Water Grill is known for its oysters, so Fred starts with half a dozen Beau Soleil oysters, then orders the Wild Skeena River king salmon. I start with the Long Cove oysters, then have the spiny lobster tail.
On the drive over, conversation was stilted, but safe: he told me how nice I looked and asked about my preparations for the coming school year. I asked him about his work. We talked about the Dodgers’s chances of clinching a spot in the playoffs and the latest U2 album.
But once we had ordered, and each of us had a drink in front of us, the real conversation began.
“I didn’t sleep with her,” Fred tells me softly but firmly as he stares into his martini glass. “I know what I did was really wrong, and I know that you’ll probably never be able to forgive me. But I just wanted you to know the truth. I would never do that to you. I would never hurt you like that.”
I look down at my glass of wine. “I know,” I say, and I think I mean it. “But you have to understand how humiliating that was for me.”
Fred nods his head almost sheepishly. His eyes flit around the room. I continue staring at my wine. Finally, he asks, “So … where are we?”
“I don’t know,” I answer honestly. “And I have to ask you some questions before I will.” I take a deep breath and begin. “I know we dated without a commitment for the first few months. Were you sleeping with anyone else at the time?”
My question is a little like the base question, “What is your name?” on a lie detector test. I already know the answer—I found out years ago that he and a girl named Lisa were not completely broken up when he first started seeing me. And what man isn’t having breakup sex with the woman he’s trying to stop dating?
If he admits to Lisa, I’ll know he’s telling the truth. If he doesn’t, I’ll stand up and walk out of his life forever.
Fred takes a deep breath. He doesn’t look up from his drink. “Yeah,” he finally tells me. “I was. Actually, I was dating her when I started going out with you. Which is a track record that’s not really helping my case here. Her name is Lisa.”
I remember how to breathe. “Okay. Anyone else?”
Fred looks up at me and shakes his head. “I didn’t want anyone else. I wanted you.”
“Until you met Svetlana,” I say, maybe a little too bitterly.
“I didn’t want her either. It’s just … it’s complicated.”
I’ll bet. I realize I’m clenching my jaw as I say sternly, “I’m listening.”
“I wasn’t really ready to take the next step with you,” Fred admits. “You’ve been talking about marriage for a while, and you’ve been really making me feel pressured and…”
My eyes bug out at him, “Wait, so it’s my fault you had an affair?”
“No, that’s not what I’m saying at all,” Fred says quickly, taking my hand. “I love you. This is all my fault. You did nothing wrong. Absolutely nothing…”
He looks at my left hand and begins stroking it. “You know, you have every right to be mad. But all I did was kiss her. Things could have been much worse.”
I quickly pull my hand away. “You’re losing me here.”
“Mel, I love you, but I need to tell you this my way. If you want me to be honest, you have to listen.”
I sigh heavily. Grab my glass for a huge gulp of wine. Force myself to tell him, “Okay, go on.”
“That night in New York you and I had just had a big argument about the couch, remember?”
I do remember. I had found this amazing red couch that I totally fell in love with, and that was 60 percent off. But it was a first-come first-serve thing, and the couch would be gone by the end of the week. I called Fred, bursting with happiness over the couch.
He hesitated. Said stuff like, “Let’s not jump into any big purchases right now.” And “We’re happy. Why can’t we just leave things the way they are?” Which quickly led to an argument about him never wanting to commit to anything. Which led to my version of “Why haven’t you put a ring on it?”
“I think that was our worst fight ever,” Fred told me.
“It was certainly our loudest,” I am forced to admit. I’m getting nauseated as I think back to that fight. That night, I screamed at him, then hung up on him. I spent the next few hours packing then unpacking. Eventually, I collapsed in a corner and cried off and on until sunlight started to seep through our curtains.
Apparently Fred found more appealing ways to deal with our fight. “So after you hung up on me, I went down to the Oak Room, got a Scotch, and really started to think hard about marriage. And what I concluded was, I didn’t want to get married. Not to you, not to anyone.”
I think I just dry heaved. Fred continues, “Then Svetlana showed up. She was beautiful. She was flirty. And, most important, she was low maintenance. This was a woman who had no intentions of ever wearing a diamond ring again. She just wanted to have fun.”
I look down at the table and can feel the tears begin to well up in my eyes.
Fred finishes his story. “When I walked her to her suite, she kissed me, and we made out. And it was wrong. And I felt like the worst human being on the planet then. So I said good night to her. And that was all that happened.”
I don’t respond at all. I can’t. My body is frozen, my mind is frozen. I want to stand up, throw my drink in his face, and storm out. But I can’t move.
“I called you the next morning to apologize,” Fred finishes. “And I told you to go buy the couch.”
Wow. This is so over. He doesn’t want to marry me. I force myself to stand up. “I have to go,” I manage to eek out (although in a much weaker voice than I had hoped for).
Fred takes my hand again, “Mel, please stay. Please, please, please. I am so sorry. I’ll never do anything like that again, I promise.” I watch him a moment. Tears also start to well up in his eyes. “Please let me make this up to you.”
In the six years we’ve been together, I’ve never seen Fred cry. I don’t know how to process this information. I slowly sit back down.
“You don’t want to marry me,” I say, shaking my head. “How are you going to make it up to me? You don’t want to marry me. It’s over.”
“I said I didn’t want to marry you that night,” Fred corrects me. “But these last few days have made me realize that I can’t live without you. In the past five years, you’ve constantly asked me what it was going to take to get me to realize that I wanted to marry you.”
Fred stands up from his chair and gets down on one knee. As other patrons turn to watch, he takes a Tiffany & Co. robin’s-egg-blue box out of his jacket pocket and presents it to me. “Will you marry me?”
Eleven
Seema
I am in the middle of a perfect date.
A gorgeous man (who can cook—natch!) is standing in my kitchen, preparing a gourmet meal of filet mignon, freshly mashed potatoes, and baby peas. Things are going incredibly well. He’s told me twice how beautiful I look tonight. We not only have yet to consummate our relationship, we haven’t even shared our first kiss yet. So I still have all of those “Oh my God! What a great kisser!” and “Should I or shouldn’t I let him take off my bra so early into the relationship?” moments of titillation to look forward to. We are sharing a fabulous bottle of cabernet, and the half glass I’ve already consumed combined with his presence and flirtations are the perfect elements to make a girl feel relaxed, confident, and just a little bit giddy.
Except it’s Scott, I’ve yet to make a move, and I am still steaming over Mel’s ridiculously stupid note, which she left on my kitchen counter.
Hi guys,
Having dinner with Fred. Things might be turning around.
Wish me luck!
Love, M
“I don’t get it,” I say to Scott, taking a sip of my wine as I watch him peel a clove of garlic. “Mel is a beautiful woman with a killer body. She could have any guy she wants. Why would she go see that loser after all he’s done to her?”
“First of all, you do
n’t know for sure that she’s seeing him to rekindle things,” Scott tells me, as he opens my top drawer to leaf through my kitchen gadgets. “Where’s your garlic press?”
“I don’t think I have one,” I say, as I look over his shoulder to see what I do have in there.
“You don’t have a garlic press?” he asks derisively.
“You don’t have a cake plate?” I answer back in the same tone of voice.
“Yeah, but you could actually use a garlic press.”
“Dude, I go through a lot of cake.”
“Fair enough,” Scott concedes. He walks over to my block of kitchen knives and pulls out a paring knife. Then he walks to my cutting board and begins to perfectly chop the clove of garlic into perfect tiny cubes. “So how much garlic do you want me to rub into your steak?”
“Depends. How much making out are we planning to do tonight?” I say, throwing him a relaxed smile.
Scott looks up and flashes me a wicked smile in return. “I’d toss this knife over my shoulder, shove everything off your kitchen counter, and take you now, but the pan is heating.”
Rats. But I’m used to the ubiquitous rejection, so I continue with my rant on Mel. “I just don’t understand why beautiful women make such foolish choices.”
“This from the beautiful woman who in the past year has dated a tormented writer living with his mother, the owner of a comic-book store with autographed pictures of William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy, and a Flying Wallenda.”
“Do you think I’m beautiful?” I ask him, flaunting my ongoing insecurities.
“Yeeees…,” he says, stretching out the word like he thinks the question’s stupid and the answer obvious. He finishes chopping and begins sprinkling chopped garlic on the filet mignons that we got from an actual butcher shop. “Should I put some on Mel’s steak?”
“Why not? I doubt she’ll be back tonight, we might as well eat it.”
“She could be back,” Scott says. He grabs his wineglass and takes a sip. “Not likely, but…”
“How can you say that?!” I blurt out at him.
“What? I’m agreeing with you,” Scott points out defensively. “You know men—when we’re done, we’re done. But women, they think they need closure. They have to sleep with us one more time, some have to talk to us one more time. You know the drill. All women do it.”
“You’ve slept with a woman one more time, even though you know you were going to stay broken up?”
Scott looks crestfallen. “Oh, honey, you can’t be pushing thirty and still be that naïve.” He grabs the open bottle of cabernet from the counter and refills my glass. “I just slept with an ex recently because she needed closure—and she called me, like, six months after our breakup.”
I stare at my glass as he refills my wine. Of course, I cannot focus on the fact that he mistakes me for twenty-nine. No, no … much bigger news was dropped just now. “You slept with an ex-girlfriend? When? Who?”
Scott shrugs as he takes the lid off a pot and checks the boiling potatoes. “I don’t know. A few weeks ago? Before Britney. Remember that girl Sherri from earlier this year?”
I do indeed. I was so jealous of her at the time that I couldn’t see straight. “The one with the on again/off again boyfriend?”
“Yeah. Well, I guess he was off again when she called me, then on again by the weekend. Point is, she needed closure with me. That’s what she called it. Closure. Mel’s no different—she has to have a seriously unfulfilling time with Fred to remember why she broke up with him in the first place. All women do it.”
Scott had sex recently.
And not with me.
And before Britney. What’s up with that? Is Britney the official BIMY girl (where everything is “Before I Met You”)?
I take a big old gulp of my wine. “So, how was it?”
Scott cocks his head. “What?”
And another gulp of wine. Liquid courage. “Sex with the ex. How was it?”
He shrugs. “Eh. Nothing to write home about.”
He flashes me one of his meltingly wonderful smiles.
So many questions I want to ask: What’s “Eh”? What kind of sex would you write home about? What kind of woman would you write home about?
And, most importantly, What do you mean, “Before Britney”? You just met her! What does she have that I don’t?
The ringing of my telephone interrupts my thoughts. I decide to let the machine get it.
Scott turns around to walk toward my spice rack. “We need cracked black pepper.”
As he brushes past me, I grab his arm. “Wait.”
Scott stops. Again, he cocks his head, curious. I look into his clear green eyes and try to get the words out of my mouth: “I love you. Pick me instead.”
I try, but no sound comes out. Instead, we stare at each other for at least ten seconds. I could stare at those clear green eyes for the rest of my life. Since I can’t get out the words, I decide to finally just make my move. I lean in for a kiss …
When I hear my machine go off.
“Hey, it’s me! Pick up, pick up, pick up!!!!” Mel yells into the phone.
Ignore her, I tell myself. Just force yourself to move forward. I move my mouth closer to his luscious pink lips, part my lips slightly, and …
“I’m getting married!” Mel screams excitedly.
That jolts me back into reality. “What the fuck?!” I blurt out before making a beeline for the phone.
Scott grabs my arm. “Don’t answer that.”
Is he nuts? “But I…”
“You’re just going to say something stupid,” he warns.
As Mel continues talking, saying things like “Gorgeous diamond” and “Water Grill,” Scott and I continue arguing. “As opposed to something smart like, ‘He’s a chode,’ ” I retort.
“He is a chode,” Scott agrees. “But nothing you say tonight is going to change anything. You need to pick your battles here.”
More words from Mel: bridesmaid, Bora Bora, black bridesmaids’ dresses (well, since I’ll be in mourning over their marriage, at least the color’s appropriate).
“I can’t just stand idly by while…”
“Yes you can,” Scott tells me firmly. “Idly by. Good words. Now, which do you need more right now: wine or ice cream?”
I am torn. I look over at my machine just as Mel is saying, “Okay, you’re really not there. I’ll try you on your cell. I love you very much, and I really appreciate you taking me in these past few days. But … um … well, just in case you’re staring at the phone right now not knowing what to say to me … just … please be one tenth as happy for me as I am right now.”
There’s a long pause. I almost pick up. “Okay, I love you,” Mel continues. “Bye.”
And she clicks off. I feel Scott stand behind me and begin to rub my shoulders. “You did great.”
“I’m going to need a lot of ice cream,” I say.
Scott puts his arm around me and leads me toward the refrigerator. “The perfect appetizer to my filet mignon.”
“And wine. I will need a lot of wine.”
“The perfect dessert.”
Scott’s phone buzzes to let him know he has a text. He pulls out the phone. “Who is it?” I ask him, thinking it might be Mel.
Scott reveals a shy smile as he reads the text. “No one.”
I can’t help myself. “It’s not Sherri, is it?”
Scott’s smile widens. “No,” he says, grinning like a Cheshire cat. “You’ll be happy to know Sherri’s out. I’ve moved on.”
Fuck. Now I definitely need ice cream.
Twelve
Nicole
I used to fantasize about family dinners. Seriously. As a child of divorce, I always had this rose-colored dream of everyone sitting down to a nice home-cooked meal (made by me, of course), talking about our days, sharing our dreams, and being each other’s biggest supporters against the trials and tribulations of life.
I wonder where those families
are. Colorado maybe?
Seriously, after a day like today, I am exhausted, overwhelmed, and feeling like a total failure at this whole stepmotherhood business.
Let’s start with that home-cooked meal. I spent the morning shuttling kids back and forth to their various “enrichment” classes, everything from Spanish for fourth graders to Chemistry for Tots—a title that scared the Hell out of me when I first read it. Then I raced over to the school for Malika’s kindergarten orientation, only to learn that my lovely husband-to-be was stuck at a meeting and would not be able to attend, and could I please collect all of the required paperwork, sign anything necessary, then write down any important school dates on the master calendar? Back to the Valley to pick up the girls from their classes, then over to a kids’ clothing store that specializes in school uniforms, where we picked up the assorted skirts, shorts, logoed shirts, and cardigans needed for the coming year.
Next was a trip to the toy store for not one but two birthday presents for the birthday parties this week ( just this week!), a trip to Target for school supplies, and a trip to the pharmacy for drugs. The drugs (sadly) were not for me but for Malika, who needed a refill of a liquid antibiotic that I spilled all over her bedspread last night when she accidentally kicked my arm as I was pouring the fruit-flavored syrup into the teaspoon, thereby splattering the filled spoon and open bottle all over everything and making her bedspread look like a Rorschach test.
By the end of the day, all I had time to make was a phone call to the local Thai restaurant for takeout. Dinner consisted of twelve assorted white boxes filled with various exotic dishes. We all grabbed a plate and scooped out what we wanted.
Side note: I want to know where that mom is who successfully cooks only one meal at night—take it or leave it, she’s not a short-order cook. Because that bitch is making me feel bad, and I want to go to her spotless house, with her gourmet kitchen and her perfectly behaved children, and tell her to fuck off. Between Malika’s refusal to eat meat or anything with sauce on it, Megan’s abhorrence of anything even vaguely resembling a vegetable, and a fiancé who absolutely refuses to have any of his food touching any of his other food, dinner in this house has become more of a train wreck of late than a bonding experience.
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