You’re Not Who I Think He Is
You’re Not Who I Think He Is
Some messes are spiritual, others administrative or legal. Some are best remedied with prayer, and others with a call to the fire department.
If Trinity was going to keep its miracle money maker of a show on the air, they would need to iron out a few new relationship kinks with their handsome lawyer, Micah Ware.
Trinity spilled out through the glass doors of the WWJD lobby, the bells above them clanging as if to wish them God speed and good luck.
Outside, Greater Napanee performed its wholesome daily opera.
The small-town traffic hummed and a pickup truck rumbled past with bales of hay stacked high and tight in a friendly nod to half of Rebekkah’s hair-don’t.
Trinity began to pound the pavement and the sidewalk under their feet radiated the day’s warmth.
People stepped out of their way, either through small town politeness or fright at seeing two men and a woman with a paper bag over her head jogging toward them.
They darted around the sidewalk displays of flower stands, tables of fruits and veggies, and bins of upright rakes and upside-down umbrellas unlikely to be used on such a glorious day.
“Are we gonna die?” Ronald asked, keeping pace and then falling behind when he needed to hurdle a fire hydrant when it was clear the three of them could not remain shoulder to shoulder to shoulder and pass the obstacle.
“I don’t think so?” Rebekkah ventured, speaking in a panting patter as she speed-walked with arms pumping with the graceful chugging motion of a train.
“We are probably not gonna die,” Japheth said, unbuttoning his topaz lamé blazer as he spun around and out of the way of a teen on a skateboard, using the sidewalk like a playground to practice ollies.
“Rino Ferrari is an imposing man. Can he come across as demanding or even a little scary when he’s making requests? Sure.”
“This is a mess! We have advertisers pulling out…” Rebekkah began.
“Rino Ferrari pushing in. I’m starting to sweat,” Japheth said, tugging at his collar.
“From the thought of Rino pushing in?” Ronald elbowed Japheth with a cheeky grin, unable to curtail a dreamy innuendo even with their lives in potential peril.
“No! Because Rebekkah is like an Olympian level speed walker. Even with that paper bag on her head. How can you even see where you’re going?” Japheth shouted at his friend who was weaving drunkenly on the sidewalk but more or less finding her way with startling accuracy.
“Can’t we just call Micah?!” Ronald complained, accelerating his trot to try and keep pace with Rebekkah.
“Oh yeah!” Japheth skidded to a stop, proudly producing his chunky Nokia. “I always forget I have this thing holstered to my belt.” He punched in the numbers and held it out between them. It rang and rang. “He’s still not picking up.”
“Must be with another client,” Rebekkah said.
“Or playing shinny,” Ronald offered generously.
“Doesn’t matter. Look!” Rebekkah said, stabbing a finger at a modest two-story home that had been converted to a business.
The eaves were buckled where they overhung the porch and the whole place would benefit from a little lipstick application to pretty up the pig.
“Weinus, Weinus & Ware LLC. We’re here, let’s just go in and ask the Canadian chambers to call Micah in the Manhattan office.
If they page him and say it’s an emergency, he’ll get off the ice. ”
Bells chimed as the door opened and Trinity stepped into the law office.
The aged wood floor groaned with the grievance of a centurion, shelves bowed under the weight of leather-bound books, and the faint smell of lavender signalled someone had recently aimed to disguise their humanity in the washroom.
A phone rang shrilly, like an accusation.
“Weinus, Weinus, and Ware. Have you had a slip-and-fall accident? No? Please hold,” the receptionist, Betty, said into the receiver, then set it down like a clattering teacup in its saucer when she looked up and saw Trinity.
She stood up like this might be a bank heist with her hands in the air.
Her reaction likely had more to do with the paper bag over Rebekkah’s head than the arresting good looks of Ronald and Japheth, but you could never be sure.
Realizing the bag was in fact distracting and perhaps disconcerting, Rebekkah reached up and pulled it off.
Betty took one look at Rebekkah and shrieked.
She then quickly composed herself, assembling her features into a reassuring smile.
She clicked toward them on high heels across the old floorboards.
She drank them in, one at a time with an assessing gaze, hair in a lacquered chignon, glasses on a rhinestone chain, lipstick the colour of pomegranates.
“Well, hello there! I’m Betty. How may I help you?
Parking tickets? Vandalism?” She turned to Rebekkah, “Did someone do that to your hair? Assault?”
“No, I mean yes. It’s intentional. I asked for it,” Rebekkah said, both hands flying protectively to her shear mistake.
“My dear, this is not your fault. No one asks to be assaulted,” the receptionist said, pen plucked from a pocket and poised to take notes. “Where did this happen?”
“At work,” Rebekkah said, mortified.
“Work-place harassment is one of our specialties, along with slip-and-fall accidents. Now, did you report this to someone in your HR department?”
“She was there,” Rebekkah said, pointing vaguely back toward the radio station. “She witnessed it.”
“This is good. Well, good for us, not for them. Tell me more,” Betty gasped, scandalized on principle. “Someone from your HR department witnessed the assault?”
“The haircut, yes. She said I looked like a Winter Wren. Like a mousy, brown blob,” Rebekkah confessed, “with a stubby tail.”
“But you sing like an angel!” Ronald added loyally.
“And you two? Did you witness it as well?” Betty’s eyes darted between Japheth and Ronald.
“Yes, we were both there. I wanted to warn her but there was just so much happening!” Japheth wailed, hands conducting a traumatic symphony as he unsuccessfully tried to paint the picture in the air with scissor strokes and hands clapped around Ronald’s eyes.
“They told us to keep our eyes closed, so I didn’t see much,” Ronald admitted with a shrug.
“I’m not a lawyer but I type up everything around here and it sounds to me like you have a solid case. Shall I open a discovery file?” Betty asked, already reaching for a manila folder.
“We’re already clients. Our entertainment attorney is…” Japheth began.
“Entertainment?” Betty echoed, intrigued.
“Yes, we host the Trinity Radio Hour on WWJD,” Rebekkah said, trying to stand where the fluorescent light might flatter her and create that illusion of being a Shiri Appleby look-a-like.
“I’ve heard you!” Betty said, delighted. “You’re good! Some provocative ideas but I think this town could use a little shaking up. So, your lawyer is Stanford Weinus?”
“No, we’re clients of Micah. We’re not sure if he’s a Weinus, Weinus or a Ware?” Japheth queried, glancing around the lobby as if their modelesque legal eagle might pop out from behind a filing cabinet at any moment.
“Micah? We don’t have a lawyer named Micah,” Betty gave a little shake of her head, smile faltering. Was this in fact a stick-up after all? Or a chuckleless gotcha set up by her humourless boss?
“Sorry, we should have explained,” Ronald offered, taking a step forward as the receptionist took a step back, “he works in the Manhattan office.”
“Manhattan office?” she repeated, as if tasting the words for the first time.
“Would you be able to call them for us please and see if they can get Micah on the line? It’s important.
Maybe even life or death,” Rebekkah whispered and the receptionist began to sweat.
She wasn’t sure anymore just whose life was on the line, and she certainly hoped it wasn’t hers.
Rebekkah winked at her through the two bangs that remained on her forehead and though it was meant as a sincere gesture of comfort, it registered as the unhinged tick of a person who had walked into the law office with a paper bag on their head.
Betty steeled her spine and wheeled back around her desk and sat down, efficiently spooling a piece of paper into her typewriter to take notes.
“My dear, I will do everything I can to bring a hard rain of justice down on the monster who assaulted your hair and called you a mousy, brown blob with a stubby tail. I’m on your side. ”
“Oh no! Those aren’t the monsters! Those are my co-workers. And we’re not sure if the other person is a monster actually. He may give us a Kia Rio,” Rebekkah clarified.
“Is he bribing you?” the receptionist asked, fingers dancing in anticipation of the answer and ready to strike.
“No, we won it,” Rebekkah said, shaking her head, which consequently shook her over-the-ear flap of hair.
“But we’re not sure if we actually get it,” Ronald added for further confusing context.
“Is this like an underground gambling ring? Do you have a gambling addiction? I’m not clear on who is bribing you…
and if the monster that may not be a monster is also the one who attacked you?
Or if that was your coworkers?” Betty asked and gracefully rested her chin on her fist, posed like a famous statue by Auguste Rodin.
“Were the disparaging comments from the HR department disparaging to you, or perhaps you didn’t realize they were disparaging?
And is this gambling ring happening during working hours or like on your lunch breaks?
Whether it’s happening on company premises or not will be an important point in our discovery. ”
Rebekkah walked up to the receptionist’s desk and placed her hands on the edge, leaning over in a way that was meant to convey comradery and candor but in fact held a hint of unintended menace. Betty leaned back as far as she could in her chair and bravely kept smiling.