by Tracy Quan
His buddy confessed? These people are such amateurs! I bit my tongue and gave him a numb, shocked how-could-you glare.
“I’m sorry,” he told me. “The landlord wants me out of there now. I was hoping I could just close that chapter of my life without you finding out. It’s really embarrassing.”
“What’s going to happen to Gary? And his wife?” I said.
Matt held me tight.
“They’re not going to make it. She’s talking about a divorce.”
“Do you realize what you’ve done?” I asked. “If you hadn’t been so hung up on preserving your male space, he might never—maybe he would have ended his affair! You helped him to prolong it!”
Matt flinched. Held me closer.
“I know. I feel awful.”
TUESDAY. 6/19/01
This afternoon, when I told Jasmine about Matt’s other apartment, she was dumbfounded.
“That. Is scary.” It takes a lot to stop Jasmine in her tracks. “All this time? You thought he was at the freaking office? And he was coming to the East Side? And you never ran into him!”
We were at Petaluma, waiting for Allison. After much back and forth, I couldn’t decline the “normalizing” lunch proposed by Jasmine. She sees herself as a referee for two warring states of mind: paranoia (mine) and irrational exuberance (Allison’s).
“This is NOT to be discussed with Allie,” I warned her.
“Don’t worry,” Jasmine said. “My lips are sealed.…but haven’t you noticed that Allison’s a lot saner when I’m in the picture?”
Not really, but what’s the point of arguing with Jasmine?
“Well,” she continued. “Gary’s wife sounds like a piece of work! So much for the sanctity of male space. And what about Gary? He endangered your husband’s space by confessing to his wife! He’s incompetent! The upside is, Matt must be grateful that he’s not married to Lady Vengeance.”
“He feels terrible. His buddy’s marriage is completely ruined. And it’s his fault.”
“Partly his fault,” Jasmine said. “But suburban cheaters are very willful. Gary would have found some other way to screw up his life. And you’d better be careful about going to Seventy-ninth Street. I wonder if Matt’s really evacuating the bachelor pad this time. Maybe you should offer to help?”
“He brought home an extra computer last night. He was going there to play computer games! I don’t understand. I never gave him any reason to do this.…Did I?”
“Well, you’re such a model wife. You’re always home first. You keep a nice place. You never get sloppy. And you’re a great cook! He didn’t want to mar your domestic landscape with his imperfections. He’s trying to be a sensitive guy,” Jasmine said.
“Look. I don’t want him on my turf and I need him to leave this area soon, so I can get on with my life. But…if he’s got some boorish tastes, maybe it’s better if he doesn’t bring them home. He says he was watching the World Series.…”
“Could have been Howard Stern! Or cable wrestling.”
“Or something much worse.” I shuddered.
“Matt’s not the kind of guy who expects the mother of his children to watch gonzo DVDs on a Saturday night. He’s lucky to have a wife who doesn’t ask embarrassing questions and he knows it.” Jasmine glanced at the window. “Behold. Her Blondness.”
Allie was on the sidewalk, talking on her phone, walking briskly toward the door. She continued her conversation as she approached our table. “…I’m looking into airfares this week,” she said. “But we still have time.” Maneuvering her hips into a chair, she took off her sunglasses. “I wish I could get the producers to fly me down but it’s not that kind of show.” She snapped her phone shut and grabbed a roll from the basket. “I’m famished!” she exclaimed. “I’ve been running around all morning. I was at Kinko’s before eight so I could see a client at ten, then I had a meeting with Roxana in the Village but the good news is Noi found a place to stay.”
“So, ah, where did you put her?” I asked.
“She’s in Portland. Working! She changed her mind about coming to New York. She says she’ll fly out later for the colloquium but now she wants to concentrate on making money.”
“That’s quite a transition. From Bangkok to New England—”
“Portland, Oregon. She met some exotic dancers in San Francisco who turned her on to a self-help group in Portland. Some of the peep show girls started their own chapter of the Wobblies and they put out a monthly magazine. They gave her a place to stay. I had no idea she was so…”
“Resourceful?” Jasmine suggested. “What does Barry think?”
“He says I should let Noi take care of Noi, and focus on the Nevada Three press conference instead.” Allie signaled for a menu. “He’s advising me on the media participation. We’re talking to 60 Minutes!”
“That’s a major network show,” I gasped. “You can’t…”
“It’s exactly what we need,” Allie said. “They’re deeply interested in the patriarchal dimension of the persecution. I spoke to the producer last night. She wants to infiltrate the Midnight Honey Ranch with a hidden camera and get the owner to talk about his collaboration with the FBI.”
“Just make sure you don’t go poking around the Midnight Honey with a hidden camera,” Jasmine warned her. “These media types might be setting you up for something ugly.”
“Me?” Allison looked surprised. “I can’t even drive. How would I get there? It’s out in the middle of nowhere. I’m staying in Vegas where I can take cabs! Anyway, I’ll be too busy organizing the press conference. If I have something to say to the owner of the Midnight Honey, I’ll say it in a public forum. This show could be a nationwide teach-in on decriminalized versus licensed prostitution. And 60 Minutes wants to document Barbie’s release. Maybe interview her family…”
My phone started chiming in my pocket. Trish, calling from her car.
“Are you alone?”
“No, but it’s okay.”
“Call me back. It’s about Charmaine.”
“She’s in Florida getting a brow lif—”
Trish ended the call abruptly.
Jasmine was now arguing with Allie about the stalker.
“Well, if it’s not Roxana, it’s that webmistress in Australia,” Jasmine said. “And when she starts dropping nasty comments about your trip to Nevada, you’ll finally believe me!”
“Actually,” Allie explained, “she…the stalker revealed herself. Last week. It’s been kind of weird.”
“Last week!” Jasmine was miffed. “And you didn’t tell me?”
“We weren’t sure.” Allie looked down at her mozzarella salad. “But Lucho figured out who it was and she finally admitted it. To him, not to me. I guess I should feel sorry for her. It’s someone I met once at a party but I don’t remember talking to her. She’s kind of shy. She’s a research assistant for one of his friends on the Colloquium Committee. Lucho says she agreed to seek therapy.”
There was a moment of silence during which we nibbled our respective salads, contemplating the dark awful spiral of shyness.
“Why didn’t you say anything?” Jasmine demanded. “When did this bitch come clean?”
“The other day. I wasn’t ready to talk about it!” Allie sipped her mineral water and looked away from Jasmine. “I’m not sure how I feel about it.”
“Is this…someone he slept with?” I asked.
“No! But she has a crush on him and she’s one of his students, and she came to his building a few times but she stopped a year ago. She’s not the only student who acts out this way. He’s been harassed before.”
“Do you think he encourages it?” I asked.
“I’m not sure.” Allie frowned. “He says it’s an occupational hazard and he’s trying his best to prevent it. Do you think he’s really trying his best? Or will I always be fighting off these—these—lovesick stalkers and…”
“Deranged fans?” Jasmine said. “You have to recognize something. This gu
y is one of the happening professors. That’s why you like him. And he’s into you because you’ve got your own following. You’re more than a groupie to him. But he’s always gonna have some fans around nipping at his heels. You either accept this guy for what he is or you move on.”
Allie sighed. “I guess you’ve hit the nail on the head! I need a glass of wine.” She gestured to our waiter. “I’ve never had a boyfriend with—with real fans and admirers! Women coming out of the woodwork! I’m not saying my other boyfriends were unattractive but they resented me for getting too much attention from other men. They weren’t like Lucho. I hate to admit this…” She hated it so much that we had to wait for her wineto arrive. “I’ve always been the one with a following. And I guess my previous boyfriends were all in competition with my following? I just took it for granted. I never had to think about competing with anyone else for a boyfriend’s attention! It’s kind of humbling,” she admitted. “I’m not sure I like it.”
“There’s a first time for everything,” I said.
“But why can’t I be like him? Lucho’s so confident! And generous! He doesn’t resent my customers the way my other boyfriends did. And when we go to parties, he’s really happy if other men are looking at me! What’s wrong with me? I don’t like sharing him with all these fans. I felt sorry for that girl but I wanted to…” Allie couldn’t bring herself to say it.
“Would you get a grip?” Jasmine exclaimed. “If you didn’t want to rip her eyeballs out, you wouldn’t be a normal woman. You have to realize that a cool professor is like a hot stripper. Stalkers are an occupational hazard. But a stripper isn’t going to leave her boyfriend for a stalker! Same thing here!”
WEDNESDAY MORNING, 6/20/01
When Trish got through to me, I was at the cleaner picking up Matt’s shirts.
“Have you spoken to Charmaine lately?” Her voice was tense.
“What’s wrong?” I said. “Does she owe you money? She’s very good about—”
“I can’t believe this! Charmaine has all these pictures of Debbie on her website!”
Charmaine has pictures of Trisha’s schoolgirlish cousin. On…
“…her what?” It was the last thing I expected to hear. “She has a—?”
“Website! And she put Debbie’s picture up!”
“Without her permission?”
“That’s not the point. She’s taking advantage of Debbie and I don’t appreciate it. When you introduced us, you told me Charmaine was discreet!”
“I thought she was!” I protested. “I had no idea she was running a website. She never told me.”
Come to think of it, that is rather discreet. But the wrong kind of discreet.
“Debbie lives here. With my husband and my daughter,” Trish said. “If she gets arrested doing outcalls with Charmaine, my whole family could be affected. And if Charmaine doesn’t leave Debbie alone, I am throwing Debbie the fuck out of my home. Tonight. I will not stand for this. You can tell Charmaine what I said!”
Before I could respond, she hung up. I stepped outside and tried to call her back. Finally, after many tries, I left a voice mail. As I walked down First Avenue clutching my bundle of shirts, I called Charmaine.
“How’s the brow lift going?”
“I’m taking my Vitamin C and—”
“Trish just called me!”
“Um—yeah?”
“Is this true? She says you have a website? And Debbie’s working for you?”
“Why is she calling you about my—”
“Listen to me. Do you or don’t you have a website?”
“Well, I do, but—”
“Do you realize that Trish is never going to work with me again? She’s furious with me for introducing you to Debbie! And I vouched for you! I told her you were discreet! And totally private!”
“I am discreet. Look, Debbie and I are both adults. Trish doesn’t own Debbie!”
“She feels that you’re taking advantage of her cousin—”
“Trish is an overbearing kinky boring pain in the ass who thinks she can run Debbie’s life and treat her like a personal sex slave!” Charmaine said. “I’ve seen her kind before! My relationship with Debbie is totally professional. I take my cut and that’s it! I don’t try to prevent her from working with other girls and I don’t need her for sex—thank you, but I prefer a cock, okay? I’m the best thing that ever happened to that girl! We have a healthy relationship and she’s learning how to be independent.”
“But you’re advertising on the web! You could both get busted!”
“Do you think I want to get busted? Do I look like a moron to you? If you’re so horrified, then tell me how I’m supposed to pay my rent and pay for all my surgery and save for my old age! And if you want to ostracize me from your exclusive little circle, go right ahead. You can pack all my things up and put them in storage. I’ll give you my Amex number and you can charge it to me!” she yelled. “I can find somewhere else to live. But tell me this! Have I ever been late with the rent? What about the key money I gave you? Do you think it’s contaminated?”
“No,” I said. “But Trish is talking about throwing Debbie out of her house! You have to calm her down. It’s not fair to Debbie. I wish you would call Trish—”
“Debbie is almost twenty-five! She is not an orphan!”
“She can’t stay at our place!” I warned her. “If Trish throws her out—”
“Okay, fine. I’ll call them both. What do you want me to tell Trish?”
“Tell her you won’t be working with Debbie in the future. And don’t call Debbie. Wait for her to call you.”
“Why should I let—”
“Just listen to me. Trish is acting like a maniac. You never never alienate someone in this business. I’m not saying Trish would ever rat on you. But it’s unprofessional to allow another girl to be that pissed off with you. Smooth it out with Trish. Make her feel better. If you don’t, you’re putting us both at risk. Trish knows too much about me and,” I added, “she knows more about you than I did. I want you to keep your distance from Debbie.”
“Why are you talking like Debbie’s a child? I don’t work with minors!”
“How many girls are you working with?”
There was an awkward pause.
“Not that many. Maybe three or four.”
“So what does that mean? Eight or nine?”
“I’m not running an escort service!” she said. “I’m just trying to make a living!”
Famous last words?
LATER
I can’t really talk to my shrink about a roommate who’s advertising her felonious behavior on the web. That’s something for my lawyer to handle. And yet, it’s giving me a very personal headache.
No matter what Charmaine says, if she gets busted, the story would be that Charmaine’s running an escort service. Out of my apartment. That’s where the computer is, where the phone is, and god knows what else. How did she manage to grow this business right under my nose?
Instead, I told Dr. Wendy about my other discovery: Matt’s bachelor space and the carnage inflicted by his buddy’s enraged wife.
“So Matt has his basement and you have your attic,” Wendy mused. “I wonder how many attics and basements there are in Manhattan? I imagine a lot are on the Upper East Side.”
“Why?”
“So many small unrenovated buildings geared for single tenants, and the density of dwellings keeps the rent down,” she said. Every Manhattanite, even my shrink, has this need to pontificate about local real estate trends. “Marriage is a very delicate and demanding arrangement,” she added.
“I had no idea that being a role model for sensitive guys was stressing my husband out! I thought that was just his nature. Does he have to go and hide somewhere to be his true self?” I asked her. “Do I? And what is marriage really about if we’re all lying about who we really are?”
“Well,” said Dr. Wendy, “there’s a naive idea that we have a true self and we’re doin
g something wrong whenever we betray that self. But the true self is a problematic ideal. We don’t always know who the true self is. There are people who feel that their truest self is the most uncultivated—the self without manners, airs, or deceptive abilities. But the part of you that hides things from Matt, the self that has a secret history and lets him think you’re ovulating when you’re really on the Pill—this is also the self that lets a frailer person get on the bus first. Even though you’d like to push her aside and jump the line.”
“So lying to my husband is my good deed for the day?”
“It’s not a good deed or a bad deed,” she told me. “But it’s coming from your civil self, a self that knows how to get along with people. If you bluntly told Matt everything you did, maybe you would also tell a friend that she’s not as bright as she thinks she is. Or you’d serve yourself first when you have a guest for dinner. This is the same part of yourself that has table manners.”
“It’s like using the right fork? I guess my mother would approve then! But what if it’s more like stealing the silverware?”
“Then, I imagine, your mother wouldn’t approve, based on what you’ve told me about your childhood.”
“But I feel like I’m being true to myself when I lie to him!”
“There’s also a school of thought that says you can’t be your true self unless you’re alone.”
“Like a monk or a spinster.”
“Right. But we’re not all cut out for the contemplative lifestyle.”
As I left Dr. Wendy’s office, I felt impossibly nostalgic, remembering a time when I didn’t have a special man in my life. When I lived alone in my hotel room, not dating or in love, just seeing men for money. I was a struggling teenager spending money as fast as I earned it, living from one day to the next. My visits to the better hotels were high points: once, I went to the Skyline Motor Inn and the five-star Pierre on the same day, then turned my last trick for the night at the Holiday Inn. That was a typical work day. Then I became a success, hustling at a more gracious tempo, secretly at home in the city’s best hotels. That’s when I began to have boyfriends, a social life, a double life. There was a kind of purity in my solitary hand-to-mouth existence, but Wendy’s right. I’m not cut out for that.
