“We want you, Ellen Peters,” Jim Brown announced.
“You’re kidding.”
Months had passed since her interview at the station and even though Brown warned her it might take a long time before they had an opening, she never thought Carter would agree to hire her.
“The job is here if you want it, but we need to know right away,” Brown told her.
She knew she had to give him an answer without a note of indecision in her voice, nothing that would warn him off.
“Give me twenty-four hours,” she said. “That’s all I’ll need.”
“No more than that, Ellen.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll get back to you. And, Jim?”
“Yes?”
“Thanks.”
She didn’t ask about money or who would pay for the move or the hours or days she would be working. They could talk about that later. What she needed to know now was how the man she loved was going to stop her from taking the job.
“I think you should take it,” he told her in the late afternoon quiet of the restaurant. “It would be good for you. It’s what you do.”
She nodded and then burst into tears.
“Come on,” he said as she wiped at the tears with the tiny cocktail napkin. “It’s not so far away. I’ll come see you. It’s where you should be, Ellen. You know that.”
As they left, she saw the seated women looking up at him and the waitresses turning to him, the tall, handsome man with a cowboy hat in his hand.
“I do love you,” he said on one of their last nights in the guesthouse bed. “You know that.”
She nodded in the darkness, her face wet with tears.
“But, we’ve only known each other a few months.”
“Six.”
“All right, six, but I’m not ready to offer you or anyone anything permanent. I’m not ready for that.”
And what about her? Where would she ever find another cowboy with a ranch and a cabin on a hill?
She didn’t cry that last morning, but it hurt when she left him leaning on Joan McBain’s fence. She knew he’d turn his attention to one of Joan McBain’s horses when her car was out of sight. He’d stand there another five or ten minutes before going to the house or the tack room or to talk to Juan Moya, Joan McBain’s man. And that, she thought, would be that.
It could have been the sportscaster’s story or the way she denied the city he loved to that San Francisco art gallery owner. It could have been her strong opinions or the voice that sometimes grew too loud. It could have been any of those things or anything else that made it so easy for Ronnie McBain to let her go and she couldn’t do a damn thing about it. He’d miss her, though. She knew that.
The first month they spoke twice a week, alternating calls.
“Love it here. Professional beyond belief,” she told him. “Miss you,” she would say.
“I miss you too,” he would answer.
“I love you, Ronnie,” she would say and hate the ring of childish pleading in her voice.
“I love you too,” he would say and she would go to bed aching for him and crying herself to sleep.
Finally, after one month, he told her.
“Ellen, I think we better stop talking for a while. This isn’t working.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s too hard. I didn’t think it was going to be this hard. We both have to get on with our lives.”
“If we could see each other, it would be okay,” she told him. “We need to see each other.”
“No, Ellen, I don’t think so. I think we need to stop this for a while.”
“Are you seeing someone else?” she demanded. “Is that it?”
He gave a tired laugh.
“No, Ellen, but if I want to, I will. I told you I wasn’t ready for anything permanent. You should be making a life for yourself out there, not waiting around for someone like me.”
“Ronnie, please, I think we need to see each other,” she pleaded.
“No. We have to stop talking for a while.”
“For how long?”
“Let it go for awhile, okay? I need some breathing space and so do you.”
She wouldn’t argue. She would play this thing like the non-pushy, non-liberated woman he wanted and she would wait. If he didn’t want her, it would be because there was something wrong with her, something she couldn’t hide and something she didn’t know how to change.
Months later she sent a note to Joan McBain. She wrote about the wonderful weather and how much she liked her job. She did not mention Ronnie. Eventually, she stopped crying at night.
*
Ellen did have another story about size. It was a better story, a sweeter one. Thinking about this story made her smile but she never told it. In a way, it was too sweet.
She had a crush on an editor at the Florida station. She blushed if they passed in the hall. If they accidentally touched, she jumped as though burned. Finally, he took her into an empty office and shut the door.
“Look,” he said roughly, “I’m queer. Do you understand?”
“Sure, I understand, but I don’t like that word,” she said, trying to hide the shock of his announcement.
“So, make it gay, but I am.”
They remained friends, sharing a beer or two in the hours after work.
“I have something I need to ask you,” he said on one of those nights. “It’s really bad,” he said. Beads of perspiration dotted his forehead.
“Look,” he fumbled for the next words. “I mean, how do women feel about a man’s size. You know, penis size?”
“What?”
“The size of his penis.” His face was red.
“I don’t know. Why are you asking?”
“Well, ah, this is really personal.” He reached for her hand.
“It’s that Chip’s is bigger than mine.” He whispered the words.
She knew his boyfriend and she didn’t like him.
“How much bigger?”
“Well, I mean, I am normal but he is much bigger.”
She gave a snort. “Unless he’s the size of an elephant, it doesn’t matter.”
He looked stunned.
“No, really,” she said. “Not to a
