Page 14 of Gulfside Girls
Ali eyed her Toledo Walleye Mug. She did like that. It went in her big messenger bag. She scanned the space again. Oh yeah, her Toledo Mud Hens ball cap. She always kept it on the hook in the middle of her door. It came in handy when her hair wasn’t cooperating after working all night here. She wore it when Toledo’s Favorite Son, Jamie Farr, was the headliner of theM*A*S*HFan Convention Frogtown hosted a few years ago.
She put the navy-blue ball cap on her head. Okay, yeah, that was it. That was all she needed.
Ali walked out of Frogtown feeling lighter than she’d felt in months.
But with no idea of what would come next.
Six
Ali
Up until one week ago, if something like this had happened, Ali would have talked to Ted about it.
But Ali didn’t call Ted. She didn’t call her sisters. She’d quit her job without anyone’s two cents about it.
She did talk to her former co-workers though.
Some came to her dad’s house with their pleas for her to stay. In between packing her dad’s stuff, she listened to them vent.
“Don’t leave us!”
“I’m calling the board; you shouldn’t be his assistant. It should be the other way around.”
“If 13ABC or 11 News knew how much you did to make Frogtown a success, you’d be the woman of the year.”
She had done that. And she was proud of it. But Ali felt done. No amount of sweet talk from co-workers could change her mind.
And the truth is, no one is indispensable. They’d find a new manager.
She’d miss them, and they were a good team. A team she’d built. And one she’d loved leading. Ali had gone to bat for them with Jerry when they deserved raises. She’d put out fire after fire and knew how to handle whatever crisis occurred at Frogtown Convention Center.
And there was always another crisis. She didn’t mind that. She liked solving each problem. She loved managing the vendors, the staff, and the visitors. She just didn’t love doing it for Jerry.
Ali knew what Ted would say. He had said it many times when she was frustrated about work. Ted would have told her to suck it up. Play nice. He’d have told her to get along. All the while, she’d listen to his tirades about being passed over for tenure or a colleague getting a paper published that he’d deemed “sophomoric.”
Well, he had tenure now and a grad assistant girlfriend to accessorize his rise. She didn’t want Ted’s career counseling any more than she wanted to work with Jerry another day.
Ali was at a crossroads in every phase of her life. She’d quit her job, her husband had quit their marriage, their kids were happily in college, and her aging father was done aging.
All she could think to do was busy herself organizing her childhood home.
She boxed up Bruce Kelly’s clothes, looked through old albums, and slept. She needed sleep more than anything else.
Over the next few days, one question emerged.
Who was she now?
Who did she want to be?
More than once, she wondered, if her mother was here, what would she say.
Her mother was denied the luxury of a mid-life crisis.Was that what this was? Midlife?
Two weeks after Bruce Kelly died, the Kelly Sisters officially learned what they already knew. His house and assets were to be split among his three daughters.
Blair wasn’t in attendance for the formality, but there wasn’t much to decide. The lawyer explained the process. Knowing they would get the house, Ali had already polled her sisters. No one wanted to live in the old Kelly house. Their lives had all moved on from their childhood in the house on Densmore.
Ali had called a real estate agent the day after Bruce passed. Lingering or waiting was bad business in this market. Demand was hot in this neighborhood, and the house was meticulously cared for.
