The Blonde Theory

by Kristin Harmel

  “Hey, Harper,” he said softly, hanging his head. “Can I come in?”

  “Of course,” I breathed, stepping aside so that he could cross the threshold. He looked glum, and I longed to reach over and pull him into a hug, but I was on edge after seeing him with Lisa and didn’t know quite how to address it. Plus, I didn’t understand what he was doing here.

  “How was your date?” he asked softly after I had shut the door behind him. My eyes welled up, and I quickly blinked back the tears.

  “Matt, I’m so sorry,” I said, the words spilling out on top of each other. He turned to face me, and I looked him right in the eye even though I wanted to look away in shame. “I should never have said that to you. Peter never called. I don’t know what I was doing. I don’t know why I said that.”

  He just stood there for a moment, staring at me, before he reached out and wrapped me tightly in his strong arms, pulling me close. My body felt weak as he pressed me into his muscular chest. I breathed in the intoxicating scent of his cologne, loving the protective feel of being nestled against him.

  “It’s okay,” Matt said finally, his words slow and soothing. “I forgive you. I understand. I really like you, and I don’t want this to get in our way.”

  “I really like you, too,” I said softly.

  I looked up at him gratefully, waiting for him to continue. I was thankful we were clearing the air. I waited for him to tell me about Lisa and apologize for that, too, so that we could start over again.

  But instead, he just continued to rub my back comfortingly and run his fingers through my hair tenderly.

  “Let’s promise that nothing like this will happen again,” he murmured. “That we’ll always be honest with each other.”

  “Okay,” I agreed eagerly, wondering if he was about to admit his misstep with Lisa and explain what he was thinking. Still, no admission seemed to be forthcoming. Sighing, I took the lead. “What did you do tonight?” I asked innocently.

  Matt released me and took a step back. He smiled down at me.

  “I just stayed in by myself,” he said, shrugging as if helpless to control his own actions and decision. “I couldn’t stop thinking of you.”

  I looked at him for a moment, frozen in place. He looked back at me, his face innocent as a newborn baby’s. Slowly, a thought began to creep into my mind. He’s an actor, said a little warning voice in my head. I tried to ignore it. Surely he hadn’t been acting with me.

  “Matt,” I said finally, choosing my words carefully and trying not to sound accusatory. I knew there was a logical explanation. “I went by your apartment tonight, to apologize. I wanted to tell you how sorry I was and how I didn’t feel anything for Peter anymore. But...” I paused because the words were hard for me to say. I drew a deep breath and continued. “But I saw you kissing the woman you were with at the restaurant last week. Lisa.”

  I said her name as if it were a bad word. Matt visibly stiffened. Then he shrugged.

  “Yeah, okay,” he said finally. “What’s the big deal?”

  “The big deal?” I repeated incredulously. “You were kissing another woman! Aren’t you going to apologize?”

  “Why?” Matt asked defensively. He shrugged again. “She’s just my stockbroker.”

  “Your stockbroker?” I repeated, failing to see how this was any kind of an explanation.

  “Sure,” Matt said. “She’s one of the women I date.”

  “One of the women?” I repeated, taken aback. I felt suddenly short of breath.

  “Yeah. Is something wrong with that? I always date several women at a time.”

  “You... you do?” I asked slowly. I flashed back to Emmie telling me that there were rumors that he was a player but that he’d never dated anyone on set as far as she knew. I had dismissed her words. Now it appeared that the joke was on me.

  “Sure,” Matt said, looking at me as if I were crazy. “Why not? I’m an actor. I’m a good-looking guy. I’m in my prime. And women like you go crazy for me.”

  “Women like me?” I repeated incredulously. I was suddenly feeling very weak.

  “Powerful women,” he said, gazing dreamily off into the space behind me. “Doctors. Directors. Investment bankers. Women with balls. Figuratively speaking, of course. God, what a turn-on.” He turned his attention back to me and smiled gently. “But attorneys are my favorite, Harper. They always have been.”

  I gaped at him, trying hard to grasp what he was saying.

  “You only wanted to date me because I’m a lawyer?” I finally asked, appalled, my voice cracking on the last word. I felt as if my stomach might overturn.

  “Well, yeah,” he said, looking surprised. “And you’re adorable and very cool, of course. But yeah, the whole power thing is a real turn-on for me.”

  “Oh my God,” I murmured, horror flooding through me.

  “What’s the problem?” Matt asked, looking truly mystified. “I thought that’s what you wanted. Didn’t you want someone who wanted to be with you because you’re smart and because you have a good job?”

  I just stared at him, processing his words slowly. I’d been so flattered when he’d said he didn’t like me despite my job but because of it. But I hadn’t taken his words literally. I had assumed that he’d meant that my job was just one of the facets about me that he found attractive—not the primary one.

  I felt sick. He had clearly slept with the majority of Manhattan’s female upper echelon. I was apparently just another powerful notch on his belt.

  “Please leave,” I whispered finally, the sight of him in my entryway with wide, innocent eyes nauseating me. “Please just go now.”

  Matt looked at me blankly. “You want me to leave?”

  I gaped at him. What, did he think his words would win me over and I’d want him to stay? That I was masochistically looking for someone to appreciate me only for my job and then dash out of my apartment to go sleep with the next single girl on the block with a six-figure income?

  “Right now,” I said firmly. My eyes were welling with tears, and I didn’t want to give Matt the satisfaction of seeing me cry. Matt started to protest, but I cut him off with a deadly stare. “Now,” I said coldly. “I’m not going to ask you again.”

  He stared hard at me, then finally shrugged, as if in defeat, and took the few steps toward my front door.

  “Call me when you change your mind,” he said with a small smile. Clearly, he wasn’t accustomed to being rejected and didn’t, in fact, recognize it when it was happening. “I won’t hold this against you.”

  I didn’t say anything. Trembling with anger now, I reached behind him, opened my door, and gestured sharply with a flick of my wrist that he should get out. Shrugging once more, he backed into the hallway and opened his mouth to say something else. But I didn’t care what else he had to say. I slammed the door right in his face with a finality I hoped sent him the message that I intended, which was to stay away. Forever. I never wanted to see him again.

  I stood there in my front entryway, trying to get the tremors racking my body under control. I didn’t think I’d ever felt this angry—or this stupid. I couldn’t believe I had believed him. A large part of my anger was currently directed at myself for being so desperate to find someone that I never paused to consider that Matt might not be all he was cracked up to be.

  I closed my eyes and leaned against the door, breathing hard. There was only one thought in my mind at that moment, although I was trying as hard as I could to push it away, to deny that it was true. But it was no use.

  Peter was right, the voice in my head repeated over and over. You’re never going to find someone who likes you for who you are.

  AFTER AN HOUR or so of feeling sorry for myself, I had a sudden, illogical, but nonetheless powerful desire to go home to Ohio. I wanted nothing more than to crawl into my childhood bed in the house I’d grown up in and have my mother tuck me in tightly and tell me to sleep well, everything would be better in the morning. But that was impossible.
It was nearly 11 pm, and there was no way I could catch a flight to Columbus this late. Besides, even if I could, I had to be at work in the morning; I had an early deposition that I couldn’t miss.

  I knew I could go to Meg’s or Emmie’s or even Jill’s, but I didn’t want to talk to them. Not tonight. I just wanted to feel like I was home somewhere, somewhere no one would bother me or moralize to me about my situation or analyze my various shortcomings. I looked around me at my uncomfortably stark apartment, which I’d put little effort into making warm since Peter had left. In this moment, it didn’t feel like the home I needed.

  Finally, I gathered my manila folders, a change of clothes, and my makeup bag and headed out the door to the closest thing to home I’d known in the last eleven years: my office.

  I doubted I’d be sleeping much tonight anyhow. At least I could dedicate my sleepless hours to the one thing in my life that hadn’t rejected me: my job.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Harper?” A concerned voice was calling my name from what seemed like far away. “Harper?” The voice sounded clearer now, closer as I finally came to, emerging from a dream that quickly slipped back into the fogs of sleep.

  I sat up and blinked, startled momentarily because I couldn’t understand where I was. My back and shoulders ached, my eyes felt dry, and inexplicably, my left cheek was killing me. I reached up to touch it and felt, to my horror, a weird series of cubic imprints pressed into my skin.

  “Harper?” the voice came again. I blinked a few times and focused, then jumped as I made eye contact with Molly, whose nose was just inches from mine. “Harper?” she asked again in that same concerned tone. “Thank goodness you’re awake. Are you all right?”

  I blinked and slowly looked around, my eyes adjusting to the harsh fluorescent light. I looked down and slowly realized that my cheek felt so strange because I had fallen asleep slumped over my computer keyboard. The j, k, and l keys had droplets of drool on them to prove it. My back and shoulders hurt because I had been slumped uncomfortably forward in my chair since sometime in the middle of the night. And my eyes were burning because I had been reading legal briefs and precedents online until I couldn’t see straight anymore. Oh yes, and I’d spent much of the night crying.

  “What time is it?” I asked Molly, my voice cracking, my lips sticky because my mouth was so dry. Out of nowhere, she produced a bottle of water, which she handed to me. “Thank you,” I mumbled.

  “It’s only seven thirty,” she said soothingly. “I’m the first one in. Don’t worry. You have time to freshen up.”

  “Oh,” I responded, suddenly acutely embarrassed and aware of how this must look. Who knew what was going through wide-eyed Molly’s mind as she found her unconscious boss slumped over her desk? I probably looked like I’d gone on some drinking binge and then wound up here. In truth, I hadn’t had a drop of alcohol; I had overdosed on pain and humiliation instead. “I wasn’t drinking or anything,” I mumbled defensively.

  Molly nodded gravely, her eyes still wide. “I know,” she said without missing a beat. “But what happened? Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine,” I said. “Just fine. Don’t worry.”

  Still horribly humiliated, I stood up quickly and, ignoring Molly’s attempts to help steady me on my feet, mumbled something about how I needed to go to the bathroom, then grabbed my makeup and clothing bags so that I could make myself at least halfway presentable.

  When I returned fifteen minutes later, after washing my face, changing into the gray suit I’d brought with me, and applying enough makeup to conceal most of the ravages the previous evening had left on my face, Molly was nervously neatening stacks of papers and folders on my desk.

  “Thanks for waking me,” I said, eyes downcast, as I crossed my office and slid into my desk chair, pushing my overnight bag underneath my desk to get it out of the way. “I don’t know what came over me.”

  “No problem,” Molly said softly, looking at the desk and not at me as she continued to straighten meticulously. “Sometimes I like to get in a little early and get a jump-start on the day,” she mumbled.

  “I’m glad you were here,” I admitted gratefully. I thought with dread of what would have happened if one of the partners had discovered me, drooling on my keyboard as if sleeping off a hangover.

  “Is there anything...” Molly paused, her eyes darting around the room, then she started again. “Is there anything you want to talk about? I mean, is everything okay?”

  I nodded.

  “Thanks, Molly,” I said, trying to sound as together as possible, although I think she and I both knew it was a charade. “Just a long night. That’s all.”

  Molly looked up at me nervously.

  “Did it, um, have anything to do with that guy? Matt James?” she asked. I looked up at her sharply. She blushed immediately and shook her head. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have asked that. It’s none of my business.”

  I sighed, then cleared my throat.

  “No, no, don’t apologize,” I soothed, feeling bad that she was so nervous around me. Was I really that mean as a boss? I paused, then nodded. “As a matter of fact, yes, it did have to do with Matt. And about a million other things.”

  “I knew it,” Molly said quietly, balling her right hand into a fist and slicing the air. “I knew it,” she repeated. I looked at her, puzzled, and she looked back at me a bit sheepishly.

  “Knew what?” I asked.

  “There was just something about him that didn’t seem right,” she admitted. “I had the feeling he was up to no good.”

  “You did?” I asked, mystified. “Why didn’t you say something, then?”

  Molly blushed furiously and shook her head.

  “That’s not my place, Harper,” she said. “I’m just your secretary. You’ve never talked to me about anything personal. I figured it wasn’t my place to say anything.”

  I felt terrible. For a moment, I didn’t know what to say.

  “I’m sorry, Molly,” I said finally. “I never meant to make you feel like that.” Great, now I was alienating my sweet secretary, too. Clearly I couldn’t even get things right with her. I was a complete failure at everything.

  “It’s not you,” Molly said quickly. “You’re a great boss. It just seems like something’s been bothering you for a long time, and you never talk about it. And you’ve been acting so strange these past few weeks. I just figured it was something you had to deal with on your own. I didn’t want to be rude.”

  I sighed. “Molly, I don’t think you could be rude if you tried.”

  “Well,” she said, pausing uncomfortably. She stopped neatening stacks of paper and straightened to look at me. “Is there anything you want to talk about? Only if you want to, I mean.”

  I studied her for a moment, her earnest face, her wide, honest eyes, and I felt a sudden, overwhelming urge to confide in her, no matter how awkward it was professionally.

  “My best friends had this idea for something they called The Blonde Theory,” I began, and before I knew it, I was wearily pouring out all the details of the past few weeks, starting with meeting Scott Jacoby, which felt like an eternity ago, and ending with the sordid details of last night’s abysmal failure.

  When I finished, out of breath and emotionally drained, Molly just stood there, looking at me. After a moment, I started to feel very uncomfortable. Maybe she hadn’t been the right person to confide in after all.

  “Um, Molly?” I asked finally. “Is everything okay?”

  She nodded slowly, then cocked her head to the side.

  “I don’t understand,” she said.

  “What don’t you understand?” I asked, confused. I thought my explanation of the whole misguided experiment and my immense failure had been pretty clear.

  “I don’t understand why you’d feel like you needed to do something like that,” she said, looking perplexed. “I mean, you have everything. You’re smart. You’re pretty. You have great friends. You have a great job.” She p
aused and looked me right in the eye. “Why would you want to pretend to be someone else?”

  I sighed, frustrated. I hadn’t considered the fact that Molly might not see how difficult it was to be me. She seemed so intuitive, I supposed I’d figured she would understand immediately.

  “Molly, it’s really hard for me to feel like I always intimidate guys and scare them away,” I tried to explain. But she still looked perplexed. I pressed on, trying to get the point of my patheticness across as clearly as possible. “Don’t you understand? No one wants to date me, because I’m a lawyer. It terrifies most guys. It’s not like I need a boyfriend. But I’m starting to feel like I’m going to grow old alone.”

  “You just haven’t found the right guy yet,” she said.

  I rolled my eyes. How many people were going to tell me that this week?

  “You don’t understand,” I said, frustrated.

  “No,” Molly said, more forcefully than I’d ever heard her speak before. “You don’t understand. I would give anything to be as smart and successful as you. You’re, like, my idol.”

  Molly’s words struck me speechless. I had never thought myself capable of being an idol to anyone—certainly not to my secretary, who wasn’t all that much younger than me. Certainly I wasn’t old enough to be anyone’s idol...was I? I was flattered beyond words all the same.

  “I’m your idol?” I finally asked incredulously.

  Molly nodded. “I want to be a lawyer,” she said. “More than anything in the world. It’s just taken me a little longer to figure out what I love to do. And it’s not like I have all sorts of s-cholarship offers or anything. So I’m putting myself through law school.”

  “You...you are?” I asked, thoroughly confused. I hadn’t had any idea. How had I not known that my secretary was going to law school?

  “Yes,” she said, blushing. “Just one or two classes a semester. It’s all I can afford. So it’s slow going. But, Harper, I want to be just like you. I don’t know how you don’t see that. You’re amazing. You have it so together.”