Thirty

  

Coffee, chocolate, men.

Some things are just better rich.

~ Overhead underneath the dryers at the Dazzling Do’s

  

Some people toss back whiskey shots when they’re upset, others find solace in boxes of Little Debbie swiss rolls or cartons of Mayfield Moose Tracks Ice Cream. Whenever Mrs. Tobias felt blue, she sought comfort in the plot of soil in her backyard garden. In the last few days she’d dug up three basketfuls of weeds, fertilized her pansies, and prepared the soil for spring bulbs.

At first, she refused to admit that anything was amiss. I’m right as rain, Mrs. Tobias had said to herself as she attacked the soil with her wooden-handled trowel. Forget the fact that she compulsively checked her answering machine whenever she went inside, even though the message light never blinked but blazed steadily, like a cruel red eye. Once she even drove to a convenience store and called herself from a phone booth to make sure her machine was functioning properly.

Mrs. Tobias didn’t know why she expected a phone call from Rusty. After all, he was the one who’d been wronged. Still, it seemed as if he’d given her up too readily. Shouldn’t he have put up more of a fight?

Clearly his feelings for her didn’t run very deep. Maybe he’s even moved on, she thought to herself as she tore big handfuls of clover from the dirt. Maybe he and that cigar-smoking Minnie from the flea market were, at this very minute, listening to The Mamas and the Papas on Rusty’s car stereo en route to a game of cosmic bowling.

“She can have him,” Mrs. Tobias whispered to herself, accidentally pulling up a few sprigs of rosemary along with a clump of weeds. A sour taste of indignation rose in her throat at the thought of Rusty and Minnie together. How dare he take up with someone else so soon after his relationship with her? She got so worked up, she had the urge to call Rusty and give him a piece of her mind. It was only after she’d bumped her knee against a flagstone that she came to her senses and remembered that the pairing of Rusty and Minnie had merely been an invention of her imagination.

She couldn’t trust her thoughts anymore. They flew about pell-mell, like deflating toy balloons. Sometimes she felt like the betrayed party. Shouldn’t Rusty have checked on her to make sure she hadn’t been spirited away from the restaurant by a band of thugs? How did he know she hadn’t hit her head and wasn’t wandering around town with amnesia?

Sometimes, Mrs. Tobias just felt plain sad. Pillow Talk came on TV the other evening, and she immediately changed the channel. Rock Hudson reminded her too much of Rusty.

And then there were the times when she called him while he was at work, just to hear his voice on the answering machine. Those were the most confusing times of all.

Mrs. Tobias got up from her crouching position in the garden and shook the pins and needles out of her legs. Inside the house, she could hear the faint ring of the phone. Adrenaline surged through her blood as she sprinted inside, the back door banging behind her.

“Hello?” she said breathlessly.

“Hello, dear,” said Cecilia. “You sound winded. Did I catch you in the middle of your morning calisthenics?”

“No, Cecilia,” Mrs. Tobias said, trying to disguise the disappointment in her voice. “I just came in from the garden.”

“Lovely day for it, although my hip tells me we might be in for an afternoon shower.”

I’m sorry it’s bothering you.” Mrs. Tobias opened the refrigerator and grabbed a bottle of spring water.

“Guess who I ran into at the club yesterday? Rutherford Spalding. You remember Rutherford? He’s an oncologist at University Hospital.”

“Oh yes, Rutherford,” Mrs. Tobias said. “I remember him very well.” Harrison used to call him “the anteater” because his nose was so long.

“Did you also know that he’s been recently widowed?”

“No, I didn’t,” Mrs. Tobias said. She remembered his wife, a white-haired woman with an imposing shelf of a bosom.

“We were chitchatting in the grill, and your name came up. It seems Rutherford has fond memories of you.”

“Really?” Mrs. Tobias said.

“Oh yes,” Cecilia said in a girlish voice. “He got dewy-eyed at the mention of your name.”

“I see where this is leading, Cecilia, and I don’t—”

“Nonsense,” Cecilia interrupted. “You obviously long for male companionship or you wouldn’t have been at Jacque’s kissing that leather-clad ruffian. And you couldn’t ask for a more appropriate suitor than Rutherford. I urged him to call you. I certainly hope you’ll agree to an outing with him.”

Mrs. Tobias was about to protest farther, when she stopped herself. After all, an evening on the town could provide her a much-needed diversion from her wild swings of emotion.

And perhaps, if she went out with someone from her old social circle, it would further convince her of Rusty’s unsuitability as a beau.

“Very well. If Rutherford calls and asks me out, I’ll go. Thank you, Cecilia, for thinking of me.”

“We’ll find the right man for you yet,” clucked Cecilia, clearly enjoying her new role as a Yentl.

A few hours later, the phone rang while Mrs. Tobias was heating tea on the stove.

“May I speak with Mrs. Harrison Tobias, please?” a male voice said when she answered the phone.

Mrs. Tobias picked up the whistling kettle from the burner. “This is she.”

“Grace, this is Rutherford Spalding.”

Rutherford’s voice sounded deeper on the phone than what she remembered, and his speech was cultured and as crisp as Melba toast. There was no dropping of ‘g’s or muddying of vowel sounds, just lovely, well-formed enunciations.

Rutherford engaged in the requisite small talk and then launched headlong into the true purpose of his call.

“Would you care to join me for dinner Saturday night?” he asked. “I know it’s short notice, but—”

“That would be wonderful, Rutherford,” Mrs. Tobias said.

And that was that. After a few moments he ended their conversation, and she stood by the phone, contemplating what she might wear for their date.

It’s for the best, Mrs. Tobias thought. For the first time since her dreadful evening at Moretti’s House of Cannelloni, she didn’t feel the need to take refuge in her garden. Perhaps her every waking moment would no longer be plagued by thoughts of Rusty. The last few days had been more trying than she could ever have imagined.