by Theresa Alan
I was pouring myself a beer when I saw them. Marc, Mark, and Mary had actually come. I’d invited them thinking I could get on their good side by pretending I wanted the honor of their presence when I knew they’d have a hipper party to go to. But they didn’t. They were at my party with their stunning significant others in tow.
Mary was dressed as a genie, wearing a bikini that displayed her ample bust and small waist, and sheer baggy pants that exposed every leg muscle she’d earned from jogging. On her head she wore a square hat in the same shimmery pink as her bikini. Sheer material flowed out from the hat over her thick honey-colored hair. Her husband stood beside her wearing a pirate’s uniform. Mark was with his live-in girlfriend (it wasn’t enough that she was astonishingly good-looking, she was also a surgeon) and Marc and his wife, who smiled a practiced smile of a former high school prom queen. All four wore ’70s disco attire, the kind of tight clothes in unforgiving fabrics that only a brave few could pull off. I thanked them for coming. Mark patted me on the shoulder and said it was good to see me as he walked past me to talk to someone more important. Marc, his wife, and Mark’s girlfriend followed, leaving me alone with Mary and her husband, Todd.
“Wow, a ton of people came,” Mary said beaming. “Quite a shindig you’ve got going. I’m sorry we’re late. I could not decide what to wear. The only thing I could think of was my cheerleading uniform, the one I wore in college—I still fit into it, thank god!—but I wore that last year. Mark was just about to pick us up when Todd came home with this costume. He knows my taste so well. It’s perfect.” She put her hand on his chest and gazed at him admiringly.
“It’s a beautiful costume,” I said. I was now completely out of ideas for conversation. “So, how did you two meet?” I asked.
“We both went to school at Hartwick College,” Mary said.
“I’ve never heard of that.”
“It’s a small college in New York.”
“Interesting. Why did you decide to go there?”
“I literally just threw a college guidebook in the air and it landed on the page describing Hartwick, so I sent off an application just for the heck of it. I know now that I went there to meet Todd.”
They were young, successful, gorgeous, and dazzlingly in love. Surely I’d spent enough time with them by now, hadn’t I?
“Well, help yourself to a beer. They’re in the cooler. I should refill the snack trays.”
I watched them go, hand in hand. I picked up a mostly empty tray of crackers and cheese and went to the kitchen. I was arranging the crackers when Lydia cornered me.
“Did you get a chance to meet my cousin?” she asked.
“Cousin?”
“He’s straight. He’s single. He just got transferred here from Iowa. He works in a hospital.”
“Lydia, you are not trying to set me up.”
She peeked out the kitchen door and we both covertly looked at Ben, who was sitting on the couch next to some guy.
“Admit it, he’s cute,” Lydia said.
He was kind of cute, though he had a beard. I wasn’t a big fan of beards. He had nice brown eyes. His hair was thinning, but it didn’t look bad on him. He wore a Renaissance-era costume.
“He’s okay. You didn’t say anything to him about me, did you?”
“I may have mentioned that I had a gorgeous, blonde, single friend, I’m not sure, I can’t remember.”
“You realize I’m never going to speak to you again.”
“I’m going to remind you that you said that when you ask me to be a bridesmaid in your wedding. Come on, I’ll introduce you.”
“That’s not necessary—” It was too late. She dragged me into the living room and introduced us. Ben and I smiled dumbly at each other and Lydia made an entirely unsubtle getaway.
“Are you supposed to be a character from Shakespeare?” I asked.
“I’m just an average Renaissance man,” he said with a smile. “I’m a member in a Renaissance revival group. We meet on alternate weekends and reenact life in the Renaissance. We do things like build our own bows and arrows. We do archery and have feasts and generally celebrate Renaissance times.”
“Oh how interesting,” I said. “How did you get interested in that?”
“I minored in history in college and focused on the Renaissance. I think it was such an important and intriguing era in terms of art and literature and culture. I have to admit, I’m not a fan of modern artists like Pollock.”
“He’s made some important contributions to modern art and, anyway, he’s the only artist whose work I could reasonably reproduce.”
“You actually make it look really cool. Are you an artist?”
“No, I got my degree in fine arts in New York. I majored in dance, but I took a lot of art and writing classes, some photography. Anything that I couldn’t possibly make a living at in real life.”
He laughed and I felt myself warming to him. So he was a little eccentric. Originality was interesting. We talked for a few more minutes until I saw newly arriving guests to greet, and I told him I needed to circulate.
I was so exhausted by the end of the night, I’d forgotten about Lydia’s plot to get me together with Ben until he was leaving. I walked him to the door.
“It was a wonderful party,” he said.
“I’m glad you could make it.”
“Would you maybe like to go out sometime?” he asked.
“Sure.”
“I’ll get your number from Lydia.”
“Great. It was nice to meet you.”
“It was nice to meet you.”
I waved to him as he walked to his car. A date! My first date in five years. I wasn’t sure how attracted I was to Ben, but it would be good practice for meeting Art. When we finally met, I wanted it to be flawless.
JEN
Kitty’s Discontent
I wanted Tom desperately, and God knows Kitty needed some attention after months of deprivation (surely that little incident with Les didn’t count. In fact, I’d nearly managed to forget about it entirely), but before Avery’s Halloween party I’d masturbated rigorously and explained to Kitty that that would be all she was getting tonight. We had to be on our best behavior lest Tom think us absolute sluts.
Even so, after a few drinks, I was ready to tear off his clothes. Instead, I opted to get to know him a little better, and I took him aside to ask him why he’d broken up with his ex.
“She cheated on me. With my coworker.”
“Really? That’s so awful.”
“It’s going to be a while before I can trust women again.”
“Sure, I understand,” I said. I waited for him to ask me about my ex. I wanted him to know that I had only recently broken up with my boyfriend. I didn’t want him to think I’d been dumped, which I had, or that I’d been single for god-forsaken amounts of time, which, compared to Avery, I hadn’t, but he didn’t ask, and anyway, if I told him the truth about Dave driving me nuts with his alcoholic, partying, titty-bar-going ways, I would sound un-understanding, and if I told Tom I was ready to commit but Dave wasn’t, that would scare him off for sure. So maybe it was a good thing the topic never came up after all.
Even so, it seemed I messed up at some point, though certainly I have no idea how. I laughed at his jokes and asked him question after question about himself, but at the end of the night, not only did Kitty not get any action (a little teensy bit of action would hardly be slutty, it would be merely advertising what I had to offer), I myself didn’t get so much as a kiss. He gave me a polite hug good-bye and said he’d see me at work Monday. He didn’t even promise to call!
Monday morning I went to work with a horrible hangover. I’d had a little too much wine during my festival of loneliness and feeling sorry for myself the night before. To add to my misery, in my stupid attempt to further my career, Sharon was treating me as her personal slave. I was already swamped with work on the stupid Expert account, but I pushed that aside and tried to keep my head from explodi
ng as I typed in Sharon’s ROI numbers for her report for her meeting later in the day.
Even though I felt like someone who’d taken a particularly harsh beating from Xena the Warrior Princess, I tried to look adorable and sexy for when Tom stopped by to tell me what a great time he’d had Saturday night and how he couldn’t wait to see me again.
Except all the lip gloss I’d dutifully reapplied each hour went to waste—I didn’t see Tom all day. Well, maybe the network had gone down and he was really busy. Or maybe he didn’t want to seem overeager. That must be it.
I went to Tae Bo after work, and as I punched and kicked and sweated my ass off, I began to finally begin feeling like something close to human.
After class, I raced home to check my messages. Not a single person had called. Was it possible that Tom didn’t like me?
I poured myself a tall glass of ice-cold Absolut Citron and wallowed in self-pity until I couldn’t take myself anymore and called Avery.
“What’s up?” I asked.
“Nothing. You?”
“I’m bored out of my mind. Tom hasn’t called.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Me too. I wish I’d find a decent guy already. I want to have kids when I’m thirty, which means I’m going to have to find a guy really soon.”
“Thirty is five years away.”
“I know, but it takes so long to date and plan the wedding, I’m running out of time.” It occurred to me just then that Avery was thirty and single. Oops. “Do you want kids?”
“I’m not sure. I used to think I did, but now I just can’t imagine doing it. I think too many women have kids because they think they’re supposed to, like it’s the accessory they need to finish off the picture of their perfect life: husband, career, kids, house, dog. Do you know Elaine in sales?”
“Yeah.”
“Her kid’s daycare ends at six, but Elaine is constantly working until seven or eight. So she’ll pick up her three-year-old from daycare, plunk him in front of the TV in her office, give him a granola bar for dinner, and ignore him completely until she’s done with her work. She does this all the time. I’m not saying the mom has to take all the burden of raising a kid, but if neither the mom nor the dad pays any attention to the kid from seven in the morning to eight at night Monday through Friday, I don’t know, I just don’t think that’s right. Why did they even have the kid if they had no intention of ever spending any time with him or giving him a balanced meal? My mom worked full time, but she made sure her evenings were for me. We’d cook a nice meal, talk over the dinner table, watch videos and eat popcorn together, just hang out. I don’t know, I just think if you’re going to be a parent, you should do it right, and I’m not sure I can do it right.”
“Our mom worked. She spent time with us, but I’m not sure how balanced our meals were. At least she cooked. If it were up to Dad, we’d have eaten frozen pizza every night of our lives. Everything Mom cooked involved hamburger meat: tacos, chili, sloppy joes, or plain old hamburgers, and every now and then for like a big-deal Sunday dinner she’d make meatloaf. The only vegetable we ever had was corn.”
“Corn’s not a vegetable; it’s a grain.”
“Really? Huh. Oh, and for fruit we’d have Jell-O.”
“Please tell me you’re kidding.”
“You know, with like slices of real fruit in it.”
“Yeah congealed in it like samples of human brains at the science museum. Gross. Hold on a second, I’ve got another call.”
Moments later she clicked back. “Jen, it’s Rette. I’m going to put us on three-way.”
“Sounds kinky.”
“Hello?” Avery said.
“Hey, Rette,” I said.
“What are you up to?” Rette asked.
“Drowning my sorrows in Absolut Citron. Stupid Tom hasn’t called since our date Saturday.”
“Did you guys have fun?” Avery asked.
“I thought so.”
“Well, if it’s meant to happen it will happen,” Avery said. “Speaking of things happening, or in my case not happening, do you think it’s weird that Art hasn’t asked me to meet him in person yet? He’s hinted that we’ll meet each other someday.”
“Why don’t you suggest it?” Rette asked.
“I don’t know. I guess maybe because I feel like if he did want to get together he would have said something already.”
“Maybe he’s overweight and scrambling to get in shape before you actually meet him,” Rette said.
“Maybe he looks like the elephant man,” I offered. “Hey, do you guys have e-sex?”
“What’s e-sex?”
“Electronic sex. Like phone sex only through e-mail.”
“How would you type and . . . do that?” Rette asked.
“No! Gosh no,” Avery said, at practically the same time. “We just talk about our days, the small little moments. We talk about our families and work and places we’ve traveled and movies we’ve seen.”
Hello, hadn’t we started this conversation talking about Tom? How had we gotten so very off track?
“Everything will be fine, Ave. I should get to bed, it’s getting late. Bye Rette, bye John-Boy.”
“See you tomorrow,” Avery said.
“’Night.”
I hung up the phone and poured myself a very large glass of Absolut and waited for it to knock me to sleep.
RETTE
Welcome to My Eating Disorder
There was Ben and Jerry’s Chubby Hubby in the house. How was I supposed to do sit-ups or read a book or apply for jobs or concentrate on anything when that chocolately good menace was in the house?
Welcome to my eating disorder. There’s not a name for it like anorexia or bulimia, but it’s very real and very destructive. Symptoms include being haunted by any fattening food product in the house; I was unable to do anything without feeling its presence, without constantly being hyperaware that yummy food was nearby and waiting to be eaten. A siren luring me to danger.
There were others like me. We just didn’t have a clinical name for our illness as of yet. The Food Haunted perhaps. The Chubby-Hubby Challenged.
Some people might be tempted to call my ailment a mere lack of discipline and willpower. Not so. I was strong enough not to buy the Ben and Jerry’s in the first place, but when skinny Greg unthinkingly brought it into the house, how could I start a diet until it had been devoured?
Every time I went to the grocery store, I’d have to do damage assessments of each and every item of food I bought. I would have to look at the amount of calories that I would intake if I ate the entire thing in one sitting. Tiny pizzas that totaled less than 500 calories were okay, but the ones that said there were three servings of 300 calories a piece—I mean really, does anyone eat merely one-third of a frozen pizza?—were a no-go. Any kind of ice cream or macaroni product also couldn’t come into my home. Clearly no cookies, chocolate, or chips of any kind could be tossed into the cart.
Even if I resigned myself to being overweight, I couldn’t eat whatever I wanted because even eating just a little too much meant that every year I’d gain another ten or so pounds until I became so fat I wouldn’t be able to get out of bed. I’d need to have my groceries delivered to my home and I’d have to hoist myself out of bed with a specially made device just to lumber to the bathroom or, of course, the refrigerator.
I had reason to believe this was an ailment peculiar to women. Males could have a box of cookies in the cupboard, eat just one or two at a time, and leave the open box there for days while they went about their lives unfettered by visions of chocolate chip cookies.
I explained to Greg long ago that he was not allowed to keep treats in the house. He was required to hide them in some secret place where I couldn’t find them. Though sometimes, as with the current Chubby Hubby crisis, he forgot, most of the time he managed to hide his stash. Thus, the back of his truck had become a treasure trove of half-eaten candy bars (half eaten!) and bags of chips. His desk drawer
was littered with Pop Tart wrappers and stale Chips Ahoy.
No matter how valiantly I tried, I could not push visions of Chubby Hubby out of my head. I went to the kitchen table and began flipping through the classifieds. I looked under “marketing” and “public relations.” Who knew, maybe the business world wasn’t so bad. I thought teaching was such a noble profession, but I’d had to kiss administrative ass, plus I’d had to placate parents and students. There was artifice and superficiality and politics and bullshit in any career.
The phone rang.
The problem with a cordless phone was that, like a remote control, it got left in obscure places. It rang and I began a frantic hunt for it. I only had three rings before the voice mail picked it up.
Finally I found it beneath the coffee table.
“Hello,” I said, out of breath from my phone safari.
“Hello, may I speak to Margarette Olsen?”
“This is she.”
“Hi, Margarette, this is Eleanore Neuman, the managing editor at McKenna Marketing. How are you?”
“I’m wonderful, thank you.” Holyfuckingshitholy-fuckingshit.
“Margarette, we would like to offer you the job of editorial assistant.”
“Oh?” I tried to be suave. She detailed the pay ($32,000 a year, she said in a tone that suggested the pay was not negotiable) and the benefits and asked me if I would be interested. I waited for a long moment, pretending to weigh my many career options, and said that the position did seem like a good match. She said that was great; when could I start?
“Does Monday sound okay?” I offered.
“That would be great. We’ll see you at eight o’clock Monday morning.”
I hung up the phone and waited to feel euphoric. Or at least relieved.
I flopped on the couch, stared at the ceiling, and waited for the news to sink in.
Instead of feeling happy, the first thing I thought was, am I settling? Could I find something better? What if there were another, better job for me? I had taken the first job I’d been offered; no one else had even called for an interview. At least the horror of a job search was over. Writing all those cover letters, amending my résumé slightly for different jobs, dealing with my prehistoric printer that printed out my résumé crooked two times out of three and took about fourteen years to print a single page, spending three dollars at Kinko’s every time I faxed a résumé, the godawful interviews and depressing newspaper ads—it was too much.
