by Sara Breaker
I watched her for a moment, somewhat amazed at how she had handled the entire thing, even with me hanging around and messing up the works. Claire was totally unflappable. And I was sort of stumped as to why on earth someone like her would be so hung up on Marco? I mean, Marco was my friend. He was a great guy. But we were more alike than different – he was nearly just as shallow as I was. Before Nina, he also hit on girls at bars and lived the sweet, sweet bachelor life like myself. Neither of us read poetry or had any compelling political views. What could Claire Hale possibly find so spectacularly winning about Marco “Ball is Life” Welling?
And for some reason, I suddenly felt an inexplicable impulse to know, to ask, or at least to stick around and discuss further how much I thought she and Marco were completely incompatible, but then—
“Alex, hi! You’re still here,” Daphne beamed as she came out from the back, fluffing up her hair. She walked straight towards me, taking my arm. “You’re so sweet to wait for me.”
Claire stopped sweeping and looked up. I shot Claire a look of resignation, even though my grin had a tinge of arrogance.
Claire met my gaze wryly. “You know Alex, you’re probably the only person who goes to an animal shelter and gets a date instead of a pet.”
I grinned wider. “Seems to work.”
“See ya later, Claire!” Daphne gave her a little wave.
“Daph,” Claire piped up, giving her a meaningful look. “Do you care at all that he’s going to sleep with you and then never call you again?”
Daphne looked to be thinking about it, as she twirled her auburn hair around her finger, before she answered. “Not really… You can join us if you like,” she shrugged.
I had to stifle my laughter, even as Claire laughed out loud. “Whatever, guys. You absolutely belong together,” she waved, more like waving us away instead of waving goodbye.
I met her gaze again and Claire shook her head in judgment. I could have been mistaken but I thought she also looked just a little bit impressed as well. I smiled. “Hey, seriously though,” I called out with a nod, as she rushed us towards the door, “I meant what I said before. That Marco’s a dog. You deserve better.”
Claire was still shaking her head in silent mirth and sheer disbelief. “I know!” she replied loudly, closing the door behind us.
I smiled to myself, before turning on my heel to walk away, slinging my arm around Daphne’s shoulders.
Marco and Nina Move in Together
When Nina and Marco arrived at The Irish, Nina was already bubbling with joy as though she couldn’t keep whatever it was in any longer. “We have fantastic news,” she beamed.
I stopped in mid-drink to look up at them as Marco announced, “We’re moving in together!”
For some reason, I instinctively glanced up at the direction of the bar where Claire was getting the next round.
Janice leapt out of her seat to give Nina and Marco hugs. “Congratulations, you guys!”
Tyler shook Marco’s hand and he met Claire’s gaze from behind him, giving her a big smile, as she arrived back. “Hey Claire, you just missed it—”
She shook her head quickly as she plunked down the pitcher of beer on the table. “No, no, I heard it,” she said as she sat down across the table from me.
“Well, that didn’t take long, you lucky dog,” Tyler was commenting to Marco, who had then turned to me for my reaction.
I raised my eyebrows at him. “Dude,” I muttered, pretending to sound disparaging. I didn’t want to rain on his parade but I couldn’t exactly tell him that I thought for a second he was doing the right thing, so I didn’t say anything else.
But Marco just laughed as he put his arm around Nina once again.
I watched Claire from across the table, as I could only imagine her irritation as the events unfolded, but from where I was sitting, it didn’t show at all. Through all the weeks of Marco and Nina’s syrupy sweet couple banter at the bar, pet names, P.D.A., incredibly annoying couple posts on every form of social media available, and the whole nine yards that we’d all had to endure—through all of it—Claire had just been normal Claire, how she always was - zinging everyone with ironic quips, correcting the facts in Tyler’s lame stories, joking around with Janice. Janice, who still seemed oblivious that Claire was probably dying inside every time she saw Marco reach out to brush Nina’s hair out of her eyes – which was way too often.
Then again, Claire had absolutely no tells whatsoever. If I didn’t know any better and hadn’t personally seen her crying at that one party, I would believe there was absolutely nothing wrong too. And I figured that was also what Claire was intending for everyone to believe.
There were some moments though in the last couple weeks, when Claire would happen to meet my gaze, and I would see a flicker of thought cross her mind, of despondence, of caution, of wariness. She knew I knew. And I was the only one who knew. But neither of us would speak about it. It felt strange to be sharing a secret like this with Claire. At the same time, it felt somehow gratifying.
“Oh yeah, that sounds amazing,” Claire’s canned response to Nina’s story about interior decorating sounded appropriately cheerful.
“We’re going to have a cute little housewarming party this weekend, so you all better clear your schedules,” Nina was relaying enthusiastically to Janice and Claire beside her. “We just need to get the place tidied up a little bit.”
“This one has so many plans already,” Marco gestured to Nina with a smile.
“I absolutely adore furniture shopping!” Nina gushed. “Marco and I have been looking around forever for a coffee table that would match the ambience of our new lounge—”
I actually already had a date planned on the night when they were having their housewarming party, but I knew I was going to ditch those plans instantly. Claire was going to be at the party. Besides—a housewarming party? Where all the chicks were frenzied with “nesting” hormones? I was so there.
***
Marco and Nina got a really “cute” apartment together. It was a two-bedroom loft, plus study, and it really was obvious which one of them was in charge of the interior decorating. Nina had filled spaces with magazine-catalog type of furniture and accessory ensembles. Everything had flowers on it—the throw pillows, picture frames, table cloths, vases. And about half of their furniture was pink.
Though Marco didn’t seem to mind, I noted on the night of the party. The guy was looking deliriously happy, holding a cheese platter, as he chatted to some of the guests.
I was wondering how long their “honeymoon phase” would last, as I’d certainly seen my fair share of relationships that did not last. Case in point: my parents divorced. It seemed to be the new status quo.
But I was happy for my friend. Sure, I didn’t agree with how he suddenly wanted to run his life, and I was still on half-and-half about whether or not he and Nina were actually going to last as a couple, but with Marco off the market, the good news was that I definitely had less competition. Claire notwithstanding.
Tyler and I were hanging around the much-talked-about new coffee table in the lounge. Janice and Claire had gone to the kitchen to get some appetizers.
I was looking critically at the glass table top. “I think I would have gone for something more natural—something in wood with natural grains. I bet that would have looked really good with the skylight.”
“Where’s your date?” Tyler prompted me, instead of responding to my comment, sort of looking around the crowd around us.
I shrugged, taking a swig from my bottle. “Didn’t bring one.”
Tyler’s eyebrows lifted in surprise. “That’s been happening a lot, bro. What’s going on?”
I pursed my lips in wordless reply.
“Don’t tell me the great Alex Keaton is hard up on dates,” Tyler teased good-naturedly.
I shot him an oh-please look.
The truth was that it was proving to be too much work to keep another girl engaged while I was on the
look-out for another breakdown from Claire.
Like what had happened at the Christmas party, when Marco and Nina arrived, and I thought Claire was going to walk out in a fit, but she had only gone outside the venue to take a phone call. Yeah, my date hadn’t appreciated having been left in the middle of the dance floor all of a sudden. So that was an easy lesson learned.
Quite frankly, it was getting irritating. This whole thing with Claire was seriously getting in the way of the babes front. It had been over a month and I was still getting nowhere. If anything, I even felt as though I was just actually making my chances worse. And did I mention—already down to twice a week!
Any other self-respecting guy would have given up weeks ago, but I told myself that for the purposes of my lofty mission, certain sacrifices were necessary. Good things came to those who waited. And I reminded myself that immediately after Claire, there would surely be no lack of babes willing to crawl back all over me as much as I wanted.
“Ty, look around,” I gestured to the room. “This party is crawling with available chicks. And thanks to Nina, there’s a fresh new batch of girl-friends in attendance who may otherwise not have had the opportunity to meet my awesome self.”
Tyler just chuckled before he tapped my arm. “You haven’t said much lately about Marco and Nina’s nosedive into deeply committed relationships. Do you finally approve or just shutting up to be nice?”
“Pass,” I replied nonchalantly.
“What’s the matter? You don’t think they suit each other?” Tyler prompted.
I made a big show of shrugging. “I don’t know,” I said flippantly. “Is that all it takes? If you ask me, inviting some girl to share all your stuff is like inviting a lawsuit waiting to happen. I don’t know,” I repeated. “Eventually, you gotta think about her feelings, and your feelings, and her priorities, and your priorities. Do I like pink furniture? Should I say something? Why does she take forever in the bathroom? Does she really wish I made more money or was she just kidding? Maybe she really does look fat in those jeans. Maybe I don’t want to meet her parents. Are we moving too fast? Are we moving too slow? Then it gets even more complicated. Certainly too complicated for me,” I concluded with another shrug.
Tyler laughed out loud. “I love how you’ve boiled commitment down to a thirty-second rant.”
“Hey, if the shoe fits,” I mumbled, taking another sip of my drink.
“Huh,” Tyler huffed, “all I know is when I met Janice, everything in my life just fell into place, you know? It seemed like the simplest thing in the world. It sort of felt like the cruisy bit you get to nearing the end of a race.”
“Well, you never did like the race,” I pointed out, shaking my head. “Janice was right. You are a useless lump. You make it all look too easy,” I said just as the girls came back.
“Who’s easy?” Janice wanted to know, looking curious, overhearing the end of my sentence.
Tyler jerked his thumb in my direction. “Alex thinks our relationship is too easy.”
And Janice laughed. “Oh Alex, my poor uninformed single friend,” she began. “No relationship is easy,” she declared. “Some can be simpler than others, but they all need work. If you ask me, the problem nowadays is that people just give up too fast. I think…when you love someone, you don’t just give up. You do the work.”
“What about when things just aren’t meant to be?” Claire put in, her tone sounding very neutral, as she munched on some mozzarella sticks. “No matter how hard you work. It can happen.”
I shot her a quick look. She absolutely sounded like she was making a general observation or commentary on the nature of human relationships, or the world, but these days I was never sure if there was any deeper meaning or personal weight to the things that Claire says.
“Well, I suppose there’s that too,” Janice conceded. “I guess all I’m thinking is it takes a certain level of maturity to be able to commit to another person, and I think it’s very mature of Marco to be taking this step with Nina,” she said. “I’m glad to see the rest of us are growing up,” she quipped, giving Claire a meaningful glance.
Claire shot her a skeptical look. “Uh, I think you better check your aim. I’m not the one here exclusively predisposed to having meaningless hook-ups,” she tilted her head pointedly in my direction. “In fact, I think Alex’s last big commitment was to this hair style.”
Tyler and Janice laughed.
I shot Claire a look, taken aback, but then put my hands up defensively. “Hey, hey, I’ll grow up when I’m good and ready,” I told them all airily, before smoothing my hair back. “Also, you don’t change a classic look when it’s always working for you.”
Claire bit her lip to keep from laughing and I gave her a brief questioning look. I couldn’t believe she was trying to provoke me when she knew full well I could expose her big secret right then and there.
But she must have just realized it herself as she then proceeded to immediately steer Tyler and Janice away from me. “In any case, I think we’d better let Alex’s hair get back to work. Heaven forbid he miss out on the next opportunity to whore himself out. Come on guys,” she beckoned and the three of them walked away, leaving me with a look of pure astonishment and disbelief.
I glanced up at Claire briefly. She was standing with Tyler and Janice in a little social sub-circle, drinking and mingling with the other party guests. I was across the room, occupied with hitting on Tessa, this model/actress that I had subsequently run into. Since after that putdown from Claire, I needed a little ego rub. Besides, it wasn’t like I had anything else to do.
“Yeah, my job can be really challenging work but it is very rewarding. One of the best perks is that I basically make my own hours, so I’d be happy to check out some bodegas with you sometime,” I was telling her.
I was being “Mr. Helpful Guy” since I had learned that Tessa had also just moved into town. I had impressed her with my expertise on all the cool spots in town, pretending to be knowledgeable about the best restaurants and dry cleaners. It was right around when I started talking about my Jaguar when she got really impressed, and we snuck off to one side so she could impress me with her own talents.
Right then, I heard Marco and Nina step out of the kitchen with food refills, announcing something about some kind of organic gluten-free bean dip, before proceeding to relay stories about their new Keto diet and how they’ve both been sharing their work-outs with each other, both of them looking perky and happy.
I stopped in mid-make-out to peek around the corner and look towards the main room where my friends were.
“Alex…what are you doing?” Tessa was not at all happy to be paused.
“Just a second,” I mumbled, craning my neck to watch Claire for a moment.
But just as she had been doing for the last few weeks or so, every time she saw Marco, she would just get a blank look on her face, take a deep breath, paste a smile on her face, and then immediately go back to party business.
I creased my forehead, my enthusiasm for resuming “formalities” with my actress dampening. But I just gave Tessa’s prompting gaze a wan smile before I leaned back into it. Fortunately, she seemed keen to continue. Admittedly, sometimes it didn’t turn out that way anymore.
A little while later, Tessa and I had decided to whisk ourselves back to my place for…an extended guided tour of the city, and I was getting our coats by the door, waiting for Tessa to come back from the ladies’ room, when just then, I spotted Claire hurriedly walking upstairs. And she looked a bit upset.
I straightened up in alert.
I was on.
Could this be the night?
I left the coats and quickly headed upstairs, following suit. Claire was in the second room I poked my head into, what looked like a potential guest bedroom. She was sitting on the bare mattress, staring into space.
Claire looked startled when she noticed me by the doorway. “Oh god Alex, why are you here?” she sounded irritated.
�
�I was just…” I tried to make an excuse but came up at a loss.
“I just want to be alone, okay?” Claire told me, her forehead still creased.
I hesitated for a moment before decidedly stepping through the door. “Um…what’s the matter?” I asked, walking closer.
She shot me an annoyed look. “Nothing I want to talk to you about.”
“Okay…should I…get Janice then?” I offered, moving to get my phone.
“No,” Claire cut in almost immediately and I met her gaze in understanding. She still hadn’t told Janice about any of this yet.
“Claire,” I shrugged pointedly, “I mean, you look like you need to get something off your chest.”
She shook her head to herself as though in disbelief. “Nothing. It’s completely ridiculous. You wouldn’t understand. Would you please go away?”
“Oh come on,” I coaxed, “are you seriously going to keep all that inside just because you’re too stubborn to talk about it with someone like me?” I gave her a meaningful look. “I know I’m not the world’s most sensitive guy but who else can you talk to about this?”
She pursed her lips, looking frustrated that my argument had some semblance of logic in it, and looking more annoyed that I was right, before she relayed, “I just saw…Nina’s diplomas.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Her…diplomas?” I echoed, thinking I heard her wrong.
“Yes, diplomas—plural,” Claire said, as though she couldn’t believe it. “They were framed and hanging in the study downstairs, and apparently,” she paused, tossing her hair emphatically, “Nina Simons has a bachelor’s degree from business school and…a master’s degree for business management—and not from some two-bit community college either.”
My forehead was still wrinkled as I couldn’t understand how that would make her so upset, but then she stood up, threw her hands up in the air, and began to pace as she explained in length.
“Nina Simons—is smart!” Claire exclaimed. “That blonde dolt is not a blonde dolt at all! I had always thought the reason that Marco and I didn’t work out was because he wanted someone less intellectual. I had always thought that it was the main thing that he couldn’t deal with about me. But dammit,” she sighed heavily, disparagingly, “if he was just going to end up with a smarty anyway, then why wasn’t it me??”
