Monkey Business

jamie is shockingly punctual

Monday, November 3, 9:10 a.m.

“I will be grading you on attendance,” Professor Small-Penis Matthews says. “Organizational Behavior is not optional.”

It is to some, I think, looking around.

Only ten of us have made it to class today. Ten out of sixty-six. Oy.

I’m not sure what amazes me more, that only ten people decided to come to class or that I’m one of them.

Those absent are most likely nursing hangovers from last night’s continuing Halloween bash. The student council bought too much beer for Friday’s party, so it decided to keep it flowing all weekend. Last night the common room was humming until three a.m.

“Can someone define Expectancy Theory for me?” Matthews asks.

Layla raises her hand. She has a really nice hand. Her fingers are long and thin, and her nails French-manicured. I’m surprised I haven’t noticed them before, considering she’s always raising it to answer Matthews’s questions. And Douglas’s. And Gold’s. And Martin’s. And Rothman’s.

Nick and Russ have taken to rolling their eyes every time she opens her mouth.

The professors love her. Especially Rothman. He’s always eyeing her. For all I know they’re involved. It wouldn’t surprise me that a top student would hook up with the young and hip professor.

“Yes, Layla?” Matthews says.

“The force of motivation is equal to Expectancy times Instrumentality times Valence.”

“And all this time I thought it had something to do with pregnancy,” I say.

Matthews glares at me.

I don’t know how I didn’t recognize Layla’s voice that time in the shower. It’s so distinct. Throaty and sexy. If she weren’t in B-school, she could be a phone sex operator.

Strange how Kimmy and Layla have become so close. The two of them are definitely the odd couple. I’d love to be a fly on the wall for one of their conversations. It would be like listening to Mary Ann and Ginger from Gilligan’s Island.

Kimmy, as well as the rest of my group, are conspicuously absent from class today.

Organizational Behavior rolls into Accounting, and still none of the others show up. Apparently my group has declared November 3 a holiday. The bell finally rings, and Layla stretches then returns her hole puncher, ruler, pink Hi-Liter, yellow Hi-Liter and purple pen to her furry pink pencil case. At the beginning of OB, I watched her remove these items in exactly the reverse order. Pen, yellow Hi-Liter, pink Hi-Liter, ruler, hole puncher. I find her attention to orderliness intriguing. And sexy.

She secures the pencil case in the front pocket of her school bag, then puts away her Accounting binder, the Accounting textbook, the Accounting course pack, and finally, her tape recorder. Layla’s schoolbag isn’t any ordinary schoolbag. With its wheels and handle, it looks more like a piece of luggage. She rolls it behind her wherever she goes, and I’m beginning to want to know why. I’m beginning to want to know everything about her.

We cross paths at the door. She does an unenthusiastic little wave, as if she’s just been crowned Homecoming Queen but has no energy. I try to think of something funny to say, but all I have is, “Good morning.” Which just isn’t funny. Even with a Spanish accent. Which is what I do, for no reason that I can think of. I am nowhere near Spanish. I don’t look Spanish. I’ve never even been to Spain. Or Mexico. The only Spanish encounter I’ve had was when a burrito went down the wrong way and I nearly choked.

“Did you have a good weekend?” I ask, quickly losing the accent.

“Yes, I did. You?”

I’m probing my brain for a wheelie-bag-related joke, but my brain’s find-key has finished searching the document and the search item has not been found. Lightbulb! Maybe I’ll be chivalrous and offer to wheel the bag for her. I open my mouth and close it again. What’s wrong with me?

“I’ll see you in Stats,” she says, and does her little wave again before disappearing down the hallway.

“Bye,” I say. And then it hits me. I should have said When’s the flight? Maybe I can use it later?

Before going to the cafeteria, I pick up the pictures I dropped off on Saturday at the campus drugstore. I sit on a bench in the middle of campus and flip through them. First are the ten pictures of the Halloween party, which didn’t come out that well. Too dark. Then there are a few from last week’s beer bash. A little brighter. Next, Kimmy’s breasts. Covered by a fuchsia shirt, of course. I took it last week in an attempt to liven up our group meeting.

The next ten pictures are of Nick’s skinny butt and Lauren’s jiggling breasts from their post-spin-the-bottle streak.

Now that was a night to remember. Not that I remember much of it. The four shots of vodka went straight to my head and made me cranky. The next morning all I could remember was why I shouldn’t drink.

I flash back to the accident I had in the ninth grade. I was riding my bike, and the car was making a left turn. The driver didn’t see me, and I was thrown right across the street. I was in the hospital for two weeks with a broken jaw, leg and arm. The drugs made me sad and crazy. The days weren’t so bad. I got to watch movies. But the nights were unbearable. I stared at the ceiling, imagining myself in a coffin. I thought a lot about death. About what it feels like to die. About the moment just before death. I’d been knocked out immediately when the car hit me. What if I had died? Which is worse, knowing or not knowing the end was coming? And what difference would it make? When you’re dead, you’re dead.

Did Dara know? Can an infant know?

Why does God let a six-month-old baby die?

I should never have worked at the hospital after college. My mother got me the job-she became a nurse after Dara died. She still works at that hospital, loves it there. She claims it makes her feel stronger. In control. But working there had the opposite effect on me. It brought me right back to that horrible frame of mind. After getting laid off, I realized I never want to be in a hospital again.

My grumbling stomach snaps me out of my depressing trip down memory lane and propels me toward the cafeteria line.

Smiling at the lunch-line lady in the hair net, I do my best Brando. “Stella!”

“Hi, sweetie. Take the pizza today.”

“Done.”

Carl rings up my meal. “Jamie, my man. How are you?”

“Splendid. You?”

“Can’t complain.” He reads my number from my temporary card and types it into a computer. “You ever going to get a real one?”

“Damn bureaucrats.” Fortunately, Carl is the only one who’s noticed my sketchy student card. I definitely must amend the situation before it becomes an issue.

Except I don’t have a clue how to do it.

Nick, Kimmy and Lauren are sitting by the window. “Good morning, gorgeous,” I say to Kimmy, and squeeze in beside her. “And a good morning, oh, I mean, good afternoon, to the rest of you. How are we all feeling?”

Lauren shakes her Snapple in the air above her head. “I slipped in puke. Someone upchucked all over my floor’s bathroom again last night. That’s three nights in a row. How do you think I feel?”

I cover her quaking hand with mine and ease it down to the table. No one wants a juice shower. “Jealous that you were put on a different floor from us?”

“I’d rather bathe in puke nightly than make conversations with you three when I brush my teeth.”

Nick snorts. “Bet you have shit morning breath, Lauren.”

I pass the envelope of photos to Kimmy. She howls at the post-spin-the-bottle shots. “These are hysterical,” she squeals. “You guys actually streaked?”

Lauren grabs the pictures. “What, you have amnesia, Kimmy? You don’t remember?”

She blushes. “I forgot.”

“You pervert,” Lauren says, focusing on the close-up shot of Kimmy’s chest. “Bet Jamie is planning to blow this one up and staple it to his ceiling.”

I massage her shoulder. “I’ve already stapled the naked ones of you, dear. And Kimmy, if you let me take you on a date, I’ll give you the negatives as well as all the prints.”

Everyone laughs.

“It’ll be your dream date,” I press on, joking. “I’ll rent a limo. Buy you strawberries and champagne. A five-course dinner at Dolce Vita’s. You’ll never look at another guy again.”

With Kimmy it’s a routine: I flirt shamelessly, she loves the attention, everyone laughs. It’s our own version of the Expectancy Theory. She’s come to expect my flirting, and I’ve come to accept her rejection. Not that I care. Okay, I wouldn’t kick her out of bed if I found her there naked, but it’s not her I’ve been thinking about lately. It wasn’t her smile that kept me up last night and woke me up this morning. Not her eyes that made me want to be early for class.

Kimmy gives me a get real! look and continues flipping through the remaining pictures. “Why didn’t anyone tell me I looked so gross on Halloween?”

My turn: “You could never look anything but drop-dead gorgeous.”

Through the window, I watch Layla wheel her bag. She catches me staring and does her wave, only this time it’s with windshield-wiper high-speed intensity.

I think I’m in love.