Looking for a Love Story (7 page)

“He was funny the first time, but he’s not anymore, Francesca.”

Well, neither am I
.

I took another six months, rewrote the first half of the book without the dog, and showed it to Nancy.

“It’s not any fun without Max,” she said.

I decided to abandon the book I clearly couldn’t write and start over with a brand-new one. “I’ve always loved the Victorians,” I told Nancy. “I think I’ll try my hand at a historical novel.” I bought dozens of history books and spent months doing research in the library. I sketched out a plot and worked feverishly at it for a few more months before I had to admit to myself that, when you got to know them, the Victorians were unpleasantly smug and their personal hygiene left a lot to be desired. Plus, my heroine was a self-righteous pill. I dumped the historical novel. “I’m going to do a courtroom thriller,” I told everyone I knew. “After all, I wanted to be a lawyer once.” It only took me a couple of months of research to remember why I hadn’t followed up on my legal career. The good news was, I never started writing that book. The bad news? I gained another ten pounds. Oh, yeah, and I still didn’t have a new book for Gramercy Publishing.

Pete suggested I take a break from writing and do some other kind of work. Sheryl suggested that I go to Weight Watchers. Alexandra suggested that I try my hand at nonfiction. But I was a novelist—one who’d had an impressive debut. I kept on going into my home office every day to sit in front of my computer and stare at the blank screen. I’d write opening lines I would read and immediately delete. And eat chocolate.

Once, I tried to tell my new gal pals about my writer’s block. “Actually it’s not so much a block as a boulder,” I said, with what I hoped was a light little chuckle. A shudder ran around the table. I translated that to mean I had their sympathy. Maybe even their compassion. “I’m so afraid I can’t do this,” I confessed. “I’m afraid I’m going to fail.”

You’d have thought I was announcing that I had a terminal, highly contagious disease. I could actually feel them backing away.

“Oh, God,” someone finally said. “This is so depressing. Let’s change the subject.”

Andy was in town to work with Jake on one of their projects, and when I told her about the incident she shrugged. “What did you expect, Francesca? Those women are all swimming with sharks—the last thing they need is you reminding them of what happens when there’s blood in the water. You want my advice?”

I nodded eagerly.

“Get your toes done.”

“Excuse me?”

“Get a great pedicure, buy a really expensive pair of sandals, and go out to lunch. No one will know you’re having writer’s block.”

“But I
am.”

“People don’t want to know that. Look like a winner, Francesca.”

That particular chunk of wisdom reminded me of one of Jake’s favorite Hollywood stories; it was about some actor and his wife who had been big TV stars but their show had been canceled, and after several years of not working they were broke. When they finally landed a network meeting, they took out a second mortgage on the house, emptied what was left in the bank account, raided the kids’ college fund, and bought a huge diamond ring for the wife to wear. I’m sure you can write the ending to this story. The wife flashed the bling, the network suits were so impressed they figured no way the couple was all washed up, contracts were signed and … huzzah! The couple were back on the tube and back on top! “It’s all about appearances,” Jake used to crow at the end of this little tale. “To hell with the real you.” Which was pretty much what Andy had said to me. She and Jake were totally on the same page when it came to the importance of appearances.

By now Jake had officially had it with Francesca the Suffering Artiste. “Screw your work,” he said. “I have some free time, and we need a vacation. Stop driving yourself crazy, and let’s have some fun.”

Fun? How the hell could I have fun when I was terrified that I couldn’t write another book? I had to keep on fighting until I’d proved to myself that I could do it. “Why don’t you go by yourself for a couple of weeks?” I said. “I think I’m close to a breakthrough.” That was the thing—I always thought I was close to a breakthrough. Each morning when I got up I was sure that this was the day.

Jake looked at me for a long time. “I don’t like all this drama, Francesca,” he said. “I’m Shallow Guy, remember?”

“I just want to write a book again. I just want that feeling you get when everything is flowing.”

“And I want to have a life. Everything can’t stop dead for your creative muse.”

But writing was the only thing I’d ever done well. I’d loved the feeling of being good at something. And yeah, I’d loved the applause afterward. I’d gotten hooked on that.

Jake went to a resort in Mexico by himself. And our buddy Andy flew down to hang out with him for a day. And yes, I know how that sounds—how it probably would have sounded to me if I’d been paying attention. If I hadn’t been so busy failing as a writer. But when Jake called to tell me how much fun they’d had, and Andy got on the phone to tell me a funny story about Jake trying to bargain in the local market for a hat he wanted to bring me—or maybe it was a handbag—it seemed perfectly innocent. I mean, a man can have a woman friend, can’t he? We’re all adults here, right?

So Jake went to Mexico and came back. And I was still beating my brains out trying to come up with a new idea. I reread books
I’d loved and rented old movies, telling myself I was looking for inspiration. Finally I stopped lying to myself and admitted I was hoping to find a story I could cannibalize. But I couldn’t even do that. Nothing worked.

Meanwhile, my loved ones were getting on with life. My brother was given a grant by a prestigious foundation to design the definitive green city someplace where there was perpetual sunshine—I forget the country. His wife had her own grant to work with him on the ecological and environmental components. Their little daughter, who was now two, was already speaking both English and Spanish, and her parents were talking about starting her on a third language. My mother was profiled in a college textbook about influential women of the late twentieth century. I tried to be pleased for them, but to be honest, the fact that they had all gone into super-achiever mode was driving me nuts.

Then, just to put the cherry on the Misery Sundae, Nancy announced that she was quitting the business. “I’m adopting a little girl from China,” she told me, at the last of our lunches, “and I need some time off. So I’m going back to California to be near my mother.”

“But you’re one of the best agents in the city.”

“I’m not getting any younger, Francesca. I’ve always wanted to be a mom, and it’s now or never.”

She was two years younger than I was—that was the first thing I thought. Then I wailed, “What’ll I do without you? Who’s going to sell my books?”

Nancy’s eyes met mine and we had one of those awkward moments. The words
What books?
hung in the air. That was when I realized it had been three years since I published
Love, Max
.

“Congratulations on the adoption,” I said, in my chirpiest voice. “If this is what you want, I’m so happy for you!”

“Me too.” Then she drew a breath. “Francesca? I still believe in you.”

I managed not to cry then. It wasn’t until I was standing on the subway platform on my way home, and this guy pulled out his violin and started playing it after putting his hat on the ground in front of him for tips, that I started to sob. I’m pretty sure we all know what the life lesson here is. When you start weeping because someone is playing “Ave Maria”—very badly—in the subway station, you’ve got a big problem.

I finally gave up my fight to write a book. I haven’t looked at the computer in four months. I wish I could say that I’ve taken a vacation with Jake and had some fun. Or at least that I joined Weight Watchers. But I wasn’t sure they’d understand about chocolate. And lately, every time I’ve suggested that Jake and I take off and go somewhere, he’s been busy. As I said, he and Andy have joined forces to work together, and they’ve been bouncing back and forth between LA and New York, rounding up the funding for their first project. In fact, they just got the final chunk of it last week. So the awards dinner for Andy that Jake and I were attending that night—the one where Jake was going to introduce her as his friend and partner—it was going to be like a celebration for both of them.

ANNIE FINISHED HER
business and there was still no sign of Jake. I told myself not to get upset. Somehow, some way, Jake had gotten past me and gone upstairs. I raced into the building and up to my apartment, but it was still dark. And quiet. And empty.

I remembered that we still had an answering machine hooked up to the phone in my office. Now that we had cell phones, it didn’t get a lot of use, but sometimes Jake liked to leave messages
the old-fashioned way. I rushed to the office and, sure enough, the red light on the machine was blinking. I pushed the button.

“Francesca?” Jake’s voice said. “Look, I know you’re probably going to blow off Andy’s dinner tonight the way you always do….” He trailed off. Then he spoke again. “We need to talk, Francesca,” he said. As if I hadn’t heard him when he said it earlier.

Annie was jabbing her nose into my stomach, which is her way of telling me that it’s past her dinnertime, and since I have an opposable thumb and she doesn’t, I’m the one to get busy with the can opener. I went into the kitchen, fed her, and tried to think rationally. According to our big clock in the foyer, it was seven. The awards dinner started at seven-thirty and the hotel ballroom where they were holding it was on the other side of town. No way Jake was coming home this late, he was probably at the hotel already. He’d gone there directly from … wherever he’d been for the last couple of hours. And whoever he’d been with.

Because suddenly I knew Jake hadn’t been alone. This was his night to celebrate his new partnership with Andy. After he’d had his Talk with me. But I’d screwed up that timetable by taking off for the park. So Jake had gone for a little advance celebration with his partner, which had lasted a bit longer than he’d thought it would. I wondered if he had a spare tux in her hotel suite—the awards dinner was black-tie, and Jake would rather chew glass than screw up a dress code.

And I had been a fool. Probably for a long time.

Here’s the thing about being in denial: When you stop, it’s like you’ve been living in a kind of half darkness and suddenly someone turns on every light in the house. All those little nooks and crannies you couldn’t quite see but knew were there are all of a sudden brightly, glaringly visible. And you start to think. You realize you have no way of knowing if your husband and his dear pal—and yours—spent one day together in Mexico or two weeks. You
don’t know if he booked a hotel room for one or for two when they were traveling together, rounding up funding for their new partnership. You don’t really know where he stayed all those times when he was in Los Angeles—where she has that roomy old house in Los Feliz. And you sure as hell don’t know what he was doing when she was in New York and they were having business meetings that lasted until two in the morning.

That’s when you hack into his private email account and read the last message he received before he took off for the day. The one he didn’t bother to delete because he never knew you had his password. The message is from his pal. His new business partner. Who is suggesting doing things to him when they’re alone in her hotel room that you’ve never even imagined. And you pride yourself on your creativity.

I changed into my gown, skipped the makeup and hair drill, grabbed my purse, and headed out.

THE HOTEL BALLROOM
was decorated in black, red, and silver. Red-and-silver trellises had been attached to the walls and live black roses—I guess they were dyed—were threaded through them. The room was jammed with small round tables that were covered with red tablecloths, black china, and silver-rimmed glasses. The centerpieces featured black roses floating in big bowls of water tinted red with silver flecks drifting around. Very festive—if you could get past the feeling that there was something creepy about roses that were black. Personally, I couldn’t. But then no one had asked me.

There was a long table on a dais at the end of the room. I scanned it, looking for Jake. I knew he’d be sitting on the dais because he was giving the introduction. I spotted him right away, seated in the center of the table in front of the microphone. He
was properly attired in black tie. So there
was
an Alternate Plan Tux. Like the woman who was seated next to him, the fun, successful pal who had been offering him an alternative to his not-fun, not-successful wife. His partner, who was glowing like a teenager—probably because she’d spent the last couple of hours with him doing all those things she’d outlined in her email. Andy. My friend.

The first course had already been served by the time I arrived. I’d been to enough awards dinners to know that they wouldn’t be starting the speeches while people were still munching on their salads, so I moved up to the dais, planning to—well, at that point, I didn’t have a plan. I was winging it. Jake was chatting with someone on his right. On his left, Andy was staring at a bowl of ugly black roses. She looked pensive. Was she having second thoughts about breaking up my marriage? No, that was too much to ask. She turned to Jake with her glowing smile and joined his conversation. I was a little less than a foot away from her. It only took a second to step in and dump the red water over her perfectly coiffed head. Black rose petals stuck to her face and shoulders, looking like polka dots—or a really gross rash. She was drenched in water the shade of cherry Kool-Aid. Did I mention that the silk gown she was wearing was beige? Talk about your sweet moments.

Andy shrieked, and Jake looked up. He saw me, jumped to his feet, and hunched over Andy, trying to shield her from me. I thought about pointing out that I was the one he’d promised to protect and cherish, but there was still some water left in the bowl so I dumped it on him instead. I watched the red liquid run down his beautiful face and over the place on the back of his neck that I loved to kiss, and I tried to be as mad at him as I was at her. But he was Jake, so I couldn’t. And that made me even madder.