Chapter One, Part 3

Dumping Billy
by Olivia Goldsmith

(Page 3 of 3)

"Oh, what's a few hundred points one way or the other?" he asked cheerfully, swallowing another mouthful.

"You've got a death wish," Kate said.

"Ooooh. Harsh words from a shrink." He winced mockingly as he opened a Snapple.

"Look, I'm leaving," she told him, gathering some notes from her desk and putting them into her file cabinet. If she left now, she'd be able to do a bit of shopping before meeting her friend Bina. She took a lipstick and mirror out of her purse, dabbed the color over her mouth, and smiled widely to make sure she didn't have lipstick on her teeth. "I'll see you for dinner."

"Where are you going?"

"None of your beeswax."

"A secret? Come on. Tell! What if I threw a tantrum like Brian?" Elliot reached into the toy box at his feet. Then he hurled a stuffed bear in Kate's direction. "Would you tell me then?" The plush missile hit her squarely in the face. Elliot curled up in the chair, held his hands in front of his face, and started to beg rapidly. "It was an accident. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry."

"I'll show you sorry," Kate warned. She threw the bear back at Elliot, but it missed him.

"You throw like a girl," Elliot taunted. Then he picked up another animal and threw it at Kate. "Duck!" he called as he reached for yet another toy to throw. It was indeed a duck, yellow and fluffy.

"Duck this, you math nerd," Kate almost shouted as she grabbed a fuzzy rabbit and pummeled Elliot's head. It felt good to blow off some steam.

"Abuse! Abuse!" Elliot screamed in delight as he rolled off the chair to protect himself. "Teacher abuse! Teacher abuse!" he continued to yell.

"Shut up, you idiot!" Kate told him, and rushed to close the office door. She turned from it just in time to get a stuffed elephant right in the face. It stunned her for a moment, then she grabbed the pachyderm and lunged at Elliot. "I'll show you abuse, you sniveling cholesterol warehouse," she threatened as she fell on top of Elliot and beat him repeatedly with the toy.

Elliot fought back with both an inflatable flamingo and a stuffed dog. He might be gay, but he was no wussy. When both he and Kate were exhausted, they sat panting and laughing together in the big chair, Kate on top. The door opened.

"Excuse me," said Dr. McKay. Despite his words, he wasn't the type to excuse anything. "I thought I heard a ruckus in here."

George McKay, the principal of Andrew Country Day School, was a hypocrite, a social climber, a control freak, and a very bad dresser. He also had a knack of using words no one else had used for several decades.

"A ruckus?" Elliot asked.

"We were just testing out a new therapy," Kate said quickly. "I hope we didn't disturb you."

"Well, it was certainly loud," Dr. McKay complained.

"From the little I know of it, AAT—airborne animal therapy—can frequently be noisy," Elliot said, poker-faced, "although it's having significant measurable success in schools for the gifted, where it's being pioneered. Of course," he added, "it might not be right for this setting." He nodded at Kate. "I'm not the expert," he said as if he were deferring to Kate's professional judgment. She smothered a laugh with a cough.

"We'll put this off until after three o'clock, Dr. McKay," she promised.

"All right, then," he said primly. He left as suddenly as he had arrived, shutting the door with a firm but controlled click. Kate and Elliot looked at each other, waited for a count of ten, then burst into giggles that they had to stifle.

"AAT?" Kate gurgled.

"Hey, straight men love acronyms. Think of the army. He'll be on the Internet in less than ten minutes, searching for 'airborne animal therapy,'" Elliot predicted. He stood up and began collecting the stuffed animals. Kate got up to help him. The irony of the situation was that Elliot had helped Kate get hired, and since then George McKay had told several teachers that he suspected them of having an affair. Ridiculous as that idea was, the sight of the two of them in the chair was not one to instill confidence in Dr. McKay, who had frequently announced at teachers' meetings that he "discouraged fraternizing among professional educational co-workers."

When Kate and her "professional educational co-worker" finished laughing, she stood up, smoothed her skirt, and put her hair back up, this time with a barrette she found in her drawer. Elliot was standing still, looking down at the chair. He heaved a dramatic sigh.

"Oh, shit!" he told her. "You crushed my banana." He held up the mangled fruit from his lunch bag, which had slipped under them during the battle.

Kate turned, struck the pose of a femme fatale, and rasped, "How times have changed. You used to like it when I did that."

Elliot laughed. "I'll leave all banana handling to you and Michael."

Kate and her new boyfriend, Dr. Michael Atwood, were going to dinner with Elliot and his partner, Brice. It was Elliot's introduction to Michael, and Kate felt a little flurry in her stomach at the thought. She hoped they liked each other. "If I don't leave now, I'll be late tonight," she told him.

"Okay, okay."

She grabbed her sweater from the back of her chair and moved toward the door.

"So you like your work so far," Elliot said, watching her. As she passed by, Kate nodded. But she kept moving: She knew what was coming. "And even though I helped you get the job, you're still not going to let me know where you're going?"

Kate didn't bother to answer as she sailed out of the room, Elliot scrambling to hurry after her. Elliot was what people in Brooklyn called "a nudge."

Copyright © 2004 by Olivia Goldsmith All rights reserved.

About the Author

OLIVIA GOLDSMITH, novelist and journalist, was the bestselling author of The First Wives Club, Flavor of the Month, The Bestseller, The Switch, Young Wives, Pen Pals, Bad Boy, and, most recently, Insiders. Her articles appeared in the New York Times, Cosmopolitan, InStyle, and the Observer, among other publications.