Slim Chance (25 page)

And then, about a month later, he called again.

“I realized that I never took you out to celebrate your new job,” he said.

“Or my birthday, or my new house,” I pointed out.

“So, you busy tomorrow night?”

“Saturday? Nope. I was just going to sit around and clean out one of Grandpa’s scary closets. You wouldn’t believe the stuff I’ve found around here. There was a pile of newspapers from 1973, and Dodgers tickets for a 1955 World Series game at Ebbets Field just sitting in a desk drawer.”

“The Brooklyn Dodgers? My God! That was the year they won the pennant! You could probably get a fortune for those on e-Bay!”

“I threw them out. I didn’t know.”

“
What?
Evie—you have to be careful about stuff like that. Forget dinner. We’ll order in and I’ll help you clean out the closets. Finders keepers, right?”

“I could cook, if you want. I think I’ve been getting better, and I might even take a class with Annie, since we’re both totally hopeless in the kitchen.”

“Uh, let’s order in for now.”

“Okay.”

“See you at around seven?”

“Great.”

I struggled to get the house perfect, which was hard since I’d only been living there for a couple of months, and it still smelled a bit musty. Drinking wine out of paper cups with my friends was one thing, but I wanted Bruce to be impressed. I sprayed lots of perfume, and turned off most of the lights except for a few lamps in the living room which made the shabby wallpaper seem warm and inviting.

When Bruce showed up, he handed me a bottle of red and a bag with a bow. Inside, there was some sort of scary doll.

“It’s a birthday-housewarming gift.”

“Er…what is it?”

“It’s a kitchen witch. It’s supposed to bring you luck in the kitchen. You’ll need it.”

“Thanks, Bruce. That’s incredibly…sweet of you. I think.”

“So, do I get the grand tour?”

I led him through the house. Downstairs, there’s a big kitchen, a living room with a fireplace, a dining room, a bathroom and a tiny bedroom off the kitchen.

Bruce liked the little room. “Wow. This is the smallest bedroom I’ve ever seen. Are you sure it’s not a closet?”

“Mom said it was designed to be a maid’s room. All these old places have them. She remembers an elderly aunt or someone living in it for a while when she was a kid.”

“Creepy. They probably buried her in the garden. So what are you going to do with it?” he asked.

“What am I going to do with any of these rooms? I have no idea. But wait till you see the master bedroom—it’s got a real fireplace. Maybe you can show me how to work it. And there’s two other bedrooms on the second floor but I’m going to make one into a den.”

“I haven’t even been here for half an hour and already you’re trying to lure me into your boudoir? Have you no shame?”

“You’ll find out soon enough,” I said, playing along as I led him down the hallway. “But let’s have a glass of wine first. Shall we adjourn to the parlor, monsieur?”

“That would be lovely,” he said, and made a big show of flicking some crumbs off the couch.

“That’s an antique,” I told him. “Don’t break it.”

“Ah, yes. I can see that. A vintage 1980s reproduction of a 1950s copy of a mid-eighteenth-century Chippendale, if I’m not mistaken. Magnificent craftsmanship. Is that the original plastic covering?”

“Give me a break. I’m just glad this place came with furniture, or else we’d be sitting on the floor right now. Until I put a bit of money aside, everything’s staying as is. The only thing I bought was a new mattress. The thought of sleeping on Grandpa’s old one…yuk.”

“I can understand that.”

I brought out some wineglasses and put them down on the coffee table. “If I’m going to seduce you, it’ll be a lot easier if you’re drunk, so please go ahead.”

“A toast, first, if you don’t mind.” He raised his glass. “To the
New
New-and-Improved Evelyn Mays. May you have health, wealth, happiness—and the time to enjoy them all.”

“Thanks, Bruce. That’s very sweet,” I said. “Bottoms up.” We both took a good, long drink. There was still some tension between us. I couldn’t tell if it was good, bad or sexual, but it was definitely there. It made me realize that we probably never could be friends, and I wondered why he was even here. Seeing each other from time to time wasn’t going to do either of us any good.

After dinner, we went out to explore the neighborhood. It was a relief to get out of the house.

We walked a long way in silence, kicking through the fallen leaves, and gazing into store windows and up at the immaculate Victorian brownstones in the nearby historic district. Something about the air reminded me of last year, when Bruce proposed.

“We’ve come a long way, baby,” he said finally, as if he were thinking the exact same thing. “Feels a bit weird, doesn’t it? Being together?”

“It feels different,” I said simply. “Things have changed.” This was my grand finale, and I knew it. We either went forward from here, or we called it quits for good. But there was definitely no point in beating around the bush anymore. I knew Bruce. Flirtatious banter aside, he wasn’t into games. And since I was playing to win, not playing games was the biggest trick I could muster. “Say something, will you?”

He stopped in front of a bench and sat down. I sat next to him. We watched the people walking by for a bit. Then he said, “There are days when I’m happy, there are days when I miss you, and then there are the days when I’m still mad as hell.”

“That’s okay,” I told him.

“I know it’s okay, but I can’t get past it.”

“Do you want to?” I asked hesitantly.

He thought for a minute. “I’m not sure. But maybe I should be walking through the doors that are open, not banging on the ones that are closed.”

What did he mean?
“My door’s always open,” I said, and hoped it made sense. I still loved him. No matter what had happened—or what was to come—I knew that intentionally cutting Bruce out of my life would never be an option. I’d have to leave that up to him.

He took off his glasses and looked at me.

“I can’t help myself, but for some reason I only want good things for you. What…what I’m trying to say, I guess, is that no matter where life takes us, I sincerely hope that you can forgive yourself.”

After all I’d put him through, how could he still be so good to me?

“I’m getting there,” I told him. “Or I’m trying, at least. I don’t think I hate myself anymore, but I’ll always hate what I did. To both of us.”

He nodded.

“What about you?” I asked tentatively. “Do you think you would ever be able to forgive me?”

“Forgive, maybe. But not forget.”

My heart thumped wildly, and my eyes burned with tears. “I can live with that.”

Bruce stood up and walked over to a big tree a few feet away. There was a paper stapled to it advertising a nearby apartment for rent. He pulled it off. “How do I know you’re serious? That you won’t pull an Evie again.”

“Pull an Evie?”

“Losing it whenever you get exactly what you think you want.”

I knew I had to answer very carefully. “I only lost it when I got what I
didn’t
want. So I guess the key is knowing my own mind.”

“That’s a start, I suppose. Do you know what you want now?”

“I think so,” I said. “I don’t want to get married anytime soon, that’s for sure.”

“I think we’ve already established that,” he said with a smile. “What else?”

“Well, I don’t want to be skinny anymore.”

“Ha! Do you actually expect me to believe that? It’s me, here. Remember who you’re talking to.”

“It’s
true.
I’d be happy to stay the way I am. I don’t want to lose any weight.”

He laughed, and so did I—that sounded so ridiculous, coming out of my mouth.

“Okay,” I sighed. “So maybe a pound or two wouldn’t hurt…”

“There you go!”

“What? I can admit it. At least I know now that my problem area isn’t really my thighs—it’s in between my ears. That’s a big thing for me!”

“Evie, I’ve been telling you that for years.”

“Yeah, but Dr. Shloff got me to believe it. I never trusted you on this, Bruce—you had ulterior motives.”

“Like what?”

“For starters, you can admit that you have a thing for fat chicks.”

“So sue me—I like having something to hold on to.” He sat back down beside me. “Seriously, though. How do I know you’re not going to go nuts every time something changes?”

“Well, this last year was the only time, really…”

“No, it wasn’t. Even the littlest things can turn you into a complete freak.”

“That’s ridiculous,” I said.

“Remember after college when you were temping at that PR firm?”

“My first real job,” I sighed.

“Well, all you wanted was to go on that cruise, remember?”

“I finally had a bit of cash. I thought it would be a fun trip for us.”

“Well, I didn’t want to go. I knew you wouldn’t like it. But you wouldn’t shut up about it. And what happened when we finally went?”

“Is it my fault I’m prone to seasickness? I had no way of knowing….”

“You puked the entire time. Even when the boat was in port. And you cried every day.”

“How could you
not
have felt it? God! It was like the Cyclone at Coney Island, only you couldn’t get off for seven days. Who could think that was fun?”

“Classic,” he sighed, and kissed me on the forehead.

“Look, I guess I can’t promise that I won’t ever freak out over anything ever again. I am who I am. But at least I’m trying now.”

“I suppose…”

“Oh, come on—you love every minute of it,” I said. “You can’t get enough of the crap I put myself through.”

“You mean the crap you put us
both
through. I haven’t had a good night’s sleep since that whole Buddhism thing last year. Those statues, my God. Just last week I dreamed that my mother had ten arms and a bun.”

“You’re Dr. Shloff’s wet dream, you know. Do you want me to see if I can get you an appointment?”

“That’s not funny. And if you don’t need that altar stuff anymore, I’m throwing it out. It’s taking up too much space in the storage room.”

“I was at a spiritual crossroads in my life,” I laughed, and
slipped my arm through his. “How can you fault me for that?” In my defense, Buddhism was pretty big at the time (
In Style,
April: “Can Hollywood Really Free Tibet?”).

“And what about the tattoo?” he laughed, shaking his head as if he still couldn’t believe it. “You were so afraid of the pain, and you agonized for months over what you wanted and where to put it, and then when you finally decided to go through with it, you regretted it instantly.”

I smacked him playfully on the arm. “Jerk!”

What else could I say? I did have half a yin-yang on my ass.