by R. L. Stine
“Too subtle,” I said.
I scrolled down to what had to be the most pitiful one of all. I let out a moan. “I don’t believe this.”
BIG FAT LOSER.
I stared at his photo. Well, at least he was honest.
And underneath the photo, he had written: “Won’t you help me find my good qualities?”
“It makes you want to cry,” I said. “The guy’s looking for a sympathy date.”
Luisa snickered. “A mercy killing would be better.”
The next one was a possible.
“Jack Smith?” Ann-Marie narrowed her eyes at the screen. “That can’t be his real name, can it?”
“It might be,” I said, scanning his reply. Very normal and sincere. He didn’t seem crazy.
I sighed. Ben suddenly flashed into my mind. Like he was watching me. And how did I feel? Embarrassed. Looking for guys on the Internet while he . . .
Ben was gone, except for those moments when I saw him smiling at me from somewhere. Here’s a secret: I kept the car-chase video game. I have it in my underwear drawer. Part of him is still with me, or something like that. I know it’s stupid.
Luisa drained the beer can and crushed it in her hand. “What if your name was Jack Smith, and your whole life no one believed you?”
“And what if you looked like Tobey Maguire?” Ann-Marie added. “And had nine inches and drove it around in a red Hummer? Then you’d be totally cool, right?”
I sighed. “You two aren’t helping me at all.” I nodded to the screen. “This guy is a possible maybe.”
Luisa made a face. “He’s so straight. Like he works in the towel department at Bed, Bath & Beyond.”
Luisa is a strange girl, but I mean that in a good way. I’ll never forget how we met. Someone at her office gave Ann-Marie tickets to a blues concert at the Beacon Theatre on Broadway. We weren’t really into blues, but we had nothing better to do, so we went.
The show started about an hour late, and Luisa was sitting next to me and we started talking. She was really funny and seemed nice, and was really into blues music, which she talked about with amazing enthusiasm.
Ann-Marie and I were looking for a third roommate. We already had an ad in the Village Voice and on Craig’s List. We had this big apartment at Seventy-ninth and Amsterdam, and our other roommate went home to Ohio, so we desperately needed a third person to help pay the rent, or we’d be hitting the streets.
Luisa had a sublet in the Village that was almost up. So, it seemed karma was on our side. She’s been with us for nearly a year. But we don’t see her that much since she works such long hours at the bar.
“You’re really going to email Jack Smith?” Ann-Marie asked.
I nodded. “Yeah. I think so. Check him out. There’s something nice about his eyes.”
And that’s how I ended up at O, America! as Jack’s freebie date, watching him do the Whisker Dance and thinking about 101 Ways to Kill a Cat, a book my older brother thought was hilarious.
Besides Jack, I found two other guys to reply to.
Colin O’Connor was really good-looking, with wavy dark hair, a great smile, and a dimple under his chin. He wrote that he was a mortgage banker, but “please don’t hold it against me.” He was one of the few guys who’d replied who wasn’t wearing a T-shirt in his photo.
I also wrote back to Brad Fisher. He said he had been a journalism major and was working as a reporter for one of the weekly give-away newspapers. His note was really funny. He wrote that he was looking for “someone who hates long walks in the moonlight, can’t dance, has no sense of humor, and doesn’t care about the whales.”
Kind of irresistible.
“So it’s Jack, Colin, and Brad,” I said to my roommates. “I don’t have high hopes. But maybe one of them will turn out to be fun.”
Luisa snorted. “You’re crazy. You picked the three most boring guys.”
“Don’t listen to her,” Ann-Marie said. “You’ll find someone terrific, Lin. I know you will.” She hugged me from behind.
“Maybe you should go out with all three of them at once,” Luisa said. “That might make it more interesting. Or maybe pick five or six of them. Big Fat Loser, too.”
“Luisa, please—”
“Yes! This is awesome. You tell them it’s a TV show. Like on Fox,” Luisa continued. “You chain them all to you, and they follow you everywhere. That way, you really get to know them. And then each week, you have a vote. Everyone votes, and you eliminate the most obnoxious one.”
The idea had us all laughing. It was a riot.
But the fun ended quickly.
It ended with one phone call.
7
I went out with Brad Fisher first. He was almost as tall as me, a wiry, thin guy, lots of energy. He had a birdlike look to him, a beaky nose that had been broken a few times in playground fights, he said. He brought it up—I didn’t. His round brown eyes were perched very close together, close to his broken nose.
I liked his crooked smile. He talked out of the side of his mouth, like a gangster, and he could dangle a cigarette from his lips and talk at the same time, something I know he learned at the movies.
We got along pretty well, even though we didn’t have a chance to talk much. He took me to Blondie’s, a loud sports bar on Seventy-ninth Street, just a few doors down from my apartment. We split a huge platter of buffalo wings, very hot and spicy, and he had three beers to my one.
We had to shout to be heard over the crowd and the music, so we mainly smiled across the table at each other and kept wiping the barbecue sauce off our cheeks with our napkins.
Then we jumped in a cab, and Brad took me to Caroline’s Comedy Club near Times Square to see Colin Quinn and a bunch of other stand-ups complain about their girlfriends and airline stewardesses and how stupid the mayor was.
Brad had another three beers to my one. And before I knew it, we were back uptown in front of my apartment saying goodnight. And I’d hardly learned a thing about him. His parents were Russian immigrants and he grew up near Coney Island, and his first after-school job had been taking tickets for the Cyclone, the famous roller-coaster there. And . . . what else?
What else about Brad? He was working as a reporter at the New York Weekly, a free newspaper filled with local news and politics and grocery store ads. But he said he was just doing that for experience. He knew someone at the Daily News who had offered to give him a try-out soon. After working in newspapers for a few years, he planned to move to TV news.
And what else?
I can’t think of much else.
It was a chilly, damp evening. Spring just refused to arrive, even though it was May. I climbed out of the cab. Brad followed me out and stood with the cab door open behind him, saying goodnight. A car rolled by, one of those huge Suburban SUV’s, blaring rap music loud enough for the whole block to enjoy, and I still couldn’t hear what Brad was saying.
And then the SUV moved past. Brad held my hand. “You know, guys stare at you wherever you go,” he said. “Do you realize that? I mean, guys really look at you.”
I didn’t know what to say to that, so I said, “Does that bother you?”
He got this strange smile on his face but didn’t say anything. And then he raised both hands and grabbed the back of my head.
He wrapped his hands tightly around my hair, and he pulled my face to his. Not gently, but hard. And he kissed me—a hard, dry kiss, pressing his mouth against mine so tightly I could feel his teeth.
It hurt. And I hated the way he held my head in place, like a wrestling hold. And when he opened his mouth and his tongue started to force my lips open, I jerked back. Grabbed his wrists and pulled his hands off my head.
I stumbled over the curb, gasping for breath, my heart pounding. My lips throbbed. Were they bleeding?
Brad stood with a crooked smile on his face. Almost as if nothing had happened. But he was breathing hard, too.
My whole body tensed. I balled my hands into fists. �
�Listen, Brad—”
“Sorry,” he said. “I . . . slipped.”
Slipped?
He reached for my hand, but I pulled it away from him.
“I’m a total klutz,” he said, avoiding my eyes. “Sorry.”
I stared hard at him. Was he for real?
“You coming, Mister?” the cab driver called.
“Hey, I’ll email you,” Brad said. He didn’t give me a chance to reply. He ducked back into the cab. The door slammed shut, and the cab pulled away.
I stood at the curb, licking my cut lip. It throbbed with pain.
Did he really slip? Was he just nervous?
I hurried into my building. Riding up the elevator, I thought about Brad’s laugh. Such a loud, showy, angry laugh.
At Caroline’s, Brad had laughed loudest at all the totally sexist jokes. He howled at every joke putting women down. And a guy who told joke after joke about blondes—What kind of word-processing program can a blonde use? A pencil! Ha ha ha—that guy made Brad roar.
Did he think I was a dumb blonde, too?
Well . . . I felt all mixed up about Brad. I mean, he was cute, like a big stork with that bird face of his and that crooked smile. And he was almost as tall as me. But what was with that kiss?
Now, here we are, one week later, with Jack Smith. We had to get back to him sometime, didn’t we?
He’s been doing the Whisker Dance and telling me his ideas on how to market Cat Chow. And I’ve been thinking about Brad, and Ben, and Luisa, and Ann-Marie, thinking about how I got into this, and trying to listen to Jack. I mean, trying to be nice and concentrate on what he’s saying, but, come on, Cat Chow just isn’t at the top of my Most Fascinating list.
We get out of the restaurant. I’m gulping like a fish for fresh air. “It’s such a nice night,” Jack says. “Let’s walk back to your apartment.”
The play was free, dinner was free—and now he doesn’t even want to spring for two bucks for the subway to get me back to Seventy-ninth Street?
“I’m feeling kinda wiped,” I tell him. “Maybe I’ll just jump in the subway over there.” I point to Forty-ninth Street. “Where do you live, anyway?”
“Hoboken. Right over the river.” He points west. “My dad lets me use a condo he owns. Rent free, do you believe it? It has the greatest view. I mean, why live in Manhattan when you can see it all from the other side?”
“Sounds great,” I say, trying to sound convincing.
“Well, I guess this is it,” he says, blue eyes crinkling up. Even the crinkling eyes don’t win me over now. “I’m heading downtown. You know. The PATH train.”
You mean you don’t walk back to New Jersey? Wow. Big spender.
“Well . . . goodnight, Jack. Thanks for the play and everything.”
He nods. “It was great.”
Two taxis squeal to the curb. The drivers, both big, burly men in turbans, jump out and begin screaming at each other. They’re both waving their fists in the air, bumping each other with their broad chests, cursing each other, screaming, spitting on the pavement.
“I . . . I’d better go,” I say.
Jack nods again. We take a few steps away from the battling drivers. A crowd has quickly gathered on the corner to watch the fight.
Jack has to shout over the screaming voices. “Can I call you?”
Oh God. Did I give him my number? I don’t remember giving it to him. How did he get it?
I don’t want to encourage him. And I don’t want to hurt his feelings. He’s not a bad guy, really. Especially if you’re into marketing for cats . . .
One driver shoves the other onto his back on a taxi hood. They begin pounding their fists at each other. The driver on his back reaches up and pulls off the other’s turban. Grunting, cursing, they begin wrestling frantically for the turban, pulling it apart as they struggle. Finally, one of them heaves it into passing traffic, and a speeding SUV rolls over it.
“Jack, I’ve really got to go.”
“So can I call you?”
“Maybe. Why don’t you email me?”
I see the disappointment on his face.
Two very young-looking police officers are jogging across Eighth Avenue, holding up their hands to halt traffic, hurrying to stop the fight.
Jack lowers his face to kiss me. I turn my head so his lips brush my cheek.
Again, I see his disappointed expression.
“Bye,” he says. He spins away, glances at the battling drivers, then takes off downtown.
Cross him off the list, I tell myself. Dull, dull, dull. He’s history.
But nothing is ever that simple, is it?
8
The apartment was smoky and sweet-smelling. The tangy aroma of pot. Lou and Ann-Marie were in a haze, too. Wrapped up together on the livingroom couch, her skirt high on her thighs, one of her bare legs draped over his. A dim light behind them pierced the fog like a distant lighthouse.
Ann-Marie giggled when she saw me. She had Lou’s hand in hers and was holding it between her legs. Her hair was wet and frazzled.
She never used to get stoned before she met Lou. She never used to cook up big pans of lasagna and mountains of spaghetti marinara. She never used to go to metal concerts or Vin Diesel movies, either.
Ann-Marie had changed a lot, all on Lou’s account, and I was happy for her, truly pleased to see her so glowing. She had been melancholy and depressed during the two years I roomed with her at NYU. No guys in her life. Unhappy because her older sisters were so good-looking and successful, and her parents treated her like she was some mutt they’d found in the pound.
The October they forgot her birthday, I wanted to drive out to Little Neck and strangle them both. Instead, I spent hours trying to get her to stop crying and tearing at her hair and pounding her forehead against the windowpane.
That was the year Ann-Marie decided she wanted a nose job for her birthday. I couldn’t talk her out of it. Her nose is perfectly okay. Luckily, she couldn’t afford it, and of course her parents wouldn’t spend anything on her.
She was so unhappy with her looks, so unhappy over everything about herself, I sometimes had the feeling she’d like to crawl out of her skin completely, leave it behind the way a snake does.
After college, I didn’t want to room with her. I wanted someone more stable, a little more fun, less depressed. I guess that makes me sound selfish. But I’d spent two years with Ann-Marie, and I knew we’d stay friends, so I started to make other plans.
But then she found this huge apartment on West Seventy-ninth Street that was actually affordable, mainly because she found a pretty good job as an assistant at a talent management agency in the Village. When she asked me to room with her, I couldn’t say no.
Ann-Marie seemed a lot better these days. Being out of all the competition and pressure at NYU freed her, I think, lightened her up. She spent long hours at her job. She liked it because it was kind of glamorous.
The agency had a bunch of TV and music performers as clients—no huge stars, but a lot of names I recognized. Ann-Marie’s job was mainly to act as Mom, to take care of them, to get them hotel rooms and make restaurant reservations for them, to be there for them when any problems came up on the road, to make sure there were food baskets in their rooms when they arrived, and whatever they wanted to drink. Occasionally she’d even buy cocaine for them, but we had to get Ann-Marie pretty wasted before she’d loosen up and talk about that part of the job.
So Ann-Marie was in a much better mood, a lot more steady. And when Luisa moved in, she helped, too, because she was just so off-the-wall and funny. And then someone at Ann-Marie’s agency told her about Meet-Market.com, she met Lou, and the old, depressed and self-doubting Ann-Marie seemed to disappear completely.
She really did leave her old skin behind.
I tiptoed into the apartment, almost choking on the sweet-sour air. “Sorry to interrupt.”
Ann-Marie giggled again.
Lou had his head back on the couch. He rais
ed it as I approached, squinting into the haze, struggling to focus his eyes. I saw the recognition on his face when he finally remembered who I was.
Whew. How stoned do you have to be to be that stoned? Why didn’t they save some of it for tomorrow? But, hey, maybe I was just in a pissy mood because Jack turned out to be such a loser.
I had to pass by the couch to get to my room. The ashtray on the coffee table contained little charred specks, the remains of smoked joints. Several empty beer cans lay on their sides on the carpet beside the couch.
“How was . . . whatsisname? Jack?” Ann-Marie asked in a throaty, hoarse voice. She brought Lou’s hand up to her face and stroked her cheek with it.
“You don’t want to know,” I groaned.
“Tell us,” Ann-Marie insisted.
“No. Really. Let’s not go there. He was pretty bad. I’ll tell you tomorrow.”
I started past the couch. Lou was sitting up now, and he was staring at my breasts. Leaning over Ann-Marie to ogle my breasts. Not even trying to be subtle about it.
Ann-Marie giggled and leaned into him. Did she notice? Did she see how he was staring at me?
“Why don’t you come sit down with us?” Lou asked, grinning. He patted the cushion beside him.
Ann-Marie giggled again and gave him a playful slap on the cheek. “Bad boy.”
“Goodnight,” I said, and, tripping over beer cans, I hurried to my room.
I closed the door carefully behind me and stood for a long moment in the darkness, catching my breath.
Ann-Marie had to notice Lou staring at my breasts like that. She had to see the way he looked at me.
Now I heard them moaning together, moaning in pleasure on the other side of the door.
Didn’t she care?
9
I don’t think about guys all the time. I do have a job, you know, as editorial assistant at FurryBear Press. We do the FurryBear picturebooks. You’ve probably seen them. They’re even being developed by PBS as a cartoon series—or rather, there’s an option on them.
I don’t always work on FurryBear, however. Rita Belson, the other editorial assistant, and I work on other titles—individually, because we never could work together. She’s such a bitch. You should have seen the look on Rita’s face when Saralynn Palmer, our boss and the co-founder of FurryBear, gave me my own book series to work on. Rita practically had a stroke. After all, she’s Saralynn’s favorite.