Page 60 of Boyfriend
I grab the phone. The text is from the airline, reminding me to check in for my flight back to Burlington tomorrow.
Well, crap. I feel a wave of loneliness so powerful it threatens to sweep me under. So I tap Carly's name and shoot her a quick message. Your shoes are cute but they hate me now. I can’t wait to give them back.
Then I realize Carly is at work right now, slinging wings and beer without me. And I have a really unhealthy shimmy of longing for the Biscuit, of all places.
Get a grip, Abbi. There’s no need to get sentimental for my crappy job. Besides, it’s not like I’d see Weston tonight. Table seventeen won’t be there. They’re on their way to Indiana.
This lonely, needy girl shouldn’t text him, right? Weston is not my emotional support animal. I’m a friend with benefits. My role is to be a good time. A fun time.
But it's fun to wish someone a good game, right? Right. Whee! Fun!
Yup, I’m losing my mind. But I text him anyway. Hi Westie! Have a great weekend. Make Notre Dame cry! Then I add a GIF of a West Highland terrier barking.
He answers me a minute later. Thanks, Abbster! How'd it go today?
Okay. Maybe. We'll see. Then my thumbs just tap out another text. I can't help myself. Can I call you?
Give me an hour, he replies. I’ll call you.
It's a very long hour. When I get up to turn on the hotel TV, I discover that the thing doesn’t work. When I hit the power button, it lights up before immediately fading back to black.
I suppose I could complain. They might move me to a different room. But that's a lot of hassle. The thing is bolted to the wall, because there's no room for a piece of furniture to support it.
Once when I was a little kid, our TV started flickering right as Mom and I set ourselves up to watch a movie together. “Oh no, Mama!” I’d panicked, thinking movie night was off.
“Hell no,” my mom had said, getting up off the couch, crossing to that TV and delivering a sharp smack to its hulking rear.
And I swear the picture snapped right into view. Like it was terrified to disobey her. Then we'd cheered like crazy people.
I miss her so much. It doesn’t help to think about that right now, though, when I’m already throwing myself a pity party in a soulless hotel between job interviews. I can’t succumb to that kind of magical thinking. If I could hug her just one more time…
My phone lights up with an incoming video chat from Weston, and I grab it like the lifeline that it is. I accept the call, and his handsome face comes into view. He’s grinning at me. “Abbi! What’s shakin’?”
“Nothing much.” I drink in his smile and his eyes that crinkle in the corners when he’s joking around. And the tightness inside my chest begins to lift. “What’s it like flying with the hockey team?”
“Noisy,” he says. “And when somebody says something asinine, you’re embarrassed because he’s wearing the same damn jacket you are.”
“That’s irritating,” I agree. “All the asinine things people blamed me for today were things I said myself.”
He winces. “Interviews went that well, huh?”
“It’s just hard to stand out in a crowd. Apparently the investment bank takes a tenth of the people who apply. I thought if they were flying me here, that meant I had a chance.”
“You do have a chance,” he points out.
“I guess.” But I realize now that I was unprepared. I thought terrific grades and a willingness to work hard were all that I needed to show. But I’d overheard some interviewees throwing around opinions about the GDP and the yield curve and equity derivatives. I know what all those things are, but I don’t have opinions about them.
I just didn’t understand how it all worked. And now I am blue.
“How about that other bank?” he asks.
“Oh, it was… interesting.” I picture the round-faced man who’d sat across from me at that other interview. “The guy kept staring at my chest, and it threw me off.”
Weston groans. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine,” I mumble. Because I hadn’t done that well otherwise. The man had asked me why I wanted to work in mortgage origination. You’d think I would have seen that one coming. But I’d gone blank for a second, as his eyes took another trip to the open button on my blouse.
The truth is that I don’t have strong feelings about mortgage origination, either. Everyone needs a home to live in, I’d said eventually. It seems like a compassionate kind of banking.
