Elizabeth the First Wife (11 page)

FX turned to me and made a slight bow. “Have I fulfilled all your requirements for the evening? Or do I need to make one more turn about the grounds to satisfy the locals?”

“We're done here. Let's go home.” I blushed. “I mean, you go to your home and I'll go to mine.”

“I figured, Elizabeth,” he said, taking my arm and leading the way to our waiting chauffeur-driven Prius. “That wasn't too bad, was it?”

No, it wasn't.

“I'm Rafa.”

And I am standing at my front door in my bathrobe and it's nearly noon
, I thought, but chose not to say it out loud. My body reacted with third-degree panic, but my face must have registered nothing, because Mr. Blue Suit, in yet another fantastic blue suit, felt the need to amend his earlier statement. “I work for Ted. Bumble said I should check out the place to see if it works for the campaign. She said she'd call ahead?”

Well, she didn't. Or maybe she had, but I'd turned my phone off to work on my book proposal. I'd lost track of time (and fashion sense) while outlining chapter ideas. Here's one now! “Chenille Isn't Sexy: Why Shakespeare's Romantic Heroines Never Wear Bathrobes.” Remember when Ophelia showed up in that nightgown? That didn't end well. I stammered, “I didn't get that call. I was working and I turned the phone off. Please come in. I'm Elizabeth.”

I crossed my arms tightly against my chest, like a tween in a
training bra, in a desperate attempt to keep the two sides of my robe together. My sleepwear underneath wasn't much better: a US Open T-shirt and granny panties. Sure, the FedEx guy was used to seeing me like this, but not my brother-in-law's chief of staff. I let go long enough to grab a belt off a raincoat in the front hall. A winning accessory choice. Bathrobe secured, I turned to face my guest.

Rafa Moreno appeared to be a Very Busy Man, as evidenced by the constant buzzing of his Droid, but he slowed down enough to take in my living room, which I appreciated. And then I noticed the large supply of drugstore items I'd left on the coffee table, because I was too lazy to walk them fifteen feet to my bathroom the night before. Now they lay there in plain sight, creating a sort of feminine product buffet, complete with a centerpiece showcasing a canister of hair removal cream. I considered darting to the other side of the room to block the sight of the spread with my body but thought that would only call attention to my sloth. And my unwanted body hair.

Rafa graciously pretended not to notice. “Bumble calls you Elizabeth the Professor. I saw you arrive last night with FX Fahey. You guys were married, right?”

That seemed like an obvious question for a guy who clearly knew the answer, but he said it like FX and I might have played on the same softball team after work, so I tried to copy his tone. I covered by clearing my breakfast dishes into the kitchen and shouting over my shoulder. “Yup, we were. A long time ago. Working with him now. He's doing a play and I'm a creative consultant.”

“Sounds interesting,” he said, though his own disinterest was evident in his tone of voice. He was surveying the real estate, assessing the square footage. “This will work. It's nice of you to donate it to Ted's campaign.”

Donate it to the campaign?
“Well, Ted is a good man, and my sister literally doesn't take no for an answer,” I responded, because, clearly, trying to explain that I hadn't quite agreed a hundred percent to this arrangement seemed like a waste of time. Classic Bumble. Rafa
thought he was checking me out, not vice versa.
Dear Bumble, thank you for sending me the attractive housesitter that I wasn't really sure I wanted. I'm sure everything will work out great, even though it freaks me out that a stranger will have access to my underwear drawer. Especially one who looks so good in a blue suit. Love, your sister Elizabeth
. “Why don't you look around to see if the place suits the campaign's needs, and I'm going to get out of my bathrobe.”

Oh my God.

“That came out. …”

Rafa put his hand up. “No need. I'll go look around your garden. You can give me an official tour when you're dressed. In actual clothes.” Then he smiled for the first time, and it was unnerving.

“Good plan,” I whispered.

“Your garden is amazing.” I found Rafa wandering around the backyard with a cup of coffee that he'd helped himself to. I wasn't sure how I felt about that, but I let it go. “Must be a lot of work.”

Three years earlier, before Urban Homesteading became a regular blog at the
New York Times
, I tore up half the backyard and created a starter vegetable garden. At the time I was involved with yet another closeted gay colleague, Mark. (Seriously, the man was in his thirties. Wouldn't he know by now?) I needed some place to put my pent-up sexual frustration that didn't involve romance novels and nachos, so I started mulching. That first summer, I experimented with a few dozen tomato vines and some basil. The plants flourished, I coped, and, by August, Mark came out to me over a caprese salad. I really wasn't that surprised about him, and the tomatoes were delicious, so the relationship wasn't a complete loss. Now the garden was a multiple-bed extravaganza with a wide variety of edibles, including an entire row of rainbow chard. I was on the verge of getting chickens.

“I spend a lot of time out here. My grandmother was the great
gardener. I'm just trying to maintain her vision but add my own twist. My goal is to be completely self-sustaining in two years. If I could only figure out how to grow Oreos. Do you garden?”

Now I was the one asking a question I obviously knew the answer to. Despite his heritage, he had the pallor of a man who spent sixteen hours a day at the office and the other eight thinking about the office. “First circle” was the term Bumble had used to describe Rafa's relationship with Ted. I didn't think first circles were allowed hobbies. Or exposure to sunlight.

“I grew up on a farm, so I like tending things. But my job doesn't allow me time to get dirty. In that way. But maybe this summer I can get back to the land.” Not likely in that suit, I thought. He changed the subject. ”I assume you have WiFi here? And my cell reception seems good.”

“In the main house, yes. But not in the guest house. …”

“Great, I'll set up in the main house,” he informed me. Not exactly what I had envisioned. “Anything else I need to know about? Ghosts? Spies? Nosy neighbors?”

“Is that why you won't be working out of Ted's field office? Nosy neighbors?”

“We want to keep this as quiet as possible for as long as possible. The election's still twenty months off. Other items I need to know about?”

Clearly, he was use to working off an agenda. “I don't have a dishwasher.”

“I don't really generate any dishes. I mainly eat out of Styrofoam containers. Don't tell the environmentalists that.” Rafa was distracted by my thriving artichoke plants, which were ready to be harvested. I only had half a dozen plants, but they made a big statement. “My grandmother grew artichokes, too,” he said. “I'm so used to seeing them on a plate with butter, I'd forgotten how much the plants look like science fiction. I wonder who the first guy was to pick one of these and try to eat it.”

“The Greeks,” I blurted out like a contestant on
Jeopardy
. I immediately felt idiotic, but that didn't stop me. “The first written references to artichokes come from Greek mythology.”

He clearly didn't expect an answer to his semi-rhetorical question, so I carried on, circling the plant as I told him the story. “According to Aegean legend, the first artichoke to be picked was actually a young girl named Cynara. She lived on an island that Zeus and Poseidon visited. Cynara was completely unafraid of the gods, so Zeus took the opportunity to seduce her, good guy that he was. He was so pleased with Cynara, he made her a goddess and took her to Olympia. But Cynara got homesick and ditched Zeus for a few days to visit her homeland. Zeus was furious at the affront, so he hurled her back to earth and turned her into an artichoke.”