by Amy Sohn
“Let’s do that,” I said. We kissed good-bye on the cheek and I went home.
As soon as I got to the apartment, I typed a column about our meeting. Except this was the ending:
We stood at the corner of Second and Seventh, facing each other. Cab after cab sped by, but I made no effort to hail one. The drink had made me see Mason differently. I didn’t worship him the way I used to. I just liked him. He was much more appealing off his pedestal than on. I wondered how it would feel to be with him again—except, on equal footing this time, even turf.
“It was good to see you. Ariel,” he said, leaning toward me and pecking me on the cheek.
“You too,” I said. I started to turn to get a taxi, but then he put his hand on my shoulder, turned me around, and kissed me on the lips. For the first few seconds I kept my mouth shut, but then he pulled me closer and I opened wide and smooched him tongue and full and loud. It was so good it made my head spin. So good it made me want to do more. But I couldn’t. Novel was my Lover, and I knew better than to blow it all on a lay I would regret as soon as it was over. The kiss was just big enough for me to get to sleep without ‘sturbing and just small enough for it not to count as an infidelity. “I think I should go home.” I finally said. Mason nodded. As I got in the cab. I debated whether to tell Novel Lover. My first instinct was not to. but as you can see, I changed my mind.
As soon as I finished, I stuck the column in an E-mail to Turner, and as I clicked on send I got a huge adrenaline rush that made me dizzy and giddy at once. The rest of the week I was sweaty and constipated. The Corposhit would come out of her office and ask me to do copying and have to repeat it a few times before I could hear what she was saying. At lunch, Sara would go on about Rick and I would nod faintly, pretending to listen.
On Wednesday, Sara and I went to the Met Life building with the papers. The illo was me smooching a guy with a huge boner and a bubble above my head of Novel Lover with question marks floating all around him.
“Is it true?” said Sara when she finished reading.
“What do you think?” I said.
“I think it’s not.”
“You’re right.”
“Why’d you do this?” I told her about my balance-of-affection plan. She shook her head from side to side gravely and said, “What if he dumps you?”
“He’s not going to dump me over a kiss.”
“But even if he does stay with you, and gets more affectionate, you’ll know the only reason was because of a lie. Where’s the victory in that?”
I spent the rest of the afternoon trying not to think about what she had said and checking my machine to see if Adam had left a message. But the only one I got was from Jason: “Liked your column, Ariel. It came as a bit of a shock to find out what had transpired, but I have to admit, I was flattered by your distortion. Call me sometime.”
That night Adam and I had plans to meet at Souen, this vegetarian restaurant on Thirteenth Street, after his class. When I walked in he looked a little pale, but then again, he always looked a little pale. I kissed him on the cheek and sat opposite him. “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking,” he said.
“About what?” I asked, with some serious vibrato.
“I think you know.”
“Yeah. I guess I do know.”
“There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you for a while now, and reading your column made me decide to tell you.”
This was a strange tune. “What is it?”
“I kissed someone else too.”
“What?”
“It was about two weeks after you and I started seeing each other. Remember that night I said I wanted to stay home and watch that Knicks game?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, I didn’t. I got together with Laura for dinner, and she invited me to her place. We wound up talking about old times and then we started kissing. It got pretty hot and she asked me to spend the night, but I realized it wasn’t right, and then I left. Are you mad?”
Mad most certainly was not the word for what I was feeling. Suicidal was far more accurate. I wanted to pick up a butter knife and lob it into my flailing heart until my aortic valve dangled on the table. He’d totally nailed me. I couldn’t tell him how hurt I really was, because on paper, we were even-Steven. And I couldn’t tell him my kiss had been a lie, because then I’d have to explain my secret plan.
“I . . . I guess I’m a little mad,” I said carefully.
“You’re allowed to be,” he said, patting my hand.
“Are you mad at me?” I asked hopefully.
“No. Mostly, I’m just incredibly relieved. It’s comforting to know we’ve both made mistakes. God, I’m hungry.” He opened his menu. “Getting this stuff out has really worked up my appetite. I’m gonna start with some miso, then maybe go for the curry rice noodles. What do you want?”
I wanted to crawl on the floor and curl up into a fetal position. This was a travesty beyond belief—and there was only one remedy. I had to outcheat him. Concoct an infidelity so insidious that there was no chance he’d have done the same thing himself. I could write that I did two men at once. But then he’d definitely dump me. There was this successful young novelist Adam was always telling me he despised—I could write that I fucked him. Except Adam knew the guy well enough that he might confront him and find out it wasn’t true. My infidelity needed to be as believable as it was chilling. I had to drive Adam to the brink of insanity. It was the only way I could make him love me back.
9
ON FRIDAY, Sara invited me to a party at Rick’s apartment. Before Rick was a naval officer, he was a Seattle rocker, so he was subletting a huge loft on Leonard Street from a famous indie singer friend. I went over around ten. The lighting was dim, Beck was blasting from the stereo, and everywhere I looked there were boys. Languid boys with soft, golden hair, in T-shirts emblazoned with vacuum-cleaning and auto-body-repair logos, in gas-station-attendant outfits with names like Leroy sewn on the lapels, boys fellating Rolling Rocks in less-than-innocent ways, slender boys, music boys, tempting boys.
I scanned the room for Sara and Rick but didn’t spot either of them, so I went into the kitchen to get something to drink. As I was removing a beer from the refrigerator, this short cutie in an Epcot Center T-shirt came up to me with an opener. “Let me help you with that,” he said. I angled the bottle toward him and he popped it open. “Thanks,” I said, leaning against the refrigerator door.
“Are you a friend of Rick’s?” he asked.
“I’m friends with his girlfriend, Sara. What about you?”
“I don’t know anyone here. A buddy of mine invited me but he hasn’t shown up yet. I like your T-shirt.” It was tight and white and it said Diva in red letters across the chest.
“Thanks.”
“I like your eyes, too. I noticed them as soon as you came in the door. You’re very beautiful.”
Whoa. “You’re beautiful” was a phrase Adam rarely used with me. When I got dressed up he would say I looked pretty, and sometimes he would say, “I like that outfit,” but he never looked at me at random moments and told me he liked what he saw. I always tried to tell myself it didn’t bother me, but now that I was hearing the words come out of someone else’s mouth, it did. When a random schmo makes you feel better about yourself than your own boyfriend, it kind of means there’s a problem.
“If you don’t mind my asking,” said Epcot, narrowing his eyes, “do you have a boyfriend?”
His gaze was steady, unflinching. I wasn’t sure what to say. One part of me wanted to lie, but the other part knew I’d never be able to pull it off. Besides, maybe he’d be more interested in me if he knew I was taken.
“Yes,” I said. “As a matter of fact, I do.”
“Have you been with him a long time?”
“Three months. But it’s been a very intense three months.”
“I know what you mean. I’ve had two-month relationships that were more intense than yearlong ones.”
“I didn’t mean intense in a good way,” I said slowly. “We’re actually having some problems.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t feel like he loves me, I get insane with jealousy each time he talks to another woman, and I’m constantly terrified that he’s going to dump me.”
“That sounds like something I read in the City Week. Have you ever read that paper?”
“Um. Once or twice.”
“Well, this girl in the Week writes this column about her boyfriend, and it’s obvious from reading it that they’re going to break up any day now. The guy sounds like he’s completely afraid of commitment and probably shouldn’t be involved with anyone, and she’s just way too insecure for it to work.”
“Gee.”
“But last week she kissed this other guy, this ex of hers, and I’m kind of curious to see what her boyfriend does about it. I can totally relate to what she’s going through.”
“You can?”
A huge bearded guy in a Massive Attack T-shirt came in the kitchen and headed for the refrigerator. I moved across to the sink and stood next to Epcot. My arm hairs touched his.
“Yeah,” he said. “I was in this relationship a couple years ago with this girl who was kind of cold to me. She had just gotten out of something else and she was protective over her space, but I wanted to spend all my time with her and I felt like if she really loved me, she wouldn’t be so distant. Did you see Paris, Texas?”
I started to say, “Shepard wrote it,” but bit my tongue after the “Sh” to keep my cover, and nodded instead.
“Well, you know that monologue where Harry Dean Stanton talks about tying a cowbell to his wife’s ankle so if she ever tried to get away from him, he would hear her leaving?”
“I love that monologue!”
“That’s how I felt about my ex-girlfriend.”
“I know just what you mean, man,” said Massive Attack, raising his bottle and taking a swig, and then skulked out.
“Anyway,” said Epcot, “it was insane. I couldn’t stand the thought of her leaving me. I became consumed by my own fear. I lay awake some nights convinced she was cheating on me, and sometimes I’d call her just to make sure she was in her own bed. It was pretty ugly.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Yeah. Well. It’s been four years since she dumped me, and I think I can safely say I’m over her. I’m Ben, by the way. What’s your name?”
I inhaled. “Ariel Steiner.”
The Rolling Rock in his hand started to shake. “Jesus! Are you kidding?” I took my wallet out of my jeans and handed him my driver’s license. “You’re not.” He blushed and shook his head. “I’m so embarrassed about what I said. I mean, I don’t necessarily think you and Novel Lover are doomed. Maybe it’ll work out. I think I was just imposing my own feelings about my relationship onto yours.”
“I think you might be right, though. I think we might be doomed after all.”
“Relationships take a lot of work.”
“I know, but maybe there’s such a thing as too much work.”
Three cute girls in tank tops came in, their arms linked. They began playing with the magnetic poetry on the refrigerator and giggling loudly at each other’s creations.
“Do you want to get out of here?” said Ben.
“What do you mean?”
“Do you want to get a drink, maybe?”
I wasn’t sure. He was so off-balance, unstable, and romantic hearted that it made me think we were kindred spirits. And all we were doing was getting a drink. That was no sin.
“Where do you want to go?” I said.
“BarCode,” he said. “It’s on First and Fifth.”
•
The bar was downstairs from a restaurant. It was tiny, with just a few tables and small red love seats around the perimeter of the room. The only people in the place were couples, and most of them were sucking face. It was a little intimidating.
He ordered a Jameson for me and a martini for himself, and we sat down on a couch in the corner. “Tangled Up in Blue” came on the stereo and he started singing along.
“Are you a Dylan fan?” I asked.
“God, yes. The biggest. I’m kind of obsessed. I have four biographies, a picture book of photos of him, Tarantula, all his albums, and about two dozen bootlegs I ordered over the Internet.”
My thighs began to quiver and I took a sip of my drink to calm myself. As I lifted my head, he said, “Wow. What a great chin scar. How’d you get it?”
“Bicycle accident.”
He reached his hand toward my face and ran his thumb over the scar. I lowered my head and looked at him. He didn’t take his hand off. He just moved his thumb from my chin to my lip. I opened my mouth and licked the tip. Then I closed my eyes and sucked the whole first joint. He started to lean in. When he was about two inches away from my mouth, I backed away. A thumb suck was one thing but a kiss was another. It was much easier cheating on paper than in life. Despite what Adam had done to me. Despite the fact that he’d given me a free dick pass.
“This isn’t right,” I said. “I’m in love with someone who’s going to put me under the bridge, but it doesn’t make me love him any less.”
“I understand,” he said. “But can I at least give you my number?”
“Sure.”
He wrote it down on a matchbook and gave it to me. I stood up and put on my coat.
“It was amazing to meet you, Ariel. I hope things work out. Give me a call if you feel like it.”
I stood up, rushed out of the bar, and got in a cab. When I got home, I turned on the computer. I had chanced upon my pièce de résistance. With Ben the sentiments had all been there—the attraction, both physical and emotional, the feeling of intense temptation—just not the cheating itself. I had all the elements I needed. Writing the actual sex part would be a breeze. I’d found my perfect faux fuck.
The beginning of the column was the way it really happened: meeting Ben at the party, telling him about the problems Adam and I were having, and leaving with him to go to BarCode. Except this time, when he leaned in to kiss me, I didn’t back away:
Before I knew it. we were kissing, and Len’s hand was slowly creeping up my skirted thigh. His mouth on mine did not feel weird; it felt right somehow, and familiar. We held each other for a long time, and then he ashed if I wanted to come back to his place.
“Yes,” I said. “Very much.”
He had a Don’t Look Back poster above his bed, just like me, and as soon as I saw it I started to think maybe my Perfect Guy would have to be a much bigger Dylan fan than Novel Lover. Novel’s favorite singer is Sarah McLachlan.
Len went over to the stereo and put on Blood on the Tracks, and as the opening strains of “Tangled Up in Blue” came on, he led me to his bed and began to unbutton my jeans. I pulled off his shirt and got on top of him. and that right feeling stayed so strong that before I knew it. we were knocking boots. But as soon as he pulled out, a wave of guilt washed over me. How could I have betrayed Novel Lover so thoughtlessly and cruelly? Didn’t he mean anything at all to me? Wasn’t our relationship even the tiniest bit sacred? I quickly put on my clothes and ran out the door.
•
For the three days after I sent in the column, I tried to act tense and preoccupied around Adam. Except it wasn’t really acting. I was tense and preoccupied. He kept asking what was wrong, but I just told him I was premenstrual and tried to look like I was lying.
On Wednesday Sara and I read the column together, and I watched her jaw hang open from the beginning till the end. “So, what do you think?” I asked.
“From knowing you, I can see it’s completely inconsistent with your character to do something like this, but it reads like it’s true.”
“Thank God.”
“You mean you made it up?”
“We went to the bar but I didn’t fuck him. I didn’t even kiss him.”
She closed her eyes, pinched the bridge of her nose
, and said, “I’ve seen you shoot yourself in the foot a thousand times before, but this time you’ve severed your entire lower leg.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I guarantee Adam’s going to break up with you.”
“Then I’ll just tell him I made it up.”
“He won’t believe you. He’ll think you’re just saying that to get him to stay.”
“I’ll call Ben and have him tell Adam nothing happened.”
“He still won’t believe it. He’ll think Ben’s just lying to protect you. It’s over. I never thought I’d say this but you’ve lied too well.”
•
That afternoon I got messages on my machine from both my dad and Zach. “What’s going on?” said my dad. “I didn’t want to say anything about last week’s column, but after reading this week’s, I felt I had to call. I wouldn’t put it past you to do what you did, but to inform Adam in such a recklessly self-destructive way—that does not sound like you.”
“What up, sis?” said Zach. “Didn’t anyone ever teach you not to cheat and tell? Or at least not to cheat and tell the city?”
But by the end of the day Adam still hadn’t called. That could only mean bad news. When I got home from work, though, the phone was ringing. “I’m on my way,” he said.
When I opened the door, he looked somber. Very somber. We walked up to the apartment and he sat on the couch. I sat on the other end of it, two feet down. He crossed his legs, then crossed them the other way. The refrigerator hummed loudly. Finally, he cleared his throat.
“I have something to say,” he said, “and I don’t think you’re going to like it.”
I knew what that meant. Sara was right. I’d botched everything up. My faux fuck would fuck me over. My not cheating and telling. Welcome to Dumpsville. Population: me.
“What is it?” I asked.
He turned his head toward me slowly. “Laura and I did more than just kiss. We made love.”
•
I choose the Whiskey Bar of the Paramount Hotel as the setting for my breakup with Adam. It’s two weeks after his admission. I have not told him my own infidelity was a lie, and I have made him believe I’ve forgiven him for his. Tonight, however, he will learn the truth. I’m dressed up, dressed to kill: knee-length black silk skirt, formfitting V-neck cashmere pullover, garters, and platform heels. Everyone else in the bar is well dressed, warm breathed, and laughing. They throw their heads back in joy because they are happy with their mates. He looks at the people happy with their mates and realizes how lucky he is to have me. He has no idea what I have in store for him.
