Rules of the Road Page 10

  What’s funny is that we were the “Poster Couple”and people were so surprised when we split up, when I left her.

  “Oh, James!” Kelsey covered her mouth out of sympathy for her friend. She herself suffered from insecurity for a long time just from a couple months of cheating. She could only imagine what her friend had gone through. But the more she thought about it, the more she started to understand the things she had heard about Jamie. Her friends described a woman who never dated, never got attached, had a lot of acquaintances but only had a few close friends. Jamie was the life of the party when she was there but never stayed for long. Yes, everything made sense. Before Jamie could wonder where she went, she sent back a message to her.

  I’m really sorry, James. No one should have to go through that with someone, and clearly she wasn’t worth your time.

  She also sent along a cartoon heart with the word friends forever written in script over it.

  Aww! Friends forever huh? Well I think that sounds about right.

  Jamie sent the same cartoon image back. They chatted for a little while longer until Kelsey’s day had thoroughly caught up to her. She finally said bye to Jamie, then said good night to the cats on her way to the bedroom. Of course, once she was actually in bed her mind refused to shut down. Her thoughts raced with everything Jamie had told her. She could completely understand why her friend had stopped dating. Though sleeping around wouldn’t have been Kelsey’s first choice to deal with circumstances, everyone had their own way of coping.

  Of course one thought led to another and before she knew it Kelsey was imaging what Jamie would be like in bed. She sighed. “She’s probably some hard-core top, all butch attitude and disposition.” She then imagined shoving the attractive blonde onto her back and completely taking control and realized that was a much hotter image. Perhaps too hot. Giving in to the heat that had started from a place slightly lower than her heating pad, Kelsey fumbled to open the drawer next to her bed. She tried to rationalize aloud to herself. “They say it’s good for cramps.”

  Chapter Seven

  WEDNESDAY MORNING FOUND Jamie in a fabulous mood. Despite her heavy chat the night before she felt surprisingly free when she woke. In the past she would get panicky or irritable if she discussed her ex with either Burke or Jenn. But with Kelsey, it felt right. Jamie figured either it was the right time for her to start letting go of the hurts she suffered in the past, or Kelsey was something special. Perhaps it was a little of both. And with the new day she too felt new.

  Spring had officially sprung and the day was going to be warm and sunny. Traffic sprinted along at a joyous pace for her and Olivia. And the tunes on her music app were rolling with the miles. One of her favorites was on and she mangled the lyrics to “Music Is My Hot Hot Sex”, by Cansei de Ser Sexy, with abandon. The band was only listed as CSS on her music app but she had downloaded their songs a few months before because she liked the band so much. Jamie made it nearly through the song when her app chimed.

  “So, how is Olivia on this beautiful morning?”

  Despite the sun being in her eyes for the eastbound direction of their morning commute, it was supposed to be in the sixties with blue skies and for that Jamie was happy. She smiled and responded, glad that Kelsey seemed to be in a better mood too. “Shouldn’t we be asking you that? I assume you’re feeling better today?”

  The other woman’s laughter came through before her words. “It’s called hot soak, hot pad, Motrin, and a good night’s sleep. Miracle workers, all!” Before Jamie could respond Kelsey sent another message. “I’m waiting.”

  At first she was legitimately confused. “Waiting for what?”

  Her driving buddy’s voice cleared it up fast. “Really, James? It’s Wednesday.”

  She glanced down to her app then moved her eyes back up to the road so she could switch lanes. “Oh yeah, heh.” She quickly responded to give Kelsey what she asked for. Jamie was almost giddy with the fact that her friend actually wanted her to ask. “So Kels, you ready to go out for coffee with me yet?” She waited a few minutes for her friend’s response.

  “Is that the best you can do? Where is my innuendo? Where is the teasing? Such a lame nerd you are.” The message ended in laughter.

  “Hey, that was mean! Fine, you want innuendo? Ahem! Kelsey, are you interested in seeing my favorite place to taste the bean?”

  “Groan!”

  Jamie tried again. “Why don’t snakes drink coffee? Because it makes them viperactive!”

  There was a few more minutes pause before Kelsey responded again. “No. Just no.”

  The woman in the pretty blue car pouted. “Aww, no to coffee or no to my jokes?”

  “Yes to both.”

  Jamie glanced at her phone, then back at the road. Then she glanced at the phone again and back at the road again. Kelsey was confusing. “Wait, yes to coffee?”

  “It was a yes to your question about ‘no’s. So that means no to both.”

  The blonde huffed in her leather seat, disappointment having brought her down to a slight whine. “But you said to ask you!”

  Kelsey’s rich laughter rolled through Olivia’s speakers and gave Jamie goose bumps. She could listen to that laughter all day. “Maybe you’re not asking the right question then.”

  Jamie thought hard about what the correct question could be. She always asked her to coffee and Kelsey always turned her down. The logically minded engineer tried to talk herself through the problem. “I always ask her to coffee, she always refuses. What if—” She was interrupted as another message from Kelsey sounded over her speakers.

  “Have you figured it out yet?”

  “Hush you! I’m thinking really hard here and I need a minute!”

  More laughter. “By all means then, carry on.”

  Jamie tapped on her steering wheel then turned down the music so she could concentrate. “Okay, what do I know about Kelsey? She’s half Irish and half Mexican-American. She bakes, she gets cranky after her Krav Maga classes and wants—that’s it!” She quickly changed her question. “So Kels, would you like to go for hot cocoa with me? I know someplace that makes the best in the city.” Kelsey’s response came back about twenty seconds later.

  “Yes.”

  Back in Kelsey’s car, Jamie’s shock came through loud and clear and she giggled. “Yes?”

  She answered with a smile on her face. “Yes, James.”

  “You promise the princess isn’t in another castle? You’re not just pissing with me?”

  Kelsey snorted her laughter and responded again. “You are such a nerd! And no, I’m not pissing with you. Definitely not my kink!”

  The response that came back took her completely by surprise. Jamie’s voice was normal at first but quickly escalated into unintelligible screaming. “Hey, that’s great! I can’t wa—holy fecking summabich! Oh my God, oh my God, oh my—” Then the message cut off with the squealing of tires and horns.

  Kelsey panicked when Jamie didn’t send another message. A minute went by and she spent the entire time trying to talk herself down from the ledge. “I’m sure it’s fine Kelsey. Just because you finally make plans to meet a cute woman for cocoa doesn’t mean karma is gonna be an ass and kill her in an accident on the way to work. I mean, karma is much slower moving than that, right?” Talking to herself wasn’t helping so she finally gave in and swiped the screen. “Are you okay, what happened? You’re freaking me out over here, James!”

  Seconds after she sent her message Jamie’s much calmer voice came back to her and Kelsey could hear honking in the background. “I’m okay.” A split second calming breath came through, then Jamie’s voice again. “There’s a goddamned cow in the middle of the highway!”

  Kelsey glanced at her phone in disbelief. No way was there a cow on the eastbound lane of the expressway. Where would it have come from? She answered her friend’s declaration with dubiousness. “I’m gonna call bullshit on you there. No way that a cow could be on the highway!”

 
“Does this sound like bullshit to you?” After Jamie stopped speaking Kelsey listened to the sharp sound of multiple horns and the mooing of one lost cow.

  Disbelief turned to hilarity as Kelsey neared her exit. “So what are you going to do? Are you at least close to your exit?” She scrolled back on her map and tried to remember which exit Jamie took for her job.

  “Oh, sick!” Jamie laughed. “But at least old Bessie didn’t leave that in front of my car. Good luck Range Rover! Oh, and a cop is here now leading the cow off to the shoulder by her head gear harness thingy.”

  Kelsey snickered. “You mean halter, James?”

  A beat, then Jamie replied. “Yeah, that!”

  “All right, nerd, now that I’m at work and you’re safely underway again I’m going to leave you to your day. I’ll talk to you later, right?”

  “But we didn’t set a day or time for cocoa!”

  Kelsey smiled at how eager her friend was to meet up. “Catch me on the ride home. We’ll set something up then.”

  “Okay, bye Kelsey. Have a good day at work.”

  “You too!” Kelsey shook her head as she grabbed her lunch and went into the back door of the office. One thing about commuting nearly forty minutes one way for work, things were never dull.

  JAMIE WAS ONLY a couple minutes late for work after that, but she spent the first fifteen minutes after she got there telling Bill all about the cow incident. Of course he didn’t believe her so she pulled out her cell phone and showed him the video. She had the foresight to pop her phone off the holder and get a short video of the officer leading the cow to the side of the highway, then handcuffing the halter to a metal sign. She even zoomed in on the officer’s face, perfectly catching the look when he realized that his job had come down to wrangling beef off the road. He also had a look about him that said it probably wasn’t the first time he’d put cuffs on something other than a criminal. Or maybe Jamie was just reading into it. Either way, the video was funny and it wasn’t long before the entire engineering office had seen it. Of course it helped that she was able to screen mirror her phone to the large flat screen TV hanging on the back wall. Before Jamie could get her phone back from Bill, he did a quick swipe in her photos and whistled at the picture he saw. “Hey, who is this?” He held the phone up so Jamie could see the picture of Kelsey she had saved from the other woman’s online photos.

  She snatched the phone from his hands. “Give me that!” She quickly stuffed the phone into her pocket and spun around to look at her computer screen, answering him over her shoulder. “It’s just my friend Kelsey, the one who I chat with on the way to work.” Bill didn’t respond, but he gave Jamie a knowing smile behind her back.

  “You mean the same friend who made those excellent cake pops?”

  Jamie still didn’t turn around. “Yup.”

  He kept prodding her to see if she’d give anything else away.

  Because, sure as anything you don’t save photos of your friends onto your phone unless you had more interest than just friends. “The one who works at the dentist’s office?”

  “Yup.”

  “Hmm.” He waited another thirty seconds then hammered it home. “The one who you have a mad crush on?”

  “Yup.” Suddenly Jamie spun around in her chair and glared at him. “No! I do not have a crush on her. I don’t have a crush on anyone.” She scowled and pointed her finger at Bill as he struggled not to lose his shit with laughter. “Jamie Schultz doesn’t do crushes!”

  He nodded. “Oh, of course she doesn’t.”

  Jamie spun back around again but he already got what he was looking for. His cubemate had a crush.

  A little while later the jackass engineer, Dave, came ranting into the office. His lines were the oldest in the building and he was usually complaining about one thing or another. However, Dave was louder than normal and everyone in the office couldn’t help but hear him as he disparaged his team and their family trees. “Those dipshits wouldn’t be able to pick their noses if I didn’t write explicit instructions and hang them in front of their faces! What a batch lot of ’tards!” His ranting didn’t stop there either.

  Jamie and Bill glanced at each other and then at the office door of the engineering manager. She glanced at the desk in front of Bill and noticed that he must have hit record on his phone right after Dave started his tirade. “Dave the Dick” was not a well-liked man in their office. He belittled everyone, not just Jamie. No one was ever safe from his racist, homophobic, and rude comments. Bill especially didn’t like him since the time Dave had effectively thrown him under the bus. Bill was on vacation and the other engineers took turns covering his lines for him. Since Dave was least familiar with the newer lines that Bill had under his purview, their manager wasn’t going to put him in the rotation. But eventually their boss gave in. Dave crashed the motors on a robot the first day and tried to say that Bill had left it programmed that way. Jamie herself went into the program and showed her boss that it hadn’t been changed until after Bill left for vacation. From that moment on, Bill hated Dave, and Dave hated Jamie. It was all sunshine and roses in the engineering office.

  Eventually their boss did come out of his office but only heard the last few words of Dave’s angry verbal vomit. “Is there a problem, Dave?”

  Dave looked up at his boss, his face still dark with anger. “No, sir. Nothing I can’t handle.”

  Their boss scowled at the irritating man. “Then I suggest you handle it quieter. I was on a conference call and they could hear you on the other end.”

  “Sorry, sir.” Dave acted apologetic and the engineering manager went back into his office and shut the door.

  Jamie looked over at Bill and watched as he stopped the recording. “You know, he said some pretty offensive things just now. And I’m pretty sure he broke about three big rules in our code of conduct manual with that little speech. That recording will get that POS fired for sure.”

  Bill nodded and made a face at her. “Gee, tell me how you really feel about him, James! Seriously though, you know Sally? She’s one of the older ladies that works on his line.” Jamie nodded. “She sliced her hand on his new tester the other day. He tried to say that maintenance must have done something to the edge when they installed the plates.”

  Jamie shrugged. “It’s possible. It wouldn’t be the first time maintenance has screwed something up.”

  Her coworker shook his head and his features took on one of uncharacteristic anger. “I watched him install those plates myself. He lied and she’s got five stitches.”

  She nodded back at him. “Do it. But don’t walk it into the office or Dave will know for sure it was you. He seems like the vindictive type and it’s probably better not to give yourself away. E-mail the voice file to yourself, then send it to the boss man.”

  Bill grimaced. “You know what this means, don’t you? We’ll be stuck covering the decrepit line until a replacement gets hired.” Something slammed over in the vicinity of Dave’s cubical, followed by another curse from the volatile man.

  They both answered at the same time. “Worth it!” Fifteen minutes later they watched as the human resources director walked into their boss’ office.

  Jamie glanced at her cubemate. “Oooh!”

  Five minutes after that their boss’s voice sounded over the plant-wide intercom. “David Carson to the engineering manager’s office, ASAP!”

  Bill grinned and jumped up from his chair. “I’m going to go make popcorn!”

  Things calmed down a bit once their former teammate was escorted out of the building. Before Jamie knew it her smart watch was chiming the end of her day. She shut down her computer then stood and stretched her back. “Finally! It’s time for me to get out of here.” Jamie was full of nervous excitement when she hit the road after work. She didn’t see the little rainbow car when she got on the highway so she brought up the music app and cranked the tunes. ‘Radio’ by Sylvan Esso was playing and she belted out the song like a pro. There was a freedom
that Jamie found while listening to music and driving that she didn’t find many other places. She couldn’t explain why it made her so happy, it just was. She didn’t care that her voice could “scour pans” Jenn had told her often enough. She just loved to sing along. By the time the chorus hit she was completely into it, despite the fact that a muddy toad probably had a better voice. The song finished and Jamie sang through another before she started to grow a little concerned. Usually Jamie came online before the first song was done. Then, like Pavlov’s dog ready for dinner, her app chimed and Jamie’s heart started to race.

  “Is it Friday yet?”

  The frustration in Kelsey’s voice caused Jamie to giggle. “Sorry to tell you it’s not. What’s got you down, Kels?”

  “Some woman smuggled her frickin dog into the office. It was in her purse and she hung it on the hook across from the chair. I was in the middle of a procedure when movement caught my eye and this little ankle biter pops his head out of the purse and barks at me.” The message ended and before Jamie could reply another came through. “It startled me so much I almost fell off my damn stool! I had to stop the procedure so she could take the damn dog out to her car. And it’s not the first time this has happened!”

  Jamie tried to stifle her laughter enough to respond sympathetically. “Wow, um, sorry? I mean, that sucks!”

  “Seriously! That woman is nuts. She probably stays home and has birthday parties for that damn dog!”

  “Hmm, do you think she knits little sweaters for it?”

  Kelsey made a face back in her car. “You are an ass! She brought her dog into a dentist’s office. I would think that should show her level of crazy!” She waited for her friend to answer. How could Jamie not understand what a kook Mrs. Ginker was? When the engineer’s voice came back it sounded like she was holding back a laugh.

  “And you’ve never done anything strange or unusual with your cats?”