Maura

CHAPTER ONE

Ann watched Tomás pace across his tiny studio on the Upper West Side. 60th and 10th to be exact. After eight months of being "exclusive," she still wasn’t sure how she felt about Tomás or his studio apartment.

Ann also wasn’t entirely sure what the word exclusive meant. According to Jen and Maura, it was a good sign if she was hoping for something more serious and long-term. In millennial dating terms, eight months was basically a 50-year marriage. And like any long-term relationship, theirs was riddled with challenges.

Even in the dead of winter, Tomás looked like he spent his weekends in the sun. His olive skin held a year-round warmth, glowing in a way that brightened the New York winter. He wore mesh basketball shorts and a white tank top.

Tomás looked like a nervous schoolboy and a model filming a shampoo commercial all in one. His movements seemed restless. Every so often, he would sweep both his hands through his curly brown locks or his “Fabio hair” as Maura like to say. Then he would play with his necklace.

Tomás always wore a cable cross pendant around his neck. The cross had a sleek, versatile look. Stylish without trying too hard. Like Tomás. That necklace bounced with him, like a loyal sidekick he never left behind. One moment he would squeeze it with his right hand. Then without fail, he would pass it to his left. Even though Tomás always wore that necklace, this was the first time Ann really noticed it. In fact, this was the first time Ann noticed a lot of things about Tomás.

As Tomás paced his doll-sized apartment, the smell of days old dishes from the sink started knocking some sense into her. The place couldn’t have been more than 600 square feet. Generous, if you were petite like Ann. Way too small for a man his size. But At 6'3", he seemed like a dream when she first liked him on Hinge.

Everything about Tomás was attractive at first. The smile on that man’s face invoked a sense of pure desire inside of Ann. His big, bright teeth reminded her of the Chiclet gum that Grams loved to eat. How that translated into desire was still a mystery to Ann, but she loved looking at him, nonetheless.

Tomás spoke both English and Spanish. His family had immigrated from Colombia when he was eighteen.  After more than two decades in the States, he still had an accent. Something he considered his dating superpower. “Women love a man with an accent,” he’d say, like it was backed by science.

When he wasn’t dressed like an early 2000’s rapper, some might even say Tomás presented himself well. Ann could admit she was a tough critic on that front. As the CEO and founder of an up-and-coming technology company, she was locked in on how she presented herself to the world. But to the world, Tomás was handsome by anyone’s standards. Of the many men she had encountered in her thirty-eight years of life, Tomás turned heads more than most.  

Yet watching a 45-year-old man pace back and forth in a small circle emptied Ann’s cup of boiling hot desire for him. Tomás always paced when he had something to say, but in such cramped quarters, it looked less like deep thought and more like a patient doing laps in a psych ward. Not exactly the ideal image of her latest romantic prospect.

What did I ever see in this guy? Ann wondered, clutching her Birkin like it might protect her from the environment. She hadn’t taken off her Saint Laurent sunglasses or her winter coat. Not because she was cold, but because she had no intention of letting her Chanel tweed suit contact anything in that apartment. This was going to be a short visit.

God, what is that smell? “Tomas,” she said, watching him push the floppy brown hair away from his face. “Do you want to tell me what’s going on? Or am I just supposed to sit here and smell the trash you clearly haven’t taken out in a week?”

            She glanced over at the apartment door. Fruit flies circled a bag of trash that was rotting faster than their courtship.

“What trash-,” Tomás looked up from his pacing, “oh shit. That’s gross. Sorry my traga,” he said in a voice that resembled a teenager still relying on his mother.

            He ran to the door, swung it open, grabbed the trash bag and chucked it into the hallway. “I will take care of that in a little,” he mumbled. Tomás squeezed the bridge of his nose, like he was trying to relieve pressure from his head.

“Are you alright?” Ann asked, “you seem a bit distracted.”

He rushed to the refrigerator. Ann sat about two feet away, diagonally positioned near the door. She leaned in for a look. Inside were two six-packs of beer and a single, lonely bag of kale.

“This should help,” he said, reaching for the bag of kale. Then he opened all four drawers in his kitchen until he pulled out scissors from the last one.

“I’ve had this weird headache all day,” he cut an inch of the bag, then ripped open the rest of it, like a city raccoon inside the trash bins outside. “Trying to be healthier, you know?”

What is he even doing? And why is he so nervous? Ann added casually, “You know, kale tastes a lot better when it’s washed and cooked.”

Tomás didn’t hear her. He moved back to the center of the room and resumed pacing. Only this time, he clutched the bag of raw kale like it was a party-sized bag of Lay’s chips.

“Tomás, I have a lot of work to do. Can you please just get on with why you asked me here tonight?”

                 “Okay, Okay,” he said, clearing his throat. He stopped walking, finished chewing and faced her, “I have…I have,” he looked at the bag of kale, like it was a distraction from his well-rehearsed monologue. Tomás put the bag of kale on the table Ann was seated at, then carried on with the show.

                  “I have been seeing other people in the city. There. I said it,” he said, backing away. Then he smiled that Chiclet smile. His shoulders dropped away from his neck, like all the weight he was carrying fell off him and onto unwashed floors that Ann’s heals had the displeasure of encountering.

            Ann lifted her foot and looked at the stiletto part of her heal. Her sunglasses fell to the bridge of her nose, revealing her eyes for the first time all night.

                        “Hmm,” Ann said, flicking the dust away, “seeing or fucking?”

Tomás cleared his throat again. “Sorry, I’ve got a tickle,” he said, darting to the sink for a drink. He grabbed a Scooby-Doo coffee mug from the cabinet and filled it with tap water. Tomás guzzled that water, like he wanted it to drown him. Or at least impair his ability to speak for the moment. That must be one hell of a tickle, Ann thought.

The truth was, she already knew the answer to her question. Ann pushed the sunglasses back over her eyes. Only a man worth her time had the luxury of seeing her best feature.

            “Honestly, Ann baby, it just happened,” Tomás continued, squeezing the Scooby Doo mug. His dimples were so deep they made him look boyish. Dangerously so, like someone who still called his mom for laundry advice. “You were so busy. I hadn’t seen you in so long. I’ve been going out with the guys a lot and these young girls’ man,” he smirked, like he was returning to a simpler time in his mind, “they like to have fun.”

Even though Tomás couldn’t see Ann’s eyes behind her sunglasses, she knew it was her stare that erased the smile from his face. She didn’t say a word. She just watched him.

Pragmatic. Cold. That’s what her coworkers always said about her, usually in hushed tones and with a hint of fear. And when she was done with Tomás, she had no doubt he’d say the same.

“So let me just clarify for a moment,” Ann continued, using her pointer finger to nudge her sunglasses even closer to her face. “You’re telling me I’ve been too busy, so rather than call me and ask me to make time for you, you decided to sew your wild oats with Gen Z?”

“Well, when you put it like that, I sound like a jerk…” Tomás trailed off, then abruptly shifted gears. “Are you hot?” he asked, eyes darting around the loft. “It’s hot in here, right?”

The date was January 14^th. Ann knew this, because she was meticulously keeping track of the days. In exactly two months, she had the biggest meeting of her career.  As the founder and CEO of NetSphere, Ann’s time was limited.

Her company designed technology that could connect camera feeds from various sources and place them in one central database. In two months, she was competing for one of the largest government contracts on the market. The department of defense wanted her technology, and she wanted that contract.

Tomás opened the window, letting in the numb, cold air. New York City screamed beneath them—sirens, shouts, the ceaseless grind of taxis. All pounding like the bassline of a pop song everyone knew, but no one liked. Ann inhaled in short, ragged bursts, then exhaled deliberately, almost defeated. She clung to her part in this twisted symphony, even as she realized, with a sick kind of clarity, that her harmony had never truly belonged.

This song. The chaos. The noise. The pain. All of it would keep playing long after Maura was gone. And when the last note finally faded, where would Ann be? She wrapped her arms around herself, not for warmth, but for protection from this grief she never asked to be a part of. The bad notes kept playing, and Ann had no way to stop them.

“Come on, Ann. Say something,” Tomás pleaded, adding his own desperate note to the unbearable chorus.

         She had nothing to say. Instead, she was distracted by the cable cross pendant around his neck. The necklace swung back and forth with him. Wherever he went that necklace went to. Tomás had a lot of annoying tendencies, but his belief that he was a religious man might have been the biggest one. Despite her fraught relationship with her father, Ann could defend the notion that he believed in God. Tomás was the kind of Catholic who liked to pray to God for things like the world cup outcome or his blackjack games.

                        “How many?” Ann said in a voice as booming as the wind flying through the open window.

                        “How many what?” Tomas replied.

                        “You said girls. Plural. How many?”

                        “Uhhh,” he set the Scooby-Doo mug on the counter and leaned back against the cabinet drawers, arms crossed.. He raised his right hand and rubbed his face, “I don’t know…. Um.”

                        “How many?” Ann demanded.

                        “Eight. Okay? Are you happy? Jesus,” he said, annoyed.

            His confession did not bother her nearly as much as his unwarranted annoyance. Ann knew she had a temper. Whenever she and Maura fought as kids, her parents insisted Ann go to her room.

As she got older, Ann began to see her temper as something separate from herself. That anger clung to her like a fast-growing, venomous ivy, wrapping itself around the parts of her that were still good. She could feel it now, coiling around her leg, tightening its grip. She shook her foot, as if she could rip the roots from her heel before they spread any further.

“So let me ask you again. Why did you ask me here tonight?” Ann asked, still shaking her foot.

            Tomás looked at her foot, “are you okay? You can take your shoes and coat off. And your sunglasses. We aren’t in the matrix.”

                        “Answer the question,” she demanded, shaking her foot as the ivy coiled higher up her leg.

                        “Because” he paused.  Tomás dropped his arms to his side and walked towards her. The cross on his neck, swinging in her direction, “because as crazy as it sounds, I still want to give it a real shot with you.”

The poison was as high as her thigh now. She shook her foot faster and more violently than before. She wasn’t a little girl anymore. She couldn’t escape into her room and scream into a pillow. No, Ann Bradford had to do something she struggled with. She had to show restraint.

“You want to be with me, but also screw these,” Ann paused, steadying her voice, pulling back just enough. “Girls? Is that what you called them?”         

“Jesus, Ann. You make me sound like a creep.”

“No Tomás,” she said, hearing her text message ding in her purse, “you’re not a creep. You’re a forty-five-year-old boy.”

Tomás sat down beside her and placed a hand on her trembling thigh. And for a moment, Ann felt the ivy loosen. The poisonous grip of anger, tension, all of it, seemed to ease. She wasn’t sure if it was his touch or if any touch would’ve done the trick, but still, the calm that followed was real. It felt... nice.

He reached for her sunglasses, gently sliding them down to the bridge of her nose, as if trying to see the part of her that had just come back into the light.

“There are those beautiful green eyes,” he smiled, tucking her long brown hair behind her ear. For a minute, he resembled the person she was turned on by eight months ago, “See? We have something here. Don’t we?” he added.

Ann could only see the cross-pendant dangling from his neck. And she realized the ivy around her leg never really left. Like Maura’s cancer, it had only gone quiet, hiding beneath the surface, waiting for its moment to take over again.

Her baby sister was only thirty-six. She was supposed to have her whole life ahead of her. Instead, she was fading faster than Ann’s faith in God. The poison wrapped itself around Ann again, creeping up her spine. But this time, she felt it for what it was. This time, she wouldn’t be distracted by people like Tomás.

“No,” she smiled, “we have an animal urge to latch onto the other.”

Tomás pulled away from her, grunting in displeasure. Her phone dinged again. Ann used certain sounds for certain people. Work texts were signaled by a bell. And the few people in her personal life had horns. She looked at her Cartier watch. 9pm. Only three people texted her at this time. Her mother, Grams or Jen.

            “We do have something, but everyone else and everything else in your life mattered more than me. So, you know what I did?  I went out and I spent my time with woman who wanted to spend their time with me. What’s the crime in that? At least I told you the truth!”

Her phone dinged again. Given the state of her family, Ann reached into her Birkin, assuming it was Grams. The late-night martinis were becoming routine. Serving as her 88-year-old grandmother’s drunk dial had its perks. Ann had negotiated a lot of art pieces with her in the last few months. Not that she’d have to fight Maura for them now. Jesus, Grams, she thought. Your timing is awful.

She glanced at the screen.

            MAURA: How did it go? What did Fabio want?

Something was wrong. Maura was never up this late. Never. Not with how weak she'd been lately. Seeing her name light up the screen at this hour sent a jolt through Ann’s chest. It couldn’t be good. Not now.

Ann looked at Tomás. “I need to go, it’s been fun, but I think its best if you continue with these other girls.”

            She stood up from the table and reached for the handle on the apartment door. Then she felt Tomás reach for her hand. “Hold on a second,” Tomás pleaded.

Ann turned around. His familiar, oversized smile had lost its usual charm. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. Ann was not sure what to make of his raw kale breath, but that was not as nearly as distracting as the cross necklace swishing back and forth, like a pendulum in front of Ann.

“I really need to go, Tomás,” she said quietly. “It’s Maura.”

“I know that everything going on with your sister has been hard for you. Please know I’m praying for her,” Tomás continued, grabbing the cross around his neck, “I know what you’re going through. I lost my pal River a few years ago.”

Ann assumed this was some last-ditch effort for Tomás to regain her trust. “Sorry to hear that,” Ann said, putting her hand on Tomás chest to stop his advances, “what happened?”

“He was my mom’s dog,” Tomás said in a grief-stricken tone, “car accident.”

The ivy had returned. Only this time it gripped Ann’s tongue. “Oh my god, you asshole. Did you seriously just compare my sister’s cancer to a fucking dog? Unbelievable. What the hell is wrong with millennials?”

                 “Grief is grief, Ann,” Tomás said as if he were reciting some bullshit line from a Mel Robbins book.

The cross swung slowly between them. At least, Tomás hadn’t betrayed her like God had. Why Maura?” she thought. She did everything right. She was the best of us.

The weight became unbearable. Without thinking, Ann ripped the cross off Tomás neck and hurled it across the room.

“Fetch, you dog,” she fired.

“What the hell—” Tomás started, but the slam of the door cut him off.

Ann stormed out of the apartment. She had made it halfway down the corridor when she stopped and looked back at Tomás’s door. Fruit flies hovered around the trash bag he threw away. As she watched them swirl in their restless orbit, a cold truth settled over her. In the months to come, Maura would be nothing more than a piece of that bag, waiting to be discarded.