Only Uni Page 13

“I wasn’t flirting! Take that back.”

  “Will not.” She thrust out her neck and dropped the frying pan she’d been scouring.

  Maybe Trish needed to police them. “What grade are you guys in?”

  Two sets of nostrils flared at Trish. “Tenth.” Then the closer girl turned back to her friend. “I’m not going to take it back.”

  “What school?” Trish finished the stock pot and took up the girl’s discarded frying pan.

  “Belfrey. Who says I even want you to take it back?”

  “Do you guys drive yet?”

  “No. Are you saying you don’t want to be friends anymore?”

  “Got any boyfriends?” Trish started on the pile of cups and tableware in a dishpan.

  One girl turned to her. “Like it’s any of your business.” Her head wagged back and forth like a bobblehead doll.

  Immature little twit. Trish shrugged a shoulder. “I’m just curious.”

  “Well stay out of it.” The girl tossed her long dark hair in a spoiled gesture.

  “Guess you don’t want to know about the girl I saw Ryan talking to.” Trish finished the pan of utensils and tackled a stack of plates.

  Two wide eyes fastened onto her. “What?” “Who?”

  Trish assumed Ryan was the tall, lounging teen she’d spotted in the foyer in a waiter’s black and white. The only one not working. “A cute blonde girl. Gorgeous curls.” Never mind she was only about ten, with an obvious crush he was gently watering with his attention, while she tried to ditch the grandmother she’d walked in with.

  “Who is that?”

  “I don’t know any girls with curly blonde hair.”

  “Unless maybe Shana got a perm and didn’t tell anybody.”

  “I bet she would, she’s so sly. She’s always been in love with Ryan.”

  “Well, I’m done.” Trish rinsed her last plate and stared at the two girls, still stroking their sponges over their dishes.

  One of them scowled as she realized how bad they both looked with their unfinished dishes. “Here.” She shoved her glass bowl in Trish’s direction.

  Trish reached out for it without thinking, but then the girl deliberately dropped the bowl onto the floor. The crash echoed off the large stainless steel air vents over the nearby stove.

  Kameko bustled up and gave a long, drawn-out sigh. “So clumsy. Good thing the girls were almost done.”

  The two teenaged cats smirked.

  Kameko didn’t notice. She grabbed Trish’s arm. “Come, I have something else for you to do.”

  The two girls facetiously waggled their fingers at Trish as Kameko turned away. Trish bared her teeth at them. They jumped.

  Kameko tossed a command to the teens over her shoulder. “One of you clean up the glass.”

  Ha!

  Kameko set Trish to chopping onions. This was going to ruin her manicure. She’d even splurged and gotten three little crystals on each thumbnail this time.

  The onion skins were terribly slippery under the dull kitchen knife. She went slowly.

  A woman came and swiped Trish’s chopped onions into a bowl, then whisked back to the stove and threw them in a frying pan with a hiss. The peppery odor of fajitas filled the kitchen.

  “Faster!” Kameko roared in her ear. She chopped faster. The knife slipped. Red blossomed onto the cutting board.

  “Aaaiyeeeeee!” Trish dropped the knife with a clatter. She whirled as she jerked her hand toward her chest, splattering blood all around. A few drops melted into the chopped carrots on the cutting board of the woman next to her.

  The woman turned to Trish. “Are you okay? It doesn’t look too bad, but boy is that a gusher. I’ll get the first-aid kit.”

  Trish dealt with reagents all day, but not blood. Certainly never her blood. The room started to spin around her. Her forefinger throbbed, and a headache slammed into her forehead, pulsing with the rapid beat of her heart. She was going to bleed to death . . .

  “Let me see.” Kameko grabbed her hand, enveloping her finger in a huge dishcloth.

  She squeezed so tight, Trish expected her finger to pop off her knuckle. “Owowowow!”

  Kameko gave her a disgusted look from her dark eyes. “Hold still.” She smoothed her other hand over her straight dark hair, pulled painfully back from her temples into a colorful be-ribboned clip.

  “Um . . . Kameko?” One of the other women called out while peering into one of the nearby stand mixers. “This cookie dough looks strange.”

  Kameko bustled over, unfortunately still holding onto Trish’s finger so she had to stagger after her. “What’s wrong?”

  “Is it supposed to be this pink color?” The woman held up a glob of sugar cookie dough the color of a blush rose petal.

  Kameko frowned. “No.” Then she looked down at Trish’s captured finger.

  Trish peeked back at her onion chopping station and noted the blood splatter around the board. Including the stand mixer in its circumferential area.

  Kameko’s glare was fierce enough to bake the cookies without an oven. “Toss the batch.” She spoke to the woman but kept eye contact with Trish.

  The woman’s eyebrows wrinkled. “Why? What’s in it?”

  “Biohazard.” Trish piped up.

  Kameko growled.

  Trish shut up. She was only trying to help. “Biohazard” sounded much better than “blood.”

  “Oh, and the carrots probably got some, too.” She pointed with her free hand.

  Kameko rolled her eyes to the ceiling and said something in Japanese that Trish couldn’t quite catch. Then she yanked on Trish’s arm. “You are a menace to my kitchen.” She propelled her across the busy space, bouncing her off a few women working, and shoved her toward the door. “I will get you a Band-Aid, and then you will go home.”

  “But I came to help.” Trish almost swallowed her words as the woman pushed her toward the church office down the hall. “Are you sure this isn’t too serious? I might need stitches — ”

  “I’ll drive you to the ER myself if you will stop ruining the food.” Kameko fumbled with a set of keys to the office door.

  The background din from the social hall had always been a soft roar — probably due to all the elderly parishioners without hearing aids — but it suddenly rose to a football game-worthy ruckus. Kame-ko’s unibrow wrinkled as she turned toward the open social hall double doors. “What’s going on?”

  A teen serving girl came running out. “Mr. Carter was complaining.”

  “What?”

  “He’s okay. He bit down on this.” The girl held out her palm, where something tiny sparkled.

  Oh, a crystal. Kind of like the ones on her manicure —

  Correction — the ones missing from her manicure. From the scrape marks on her thumbnail polish, the onions and the knife probably had something to do with it.

  How — ? Oh. The onions the woman had dropped into the fajita pan.

  She cleared her throat. “Kameko?”

  “What?” Really, the woman didn’t have to snap at her.

  “You might want to check the fajitas . . .”

  FIFTEEN

  On Friday evening, Trish drove home, preparing herself for battle. Somehow the “helmet of salvation” described in the Bible seemed inappropriate to deal with a chain-smoking slob and her flea-infested, highly-allergenic furball.

  Aside from their tense phone conversations, face-to-face discussion with Marnie resulted in a limpid look and a dispassionate shrug, even when her cat had eaten Trish’s goldfish. She couldn’t understand where the cat kept all the hair it deposited; there was enough fur on the living room couch to clothe three cats and weave a rug.

  As a last straw, the entire apartment reeked of cigarettes. The next time the landlord came for his rent check or to deliver a package or to fix the garbage disposal (which still didn’t work), he would discover their secret and they’d be out on the street. Minus the move-in deposit.

  Where had her quiet, only slightly messy roo
mmate gone? Where had this stranger come from? She’d been hesitant to lay down any ultimatums because Marnie had been such a good roommate in months past, but lately . . .

  Her stomach had been upset all week because of this. She couldn’t take it anymore, although she had to be honest with herself that she appreciated the fact she was eating less because the stress had affected her appetite.

  Trish rattled the doorknob as she unlocked it and flicked open the door. A round grey puff on the couch jerked in surprise, then dropped down onto a pizza box, hopped over a dirty plate, slithered through a stack of magazines, leaped over a pile of laundry, and whizzed into Marnie’s open bedroom.

  “Marnie, we need to talk!” Trish’s voice cracked, spoiling her dramatic Xena: Warrior Princess pose.

  Marnie sauntered out of the bedroom. A cigarette stuck to her bottom lip and rained ashes on the carpet. “About what?”

  At the sight of her flaunting her ciggy, Trish shot a hand out to slap the door closed behind her. “Will you put that out?”

  She responded to Trish’s tirade with rolled eyes, pursed lips, and a snort of smoke from her nostrils. She turned back into her bedroom and returned sans cigarette.

  Trish took a deep breath, but inhaled a combination of acrid smoke and cat hair, and started coughing. At the kitchen sink, she fired water into a glass. “Marnie, that’s it.”

  After a fortifying gulp, Trish squared off in the living room. “Anyone who comes up here can smell the cigarette smoke. You have to stop it or find somewhere else to live.”

  She let loose a long-suffering sigh. “All right, I’ll smoke outside.”

  “You said that last time.”

  She gave her a narrowed What more do you want? look. “I promise this time, okay?”

  “And the cat has to go.” She’d been intending to threaten to give it away herself, but Marnie’s eyes shrank to little black beads, making Trish hesitate.

  Even her rounded cheeks looked sulky. “I’ve been keeping him in my room.”

  “No you haven’t. He’s been shedding on the couch.”

  “It’s not bothering your allergies anymore.”

  Trish clenched her teeth and counted to ten. Don’t get into it. Just lay down the law. She enunciated each word as if she were crunching glass. “The — cat — has — to — go — tomorrow.”

  Then quiet, insolent Marnie exploded into a barrage of Spanish. The peppery words flew at Trish’s face like a flock of birds, startling and flustering her. Thanks to Hispanic friends and her high school Spanish classes, Trish understood some of it. Something about stupid rules, and being chained by a — something she didn’t catch — demanding to know why she couldn’t do what she wanted since she was an adult and independent and — something else.

  Then Marnie reverted back to English. “And you. Why can’t you keep quiet about my cat? Why should I abandon my baby? You should be helping me keep him. That would be the Christian thing to do.”

  Marnie stalked to her room. She slammed the door so hard that the walls shuddered and a picture dropped to the carpet. Trish stood in the empty living room, staring at the closed door. It was almost as if the conversation had never happened. Her mouth opened and closed but she couldn’t get anything to come out. She’d only be talking to herself again anyway.

  Trish tottered into her bedroom and collapsed on the edge of her futon mattress. She’d been on edge and irate all week, what with a whining call from Marnie every day and then more problems to discover when she came home. Her feverish, heightened emotions sucked the energy out of her until she fell exhausted into bed each night. When she wasn’t blazing mad, her anxiety swung into depression.

  Her nose tingled and her eyes started to swell. She sniffed. The sound triggered a tightening in her chest, and she pressed her fist over her breastbone, as if she could keep her heart from pounding harder.

  She couldn’t take it anymore.

  My power is made perfect in weakness.

  The sobs and wails came heaving out of her. She had forgotten rule number three, to persevere and rely on God. She had forgotten her God. But He hadn’t forgotten her.

  Oh Lord, I totally failed on rule number three. I should have come to you first for wisdom and guidance. I should have prayed before ever agreeing to room with Marnie. But even after she moved in, I should have asked you for help.

  Shoulda, woulda, coulda. It seemed her life was always like that.

  I know this is a little late, but please give me wisdom about what to do now.

  She still had to get her point across. She couldn’t lie about the cat. She had to do the right thing, regardless of what Marnie thought Christians should do. It had nothing to do with the fact that out of all the cats in the world, this one was the feline version of Godzilla.

  She would wait until Marnie had calmed down — tomorrow? Trish wasn’t being a coward, she really wasn’t — then give Marnie the ultimatum: She would have a week to get rid of the cat or move out. If she stayed, Trish would tackle the smoking after that.

  She plucked a few tissues and blew her nose. Now that she had prayed, her head had cleared of cobwebs, and her stomach no longer quivered. She felt as if a hand rested over her heart, stilling her emotions.

  Everything would turn out okay. She breathed a sigh of relief.

  And then she sneezed.

  The next morning, Marnie sat watching Saturday morning cartoons when Trish stumbled out of her bedroom toward the kitchen. She cast a groggy glance at the figure on the couch as she honed in on the coffeemaker.

  She started the coffee, leaned her tummy against the counter, and closed her eyes, listening to the gurgle and burping of the appliance. She sucked in the aroma as it dripped into the carafe.

  What was she supposed to do today? Something about Marnie. But Marnie was already awake. Trish sighed. She’d be coherent and halfway human in about thirty seconds.

  She poured herself a cup and sipped. Okay, brain, start moving.Something about the cat . . .

  Oh. Trish inhaled and straightened for a moment before slumping back into a limp noodle posture that would have made her mother cluck. That’s right, she needed to speak to Marnie. Well, no sense putting it off. “I need to talk to you — ”

  The telephone jingled. Trish had the handset at her ear before the second ring. “Hallo?”

  “Marnie, tienes que llamar a Mamá. Ella está preocupada por ti . . . ”

  Trish walked to the couch and held the cordless phone to her. “It’s for you.”

  Marnie barked into the phone, “Mamá, tienes que dejar de llama-rme. Te estás poniendo pesada . . .

  Trish had inhaled two more cups of coffee by the time Marnie hung up. Ah, she felt positively feisty now. “We need to talk — ”

  The razor-sharp buzz of the doorbell sliced through the room. Trish froze.

  Marnie blinked at her for a moment. Then comprehension dawned, widening her liquid eyes and pulling her mouth into an O the size of a corn tortilla.

  Marnie bolted for her open bedroom door, then slammed it shut. Behind her.

  Trish gasped. The nerve! Abandoned by the very cause of the problem.

  Bzzzz cut into her thoughts. She broke her head from the coffee fumes to sniff around the room. She dove for the bathroom, snatched up the can of air freshener, then raced around dousing the apartment, hopping over bowls and pizza boxes.

  “Who is it?” Trish winced at her frenzied tone while she jerked open the tiny windows flanking the living room’s picture window. Oh, please, don’t let it be the landlord . . .

  “It’s Mrs. Navarre, Trish. I signed for a package for your apartment yesterday.”

  She crumpled in sheer relief, smearing herself over the arm of the couch. Oh, thank you, God . . .

  “Trish? You still there?”

  The click of a door preceded Marnie’s cautious head peeking out. “You going to answer that?”

  Trish’s mouth dropped open. She couldn’t find her voice, and “urk”-ing sounds cam
e out of her throat. She gave Marnie a long, incredulous glare while she stalked to the door and yanked it open.

  Mrs. Navarre jumped at her violent action but smiled as she offered the brown parcel addressed to Marnie.

  “Thanks.” Thank goodness for every single one of Mrs. Navarre’s eighty years, and her failing sense of smell. The old woman nodded and walked away.

  Trish kicked the door closed. She tossed the package on the counter, then advanced on Marnie, who stood by the couch. “We need — ”

  Yowl!

  Trish catapulted down and almost cracked her head on the edge of the coffee table when she fell to her hands and knees. Marnie gave a muffled shriek and lunged for the floor behind her.

  “You tried to kill my cat!” She picked up the mongrel, who spat a baleful I will enact my revenge, you stupid human! hiss at Trish before it affected a victim posture and screamed bloody murder.

  Trish should have jumped up at the sight of the injured animal . . . but she didn’t. She got to her feet slowly, then sighed. “Let me see.”

  Marnie squeezed the cat and twisted away, her breath coming in quick heaves. “You’re trying to hurt him.”

  “I tripped. Over a cat who was supposed to be in your bedroom. Now let me see him.”

  Her acidic tone cured Marnie’s hysterics. She held out the feline. Trish ran her hands over his fur in a body check. “Nothing’s broken. I think he’s okay.”

  “You stepped on his paw. Shouldn’t you wrap it or something?”

  “It’s your cat — ”

  “You injured him.”

  She needed to pick her battles. After all, she still needed to talk to her.

  Trish turned away so Marnie wouldn’t see her roll her eyes. She dug an old T-shirt rag out of her closet, then returned to wrap the flailing limb. The cat recoiled at the sight of the large white swath and scrambled to get away.

  Hmph. He wasn’t that injured.

  Trish grabbed the cat and wrestled it into submission so she could wrap the paw. Marnie crooned saccharine Spanish phrases and annoyed it by rubbing its tail.

  Here was her chance. “Marnie — ”

  “Oh, by the way, I’ve decided to move out. I’ll leave in two weeks.”Marnie then launched into more Spanish to comfort her pet.