Confessions of an Ex-Girlfriend

by Lynda Curnyn

  Mom stared alternately at the dress and then at the clerk, as if trying to decide if she should let this little scrap of woman in a beaded top and Day-Glo lipstick make one of her most important wedding-day decisions. “I, uh, I was thinking maybe something…less white. And less…flowing. Maybe a suit?”

  The woman slapped the hanger onto a rod above her head and turned to face my mother. “First, let me tell you something, sweetheart,” she began, leaning in close, confiding. “I don’t care what they say about what you should or shouldn’t wear for a second or third marriage—no woman over the age of fifty looks good in ivory. Unless she’s a blonde, and, clearly, you are not.”

  My mother glanced at me, but I was staring steadfastly at this little dynamo turned prophet.

  “Second,” she continued, with a crack of her gum, “you been down this road before. The first time you did it for your parents. The second time, maybe love. Maybe loneliness. Who knows?”

  My mother’s eyes widened.

  “But if you’re lucky enough to get to number three,” the woman said, her mouth moving into a wise smile, “I’ll put money on it that you’re doing it for you.”

  Finally my mother smiled, as if the woman was speaking her language.

  Tugging on the skirt of the dress, the saleswoman said, “See this fabric, this cut?” At my mother’s nod, she continued, “You have a little pre-wedding stress, decide to eat that extra piece of coffee cake in the morning, you got some give here. And no one will even see what you’ve been up to.”

  I smiled. It was as if she’d seen into our feminine souls.

  “The sleeves are sheer enough to keep you cool, yet don’t require four nights a week at Jack La Lanne for the next six months to look good. And the cut of the neck—no woman, even one your size,” she said, with a nod to my mother’s all-but-nonexistent chest, “will look bad in this.”

  As she glanced down at herself, Mom looked uncertain.

  “Trust me,” the woman said, picking the dress up and pressing it into my mother’s hands, “try it on.”

  A few minutes later, my mother stood on a pedestal before a three-way mirror, a vision in off-white.

  She smiled tremulously, and I knew she knew she looked good. The salesclerk, who had introduced herself as Betty as she helped my mother into the dress, stood looking on, a satisfied expression on her face.

  “You look beautiful, Mom,” I said.

  She beamed at me. Then, with a nervous glance at her generously padded bustline, said, “But I think I must have gone from a B to a C cup.”

  Betty smiled wryly. “Listen, sweetheart. Even a woman going for number three needs some illusions.”

  With that, my mother’s decision was made. And once Betty had taken a few measurements, she turned her focus on me, having learned that I was to be the maid of honor, and—as my mother had told her in a moment of camaraderie—that I had just been brutally dumped by my longtime boyfriend.

  “Cruise ships are the best places to meet men,” Betty said. And since she’d just finished showing us the beautiful necklace and earring set she’d made from the diamonds received from her first three husbands, I submitted meekly to her choice of a slinky little number in a soft lavender, with just enough shirring around the waist to disguise any last-minute anxiety binges.

  Everything was going to be all right, I thought, as we paid for our dresses and waved goodbye to a satisfied Betty.

  And even if everything wasn’t all right, at least I would be wearing a great dress.

  Confession: I am ready to chuck any future prospects for misguided hopes.

  Though I usually find a return to the city after a weekend at home redeeming, on this particular Monday night after a long holiday weekend on parade as the last unmarried member of my family, I did not find the same solace I normally did at the sight of the cafés and shops twinkling in the growing dusk. Instead all I saw was couples walking arm in arm, or bent toward one another in conversation over tiny candlelit tables. As I trudged up the stairs to my lonely apartment, I even found myself wishing a good ransacking had occurred while I was away. Nothing too serious—just a couple of thugs who slipped in through the window by the fire escape and stole a few essential items: like my laptop full of half-baked dreams and my collection of Derrick memorabilia. After all, anything was possible in New York City, right? Even sentimental thieves. But as I slipped into the dark, quiet apartment and flipped on the light, everything was just as I had left it. And so was my life.

  With a sigh, I began to unpack my tote, when I noticed the light was blinking on my answering machine. I slapped the Play button with something resembling indifference, though what girl living alone in NYC is ever truly unfazed by the sight of a blinking red light on her answering machine?

  After the sound of fumbling, as if the caller couldn’t get a grip on either the receiver or his thoughts, a voice filled the air that stopped my heart: “Hey, Em, it’s Derrick.”

  My tote bag hit the floor with a solid thud.

  “Just calling to check in. See how you’re doing. Um. Was going to call sooner, but it took me a little while to find a place. Believe it or not, rents in L.A. are almost as bad as NYC.” Then he laughed, that soft chuckle he always gave when something defied his inner sense of logic. Warmth curled through me. “Anyway, I didn’t think you’d be home this weekend—you’re probably out on the Island, beaching it or whatever. But I was just sitting around thinking about you, so I figured I’d give you a call….” Pause. “Give me a ring when you get in. The number here is 213-555-5684. Anyway, hope to talk to you soon. Miss you.”

  Stunned, I lurched for the machine and hit Rewind. I needed to hear it again, every breathtaking word—but especially the last two. He missed me. Missed me. I played it back, my heart gliding over the sound of his voice, which to my undernourished ears sounded filled with longing…for me. I scribbled down the number, once on a scrap of paper I found by the bed, and again in the more secure place of my address book. As I stared at the unfamiliar phone number I’d jotted down right beneath his old Rivington Street address—which I still couldn’t bear to cross out—I contemplated whether or not I should call him back right away. A glance at my watch told me it was nine-thirty, which meant six-thirty his time. Would it seem too desperate of me? Maybe I should torture him for a few weeks, make him think I’d forgotten about him the way he’d seemingly forgotten about me. Then, realizing that I would never survive those few weeks, I picked up the phone and dialed.

  He answered immediately. “Hello?”

  “Derrick?” I inquired, though I knew that voice better than I knew my own.

  “Emma.” The relief in his husky voice set my heart hammering triple time. “I was hoping you would call tonight. How are you?”

  “Great, great,” I replied, and suddenly I was. “How’s L.A.? The new apartment? What am I saying? How is the new job?”

  He laughed. “Everything is good, good. The job is fine. A lot of big egos, but I’m managing okay for the moment, as long as I tiptoe through.”

  “You hate it?” I asked hopefully.

  “No, no, not at all.” Then he laughed again. “God, do I miss you, Em—sarcasm and all.”

  I ignored the fact that I wasn’t being sarcastic and latched instead onto the fact that he missed me. He missed me! “So tell me everything. The apartment is okay? Not too lonely?”

  “Naw, in fact, rents were so crazy, I had to do the roommate thing again.”

  “Anything like your old roommate, Craig the Crud Monger?”

  “No, thank God. The apartment is actually terrific. It’s a short ride from the beach, and it’s got a great view of the water from my bedroom window.”

  “Wow,” I said, turning my head to gaze through my own window at the brick wall of the building next to mine. “That sounds incredible.” And incredibly romantic. A heaviness developed in my chest.

  “You really have to come for a visit, Em. I think you might like it out here.”

&n
bsp; The heaviness dissipated. “Yeah? Well, as it turns out, I still have a week’s vacation left to me, and I could probably even take it before the end of June.”

  He paused, and in the brief silence I cringed at the sound of my own desperation. “Well, it’s something to think about,” he said, then graciously changed the subject before I uprooted my entire life and put it on a plane headed for the West Coast. “So how’s your job going?”

  “Great,” I said, still mentally chastising myself for seeming too needy. Hoping to recoup some of my self-esteem, I elaborated. “In fact, one of the senior features editors just left, and I’m up for the promotion.” Hah. That ought to salvage me. Let him see just how grand I was doing despite his abrupt exit from my life.

  “That’s wonderful, Em. I always knew you were destined for greatness.”

  He did? I filed that one away—I didn’t have time to contemplate all the reasons a man would leave a woman he deemed destined for greatness. I was too busy basking in the warmth, the pure, unadulterated love, I heard in his voice. “God, Derrick, it is really good to hear from you.”

  “Yeah, and it’s good to hear your voice. I was so caught up in the craziness of the new job, settling in, that I didn’t have a chance to miss you. Then came this long weekend, and all I could think about was how the hell we managed to share that house in East Hampton with sixteen people last Memorial Day weekend.” He laughed. “Remember that? I never thought I’d find myself sharing a bedroom with you and Sid,” he said, referring to a guy he used to work with during his waitering days at Reservoir, “and Sid’s nutty pseudostripper girlfriend. What was her name?”

  “Barbie, I think. Or was it Bambi?”

  “Something like that.” He chuckled, then in a lower voice, he said, “But somehow we managed to escape them all for a little strip show of our own….”

  A silence ensued as we both remembered the night we snuck off and made love on a deserted section of beach, the moon high above us, its light filling us with both the thrill of desire and the anxiety of being exposed completely to anyone who happened to stroll by. It was one of the most exhilarating lovemaking sessions we’d ever had, and the sizzling memory of that heady night fairly crackled over the line between us now. As heat flooded through my veins and set my skin pulsing, I suddenly understood why people resorted to phone sex.

  “You looked so beautiful that night,” Derrick was saying. “Your hair was long, and it almost covered your breasts.”

  My hair was never that long, but I wasn’t about to destroy his fantasy, especially since I had a starring role in it. “You weren’t so bad yourself. All tan, with that little shadow of beard on your face.”

  “Ah, Em, those were good times.”

  “They were.” I let the truth of that zoom home, hoping against hope it would spur him into some sort of action, like packing a bag and catching the next flight out for a week of debauchery at Chez Moi.

  Instead he said, “I ought to let you go.”

  No! “We can talk some more, if you’d like….” I offered, as if he were the one in desperate need of keeping the connection going.

  “Yeah, well, I have to be in early tomorrow for a meeting with one of the producers, and I have all this stuff to prepare tonight. You know, duty calls.”

  Since when had he become so responsible? I thought, then realized he’d never had a job he cared enough about to be well-prepared and well-rested for. “I understand,” I said.

  “Talk to you soon, okay?” he asked hopefully. “You have to keep me posted on the big promotion.”

  “Of course,” I said, wanting to leave the lines of communication wide open enough for him to call every time the mood struck him, and hoping that would be often. “And you need to keep me posted on how the big screenwriter is doing.”

  He laughed. “Good night, Em,”

  “Good night, Derrick.” Love you, my brain echoed, partly out of habit but mostly out of pure longing, as the sound of the dial tone filled my ear.

  Confession: I am ready, willing and able to harbor a few illusions about my love life.

  For the first time in a long time, I hesitated before calling Jade or Alyssa. I knew both were more than likely home from the long weekend, Jade full of ribald tales of Fire Island finds and Alyssa full of future-in-law angst. Yet I could not bring myself to dial a single number in the warm, cozy afterglow of Derrick’s phone call. I didn’t want Jade to tell me, in that bland voice she gets whenever she’s referring to the ills of mankind, that Derrick only called because he was lonely. That his warm and fuzzy words meant little in actuality. And Alyssa…Alyssa would see right through my sudden happiness. She’d recognize it for what it was: false hope.

  But false hope was better than no hope, right? Besides, I was still addicted to the idea that Derrick and I were Meant-To-Be. I was only waiting for him to figure it out. And judging from the lonely ache behind his voice, I thought he was on the path to the higher truth. My truth.

  I opted to call no one, nestling in for the night and shamelessly listening to my Sade CD, reveling in her lush, sexy lyrics about true love as if they applied to me.

  I even made it safely to the office the next day with my illusions intact, resisted answering the juicy e-mail from Jade I received once I opened my computer, despite the fact that she alluded to what sounded like a meaningful sexual encounter. In fact, I was just heading safely off to lunch with my illusions, when Rebecca showed up at my cubicle. The first thing I noticed was that she looked terrible. And Rebecca never looks terrible. Her face was solemn and her eyes red-rimmed as she asked in the kind of small, pathetic voice I would never have expected to come from her lips, “Have lunch with me? I really need to talk to someone.”

  With a glance at her ringless left hand, I remembered. The proposal scene. Apparently it hadn’t happened according to plan. Nodding helplessly, I grabbed my purse and followed her to the elevators.

  As we headed over to Tivoli, a small Italian restaurant only a few blocks from the office with prices even the lower echelon publishing set of midtown could afford, we said very little. It wasn’t until we were seated across from one another, menus in hand, that Rebecca finally spoke about the subject that clearly weighed cruelly on her mind.

  “It didn’t happen. No ring, no proposal, no…nothing.”

  I saw tears threaten, and a stab of sympathy shot through me. I grabbed her hand across the table and gave it a squeeze. “What happened?”

  “Well, we drove out to East Hampton, like we planned,” she began, blinking back her tears as if she were taking strength from the memory. “All the way out, we’re having a grand old time, talking about the last time we were there, how much fun it was.”

  I nodded encouragingly.

  “We get to the B-and-B—the one I told you about, with all the antique moldings and authentic landmark window casings? Well, the first thing I notice is that the whole place has been renovated. That should have been my first clue.”

  I smiled weakly, not getting what a little fresh paint and spackle had to do with anything.

  “Naturally Nash sees how surprised I am, and he explains that they renovated the whole place. He actually liked it.” She rolled her eyes. “I mean, it wasn’t bad, though I would have left more of the original effects. Thank God they had the sense to leave the staircase, which is a real nineteenth-century beauty.”

  Another nod, my plastered on smile diverting into a faux frown. As if I knew anything about what constituted a landmark staircase.

  The waiter came by, took our orders, then politely disappeared, allowing Rebecca to go on with her seemingly senseless tale.

  “The whole weekend, he just seemed…off, or something. I mean, every time we were in the room alone, he started waxing poetic about the new shower massage they’d put in, or how he preferred the new carpeting to the hardwood floor they had previously. Well, I figured out where all that was coming from.”

  Oh? I leaned close, hoping it would all come together for
me, too.

  “I was down at the front desk, asking about renting sailboats in the area, because Nash likes to sail and I thought that might not be a bad place for him to pop the question. Out on the open sea. Just the two of us. Well, I get to talking with the front desk clerk about all these seemingly marvelous renovations and she lets slip how they had sent twenty percent discount vouchers to all their previous guests to welcome them for their first season under the new renovation.”

  Ah. “Well, he is an accountant. And isn’t that one of the things you told me you loved about Nash—his good head for money?”

  “Yeah, I’ll give him a good head,” she muttered. “I thought we were there for romance, not discounts.”

  Though I was shocked at the level of bitterness Rebecca was showing, I said nothing.

  “Anyway, the whole weekend, all I kept wondering was when he was going to do it, when, when, when. At one point we were eating at this restaurant overlooking the water, and I thought for sure the moment had arrived. The sun was setting. We’d just been served a beautiful little bottle of Bordeaux. Nash was looking at me. I was looking at him. And then he launches into some stupid story about how his boss hadn’t called him yet about some meeting he was planning for next week. I don’t even remember what it was about, exactly. All I know is that this was definitely not the moment to be thinking about work!”

  “Maybe he’s having a little anxiety about work and needs to come to terms with it before he can make his next move,” I counseled, as if some age-old wisdom about why men do the things they do was suddenly welling up inside of me. “You know, some men don’t even think about the marriage question until they’ve got a solid six figures and a fat 401K.”

  “Oh, he’s got all that,” Rebecca said dismissively, then sipped her water daintily, as if dating a penniless man was never an issue with her. She sighed. “It was as if he wasn’t even thinking about our future. About us. By the time Sunday rolled around and I knew there was gonna be no ring coming this weekend, I was furious!” Her lower lip trembled and curled.