Liar's Guide to True Love (3 page)

“I don’t know why you feel compelled to lie,” Kate goes on. “Wedding obsession aside, because I know it’s your profession, you’re a terrific person just the way you are. Didn’t you meet another guy at your last shindig?”

“Mmm, yes, the older brother of the groom—how stereotypical. His name’s Seth. I think it was mostly the champagne talking since he only asked me out for a Thursday.”

“Darling! Thursday’s the new Friday! Not as good as Saturday, but most definitely not as bad as a Tuesday. Even Wednesday is earning stripes as a legitimate date night.”

“You think? Here I was thinking it was low pressure and maybe I could keep my little problem in check.”

“Babe, your problem stems from some deep-seated emotional issues that you have with your mother, or some Psych 101 crap like that. Come to think of it, now that I have met Ms. Bridget a few times I can see why you’re always trying to fit yourself into the man-mold.”

My cell phone rings and unbelievably, it is my mother. Well, actually not so unbelievable. Since she knows I’m not working today she will undoubtedly call every five minutes.

“Cassie, it’s your mother.” As if I didn’t already have a special ring tone for her. “I was talking to Beth, you know, the one whose daughter is getting married as soon as she graduates from
law
school. She and I were thinking how much fun it would be to go into business together. We could make wedding favors that you could sell to your girls.”

“First of all, Mom, they’re my
clients.
And you know I don’t like to push particular products on to a couple.”

“But we would make such lovely things! Little almonds wrapped in tulle…” She goes on to list a couple more trite favors that I can’t bring myself to tell her no one does anymore. “But then I suppose it would be difficult to transport them to you. If you lived near home, on the other hand, we could drop them off anytime.”

“Well I live in the city now, so I guess you’ll have to find someone else to partner up with in your business venture.” I roll my eyes at Kate. “Listen, Mom, I’d love to chat, but I’m having lunch with Kate right now.”

“Oh, well tell her I said hello, then. And don’t forget to call Emma.”

This lunch has gone from bad to worse. Thank goodness for Kobe beef.

“Can I have your apartment when your mom convinces you to move home?” Kate winks and offers a cheeky smile.

“That’ll be the day. I think she fantasizes about the day when Emma and I can share a fence in neighboring lots in the same subdivision. The scary thing is that Emma would love that too—it amazes me that my little sister is going to be a
mother
. Aren’t mothers women with short hair who subscribe to
Better Homes and Gardens?
Aren’t they
old?
She’s twenty-seven for Christ’s sake. It’s like children having children!”

“You know, Emma might be on the right track with the kid thing. That whole biological clock thing is true—just because you don’t want kids now doesn’t actually mean you’ll be able to have them when you’re ready at forty. I mean if you think about it, most of the country has kids in their twenties—it’s just us immature city women who postpone it until it’s too late. Then we end up on fertility drugs and having six kids at a time! Or spending months, even years, on pins and needles waiting for an adoption to come through! You watched
Sex and the City.
Do you want to be Charlotte? And then become
Jon & Kate Plus 8?
We all know how
that
turned out.”

Kate looks too serious, so I try to break the mood. “Or maybe we just take our time enjoying ourselves without needing to find a nanny. You don’t want to be Mrs. X in
The Nanny Diaries
.”

“I would never be that bitchy, no matter how rich I was.”

Ahh, wealth fantasies. A much safer topic. “When I win the lottery I’m going to learn to fly a Cessna so that I can jet myself back and forth between the Hamptons.”

“Like JFK Jr.?”

“Be nice, or I won’t share my winnings.”

“Once I’ve made my first few million I’m going to buy a beach house in Maui. Or better yet, I’ll invest in a resort so that I can just live there and have a wait staff. Nothing like daily maid service—one of the upsides to traveling so much for work and living in hotels.” Kate starts digging around her purse as we get the bill for lunch. “Damn, I left my lipstick on the dresser.” She looks at me expectantly.

I open the side pocket of my latest Prada totebag (I do replace them once they get worn out—frayed Prada is simply unacceptable, and my bags tend to get quite a beating). I pull out four lipsticks: Chanel, Lancôme, Bobbi Brown and Kiehl’s, all in universally flattering colors. She picks Chanel and I pick Bobbi Brown.

After lunch we spend the next couple of hours walking around Soho—the same strip of Broadway that we have walked up and down for years. Kate stops to notice all the stores that carry kids’ shoes now, and kids’ clothes, and she notices all the kids being hand held, strolled and scolded. “It’s like the entire world now caters to them! It used to just be the Upper West Side that was like this. People with kids moved to Brooklyn. What happened to the world of thirty-somethings?!”

“People are having fewer children these days. They can afford to lavish designer clothes on them, especially in dual-income households.”

Kate glares at me over a pair of stiletto heels that would never survive a walk over subway grating. I guess it wasn’t a serious question.

We continue shopping mostly in silence until it is time to head to the St. Regis. And when tea time finally rolls around and we see Suzanne I am so relieved that I even think her affected Briticisms are funny. “
Darlings!
You must have had a lovely time, shopping about like ladies of leisure.” She kisses us each on both cheeks. “That jumper is a gorgeous color on you, Kate.” I can almost hear colo-u-r in her voice. “Mia called and said she’d be late. So let’s just get seated, shall we?”

Our high tea is served and Suzanne has just finished asking for extra clotted cream. I think she just likes saying “clotted cream.” Kate is looking at a mother across the room who is introducing her nine-year-old to scones. She doesn’t exactly look wistful or sulky, more like—confused. As in “why in the world would someone want
that
.”

“You’ll never guess who I saw walking down Madison,” Suzanne says.

“Jude Law.”

She rolls her eyes. “He’s in
London
these days.”

“Woody Allen.”

“Kevin.”

My ex. My says-all-the-right-things (at the right time), charms-the-family (even my dad), charms-the-friends (platonically), moves-to-Boston (for law school), still-calls-me (occasionally), drunk-dialing Ex.

“He looks
good,
” Suzanne continues. Kate finally decides to pay attention to the conversation.

“Charming though he is, Kevin is the last thing Cass needs. She has got her hands full with what’s-his-name for Thursday night.”

So she was paying attention during lunch. I won’t disown her after all.

“What was he doing?” I couldn’t help but ask. “I thought he was moving to Brooklyn to shack up with his artsy fartsy girlfriend.”

“That’s over now. He’s apparently decided to return to his blueblood roots. He was wearing a dark grey suit that must have been made for him. And cuff links. He
looked
like an attorney.” Suzanne paused for half a beat. “He asked about you.”

God, I am pathetic. I try not to be on the edge of my seat. I shrug, but they know me well enough to realize I am not that nonchalant.

“I told him you were getting on fabulously, never better.” I love that Suzanne would say that no matter what my situation. But I’m also glad that it’s also true these days. “I said you were dating loads of men, but no one special. He seemed pretty interested in that bit of info.”

“Oh for Christ’s sake, Suzanne, Cassandra does not need a nostalgia fuck.”

“Must you be so crass, Kate?” Suzanne glances around sheepishly. She has a point—we are having high tea after all. You’d think we would be more civilized. “You never really had closure you know,” Suzanne continues to me. “He left for Harvard. You stayed here. You might be married by now if he had stayed.”

She acts like I have never thought this before. Like I didn’t think about it for months after Kevin left. Like it still didn’t cross my mind every now and then, when something about one of my grooms reminded me of him (remember the mop of curly hair that falls in his eyes?). I had accepted a long time ago that he wasn’t really right for me (wouldn’t I have moved to Boston when he asked me to?). But Suzanne thinks marriage is the key to ultimate happiness in life. You would think one failed attempt might sour her on the whole notion of lifelong monogamy. But no, it has made her determined to find true love for herself and for her friends.

“He’s back in the city now. You could—”

“He’s
been
back. For two years.”

“He’s single now.”

I am tempted to confess to Suzanne that Kevin’s relationship status didn’t matter to me. How it hadn’t mattered the first time we ended up in bed together after he moved back to the city, leaving behind a girlfriend in Boston. I had justified it as my payback. And how it hadn’t mattered months later after he’d broken up with her because he’d met a true “creative soul” who complemented him. I told myself she was such a free spirit, they must have an open relationship. Only Kate knew about my occasional “nostalgia fucks” with Kevin. The first time it happened I called her in the wee hours of the morning for some psychoanalysis. “What does this mean? Do I want him back? Does he want me back?” Her response was, “Hey, sometimes it’s hard to give up great sex. So why should you?” As close as Suzanne and I are, this was one of those things that a girl who “saved herself for marriage” wasn’t going to understand.

“Aren’t you curious about him?” Suzanne is almost glowing at the possibility of Kevin and me becoming a “we.” I know what is coming next. “What if he’s the One Who Got Away?”

“The One Who Got Away.” Kate knows what’s coming too. “Why dwell on someone you’ve already had when there are so many more worth having?” She ogles obviously at a blond walking in with his grandmother.

“It would be such a terrific love story, one you would tell your grandkids about.” Suzanne goes on, pretending not to notice Kate’s obvious attempt at stopping her. “How you were freshmen at NYU, then started dating when you were sophomores. Then after graduation he went off to Boston to become a lawyer—the heartache of a long-distance breakup, and then how you found one another years later. It’s destiny.”

“You’re ridiculous.” I finally have to step in. “You happened to run into him on the street for what, three minutes? And now you have us married off.”

“He
asked
about you.”

“I don’t
care
.” Thankfully Suzanne recognizes that tone in my voice and ends the subject. And I hope she doesn’t call later to resurrect it.

Mia finally walks in, looking frazzled as usual. And as usual she has her hair pulled into a low ponytail and isn’t wearing a bit of makeup, not even lip gloss, because she simply “can’t be bothered” when she spends most of her days and much of her evenings in the office.

“Mercury is in retrograde,” she says by way of explanation.

For those of you who aren’t well versed in planetary matters—Mercury is the planet of communications. When it’s in retrograde, it means things have a tendency to go wrong because of miscommunications. We all nod compassionately. Mia is the only one of us who still religiously checks her horoscope. “Last week my client tells me the creative is due in three weeks. On Friday she calls to say it’s due on
Monday
. Our designers are working around the clock to get it done.” Mia pops a salmon finger sandwich into her mouth and gulps tea. “So what is everyone doing tonight?”

“Great Abs Guy,” Kate says, unabashedly. “Oh, I’m sorry, I thought you said ‘
who
is everyone doing tonight.’”

“No plans,” I say, “now that the wedding’s been called off. Hey, why don’t the rest of us do something? Go someplace nice for dinner, then drinks? I haven’t been out on a Saturday night in ages!”

Suzanne beams. “Sorry, but tonight is date number three with Grant. We might go see that new Ryan Reynolds movie.”

“I think it might just be me and Tivo tonight,” says Mia. “I’m too tired for a night out.”

“Why don’t we make it a threesome,” I say, trying not to be disappointed that no one is up for going out with
me
. “I’ll bring the bubbly.”

Later that night Mia comes over with DVDs in hand.
Mean Girls
because we love discussing the rise and fall of Lindsay Lohan, and
Sixteen Candles
—because you can’t go wrong with a classic. We pop popcorn and I break out the Veuve Clicquot.

“I
love
that you have champagne all the time!” Mia looks so much happier now that she’s done with work for the day. “Your job perks are a lot better than mine. All I get is toothpaste now and then.”

“Here’s to celebratory couples who like to booze it up!” We clink glasses (proper crystal flutes, thank you very much. We’re no longer in college, after all). We settle into my cushiony sofa and play some music. It’s not exactly the night out I thought I’d have when the wedding was cancelled, but I love being out of my early twenties and not feeling like I need to be at the hottest bar/lounge/club of the moment.

Our dinner arrives—pad thai, that coconut soup that I can never remember the name of, curried shrimp, and chicken. I turn the containers out onto plates—somehow it always tastes better when you use real plates and real flatware. I pop a noodle into my mouth with my fingers. “So how’s it going with David anyway? How come you’re not hanging out with him tonight?”