Over the years when I'd run into Daniel, he'd be flirting, smiling, flexing and generally looking hot in a way that I appreciated but didn't really feel. His green eyes slanted down a little, and he had a killer smile (and knew it). His hair was cut very short, almost a crew cut, possibly because of work. Like all the other man-children in Brooklyn, he didn't shave daily. He was tall and had those ridiculously beautiful, strong arms; I'd once seen him flex his biceps for a False Alarm and actually tear his T-shirt. So yeah. I knew all that.
But today, he'd acted like any good big brother would, and now...well, he looked very... He looked kind.
"It's nice to be back here," I said, my voice a little husky.
"Good. How much do I owe you, by the way?"
"A hundred bucks."
"I'm guessing you charge more than that."
"Not today."
"How about three hundred? Would that cover it?"
"Daniel, you did me a favor. Plus, I plan to eat a lot tonight. A hundred is all I'll take."
He smiled. "Then make sure you order a bottle of expensive wine."
We ordered, and I picked out a not-too-expensive bottle of wine. "How are things at the Re-Enter Center?" I asked.
"Not bad. I got a good group this year."
"Carpentry, right?"
"That's right."
I had a sudden idea. "Hey, do you ever make furniture?"
"Sure."
"Do you think you could make a porch swing?" It would be the perfect present for my in-laws on their fiftieth. A beautiful, one-of-a-kind swing where they could sit and remember their dead son.
I swallowed. The spike was back.
"Sure, I could," Daniel said. "I made one for my sister a couple years ago. Is it for you?"
"My in-laws."
"Got it. Sure, I'll send you some pictures and you can see what you like." His phone chimed, and he glanced at it. "It's my lieutenant. I have to call in, but I'll be right back, okay?"
"Is it really work? Or is it a False Alarm?"
He looked confused. Right. He didn't know our name for his bimbos. "I'll just be a second."
"Yes. Go protect and serve."
"God, Kate," he said, tousling my hair. "Get it right. The cops protect and serve. We're New York's Bravest."
"Go. Be brave. Make that call." I smiled at him.
Al brought over a bottle of fume blanc and poured me a glass. I took a sip. Hello, wine, my old friend.
The last time I drank wine was the night my husband died.
The wine soured in my mouth, and I had to force myself to swallow. If wine was ruined, Nathan's death would really be a tragedy. Right? Get that? Gallows humor. Ha. I forced myself to take another sip to ease the spike in my throat.
I'd brought Nathan to this restaurant a couple times. We'd sat in that booth over by the window. Once, we'd come with Paige, before we were engaged, before Paige had such a bug up her ass. Something got us women so silly we couldn't talk, and Nathan just sat there, smiling, and I remember just loving him so much, feeling my whole insides warm and--
Porto's door opened, and there was Paige as if I'd conjured her. She did a double take when she saw me, then came over.
As ever, she wore an awesome suit; she was the real deal of a corporate attorney. Heels, too. She looked fantastic.
I felt a stir of oily black anger.
"Kate?"
"Hey."
"What are you doing here?"
"Work."
"Oh." She set down her gorgeous leather bag. "Um, can I sit for a minute?"
I didn't want her to, but I shrugged. She sat.
"So. How are you?"
Well, my husband died, and I seem to be having heart attacks every other day or so, and thank God my sister got dumped and moved in with me, because I'm so sad my bones hurt, Paige. They actually hurt. "I'm fine."
What was it about female friendships? Why was it so crushing when they failed?
"Look," she said, and her tone was a little impatient. "I've been wanting to call you, but I really didn't know what to say. But you're good?"
"Fine."
I guess she could read something in my face. "Well, you're here, having dinner with a friend, I guess. That's a step in the right direction. It's good. You should get out, see people."
"I appreciate your input."
She took the veiled insult.
I'd talked to Nathan quite a bit about Paige after she dumped me. His take was that I was better off without her. Men never could understand women and their friends.
But I was a little obsessed. Who dumps a friend because that friend is happy? Though I did it on the sly, I checked her Facebook page, her Twitter, looked at her Pinterest board. She had one for wedding dresses, for God's sake, and it was public and under her real name. If there was a better way to scare off a potential boyfriend, I didn't know what it was.
She'd been my closest friend, and I didn't make friends easily. My very best friend, and all she could manage was to write her name at the bottom of a shitty card from Duane Reade.
"So you're just going to sit there and judge me?" she said.
"Pretty much, yes."
"Hey, Paige." Daniel returned, shoving his phone into his jeans pocket.
Her mouth fell open and her eyes widened. "Really? Daniel?"
"Yeah," he said. "Hi. How are you?" He sat down. "You joining us?"
"No," she said. "Wow, Kate. You're doing much better. Better than I would've thought."
That oily black anger bubbled, hot and sticky.
"Paige, don't be such a bitch," Daniel said easily. "She took some pictures of my sister as a favor. It's dinnertime. We're eating, not getting married, and how about a little compassion for your friend? Her husband died, in case you forgot."
Damn. That was perfect.
"Who can forget?" She stood up. "You two have a nice dinner."
She left. My cheeks were hot with all the things I didn't say. The wine went down faster now.
"You okay?" Daniel asked.
"Yep. Fine."
"Why would you say fine? She's a pill. It's okay to admit it."
"We were friends for years."
"I know." There were those kind eyes again.
"So what's going on with you these days, Daniel? Got a girlfriend?"
"Nah. Not really. You know me." I smiled. "Family's good. Well, not really. My sister Jane, you know her?"
"No." I'd never met any of Daniel's family until today.
"Well, her husband left her. And she's seven months pregnant."
"Good God."
"Yeah. So I've been helping her out. She's got three other kids. My other sister has six."
"Nice. I have two nieces and a nephew myself. The baby's only three."
"Great age." He smiled.
We ordered, eggplant parm for me. He got steak (such a cliche) and a side of pasta, and a Caesar salad, too, and ate four pieces of garlic bread. Hungry lad.
He told me about work, brushing off the danger, sadness and fear that his job must entail, as was the way of every firefighter I'd ever met. I told him about Ainsley coming to stay with me, though not why, as well as some of the lesser challenges I faced as a widow: not understanding the complexities of Nathan's light switches, and having to jazz-hand in the bathroom, and eating under what seemed like an interrogation light because I couldn't figure out the dimmer switch in the kitchen.
We'd never really talked before, other than a few hey, how's it going conversations. Once in a while, we'd run into each other while teaching the ex-cons. Otherwise, no.
This was nice. Daniel laughed in the right places, kindly.
There was that word again.
He paid for dinner, and I realized with a little shock that it was past eight.
"I'll walk you to your car," he said.
"No, it's fine. This is my old turf."
"I'll walk you, Kate."
"Okay. Thank you, Daniel the Hot Firefighter. And thank you for dinner."
It was getting cold, and I shivered a little. Without a word, Daniel put his arm around me.
I wasn't sure how to feel about that. On the one hand, he was just Daniel the Hot Firefighter. On the other, he was Daniel the Hot Firefighter. He smelled good, a combination of soap and a little sweat and garlic.
I wasn't cold anymore. There was that, too.
When we got to my car, I stashed my bags in the trunk. "Thank you," I said. "This was an unexpectedly nice day."
"Well, thank you for doing this for Lizzie. She's already texted me six times about how great you are."
I smiled.
"Kate..." He shifted his weight and crossed his arms. "My sister Jane? The one who's pregnant?"
"Yeah?"
"Well, she lives in Tarrytown." It was the town south of Cambry-on-Hudson. "Maybe when I go up there, we could grab a beer sometime."
I hesitated.
"As friends," he added.
"That would be really nice," I said, a wave of relief washing over me. I liked Daniel. I always had. Just not that way. And obviously, I didn't want to date anyone.
"Good. I have your number. From your website. I'll call you sometime."
"Have a good night, Daniel. Be safe."
He winked at me, back to Daniel the Hot Firefighter, Conqueror of Vaginas, and headed off.
I took the long way home, opting to cross the East River via the Brooklyn Bridge and go up the West Side Highway, since it was more beautiful that way. I'd driven this route many times, back when Nathan and I were dating.
For a cruel, beautiful instant, I forgot he was dead. I imagined telling him about Lizzie and Daniel and seeing Paige, imagined him waiting for me, his sweet, shy smile, his good clean smell.
The image was so powerful that I didn't realize the light had changed, and horns were blaring behind me.
Chapter Fifteen
Ainsley
In the past week, Eric was on TV four times.
It seemed that dumping your girlfriend after "surviving a horrific battle with cancer" played well in Peoria. Good Morning America, The Doctors, Live with Kelly (and I loved her, damn it!) and Jimmy Kimmel Live!. I DVR'ed them all. Of course I did, and watched it in Kate's media room one night when she was asleep, furiously eating popcorn, weeping, yelling at the TV and nearly choking at least twice.
He looked fantastic, the bastard, not like me, with red-rimmed eyes and popcorn in my cleavage. He said all sorts of sanctimonious things about the death of this great friend of mine ("One game of golf and your man-crush doesn't make him your great friend, you dick!") and about how Sunshine was one of those people who had a pretty strict agenda of her own ("To raise your children? That agenda? The reason we bought a house with four bedrooms?").
Wine was chugged from the bottle, I'll admit it.
To my relief, the hosts all gave him a hard time. He answered their questions with ease. "I do regret hurting her, believe me. But you can't live your life according to what you once wanted when something as radical as a near-death experience completely changes your priorities."
He used the words live life large eleven times in the four interviews. He'd gotten two tattoos since posting the Corpse blog. One said--surprise!--Live life large! The other was NVC... Nathan's initials.
I hoped the Coburns weren't watching my ex-boyfriend use their son for his fifteen minutes of fame.
Eric wasn't the only one who'd been approached by the media. Oh, yeah. I'd been called, too. Thanks, but no thanks. I let them all go to voice mail.
The Friday meeting with Eric that Jonathan had set up loomed like a tornado on the horizon. Eric had even sent me an email to confirm. And another to Jonathan, cc'ing me, saying how much he was looking forward to our "pitch" and seeing how it compared with the others he'd been fielding.
Jonathan had sent me a memo with bullet points on the pitch. It was color-coded.
At least I had Kate to look after. Though I felt guilty about it, I was glad to have a purpose. I baked her a chocolate cake to temper her cramps and found some sci-fi movies for us to watch. Brooke and her sons had come over the other night, and the second she walked in the house, Brooke started to cry. I took the boys into the media room and played astronaut with them, tipping them back in the chairs and doing a countdown with all sorts of drama and blastoff noises. At least I'd been able to make them smile.
Kate was quiet and appreciative. She'd always been on the reserved side, always seemed so together, always a little removed from the complicated, messy, intense feelings the rest of us dealt with. Maybe it was the camera, always by her side, always documenting life rather than making her live it, in a way.
Even so, I still felt fairly useless. I wasn't able to think too far into the future. My job wouldn't cover rent on a decent place in town, and I loved Cambry-on-Hudson. I scanned the internet for jobs that might pay more than the magazine, but there wasn't much out there. Nothing for philosophers, nothing for disgraced news producers.
Interior decorating might be fun, but I quickly learned that was a field glutted by housewives who thought they had good taste (like me); any real career came only after a degree and an apprenticeship.
Dog-washing? Dog-sitting? Ollie told me with his beautiful brown eyes that I was the world's greatest person. At least I had him.
On Monday night, Kate told me she was going back to the grief group, and I perked up. "That's great!" I said. "Hey, do you mind giving me a ride? Not to your group this time, but, well...maybe the divorce group."
And so it was that I walked into the basement of St. Andrew's, waved to the adorable Leo and the even more adorable George, then went into the next room. Alas, it was AA, where they were chanting the Serenity Prayer. I finished with them--"And the wisdom to know the difference" could be applied to so many situations, after all--then went into the correct room, according to the sign. DWI: Divorce With Integrity.
"Catchy name," I muttered.
And there was Jonathan, who did a double take at the sight of me. Super. Still, I smiled. It was not returned.
There was no Lileth for this group, just four people, two middle-aged women: one wearing yoga pants and a tired T-shirt, no makeup; the other decked out in skintight leather pants, stacked heels and cropped top more suitable for an eighteen-year-old French prostitute than a fifty-year-old soccer mom. Tiny frame, double D boobs, tight eyes. Her teeth were so white they hurt my eyes. Seemed like she'd coped with divorce by becoming a plastic surgery junkie. She reminded me a bit of Candy.
For men, we had Jonathan and another guy, about forty.
"Hi," I said. "I'm Ainsley. I work with Jonathan, and my boyfriend of eleven years dumped me on his blog. Do I qualify for this group? The widows and widowers kicked me out."
They swarmed me (minus Jonathan). Marley and Carly were the women, each divorced in the past year, both with kids. Henry was the other guy--midforties, good-looking, well dressed and possibly in the closet. If not, I might introduce him to Kate. When the time was right, of course.
The metal chairs were in a circle, same as the grief group.
"Sit, sit," Carly (or Marley) suggested. "We'd love to hear your story. You're Sunshine, right? Sorry, I read the blog. Who hasn't?"
"Yep. Feeling more like a little black rain cloud these days." I looked at the chairs. "Can I make a suggestion? Is there any reason why we can't go out for a drink instead of staying here?"
"We always meet here," Jonathan said.
"You have a point," Marley (or Carly) said to me. "I could go for a strawberry daiquiri. Why do we meet here, anyway?"
"To avoid becoming bitter alcoholics?" Jonathan suggested.
"Who's bitter?" Henry said. "A pina colada would taste great righ
t now. And if things go south, we know where to find AA."
*
Twenty minutes later, we were sitting in Cambry Burgers & Beer. I'd suggested Hudson's, which was closer, but Jonathan grimly insisted on this place, which was lively and fun (surprising, because Jonathan had picked it.)
We ordered drinks and appetizers and exchanged the usual getting-to-know-you chitchat. Except Jonathan, who already knew me, of course.
"So I went on my fifteenth first date this weekend," Marley said (I'd ridden with them and figured out who was who on the ride over). She had an inch of gray roots showing and cracked her knuckles as she spoke. "He won't call. I'm surprised he even made it through the entire drink."
"What did you wear?" I asked.
"Does it matter?" Jonathan said.
I turned to him. "Yes. It's all about first impressions, Mr. Kent." I looked back at Marley. "I would love to give you a makeover."
"I've been asking her to let me do the same thing for a year," Carly said.
"So I can get a pair of these, Barbie? No, thanks," she said, jabbing Carly fondly.
"Maybe we could do mutual makeovers," I suggested. "All us women style each other."
"Except you, Ainsley, you're adorable. I wouldn't change a hair," Marley said. She chugged half her margarita. "You really think you could help me? I'm old, honey. I'm fifty-four."
"That's not old, and sure!" I said. "I love clothes. And makeup. And shoes."
"That would be fun," said Henry. "I'm a hairdresser. I'd love to have at you both. Not you, darling, you're perfect," he added, adjusting a strand of my hair. "Though a streak of gray would be very on fleek."
"I've thought about it," I said, smiling at him. "So on this first date, Marley, did you talk about your divorce?"
"Of course. He has to know what I've been through."
"Ah, that's a no-no. My mom is Dr. Lovely, the advice columnist. She just wrote about this."
"Really? I love her! I read her online every day! No wonder you know so much."
I smiled, oddly proud of Candy.
Jonathan stared fixedly at a point past my head. Carly detailed a wretched first date she'd had with a ninety-one-year-old man who'd lied about his age by three decades, and Henry told us he wasn't quite ready to put himself out there just yet.
I did wonder about Jonathan. I'd seen him on that date the night Eric dumped me. And I was dying to know what my stick-up-the-colon boss did in his spare time. Taxidermy seemed about right.
"Okay," Marley said after we'd put a dent in the appetizers. "We actually do talk about divorce stuff, Ainsley, so let's get down to business. Everything's confidential, okay? That's one of our rules."
On Second Thought Page 18