“Vee see you haf not chosen to participate in zee program,” she would say. “Vee see you haf gained two pounds, hafn’t you—you leetle piglet!” Whap! She cracks her riding crop against her boot.
At this point she could offer up a whole host of horrifying punishments. She could threaten to post a naked picture of me under fluorescent lights online, or she could even threaten to kill a kitten. If I knew that upon any weight gain, no matter how insignificant, a kitten would be killed—I would never gain an ounce again. Fear and shame I respond to. “Whoopsie boopsie” I do not.
My Lee, this pretty Hmong girl without an extra pound of fat on her anywhere, gets on the scale. “Well, My Lee,” Indra chirps, “congratulations! Once again, you’re well within your recommended body weight!”
My Lee looks disappointed. “I didn’t lose anything?” she asks. “I was at a hundred and twenty-two last week, and this week I was trying to get to a hundred and twenty-one.”
Indra gives her a sympathetic little pat on the back. “That’s all right,” she says. “You keep trying. Our ideal weight is whatever we want it to be.”
“Even if it’s medically unsound?” I ask.
All the women shoot looks at me and Indra ignores the comment.
“We can up your dose of ephedrine,” she says and makes a note on her chart. “You’ll have that pound off in no time. My Lee gets to pick My Lee’s ideal weight. No one else.”
After everyone weighs in, the gold star goes to Babsie, a battery-shaped woman from Kentucky. Babsie is trying to lose eighty pounds, but her mystery allergy to vegetables and the fact that her husband hasn’t touched her in three years is slowing her down. She bursts into tears when she is declared the “biggest loser” of the day and tell us all that we are her best friends.
“Okay, ladies!” Indra says. “That’s all the time we have. You all did great. I’ll see you next week and remember our motivation quotation!” Then the whole group answers in unison, “I can be the ideal me. Through change and love and un-i-ty.”
I leave early. I think this is a cult and not in a good way.
Sunday afternoon, four days after our fight, Brad calls. Why even bother? I’m nearly dead with worry at this point. I’ve spent my nights drinking red wine, crying, journaling, and doing terrible things to the Tinkertoy family. I gave them an earthquake by briefly rattling the house with both hands, made oversize plastic novelty ants invade their living room, and gave the children drinking problems by scattering miniature beer cans all around their rooms.
My hands are shaking while I’m on the phone, but I try to stay cool. Brad asks me to meet him at some Mexican place tonight so we can talk. I say sure.
I hang up.
He’s definitely breaking up with me.
1. He asked me to meet him there, not drive together.
2. He knows I hate Mexican food.
3. No one has ever said, “We need to talk” and meant about something good.
This is all besides the fact that David dumped me in a Mexican restaurant and to this day I can’t even see a burrito without feeling sick.
I smell trouble. I smell big, big trouble.
I prepare myself by having a three-hour talk with Christopher, drinking two glasses of wine before I leave the apartment, and popping a Vicodin in the car.
I hold my head high as I walk through the grimy glass doors of the restaurant and into the humid smell of oily taco seasoning and beer. There’s a sign at the hostess stand that says, INDIAN TACO AND BINGO NIGHT!
Instant headache.
“Jen!” Brad waves to me from across the crowded room. He’s early, which is suspicious action number four. I smile weakly, feeling all my plucky resolve draining out of my feet. This is going to suck. This is going to be up there with my top three bad, regrettable, terrible no-good memories, possibly locking in at number one, depending on how much I drink.
I sit down at the faded red-and-white-checked tablecloth. A lone red candle flickers.
“Hi,” I say.
“Hey.” He leans over and gives me a quick, awkward kiss on the cheek. He says something about how cold it is outside. Great. We’re already talking about the weather. The short, bored waiter arrives and asks us what we’d like. “What’s an Indian taco?” I ask.
He doesn’t look up as he answers. “Corn,” he says. “No beans.”
“That’s it?”
He shrugs. “Free bingo card too.”
“Great, we’ll have the Indian tacos,” Brad says, obviously already annoyed at how much time this breakup is taking.
The waiter scribbles down our orders. His apron is greasy, and acne pebbles his face, but he has a thick wedding band on his finger. He probably has a happy wife at home and three brilliant kids. He’s probably been married since he was eighteen.
“Jen, are you listening?” Brad asks. “Do you want just one margarita or should we get a pitcher?” The waiter is still there tapping his pad with his ballpoint pen.
“Whatever’s biggest,” I say. “Bathtub, goat bladder, pitcher, whatever. Perfect.”
Brad smiles tightly. “Pitcher then.”
The waiter leaves and some other guy walks up. “Hi, fucker!” he says to Brad, pounding him on the shoulder.
Brad beams. “Hey, asshole!”
Then the guy leaves. That’s it. That’s the total of their conversation.
“What was that?” I ask. “Do you hate each other or something?”
“That’s just how guys say hi. It’s a form of flattery.”
“Isn’t flattery a form of flattery?” I ask. “And a more direct route?”
“You wouldn’t understand it. Girls don’t get it.”
“Girls don’t get it because it’s stupid.”
Brad rolls his eyes and scoots his chair out farther so he can see the horrible band. Conversation over. Communication done.
Maybe I should just tell him I never want to see him again right now over the oily tortilla chips in the red wicker basket. Maybe I should blurt it out first, so I can be the one who dumped him. So I can say to people, “You know, it just wasn’t working out. We weren’t right for each other, so I told him it was over.” Then I could pretend not to care, and talk about true paths and destiny. I could tell people I’m ready for whatever wonderful plan the universe has in store for me next, even though what I’m fairly certain the universe has in store for me next is another humiliating crack on the jaw.
Brad drums his fingers on the table to the music. So this is what the slaughtering field looks like. Yes, this is definitely a breakup. I list the things I don’t like about him in my head to try and make this process easier. He snores like a Kodiak Bear, he picks his nose without looking to see if anyone is watching, I caught him downloading porn on his laptop, he farts without apologizing, he’s selfish, and he expects me to give him oral sex, rarely with any reciprocation. (Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind giving head, but there’s a limit. Twenty minutes actually is the limit. If he doesn’t cum after twenty minutes of me having my jaw unhinged while fighting my gag reflex, I get up and turn the lights on.)
A pretty girl walks by our table, a tight little blonde, and I study Brad out of the corner of my eye to see if he looks. Of course he looks. Very briefly, but he tries to be all clever by not moving his head, only his eyes. Like I can’t see that.
“Is it really that hard not to look at other women?”
“What?”
“I asked you if it was that hard not to look at other women.”
“I don’t think I did.”
“Oh, you did, Brad. You definitely did.”
“I don’t know. Maybe it’s a knee-jerk reaction?”
I snort. A knee-jerk reaction? What is he, a feral dog or a domesticated raccoon?
The waiter sets our Indian tacos down.
“I’m glad you finally called,” I say casually, poking at my food as though it looked fabulous. “I was starting to think we were never going to speak again.” I’m hoping to
convey an insouciant ambivalence here and not sheer terror.
“Of course I was going to call,” he says, shoveling a forkful in his mouth.
“Could you not talk with your mouth full?” I ask.
He rolls his eyes.
What do I care? It’s not like I’m ever going to see him again. “So if you were going to call me, what did you do for three days?” I ask.
Brad takes a sip of margarita. “I just spent some time with my mom. She wasn’t feeling good.”
“Nothing serious, I hope.”
“No. Migraines. She’s all right now.”
“Well, thank goodness for that.”
We eat in silence. The mariachi band stops and the bingo announcer tells us about all the amazing prizes we might win. Wow. I might go home not only single tonight but with a waffle press and a trip to Grand Casino to see Merle Haggard perform.
The sad part is, I would love that.
The announcer says that the game will begin shortly, so we should all get our cards ready. Before that though, we’ll be enjoying the soothing sounds of some acoustic guitar.
Our plates are cleared, we’ve finished most of the margarita pitcher, and there’s still been no mention of breaking up. I start to think maybe I’ve imagined the whole thing. Maybe Brad isn’t about to publicly humiliate me, but then he takes my hand and says, “Jen, we have to talk about us.”
“We didn’t get bingo cards,” I blurt out. “Why didn’t he give us bingo cards? He said bingo cards came with Indian tacos. I think if we’re going to eat racist food, we should get bingo cards.”
“Jen, it doesn’t matter.”
“Oh really? It doesn’t? Why don’t you tell that to the Board of Native American Affairs? I don’t think they’d care for the name ‘Indian tacos.’”
At this point I realize everyone around me is staring at me.
“Oh God,” I say and run to the bathroom, where I think I might be sick. I suspect Brad’s consulted some kind of “breakup advice” Web site because he seems to be doing this with great caution and very calmly. I myself have read these sites often, so if and when a guy starts to break up with me, I’ll know the signs and can beat him to the punch. Brad has already executed the top two breakup tips.
1. Always break up in public, but never at a bar or restaurant you like, because it’ll spoil one of your favorite places.
2. Never break up at the beginning of a meal. Wait till after you eat or you’ll have a very awkward/hostile meal.
I urgently text-message Christopher from a bathroom stall.
Me: He’s breaking up with me!
Christopher: Good riddance.
Me: No! I don’t want to break up!
Christopher: Oh just get it over with. We hate him. Everybody hates him.
Me: Not helping!!
Christopher: Spill a drink on him. He won’t break up with you if it looks like he peed his pants.
When I go back to the table a musician is onstage painfully plucking out “La Cucaracha” on his guitar, which will now and forevermore be the soundtrack of the Brad breakup. “The Cockroach.” How perfect. The guy is playing horribly, like maybe he isn’t a paid musician, but somebody’s unemployed cousin who needed a gig.
Brad looks nervous. He’s gearing up to say something.
I bump my margarita, hoping to knock it over, and it wobbles momentarily but then infuriatingly rights itself, so I pick the glass up and drink the fizzy, salty drink down whole. If it’s not going to help the situation one way, it’ll help in another.
Won’t be enough, though.
The waiter flashes past and I grab him. I mean I physically lean out and grab his arm with my hand. Waiters hate this more than they hate anything. I know because I waited tables at a pub in college and anytime someone touched me I spit in their beer. I tell him I want a shot of tequila, no two shots. Spit be damned. Spit is the least of my problems right now. There’s nothing left to do except let this happen.
Just breathe. Relax.
I can do this.
Brad takes a big sip of his margarita and clears his throat.
“What man drinks margaritas?” I ask suddenly.
“What?”
“Seriously. I’ve never met a man who drank margaritas. They’re too girly.”
“Jen, I have to say something.”
I want to throw up. The waiter plunks down two shots of tequila in front of me. There’s a special place in heaven for this man. He’s delivering essential field medicines to the mortally wounded. I slam the tequila. Both shots. My heart is hammering in my chest and “La Cucaracha” tap-dances on my last nerve.
Brad starts to talk but I cut him off.
“No,” I say, holding up my hand. “I don’t want to do this.”
He’s perplexed. “Don’t want to do what?”
“I don’t need a man, I don’t want a man, I’m fine without a man, I’m better without a man.” I stand up and sling my purse over my shoulder.
“Jen?” he says. “Where are you going?”
“Anywhere that man isn’t playing the guitar,” I say, pointing at the stage.
I pause. Again, the music has stopped and the whole room, including the musician, is staring at me. “Oh, come on!” I say and storm out.
Brad follows me outside, where I pant in the cold air, while trying to remember where I parked my freaking car. A guy in a full-length safety orange snowsuit is leaning against the window smoking a cigarette. I can’t help noticing him, because his snowsuit is the exact same color as the Scout. I briefly wonder if he is the Scout, in human form.
“Jen,” Brad says, “please, let’s talk.”
I put my finger in his stupid face. The tequila is thrumming deliciously in my head. “I get it,” I say, “it’s over, but let’s spare each other the speeches, okay? I get it. You love me but you’re not in love with me. We’ve grown apart. You don’t feel that spark anymore with me. You met someone else. You need to be alone right now. You’re moving across the country. You have a disease. Whatever it is, you want to move on. I don’t care.”
He tries to say something, but I won’t let him. “I know you still care about me and you want to be friends, Brad. I get it, but here’s what you don’t know, I don’t want to be friends with you.”
“But, Jen—”
“I don’t want to be your friend because you’re a snob and because your penis bends to the left. Because you don’t clip your toenails and I know you downloaded porn called ‘Grannies Who Chug Cock.’”
The orange snowsuit guy says, “Ouch!”
I go on. “I don’t want to be your friend because you won’t stop bothering me about anal sex and you never once asked if you could pick up my dry cleaning.”
I’m really getting going now and his bad habits are popping up in my head like a field of bright yellow daisies. I can hardly pick them all in time. “Because you don’t like my toy collection or my cat and because I called you once and told you there was a spider as big as my head in my bathtub and you didn’t come over and kill it!”
The orange snowsuit guy shakes his head. “Ya gotta kill the spiders, man,” he says. “Ya gotta.”
I put my hands on my hips. Maybe it’s my nervous exhaustion or my new tequila-sponsored honesty, but I feel a jolt of something I can only describe as angry joy surging through me. “I don’t want to be your friend, Bradford, because worse than everything else combined, worse than you being selfish and inconsiderate and always late, you’re a mama’s boy.”
There, I said it.
I step back, out of breath. He gulps air like a big, stupid fish.
“But, Jen,” he says, “I wanted to apologize.”
I don’t think I heard him right.
He shakes his head. “I wasn’t breaking up with you.”
“Uh-oh,” the orange snowsuit guy says.
Brad tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. “I was trying to tell you…that I want to be your boyfriend.”
“You do?”
“Yeah, you nutcase.” He wraps his arms around me.
I feel unsteady. Tears ready to roll. “Really?” I whisper.
“Really,” he says and kisses the top of my head. “I love you. You’re the only woman I want on this whole broken planet.”
“I did not see that coming,” the orange snowsuit guys says, shaking his head.
“I love you, too!” I say and bury my face in his coat. He smells like heaven. Absolute, perfect heaven. “I wasn’t trying to download ‘Grannies Who Chug Cock,’” he whispers. “I swear. I clicked the wrong thing.”
I laugh, eyes full of tears, and we kiss. It’s like no other kiss before. It’s deeper, truer, and with more tongue. I’m flooded with relief, like I’d been dying of thirst and now a river of crystal-clear water is washing over me. I look up at him and frown. “Why did you take three whole days to tell me? You should have just told me right then! We wouldn’t have had a huge fight.”
“Just shut up and be my girlfriend,” he says.
“Really?” I ask. “Your girlfriend?”
“Really,” he says. “My girlfriend.”
God, I love this man.
“Let’s go home,” he says. “We can talk about all that other stuff you said, um, tomorrow or maybe never.” He links his arm in mine and we walk down the sidewalk together.
I hold back the tears for two blocks.
I throw myself into fervent “good girlfriend” research. If there’s advice, I want it. If there’s a tip, I’ll take it. I don’t care where it comes from. Vogue, Cosmopolitan, Woman’s Day, Teen Beat, they all have a lot of articles about “capturing” and “luring” and “keeping” men. It’s like getting a man to stay with you is the equivalent of hunting for large game. The ultimate goal is to find the tastiest prey, hunt it down, and then nail it to the altar.
Woman’s Day says the best way to keep a man is through his stomach. They have recipes he’ll love! and provide ample ways to incorporate comfort foods with intimate evenings so your guy starts to associate food and sex with you. “Capture a man’s appetite, and you capture the man.” This of course is pure, unmitigated bullshit. The key to keeping a man is to keep him wanting you, and that particular code has as many variables as there are men.
Jennifer Johnson Is Sick of Being Single Page 16