Free Shining Through by Susan Isaacs

you’re in love with Mr. Berringer!”
    My stomach flopped over; for a second, I thought I was going to give back my drink. But I just swallowed and said, “You talk about behaving normally? You’re the one who’s nuts.” I tried to kid myself: Gladys is a great kidder. But Gladys was genuinely upset and very serious. She held her head high; her flared nostrils looked like two dark tunnels cut into a mountain. “When did you come up with such a crazy idea? Hey, and anyway, if I was gone on someone, wouldn’t I tell you, of all people?”
    “I always would have thought so, Linda. We’re best friends.”
    Boy, was she ever on the alert. Her eyes were like two thumbtacks, trying to pin me to the wall. The possibility of SHINING THROUGH / 51
    me, Mr. Berringer, a secret crush: It was the stuff Gladys’s dreams were made of. And if I did anything—sip my drink, twirl my beads—it would give me away. So I sat frozen. But there was terrible silence. I could hear the bartender squeezing out the sponge, moving a glass, cleaning up a spill. Then I made myself smile. I said, “Okay, you’re right, Gladys. Mr. Berringer really swept me off my feet. I’m madly in love. It was his smile that got me. You know, the smile he only gives to seven million people every day. So deeply personal. So very, very private.”
    But Gladys didn’t let down her guard. “Oh, come on. He’s not a human being. He’s a charm machine. You don’t think—”
    “All I know is, you say you’re drowning in work, but you have time to run around the office, talking to this one, that one—”
    “So what? Since when do you stay stapled to your desk?”
    “All of a sudden you’re best friends with Marian Mulligan, and you’re asking her so many questions even she’s getting suspicious. If she gets suspicious…And you never even told me you were talking to her.”
    “Gladys, I’m sorry. I’ve been crazy with work, and this is the first chance—”
    She cut me off. “How come you have time to talk to that moron Marian?”
    “Because I’m very curious. Okay? I admit it. I’m curious about Mr. Berringer, and her boss is handling part of the separation agreement. And Mr. Berringer’s my boss…. How many bosses do you know whose wives leave them?”
    “You’re buttering up Marian, and then you’re stopping off at Wilma’s and Helen’s, asking all kinds of questions, like you were Mr. and Mrs. North.” She almost had tears in her eyes.
    With the other girls she was queen, but I was her friend . “I would have gone with you to ask.”
    “Gladys, what’s the big deal?”
    She banged her glass on the table. “Linda, the big deal is, all you do is talk about him. Someone says, Gee, there’s a great glove sale at Ohrbach’s, and you say, Oh, Mr.

    52 / SUSAN ISAACS
    Berringer, he wears gloves. Oh, and by the way, Mrs. B, when she walked out on him…do you happen to know what color gloves she was wearing when she left?”
    “Gladys, what’s with you? I didn’t talk to you about Mr.
    Berringer for a couple of days, so it’s a major felony?”
    “I just don’t want you to make a fool of yourself. If any of the partners get wind of it…”
    What was she trying to pull? I thought. And then I realized: She wasn’t only desperate for gossip; she was scared that if I’d fallen for John, I’d want to cherish him alone. I’d float up to the clouds, abandon her. Gladys wanted to keep me, and keep my crush for just the two of us. A Sunday special.
    And part of me wanted to-be kept. What a relief it would be, to talk about John, to have someone—a sober someone, my best friend—to take pleasure in all I’d gathered. Let me tell you about the veins in his hands, Gladys, about the way he holds the phone. But then what would I be? Just another girl with a cheap pash for her boss.
    It burst out of me: “Listen, Gladys. There’s a big, fat difference between worrying about someone—someone you have a lot of respect for—and going