Adult Assembly Required, page 10
Maggie hooted with laughter. “Me? Are you mad? Why would I risk my hard-won peace and quiet?” She ran her fingers through her hair, leaving one side sticking up in pieces like the Sydney Opera House.
“I don’t know,” he replied. “A desire for physical intimacy? Someone to keep you company? Someone to travel with?”
Maggie looked off into the garden and shook her head. “I’m too old for physical anything, and the thought of traveling is exhausting. As for company, that’s what dogs are for.” She tipped her head toward the house. “And all these tenants. It’s rare there’s no one else in the house, there’s usually someone to talk to.”
“You dated when I was younger.”
Maggie stood up. “No, Asher, this old lady is not interested.”
“You’re not old.”
“I’m sixty.”
“Sixty is the new fifty.”
“Really? It feels like the old sixty to me, and I wasn’t all that interested at fifty, either.” She headed into the house, saying over her shoulder, “If sixty becomes the new thirty, let me know.”
He watched her go into the house, and looked at his phone. His sister still hadn’t responded to his earlier text. He frowned, and texted her again.
“I’m home, when can you get together?”
He finished clearing the table, loaded the dishwasher, and set it going. He stood and looked around the kitchen he’d grown up in, very tired and glad to be home. As he headed up to the guest room, he checked his phone one last time. Nothing.
FIFTEEN
The next morning Laura was up at seven and did a fast three-mile run. Walking back to the house, she pulled out her phone and called her mother.
“Dr. Costello,” said her mother, in the tone of voice she used when she was working. Clearly Laura had caught her on campus. Laura took a deep breath.
“Hi, Mom, it’s me.”
“I hear that,” said her mom, then waited. Laura swallowed. There was something about her mother that made Laura feel like she’d messed up before she’d even begun. Possibly by just being born.
“Mom, why did you give Nick my address?”
“Because he asked me for it,” said her mother readily. “Why shouldn’t he have it, you guys are still friends, right?” She paused. “Or have you left that behind as well?”
Laura rolled her eyes. “Mom, I haven’t left anything behind, I just moved out to the West Coast for grad school, I didn’t embark on a continuing five-year mission to explore strange new worlds.” Her mother was a sucker for a Star Trek: The Original Series reference.
It didn’t help. Her mother sniffed, “Well, I’m still hoping you’ll come to your senses.”
“I’m fully sensible, honestly,” replied Laura. “Please don’t share my personal information with anyone else, OK?”
“Who else would want it?” said her mother carelessly.
Wow, thought Laura, thanks for the vote of confidence, Mom.
“I’m grading papers,” her mother continued. “Did you need anything else?”
“No, Mom.” Laura had reached the house, and headed to her room.
“OK, goodbye.” Her mom hung up.
Laura threw the phone on her bed and looked at herself in the mirror just to remind herself she was a grown-ass woman.
“She’s not the boss of you,” she said aloud, and then headed to the shower.
* * *
• • •
All clean and dressed, Laura took a cup of tea to the patio, found it deserted, and sat on one of the faded yellow chairs. Despite her mother being a major downer, she felt a lot better than she had the night before; a good night’s sleep had clearly been called for. She closed her eyes and leaned her face back to catch more early sun.
“Good morning,” said Bob, appearing through the French doors to the kitchen. Laura opened her eyes and snapped her head up.
“Hey there,” she replied, never at her wittiest first thing.
Bob was wearing an extremely faded T-shirt with a logo for a seed catalog and sweatpants that looked suspiciously like they got slept in. He was moving slowly as he came over to join her, but Daisy fairly flew over the doorstep and trotted down the stairs. Apparently, she’d already finished her double espresso, fresh juice, and croissant, and was ready to seize the day.
Laura looked at Bob, slightly rumpled and puffy from sleep, and realized Polly was right—she was getting used to his face. It was a relief, she realized; she really wasn’t ready for any . . . thing.
Bob smiled gently at her. “Feeling better this morning?”
OK, the smile is still a bit of a stunner, I won’t lie. “Yes, thanks. I guess I was tired.”
“Uh-huh,” replied Bob. They fell into companionable silence, though the morning soundscape of Los Angeles was loud enough. The birds were singing with a great deal of verve, a pool pump was growling away in the distance, and three competing leaf blowers were coming to blows somewhere close.
Apparently inured to the noise, Bob sipped his coffee in silence, watching Daisy and not looking at Laura until he felt totally conscious. As he’d walked onto the patio, her eyes had been closed, her head tipped back, and she’d looked very much as she had in his dreams the previous night. It had been a little startling. Bob tended to wake up feeling good in the mornings, ready to work, ready to get outside and get going, but not in any way ready to chat. One of his favorite things about his work, for him, was that he rarely needed to speak to anyone first thing in the morning. Sitting across from Laura was a challenge, though, because he very badly wanted to talk to her and couldn’t think of a single thing to say. I dreamed about taking you to bed last night probably wasn’t the best opener.
“Right.” He stood and stretched. “I need more coffee.” He held out his hand for her cup. “Want some?”
“It’s tea.”
“I can make tea,” he said, taking her cup.
Standing at the kitchen counter, Bob found himself in a bit of a quandary. It had been at least six months since anyone had seriously stirred him, and well over a year since he’d slept with a woman. That experience had been brief but pleasant, and he and she were still friendly. He hadn’t gone to her wedding or anything, but it was cool. Possibly as a result of being the youngest child and only male in a family run by his mother and grandmother, both of them unrestrained masters of life, he was thoughtful about women, and liked them, even though they often rendered him mute. It was conceivable that never getting a word in edgewise his entire childhood had led to his social shyness, but more likely it was simply the way he was. He frowned, moving to pour the now-boiling water into Laura’s cup.
“Sugar?” he called out, turning his head to hear her answer.
“One, please,” she replied, and her voice hit his heart like a bell. Oh crap, he thought to himself. That is not a good sign. He stirred the sugar, pressed out the tea bag, and poured the milk, all while trying to think of something pleasant to talk about. When he returned to the patio and handed her the cup of tea, his fingers touched hers briefly. Not that he noticed.
Polly burst through the kitchen door, carrying Ollie under one arm. As usual, she started talking as soon as she saw another human face. “I had the most terrible nightmare that I was Raquel Welch in that old movie about getting all small and going into that guy’s body. Remember that movie?”
Bob and Laura shook their heads.
“You’re missing out,” continued Polly. “Anyway, I was her in the movie and there’s this bit where the bad guy gets all smothered by a white blood cell, and Raquel Welch gets all these antibodies all over her, but it’s fine because they dry out and snap off like twigs once she gets back in the sub, and anyhow, in the dream I was her but being smothered by the white blood cell and I woke up and Oliver was sitting on my chest staring at me!” She took a breath, the first in quite some time, and dropped the cat onto the patio. “He was the blood cell!”
The blood cell sat down and radiated insouciance. Polly sighed dramatically, then moved on to the next thing. “What are you guys up to today?”
Bob got to his feet and picked up his cup. “Nothing as exciting as that, I’m afraid.” He headed into the kitchen, looking back to smile at Laura, and said, “Have a good day.” Then he was gone.
Polly turned to Laura. “He definitely wants to date you.”
“You are definitely delusional,” replied Laura, “and I am definitely not interested. He seems like a nice guy and he’s cute and everything, but I’m not open for business, so to speak. I’m closed for the season.”
Polly shrugged. “Trying to bring a little joy into your life.”
“I’m plenty joyful, thanks. Are you off to work?”
Polly nodded and grinned. “Bored?”
Laura laughed. Polly seemed self-absorbed and generally on a planet of her own creation, but she saw through Laura every single time.
“Is it that obvious?”
Polly stood up and shook her pant legs down over her boots. “Come to work with me, Nina will press more books on you. It’ll make her so happy.”
* * *
• • •
The bookstore cat, Ferdinand, was sitting in a box on the floor of the back office. Ferdinand had arrived the previous Christmas, theoretically to deal with a rodent issue the store was having. While the rodents had indeed moved out, Ferdinand had moved in and revealed herself not to be an enormous tomcat, but a very, very pregnant ladycat, and several families in the neighborhood now had bookstore kittens. Liz had already named her Ferdinand, inspired by the cat’s commitment to stationary contemplation, and decided not to change it. Ferdinand was no longer pregnant, but she was still built along capacious lines, and the box she had selected—which was the tray-like lid of a box of printer paper—was not. She overflowed enough to obscure the box but didn’t reach the carpet, which was making Nina think of the speeders in Star Wars.
Nina looked up and saw Polly and Laura coming in. “Good afternoon, Polly,” she said, pointedly looking at the time.
“Pfft,” said Polly, dumping her purse and phone under the register. “It’s barely ten a.m., the tourist slowed me down.”
Nina looked at Laura, who shrugged, having already learned that clarifying anything Polly said was a waste of time and effort. The brief drive to Larchmont had been uneventful, and Polly had talked the entire time about other great movies featuring Raquel Welch, of which there were many more than Laura had realized. Perhaps she could take Polly everywhere so scary thoughts wouldn’t have a chance to get a toehold. Laura turned to Nina.
“I was thinking of getting a jump start on school. Is there anywhere good around here to study?”
“How close?”
Laura shrugged. “Walkable.”
Nina nodded. “Sure, but you’ll need to narrow it down. Larchmont has a walkability score of eighty-five.”
“You don’t say,” said Laura weakly, not completely sure what that meant.
“I do say. Are we talking coffee shops or libraries?”
“There’s a library?”
Nina fixed Laura with a basilisk eye and raised her eyebrow. “Are you expressing surprise there are libraries in Los Angeles? Did you think we were all illiterate cultural dilettantes?”
Laura shook her head. “Uh . . . no?” She was pretty sure she knew what a dilettante was, but she wasn’t taking any chances.
“Fair enough.” Nina looked mollified, and continued, “There are actually two—yes, two—public libraries within walking distance of Larchmont, though one is much closer. I’ll find you the addresses.” She made a face. “And the hours. There have been a lot of cuts, and one of them was only open two days a week for a while.”
“Doesn’t the library kind of steal your business?”
Nina looked surprised. “No, because there are lots of people who want to read books but don’t want to acquire books.” She shook her head. “Those people go to the library, and if they want to own something they’ve fallen in love with, they come here. The books want to be read, I don’t think they care much beyond that.”
“I guess so,” said Laura, having never considered the inner motivations of books.
“Well, of course,” said Nina, who thought of little else. She paused. “Of course, you could take the bus down to the central library, which is an amazing place.” She looked curiously at Laura. “Are you going to get a car? It’s going to be very challenging to live here without one, although, of course, lots of people do it. In fact,” she said, her face brightening in the way it did every time a fact popped into her head, “Los Angeles has a lower rate of car ownership than Seattle.”
Laura hesitated. “I was planning on it, but honestly, the buses aren’t that bad, and owning a car is so expensive.” And ever so slightly terrifying.
Nina nodded but Polly was horrified. “Dude, you can’t not have a car here. How will you make a getaway?”
The other two swiveled to look at her. “What do you mean?” said Laura.
Polly seemed genuinely concerned. “What if you need to blow the joint, flee the scene, get out of Dodge?”
“Make like a tree and leave?” asked Nina, always up for a bad pun.
“Make like an atom and split?” added Laura, also ready to play this game.
Polly made a tutting noise. “It’s all very well to joke around, ladies, but a woman needs the independence and freedom of her own mode of transport.”
“I could get a bike,” suggested Laura.
“Oh great,” said Polly. “Sure. You escape a dicey situation and then immediately get mown down by a distracted driver. Have you seen how people drive in this city?”
The noise. The mirror. “Yes, actually, only just recently.”
Nina cleared her throat, but Polly held up her hand. “I can tell you’re about to tell me which other cities have worse drivers, or what the actual number of accidents per square yard is . . .”
“Well, you wouldn’t measure in yards . . .”
“But it doesn’t matter. My point is that riding a bike is dangerous, taking public transport is slow, and walking from here to UCLA isn’t practical.”
“Well, I won’t be here once school starts,” said Laura reasonably.
“Exactly!” said Polly. “There’s the problem. You have to get a car, so you can be here.”
Laura shrugged. “I’ll get around to it.”
“I have a mechanic friend who can help,” Nina said surprisingly. “He’ll help you find a good used car, he’s nice like that.”
“Uh, OK,” said Laura. “I’m going to head to the library, so . . .”
“Oh, that’s right,” said Nina. “I’ll draw you a map.”
Polly had been pulled away by a customer, and Laura hoped she’d let the car conversation go. The thought of driving in Los Angeles, with the traffic and unfamiliar roads, was genuinely making her break out in a sweat. She hadn’t been able to get behind the wheel in New York, but she’d been hoping it would be a different story here. And hopefully it would be, she just needed to work up to it. This, she told herself, is a problem for future Laura. For now she was going to go hide in the library.
* * *
• • •
Laura left the store with directions to the closest library, along with far too much information about it. (It was built in 1927, was of architectural significance, and had a fireplace, which Nina considered daring for a place filled with paper. Nina had then started telling Laura about a terrible fire at the Los Angeles Central Library, but fortunately a rush of customers—three at once—had come in, and Laura headed off to get an early lunch, not having had any breakfast.)
Now she was waiting in a strangely long line for a sandwich, farther up the boulevard. Surely the sandwiches couldn’t be that good? Suddenly three people ahead of her wimped out and went to Chipotle instead, and she vaulted forward in an instant, realizing once she was inside the store and could smell the bread that it was 100 percent going to be worth it.
Nina had told her about a little park a few blocks farther east, close to one of the libraries. She’d seemed incredulous that someone would willingly walk that far in August, but Laura was used to walking hot streets to reach cool parks. Maybe the heat would keep people indoors, and she’d have the park to herself.
She could not have been more wrong. Dozens of kids ran around joyfully on the sandy surface of a fenced-in playground, with giant shades like kites above and nannies and parents alongside. The sounds of glee mingled with horns and engines from Beverly to create a level of ambient noise that made Laura glad she was headed to the library later. For now, though, she pulled out her notebook to give herself a flat surface for her sandwich, and unwrapped it. Prosciutto, Brie, tomatoes, aioli . . . luckily the sounds of the playground hid her gluttonous moan of pleasure.
A shadow fell across her book, and Laura looked up to see Bob, who also carried a sandwich in the now-familiar white paper. She held her hand over her eyes and he stepped to the side, putting her face in shade.
“Larchmont Wine and Cheese and Robert Burns Park in the first week?” he asked. “That’s hard-core local knowledge.” He paused. “Can I join you?”
Laura nodded, not being able to come up with a good reason why he shouldn’t. She didn’t dig very deeply, to be honest; if two consenting adults like park benches, there’s no reason they shouldn’t share one. He sat down and unwrapped his own lunch.
“Nina at the bookstore told me about the park.” Laura kept eating her sandwich as Bob started his. She couldn’t tell what he’d ordered, and was that too personal a question to ask?
“I got the vegetarian,” he said, having swallowed the first bite and apparently developed telepathy. “I’m not a vegetarian, but I love roasted peppers and goat cheese.”
