by Holly O'Dell
I rolled my eyes. "If only it were that simple for me. You know, it's not like I've been pining for Devin or anything ... I've simply blocked him out."
"That's exactly your problem" Anna pointed her fork at me for emphasis. "You never processed any of this stuff so he's taken on this godlike thing for you. And now here you sit, totally stressed over seeing him after two years. Sooner or later, you've got to deal with it, sweetie."
"I know," I muttered.
"You realize that you were basically offered a part nership in the firm today, right? I can't help but wonder if you're trying to sabotage yourself."
"I see that your bachelor's in psychology really does come in handy once in a while." Anna and I both graduated from the University of Missouri. Fortunately, Anna had disliked her temp job as an envelope stuffer post-graduation as much as I'd abhorred my job in birdcage-liner hell, and after only one week of scheming, we agreed to move immediately to New York City in pursuit of the glamorous dream we had seen in dozens of movies. Silly us.
Anna had worked odd jobs all over Manhattan for the past six years but finally found her niche as a makeup artist for off-Broadway plays. Although she enjoyed analyzing all the has-beens and wannabes of the New York theater scene, she saved her best psychoanalysis for me.
"I wouldn't label this as psychology. It's tough love."
"Tough love? Well, you're really gonna pull out the tough love now, because I have a confession." I paused. "I sometimes still listen to the sad rejected-girl CD I made"
"Girl, Dumped"? Anna shook her head. "I should have tossed that CD onto the subway tracks when I had the chance. I mean, `Always on My Mind' by Willie Nelson? `Even Now' by Barry Manilow? `Sad Songs Say So Much' by Elton John? Good god, girl. I said it then, and I'll say it now. If you're going to grieve, at least pick something a little more modern"
It was this tough love that Anna often had to implement the first few months after the breakup. Now she leaned across the table, pushing away her plate of halfeaten pineapple fried rice. "You know what, Kate? You're a lot stronger than you give yourself credit for. What did you lose, 10 pounds after you broke up with that bastard? Got a promotion? You taught community ed classes, for god's sake. You had the chance to explore who you are and not let some guy's rejection dictate that"
"Sure, and let's count all the dates I've had since then"
"What do you mean? I've tried to set you up"
"Yeah, with either your gay actor friends or their freaky directors."
Perplexed, Anna looked up at the ceiling. Even she couldn't remember the last date I had. "Oh, wait! What about that blind date you had? The scientist guy?"
Oh yeah, the blind date. The blind date who just happened to make reservations at Balthazar, the restaurant where Devin and I went for our first date.
This was my life. Thousands of restaurants in this darn city, and this was the one Mr. Blind Date picked. It was destined to be a tragicomedy, and a miserably boring one, at that. He might have been a chemist, but the chemistry between us was pathetic. He droned on about his latest project at the lab and I gave myself credit for managing a polite nod, just like a good Midwestern girl is taught to do. The worst part was I couldn't help but scan the restaurant for Devin.
And he was there.
Okay, not him, but his cologne, which I inhaled when a patron wearing Devin's signature scent passed by the table. Instantly, my eyes went into leak mode. When the tears started splashing on my braised lamb, I knew I had to do something. Without explanation, I fled to the bathroom. Fifteen or twenty minutes later, after the worst of the tears was over and the puffiness had diminished enough to accept as passable, I returned to the table.
Only to find a credit-card receipt and a note that read, "Sorry I left but I cant date some one who has undelt with issues."
How perfect-getting a kiss-off note from an illiterate. It was meant to be, then, because I couldn't date someone who couldn't spell or hyphenate properly.
I shook my head, attempting to rid it of the debilitating tale. "Dating just isn't something I do very well. I think you need to be genetically programmed or something. And Devin definitely isn't in the cards. So what do I do?"
Anna tucked a renegade curl behind her ear. "Kate, listen to me. Being on this project is the best thing that could happen to you. It'll be liberating. You haven't seen him in two years." She laughed. "He is going to be putty in your hands. His dad is hiring you to publicly babysit him. It's humiliating! You're in control here. Frankly, you've always been in control. Maybe now is the time to start admitting it."
"How do you always know what to say?"
Anna shrugged. "It's what keeps me mysterious."
I smiled and checked my watch. "Well, I have quite the afternoon and evening ahead of me. Michael and I are getting together tonight to come up with something to present to Devin and his dad"
Anna's eyes widened. "Michael? Cute California Michael?"
I snorted. She had seen him briefly a few months ago when she paid me an office visit; only she could think of Mr. Stiff as cute. "More like Socially Awkward California Michael. Yeah, he stopped me on my way out the door to meet you and reminded me that the only way we'll meet our deadline is by working tonight. And since I don't want to die of boredom at his house, I told him to stop by my place."
"Oh, come on. Aren't you just a little attracted to him? That sunkissed brown hair?"
"Highlights," I offered.
"And he has those gorgeous hazel eyes"
"Contacts, I'm sure"
"And that nice, straight jawline"
"Plastic surgery, probably"
Anna pointed at me. "Admit it! You noticed."
"Doy, I'm not blind. He's just not my type, and besides, he's kind of stilted anyway"
Anna looked at me speculatively. "Girl, this could be the antidote you've been waiting for."
"Look at me. I am in no shape to enjoy his company while I figure out how to remake the image of an exboyfriend. And like I just said, he's a little uptight for my taste"
"Then you have another project on your handsloosen that boy up!" Anna winked.
My eyes frantically scanned the Thai restaurant. I hushed Anna, but that didn't stop the dicey commentary.
"What, you worried that someone you've never met might have heard me? Maybe a little lovin' is what you and Michael both need," she chortled.
I slid down my chair, though that certainly didn't hide my burning face.
"You're just as uptight as he is! In all seriousness, Kate, there are a lot of women throughout the country who would die to give their exes a personality makeover."
I raised my eyebrows. "Lucky me."
The last thing I wanted to do was pore over press clippings from the last five years that illustrated Devin's womanizing ways. Interestingly, there was a gap in 2004 when we dated. Devin had shielded me from the spotlight. He had said he was protecting me from the media glare, but a pessimistic voice deep within my subconscious told me that he didn't want us to be seen together. Whenever I brought it up with him, he'd dismiss me. "Quit being ridiculous," he would whisper in my ear. "Besides, you're too sweet to be under gossip-hound scrutiny."
One picture of us had found its way into New York magazine, however, and I kept the clipping folded up in my dictionary on the page with the word mystery. I had attended a multiple sclerosis benefit with Devin. Under the picture read the caption, "Devin Underhill, vice president of Hotel Bella, Inc., with an unidentified guest."
Unidentified guest. That pretty much summed up our whole relationship. The picture had appeared in the magazine two months after our breakup. Needless to say, I spent another two months scrutinizing the photo daily.
The only saving grace was that it was actually a presentable picture-good thing, too, or else I would have had to move to Saskatchewan. My wavy chestnut hair barely touched my shoulders, which I'd shown off in a black halter top gown. When Anna first saw the picture, she immediately called me at work. "What a bab
e you are. You look better than any starlet he could have brought to one of these gala events. Who did your makeup?" Anna, of course, had done my makeup for my first-and last major outing with Devin. She had pulled out the photo shoot lights and everything. Rather intimidating, really, trying not to sweat off the layers of caked-on goo. "I mean, I knew I did a good job on you, but you surpassed my wildest dreams" I'll admit, I'd known she was overcompensating since at that point the breakup was still fairly fresh, but I took what I could get.
I looked at the photo now, shifting my attention to Devin. Hot, there was no two ways about it. His jetblack hair provided the perfect contrast to his crystalblue eyes. They gave me flutters every time I saw him. And at six feet five, he'd made me feel petitesomething my five-foot, nine-inch frame never allowed around most men. And those broad shoulders. Yum.
I cut off that line of thought with a sigh. Where was the justice? Blessed with a fortune, blessed with perfect genes ... I looked at the photo one last time. Maybe I wasn't Devin's typical girlfriend, but at that moment, in that picture, I had believed that we were the perfect fit.
I dropped the picture when my door buzzer sounded. Michael had arrived for our evening appointment. Tripping over the Devin-related magazines and Internet printouts scattered on the floor, I sauntered toward the door. I flipped the deadbolt, turned the handle, and found a box brimming with magazines practically in my lap.
"Sorry," Michael said, clutching at it. "I was just leaning it against the door jamb"
"Whoa, you're certainly ahead of me on the research," I commented.
"Do you know how many magazines Gwen has in the storage room? Everything that's been in print on the East Coast since 1972, I swear. I grabbed everything I could from '95 through now." Michael grunted as he threw the box on the floor next to my research materials. He was still wearing his work clothes.
It was awkward having a man in my house after all these years, even if he was just a platonic coworker. Before Michael arrived, I hid all personal items-even the innocuous stuff, like my toothbrush.
I watched him scan my loft-the hardwood flooring, the shadows of the walls, and angles of the ceiling. It might not have been ultra-modern like the condo he likely lived in, but he seemed genuinely impressed.
That is, until he opened his mouth.
"Wow! What's Gwen paying you to live in a loft like this?"
Not only stodgy, but tacky. I bristled. "Probably not as much as you, considering that she talked about you every day for the two weeks before you started at the office. She loved the fact that she was getting one of the hottest publicists from L.A."
"One of the hottest publicists, huh? That's flattering. She speaks highly of you, too."
"Well, I work hard," I said with a nonchalant shrug. "I do pretty well, but I choose to have a great place rather than great furniture." Michael and I simultaneously looked at the two main pieces in my living room-a red-and-gold loveseat I'd found at an estate sale on a road trip to the Pennsylvania countryside, and a used purple-velvet couch an old neighbor abandoned in her apartment. "Some day I hope to have the trendy New Yorker lifestyle, but for now, this is home"
"Trendy New Yorker? I think you're well on your way" Could that be flirting? I wondered, but immediately reneged that thought. He wouldn't know what flirting was if a woman brazenly threw herself at him.
"Can I get you something to drink?" I said, trying to disrupt the disturbing mental image I had just created. "I have water and soda. Pretty basic."
"I'll have some water thanks" Michael followed me into the kitchen and leaned against the counter. "So, do you find it odd that Gwen seems really wrapped up in this Underhill account? I don't want to sound arrogant, but I've had much more challenging subjects. I mean, he's a dim playboy."
I thrust the bottle of water at Michael. No need to be reminded of my poor choice in dating Devin. I shifted to my business persona. "I did some more research on Hotel Bella itself, and yes, it is losing profits. And in recent surveys, guests have indicated their displeasure with the franchise's image. But how "Father Fox" connected this demise to Devin is beyond me"
"The best guess I have is that Hotel Bella has positioned itself with high-end, posh accommodations offered by a well-to-do but still down-to-earth family," Michael said dryly. "And now that you have the heir to this regarded business running rampant all over the city, people are starting to get turned off. Or at least that is what we say tomorrow. It's impossible to connect something as objective as statistics to something as subjective as behavior."
I suppressed a big, fat eye-roll at his stuffy language. "Did you get that out of a brochure?"
Michael cleared his throat. "Okay, let me refocus: Why does Gwen care so much?"
Michael was right. Gwen did seem overzealous about the whole thing. "For starters, she wasn't shy about how much dough she's gonna bring in from the Underhills. But I can't help but wonder if she might not have a crush on Fox. Here he is, a good-looking, widowed, wealthy man whom she referred to as an `old friend' earlier today. All I know is that I don't care what the reason is because-" I stopped myself. Gwen had promised me a partnership, but I couldn't assume she had done the same for Michael. But apparently she had.
"Oh, you mean becoming a partner? Yeah, she told me that she offered it to you and asked if I'd be interested in joining the club."
I felt slighted. Why would Gwen want that yawner to run her company? Was she just doing a little doubletalk trick with us? Why would a publicist use that trick against her own? But now was not the time to jump to conclusions. Surely Gwen wouldn't manipulate me like that. And the last thing I wanted was for Michael to think I was obsessing over the situation.
"Well, if we do become partners," I grinned, "the first order of business is to take down that `Hang in There, Baby' poster. You know, the one with the cat dangling from the scratching post?"
Michael laughed. "Yeah, I think she stole that one from my third-grade classroom"
I put my hand up. "Wait. Where's my computer? I've got to write a press release"
"Huh?"
"I think that's the first time I've ever heard you laugh. This is news."
"I laugh," he objected.
"I don't think so"
"Of course I do"
"Nope"
"That's because you don't joke in New York. Everybody's always so busy being aloof and urban and ironic. Everybody thinks they're in a Woody Allen movie."
"So, if Woody Allen is our director, who's the director for the L.A. crowd?"
His eyes crinkled with humor. "Ah, everybody's the director of their own movie there" Huh, Anna was pretty observant the first time she met him. His eyes were hazel, and I had noticed for the first time the little dark flecks near the middle.
I swallowed. "We really should get started on this." Yes, and get out of the kitchen into the nice, open living room. "How about you start going through all those magazines while I whip up some strong coffee for myself?"
I returned to the kitchen and dug for my espresso maker. "Hey," Michael yelled from the living room. "Is this a first edition of Catcher in the Rye?"
I peeked my head around the corner. "Yup. I got it as a gift from my mom. I was obsessed with that book in high school. Could really relate to that teen-angst thing."
He carefully flipped through the delicate pages. "Hmm, and I thought only guys could relate to Holden Caufield." We shared a look, one of those that's a beat longer than it should be. I turned back to my cupboards, plowing through the plates and bowls obstructing my way to my coffee maker.
"Wow, your hair's really long in this picture," Michael said from the doorway.
I jumped and knocked my head on the cabinet. When I came out and saw him holding the photo from New York magazine, all I wanted to do was crawl back in. How had he gone from J.D. Salinger to Kate Brown history in one minute?
Michael stared at the photo, looking horribly con fused, or maybe lost. I tried to explain. "Yeah, I got it cut right after that picture
was taken and my friend Anna said I looked like Halle Berry but I really thought I looked more like the love child of Rod Stewart and Elton John after he got his weave, so I cried for two days. Anyway, you probably don't care since guys usually don't give a crap about bad haircuts but I am glad that it's grown out a bit and I think this length is still considered short but not as short as it was that fateful day when no one stopped me from getting my hair chopped" I stopped.
Michael grinned slightly as he watched my cheeks redden. "Okay, do you want to breathe and tell me the real story?"
"It was two years ago, we only went out for six months, and please don't tell Gwen because she'll fire me for withholding this information from her."
"So you dated Devin Underhill," he said thoughtfully. "Hunh."
"What's with the `hunh' ?" I bridled.
"He just doesn't seem to be your type"
My type? What did Michael know about my type? Of course, it could just have been guy-speak for "You don't seem like his type" Instead, I gave Michael the answer I thought he was looking for. "Everybody's got a past, and that's mine," I said. So it was a movie line, but I wasn't above using whatever tools came to hand. Besides, it was New York and ironic. "Look, I was younger and didn't have my priorities straight. Now I do, and can we please just forget about it?" My voice was headed dangerously close to squeaky. "I assure you, Michael, it's in the past and it's not going to interfere with this project. I am all about professionalism, and I ask the same of you"
"How did it end?"
Oh, that was the capper. He wanted me to trot out my romantic failures for him? Not in this lifetime. "It's not important," I said coolly. "Trust me. I want nothing more to do with him, romantically, anyway. Unfortunately, he has become my ticket to succeeding at Gwen's firm, or so she alleges, and I am doing my best to forget that we ever dated"
"How did it end?" he repeated, idly curious.
"How do you think it ended?" I snapped, wondering why I was on the hot seat in my own home. "He lost interest. We were just a mismatch from the start. You know, forcing something to be there that shouldn't have gone past the second date?" I quickly turned to my espresso maker, never more interested in making some high-caf brew as I was at that moment.