also, there’s a dead bird on our balcony.”
“I guess Audrey’s sticky things didn’t work?” he asks.
“They might work. If I actually put them up.” I scowl and he chuckles. I set a mental reminder to put the window clings up tonight after work. Then I let out three sneezes in quick succession, which is when I realize how sore my throat is.
Ryan glances at me, fridge door open and orange juice in hand. “You getting sick?”
“Allergies.” I stand to wring the brackish coffee-drenched cloth out in the sink.
He juggles the orange juice with the carton of eggs, and nudges the door closed with his hip. Placing the eggs on the counter beside the stove, he lays a hand against my forehead. “Meg, you’re sick,” he says. Then he kisses me on the lips.
“Ryan!” I shove him weakly with my free elbow. “Now you’re going to get sick.”
“I thought it was allergies?” He smirks, grabs a frying pan from the rack and turns on the stove, the gas flame coming to life with a whoosh. “Maybe you should take the day off. Drink hot water and lemon. Doctor’s orders.” He cracks an egg into the frying pan one-handed, then tosses the shell into the sink before repeating the steps with a second egg, leaving a thick trail of egg white along the countertop as he does. Ryan is a decent cook, but has never learned to clean up as he goes, and somehow I’ve ended up doing most of both. I sigh, run the dishcloth across the counter to wipe up the egg white and then turn on the water and nudge the broken shells into the disposal’s whirling blades until they’re pulverized.
While I refill the coffee machine I fantasize about crawling back into bed, indulging in a day of on-demand movies and copious amounts of tea with honey, and then I picture my calendar. I could do the agreements and marketing plans for my new listings from bed, but everything else—including the four showings I have today—requires me to be dressed and present.
“I wish,” I say. “But houses can’t stage or show themselves.”
“Good thing, otherwise you’d be out of a job,” Ryan says, generously pouring hot sauce on top of his eggs. “What about pushing your showings back a bit? Go in a little late.”
I take a sip of orange juice and wince, the acidity burning my throat. “I told Tom I’d help him out this morning. He’s got an agents’ open house at the McLaren property in a couple of weeks. Remember, I told you about that listing? The one with the tennis court and pool?”
Ryan nods, swallows a bite of egg. “Right. With the nude statues in the garden?”
“The very one.” The home’s owner, a widow with a lot of money and specific tastes, had a thing for bronze statues of naked women in a variety of bizarre poses—Tom and I were currently debating whether to have the statues removed and put in storage before the open house. “Anyway, it’s a major listing, and he’s promised me a chunk if I help him out.”
“How big a chunk?” Ryan asks.
I set my index finger and thumb about an inch apart and squint at the space between them. Ryan pushes back from the table, wiping his face with a napkin. “That hardly seems worth getting out of bed for even when you’re well.”
A prickle of irritation moves through me. I know I’m being oversensitive, and Ryan simply voiced a fact. I’ll probably do most of the work, and Tom will take most of the credit—and the commission. Tom’s reliance on me—calling me on vacation, on my days off, much too late in the evening, and me always taking his calls—has been somewhat of a sore spot between me and Ryan, especially lately as my own client list has grown.
However, as I’ve often reminded Ryan, I owe Tom—so I take his calls when they come in, and help him when he asks. When I tried to reenter the workforce after a decade home with Audrey, my skills stale and as outdated as the plastic-cased Bondi blue iMac I used to craft my resume, Tom and his brokerage gave me a chance when no one else would. I started as his administrative assistant, then got my real estate license, and over the last six years I’ve proven I’m great at selling houses—I’m now in the top one percent of Realtors at the brokerage. But as Ryan has reminded me more than once, I didn’t have to go back to work, his salary plenty to keep us more than comfortable. In some ways it seems like he still sees my career as a hobby, which is incredibly frustrating.
My phone pings at me, and I glance at the screen. Pull dinner out of freezer. “Do you want chicken Marbella or tilapia tacos for dinner?” I ask Ryan. My best friend, Julie Larrington, and I do batch cooking once a month, which makes life a lot easier when I have to work late, like I will be doing tonight. “Or turkey and white bean chili? I have one more of those, I think.” My arms reach deep to the back of the freezer, and I shiver with the cold blast of air on my bare arms.
“Chicken gets my vote.” He swallows the last of his vitamins before grabbing his travel mug to wash it out. “But remember I’m in that conference all day? I won’t be home until eight, eight-thirty.” Ryan’s a radiologist at Massachusetts Memorial Hospital, which is only fifteen minutes from the house. He loves his job, especially the flexibility, but has grown weary of the hospital’s inefficiencies. Today’s conference, for example, is focused on “nurturing internal relationships,” which Ryan says could be covered in sixty minutes but will take ten excruciating hours instead.
There’s a sigh from the kitchen doorway. Our fifteen-going-on-twenty-five-year-old daughter leans against the door with her backpack slung over one shoulder and an amused look on her face—which has more makeup on it than we agreed was appropriate for school. But I think back to my dad’s advice when she was born. “Margaret, not everything should be a battle. Ask yourself, ‘Is this the hill I want to die on?’ I promise you not every hill is battle-worthy.” I decide the makeup hill is not the one I want to die on today.
I miss having my dad nearby, but he and his arthritis escaped Massachusetts’s frigid winters a few years ago for a condo in sunshiny Florida that he shares with a Boston Terrier named Polly, and his second wife, a retired accountant named Carla.
Audrey pushes off the doorframe and walks into the kitchen, the rubber soles of her moccasin shoes squeaking against the hardwood. “Did you say Rabbit Rabbit Rabbit this morning?” Her English class recently did a mythology and folklore segment, where she learned the superstition of repeating the word rabbit on the first day of each month, for good luck.
“No, I did not.” I wish it were that easy to ensure luck, but I keep my pessimism to myself.
“You look, like, really bad,” Audrey says, glancing at me from the fridge.
“Thanks a lot.” Then I see the clock on the microwave and curse under my breath. “Did you eat breakfast?” I ask Audrey, as I gather my phone, wallet and a wad of tissues, stuffing them into my purse. I have exactly fifteen minutes to get ready before I have to take her to school, which means dry shampoo and a ponytail.
“Like, an hour ago. I packed you a lunch, too, because you weren’t up yet.” She grabs my reusable lunch bag out of the fridge, and I see the sticky note on it reading, Mom.
I’m so grateful she’s not the kind of kid I have to drag out of bed in the morning and nag constantly to clean her room, eat properly, do her homework. Audrey has a 4.2 GPA, is the assistant editor of Merritt High’s student newspaper, and volunteers with her friend Kendall at the assisted living center, helping run the senior center’s art program. Sometimes I think she’s better at being an adult than I am. While I rely on multiple calendars and far too many reminders that beep and trill and interrupt me on a daily basis to keep on top of our lives, Audrey seems able to do it with a natural ease.
“Thank you,” I say, kissing her on top of her head and setting the bag beside my purse. “I’ll be right down. Just need ten minutes. Twelve, tops.” I start out of the kitchen, then turn back. “Chicken okay for you tonight, Aud?”
“I don’t eat chicken, Mom,” she says, sitting down now that she knows we’re not leaving right away.
I