Chapter 41

It was almost to the point where I dreaded getting phone calls from my mother. Her calls were either to complain about something, to give advice that I really didn’t want to hear, or to deliver bad news.

I would love to get one of those “just called to say hello and hope you’re having a great day” phone calls, from her or anybody else. But those kinds of calls had gone away, not that I ever enjoyed many to start with.

Nancy showed a little more interest in the phone call than she should. There was no privacy in the offices of The Langford Review with all our desks crammed together. Sadly, unlike Las Vegas, what happened at The Review did not stay at The Review.

I would feel her staring at me in the strange way a person always knows they are being stared at. I would turn in her direction and she would look away. It almost got to be a game, except the phone call was too serious to take things all that lightly.

“Michael, I just got through talking to your boss, some Bruiser fellow,” she began.

“Was it Brewster?” I asked.

“Yeah, he sounded like one of those guys who has his pants buttoned too tight. The man talked too quickly, like he didn’t want to have a conversation. I thought that was rather rude, Michael. If a person calls you, they should continue with the conversation until both sides are through and…”

Oh joy, a phone call about telephone etiquette. I wanted to tell her to get to the point, but knew that would bring on another lecture. You didn’t tell my mother things like that, it would just keep her talking that much longer.

She continued on for a couple of minutes. Every few seconds, I would mumble something into the phone to let her know that I was still there. I almost caught Nancy twice, but the woman was awful fast in shifting her gaze. I tried the just stare at her until she looks at me trick, but Nancy saw me staring at her and smiled back.

I nodded at her. She smiled and did a little wave, like I had brightened her day.

Mom was rattling on about some phone call last week with one of her friends. Apparently her friend was right in the middle of something important and continued talking, even after nature called.

“The woman was talking to me while using the restroom!” Mom stated. The outrage! I didn’t see what the big deal was. I did it all the time. The trick was to cover the mouthpiece when the package was delivered.

“I can’t believe she’d do that!” I exclaimed, showing more unease than I felt. Who cares? I wanted to tell her that, but knew it would hurt her feelings. Mom didn’t need any more hurt right now. She was up to her quota in hurting, just didn’t show it.

“Anyway, that Brewster guy called for you,” Mom added. “He said you won’t answer his calls.”

“I’ve been having trouble with my cell phone,” I answered.

“How come I can always get hold of you?”

“It’s because he’s calling from Tulsa. You’re calling from here.”

“I didn’t think that would make any difference?” she declared. Mom would have been a great detective, at least if I was the only person she had to investigate. Mom always knew when I was twisting the truth a tad bit. Notice, I didn’t say “lying”, it was “twisting the truth” or omitting some details.

She could just stare at me and I’d melt and confess sins that Mom didn’t even know existed or suspect me of committing.

“The man said he left messages for you to call him back, Michael,” Mom chastised me. “It’s very rude not to return messages when people need to talk to you. I really can’t blame him for being mad.”

“He was mad?” I asked. That was not good news.

“Yes, he expected you back two days ago. I told him your father had died on Saturday. This Bruiser guy thought you should have been back at work yesterday.”

“Yeah, well he’s a butt zit.”

There was silence for several seconds. I had broken one of our laws. Mom did not like for me to talk badly about a person in her presence. Calling people names was even a bigger “no-no”. She could do it and Dad always did, but one Michael Hunt just did not do those kinds of things. I had never tried the old “butt zit” comment before on her. Now, I wished it had been held in storage.

“Michael Hunt!” she almost hollered. “I didn’t raise you to call people ‘butt zits’!”

I almost laughed. It wasn’t every day that I got to hear my mother say that.

“Sorry, Mom.”

“It’s okay, this time,” she decided. “I know you’re under a lot of stress.”

She had no idea. My blood pressure was probably off the charts.

“What else did he say?” I asked, snuck a peek at Nancy and caught her. Success!

A woman walked through the front door, came right to my desk and sat down in the chair. It was obvious that I was talking on the phone, but it didn’t matter to her. She picked a pen off the desk and started tapping it on the desk.

The woman had too much hair and makeup. Her clothes were not purchased at Wal-Mart. I didn’t know much about clothes, but knew her attire was bought at a store that was much fancier. She apparently didn’t think I should be on the phone when my services were needed by her.

I covered up the mouth piece.

“I’ll be with you in a minute,” I said.

The woman nodded, continuing to tap the pen. It was difficult to listen to my mother and this other woman playing taps.

Nancy came to my rescue and took the woman over to her desk. I noticed the woman wearing high heels that appeared to be almost four inches. Her feet were twisted in some strange direction that couldn’t be comfortable. She sat down at Nancy’s desk and they seemed to be staring at each other without talking.

Mom had gone off on another rampage about something that was bothering her about society, before getting back to the point.

“He wanted to get hold of you,” she added. Okay, that wasn’t too bad. “So he asked where you were.”

This was getting worse.

“What did you say?” I asked.

“That you were at the newspaper office.”

“And what did he say next?”

Uh oh, there was a silence from the other end of the phone. Mom didn’t want to tell me what happened. This was bad. She always paused before delivering the bad stuff.

“He, uh, asked why you were at the newspaper.”

“Mom, you didn’t!”

“I wasn’t thinking,” she admitted. No, I’m sure she wasn’t.

“You told him that I was putting out the paper,” I said.

“Yes, I’m so sorry, Michael. I didn’t think he would care.”

I wanted to tell my mother that when people were paying you to work for them, they didn’t appreciate you doing the same thing for somebody else.

“I take it that he cared.”

“Well, uh, yeah, he did.”

“What did he say, Mom?”

She paused again.

“Just tell me,” I urged her.

“He said your services were no longer required.”

I was fired? Me? Canned? Let go? Given the dreaded pink slip? This had never happened before. It probably should have a few times, but I had always survived.

Brewster fired me by telling my mother! I didn’t know what to do, but this was too much. Brewster would regret this, somehow and someway. I might even send Squiggy and Mule to pay him a little visit. The boss in the Christmas Vacation movie would think he got off light compared to what was going to happen to him.

“Okay, I’ll talk to you later, Mom,” I muttered.

“I’m sorry, Michael!”

“Don’t worry about it,” I said, but knew it was a waste of words. She would worry about it. So would I.

As soon as the phone was in the cradle, the woman was back at my desk.

“Good morning,” she said, trying to be cheery but failing badly.

“How are you?” I asked, while staring at the front door.

“Fine, I want you to do a story about me,” the woman said. “One of those features things.”

I needed stories to fill the paper so I showed some interest.

“What’s newsworthy about you?”

That took her by surprise. I guess she thought just her presence was newsworthy enough.

“What do you mean?” she fired back.

“What is there to write about?’

“Oh, I just moved back to Langford.”

I held out my hands. That didn’t interest me a great deal, and I doubted it would our readers either.

“My husband is putting in the hardware store out on the highway,” she added. “He will buy a lot of ads!”

She was getting more newsworthy all the time. We made an appointment for the following day and I sent her on her way.

Nancy snuck up behind me and put her hands over my eyes.

“Guess who?” she said.

Since she and I were the only people in the office, I took a wild guess and decided it was probably her.

“Uh, Nancy?” I said.

“How’d you know?” she asked.

“Lucky guess.”

She laughed, it almost sounded forced.

“I was wondering, do you have any plans for tonight?” Nancy asked.

“I have a city council meeting at six,” I answered, never more grateful for an event to cover.

“It’s actually a school board meeting at five thirty.”

“I’ll cover that. Why do you ask?”

She moved over to the side. I saw her look and knew this was not good.

“I wondered if you might want to come over for dinner and a movie?” Nancy asked. “I’ve got a DVD player!”

Yeah, and so did half the population. Alarm bells were going off. The inner me was issuing a warning. You did not date people who you worked with, especially when they were some fifteen years younger.

“I don’t think that would be a good idea,” I said.

She looked hurt, almost like tears were fixing to fall.

“Nobody would have to know,” she fired back.

“I’m not worried about anybody knowing. It would just be awkward.”

“Okay, but let me know if you change your mind,” she started walking away, then stopped and turned around. “I used to be a gymnast.”

That bothered me for a lot longer than it should. I settled back in and started writing stories, answering the phone and practically begging people to buy ads.

After a while, I was in a zone. I was writing about my father dying, the large story that I planned for the front page. I needed to get as much of the paper done today as possible since the funeral would be the following afternoon.

I finished the story on my father and the football game. I didn’t question the coaching or the ability of the players, just bragged about the good effort. That would sell more papers and right now, I needed to sell all the papers I could.

Nancy was a good camper. She had forgiven me for turning down her date and kept bringing me drinks and stuff to eat. I’d start to get hungry and food would appear in front of me. If I was thirsty, she would bring me something to drink.

She was also a hard worker. Teresa popped in and out several times. I could tell she was stressed about her breast enhancements. Hopefully, Teresa getting bigger breasts would not tempt Nancy to get some new ones. Her cups were already running over.

We got a lot done, which was a relief. Teresa turned in two stories that were pretty much fluff. I wished she could handle the story on the lady who visited earlier, but no, getting better breasts was more important than work. I’m sure her drunk of a husband would appreciate them.

I announced that it was time to call it a day just before five. Nancy said she had to wrap some stuff up and would close later. Teresa was already gone, probably at the nearest convenience store getting her pride and joy some beer.

“Call me if you get lonely or want to do something,” Nancy said.

I waved and headed out the door. It was almost time for the school board meeting, but first I wanted to run by mom’s house to get my camera and check on her.

Sandy was not at her house, I just happened to notice while driving past, a lot slower than was normal. There weren’t any cars in the driveway at Mom’s house, so I was glad none of Mom’s cronies were visiting. They liked to dispense advice a lot more than I cared to hear it.

I parked and walked up on the porch. There was laughter coming from inside. That was a little strange. I opened the door and walked in. All I could see was Mom’s back. She was sitting on the floor and appeared to be playing with something.

As I started to ask her what was going on, she turned around to look at me. A head looked around from behind my mother.

It was M.J. He was dressed in jeans, a tee-shirt and a Bob the Builder hat. M.J. was smiling, until he saw me.

“Hello,” I said and walked inside. They were in the family room, playing with little cars. Mom seemed happy to be playing with M.J.

“Good evening, son!” she said, with way too much enthusiasm.

I tried to pet M.J. on the head while walking past. He dodged away.

“Hello, M.J.,” I offered.

He waved and went back to playing with his cars. I remembered playing cars with my mother in the same spot on the carpet.

I walked into the kitchen to get something to drink. Mom got her creaky old bones up from the hard floor and followed me. I was exploring the refrigerator when she arrived.

“What’s he doing here?” I whispered.

“I don’t know,” Mom answered. “April came by about thirty minutes ago and asked if I would watch him.”

“How long?” I got a Diet Dr Pepper and some leftover ham.

Mom looked down at the floor and around the kitchen before glancing back at me.

“Apparently a long time,” she answered.

“Why do you say that?” I asked, and took a big bite out of the ham. Apparently, it was too big of a bite.

“Michael!” she said, then got back to the important stuff. “She dropped off all his clothes and toys.”

“I didn’t think that was supposed to happen until later this week.”

“It wasn’t,” she said. “Something’s wrong with her, she acted really strange.”

“She probably had to go to the hospital early.”

“I don’t think so, Michael. April had her car loaded up like she was leaving.”

M.J. burst through the door into the kitchen, saw we were there and acted relieved, for a second.

“I miss my Mommy!” he said, and started to cry. “I wanna see her!”

The boy and I had that in common. I wanted to see her also, to find out what was happening, but had a bad feeling that wasn’t going to happen.

Chapter 42