Transit Girl

by Jamie Shupak

  Then, for the first time in over two years, I slide my engagement ring right off my finger. It’s never come off—not for a shower, not for a workout, not for anything. But now it was coming off for good. Everyone always oohed and aahed at the size and sparkle of the rock, and I would always joke, “You can have the ring, but the boy comes with it.” Doubt anyone would want it now.

  I reach for the pad of Post-its at the end of the counter, on top of the stack of mail. Every morning before I would leave for work, I’d scribble a quick note to him on one of those square yellow pieces of paper. “Good luck with the meeting today!” or “Hope you had fun last night!” or “Can’t wait for sushi dinner later!” Everyday after I’d thought of something sweet to say, I’d stick it to the mirror in the bathroom. That way, I’d think, it was like I was there when he woke up, even though I’d already been at work for six hours. The one time in five years he left me a note in return, he stuck it to Zelda’s leash. “When you take her out, can you grab my dry cleaning,” it said.

  I’m staring down at the Post-it in front of me when I realize I have nothing sweet to say to him anymore. I actually have nothing at all to say to him anymore. So instead, I place the ring in the middle of the blank yellow square and leave it on the kitchen counter, on top of that ugly marble he’d approved from afar. I leave my pen too, just so he would see that I thought about it, but abandoned it instead. I reach down and grab Zelda, and together, we walk out the door and leave the Post-it as he did my heart—empty.

  CHAPTER 11

  The next day, I still cannot believe what happened. I keep replaying it in my head—leaving the ring, taking Zelda, walking out of our home—and it’s like it was a different Guiliana. I am not a fan of alternate routes; actually, that’s an understatement. I hate them. I know these aren’t the words you’d imagine coming—or even want to hear—from a traffic reporter, especially one who offers up sensible, practical alternate routes every day on New York News Now. But those routes are great only in theory. Don’t get me wrong, I stand by the detours I dish out every morning. They’ll get you where you need to go, if you are a person who likes that sort of thing—in traffic, and in life. In practice, though, I prefer the direct route. I prefer the route I planned—no matter how slow or snarled the traffic gets. Maybe I’m a bit of a control freak, but if I’m stuck in a jam on a highway with a sea of red brake lights ahead, I’m still not going to opt to get off at the next exit. I don’t want to see if I can figure out how to get to my destination; no, that’s not me. I’d rather sit and wait it out—just ask JR.

  Then came last night when, for the very first time in my life, I saw the ugliness that lay ahead, and grabbed the steering wheel at the last possible second and veered—skidding on two side wheels, dust billowing up—into that exit lane. I had no idea where this road would take me, but I knew it looked better than the one I was on before.

  My alternate route, it turns out, dead-ended at Gemma’s couch, where Zelda and I are curled up in the corner—same place we’ve been since we left our old home. Before V-Dub got here a few minutes ago, Gem was telling me how he booked this long weekend away at a bed and breakfast upstate for them to celebrate their anniversary. She of course called it too mushy-gushy for her taste, and I told her to just be grateful to have a thoughtful guy who wants to take you away. Now, watching them snuggled together on the opposite corner of the couch, I think that maybe I have a future in dating advice. What a joke.

  Gemma gets up, and I can see Zelda quickly peek in her direction, then go back to sleep. “It’s going to be okay, girl,” I lean in and whisper to her furry ear, even though it’s me that needs convincing. She’s snoozing under my armpit once again, not a care in the world. I try to poke her awake—though who can blame her for not wanting to be right now—and she’s not having it. “Did you say something, G?” Gemma calls out from the kitchen.

  “No, no … just talking to Zelda. I’m ready when you are, Gem.”

  “Good, then let’s get started. What better way to escape the drama of your own life than to watch the drama of some fake teenagers, right?” I smile weakly as Gemma plops back down between her man’s legs, and starts flipping through her DVR. She stops on last week’s Gossip Girl and presses play. Shots of Paris fill the screen as the episode opens. Fucking Paris. Gemma gives me a sideways look. “You want to watch 90210 instead?”

  “Yeah,” V-Dub interjects. “We should change it.”

  “No, no, it’s okay,” I say, trembling. It’s really not okay—the one day I need some Upper East Side distraction, and the show begins with a montage of all the places JR and I went when we were in love and in Paris? “Bullshit,” I mumble under my breath.

  Gemma holds up the remote, finger poised. “Keep it playing. It’s okay,” I repeat like I did with Zelda, hoping that the more I say it, the better the chance I have of actually believing it. I used to say JR was the Chuck to my Blair. Their tumultuous, torturous relationship, the constant push-pull of emotions and shady schemes mirrored ours for years. JR would roll his eyes when I’d say that—he thought I was being dramatic. “We’re nothing like them, G,” he’d say, “no drama here.” A break-up initiated by a cheating fiancé, revealed through a scandalous text message, sparking a drunken, half-naked viral video—nope, no drama here.

  “We’re totally Chuck and Blair,” I say under my breath.

  “Huh?”

  “Nothing.” The show’s main characters replace shots of Paris on the screen, and I start paying attention. Blair hasn’t seen Chuck all summer, because she’s been living it up with her best friend, Serena. Blair finds out Chuck is in Paris as well, with a new woman, and she goes to confront him.

  JR would always watch Gossip Girl with me. He’d be messing around in the apartment—working at the counter or taking bong hits in the living room—but within two seconds of hearing the famous voice over intro blare from our bedroom TV—“Hey there, Upper East Siders! Gossip Girl here … ”—he’d be sprawled out next to me on the bed. I should’ve been psyched—a boyfriend who loves teen dramas—but I knew GG was appointment viewing for him, not because he got to spend time with me, but because of Serena van der Woodsen. “God, you’ve got to give it up for blondes, huh?” he’d mutter while running his hand absent-mindedly through my thick brunette waves. I had to watch season three over because I’d spent most of it staring past him into the mirror on our closet wondering why he was with me at all—why didn’t he just go get himself a hot blonde already?

  Back on the screen, Blair appears in a floor-length red gown. She approaches Chuck, the Eiffel Tower looming in the background of the shot. The music, a slowed-down version of Sia’s “I’m in Here,” plays softly in the background. The tone of her voice in the song—the melancholy, the yearning—mimics everything inside of me. As their eyes meet, the music hits a crescendo.

  Then as they as they stare at each other for a moment, unable to speak, the music softens again. The hurt in both of their eyes is palpable, and tears start slowly welling up in mine as Chuck explains why he fled to Prague. He wanted to start over with a new identity, in a new country, after hurting Blair so deeply.

  Blair: “I don’t think that great man you’re talking about wanting to be is a coward. I think he would face up to what he did.”

  Chuck: “I destroyed the only thing I ever loved.”

  I’m shaking. The tears that formed pools in my eyes are now streaming down my face, one at a time. What would I even say to JR if I saw him right now? Blair’s eyes are red and watery as she looks away from him, down to something she’s holding in her hands. The music kicks back in, loudly.

  She hands him the box with her engagement ring inside. As it passes from her fingers to his, they both close their eyes for a moment, and tears stream down their respective cheeks. My accompanying sob wakes Gemma from her TV stupor.

  “G! Oh my god, I am so s-s-s-s-orry.”

  I hold up my hand. “Shhhh!” Back on-screen, Blair lets go of the engagement
ring. “I don’t love you anymore,” she says to Chuck. “But it takes more than even you to destroy Blair Waldorf.”

  “See?” I manage to eke out between tears. “If Blair can do it, I can do it.”

  “I don’t care, that’s enough of this,” Gemma screams, hitting the pause button on the remote.

  I’m done—curled up in the same fetal position I was the morning JR got arrested, sobbing. Everything feels as it did then—the emptiness in my stomach, the tightness of my throat wanting to swallow, Zelda’s soft fur itching my neck. All I can think is, Does Blair really not love him anymore? I know I hate JR right now, but when will I stop loving him? And then, as if following a script from that morning—there’s a familiar pounding at the door.

  Bang, bang, bang.

  Zelda leaps up, always the first to sense when something’s up. Gemma and I watch as she makes a break for the door, barking uncontrollably. We look at each other.

  “I’ll get it,” V-Dub says, in his best here-to-save-the-day voice. Gemma scooches to the side to let him up off the couch, and he makes his way to the door. He looks through the peephole, then shoots a glare right back to me; I’m frozen like Chuck and Blair on the screen.

  Bang, bang, bang.

  “G,” he whispers. “I don’t know if I should open it. It’s the cops.”

  CHAPTER 12

  I push V-Dub aside and look. “Oh my god, it’s the officer who arrested JR,” I whisper.

  “What do we do?” Gemma asks, looking to V-Dub for answers. I peek one more time.

  Bang, bang, bang.

  “Ms. Layne? Your … umm … husband said we’d find you here?” Gemma’s about to say something, so I cup my hand over her mouth. “Ms. Layne? Can you open up? We need to talk with you—it’s about JR.”

  Suddenly, I’m on autopilot. I take my hand from Gemma’s mouth and slide the deadbolt. Is he okay? He didn’t answer my call—he never acknowledged my call—he must not be okay. That’s all I’m thinking. I’m shaking as I turn the knob and crack the door.

  “We’ve got to stop meeting like this.” I’m trying to match the cop’s smile but my heart’s pounding too fast to conjure up anything believable.

  V-Dub sees me struggling and jumps in. “What seems to be the problem, officer?”

  “Mind if I come in?”

  Gemma grabs for my hand as I pull the door open the rest of the way and let him in. “This Zelda?” he asks.

  I nod. “Sorry, she doesn’t like strangers. Wait—how’d you know her name?”

  “Well, she’s who I’m here for.” I’m trying to catch his eye but they’re both planted firmly on my four-legged baby. He shifts uncomfortably under his bulletproof vest. I can tell he doesn’t want to be here. He hands me a stack of papers. “JR filed these, Ms. Layne. He’s accusing you of dognapping.”

  “DOGnapping? What is she, Cruella DeVil?” Gemma grabs for the stack of papers. “This isn’t dognapping. Zelda is her fucking child. This is kidnapping. Dognapping would be if she took Courtney.”

  I look at Gemma, and we can’t help but laugh for a second.

  V-Dub isn’t amused. “I’m sorry, officer, but what can we do to get you to toss these papers and forget all this happened?”

  “I … I’m really sorry. But it’s a legit law, the Animal Welfare Act of 1966.” He leans in toward me and whispers, “I feel like a jackass for doing this.”

  Gemma leans down to stop him. “Listen, officer, Zelda’s not going anywhere. He cheated on Guiliana with his fucking assistant. She’s keeping the goddamn dog. Right, G?” She turns and looks at me.

  Now everyone is looking, waiting for me to say something.

  “I’m sorry, but there’s no way I’m giving you Zelda. There’s no way I’m giving him Zelda.”

  “She has to come with me,” says the cop. “I’m really sorry.” Just then his partner appears in the hallway carrying an enormous dog crate, big enough to fit ten Zeldas. He leaves it there in front of us—in all of its icy, metal glory—and heads back downstairs to the patrol car, where he said he has a special leash for her.

  The sight of that—and the thought of her in there, all alone and scared, becomes too much for me to handle. “I’m really sorry too,” I say as I hunch down and throw my barely 100 pounds into his doughy belly, just like Richard and Adam taught me during football lessons in the backyard when we were kids. “Go low,” they’d say, “that’s your best chance to knock them down.” And that’s just what I did, catching him off guard. He stumbles out into the hallway, losing his balance and crashing to the floor. V-Dub tries to grab me and I turn around, putting my firm index finger in his face. I mouth, “Don’t you dare try to stop me,” and he backs away. I turn back to the officer and jump on him like a linebacker sacking a quarterback. Zelda barks furiously alongside us as I pound on his chest, screaming at the top of my lungs about how I’m not going to give her up—not to them, not to JR, not to anyone. When he looks bruised and beaten to the point where he won’t fight back, I jump off and dart back inside. Gemma and V-Dub are staring at me—and I don’t know whether they’re proud or petrified—as I slam the door shut and jam the lock back in place.

  “Are you fucking insane, G?” V-Dub is beside himself. “What are you doing?”

  I survey the scene: Gemma’s jumping up and down, Zelda’s jumping and down, but I feel surprisingly calm. I know my back is going to pay for this in the morning, but right now Doctor Macaroni is the last thing on my mind. “I don’t know,” I say. And I’m telling the truth. I really don’t know. But I do know one thing. “I just couldn’t let him take anything else from me.”

  CHAPTER 13

  Jail is dirty. Jail is demoralizing. Jail is downright depressing.

  Which is why, when Gemma arrives to bail me out just after two in the morning, I cry tears of relief. I had been sitting under an interrogation light—that did nothing to hide the maniacal-looking bags under my eyes, I’m sure—since the officers barged back into Gemma’s apartment and took me away. It’s quite the motley crew in here—the girl biting her nails so intensely that her cuticles are now bleeding all over the place. The one who’s on something so strong that she’s been moaning like she’s mid-orgasm all night. Amid all these distractions, I keep thinking that JR was here the other day, sitting on this same slab of concrete that they call a bench, staring at these same blank cement walls. Was he thinking what I’m thinking now: What happened to us? Or was he thinking about Courtney and if she was worried about him in jail? My inner thoughts are like sumo wrestlers pounding each other against the sides of my brain, giving me a massive headache. And it’s freezing in here. Why is it so cold?

  Assaulting a police officer. Resisting arrest. Dognapping. Gemma reads the charges aloud as she hands over my bail. She’d spent the evening running around trying to scrounge up money without having to call my parents. “I called that fucker JR about a thousand times too, G. I told him what happened and that he better drop these bullshit charges.” She was amped, doing that unibrow thing again, furious at JR. “Have you ever heard of someone getting arrested for DOGnapping?” she asked the taxi driver through the metal grate as we pull away from the station.

  “Gemma, shut UP!” I hissed. “I don’t need anyone knowing about this.”

  “Maybe too late.”

  “Excuse me?” I caught the driver’s gaze in the rearview mirror and follow his eyes as they move to the seat next to him, where there’s an early edition copy of the New York Toast. At first I don’t recognize myself on the front page—I don’t know the photo. And it’s blurry. Then I realize that’s because it’s not a photo—it’s a still from my infamous Banter video. The headline is printed right across the black bar covering up my chest: DRIVING MISS CRAZY: TRANSIT REPORTER’S DOWNWARD SPIRAL CONTINUES.

  “Oh my god, G,” she looks at me, her fury pivoting to fear because she knows I made a promise to Maryann and Joe that I’d stay out of the press. “How’d they find out so fast?”

  “I don�
��t know, but I’ve got to get to work.”

  When Eric walks into the makeup room I’ve already been sitting there in the dark for two hours, since 2:37 AM, when a cab dropped me off outside the NYNN studio. I couldn’t fall back asleep once we got home from jail, so I just took a quick shower at Gem’s and came straight here. I made up some story to Marko about having to go in early so he wouldn’t come to pick me up.

  Luckily Eric’s the first one to break the ice. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to use it for ‘In the Headlines.’“

  I give him a look. “In the Headlines” is Eric—and NYNN’s—signature segment. He rounds up the interesting stories from each of the New York newspapers for the day and does a show-and-tell routine for our viewers, summarizing each one.

  “But I’m tempted … I mean, ‘Driving Miss Crazy’? That’s classic New York Toast!”

  “Eric, I …”

  “Hey, I’m just kidding.” He sits down and looks at me in the mirror. “You’ve had a … shitty week, shall we say.” I’m surprised that, like V-Dub, he’s so pulled together all the time that I’ve never heard him swear before. I nod. “But everyone has shitty weeks, Guiliana. Unfortunately, you’re someone the press cares about, so your shitty weeks get put on the front page of the paper.” He pauses thoughtfully before continuing. “The good thing about all of this is that you’re not shitty—you’re great—it’s just the situation that’s not ideal. So we’ve got to fix the situation.”

  “They’re going to fire me, Eric.” My voice is a shaky whisper.

  “No, they’re not.”

  “Yes, they are. Maryann said if I get any more bad press—actually she said if Banter wrote anything more about me—I was done. And while Banter didn’t write anything, I’d say the front page of the Toast counts as negative exposure.” Eric scrunches up his mouth and shifts around in his seat. It’s the face he uses on-air sometimes when he’s biding time, trying to think of a quick response to my witty banter.