by Ilyse Mimoun
A lot of your friends are reading Fifty Shades of Grey. You’d prefer a book called Fifty Shades of Emotional Availability, in which a normal-looking woman with a normal-looking body falls for a guy who is neither rich nor powerful but just a really decent person. Less handcuffs, more enduring sense of emotional well-being. Probably wouldn’t sell.
You’re lamenting this to Crystal on the phone one night when she reminds you about that guy Max412, the one who spelled things correctly and read Jane Austen. Your original instinct. You decide to message him, and a date is set up. This is officially the first post-Greg date you are really excited about.
Go get him, tiger! Turn to page 49, section 16.
31
You’ve officially had it with romance, especially online dating. Men look at your profile, then don’t message you. Men message you, then don’t follow up with an invitation. Men send an invitation, then flake, then text you two weeks later as if nothing happened. If you say anything, you’re the crazy one. The law of the Internet jungle is that you cannot take anything personally. If you expect reliability or consistency, you are uptight and no fun. The whole thing is a litmus test for how uptight women are and how far you are willing to lower your standards.
You close down all your accounts. Churlishbutgirlish is no more. Your first screen name before Greg was morebeeswithhoney. Today, after yet another breakup, your screen name would be ihateyou. What’s the point anyway?
You fall to your knees in a moment of desperation. Help me, you whisper. Please.
The response is overwhelming: perfect silence.
This is the silence of complete loneliness, loneliness without end. It weighs you down, like your cells are now stones.
You lay down on your couch for a really long time . . .
Turn to page 122, section 35.
32
“Greg!” you gasp.
He looks shockingly . . . human. The man wreaked such havoc on your heart that in your mind he had morphed into a powerful, almost mythic figure. In truth the breakup was more memorable than the actual relationship. Dealing with it, healing from it, has changed you more than the time you spent together. And now here he is—just a guy. Stubbly. Bear-like. Familiar. Your brain feels thick.
“I didn’t know if you’d be coming home,” he said. “I figured you’d be out with a new boyfriend or something.”
“I am. I was. I mean . . . what are you doing here?” you ask. But you know what he’s doing here. This is the moment you’ve dreamed of forever. The moment Greg tells you, “I made a terrible mistake. I’m so sorry, baby. I love you—I think I was having a midlife crisis or something. I’d do anything to get you back. Tell me what to do.”
You let him in your apartment, if only to relish this moment. You’re still reeling from your evening, and this is an interesting distraction. You both sit on your couch, and you smell his corn chip smell. You let him cry, let him beg. “Oasis was an idiot. You are a goddess . . .” Blah blah blah. Godammit, this should feel more satisfying than it does. Why do they always come back at the precise moment you don’t care anymore?
On the other hand, there’s symmetry to it. Your recent escapades began with Greg breaking your heart. Shouldn’t they end with him mending it? You did always love him. Don’t you both deserve a chance at happily ever after?
If you give him another chance, turn to page 111, section 33.
If you’ve evolved beyond Greg, turn to page 201, section 55.
33
Hooray––you got your man back! You always were a big softie, weren’t you? And now that Greg lost you once, he suddenly appreciates you in a way he didn’t before. At night he squeezes you tight and says he’ll never let you go. You fall in love again, now in a less deluded way. The first time around, Greg was Godlike in your eyes. Now you see him as far from perfect, but you’re okay with it.
One Sunday you’re enjoying a day at the beach together when your friend Crystal unexpectedly shows up, wearing a flowing green robe.
“Hey, what are you doing?” you ask, putting down your novel.
“I’m an ordained minister of the Internet Rose Ministries. I’ve come to marry you to Greg.”
“Is it okay, baby?” Greg asks, his milky eyes swimming with tears.
In your childhood there had been images of flowing cream lace dresses, of bridal veils, and daisy bouquets––and drunken speeches made by your parents. Now you’re ready to give up the fantasy of the wedding for the reality of simply being married.
So you guys say your vows right then and there, you in your sandy tank top and board shorts, Greg in his damp Speedos.
After that, time moves at an astonishing pace. It’s a winding road of negotiations, phone bills, holidays with in-laws, sex, health fads, a mortgage, binge-watching TV shows, less sex, health scares, gray hairs, under-eye cream, wine glasses in the sink, old fights, new fights, where’d you put my sunglasses . . . and suddenly it’s twenty-five years of marriage later and it all happened so fast.
And tonight all you can tell yourself is that you obviously hadn’t planned on killing him.
And to be clear, you never could have actually taken a weapon and sliced right through his flesh, through the valleys of muscles and tendons and right to his bright white bones. Nor would you ever have dreamed of wrapping a gloved hand around a pistol and lodging a bullet into his spleen. No, such acts would have been unthinkable.
But tonight when Greg started choking on his pepper steak, gasping and wheezing and grasping for your hand, well . . . you let him. Not with the cold gaze of a heartless killer either, though that was something the two police officers in your kitchen could never understand. No, it was awful and surreal to watch him die in front of you. But that wouldn’t make you any less culpable, so you had to prevaricate a bit.
“You’re saying you were in the bathroom when your husband started choking?”
“Yes, sir,” you say, looking the clean-shaven cop right in the eye. You sip your tea and don’t have to try to look shaken—you are.
“And you couldn’t hear anything?” the chubbier cop asks.
“No, of course not,” you allow an edge to creep into your tone. You have seen enough television to know that innocent people get defensive when they’re accused of something—only the guilty remain calm.
“Do you normally take five or six minutes in the bathroom, Miss?”
Your bathroom is painted yellow with a framed photo of an old Clint Eastwood movie. The bargain had been that you could get scented soaps if Greg could get Clint. There was no bargaining about leaving the toilet seat down—he simply wouldn’t do it. He found the request enraging and thought your argument—that all civilized men made this concession for their wives—just reflected how emasculated modern men had become. More to the point, though, he explicated one evening over leftover paella—and Lord, Greg loved to explicate—it’s such an inane request, it’s so trivial, I can’t believe you’d bother to get mad about it.
This was the way Greg shut down a conversation—by pretending to appeal to your maturity. And it was hard for you to argue that the toilet was a serious matter; you aren’t globally insensitive—you know there are bigger problems in the world. What incensed you was Greg’s refusal to understand the symbolism of the issue, how it made you feel neglected, disregarded. How those feelings were important in a relationship. He just refused to look at it through your eyes. Several years ago Dr. Cain had said that the key to successful relationships was a rich understanding of the other person’s experience. You had heard those words with a sinking heart. You know that for all of Greg’s good qualities—and he had many—the ability to truly understand your inner world would never be one of them. He was, however, witty, hardworking, and generally good-natured.
“I’d say my bathroom times vary. On this particular evening I wasn’t feeling great.”
“How come?” Neither cop is drinking the tea, and the jasmine fragrance steams up from their china cups.
Y
ou sigh and pretend to think about it, because answers that spill too quickly sound rehearsed. “I actually wasn’t feeling very well that night.”
“Why is that, do you think?”
“I think I had some bad chicken for lunch.”
The chubby cop is sitting just where Greg had, Greg with his nostril hair and protruding gut. Greg who once dumped you for Oasis. Greg who scored “Low” on the Compassion quiz in Marie Claire magazine. What more did you need to know? Greg may have taken out the garbage, washed his own dishes, and ordered in soup when you were sick, but he performed these things with studied dedication, like a dutiful student. He never said, “Aww.” He had never once said “Awww.”
“Where was that now?”
“At Lil Bits Café on Twelfth Street,” you say truthfully, prepared. “I’m sure I have the receipt in my wallet. I was there with my friend Crystal.”
“That won’t be necessary,” clean-shaven cop says. “I’m sorry we have to ask these questions but . . . was everything going okay in your marriage?”
“Yes. Greg and I have . . . had a strong, healthy relationship.”
“You seemed to take an awfully long time to call the police.”
“I was in shock,” you say, and that was true too. You hadn’t planned on letting Greg perish. You loved him. At one time you were madly in love with him. It’s just that when he started choking, time stilled. You floated out of your body, watched the scene from afar. You both looked old and tired. How many nights had the two of you shared at that kitchen table? How many glasses of wine, heated conversations? Neither of you were yellers, but conversations could be tense. How cold Greg had been at his own father’s funeral. What a wreck you had been when he lost his job instead of being supportive. The questions about the girl from the Internet—was it serious? Had they met in person? Why had he been willing to risk everything again? The last question required no answer.
The gradual death of love was insidious but unmistakable. For the past ten years a painful loneliness gripped your insides. You walked around with a sinking feeling in your belly all the time. Once, in the middle of the night, you asked Greg if he ever felt lonely. He hugged you with his strong arms, and said, Of course not. You had no idea whether he was intentionally lying or didn’t even know how bad things had gotten or maybe he did know but was trying to comfort you. It strikes you now that his inner world was a mystery to you, not just vice versa. What if all your conclusions and dime-store analyses of him were just wrong? What if the ugly baffling ways he seemed to change were not changes at all but merely projections of your own sadnesses finally coming to the surface? What if he was the same Greg all along—kind, considerate, and dear?
With a wrenching pain, you burst into tears, and this is a good thing because the police are actually beginning to grow suspicious.
“It wasn’t perfect!” you cry out. “There was cheating and silent treatments, and he always erased my favorite shows! I can be a real bitch too! But that’s marriage! I want him back—you’ve got to believe me, I want him back!” You sob into your folded arms, regret rolling over you in sickening waves.
“We believe you, ma’am,” chubby says, and the two men get up to go. There is really no reason to think this is anything other than an accident––a poor schlep, and an odd woman who waited one minute too long to call the police. They leave you to your grieving, a project that will never complete.
You sit at the table for hours, even when dusk gives into blackness. You sit upright only once, when a terrible thought occurs to you. We should have had a child.
You sit like that until morning. Then you get up to make a fresh cup of tea.
THE END
34
Your heart roars as you whisper Fuck fuck fuck. Thank God you brought your purse! You apply pressed powder to your upper lip and chin to conceal the redness from Steve’s stubble and then reapply your lipstick once more. (Why oh why did you pick a lipstick color called Brazen?) It still doesn’t look great but you’re terrified of bumping into Steve again, so you run back into the dining room. Your vision blurs with tears.
“Are you okay?” J. P. asks.
“Yes, yes,” you whisper in his ear. “I’m just drunk.”
J. P. believes you because he is a sweet and wonderful person, and you are a disgusting moral reprobate.
It’s time for almond tart and strawberries with cream, and your only goal is to avoid having a complete nervous breakdown. What the hell were you thinking? Why were you willing to endanger the one amazing relationship you’ve had in years? Are you afraid to be happy?
You love J. P.! No—you are desperately in love with him!
No—that’s crazy too! How can you be desperately in love with someone you’ve known for only three months?
Ahh! What is love? What the hell is love anyway? What are you? What is life?
“So can you get your brother a job?” Mr. Moretti is asking J. P.
“Don’t waste your breath,” Steve says. “J. P. doesn’t want a slacker like me at Spoiled Geniuses Incorporated.”
“That has nothing to do with family!” Mr. Moretti yells, but not particularly at J. P. It seems like he just wants to make a big declaration.
“Dad,” J. P. says calmly. “Steve has never even taken the LSAT.”
“Well, then, it is what it is,” Mother says, her bird-like face placid. “HE’LL HAVE TO FIND SOMETHING ELSE!”
J. P. squeezes your hand under the table. You want to lick his fingers, like the dog that you are. Instead, you just squeeze back. The rest of the night you don’t let go.
THE END
35
The first months without dating are brutal. The practice had been as much a way to fill time as it was a romantic endeavor. The whole online scene had a manic feeling to it. One minute you were rejected, the next you were buzzing with activity. Now life has flat-lined. Everyone else is behind closed doors with their puppies and tricycles and inspirational quotes on the refrigerator. Behind your closed door is just . . . you. You have tried and failed to find a partner. Now you have to find a way to make your life bearable.
This is a difficult mission. You can’t do something crazy like quit your job and join an ashram because there is this thing called money and another thing called health insurance. And you can’t become a mountain climber or a daredevil because you’ve got a bum knee. So what you must do is figure out what, besides men, really makes you happy in life. And it’s amazing to see how little you know about this.
You start singing in the shower, mostly folk songs.
You join a knitting club from Meetup.org.
You take motorcycle lessons.
You write a children’s book called Puppies and Peanut Butter about a puppy who keeps getting peanut butter stuck to the roof of his mouth. It’s stupid and you never find a publisher, but it’s a very fun experience.
You go to your friends’ houses—the ones who have kids—but this time without the resentment. Some are pretty cute, with cheeks like plump, juicy peaches.
You go to the movies by yourself. You see everything. You post your snarky comments on Facebook. One time you get seventy likes.
You read everything by Joyce Carol Oates. This takes a while.
You pray. You don’t pray for things to change; you pray to be open to lightness and joy. You don’t pray to a god in the sky. You pray to lightness itself, joy itself. You ask them if they’ll touch you. Sometimes they do. Sometimes they don’t.
It’s not that you get happy, but you get busy. You stop pushing against the tide. You’re okay. Not amazing, but okay. You get to the point where you honestly don’t care about meeting a man.
Which is precisely, of course, when you meet Anthony. Well, you don’t exactly meet him—he’s here to fix your toilet.
“Do you see the problem?” you ask him, hovering uncomfortably by the bathroom door. You’re sure you use too much toilet paper, and many previous plumbers have shamed you for it. You await your scolding.
“Yeah, don’t worry about it. I’ll be done in a few.”
Well, that’s nice. Anthony has a terrific New York accent, which you always enjoy. He’s got thick, arched brows, like he’s daring you. And somehow he’s conquered the whole plumber ass-crack problem. He wears tight jeans, but they stay in place. Wait—are you checking out a plumber’s ass?
Reminding yourself that this isn’t a Leonard Melfi play, you return to the living room, where you are working on your home computer. There is much to be said about the distinctions between green teas: the crisp rice flavor of genmaicha versus the pungent floral jasmine versus the sweet refreshing Japanese sencha. Los Angeles may be the only place in the world that wants to hear about this, but when Downward Dogs yoga magazine asks you to write an article, who are you to say no?
“All done here, miss,” Anthony says. The word miss makes you feel grown up, even though you are wearing your college sweatpants and an old tank top.
“Oh thanks! Do you want some water or something?”
“Sure, that’d be great. Cute apartment. I like the picture over your toilet,” he says, referring to your framed Ghostbusters poster.
“Oh, thanks,” you say. You’re not exactly embarrassed; after all, Ghostbusters is one of the finest films ever made. But something about Tony’s gleaming arms and the hair poking out of his V-neck makes you self-conscious.
“Sometimes I feel like people don’t talk enough about Egon,” you say, referring to the nerdiest of the busters.
“Oh yeah, I agree,” Anthony says. He has a very full mouth and olive skin. “I mean, Egon is really the brains behind the whole operation.”
You laugh and open the refrigerator for a pitcher of water. (You keep one handy in case the faucets go dry. Why aren’t more people panicking about the drought?)
