[email protected]: You mean like ducklings and goslings following their mothers?
[email protected]: I guess, something like that. Bonding with someone who shares your history.
[email protected]: Is that what you’re trying to do? Rekindle an old romance? Manny is just playing games, and you’re playing with fire. That’s the thing about old flames—you can get burned.
****
Why am I even contemplating meeting my old flame? When I was growing up, my father never even let me play with matches. Now I am about to start a firestorm. Am I just looking for validation that I am still an attractive, desirable woman, not a dried-up old prune praying for menopause so I can finally have sex with my own husband without birth control? Or is it the fact that Matt has become more like a roommate than a husband?
I don’t want to talk about sex to my best friend, or anyone. I’ve read the surveys of couples who argue about having sex only two or three times a week, which is considered average. Apparently my sister-in-law is above average, because she confides that my brother Joel wants to do it every day.
There’s even a category for couples that have sex fewer than ten times a year. I don’t need a survey to tell me I am stuck in a “sexless” marriage. The horrifying thing is there isn’t anything my husband does for me that I can’t do for myself. The expiration date on my marriage has long since passed. The truth is right there in front of me, gasping desperately for air, flailing like a fat, slippery tarpon slapping on a hot pier before it stills and loses consciousness. I want to throw the tarpon back, but, like with a train wreck, I can’t seem to look away.
I am not the type to write to an advice columnist or see a therapist, at least not for that problem. So I suffer in silence. Is it abnormal for a fifty-year-old woman to think about sex? Not according to a landmark sex study conducted by the AARP about sexuality in midlife and boomers and a second sexual revolution.
Fifty or not, I want a spicier sex life, and I am not ready to be put out to pasture. I’ll even settle for a bland sex life. What I really want is the exciting kind of love I read about in my romance novels and see in the movies or hear about in songs. I guess I’m going through the classic midlife crisis. I just never imagined anything so colossally mind-altering would happen to me.
Am I just looking to fulfill my sexual fantasies with Manny? I already know he is capable of doing that. For example, Matt is not into breasts. At least not my breasts. In fact, he never comes near them. And I can’t even remember whether he ever did. You know, like some men treasure the special spot behind a woman’s knees, or crave some other part of her body. Well, Matt doesn’t crave or cherish any part of my body, that I’m aware of. On the other hand, my breasts were always the focus of Manny’s attention.
So when Matt and I are in bed together, I have to imagine that someone is pulling my hands roughly over my head and overpowering me, someone is teasing my nipples with his tongue, and plunging himself deep into me, because Matt doesn’t do that. And the person I almost always imagine doing that is Manny.
I know what I want, but I don’t ask for it. So Matt probably has his fantasies about what he’d like me to do to him, and I have my fantasies about what I’d like him to do to me. In the end, even when we’re together, we’re not really together at all.
No, there is more to it than sex. Much more.
When I called Matt from the road and told him I was heading to Palm Coast early to open up the condo before he got there, he sounded suspicious. But there was no way he could have known what I was contemplating. He was just upset that I’d left for Palm Coast without telling him. He said he was worried about me, but I didn’t believe that.
“Did you take the garbage can down?” Matt began. “Tomorrow’s garbage pickup day.”
“I did that this morning,” I replied.
“Good. Did you pick up my shirts from the cleaners?”
“Yes.”
“What about my prescription?”
“Taken care of.”
“Did you go grocery shopping?”
“There’s plenty of food in the fridge. I even made you a brisket for tonight. You’re lucky I don’t chew tobacco. And anyway, you’ll be in New York the rest of the week.”
“Hmm. Did you deposit my paycheck at the bank?”
“Yes. I did everything on your list.”
I waited.
“What about Carlos?” he asked. “Did you leave the check for Carlos?” Carlos the Jackal is our nickname for the man who cleans our house. His real name is Carlos Santana. Seriously. We couldn’t call him that. There was only room for one Carlos Santana in the world. Carlos works for a company called Delta Cleaners. I’m convinced Carlos is the original hit man, employed by Delta Force to get on my nerves.
His weapon of choice? The vacuum cleaner. He follows me from room to room vacuuming behind me. I try to stay out of his way. When I’m comfortably settled with a book in the living room he starts vacuuming around me. When I move to the office, he moves with me. Next, I seek refuge in the den and he’s right there behind me, wielding his weapon of mass dustruction. I wouldn’t mind, except Carlos does not have an adorable butt crack when he bends over, like Ricardo, the washing machine repairman. But back to The List.
“It was on the list, wasn’t it?” I countered.
“We have some bills due, Julie. Did you pay the bills?”
“Yes,” I said evenly, even though I hate it when he treats me like his secretary or his errand girl. I’m sure he doesn’t treat Gretchen that way.
“Did you stop the mail and the paper?” Matt asked.
“Yes.”
Silence.
“I don’t report to you,” I hissed. “You’re not the boss of me.”
“Now you sound like Natalie,” he replied, trying his best not to sound amused.
My first-class pout was wasted on Matt because, unlike my mother, my husband can’t see through telephone lines.
“You know, Julie,” he sighed, in that low, slow, deliberate, newly annoying voice he uses that sounds like the Horatio Caine character that used to be played by David Caruso on the show CSI: Miami, “I thought we were going to drive down together this weekend.”
“Well, yes (Horatio), I know we talked about that. It’s just that you will be out of town most of the week, as usual,” (I couldn’t resist adding that—it had become my mantra, after all) “and Josh and Natalie are in college now. So there’s really nothing to keep me there. Except the dog, and I already took her to the kennel.”
Matt hates taking the dog to the kennel because the dog hates going to the kennel. She starts shaking every time we get near the place. I’m always the bad guy because I’m taking her to jail, and Matt gets to be the hero and rescue her when it’s time to go home.
“I thought you wanted us to get more use out of the condo,” I said.
“What about the wedding? Aren’t you expecting the RSVPs?”
“They can wait a week. And besides, the bride’s family is handling most of that.”
“Have they heard from anyone yet?”
Matt is so predictable. I knew he could care less about wedding details. It was just his way of keeping me on the phone.
“Yes, Zandy’s mother said the Red Aunt (that’s what we call my mother’s sister Betty Jean because she has red hair) couldn’t attend because she has a CD coming due at the bank. And the Black Aunt (my mother’s sister Ruth has black hair) won’t come either.”
“Why not?” Matt wanted to know.
“Well, as she pointed out when she called me to decline, we have a lunch from noon to 5 p.m. and the dinner reception starts at 7. She says there’s nothing to do from 5 to 7.”
“Your relatives are insane.”
Actually, he’s right about that. The Black Aunt has diarrhea of the mouth and telephones her sisters twice a day on three-way calls. And that’s just when times are good. Her standard opening line before launching into her litany of troubles is, “Wait. Let me preheat
the oven. It’s gas, and it’s big enough for the three of us to stick our heads in.”
When I asked my mother why she puts up with that, she responded, “I’d better be nice to her. We’ll probably end up in a nursing home together.”
“What about the kids?” Matt asked, pulling my attention back to the conversation. “What if they need you?”
“The kids are just a phone call away. We’ve managed to raise two perfectly capable children.”
“Yes, they’re perfectly capable of calling their mother for help whenever they have a problem.”
Matt was right about that, too. I was really good at solving problems (except my own, apparently). These days, it seems, my children are mostly too busy living their own lives to call me. Now I know how Abercrombie must feel, hanging around waiting for table scraps.
The truth is, no one really needs me anymore. Except the dog and the frogs. I am really good at saving frogs. Every morning, I go to the skimmer to rescue some tiny chlorine-logged frog before the pool pump turns on. Or I coax a frog doing laps in the pool into the mesh leaf skimmer, tossing him a lifeline to safety. But we are about to close the pool for the season.
“Okay, then, what about the hurricane?” Matt posed. “It’s predicted to make landfall in Florida tomorrow. Everyone is evacuating. You shouldn’t even be going there. Remember Katrina? Remember Andrew?”
“Of course I do. But I’ll be okay. Palm Coast hasn’t had a direct hit from a hurricane in a hundred years.”
“So the realtor says. I think the hurricanes were just churning out there in the Atlantic, waiting until we closed on our condo before unleashing their full fury. And it’s all part of a hyperactive storm cycle that will last for the next two or three decades.”
“Great. Now you sound like my mother. Stop reading the papers. I did. I’m much happier. And the storm is not expected to hit Palm Coast.”
“You’re an ostrich with her head in the sand.”
“You know how much I like the sand,” I countered, letting him mull that over for a minute. “Daddy,” I whispered, trying to stop Matt from continuing on his rant. “Aren’t you going to ask me if I did all my homework?”
Matt already thought I was a child. My snotty attitude just confirmed it. I knew he couldn’t find fault with me for anything else, but I could tell by his deafening silence that I still needed to bolster my case.
“And we have so many things to bring down to the condo. I think we needed to take two cars anyway. I brought that Turkish carpet we bought in Istanbul, the light fixture for the foyer, that pewter mirror I got from The Pottery Barn, and some pillows and sheets for the twin beds. And it’s good that I’m going down early so I can prepare the condo in case the hurricane does hit.”
“You’ve never driven down there alone before,” Matt pointed out. That was true. If Matt doesn’t drive, I usually fly into Jacksonville or Daytona and we rent a car for the short drive to the condo.
“Well, I’m fifty years old. Isn’t it about time I did?” I countered. “Look, Matt. There’s a lot of traffic on the road. I need to pay attention.”
“Yeah, you’re probably the only car driving into Florida. The traffic is all going the other way.”
“I’ll call you when I get there, and I’ll see you this weekend,” I said, cutting off any future arguments.
I drive in peace for a few hours until Mackie calls.
“Mackie, I tried to stay away from him,” I tell my best friend as I pass Valdosta, heading for the Florida border. “I looked for signs the whole way down. Heavy rain, a lightning bolt, a tree in the road, a flock of birds, anything. There was nothing.”
“What about a Category Five hurricane? I know you don’t watch TV. Did you know you are heading right into the path of a killer storm?”
“Now you sound just like Matt. And my mother. She called last night to warn me about the hurricane. Y’all have weather issues.”
“Since when do you say y’all?”
“Since I moved to Atlanta. I’m practicing my Southern. Look, Mackie, I’m having hot flashes every fifteen minutes just thinking about Manny.”
“It sounds like you’re about to give birth. And anyway, my flashes are hotter than yours.”
“They’re sympathy flashes.”
“Very funny.”
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I even ignored my horoscope. It said, ‘You may yearn for a new romantic partner. But you’re headed for stormy weather if you hook up with an old love.’ ”
I believe in signs of all kinds, including horoscopes and even fortune cookie predictions. Last night I picked up Chinese takeout and my fortune read, “Happy Life is Just in Front of You.” Well, I am determined to reach out and grab that happy life.
“Julie, why would you let Manny back into your life again after everything he’s put you through?”
“I guess it’s the feelings we share.”
“Did you ask him what this is really about, why he got in touch with you after twenty-five years?”
Mackie has heard rumors that Manny’s wife, Nita, threatened to kick Manny out of the family real estate business if he didn’t shape up.
“She thinks he’s been fooling around with one of his clients, you know, that Latina singing sensation in Miami who just came out with a new crossover album, ‘Magdalena: Singing in the Key of Country,’” Mackie says. “Her new hit, ‘If You’re Not Devoted, Then This Gun is Loaded,’ is off the charts. Apparently, Magdalena was more than grateful when Manny found her an Italianate mansion on South Beach. It wouldn’t surprise me a bit if Manny was sleeping with that woman, and, if the rumors were true, his entire stable of clients.”
“Does Nita know that Manny’s been back in touch with me?” I ask.
“You would have heard about it if she did,” Mackie says.
“What does Little Jon say?” I inquire.
“Don’t use Little Jon as an example of fidelity,” Mackie says bitterly. “He doesn’t exactly hold up under close scrutiny. He should have gone into real estate like Manny. He has trouble staying off other people’s property.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Nothing.” Mackie sighs.
I had already asked Manny why he was suddenly so interested in getting together.
“I miss you, Julie,” he’d told me. “I’ve been thinking about you, and I wanted to see you. Does there have to be a reason?”
“After twenty-five years, yes,” I said.
“It’s seasonal. I start feeling this way every spring,” he admitted, hesitating. “That was the time we were the happiest together, before you—got married, had the baby. Before I knew it was not going to happen for us. I’m having trouble concentrating. I’m having memory problems. I can’t stop remembering the way we were together.”
Jeesh! He sounded sincere, but maybe it was scripted. Or a plea for help.
“I know he initiated the contact and he won’t leave you alone,” Mackie says. “He just keeps sniffing around, playing you. Wanting what he can’t have. He hasn’t changed at all.”
“Mackie, in all fairness, it’s not all his fault. I want this as much as he does. But I really think all his big talk on the Internet is just that, talk, Internet innuendos. I’m finally calling his bluff by agreeing to meet him for lunch. I can’t go on like this. I think I could be content with Matt if Manny wouldn’t intrude on my life, fracture it, you know, churn up all these old feelings. Letting go of him and the hold he has on me is the first step, and I’m almost all the way there.”
“I think addiction is a twelve-step program,” Mackie observes wryly. “Admit it, you’re still obsessed with him.”
“Well, whatever happens, I plan to get him completely out of my system, exorcise the devil so I can get on with my life,” I insist. Maybe find my way back to Matt.
I pause as another, much more terrifying, thought occurs to me.
“You don’t think he knows about Josh, do you?” I say, clutching the wheel, suddenly wo
rried. “And that’s why he wants to get me alone?”
“I don’t think so,” Mackie stated. “Not after all these years.”
But there had been some close calls. Like the weekend of Josh’s Bar Mitzvah. Since our families were still close, I was expected to invite Manny and Nita to my son’s Bar Mitzvah. There was Josh standing up at the bimah in the synagogue, chanting his Torah portion, and all I could think was, My God, Manny is going to see it. He’s sitting there right in the second row, and he is finally going to see the resemblance. And Matt is going to see it. And everyone in the family is going to see what I see. The thing I’d been trying to avoid for thirteen years. The thing I had worried about every day since Josh was born. How could I not think about Manny when his face was forever staring back at me?
I could see it as plain as day. It made my heart stop every time I looked at my son. He was the spitting image of his father. With his dark and brooding good looks, even at thirteen. And those dreamy eyes. There was no mistaking whose eyes he had. Or whose son he was. And here they were, in the same room. People were finally going to put two and two together. And I would be so screwed. I’d be branded like that woman in The Scarlet Letter.
Last year, when we moved Josh out of his apartment after he completed his undergraduate degree, I almost choked at the mess. And I almost blew it.
“This place is a rattrap, Josh.” I laughed. “I can’t believe Zandy is going to marry you. You’re a total slob, just like your father.” My hand flew to my mouth as soon as the words were out. Luckily, Matt had just left the apartment to haul the TV out to the car. Josh just stared at me like I was losing it. Everyone knew Matt was immaculate. Nothing in his life was out of place. It was Manny who was the pig.
I was saved from the certain doom of discovery only by the fact that Matt, like Josh, had dark hair but his was curly and springy. And he had a light complexion, almost white. There was nothing of Matt in Josh in the looks department. But I guess people see what they expect to see, and after a while, like pets that grow to resemble their owners, kids tend to look like their parents.
Stones Page 4
