Вдова Хана. Ульяна Павловна Соболева

most importantly, how?”

      “You have to promise not to laugh.” Alyssa looked hard into Jade’s eyes.

      “Laugh, nothing. If you’ve got some method I should know about, who am I to judge?”

      “Okay. Well, I don’t know if this method would work for you, because it requires you to get a pet.” Alyssa paused, glancing at me for reassurance. “You see, Lulu hasn’t been feeling well lately, so I took her to the vet. And, well, the old vet retired, leaving his practice to a new, young…gorgeous…vet.”

      “You’re sleeping with Lulu’s vet?”

      “No!” Alyssa and I shouted in unison, the sound of my own anxious denial making me realize just how important it was for me that Alyssa didn’t do anything to jeopardize what she had with Richard.

      “Then what? You’re sharing housebreaking tips? Flea baths? What?”

      “Nothing is going on really,” Alyssa said. “It’s just…”

      “She has a crush on him,” I said, butting in. “You know, puppy love.” Then I glanced at Alyssa. “Uh, no pun intended.”

      “I don’t know if it’s just a crush,” Alyssa protested. “I mean, it’s just like you said you felt with Ted, Jade. I feel a real connection with him.”

      “Yeah, well,” Jade said, “you can take that for what it’s worth, Alyssa.”

      “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—” Alyssa began.

      “Look, no apologies needed, Lys,” Jade countered. “There’s just one thing you need to think about, and think hard. Just how important is this cute little pooper scooper to you? Enough to risk losing Richard for?”

      When Alyssa didn’t respond, I turned to gape at her. “Alyssa!”

      “Hey,” Jade said, lighting a cigarette and leaning back in a sort of blasé-about-relationships pose she’d adopted ever since Michael had torn whatever romantic streak she’d formerly had out of her. “If it means that much to you, I say go for it.”

      “Jade, don’t encourage—” I began, but Jade leaned forward then, confidingly.

      “But whatever you do, please do it outside of his office. I can’t imagine all those wee wee pads and antiseptics making for much atmosphere.”

      “Ha, ha,” Alyssa said, lifting her drink to her mouth to try to hide her smile.

      A smile, I might add, which said she was planning on doing just what Jade suggested, and with a man whose only distinction so far was in making Lulu’s most recent bellyache go away.

      I had to face facts. Alyssa and Richard were truly on the rocks. And Jade, who I saw light up as our handsome waiter returned, had gone from Girl Who Couldn’t Get Enough to Girl Who Couldn’t Get It At All.

      Then there was me, of course, who didn’t have a hope in the world of convincing the man I loved that he’d just made the greatest mistake in the world by moving across the country away from me, especially considering the fact that the creep hadn’t even taken a moment to call yet, even to say hi.

      The question that was stuck in the recesses of my mind, wedged in tight by anxiety, suddenly wafted up, unbidden.

      What would become of us?

      Confession: Things could definitely get worse.

      After an evening that ended with Jade—egged on by Alyssa—successfully securing our waiter’s phone number, I woke up the next morning resolved to make myself a smash success at Bridal Best. Maybe it was Alyssa’s encouragement, or maybe it was a rebellion against Jade’s utter disbelief in my decision, but I wound up spending part of Sunday preparing a presentation to make to Caroline on Monday, and giving myself a French manicure that I hoped would somehow raise me to some new professional level. On Monday I donned the only thing in my closet resembling a suit—a pair of black trousers that didn’t look too faded against the one black blazer I owned, and a white shirt that looked less than my others like your standard T—and headed for the illustrious midtown office where my new destiny awaited me. My intention was to discuss my decision with Caroline and get her approval to move on to the next step: persuading the Powers-That-Be at Bridal Best that not only was I the best candidate for senior features editor they could hope to have, but that I was, in fact, of one mind with the editorial mantra “Give me marriage or give me death.”

      Once I arrived, I walked with purpose to my cubicle. I kept my gaze focused forward to avoid seeing any raised eyebrows over my sudden upgrade in office attire. “Confidence,” Alyssa had said as she hugged me goodbye after dinner. “All you need to do is show them how sure you are of your ability to do the job.” But all I could do once I sat at my desk in order to practice my seemingly unrehearsed speech was think about Sandra and Rebecca, sitting over lunch while Sandra dictated the surefire route to senior features editor to her protégée. How could I compete against that kind of inside track? Everyone knew what an incestuous business this was. It was as if the most coveted positions were carefully kept open for those chosen few who managed to emulate their superiors so perfectly that the Powers-That-Be couldn’t help but strive to make the little mini versions of themselves grow up to be the new Powers-That-Be.

      Now one could argue that Rebecca, with her perfect boyfriend and her perfect bob and her stylish little silk blouses and knee-length skirts, did not even remotely resemble Sandra, who tended more toward a disheveled, layered look. But I was certain now that a bond had formed between them from the moment Rebecca had joined the staff. At the time, Sandra had recently joined the Happily Married, and I imagined her taking one look at Rebecca, with her pedigree schooling and her upwardly mobile boyfriend, and seeing enough of herself and her happy little life to reach out. After all, it had been only mere months since Sandra had landed her own financially stable husband and Upper East Side Duplex, and I’m certain she couldn’t help but see a dinner party with Rebecca and her beau as nothing less than a prime opportunity to bring out the Lenox china she had obsessed over and ultimately registered for in the months before she marched off to her ill-fated marriage. And despite the fact that Sandra had now, for whatever reason, just joined the Disastrously Divorced category, I knew that ultimately she had shared something with Rebecca that night—something that would only grow now that Sandra had given up her role as Successful and Married and needed to hand the mantle on to someone else. Someone as polished, as poised, as perfect as Rebecca.

      How was I going to compete with that? Me, with my scuffed pumps pulled from the bottom of the closet and phantom boy friend?

      “Looking sharp,” came Marcy Keller’s voice as she popped her head around the wall of my cubicle and gave me a conspiratorial wink.

      Feeling horribly grateful for the compliment, even coming from a woman more known for her calculation than her camaraderie, I actually smiled at her, which gave her just enough invitation to slide her spindly form into my guest chair.

      “So you’re finally going to do it, huh?” she asked, in a kind of harsh whisper that suggested I was going to take a machine gun to my colleagues rather than go in to my superior to ask for a promotion.

      “No better time than the present,” I replied with false bravado.

      “I agree,” she said, nodding vigorously, eyebrows arched above her big black frames. “Especially since Rebecca has already put together her clips and her résumé and handed them in.”

      “She has?”

      “Of course.”

      I glanced over the gaping “to be filed” box where I had stuffed everything of personal relevance, from bedraggled clips and old vacation memos to takeout menus for local eateries. “Do you think I should put together something before I go in to Caroline?”

      Her gaze followed mine to the pile of papers, and I saw her eyes widen briefly. “Nah,” she replied, swatting her hand through the air in a gesture that suggested I was worrying for nothing. “That would take too long.