The Juggling Act
The Juggling Act
The next day Ruth calls Stevie down to her office to do something she rarely does—apologize. She hadn’t meant to lash out at her like that. She’d been surprised and even impressed that Stevie hadn’t cried. If anything, she’d pushed back—respectfully, professionally. She’d actually behaved more professionally than Ruth had.
There’s a light rap on her door. “Ruth?” says Stevie. “You wanted to see me?”
She motions her inside, gestures to the seat opposite her desk. “I wanted to talk to you about yesterday’s meeting.” She’d like to come right out and say she’s sorry, but the words get stuck in her throat. Instead, she says something she’s often thought but has never verbalized. “You remind me a lot of myself when I was younger.”
“I do?”
She can’t tell if Stevie is flattered or offended. “My first job when I left Denver and came out here was at Paramount Pictures. I was a secretary.”
“That must have been exciting.”
“It was.” She reaches for a cigarette and lights it. “When I started I wasn’t great at my job,” she says, exhaling smoke from the corner of her mouth. “But I became great because, like you”—she points her hot ash Stevie’s way—“I worked harder than the other stenographers. I went into work every day thinking of ways to be more efficient. The bosses noticed what I was doing, and I went from typing scripts to working for some big directors, like Alexander Hall. You think I’m a tough boss?” Ruth laughs. “My point is that I wanted to be the best at my job. Right now, Charlotte is the best, but you’re going to surpass her one day. The main thing, if I can pass along some unsolicited advice, is that if you’re going to be successful at anything—I don’t care what it is—you have to learn how to bounce back from disappointments, rejections, false starts and even temporary failures. You have to find the strength to pick yourself up and keep going. When things go wrong, you need to change your plan, maybe change your approach, but don’t you dare ever give up.”
Ruth’s secretary buzzes in, her voice staticky. “I have Barbara on line three. She says it’s urgent.”
Ruth sighs. “I have to take this.” She pulls off her clip-on earring and reaches for the receiver. “Yes, Barbara?”
Stevie can hear Barbara’s voice through the phone as she shouts at her mother about not wanting to ride with the chauffeur…wanting to walk with her friends to the picnic…Stevie’s embarrassed to be overhearing this and makes a should-I-leave gesture, at which Ruth shakes her head. Trying to make herself invisible, Stevie looks around Ruth’s office, which can only be described as playful elegance. The antique desk works surprisingly well with the modern pink leather sofa.
“Barbara, we’ve been through this,” says Ruth, tapping her cigarette to the ashtray.
“Nobody’s going to kidnap me,” Barbara shouts back.
“That’s right, because you’re going to be safe in the car.” Ruth actually agrees that the driver is a bit extreme. It’s not like they’re the Lindberghs. But Elliot, the worrier, insists, so she insists.
“But I don’t want to be driven there.”
“Barbara, I’m not going to discuss this with you any longer.”
There’s a screech coming over the phone, loud enough to make Ruth squint and pull the receiver away from her ear.
Stevie diverts her attention to the family photographs on Ruth’s desk: framed pictures of the four of them. In one, they’re standing before a mountain; another has a waterfall in the background; another looks like one of those professional family portraits. Stevie thinks how lucky those kids are to be growing up in such a loving household, going on family vacations. The only thing close to a family vacation for Stevie was tagging along with her parents to the encyclopedia conventions in places like Lincoln, Nebraska, and Eugene, Oregon.
Stevie admires what Ruth has been able to do. She has an adoring husband, two beautiful children and a thriving career. Stevie’s mother could barely handle one kid, and any type of work or interests outside the house would be out of the question. Stevie is heartened by Ruth’s example, because one day she would love to have a husband and family of her own, but not at the cost of her career. Ruth is showing her that it is possible for a woman to juggle all three.
“I’m hanging up now, Barbara. This conversation is over.”
“But—”
“Goodbye, Barbara.”
After setting the receiver back in its cradle, she says, “My daughter,” with an exasperated shrug. Clipping her earring back in place, she says, “I just wanted to let you know that I think you’re going to do very well here.”
“Thank you, I’m trying.”
“I know you are.” She smiles, grinding out her cigarette. “How are the wedding accessories coming?”
“They’ll be ready in time for the meeting.”
“I have no doubt.”
And that is as close as Ruth can get to apologizing.
—
Later that week, Stevie and Charlotte present the wedding set accessories—a bouquet, blue garter, pearl necklace, little white gloves and white shoes. Ruth seems genuinely pleased. It’s as if the previous meeting never happened.
Now it’s five o’clock and Stevie is exhausted. She grabs her pocketbook from her bottom desk drawer, says a quick good night to Mia, Charlotte and Patsy, waving to Twist and Frankie before heading down the hallway, past the turnstile and out to the parking lot.
It’s especially hot, even for August, and her old clunker has been poaching in the sun all day. The pavement is giving off a wavy mirage-like haze and the leather seat sears her bare arms and the backs of her legs. The steering wheel is too hot to grip. She cranks down the window, and when she turns the ignition, nothing. She tries again and again, her foot pumping the gas pedal, all to no avail. The last thing she needs is car trouble, especially since she’s recently replaced the battery. She’s thinking she’s going to have to call for a tow truck when Jack wanders over, and the sight of him evokes a smile. It’s involuntary and already out there. He’s seen it, and she’s annoyed that he has this effect on her.
“What’s the problem here, kiddo?”
“It’s dead.” She keeps her eyes straight ahead and sighs to indicate that no, she’s not happy to see him, not one little bit. She squeezes the scorching-hot steering wheel as if holding tight to that thought.
“Well, let’s have a look.”
She gets out of the car and he steps in. After trying the ignition, he releases the hood and lifts it up, his shirtsleeves rolled to his elbows. “Yep,” he says, nodding, “your spark plugs are shot.” He snoops around a bit more, tweaking this coil and that. “Your alternator’s about to go, too.”
“Shit.”
“Well, don’t worry. Easy fixes, kiddo. Very easy.”
“You know how to fix cars?”
“Please, I used to build missiles for a living.” He slams the hood closed. “Gotta tell you, though, this one really ain’t worth fixing. You need a new car.” Jack dusts his hands off. “Come with me.” He gestures toward his shiny black Alfa Romeo, parked next to Elliot’s Mercedes.
“Where are we going? What about my car?”
“Don’t ask so many questions. Just relax. Trust me.”
She half expects him to wink, but instead she’s the one who winks after she says, “Trust you? Yeah, about as much as I trust my car will ever start again.”
They end up at the Bozzani Volkswagen dealership on Sunset and Broadway.
“This is a crazy idea,” she says. “I can’t afford a new car and I can’t get a loan.” She’s already tried and was turned down. They said she needed a male cosigner, and Stevie’s too proud to ask her father for help. After supposedly wasting his money on design school, she’s reluctant to ask him for anything.
Jack cocks his head to the side and gives her a smile. “I can cosign for you.”
“I can’t let you do that. Besides”—she offers a coquettish shrug—“how do you know I’m good for it? I could skip out on my payments, and you’d be left with the loan.”
“I’ll take my chances.”
“You’re a gambling man, aren’t you?” she says, wondering why she’s giving him that same flirty smile she used to flash at Russell. “Seriously,” she says, reining herself back in, “why would you do this for me?”
“It’s not for you,” he says. “It’s for me. We have a lot of work to do on Barbie, and I can’t afford to have you stranded on the side of the road somewhere in a broken-down car, unable to get to work. C’mon, let’s just test-drive a few. Just for fun.”
And it is fun. They take out several models, going from the Beetle Convertible to the Beetle Sedan to the Sunroof Sedan, zipping around corners, racing alongside the streetcar tracks and whirling past City Hall. And after much protesting on her part, Jack cosigns the loan for Stevie’s cherry red convertible with the matching leatherette interior. She loves the new car smell, the radio and the whitewall tires.
When Jack presses the keys into her hand, she feels his fingers linger, her skin absorbing the gentle heat of his touch.
“I won’t sleep with you because of this,” she says.
“I don’t recall asking you to.”
Now she’s embarrassed, wishing she hadn’t been so presumptuous. “And you mean it?” she says, trying to recover. “There’s no strings attached?”
“Not even a thread.”