The Baby Chronicles. Judy Baer

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ thought about it for a moment before answering. Then he glanced at me hopefully. “Then I won’t have to worry about guys flocking to our door asking her out on dates before she’s ready.”

      Before she’s thirty, you mean.

      Chapter Three

      Wednesday, March 3

      To whom it may concern:

      To the owner of the leaking Ziploc bag that at one time may have contained a sandwich and some baby carrots that now houses fuzzy mold and oozing liquid, please remove your biological warfare project from our refrigerator. There are some in this office who want to keep their lunches cold and do not want vomitous yellow gunk dripping onto our yogurt cups. If this is not done immediately, fingerprints will be lifted from the plastic bag and the guilty party will be fined large amounts of money and forced to eat the contents of the baggie.

      The Management

      War has broken out in the Innova lunchroom, and it isn’t pretty. We’ve been eyeing each other with suspicion, covertly watching our once-trusted friends and coworkers stash their lunches in the break-room refrigerator to identify consistent patterns of behavior. Betty is my top suspect, for leaving a Tupperware container of cottage cheese and pineapple on the counter until the cheese aged into a yellowed slime the texture of yak milk.

      Harry usually picks up something at the deli, so I assume the half-eaten pastrami on rye that’s fossilizing on the bottom shelf is his. Bryan is hard to pin down because he brings his lunch in everything from old bread bags to cast-off foam containers. Mitzi carries her meal in a tidy Gucci purse she’s turned into a lunch box. I suspect that beneath that designer exterior lurks a plebian plastic bag carrying the hard-boiled eggs that she intentionally leaves in the fridge for weeks at a time to torment the rest of us. Old eggs give off a distinctive rotten, sulfurous smell that is easily recognized but requires a full-scale refrigerator cleaning to eradicate.

      And that’s part of the problem. Nobody wants to be in charge of cleanup, so we’ve allowed a zoo of microscopic bacteria, fuzz, mold and moss to build and flourish. Our lunchroom is not called the Bacteria Buffet for nothing.

      I’ve ordered Mitzi to do the dirty deed, but she says it isn’t in her job description, that removing toxic waste is the task of a professional. Her only concession to helping out with this office problem was to send her cleaning lady in one day to do the job—and then submitting her bill to me for payment.

      Mitzi breezed into the break room on strappy sandals that matched her pink designer suit, put her Gucci lunch box on the table, opened it and took out a delicate tray of sushi. She batted her fake eyelashes at me and put the sushi in the refrigerator. Then she took a bottle of designer water out of the bag and tripped off to her desk to file her nails, read the paper and make sure she and her husband had secured tickets for the symphony—all of which, she insists, are somewhere in the “unwritten” agreement concerning her job description.

      Mitzi missed her calling. I could see her as an executive for a company run by Barbie and her stiff-legged dolly friends. Barbie has a Dream House. If she ever develops a Dream Office, Mitzi is the one for her. Work would involve picking out professional-looking suits in all shades of pink, refurnishing rooms with expensive furniture and groaning over long days at the office when one should really be at the beach.

      “There you are, Whitney. I’ve been looking for you. Where have you been?” Harry had a stack of contracts in his arm and a frazzled look on his face.

      “Standing here. You’ve gone by the door three times and looked in.”

      “Nonsense. You must have been hiding.”

      I didn’t bother to point out that hiding from the boss during office hours is frowned upon, even here at Innova where the expression “running a loose ship” was probably invented. Besides, I know from experience that around here, you can run but you can’t hide.

      “Take a look at these, decide what we should do about them, report back to me and we’ll determine our next step.” He thrust the papers at me as if they were the proverbial hot potato. All Harry really wants to do is design software. Things written on paper bore him, even contracts that bring in paying customers.

      He spun on his heel to leave, then paused and turned back. He’s very graceful for a short man who’s carrying more weight that he should around his middle.

      “Whitney, I don’t say it much, but I really do appreciate what you do around here. Bringing you into the Innova family was the smartest thing I ever did.”

      I blinked, dumbfounded. “Why, Harry, thank you…”

      “And get those things back to me ASAP and tell Mitzi to get the lipstick off her teeth on her own time.” The touchy-feely moment was over, and he was gone.

      The Innova family. I like the sound of that. Dysfunctional as it is, I’m glad I’m part of it, too. Then the word family brought me back to the conversation Chase and I had had last night, the one about starting our own little family.

      How much, really, had the idea of having a child right now been sparked by the thought of sharing those special months with Kim? We shop together, we eat together, we pray together. Maybe being queasy and nauseous together would be fun, too.

      After work I stopped at Norah’s Ark, my favorite pet shop, to get food for Mr. Tibble and Scram. Norah was behind the counter, having a deep conversation with a turtle. Her dark, curly hair was fastened into a ponytail that erupted from the top of her head. She has remarkable gray-green eyes, full of humor and compassion and a ready grin.

      “Hi, Whitney, how’s Mr. Tibble? What’s Scram up to? Oh, yes, and Chase?” Norah always asks about the pets first.

      After leaving the pet store, I picked up a pizza and arrived at home by six-fifteen. Chase was already there. Odd. He usually doesn’t arrive until seven or after.

      At least I thought he was home. His car was in the garage, but the house was dark. I found him in the darkened living room, lying on the couch with a pillow over his eyes. Mr. Tibble was sleeping on his chest, his head nuzzled beneath my husband’s chin. Scram, who’s learned his place in Mr. Tibble’s pecking order—below the bottom—was sleeping across one of Chase’s ankles.

      When Mr. Tibble heard me come in, he turned his head and sleepily kneaded his claws into Chase’s chest. That started a chain reaction. Chase jumped at the needle-sharp nail pricks, Mr. Tibble yowled and hung on by his claws to Chase’s shirt. Scram, jettisoned off Chase’s leg and sure he must be somehow the cause of all this commotion, headed for the hills, or, in this case, the back of my favorite chair.

      “I usually don’t see this much excitement when I walk into a room,” I commented, first prying Mr. Tibble off Chase and then rubbing the broad part of Chase’s chest where the cat had been hanging.

      “So much for a nap. I think I may be going into cardiac arrest. Could you do CPR on me, please?” Smile lines crinkled around his beautiful blue eyes, and I felt my own heart do a little lurch.

      “Oh, I’ll bet you say that to all the girls.” I put my arms around him and kissed his lips. “What are you doing home? I didn’t expect you until seven.”

      “Tired, that’s all. I got done early today and decided to sneak out.” He brushed a strand of hair from my eyes. “Maybe I’m getting old СКАЧАТЬ