From Now On (15 page)

             
Jo had fielded multiple complaints brought to her attention by the secretaries over the years about the lack of trustworthy daycare in the area. One single mother had told her that the only daycare center she could find was one that charged almost half her monthly salary and refused to keep the kids after five despite the fact that it took her forty minutes to get there from the office. Another told her that her husband’s company offered a stipend for daycare, but it didn’t cover any of the daycares near their house or her office and her husband worked the night shift, so it made little sense to put the kids in a daycare near his work.

             
Jo had worked up a reasonable plan for an in-house daycare facility at BerCo last fall, but Kathleen had turned it down without even looking at it. Jo found herself wondering how Kathleen would respond if she showed it to her now. It had been humiliating to have the plan shut down via email. How would it feel to have it happen face to face?

             
Jo wanted to find out.

             
Jo drove to the office to search for the daycare plan in her files. She thought if she tweaked it a little, maybe she could show it to Kathleen on Monday. But when she got off the elevator, she was surprised to see a light on in Kathleen’s office. After searching her files and updating a couple of figures in the original plan, Jo thought she would take a chance. She stood in the doorway of her office for a moment, the same place she normally froze when it came to any kind of confrontation. But this time she didn’t even stop to run her fingers through her hair.

             
Her heart pounded in her chest as she paused outside Kathleen’s office. It crossed her mind that she could turn and walk away now and Kathleen would never know she was there. Instead, she tapped on the door frame.

             
Kathleen, dressed casually in jeans and a white cashmere sweater, looked up in surprise from her desk. “Jo,” she said somewhat breathlessly. “What are you doing here?”

             
“I was wondering if I could talk to you for a minute.”

             
“Sure.” Kathleen waved Jo to a seat in front of her desk. As Jo perched on the edge of the chair, smoothing a wet palm over her pant leg, Kathleen sat back and studied her. “I heard what happened between you and Becca yesterday.”

             
Jo nodded slowly, chewing on the inside of her cheek for a minute. “I was going to come talk to you about that after it happened, but I got sidetracked.”

             
“Yes, I was surprised to hear you had left early.”

             
“I’m sorry, Kathleen,” Jo said. “It was very unprofessional—”

             
“Not at all. It’s nice to see you being spontaneous for once.”

             
Kathleen laughed when Jo looked sharply at her, surprised to hear such a thing from her rigid boss. “You think you’re the first person to fall in love, but you aren’t. It’s happened to the best of us,” Kathleen said, reaching across the desk to show Jo a picture of her with a very handsome white-haired man.

             
“Your husband?”

             
“Four years next month.”

             
“Congratulations.”

             
Kathleen took the picture back and studied it herself for a brief moment. “I hope you find as much happiness with Mark as I have with Donald.”

             
Jo tilted her head slightly.
“Do you mind if I ask how…”

             
“This isn’t a business, don’t you know. It’s actually a very efficient rumor mill.” Kathleen shook her head. She sat back and studied her arched fingers as she pressed them into a triangle. “So, this thing with Becca?”

             
“She wanted to make me start going through the complaints each week the way the secretaries have been doing since before I came here. I told her it would take too much time from my regular duties.”

             
“And she suggested giving some of your regular duties to Beth?”

             
“Yes.”

             
Kathleen nodded. “Becca has been doing quite a few surprising things since her promotion. But that doesn’t give you the right to behave insubordinately toward her. She is still your immediate supervisor.”

             
“I know,” Jo said with a slight tilt of her head. “I’ll apologize on Monday.”

             
Kathleen nodded her approval. “Is that all?”

             
“No,” Jo said before she could talk herself out of it. “I heard a rumor that you plan on presenting a proposal to the CEO to begin a daycare center in-house at BerCo.”

             
“That’s true.”

             
Jo gestured with the file folder she still clutched in her left hand. “If you recall, last fall I suggested the same idea. I thought you might like to take a look at the proposal I worked up then.”
             

             
“As I recall, I shot that plan down.”

             
“You did,” Jo admitted. “But it was a good plan and I thought maybe it could help you design your own plan.”

             
“You’d be willing to share credit with me?”

             
“Or blame, depending on how it’s received.”

             
Kathleen leaned forward and held out her hand for the report. She silently looked it over, then studied Jo for a long second. “I think I may have underestimated you, Jo,” she said with some amusement in her voice. “In fact, I’m almost positive.”

             
Jo spent the afternoon working with Kathleen on the daycare plan, enjoying the collaboration more than she had ever imagined she would. Kathleen was actually a lot more laidback than anyone at the office had given her credit for. She had a sense of humor that was intelligent, sometimes making droll jokes that were so subtle that it took Jo minutes to catch the punch line.

They managed to put together a proposal in less than four hours, between Jo’s previously written plan and Kathleen’s well-organized ideas. It was a strong proposal, based on a great need and with a financial plan that would defer most of the company’s cost.  Jo had confidence that the CEO would at least take it under consideration, which was the most they could ask for at this point.

             
When Jo finally packed up to go home, she checked her phone for email messages and discovered that Emily had called several more times during the day. Jo quickly called her back and arranged to meet at a local deli.

             
Jo could see something was wrong the moment Emily walked through the doors.

             
“Where have you been?” Emily groaned as she fell into a chair across from Jo.
             

             
“I went into the office for a while. Why?”

             
Emily shook her head before burying it in her hands. Jo reached over and smoothed a hand down Emily’s arm. “What’s going on?” she asked softly.

             
“Mom’s driving me nuts,” she said in a muffled voice. “She’s obsessed with this wedding.”

             
“What is she doing now?”

             
Emily sat up and looked around the room, as though afraid of someone overhearing. “She just…she is so focused on the perfect way to do things. We have to have it at the perfect church, have the reception at the perfect hotel, have the perfect flowers and perfect food at the reception. It seems like every time I suggest something I want for the wedding, Mom disagrees.”

             
“She’s just excited, Em. She’s been waiting for this day since you were born.”

             
“That’s another thing,” Emily said, glancing almost guiltily across the table at Jo. “It’s like she’s built this whole ideal around me, this world that I don’t even fit into. I use to dream about all this with her, too. But somewhere along the way my dreams changed, but hers didn’t.”

             
Jo bit her lip, a thousand words jumping to the tip of her tongue, but none that would be helpful at this particular moment. Emily had always been their mother’s prize child, the feminine little girl who made up for Jo’s tomboyish ways. Jo could remember watching from the sidelines as Emily imitated their mother as she put on her makeup, preparing for a night out on the town. Mother used to laugh and call Emily her “special little fashionista.” They were always more like sisters than mother and daughter.

             
“What does Ryan think?”

             
Emily sighed. “He keeps telling me that it doesn’t matter, that he will marry me anywhere at any time. But I know it bothers him, too. The cost alone—”

             
“Weddings are expensive.”

             
“Yeah, well, it doesn’t have to be this expensive.” Emily reached into her handbag and showed Jo a contract from a local caterer. The down payment alone was enough to pay Jo’s rent for three months. “We wanted to buy a house.”

             
Jo set the contract aside. “Tell me something.”

             
“Anything,” Emily said, looking at Jo with wide eyes and a wistfulness Jo hadn’t seen from her in years.

             
“What kind of wedding do you want?”

             
“Something simple,” she said quickly. “Just family and a few friends and a preacher somewhere romantic. On the beach or in the park. And a nice party afterward with cake and music. I always wanted to dance at my wedding.”

             
“Then that’s what you should have.”

             
Emily smiled at the picture that had formed in her head. But then the smile disappeared and she bit her lip, as though punishing it for the happiness it revealed so briefly. “I can’t do that.”

             
“Why not?” Jo reached over and took Emily’s hand. “It’s your life. You can’t let Mom tell you how to live it forever.”

             
“But Jo, she would be so disappointed.”

             
“Yes, but she’ll get over it.” Jo sat back and glanced at the window into the dark street beyond, not really seeing the busy intersection but her own struggles with their mother. “If you don’t put an end to this stuff now, it’ll just continue. Do you really want Mom to tell you how to take care of your husband? Or how to raise your children?”

             
“I don’t know,” Emily said again.

             
“Just think about it,” Jo said.

             
Maybe, Jo thought to herself, I should, too.

             
“I’ve got the kids tonight, or else I would already be there.”

             
Jo settled back on her couch, the phone pressed to her ear. “I know,” she told Mark. “It’s okay, really.”

             
“For you, maybe,” Mark groaned.

             
Jo chuckled. “Having a bad day?”

             
“Let’s just say, I would much rather be in bed with you than dealing with the reality of my life.”

             
“Tell me what’s going on.”

             
Jo could hear the sound of cartoons in the background as Mark said something indecipherable to someone in the room with him. A second later, silence floated through the phone speaker. “Sorry about that,” Mark told her. “Missy thinks she shouldn’t have to go to bed as early as her brother. I’m learning there are some battles that just aren’t worth fighting.”

             
Jo smiled, memories of many late nights, sitting at the kitchen table sharing a glass of milk and a handful of cookies with her dad. She never liked to go to bed on time, either.

             
“I can’t wait to meet your kids,” she said on a sigh, lost for a minute in her memories.

             
There was a long hesitation. “Someday,” he finally said.

             
There was an edge to his voice that made Jo’s heart skip a beat. She told herself it was the custody battle with his ex that was holding him back, making it so hard for them to even talk about the kids. But it didn’t make it any easier to know that he was purposely keeping such a huge part of his life from her.

             
“Jo, I—” he began when she didn’t immediately respond.

             
“No, Mark, it’s fine.”

             
“Don’t do that with me, Jo.”