Wife 22 (13 page)
Authors: Melanie Gideon
I shut the book and press it to my chest. Just holding it fills me with hope.
“
Creative Playmaking
?
That
used to be your bible?” asks William.
That William has no memory of the book and how important it was to me (even though it sat on my bedside table for five years or so) is not a surprise.
I text William in my mind.
Sorry I ass. But you ass, 2.
Then I say to Caroline, “We’re off to do errands. Want to come?”
ESTIVE
M
OROCCAN
P
OTLUCK
AT
N
EDRA’S
H
OUSE
Me:
Hello, Rachel! Where’s Ross? Here’s the lamb.
Nedra
(
peeling back the aluminum foil from roasting dish and frowning
): Did you follow the recipe exactly?
Me:
Yes, but with one wonderful twist!
Nedra
: No good can come of wonderful twists. Linda and Bobby made it after all.
Me:
I thought they were going to the game.
Nedra
(
sniffing the lamb and making a face
): They couldn’t resist your restaurant-quality dishes. Where are the kids?
Me:
Peter’s here. Zoe’s at home doing sit-ups. Where’s Jude?
Jude
(
walking into the kitchen
)
:
Wishing he was anywhere but here.
Nedra:
Darling, are you going to join us? Alice, wouldn’t that be lovely if Jude joined us?
Me:
It would. Yes, Nedra. It would be so, so lovely.
Nedra:
See, darling. See how wanted you are. Please say you will.
Jude:
(
looking down at the floor
)
Me:
(
looking down at the floor
)
Nedra
(
sighing
)
:
You are big babies, the both of you. Will you please make up?
Jude:
I’m going to Fritz’s to play Pokémon.
Me:
Really?
Jude:
No, not really. I’m going to my room.
Nedra:
Bye, bye, darling. One of these days the two of you will love each other again. It’s my dying wish.
Me:
Must you be so melodramatic, Nedra?
Jude:
Yes, must you?
Nedra:
Melodrama is the language the both of you speak.
Nedra:
Men, gather round. The costume portion of the evening will begin. Kate and I brought you each back a fez from our most recent trip to Morocco.
Peter
(
unable to wipe stricken look off his face
)
:
I would prefer not to wear a fez as I’m already wearing a trilby.
Nedra:
Yes, which is why we got you a fez—to get that damn trilby off your head.
Kate:
I think his trilby is cute.
William:
I stand with Peter. Being a woman, you may be unfamiliar with the codes of men and hats in the twenty-first century.
Bobby:
Yes, it’s not like the 1950s, where you take off your hat when you go to dinner. In the twenty-first century you wear your hat throughout dinner.
Me:
Or if you are Pedro, throughout the month of June.
William:
And if you start off the evening with a hat, you don’t switch to another hat. Hats are not like cardigan sweaters.
Nedra:
Put on the fez, Pedro, or else.
Me:
What about us?
Nedra:
Kate, Alice, and Linda, I have not forsaken you. Here are your djellabas!
Me:
Fabulous! A long, loose garment with big sleeves that soon I will be dipping accidentally into my mint sauce.
Peter:
I’ll trade you for my fez.
Nedra
(
sighing
): Must you all be so ungrateful?
Kate:
How was Salzburg, Alice?
William:
You were in Salzburg?
Nedra:
Yes, eating
palatschinken
. Apparently without you.
Me:
I was in Salzburg on Facebook. I took the “Dream Vacation” quiz. I’ve always wanted to go to Salzburg.
Bobby:
Linda and I are on Facebook. It’s a fabulous way to stay in touch without really staying in touch. How else would I have known you were going to Joshua Tree this weekend?
Linda:
It’s a women’s weekend, Bobby. Don’t sulk. Ladies, you’re welcome to come.
Nedra:
Will there be drums and burning of things?
Linda:
Yes!
Nedra:
Then no.
Linda:
Hey, did we tell you guys we’re renovating? We’re redoing the master bedroom. It’s the most marvelous thing. We’re making it into two master bedrooms!
Me:
Why would you need two master bedrooms?
Linda:
It’s the new trend. It’s called a flex suite.
Kate:
So you’ll be sleeping in separate bedrooms.
Peter:
Can I be excused?
Subtext: Can I sneak into your office and play World of Warcraft on your computer, Nedra?
Nedra:
What, you don’t want to talk about the intimate sleeping arrangements of your parents and your parents’ friends? By all means, Pedro, go!
Linda:
Isn’t it great? It’ll be like we’re dating again! Your suite or mine?
Nedra:
What about spontaneity? What about waking up in the middle of the night and having wild, half-asleep sex?
Me:
Yes, I was wondering about that, too, Linda! What about half-asleep sex?
William:
Isn’t that called rape?
Linda:
I have no desire to have sex at two in the morning. It’s a known fact that it gets much harder to share a bed as you get older. Bobby gets up three times a night to pee.
Bobby:
Linda wakes up every time I move my middle toe.
Linda:
We’ll share a bathroom, of course.
Me:
Now
that’s
the thing I’d like two of.
Linda:
Twin suites are going to reignite the mystery and the passion in our marriage. You’ll see. God, I miss Daniel. It’s the most ridiculous thing. I couldn’t wait for him to leave for college and now I can’t wait for him to come home.
William:
Did I mention that a few weeks ago the dog urinated on my pillow?
Kate:
I know a dog psychic you can call.
Nedra:
I had a client once who peed in his wife’s lingerie drawer.
Bobby:
The wife had a lingerie
drawer
? How long had they been married?
Me:
Jampo knows you don’t like him. He senses that. He’s a truth-teller.
William:
He’s mean. He eats his own shit.
Me:
Exactly my point. How much more truthful can you be? Willing to eat your own poop?
Nedra:
Why does this lamb taste like face cream?
William:
It’s the lavender.
Nedra
(
putting down her fork
)
:
Alice, is this your idea of a twist? The recipe said rosemary.
Me:
In my defense, a rosemary bush looks almost exactly like a lavender bush.
Nedra:
Yes, except for the purple lavender-smelling flowers.
Peter:
Can I talk to you in private?
Me:
I’m going to the bathroom. Can it wait?
Peter
(
sounding teary
)
:
I have something to confess. I did something really bad.
Me:
Please don’t confess. You don’t have to tell me everything. It’s good to keep some things private. You know that, right? Everybody has a right to a private life.
Peter:
I have to. It’s weighing so heavy on me.
Me:
How will I react?
Peter:
You will be very disappointed and perhaps a little disgusted.
Me:
How should I punish you?
Peter:
I won’t need to be punished. What I saw was punishment enough.
Me
(
opening the door
)
:
Jesus, what did you do?
Peter
(
crying
)
:
I Googled P-O-R-N.
Linda:
I don’t understand why “roommate” is such a dirty word. Anybody who’s been married for more than ten years are roommates a lot of the time and if they don’t cop to that, they’re lying.
Nedra:
Kate and I are not roommates.
Me:
Yes, and you’re also not married.
Linda:
Lesbians don’t count anyway.
Nedra:
Gold-star lesbians. There’s a difference.
Me:
What’s a gold-star lesbian?
Kate:
A lesbian who’s never been with a man.
William:
I’m a gold-star heterosexual.
Nedra:
Alice, do you ever feel like you and William are roommates?
Me:
What? No! Never!
William:
Sometimes.
Me:
When?
William:
I can’t believe we’re doing this. Why are we doing this?
Me:
Because Peter was so traumatized. I have to know what he saw.
William
(
sighing
)
:
What’s Nedra’s password?
Me:
Nedra
. Should you type PORN in caps?
William:
I don’t think it matters.
Me
(
gasping
)
:
Is that a butternut squash?
William:
Is that an icicle?
Me:
Oh, my poor baby!
William:
Clear history.
Me:
What?
William:
Clear history, Alice. Quick, before Nedra’s spam folder is flooded with penis enlargement ads.
Me:
I always forget to do that. Stop looking over my shoulder. Go on ahead. I just want to check Facebook.
William:
You’re being very rude. There’s a roomful of people out there.
Me
(
waving him away
): I’ll be there in a sec.
(
five minutes later
) I have a friend request? John Yossarian wants to be friends? John Yossarian? That name sounds familiar.
GOOGLE SEARCH “John Yossarian”
About 626,000 results (.13 seconds)
Catch-22,
1961 by Joseph Heller, All Time 100 Novels,
TIME
Captain John Yossarian is a bomber pilot who is just trying to make it through WWII alive.
John Yossarian … Gravatar Profile
I’m John Yossarian. I rowed to Sweden to escape the insanity of war.
Captain John Yossarian:
Catch-22
John Yossarian spends all his time in the infirmary pretending to be sick so he won’t have to fly … preservation of life.
Me
(
a smile breaking across my face
): Touché, Researcher 101.
(
clicking confirm friend
)
(
sending him a post
) So—
Yossarian lives.
38.
“That is
not
a La-Z-Boy.”
“Alice, what do you think?”
“That depends. Are we speaking about the chair or the man?” I asked.
William had won a Clio for his La-Z-Boy spot and Peavey Patterson was throwing a party at Michela’s in his honor. We’d taken over the entire restaurant. I was stuck sitting at a table full of copywriters.
The chair—of course it was hideous but it did make the firm an awful lot of money, and now I was at this fancy party, so who was I to complain? The man—he was the opposite of lazy: in fact he was the very essence of drive and potential, standing there in his navy Hugo Boss suit.
I watched him surreptitiously. I watched Helen watching me watch him surreptitiously but I didn’t care; everybody was staring. People approached William nervously, like he was a god. And he
was
a god, the god of ugly recliners, Peavey Patterson’s very own Young Turk. People flitted around him, touching his forearm and shaking his hand. It was exhilarating to be that close to success, because there was always the possibility a bit of that success would rub off on you. William was polite. He listened and nodded but said little. His eyes drifted over to me, and if I didn’t know better I’d think he was angry—such was his glowering. But over the course of the evening, his gaze boldly and compulsively sought me out. It was as if I was a glass of wine and every time he glanced at me from across the room, he took a sip.
I looked down at my plate. My
Linguine con Cozze al Sugo Rosso
was delicious but virtually untouched, because all this clandestine staring was making me light-headed.
“Speech, speech!”
Helen leaned in and whispered in William’s ear, and a few minutes later William allowed Mort Rich, the art director, to ferry him to the center of the restaurant. He took a piece of paper from his jacket pocket, smoothed it out, and began to read.
“Tips for Giving a Speech.
“Make sure you are not in the bathroom when it’s time to make your speech.
“Thank your staff who helped you win this award.
“Pause.
“Never say you are unworthy of winning. This will offend your staff, who did all the work so you could stand up in front of everybody and take the credit for winning this award.
“Don’t thank the people who had nothing to do with you winning this award.
“That would be spouses, girlfriends, boyfriends, bosses, waiters and bartenders.
“On second thought, thank the bartender, who had everything to do with you winning this award.
“Pause.
“If you have time, call out each person’s name individually and compliment them.”
William glanced at his watch. “No pause.
“Smile, look humble and gracious.
“Close your speech with an inspirational comment.”
William folded up the paper and slid it into his pocket.
“Inspirational comment.”
The room exploded with laughter and applause. When William sat back down at his table, Helen took his face in her hands, looked deeply into his eyes, and then kissed him on the mouth. There were a few hoots and claps. The kiss went on for a good ten seconds. She glanced at me, flashing me a startled but triumphant look, and I turned away, stung, my eyes involuntarily filling with tears.
“Sa-woon. Are they engaged yet?” the woman sitting next to me asked.
“I don’t see a ring,” said another colleague.
Had I imagined all this? This flirting? It appeared I had, because for the rest of the evening William acted like I wasn’t even there. I was such a fool. Invisible. Stupid. I had on flesh-colored stockings, which I could see now weren’t flesh-colored at all, but practically orange.
Around midnight, I passed him in the hallway on my way to the bathroom. It was a narrow hallway and our hands brushed as we squeezed by. I was determined not to say a word to him. Our running days were over. I’d ask to be transferred to a different team. But when our knuckles
touched, a current of undeniable electricity passed between us. He felt it too, because he froze. We were facing opposite directions. He looked out into the restaurant. I looked toward the bathrooms.
“Alice,” he whispered.
It suddenly occurred to me that I’d never heard him say my name. Until this moment he’d only called me Brown.
“Alice,” he repeated in a low, gravelly voice.
He said “Alice” not like he was about to ask me a question or tell me something. He said my name like a statement of fact. Like after a very long journey (a journey he hadn’t wanted or expected to take) he’d finally arrived at my name, at
me
.
I stared at the bathroom doors. I read
Women
,
Donne
. I read
Men
,
Uomini.
He reached for my fingers, and not accidentally this time. It was the briefest of touches, a private touch not meant for anybody but me to see. I put my other hand on the wall to steady myself, weak-kneed from a combination of too much wine, relief, and desire.
“Yes,” I said, then stumbled into the bathroom.
39.
Suck it up.
40.
I can’t remember.
41.
We appear to be a couple people envy.
42.
Ask me again at a later time.