very personal turn this conversation has taken. “So we’re in agreement that Eva isn’t on the A team?”

“Yet,” Allie emphasizes, “but she will be.” She hesitates. “As soon we get you on the A team.”

“I’m not on the A team?”

My question is met by a deafening silence. I guess I’ve had my answer. I’m one of the B team.

Maybe even the C team.

“Interesting,” I say, clearing my throat. “Good. This has been a most enlightening morning. And now could I suggest we return to our slogans, graphics, and ad campaigns?”

I don’t even wait for an answer. I grab my pencil, duck my head, and start making notes for Allie about changes I want made in the mock-up before we present the final design.

A team. B team. Blech.

By the time Eva gets home from school and she’s tackled her homework and I’ve wrapped up business for the day, the last thing I want to do is make dinner. We’re still in the first week of school and I’m already wiped out. How the hell are we going to get through nine more months of this?

Eva suggests we go to P. F. Chang’s at Bellevue Square for dinner, and I second the suggestion. Chinese food and an icy cold beer sound like heaven.

It’s still dazzlingly bright outside as we drive to the mall, trees profusely green and heavy with leaves. Traffic in downtown Bellevue is always congested, especially this time of night as commuters clog the streets en route to the freeway. I take all the back streets, enter the parking garage closest to 100th Street, and park on the third level before cutting through Nordstrom to reach the restaurant.

We arrive early enough to be seated within fifteen minutes, and we order immediately, choosing our favorites off the menu.

Over the lettuce-wrap appetizers, we talk about our day. “You haven’t told me about brunch,” Eva says, scooping the seasoned diced chicken mixture into the crisp, cold lettuce cups. “Is the Belosis’ house as nice as everyone says? What did you eat? Did you have fun?”

Calling the brunch fun would be an exaggeration by any stretch of the imagination, but it was rather exciting to go someplace new and get a glimpse into how the other half lives. “It was really interesting. It’s good I went.”

“Yeah?” Eva looks at me over her bite. “So who did you talk to?”

“Um . . .” I picture not-so-smiling Mary-Ann and then the radiant Taylor. “Mrs. Lavick, Hunter’s mom.”

“Hunter’s got serious food allergies,” she replies matter-of-factly. “And he goes to these special chess camps in summer. Plays Russians and Albanians. Pretty intense.”

“I’d say so. They’re an interesting family, aren’t they?”

“You think?”

“Hunter plays chess with Russians, and the dad’s apparently quite connected. He’s a physicist—”

“Dr. Lavick’s not a physicist. He’s a pharmacist.” Eva looks at me disapprovingly. “Who told you he was a physicist?”

“Someone,” I answer vaguely, not revealing Taylor as the source to Eva, as I don’t want to damage Eva’s hero worship. Besides, it’s an easy thing to mix up. Pharmacist and physicist.

“Was she nice to you?” Eva asks, preparing another wrap, sprinkling it carefully with her favorite soy chili sauce blend.

“Uh . . . you know.”

Eva nods. “She’s kind of serious. You can see why Hunter’s so . . . intense.”

“Yeah.”

And then I get that crazy feeling again, the one that’s hot and sharp, and I look up, glance around, and he’s there, being seated at a table next to us.

He’s not alone, either.

He’s got a tall, statuesque brunette with him, and she’s beautiful, beautiful the way my friend Tiana is. Perfect features, thick glossy hair that reaches just past her shoulders, and a stunning smile.

Before I can look away, he sees me staring, and our eyes meet, and the sharp sensation inside my chest heightens. It hurts. Looking at him hurts. Looking at him with another woman is even worse.

It’s so crazy. I feel crazy. I don’t understand it. Don’t understand why he impacts me, or why I care, or any of it.

Men don’t do this to me.

Men don’t interest me.

Men don’t.

But this one does.

For several minutes, I struggle with my lettuce wrap, suddenly conscious of everything I do wrong—the messy soy sauce spilling, the way food dribbles on my chin, the clumsy way I reach for my beer.

I can’t eat dinner like this, feeling so awkward, and so under the pretext of helping Eva dish rice, I reposition my chair slightly so that he’s no longer in my line of vision.

Moving my chair helps, and gradually I relax and Eva and I enjoy the rest of our dinner—a mu shu duck with tangy plum sauce and P. F. Chang’s version of cashew-nut chicken. And even though we finish our dinner at a leisurely pace, I haven’t really tasted anything since he sat at the table across from ours. It’s been impossible to taste anything, or feel much of anything, with that rock in my gut.

Someone stops by his table to speak to him, and he rises, unfolding from his chair like a gladiator or mythic warrior. He’s so big that he immediately commands attention, and it’s not just his height but the way he fills the space.

Eva glances at him, stares, and then turns back to me. “He’s so tall,”

she whispers.

I nod. But it’s not his height that fills my insides with wild, uncomfortable butterflies. It’s something else. His energy. His focus. His eyes.

I loved it when he looked at me in the store. Shivered when he looked at me here. There is something in his eyes, something in that long, piercing gaze, that makes me feel overwhelmed, dazzled, confused.

He, whoever he is, makes me feel anything but controlled. He makes me crave all the things I’ve denied myself these past ten years. He makes me want the things I’d nearly forgotten . . . heat, touch, hunger, skin.

Our waiter arrives with the bill and I pay immediately, thinking we’re better off going now before my insides start knotting with nerves and adrenaline again.

Eva and I are out the door and heading for Nordstrom’s and then the parking garage when Eva remembers her sweater.

“My sweater,” she says, stopping in her tracks. “I left it on my chair.”

We quickly walk back to the restaurant, and while I wait by the hostess stand, Eva runs to our table to look for her sweater, but she’s met partway by my mystery man.

“Thank you,” I hear Eva tell him as he hands her the lilac-colored sweater, her voice rising at least an octave.

“My pleasure,” he answers, his voice so deep that it sounds like a growl in comparison.

Eva dashes back to me, smiling. “Did you see? That man, the very tall one, he brought me my sweater.”

“I saw.”

Eva takes my hand as we leave the restaurant again. “He’s handsome, Mom.”

I feel butterflies in my middle, and my pulse races. “You think so?” I ask, striving to sound normal.

“Mm-hmm.” Eva looks up at me. “And his girlfriend, she’s pretty, too, isn’t she?”

Now my stomach falls. “Yes.”

“I think she looks like Aunt Tiana.”

I squeeze Eva’s hand. “I thought the same thing.”

We walk to the parking garage, and I have to be honest. I’m not surprised that my Man as Big as a Mountain has a girlfriend, but I am disappointed.