“You want me to come with you?” I offer. God knows I have nothing more exciting planned today.
Mary pauses, and I can tell she’s thinking about it.
“Thanks, El, but no. Sam will be there. That will help. Maybe. Though, I may need some serious chocolate therapy afterward.”
“I could meet you at the Godiva store later.”
“Ella, you are a goddess. One-thirty? I’ll see you then.”
Before I can respond, Mary has hung up the phone. I stare at the silent receiver.
How was your morning, Ella? How are things with Brad? Did he give you that stupid dry peck again this morning? Can we talk about your problems today for a change?
No, that’s not really fair. Mary’s a good friend. And I’m sure if I asked, she’d come to my pity party.
But I don’t. Because I know she wouldn’t get it. She wouldn’t get how Brad could end up in the guestroom, and I could end up longing for the days when strangers would pay $60 to see me dance around in feathers and little else. Mary still thinks once the ring is on and the cake is cut and the honeymoon in Hawaii booked, life is one big happily ever after. She has no idea that one little “I do” does not magically transport you to a world where love conquers all and you never have to worry about waking up in an empty bed alone.
Sometimes I think about warning her. I wish someone had warned me. About that slow transformation that erased Ella the Showgirl and replaced her with Ella the Woman Whose Husband Can’t Wait to Escape in the Morning. Or about the not so slow transformation from Happy Newlywed Couple to the Parents of Twins Whose Sole Mission in Life is to Make Sure You Never Have an Adult Conversation Again. Thank God for Sylvia or I might have gone crazy months ago.
Shit. I just remembered Sylvia has the day off. It’s me and the munchkins all day. I lean my head back on the Laura Ashley cushions and take a deep breath.
It’s not that I don’t love my babies. I do. More than I ever thought I could love anything. It’s just so damn hard to love them both at the same time, all day long, when I’ve had no sleep. This is why wives don’t go out clubbing at two in the morning.
“Miss Ella?” Juanita calls from the kitchen. “Benny needs a change. You want I should do it?”
“No,” I say, setting down my cup of coffee. “No, I’ll do it.”
And so another perfect day begins.
* * *
Karen is talking. I think. Or maybe it’s Jennifer B. Or Jennifer L. It’s hard to tell. All the safely drab khaki and seasonal sweaters are starting to swim before my vision. Coffee. Must have coffee.
“Karen,” I say to my neighbor. “Do you have any coffee?”
“Oh, of course. I was going to put some out. Decaf?”
“Regular,” I say. A statement that is met with odd looks from every woman seated in Karen Richardson’s exact-copy-of-mine living room.
“Late night,” I add, at the risk of being ostracized for drinking a caffinated beverage after 11 a.m.
“Oh, poor thing,” says one of the Jennifers. “The twins?” she asks, cocking her bobbed head to the side.
I nod because I know it’s what they’re expecting. Even as I remember how it felt to be slinking into a skimpy dress. How that Manhattan felt in my hand as I threaded my way through the crowd of models and actors and casino moguls. So… alive.
“Here’s your coffee,” Karen says, handing me a porcelain mug with pink tulips printed on it and a World’s Best Mom saying underneath. “Sorry, I didn’t have any regular. It’s decaf.”
That figures. I stare down at my decaffeinated coffee with nonfat French Vanilla creamer. And I’m suddenly tired of decaf and vanilla. I clear my throat.
“Actually, it wasn’t the twins. I was at a club opening,” I say more loudly than I meant to. So loudly in fact that even Jennifer #1’s conversation over her son’s potty training with Karen Hellman from Joshua Tree Drive, comes to a halt.
“Oh?” Jennifer #2, from three doors down, says, sipping her chamomile tea with nonfat milk out of a mug that says, “My child was student of the month at Carter Elementary.”
“On the Strip,” I add.
“The Strip, Ellen?” Karen Richardson asks. Karen insists on calling me “Ellen,” as if my name, Ella, is too short for her. I’ve told her over and over that “Ella” is not short for anything, it’s my full name. But somehow she can’t imagine anyone naming their child anything as short as Ella. It would be like calling one of the Jennifers, “Jenny.” Heaven forbid. Wives are not Jennys. Cute co-eds on MTV spring break are named Jenny. Wives in the Lone Hills Development in Henderson, Nevada are called Jennifer. And Ellen.
“Was it for Brad’s work?” asks Jennifer #1, trying to reconcile the idea of going out on a school night. “I went with my Brian to a jazz club last month for a thing with his boss and his wife. Lovely couple.”
The tension in the room eases some, in a chorus of “oh”s and “how nice”s. Jennifer #2 asks Jennifer #1 what she wore. Jennifer #1 tells her about the sequined two-piece she found on sale at the Nordstrom Rack. Turquoise, past the knee, very tasteful.
“I wore Versace,” I blurt out, and again all eyes are on me. “And it was a dance club. Not a jazz club. And I didn’t go with Brad.”
Good for you, Ella. You deserve a night out and I bet you looked fabulous in that Versace.
But of course no one says that. Karen Richardson gives me her I-smell-dog-doo look. Jennifer #2 sips her tea again and exchanges a look with Karen Hellman. I suddenly fear I’ve said too much, that I’ve just stepped out of their world too far and I can’t go back. Please, Karen, don’t take away my World’s Best Mom mug!
“But, Brad goes to bed early anyway,” I quickly add, as if I’m on trial for abandoning my husband on a weeknight. Which I’m not. Brad escapes every day to the Rejuviskin clinic. Don’t I deserve an escape too? Don’t I deserve a life every bit as much as he does?
I remember a time when I used to have my own life. Only it disappeared so slowly, piece by piece, that I never even realized what was happening until it was too late. First it was quitting Jubilee after I got married. Then it was introducing myself as “Ella, Brad’s wife” to his friends and co-workers. And after the twins came along it was, “I’m Ella, Benny and Timmy’s mom.” And suddenly I realized one day that my name no longer stands alone. It has to be prefaced by my title in order to mean anything to anyone. Wife. Mother.
But not when I’m with Kit.
Those few times a year when Kit calls me to go out with her, I’m suddenly transported three years back in time to the days when I was just Ella. No explanation or qualification necessary. Because just being Ella was enough.
I’m no fool. I know that I’m not Kit’s first choice to go to these wild parties with her. And I sometimes catch her rolling her eyes when I say something she doesn’t consider chic enough. I don’t care. Kit is my lifeline to Just Ella.
The first time I stayed out all night with Kit was right after Brad and I had gotten married. It was just starting to sink in, my new name. Ella Brad’s wife. He’d taken me to a party at work and instead of asking my name, people asked me who my husband was. I’d never felt so insignificant before in my life. Still, we were at his office party, so I smiled prettily and clung to my new husband’s arm.
And then when Kit called the next day I slipped on my red lace Versace and ran as fast as my strappy heels would allow to the opening of Crap Shoot, the Palm’s now defunct exclusive VIP room. We stayed out until dawn, drinking champagne, flirting with the heads of movie studios, casino investors, and high rollers who thought nothing of dropping a couple mil on a hand of blackjack. It was wild. It was exhilarating. It was almost like after months of being underwater, I finally had a breath of fresh air.
Brad was pissed when I got home the next morning, but I didn’t care. The high of finding myself again lasted for weeks. Every time I went back to my closet and saw that red Versace, I remembered Just Ella.
But it was like a dru
g, because once the high did wear off, I needed it even more. And after the twins came along, the high only lasted as long as it took me to get in the door and hear them both wailing, and Brad cursing, and Juanita running on in rapid Spanish trying to calm them all down at once.
Even now, as I sit in Karen Richardson’s living room, surrounded by her QVC collectibles and matchy-matchy Laura Ashley florals, I’m having the hardest time remembering Just Ella.
Jennifer #2 asks which nursery school Karen’s son is on the waitlist for, and the conversation swings away from me and my husband abandoning night. They’re all asking about accreditation and academic versus play-based enrichment programs.
Someone asks me when I plan on sending the twins to nursery school. Oddly enough, I open my mouth and tell them, sounding like the perfect mother I am. Karen Hellman nods and asks if Timmy is letting go of his binky. Jennifer #1 says she read an article in Desert Parent Magazine about that. Jennifer #2 read it also.
I sip my coffee again.
Seemingly, they have all forgotten about me and my highly inappropriate behavior. Or maybe they’re just choosing to ignore it, lest they start thinking about the possibility that they too could abandon their husbands for a night on the town. It could lead to total domestic anarchy.
That’s okay. I play along. Pretending that I didn’t just spend the night with two showboys, a Latin hunk and a movie star at one of the hippest spots in Vegas. Pretending instead I watched Leno and chuckled softly at his witty audience banter and went to sleep beside my husband with a sweet peck on the cheek.
My husband and I are still as much in love as the day we met.
I know the role of Dr. Brad’s Wife by heart and I can play it even with a cup of weak decaf in my system.
Until Kit calls again.
Chapter Five:
Mary, the Queen of Hearts
My mother is wearing a Prada. I’m in a twin set from Target and a Levi's denim skirt (bought on sale) and my mother is wearing Prada and (I inhale as I approach) Chanel. No wonder I’m still single.
“Honey, what on earth are you wearing?”
I look down. Is this a trick question?
“Levi's?”
“No wonder you’re still single.”
I try to ignore my mother’s greeting (or lack thereof), instead bending down to plant a kiss on my sister’s flawless cheek. “Hi Sam,” I say.
“Hiya,” she replies, moving her $200 Juicy bag off the chair next to her. Sam’s dad, a.k.a. Mr. Baseball, sends Sam a monthly allowance that could support a small country, thus my sister doesn’t exactly share my passion for bargain hunting. Today she is a vision in leather boots and tasteful pearls, her long chestnut hair flowing down the back of her trendy Fendi dress that probably cost more than my car. I tug at the hem of my 50% off skirt.
“So, I have news,” I say, plopping myself down beside Miss Tasteful Pearls in the vacated wrought iron chair. (Which I think is supposed to be “rustically charming” but in reality, it’s a little cold as my skirt rides up on my thighs.)
We’re at Bertolini’s at the Forum, in the “outside” seating section. Which means sitting on patio furniture while colored lights change the painted ceiling from cloudy blue to dusky pink. Yep, even the sky is fake in Vegas. The Fountain of the Gods bubbles to the right of me, the up-lights casting a perfect glow on my mother’s pink Prada suit, and I know she’s purposely chosen this backdrop. Mother has a knack for that kind of thing. I have never seen her nail polish chipped, I don’t think a skirt has ever dared ride up on her, and the idea of buying clothes at a clearance sale might very well make her break out in hives. Tasteful ones. That coordinated with her Prada suit.
“Samantha has some news too,” my mother says, a smile quirking the corners of her mouth. Though, in all honesty, after Dr. Gregerson performed her last facelift her mouth just kind of does that on its own.
“Oh, but you can totally go first, Mary,” Sam says, turning her blue eyes on me. Which I find uncharacteristically generous of Sam considering her news must be that Trevor has finally asked her to moved in with him, and I can see her fairly bursting at her Fendi seams to share it.
“Fine,” my mother concedes with about as much enthusiasm as an undertaker, “Mary first.” She sits back in her chair sipping her diet iced tea. I try to ignore her. I do have news. And it’s real. This is a big step for me, emotionally speaking. I’m a new me. A free me. I feel… What was that word Ella used? Liberated.
I take a deep breath, leaning in close for emphasis. “I sent the ring back.” Bombshell dropped.
My mother looks at me like she’s still waiting for the punch line.
“The ring? I sent it back,” I say again. Nothing. Mom still has that blank Botoxed-to-high-heaven look on her face.
I turn to Sam for backup.
“Oh, right. That little package,” she says. “It’s, like, so about time you were finally over him. Good for you, chickie.”
As much as I appreciate the token, “Good for you,” this isn’t exactly the kind of support I was looking for. What does she mean, “finally?” We were soulmates, it was only six months ago. I’m allowed a little grieving time, dontcha think?
“Yes, I’m over him,” I say, just a little more sharply than I might have meant to.
“Who? Who are we talking about?” my mother interjects, looking at us like we’re speaking another language.
Sam looks tentatively at me. She has been apprised of the never-speak-his-name-again rule. However, in a show of just how over him I am, I nod her on. Go ahead, speak the name that must never be spoken.
“Brandon,” Sam says, still looking at me as if I might burst into tears. (Which, I’m happy to say, I don’t.)
“Brandon? Oh good lord, Mary, don’t tell me you sent that beautiful ring back to that poor boy? You’re going to break his heart.”
“Mother, he left me for a cocktail waitress.”
She waves this aside like a minor detail. “He’s just young, sowing his oats.”
I give her a healthy eye roll.
“He’ll come around, Mary. Trust me, no Asherton has ever married a cocktail waitress. You just need to be patient.”
See, this is typical of the Black Widow. Marriage is a negotiation, and if you wait at the table long enough, you’re bound to wear down the other party sooner or later.
“Mother, he left me, okay?” Even as I say it, I feel that familiar depression coming on. The one that can only be kept at bay by mass quantities of chocolate cookies with double stuffed cream centers.
“Well, I don’t see why you had to send the ring back,” she answers, taking another dainty sip of her iced tea.
Hmmm, how to explain to the Black Widow what a huge step it is that I’ve finally given up the last emotional attachment I had to a man that I thought might very well be the father of my children? I look at Sam for help, but she’s engrossed in her egg white omelet that’s just arrived. Fine. Forget it. My mother would never understand the huge emotional step I have just taken. She would have to actually feel emotions for that.
“Never mind,” I say, picking up my menu and wondering why on earth I even bother. The waiter brings my mother another ice tea of the day, and I order a stack of strawberry waffles with whipped cream. As soon as he walks away, my mother pastes that smile on her face again.
“So, do you want to hear Sam’s news?
Actually, I don’t. Once again I have the feeling of being skimmed by my mother, like a book that’s just too long and complicated to actually sit down and read. My mother wants the Reader's Digest version of my life. Condensed, neatly edited for content, and packaged in a slick cover – preferably one with a picture of me and my country club-worthy husband on it. She will never understand what a huge thing it is that I am now completely Brandon free.
However, Sam is my little sister and, despite her perkiness that could drive a Disney character insane, I love her. So, instead I say, “Sure. What is it?”
You w
ill forgive me when I say the next few minutes are a blur of shock and total despair. I’ve already mentioned my belief in the odds of finding love in Las Vegas, so it should come as no surprise that my jaw drops, my mouth actually hanging open long enough to inhale the chlorine scented air beside the Fountain of the Gods, as my little sister says, “I’m getting married.”
I feel faint.
“Isn’t it cool?” she asks, beaming from ear to perfectly shaped ear. “Trevor like so asked me to marry him. We’re, like, doing it on Valentine’s day. How romantic is that, right?”
“My baby’s getting married,” my mother says and actually reaches across the table for a half embrace with Sam. I’m not sure if I’m more shocked by my sister’s news or my mother’s display of public affection.
“But… but you’ve never even dated anyone else,” I hear myself sputter.
“Mary, just because you have to go through the whole town first doesn’t mean Samantha has to.”
Ouch. Thanks, Mom.
“Don’t look so shocked, Mary, you know I’ve been dating Trevor, like, forever.” Sam rolls her eyes in that adorable Meg Ryan way everybody loves.
“Yeah, sure, but he’s your high school sweetheart.” Which means you’re supposed to dump him for some guy who plays in a band, then dump him for some guy who looks really good in running shorts, then dump him for a guy who actually has a steady job, then be dumped by him, then wonder what happened to that nice guy you dated in high school who really wasn’t all that bad after all. But you’re not supposed to marry him!
Sam just looks at me with that blank expression in her big blue eyes and says, “We’re soulmates.”
I think I’m going to throw up.
This conversation is all wrong. She’s supposed to be happy for me that I’m moving on with my life. We’re supposed to be celebrating my singleness. I mean, she’s only twenty-one. What does Sam know about soulmates?
I look from my mother’s beaming face to Sam’s. And I can’t believe it. I can’t believe that this is actually happening to me. This sucks. This really sucks.
What Happens in Vegas Page 5