Like a Boss - Annabelle Costa Page 0,77
were... well, I don’t want to think about that part. Sadie puts up a kettle of tea and she sits me down on her sofa while Melvin is in the bedroom putting the rest of his clothes on.
“We should double date,” Sadie says to me, as she settles down next to me on the couch. “You and Luke with me and Melvin.”
I laugh. “That’s a nice idea, but Luke and I broke up.”
Sadie looks heartbroken. “You didn’t! He was wonderful. How could you?”
“He wasn’t as wonderful as you think,” I say.
“Don’t tell me that,” Sadie says, patting her hair. “I met him and I know he’s a good boy.”
“You met him for five minutes.”
“That’s all it takes,” she insists. “I was a human resources director for forty years, and if there’s one thing I know, it’s how to judge a good egg.”
I had no idea that Sadie had a big career when she was younger. I can’t even imagine her wearing anything besides a housecoat, much less a suit. “You didn’t tell me you were a human resources director.”
“Well, what do you think!” Sadie shoots back indignantly. “That I spent my whole life sitting around the house dusting doilies?”
“I guess not,” I say. “But you’re wrong about Luke.”
“I’m not wrong,” she says firmly. “I could tell how crazy he was about you, and that he’d treat you right. Sometimes good people end up in bad situations. But deep down, he’s a good man. And you don’t want to let go of a good man. They’re hard to find.”
Somehow I can’t help but think about that story that Luke and I argued over in expository writing, Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man Is Hard to Find.” I always thought he was arguing with me to infuriate me, but it turned out that he was arguing with me because he was in love with me.
“Is there anything else wrong, Ellie?” Sadie asks me, peering at my face.
“No, nothing.” I can’t tell Sadie about my pregnancy. She is old-fashioned, and I’m sure she would tell me I can’t be a single mother. She will try to convince me even harder to get back with Luke.
“Let me grab the tea,” Sadie says. She jumps up off the couch, and I can’t help but hope I’m exactly like her when I’m that age. Burning hamantaschen, and knocking knees with a skinny old guy named Melvin. There are worse retirements.
Sadie returns with two piping hot cups. She passes one of them to me. I pick it up and blow on it, letting the heat soothe my nerves. I need this. I’m about to take a sip when Sadie adds, “I slipped in a little bourbon. I can tell you could use it.”
I’ve barely gotten a drop in my mouth, when I spit it out rather dramatically. Why would she do that? Why would she put alcohol in my drink? I can’t have any alcohol now!
Sadie raises her thin gray eyebrows at me. “Now that,” she says, “was very interesting.”
“Sadie...” I murmur, putting the cup of tea down on her coffee table.
“No explanation required,” she says. She picks up my cup of tea from the table. “I’ll go exchange this for a virgin tea because it’s clear that’s what you want.”
What I want. I have no idea what I want.
As Sadie clomps off to the kitchen in her slippers and housecoat, I can’t help but wonder how a little old lady like her got to be so smart.
Chapter 32
My ultrasound is Monday afternoon. I’ll be all alone. Well, I won’t be all alone. There will be an ultrasound tech there. And obviously, my fetus will be there. But there won’t be a father in the room. I’ve decided that much.
The funeral is in the morning, so I will have to hightail it when it’s done. It’s going to be a busy day. But obviously, I can’t leave Luke hanging with this funeral.
The death of Thomas Thayer is big news, which I realize after I see it on the local news. It’s big news at work too. Everyone is debating whether or not it’s a good thing that the elder Thayer died. It’s generally believed it’s a bad thing, not out of any respect for the old man’s life, but because Luke is known for being a thousand times worse than his father. It seems like more and more, I hear the word “monster” used to describe him. You can’t go on the internet without seeing it.
This is why