by Jill Kargman
“Elliot! Hello, dear,” said Missy, rising to kiss him. Her massive, tanned boobs pressed against him as her husband talked with Lyle and John about acquiring a canvas for their Amagansett home.
When he sat back down, I inquired about his buxom friend. “What’s Missy’s last name again? I met them through my ex-husband once.”
“Missy and George Miller.”
“Is he in finance?”
“Yes. He has a hedge fund, Miller Ventures.”
“Ahh, figures,” I said. “Well, at least if their private jet crashes, her chest could get her across the Atlantic!”
I couldn’t believe I’d said it out loud.
I was sponging Kiki’s style of unleashing unsolicited brazen commentary. Shit.
But to my relief and surprise, Elliot was cackling. Guffawing, even.
“Yeah, you’re right, no sinking there.” He laughed, leaning in conspiratorially. “She’s a character. I sat next to her at a dinner once and she went on about how she hired a surrogate for all three babies even though she could carry them,” he said in disbelief. “She was too paranoid about George losing interest if she got stretch marks. I was floored.”
Holy moly. You can’t invent that!
“So you must be a hedge funder, too, no? I saw you at that nightmare event last week.”
“Um, I—”
He paused, waving back to someone who had called to him, and then turned back to me. “I’m an art consultant.”
Hmm, so I’d pegged him wrong. “Oh . . . so is this a good moment for you?”
“So-so.”
“You must work for a ton of those awful hedge fund people.
They all have too much money and decide they want to be collectors all of a sudden but have no taste, right? Let me guess: They just want the big names. Even if it’s a crappy Picasso or Warhol, they’re label whores, right?”
“You seem to know your stuff,” Elliot said.
“That’s a fun job,” I pondered aloud. “Shopping with other people’s money, very cool. I’d love to visit artists’ studios and galleries all day.”
“Well, let’s do it sometime,” he offered.
I looked down the table at John, who was deep in conversation with Lyle. But before I could even entertain the idea of juggling all my potential suitors, Elliot popped that idea bubble.
“Not a date, just . . . as friends,” he added.
“Oh, okay, sure,” I said. Maybe he wasn’t single? I didn’t see a ring. “I’d like that.”
“Great!”
“Do you have a card or something?”
“No. No, I don’t. Uh . . .” He fumbled for a piece of paper.
Luckily I had little cards, which I’d had printed after fishing out a pen from my bag too many times. I handed one to him.
Just then, John got up, walked over, and squatted beside me on the floor next to my chair.
“How about we get out of here?” he asked, in front of Elliot.
“Um, sure—” I said, gathering my coat.
“I’ll see you soon, then,” I said to Elliot, who rose to say good-bye.
But before John and I reached the door, there was a hand on my arm.
“Holly, I like that spitfire Kiki,” said Lyle Spence, his eyes flashing. “How can I reach her?”
I smiled, knowing Cupid’s arrow was lodged in his bum. After a parade of skeletal models and actresses and glamazons who perhaps rocked out at a photo op but bored him to tears the next morning, he was curious about Kiki, who had stormed into his gallery looking incredible in a Proenza Schouler satin dress and black Mendel coat with black leather high boots. It was clear to me that she had made her mark, like a constellation in that massive white loft, but in reverse: She was a bold, black-clad, fiery point of heat against the white sky of his cavernous space. I happily wrote down her number and walked out into the cold night with John holding my hand.
27
“When a man brings a woman flowers for no reason, there’s a reason.”
Ahhh, what to discuss on a date, post-divorce. The air between you is fertile ground for landmines of the past—baggage and children and exes. Should I plunge right in? Regale John with my whole history? With Nick there had been loud music, ambient bar noise, and no void to fill with intense conversation, but there I was with John, alone. I felt like talking points had to be structured, plotted out, almost, to avoid the elephant in the room: the Split. The demise of my marriage had been pervading my every thought and it seemed unnatural to be a tabula rasa now. I felt like a slalom skier expertly swerving to avoid the stakes of my last ten years looming down the hill. Or you can do what I did: Turn the spotlight on the man and make it all about him.
“Your work is . . . incredible, John. You have so much talent. I . . . loved the paintings.” I couldn’t make eye contact, though. Like a shy adolescent, I couldn’t be up front about his up-front twig and berries.
“Thanks,” he said, looking me right in the eye. “Were you surprised by the subject matter?” he asked boldly.
Clearly I wasn’t too good at hiding my coy reaction.
“I was, uh, well, surprised at first, but I truly thought the pieces were truly amazing. Uh, the canvases, I mean.”
“I’m glad to hear it. And I’m glad you came, Holly.”
We walked and talked until we reached a clearing of buildings, revealing a full moon gleaming in the sky.
“God, look at that moon,” I said in awe. “It’s like a movie.”
“Why is it like a movie?” he asked.
“I don’t know; it’s just so . . . perfect.”
“Are you one of those girls who is obsessed with movies?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” I stammered. Yes, you are, you liar. “I guess, a little.”
“Oh,” he said. Wrong answer, Holly! “I’m not much of a film buff.”
“Me neither: ‘Buff’ sounds all art house and indie, like I watch four-hour Korean films. I don’t like films, I like movies. I like expensive Hollywood movies.”
“Either way, it’s a fantasy. I prefer real life to that. How could a movie capture this? Nature is perfect on its own. It doesn’t have to be a faithful simulacra in art to be perfect.”
Uh-oh, the artist thought I said something weird and childish. “I don’t know, I just always do that I guess. A photograph or a movie can be kept forever and nature is fleeting. I am just saying the moon is so big and bloated, it’s almost surreal. And tomorrow it will wane and be more real again.”
“I’m not sure I understand,” he said blankly.
“It’s just that sometimes I see something like this and this sounds weird, but it’s almost painful because it’s too good. And it’ll be over and there’s no rewind button.”
“I’d rather never go backward. Life should only be on the play button.”
“Mm-hmm,” I offered halfheartedly.
“Like . . . now, for example.”
John stopped in his tracks and put his arm around my back, pulling me in and kissing me out of the blue. It wasn’t some great jolt of mad love, but still, I felt buzzed. Like with Nick, a kiss beyond a decade-long marriage was still new, and I felt young and desirable. And scared. I was suddenly aware that he had raging hormones and his strength, holding and pressing me, was somewhat alarming. Tim’s boyish face and hands were so different—John’s sexily vein-defined hand grabbed me desperately, and while I was fully absorbed in our make-out-fest, my mind wandered to the paintings of his body, taut but worn. With younger guys, you know where they’ve been. But John, who had never married, probably had had a lot of experiences, and I could feel it in his body, all the women he had touched with those hands. And forget about silly “bases” and fooling around with a nearly fifty-year-old—non-shag hookups were clearly not happening at this phase of life. While I sometimes wanted to be Kiki-esque on a free and lust-spiked level, I’d never had sex without some sense of deep comfort. With thoughts of this entering my mind mid-kiss, I told John I was a
bit tired and freezing and wanted to go home. I think he was surprised, but he kindly hailed a taxi. He offered to drop me off out of his way, and leaned in to kiss me again in the cab. It was nice, but I wasn’t so blinded by frenetic passion that I didn’t notice Mohammed the driver staring at us through the rearview, which semicreeped me out. But John didn’t seem to see or care. His hand went down my neck to the top button of my coat, which he nimbly unfastened. He slid his hand down my back and grabbed me with those worn hands that gripped brushes all day. He kissed the side of my face and neck, which tickled in a sexy way that lit me up and made me feel warm and alluring, which is exactly what I needed. But then, in the heat of our encircled arms . . .
“I said, GO UP SIXTH! Comprende?”
Rude . . . John had totally snapped at the driver mid-neckbite. Who wasn’t even Spanish. His snap was arresting, but then he turned his attention back to me and told me I was beautiful.
“Holly—” He lunged for me.
We kissed until we reached my building. I kissed him good night and went upstairs and crawled into bed, thoughts spinning dizzily through my head as I glanced at the cable box. Midnight. Maybe Kiki would be home by then? I hit her number on speed dial.
“YOU GAVE HIM MY NUMBER? ARE YOU ON CRACK?”
Caller ID.
“What? Wait, Lyle Spence? He called you already?”
“TWICE. What were you thinking? I know I give my number out to lots of guys, but I choose them based on good vibes. The guy could be a serial killer.”
“No way. Serial dater, maybe. You struck a chord in him.”
“So he said on my machine. Scumbag. He’s hot as hell, sure, but I don’t like ’em so pretty. How was your night?”
I turned Letterman on mute and regaled her with details about the breathless smooching, the flattering comments. But also that my gut said John Taplett, he of mammoth penis, was not The One.
“Who cares?” she said, almost laughing. “You don’t need Mr. Wonderful, Holly. You need Mr. One-Nighter.”
“I’m not good at that. I get attached. Not Glenn Close attached, but I’m emotional. Plus, I feel like if it’s not going to be my husband, then why should I waste precious time?”
Kiki was quiet. “I seriously do not understand how you can just get divorced and be talking about that prison of marriage again so blithely! Anyway, what makes you so sure he’s not the next Mr. Holly?”
“I don’t know. He’s sexy and very confident, but I don’t have the same comfort zone I did with Tim.”
“Holly, news flash: It’s apples and oranges! One was a husband you were with for years, and the other is one night so far. No one could compete with that—it’s two totally different things! No one could be as close as Tim after one night.”
As I lay in bed trying to fall asleep, I realized that she was right. I just prayed the ghost of my marriage wouldn’t make it impossible for me to ever connect with someone again.
28
“Every woman should have four pets in her life: a mink in her closet, a jaguar in her garage, a tiger in her bed, and a jackass to pay for it all.”
—Zsa Zsa Gabor
The next day after school, Miles’s class had a gathering at the home of Teddy and Millicent Logan, he of Hexagon Capital. At the party, Millicent, Mary Grassweather, and Emilia d’Angelo came up as I was ladling some hot cider while Miles scampered around with some kind of Nerf sword.
“So, Holly. How’re things?” Mary said, literally cornering me. “Any . . . dates?”
None of your business, I felt like saying, but bit my tongue. “Oh, not quite there yet—” I lied.
“Really? Well, time to get back on the horse, so to speak,” Emilia teased in a singsongy voice.
“You want to act soon while you’ve still got it!” added Millicent with a wink. “The men today, they’re going for the gals in their twenties!” Where was one of her stuffy husband’s polo mallets when I needed it?
“I’m in no rush. Miles and I are doing great.”
“Okay, well, don’t wait too long!” Mary advised solemnly. “And we know plenty of nice guys Teddy works with at the fund we could set you up with.” I loved how they assumed that the fund would be catnip to me when it was, in fact, potassium cyanide.
“Thanks—” No, thanks.
“You just say the word!” Never.
I extracted myself with complaints of my tiny bladder, heading for the bathroom. But before I got to the hand-stenciled hallway, Posey touched my arm.
“Holly, hi—” she said, looking a bit upset.
“Hi, Posey,” I said stoically. I still was a bit wounded that as soon as Tim and I had split up, there was zero word from Posey.
“Listen, um, I feel really bad,” she said, looking down. “I miss you and I’ve been unfair. . . .”
“What do you mean?” I asked casually.
“I just . . . I know we used to spend so much time together, and that this transition . . . you must be going through a hard time, and I kind of haven’t been there.”
Finally, an acknowledgment. “Posey, we’re all busy, it’s okay.”
“It’s not that. I just feel awful, but I told my husband I wanted to invite you to the theater with us and he said that, you know, he does a lot of business with Tim and your brother-in-law, or, uh, former, whatever—anyway, he said he felt uncomfortable with me kind of fraternizing with you when he is so . . . enmeshed financially with the Talbott brothers, and I just feel terrible.”
Wow. A forbidden friendship! Just like me with Kiki. But, unlike Posey, I did what I had wanted to do, what my heart dictated rather than my husband.
“You have to do what you have to do, Posey. Don’t worry . . .”
“Sorry about all this . . . if you ever need to talk—”
“Thanks so much,” I said, forcing a smile. I loved how she didn’t even finish her sentence. It was like If you ever need to talk, don’t call me ’cause my husband is so up your ex’s ass and loves making dough off him that you are banished! Nice.
She smiled back, squeezing my arm as I let her off the hook. I headed into the bathroom, closed the door, and exhaled. Just what I had suspected. I was an outcast! It’s weird; you can know something in your gut but then just dismiss it as paranoia, but then when you’re confronted with the cold hard fact that people see you as tainted goods, it stings all over again. It’s like Sunny von Bülow knowing full well that Claus was banging that mistress but it was their love letters on her doorstep that sent her ballistic.
It suddenly, in that lavish powder room, became clear: Everyone in New York was either in business tangentially with Tim and Hal or wanted to be, so I would never be allowed to be back in that circle. Not that I wanted to be. But being a hedge fund wife did help me raise money, fill the ballroom at the St. Regis for my hospital benefit, and now I couldn’t even do the charity work I used to! Well, so what. So I was booted out of the Wall Street elite. Truthfully, I was fine with it. These other women, on the other hand, would simply die. Without their money, fancy events, the life, they would wither on the vine! And that is why, whatever their husbands may or may not do “on the side,” as Sherry Von said, they would always look the other way for fear of disrupting the delicate dreamy diorama of their lives.
I studied the Brunschwig & Fils paper and Hinsen sconces on the wall in front of me. Millicent’s Vie Luxe Palm Beach-scented candle lingered in the air. I looked at the elaborately woven interlocking letters of her custom-monogrammed hand towels all lined up like little sergeants in a perfect row, not a crease on ’em. She really had the hedge fund wife loot down pat.
HEDGE FUND WIFE TRAPPINGS
As I dried my hands I thought a bit about what Emilia had said. I did need to get a move on it, when I thought about it strategically, but on the flip side, shouldn’t love not be sought out but rather fall in your path? My mom always said that if you make your life interesting, someone will want to join it. If I stayed on my own path, rather than chase someone else’s, I�
��d be happier, anyway. I knew what I needed to do: get a job. And also: get out of this party ASAP. And at that moment, with all the stuffy banker wives in my midst, the bricks of my path were leading me back to Chef Boy.
29
“Alimony, a Latin term for removing a man’s wallet through his genitals.”
—Robin Williams
Kiki and I went for dinner at Il Buco on Bond Street the following night. I am certain I consumed a wheel of cheese. We had a cozy little table in the back and drank a delicious Bordeaux, laughing about one of Kiki’s crazy clients, a lingerie store off Madison that sold $600 vibrators.
“You just see these hedgie wives walk in to survey the lace thongs and bras, and then their eyes fall on these megaschlongs and their baby blues just widen into saucers—it’s fucking genius!” she squealed, banging the table. Just then, I felt my heart drop into my stomach. Oh, no, they were walking toward us.
“What’s wrong?” Kiki asked, brow furrowed, looking up to find the unfortunate coincidence of the Logans and the Grassweathers heading for the table right next to us. Ugh. Our fun night and unedited conversations would now be shadowed by their presence.
“Oh, my goodness! Holly Talbott, what are you doing down here?” Little did they know I was downtown all the time. They were the ones who were fully trapped in 10021-land. This was clearly “steppin’ out.”
Teddy Logan looked at Kiki while Millicent glared. After a round of introductions, it became clear that our little table for two had now morphed into a larger table for six, much to the women’s collective chagrin. The husbands, however, seemed visibly pleased about the new blood present, especially that coursing through the very hot veins of Kiki in her fishnets, extremely short minidress, and thigh-high boots.
“We’re celebrating tonight!” said Millicent, all aglow. “Our daughter Penny won her horse show today! We’re just ecstatic!” she said, hand on chest. “We’ve been in Millbrook all day, watching her jumping—she was just incredible.”
