Track 5 Little Lies
Track 5
Little Lies
Maggie and Jason
Maggie woke up at dawn and changed six times before she and Jason started out on the two-hour drive to Gambier. In the end, she decided, it didn’t matter what she wore. She would not meet her mother on that day; Jason needed to vet her first. She would wait to spring this news on him until the last leg of the ride.
“J?” she said in a saccharine-coated plea as they exited I-71. “Can I ask you a favor?”
He looked at her quizzically. She had been staring out the window since they left Main Street, and conversation had been limited to a couple of yes and no answers and a grunt or two. Jason had let it slide. This could not be easy for her.
“Of course,” he answered, patting her knee.
“You may not like it. It’s possibly unethical.”
“Worse than when you made me steal two pieces of Bazooka Joe from the candy bins at the Popcorn Shop?”
She laughed. “Yes, worse than that.”
“Lay it on me.”
“I want you to meet Beatrix on your own. Maybe say you are thinking of applying for a job.”
“She’s in the English Department. I’m in Philosophy and Ethics. It makes no sense.”
She must have looked deflated because he reconsidered.
“She’s a Henry James expert, right? How about I say I’m writing a dissertation on ethical judgment through the lens of Henry James and would love to ask her some questions?”
“I have zero idea what that means, but it sounds perfect.”
“Perfectly unethical,” he grunted.
···
The Kenyon campus was small and easy to navigate. They had both been there once before, on a college counselor–led trip during the winter of their junior year of high school. All they remembered was the gorgeous new gym and how beautiful the lawns and halls looked in the snow. It wasn’t lost on either of them, as they thought about it now, that they may have walked right by Maggie’s birth mother.
“It looks different in the spring, doesn’t it?” Maggie remarked, trying to make normal conversation when she really felt like vomiting.
“Still so beautiful, though,” Jason responded.
She could picture him in this old-school/old-timey academic life, living in the bubble of a college campus, wearing vests, smoking a pipe, and making jokes in Latin. Case Western, with its modern buildings and abstract sculptures, had a much different vibe. Professors there commuted from all over the place, and its proximity to Cleveland gave it a more urban feel.
She stopped in front of a campus map, her eyes panning from the you are here mark to the academic buildings, searching for one named Waite House.
“It’s over there,” she said, pointing to the left before putting her hand to her stomach.
“What’s the matter?” Jason asked.
“My stomach hurts. Probably IBS rooted in generational trauma. All my Jewish friends in college had weak stomachs when they were nervous.”
“You’re nuts, you know that?” He wrapped his arms around her for a hug. This time, she took the comfort. She needed it.
They made their way to the English Quad, where Waite House and Beatrix Silver’s office were located. Before pulling open the heavy wooden door, Jason paused.
“Are you ready?”
“Not at all. I think I should wait out here.”
“Really?”
“Yes. You know me better than anyone. Just go in there and figure out if I would want this woman in my life.”
She held up her mood ring; it was black. He laughed.
“I need a little more than that.”
“If you meet her and she sucks, nothing lost, no drama! I’m doing so well right now. I just got that business improvement loan. I’m coming to terms with losing my parents, a little bit at least. We are engaged to be engaged.”
“Though we haven’t told anyone,” Jason pointed out. “If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it…”
Maggie smiled. He may be the most patient man in all of Ohio, but even Maggie was not sure why she still wanted their quasi-engagement to remain quasi.
“I know. I think I’ve been waiting for this. Like you said, I need to know where I come from before I decide where I’m going.”
“OK, then, I’m heading in.”
He ruffled her hair and motioned to a bench where she could plant herself.
···
While it was true that Jason was particularly inept at lying, he wasn’t a bad actor. When he and Maggie had auditioned for Romeo and Juliet in high school, he got Romeo, and she got the fourth handmaiden.
He stood outside of the door marked beatrix silver , fluttered his lips like he learned in drama club, and got into character. One more flutter, and he rapped his knuckles on the door.
“Come in!” a gravelly baritone voice bellowed, leaving Jason to wonder if Maggie’s mom had a two-pack-a-day habit. That wouldn’t bode well for anyone.
A towering man in a bow tie rose from behind the desk to greet him.
Jason looked down from the desk placard that read beatrix silver to the man behind the desk and back again. The man laughed and reached out his hand.
“Dave Weinstein. My office is being painted; you’re looking for Professor Silver, I presume?”
“I am.”
Jason looked around the small office, taking it in. At Case, some professors went all out personalizing their studies, filling their bookshelves and walls with photographs, important works, and memorabilia, while some didn’t reveal a clue as to who they were. Beatrix was somewhere in the middle. Her walls held her diploma, a couple of awards, and a few black-and-white photos. Her shelves were, unsurprisingly, filled with volumes and volumes of literature. A wedding photo sat on the corner of her desk. It looked recent. The wall to his left was covered in cork and filled with fliers and events, both past and future.
“Do you have an appointment?”
“No, no,” he improvised, “I’m an old student. Just stopping in to say hello.”
“Oh, that’s a shame. You just missed her. She turned in her final grades and she’s heading east for a wedding, I believe.” As he said it, he motioned to the bulletin board.
Jason noticed what looked like a wedding invitation. He inched toward it to get a better look.
“Would you like to leave a note?” the man asked.
“Um, I’ll be in the area again in the fall. I’ll stop back then.”
“I’m afraid that won’t work either. Professor Silver is traveling abroad in the fall to England. She’s chairing the Kenyon-Exeter program for the year. Lucky gal!”
“Yes, very.”
“Did you go?”
“I didn’t.”
“Too bad. You missed a great opportunity.”
It was clearly time to leave, but he needed a better look at that invitation.
“On second thought, I’ll write a note,” Jason blurted out, reaching for a pen before purposefully flinging the whole cup of them off the desk. “Sorry, sorry.”
Startled, the man bent to collect the scattered pens. With one quick swoop of the hand, while the professor was playing Pick-Up Sticks, Jason swiped the invitation from the bulletin board and shoved it in his pocket. He was amazed by how quickly he went from liar to thief.
“I’ll just email her,” he flip-flopped.
And back to liar.
Maybe they would hold up a bank on the way home, profit from his crooked turn.
“As you wish,” the man responded, adding, “Have a good summer.”
“You too,” Jason called back to him, halfway out the door.