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“I saw your email,” Abi said. She’d seenallthe emails.
“I’m not sure why she’s making such a huge thing out of it all of a sudden,” Rachel said, shifting uncomfortably in her seat. At the look on Abi’s face, she fiddled with the arm of her travel cup. “I mean, she was already making it a thing, but David vetoed her so we thought that was the end of it. Whatever happened this weekend—”
“You mean she didn’t tell you?” Abi said, her tone icy.
“Well, I saw the email chain,” Rachel said, and Abi wondered if her tone was a little defensive. Whatever tiny shred of patience Abi had left went right out the window.
“Was that the one where she questioned my educational credentials, or the one where a first-year parent whose kid isn’t even in the class who’s going to be using the Haggadot in question asked about the process was for requesting my resignation and she responded with an animated gif of Sue Sylvester winking?”
Rachel blanched. Abi felt zero sympathy. She did take a sip of the coffee, though, because, dammit, she needed to do something with her hands.
“I really don’t know what’s gotten into her—”
“Come on, Rachel,” Abi said, wondering if she should text David and ask him to get down here right the fuck now. Actually, that wasn’t a terrible idea. She reached for her cell phone, her fingers clumsy with rage. Unsurprisingly, Simcha hadn’t bothered to include David on any of her emails, even though he had a kid in the preschool himself. But other people had included him. And he was doing his best to help. He’d gone so far as to send an email to all the parents from the office of the rabbi explaining why Abi made the decision she did and why he stood by her, but all that did was give Simcha another target.
“Abi—”
“We both know what this is really about,” Abi said.
“I don’t,” Rachel said, looking genuinely confused. “It’s about the Haggadah situation…”
“Rachel,” Abi said, feeling the barest hint of relief at David’son my wayresponse to her text. “Come on. Simcha is being Simcha, and it was cute when she wasn’t trying to get me fired, but she’s causing actual harm now, and itstartedbecause she wanted to bone your boyfriend.”
All the color drained from Rachel’s face. Abi wished she was the kind of person to take pleasure in something like that. Instead, she just felt like a jerk. She reminded herself that she’d committed to being ten whole percent less of a bitch. Then, she reminded herself that that was only when she was interacting with Ilan. So, technically, she had permission to be a full bitch now. Not that she was looking forward to that.
“I appreciate you doing me the courtesy of not denying it,” Abi said, she sat forward in her chair and rested her elbows on her desk.
“How did you—”
“Ilan told me,” Abi said shortly. “Did you know she propositioned him?”
“I—she—” Rachel faltered, then looked at Abi askance, “She didn’t. Did she?”
“Yeah. She did,” Abi said, wondering if Rachel truly had no idea or if she were just that good of an actress. She didn’t usually go around wondering if people she considered her friends were duplicitous, but after all the things Ilan had told her, she couldn’t help wondering. “She’s also made a point to be derogatory about him in my presence more than once, which leads me to believe she’s done it to him directly pretty freely as well. She’s causing damage.”
“I didn’t know,” Rachel said, her mouth a thin line.
“I honestly don’t care,” Abi said, wondering where the hell David was, “and I don’t care what your situation is either, for the record. Josh has you in a tight spot. I get it. It sucks. But there’s a big difference between having a discreet relationship and treating the guy like a piece of meat with your friends because it’s funny. If we heard a man do that to a woman, we would lose our minds.”
Rachel swallowed hard. She looked sick. Abi wondered if it was because someone knew details about her personal life she’d been working hard to keep personal, or if it was because she was taking Abi seriously and fully understood how fucked up the entire situation was.
“David’s on his way, so I’m not going to say anything else about this. It’s your business. But you need to be aware that Simcha is using this Haggadah situation to punish me over this bullshit. We’re not teenagers. We’re grown women, and the two of you have kids. Fucking act like it.”
There was a discreet knock on her door, and Abi stood abruptly to open it. She didn’t need to hear Rachel’s response to what she said. She stood by it. She’d say it again.
When she opened the door David stood on the other side looking like he was prepared for battle. There was a smudge on the lens of his glasses that could have marred the effect, but Abi wasn’t in the mood to point it out. She just stepped back and let him into her tiny office. Rachel was seated in the chair, fingers white-knuckled around her travel mug, back ramrod straight. She was pointedly not looking at the door as David shuffled inside, and Abi told Sarah they were going to need to be undisturbed for a bit. If David wondered why Rachel looked so shell-shocked, he gave no indication. Instead, he took the second seat across from Abi’s desk and clasped his hands together in his lap.
“Let’s talk about how we want to handle asking for Simcha’s resignation from the PTO Board this afternoon. We’re all agreed that’s the best course of action, yes?” he said, as soon as Abi returned to her seat.
* * *
Ilan wasn’t sure what he was expecting when he picked up the guinea pig from the vet’s office, but it had taken a lot of effort not to laugh in the receptionist’s face when she brought Cream out in his little carrier case. He had a feeling the little guy knew it too, if it was possible for a rodent to look sheepish, this one did.
“His hair is growing back,” the receptionist said, almost defensively. Ilan just nodded, because it was obvious. In some places, the guinea pig had wild white hair like Albert Einstein. In other places, his coat looked like a gym teacher’s buzzcut.
“You’ve been through it, huh,” he said to the fuzzball as he secured the carrying case in the passenger seat of his truck. It was plastic, and about the size of a shoebox for a set of work boots. But it wasn’t so big that it made sense to use the seat belt to hold it in place. Instead, he used a series of bungee cords. At least that way the critter could still see out and Ilan wouldn’t be worried the carrying case would go flying if he took a curve too hard. Cream had clearly been traumatized enough.
On the way to Abi’s house, he stopped at a gas station and after a quick google search on his phone, he decided carrots were probably an okay treat for the guinea pig. This particular gas station, called Jack Daniels (no relation, though the sign utilized the logo), also had a short order counter in the back and a grocery store of sorts. It wasn’t as well stocked as the Co-op, but it had all the things he needed when he forgot to go to the grocery store during the week. Ilan knew for a fact the owner’s daughter owned a hobby-farm and that’s where the produce and a good portion of the meat came from. He waved to the cook who tossed his spatula in greeting.
