3. Chapter 3
Chapter 3
It is a truth universally acknowledged that _____.
“Carl, did you hear that Mr. Bingley is coming to visit? The higher-ups tell me that he’ll actually rent a house in the area while we go through this restructuring.”
I paused. Was calling the house Netherfield too much? Just one more read-through, and then I’d hit Send. My fingers hovered over the mouse as I hunched forward and skimmed over the email open on my laptop for the sixth time.
“No, not a single word has been spoken about Mr. Bingley throughout the office,” said Carl, rolling his eyes.
“This is our big chance, Carl! He’ll need an executive assistant while he’s here. And who knows, maybe something else too,” Janice said with an exaggerated wink to the managing editor. “We have to make sure our copy girls meet him right away, before he has a chance to consider anyone from the administrative department.”
“Hold on. Let’s not embarrass ourselves. You know Elizabeth is the only one even remotely qualified for the position. The rest would rather be writing articles for Teen Vogue or TikTok or whatever teenagers read nowadays,” said Carl.
I looked away from the screen. “What do teenagers read? Is that sentence going to say more about my ignorance than Carl’s?” I asked aloud to my audience of no one, chewing on my lip. Shaking my head, I zeroed in on the draft again.
Janice feigned shock before giving up, knowing that wouldn’t work on Carl. His opinions of their staff were well known. She took a deep breath and tried to keep a level voice. “Carl, you know we have to try. Most of them will never get another opportunity like this. Can’t you at least try to arrange a casual drop-by when everyone’s in the office?”
Carl sighed. “I just don’t see the point. If you’re so hell-bent on having the girls meet him, email him yourself and ask him to come choose his assistant—or his bride—from our office.”
Janice was too angry to see the laughter and delight in Carl’s eyes. “Oh, why do you have to do this to me? Seriously. You have to be difficult. Always.”
Carl laughed. “And that’s why you love me, right?”
Janice decided she’d had enough and gave into her rather frequent urge to dramatically storm out of his office. He may be the boss, but she didn’t have to like it.
Unbeknownst to Janice and the department staff, Carl had already talked to Charles Bingley.
Back in the office, Janice was holding a meeting with the copywriters when Carl came in late. “So nice of you to join us,” Janice said with disdain.
“Well, I wouldn’t miss it. You know how I love your weekly meetings.”
“Rather somber meeting, thanks to you,” she grumbled. “I was just telling the ladies here that you’re not interested in helping them succeed. They might as well resign themselves to working the copy desks forever.”
“What’s wrong with working the copy desks? I love my job,” said Elizabeth.
Janice scowled. “Please. You can’t be serious. Don’t you want to move up in the world? Imagine the prestige and salary that you’d have if you were an assistant to—”
Carl interjected, “Have you all polished your resumes, girls? I’m sure Charles will be dying to see them.”
“Oh, as if it matters, because you know as well as I do that none of us will ever get an introduction, thanks to you!” Janice said, her voice rising. “We won’t be meeting with Charles Bingley after all, ladies. In fact, I am sick of talking about it. I’m sure he’s a jerk anyway—or worse, he probably has a girlfriend. I haven’t even met him, and I already dislike him.”
Carl stood up and walked toward the door. “Oh, that’s too bad. I wish you’d told me earlier.” When Janice didn’t reply, he continued casually, “We’ve been emailing for days now, and he’s going to come meet us as soon as he arrives. Well, it’s too late now. We’ll just have to grit our teeth and suffer through this visit until it’s over—”
I stopped reading, sitting up straight. This was ridiculous. It was only a first draft. And it was only Jack .
Before losing my nerve, I clicked the Send button. Releasing a long breath, I quickly sent a text asking Jack to check his email.
Hands shaking slightly, I closed my laptop and rose from my swivelly desk chair, whose black seat had once been plush and comfortable but had worn thin since I’d spent most of my waking hours in it. After an awkward stretch to loosen up my stiff lower half, I started wandering aimlessly around the one-bedroom apartment, which admittedly had little space for wandering. I loved the open concept, except when I didn’t: with my couch only a few steps from my work desk, it was difficult to observe any work/home life boundaries. I briefly considered folding the laundry gathering wrinkles in the basket near the couch or opening the stack of mail on the kitchen island that, along with the mismatched grey stools, doubled as a dining table—on the rare occasions I didn’t eat on the couch.
An impossibly long minute later, I found myself sitting in my worn desk chair with my laptop open, absently checking my email and social media and tapping my heel on the floor. Perhaps I should have just walked down the hall to his apartment and knocked on the door.
When Jack’s name flashed across the phone screen, I started, my heart racing as I swiped to answer the call. “Well?” I drew in a steadying breath after hearing his familiar, warm laugh.
“Well, hello to you too.”
“Come on,” I pleaded, “don’t keep me waiting. How bad is it?”
“Well, I guess we’re getting straight to it then, are we?” He chuckled.
“ Jack! ”
“Right, right. Well, I’m not sure where exactly to begin,” he said carefully.
I began pacing around the room. Suddenly I was relieved I hadn’t just walked down to his apartment. At least I could maintain a bit of dignity as I bit my lip to shreds.
“I mean, does it have potential? Absolutely, it does,” Jack said slowly. “I do have a few pieces of, well, constructive criticism.”
“Just say it.”
“All right. What’s up with the opening line?”
“Oh, you know, Pride and Prejudice spinoffs always start with something like that. It’s like a hook for the crazed Austen fanatics.”
“Oh, those fanatics,” Jack said, coughing to suppress a laugh. “You say that as though you’re not one of them.”
“Ha-ha. Point taken. I mean, fans like me. But I’m not as obsessed as the rest.” I could imagine his smirk in response, but being teased by Jack about my Jane Austen devotion didn’t bother me. I’d been an Austen fan for almost all of the fifteen years we’d been friends. “So, what else?”
“Well, where’s the distinguished Mr. Dah-cy ?” Jack asked, his voice deepening intentionally as he spoke the sacred name of my fictional true love.
“He hasn’t been introduced yet.” I sighed, slumping once again into my desk chair. “I’m not sure what to call him. I’m trying to keep the names faithful to the original, but Fitzwilliam? Most contemporary authors tend to change it to William or Will or Fitz—or even something totally different, like Mark in Bridget Jones’ Diary .”
“What’s wrong with Fitzwilliam?”
“Are you serious? You like it?”
“Are you serious?” Jack nearly choked over the words, unable to conceal his amusement. At my silence, he continued, “Well, no. I’m not a fan of the name. It makes him sound like—I don’t know—a weirdo, or worse.”
“ A weirdo ? So eloquent, coming from Jack Normandy, the esteemed writer,” I said with a teasing tone. “But I kind of like it. I mean, he is Mr. Darcy after all. I feel like I should be authentic and respect his first name at least.”
“Sure, if that’s important to you,” Jack conceded. I imagined him shrugging with a friendly tilt of the head, as he usually did when we disagreed about anything, big or small. “Other than that, I think the dialogue needs some work. A bit contrived, a little flat. You need a great deal more setting and scene details, that sort of thing. I didn’t really get any sense for the space they’re in, and there’s a risk of seeming like talking heads. The characters seem a little overdone to me, the syntax a bit, uh, simplistic.”
I groaned while slumping further in my chair. I ran my fingers through my wavy hair, its oily feel reminding me I’d forgotten, once again, to wash it after yesterday’s run. I shook my head briefly and inhaled deeply. “Jack, you’re my best friend, so please be honest when you answer this: Is there anything you did like about it?”
“Everything else. I liked everything else,” Jack said, his tone soothing now. “Seriously, Vivi, writing the first chapter is always the hardest part. Good for you.”
But two weeks later, I had written very little, already feeling stalled in my own novel because of the stalled progress in my real-life love story. I’d encountered Gregory only once since the office party, and his stiff nod to me (or maybe to the man walking behind me) in the Bolder office hallway hadn’t inspired me to write a sentence, much less a chapter. I needed chapters.
Inspiration arose one morning in the form of a dinner party invitation. Another work party? I initially groaned while dressing for my morning run. Normally I would immediately start devising excuses not to attend. But I wasn’t about to miss this party. Although the invitation was emailed by Brandon himself, Ellen had to be involved, given her rather obvious matchmaking agenda.
Lost in thought, I started when I heard a brief knock just before Jack opened the door and walked in. “Are you ready?”
“Almost.” I turned to the kitchen to retrieve my water bottle. When I pivoted back toward him, my intended greeting died on my lips upon noticing the dark circles under his normally bright blue eyes as he tried to yawn discreetly. His usually neatly parted brown hair was disheveled. His running pants and shirt hung on his lean frame, rumpled as though he’d slept in them. I tilted my head with concern. “Are you OK, Jack?”
He sighed deeply, studying a spot on the ceiling before turning tired eyes toward me. “Do I look that awful?”
“You could never look awful, just … you look a little tired,” I said, fastening my Garmin to my wrist and then holding it up to the window until the GPS signal finally appeared. “Up late on deadline on a Sunday night?”
“Yes,” he said.
I waited for him to explain, but he simply glanced down at his own watch and then back at the door.
If I didn’t know better, I’d say he was agitated, but that was incredibly unlike him. He must be working on a very important article. Despite his relatively short career thus far, Jack was a highly respected writer for Randall’s , that magazine of literary and cultural content rivaled only by The Atlantic . Most of the time, he was working on a highly relevant, extensively researched feature piece, and sometimes he was also writing a book simultaneously. But he was one of those rare individuals who maintained a good work/life balance with little effort. Well, most of the time. Apparently not today.
Today’s run, part of our current half-marathon training plan, was merely a four-miler, and the weather conditions were nearly ideal for running. Like every other season in Minneapolis, spring was rather unpredictable. It could be 80 degrees, or it could be well below zero with several feet of snow—the latter scenario being much more common, of course. But today, the first day of March, was only slightly cool, and most of the snow had melted the previous week, at least on the partially wooded bike trail where we often ran, just two blocks from our apartment building in the city.
About two miles in, Jack was still rather quiet and seemed distracted. Though awkward silences sometimes made me anxious, my easy friendship with him usually made for rather comfortable silences, ones I cherished, actually. Still, during a run, I much preferred chatting to avoid thinking about how many miles or minutes or even hours were remaining.
Hesitating a bit, I considered how to capture his attention. After a few more minutes of silent running, I broached the subject of the upcoming dinner party, to which Jack had also been invited.
“You actually don’t sound like you’re dreading it, Vivi,” he said, giving me a sideways glance and a brief half-smile as he unscrewed his water bottle cap, spilling some on his pants.
“Well …” I paused. “I guess I’m not.”
“Hmm.”
That’s it? I observed him as he closed his water bottle, seeming unaware of how much had splattered on his clothes. Being absent-minded was so unlike him. I expected more of a reaction than Hmm , but he only offered me a quick glance before staring at the ground again. He looked almost … forlorn. Something must truly be bothering him. Or I was hallucinating.
After nearly tripping over a large tree root across the path—shocking, as he was never clumsy—he suddenly lengthened his stride, pumping his arms considerably faster. “Let’s aim for a negative split today, Vivi.”
He knew how much I hated those, but I wasn’t about to protest now. “Oh, OK,” I said as talking became more difficult. Either he was attempting to avoid conversation by running at a faster pace, or he simply wanted to return home sooner for some unknown reason . Either possibility was disturbing.
It wasn’t in Jack’s nature, at least around me, to be distant or withdrawn or sullen. He was usually an open book—well, except when it came to his love life, where he was always very discreet. Once upon a time, I’d been annoyed by his unwillingness to share absolutely everything with me, even about his love life, as I did with him. However, I had eventually, grudgingly begun to accept that there was usually nothing to talk about anyway—he was too busy for a love life and had rarely, if ever, shown serious interest in someone. The latter was understandable, as his own mother had married for the third time when Jack was only six years old. Had that relationship actually lasted, perhaps he could have finally seen what a stable, loving relationship could look like, but like all the others, Toni’s third marriage had lasted only a matter of years. He rarely talked about it; I learned bits of their history from his sister, but naturally, his experience must have affected his own outlook on long-term relationships. Still, his reluctance to share that side of himself had irked me for many years. Eventually, I began to see his discretion as honorable and even wise—something to admire, especially since I could never quite manage that sort of discretion myself. Jack was nothing if not honorable.
And that’s why I knew he was dealing with something, or some one , but wasn’t likely to confide in me easily.
I gazed at the evening sun descending toward the horizon beyond my laptop screen. Living in a small apartment in a major city, I could find many things to complain about, but my view wasn’t one of them. Only recently I’d decided to move my desk in front of the window so I could actually enjoy the view. The window was small, and the drapes were a dull shade of light blue that, like the walls, I would never have chosen myself, but I had never given any serious thought to redecorating. Or even buying a comfortable new chair. It wasn’t that I couldn’t afford to put a little time or money into making my apartment more to my own tastes or even that I wouldn’t enjoy it—no, it was the sense that this place was only temporary. I wouldn’t live in a small apartment forever. I wouldn’t live alone forever. Right? So this was just a short-term thing. Except that it had been nearly five years and counting, and I was now in my 30s. I gazed up at the faded, dusty curtains and wondered to myself whether they were even blue originally. Surely they’d once had some luster.
My screen went dark, since I’d been zoning out for a while. Looking down at my screen, I scrolled around in the document and decided that this page was as good a stopping point as I was likely to find in this long slog of an edit.
Closing my laptop, I gazed again at the scene outdoors, a small, square park that was perfect for watching the sunset in the spring and even more perfect for admiring the blooming flowers in summer. And admire them I did; there was little I liked better than a floral scene, as long as I was not the one doing the painstaking work of gardening, of course. Jack was into gardening, but I had a brown thumb. Not for the first time, I fantasized about owning a large garden, a formal garden on a large estate perhaps, where I could take leisurely strolls among the neatly trimmed hedgerows with the scent of flowers, walking arm in arm with some faceless but surely handsome, well-dressed gentleman. Jeremy Northam, maybe. Gwyneth Paltrow’s Emma had much to criticize, but Northam was still my favorite Knightley.
Wrong Austen story.
I smiled, deciding it would be an Austen kind of night. I could text Jack and plead with him to watch Pride and Prejudice with me for the hundredth time, but something held me back. Given that he’d been uncharacteristically moody, he might not even want to come over.
But I might have just imagined it, and Austen can cheer anyone up, right? It was worth a try.
Viviana
P3
Jack
I hope you enjoyed your movie. Have you done any more writing?
Viviana
Um, does thinking about writing count?
Jack
Ha. Don’t eat all my rum raisin ice cream, OK?
Viviana
Don’t know if I can resist, Jack
Jack
Oh, all right, you can have a small taste.
Viviana
Gross.
Giggling, I set my phone back on the coffee table and resumed watching the movie, while my thoughts returned to Annie.
Is it really meddling if I’m helping someone find their true love?
No.
Well, maybe.
But I’d be steering her toward the right guy rather than my usual tactic of trying to drag her away from the wrong one .
In fact, all evidence suggested that Annie would not even need any steering. Surely my Jane was already falling for my Bingley without any meddling necessary.