Bad Boy (11 page)

“They don’t come over here now,” Jon admitted. And it was too bad. The view was spectacular. “Not even my mother.” Not that he spent much time here. He was always working.

“Then again, you don’t get to go to
their
places now, either. Follow my rules and you will. You know, you’re really kind, and so good at what you do. You deserve to have a wonderful woman in your life.”

“Well, I do, but I don’t sleep with you.”

“Right. But now you can have both.” She
_p. 104
paused. “It’s funny. You manage to do so well in work, but you can’t pull your private life together. I can’t manage to break through with work.”

“And your personal life is okay? Excuse me, but your career
and
your boyfriend need a shot in the arm.”

Tracie gave him a murderous look. Jon shrugged and moved to the refrigerator. “You want a drink or something? I’ve got cranberry juice and cranapple. Good for your urinary tract, you know. I think I also have
‌
—”

“Stop!” She got up off the sofa and went toward him. “Rule Number Four: Never offer them
anything.
You make
them
offer. That’s the key to the whole thing. And never use either ‘urinary’ or ‘tract’ unless you’re a vet, a gynecologist, or a religious fanatic.”
[rule4]
She took him by the lapels of his jacket. For a moment
‌
—a very brief moment
‌
—Jon thought she was going to kiss him. That or head-butt. “They’re going to be asking
you
to go to bed with
them
.”

“Them? More than one?” he asked, and realized his voice had risen an octave.

Tracie just ignored him, pulled on his lapels, spun him around, and twisted his jacket right off him. “Well, not at first,” she said. “That’s the advanced class.” With a flourish, she threw his jacket in the wastebasket.

“Hey!” he began to protest, then remembered her stricture.

“No sports jacket. Ever. And no checks or plaids. Solid colors only. And dark ones. In
_p. 105
fact, to begin with, we’re going with the Henry Ford approach: any color you want, as long as it’s black.”

“Black? But I don’t
‌
—Every
‌
—” he stopped himself. “Fine,” he said.

Tracie walked around him slowly, like an officer inspecting the troops. “Where did you get that haircut?” she asked.

“Logan’s.”

“Never go there again except to clobber him. Stefan will try to fix it. If I beg him.” She looked down at his legs. “Forget khakis. And you don’t wear anything from the Gap, Banana Republic, J. Crew, or L. L. Bean.” Jon was desperately trying to remember what she was saying, wishing for his Palm Pilot, and attempting not to take offense, all at the same time. “Look, if you wear this stuff, you’ll just create a pucker in women.”

“What’s a pucker?”

Tracie made her big eyes bigger. “It’s the female equivalent of a wilt in a man. There are some looks that are so bad, they make us pucker up to be sure we would never carry any of that genetic material.”

“More information than I require.” He tried to think of what, if anything, in his wardrobe was left. “So where do I get my
‌
—” he began.

“You wear either cool stuff from thrift stores or really, really expensive Italian clothes,” Tracie said. “And you mix them. Let’s go through your closet.” She stalked across the room and pulled open the door to Jon’s walk-in. He followed her. The clothes were metic
_p. 106
ulously arranged by pattern. Checks on one side, plaids on the other, descending down the color scale from light to dark. Tracie moved down the middle of the aisle like a machine gun mowing down soldiers. She pulled the first sports jacket off a hanger and dumped it on the floor. “No.” She pulled the next and dumped it, too. “No and no and
‌
—ecch! No!”

“What’s wrong with madras?”

Tracie ignored him, except to give him a withering what’s-right-with-it? look. She opened his bureau drawers one after the other and scrabbled through his stuff. Jon panicked for a moment and wondered if there was anything that he . . . Well, he had no time to think, because Tracie threw him a black crewneck sweater, jeans, and
‌
—in desperation
‌
—pulled off her own belt. Jon cringed.

“No! Not the strap! Are bad clothes a whipping offense?”

“No, but spending real money on this crap probably is. We definitely have to go shopping. I’m not sure I can pull more than one cool outfit out of this. Okay? So here’s the point. You
are
going to change: what you wear, what you say, where you go, what you eat.”

“What I eat? Maybe we’re talking too much change,” Jon said.

“Hey, you asked for this. You get it.” Tracie raised her brows. Silently, she gave him the belt and pointed back to the closet. He headed over to strip off his clothes behind the door.

“Change now?” She gave him a look. “That
_p. 107
was just a question,” he said as he slipped into the straight-legged jeans.

“No questioning the alchemist,” Tracie called from somewhere near the door. “Otherwise, the magic doesn’t work.”

Tracie was going through his coats and jackets again. She began to bundle all the rejected clothes together and stuff them into a plastic bag.

Jon stepped out from the closet. Now he felt meek and small, like the real Oz. Tracie dropped the bag and looked him over. “Well, that’s better. Except the shoes. No more sneakers.”

“No more sneakers? But . . .” Tracie raised her brow and spun on her heel. “That wasn’t a
but
,” Jon hastened to tell her. “It wasn’t even a question. It was . . . a clarification. So what do I wear instead of Nikes? Sandals?”

Tracie turned back to face him. “Only if you think Jesus had a hot social life. Look, footwear is very important. Nice guys wear Nikes, or Top-Siders, Keds, or Converse. Boring! Sexy guys wear Doc Martens or boots.” She squinted and looked him over again. It made Jon feel . . . peculiar. Surely she was taking this too far. “Look,” she said with a sigh. “I have to tell you about the pants thing.”

“What pants thing?”

Tracie seemed not to hear him. “I’m really trusting you by telling you this, but I feel you have to know. Most women have a pants thing.”

“What?” Jon asked. He was afraid she was
_p. 108
going to tell him that he had to stuff socks in his crotch and that women picked out their lovers and husbands based on bulge factor. He just didn’t think he could bear it, but before he could tell her to stop, she began with a completely irrelevant question.

“Did you see
Out of Africa
?” she asked.

“The movie?” he replied.

“Yeah. With Robert Redford and Meryl Streep.”

“No,” he said.

“How about
Legends of the Fall
?”

“I don’t know anyone over fourteen who saw that one.”

“Well, there were some of us,” Tracie informed him. “And it was all about the pants thing. A lot of women have the pants thing.”

“What the hell is ‘the pants thing’?” he asked.

She sighed. “It would be easier if you’d seen the movies. But it’s all about a certain kind of pants. Not tight, tight ones . . .”

Relief flooded Jon like water on a service station’s bathroom floor. He wouldn’t have to stuff his pants, though he wasn’t sure what kind of pants he wouldn’t have to stuff.

“But not those pleated pants, either. God, not those pleated khaki Docker things that make men look like throw pillows when they sit down. You want pants that are flat in the front. I mean, Robert Redford was already a middle-aged wrinkle bunny when he made
Out of Africa,
but he looked so damn good in those pants. My friend Sara says it’s the
_p. 109
swoopy hair thing, but most women I know admit it’s the pants thing.”

“Where do you get those pants?” Jon asked, mesmerized.

“I’ll have to go with you. Because it’s not just that they’re flat in the front; it’s also the way they hug your . . . back.”

“How high do they come up?” Jon asked, imagining some kind of one-piece overall. “They cover my back?”

Tracie shook her head in despair. “I mean your butt. Sometimes, I admit, women look at men’s butts.”

“Not our crotches?” Jon asked.

“Don’t be disgusting,” she said dismissively. “Why do . . .” Then she looked up and was silent for a moment.

He couldn’t imagine what she was seeing on the ceiling, but it was clear that she liked it. Maybe it was Robert Redford’s butt. “It’s a funny thing,” she said. “It also has to do with the textiles. Nothing shiny. No. A man in shiny pants is . . .” She shook her head to get rid of the thought. “It has to be a smooth, firm fabric. See, it’s about butts, but it’s also not about butts. If you know what I mean.”

Jon hadn’t a clue. But he didn’t want her to stop now. He felt as if he might be about to witness a biblical revelation.

“It’s like most naked butts are not that cute, but one that’s in a nice pair of pants, that’s just sitting there kind of cupped by them, not too big, not too flat, just kind of narrow yet full . . .”

_p. 110
Forget this! “You are an embarrassment to yourself and others,” Jon said. “Tracie, are you telling me responsible adult women make choices based on trousers and footwear? Details like that?”

Tracie opened her big eyes even bigger. “Jesus, Jon. In all these years, I never knew you were so ignorant. You know what they say: God is in the details. We
‌
—women
‌
—talk about details for hours. You guys are the big picture; we
are
details.”

“But
I
am details. I was a computer analyst for four years. Nothing but details.”

Tracie nodded, but not in a positive way. “Exactly. Wasn’t that just the time your celibacy kicked in?” Jon tried to think back, afraid that Tracie might be right. “Look. Trust me on this one. It’s not that there’s anything wrong with your job. It just isn’t sexy. Don’t tell
anyone
.”

Slightly hurt, Jon shrugged. “But what if they ask what I do?”

“And they will. Women want to know everything. You just be vague. Vague drives women out of their minds.”

“In a good way or a bad way?”

“Both.” She laughed. “It took me three months to find out if Phil was an only child. But the point is, they’ll come back for more. Just clear your throat and tell them you’re . . . in sales. Let
them
try and figure out if it’s drugs or rebuilt engines.”

“So let me get this contradiction straight: Women are driven crazy by vague and they go over details like monkeys on fur.”

_p. 111
“Right. Beth from work spent an hour and thirty minutes today discussing the cable-knit fisherman’s sweater that this guy she went out with wore on their first date and if it meant he was gay.”

“Did it?” he asked. She picked up a black jacket and threw it at him. Jon struggled into it.

“Yeah, unless he’s a fisherman,” Tracie said, smiling at him. At seeing Tracie’s pleased face, Jon struck a series of supermodel poses. “
Okay.
Now you’re put together.”

Jon went to the mirror and checked himself out. He had to admit he looked different
‌
—and improved. The crewneck sweater, one he only wore over a polo shirt, kind of hung off his shoulders in a sexy way. And the pants, though a little uncomfortable, were tight enough along the legs to make him look a little taller.

“Look at your buns!” Tracie said. “Wow! You’ve had hidden talent all this time.”

He blushed, but it didn’t stop him from half-turning to look over his shoulder. “Have I got the pants thing?” he asked, hoping it might be true.

“Well, the pants aren’t perfect, but it’s easier to fix that than the butt. Okay, this is what you’re wearing from now on.”

“You mean every day? How do I keep it clean?”

“The French only have one outfit and they wear it over and over.”

“But they’re used to body odor in France,” he protested.

_p. 112
“Look, wash it out every night until we go shopping. It’s worth the trouble.”

“Can’t we do it on-line?” he asked. “That’s how I buy most of my stuff.”

“Oh, that’s why it looks that way. Do on-line shopping if you want to have on-line sex. If you want it up close and personal, we’re going to have to feel the goods, babe.” She looked him over. “You actually look really presentable.”

He eyed himself in the mirror. He had to admit he looked a lot more like a man and less like a Salvation Army hanger. “I think this is a good look for me,” he said.

“Meet me tomorrow night and we’ll go shopping,” Tracie told him. “It’s something I’m very, very good at. And bring your cards.”

The first place Tracie dragged Jon to shop at was Secondhand Rose’s, a hip vintage-clothing emporium north of the city. Jon looked around at the odd clerks and the rails stuffed with even odder clothes. “Tracie, this is used stuff,” he said.

She didn’t have time to explain. “No it’s not. It’s vintage,” she told him, and started tearing
_p. 113
through the first rack. She could get him shirts, sweaters, or even jeans that were new, but to replace that impossible Micro jacket, she’d need something that didn’t look as if it came right out of the Gap. In her opinion, the key to really interesting dressing for a man was not to be
too
different from anyone else, except in a single particular: a fabulous jacket or a great pair of boots. And it had to be something that couldn’t be ordered from a catalog or bought at a boutique
‌
—that showed no originality or interest. A Prada jacket cost big bucks, but any asshole with a platinum card could buy one. Tracie was looking for something unique, something that would fascinate.

Maybe that was why it was so hard to find something worn, unique, and appropriate. In a way, this would still be like being a billboard, but instead of advertising Bill Gates or Ben & Jerry’s or Micro/Con, you were advertising yourself
‌
—your inner self: “This is the kind of guy I am. One who bought this black lambskin jacket twenty years ago and wore it until it was the texture and thinness of baby’s skin. And I love it.” She looked at Jon appraisingly, her eyes partially closed.