by Lynda Curnyn
Though Alyssa knows me better than most, when it comes to this ex-girlfriend business she cannot relate. After all, Lys has been successfully dating since puberty. Once I asked her how she always managed to have a boyfriend on hand, and she laughed, saying she usually hung on to the guy long enough for them to grow completely sick of each other, then broke up with him just as New Boyfriend stood waiting in the wings.
Now if this were any other girl, I might have said Alyssa suffered from Chronic Boyfriend Syndrome—a condition that leads many women not only to date, but also to plan their lives around men who are for the most part reprehensible but seem preferable to the other option…which is no boyfriend at all. But I can honestly say that despite her claims, I am sure Alyssa never dated a guy out of this kind of neediness. It is just that she is utterly lovable—so lovable, in fact, that most men upon meeting her wish they had an Alyssa of their very own.
Her current beau, Richard, the first man Alyssa has ever dared live with and, I must admit, the best guy she’s ever been with, is a perfect example of this. Richard was the roommate of Alyssa’s last boyfriend, Dan. They were all in law school together, and since Alyssa pretty much lived at Dan’s place in order to avoid her own awful roommate, Richard took every opportunity to bond with her whenever he was in her warm and fun-loving presence. I can just imagine his joy when Dan up and moved back home to Ohio to practice law with his father’s firm, leaving Alyssa free and clear for Richard, who had already fallen hopelessly in love with her from the sidelines.
Now, as Alyssa looked up from her mushrooms, silently demanding my assent to her psychobabble, I struggled for words to explain how I felt.
“I don’t think I’m angry, Lys. I think I just miss him, is all.”
“Well, get angry, Em,” Alyssa said, turning from her sauté to look at me. “You’re not going to get over this unless you do.”
The thought of getting over Derrick horrified me. Derrick was the man I loved. My soulmate. Getting over him was not an option.
“Mmm-hmm,” I muttered vaguely in response, and while I sat pondering the audacity of her suggestion, I found myself agreeing to stay to dinner with her and Richard, which, I realized later, was a mistake. As I watched them exchange tidbits of their day along with meaningful glances, one thing became very clear: I needed to get a life. A life that didn’t involve…couples.
Confession: I have been operating under the mistaken belief that I would never, ever, have to enter the dating world again.
I called Jade first thing Saturday morning and practically begged her to have brunch with me. And despite a slight hangover, best bud that she is, she agreed to drag herself out of the house before dusk.
We met at French Roast, mostly because they had outdoor seating and Jade would be able to smoke. As I sat waiting for her at five to one—I am chronically early, a habit I developed probably to have something to hold over the chronically-late-but-otherwise-perfect Derrick’s head—I looked forward to some solid single-girl bolstering. After all, Jade was one of the few friends I had who seemed fearless in the face of the battleground that was the NYC dating scene. She never seemed to suffer the same kind of losses other women did. When she gave out her number, the man always called. Sometimes she didn’t even pick up the phone—that’s how sure of herself she was.
At one-fifteen, she breezed up to the sidewalk table I had secured, looking effortlessly gorgeous in capri pants and a tank that showed off her toned shoulders. Jade is one of those women who was born to wear clothes—a perfect size 6 with just enough bust to matter and no hips. Her hair, a deep, rich shade of red, fell in soft waves down her back, seemingly without effort or design. Her eyes are green, her skin smooth and flawless over high cheekbones. She is the kind of woman other women would hate if they could, simply by virtue of the fact that no man can ignore her when she is in a room. But there is something about her that is irresistible to both men and women. It amazes me sometimes that we are even friends, she graceful and self-assured, me always fumbling and often angry. Yet we’ve known each other since grade school and are bonded together by shared memories of first bras, first boyfriends and first successful undereye coverage finds. When she was edging toward twenty, a photographer encouraged Jade to put together a portfolio and she did, but when the time came to submit it to modeling agencies, she shrugged off the opportunity, as if it were something anyone could do. As it turned out, after various attempts at other careers, she landed a job on the other side of the camera, working as a clothes stylist for Threads Magazine.
“Sorry I’m late,” she said, giving me a solid one-arm hug, then pulling back to look into my eyes—gauging my mood, I suppose—before she slid into the chair across from me. First we ordered, she the niçoise salad—not because she needed to eat light, but because she liked to, believe it or not—me, the smoked salmon hash with eggs—a fancier version of the kind of greasy, carbohydrate-laden meal I chose whenever I was throwing myself a pity party. Then she said, “Okay, spill. What’s going on with you? Are you moping? I can see you’re moping. He’s not worth it. No guy is, really.”
And so I began my discourse on how my life had suddenly lost all meaning now that I had gone from Happily Coupled-Off to Horribly, Achingly Single…and all before Memorial Day weekend, no less.
“Alyssa says I’m unable to get angry because he left me for a good reason. It’s true I can’t really get angry at Derrick for going after his dream. I mean, all he’s ever wanted to do was make a living at writing, and when he sold that screenplay, he got the chance to do it—in L.A.”
Jade lit a cigarette, making me painfully aware that I no longer smoked, despite the occasional desperate urge I suffered. “So let me ask you something. If you are so heartbroken without him, why don’t you go after him? Move to L.A.”
Leave it to Jade to go straight for the jugular, asking the question I didn’t even want to ask myself. “And give up my career?” I said, practically parroting Derrick’s rationale for not inviting me with him, a point that still jabbed at my ego.
“At Bridal Best?” she asked, her eyes bulging in disbelief.
“I am next in line for a promotion, you know,” I said defensively, realizing how ridiculous I suddenly sounded, glorifying my day job. The very job I took great delight in mocking whenever Jade and I got into a gripefest about work, usually over drinks during a Friday night happy hour. But how could I explain to Jade, who knew that all I’d ever wanted to be was a writer, that for the past two years of my life—The Derrick Years as I imagined I would one day call them—my creativity had been confined to my role as editor at a magazine? A magazine, as I often joked, that thrived on the fact that happily-ever-after was not only every woman’s ambition, but a prosperous industry. There had been room for only one writer in our relationship, and Derrick, with a screenplay under his belt as well as a string of short stories published in literary journals, had won the role hands down. As for myself, I hadn’t written a word for the last year and a half. Not that Jade knew that. No one knew, really. Except Derrick. There was no hiding your failures from someone who spent seventy-five percent of his life in your one-room studio.
“Besides, how could I give up my rent-stabilized apartment?” I added weakly as the waitress came by with our meals.
While Jade blew out a last puff of smoke, staring at me as she stubbed out her cigarette in the ashtray, I tried to bury myself in my meal, avoiding her gaze. Jade knows me better than anyone, sometimes even better than I know myself, and I was not yet ready to face whatever ugly truths I was hiding from myself.
“Emma—”
“The truth is, Jade, he didn’t want me with him while he went off to become rich and famous. He doesn’t want—me.”
Her eyes were soft when I looked up again, and somehow her pity stung more than her anger might have.
“What you need is a nice rebound relationship. And I know just the guy,” she said, resolve firming in her eyes as she dug into her salad. “I just styled him th
e other day for an outerwear shoot.”
“I don’t date models.” Translation: they don’t date me. “You don’t even date models anymore.” After months of trying to keep one around long enough for at least one evening of unparalleled ecstasy, even Jade finally realized they were too self-absorbed to truly seduce. At least I hoped she realized that.
“C’mon, Emma. You know the best thing you can do for your self is get right back out there. Besides, this guy might even be nice.”
“Then why don’t you go for him?” I asked, studying her expression. I always distrusted the idea of dating the men Jade passed over herself. She was such a solid judge of masculine virtues, I knew that if she didn’t want the guy, she must have found some serious flaw she would never fess up to while she was trying to sell me on him.
“He’s not my type.”
Now I knew he was flawed. “Forget it.”
“I might even be able to line him up for next weekend.”
“Next weekend?” I said, shocked she might even suggest that I—with that extra five or so pounds of relationship flab firmly intact on my thighs and my emotions still tattered and flapping in the wind—might be ready to sit across a smoke-filled table from a startlingly handsome man and utter meaningless words designed to make myself seem just as accomplished and attractive as he was. “Thanks, but no thanks.”
“Well, what are you going to do?”
“I don’t know. I’m just trying to get through this weekend, never mind next. Speaking of which, what are you doing later? Want to see a movie?” I asked, hoping to avoid an evening alone.
“Can’t. I have a date.”
“Really? With Steroid King?”
“You mean Carl? No, he’s history,” she said. “I told you—he couldn’t, you know, perform. I don’t think you should have to deal with penal dysfunction in a man unless you’re in love with him. You remember what I went through with Michael?”
Michael was the man I would say came the closest to being the love of Jade’s life, except that he brutally dumped her for some dippy little blonde from his office after she struggled for over a year to put up with his vanity, his immaturity and, worst of all, his impotence—not that he ever called it that. He just claimed not to be interested in having sex with Jade, which did wonders for her ego. Ever since their breakup two years ago, Jade has done everything in her power to keep her heart out of it and go strictly for kicks—all those kicks she never really got from Michael, sexually speaking. But the great irony of her life has been that despite the fact that she is beautiful, intelligent and financially self-sufficient, she can’t seem to find a man in all of NYC capable of delivering a satisfying sexual experience. Having gone through some dry spells myself since moving to NYC, I could sympathize. In fact, we often joked that we could start our own sitcom, called No Sex in the City. Carl had merely been Jade’s latest dating experiment—a musclehead so pumped up on steroids, he couldn’t seem to get a rise out of any other part of his anatomy.
“No, this is a guy from the gym, too, but he’s the real thing. Gorgeous, in that lean, surfer’s body kind of way.”
“Let me guess…he’s a model.”
“Yeah, but he’s very down-to-earth,” she argued, leaning back from the salad she’d barely touched to sip her water.
Though Jade didn’t like to hear it, I firmly believed her trouble with men began with her selection. She had always been a connoisseur of the beautiful people, which was probably why she was such a high-in-demand stylist in the fashion industry. But what she apparently hadn’t figured out yet was that that beautiful men all had one thing in common and that was an inability to love—or even desire—anyone more than they loved themselves.
“I know what you’re thinking, Em,” she said, “but this time I have the best of both worlds. Ted is beautiful, but I get the feeling he doesn’t even realize just how beautiful.”
“Hence, his career choice.”
“Please. The guy was living out in the middle of a cornfield in the Midwest when a scout spotted him at a club.”
“This story sounds familiar.” Why was it that no models ever seemed to actually apply for the glamorous, high-paid jobs they wound up in?
“He almost seems…innocent,” Jade continued. “I mean, he practically blushed when I gave him my phone number.”
“You’re kidding?”
She started to laugh, then lit a cigarette. “So what are you going to do tonight? Go out with Alyssa?” Jade and Alyssa had become fast friends from the moment I introduced them in college, despite their very different personalities.
“No, no. She’ll probably be doing something with Richard. And there is no way I can deal with a night of hanging with the Happily-Almost-Married.”
“Well, I don’t think you should stay home,” Jade advised. “Want to meet up with me and Ted for drinks?”
“His name is Ted?”
“I know. Doesn’t it sound almost…harmless?”
“Very boy next door.”
“Well? What do you say? Drinks with me and Ted Terrific?”
“Naw. No, really. I want to stay home. You know. Get into myself again. Maybe I’ll do a little renovating. I’ve been meaning to move my bookshelves. Maybe hang a few pictures.”
“Are you sure?” Jade demanded.
“Of course I’m sure. It’s not like I’ve never spent Saturday night alone before.”
Confession: I have not spent Saturday night alone for two years.
This wasn’t exactly true, as there had been times when Derrick spent Saturday night home writing, and I spent Saturday night home alone, also writing. Or at least that’s what I told Derrick whenever he suggested we take Saturday off to catch up. “Oh, sure. I’ve been meaning to get started on a short story I’ve been thinking about,” I would always say. After we hung up, I would turn my computer on, and as it booted up, I would start hand-washing all my lingerie or organizing my sock drawer. If things got really desperate, I would take an old toothbrush and some cleanser to the grout in the bathroom. If Derrick happened to call during these binges of avoidance to ask what I was up to, I always replied, “working.” It wasn’t exactly a lie.
Now I didn’t dare turn on the computer. Couldn’t even bring myself to gather up the hand-wash, for fear of the memories it might conjure up. Instead I curled up on the bed, fetus-style, contemplating the night ahead of me.
I had already called Alyssa and learned that she and Richard were going to Richard’s sister’s house for dinner, confirming that I was, indeed, alone for the evening, without even friends to call. There was always my office pal, Rebecca, but she and I have never ventured into weekend territory together. Then there was Sebastian, my hairdresser and sometimes friend—that is, when Fire Island or some handsome new man didn’t beckon him away. But I hadn’t spoken to Sebastian in a while and felt like a fraud calling him up now, expecting him to be there for me when I hadn’t been much of a friend to him lately.
“Do something for yourself,” Alyssa had said when we spoke on the phone, “take a hot bath, do one of those home facials, curl up with a good book.” I knew she was right. That was what I should have done. It was, in fact, what was advised by every woman’s magazine and every relationship self-help book—not that I’d read any, but my mother always reads enough for both of us.
Instead I gorged myself on a pint of Ben & Jerry’s Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough, overplucked my eyebrows and proceeded to pore over old photos of Derrick and me on vacation last summer in East Hampton, where we had rented a house with some of his friends. I studied that face I loved so much, saw the happiness in his eyes as we stood, arms entwined, tanned, rested and utterly in love. Or so I thought.
What had gone so wrong? I wondered now.
The phone rang, shattering the gloomy silence of my apartment. I picked it up, then remembered—too late—that I should be screening on this first Saturday night alone.
“Emma! You’re home! I didn’t think I’d catch you—”
/>
“Hi, Mom.” There I was, caught by my mother, home on a Saturday night. “Yeah, well, figured I’d stay in tonight, catch up on a few things. How are you?”
“Fine, fine. Clark just went out to get some milk and eggs for the morning and I just thought I’d try you, see if you were around.”
Clark was my mother’s current boyfriend, and despite the fact that they had been together close to three years, I didn’t trust things to last. It wasn’t that Clark wasn’t the greatest guy in the world for my mother, it was that my mother didn’t have the best luck with men. I was starting to wonder if it was hereditary.
“So how’s everything with Derrick?” my mother asked. This question was a fairly routine one, occurring as it does at least once during our weekly phone calls. There was a subtext to it, which my mother will firmly deny if challenged: Is everything progressing normally? Will there be an engagement announcement soon? Am I ever going to see a grandchild?
I tended to ignore the subtext and answer with a cheerful “Everything’s fine.” And somehow, despite the fact that my mother would more than likely never see that grandchild now that her thirty-one-year-old daughter’s last chance had just up and left for L.A., putting that daughter—who had an average rate of two years between boyfriends, with one in three of those boyfriends actually being tolerable enough to consider propagating with—pretty much out of the running for motherhood. Despite all of that, I stuck to my faithful reply: “Everything’s fine. Derrick is fine. We’re fine.”
I don’t know why I lied. Maybe I didn’t want to get into it. I knew I would tell her. Eventually. I just didn’t want to hear how I had failed while my insides were still aching with the loss of him.
As it turned out, my mother had other things she wanted to talk about anyway.
