Perfect on Paper

by Janet Goss

  Mostly in vain.

  I turned to face Lark. “Listen—I know this party is a big deal for you, but… don’t you think you deserve a real boyfriend?”

  “What do you mean? Sandro is my real boyfriend.”

  No, he isn’t, I thought but didn’t say. A real boyfriend answers the phone when you call him. Yours can only text you from his bathroom. And you’ll spend this entire evening on opposite sides of the room, pretending to ignore each other.

  And somehow, you’ll find a way to convince yourself it’s all worth it.

  The chauffeur swung open the door, and Lark clutched my hand. “This is so exciting!”

  Excitement’s overrated, I thought, wishing I were back at the brownstone with my real boyfriend.

  The party was well under way by the time we arrived, but the noise level dropped perceptibly when Lark removed her coat and turned to face the room in a swirl of satin and chiffon. The owner of the gallery approached her with open arms. “You’re exquisite!” he gushed, kissing her on both cheeks before handing me his empty champagne glass.

  “Hi, Lucien,” I said, handing it back to him.

  “My goodness. Is that you, Dana? I thought you were one of my caterers.”

  He sauntered off before I could confirm my identity.

  I surveyed the crowd while Lark accepted compliments from a steady stream of admirers. All eyes were on her.

  All eyes but Sandro’s. I spotted him in a corner next to one of his triptychs, his gaze fixed firmly on his wife: a statuesque Italian with a prominent nose, bright yellow hair extensions, and the perkiest breasts I’d ever seen on a woman in her fifties. Her husband’s face was a furious shade of magenta.

  Lark plucked two flutes of champagne off a passing tray. “Do you think Sandro knows I’m here?”

  I looked back to the corner. His color had risen; his eyes were still riveted to his wife.

  “I think he’s aware.”

  “I’m going to the ladies’ room. Maybe he’ll follow me back there.”

  She made her way through the horde, and I braced myself for an onslaught of refill requests. But salvation arrived in the guise of my former coworker. We’d been inseparable during my years at the gallery.

  “Rodney Ambrose,” I said, embracing his tiny frame. “Skinny as ever.”

  “Look who’s talking,” he drawled, hugging back. Over his shoulder, I watched Sandro excuse himself and disappear down the hall leading to the restrooms.

  Rodney took a step back and looked me up and down. “I hate to admit it, but life after Lucien seems to be agreeing with you. Even though I’m never going to forgive you for abandoning me.”

  “I didn’t realize you were still working here.”

  But I couldn’t say I was surprised. The artwork Rodney produced in his off-hours had limited appeal. He was a photo-realist who painstakingly re-created the covers of romance novels, replacing the original model’s face with that of his alter ego, Ambrosia.

  He squeezed my hand. “God, I’ve missed you, Dana. I can’t even keep track of how many assistants we’ve run through since you left.”

  “Sorry to hear it.”

  “You know how it is. They manage to get one of their pieces into a group show at some god-forsaken outpost in Gowanus or Dumbo, and the next thing you know, they’re the toast of the demimonde.”

  “Don’t worry, Rodney. Your day will come.”

  “So, how about you? Sell any paintings lately?”

  I didn’t have time to answer before I felt a tug on my sleeve. I turned to face an agitated Lark, our coats draped over her arm. “Come on, Dana. We have to leave. Right now.” She tugged harder, and I followed, giving Rodney the universal “call me” sign just before he was engulfed by the crowd.

  We made it to the sidewalk before her tears began to flow in earnest. “I’ve ruined everything,” she whimpered, letting out a high-pitched wail.

  I took her by the elbow and steered her down the block to the corner. “Tell me what happened. What did Sandro say to you?”

  “Oh, Dana. He said I looked like a slu—a slu—”

  “A slut? Seriously?”

  In response, she wrapped her coat more tightly around the offending outfit.

  “Lark, everyone at that party was dazzled the minute you walked in. You looked like a real-life Cinderella tonight.” And if you could only have managed to stick around a little longer, you might have finally met your prince, I thought, scanning the traffic streaming up Tenth Avenue.

  “Then why did Sandro—?”

  “He was jealous, pure and simple,” I answered before leaping halfway into the left lane to flag down an approaching taxi.

  “Do you really think so?”

  “Of course he was jealous,” I said, wincing at the realization I’d bartered two Hannahs for a dress Lark had worn in public for mere minutes. Damn that Sandro Montevecchi.

  “Are you positive?”

  “What else could it be?”

  She pondered the question for a moment, then sighed happily. “Then I was right to leave the party. I’ll apologize, and he’ll calm down, and then everything will be okay.”

  Sure it will, I thought. For Sandro.

  Lark unfastened the diamond bracelet and handed it to me before getting into the cab. “Tell Vivian thanks again!”

  Yeesh, I thought, watching her wave goodbye from the rear window. At least when I’d squandered my future on a married man, I’d done it with a nice guy.

  I looked at my watch and was sure it had stopped. Could it really be only half past six?

  Of course it could. I’d barely had time to finish my glass of champagne.

  I pulled out my phone and called Hank on my way to the L train stop on Fourteenth Street.

  “Don’t tell me that party’s over already,” he said when he picked up.

  “Oh, it’s over, all right.”

  “Does that mean you’re coming down?”

  “As soon as I change clothes.”

  The first thing I did when I arrived home was secrete Vivian’s bracelet in the toe of a sock, which I buried in the bottom of my hamper. I couldn’t bear the thought of going downstairs and telling her how the evening had played out; the diamonds would be safe until morning. I added my party outfit to the top of the pile, then turned on the computer.

  Gridmeister was at it again:

  I’m bored. You up for some excitement?

  “No more excitement,” I said, dispatching his email to the trash and grabbing my keys.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  A HOT DOG MAKES ME LOSE CONTROL

  The happy prospect of spending the holiday with my brother and Hank further strengthened my resolve to avoid Billy in the week leading up to Christmas. And I nearly managed to pull it off—but not without a great deal of typing. A few days after the gallery party, a final grid arrived in my in-box, along with a note: “Let’s get together and clue this thing.”

  “I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” I wrote back.

  “What did I do?”

  “Wreaked havoc on my equilibrium.”

  “You have no idea how pumped I am to hear that.”

  And so on. This guy was making my insides melt, even though his use of the word “pumped” did render me just the tiniest bit queasy. People in my peer group tended to use the word as a verb, not an adjective.

  Eventually I convinced Billy to let me compose the initial set of clues remotely, but just this once. According to him, crossword construction software was required to produce puzzles in the proper format. “But don’t worry,” he wrote. “I’ll burn a copy of the program and give it to you when we get together to go over the finished product.”

  “And you agreed ?” Elinor Ann said the evening before the rendezvous was to take place.

  “I hadn’t planned on it. But then I realized that seeing Billy would be the perfect Christmas present for Hank.”

  “Is that so? Tell me—how does one go about wrapping such a genero
us gift?”

  “You didn’t let me finish. If I sit down with Billy and tell him I have a boyfriend, he’ll back off. Hank will never have to know anything happened, and then everything will be fine.”

  “If you tell Billy about Hank.”

  “Of course I will.”

  “I don’t know, Dana.… Can’t you just tell him in an email?”

  I’d considered that option but ultimately decided it was best to have the conversation face-to-face. “I’m the one who messed up here. He had no idea Hank even existed. Besides, I’m hoping to salvage our friendship. If it weren’t for Billy Moody, I’d never realize my dream of having a puzzle in the New York Times.”

  “That’s only been a dream of yours for—what? Two weeks?”

  “More like three. But that doesn’t make it any less of a dream.”

  “If you say so.”

  Elinor Ann had problems of her own. Angus had broken his wrist during the first basketball game of the season, when the Tulpehocken Trojans had defeated the Kutztown Cougars.

  “So now the only Cougar I know is you,” she said. “Plus my eager errand boy isn’t allowed to drive until the cast comes off.”

  “Will he be okay?” I asked, relieved she hadn’t thought to throw in a Trojan joke while she was at it.

  “I expect so. The doctor said it was a clean break.”

  “Will you be okay?”

  She sighed. “Now that I’m forced to go to the grocery store on my own—well, let’s just say I had to take a saw to the deep freeze the other night to liberate the last bag of frozen peas.”

  “I think you’re looking at this the wrong way. If Angus can’t drive, he’s less independent. He needs you again.”

  “Hmm. I hadn’t thought of it like that.”

  “Maybe grocery shopping won’t be as scary as you anticipate. Don’t you think tomorrow’s as good a time as any to find out?”

  “I guess so. On one condition.”

  But I was way ahead of her. “You’ve got yourself a deal. You go shopping, and I’ll come clean to Billy.”

  I chose Katz’s Delicatessen for our meeting, since its cavernous, cacophonous room and lack of table service struck me as an appropriately unromantic setting in which to conduct our business. And the moment that business was concluded, I’d follow through on my promise and bring up the real issue at hand.

  But I’d forgotten how skilled Billy was at derailing my good intentions. When I spotted him outside Katz’s, my pulse rate soared. I don’t know how he managed it, but we were kissing before we’d even exchanged hellos. I braced my hands against his chest in an attempt to distance myself, but somehow they found their way around his neck, and in no time we were grinding away like bonobos.

  We were eventually interrupted by a stentorian blast from the horn of a passing dump truck. “Nail her, buddy!” the driver hollered, loudly enough to be heard the entire length of Houston Street.

  The incident, while mortifying, had the desired effect of bringing me to my senses. “Maybe we should go inside,” I said.

  “Great. I’m starving.”

  I wasn’t. As soon as the smell of food hit me, I realized I had no appetite. A patron walked by carrying a pastrami sandwich the height of a seven-layer cake, and a wave of nausea—or was it panic?—swept over me.

  Ah. But I could order a knish. A nice, bland, relatively compact knish. We approached the counter, where Billy caught the eye of a server.

  “I’ll have a knish,” he said.

  Great, I thought. I wasn’t about to order the same thing. What else on the menu was smallish?

  “I’ll take a hot dog.”

  What the hell had I ordered that for? There was no genteel way for a woman to ingest a hot dog. Now I was about to sit directly across from Billy Moody and go down on a six-inch length of meat.

  We picked up drinks and made our way to a table, where I turned my head and took a surreptitious bite of my lunch. What the hell had I done that for? Now I was going to have hot dog breath when Billy kissed me again. If he kissed me again. God, I hoped he was going to kiss me again.

  No, I didn’t. I had to stay focused. I took a big swig from my bottle of Dr. Brown’s Cel-Ray, hoping its medicinal taste would jolt me back to reality.

  Billy pulled the puzzle and two pages of clues from his backpack and spread them out on the table. “I think we’re all set here. Just wanted you to look it over one last time before I send it off.”

  I’d looked it over on the computer so many times in the past week that I could practically recite the clues from memory, but I dutifully scanned the pages. “Seems fine to me. So… what happens now?”

  He shrugged. “I send it in and we wait.”

  “For how long?”

  “For as long as it takes to hear back.”

  “But—that’s torture!”

  He grinned. “Maybe you’ll learn a lesson from it.”

  “Such as…?”

  “It’s not nice to keep a person waiting for too long.”

  We sat there, smiling at each other and allowing the sexual tension to ratchet up a few more notches.

  Which was not what was supposed to be happening. Our business had nearly concluded. It was almost time for the big reveal. There was just one more matter to discuss.

  “Did you bring that disc with the crossword construction program?”

  Billy mock-hit his forehead with the butt of his hand. “Son of a gun. Slipped my mind.”

  Suuuure it did, I thought.

  “Do you have a few minutes?” he said. “We could go over to my place, and I’ll burn it for you right now.”

  I shot him a bemused look. “Are you sure you forgot, or is this how word nerds lure women to their lairs?”

  “Why don’t we just call it a happy accident and leave it at that?”

  Why not, indeed. If I did go over there, perhaps the post-collegiate dorm room I imagined he called home would have an adverse effect on my libido. And wouldn’t it be better to tell him about Hank in private?

  Of course it wouldn’t. But once I told him, I had a feeling I was never going to see Billy again. And the closer I got to that moment, the longer I wanted to put it off.

  “Okay.” I took a final slug of Cel-Ray and got to my feet. “Let’s go.”

  The apartment was remarkably nice, a real one-bedroom on the third floor of a walk-up with no evidence of roommates. Instead of the beer-can pyramids and dirty-sock funk I’d expected, there was a grown-up’s leather sectional. Framed, matted copies of his published puzzles hung in an eye-level frieze around the living room. And all of the lamps had shades.

  “This is… surprising,” I said, ogling his midcentury modern coffee table and sisal area rug.

  “You expected a basketball hoop and assorted swimsuit calendars, didn’t you?”

  “Well… what do you do, anyway? Besides crosswords.”

  He groaned. “Tutor rich prep school brats.” He cocked his head toward the blinking answering machine on his desk. “That thing’s probably full of frantic messages from neurotic moms who want to arrange extra flash-card sessions before the next SATs. The only reason I put in a landline is so I don’t have to talk to them until they’ve calmed down.”

  “I see. So if I called you, I’d get a machine?”

  He slipped his hands into the back pockets of my jeans and pressed me against the wall. “If you called me, you’d get my undivided attention.”

  He tasted like knishes, which meant I surely tasted like hot dogs, but neither of us seemed to mind. In fact, I wouldn’t have minded kissing Billy Moody for the rest of the year, and the year after that…

  Until something brushed up against my ankle and I shrieked.

  “Relax,” he said, scooping up—Puny? “This is Biddy.”

  “No, it isn’t.” I opened my wallet and extracted a photograph. “It’s Puny.”

  “Yow. Maybe they’re brothers. I got mine off Craigslist from some nutcase whose new landlord didn’t al
low pets.” He looked at the picture, then at Biddy, and back to the picture. “You know, when you and I move in together, we’ll never be able to tell which one is which.”

  “Oh, right—move in together!” I laughed, even though the thought of having Billy Moody around all the time wasn’t so much funny as dangerously enticing. Plus I’d wind up with a much nicer coffee table.

  “Don’t mock me,” he said, dropping the cat and pulling me onto the couch in one fluid gesture. “It’s not that preposterous an idea. Tell you what—let’s pretend for a little while. Give us a chance to see what it’d be like.”

  I should not be kissing this boy, I thought, kissing this boy. This is wildly inappropriate. Not to mention wrong. Not to mention Hank, who really does deserve to be mentioned… just as soon as we stop…

  The phone rang—not his cell, but the landline.

  “Ignore it,” he muttered, tugging on my shirt button.

  I followed his advice until the beep sounded and a woman’s voice came through the speaker.

  “Biiiiilllly,” she said in a breathy tone that would be ideally suited for a career in the phone-sex industry. “Billy Moooody. Pick up. We have pussy issues to discuss.”

  I leapt from the couch. “Pussy issues?” I said, rebuttoning my shirt—which should never have been unbuttoned in the first place.

  He leapt from the couch. “It’s not what it sounds like.”

  “Are you free tonight?” the woman on the answering machine continued. “I was thinking I could come over after dinner, around ten. Let me know!”

  I was almost to the door by the time she hung up, but he somehow managed to grab hold of my wrist. Briefly I considered screaming my head off until the cops arrived, but if there did turn out to be a perfectly reasonable explanation, well—there went my shot at a crossword in the New York Times.

  I shook free of his grasp and drew myself up to my full height of five feet, nine and seven-sixteenths inches. “I had no idea rich prep school brats had such youthful-sounding mothers.”