Again and again, the phone rang and never did anyone answer. Thirty times over the course of the weekend, Astrid must have heard, “Alex. Leave it.” Beep. She never left a message. What would she say? Hi Alex. It’s Astrid. Just wondering when you might have time to give me a call and let me know you’re not dead. Oh and maybe when you’re not so busy being an ass, we can talk about how we knew each other when I was seventeen and how come I had to hear that bit of information from a chatty waitress at a bar with an annoying tendency to hug me. She could add that the waitress was blonde and leggy and she got her phone number-maybe that would pique his interest enough to secure a call back. Asshole. She was infuriated with him and every invidious beep she heard was like a slap in the face. A big sign that read I’m ignoring you! Astrid knew that was unreasonable and probably not the case at all. There were a hundred legitimate reasons why Alex wouldn’t, or possibly couldn’t, call her back. She could forgive him that. Forgive him of keeping vital information from her? Information that directly related to her? Not so much.
Astrid snapped out of her seething with the sound of Todd’s phone reverberating throughout the small office. At first, wishful thinking told her it was her cell phone, but then she quickly became cognizant of the fact that her phone would never make such a shrill, God-awful noise. Todd was busy working with the new intern and signaled to Astrid, who was already en route to his office, to go play secretary. Only Todd would keep a telephone that still had a rotary dial, Astrid thought to herself as she approached the desk. She picked up the chunky black receiver and slipped into her professional office voice. “Reidsville Weekly, this is Astrid. How may I help you?” Astrid wondered if that was how you were supposed to answer the phone when you worked at a newspaper. She got her answer when a woman laughed raucously on the other end. “Girl, when did you become Todd’s Sex-a-tary?” “Oh, ya know, normal Todd stuff. He was all hot for me until the new intern walked in and I was quickly demoted.” Astrid saw Todd smirk and shake his head as he overheard. She gave him one quick acknowledging wave and mouthed “Carmella.”
Everyone knew Todd would never get involved with an employee, even if she was technically only a volunteer, but there was a long-standing inside joke that Todd was the office play-boy. Carmella and Astrid fueled the fire simply to annoy him, but recently, Todd had taken to laughing about it instead-probably hoping they would stop. They wouldn’t. “Let me guess. Blonde. Leggy. Big boobs?” Carmella asked. “Does it really matter? She’s got legs; Todd‘s one and only prerequisite.” Astrid was very proficient at sarcasm, but the new girl hadn‘t been there long enough to pick up on that yet. She did know that she didn’t appreciate being the scapegoat for Astrid’s joke. She looked at Todd with searching eyes, wondering if what Astrid was saying was true and why she could be allowed to talk about her boss like that. She looked about ready to bolt when Todd marched to his office and snatched the phone away from Astrid’s ear, scowling.
He held it away from him for a moment, patiently waiting for Carmella’s fit of laughter to subside. When she registered the silence she said, “Sorry, Todd.” “Uh huh,” was Todd’s subdued response. They both knew she didn’t mean it. Getting right to business, Carmella went on, “actually, I was wondering if you would mind Astrid and I switching shifts this week if she’ll agree to that?” “You could have asked her while you were on the phone with her rather than scaring my intern.” “Astrid is the one who scared the new girl, not me. And you should consider that when you make your decision about trading shifts.” Carmella always knew how to get what she wanted. “Fine,” he said stiffly to the phone. “Astrid, you’re switching shifts with Carmella this week. I wouldn’t want your winning sense of humor to send Donna running for the hills.” Todd was mad, but not that mad if he was still able to poke fun at Astrid.
“Is she coming in now or do I get until tomorrow?” Astrid was unhappy about the switch because she needed the distraction and the money, but resigned because she knew they would have their way regardless. Todd asked Carmella to come in as soon as she was available which meant Astrid was free to leave immediately after he was off the phone. She clocked out with only two hours of work to her name that day and seeing this made her aggravation with both Todd and Carmella flare. How was she going to pay her property taxes, car payment or any of her other bills if she kept switching off with Carmella? Possibly, Carmella needed the hours more than she did, but that knowledge did nothing to soothe her irritation. She wished the paper generated enough money so that both of them could work at the same time, but unfortunately, there was not often a need in such a small, quiet town for two photographers who occasionally did clerical work when nothing else was going on. It was also the reason the paper took unpaid interns like Donna. They were mostly college students needing the experience and since there was no money to hire anyone else and usually not enough work to be done to merit even a part-time helper, it was a nice compromise.
Astrid took her time getting out the door, trying to prolong the amount of time she could go before the inevitable monotony set in. She liked coming to work because, even if she only made copies, it gave her something to do. She liked to stay busy, especially lately with the new information she’d acquired and her growing desire to hunt Alex down and strangle him. That probably wouldn’t be a very effective way to get anymore facts from him, but it sure would make her feel better on a short-term basis. Grabbing her camera and car keys, she called to Todd that she was leaving, not bothering to hide her annoyance. As she passed Donna silently scanning through an article and making angry, bright red corrections, she felt a sudden need to apologize for her earlier teasing.
“Donna, right?“ Donna looked up, all business- a look that said ‘I’m trying to be professional, but inside I want to rip your shiny black hair out‘. “Yeah, about earlier. I’m sorry. It wasn’t nice of me to use you to make fun of Todd. And just so you know, Todd would never engage in sloppy interpersonal relations with an employee.“ She stopped here, giving Donna time to process this. The serious look she had on her face seemed to soften as she took Astrid’s words to heart. Donna smiled and nodded her head to indicate the apology was understood and accepted. Todd looked on from behind his computer with an astonished look on his face. “At least not with the women,“ Astrid continued sincerely. She stepped out the door leaving behind a quiet babble of laughter, including Donna’s.
She drove home satisfied that she was able to make one last crack at Todd for the week. She thought he deserved it and even if he didn’t, it sure lifted her mood, if only temporarily. It passed quickly and when it did she turned the radio up and tried to drive the rest of the way home with only guitars, drum beats and lyrics thrashing in her head.
She woke in the morning
She knew that her life had passed her by
She called out a warning
Don’t ever let life pass you by
The lyrics hit her suddenly and resonated in a way that almost made her want to cry. Almost. She pulled up to her house and shut the engine off, letting Incubus cease along with the sound of her car’s quiet purring. She sat there in the driver’s seat dreading going inside and sitting like a pathetic bump on a log. She’d already cleaned everything in the place over the weekend in between assaulting the buttons on her cell trying to reach Alex and having more ominous dreams about that Aysa girl. There was nothing left to clean and nothing she really wanted to do. She was so bored with closing in on herself and pondering life. She did that because there was nothing else to do; no one to ponder life with, but now...light bulb! Now she knew Lalita! Lalita who was quite loquacious and wanted to have lunch with her. Well, why the hell not? Astrid normally wouldn’t impose her company upon someone no matter how eager they seemed, but she was fed up with sitting around expecting to remember anything. It was pointless when she finally had someone who was willing to talk to her. Someone willing to talk to her…someone willing…
Astrid was on the verge of an epiphany. The last one she started to have, in the kitchen with Alex, she stifled it-stopped it in its tracks. This one would not be stopped. She had to be willing to talk to people. Not the other way around. She was the one who needed to stop being so withdrawn and open up or else no one would ever know how to help her. She thought that keeping her mouth shut and waiting for something to come to her was the thing to do and maybe at first it was. But not anymore. What was there to gain by hiding things? Talk of emotions was not Astrid’s forte’, but facts-she could do facts-and maybe Lalita would give her those since Alex wouldn’t, or more appropriately, since he couldn’t considering he wasn’t around.
Her epiphany continued as she realized it was probably her own fault Alex hadn’t told her anything. That was something she wasn’t quite ready to accept yet, being that she still wanted to be mad at him. He hadn’t called her and he also sat back and listened as Astrid made up family stories when he knew full well none of those things were true. He could have chimed in at anytime. When he saw the pictures on her coffee table, again, he could have spoken up instead of vandalizing one of them. Maybe ‘vandalize’ was the wrong term, but Astrid didn’t care; she wasn’t done being mad at him yet. On top of that, he kept leaving unexpectedly and he never told her where he went or what he was doing. It never bothered her before, but in light of her new angry feelings toward him, she began to wonder what Alex was up to. He had secrets of his own and the symbolism she gained from his note was that he knew Astrid‘s, yet she knew none of his. It was hardly fair. She was in the dark about everything while he ran around like Mr. Omnipotent.
No more. Astrid ran inside the house and pilfered through the junk drawer in her kitchen to find Lalita’s number. She’d stuffed it in there while cleaning, thinking she’d never use it, but not having the heart to throw it away. It was Monday morning and Astrid didn’t know if Lalita would be working at the bar, if she had some other job or if she‘d be sleeping, but that’s why God invented voicemail and thanks to Todd and Carmella, she had the whole week to wait.
The phone rang only twice before Lalita picked up. “Hello?” she answered sounding unsure at the unknown number. “Lalita?” “Yeah…” she waited, drawing the one short word out until it sounded like a question. “Hey, sorry for bothering you, but this is-” Wait-this is who? What could Astrid say? She planned on explaining everything, but not over the phone. “-it’s me.” Well that was brilliant, she thought dryly to herself. “You gave me your number at the bar the other night and I was wondering if you might want to have lunch sometime? Ya know, catch up like you suggested.” “Oh hey Doll! Yeah, sure. When?” “Is today good? I was unexpectedly relieved from working for the rest of the week so I’m off with nothing to do.” “Do I detect a note of annoyance in your tone at being off of work for the week?” Of course Lalita would find that hard to believe-she was probably aching for more time away from the beer guts and bar fights. “It’s not exactly a vacation,” Astrid replied. “So, anyway, are you busy today?” “No, actually today is good. Where do you want to meet? Please don’t say the bar,” she begged.
They decided on Madelynn’s Coffee Shop, which was a little further away for Astrid , who still ended up being there before Lalita. Astrid didn’t mind in the slightest. It gave her a chance to prepare herself a little more for her approaching disclosure. Astrid was so unaccustomed to being the main contributor to any conversation and she had a feeling what she was about to tell Lalita would sound like some kind of juicy gossip to her-gossip of which she would want to consume every detail. She was more nervous than she’d ever been. Astrid started to wonder if telling Lalita anything was a good idea. She didn’t really know anything about her and she only assumed all the things Lalita had told her were the truth. What if they weren’t? What if it was some sort of conspiracy theory? Astrid laughed out loud at herself, causing a small grouping at a table nearby to look at her with disquiet.
Lalita came in shortly after, apologizing for keeping Astrid waiting. After all the usual niceties were observed and they had gotten their drinks, Astrid planned to launch into her I-don’t-know-you-from-Adam’s-left-nut speech, but she couldn’t get the words out. She depended on Lalita’s inquisitive chatter to make the conversation flow in that direction, but somehow, it seemed that removing Lalita from the energetic essence of a Friday night bar crowd had severely depreciated her vocabulary. Not that Astrid thought she was dumb, merely that she didn’t talk as much. She still seemed happy, just not quite as exuberant and she seemed to pay attention better than she had when Astrid had initially met her.
“You seem so quiet. Is everything okay?” Astrid asked. “Yeah, why wouldn’t it be? “It’s just that you seemed so wired the other night. That’s all.” “Well, we were at a bar. That kind of atmosphere tends to do that to me. You of all people should remember that.” Lalita seemed a little disappointed that Astrid didn’t immediately recall what she meant. “Actually, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about.” “I did fine while you were gone if that’s what you’re worried about. Some people still think I’m crazy; most just think I’m stupid, but I can handle that. I couldn’t depend on you to help me forever and I knew that.” Lalita had misunderstood and now she was sincerely letting Astrid off the hook for something when Astrid had no idea what it was. “Lalita, I’m sorry, but I don’t know what you mean. That’s what I wanted to tell you.” Astrid had to spit the words out or she’d never do it. “I don’t remember you. I don’t remember anything.”
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