Chapter Thirteen

THE ANDERCHRONICLES

By Me, Ellee

[WARNING: The following story has been rated FNF*]
*Fiction NOT Fact

[Author’s Warning: Any person in this story resembling someone you know, or think you know, or maybe just know about, or even fantasize that you know, or that you want to know, or that you need to know, is purely coincidental and should be disregarded]

“A Sad Good-Bye”

By the time Andy and I left his apartment, for the last time, for the ‘Big Exchange,’ Harriet had arrived and found the, by now ‘daily destruction’ of HER kitchen. I’m not even going to get into the scene that followed when she saw it. It’s not worth repeating. Well, actually it is, but I am far too traumatized to do it.

As Andy escorted me out the door, Harriet said,“Good riddance!”

To which I responded, “And a good riddance to you, too, Dahling, you old hag!”—but only to myself. However, I enjoyed saying it, nonetheless.

Inside the elevator, Andy and I were alone. He hadn’t said a word since the kitchen mishap. He seemed distant, obviously deep in his own thoughts about something, so I didn’t say anything either. I figured it was better that way, anyway. I hate good-byes. I mean what could either of us say? Bye, it was nice to meet you; I had a great time; it was fun; have a good life? Or possibly, Wish you hadn’t come; glad to see you go; you’ve been a pain in the . . . Well, see what I mean?

I knew within a very short time I would no longer be with him. It was all coming to an end. It had only been one week, but felt much longer. I had grown accustomed to being with him and yes, even with—aawk!—Harriet, and his mother, and especially Molly. She would miss me—I would miss her! But Andy wouldn’t miss ME!

After the elevator doors closed, Andy turned to me and said, “There’s something I need to say to you, Ellee.” His eyes fastened on mine as he spoke. What could he possibly need to say to me? And why were his eyes so blue? I indicated I was listening, so he continued,

“My name is ‘Anderson’ . . . so please . . . don’t call me ‘Andy!’ You always call me ‘Andy’—just call me ‘Anderson!’”

What? This was what he NEEDED to say to me? What difference, I wondered, could that possibly make now? I continued staring at him, still not saying a word.

“Did you hear what I said?”, he questioned when I didn’t respond.

“Yes, I heard.” My eyes were still on him.

“Why are you staring at me like that?”

“I’m not staring,” I said, but I was—his eyes were still so blue.

“Yes, you are.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Why do you say you’re not, when you are?”

“Well, you’re staring at me, aren’t you?

“No, I’m not staring at you, but you’re staring at me.”

Just then the elevator doors opened and several people were waiting for us to exit. Our verbal conversation stopped, but our eyes continued the exchange. Only it was harder to understand what he was really saying now that the words had stopped. I thought his eyes seemed to be saying . . . well . . . possibly that he was somehow a little . . . sad—they had narrowed to that ‘squint.’ But that wasn’t possible, I thought. I must have misread their message. My eyes, on the other hand were definitely speaking about the sadness I was feeling.

As our eyes continued this communication, until the last second before Andy hailed our taxi, it was obvious each of us was trying to read what the other was saying. But after that, we both just stared straight ahead, silent, as the taxi pulled away from the curb and maneuvered into traffic. I turned to look out the window to snap a mental picture to take with me, but the windows in the cab were all foggy. As I cleared a little opening with my hand, I caught a passing glimpse of the park where we had shared a few Magical hours together just the evening before. It seemed so long ago, yet those few hours we shared were ours forever. We had made them ours. I knew Andy would always remember them, as I would.

We had just passed Third Ave and Bangkok when our driver turned on the radio, and as fate would have it, the song the DJ was announcing was “Lost Possibilities” by the Xacto Knives , and when the intro started, Andy closed his eyes for a moment, and then glanced over at me when Purvis Angus, the lead singer began crooning his painful song:

Why . . . did it have to end . . . this way?
Our love never had a chance . . . to be
Given time, who knew the possibilities?
Now they’re . . . . . . Lost to me.
Possibilities
Lost possibilities
The chance is gone, The chance is past
We’ll never know . . . could it last?

I saw the little verticle wrinkle between Andy’s eyes deepen as the artist sang of his own private pain over lost possibilities when he and his girl called it quits—after a whole week of pure bliss. Was Andy in pain, too? I knew I was. Were we feeling the same pain? Or was it all just a bad song? All of a sudden, as I heard Purvis’ voice crack at the end of the song, when he sang the last heart-wrenching words,

. . . my heart sank into the depths of the sea
And gloom washed up oooooover . . . me
Lost possibilities
Lost possibilities

I felt the tears stinging at my eyes, and knew it would never do to start crying RIGHT THEN—AT THAT MOMENT—IN FRONT OF ANDY!! So I pursed my lips together tightly, hopefully sealing the sobs inside, and then turned to gaze out the window to hide the emotion which was now tugging on my face, as my bottom lip autonomously took over and began quivering, but the windows had fogged up again, and I noticed nothing but a blur of colors streaking past, as our taxi hurled us to the end of our . . . relationship.

At that very moment I found myself wondering, Did we even HAVE a relationship? And then it hit me—like a katabatic wind roaring down a steep glacial incline—WE DON”T HAVE A RELATIONSHIP! At that, my heart was seized in dolorous agony, as the anguishing pangs of this rueful discovery flooded every chamber of my heart! But what do you call what we’ve had this past week? I questioned myself. Certainly Andy had been upset with me more time than he had not. And he had made arrangements to have me out of his apartment for several evenings. And, he had definitely spent a lot of time yelling at me, and being mad. Yet, what about the night before in the park—all the fun we had together with Molly?

With all these thoughts whirling around in my mind, it was hard to piece together a coherent concept of what that whole week had meant in terms of a relationship. And then, like a second katabatic wind slamming into me, I realized—Andy had only ENDURED me this past week, much like one would endure a bad case of poison ivy, because he is a NICE GUY! And now that he has the chance, he is going to unload me, once and for all, when he makes that exchange of the Christmas present he didn’t want in the first place, wished he hadn’t received, has no need for, and finds totally annoying.

At that I wanted to burst into tears, the kind which can’t be stopped, and just give myself over to sobbing like my heart was breaking—which, of course, it was! And the song . . . well, it ended rather badly with the sound of Purvis crying . . . but he cried in harmony with the violins and the cello. And so, in my heart I joined in and cried, too . . . in harmony . . . with the violins and that one cello.


However, somewhere before the song had ended entirely—Purvis cried a long time—a little tear accidently escaped my left eye, and was making its way to pool in the little indentation at the side of my nose, taking with it some of my make up. I found it necessary to mop it up quickly before Andy noticed. So, after opening my handbag in search of a tissue, something happened which shouldn’t have, but, DANG! it did!

As I rummaged through all the debris inside my bag, I inadvertently flipped out a bottle of hand lotion, the lid of which had not been adequately secured after the previous use, and wouldn’t you just know it? Somehow the whole thing ended up in Andy’s lap, saturating his suit coat and pants! As I watched the bottle of lotion in flight, I sucked in enough air to inflate a large balloon; and then I sucked in even more when I saw where the lotion had landed. After which, I sucked in another fair amount as Andy’s eyes met mine. At that point, I could have inflated a huge, yellow weather balloon with the amount of oxygen I had taken in!

With my lungs ready to pop, I started choking and coughing and gasping as the air was expelled in a violent gust of wind. All this occurring while Andy just sat there watching, disbelief written all over his face, shaking his head, but displaying no other emotion. His gaze traveled from me to his lap, to me, and then back to his lap—again, no emotion. After which, taking a big breath and releasing it ever so slowly and calmly he said, letting his hands drop on his knees,

“Ellee . . . you’ve managed to take out two of my suits today, already. And it isn’t even noon, yet. How many more do you plan on attacking today? You know, at this rate, I won’t have anything to wear by nightfall.”

I was ready to respond with some sort of apology when the cab suddenly jerked to an abrupt stop, thrusting us both against the restraint of our seatbelts. We were there! MY FINAL DESTINATION—IT WAS TRULY OVER! I would be out of his life for good within minutes. And he . . . he would be . . . out of mine, too.

I couldn’t stop the tears from clouding my eyes at that moment. They hadn’t yet spilled over, but as I looked through them I saw dear, sweet Andy as a Chardin watercolor. Silver, white, brown, blue, pink, tan, cream—all washing together in a lovely canvas of Andy. When I blinked, the canvas vanished and the medium all washed over the lids, and was cascading down the slopes of my cheeks, like a gentle springtime rain. Andy reached over to catch this spring runoff with his fingers. It was then I noticed his eyes were becoming gently sloshing pools of blue, as the spring runoff collected there, too. We were captured—suspended in a visual embrace for a tiny moment in time.

“Ellee . . . . Ellee . . . . . . ELLEE!” the voice broke in—Andy’s voice.

But . . . what . . . ? My eyes had re-focused, but my mind hadn’t. I looked up at Andy. He was outside the cab now, holding the door for me to get out. How did . . . ? And then, as I organized my thoughts, it became clear—I had been hallucinating again. Once again deceived by the Anderdelirium that had brought me here in the first place. It was good I was leaving.

As I exited the cab and stood up to face Andy, I again detected a look in his eyes which didn’t quite fit with where the cab had just brought us. His eyes were still so blue. In fact, they seemed bluer than usual. Maybe it was the light.

Once we were inside the department store, we discovered a long, possibly two-hour line at the exchange windows. At first I thought maybe Andy wouldn’t want to wait, but knowing how badly he wanted to make this exchange, I decided he really wouldn’t mind at all. So we stood there, waiting, inching our way to the windows. I had plenty of time to apologize for ruining yet another of his expensive suits, mentioning that I was certain it couldn’t happen again. His response, after laughing, was,

“I wouldn’t bank on that.”

Finally, after about forty-five minutes into the wait, he turned to me and asked,

“What astrological sign were you born under?”

Why on earth would he want to know that, I wondered? What difference would that make? I was within minutes of being out of his life forever. Maybe he was just making small talk.

“Ellee? I asked you what astrological sign you born under.”

“You really want to know?”

I couldn’t understand his sudden interest in my astrological sign. Besides which, I didn’t exactly know how to answer him.

“Are you familiar with Odysseus, the Greek hero from Homer’s Odyssey?” he replied. “He trotted around the known world for years, having all sorts of wonderful and exciting adventures, but in the end he came home and all he wanted was his family—his beautiful wife, Penelope and his son. That’s what finally mattered to him. Those who study astrology know that Odysseus is the perfect example of a Gemini. As it turns out, Gemini people are compatible with many people born under other signs. But with others they are not and I . . . ”

“Well,” I broke in, “I’ve read the “Odyssey,” I know the story, but I don’t really know how to answer your question. There’s a problem with . . . well, you see, every so many millennia, the Earth’s magnetic poles switch places.” His eyes narrowed slightly, as if trying to focus in on what I was saying. “This is due in part to the velocity of the solar winds and their effect on earth’s magnetic fields during winter solstice when the Earth is at it’s apex in the ellipsis . . . ” His focus was becoming tighter—his eyes, all but closed now, “thereby precipitating a repositioning of the astrological charts in the night sky.” At that his eyes sprang open wide, like he had seen the light—or maybe not. “ It was during one such switch that I was born. Therefore it has been difficult, if not down right impossible, to determine under which astrological sign I came into this world. But up to this point I’ve been okay with that . . . Are you okay with that?”

He seemed really confused at this point, and didn’t respond right away, but after a few minutes said,

“You know . . . I probably shouldn’t have asked that question in the first place. Let’s just not worry about it, okay?”

But it wasn’t okay, and I WOULD worry about it. Somehow I had offended Andy again, and I really didn’t want to cause any more trouble—we were sooooo close to the end of this . . . this whatever, and I wanted it to end on a more positive note than it had been. Why was I always causing these mishaps and disasters and screw-ups and saying dumb things? I wasn’t that way back home—in North Forty. Why was I that way there—in New York City—with him? And then it came to me, like 360 bolts of blue lightening smacking me right between the eyes–an epiphany,

I WAS A NERVOUS WRECK IN THE PRESENCE OF THAT MAN!

There, I said it! I admit it . . . I mean, wouldn’t you be a nervous wreck around HIM? Wouldn’t you say the wrong things, and do the wrong things around him, just because you’d want to be really cool in his presence, saying and doing cool things, so he would think, WOW! she is sooo cool— I really like her? But then nothing you said or did would come out like you intended, and he would look at you and think, Geez, what a dork! Well . . . that’s the pressure I was under for that entire week, and what can I say—I BLEW IT! I JUST BLEW IT!!!!

So with that miserable thought in mind, once again I wanted to cry, but knew I couldn’t, so I quickly rummaged through my handbag again, being careful not to launch anything in Andy’s direction, and grabbed a handkerchief which I stuffed into my mouth preventing any sobs from escaping. And at that precise moment, I looked up and saw WE WERE NEXT IN LINE TO TALK TO THE EXCHANGE CLERK! I wanted to break and run back to Andy’s place, and hide somewhere in there with Molly. But I knew I had to face this moment of truth.—Andy was about to exchange The Christmas Gift He Didn’t Want!

“May I help you, ummmmm Mr. Cooper?”, the sweet young thing with glowing eyes, named Xtina—according to her name badge—asked, obviously recognizing Andy.

“Yes,” he said, flashing one of his disarming smiles in her direction as his eyes caught sight of her.

As he stepped up to the window, I thought I heard a tiny giggle escape under his breath—as if a little twinge of joy had suddenly seized his soul upon realizing that within literally seconds his exchange would be made, and he would at last be free of that annoying present he didn’t want. And so he began his explanation,

“I have a gift I need to exchange. It’s something I really don’t want; I didn’t ask for it, but got it anyway,” he laughed, “It’s annoying and actually somewhat obnoxious; it’s not something I will ever use. I mean . . . it really is quite useless. I just want to exchange it for something else.”

As he made his case, his head tilted slightly down in an attitude of shyness, and his eyes were flashing that little boy look, pleading for even a hint of mercy from Xtina, who bless her heart, couldn’t resist and quickly added, gushing,

“Oh absolutely no problem . . . Andersonnnnnn.”

Her neck and face promptly displayed several shades of blushing red, and her eyelashes started fluttering in a nervous spasm as her eyes dilated from the shear proximity to this beautiful man in front of her, that she had only seen on TV, but was now seeing in the flesh. It was almost too much for her! She looked as if she were about to collapse. She had switched so effortlessly from ‘Mr. Cooper’ to ‘Anderson,’ but I realized it was the Anderspell he had cast over her, because he had cast that very same spell over me, landing me in this whole mess where I now found myself being referred to as annoying, obnoxious and useless.

No one can ever really understand what I was feeling inside at that moment. It was like my life was being disassembled and all my parts disconnected—broken up into cubes and fractured into little triangles with no sense of any cohesiveness remaining. I started biting the hankie I had stuffed into my mouth. Thankfully it was absorbing the tears which were by now spurting from my eyes. I’m sure at that moment, I looked like Pablo Picasso’s “Weeping Woman” come to life. Luckily, Andy was so involved with his exchange, he didn’t notice my sun being extinguished and the light of all my stars canceled. And I was so involved with this disintegration of my universe that I almost didn’t hear when Xtina said,

“What is it you want to exchange?” She was smiling sweetly as she said this. How could she not know this wasn’t the right time to smile sweetly? I forgave her.

But her words caused an immediate paralysis of my whole body. THIS WAS IT! What I had feared from the moment Andy took me out of that FedEx box! He was getting rid of me! It was a done deal! Finished! Over! Fini! Finuto! My heart stopped as I saw Andy open his mouth to speak,

“Oh, I’ve got it right here.”

And with that he reached in his pocket, pulling out a small box, which he placed on the counter and took off the lid, exposing its contents.

“See what I mean?” he asked, as he showed the two of us what was inside.

“Oh absolutely! Anderson, absolutely. No problem. No problem. Really it’s not a problem at all. Not in the teeny tiny least!”

She was still smiling sweetly, and had added a giggle. I figured she had no idea what she was even saying at that point—from the look on her face it appeared she had gone off into Anderland somewhere. Poor woman. She had all my condolences. I knew the feeling.

“Well, what do you think?” His elbow nudged me for an answer.

As I looked inside I knew Andy was right on in his assessment. There inside the gold box, resting on a neon blue satin pillow, was a pair of very expensive cloisonne Mickey Mouse cufflinks. Each of the eyes was set with a half-carat diamond.

“Wow!” I exclaimed, "you’re right. Well . . . they probably ARE useless. I mean, I don’t know where you could wear these. Maybe Disneyland.” We both laughed.

“I really don’t want them, because I’m never going to use them—ever, not even at Disneyland. I wouldn’t be wearing cufflinks to Disneyland anyway.” We laughed again. “And they really are obnoxious and annoying. Listen to this.”

He pushed on Mickey’s nose and Mickey started singing,

M - I -C- K - E - Y M - O - U - S - E

All three of us were laughing then—Xtina had returned from her little side trip.

“Okay, do you have any other returns or is this it?” she asked Andy.

My heart stopped once again, and I held my breath waiting for Andy’s reply. For a split second he disconnected and went somewhere else, but returned almost instantly. No one else would have even noticed, but I did—I saw a slight Andersquint flicker across his eyes and then vanish.

“No, that’s it. That’s the only exchange.”

After that she quickly entered all necessary data into the cash register and gave Andy a receipt to spend anywhere in the store. From there we went to the electronics department and he bought himself another laptop. I wondered why he needed two, but didn’t say anything. Maybe his was broken. However, it seemed fine to me whenever I used it. After that he bought us lunch and we returned to his apartment.

Harriet had left on her vacation so she wasn’t around when we got back. I tried to imagine how simply delighted she would be when she returned in a week and found that I was still there. Poor woman! I would have been worried about her going into cardiac arrest—except that woman doesn't have a heart.

Andy left after that, and I didn’t see him the rest of the day. He wasn’t even there the next morning when I went into breakfast. But there on the table, at my place, was a beautifully wrapped package with my name written on top. When I opened it up, I was shocked, to say the least, to find the laptop he had purchased as part of the diamond-eyed, singing Mickey Mouse cufflinks exchange. There was a little card stuck on the keyboard which read,

A Merry Christmas to Ellee
(Now you don’t have to use mine anymore)

P.S. Just so you know, I’m a Gemini
Signed,
Anderson (Not Andy)

Well, well, well . . . what do you make of all that?

Bye for now,
Love,
Ellee