by Rona Jaffe
“It depends,” said Emma, “on which movie and which man.”
“No, I think you like movies better anyway.”
Emma thought about that for a while. “You can’t compare them. They’re two different things.”
“Truth …”
“Okay, at this point in my life if I had to give up one or the other I’d stay with movies. My career, I mean. But I don’t have to decide because I can always have both.”
“I didn’t ask which you’d give up,” Kit said, giggling again. “I asked which gave you the biggest orgasm.”
“Oh, you asshole,” Emma laughed, taking a swipe at her. “You are totally sick.”
They lay on the floor, weak with laughter and tired from the wine. Finally Emma said, “I’m too drunk to drive. I’d better call a cab.”
“Oh, stay,” Kit said. “You can sleep on the couch. I don’t mind. If you take a cab you’ll have to get someone to drive you back here tomorrow to get your car, and that’s so much trouble.”
“I don’t even have a toothbrush.”
“I have hundreds. Besides …” Kit thought about the creepy guy again, as she did from time to time, and it scared her in a way that was not fun, not exciting, not sexual. “There’s a strange boy in my acting class who has a crush on me. He keeps hanging around. He wants me to go out with him but I won’t. I think there’s something not right about him.”
“Did you tell anybody?” Emma asked, concerned.
“What’s to tell? He didn’t do anything yet. Just looks at me. Sometimes he sits in his car outside my house. I’d feel better if you stayed.”
“I’ll stay,” Emma said.
Kit felt relief flooding over her and went to get her extra quilt. “Good,” she said.
“You realize that when you’re a famous actress this sort of thing is going to happen a lot,” said Emma.
“When I’m famous I’ll be able to afford to live in a house with big gates.”
Emma poured the last of the wine, trying to divide it fairly and spilling a little in the process. “You’re an interesting, uh, what’s the word I’m looking for? Contradiction. Lots of times you’ve taken dangerous chances with men you didn’t even know, and you weren’t worried at all, and then something like this really scares you.”
Kit felt the familiar choking sensation. She moved it around inside her psyche until it became something she felt much more comfortable with: rage. “I pick the men I have anything to do with,” she said. Her voice was still low, but it was filled with a lifetime of hidden emotion. “They can’t pick me—I pick them. My choice. My decision. Nobody is ever going to have power over my life but me.”
Not ever again, she thought.
Chapter Eight
Annabel, who had never wanted to become a businesswoman, who had always wanted only to have a good time, discovered now that her work had become her life. It was her own choice, but a choice by default; she was not happy with it and it did not satisfy her. That summer in New York, after her business trip to Europe, she’d had two more one-night stands, and after each felt the same unaccustomed sadness. She knew what it was from: she had grown beyond that form of recreation. She wanted a man to love and live with, to read the Sunday Times with and then take a walk, to be there for her, to share her life. Not the temporary, part-time live-in lovers she’d had while she was raising Emma; for no matter how fond she’d been of them she had never deluded herself that she was madly in love with them. No, now finally, at forty-six, Annabel wanted what she hadn’t wanted since she was twenty.
More and more often lately when she walked home from work in the autumn early darkness, carrying her lonely dinner from the neighborhood Korean salad bar, Annabel thought about Max. Dear Max, her best friend, her stability, the person she could always run to with her troubles and know he would cheer her up … dead now five years, never coming back. She had always realized that as you got older people you cared about died, but nothing had ever prepared her for Max’s murder, and nothing would ever make her get completely over it. It was Max she had gone to when she thought she was pregnant in college, Max she had run to when she left her miserable marriage, Max who had been like a father to Emma as meaningless lovers drifted in and out of Annabel’s life. And Max had truly loved her, just as she had loved him. If only Max hadn’t been gay, she could have married him and all of them could have lived happily ever after.
It was pointless to dwell on what might have been. Even if Max were alive she would not be reading the Sunday Times with him. She could hear him in her head, just as if he were alive. Annabel, he was saying, now that you know what you want, you know what to go for.
Or perhaps it would come looking for her. She cheered up when she thought about that. She had the confidence and the optimism of a beautiful woman to whom romantic adventures came easily. She only had to choose a man with some depth.
When the young man walked into her boutique to buy a birthday present for his girl friend he was so gorgeous Annabel’s breath caught in her throat. Much too young, of course; about twenty-six. Therefore just right for her. Over six feet tall, with a beautiful body, thick black hair, brilliant blue eyes, a face that had it been a shade craggier or a shade prettier would have been all wrong, but as it was was perfect. Even Maria and Pamela were standing there gaping at him. He ignored the effect he had on them, since he was obviously used to it. But when he saw Annabel he stared at her for just a moment too long, and she realized that some combination of luck and chemistry was causing him to have exactly the same reaction to her that she was having to him.
She said perhaps a dress was difficult to buy for someone else and a sweater might be better. Or a handbag was always safe. She wanted to see just how personal a present this was going to be for the girl friend who suddenly stood between them. They settled on a very nice shoulder bag. During these negotiations Annabel cleverly found out the size and shape and age of the girl friend (his age, twenty-six; she had guessed correctly, tall and slim; so she, too, was his type) and after he had made the purchase Pamela brought in afternoon tea and he lingered.
His name was Dean Henry, and he was a very successful commercial artist who had done covers for Time magazine, as well as many ads Annabel recognized as soon as he mentioned them. He was a prodigy, the combination of talent and a single-minded determination to become an artist ever since he was a child. She liked people in the arts, and one who was also making money was an improvement on the young men she usually chose. It was late now, finally time to close the store. He seemed ready to hang around forever.
“My card,” Annabel said, handing him one although there was a whole glass bowlful of them on the counter.
He took it, and then he looked into her eyes and she felt younger than he. “Could I take you to lunch tomorrow?” he asked.
“That would be lovely,” Annabel said. She didn’t tell him that she never took time off for lunch; for him she would.
“I’ll come get you at one o’clock, all right?”
“Perfect.”
He left then, with the gift-wrapped birthday present, and Maria helped Annabel pull the metal safety gates down over the front display windows and lock them. “I never saw such a good-looking man in my whole life,” Maria said. “He really liked you.”
“We shall see,” Annabel said, hiding how excited she felt.
“I wonder what the story is with the girl friend.”
“We shall see that too,” Annabel said sweetly. “Goodnight.”
The next morning she got up early and washed her hair. As she applied her makeup, music playing softly on the stereo, she felt the way she had years ago getting ready to go to a dance. It was the promise of something new, romantic and wonderful. And now that she was an adult, and free to do what she wanted, it was also the promise of something intensely sexual. Ordinarily, in the mornings getting dressed, she would have the news on, but today she didn’t want to hear about a single tragedy, and that seemed to be all the news was lately. S
he even stopped to straighten up her apartment, and made the bed, just in case …
Dean came to pick her up at the shop promptly at one, and took her to Le Metropole, a small French restaurant where he had reserved a table in the corner by the window. Light filtered softly through the lace curtains, gilding them both, touching the crystal vase of red and blue anemones, glinting off their prudent glasses of Perrier.
What had happened to her good resolutions? This could only be a one-day stand, or a brief fling at best, since he was not only already taken but cheating. She was acting like a loon. But he was so exceptionally good-looking, and so sexy, with the bonus of being talented and successful, and perhaps even intelligent and interesting … she couldn’t believe she’d be depressed after him.
“Let’s have champagne,” he said. “I just feel like it.”
“I always feel like it,” Annabel said, and laughed.
They toasted each other with their champagne glasses and looked into each other’s eyes and then looked away, embarrassed. “I want to tell you about my situation,” Dean said.
“In case I’m wondering.”
“Yes …”
Shorthand. They both knew what was happening to them. Annabel wondered why she had always been so astute about physical attraction but unable to read men’s minds about other things. Perhaps the men she chose had no minds to read. No, that wasn’t fair. Most of them were bright, most were sweet, nearly all of them well-intentioned.
“Do you want to know her name? Her name is Monica. We’ve been living together for five years. Since we were both twenty-one. That’s a fifth of our lives. She wants to get married and have children. I want to leave her because I’m not in love with her anymore. I’m very, very fond of her, but I don’t love her, and I don’t want to get married and have kids. Not yet, anyway, and not with her. I feel really badly about this. She and I were going in different directions for quite a while. I know this sounds totally cruel. But isn’t it better to break up before we cause each other any more pain?”
“Damage,” Annabel said. “Before we do any more damage to each other—or to ourselves. That’s what I said to my husband in a note I left him. I was married to him for a fifth of my life. At the time I thought it was a slightly pompous note, but as I look back it did have a lot of truth in it.”
“I want to wait until after her birthday,” he said. “I’ll tell her then. There’s never any right time, but I’m doing the best I can.”
And when will this unforgettable birthday be? Annabel wanted to ask, but stopped herself. That was the sort of too-sharp thing Chris would say, but she would only think. She was always charming. And it was true; there was never any right time for leaving someone who didn’t want to be left. She nodded.
“I’m telling you all this,” he said, “and I don’t even know if you’re free, or if you’re even interested in me.”
“Yes you do,” Annabel said lightly.
“Well, I hoped,” he said, and then they both laughed, giddy with their discovery of one another.
Lunch passed in a fog. They ordered without caring and ate about two bites of it. They held hands under the table, which Annabel had not done in years. As soon as they could decently pretend (for whom, the waiter? the patrons?) that they’d had a normal lunch date, they rushed off to Annabel’s apartment. She didn’t even bother to call the girls at the boutique. They would figure it out, and she would see them when she picked up Sweet Pea at closing time.
He was not only insatiable, but romantic and loving. He acted as though he had been waiting for her all his life, and although Annabel knew better, she liked pretending it was true. It was dark when they lay together, exhausted, and she waited for that little pang of sadness, but all she felt was contentment.
She glanced at the clock on the bedside table. “I have to go get my cat.”
He wound her auburn hair around his fingers and then let it fan down in a shower of golden lights, like a magician doing his magic act; looking at it as if he were also the child watching the magician. “Can I see you tomorrow?”
“I have to work,” Annabel said. “What about Sunday?”
“Lunch on Sunday?” he said.
“Perfect,” she said. “Why don’t I get some food and we’ll have a picnic here.”
They had three dates, if you could call them that. Three picnics where they ignored the food and went to bed to devour each other. He told Monica, who wanted a husband and children, that he wanted only to be free, to “find himself.” And then he asked Annabel if he could stay with her while Monica was looking for her own apartment.
It took Annabel about two minutes to say yes. She had never been a person who worried about consequences until afterward. Dean was not what she had been looking for: he was too young, it was impossible that it could last. But she was interested in him now, not some unknown someone else. She knew she was falling in love with him, and that it was insane. Their relationship was mostly physical—not that he wasn’t bright and talented and fun to talk to—but they had no shared history. Even when they read the Sunday Times together they would be looking for different things, seeing them through different eyes. But wasn’t that often the way with people who weren’t twenty years apart in age? She didn’t want a soul mate any more, she just wanted to be with him. She liked that he was not like her, that they came from a different place in time. Whatever someone else might consider a flaw in their relationship she found interesting, a challenge. His extraordinary good looks still stunned her. That proved he wasn’t a boring person, because you got used to beauty so quickly. Didn’t you …?
Chris, speaking of a person who had fallen in love with beauty, had stopped coming around the boutique, although she and Annabel still spoke on the phone almost every day. Finally Annabel had to make a lunch date with her in order to see her.
“Don’t get shocked when you see how I look,” Chris said on the phone.
“Shocked how?”
“I’m fat.”
“You could never be fat.”
“Well, I’ve gained quite a lot of weight since you saw me last. But I don’t want you to talk to me about it, okay?”
“I won’t say a word,” Annabel said cheerfully. She couldn’t imagine Chris, whom she’d known ever since they were eighteen, through frumpiness and chicness, as being anything but lean.
She was wrong. They met at Chatfield’s, a little restaurant that looked like a country inn and specialized in plain grills and good salads, with a few mandatory substantial items included for men who made business lunch their main meal. Chris was already seated at their table, but even sitting down it was obvious how much she’d changed. No wonder she’s been avoiding the boutique, Annabel thought. First of all, Chris was wearing a black muumuu. It billowed around her, making her look dumpy and matronly. But her face … it was her face that shocked Annabel, because it was puffy.
“I declare, Christine, you certainly have made yourself a stranger.”
“You said you wouldn’t talk about how awful I look,” Chris said defensively.
“I said you’ve been acting like one, not looking like one. You can’t be too busy at the office to spare a little time for me.”
“I’m going through a difficult …” Chris said, and stopped, her eyes filling momentarily with tears.
The waiter came over and they both ordered white wine. Chris put ice in hers and began methodically to devour the entire contents of the basket of crusty peasant bread, slathering each slice with butter. Annabel pretended not to notice. “Tell me about it,” Annabel said.
“It’s too boring. Tell me about Dean.”
“He’s living with me at the moment. I’m very fond of him.”
“Are you in love with him?”
“Maybe,” Annabel said.
“You look like you’re in love,” Chris said. “God, you’re so lucky—you always do exactly what you want.”
“You could too, you know.”
“No. I can’t. I just e
at.”
The waiter came over to announce the specials. Grilled shrimp, and a pasta with porcini mushrooms, cream sauce, Gorgonzola cheese and walnuts. Annabel was on the verge of making a face at the richness of the latter when Chris ordered it.
“Chicken and vegetable salad,” Annabel said. “And another glass of wine, Chris?”
“Not at lunch,” Chris said. “I need my wits at the office. I’ll have an iced tea.”
“Two,” Annabel said. She was relieved that only food and not alcohol too seemed to be Chris’s problem. The bloated face, she decided, must be from too much salt.
“Is all this because of Alexander or Cameron?” Annabel asked when the waiter had left.
Chris wiped up the last of the dish of butter with the last bit of crust. “Oh, Cameron doesn’t look at me in the same way anymore, and who could blame him? And Alexander hasn’t looked at me in ages. My son, of course, thinks I’m a beast. He’s ashamed of me. He nags me to go on a diet. Alexander says nothing, but I can imagine what he thinks.”
“Are you ever sorry you didn’t go to bed with Cameron?”
“I guess I am. After I ran away and started to stuff myself, I couldn’t stop. I’m hungry all the time. I’m starving. And even when I’m full I can’t stop because there’s a little place inside of me, which I think used to be my heart, which is still starving.”
“Maybe it’s not your heart,” Annabel said.
“Maybe not.” They smiled at each other. “Do you remember how many years I waited for Alexander?”
“I do.”
“I’m still waiting. I couldn’t even handle the thought of an affair. I know I’m trying to make myself unappealing to Cameron so I won’t have to make a decision.”
“Well, you obviously don’t need an analyst,” Annabel said.
“An analyst would probably say that’s just the top layer,” Chris said. “Then there are layers and layers that make me obsessively in love and also so ambivalent.”
“It sounds pretty simple to me,” Annabel said.
Chris polished off all her pasta and ordered carrot cake. She demolished that, too, including the sugary icing, in quick, methodical bites that were without any pleasure at all. Annabel felt like grabbing the plate away from her, but what good would it do?
