There's Cake in My Future

by Gruenenfelder, Kim

  Scott looks me in the eye and seems to genuinely ask me, “How do you know?”

  I cross my arms, irked. “How do I know … which one?”

  He shrugs and smiles. “Pick one. Any one. How do you know I won’t be the next person to fall in love?”

  It’s at that point that I realize—maybe he’s already fallen in love with the girl he just started seeing two weeks ago.

  Damn it. Why didn’t I break up with Conrad sooner? Better yet, why didn’t I make my move on Scott sooner? I had almost a fucking year, and I blew it. I should have just kissed him that first night and gotten it all out in the open. Either he would have been interested—in which case I wouldn’t be in this Hell (not even Hell—limbo. At least in Hell, you know who your enemies are), or he wouldn’t have been interested, in which case I could have had him as a coffee friend but never allowed myself to fall for him.

  I look at his beautiful face. He’s smiling, and his sparkling eyes seem to be dancing. His lips are pink and plump and sexy, and I desperately want to kiss him. I do. I ache for it. Even though I know it’s no good for me, I will dream about it a hundred times tonight before I go to sleep. I’ll fantasize about the perfect place, the perfect time, how he’ll kiss me back, and how my life will be changed forever.

  But this isn’t the perfect time or place. There never has been a perfect time or place, and now that he’s dating someone new, there probably never will be.

  Scott jokingly wags his eyebrows up and down like Groucho Marx in an old black-and-white film. My eyes narrow, and I eye him suspiciously. “You are totally fucking with me, aren’t you?”

  Scott laughs. “Of course I’m fucking with you.” He lifts up his silver heart to inspect it in the light. “I’m constantly amazed that women, particularly intelligent women, believe this crap. When was the last time you heard of a guy reading his horoscope or having his tarot cards read?” He slips the heart into his pocket. “I do want to keep this, though. I have a piece I’m working on that I want to put it in.”

  I smirk “Please don’t tell me you’re calling the piece, ‘Crap Women Believe In.’ ”

  Scott laughs. “THAT would be an awesome piece! I could totally get some bachelor to buy that!” He pulls a small notebook from his pocket, and a black ink pen. “The battle of the sexes always fascinates me,” he says, as he begins sketching his new project. “I could do it all in powder-pink and white, like a wedding…” I watch him as he quickly (and flawlessly) sketches a three-layer wedding cake as the centerpiece, then surrounds it on all sides with a series of shelves. “For the top shelf, I’d intersperse diet books like The Zone and Ten Days to Skinny with self-help relationship books like Think Like a Lady, Act Like a Man and He’s Just Not That Into You.”

  “It’s Think Like a Man, Act Like a Lady,” I correct him.

  Scott looks up to give me a pitying look. “You disappoint me, Singh.”

  “I didn’t say I bought it, I just know the title. Knowledge is power. And I actually think I like that Ten Days diet book. I was leafing through it at the bookstore—it had some interesting ideas.”

  Scott continues to draw ferociously, a man possessed. “No woman needs a diet book. Every woman I know knows enough on the subject to write a diet book herself. And it would be a short book, too. Page one: walk every day. Page two: if you’re wicked serious, go to a gym three times a week and lift a few weights. Page three: quit eating all that crap. Whether your crap is Zingers every time life throws you a curveball, Twinkies hidden in your desk drawer, or eating a two-thousand-calorie ‘salad’ loaded with dressing and meat, knock it off!” He turns the notebook around for me to scrutinize his work. “What else do I need?”

  I look at the drawing and decide to betray my own sex in the name of flirting. “A Christian Louboutin shoe.”

  “Which a woman believes will help her catch a man. Perfect!” he says, drawing an insanely high heel.

  “Plus a DVD of Sex and the City, an eyelash curler, maybe a deck of tarot cards…”

  “You are on fire, girl!” Scott says happily, taking a quick sip of champagne, then going back to his sketch.

  My home phone rings. “Hey, can you do one of these about men?” I ask as I head to the phone.

  “No,” Scott answers me firmly.

  “What? Why not?”

  “I wouldn’t know what to put in the display.”

  “Under ‘Crap Men Believe’?” I exclaim. “You’re kidding, right? How about a Knicks jersey, a letter from Penthouse, a porn DVD, and an old pizza box.”

  “Hey—the Knicks have a shot this year. And a porn DVD is clichéd.”

  “No more clichéd than a diet book,” I insist as I sip my champagne. “Oh! And for the center of the piece: a pillowtop mattress thrown onto the middle of the floor, with no box spring or headboard in sight.”

  Scott laughs at my joke as my phone continues to ring. I look at the caller ID. It’s Mel. Damn it. She knows I’m seeing Scott tonight.

  I pick up. “Hello.”

  “I don’t think I’m getting the ring or the chili pepper fortune.” Mel says, and she sounds like she’s been crying. “Do you think there’s a toilet charm? Because that is where my life seems to be headed at the moment.”

  “What happened? Are you all right?”

  “No,” she says quietly. “If I were all right, I’d be in a romantic restaurant right now planning a trip to Bora Bora with Fred, dreaming of his proposal to me while we’re there, and being completely oblivious to where my life was headed. Instead, I am stunned, ready to throw up, and parked in front of your house.”

  I’m confused. “Wait,” I say, walking to my front window, and pushing back my curtains to see her bright blue Prius parked out front. “You’re outside? Why aren’t you coming in?”

  “Because Scott’s car is parked in your driveway, and I don’t want to bother you,” Mel reasons. “But I don’t know where else to go. Fred’s cheating on me.”

  Six

  Melissa

  Seema and Scott run out to get me and bring me inside.

  I quickly catch them up on the last hour of my life and have just finished the part about some strange Swedish woman throwing a drink in Fred’s face.

  I then fill them in on what happened next: Fred wasn’t stupid. I saw a woman throw a drink in his face—he wasn’t going to get off without a full-blown explanation.

  Svetlana, that’s her name—as if I could ever compete with a Svetlana—had been a client of Fred’s for three months. She was the trophy wife of a seventy-eight-year-old studio head who she caught getting head one night from an even younger woman than herself. Fred was her divorce attorney.

  I had actually heard about her. Her husband had forced the final arbitration to be in Manhattan—so Fred was stuck there for a week and a half while both sides hammered out whether a five-year marriage to a decrepit guy was worth one hundred million dollars or one hundred and fifty million.

  I remember Fred asked me to go with him to New York, but my high school was in the middle of state testing, and I didn’t want to leave my students.

  I guess I should have.

  I sit on Seema’s couch, numb, as I continue my story. “Fred told me, in a moment of tearful confession, that the night the case was settled, he took her out for drinks at the Oak Room. They had too much wine, he walked her back to her suite, she kissed him, and they made out for a few minutes.”

  “Oh, good Lord…” Scott mutters under his breath.

  “She’s not done with her story yet,” Seema tells him.

  “Yeah, but obviously…”

  “Scott…” Seema says warningly.

  “Fine,” Scott says to Seema, crossing his arms. Then he turns to me. “But you do know he’s lying about that, right?”

  I take a deep breath before I answer, “Honestly, I have no idea.”

  “Finish your story,” Seema tells me sympathetically.

  “Yes, you do!” Scott insists to me. “They did NOT just make
out for a few minutes. You do know that, right?”

  I look over at Scott, surprised at his vehemence. I shrug. “He says that’s all that happened.”

  “Oh please. What’s he going to say? ‘I fucked someone in a hotel room three thousand miles away. I never thought I’d get caught. Oops.’ ”

  His statement makes me burst into tears. Now I’m sad and embarrassed. Seema gives me a hug. I can’t breathe. I’m feeling sick, my nose is clogged, and my life is over.

  I take a Kleenex from a box Scott brought into the living room, wipe my eyes, and gauge Seema’s and Scott’s reactions.

  Seema’s eyes are wet as well, she is so shocked and saddened to hear my news. She looks almost as heartbroken as I feel.

  Scott, on the other hand, looks angry. And the longer he listens, the angrier he gets.

  I take a deep breath, and end my story. “Honestly, I don’t know what the truth is,” I tell them. “Fred’s called me at least seven times on my cell, and left texts. I haven’t picked up, because I don’t know what to say to him. I’m not ready to go home yet. I’m not even sure if I have a home to go to anymore.” I tear up again, but don’t cry. “I just have no idea what to think or what to do.”

  “He’s a chode,” Scott states matter-of-factly. “You’re better off without him.”

  I stare at him blankly. Seema glares at him. “Don’t say things like that!” she chastises Scott.

  “Why?” Scott rebuts. “The guy’s not only cheating on her, but he’s lying about it with some insipid, ‘Strange girl only stuck her tongue in my mouth for a couple of minutes’ lie! He’s a total chode!”

  “Because you don’t say things like that to someone who doesn’t even know they’re broken up yet,” Seema admonishes.

  “What? You’re going to tell her to forgive the chode and marry him?” Scott argues.

  “Of course I’m not going to tell her to marry the chode,” Seema counters. “But there’s a time for venting and a time for constructive advice. Check your watch.”

  “Excuse me,” I say quietly. “What’s a chode?”

  “Chode,” Scott repeats. “He’s a dick, a knob, a prick—”

  “Thank you for the anatomy lesson,” Seema interrupts, cutting him off.

  “He’s also an asshole,” Scott can’t help but add.

  Seema throws down her hand on her coffee table as she asks firmly. “Will you stop that?”

  Scott ignores her. Asks me with complete sincerity, “Do you want me to go beat the crap out of him? Because I am so there.”

  Seema tries a different approach. “Scott, can you go get us some drinks please?”

  “She hasn’t answered my question.”

  “She doesn’t want you to beat him up,” Seema insists. “How is landing yourself in jail going to help her?”

  “Actually, I would kind of like him to beat Fred up,” I admit to Seema.

  She looks mildly horrified.

  “I didn’t say I was actually going to have Scott do it,” I tell Seema. “I know that would be wrong.” Then I turn to Scott. “That is so sweet of you to offer, though.”

  Scott looks a bit disappointed.

  Seema takes my hand gently. “What do you want?”

  “That’s the million-dollar question,” I tell her. “I want to find a way to get past this. I want it to have never happened.”

  Seema doesn’t say anything—just nods her head knowingly. She gets what I’m saying. She pulls me into a hug, and we just sit there in silence.

  Which is broken by the unlikeliest of heroes. “Nooooo!” Scott booms in his masculine voice. He gets up and begins pacing around. “I don’t get women sometimes.” He flips around to me. “Aren’t you pissed?!”

  Scott’s clear green eyes stare right at me. I take a moment to collect my thoughts. “I … well, of course I am. I mean—”

  “No, no,” Scott interrupts. “That’s not the sound of an angry woman. That’s the sound of a woman who thinks this is somehow her fault.”

  I think about that for a moment, then admit aloud, “Well, you got me there.”

  Seema’s jaw drops. I try to explain myself to her. “I keep trying to figure out what I could have done differently to make Fred not cheat on me. Maybe if I had gone to the gym more. I’m a runner, but I never lift weights. Or maybe if I had had that nose job—he always teased me about my nose. Or if I had just stayed on a diet—”

  Scott interrupts my thoughts. “Jesus—do you realize how ridiculous you sound? You have a smoking body…” He turns to Seema. “Wait, I’m allowed to say that, right?”

  Seema and I look at each other. “Um…” Seema debates. “Can he say that?”

  Duh. I nod my head yes.

  Scott continues, “Don’t be sad. Get angry!” He walks out of the living room and into Seema’s office, where he yells, “Sweetheart, where do you keep your notepads?”

  “Top right drawer,” Seema yells back. Then she looks at me. “Can I get you something? Something with sugar in it? Something with booze in it?”

  “Actually,” I say, “I would kill for a peach Bellini the size of a small horse.”

  Seema pats me on the knee, then heads to her kitchen as Scott walks out of her office carrying a legal pad. “Here’s what I want you to do,” he says, handing me the pad. “I want you to write down one hundred things that you hate most about him.”

  Seema emerges with a champagne flute just as Scott clarifies his assignment to me. “Not things that are going to make you blame yourself. You can write, ‘Number one, he won’t marry me.’ But only if you realize that that’s his fault—not yours. Only if the statement means, ‘He’s an asshole!’ Not, ‘What could have I have changed about myself?’ Personally, I would start with ‘He likes Nagel.’ And not as an ironic or a kitschy eighties thing; he actually likes him.” Scott stops talking as he notices Seema carefully pouring peach puree into the flute. “What the Hell are you doing?”

  She looks up at him. “I’m making Mel a drink.”

  “Are you out of your mind, woman? You’re going to give her a bridal shower drink on the day she finds out her boyfriend cheated on her? My God, it’s amazing we ever breed with you people. You make no sense.”

  Scott walks out of the room and into her kitchen. I lean in to Seema. “Where’s he going?”

  She shakes her head. “I don’t know,” she sighs. “But I’m sure he’s making some testosterone point.” She then whispers to me, “Why do I like this guy? He’s a total freak.”

  Scott reappears with a bottle of Gentleman Jack and a shot glass. He opens the bottle, pours a shot, and hands it to me. “Here. Drink this.”

  I hate whiskey. I look at Scott. “I’m not really a…”

  “Drink it,” he says, in a low, commanding voice.

  What the hell?—I drink the shot.

  “Well?” Scott asks.

  “It’s dreadful,” I sputter. “Like drinking broken glass.”

  “For the next hour, if you want a drink, promise me you won’t drink overly sweet girlie drinks that will get you drunk, make you cry, and make you long for weddings, true love, or Fred. Drink a man’s drink—a hideous drink, if you will. Use it to get angry.”

  He scribbles Why Fred is a Chode on the top of the notepad, then underlines it. “Okay, what’s your number one?”

  I suddenly feel put on the spot. I have spent the last six years cultivating an image of Fred for all of the world to see. A happy image. A loving image.

  An image that might not necessarily have been completely 100 percent true.

  I mean, it was true when we met. Fred really was amazing. He was still in law school, and I had just started teaching, and we were both wildly in love, and absolutely sure about what we wanted in life.

  Then, somehow, life got in the way.

  It wasn’t just his high salary and seventy-hour workweeks crashing against my small salary and wanting to keep my summers off. Although certainly not agreeing on how much money and free time
you can live with is big. It was sex that slowly got routine, and less and less frequent. And not being able to agree on a place to live together for so long that I finally had to move into his place, which I hated every day. Or not agreeing on a place to go on vacation, which led to not going on vacation together at all.

  Sometimes, a relationship withers, and by the time you realize how close it is to death, you don’t know what to do to save it.

  I desperately want the guy who brought silver roses to me on our second date back. I miss the man who lay in bed with me all day every Sunday, equipped with a Sunday Times, a few rented Blu-rays, and breakfast delivered to our door. I want my buddy back who watched BBC America with me every Thursday night.

  I miss him, and I know he’s still lurking somewhere inside the too-sleek yuppie who crawls into bed with me every night. I know he’s still there.

  Or, at least until tonight, I thought he was still there.

  As I stare at the blank sheet of lined paper, I am at a total loss as to what to write.

  1. Nagel.

  Scott reads my number one upside down. “That’s cheating,” he says. “I totally served that one up for you. Show some originality.”

  “But I can’t stand Nagel,” I point out.

  “And I don’t like wet socks. Who does? Movin’ on to number two.”

  I’m not really comfortable telling my friends the real reasons my relationship isn’t working. So I start by writing down some of my minor grievances:

  2. Works too much.

  Scott smiles. “Good.”

  3. Cannot see a dish in the sink to save his life.

  4. Will not shop for Christmas presents until December 24th.

  Seema reads that one. “Hmmm … so basically number four just makes him male.”

  Scott turns to Seema. “You loved your gift card.” Then he turns to me, “Keep going, sweetheart.”

  5. Blares U2 at 8:00 A.M. on Saturday morning while getting ready for his softball game.