The Wife of Reilly

by Jennifer Coburn

  I was certainly not the loosest girl in my school. The reality was that we lived in the suburbs and my friends weren’t old enough to drive. So, sex was our after-school activity. When I think about it now, I wish I’d joined the field hockey team instead.

  I didn’t even physically enjoy sex, but the power I wielded with it was addictive. When I said yes to boys — actually, I never really ever said yes as much as I did not say no — I loved watching their grateful little faces contort with pleasure. If my body was not seduced by sex, my soul most definitely was.

  Father taught me all about statistics when I was eight years old, but I was never particularly lucky at playing the odds. A few months after my seventeenth birthday, I got pregnant. For three days after my pregnancy was confirmed at Planned Parenthood, I entertained romantic fantasies about having a baby and thought about asking my mother to help me raise a child while I attended state college. Ultimately, I decided to have an abortion and go to the University of Michigan, which I had dreamed of attending since eighth grade.

  My mother took me to the clinic on a Saturday morning and waited in the lobby while I had the procedure.

  “You’re going to feel a little pinch,” a nurse said to me as the doctor numbed my cervix with a long needle. She held my hand and brushed my long hair away from my face. “Try to relax. It will all be over soon.”

  The nurse told me I was brave and I remember thinking how wrong she was. If I had any courage at all I would have insisted on using birth control instead of weakly conceding after my boyfriend assured me he could pull himself out in time. If I were really brave I would have forfeited the comforts of popularity and dated boys who didn’t reward sex with varsity jackets.

  I heard the soft buzzing of a small vacuum after a cold metal instrument entered me. “You’re going to feel some cramping like you’re having your period,” explained the nurse. The nurse was my mother’s age, which I found to be the greatest comfort of the entire episode. An adult told me I was okay, rather than silently condemning the teenage slut who knew she could get pregnant and still did nothing to prevent it.

  When the procedure was over, my mother hugged me and took me to Denny’s for breakfast. I remember feeling such relief that every face in the restaurant did not immediately turn to me and start whispering. My secret was safe. I was relieved, and intensely alone at the same time.

  Reilly was the first man I dated who seemed perfectly content waiting to consummate our relationship. At the time, I was ready to slow down and enjoy a man who listened to what I was saying instead of mapping out his strategy to get my pants off.

  “I’m sorry if I gave you the impression I wasn’t interested in you, Prudence,” Reilly explained after our trip to Pittsburgh. “I really like you very much. I was hoping we could go out this weekend.” I was nervous for that date too.

  * * *

  Prospective wife of Reilly number one was waiting for me at the restaurant at our appointed time. Her name was Anna Weiss. She wore a short red dress and had long, curly brown hair and a round, innocent face. Anna was already sipping a glass of white wine and immediately launched into telling me what an insane day she had at her job. She taught kindergarten though she didn’t have any children of her own yet. She’d never married, she told me. During her five-minute life summary, my cell phone rang. What time is it in California now? I wondered. Anna seemed like the type who wouldn’t appreciate my answering the call during our meeting, so I let it roll into voice mail. My energy was boosted by the thought that at that very moment, I was in Matt’s thoughts. I wondered if he had any news about his film. Anything exciting to share. Or had he just called to say hello and blow a few hours talking to the sexiest woman he’s ever known?

  “Thank you for meeting me, Anna,” I said. “As I explained on the phone, my brother has asked me to meet his dates first because he travels quite a bit for his job and will be out of town for the next few weeks. But your letter was very intriguing to him and he’s looking forward to getting to know you.”

  She nodded and smiled as she dipped her chips into mild salsa.

  “Why don’t I show you a photo of Reilly and tell you a little about him?” I suggested. Anna liked that plan. I showed her a photo of Reilly and me on our Alaskan cruise, and hoped our arms thrown over each other’s shoulder would pass as a sibling pose.

  Reilly’s looks hadn’t changed much from when we first met. He wore his brown hair in the standard professional men’s cut, had green eyes and a prominent chin. It was slightly out of proportion with the rest of his face, but not so much so that it was distracting. His body was like a rugby player’s, broad around the shoulders with muscular legs and a stocky middle. I always went for athletic men. I remember in college, Evie always liked these skinny blond guys from the drama department who looked like they wrote angry poetry and sketched in charcoal. These waifs looked like one strong breeze would blow them away. I liked a man who looked like he could stand outside in a hurricane and still have his feet firmly planted on the ground by the storm’s end.

  “Your brother is cute,” said Anna. I told her about Reilly’s job, his limited hobbies and his values. “Sounds like a real sweetheart,” Anna approved.

  “He is,” I said with a twinge of guilt.

  Anna rattled on about how she moved from Ohio after college and got her master’s degree in education a few years ago. “My real passion is writing,” she said.

  “Really?”

  “Oh yes, I have dozens of ideas for novels swimming around in my head,” she said.

  “Wow, that’s quite a few. Any swimming on paper?”

  “Well, I started writing my memoir last year, but I lost interest.”

  You lost interest in your own memoir?

  “I’m thinking about writing children’s books,” she added.

  “Really? About what?”

  “Animals.”

  “Oh, well, what do the animals do?” I inquired.

  “That’s where I get stuck,” Anna said. “Something that teaches kids a life lesson, though. I think children’s books should do that.”

  “Oh.”

  Our date spiraled downward with awkward chitchat from there, and dinner had not even been ordered yet.

  “So, do you like sports?” I asked.

  She nodded her head. “I love basketball.”

  “Good. Great. Reilly loves basketball,” I answered.

  More silence.

  “Do you have a favorite team?” I asked Anna.

  “Well, you’ve gotta follow your Knicks, but who can’t help love the Lakers? Guess that’s why I was willing to go out with a guy named Reilly through his gatekeeper sister, you know?”

  I’m lost.

  “They’re great, those Lakers. Reilly really likes them too.”

  For the next ten minutes I felt as if Charlie Brown’s teacher were talking to me. Empty honking that meant absolutely nothing. I couldn’t comprehend, much less retain, a word she was saying.

  “So, Anna, what else? What are you looking for in a relationship?”

  “I hope you don’t think I’m being rude, but I think this isn’t going to work out,” Anna said. “If it’s all the same to you, I think I’m going to call it a night,” she said as she got up to leave.

  What happened? I scared her off by talking about a relationship too soon. I know better than to shift from sports to love in two seconds. What’s wrong with me?!

  “Did I say something to offend you?” I asked.

  “No, it’s not that at all. I just don’t feel like we’re really connecting.”

  You don’t have to connect with me! It’s Reilly you need to connect with!

  “What do you mean?” I fumbled. Asking a question someone’s already answered rarely works in getting a different response. Case in point. Her response.

  “I just don’t feel that we’re connecting, that’s all.”

  “It’s only been a half-hour,” I pleaded. “Relationships take time.”

&
nbsp; Anna was standing. Her coat was already on. Game over.

  Then she left. “Can I call you?” I stopped myself from shouting after her. As Anna disappeared, I heard Jim Morrison singing, “Don’t you love her as she’s walking out the door?” And I did. Anna never looked better than she did from the back, leaving. Honestly, she bored me, which unfortunately did not lessen the blow of her rejection. In fact, it made it worse.

  * * *

  “Hey,” I said when Matt answered the phone.

  “Malone. What’s up?”

  Just out dating women.

  “Not too much,” I said. Think of something interesting to tell him! “What’s going on with you? How’s the film coming along?”

  Matt said he didn’t like talking about the project because he wanted to save all of his energy he had doing instead of talking. Plus, one of his producers was semi-paranoid about the idea being stolen, and made everyone agree to keep quiet about the film. This made me want to hear about it even more. Was he willing to break the rules to share his life with me? God knows I had certainly done the same for him. “Can you tell me a little something about the film, Matt? We are going to get married. I think you can trust me.”

  Matt paused as he thought about it for a moment. “Okay, it’s a satire of the life of Louis Pasteur. It could be about anyone. The overriding theme is about the abuse of the power of the media in today’s culture.”

  “Wow,” I said. What the hell is he talking about?

  “You know what I mean?”

  “Absolutely. So how does Louis Pasteur fit in?” I asked.

  “Did you ever read The Wind Done Gone?” he asked.

  Shit, why didn’t I read The Wind Done Gone?! What’s The Wind Done Gone anyway? “I’m not sure. What’s it about?”

  Matt told me that it was a spoof of Gone with the Wind, told entirely from the perspective of a black slave.

  “That is so clever!” I exclaimed.

  “Ours is pretty clever too,” Matt said, sounding a bit irked that I sounded more enthusiastic about The Wind Done Gone than his film, Sour Milk.

  “So what’s yours, the story of how the cows felt about pasteurization? How they lost their power to wipe out masses of people from bad milk after Louis Pasteur invented the pasteurization process?” I laughed.

  “No,” Matt said flatly. “I told you it’s a social commentary about the power of the media. Look, it’s tough to explain over the phone. It’s a pretty complicated concept. I’ll just show you what we’ve got when you come out here.”

  Very complicated? Excuse me, but I just went on a date with a woman to replace myself in the life of my not-so-dead husband. I think I can handle it.

  Chapter 11

  After my first miserable failure at dating women, I was afraid to try again, but had already scheduled lunch with Michelle Amster, a thirty-five-year-old divorced computer programmer, and Theresa Mumon, a twenty-nine-year-old tax attorney, the next day. Then on Wednesday it was breakfast with Pamela Kahn, lunch with Yasmine Leery and drinks with Tina Ellenson.

  What went wrong with Anna? I wondered as I tried to get to sleep. I didn’t necessarily think she was the ideal woman for Reilly, but it seemed strange how she left so abruptly. If it was because of something I said or did, I needed to know about it so I wouldn’t chase off the rest of the lot. I decided to call her in the morning and get some feedback so I could change my approach if necessary.

  I stared at my blue stars and listened to my harp CD that Daniel promised would help me sleep. I drank two cups of Sleepytime tea, but was still wired at four in the morning. Why didn’t Anna like me? And why did Matt think his film was too complicated for me? What else did he think was over my head? Was he right? If we were at a dinner party, and Matt explained his film concept, would everyone else be fawning over his brilliant idea? I imagined Matt in Los Angeles at a cocktail party with Steven Soderbergh and Rob Reiner, who each tell him that his film concept is indeed genius and that only a pathetic half-wit could miss the point. Can I marry a simpleton? Matt would wonder, beginning the process of our engagement unraveling. I realized I was never going to get to sleep that night, and decided to take advantage of the time difference and call Matt. I had a single mission: show him how much I got the concept of Sour Milk.

  “Good morning, sunshine,” I said gently when I heard Matt’s exhausted voice.

  “Malone, what’s going on?” he said in a fog.

  “I just wanted to be the first person to say good morning to you today,” I said.

  “Well, you’ve got that covered. It’s one in the morning.”

  “No it’s not, it’s seven,” I corrected him.

  “Malone, I am sure you are a hell of an accountant, but you’ve got to keep this time difference straight. We’re three hours earlier than you, not later.”

  “Oh my God!” I realized he was right. “I’m so sorry. I’ll call you back later.”

  “Don’t worry about it. What are you doing up at this time of night? Even bad girls need their sleep, don’t they?”

  So about your film…

  “I was up thinking about the idea behind Sour Milk, and wanted to let you know that I think it’s incredibly insightful,” I said. Although I knew Matt was three thousand miles away, I walked into the bathroom and examined my face in the mirror. I placed my index fingers under my eyes to see how I would look once the bags were removed. I held a white tube of makeup remover next to my teeth as Matt responded.

  “Yeah?” Matt coaxed for more. My teeth are practically yellow next to this!

  “Absolutely,” I said. “It takes a while to fully absorb the enormity of your message, but once I really understood the profundity of the concept, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I haven’t been able to sleep thinking about the impact your film is going to have.”

  “I’m so glad you’re saying this,” Matt confessed. “You never know how people are going to react to something that’s a little different, you know?”

  I curled up on my couch, relieved that I had redeemed myself in Matt’s eyes. Not only did I understand complicated films, I stayed up nights contemplating their impact. Matt confided that he was feeling less than sure of himself, and I was there to bolster his confidence. Things were back on track. We chatted for another half-hour before I started to feel tired as snow fell for the first time that season.

  The next thing I knew it was eleven o’clock. I made a coughing, sick voice as I called Lara and told her I had the flu. Then I hopped into the shower to get ready for my lunch date with Michelle. Between the lack of prep time, the weather and the inability to locate my umbrella, my hair was flat against my head by the time I arrived at the restaurant. I showed up a few minutes late and Michelle was already sitting at the table. She made a point of looking at her watch as soon as she saw me, then pursed her lips slightly to let me know she was displeased with my tardiness.

  “You must be Michelle,” I asked the woman. She had long, black, 1970s Cher hair, which looked somewhat out of place with her masculine business suit. She looked as if she could be part Asian or part Hispanic.

  “I am,” she said, standing to shake my hand. “I don’t want to start off on the wrong foot here, but I think it’s very rude to be late for our appointment. My time is important too.”

  She hates me already?!

  “I’m really sorry. It was completely out of my control. You’ll be happy to know that my brother Reilly is always very prompt. When we were kids, he always gave me a hassle about being late."

  She nodded once, her acceptance of my apology. “You know, people say a lot of things about me, but they never call me a bullshitter. I say what’s on my mind and just like to clear the air about it right away.”

  “That’s a great way to be,” I said, trying to win her back.

  “So tell me about Reilly,” she said. “Why is it that I’m meeting you instead of him?”

  I didn’t like Michelle. First, she scolded me for being late and now she was demandin
g information. I had a plan for how these dates were to go and answering questions and apologizing weren’t part of it.

  When Michelle found out I was an accountant, she kept grilling me about tax shelters and her 401(k). I told her that I didn’t handle accounting for individuals, but she was unstoppable. By the end of lunch, I felt as though I’d given a free seminar on financial planning. In just an hour, I’d grown to hate Michelle, but politely thanked her for her time anyway. The least she could have done was pick up the bill in exchange for all the free advice I’d given her, but when it came she just sat and smiled as I took out my American Express card.

  At first, I thought that Theresa would be the perfect fit for Reilly because we were so much alike. Theresa was about an inch taller than me with the same shaggy hair cut in auburn. We both laughed at the fact that we were wearing the same pants suit, but the similarities became less amusing to me as the date progressed.

  “Isn’t it tough getting old in this city?” Theresa asked me. “Last weekend, I was so lonely I got drunk by myself and started calling old boyfriends just to try to recreate a feeling of better times in my life, you know?”

  “Maybe one of them was really your soul mate and you should make another try with him,” I defended her to herself.

  “Not on your life,” she said. “Even drunk I could see what a fool I was making of myself. Later I turned on the television and ordered those water-filled bra pads that are supposed to make you look like you’ve had a boob job. Can you say mid-life crisis?”

  “I don’t think you should be quite so hard on yourself, Theresa. You’re hardly middle-aged. Life doesn’t really begin till forty, isn’t that what they say?”

  “That’s what people in their forties say,” Theresa laughed. “You’re right. Listen to me going on and on about how old I feel. I should be telling you about all of my good points, right?”