“Some place called Celebz. Jason says he’s been there before.” She finished the last step of her makeup routine—extra-thickening mascara—and put the mascara tube back into her makeup bag, full of the department-store splurges she had made specifically for her wedding week. She felt a twinge of shame when she saw the $50 Tom Ford lipstick in peach-pink, but she genuinely felt it was the only shade that didn’t make her look haggard.
“You don’t need to get all dressed up. It’s just a bar. This is going to be the Zoogli barbecue all over again. Watching you run off screaming with barbecue sauce on your white skirt was pretty hilarious for me, but you were upset for days.”
“That’s because it was a Club Monaco skirt that I bought at a sample sale and I never would have been able to afford it otherwise, smart-ass. My reaction was completely justified. Also, the Zoogli barbecue was in California, where everyone dresses like eighteen-year-old coders. New York is different. No hoodies and sneakers at clubs.” She hoped he didn’t take this as a critique of his usual night-out uniform of a white T-shirt and jeans. She thought it made him look like a Calvin Klein model, but her girlfriend Jennifer told her he had the same fashion acumen as Homer Simpson.
“Yeah, but Westchester? I don’t want to trash your home county or anything, but all the bars I’ve seen so far look like pizza parlors.”
“There have to be a few places that are heating up. It’s Saturday. Jason will know a good place.”
* * *
“Ready for the party countdown?” Jason was behind the wheel. “The British GPS bitch says we’ve got five more minutes.” Emily sat in the back seat with Lauren and Matt, while David rode shotgun. Lauren had done her version of dolling up: bright blue eyeliner, red lipstick, a Ramones T-shirt that showed off her arm tattoos, too-long bootcut jeans that were frayed at the cuffs, and red Converse sneakers with doodles on them. “Ariel drew on my shoes,” she boasted when she caught Emily looking. “That’s just how little of a fuck I give about clothes.”
“Are you sure this place is good?” Emily asked Jason.
“Pretty decent.”
“Am I overdressed?”
“Nah. Well, maybe a little. But at least you didn’t think it was sexy to dress like the guys from Superbad like Lauren.”
“I didn’t wear this to be sexy,” Lauren said. “I wear what I fucking want. Just because I’m not as desperate for male approval as Emily—”
“Hey, I didn’t even say anything!”
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to insult you. I’m just used to getting judged. The hardest person to be in this world is a woman who dares to veer the tiniest bit outside Western standards of femininity.”
“What about a disabled albino hermaphrodite in Rwanda?” Jason said.
“Actually, it’s called intersex. And I’m not here to play the oppression Olympics.”
“Well, no, unless you’re the one winning. Hear ye, hear ye, the white woman in her thirties, whose parents pay her rent, is oppressed! May as well be straight out of a refugee camp.”
“The only reason I even need Mom’s money is because our patriarchal society devalues a gender studies degree. For women, receiving money from parents is actually a form of indentured servitude. If I were a man, society would be handing me money just for showing up, and Mom and Dad wouldn’t have to. You’re saying this from the lofty, privileged perspective of a white cis man.”
“What’s cis?” Jason seemed legitimately confused this time.
“It’s what you are. But it’s not my job to educate you, so Google that shit.”
“How is it spelled, like sissy? How can I Google it if I don’t know how to spell it?”
“Forget it. You have no interest in learning anyway. And like I said, it’s not my job.”
“Well, you don’t have a job, Lauren.”
“That’s one thing we have in common then. But even if you refuse to give any credit to Cunt, it’s at least more legitimate than WalkShare.”
“What’s WalkShare?” David asked, eager to change the subject.
Jason cleared his throat. “WalkShare is a revolutionary mobile app that I’m releasing next month. It is what would happen if Tinder fucked Uber. For just ten dollars per person, we match you with up to five walking buddies from the two locations you select, with a fifty-fifty male-female ratio—unless you pay more for the RatioPremiere membership, in which case the ratio is on your side. Then—boom: walking to work just got sexy.”
Lauren sighed and put her head in her hands. “It’s ridiculous.”
“You’re not single,” Jason said. “Never underestimate a man’s drive to get laid.”
“What about the women? Women spend their time specifically trying to avoid strange men following them home. I’m constantly avoiding men.”
“Well, they don’t need to use WalkShare when they’re walking home, do they, Einstein?”
“I don’t know about you, Emily,” she said, “but even when I was single, when I wanted to do my groceries I just wanted to do them. I didn’t want to turn it into a Pied Piper trail of perverts following me. No matter where I went, men harassed me, flirted with me and propositioned me. I would pay to remove that experience from my life.”
Emily wondered for a second how Lauren got so much more male attention than any of the other women she knew, but she didn’t say anything. Despite her anxieties about her looks, Emily was aware that she was at least a bit above average in attractiveness and yet the only times she got hit on were when she chose to wear dresses on her walk to work. And even then, most of the guys hitting on her were homeless, on drugs and old enough to be her father, not even bothering to flirt with her but preferring to shout sexual expletives in her direction. Sometimes she wondered if those men were her “league” all along. She knew she got lucky with David.
“I think WalkShare sounds like a cool idea,” David said, humoring Jason. “You never know what’ll go viral. Just look at Tinder—when that came out, I thought the only people using it would be creeps who actually call those late-night sex-chat numbers off the TV. But several of my buddies are actually living with women they met on Tinder. My boss Robert always tells me that a good product is ninety percent hunger.”
“There we go,” Jason said. “David thinks it’s a cool idea. He’d be a great client. Tall, good-looking, prime age and future billionaire. Too bad he’s about to be off the market.”
“He’s not about to be off the market,” Emily said. “He’s been off the market for three years.”
“Emily, just because a guy is dating you doesn’t mean he owes you exclusivity. Obviously David’s a faithful dude, but technically exclusivity starts at marriage. Don’t take this personally, but women demand so much of men.”
“At least women don’t rape!” Lauren snapped. Matt nodded solemnly.
“Point taken,” Jason said. “Can we move on? It’s going to ruin my game if we keep it up with the rape talk, and I can’t have bad game because tonight I’ll have my go at a heaping platter of Westchester poonani.” He briefly affected an Ali G accent when he said poonani.
“They can go one of three ways: total JAP, Jersey Shore guidette or uptight Greenwich import.” He paused, and looked at David. “No offense, dude.”
“I’m actually from Fairfield,” he said. “At least you didn’t call me a spoiled frat bro. That’s the real Fairfield stereotype, for the record. That or bow tie–wearing douchebag. Either way, I don’t take offense.”
“I take offense,” Lauren said. “You can’t classify women like that.”
“Jason, seriously,” Emily said. “If Lauren promises not to go on about rape, you need to stop saying stuff that’s designed to piss her off.”
“Thanks, but I can fight my own battles,” Lauren said. “I deal with guys worse than Jason on my blog daily, like this dickweed named Butthole_Man_80 who keeps stalking my posts.�
��
“Maybe we should all just save this for therapy with Mom tomorrow,” Emily said.
“Oh, fuck,” Lauren said. “I forgot about that.” For just a moment, all three siblings fell quiet, collectively dreading therapy with Marla.
“I agree with Emily,” Jason said. “Let’s try to have a fun night. Sorry if I was too harsh, Lauren. You know I’m just teasing.” He winked at her from the rearview mirror.
“Your teasing is built on centuries of white male supremacy. But I won’t dwell on it tonight. We can wait for the therapy session.”
“What’s this therapy?” David asked.
“Oh, nothing,” Emily said. “Just, Mom wants us to do some family therapy this week, with her as the therapist. Obviously it’s one of her usual power trips, so we’re just going to suffer through it and get it over with.”
“What could be so bad about that?” All three siblings glared at him. “I mean, I know your mom is, well...your mom. But free therapy? Babe, you’re always complaining about how pricey therapy is. You told me that you’d rather buy a dress for the cost of a therapy session, because at least you’re guaranteed to have a result from a dress.”
“My point still stands,” she said. “But this isn’t really therapy. It’s just an excuse for her usual tornado of criticism.”
“Enough about this,” said Jason. “Here we are. Celebz. See? I told you this was the shit.”
Celebz was wedged between an organic smoothie store and a hair salon in a strip mall whose glory days were long gone. All the parking spaces were empty, except for two minivans and an SUV.
“Is anyone even here?” Matt asked as Jason parked. It was a perfectly reasonable thing to ask, but because Matt was usually so quiet, it came off as weirdly abrasive.
“It’s only ten,” Jason said. “Give it some time.”
The facade of Celebz was black with tinted windows, in an attempt to look like an upscale club—an illusion shattered by the flyers for dog-sitters and guitar lessons taped to the windows. There was no bouncer in front, only an open door next to an abandoned stool with a bunch of neon pink wristbands splayed across the seat. As Emily stepped out of the car, she made sure her cork wedge shoes didn’t get scuffed. David put his arm around her waist and squeezed it slightly.
Celebz’s decor was dated, although it was hard to pinpoint the year when it might have ever been up-to-date. Behind the bar, there was a ten-foot-wide painting of a pair of giant female breasts, with molten gold running down them and dripping off the nipples. On the opposite wall was a painting of a shiny red convertible with a pair of gold-embossed women’s legs emerging from the front seat. The walls were adorned here and there with black-and-white celebrity photos, but without any autographs on them: Sarah Michelle Gellar, Renée Zellweger, Tyra Banks, Josh Hartnett and Matthew Perry. Kelly Clarkson’s “Since U Been Gone” boomed from the speakers, while a television over the bar played a grainy Lil Wayne video with the sound muted. Lil Wayne’s lips briefly synced up with Kelly Clarkson’s words as he posed next to a woman’s butt in leather panties.
The place was dead. A bartender in her early thirties wearing a nose ring and tank top presided over an empty bar and listlessly played with her phone. Of the fifteen or so tables in the club, only three were occupied: a group of leathery older men spoke Russian loudly and toasted each other with red wine; a silver fox dressed like a Republican senator in a blue suit and red tie was sharing a bottle of pinot grigio with a pearl-necklaced fiftysomething who had exfoliated one too many times; and, in a booth in the back, two women in their thirties, one East Asian and one blonde, were drinking frozen margaritas in a valiant attempt at a girls’ night out.
Emily and the others settled at a table near the center of the room, across from the two women. “Good job, Jason,” she said. “I can see this is really where the party is at.”
“Things are just getting started. Just wait till midnight.”
Lauren looked incredulous. “Midnight? I need to get to sleep or tomorrow is going to be a nightmare with Ariel. It’s hard enough for him to be in a new house, let alone being in a new house and not having me and Matt in bed with him. These kinds of transitions could ruin his self-esteem.”
“Dude,” Jason said. “He’s four. He needs to learn to sleep alone.”
“Don’t tell me how to raise my kid.”
“How about I buy everyone a beer?” he said. “Huh? Huh? Anyone? Free beer, right here!”
“Grains,” David said, waving him off.
“Say what?”
“Emily and I don’t do grains. It’s a LifeSpin thing. Thanks, though.” He turned to Emily. “I’ll get us vodka sodas.”
“Wait—you don’t do grains?” Jason asked, drawing out the word do.
“I know it sounds silly, but grains do serious damage to the gut’s digestive flora.”
“You’re fucking kidding, right?”
“It’s your wedding weekend,” Lauren said. “Grains aren’t going to kill you. Also, this is a really dangerous philosophy to be marketed at vulnerable, mentally ill young women like Emily. LifeSpin? You may as well call it LifeAnorexia.”
“That’s...not exactly a good pun,” Jason said.
“It wasn’t meant to be a fucking pun.”
“DeathSpin would have been better.”
“Emily, do you seriously believe this stuff?” she asked.
“Uh, well—yeah, I mean—it’s actually about health, not weight loss. You can be perfectly healthy without eating grains and sugar. I haven’t even lost a pound since I started.” Emily wished she was actually proud of this, instead of secretly resenting David for having lost fifteen pounds on LifeSpin, when she truly hadn’t lost anything.
“I should hope you fucking didn’t,” Lauren said. “It’s not just about you, it’s about all the other impressionable women out there who look at you and see what you do. What if you have a daughter? Do you think it’s healthy for her to see her mother eating fucking...green beans?”
“Beans are also a gut irritant, by the way,” David said. “This stuff is actually pretty cool once you read about it—if you want to lose weight instead of just maintain, you just cut out all beans, grains, dairy and fruit, except for berries. We’re just maintaining, so for us it’s not as crazy, but my trainer Gillian lost fifty pounds last year with that method and she feels amazing.”
“I’m sure she’s a great role model for young girls, too.” While Lauren usually prided herself on being an advocate for all womankind, women who successfully lost large amounts of weight really pissed her off. She had written a scathing post for Cunt after Jennifer Hudson lost eighty pounds through Weight Watchers, arguing that the actress was to blame for the bulimia epidemic. It was called “An Open Letter to Ms. Hudson” but wasn’t written in the formal tone that title promised. Half the content was gifs of angry cats.
“It’s not like that,” David said. “First off, Gillian ran a 5K and she’s super healthy. Second, the stuff on the LifeSpin FoodMatrix is way healthier than pretty much any popular diet you see these days. This woman at my office started on this diet where she could only eat cucumbers and dark chocolate, and she wound up fainting in the middle of a team-bonding golf trip.”
Emily laughed. “Are you sure she didn’t just fall asleep? Team-bonding golf? I’d give up all food for a month just to get out of that.”
“This is exactly what I’m talking about,” Lauren said. “Now Emily is talking about giving up food.”
“Oh, come on,” David said. “LifeSpin isn’t about starving yourself until you look like Mary-Kate Olsen’s ankle. It’s just about being healthy and getting in shape.”
Lauren raised her sharply painted eyebrows. “In shape?” she asked. “What’s in shape to you? Am I not in shape? Does everyone need to look like a twelve-year-old boy to be in shape?”
“I thought you were a
nti–body shaming,” Emily said. “Twelve-year-old boy. Nice.”
“I’m just making a point.” Lauren flared her nostrils at David. “What’s in shape? You realize you can be healthy at any weight, right, so what’s the point of being in shape other than to cater to your narrow-minded, white aesthetic preferences? Am I in shape enough for you?”
“Why do you even care if I think you’re in shape?” he said. “You’re engaged.”
“That’s right,” she said, pulling Matt closer to her. “And he fucking loves how I look and would probably throw up if I lost weight. And even then, he’s evolved enough not to care about the physical side of things. He loves my intelligence, my wit, my sense of humor and the taste of my vulva. So fuck you and your body policing.” Emily involuntarily cringed at the word vulva and clenched David’s hand. Matt smiled wanly and stroked Lauren’s arm.
“David isn’t saying all bigger people are unhealthy,” Emily said. “He’s just talking about healthy lifestyle choices. It’s not about how you look—it’s about how you feel. This girl Julia at my office is in LifeSpin too. She’s a big girl, but she can lift way more than I can and she’s in the advanced yoga class.”
“Still,” Lauren said. “I don’t like how this whole LifeSpin thing conveniently started when you met David.”
“Enough,” Emily said. “You’ve made your point. Nobody should ever better themselves or eat well, especially if it’s a man’s idea. We get it, now drop it.”
“I’ll drop it if I see you drink a fucking beer. Both of you. Then let’s see how poisonous all these grains are.” She crossed her arms and smiled smugly, as if she had just presented them with an impossible Sophie’s Choice dilemma.
Emily and David looked at each other.
“Are you guys getting beers or not?” Jason asked, standing up. “I really want the previous two minutes of my life back.”
Family and Other Catastrophes Page 7
