True Love (and Other Lies)

by Whitney Gaskell

  “Thank you for calling, Claire. And our next caller is . . . Marie from Des Moines. Marie, you’re on the air with Dr. Deirdre Blum,” I heard Dr. Blum say, and then the line went dead. It was actually pretty rude . . . I hadn’t asked for her to butt in to my private business and dispense unsolicited advice, but now that she had, I should at least have a chance to flesh out what she was saying.

  My mother appeared at the door and peered into the room at me.

  “Well? What do you think?” she asked.

  “I think that I’m going to kill you,” I said slowly. “I can’t believe you called a radio talk show to discuss my personal life.”

  “That’s not what I meant. What did you think about her advice?”

  “You heard?”

  My mother nodded. “I was listening to the radio.”

  I closed my eyes and shook my head, praying that no one I knew listened to talk radio in the middle of the day, and that if they did, they wouldn’t be able to figure out who I was. Why had my mother given them my real name? Couldn’t she have used an alias?

  “I think her advice was great,” Mom continued. “If you call and ask Madeline for her blessing for you and Jack to continue dating, I think it will go a long way to repairing the damage.”

  “But it’s totally futile. I doubt Maddy will even speak to me, much less give me her blessing to date Jack,” I said. “It’s completely hopeless.”

  “But it’s the right thing to do. And you never know, she might surprise you. You two have been friends for a long time, you’ve been through a lot together. Maybe she’s feeling as bad about this as you are,” Mom said sagely.

  “But there’s Jack . . . if she says no, then I’ll lose him completely,” I said.

  It wasn’t until I actually formed the words and heard them out loud that I realized just how terrible that would be. Ending my relationship with Jack would make breaking up with Sawyer feel more like the end of a high school crush. In fact, what the hell had I done back in London? By accusing Jack of using me in a twisted revenge plot—and I had to admit that the more time passed and the more distance I had from the situation, it did seem ridiculous—I had probably already tanked the relationship. But maybe if I called and apologized to him, and we had a chance to talk everything out, we could salvage things. Jack had told me he loved me . . . and I loved him. I didn’t have a lot of experience with the whole true-love thing, but from what I’d gleaned from childhood fairy tales and The Princess Bride, love was supposed to conquer all. Maddy had already made it clear that she didn’t want anything else to do with me, so why should I lose them both?

  “It’s the right thing to do,” my mother said again, her voice soft and gentle. As usual I found this maternal superpower she possessed—the ability to read my mind—a little creepy. The FBI should hire her to interrogate suspects.

  And maybe because I knew she was right, I crumpled up on the bed, curled into a fetal position, and let the tears pour down my cheeks and soak into the pillow. As I cried, my breath coming in hiccuppy gulps, my chest rising and falling with a jagged irregularity, my mom sat on the edge of the bed beside me and stroked my hair.

  “You’ll get through this. And don’t forget, things have a way of working themselves out,” Mom said. “Besides, I know what will make you feel better.”

  “What’s that?” I sniffed.

  “We’ll go to the salon and get your highlights retouched. There’s no way you’re going to feel better as long as your roots are showing,” she said.

  I groaned, and buried my head back in my soggy pillow.

  Chapter 21

  I went along with my mom’s plans for beauty salon therapy more for her sake than my own. Letting her flutter around me, directing the hairstylist and colorist and manicurist on just how to fix me up, cheered her to no end. I did draw a line at having my hair cut in the short, ultra-blonde Meg Ryan–inspired coif that middle-aged Floridian women seemed so fond of—I called it the “Lemon Head” look—but other than that, I let her have her way. When we left the salon a few hours later, my hair was a few inches shorter, brushing against my shoulders in a blunt-edged bob, and lightened considerably with the addition of golden-blonde highlights, and all twenty digits were polished in a shiny coral (a color I personally can’t stand, but it made my mother happy, and I figured that she deserved it after putting up with my Eeyore routine all week). I actually did feel a little better—never underestimate the power of beauty products, I guess.

  “Do you mind if I make an overseas call from your phone?” I asked my mother when we got back to her house from the salon.

  She shook her head and gave me a quick hug. “Good luck, honey. I hope she surprises you.”

  “Me too,” I sighed.

  With Sasha at my heels, her nails clicking against the hard tile floor, I took the cordless phone back to the guest room. I shut the door and climbed onto the middle of the king-sized bed, followed by Sasha, who jumped up next to me, turned twice, and curled into a ball, her head resting on my pillow. Before I could lose my nerve, I punched in Maddy’s phone number. It was nine o’clock London time, but I didn’t expect I’d catch her at home. Unlike me, Maddy loved to spend her evenings out, taking advantage of all of the invitations to restaurant openings and gallery showings that came her way through her work connections. After a long day at work, the only thing I wanted to do was crawl into my pajamas and read trashy paperback romance novels.

  “Hello.” Maddy’s voice was suddenly on the other end of the line, sounding far more composed than she had the last time I’d heard her. I was so startled to reach her on the first try that my mouth went dry and I couldn’t seem to form any words.

  “Hello?” she repeated, and then I heard her sigh, and knew she was about to hang up.

  “Wait, don’t hang up. It’s me,” I said. “It’s Claire.”

  “Well, that just makes me want to hang up even more,” Maddy said in a clipped, businesslike tone.

  The phone went dead. I hit redial and heard the phone ring four or five times. She’s screening, I thought, trying to think of what kind of a message I could leave on her answering machine that would entice her to answer. Just as I was deliberating whether I could pull off a convincing enough British accent to pass as the social secretary for Buckingham Palace, she picked up the phone.

  “Hello,” Maddy said, this time sounding more on edge, more wary.

  “Please don’t hang up. Just give me a minute, let me say my piece, and then you never have to talk to me again,” I said.

  “And why do you think you deserve even a minute of my time?” she asked stiffly.

  Ouch. I thought about invoking our longtime friendship, but had a feeling this might outrage her more than anything. “I don’t. But if you don’t listen to me now, I’ll just keep calling and bothering you until you do,” I said instead.

  She hesitated, and was so quiet, I thought that she might have hung up on me again. But then, in a low, toneless voice, she said, “Fine.”

  Now that I had her attention, I wasn’t quite sure how to begin. Should I set forth my case of why I thought that Jack and I deserved a chance together? No, she’d just react to that with hostility. Should I beg? Well, it might be a better strategy, but Dr. Blum didn’t say I had to surrender my dignity while giving Maddy’s back.

  Crap, I thought. I probably should have thought this through before I called her.

  “If you don’t have anything to say, I’m going to hang up the phone again,” Maddy said, interrupting my strategy session.

  “No, don’t do that,” I said hastily, realizing I’d just have to wing it. “First, I wanted to let you know again how very, very sorry I am. About everything. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you right in the beginning that I went out with Jack. I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you that we were seeing each other as soon as I learned who he was. And I’m sorry that you found out by seeing us together instead of hearing it directly from me. But most of all, I’m sorry that I hurt you. I
’d do anything to take that back.”

  “I noticed that you didn’t say you were sorry that you were seeing him,” Maddy said, her voice brittle.

  I paused, not sure how to go on. “Well . . . I am sorry that I dated him under these circumstances, since it meant that I had to lie to one of the most important people in my life. But,” I said, taking a deep breath, “I’m not sorry that I met him, Maddy. I love Jack. I didn’t mean for that to happen, and I’m sorry that it hurts you, but I can’t help it. And he loves me, too.”

  Maddy laughed. It was the same ugly, harsh bark that I’d heard on that horrible afternoon at her apartment a week earlier. God, had it been just one week? Floating around in the pool all day, every day, had eroded my sense of time.

  “I already told you, Claire, Harrison doesn’t love you. He loves me and he was just using you to hurt me. I know that’s hard for you to hear, but it’s the truth,” she said.

  I’d expected to hear a repeat of Maddy’s far-fetched theory—which was based entirely on the unflattering and unkind assumption that she was inherently more desirable and loveable than I was—and I had to steel myself against the surge of anger now flickering inside of me. I tried to instead focus on the giving-her-back-her-dignity thing.

  “Maddy, again, I’m very sorry. I know how painful all of this must have been for you, and it kills me that I had any part in hurting you,” I said dogmatically. I figured sticking to my apology was about the safest route I had.

  Maddy was quiet for a minute. “So, you don’t believe me,” she finally said. “You think that he actually gives a shit about you.”

  “Yes. I think that he does. I never thought I’d say this about anyone, but I think he might be the one. I know that must be so hard for you to hear,” I said.

  “Why did you call? What is it you want me to say?” Maddy asked. Her voice was breaking a little, and I knew that she was crying. I could now understand why men hate it so much when we break down into tears in the middle of emotional conversations. It’s utterly devastating and impossible to ignore.

  I closed my eyes, and rubbed at my face with my free hand. This was it. This was the point where I handed over my romantic fate to her, and I really didn’t want to do it. I could tell from the way she was talking to me that our friendship was history, and that she’d probably revel in the chance to hurt me as much as I’d hurt her. And as truly sorry as I was that I’d been the source of her pain, I just didn’t think that giving her the power to end my relationship with Jack was really the best solution. Dr. Blum had thought so, sure, but then again, I’d done a little Web research on the woman and learned that she wasn’t even a real doctor. She had a Ph.D. in nutrition, for Christ’s sake, and hadn’t even gone to school for psychology. And so what if my mother agreed with her? Hadn’t I taken a blood oath that I’d never, ever turn into my mother? So why take her advice on what could be one of the most important decisions of my life?

  “The thing is . . . once I learned who Jack was, I should have asked for your permission before I continued seeing him. It would have been the right thing to do, and I . . . well, I screwed up. But I want to make this right, I want to make things right between us,” I said.

  “I just don’t think that’s possible,” Maddy said. “I don’t trust you anymore. I don’t think I even like you anymore. And I certainly don’t want to be friends with you anymore.”

  The finality with which she said this reverberated through me. I took a deep breath and forged ahead.

  “I want you to know that I’m not going to continue to see Jack unless you give us your blessing,” I said, the words leaving me with a great whoosh. The phone went silent, and I thought that maybe Maddy had hung up on me again.

  “Hello?” I asked tentatively.

  “What?” Maddy sounded shocked. “What did you say?”

  “I mean it, Mads. I’m in love with Jack, and I think he loves me, but I’m not going to see him anymore unless you say it’s all right,” I said.

  “So, that’s just it? You’re not going to fight for him?” she asked.

  “I never saw this as a competition. It was never about taking him away from you,” I said.

  “How do you expect me to respond to this?” Maddy asked.

  “I don’t expect anything. I hope you’ll give us your blessing, and I hope that you and I can get past this, and that I can somehow make everything up to you, and we can remain friends, but . . . it’s up to you,” I said.

  There was another long pause, and hope began swelling inside of me. Maybe this meant she was considering it. That was a good sign, wasn’t it? I’d expected her to dismiss my request—and me—with a caustic insult or two thrown in for good measure.

  After a few more interminable moments of silence, Maddy finally spoke. “I’m not going to give you my blessing, Claire. I honestly don’t know why you care—it’s not like your doing this is going to make things better between us. Like I said, I don’t want to be friends with you anymore. And I also don’t want you and Jack to be together. In fact, I hope being apart causes you two as much pain as you’ve caused me,” she said.

  And then she hung up on me again, clicking the off button on her cordless phone with an anticlimactic beep. Technology is wonderful, but it has taken away the satisfaction of slamming a receiver down with a loud clatter when you want to not only hang up on someone, you also want to underline the force of your snub. But even so, I got the picture, and I didn’t call Maddy back.

  Instead, I made another call, again overseas. I wasn’t as nervous about making this call as I had been about the one to Maddy. I just felt dead inside, hopeless and helpless. The finality of what I had to do was horrible, but now there was no going back. I reached up and touched my diamond necklace nervously, rolling it between my fingers, remembering how happy I’d been on the morning when Jack had given it to me.

  “Hello,” Jack said.

  I felt the familiar rush of warmth I always did at hearing his voice. It was like being dipped and swirled in melted chocolate.

  “Hi, it’s Claire,” I replied.

  “Claire! God, I’ve been trying to get ahold of you for days, I must have left you a dozen messages! I’m so glad you finally called me back, I didn’t think you were going to,” Jack said. He sounded relieved, even elated, to hear from me, which was miraculous considering how things had been left between us. Not that it made me feel any better, though—considering why I was calling him, it might have made things easier if he’d cursed and spit on the ground upon hearing my voice.

  “Oh, I didn’t get your messages. I haven’t been home, and I haven’t checked my machine. I’m in Florida, visiting my mom,” I explained. “I came here right after I got back from London.”

  “Are you having a good time?” Jack asked.

  I looked at my coral-painted toenails and considered his question. “It’s been nice having the time with my mother. We’ve gotten closer, I think,” I said.

  “I’m so glad you called. I know how angry you are, and I know that it was completely wrong for me to have lied in the beginning about not knowing who you were,” Jack began.

  “I’m not angry about that anymore,” I said wistfully, wishing things were that simple. At that moment, his ploy of meeting me on the plane sounded more like an adorable story we could have one day told our future children, rather than something to break up over. “Actually, I think it was kind of romantic, like something Cary Grant would do in one of those old screwball romantic comedies.”

  “Really?” Jack asked, sounding both pleased and surprised. “Because you were really upset when you left here . . . you were so mad, you actually believed that ridiculous story Maddy made up, about my diabolical revenge plot. You don’t still believe it, do you?”

  “No, I don’t,” I said.

  Jack let out a sigh, and when he spoke again, relief rippled through his voice. “I can’t tell you how glad I am to hear you say that. When you left here, I . . . well, I didn’t think I was ever
going to see you again. I was sure that between my not coming clean about meeting you on purpose, and that garbage that Maddy told you, that I’d lost you for good.”

  “I think Maddy was just so hurt and so confused that she was trying to make sense of it all,” I said.

  “Her way of making sense of everything was to lash out at you and make me out to be a monster. I’m sorry she was hurt, but that’s no excuse for the way she’s behaved,” Jack said.

  “I don’t think any of us have handled this well. You lied to me, and I lied to Maddy, and she lashed out at both of us. It’s all just been a mess from the beginning.”

  “But . . . now everything’s cleared up, right? You know the truth, and so does Maddy, and now we can just move forward.”

  “There’s still something you don’t know,” I said, and then I paused, hoping that the sob welling inside of me would wait until I was able to get it all out. I knew I might not get through everything without tearing up, but crying hysterically wasn’t going to help anything.

  “What’s that?” Jack asked cautiously.

  “Before I called you, I called Maddy, both to apologize to her again for the deception, and . . . and to ask her blessing for you and me to continue seeing each other,” I said slowly.

  “I don’t understand. You did what?”

  I was unprepared for the force of anger with which Jack spoke. I honestly hadn’t known how he would react to the news that I’d put the future of our relationship together in the hands of his ex-girlfriend, whom he likely viewed as a bitter, vindictive woman bent on destroying his happiness. I’d sort of pictured it through the misty lens of a Movie of the Week—the conversation would be bittersweet, like Romeo and Juliet exchanging vows of love while knowing that the promise of a future together would never be fulfilled (although minus the double suicide, of course). In my mind, we’d both be brokenhearted but dignified, melancholy but resigned.

  “I told Maddy that you and I wouldn’t continue our relationship unless she was okay with it,” I whispered.