Hurricane Mavis saved that afternoon. I needed something exigent to drown out the sounds of Garlic Breath playing Spider Solitaire in the next cubicle and Dr. Lander’s voice bouncing around inside my head. Five minutes into my drive to Bettel Occidental Commodities, NPR reported that Mavis was building strength to the east of the Dominican Republic. By the time I sat down at my desk, I was planning charts and graphs on the storm’s impact on regional shipping routes. As a commodities analyst I needed to consider the effect of a direct hit to the southeast dependent on the tides, ports and evacuation routes. I was giddy with the possibilities.
My happy bubble of concentration popped when the elevator doors slid open and my boss, Letitia, clattered out. The entire eighth floor peeked out of their cubicles like doughboys watching for incoming grenades. Everyone looked to see what kind of cup Letitia held. We knew that fattening coffee drinks meant her presentation went well, where iced tea meant it was time to hide under your desk. She held a Venti iced tea against the hip of her sleek black dress. I was relieved to hear the sound of Letitia’s stiletto heels tapping out someone else’s fate on the other side of the eighth floor. Analysts had a short life span in Letitia’s department. She had a way of sucking the life out of them and scattering their empty shells around the building. Earlier that week, I found a file box filled with picture frames and coffee mugs protruding from Bald Guy with Twin Girls’ cubicle. He had put the decimal point in the wrong place on his monthly report. A fat woman with cropped grey hair had pinned pictures of kittens to the walls of Bald Guy’s cube. I gave her six weeks.
Letitia’s footsteps stopped on the other side of the room. “You call this a market analysis?” She paused to make sure we were all listening. “Where are the long-term trends? The seasonal overview? When did you send this to Blaine?”
“I ran out of time, so I added it to the end of Blaine’s PowerPoint this morning,” a woman’s voice wailed. I recognized it as belonging to Short Red Hair who sat next to Pathetic Dog Owner. I made a mental note to password protect the presentations.
“Swenson asked me a question about the global impacts that I couldn’t answer because you didn’t include any background notes. You made me look like an idiot in front of the executive committee!” The entire room sucked in their breath as if watching a cheetah taking down an impala on the outer edge of the herd. “Why can’t you be more like Blaine? They loved the bauxite presentation.”
I smiled. I had done a particularly good job on that PowerPoint; the bullet points were animated, the graphs were detailed, and the data points overlaid my projections.
“Oh come on,” Short Red Hair said. “That’s not fair. That guy is a machine.”
“Listen to that, Blaine,” Garlic Breath clucked through the cubicle wall. “They think you’re a dude.”
“Blaine is a machine,” Letitia replied with a flip of her sleek black ponytail. “She works harder and is smarter than all y’all combined.” The recognition felt hollow when used against someone else. “You know, if you spent less time shopping for shoes—”
“What?”
“It’s a corporate firewall, you idiot. IT tracks your browser history and alerts me to any irregularities. Unless you’re preparing a report on leather futures, there is no reason to spend so much time on Zappos.” The room exhaled in relief. If Letitia could make light of the situation, then she wasn’t that angry. No one would be fired that day.
***
As soon as Letitia was safely encased inside her glass fortress of an office, Pathetic Dog Owner lumbered into Garlic Breath’s cubicle. “Did you hear that? Letitia called Blainiac over here a machine.”
I stared at the hurricane rotating in the Atlantic, but I couldn’t concentrate anymore. I wished Garlic Breath would choke on one of the pork rinds he was always munching.
“Do you think Letitia will give her another big bonus?” Pathetic Dog Owner grumbled.
“Keep your voice down,” Garlic Breath hissed. “I told you that on the down low. No one’s supposed to know that Letitia gives her a little extra here and there in exchange for compiling everyone’s reports for her presentations. Letitia doesn’t know I overheard Blaine whining about not getting credit for her work.”
“Like that’s ever going to happen,” Pathetic Dog Owner said. “Letitia’s no idiot. If it means throwing Blaine a bone every once in a while, she’ll do it.”
Little did Garlic Breath and Pathetic Dog Owner know, Letitia had thrown me far more than a bone. Every quarter our department successfully predicted market trends, Letitia received a bonus that more than doubled her salary. In exchange for me doing most of her job for her, she shared those bonuses with me.
“And, could you see Letitia ever letting that train wreck stand up in front of the steering committee?”
Why can’t you just leave me alone and let me do my work? I looked up and saw Pathetic Dog Owner peeking over Garlic Breath’s cubicle wall. I winked at him. His head popped back down behind the wall as the two of them guffawed like the football players who would make faces at me through the library stacks in high school. I put my headphones on and listened to the emergency weather messages about the hurricane to block them out.
***
At 5:01, everyone else shut down their workstations and head for the exits as if the building was on fire. I waited for Garlic Breath to gather his lunch box and sundry electronics, then picked my way down the line of cubicles to Letitia’s glass walled office. The late afternoon sunshine reflected off Letitia’s diamond earrings, projecting rainbows across the slick glass and steel desk. I pushed open the frameless glass door. “Excuse me, Letitia?”
Letitia startled and automatically whipped her reading glasses off her nose. She spun around in her chair to block her screen. “Blaine! What’s up?”
“I’m sorry I didn’t make it back this morning but—”
“You weren’t here?”
“I left a note. Didn’t anyone—”
“You okay?”
“I’m fine.” I checked that everyone had indeed left before I whispered, “Well, actually, I need to take Thursday off. I am having some ‘woman troubles’ and need to have a procedure. I can dial in from home and post my reports before the close of business.”
Letitia crossed her spindly legs and rolled one slender ankle as she mused, “I had a cyst on my ovary a few years ago. It was nothing serious, but boy, was I crampy for a few days. If you want to just lie on the couch Friday, you can work from home.”
“That won’t be necessary. I’ll be fine.”
Letitia uncrossed and recrossed her legs. “Hey, good job on that bauxite report. They really liked it.”
I rolled my eyes and turned to leave. Of course they liked it. It was an awesome presentation.
“So what’re you working on now?”
“There’s a hurricane coming. I’m analyzing the ramifications. That’s what I do, the research and analysis that you present as your work.”
“Come on Blaine, I know you’re mad that I didn’t have you present the bauxite research yourself but… well … that’s just not going to happen.” Letitia shrugged and flipped her long ponytail over her shoulder and flashed me a brilliant, capped smile. “Frank Mariano did imply that there would be a bonus in the works for me. I’ll share it with you.”
I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from pointing out that the entire bonus should have been mine. I had done all the work while Letitia got all the glory. “I want my half in cash this time. I don’t like having to go to the bank to deposit your checks.”
***
Even though my day had been disrupted, I left work as usual at 6:18 and drove to Silver Star Fitness for my daily workout. If I didn’t get a full hour of aerobic exercise, the nightmares would get me. Tuesday was a stair stepper day. I changed into a pair of bike shorts and oversized T-shirt in the locker room and mounted my preferred machine, the one in the corner away from the television and nattering housewives that hogged the recumbent bikes. As I set the machine’s program for the Eiffel Tower, I thought about Jane Babcock-Roberts.
I didn’t know anyone actually climbed the Eiffel Tower anymore. View or no view, that can’t be safe. You could get trapped way up there with an axe murderer. No way. I’ll stick to my nice predictable, safe machines.
The next thing I knew, the machine beeped indicating that I had climbed to the top. My long hair was plastered to my head and my muscles ached, yet I didn’t feel the sense of release I usually got from my workout. I moved to a treadmill to warm down by running a couple of miles.
I wonder how that Jane woman is now. Did she tell her son about the cancer?
I hoped not. The longer her son didn’t know Cancer, the better. I knew Cancer. He stole my grandparents. He made my mother come back from wherever she’d been for the first seven years of my life and pack my little life into the trunk of her big yellow Plymouth. Cancer killed the only people that ever loved me. And now he’d come for me.
After my workout, I stepped into Lucky Lee’s Chinese Restaurant, conveniently located two doors down from the gym. As soon as I opened the door, the tiny woman behind the high counter put a hand on the red plastic bag in front of her. “Hold on just a sec, Miss Lara. I think Helen forgot your Pineapple Surprise. Can you wait a few minutes? Do you have time?”
I don’t know. Do I?
“That’s fine, Mrs. Lee. I can wait.” I put my gym bag down and picked up the takeout menu. There was no real reason to read it. I ate the same thing every night - Moo Goo Gai Pan, white rice and Pineapple Surprise. Over the years, the Lees had learned to have it waiting for me. I appreciated their efficiency.
“Good workout tonight?”
“Some old lady set the treadmill to the slowest setting and I had to reprogram the whole thing. But, it was fine.”
Susan Lee straightened the already straight stack of menus next to a waving cat statue. “It’s supposed to rain tonight. My garden sure needs it.”
“We are 3.6 inches below average right now but that is 30% better than—” The arrival of a ten-year-old girl in a bright yellow soccer uniform spared Susan Lee any further discussion of North Carolina’s annual rain fall.
“Here you go, Miss Lara.”
I smiled at Helen Lee. “Game today?”
“Just practice.” Helen tightened the yellow bow around her long ponytail. “Hey, guess what? I got an A on that spelling test today. Thanks for helping me study.”
“Thank you for sitting with her when you came in last night.”
“It’s okay.” I tucked a strand of my dishwater blonde hair behind my ear. “I like helping Helen with her vocabulary. I was always wicked good at English.” Little did the Lees know, drilling Helen on her spelling words had been the highlight of my week.
***
Seven and a half minutes after leaving Lucky Lee’s, my reinforced steel garage door squealed and thumped closed behind me and Ruby, my precious red VW Bug. I lingered in the garage to wipe some dirt off Ruby’s hood. On this terrible day, I wished the little car could give me back some of the love I poured into her. Ruby’s paint gleamed, her leather was supple and her engine well tuned. In her trunk, I kept a neatly packed bag with a change of clothes and photocopies of my important documents. It took me less than a minute to unlock the three deadbolts between the garage and my apartment, enter, and lock myself inside. I hung my keys and backpack on their respective hooks next to the door. Everything I needed was at hand in case my stepfather tracked me down and I needed to make a quick getaway.
I dropped the bags of food on top of the three moving boxes full of books I used as a makeshift coffee table. The food could wait; I needed a hot shower. My skin prickled with dried sweat and I felt dirty. People had been touching my body. Twenty minutes later, I flopped down on the couch and reached for the remote. It was gone.
Can this day get any worse? In a fit of frustration, I clawed at the old wool blanket thrown over the back of the couch and yanked out the soft leather cushions. I finally found the remote wedged between two of the moving boxes. I slammed it down on top of the closest box before putting the couch back together and folding the threadbare blanket so its broad stripes lined up again. The red and blue stripes reminded me of the tiles in the Ellery Cancer Center that morning. Dr. Lander’s voice echoed in my head. Cancer. Cervical cancer.
I grabbed the remote and turned on the TV as loud as possible. I went around the channels three times before settling on a Law & Order rerun. Every other channel seemed to be showing stories of miracle diagnoses and bizarre surgeries. Before opening the bags of Chinese food, I laid an old towel over my lap in case I dropped any food. The brown leather couch and big screen TV were the only pieces of real furniture in the three-bedroom condominium. And, I bought those begrudgingly.
I considered furniture an impediment. Material things weren’t worth their high cost. For much of my life, my mother had shuttled me from one roach infested trailer park to another. Any toys or treasures I accumulated along the way were either sold or left behind when Mama lost yet another waitressing job. We eventually stopped living out of suitcases the year I turned fourteen and we moved to Hawthorne, New Hampshire. That was the year Mama married Dale Clemmons. Mama was happy she finally found a man willing to take her. She didn’t care that Dale considered us a package deal. She wanted the security of Dale’s 300-acre dairy farm and the promise of a full wallet. Dale wanted Mama to cook and clean and pump up his ego. No one cared what I wanted. Mama decorated the drafty back bedroom in the crumbling addition to Dale’s rambling farmhouse with flowered wallpaper and a fussy white canopy bed, as if ruffles and bows could hide what Dale did to me there.
Sometime during the second episode of Law & Order, my eyelids grew heavy. My apartment fell away. I was back in the Ellery Cancer Center following the tiles in the floor. I never lifted my eyes from the floor yet I kept losing my way. Then, I bounced off a Pepto-Bismol membrane and landed with a splat in a puddle of sticky jelly. On the other side of the translucent membrane, green cancer cells were hacking off pieces of the membrane and devouring them with glee. I pushed at the surface of the membrane, desperate to find an opening, when one of the cancer cells stopped and looked up. It was Dale.
I gasped awake. My eyes were open in the blue glow of the television, yet I could still see Dale’s smirking face, pink flesh hanging from his lips.
This is Dale. He gave me cancer.
That can’t be right. You don’t catch cancer. Do you? I vaguely remembered reading something about vaccinating kids against a virus that caused gynecological cancers. GVB? HPH? HPV?
Okay, calm down. Use your brain. Learn what you need to know. Knowledge is power. I found the packet of information the nurse gave me and started reading.
For the first time in my life, the pursuit of information failed me. I learned that cervical cancer is caused by the sexually transmitted Human Papillomavirus. Since Dale was the only person I’d ever had sexual contact with, he had definitely given me the virus that led to the cancer. He really was devouring me from the inside out.