After peeing, she looked at herself more. What an asshole, but what to do?
Jillian deleted the voicemails and took another two Tylenol T3s with codeine and decided that the courthouse must have had the wrong number, because she really didn’t have the money and wouldn’t have the money for another two weeks, at which time she would call the courthouse herself because she was a responsible person.
More dinner? She could make Randy another dinner? A very delicious dinner? She got the impression that something was on the horizon.
At five o’clock, Elena came to pick up Adam and stopped to talk to Barb a second. They talked about how weird Adam was while Adam crawled around on the ground, apparently pretending to be a dog. Barb told Elena about the sister dog thing.
“Ugh,” said Elena, throwing her hands up.
“Adam!” shouted Barb. He trotted up to the women.
“Time to go home, sweetie,” said Elena.
• • •
It was around five, so Megan would be home any second. What a nasty, burdensome feeling. Can you believe it, his hands were sweaty, even though he’d given himself an extension for thinking about this whole thing. “This whole thing.” He felt gross.
The downstairs door slammed and he saved his project. Megan walked in with groceries. “Hey, cutie,” she said.
• • •
Elena thought about how Jillian would probably fuck something up this weekend at the church eighties party. She thought about it in detail, watching Adam fidget in her peripheral vision. She pulled into a parking spot on the street outside of Jillian’s apartment building, pumping herself up for the possibility that Jillian would not be home yet. She and Adam would wait inside or maybe she and Adam would take the dog for a walk and she would leave Jillian a note. “You were not here when I got here, and your dog needed out so we took her out.” She would not call the dog by its name in the note, she decided. She walked up to the building with the weird, kicking, spasmodic child’s limp, damp hand in hers and she wanted to bear down on his pudgy little baby fingers to teach them how to firm up like a normal person’s hands.
But Jillian was in, sitting on the couch with that dog. Adam let go of her hand and took a few steps to the side. The house smelled like piss.
“Hey, I just got back from walking the dog, great timing,” Jillian said.
Yeah, right.
“You might crack a window in here, the weather’s fine,” said Elena.
“Oh, I know. I just felt a little chilly on the walk home.”
“It’s not chilly,” said Elena.
“Hmm,” said Jillian.
“So, any word on when you’re getting your car back? We could really use your help driving this weekend. We need a runner.”
“Well, I spoke with the court today and they said my court date is in two weeks, then I should be able to straighten all of this up and get my car back.”
“Oh, so you won’t have it for this weekend?”
“Nope, it’s going to be another two weeks. Hey, Elena, thank you so much for helping me with Adam. You really don’t know how much of a blessing you’ve been to me.”
Elena humphed. “It’s the least I can do to help.”
“It’s really a prayer answered.”
“Well, just try to get your car back as soon as possible, that’ll be thanks enough for me.”
“Will do, Miss Elena.”
• • •
Randy smiled about the groceries, and tried not to let on that he’d been thinking about breaking up with her all day.
• • •
Jillian made a shopping list of all the things she needed and then made herself a budget. She needed more toys and, eventually, a dog walker for Crispy and also a crate so she wouldn’t have to keep shutting her in the bathroom, and also a proper bed for her. The total for this was about four hundred dollars, which was twice as much as she owed for the fine. Would she have to pay to go to court? Not if she didn’t need a lawyer. So no lawyer. And getting the car out, she’d heard, would be about a hundred dollars. But Crispy was a priority. She rearranged her list in order of priorities, toys and the crate came first, then the car business, and then a dog walker.
Maybe she’d be able to get her car back in a month? Ugh. Maybe she could get an extension.
5
The weekend came and Randy thought, We should stay in, but wasn’t entirely comfortable alone with Megan since his understanding that things were not going well between them, so he invited their friend David over. This will make her comfortable, he thought. Just two people, where she lives, a low-pressure drinking thing.
David came over and Megan drank two beers quickly.
“How’ve you guys been?” David asked.
“Eh, fine, I guess,” said Megan.
“Pretty good,” said Randy. He explained his project for Kelly’s store and said he was getting paid for it, and he and David talked about formats for a while, while Megan smoked cigarettes. She tried to interject, but her comments were flaccid. When she spoke, David glanced at her and raised his eyebrows and nodded and then turned back to Randy.
“Where are you working now?” asked Randy.
“Oh, I’m working for Albert.”
“Cool, man, I know Albert.”
“Yeah, I took a class with him and we really hit it off. It was one of those weird experiences when you have a class and you and the prof both kind of look at each other one day and realize ‘We’re probably going to be friends.’”
“Ha ha,” said Randy. Randy picked up his beer.
“Yeah, that happened to me all the time,” said Megan.
“Really?” said David.
Megan shook her head and said she was just kidding.
“Well, Albert sent me an email a few weeks ago and said ‘Man, I really liked your writing in class, and I’m looking for
