A Job Works Every Time

“Lou moved into his new condo yesterday.”
“Oh really?”
“Yeah, we took the kids out and later I went over.”
“You went there?”
“And I stayed for breakfast the next morning! So there’s Lou and I having breakfast, and his girlfriend comes in and he says, ‘I brought Edie over to show her the apartment and I invited her to join us for breakfast.’”
“You got weird relationship, Edie. So is she pretty?”
“Na. She’s kind of plain, but young. It would have been our twenty-ninth today. We’ve got a history behind us. Twenty-seven years and two kids. I didn’t ask for money, so we’re friends. We feel relaxed together, you know what I mean? Like we go to a movie and he farts. Whose husband doesn’t fart in front of her? And you know what he says? ‘You know, Edie, you’re still the only one I fart in front of.’”

Edie pours water from the bucket on to the coals even though the sign says “Please don’t throw water on the coals. This is a dry sauna.” She tucks the corner of her white gym towel under her armpit. Her legs are a map of veins, the dark blue lines blurring under the sepia wash of her Miami tan. It’s scorching hot on the third bench, but I lie flat on my frayed green bath towel and slide my memory’s doors open. They’re like those self-closing doors that keep out cold and heat, and I have to consciously keep them propped open. I’m thinking Jewish yentas would flesh out my book and I can't wait to tell Abie, so I swoop down on the sauna dialogue.

“So Myra, you coming to Vegas with the girls?”
“Who’s to know? I didn’t talk to Saul about it yet.”
“What you mean, talk to Saul? You’re a big girl, Myra. Look at that behind you got. Never mind, never mind─you need Saul’s blessing before you wipe yourself?”
“And who’s going to pay for the hotel and shopping? So I'll bring it up after supper and he'll says ‘sure if you really want’ and then I'll look at his face.”
“What’s all this looking meshugas?”
“It’s like this─Saul unbuckles his belt after dinner and he goes into the family room to watch the news, I finish off the dishes, have a cup of tea, maybe a little nosh, and when I go up, he’s in bed reading the newspaper, with his pillow and mine behind him─a man needs two pillows he says, a woman can use her own head, it’s so soft. When he said that I started adding extra schmaltz in his food whenever he complains about his weight. Nothing too fatty, you know, just a little extra olive oil.”

I gasp because I do that too. In Abie’s salad’s. The women look up at me. “The heat,” I say, leaning back and covering my face with a wet washcloth. Maybe if I can’t see them and my face is covered, they’ll continue. When Abie suggested I go to this women’s gym, he didn’t know the joint would be full of dialogue.

“Myra,” Edie turns to squarely face her friend. “Do like I do, give him a job . . . a job, you yutz, offer him a job.”
“Gonif! You do that?”
“Every time. I want something real bad, I offer Mort a job. Depends what I want. A dress─one job. A dress and shoes. Two.”
They’re laughing and nudging each other like two crazed schoolgirls.
“How much for a trip to Vegas?” Myra asks.
“Tell him a year and then schedule a lot of dentist appointments.”