“No,” he said.
“Well, she looks very unhappy.”
“Okay,” he said quietly, shoving the schedule back into his backpack.
“Okay?”
“You don’t want me to go back to school, or have plastic surgery to make myself look like a cat.
Okay, I get it. So noted.”
“And you don’t want me to open your backpack …”
“I really don’t.”
“Fine,” she said, walking back to the kitchen. “So noted.”
THE COURIER HAD begun holding weekly Millennium Preparedness meetings. All the department heads had to attend, including Greg, who was expected to give a readiness report at each one. He usually came back from these meetings looking red-faced and hypertensive.
“I don’t know what they expect of me, Lincoln. I’m one man. The publisher thinks I should have seen this Y2K thing coming. Last week, he yelled at me for sending all our old Selectrics to churches in El Salvador. Even though the board gave me a plaque for that three years ago. It’s hanging in my den …I think I just talked them into buying backup generators.”
Lincoln tried to tell Greg, again, that he really didn’t think anything bad was going to happen on New Year’s Eve. Even if the coding failed, Lincoln said, which it probably wouldn’t, the computers wouldn’t get confused and self-destruct. “Logan’s Run isn’t real,” he said.
“Then why do I feel too old for this shit?” Greg asked.
That made Lincoln laugh. If he worked days, with Greg, he might not spend so much time thinking about quitting.
From: Jennifer Scribner-Snyder
To: Beth Fremont
Sent: Tues, 10/12/1999 9:27 AM
Subject: Another nice story.
The way you were complaining last week, I had lowered my expectations. But look at you—front page, above the fold. Giant picture, nice lead, nice ending. I especially like the quote from that protester: “If the Taj Mahal had been built on 84th and Dodge, they’d tear it down for parking.”
<<Beth to Jennifer>>
1. Stop, you’re too nice. You’re like my mother or something.
2. That protester was very cute. Lovely red hair. A pharmacy student, no less. (Now I sound like my mother.) We had a very nice conversation about the way this city worships good parking. I said that eventually, we’ll tear down every building of interest and just run shuttles to Des Moines and Denver.
We’ll have a parking-based economy. He thought that was very funny, I could tell. And then, when I asked for a follow-up number, in case I had further questions, he asked for my number. (!!!!)
<<Jennifer to Beth>> What? That happened yesterday? Why are you holding out on me? If cute, redheaded pharmacy students ever gave me the time of day, you’d be the first to know. Not like that would ever happen. Even construction workers don’t whistle at me.
<<Beth to Jennifer>> That’s because you ooze preemptive leave-me-alone death rays. Besides, anyone who gets within 10 feet of you spots the giant rock on your finger.
<<Jennifer to Beth>> And also, I’m dumpy. What did you tell the cute anti-parking guy?
<<Beth to Jennifer>>
1. If you keep insisting that you’re dumpy, I’ll stop sharing my romantic misadventures with you.
You’ll have to read about them in Penthouse Forum like everybody else.
2. I did something weird. I lied to him.
<<Jennifer to Beth>> You didn’t tell him you had a boyfriend?
<<Beth to Jennifer>> Nope. I told him I had a fiancé.
“Sorry,” I said. “I can’t. I’m engaged.” And then he looked at my hand and blushed. (It was an adorable, redheaded blush.) And I was like, “I left it on the sink.”
I felt like you at the Baby Gap, buying munchkin overalls. Just making up my life. (Actually, it was more pathetic than that—because you don’t even want a baby. I want to be engaged. Somewhat desperately, let’s face it.)
Last night, when Chris came home and climbed into bed, I couldn’t look him in the eye.
One, because part of me really wanted to give that guy my number.
And two, because I’d lied.
<<Jennifer to Beth>> Don’t overthink wanting to give out your number. You were flattered.
Attracted. That’s natural. I know this from reading Glamour and watching The View, of course, not from personal experience.
Did Chris notice that you couldn’t face him?
<<Beth to Jennifer>> No, there was no face time. He fell asleep before I could ask him how practice went. A long night grinding the ax takes it out of you.
<<Jennifer to Beth>> Ew. Is that a euphemism for masturb@tion?