[based partly on the original SB dialogue in parts dealing with the transfer]

“Yeah, I realize I’m putting you in an awkward position,” Mason was saying, “however, if you’ve approved of Julia’s transfer without consulting me, you’re putting ME in an awkward position, too. Look, some of the cases that Julia and I are working on together are very important to the firm, and...”

When he hung up he was grinning broadly. That was easy. Julia was not being transferred to Boston; period.

Of course he needed to brace himself up for bearing Julia’s reaction; he never doubted she was able to put two and two together and figure out who was behind blocking her transfer. Nor did he doubt that she would be furious. That was okay, he could handle a furious Julia. He was not sure he could handle it if she left, but that was too dangerous a route for his thoughts to take.

In the evening, when he got home, he got a call. Julia, he knew it before he picked it up: the ringing itself seemed irate enough.

“Good evening, Julia. Is anything wrong?”

“You know exactly what’s wrong,” she spat out. “What did you say to Smith?”

“In regards to--?”

“Don’t!!…” she hissed. “Oh – guess what? They suddenly cancelled my transfer to Boston.”

Mason smiled. “Perhaps he felt you are too valuable to the firm to allow--”

“His! – words! - exactly! Of course he was only too happy to oblige my request yesterday, and he seemed to have his second thoughts about an hour after I told YOU I was leaving.”

“Julia,” he said reasonably, “you shouldn’t diminish your own worth to the firm by automatically assuming I had--”

“Don’t – don’t try to – this kind of meddling in my life is a bit too low, even for you, Mason.”

“Anything I might have said was totally based on my professional feelings about your leaving the firm, Julia.”

She slammed the receiver down.

“I guess she didn’t buy that,” Mason confided in Matt and patted his head. “You know, son, I’m going to have a lot of sound advice for you when you grow up.”

If he knew Julia, in a very short while she’d be there, ringing at his door, exhaling fire.

“Like a dragon,” Mason told Matt. “Have you missed our Julia, son? I think I have…”

*
She was on the doorstep in record time. Furious, her eyes casting lightnings, and very beautiful in that mood.

“What do you think you’re doing?” she said bursting into the room.

“Hallo Julia,” Mason said coolly, locking the door. “Matt, let me re-introduce you, please: here’s Julia who’s been neglecting us almost a month. Remember her? Does the name ring any bell?”

The boy smiled. He must have recognized her voice, irate as it was. Julia had to slow down, though it was not fair of Mason.

“Hi sweetie,” she said. “Now ask your father, will you, who’s been neglecting whom – ok this is not what I’ve come to discuss. I wonder why you think you have the right to dictate me what I should do and what I shouldn’t!”

Mason shrugged his shoulders. “Julia, running away would have been a big mistake for you, you know that.”

“And that’s why you talked to Smith? About what was right to ME?”

“Basically – yeah.”

It seemed like this utterance was suddenly rather hard for him to articulate. Julia watched him closer. “And what about your life? Can you tell me what your feelings really were about me going to Boston and why you did what you did?”

“I won’t deny there were – shall I say – underlying motives as well.”

Julia paced the room.

“You may have caused me my transfer, but I want you to know that you cannot interfere with my life, and if you think that you will, you’re dead wrong, bucko!” she yelled.

“Wouldn’t dream of trying. You know, son,” Mason complained, turning to Matt, “people keep refusing to let me run their lives for them.”

Against her will, Julia almost smiled. She also noticed that he’d said ‘son’, and it seemed to come very easily. She was glad.

“I’m quitting the firm now,” she said with determination. “You can’t block my resignation, and if you do, well, I’ll just walk out.”

“Do you hear that, Matt?” Mason went on in the same droll tone. “Our Julia is given to committing professional suicides on quite a regular basis, don’t you think?”

Julia sighed. ‘Our Julia’ tugged at the heart.

“A career is very important for me, Mason, and you know it,” she said, “but there’re things – of course you’d know nothing about them – like mental health, for example, that matter more.”

Mason chuckled. “Ok. What was it you said when you walked in? I’ve been neglecting you, or something?”

“Well haven’t you?”

“I was trying to give you some time to regroup, to come to terms with the idea how won--” he stopped short. “That was not easy for me, I should admit. But now I see I’ve been overestimating your intelligence.”

“You are impossible.”

“So I’ve been told.”

Julia felt helpless. She hated the feeling. She also knew that since Mason would not admit he cared, or at least wanted her, there was no use staying.

“I cannot let you do it,” she said stubbornly. “I’m quitting and leaving for Boston.”

“For Boston?” he cocked up his eyebrow. “Who wants you in Boston if it’s not a transfer?”

“Don’t worry,” she snapped out. “There IS someone who does.”

“Sooooo…” he screwed up his eyes. “So, Julia?”

“So, Mason?”

“There’s someone in Boston you’re dying to reunite with?”

“What of it?”

“Just curious. What is he, a brain surgeon? or a nuclear physicist, maybe?”

‘A waiter,’ she was inclined to say, just to see his face. She had always thought Mason Capwell was a real snob; and Pearl, wasn’t Pearl a waiter - to add to other accomplishments of his?

Instead she said wearily, “Oh just leave me alone. What right do you have to ask me this?”

“I see.”

He turned away and came up to the cot. “Matt. Bid Julia farewell. She’s a quitter, and a coward, and a liar, not a good company for little boys to keep.”

“I may be a quitter and a coward in your eyes, but I am not a liar,” Julia argued.

Mason turned to her again. “If it’s so, can you give me an honest answer to one question?”

“I—I—I’ll try,” she mumbled.

“Is the man waiting for you in Boston – provided there is a man waiting for you in Boston – the one you planned to have your baby by?”

Julia was challenged. Well, that was the truth, wasn’t it?

“Yes,” she said simply.

/Olga Lisenkova/

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