Living Single (17 page)

Authors: Holly Chamberlin

BOOK: Living Single

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Chapter Twenty-eight

E—still regaining strength but Jorges is helping my recovery. txs for money. you didn’t tell yr father did you? Mother

Where does one have sex with one’s lover if A, one’s lover is married; B, one’s lover won’t come to one’s perfectly lovely home; and C, one is opposed to checking into sleazy one-hour, no-tell motels?

Answer: One has sex wherever one can.

We fooled around in Doug’s office, after hours, of course. We fooled around—to what extent we could—in the dark of a movie theater’s back row, at the last showing, of course. We made out—what an embarrassing teenage term—in a nightclub called Mercury, where we were by far the oldest couple in the place. After our second visit, I declared Mercury off-limits. I’d heard a snicker on our way out. A snicker from a twenty-something with the flattest stomach I’d ever seen. I thought very bad thoughts about her.

And because it was August and the weather hot and humid but not altogether unpleasant, we found ourselves—involved—in the great outdoors.

Yes, even once in an alley in the Leather District somewhere near South Station. There was definitely something thrilling about doing it against an old brick wall in the dark of night. It had the prostitute fantasy-thing about it—but ultimately, that fantasy could not survive the monstrously huge rat I saw scoot over Doug’s shoe. That was the end of the alleys.

Sex with Doug Spears was great. But the occasional excursion was fun, too. And romantic. It made me feel, for a brief time, as if we were a real couple. An everyday-world couple.

One day Doug and I skipped out of work and treated ourselves to a day in the North End.

“You know,” I said, as we walked along Hanover Street, “I never even considered playing hooky when I was a kid. Never. Besides, if I had played hooky the guilt later would have made me confess and beg for punishment.”

“What about college? Don’t tell me you made every single class in college. No hangovers? No blowing chemistry—”

“Chemistry? Who do you think I am?”

“Okay, no blowing French to hang out with Pierre and get your own hands-on language lesson?”

I laughed. “Well, okay, in college I did skip a few classes. On rare occasions. But never for a guy.”

“You’re an example to all women.”

“I’m an example of someone who didn’t have nearly enough sex in college.”

“I hope we can correct that sad situation now,” Doug said, nuzzling my ear.

“After we eat.”

“I love a girl with a healthy appetite.”

“Good,” I said, “because you’re paying.”

“Then I’d better get some more cash,” Doug said and there was something in his tone I didn’t get.

Until the next moment I realized that, of course, he couldn’t put a midweek North End meal on his personal credit card in case Carol might see the bill and question the occasion. And he couldn’t put the meal on his corporate card because he’d told his staff he had a doctor’s appointment that afternoon.

We were hedged in and our happiness proscribed no matter where we went or what we did. My spirits plummeted.

“So, what’s on the agenda?” Doug said when he’d gotten the cash.

If he could make an effort at enjoyment, so could I.

“Well, first stop is the Daily Catch, also known as Mangia Calamari. We order the fried calamari, which I eat with a dash or two of hot pepper oil.”

“Sounds good so far. Except don’t expect me to kiss you afterward.”

“Ha. The best is yet to come, believe me. Then we order black pasta with aolio oilio. It’s served in the pan right on the table. Maybe we’ll order the monkfish marsala. Do you like monkfish?”

“I have no idea.”

“Well, you will. There’s something very sexy about marsala sauce.”

“You open whole new worlds to me, Ms. Weston.”

“Don’t mock. Then, we’ll go across the street to Café Vittorio for dessert, maybe some hazelnut gelato or a Napolean. And to use the bathroom.”

“Why can’t you use the bathroom in Daily Catch?”

“Because there is none.”

“Isn’t that illegal?”

“I have no idea.”

We proceeded as I’d planned.

During lunch, Doug surprised me with exciting news. It seems that he and Jack Nugent had been talking about luring me to Trident.

“But I’ve never even considered doing branding and positioning for big corporations,” I said, stunned.

“Maybe it’s time you did. We’re not ready to make a specific offer yet,” Doug explained. “We’re working on tailoring a position for you and your strengths. But Jack does want you to know what we’re thinking. If coming on board with Trident is out of the question for you, we’d like to know now, before we spend any more time on the idea.”

“Of course I’m interested,” I said, and I meant it. I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that the rest of lunch and coffee after—Doug’s hand playing on my thigh under the tiny table at Café Vittorio—was more fun than it might have been if Doug hadn’t dangled the lure of a lucrative career move.

I decided to do some shopping while in the North End. I dragged Doug to Monica’s for cheeses and olives and prosciutto, all of which I would eat alone or with my friends, certainly not with Doug, who’d never been to my apartment and who said it was where he drew the line. Something about crossing my threshold, he said, would make him feel too guilty about our relationship to continue seeing me.

I didn’t understand but I accepted his feelings, though his refusing to visit my home did hurt on some deep level. Home is where people in love should feel most in love. Doug and I had no home.

Three hours later we made our way back to the Back Bay through the circuitous path resulting from the construction nightmare known as The Big Dig. Back to our separate lives. Doug home to wife and kids. Me, home to Fuzzer.

As I walked back to the South End, clutching my bag of Italian treats, I thought about the afternoon alone with Doug and began to feel sad again.

Sometimes, escape doesn’t seem worth it. It makes reality seem too horribly grim.

I had a troubling conversation with my father not long after that. I’d just gotten home from work when the phone rang. I hoped it would be Doug; we’d had plans to meet but at the last minute Doug had canceled. He’d been called home early by Carol. She had been throwing up all day and just couldn’t handle the kids, now that they were home from school and activities.

Of course, I took Carol’s stomach virus to be a sign of pregnancy. I was not in the happiest of moods.

It was not Doug calling. It was my father.

“Oh. Hi, Dad,” I said.

He laughed. “Not a very enthusiastic greeting. Expecting someone else?”

“No, no,” I said quickly. “I’m sorry. I just got in.”

“Well, I won’t keep you. You probably have plans. I just wanted to check in and say hi.”

“Okay,” I said. “Hi. What’s going on?”

I walked with the phone into the kitchen to feed Fuzzer. The Great Beige Beast was yowling as if he hadn’t eaten in weeks.

“Erin,” Dad said, not answering my last question, “I haven’t heard you talk about anyone in a long time. Have you been out with anyone lately?”

I popped open a can of food. Fuzzer threw himself on the floor at my feet and screamed.

Why did Dad have to ask me this?

“Erin?”

“Sorry, Dad. I’m just giving Fuzzer his dinner.”

“Is he being his usual dramatic self?”

“Of course.”

“So, what’s the answer? Have you been out lately?”

“You mean, on a date? No, not really. Nothing worth mentioning.”

Liar. My stomach began to squirm. I spooned chicken in gravy into a bowl and set it before Fuzzer, who immediately tucked in.

“Oh. I wish you would meet someone worthy. I don’t like to think of you being alone. You’re not lonely, are you, Erin?”

Oh, if only he knew. If only I had trust enough in his love to tell him the truth.

“I’m fine, Dad,” I said. “I can take care of myself.”

Could I?

“I know you can. But I’m your father. I reserve the right to worry about you. I want you to be happy. And, well, I know you’re not entirely comfortable with my seeing Abby. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your maturity about it all.”

If Dad only knew how torn up I was about—everything.

“Thanks, Dad. And I know you care. I appreciate your concern, really. And if I need any advice, I promise I’ll come to you.”

Would I? I hadn’t thus far.

“Okay,” he said. “By the way, have you heard from your mother lately?”

“Yeah,” I said lightly. “She’s fine, you know.”

“She’s not hitting you up for money is she?”

How had he known?

“No,” I lied. “Of course not.”

Dad didn’t respond right away. Then: “Okay. Well, I guess I should be off.”

“Plans?”

“Nothing much. Abby wants to see some movie.” Dad’s voice lowered. “I think it’s one of those chick flicks.”

I laughed. “Your secret’s safe with me,” I said. “And, Dad? Thanks. Really.”

After we’d hung up I took off my shoes and lay down on the couch. I felt like a Victorian lady about to have a spell. A headache was coming on. I shivered and drew a chenille throw over my legs. A sadness settled heavily on my heart. A sadness not relieved even when Fuzzer curled up on my stomach and went to sleep.

Chapter Twenty-nine

D
oug and I met for a quick lunch, sandwiches in the Common. We found a bench not occupied by a homeless man or covered by pigeon poop and sat.

“Can I ask you a question?” I said, unwrapping my mozzarella, basil, and tomato sandwich.

“Could I stop you?”

“No. Why didn’t you acknowledge my thank you message for the Valentine’s Day roses?”

Doug didn’t have a snappy comeback. He took a bite of his proscuitto, marinated red pepper, and provolone, chewed, swallowed. Finally, he said: “It struck me when I heard your message that I’d made a huge move and though I didn’t regret it, I swear, I ... I got scared.”

“For weeks. Until you called and asked me to lunch at Radius.”

“Exactly. Silly, huh?”

Not at all. In fact, Doug’s very human reaction endeared him further to me.

It never occurred to me that he could be lying. Covering the fact, for example, that he’d found a hotter prospect and had had fun with her for a while, knowing I’d probably be around, hooked by the big romantic gesture, intrigued by his ensuing silence.

That kind of thing just never occurred to me at all.

As it was a bright day with little humidity, when we’d finished our sandwiches we took a long and circuitous route back to our offices.

Along the way we passed an old and slightly crumbling Catholic church, St. Luke’s. A midday service, mass or some prayer thing, was just letting out. The attendees seemed mostly to be very old Irish-American ladies. I spotted a few homeless people, as well.

“Well, the Church is good for something,” I said dryly. “It gives the homeless an opportunity to get out of the hot sun or the bitter cold.”

“So, you don’t go to church anymore?” Doug asked.

“No. I’m what’s known as a recovering Catholic. It sounds less complicated than it is. It’s not a joke, believe me.”

“I can’t begin to imagine what it involves. I won’t laugh. Just get better soon, okay?”

“I’m trying. My friends are a big help.”

I wondered ... Since the unhappy conversation with my girlfriends at Dish the month before, I’d been wanting to ask Doug how he’d feel about meeting my friends. In the abstract, of course. Until he and Carol separated, when he’d be free to come to my apartment and all.

“Doug,” I said, “let me ask you something else. Would you want to meet my friends? You know, Abby, JoAnne, Maggie. Damion. I’m not setting something up or anything,” I added hurriedly, lest he think this seemingly innocent question was a feminine-type trap. “I’m just ... wondering.”

Doug’s answer was swift in coming and final in tone. “That’s not a good idea, Erin.”

“But ...”

“Look, it’s very important that we be careful about who sees us together. We have to be vigilant.”

“But they’re my friends,” I said, slightly confused. “They already know about us.”

Doug shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. Besides, it’s not like I want to become friends with them.”

That was a bit of a shocker. “Oh,” I said eloquently.

“And they sure as hell can’t want to be friends with me,” Doug said with a laugh.

“I just thought, you know, because they’re important to me you’d at least maybe want to meet them, even if you can’t really meet them. I thought ...”

“Hey.” Doug’s voice became low and intimate. “Aren’t you and I enough? Why do you want to bring other people into this?”

Because, I thought, that’s what real couples do. They share friends and family. They share their full lives.

I said, “I don’t. I’m sorry. Let’s just forget it.”

And we went back to our separate offices.

Abby had decided we all needed a little culture so she suggested we journey to a museum. She voted for the Museum of Fine Arts. Maggie suggested the Science Museum. I went with the Isabella Stewart Gardner. JoAnne won with her vote for the John F. Kennedy Library and Museum. Saturday we made the excursion. Abby drove, something she rarely did in the city of Boston itself. I kept a tight grip on the door handle and buckled my seat belt tightly.

We made it to Dorchester without accident.

“Wow,” I said. “Just, wow. I always forget how beautiful it is out here and then I’m shocked all over again.”

The building itself is stunning, another of I. M. Pei’s contributions to Boston, and the brightness of the blue sky, the glittering water, the white sailboats and yachts bobbing gently, made the place seem magical. Like, well, Camelot.

I kept this tired old observation to myself.

We split up and wandered alone, occasionally joining for a comment or observation.

I was standing in front of a display case that contained a marked-up draft of a speech when Abby joined me.

“I forgot that once upon a time politicians had brains,” she said.

“Not every politician did. And not every politician today is dopey.”

“George Bush is. But Bill Clinton isn’t.” That was JoAnne. “Wasn’t. Just horny.”

“Granted. Something else he had in common with JFK,” I noted. “An addiction to his dick.”

Maggie completed the group. “Who, JFK?”

“Yes. And Bill Clinton.”

“Oh, who cares?” she said. “As long as his penis doesn’t affect public policy he can play with it all he likes.”

“The American public is pretty unsophisticated about sex, isn’t it?” I said.

JoAnne laughed. “Fixated, you mean. We’re a nation of guilty eleven-year-olds. With a few exceptions.”

“JFK was a good president, wasn’t he?”

“He tried, Abby. I’ll give him that.”

“I think Bobby was cuter,” she said.

Maggie grinned. “You would.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing,” I said, watching Maggie stroll off to another display. “You know, rumor has it that Jackie and Bobby were having an affair after Jack’s death.”

JoAnne rolled her eyes. “If you had to go home to Ethel and a passle of screaming kids, you’d make nice to Jackie, too.”

“Meow. Anyway,” Abby said, “it’s only a rumor. Maybe they were just good friends. You know, consoling each other in their grief.”

I sighed. “Anything’s possible.”

“If it makes you happy to think so ...”

“You two.” Abby strolled off again, obviously exasperated by JoAnne’s and my cynicism. Again.

“Could we not talk about illicit romantic relationships, please?” I said when she’d gone. “For five minutes?”

“Too close to home, honey?”

“Uh, yeah. Though how we’re going to avoid talk of affairs surrounded by photos of the Kennedy men, I have no idea.”

“We can always blow this popsicle stand and go somewhere for drinks,” JoAnne suggested. “I, for one, am beginning to get museum legs.”

“You’re lazy. But I’m there. I’ll find Abby, you get Maggie, and we’ll meet in the lobby.”

“Deal.”

The excursion to the JFK Library and Museum had—not surprisingly—raised the topic of marriage and two hours later, at Jacob Wirth, the topic would still not lie down and shut up no matter how often I tried to introduce a new, neutral topic, like—toothpaste preferences. So, reluctantly at first but gradually with more enthusiasm, I joined in.

The current subtopic was intimacy.

“I want the kind of intimacy that ... that comes when you share a checking account. That comes when you buy furniture together. I mean—I want to be part of a team,” I said.

“I should point out,” JoAnne drawled, “that lots of teammates are miserably unhappy over the lack of romance in their lives.”

“Okay. But maybe they function smoothly on a daily basis and are friends and companions and eat dinner together every night and take care of each other when they have colds. Isn’t there something to be said for all that? Maybe all that starts to mean more than passion.”

“You’d rather be Archie and Edith Bunker than Heathcliff and Cathy?” JoAnne said.

I rolled my eyes. “Well, they’re both a little extreme, don’t you think? Come on, how can you choose between ignorance and insanity?”

“Can’t you have all that with a friend?” Maggie said. “I mean, a roommate or a best friend? If you take the sex out of the equation, isn’t that what’s left? Friendship?”

“I guess. But, no,” I said. “I think there’s something more than just friendship to a marriage. Look. Even if a husband and wife aren’t superpassionate, they sleep in the same bed, they hug ...”

“They clean the sleep out of each other’s eyes.”

“Oh, gag!”

“They know each other’s bodies,” I went on, ignoring the goofing around, “they have this bond that’s—deeper, more tender than what exits between two people who are just friends.”

“Or the bond that exists between two people who are just lovers,” JoAnne pointed out. “Between two people who fool around—in his office, after hours?—but who don’t go grocery shopping together and plan their yearly budgets and buy each other’s mothers birthday cards.”

“I know,” I said miserably. “I know.”

I said I wanted a marriage. And yet I chose to have an affair.

Do what I say, not what I do, Reason crowed. What kind of an example are you setting for yourself? What are you trying to prove? What are you running away from?

And how did JoAnne know Doug and I mostly had sex in his office, after hours? Were we that much of a cliché?

Maggie asked me: “Do you seriously want to be the kind of wife who makes sandwiches for her husband’s poker parties? Do you really want to be the kind of mother who has her kids’ Christmas portraits taken at Sears?”

I laughed. “Lord, no! I’m too jaded for that. But I do intend to use my kids’ pictures on our holiday cards. I’ll take the pictures. No goofy backdrops. Something tasteful, like my beautiful kids and a noble dog and a sleek cat in front of an elegantly decorated tree in my elegantly decorated living room.”

“What if your kids are ugly? It happens, you know.”

“Impossible,” I said. “My kids will be Caroline and John Jr. cute.”

“Let’s hope their fates will be happier,” Maggie added.

JoAnne raised her glass. “To the memory of John.”

We joined her in a toast.

“To his sister’s bravery in the face of adversity and loss.” Abby.

“To Caroline.”

“To Carolyn Bessett Kennedy.”

Our toasts were followed by a spontaneous moment of silence.

“You know,” I finally said, “we might not have everything we want in life, but we have each other. And that’s pretty damn good.”

JoAnne laughed but it sounded forced. “Uh, oh. Erin’s getting maudlin. Time to cut her off.”

I made a face.