Ghosts of Boyfriends Past

by Carly Alexander

  And for what did we wait? What the hell were we holding out for . . . permission from our parents? It was one of the reasons I’d had to move on from Ryan. Not that I was savvy, but the guy was so damned earnest, it drove me nuts.

  “Maddy?” Mom said, wrenching me back to reality. “Is the coffee ready?”

  “Oh, sure.” I grabbed a penguin mug and poured, trying to think of a diplomatic way to get rid of Ryan as soon as he finished eating. Unfortunately, I couldn’t be too blunt, and my mind was a bit too numb to conjure up a creative plan. “Here you go,” I said, forcing a smile.

  Mom seemed to take that as her cue to exit. “I’ve got to run—a party with some friends over on Russian Hill. But you two can keep each other company.” Mom stood up, prompting Ryan to press a napkin to his face and rise to attention. “Oh, Ryan, you always were so polite!” Mom kissed him on the cheek, then hurried off upstairs.

  I slunk down into a kitchen chair and pointed to the pie. “Finish your grub, soldier.”

  Sitting across from me, Ryan tilted his head to catch my eye. “Are you angry about something?”

  I sighed, unnerved by the vulnerability in his blue eyes. “No, just disappointed.”

  “Really? I’m sorry.”

  “It’s not your fault,” I said, remembering how Ryan had always had doormat issues.

  “But I’m still sorry you’re disappointed.”

  Major doormat issues. I went over to the kitchen counter and hoisted the bottle of Bailey’s Irish Cream. “Would you like to make that an Irish coffee?”

  “Yes, please.”

  “Now you’re talking.” There just might be hope for you yet, Ryan, I thought as I poured the liquor into his mug. Maybe a shot or two would loosen that stick in his ass.

  An hour later, Ryan and I were ensconced in separate corners of the love seat, watching It’s a Wonderful Life. I had hoped that the prospect of watching Jimmy Stewart disparage the value of life would scare Ryan off, but he had insisted the movie was one of his favorites.

  Just my luck.

  “So how is New York?” Ryan asked as George Bailey teetered on the bridge. “I’ve always wanted to go there. Is it as crazy as people say?”

  “Crazier,” I said. “And I love it.”

  “So you’re planning to stay there?”

  “Definitely,” I said, though I hadn’t really given the issue of locale much thought since I’d chosen to attend Columbia. Once you get a taste of New York City, it’s not like you’re dying to try Topeka or Cincinnati. “How about you? Where are you off to next?”

  “I really can’t say. I don’t even know, but I have to report in tomorrow, and we’ll ship out the following day.”

  “That must suck.”

  “It does.”

  “What else?” I asked. “What else don’t you like about the Navy?”

  He frowned. “It’s not exactly Carnival Cruises. Life on a ship can be bleak, isolated. And it’s so regimented. I’m just a cog in the big wheel.”

  “And I thought working at Skyscraper was brutal.”

  He snorted. “It’s not always terrible. Just most of the time.”

  “Wow, and you seemed so into it. Back in high school, you were dying to get into the Naval Academy. Like it would make your life perfect.”

  “What the hell did we know back in high school?” he said casually.

  “Oh, please, don’t remind me,” I said, warming up to him. “So there’s a chink in the armor? You’re not going to be a Navy man for life?”

  “Please . . . I’m hoping to do five and get the hell out.”

  “Really?” Maybe I had judged him too harshly. I pulled my knees onto the couch and shifted toward him.

  “Really. Don’t you ever feel like bailing out from your job?”

  “Yeah, like every day.”

  He squinted at me, surprised. I went on. “The real world isn’t as glam as it should be. I’ve this boss who’s a bear if she forgets to take her Valium. And I’m such a peon in the pecking order that everyone thinks they can walk all over me. I sort of hate it, but I haven’t found anything else yet, and my parents think I scored a really great job. I hate to disappoint them.”

  “Mmm.” He tugged on the hem of my pants. “Why don’t you explain it to them? Your mom is pretty cool.”

  “Yeah, but Dad is totally out of touch. He thinks I should use Skyscraper as a springboard to Town & Country or the New Yorker or something. The man can’t accept that his daughter was hired to count paper clips.”

  Ryan circled my ankle with his hand and pulled, yanking me flat on my back. “You always were a great counter,” he said, leaning over to poke me in the ribs. “One, two, three—”

  “Aaagh! That tickles!” I belted out a laugh.

  “I still know the spots,” he said, sliding his fingertips over my rib cage.

  It was a fun part of hanging with Ryan—something I’d forgotten. We used to wrestle in the grass like siblings, a match that usually dissolved into a round of tickling, then . . . other things.

  I squealed and flailed. “Stop!”

  But his hands were relentless. “Ooh, I forgot this spot.”

  “No!” I gasped, rolling aside. I flopped off the couch onto the floor, dragging Ryan with me.

  As soon as he landed beside me I went for his neck, wiggling my fingertips under his ears. “I remember a few ticklish spots, too!” I said victoriously.

  “No!” he wailed, leaning his head down to stop the tickling. He crunched his chin over my hand and let out a howl. “Stop! Stop!”

  “Ouch! You’re hurting my hand!” I protested.

  Suddenly, he lifted his head. “Sorry.”

  “Just kidding,” I said, realizing that his face was barely an inch from mine. We were both breathing heavily, and I could feel the heat radiating from his body, which stretched before me, so lean and rock-solid.

  “That’s not fair,” he said, placing a hand on my neck, tenderly. Something flickered in his blue eyes, as if he were suddenly aware of how close our bodies were. I don’t think either of us had expected anything like this to happen, but now that we were here on the floor, the final outcome seemed inevitable.

  I felt the familiar yearning in my abdomen. I definitely wanted to get closer, even if it wasn’t going to go anywhere after today. I mean, the guy was shipping out.... Who knew where he’d end up? And although there was no future for Ryan and me, we did share a heartfelt past.

  Locking my vision on his blue eyes, I slid a hand under the crisp hem of his white jacket. He closed his eyes when I cupped the bulge in his pants, as if he felt incredibly relieved that we could get to this point. I stroked him, realizing this was the right thing to do. Ryan deserved an unforgettable send-off from his “girl back home,” even if I wasn’t really his girl.

  “I’ve missed you,” he whispered.

  “Shh,” I said, placing his hand between my legs. I didn’t want to talk about feelings right now. “Let’s just focus on this moment,” I whispered. “This moment in time.”

  He moaned as we pressed against each other, our fingers searching for bare flesh.

  Running my hands under his crisp white shirt, I felt a wicked surge of pleasure at having penetrated his dress whites. There’s something about a man in a uniform . . .

  10

  “I can’t believe you’re leaving me,” I told Leo as we exited the Ansel Adams gallery at the Art Institute. “Everyone is abandoning me.”

  “Oh, get over it, Toots,” he said as he approached a sculpture installed in the corridor. “If you want to talk abandonment issues, call Wolf. He’s given me an earful in the past twenty-four hours. Besides, you wanted Ryan to leave, didn’t you?”

  I nodded. “But not you. San Francisco won’t be the same without you.”

  “I’ll see you next week when you get back to the Big Apple.”

  “Ten days,” I said. “Remember? I’m taking a week of vacation.” I paused in front of the rounded adobe sculpture. “
What was I thinking? No one over the age of eighteen should spend more than ten days total staying in their parents’ home.”

  Leo glanced down at the brown sculpture and pursed his lips. “Looks like a very large fava bean.”

  “Or an imploded embryo,” I said.

  He nodded. “Yes, I definitely see it.” He flicked his sunglasses down from the top of his head and smiled. “Should we have lunch in the Institute café, or head elsewhere for a coldie?”

  “I happen to know two cool places in the area,” I said. “What are you in the mood for, a microbrewery or a tiki bar?”

  Leo threw up his hands in glee. “Tiki!”

  “Okay, then,” I said as we stepped out in front of the Institute’s outdoor fountain. “We can walk to the Fairmont from here. But promise me you won’t end up dancing on the table with a coconut bra.”

  “Only if you’ll perform a hula dance,” Leo threatened.

  We ended up jumping on a cable car for part of the trip, since I’d forgotten how many steep hills dotted the Nob Hill neighborhood. “How did Nob Hill get its name?” Leo asked as the car clanged on its track.

  “It really was called Snob Hill, after four big swells who made pots of money building the Transcontinental Railroad. Stanford, Hopkins, Crocker, and Huntington. They poured their gold into building four fabulous mansions on the hill.”

  Leo nodded. “I take it this was part of your school social studies curriculum?”

  “Like, every year,” I admitted, signaling that it was time to jump off.

  The Fairmont Hotel was one of those palatial structures that always made me feel like donning a princess gown before entering. Inside, I led Leo to the Tonga Room, which boasted tiki huts, man-made tropical rainstorms, and a floating bandstand.

  Leo twirled under a puff of mist. “I love this place! What are you drinking?”

  “Let’s start with mai tais,” I said. “Then we’ll work our way up to rum punches.”

  The waitress let us have a table inside a tiki hut strewn with Christmas lights. When she brought our drinks in cups that resembled hollowed-out pineapples, I insisted on paying the tab.

  “This one’s on me. Consider it your bon voyage drink.”

  “That’s so sweet,” Leo said, adjusting the paper umbrella in his mai tai. “But you really don’t have to. Or do you have an ulterior motive?” He gasped suspiciously. “Are you trying to buy my favor?”

  “Of course not!” I protested. “I mean, no, not really.” He narrowed his eyes at me, relentless. “Okay, okay, I just wanted to get in one last pitch for Sugar.”

  Leo jabbed the air with a long, decorative toothpick. “Ah ha! I knew it.”

  “Come on, Leo. She’s been a good friend to me, and we need roommates. It’s a win-win situation.”

  “She’s a dixie-chick prima donna,” he said, “and I’m not giving up the room with the private bath.”

  “You don’t have to! Sugar is willing to share the big room with someone else.”

  “I’ll believe that when I see it.”

  I took a sip from my drink, trying to think of another approach.

  “But, Leo—”

  “Don’t ‘But Leo’ me. Didn’t you hear what I said?”

  I blinked.

  “We’ll give her a chance to prove herself.”

  “Really? Well, all right! Okay!” I swirled a fist in the air. “Woo-hoo!”

  “Now who’s making a scene?” Leo demanded. “And you worried about me in a coconut bra?”

  I flashed him a satisfied grin. “You won’t regret it. You know, we are going to have a great apartment.”

  “Just as long as no one tapes over my soaps, we’ll be fine.”

  “Call me the minute you get the keys from the realtor,” I told him. “And make sure the painters used the right shade of white before you give them the first month’s rent. A friend of mine paid up front and then saw that the apartment was painted this hideous shade of orange. They called it ‘nacho cheese,’ but it was really nauseating cheese. Anyway, she had a hell of a time getting it redone by the landlord.”

  “I’ll take care of it, don’t worry,” Leo said. “And if I have any problems, I’m sure Miss Sugarplum Fairy will intercede.”

  “Sugar will help you,” I said, ignoring his barb. “You’ll see.” As we sipped our drinks, I felt myself sliding into a tiki room stupor. I was glad that things were working out back home. The apartment would be partially inhabited by the time I landed back in New York.

  But I also felt a little out of sorts, stuck between two worlds. Why was I even returning to New York? Yes, there were my good friends Leo and Sugar, but I had good friends here, too. I hated my job at Skyscraper. I dreaded having to brush up against Hugh again. And I was sure there’d be scads of shrieking notes on my desk from Drucie complaining about missed deadlines and facts that needed to be checked.

  “Madison?” Leo said brusquely. “You’re looking far too serious for a young woman sucking on a coldie in a tiki bar.”

  “Sorry. I just had this feeling of ennui about my life.”

  Leo held up his hands. “Stop that, this instant, or I will rise upon this table and do the dance to summon the tiki gods.”

  “Don’t you ever wonder if you’ve made the wrong choice?”

  “No, never.”

  “If you’re in the wrong place? I mean, maybe I don’t belong in New York. I definitely don’t belong at Skyscraper.”

  “Then look for another job when you get back,” Leo said, toasting me with his drink. “But do not throw out the entire mai tai just because one maraschino cherry has a spot on it.”

  I nodded sagely. “Good advice. I think I’ve heard it somewhere before.”

  Leo folded up the little paper umbrella from his drink and tucked it behind his ear like a decorative flower. “And when all else fails, drink heavily.”

  As I watched Leo walk through the security gate at the airport, I realized how much I’d miss having him here. He was my buffer from myself, my disembodied conscience that saved me from having to face my own failings and the insecurities those failings spawned. In short, he took me from one good time to the next with just a brief, mocking nod at the issues.

  God, I would miss him.

  With Leo gone, I knew it was time to take care of all those things I didn’t get around to while he was here. I went for a pedicure with Mom. I called two of my girlfriends from high school and found out that Rikki was living with a boyfriend in Toronto and Lizard was buried in the busy season at work (liquor sales? go figure) but that she would call me as soon as she dug herself out.

  Then there was the annual father-daughter lunch. I boned up on last month’s issues of the New Yorker so that I would have something to say when he took me to Moose’s, as he had somehow gotten into his head that I was a budding literary mind. But then, over a lunch of pan-seared scallops and lobster risotto, he grilled me about books on the New York Times best-seller list, telling me how his reading tastes had changed from short stories to novels. Lucky you, I wanted to say, at least you’ve got a few minutes to read each night. Honestly, working at a magazine all day sucked up so many of my brain cells that by nighttime I was lucky I could hold a conversation at a bar, let alone read a diatribe on finding mathematics in the stars.

  But could I say that to my father? And did he really care what I thought about his personal reading list?

  That was what surprised me most. I sat there nodding while he reeled off his opinions, like a fifth-grader delivering book reports. It was a total waste of time, but at least the food was exquisite. As a buttery scallop melted in my mouth, I glanced off and pretended I was lunching with David Bowie or Jack Nicholson—some older guy who was still an incredible score. Then Greg would come in and see us together and—

  The fantasy faded as Dad’s pager went off a third time. “I really have to run, Maddy,” he said, “but Mary will put this on my tab. Order dessert, if you want.” He leaned over the table, kissed me on th
e forehead, and winked. “We’ll talk later.”

  Oh, sure, I thought, watching him go. We’ll talk in about twenty years, when they’re wheeling you out of the OR because you collapsed in some man’s chest.

  I did order dessert—a rich chocolate soufflé that took thirty minutes to prepare—but I asked Mary, the owner, to give it to our waitress as a token of appreciation. In all the years that Dad, the world-renowned heart surgeon, had eaten here, he’d probably never given the woman more than a twelve-percent tip. A few weeks at home and you remember all the ways your parents embarrass you.

  Struggling with feelings of displacement and the usual case of postholiday blues, I tried to bow out of the New Year’s Eve cleaning of the attic. It was a ritual Mom had started when I was a teenager—a Zen way to streamline our lives and remove the extraneous possessions that weighed us down.

  “Mom, at the moment, material things are not the problem. If I eat one more piece of pecan pie, I’m going to crack the marble floor at the bottom of the stairs.”

  She let out a laugh and rubbed my back. “Oh, honey! A few extra pounds does not a porker make. I am so glad I never had food issues with you. Those girls in your school who struggled with anorexia . . . It was such a heartbreaker, a major power struggle.”

  “Yes, food was never an issue with me,” I teased. “I like it too much to give it up.” It wasn’t until college that I realized how lucky I was, not having to sweat at the gym every time I devoured a wedge of cheesecake. I probably had Mom’s speedy metabolism to thank for that.

  “Just help me go through a few boxes,” Mom said, leading the way up the narrow stairs to the creaky attic of my childhood nightmares. “It’s just too overwhelming for me to do on my own, but it will be fun if we do it together.”

  “You haven’t seen my new method of housecleaning,” I told her as she opened the door and flicked on the light. “I just throw everything away and buy new.”