THE NOTE
Like
the first Saturday of every month, Roger Whitney left the neighborhood
barbershop to meet his men’s group. He sported the same haircut he had for the
past forty years. “If it works, then why change?” he said to the mirror when he
spread Brylcream with a comb.
As
Roger sat drinking coffee at the Uptown Bakery waiting for his friends, the
same buddies he’d had most of his life, he wondered whom his wife had invited
for dinner. Her list of friends was long, and changed, as often as the seasons.
The truth was that Marjorie liked variety. She spent most of her time and their
money redoing and then redoing again. He didn’t think she wore the same clothes
twice, or at least he couldn’t tell if she did, and her hair had been so many
colors he wasn’t sure what was natural.
One day a couple of years ago he came
home from a business trip and drove right past their house. A new porch, paint
job and landscape made it look so different he didn’t recognize his own home.
After coffee and discussions with
the group, Roger went to the hardware store, another Saturday ritual. This time
he brought his general-purpose hammer with him to get the handle replaced. It
would be ready in an hour. He glanced in store windows as he walked along the
street and tried to understand why people, especially Marjorie, had to transform
the world on a regular basis.
He almost passed up the car
forgetting his truck was in the shop and that he was driving Marjorie’s BMW,
something he didn’t like to do. He was comfortable with his Ford pickup, not
hot-rodding around in a convertible, a red one, at that.
He fumbled for the remote control
starter device, aggravated that the new car didn’t even use keys. It was then
he noticed a paper stuck under the windshield wipers. “Damn advertisement,” he
said, carefully removing it. He frowned thinking about the people who place flyers
under blades and how they should know this causes pressure on the rubber,
enough so that they no longer work properly and had to be replaced. It was a
conspiracy. The flyer was probably put there by the auto supply store.
However, when he looked closer, he
realized the flyer was not a flyer. It was a neatly folded handwritten note. He
slid back into the driver’s seat, put on his reading glasses and opened it. “Dearest one. I looked for you when I saw
your car, but couldn’t find you. I was hoping to steal a kiss. I have a last
minute appointment and can’t meet you at our regular place. I’ll be crazy until
I see you! All my love, XX”
Roger read the note again. Then,
again. And again. “Who would leave me a note like this?” He took off his
glasses and rubbed his eyes. The
handwriting was neat. No misspelled words. There was no doubt it was from a
lover and he didn’t have one, other than Marjorie.
He frowned as another thought entered his
mind. “This is Marjorie’s car. What if the note wasn’t meant for me?" He hit the steering wheel
with his fists.
He got out of the car searching for
a suspicious looking man. “Yes,” he said to himself. “This note was meant for
Marjorie and is from her lover!” He
almost cried. His hands shook so much he dropped the starter gadget and had to
crawl under the car to find it.
“How could she? But then again, why
wouldn’t she?” Roger knew he was set in his ways, but it had never occurred to him
his wife would toss him out of her life like she did everything else.
He thought about last spring when Marjorie’s
best friend was Lydia Marshall, a woman who taught some kind of jewelry class.
She was at their home every morning. When he left for work the two women would
be talking, laughing and drinking coffee while they set boxes full of beads on
the dining table. One day the project was gone. Marjorie explained she was
bored with jewelry making. Two days later a woman named Betty or Beatrice or
something was there with a yoga mat. Marjorie was dressed in stretchy work out
gear, was playing an Eastern sounding CD ready to meditate. About a month ago
the yoga teacher was out and Marjorie was off on a new bicycle with Judith
somebody or other.
“What if I’m like these friends?
Obsolete. Out of date. Not the flavor of the month,” he continued talking to
himself. He was certain. She had found
somebody else. He had warnings from her all along. From the beginning of their
marriage she told him he was stodgy, too dependable, inflexible. He should have
seen it coming.
He backed the car out of the space looking
around for XX, whoever he was. He turned into traffic and drove away. Fast. Then
faster. And faster. He went through town and continued past the city limits. He
lost track of time and space. His brain was a land mine exploding with
memories.
He thought of his first day at work
many years ago when he fell in love at first sight. Marjorie had handed him a
clipboard. “Welcome to Brazos Engineering,” she said with a smile as beautiful
as a toothpaste ad. “Please fill out these forms.” He watched as she worked,
sorting files, tapping her pen on the desk, answering the phone, crossing and
uncrossing her legs, all the while turning in her swivel chair. When her blouse fell open exposing significant
cleavage, he had a difficult time concentrating on the paperwork. He knew
someone like him, a certified nerd that carried a slide rule in his pocket,
didn’t stand a chance with a dish like the boss’s sexy assistant.
Yesterday should have alerted him
that their marriage was in deep trouble. Marjorie used a screwdriver and left
it on the kitchen drain board instead of returning it to the outlined slot on
the tool board in his workshop. He made a big deal of it.
She shouted at him. “You are a
fuddy-duddy, always having to keep things in exactly the same place.”
He had been firm. “You are messy,
leave stuff all over instead of doing the simple and practical task of keeping
things in order.”
“Damn it to hell!” He was jolted
into back to reality when he crashed, hitting a barrier that stretched across a
dirt road. A stunned Roger turned off the engine, slipped out the door, zigzagging
to the front of the car to assess the damage. He leaned against the bashed
bumper. He was sure the front end would have to be replaced. Looking around at
the surrounding forest, he realized he had no idea where he was and no inkling
how long he’d been there. He sunk to the ground, devoured by more memories.
He heard about Marjorie’s interest
in ballroom dancing from another employee. His dancing was mediocre at best, so
he went to the local Arthur Murray Studio and took a few lessons. As he waited
by her desk for the boss, he mentioned how he liked to dance. The next evening
he had his first date with Marjorie.
Four months after their first date
Marjorie decided the two of them should take up tennis. She signed them up for
lessons and bought rackets for their new endeavor. When he inquired about dancing
she said she wanted to concentrate on tennis instead. He wanted to concentrate
on Marjorie and did just that for the next twenty-four years.
He shook his head, struggled up and untangled
the car from the barrier. Thank goodness the damaged auto ran. He followed the
road until it hit the main highway. When he looked at the dashboard clock he
realized it had been hours since he found the note. The hammer would be ready.
He headed back to town.
When they’d been dating for a year
she decided a trip to Las Vegas would be fun. The trip ended with them in a
wedding chapel wearing matching gold bands.
He loved Marjorie, never looked at
another woman. He couldn’t imagine kissing anyone else. How could she? His mouth was dry. His heart beat
so fast he thought he would have a heart attack. “When I find out who ‘XX’ is,
I’ll ……. “
He found a parking space, the same
one he’d had that morning. “I’ll get the damned hammer and then go home and confront
Marjorie.” Instead, he went to the barbershop.
“What are you doing back, Roger?
Forget something?”
“Nope. George, can you do anything
different with my hair?”
“Huh? You’ve had the same cut all
your life; I think.”
“Yeah. I want something new,
different.”
Within thirty minutes Roger was
transformed. His style was a duplicate of Brad Pitt’s on the cover of People
Magazine and his color was bleached from brown to blond.
He went in the shoe store and a few
minutes later walked out wearing orange Nike’ Airs. Seeing his image reflected
in the store’s window, the new Roger swaggered back to the car ready to
challenge Marjorie.
“Hey! Mister!” A young woman ran after him. Her
uniform had Marilyn’s Beauty Emporium embossed above the pocket. “Wait! Please
wait.”
Roger stopped. “Do you mean me?”
Maybe the hair was attracting young women. He couldn’t know for sure. He
stopped at his car and realized it wasn’t his car but an identical car without the bashed grill. A handsome man
got out and joined the woman. As Roger digested the situation, the woman
continued to talk.
“I’m SO glad you came back to town.
You were here this morning, right?”
“Yes.”
“I wasn’t sure because of the smashed
front end of your car.”
“Yeah,” he grimaced.
“See, this morning I saw your car
and I thought it was my boyfriend’s. You didn’t by chance find a note stuck
under your wipers?”
Roger nodded his head. “Yeah. I
did.”
“See, Charlie, I did leave you a
message.” The woman spoke to her boyfriend.
Roger grabbed hold of the car door
to steady himself and took a deep breath. He reached into his pocket and handed
the folded paper to the couple.
As they walked away, Roger stared wide-eyed,
thinking about the note. He looked down at the bright orange shoes and ran his
hands through his short, spiky blonde hair. He laughed out loud, the first time
in a very long time.
Roger made one more trip down the
sidewalk and bought a dozen long stemmed red roses. Then he got into the
wrecked BMW and drove home to Marjorie.
