Emily's Reasons Why Not

by Carrie Gerlach

  I shrug. Funny. He’s amusing. I love that. I don’t mind the skin. A servant brings me a fresh cocktail.

  “I brought you here because it’s beautiful and I like to share it. I brought you here because you’re smart and gorgeous and it’s away from the crowds and bars of L.A. It’s the right place to get to know someone, and if you have the money, why not do it?”

  He did have a point. A good point. But how was I supposed to be rational when his personal masseur was coming to give me an hour-and-a-half deep-tissue rub before dinner?

  He holds up his ginseng vial and taps my glass, “Cheers.”

  Reason #4: If you like his life more than you like him, it makes it hard to be objective.

  Three days in Hawaii.

  What I have learned: Magnum is a passionate, sweet kisser. He likes candlelight, beach bonfires, and the warm ocean water. He likes excellent champagne, old rock and roll, ginseng, and making me feel good. No sex. Not that after the third day in the Garden of Eden I don’t want to. I am just taking it slow. Dr. D. would be proud.

  Back in L.A. and back on the couch, I tell Dr. D. about my new Magnum. “He owns a record label,” I say as I play with the new Palm IV that Magnum gave me.

  “And you own a PR company. How’s that going? Must be hard holding down the fort when you’re running off to Hawaii.” Dr. D. studies me, knowing I have NO intention of looking him in the face.

  Reason #5: When your therapist knows, you know … he’s probably the wrong guy.

  He did have a point. I was neglecting my work, but living my life. The MTV clients were happy. ESPN was happy. I had been asked to speak on a communications panel at the NCTA cable convention. JJ was handling the business nicely in L.A. When I was traveling I had the Blackberry, e-mail, and cell phone. Jesus, Magnum’s jet even had video conferencing!

  Three weeks. Three trips. I could get used to this. Although I didn’t feel the way I felt about Reese. I felt good, though. I felt, I don’t know, safe. Somewhat taken care of, which was something new, and it didn’t feel bad.

  My entire life I may have just needed an older man. But was that man Magnum or my Dad?

  Reason #6: There is no substitute for the real thing.

  At Two Bunch Palms, a health spa in the heart of Palm Springs, it is eighty-five degrees and sunny. Sting’s new CD echoes from our private bungalow and I float in our private pool topless. Magnum strolls out, holding a glass of Crystal Rose champagne. I paddle over to him, never getting off the raft. He sits on the edge of the pool and hands me my champagne flute. It’s kind of pink and tastes a little smoky. It’s heavenly. This life is heavenly. Magnum pulls a little joint from his platinum forties cigarette case and sparks it. He sits there in swim trunks and a Lenny Kravitz T-shirt wearing shades and a ball cap, smoking a joint and sipping champagne, and I wonder—Is this what my life is destined to be?

  He may be old, but he is 100 percent the coolest person I have ever met. And to top it all off, the sex was brilliant! He did everything I wanted, and as a bonus, he could go for hours. I mean hours! Two hours! It was wild!

  “Want to go sit in some mud?” he says while trying to hold the smoke in.

  “What kind of mud?” I take a hit off his joint, which makes me a little lightheaded. My exhale is followed by extreme coughing, eye-watering, and falling off the raft into the pool. Should have known better.

  “Special mud imported from India, meant to rid your body of toxins.”

  Maybe that is why this guy looks forty-five instead of fifty-seven—except for that skin thing, which, I might add, gives “beauty is only skin deep” a whole new meaning.

  I stand, looking at two huge tubs filled with mud on the balcony of the spa.

  “Did I mention that I am allergic to many strange elements when they are applied to my naked body? I get … I’d rather not get into it, trust me, it isn’t pretty.” I look from him to the tub of mud. Okay, this stuff seriously smells like poop. Crap, shit. Like someone took a huge dumparooney in that tub and now I am supposed to get in. Maybe this is cool to people with lots of money, but to me it is simply gross, and somewhat scary.

  I take a step backward. The only smell that is worse was when I was a kid and my older brother, Ben, polluted our bathroom every morning. And this runs a close second. What’s worse? It’s steaming. A hot, steaming tub of turds.

  I scrunch my face and clinch my hands. “I can’t.”

  “You can. Just take a chance. It’s good for you.”

  “No. Really, last time someone put mush on me, I had some sort of itching thing.”

  “Yes.”

  “No.” I back away.

  “Yes,” he reaches for my hand. “You can do it.”

  Okay, his tone just changed. It went from sexy, British, Magnum guy to fatherly and authoritative.

  Reason #7: You’re not my dad, so don’t tell me what to do.

  If I don’t want to sit from head to toe, naked, in a hot, steamy tub of crap, I shouldn’t have to. Wow, I just felt like I was about to have a tantrum. But maybe he was right. He had been right about everything else. I mean, the guy is Mr. Cool, Mr. Jet, Mr. Success. Maybe he did know more than me. I reluctantly climb into the tub, thinking that he must know something I don’t. He wouldn’t do anything to hurt me. Just do it.

  Gag. I am physically gagging.

  “You’re being immature,” he says, almost disapproving. I try to breathe through my mouth, but now I am eating what tastes like Sam’s gas after a steak bone. Ahhhh, I miss Sam. But not enough to stay in this!

  “How can you possibly enjoy this?” I say in one breath. “It’s an acquired taste,” he says as the lady places cucumbers over his eyes.

  But this isn’t getting any better for me. I look around at my naked body covered in dark brown, stinking goop, twigs, and small things that appear to either be rocks or … oh God, I am starting to itch. I am having a flashback to the spa with the dirty scrubs. Really itch! The more I dig at my leg, arm, and boobs, the more nauseous I feel. The more dirt and ooze that slips under my nails, the more lightheaded I feel. Itching, scratching, barely breathing, my stomach begins to turn and I reach for the side of the tub, getting up, but I slip, fall, and go under. My face and head in the crap … I struggle to get out, scramble for the side, my hands, arms slippery, itchy, I try to get up but before I can get out, I lean over the side of the tub with only the whites of my eyes showing and throw up all over the Indonesian rug.

  Reason #8: No matter how old someone is, no one knows you better than you know yourself.

  “How was I to know that you were allergic to it?” Magnum says as some spa guy hoses me off.

  “BECAUSE I TRIED TO TELL YOU! I KNEW!” I stand clawing at my calves, sides, and back. “Where’s the cool dip?” I stomp off like an allergy veteran and walk down into the small, cool dip pool of ice cubes. “Holy shit!” I gasp as mud dissolves into the cold dip.

  “The water will stop the itching and reduce the swelling of the hives,” Magnum responds.

  “Thanks, I know, ‘cause it’s going to kill me from fucking hypothermia.” I bounce from one foot to the other.

  We drove home that night from Two Bunch and I felt like a scolded child.

  I call Dr. D. on my cell while Magnum fills up the car with gas and Dr. D. tells me what I’ve known the whole time. “This is not healthy. Isn’t it more fun to experience something with a man for the first time than having someone show you something they’ve already experienced?”

  I look back at Magnum in his cute Lucky Jeans and sweater. “I guess, but …”

  Dr. D. cuts me off. “Did you say ‘but’? You’re not done with him. Call me when you break up. No bill for this one.”

  Two nights later, I look at the new black Armani dress that was hand-delivered from Saks in a large white box with an oversized red bow: a surprise from Magnum as an apology for the whole mud thing. He wants me to wear it to a black-tie fund-raiser on Saturday night. After spending the last three days covered in c
alamine lotion, I want nothing more than to put on that dress and feel beautiful, so I agreed, and somehow, for the first time, realized how Lance must have felt when I took him shopping.

  Ok, good, bad, right, wrong, presents, gifts, champagne, wrinkly skin, hives, I am seeing the reasons on my list. But they are written on Tiffany letterhead and they don’t seem so bad.

  Saturday night, 8:15 P.M. I am standing next to Magnum. He is showing me off to his record industry friends. My dress is a little too tight, and my boobs are a little too pushed up and smooched at the top. I stand there in a group of fiftyish guys with their eyes darting from my boobs to my hand, which is wrapped in Magnum’s.

  We walk away, and one guy says, “Nice meeting you, Amy.” I open my mouth to correct him and notice the smirking and looking at each other … like who cares anyway. I realize that it really doesn’t matter what my name is.

  I was fucking arm candy! I thought at thirty-two you couldn’t be arm candy anymore! I own a home. I have my own money. I have clients and a company. I thought that at a certain age you just outgrew the bimbo status. But as it turns out, you don’t.

  Reason #9: Don’t be a float at the old folks’ parade.

  As the night went on I realized no one really even cared that I was a fairly successful, somewhat witty woman! And even if I had worn a pantsuit it would never have made the point. Don’t date a man twenty-five years your senior or you will most definitely be his … booby prize. I woke up in Magnum’s oversized king bed with down pillows and the comforter wrapped gently around my naked body.

  Ow, my head, what is that pounding? Wow, that’s my breathing. I roll over and look at the nightstand where Magnum has left me two Advil and a large glass of orange juice. Ah, he knows. See, this is something older men do. But he is nowhere to be found. I get up to open the long, heavy tapestry drapes and the sunlight pierces my skull like pins in a voodoo doll. Maybe a shower will help.

  Standing in the middle of the marble shower with two huge showerheads pouring down on me, I start to remember the Citron martinis, the dancing, the champagne, maybe the karaoke. I can’t remember exactly when I accepted my bimbo status and just went with it … I remember more Citron martinisand then … being dragged home as if I was a naughty schoolgirl after getting caught drinking beer and making out with my boyfriend sophomore year in high school.

  After toweling off and slipping into his fluffy robe from the Four Seasons, I look for lotion, any lotion, to apply to my very dehydrated skin. I open the medicine cabinet and there, staring me in the face, is the bottle! And not of lotion.

  Okay, it’s a medical revolution. It’s a damn miracle in some cases, but … I reach for the phone on the bathroom wall and dial.

  “Hi, it’s me,” I say in a whisper as I climb back into the shower with his robe on, clutching the bottle. “Are you up?”

  “Of course I am. It’s noon,” shouts Reilly. “What’s wrong? You sound like you’re standing in the toilet.”

  “I am. Sorta. Look, I found something in his medicine cabinet,” I whisper, eyeing the bottle.

  “Oh, shit, what? Antidepressants. That’s okay, he’s balancing,” she laughs.

  “Worse,” I say.

  “Barbiturates? Crack? Coke? Herpes medicine?”

  “Worse. I could live with all that,” I say, ducking further into the corner of the shower. I sit, climbing up on the little bench, crouched.

  “C’mon! What? What’s worse than crack?” Reilly starts to match my whisper.

  Silence hovers between us for a good five, six seconds. “Viagra,” I say.

  “Well, no shit, Em. What did you think a guy who can ‘do it’ for two hours is using? It doesn’t even matter how old he is …”

  The shower door opens and Magnum is standing there looking at me, bewildered.

  “Whoaaa!” I fall off the shower seat, dropping the phone and spilling the little blue pills all over the marble and down the drain.

  Magnum had come to tell me that a friend at his company had passed away last night. A heart attack. A young music executive who was really talented. A husband, a father of young twin boys, and, more important, a friend.

  Lower than a bottom feeder. I feel lower than a bottom feeder.

  How could I break up with this man who was standing in front of me—not mad that I got wickedly drunk last night, probably embarrassed him at some point, fell asleep minus any Viagra-induced sexual activity, who had bought me nothing but beautiful, thoughtful gifts, spoiled me rotten, told me I was “beautiful,” who now needs me to stand next to him at his friend’s funeral. I can’t. I simply can’t break up with him no matter how many reasons I have.

  Two days have passed since the Viagra incident. We are on our way to Forest Lawn Cemetery. I hate funerals. Did I mention that? The whole death, gone forever … scares the shit out of me. I mean, I have abandonment issues. Isn’t death the ultimate abandonment?

  But here I go. Bravely holding my man’s hand as we sit across the casket from the widow and two of the most beautiful, curly-haired three-year-old twins I have ever seen.

  The priest goes on about loss, the afterlife, and returning to the earth. I can’t help but stare at the widow. Her blonde hair, blue eyes; tired, almost scared face. My heart sinks for her. I think of the many nights alone she is going to have to brave in a king-size bed with his pillow empty. Her soul mate, her husband, her friend taken in the prime of their lives. I think about the struggles she will face raising those two little boys alone. I wonder what he must have been like? Handsome and young and a good father. I can imagine him playing touch football with his boys as they grow up. It’s all so upsetting. I lean over and whisper in Magnum’s ear, “It’s very sad, I mean the wife, alone, with those babies. It’s such a shock.”

  He nods his head in agreement.

  I keep staring at the widow, wondering, feeling, identifying.

  “My God, it’s seriously such a tragedy,” I whisper again.

  Magnum whispers, “Yes it is.”

  Listening to the priest continue on about “ashes to ashes, dust to dust,” I look again at the widow before whispering to Magnum, “How old was he?”

  Magnum leans over and whispers in my ear, “My age.”

  But it seemed louder than an AC/DC concert. “MY AGE … MY AGE … MY AGE!”

  I almost fall off my chair.

  There it was … the motherlode, the biggest REASON of them all.

  Reason #10: If he’s going to die of old age before your children are in junior high, he’s too old for you!!!

  She was me, an image of tomorrow, a ghost from Christmas future. Me alone. Abandoned at thirty-six with two small children under the age of five. Nope! Not gonna happen. I start to get up and the priest eyes me.

  Everyone eyes me.

  I cover my face as if to be crying, which at this point isn’t far from the truth, and I walk away. Magnum looks from me to the group.

  “It’s very upsetting to her,” he says and they all nod in sympathy, understanding. As if I was that widow—they know. He looks back at me. This time I have broken from a fast-paced walk to a full-blown sprint.

  Up the hill, past a hundred graves, up another hill, past a hundred more … Jesus, how big is this place? Surrounded by tombstones, I sit resting as the sun starts to set toward the ocean.

  I watch cars leaving. I can breathe again. Magnum finally finds me, sitting against the headstone of a woman named Irma Banks. Apparently she was a devoted wife and mother. We drive home in silence, like I’m doomed to be grounded, a bad high schooler, and he’s a disappointed parent.

  He drops me at the front of my house and doesn’t get out. I turn around to apologize but he just drives off in his black 850 BMW. Not that I expect him to come in or anything. He is old enough to know better.

  Reason #10: If he’s going to die of old age before your children are in junior high, he’s too old for you!!!

  Reason #9: Don’t be a float at the old folks’ parade.

&nbs
p; Reason #8: No matter how old someone is, no one knows you better than you know yourself.

  Reason #7: You’re not my dad, so don’t tell me what to do.

  Reason #6: There is no substitute for the real thing.

  Reason #5: When your therapist knows, you know … he’s probably the wrong guy.

  Reason #4: If you like his life more than you like him, it makes it hard to be objective.

  Reason #3: Compromise is compromise no matter what season of life you’re in.

  Reason #2: If you’re not over your ex, you’re not ready, no matter how old you are.

  Reason #1: If his age is old enough to notice, it’s old enough to matter.

  Chapter ten

  Smooth Sailing

  Friday evening. Walking on the strand, I see dolphins just past the shore break. It warms me inside. I look at the sun setting and I get an overwhelming sense of “okay.” Maybe it is my thirties or maybe it is just that I am finally at a point where I am happy being Emily. Magnum had done one thing. He had helped me over the hurdle of Reese. I wasn’t mad at Reese anymore, or for that matter, any of them. I wasn’t unhappy. I was just me. Still single and somewhat normal and now drama-free. I have resolved that my life isn’t supposed to be the cookie-cutter life that everyone else has. Or pretends to have.

  I sit down on the beach and dial Dr. D.

  “I want to see you,” I say into the phone.

  “Why? Are you breaking up?” he says in a way that might be categorized as humor.

  “No, it’s just … I feel a little strange. Like I am standing on one foot but I have learned to balance on it and I don’t know if that is, well, just how life is or if I have just come to accept that my life will never be fixed and will always be an evolving ‘work in progress, please excuse the mess.’ ”

  He lets out a long breath. “Okay, come into the office tomorrow, Saturday, at ten in the morning before I launch my boat for the first time.”

  As Dr. D. walks into the waiting room of his outer office he stands there a good long minute looking at me, then smiles. I am happy that he slipped me in on short notice and even happier he has given up part of his Saturday for my mental well-being. He turns and I follow him back into his office. We both sit. I catch a glimpse of myself in his mirror and wonder who that girl staring back at me is. She seems more peaceful.