* * *
I set some lofty goals for myself this week. To truly let go—let Frankie sit in Lina’s office all week without commenting on it, and to let Frankie have a sleepover at Tita Gloria’s Friday night so that Lina and I can stay out late. To not spill my guts about my new realization and scare Lina away, because she’s trying not to lose herself right now, and she’s trying to rebuild. As much as I would love it to be, ‘herself’ on a theoretical level does not include me and my five-year-old daughter.
I go straight to Lina’s office right after work and keep my mouth zipped shut about Frankie sitting on the floor, happily surrounded by a pile of books about the Titanic. She doesn’t bring up after-school. Lina comes home with us on Monday.
It becomes increasingly difficult to keep my mouth shut as the week progresses, though. Not because of Frankie, but because of Lina. She’s looking more and more frazzled as each day crawls by, with each day I show up in her office.
It’s little details, minutia, only noticeable if you spend as much time obsessing over her face and body as I do.
The slight inward curve of her shoulders. The incremental darkening of the circles under her eyes. The juicy pink of her lips losing color and moisture, getting chapped. The strain on her face.
The dampening of her smile.
By Thursday, I can’t take it anymore, so I don’t quite meet my goals for the week.
“Are you okay?” I finally ask her. I sit on the other side of Lina’s desk while Frankie runs to the bathroom.
“What do you mean?” she says with a forced brightness. “I thought we were going to let Frankie sit in here without freaking out this week.”
“I’m not asking about Frankie, I’m asking about you.”
“Do I really have to tell you again that I’m fine with it?” She starts to get testy quite quickly.
“That’s not it. How are you doing with your goals this week? Are you balancing? Letting go? Are you taking care of yourself? Have you looked at AP resumes?” I find myself delivering rapid-fire questions, much in the same way my mom did when she noticed I wasn’t doing my best.
Lina rubs her eyes. Her hair is up in a limp topknot, frizzy strands falling out the sides. “I’m not doing a great job this week. I’m insanely busy. I haven’t had time to look at AP resumes. I’ve been getting home at like nine and collapsing. My body feels like it’s shutting down.”
I don’t tell her that it looks like her body is shutting down, too, because I still have some tact. “Do you want to cancel our date tomorrow, so that you can just go home and sleep all weekend?” I don’t add that it looks like her body seriously needs it.
Her eyes are glazed when she answers me. “Hard no. We’ve had this planned all week. I’ve been looking forward to it, and it’s part of my relaxing plan. And yours, too.”
“It’s not relaxing if what you really need is sleep,” I attempt.
“I’m fine,” she huffs.
“Do you want to sit together and make some lists? We can prioritize some of your workload?”
Lina stands and starts walking towards the door. I bury a smirk, because I know this trick. I adopted it in my early thirties, when I was fresh out of the venture capitalist firm and started off on my own.
“I don’t have time to do that,” Lina says. “It would take me hours to make the list because the list is so long. And I have an order of prioritization in my head.” She stands next to the open door.
Instead of leaving, I embrace her. Her body temperature seems a little high. She might be coming down with something. I try to transfer what little energy I have into her body and she allows herself to wilt a little in my arms. I feel like I’m holding a dehydrated dandelion—one that’s typically hardy and vibrant but hasn’t been rained on in a while. “Okay,” I whisper. “I don’t want to tell you how to do your job?—”
“—then don’t.”
“—but I think you should maybe prioritize hiring an AP.” I find myself carrying some of her weight while she melts against me.
“Okay,” she whispers.
“I’ll come over and pick you up at your apartment tomorrow,” I say, before kissing her hair and stepping away and making sure she’s steady on her feet. “Our dinner is in your neighborhood.”
“Okay,” she repeats, still a little wobbly.
And because she is an expert at it, she pastes on a huge smile that covers up the thin stretch of her life, and I let it go, because that’s my goal for the week.
NINETEEN
Lina
