Page 32 of Maybe Some Other Time

Chapter thirteen

No Place Like Home

S ince the truck had no trunk, Thelma carried her shopping bags wherever they went, much to her chagrin.

Trust has fallen in society, I see. Indeed, she wasn’t surprised that Gretchen suggested she carry her bags into the Mexican restaurant where they enjoyed an early dinner.

They were offered a generously sized booth, and Thelma had no qualms shoving her bags from three different shops toward the wall.

“A whole new wardrobe, in my style,” she said while the waiter went to get their water.

Gretchen picked up the cocktail menu before the food one. “You were whipping that card out like it had free money.”

Thelma flipped through all the pages of the menu, simultaneously impressed at the number of entries to choose from and balking at their hideously high prices.

It was far from her first time at a sit-down restaurant in the 21 st century, but she still couldn’t get used to paying $15 for dinner.

That was steak and lobster prices, and we did it once for our anniversary.

So did most of the neighborhood. You went to Princeton’s for dinner, and then spent a night in a nice room at the Conroy Tower.

Then you had your next child nine months later, ensuring all your children were born in the same season.

Hilariously practical for planning, terrible for the budget.

“I figured I might as well use it.” She referred to the preloaded debit card the FBI had given her all those weeks ago to help cover necessities.

Thank you, American taxpayers. Thelma had been sitting on most of the balance since Robbie had immediately taken her in and paid for most of her clothing and food, but now it had been properly decimated.

Some of those genuine “vintage” clothes had cost a pretty penny.

And will be treated with due respect. Linen! Cotton! Thelma’s body rejoiced!

But not as much as when she peered over the menu and at her date, who noticed her back.

“What?” Gretchen asked. “By the way. Get whatever you want. This is my treat.”

“Whatever I want?” She snatched the cocktail menu out of Gretchen’s hand. “Let’s see what’s good.”

“I mean, we’re at a Mexican restaurant during happy hour.” Already, some of the other booths began filling up around them. “We’ve gotta get the giant margarita.”

Thelma caught one passing by, landing on the table of a group of women celebrating someone’s promotion at work. “Oh, no, that’s way too big.”

“We’ll share one.”

“You’re driving!”

“You’ll drink most of it, bet on it.” Gretchen removed her driver’s license from her wallet as the waiter came back over. “Besides, they really water these down,” she whispered across the table, although the waiter clearly heard her—and slightly nodded.

The waiter brought them the giant margarita to share alongside their chips and salsa.

My favorite part… Robbie and Megan’s regular neighborhood eatery was a taco-specific restaurant on the corner of the street, and they always handed out free chips and salsa, much to Thelma’s delight.

I’ve gotta be careful about gaining weight.

It was one of the biggest warnings the other women in the group gave her, especially those who came from the early 20th century and before.

They warned her that modern food was made with all sorts of chemicals that promoted addiction and overeating.

Since she was determined to still fit into these ‘50s dresses, Thelma had taken to fasting when she knew she would be eating out. Like today.

She dug right into the chips and salsa as if she hadn’t eaten in a day. I haven’t! Only water and coffee with a splash of milk.

“I’m thinking fajitas,” Gretchen said after checking out the menu. “What do you think?”

Thelma pulled over the margarita, careful not to turn it around.

She had, after all, designated which side was hers and which was Gretchen’s.

She sipped, only having to barely tip the giant glass to get the tequila and margarita mix in her mouth.

Amazing. It was only her third time having a margarita in her life…

and second since coming forward. Despite living next to Mexico my whole life, I only had a margarita once.

Coincidentally, at one of her dinners out with Bill at Princeton’s.

“No idea what those are.”

“You’re… you know what? Never mind. I know better than to think you’re pulling my leg anymore, cult girl with a ‘50s fetish.”

Thelma’s shoulders shimmied as she mixed chips and salsa with the margarita liquid in her mouth. “You can’t insult me,” she said to her date. “I just happily admit my ignorance, but am always willing to learn new things.”

“All right…” With a mischievous look, Gretchen put down her menu. “Then the only question is… what’s your protein of choice? Or do you want the vegetable version?”

“Mm, what do you recommend?”

“Steak, all the way.”

“Then let’s get steak!” I know steak! And shrimp! And chicken! Were those potential proteins?

Gretchen ordered her date the steak fajitas and got the “surf and turf” combo for herself. When Thelma discovered that it included shrimp, she was more excited than ever.

“The last time I had shrimp…” she said after swallowing salsa, “was at a cocktail party for my husband’s job. They had, you know, shrimp cocktails.”

“What, uh, did he do?”

Thelma had to answer with more chips in her mouth.

“City planner. He’s why they ripped out those medians on…

” She stopped. “Back in my hometown. He had the medians ripped out because they were causing congestion issues.” She swallowed, napkin over her mouth.

“But that party had good shrimp. Beverly Beddingfield said I would get fat if I kept eating them, and indeed, I gained a pound at my next weigh-in.”

“Weigh-in?”

“Oh, yes, I weighed myself every week. Mondays, usually.”

“Why?”

Thelma shrugged. “Had to stay at 120.”

“…Why? Were you a boxer?”

It took Thelma a moment to get that. “Oh, my. Wouldn’t that be something?

” In truth, she didn’t know why she did it, besides the silent pressure to remain slim and pleasing to the eye.

Whose eye, though? Bill used to tease her for caring so much about her weight, claiming that she could always stand to gain a few pounds and that her “face was never as lovely as when it was fuller,” particularly during pregnancy.

He didn’t even mind the swollen feet, let alone the swollen stomach. Never put a damper on things for him.

But maybe it hadn’t been about him. And it certainly hadn’t been about Sandy, who mentioned she often felt pressured to stay thin as well, despite her not looking for a husband. “The workplace demands it. I won’t get work if the editor finds me displeasing to look at.”

“I’m so tired of talking about my past,” Thelma announced. “Tell me all about yours. Quickly. Before the fajitas arrive.”

And boy, did they, sizzling and smoking in both of the waiter’s hands as he proudly presented them with steak fajitas and all the fixings (including, yes, shrimp.) By then, Thelma had learned about Gretchen’s childhood growing up in the same home she now lived in, including her father, the podiatrist, and her mother, the homemaker who occasionally worked “for fun” at the local elementary school as a classroom assistant.

“Back then,” she said, taking her share of the huge margarita, “you could get by on one income in Van Nuys. Let alone if one were a doctor. So, my mother didn’t have to work unless she wanted to, and she did after I went off to middle school.

I was a disappointment by then, anyway.”

Thelma cocked her head in curiosity. “Why? How could a child be a disappointment?”

“My mother was a homemaker, but she had a Master’s in childhood development.

And my father was a doctor. So were most of the men in his family, and the others in my mom’s family all had good, educated jobs as well.

They thought I would just naturally pick up their scholarly ways and become a lawyer, hotshot author, I dunno…

anything but a kid who spent all her time in woodshop once she was old enough.

My mom went from thinking it charming that I brought her home perfectly built and sanded birdhouses to wondering why I couldn’t do anything more delicately academic.

Because, by then, I was also spending a lot of time after school playing basketball.

Did Varsity from middle school through graduation. ”

Thelma cupped her hands around her face as she leaned her elbows against the colorfully mosaic table. “Did you get your letters?”

“ That’s what you care about from that?”

Thelma sighed. “I love a good Letterman’s jacket. Very stylish.”

As if she couldn’t believe anything coming out of Thelma’s mouth, Gretchen doubled over laughing, catching herself against the leather booth seat and nearly smacking her forehead against the table.

“Of course I have one!” she exclaimed when her laughter died down. “It’s in my bedroom closet. Oh, my God, I am such a jock…”

After the fajitas arrived and they were distracted by their food, Gretchen went into her experience of attempting college, dropping out, and moving in with a girlfriend during her carpentry apprenticeship.