Gandhi's Guide to Getting By

chapter sixteen

I'm going to be late for Jen's. She and Bluey had some sort of fallout last night. Stella, who always hears about everything before everyone else, told me about "the fallout". She doesn't think Jen should be alone. She made it sound like who knows what Jen might do if we're not there to stop her from doing whatever it is she might do. "You know how it is," she whispered. Whispering is what Stella does when she wants to be dramatic. "Well maybe you don't, but trust me, Jen should not be alone." It's watching too many soaps as a kid that has Stella turning every event into a potential stay-tuned-until-next-time crises.

Stella's version of the fallout? Bluey moved out. He's fed up with Jen being wishy-washy. What is Jen being wishy-washy about? Yeah, right, like I don't know, traitor that I am. Anyway, Bluey found some tiny one room place on top of the restaurant where he now waiters (he was promoted from bus boy to waiter). His boss, who owns the building, said he could crash there for a week. Poor Jen, she's a mess. Anyway, thank goodness Jen has friends like Stella (i.e: who is not the kind of friend to sleep with her friend's ex-boyfriend). So what if I'm not sleeping with Matt yet, I will be, won't I? Or have I taken some weird celibacy oath she doesn't know about. Actually, who cares whether I've taken an oath or not because obviously I'm a traitor and traitors don't understand about oaths. Anyway, the point is, Stella being the magnanimous human being she is, has organized what she calls a "wellness get together". Stella is in charge of pizza, Shelby in charge of salad, Kate in charge of wine (which she expects us to contribute towards), Anne in charge of plastic plates, cutlery, and glasses (Jen only has two of everything) and I'm in charge of brownies, chocolate ice-cream, and any other eat-your-feelings kind of food I can think of.

Right now, though, I've got Justin, new caretaker of Heart, to deal with. He stormed in about two minutes ago, my "free coffee poster" in his hand. He barely glanced at Melinda, Derek, or Mina, his dark eyes on me, and me alone. He didn't even notice Heart who was sprawled on the floor, exhausted from two hours of intensive pampering. If this were one of Shelby's Harlequin Romances, his eyes would no doubt be described as "smoldering", and maybe "smoldering" is what they are, but it isn't with love, passion, or lust they're "smoldering" with. It's more of a, How badly will it hurt my political aspirations if I put my hands around her neck kind of smoldering.

He stands in front of "my" desk, his "smoldering" eyes looking down on me. In a Harlequin romance, this would be the page where he breaks down and professes his love for me, only Justin's obviously not feeling the love. Plus, he doesn't show any signs of breaking down.

"What?" I say when he doesn't move or say anything.

He opens his mouth, then closes it again. He's probably not sure what words to choose. How do I phrase this, I can practically hear him ask himself, to make the biggest impact?

Impact is an important word in Justin's universe. It's almost as important as heart and soul. We actually managed to have a full-fledged fight over the word "impact." The fight concerned an e-mail which literally read:

Dear Council Member Young, Am I obliged to answer the pollsters who come to my door? Angela.

Justin, who happened to read both the e-mail and my still unsent response (i.e., he was standing right behind me, something he calls "supervising" and the police call "stalking"), thought my response was "missing the impact of the positivity Council Member Young is synonymous with". "Don't you see," he said, "It's not enough to simply say, No, you are not obliged to answer a poll. You have to make Angela feel like she should answer because what she thinks is not only important to the pollsters, it's important to us." I wanted to ask Justin if he even knew who Angela was. In fact, I had a slew of questions I wanted to ask him: What if Angela thinks Council Member Young is a bitch? Is that important? What if Angela thinks affordable housing is a priority? Is that important? What if Angela thinks you're an idiot?