Her Fake Engagement

by Gigi Garrett

  I’m not super keen on this idea, but it’s Elsa May’s night—so I reluctantly pick up my flute and head toward the bedroom.

  Apartment 404 is almost the ideal NYC pad. It’s in the West Village, my favorite neighborhood. It has a doorman, a roof deck, and yes, a dishwasher. (Don’t tell Samantha.) The only catch was that for almost four years, Elsa May and I had to share a bedroom. It was the only way we could afford the place back then. We actually liked our twin beds and Bert and Ernie lifestyle. It’s been more than a year without her here and I still miss her—and sometimes I forget she won’t be waiting for me when I come home.

  “OMG,” Elsa May squeals, opening the door to “our” tiny bedroom with a very obstructed view of the Empire State Building. “You pushed the beds together.” Her face falls for only a second before she recovers. “I guess it was finally time, since I haven’t lived here forever.” She falls back onto the king bed I constructed out of our twins and rolls around. “Maybe you’ll actually get lucky now,” she laughs.

  Then she sits up and rubs her eyes. “But use double protection. Or you’ll end up with a tiny monster.”

  “How is my favorite little girl?” I ask. While Elsa May tries to keep her seven-month-old daughter, Birdie, off social media, she does send me an adorable picture of the day, which always makes me happy but is also a daily reminder how much life has changed. “I saw Birdie got another tooth.”

  “Tell me about it,” she says. “I think teething is the baby equivalent of a hangover. You can try to make it a modicum better, but there’s no actual cure. You have got to go through it and go to bed hoping for a better day.”

  “Speaking of hangovers,” she adds, taking a long sip out of her mug, “can I borrow something to wear?” She points down at her outfit. She’s dressed in black yoga pants and a long-sleeved Splendid-brand shirt. But with long, wavy, auburn hair, green eyes, and Photoshop-quality skin and cheekbones, she still can turn heads, even if she has what appears to be a tiny bit of spit-up on her shoulder.

  “Of course,” I say. “What is mine is still yours.”

  Elsa May sighs. “My wardrobe is so 2016. But that’s what happens when you haven’t stepped inside a Bloomie’s or Saks since you peed positive on a stick.” She starts riffling through my closet. “Can we stay out all night?” she asks, examining a Betsey Johnson floral dress. “Please. For old times’ sake.”

  I pull out a pair of suede booties and a black shift for her. “This look is very 2017,” I say. “I’ve seen four girls on the 5 train wearing the same thing this week. And Elsa May, I’ve never stayed out all night—and neither have you.”

  She places her hands on my shoulders and gently shakes me. “Lottie, you need to start partying all night. Regularly. You might not realize it now, but your life as you know it is going to end within the next decade—or whenever you have a child.”

  I laugh, but Elsa May wags her finger at me, exposing chipped pink nail polish. “You must embrace this YOLO thing that the bright young things are doing while you can. For the both of us.”

  I laugh again. Elsa May and I are what you call “good girls.” Ever since we roomed together in college, she’s always been—or, rather, always was—working hard to eventually make partner at a big law firm. That plan got a bit sidetracked, however, when she got pregnant during her last year of law school at NYU.

  While Regents—our college—randomly paired us together, we’re the perfect match. We have fun occasionally, but mostly, we do exactly what is expected of us and work hard to get ahead.

  Or at least, that’s how we were before Elsa May had Birdie.

  Now I watch as Elsa May exchanges her Connecticut stay-at-home mom look for a strapless LBD in the city look.

  “I can’t believe you had a baby seven months ago,” I say, eyeing her transformation. “You’re in better shape than I am despite my weekly runs and ridiculously overpriced SoulCycle classes.” I frown. “Please take off my dress immediately, so I can burn it.”

  She rolls her eyes. “It’s the chasing-a-crawling-baby workout,” she says. “It’s like living at a gym twenty-four-seven, and I don’t recommend it. So what’s our plan for tonight? I know this is supposed to be Elsa May’s out-of-baby-jail dinner with Mia, but can we go out for a little while after? I want to go to a bar and feel young again.” She scratches at the dried baby spit-up. “Or at least feel alive again,” she says with a sigh.

  Sighing myself, I bend down and rub my sore feet. I’ve missed her endlessly, but I’m exhausted and want to be in bed by midnight. (Even though I’m twenty-nine years old and there’s no mom around to enforce it, I still stick to a bedtime. Eleven on weekdays and midnight on weekends. As a rule, the most successful people are the early to bed, early to rise types. Larks, they call us.)

  Elsa May sticks out her bottom lip. “I’ve waited fifteen months for a night out with you in the city. And Birdie is finally sleeping through the night and won’t even miss me.”

  I pause. Elsa May sighs back and points to her newly voluptuous boobs. (She’s got to be at least a D cup now.) “And I’ve stopped breastfeeding, so I’m no longer a human cow. Wait, that reminds me.” She pulls out these round cotton pads and stuffs them in her bra. “I’m still leaking. Ugh. Please, Lottie. Tell me we can go out.”

  I smile. “Okay, we can stay out for a few drinks. I’ll change into something dinner-to-nightlife appropriate. But I promise you, after tonight you’ll remember how brutal this city can be for us single girls. You’ll probably be happy to go back to watching Dateline next Friday.”

  “Don’t wish your single days away,” she says. “You’re going to wake up one day married with a little baby—who’s amazing, of course.” She pauses. “And you’re going to be happy, or something like happy. But you’re also going to wish you embraced that YOLO thing a little more.”

  I squeeze Elsa May. “I’ve missed having you here.”

  * * *

  We’re standing outside Esther’s, which is a new Italian fusion restaurant near my apartment.

  Elsa May is staring up at the sign. “I can’t believe that Gianna’s is gone.” She sighs. Gianna’s was our old favorite place to get Sunday delivery. “And they’ve built an entire new restaurant while I was gone and I’ve done nothing!”

  “Birdie is nothing now?” I ask, holding up my phone with an adorable Birdie photo as the screen saver. “You made and carried a baby who is now practically a toddler. And you also got married.”

  Elsa May makes her top lip form a thin line. “You of all people know what I mean. And I didn’t get married: I eloped and was four months pregnant. There’s a big difference.”

  I do know what she means. Elsa May is supposed to be starting her second year as an associate at Barker & Barker right now. That’s her plan. It has always been her plan, ever since she declared as a political science major during her first semester at Regents. But she still hasn’t taken the bar, and it’s unclear if the firm is still holding her spot in case she ever has time to study and take the bar in between feedings and changings.

  And while Elsa May is legally married, there was no wedding. Much to her mother Scarlett’s dismay, Elsa May and Thad eloped in the Bahamas. Elsa May couldn’t handle finishing law school and planning a wedding with her overbearing mother, especially while pregnant and having morning sickness.

  While I totally understood her reasoning, it still made me sad not to get to see my best friend get married. Everything changed so quickly, and I know now why ceremonies are important. They help us go through and absorb change slowly. Elsa May getting pregnant and married felt to me like a Category 5 hurricane blowing through unannounced. I feel like I’m still picking up the scattered pieces of my old life and putting them together to make a new life—one where I don’t live with Elsa May and one where I’m not Rock’s—or anyone else’s—girlfriend.

  Elsa May’s frown turns into a wide grin, and she begins to wave wildly. “There’s Mia,” she squeals. “Enough of this refle
ctive psychobabble. I’m going to be Fun Elsa May now.”

  I suppress a yawn. “And you’re going to be Fun Lottie,” she adds under her breath.

  I’m not sure a Fun Lottie exists within my DNA structure, but I smile because I imagine that’s what a Fun Lottie would do.

  “Elsa May!” Mia calls out, pulling her in for a long hug. Then Mia angles her cell phone above their heads. “Groupie,” she says, clicking a photo. “I hate when people say ‘selfie’ when there’s multiple people in the shot,” she adds. She examines the photo and starts cropping out the background. “What should I hashtag this? #Mom’sNightOut? Are we really that old?”

  “At least we know what a hashtag is,” I say. “My dad just asked me what is with all the pound signs these days?”

  “Sadly, only I am that old,” Elsa May says. “You two are eternally young as long as you stay on Manhattan like Tinker Bell did with Neverland.” She pets Mia’s outfit. “Is this a romper? A onesie? A jumper? Or some word I don’t even know? And how do you keep getting hotter? It’s both unnatural and unfair.”

  The boys back in college nicknamed Mia “Me-Ow.” Green eyes. Jet black hair. Olive complexion. Without a doubt, she’s one of the most attractive people I’ve ever known. She’s also a good yin to Elsa May’s and my yang. Simply put, she’s more fun than we are; she always has been, ever since we were all randomly placed on the same freshman hall. (Mia lived across the hall and one door down.) By the second day of school, Mia knew where all the parties were, and by the second week of school, everyone knew she was the party—and still is. While Mia works in a boring accountant job in the upscale jewelry store Trinity Jewels she’s super passionate about fashion, which she expresses through social media—on her blog, Snapchat, and Instagram. Online, she goes by the moniker “Mia Wears.”

  “Lottie,” Mia says, holding up her phone again. “Please get in the picture. I need to document this reunion.”

  “Okay, okay,” I say, finding my way into the frame.

  “When are you going to join Tinder or Bumble?” Mia asks, looking at the new photo on her phone and then holding it out to show me. “This would make a great profile photo for you. You look so pretty. You know, you really should smile more often. Everyone would totally swipe right on this pic.” She gives me her best sexy-eye look, which is pretty damn good. “I’m totally girl crushing on you after seeing it.”

  “I do smile,” I argue. Right after I sign a deal and get my commission, that is.

  “I want to online date,” Elsa May says. “They should have those for playdates. Some of these Greenwich moms are Stepford wife robots. I wish I could prescreen them, although they might all end up left swipes.” She scrunches her nose like she used to when she was studying for exams. “If you thought making friends as a kid was hard, it’s ten times harder as a mom. I swear, no one even knows my name. I’m just Birdie’s mom now.”

  Mia and I look at her like she’s an alien. “Sorry,” she says. “Please continue and ignore that outburst.”

  “I’m not joining Tinder, Hinge, OkCupid, Match.com, or any other online dating site,” I say. Like everything else in my life, I have rules about social media. Namely, I do not, under any circumstances, use it in my romantic life. I don’t online date now and never will. I don’t care how many marriages that eHarmony guy says they produce, or how catchy that FarmersOnly.com jingle is.

  If I don’t settle when it comes to my work, why would I when it comes to what I want from men? I have standards.

  Mia rolls her eyes at me. “Okay, Duchess Lottie. Just keep waiting in your parlor for potential suitors. Make sure to have your dance card handy when all these lads come a-calling. And keep your bonnet fastened. A proper lady always does.”

  I laugh because this is only the hundredth time Mia has said that to me. But sue me, I’m old-fashioned. I want a love story and a meet cute, not some relationship based on a right swipe and a mutual like of Joe’s Pizza and the band Chainsmokers.

  “I’ll go check in with the hostess,” I say as Mia starts showing Elsa May her latest online conquests.

  But even though Mia is always flirting, winking, and swiping with guys online, she rarely goes on any dates. She’s still too broken up over her college boyfriend, Ansell, who left her for another girl and the suburbs over two years ago.

  That’s the thing. Sometimes, even when you live by the rules, you can still get hurt. That I know too well.

  * * *

  Elsa May holds up her umpteenth glass of champagne.

  “One more toast,” she says, slurring her words a little. It’s nearly one thirty in the morning, and I’m beyond ready for bed. But hanging out with a new mom who’s baby-free for the night is apparently like partying with Lindsay Lohan in between her stints at rehab. Enough is never enough. More is always more.

  Elsa May is smiling so big that I can see her molars, so Mia and I go along with toast number four.

  “To my best friends. To the greatest city. And to the night.”

  “Cheers, cheers,” Mia says as she clicks away with her bedazzled phone.

  “This bar is so extremely fun,” Elsa May says, looking around at Barrow’s Pub, the half-empty dive bar chosen specifically for its proximity to my apartment. It’s dirty and dark, and could be any dive bar in America, but to Elsa May right now, it’s heaven.

  “Those guys at the pool table are megawatt-hot,” she whispers loudly. She forlornly looks at her engagement ring, an enormous emerald with two triads, which is an heirloom from her husband’s family. It’s a ring that most girls would kill for, but she’s looking at it right now like it’s a ball and chain.

  “So hot,” she repeats, googly-eyeing them.

  I’ll admit that the guys playing pool are pretty cute, if you’re into younger, hipster-lite guys, which I’m not. I have about two hundred rules of dating, but the big three rules are: (1) older, (2) real job with paycheck and savings, and (3) Manhattan address. Oh, and I purposely avoid meeting guys at a bar. Those types of connections never seem to work out. It’s like that Someecard says, “When you shop hungry, you come home with stuff you don’t need.”

  Elsa May leans forward in her chair to get a better view of the men in flannel. “You girls should go talk to them,” she pushes. “Or even better, sleep with them. Pleeeease? Do it for me.”

  Mia laughs. “Just so we’re clear on our math here: How many one-night stands have you had, Elsa May?”

  She drains the last of her champagne, which is probably five-dollar-a-bottle André and hangover-infused. “Big fat zero. But I should’ve had some. What’s the YOLO sexual equivalent? YOFO? Go YOFO,” she commands, laughing at her own joke.

  Like me, Elsa May is a serial monogamist. She met Thad in a criminal law class their first year at NYU.

  She gets an incredibly serious look on her face, the one she would get while studying for a tort law exam. “I blame my mom for that. And television. They made me think that one-night stands only led to STDs, when they actually probably lead to orgasms and happy memories that will help get you through the rest of your boring, monogamous life.”

  She puts her hands over mine. “Don’t make the same mistakes,” she begs. “YOFO,” she calls out like a battle cry.

  Just then the door to the small bar pushes open and nearly smacks Mia in the face. A parade of girls stumbles in. One of them is wearing a bachelorette crown and a sash, and they’re all very drunk, which must be why they’re belting Katy Perry’s newest song at the top of their lungs. Off-key, of course.

  “Bachelorettes!” Elsa May exclaims. “It’s a bachelorette party!” She says it as if she’s spotted Waldo. To be fair, Elsa May’s “bachelorette” party was a spa day with me and Mia since, well, Elsa May was five months pregnant and already married at the time. I think she feels the same way about bachelorettes as she does weddings—like she majorly missed out.

  (For the record, I liked the spa day, as I find typical bachelorette parties both cheesy and tasteless. Both t
he bachelorette parties I attended back in my hometown started in a limo with neon lights and ended with someone holding the bride-to-be’s hair back.)

  Mia and I both roll our eyes at the noisy girls. But within minutes, this group of girls has totally transformed the bar. They play admittedly catchy eighties music on the jukebox and order tequila shots for the whole bar. (I decline mine. Another rule: no shots.) Even tired old me will concede that they have totally livened up the place.

  Then three of them climb onto the pool table and start provocatively dancing. And the cute guys—who were in the middle of their pool game—do nothing but stare and smile, even as their pool balls go flying. Even the bartender just smiles. And then sends them free drinks, as if they need any. As if it’s morally responsible to do so.

  These guys—these attractive and seemingly normal guys—are totally in awe of this group of girls. As is Elsa May, who is leaning back in the booth and just watching them like a movie. All she needs is some popcorn.

  It’s as if social mores and norms completely do not apply to bachelorette parties—which I guess is the appeal.

  I silently pray that Elsa May is almost ready to surrender the night, despite having no actual clues pointing to that.

  “One more round,” she tells us and sashays to the bar, all the while never taking her eyes off the group. “This is like wedding crashing,” she says when she brings back drinks, “but better.”

  She points at the girls and says almost too loudly, “Sure, those girls might not be as smart as us, and they certainly aren’t as pretty . . . but they are definitely having more fun and that counts the most. Let me be clear: I want what they are having.”

  Just then, one of the girls blows a whistle—an actual whistle that she’s wearing on a string around her neck. “Next stop,” she cries out. “The night is young.” And like little drunk ducklings, they all follow each other out of the bar and into the night.

  “Ohmigosh,” Elsa May squeals when they leave. She gets up, dashes to the barstool area, and plucks a bedazzled crown off the ground. “Mia and Lottie!” she shouts. “They left their crown!” She holds the sparkling crown up and reveals all its tacky glory. It has hearts and spells out “BACHELORETTE” in cheap rhinestones. Then she places it on her head. I simultaneously cringe and laugh. What has happened to my Elsa May?