I Was Told It Would Get Easier(53)

My sister reappeared. “Sorry, Teddy threw up.”

“From strep?”

“Yeah . . . I guess I overdid it on the consolation ice cream.”

I smiled at the phone, like my daughter did. “You lead a very exciting life.” I was getting tired and wondered if I could persuade Emily to go for room service instead of going out.

“True story.”

“Didn’t you have news? You texted me.”

“I did?” She paused. “Nope, I have no idea what it was.”

“Probably not that you’re pregnant then, you’d remember that.”

She laughed. “I hope so. Oh, wait, I remember. I spoke to the other Jessica, not the Harvard Dropout Jessica, but the other one, Moldy Nose Ring Jessica . . .”

“I know which Jessica you mean . . .” (Jessica was a very popular name when I was in school. I was Pushy Jessica; let’s not dwell on it.)

“And she said Tim Martinez was getting divorced.”

“And this is news because . . .”

“Because you guys dated in high school.”

I frowned. “And so . . . what? I’m supposed to move back home and marry my high school boyfriend?” All I remembered about Tim Martinez was that his was the first erect penis I’d ever seen. The rest of him was far less memorable, which didn’t bode well for a reunion tour.

“No, silly. He’s in Los Angeles.”

I sighed. “I don’t have time to date, you know this.”

“Your vagina is going to close up.”

“It’s not, because that’s not how biology works, and also I didn’t say I didn’t have time for sex. I have sex.”

“With whom?”

“None of your business.”

I suddenly realized Emily was looking at me and frowning. I shook my head at her. “I don’t really have sex. I’m lying to your auntie so she’ll stop bugging me to date someone.”

“You don’t have time to date,” said Emily, returning to her screen.

“I told her that.”

“You don’t have time for anything,” she added, swiping upwards like someone flicking dust.

“I’ve got to go, Liz,” I said. “Was there anything else?”

My sister sighed. “No. Call me tomorrow.”

“I will, let me know about the audition.” A national ad campaign was a lot of money; it would make a real difference in their year.

“Okay.”

We hung up and I tried to decide whether to ask Emily what she meant by saying I never had time for anything, and then decided against it. If I took the bait every time she dangled a potential argument in front of me, I’d have been hooked and landed years ago. We can always argue later, and probably will.





EMILY


So I borrowed a math shirt from Casper, and Einsteins turned out to be really fun. Who knew? I mean, math is okay, I don’t hate it, but you know. We ordered Fermat’s Prime Burgers, Fibonacci Fries, and Infinite Shakes, which came with endless refills. This last part prompted a totally ridiculous argument between Casper and Sam (falling mother kid; he and Casper are at the same school) about whether or not milkshakes could be truly infinite, because that would also mean infinite cows, infinite vanilla plantations, and infinite refrigeration, and Will and I sat there and did our best to not get a headache. I realized I wasn’t mad about any of this; maybe college wouldn’t be so bad. Assuming it’s mostly hanging out with smart people and eating themed food. There’s probably more to it than that.





JESSICA


Emily seemed to be having a good time with the other kids, and I’m not exactly miserable myself, hanging out with several of the parents and eating Cartesian Chili and Newton’s Apple Pie. I was a little bit worried the servers were going to deliver the pie by dropping it on our heads, but they handed it over in the usual way.

I mentioned my concern to Jennifer, Casper’s mother, and she looked at me quite seriously. Mind you, she looks serious most of the time; it might be a job requirement if you teach at Caltech.

“I’m not sure that story isn’t apocryphal, anyway.” She reached for her phone, presumably to look it up.

“Well, it doesn’t really matter if it’s true or not, does it?” I asked. “It only matters if they need a reason to drop food on customers’ heads.”

She regarded me curiously. “Why would they do that?” I suddenly realized she had no sense of humor at all, and probably regarded me as a subject for study.

I began to regret opening the topic. “Uh, because customers can be really annoying? Didn’t you ever work as a waitress?”

She shook her head, and a little flare of doubt appeared in her eyes. This was a challenging conversation for her, apparently. The flowchart hadn’t prepared her for this one.

I wrinkled my eyebrows. “What did you do in the summers and through college? I did waitressing, some of my friends worked in hotels . . . you know?”

“I interned at NASA.”

“Oh.”

“And then after high school I worked on my dissertation whenever I could, of course.”

“Of course.”

She tried. “In the last summer of college I worked at Disneyland.”