Room for Love (5 page)

“I just called to wish you a happy birthday, dear,” she says. She already sent a card saying to buy myself a spring outfit on her.

“Thanks,” I say, walking down the short hallway into the living room to show Court the dress. She gives it the thumbs-up. “And thanks so much for the gift.”

“Is that
boy
coming to your party?” my mom asks. She sounds like she's referring to a disease that could make my ears fall off.

“Jake? Yes, he's coming,” I say, puckering my lips at my reflection in the living room window.

“You know, Jacquie, what they say: Can't find Mr. Right—”

“Yeah, yeah, Mr. Retarded,” I say, making the hand sign for “chatterbox” at Courtney.

“What?” my mom asks.

“Nothing.”

“Let me put your father on,” she says, handing over the phone.

“Daddy!” I say, sitting down on my desk chair to savor the one conversation I'll probably have with my dad for the next three months.

“Happy birthday, baby,” he says.

“Thanks, thanks so much. What are you guys doing tonight?”

“Your mother's making dinner and I have blue books to grade.”

“On what?”

“It's for my first-year survey course on Western political thought. They will be awful.”

“It'll be a long night,” I say.

He laughs. “Yes.”

“Look, I really have to go. I'm so sorry, but we're late for this party, and I'm the guest of honor. Can we talk soon?”

“Yes, baby,” he says. “Have fun.”

Courtney has dimmed the lights—they're all on dimmers, one of my apartment's many attributes—and lit three candles that are neatly placed on a tray on the floor. One of them she apparently brought with her from home, because it's covered in glitter, animal stickers, and magazine pictures of happy things she hopes will come into my life: babies, kittens, sunny beaches, yachts, kisses shared by a pretty girl and a tall, hunky guy. I already have one similar candle creation à la Courtney by my bed and another on the edge of the bath. She makes them with her students. Courtney kneels with a pad of paper and a pen in her hands. “All right, beautiful thirty-two-year-old Aries woman, make three wishes.”

I sit cross-legged in front of her. “Okay. I want to find a really well-paid writing gig.…”

“Say it in the present tense,” she says.

I kick myself for forgetting the first rule of creative visualization. “Okay, I
am finding
a freelance writing job that I love that will supplement my income so I'm not killing myself to pay my bills every month.”

“Keep it positive, Jacq,” Courtney corrects me. “And be as specific as possible. You're more likely to get what you want if you can define it.”

“Sorry, right. Okay, I am finding a regular writing gig for a high-paying, glossy magazine, that I love doing and that will provide me with enough extra income to keep me living the lifestyle that I'm accustomed to.” I smile, all proud, and concentrate on my next wish. “Okay, I'm finishing fixing up my apartment.”

“Specific,” Courtney says.

“I am painting the bathroom and putting up the kitchen tiles and refinishing the floors and buying curtains and hiring someone to build shelves.” I pause to figure out if I've forgotten anything. “And I'm getting rid of Alicia.” Courtney laughs. “Seriously, I'm transforming this apartment into my vision of the beautiful, peaceful home I know it can become, one that can be my sanctuary in the big, noisy city and where maybe I can even settle down and build a life with someone.”

“One more.”

I blush, struggling to find the right words. “I am marrying and having babies with a man who is totally gorgeous, with beautiful lips and eyes and broad shoulders and a thin waist, who's really smart, brilliantly witty, who appreciates Godard, but maybe secretly likes Truffaut better, oh and who worships Wong Kar-Wai and Bergman and Fellini as much as I do, but I guess it would be okay if he had different taste, like he's a big Bresson or Kubrick or Tarkovsky freak, I mean it would give us something to talk about, but he has to like Almodóvar films and David Lynch films and he absolutely has to like
Moulin Rouge!
And, oh, I'd love it if he's lived abroad—no, wait, he's from another country! Italy or France or Brazil or Australia, maybe, so he's got family there and a house in, like, Positano or the Cap d'Antibes, where we can spend summers, and who loves dogs, God, who has a dog. I guess he should have money; hell, I am describing my perfect guy, after all!”

“Okay, slow down, love. That's great, good details. But is it really necessary to be with someone with a passion for French movies? Think hard and list the qualities that are actually most important in your perfect divine romantic partner. That's who you're looking for, after all. For example, I think it's time you found someone attentive. I think that's an important one for you, and openhearted. I've seen you with too many self-involved men whose hearts are closed.”

“Right.” I close my eyes, take a deep breath, and start again. “Okay, I'm meeting and falling in love with a man who is attentive and openhearted.” I think about Jake and all that's been missing in our relationship. “A man who is giving and sweet—sweet is so underrated—intelligent, financially stable, confident, firmly established in an interesting, creative career, who has, um, good taste in movies and books. God, I know it's superficial, but I need to be really attracted to a guy. Without chemistry, it'll never work.”

“That's all right, you can say that if it's something that matters to you. Don't be embarrassed, just verbalize the qualities that you really need in the man you love.”

“Okay, who's handsome, sexy, honest, loving, considerate, and who loves me as much as I love him.” I pause to think. “God, at this point, he has to be able to build bookshelves and lug shit, so handy, and thoughtful, I guess, and who loves dogs and makes me laugh and who's a hot, smokin' babe that I want to eat every time I see him.”

“Don't forget ready for a relationship,” she says, nodding.

“Yeah, the most important thing: ready for a relationship, excited about a relationship—with me, of course.”

“Now write that down,” she says. I do my best.

“Okay,” Courtney says. “I'm going to burn your wishes, to put them out into the universe.” I love Courtney.

We stare into the middle candle for several minutes, until I feel entranced by the flame. Then she breaks the spell by pulling the piece of paper with my wishes inscribed on it out of my hands and letting the flame gobble it up.

Thanks to all that positive thinking, Courtney and I are running forty minutes late to my own party. I take a last look in the mirror, pile all thirteen tons of my mop on top of my head, stick it up there with a barrette, add red, red lipstick and a spritz of perfume, throw on a puffy red jacket that matches my lips, and waltz out the door. Luckily, my friends are gathering right around the corner at my favorite bar on Avenue C, which boasts forty-two different kinds of beer and a mojito famous for making patrons do things they wish they hadn't.

On the way down the stairs, Courtney says, “So, Jake's coming, finally?”

“Yeah, kind of late, though. He has his meeting with that gallery guy.”

“You know, Jacquie, it wouldn't kill you to go out on a date with someone else from time to time.”

We walk outside into the frosty night. The multigenerational posse of men who spend their lives hanging out in front of the garage next door to my building are sitting in a row of lawn chairs, bundled in matching Windbreakers. They stop chattering in Spanish and nod in silent recognition as we pass. I nod back. Beyond them, at the end of the block, J
ESUS
S
AVES
burns red and periwinkle neon against the black sky. Dry leaves rustle on the cold pavement, as the wind whips them into the air, and swirl wildly above all our heads. We all stare upward.

“Courtney,” I say, snapping out of it, “whatever you might think of Jake, I am seeing someone right now and I'm not just going to start going out with other people. I'm going to let it play out and then we'll see. I might be a slut, but I'm pathologically faithful.”

She walks silently beside me. I can feel her frown without even looking at her. We both watch a woman with fluorescent pink hair in a leopard skin coat and combat boots pushing a stroller, until my gaze is drawn to a yellow Lab wearing tiny red booties on his paws who's tied up to a parking meter outside a deli. “Hey, baby, nice footwear,” I say, reaching out my hand to pet him. He gives me his paw to shake instead, then licks my palm passionately.

“Plus, I don't date,” I tell Courtney.

“You're always saying that, but it's not really true, is it? You and Jake go on dates.”

“That's not dating. That's getting food with someone I'm having sex with. I do that, I mean, I have to eat.”

As Courtney shakes her head, I say, “I just don't go out with guys I don't know. I meet someone and either we have sex and fall instantly into a relationship—fling, affair, whatever—or we don't. I mean, you want to sleep with someone or you don't, so why force yourself to make dinner-table conversation with a guy if you don't feel an immediate, barely controllable urge to jump on him?”

“Well, apparently that routine doesn't work very well,” Courtney says. “You end up with these men who don't treat you well and wasting time that could be spent meeting someone great.”

I stop in my tracks right in front of the bar and turn to face her. “Look, Court, I know what I do. I've been doing it since I was, like, fifteen. I just don't know how to stop.” Mid-rant, I wave and make kissy lips at a passing poodle in a shearling coat, then continue, “You know, sometimes I actually pray that I'll meet someone and let myself slowly get to know him and it will slowly dawn on me that this sweet, attentive, generous, intelligent,
openhearted
person is actually The Guy, because he is so damn wonderful and sweet and the rest of it, and then we'll live happily ever.” I'm well aware that I'm raising my voice now, but I don't care and the whistling wind seems to be whipping up my volume.

“But the thing is, Court, after I'm done praying, I usually do something like tequila shots and hook up with some cute blond boy and run around grinning for weeks or months or whatever until he commits some unforgivable crime that makes me realize he's a dick, but by then I'm already hooked, 'cause he's cute and I like sleeping with him, not to mention the pure drama of it all. Courtney, where would I be without the crying and screaming and showing up at your place in the middle of the night to sob on your shoulder?”

“Oh, honey,” she says, defeated. “Let's go get you a drink.”

The first person we see inside is Alicia, who's holding her long, straight black hair in her fist while pounding tequila with her friend Claire. Alicia scrunches up her dark eyes and lets out a whoop, slamming the empty shot glass onto the bar, then bites a wedge of lime and grimaces before throwing one arm around Claire's shoulder and the other around me. I hug them and in return get the requisite “happy birthdays” and free drinks, mixed by my bartending friend Johnny, a naughty Irishman who gets a thrill out of turning my brain into mush.

“Happy birthday, gorgeous! Love the polka dots,” he calls from the other end of the bar. “Next one's on me.” I pull myself onto the bar to give him a smooch.

By midnight, forty of my friends and acquaintances have taken over the place, one group playing a game of advanced quarters at a big table in the back. I haven't turned into a pumpkin, but I have marinated my brain in mojito, which makes the conversation I'm having with Stefan, a onetime boyfriend who's trying to persuade me to go home with him, almost bearable. Jake still hasn't arrived. Courtney keeps looking at her watch, throwing menacing looks at Alicia, and making ever-so-subtle comments like, “I'll strangle him,” under her breath.

My lanky gay boyfriend, Jeremy, dances in, wearing an off-white puffy jacket and matching ski cap, high from a successful first date.

“Well, where is he if it was so great?” I ask him.

“He had drinks plans after dinner, but it was magical, really. We're going out again this weekend.”

Jeremy's always getting his heart busted by some guy he's supposedly going out with again this weekend, so I'm skeptical. Gay Boyfriend and I met at the dog run. I don't technically have a dog, but I do have dog envy that drives me to hang out at the dog run and flirt with other people's. I used to fantasize about meeting a handsome dog owner and knocking out the desire for canine and desire for canine-loving beau with one stone. Unfortunately, the only person I ever fell in love with there was Jeremy.

One blissfully balmy summer night, Jeremy's Chihuahua got spooked by the unsavory advances of an enormous Rottweiler named Ralph and ran away so fast that he slipped right out of his tiny collar. Jeremy was chasing him through the park, shouting, “Napoleon!” when the little guy came to an abrupt halt at the sight of Larry, the mini-mutt I was babysitting while his mom (my neighbor) was out of town. It was homosexual puppy love at first sight for Napoleon and Larry.

While they sniffed each other's butt, barked gleefully at big dogs, and got their leashes adorably tangled, I was busy falling for Napoleon's dad. He was tall and masculine, with a smile that reminded me of Robert Redford circa
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

“He has a little dog?” my sister said when I called her later. “He either has a girlfriend or he's gay.”

I wasn't aware of that rule—or maybe I was in denial. I could have noticed he was a little too well-dressed and -behaved when we met in the park, but who stops to ask if someone's gay when you just don't want him to be? As the sky drained of its color and we chatted as if we'd always been friends, I envisioned myself on a deserted beach, barefoot in a simple yet striking white dress—like Katharine Hepburn in
Philadelphia Story,
only sexier and shorter and sleeveless—clutching Jeremy's hand before a female justice of the peace, our three scrappy kids—boy, girl, boy—with dirt on their faces climbing tangled trees in the sprawling backyard of our charming Catskills cottage, one of the boys tumbling from a branch, scraping his chin, crying for Daddy. I guess my intentions became clear, because Jeremy interrupted my reverie with a non sequitur: “My ex-boyfriend used to work at a bar on a beach in Spain.” I was like, “Come again?” We had not been talking about Spain or bars or beaches. The only relevance was a sexual preference that Jeremy apparently thought he needed to insert, however gracelessly, into the conversation. I was crushed.