* * *
My phone buzzes an hour later, right after Gladys leaves my office. I glance at my phone. It’s Superintendent Daniels.
Greg Daniels
We’re all set for tomorrow, Wednesday, and Thursday at noon. We will come to you.
I stare at my phone. It’s happening then. I respond immediately.
Looking forward to it. Thanks again.
The first person I text is Oliver.
I’m going for principal position have interview tomorrow-thursday NEED ADVICE can I call you later
The first person I call is… Dom. But he doesn’t pick up, because he owns and runs several companies and is obviously busy. I text him toCALL ME.
And that’s all the time I have before my next meeting.
SIXTEEN
Dominic
I failedat Day One of being a Dating Father. A Father Who Dates.
I slept poorly because I couldn’t stop thinking about her. I spent my night replaying the imprinted moments of last week in my head, not just the sexual ones (which, obviously, yes) but also the Pirate Plunder and the Forty-Seven Minutes in Heaven and the way Frankie would take her hand whenever she was close by and the lovely picture our skin made together in morning light. The cool confidence with which Lina carried herself through everything. Through work, through play, through sex. How she very confidently tore through the fabric of my self-imposed years-long stretch of abstinence in just a few days, just by being herself, by merely existing in the same space, the same vacation-land bubble.
But because of my full night’s perseveration, I stumbled out of bed an hour later than I should have. I was in a terrible mood. Frankie was in an even worse mood. We were forty-five minutes late for camp. When we arrived at camp, her counselor asked me where her lunch was. I squinted at her for a moment, trying to process words through a sleep-deprived brain, before saying that I had completely forgotten about it and to please not call Child Protective Services. I ran to the closest bodega, got her a sandwich, and dropped it off.
At this point, I was an hour and a half late to every meeting I had scheduled today. I could not problem solve. I had no critical thinking skills. I had to skip lunch, and I had to ignore the first Real Life text sent to me by my not-but-maybe-almost girlfriend because of a major issue my FinTech company was having.
I am failing Dating Father life. I am feeling deeply unwell.
The first chance I get, I fire off a text.
I’m slammed today. I’m so sorry. I’ll call you back as soon as I can.
She doesn’t answer, presumably because she is busy being a boss-ass bitch who has no time for pathetic, sleepy old men like me. And I don’t have time to worry about this because I immediately get a call from the CFO of my manufacturing company.
* * *
“Guess what?” Lina asks, over the phone.
It’s almost nine o’clock at night when we finally catch one another in our day of phone tag, but at the first sound of her voice, my anxieties melt away and allow space for serotonin and other related happy brain chemicals.
“What?”
“I’m interviewing for principal this week.”
It takes an embarrassingly long time for my exhausted brain to process this simple statement. “Wow,” I manage, a paragon of eloquence.
She laughs, thankfully. “You sound like shit.”
“I feel like shit,” I admit. “But wait, that’s amazing, Lina. You deserve it, obviously. But how did it come about? Didn’t you say you never wanted to be a principal?”
“Biting off more than I can chew is basically my middle name,” she says. “But after spending an hour at work meeting with the superintendent, I realized how fucked PS 2 was going to be this year if we didn’t start the year off with a principal who wasn’t me. I have to do this. It feels right. And we can’t risk another Courtney Thomas.”
“And you’ve been doing the job all year anyway,” I add on.
