Jennifer Johnson Is Sick of Being Married Read online

  When he doesn’t answer, I look over and he lets out a huge snore.

  He’s unconscious. Deeply asleep and blissfully gone . . .

  Once again without me.

  3

  Queen of Keller’s

  The next morning I take Ace to the vet, Doc Hodge. An excellent vet with a personality akin to irritated oatmeal. He’s boring, but he gets cranky if you don’t do things right. Mother Keller took her beloved Pomeranian to him and Doc Hodge kept that awful little creature alive much, much, much longer than it ever should have lived. A large woman in a bubblegum-pink smock leads us down to an examination room.

  Ace is not happy. He’s been highly suspicious of this situation from the get-go and now he whimpers pitifully, locking his legs up so I have to carry him. “Sorry about all this darn mess,” the woman says. “Got a buncha construction going on this week. Expanding the physiotherapy room.” She leaves us alone in the room and a construction worker wearing a safety-orange jumpsuit pops his head in.

  “Oh,” he says. “You in here?”

  I look around and sigh. “Apparently.”

  “Mind if I do some work real quick?”

  “Where?”

  “Ceiling.”

  “Why?”

  “Pipes.”

  “Oh.”

  He comes in clattering a long aluminum ladder behind him and nearly takes my head off swinging it around. Ace squirms as the guy sets up the ladder. I realize he’s actually kind of cute, in a rough Steve McQueen way. His stitched name tag says NICK. He climbs up the ladder and starts monkeying with the ceiling tiles while we sit there for ten hours or so. I get bored. “So you’re in construction?” I ask him. His head is stuck up in the ceiling tiles.

  “Nope.”

  “An electrician?”

  “Nope.”

  “Well, you’re not a plumber.”

  “Why am I not a plumber?”

  “No plumber would wear moccasins.”

  “Maybe I’m a poor plumber.”

  “No such thing, unless you’re a plumbing social worker. Out there helping PVC pipes get into low-income housing, finding jobs for unemployed faucets. Trying to keep caulk guns off the streets.”

  “Funny lady,” he says flatly.

  “Oh, I can go on.”

  “I have no doubt.”

  Ace whines and Nick looks over his shoulder. “Doesn’t like the vet much, huh.”

  “He’s never been before. I smuggled him here from the Caribbean.”

  “Wasn’t having a good time down there?”

  “Neither of us was.”

  “Yep.” He sighs. “Paradise can be hell.”

  “Where’re you from?”

  “You know, I always hated that question.”

  “Why, are you from Wisconsin?”

  “Wow. She’s mean too.”

  “I’m not really that mean.”

  “Too bad. You just got interesting.”

  “Really? Well, you’re lucky. I’m still waiting.”

  He snorts and shakes his head, grabbing a wrench from his belt. “Wisconsin’s not all bad. Wisconsin’s like Minnesota’s storage shed. It’s where we put all our messy, dirty, and dangerous crap. Like firework factories and cheese plants. The Wisconsin Dells too. Plus all our serial killers.”

  “I know.” I shake my head. “What’s with Wisconsin and serial killers?”

  “No idea. But if I lived in a storage shed, I might make butt-skin lamps too.”

  “What?”

  The door suddenly swings open and Doc Hodge walks in. Ace starts growling at him and pretty much keeps on growling the entire time we’re there. The doctor asks if I bought Ace from a breeder or a pet store and I say, “Yep! They were having a half-off sale.”

  Doc Hodge stares at me. He gives Ace a full examination and about an hour later, after multiple blood tests, fecal smears, and X-rays, he frowns at me. “So where did Ace come from?”

  “Where?” I look over quickly at Ace and Nick clears his throat.

  “I ask, Mrs. Keller, because Ace has some intestinal parasites normally found only in the subtropics.”

  “He isn’t sick, is he?”

  “Nothing too serious, it should respond to antibiotics, but if Ace came from a subtropical climate, he’ll need to be quarantined.”

  “Quarantined? No, no . . . he’s from here. He’s a rescue dog.”

  “A rescue dog from where?”

  My mind goes blank and the ladder guy clears his throat again. “Wisconsin! I rescued him from Wisconsin.”

  “Where in Wisconsin? We’ll need to get his paperwork.”

  “Oh. I just found him . . . down by the old . . . cheese mill.”

  The doctor looks at me. “The old cheese mill?”

  “Yep. Ace was just walking along, eating some cheese. He loves cheese.”

  “Cheese is very bad for dogs, Mrs. Keller.”

  “Nope. I don’t ever let him eat cheese.”

  “All right, well, we’ll have to do some more tests and I’d like to fit him for a prosthetic at some point, but for now I’m giving him an antibiotic for the parasites and antifungal drops for his ears. I’d like him back in two weeks.” Doc Hodge leaves and Nick, still up on his ladder, shakes his head and chuckles. “Lady,” he says, “you are the worst liar in the world.”

  “I know. Damn it! It was the cheese mill. Why did I say ‘cheese mill’?”

  The cheese mill fucked me up.

  Ace and I drive home, where he runs around the yard like a lunatic. He’s so happy to be away from pokey-proddy-pinchy Doc Hodge. He gallops down the dock, where Bi’ch is fishing with a chubby little Hmong boy, who says he’s her grandson.

  It turns out Bi’ch Fang lives in our guesthouse with her entire family, including her glittery sixteen-year-old granddaughter, Star Fan; her chubby fourteen-year-old grandson, Pho; and Pho’s eleven-month-old son, a little dumpling of a baby named Pac Man. Pac Man was conceived by Pho and his girlfriend at the Kenwood Rec Center in the handicapped bathroom stall. Anyone who thought they were too biologically young to conceive children . . . was corrected. Now the whole Fang Gang lives with us: Bi’ch, Star Fan, Pho, and Pac Man. Leave it to Mother Keller to find me a maid who’s ancient, can’t cook or clean, and comes with her own village. I decide to not freak out and instead focus on the afternoon, which is important.

  There’s a big board meeting this afternoon about Ed Keller’s retirement plans and who might succeed him as the new president. It could even be Brad. Imagine that! If you went back in time and told me I’d be married to the president of Keller’s someday . . . I’d think that was about as likely as my marrying the president of the United States. After the board meeting there’s a pep rally in the lobby. Ed wants me to be there because all Keller’s royalty should be. That’s what he said, a statement I found both bizarre and heartwarming. Imagine me as a queen.

  The Queen of Keller’s.

  I get ready quickly, throwing on my trusty black dress and my “no problem” black pumps, which I can walk a mile in and not get a blister. I know because I walked a mile in them once, when Christopher and I went to a club downtown and his car broke down on the way home. Christopher’s my best friend, my little gay bee who goes buzz-buzz-buzz all around me. He works at Keller’s Department Store, in visual display.

  He dresses the mannequins and does the store windows, and I’ll never understand why a bigger store hasn’t whisked him away yet. We’ve known each other since high school. Without him they would’ve found me hanging from the aluminum bleachers on the football field. The secret to surviving a religious high school or any war zone is to find your people. Even if it’s only one people.

  One is enough.

  I meet Christopher for lunch before the pep rally. He hasn’t seen me in weeks, not since the wedding, and the first thing he says to me isn’t “Hello” or “Welcome home” or “Gee, you look terrific!” It’s “Seriously, Jennifer? I thought we decided you weren’t wearing bla
ck anymore.”

  He hates it when I wear black, but I look good in black. Half my wardrobe is black. It’s the gold standard for girls with body issues. He says I’m just addicted to being boring.

  “So I don’t understand,” he says. “Brad’s parents just gave you a house?”

  “Yep! The house right next door. Hideous. Like a Ramada Inn crossed with a ski chalet.”

  “Still, it’s right on the water. Must’ve cost—”

  “Three point two million.” I nod.

  “Huh. A bargain! Still, how delightfully manipulative. So Disney evil queen. I love Mother Keller, she’s like a . . . Christian Cruella de Vil.”

  “It’s true.” I shrug. “You’ve always loved evil queens. Ever since your first boyfriend.”

  “Come on,” he says. “You have to admit, it’s the perfect trap. It’s a gift you can’t refuse, it makes them look ultra-generous, and Mother Keller gets to keep her baby Brad tied nice and tight to her apron strings.”

  “Christopher, please stop calling him a baby.”

  “Sorry! I calls ’em as I sees ’em.”

  I glumly sip my water.

  “So how was the honeymoon?” he asks me, taking a bite of scampi. “Was it filled with condoms and horses galloping down the beach?”

  “No. It was sponsored by a three-legged dog and Imodium A-D. I’m exhausted. The wedding was brutal, but the honeymoon was from hell.”

  “I’m not allowed to have a wedding.”

  “Consider yourself lucky.”

  “I consider myself discriminated against.”

  “Well, that too.”

  “Still, a girl can dream. The senate’s voting on the Family Equity Act soon.”

  “I forgot about that.”

  He sips his water. “I have our whole wedding completely planned out, just in case the bill passes. I want to be the first married gay bee in Minnesota.”

  “Does Jeremy?”

  Christopher shrugs. “Jeremy doesn’t care what party he goes to, as long as there’s dancing.”

  “It’s not a party . . . it’s a binding legal union.”

  “With a party at the end. Besides, marriage was meant for gays. The pageantry! The drama! The dresses! Why do you straighties even care about who gets to have one?”

  “It’s not that we want it, we just don’t want anyone else to have it. Are you registered?”

  “At Williams-Sonoma, Ralph Lauren, and Discount Sex Barn.”

  “Didn’t you register at Keller’s?”

  “Why? Do I want crappy wedding gifts?”

  “Don’t talk to me about crappy wedding gifts. We got some of the crappiest wedding presents ever given. Brad’s aunt gave us a basket of ceramic walnuts. What is someone thinking when they decide that of all the things in all the world . . . what you need is a basket of ceramic walnuts? Brad thought they were real. Nearly cracked a tooth. Then he set them out on the deck, hoping to piss off the squirrels.”

  “And the ceramic walnuts are officially . . . awesome.”

  “We got four fruit hammocks too. Heard of those? It’s a miniature hammock . . . for fruit.”

  “It’s also an uncomfortable sex act involving dental floss.”

  “Well, we own four fruit hammocks now, which require four handwritten thank-you notes. What am I supposed to say to these bastards who completely ignored my bridal registry and gave me something so stupid it shouldn’t even exist? I’m supposed to write them a thank-you note? When they’ve essentially slapped their dicks in my face . . . on my wedding day?”

  “Lovely image.”

  “What am I supposed to say? ‘Thanks for ignoring our gift registry and getting us something so stupid it makes me want to kill myself’? ‘We love weird fruit-containment systems, how did you know?’ ”

  After we finish lunch Christopher asks if this is what I’m wearing to the pep rally and I say, “Yes, Christopher, it is. I’m not Cher, I wasn’t planning a costume change.” He sighs and says all I do is hurt him.

  Then he leaves me to go buy hair-care products, which he has to do on the sly and then sneak them back home, where he transfers them into different bottles. His boyfriend, Jeremy, has his own product line, which he sells at his chic salon in Edina. Christopher hates the stuff, though, and only pretends to use it. That’s how I know they really love each other. Christopher transfers his shampoo so he won’t hurt Jeremy’s feelings . . . and Jeremy never lets on that he knows about it, just so he won’t hurt Christopher’s. They are definitely together forever.

  I walk through the skyway alone.

  I pass Frontier Travel, the wide glass windows filled with exotic travel posters and sleek white cruise ships on aquamarine water. I see my old pal Susan sitting behind her desk and I wave. “Hey, lady!” I say, popping my head in.

  “Hey, Jen! Come to accept one of my humble writing assignments? I need an article on Spam Jam in Austin.”

  “Really? Nobody’s snapped that up yet? A weeklong canned-meat festival?”

  “Come on, Jennifer. You have to start somewhere.”

  “Yes, but does it have to be covering Spam?”

  “No! I need loads of stories for the guidebooks. There’s the Bean Hole Festival in Pequot Lakes or the Eelpout Festival in Walker . . .”

  I arch an eyebrow at her. “What’s a . . . bean hole, exactly?”

  “You could even do something more edgy, like Gnosticon or Polka Fest!”

  “Tempting.”

  I politely decline her kind offer and promise to let her know if I change my mind. All the while I’m wildly thanking God that I was spared from a life as a writer. I can’t believe that once upon a time, I actually wanted to be a writer. A real one. I wanted to pen the next great American novel and break hearts with my searing insights and razor-sharp wit, but then there were bills to pay and rent to make and thousands of meaningless items to buy with high-penalty-interest-rate credit cards. No matter how much money I made, I needed more. I could hardly cover my expenses, let alone luxury items like unprocessed food or basic health insurance. So I took a job as a copywriter at Keller’s Department Store and there I honed my craft, weaving together the perfect ad campaigns for preteen bra sales and men’s incontinence underwear.

  The rest is . . . history.

  I pass the Cinnabon counter quickly, ignoring the sweet, cinnamon-scented air swirling around me. If I had a nickel for every calorie I consumed at that godforsaken counter, I could buy Keller’s Department Store myself.

  I nod at the girl behind the counter, who wears a red hat. She’s the seat of evil itself.

  The Cinnabon girl.

  “Hey, Satan,” I say.

  “Hey, haven’t seen you around for a while.”

  “I’ve been . . . away.”

  “Well, looks like you’re back.”

  A colorful poster catches my eye.

  JOIN THE

  CINNERS CLUB

  FOR CINNERS . . . JUST LIKE YOU

  “What’s that?” I ask.

  She says it’s an all-you-can-eat-Cinnabon club. You just pay one low annual fee and you can have as many Cinnabons as you want. They also deliver. My jaw drops.

  All-you-can-eat Cinnabons?

  I shudder at what I might look like if I had a membership. I’d become some blobby glutinous mass that oozed out everywhere. I’d look just like a Cinnabon. She tries to hand me a glossy pamphlet, but I don’t take it. “I’m doing a gluten-free thing these days,” I tell her. “And no sugar. I feel like a new person basically. I’m running marathons . . .”

  She just looks at me and holds up a key chain. “Every membership comes with a free scratch-n-sniff Cinnabon keychain. It smells like a real Cinnabon. It’s warm too. There’s a watch battery inside.”

  “That’s . . . that’s . . .” I’m too overwhelmed to speak. I pivot on my foot and march away.

  She’s the devil.

  I take a deep breath as I walk through the heavy glass doors of Keller’s Department Store. How stra
nge to be back, to walk through the doors as a Keller family member and not just a lowly copy girl in the marketing department. I try to maintain a semblance of dignity as I walk through the store. I walk in a stately manner, like Cleopatra balancing a book on her head.

  It’s still too early to go up to Brad’s office, so I sneak up to the marketing department, where I used to work. Where I spent untold hours writing mediocre crap, reworking old sale copy, recutting used radio scripts, refreshing stale slogans . . . or trying to, constantly resurrecting the same dead marketing ideas that were dead for a reason. God, I hated myself while I was doing that. I would’ve been better off selling makeup. At least I wouldn’t have had to watch my own hands butcher the English language so much.

  Walking back into my old office is icky, weird, and hot. Nothing’s changed. The ceilings are still too low, the carpet is still worn out, the heat’s still on too high, and the same torn motivational poster is still Scotch-taped to the break room door. Two little acorns rest on a bed of moss and it says: THINGS THAT ARE SMALL NOW CAN BECOME GREAT SOMEDAY. It might be more inspiring if the acorns didn’t look like small brown baby testicles.

  It’s the perfect time to look around; the whole department is at the weekly roundup meeting. I peek at them through the conference room’s glass window. I do not miss that meeting, which is run by Carl, who’s still wearing the same upsetting crotch-bulging khakis. I used to terrorize myself in meetings just to stay awake by imagining that for some post-apocalyptic reason, I had to have sex with Carl, because the fate of the planet depended on it.

  I see my soul-crushing cubicle, Old Ironsides, where I worked every day, underneath flickering fluorescent lights that eventually would induce seizures. I have no idea who sits in my cubicle now. Ted’s still at his old desk; his Star Wars action figures are positioned in some sort of group orgy. Ted was my fellow inmate, my friend, and my Bookmark Guy. The guy I always held a place for in my mind if nothing else worked out. He’s so nice . . . but he’s a redhead, and not in a good way. We both toiled together underneath the thumb of my old boss, Ashley. Ashley was shocked when I started dating Brad, more like horrified actually. She just couldn’t believe Brad Keller picked me. She certainly didn’t think it would last and told me so often. Now, here I am, Ashley, so suck it.