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IT WAS PAT’S FAULT that I was late for my lunch with Donnie. I had been heading out of the campus parking lot on my way to Donnie’s house, just as Pat pulled in. I saw that he was driving an aged but respectable Mercedes Diesel. Emma rode in the passenger seat. Naturally, I had to back up, re-park and go over to examine the car.
“Pat,” I exclaimed, my surprise shoving aside tact, “I thought you were broke! How could you afford this?”
“The ad revenue from Island Confidential,” he said. “It’s modified to run on used cooking oil. The car, not the website.”
“You get ad revenue? That’s so...corporate! I don’t remember ever seeing ads on the Island Confidential website.”
But Pat did have advertisers, and apparently there were enough of them to allow Pat to buy himself a car with a decent paint job (an inoffensive tan) and a muffler that would stay put without duct tape.
“Ad revenue is what pays the bills.” Pat perched comfortably on the hood. “Not even I could live on what they pay part-time instructors.”
“Why do you do it then?” I asked. “I mean, not that we aren't lucky to have you.”
“Library privileges. I need the databases for research and fact checking. Otherwise, you’re right. It’s not worth it. Anyway, you both have your ad blockers turned off for Island Confidential, right?”
“I don’t bother with ad blockers,” Emma said. “They slow down your computer.”
I peered into the car’s windows. The tan leather upholstery was worn to a dark gray at the edges but overall it looked like it was in good shape. This was by far the most deluxe vehicle I'd ever seen Pat driving.
“So Pat, you’ve been doing okay financially, yah?” Emma asked.
“Yeah, I guess I have.”
“So why didn’t you come to the race with me and Molly on Labor Day Weekend? Molly thought it was cause you couldn’t afford to pay for a room!”
“Oh no. I could afford to go. If I wanted.”
“You could?” I turned my attention from the car's interior back to Emma and Pat. “So why didn’t you? It would’ve been fun to have you there.”
“Yeah, we shoulda had someone there to keep Molly out of trouble! What’s the deal?”
“It was going to be a whole weekend with you and Yoshi, and Molly and Donnie. I wasn’t up to sitting through the extended director’s cut of the Patriarchal Heteronormativity Show.”
“Oh, Pat,” I sighed, “Heteronormativity? Is there any more ungainly, cobbled-together non-word than Heteronormativity?”
“Do you have a better one? Besides, I happen to know you used ‘heteronormativity’ in your dissertation.”
The ensuing debate took longer than expected, and by the time I had noticed what time it was, I was already late for my lunch date with Donnie.
I had skipped eating at noon so I could enjoy my late lunch, and I had to pace myself. If Donnie hadn’t been sitting right across from me, my gnocchi in gorgonzola sauce would have been a delicious memory by now. Donnie was there, however, and I was struggling to maintain the ladylike image that I had been cultivating for his benefit. Impulse control, I reminded myself (as I often find myself reminding my students) is the foundation of a functional society. The effort of restraining myself made it impossible to keep up my end of the conversation, so I dined in dainty silence.
"Heard from Davison today," Donnie said.
“So his semester is starting off well?”
“Not especially.”
Having grown up among people who were frank, if not operatic, about their complaints, it’s taken me a while to get used to Donnie's communication style. But I’ve learned. When he tells me everything's fine, I can be sure it isn't. And if he says things aren't going especially well, that means disaster.
“Not especially?" I asked. "Is something wrong?”
“He told me he has one semester to bring his grades up. If he doesn't, he could lose his eligibility.”
“Lose his eligibility? That sounds serious.”
“Davison can’t stay on without his athletic scholarship. I couldn’t afford it.”
“So what are you going to do? You don’t want him coming back here! I mean, he’s got such a great opportunity where he is!”
“I told him to add a couple P.E. classes and drop econ. Do you think that was the right thing to tell him?”
“He should also think about retaking any classes he’s failed, if his school has a policy where the new grade overwrites the old one. That’s the quickest way to raise your GPA.”
“Good point. You should tell him the next time you talk to him. So what’s new with you?”
“Me? Well, I just—I mean, I don't know, let's see."
I searched for something to talk about, that didn’t have to do with Pat. It was a shame. Pat’s new car could run on leftover cooking oil from restaurants, and I know Donnie pays to dispose of his used oil. But I knew better than to suggest the two of them cooperate in any way. I’d found it was best to keep them apart as much as possible.
The last time Pat and Donnie had spent any time together was at the Pair-O-Dice Bar and Grill. Donnie and I had met up with Pat and Emma for sunset happy hour. Donnie had started to tell us about his recent trip to a restaurant supply trade show in Cremona.
“I always enjoy Italy,” he had declared. “The food is wonderful” —here he put his hand on mine—“the people are beautiful—”
At which point Pat had interjected,
“Hey Donnie, wouldn’t it be funny if Molly actually turned out to be from some Balkan hellhole? OW!”
Emma and I had kicked Pat under the table at the same time. And Emma didn’t hold back.
Afterward, Donnie had remarked that Pat didn’t seem to approve of him. Was Pat jealous, Donnie wanted to know?
“Pat has kind of a caustic sense of humor,” I had explained. “He’s like that with everyone.”
Which was true. Pat hadn’t liked Stephen either, when I’d dated him.
In any event, I certainly wasn’t about to prattle on about Pat’s new car. What else was there to talk about? I couldn’t say anything about Sherry. Or, worse, Sherry and Davison. And I was pretty sure Donnie wasn’t interested in getting into an argument about the word heteronormativity.
“Wasn’t this weekend lovely?” I took a piece of bread and dabbed the last of the cream sauce from my plate, hoping he wouldn’t bring up that unfortunate episode with Davison.
“I’m glad you enjoyed it. It seems like I hardly saw you except for the drive back. And you were asleep for most of it.”
Donnie didn’t like being left alone. I shouldn’t have been surprised by that, but I was.
“Driving makes me sleepy,” I explained. “And your music selection was so nice and soothing I must have drifted off. I have to listen to something upbeat if I’m going to stay awake in a moving car.”
Donnie likes the same kind of music Emma does. Smooth vocal harmonies poured over a bed of languid slack-key guitar. He may as well have had sleeping gas seeping out of his car speakers.
“Anyway, you know how Emma is. She insisted on having me around for moral support. I thought our sunset dinner was, um, what a wonderful view of the sunset.”
“Actually, Molly, there was something I wanted to ask you.”