Scot on the Rocks

“I was just about to say the same thing to you.”

27

The following Monday, I marched right into Jack’s office and brought him the research I’d done for him over the weekend. Well, more like fell right into Jack’s office. I was still figuring out how to negotiate the crutches and the plastic boot I was condemned to wear on my ankle. (“Oh, my God, that thing is hideous, are you really going to wear that out of the house?” was Vanessa’s reaction.) I wore my hair down for our big meeting and I kept catching pieces of it against the crutches underneath my armpit. Not the image I was going for.

“Thanks,” he said, barely looking up from his computer. I’d worked hard on the research — I didn’t want to give Jack any more reason to hate me than he already had — and I’d also drafted a comprehensive memorandum outlining the case law for him and highlighting future points for argument, which he hadn’t even asked me to do. I was hoping to get more mileage out of my weekend’s work than a mere “thanks.”

“Is there anything else you need me to do?” I asked, hoping he would say yes and extend the conversation a bit further.

“Nope,” Jack said, eyes still locked on the computer, “you’re all set. Thanks.”

“Tell me the truth,” I said, trying to be cute, “is that really your fantasy football league that you’re working so hard on?”

“No,” he said, turning his screen to face me, “it’s the survey for the Healthy Foods case.”

“Oh,” I said, still standing in front of his desk. In a false-advertising lawsuit like the Healthy Foods case, what must be proven is actual confusion — that consumers were actually confused into buying your product because of your false advertising. Jack was crafting a survey that would then be conducted out in the public to prove that consumers weren’t actually confused into buying Healthy Foods coffee because they thought it was healthy. A case can be won or lost on a survey, a fact I knew acutely since Jack and I had drafted the winning survey on the last false advertising case we’d been on together. I couldn’t help but feel a slight pang of disappointment that he hadn’t wanted to work with me on the Healthy Foods survey.

“Don’t you have other work to do?” he said, turning his screen back to face him and beginning to type.

You’re losing him, I thought. Get his interest back.

“Yes,” I said, hopping over to his visitor’s chair and plopping myself down, crutches strategically placed against his desk for maximum sympathy, “but I think I’d rather consult the Magic 8-Ball to find out if we’re going to win our case. Magic 8-Ball,” I said, shaking it slowly in a manner that I was hoping would look seductive, “are we going to win the Healthy Foods case?”

Jack grabbed the Magic 8-Ball from my hands and threw it into his garbage can. I felt my body involuntarily jerk back into my chair from the sheer force that he had used to throw it down. I was certain that its contents were in the bottom of his garbage can, blue liquid oozing out everywhere.

“Stop,” he said. “Enough. If you want me to find you some work to do, I can find you some work to do.”

“For you?” I said, perking up. “Okay.”

“No,” he said, looking me dead in the eye. “Not for me.”

“But we always work together,” I said.

“Well, Tina and I worked really well together at the client’s office last Friday, so I think I’ll be working with her a lot more on a forward-going basis. You’re getting too senior to be doing all of your work for me anyway.”

“Oh,” I said, immediately feeling the urge to cry. “Of course.” I grabbed for my crutches and tried to steady myself as I stood. I pushed back the visitor’s chair with one crutch and hopped around to face Jack’s door. Jack sat at his desk staring at me.

“Anyway,” he said once I’d almost made it to the door. “I’m sure you’ll be too busy planning your wedding to Douglas to work on my cases anyway.”

“My wedding? I’m not marrying Douglas,” I said, turning to him quickly on my good leg and almost losing my footing. I hadn’t heard Douglas’s name in a week. He hadn’t even contacted me in as long despite his declaration of love and marriage proposal at Trip’s wedding, and I had a visceral reaction to hearing it spoken. “Where did you hear that?”

“Vanessa told me that he proposed to you in L.A. after I left the wedding,” he said.

“But did she also tell you that I said no? That I stormed out on him?”

“Yeah, she told me that part,” he said, looking me dead in the eye. “But I know you, Brooke, and you’ll be back for him. I know what you like. What’s important to you. You’ll be planning that wedding to Douglas in no time.”

“No, I won’t,” I said. “I won’t, Jack.”

“You know what, Brooke,” Jack said, shaking his head, “it doesn’t even matter anymore.”

“But I love you,” I blurted out. I didn’t mean to say it — and certainly not like that — but the words just fell out of my mouth.

Jack stared at me in silence for a moment before looking back to his computer. “I wish I could believe you,” he said as he began to type. Partners sometimes did this charming little trick when you were excused from their offices. They would bark out their orders to you, and before you could say a word, they would then pick up the telephone or begin to type or start reviewing a file without even telling you the meeting was over. Jack and I used to joke around about how unbelievably rude this practice was and report back to each other whenever a partner did it to us, putting them on a mental list of people we never wanted to work for again. I stood in Jack’s doorway for a moment, staring at him, certain he would look back up at me and want to talk, but he kept on typing furiously.

“It’s true,” I said. Jack still didn’t look up from his computer. I continued to ramble on anyway. “When you rejected me after that South Carolina trip, I couldn’t stand it. I made up all of these excuses about why you weren’t right for me, and it kept me away from you for all of these years. But now —”

“I rejected you?” Jack said. “You were the one who rejected me. I was ready to leave the firm for you — something I’d worked my ass off for — and you barely gave it a day’s thought.”

“I did give it a day’s thought,” I said. “In fact, it was the only thing I thought about until Danielle Lewis took me for lunch and threatened me with my job. I got scared and I ran away from you. I was wrong. I should have fought for you. But all of that doesn’t matter anymore. What matters is now. What about now? Isn’t now what’s important?”

“There is no now,” he said. “You’re going to get back with Douglas.”

“I’m not back with Douglas. I will never get back together with Douglas. I’m sorry about everything that’s happened. I want to make everything all right now. I want to be with you. I love you.” I began to hop back into his office, certain that he would jump up from his desk and hold me to him and tell me that he loved me, too, but he didn’t even get up from his chair.

“Really?” he asked.

“Really,” I said, my voice almost a whisper.

“See, Brooke,” Jack said, pointing to his computer, “that’s why I’m so good at crafting surveys. I’m very good at knowing that just because a product’s label says one thing to you with a big beautiful smile, you’d have to be a fool to believe it.”

I stood there frozen. I couldn’t believe that Jack didn’t believe me, didn’t forgive me, didn’t want to be with me. There was nothing left to say. As I turned around and hobbled out of his office, I could feel his eyes burning into my back.

I hopped back to my office, slammed the door shut and slumped down into my chair. I set my crutches down, leaning them on my desk next to me, but before I could stop them, they slid down and fell to the ground. I considered picking them back up for a moment, but the thought of reaching over and then getting back up