The Lonely Hearts Club

by Brenda Janowitz

  “By the end of the week soon?” my dad asks, and I know what he’s saying. It’s either pay rent or he’ll let the month-to-month renter he’s presently got in the loft sign a year-long lease. It’s been long enough. He’s been telling his month-to-month renter that he can’t sign a year-long lease in the hopes I’d be able to return, but that’s all over. This month, he’s not going to do it again. This month, he wants the money.

  “No,” I say. “I’ll bring the rest of my stuff over to Chloe’s.”

  “You can stay with me!” Barbie exclaims with glee. “We’ll be doing so much with wedding planning that it actually makes sense!”

  Barbie can never express a thought without saying it emphatically.

  “I think I’ll stay at Chloe’s,” I explain.

  “But she’ll be back from California soon,” Barbie pleads.

  “Thank you so much for the offer,” I say. “Really appreciate that.”

  Barbie’s face falls. But then, like a baby with something shiny, she remembers that she was discussing floral arrangements, and she starts talking again.

  “I really wanted calla lilies, but then my friend who read this book about the meanings of flowers told me that calla lilies represent death. So I can’t use those now, can I?” She laughs, as if this is a very funny joke, so the rest of us begin laughing, too.

  My mother tries to say something about calla lilies, but Barbie’s already onto her next tangent.

  “And I really love hydrangea, but they can fall the second you cut them, and what if my bridal bouquet gets all limp? How bad would that look? And anyway, I really need a flower that I can dry out so I can keep my bridal bouquet. Jo,” she says solemnly, as if she were about to bestow upon me the secret of the universe or the key to a city or something, “you may be in charge of taking the bouquet and drying it out. Do you think you could do that? If you can’t, I’m sure one of my sorority sisters could do it. But I really want you to feel included, so I want to give you little jobs that you think you might be able to do.”

  I can barely hear Barbie talking any more. All I can think is: If this moron’s planning an entire fancy wedding, how hard could it be to plan a party for 10,000 anti-love New Yorkers? Surely they won’t care about floral arrangements. I can just take a peek at Barbie’s binder filled with wedding plans and figure out what needs to be done to plan a large-scale party.

  As Barbie dissects the difference between red and pink roses (red conveys passion, pink says joy and appreciation), I snag her wedding binder. I half expect to see a Photoshopped picture of her and Ryan Gosling on the cover, that’s how juvenile the whole thing is, but I get past the lace and tulle pasted to the front and open it up.

  The thing is an organizational marvel. She should be the one running my dad’s office. No wonder I got fired. It’s divided into sections with color-coded tabs: venue, entertainment, décor, food, attire.

  I can probably find a venue. I’ve played all of the downtown rock clubs before, and all of the owners know each other. I can probably get a huge discount, too, based on the amount of alcohol I’d assume an anti-love crowd would consume.

  Between Chloe and me, we’ve got entertainment covered. We’ve got so many connections in the music industry combined that it will be more about whittling down our options so as not to offend friends, rather than finding musical acts. That one’s easy.

  My mother can help out with the décor. She can get out her own feelings of rage about Barbie and Andrew’s wedding by creating the ultimate shrine to lonely hearts everywhere. The anti-Barbie wedding, if you will.

  As for food, I’m not really sure what one would serve at a party dedicated to all things anti-love. Pigs in blankets seem like they’d be more festive than the occasion merits. In my mind, I mentally change this tab to instead read: drink. We’ll need an open bar with copious amounts of alcohol. Who needs to eat?

  Attire. That one’s simple: Everyone wears black from head to toe, or you don’t get in.

  “What do you think, Jo?” Barbie asks me, and I have no idea what she was just saying. I nod yes and think to myself, Yes. I could do this. I could actually do this. The Lonely Hearts Club Ball.

  27 - Can’t Get You Out of My Head

  “It’s just like a sleepover,” Chloe says, “the sort we had when we were younger.”

  Chloe’s back from California. And we’re celebrating. I’ve got the apartment decorated—streamers and balloons that I bought at the party store down the street—and a bottle of prosecco chilling in the fridge.

  I’m so happy Chloe’s back. My best friend is finally home. But now, of course, I have to give up the bedroom and move onto the pullout couch. And I have to hide my relationship with Max. Or maybe I just tell her? But what would I say? Hey, Chloe, I know I’ve been dedicating my life to this anti-love movement, encouraging you to do the same and drudging up memories of the biggest heartbreak of your life, but hey! Guess what? I’m dating Max now, so that’s all an act!

  Maybe not.

  “Didn’t we have balloons like this at that slumber party your mom threw us when everyone at school was invited to Debbie Berman’s sleepover party except us?”

  “I don’t really remember that,” I say.

  “How could you not remember that?” she asks. “We spent half the night crying about what losers we were. How we were completely invisible and no one would even notice that we weren’t there.”

  “I guess,” I say.

  “This slumber party is going to be much, much better than that one,” she says, opening the bottle of prosecco.

  “And much longer,” I say. “Or was that your subtle way of telling me you’re kicking me out after tonight?

  “I am not kicking you out,” she says. “That was my way of telling you that I’m psyched you’re here. This is going to be so much fun.”

  Chloe fiddles with the computer to get some music playing and I send a text to Max—there’s no way I’ll be sneaking out of Chloe’s place tonight. Chloe spins around and clinks her glass to mine, a toast.

  “So we’re really doing this?” Chloe asks. “The Lonely Hearts Club Ball? The Web site was not enough for you?”

  “We’re doing this,” I say. “Haven’t you been reading the site? People want this. People want to meet.”

  “How on earth are we going to do this?”

  “Easy,” I say, and present Chloe with my answer to Barbie’s wedding binder—it’s my Lonely Hearts Club Ball binder. A black binder from Staples like Barbie’s, not decorated but with the same tabs Barbie had in hers: venue, entertainment, décor, food drink, attire.

  My tabs are not color coded.

  “This seems like a lot to do,” Chloe says, flipping through the pages.

  “We have a long time to do it,” I say. “We’re throwing the party on Valentine’s Day.”

  “That’s genius,” she says.

  “Thanks.”

  It feels good to be throwing ideas around with Chloe. Working with her on the Lonely Hearts Club Ball reminds me of our short time working together at supergood. We make a great team. I remember, for a second, how we used to collaborate together on art for the Lonely Hearts Club Band demo covers, but then I quickly force myself to stop thinking about that, like I always do.

  “Overall concept?” Chloe asks.

  “Anti-love, all the way,” I say.

  “That’s a good start,” Chloe says, “but we need more. What, are we just going to hang some black drapes and call it a day?”

  “No,” I say, even though I hadn’t really thought of anything past “anti-love.” I think about how Barbie plans to manifest her theme of “summer in the South of France” throughout the wedding. One of her ideas was to have tiny jars of sand on the tables (my mother quickly nixed that idea). “We can have smashed Valentine’s Day candies in little mason jars on the tables.”

  “Needs to be bigger,” Chloe says. She pulls out a sketch pad and begins to draw.

  “I’m going to bring my mom
in to help us decorate,” I say. “Maybe she can come up with something.”

  “Your mother’s going to help us?”

  “Yes,” I say.

  “I’ll believe that when I see it,” Chloe says, with laughter in her voice. “How’s this: unhappy couples throughout history. Think Sid and Nancy, Tina and Ike Turner, Jack White and Karen Elson.”

  “That’s kind of dark,” I say. “Don’t you think?”

  “Isn’t that the point?” Chloe asks, her brow furrowed. “I’m sorry, isn’t this—”

  “Yeah, sorry,” I say. “You’re right. Love that idea.”

  “We can get a local artist to mock up faux portraits of the unhappy couples. And then, on the bottom, where the plate would read the name of the painting or the name of the artist, we can instead have anti-love quotes from our users.”

  “Genius,” I say, as Chloe shows me a rough drawing she’s just created of Sid and Nancy.

  “‘I’ve only been in love with a beer bottle and a mirror,’” I read from the bottom of the drawing.

  “Sid said that once.”

  “Perfect,” I say. “That might be better than quotes from our users.”

  “Good point,” Chloe says, drawing again. “So let’s have quotes from the unhappy couples under their portraits, but instead, we can have the quotes from our users etched on the walls. Or tucked into cookies or something. Or set up like a tree, and when you come closer, you see that it’s not a tree at all, but actually little pieces of paper that look like a tree. Each piece of paper can be a quote from a user.”

  “That’s perfect,” I say.

  “This is fun,” Chloe says.

  “Ooh, I have an idea,” I say. “At midnight, let’s stage a reenactment of the Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre. We can get fake tommy guns and everything. Maybe hire some actors to dress up as mobsters?”

  “Love it,” Chloe says, and goes back to her sketch pad. I do a quick Google search on the Valentine’s Day Massacre, and Chloe interrupts my train of thought. “Are you humming?” she asks. “What are you humming?”

  “I’m not humming,” I say, quickly. A little too quickly.

  “As I live and breathe,” she says, “Jo Waldman, you are humming a pop song.”

  “No, I’m not.”

  Chloe hums a few bars herself. “Yes!” she says. “You were just humming that Faith Hill song!”

  “It was playing in your elevator on my way up tonight,” I explain.

  “A pop song turned into Musak, no less!” Chloe says. “Alert the press!”

  “It’s just an annoying melody that got stuck in my head.”

  “‘This kiss, this kiss,’” Chloe sings out loud. She grabs my arms and holds me close for a slow dance. “‘Unstoppable! This kiss, this kiss!’”

  “Okay, enough,” I say, and sit back down.

  “Are you getting soft on me?”

  “No,” I say. “But I am rather disturbed that you seem to know the lyrics to that song.”

  “Well, there is this guy,” she says. With Chloe, there’s always a guy.

  “What’s his name?” I ask. “Actually, don’t even bother telling me. By the time I remember it, there will be a new one.”

  “I don’t know his name,” she says, with a devilish look in her eye.

  “The plot thickens,” I say. “Do tell.”

  “I’ve been having flirtatious e-mail contact with Rockboy1983,” she says. “The whole time I was in California, he kept me company. Online, that is.”

  “You love the rocker boys!” I say. “I’m confused, is that the name of his band or something?”

  “That’s his username on the Lonely Hearts Club blog,” she says. “You don’t remember him? Girlfriend’s pregnant, he’s stuck?”

  “I knew that sounded familiar,” I say. “But if he has a girlfriend, why are you e-mailing him?”

  “He doesn’t love her,” she says.

  “Chloe, stay away from this guy,” I say.

  “We haven’t even met yet,” she says. “Relax.”

  “But now we’re planning a party where the two of you can meet.”

  “Isn’t that the point of this party?” Chloe asks. “We’re all venting about love, but all we really want to do is find it, right?”

  “This is not love. He’s just another guy in a band who’s not going to love you the way he should,” I say, and Chloe’s eyes fill with tears.

  “Chloe, wait,” I say. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

  “I’m not crying because you said it,” she says. “I’m crying because it’s true. Billy didn’t love me. Not really, anyway.”

  “Of course he loved you,” I say. “Of course he did. Just because his demons overtook him doesn’t mean he didn’t love you.”

  “What’s the point of all this?” Chloe asks, blotting her eyes with a tissue. “Do we want love or do we hate love? I can’t even tell anymore.”

  “Neither can I,” I say. And I really mean it.

  28 - Brilliant Disguise

  I always thought I’d be in the New York Times one day, but I thought it would be the Arts section, not the Styles. And I thought it would be for my music, and not as some trend piece. But here I am, on the front page of the Styles section, the poster girl for the anti-love movement currently taking place in Manhattan.

  “Above the fold,” Max says. “Nice.”

  Max tosses me the Times and then brings me a cup of coffee in bed. He’s got a great apartment on the Upper West Side—a prewar place filled with light and far enough away from Chloe’s to avoid being caught. He hops back into bed with his own cup of coffee and my cell phone buzzes.

  It’s a text from Chloe: Where ru? Never came home last nite?!

  I text back: Didn’t think u were making it home—what happened to rockboy?

  Chloe: Never showed. U were right. Brunch?

  I text back: Crashed with some old college friends - meet u l8r?

  Chloe: I’ll be in the park drawing.

  I should have known Chloe would be in the park drawing. The second the weather heats up, that’s where you can always find her—at Bethesda Fountain, with her sketch pad and charcoals. And it’s already summer, so the weather’s perfect for it. But there’s no way I’m leaving Max’s bed anytime soon.

  “Lemme see,” Max says, and grabs the Style pages from my hands. “‘Manhattanite Jo Waldman has started something. In just a few short months, she’s become the spokesperson for all things anti-love, a movement that’s 875,000 people strong and growing.’”

  “I can’t listen,” I say. “Don’t read anymore.”

  “Aren’t you closer to 900,000 these days?”

  “I don’t know,” I say.

  “You don’t know?” he asks. “I check every half hour to see if we’ve hit a million yet. I can’t believe you’re not checking this thing more often.”

  “That’s why I employ a super-handsome IT guy to take care of that stuff for me. And maintain all of the fabulous ads he’s procured.”

  “Employ? You’re paying me for my time?”

  “No,” I say, twirling a lock of seriously mussed hair around my finger. “But you still must do as I say.”

  “Yes, mistress,” Max says, and puts his coffee mug down on the bedside table. “Anything you say.”

  My cell phone rings. “Please hold for Bee Maran.”

  “Hello?” I say.

  “Hi, Jo?” a voice I can only presume belongs to Bee Maran says. “I’m the booker for The Today Show. I just read your Styles piece and we want to book you.”

  “I don’t understand,” I say, and put my phone onto speaker mode. Max and I huddle over the phone as Bee explains.

  “We want to do a story on this anti-love movement you’ve started,” she says. “Usually summer is when we talk about fun outdoor dates or how to meet people in the Hamptons, but this summer is looking like it’s going to be dominated by punk rock and black roses. All because of you.”

  “Black ros
es actually symbolize death,” I say.

  “Is that a no?” Bee asks.

  “She’ll do it,” Max says, and Bee thanks him. He grabs my phone away from me and takes out a notepad to write down all of the information Bee gives him. I’m glad he has the presence of mind to think about jotting this stuff down. I’m sort of awestruck by the whole thing—a mix of excitement and fear overcome me. By the time I’m cognizant enough to speak clearly again, Max has already made all of the arrangements with Bee.

  “I can’t believe you just did that!” I say to Max as he shuts my phone off.

  “You aren’t getting this whole ‘advertisers bringing you money’ thing,” he says. “Don’t you ever want to move back into the loft? Or get a place of your own? Or move off Chloe’s couch?”

  “Yes,” I say. “I do. Of course I do.”

  “Well, this will get us even bigger advertisers,” he says. “And maybe we could even line up some investors, start getting ready to sell the site when interest peaks.”

  “Sell the site?” I say. “It’s my band’s Web site.”

  “It’s the Lonely Hearts Club now,” he says. “And the way to make real money off this thing is to sell it when it’s hot. Lesser Web sites have made millions off sales like these.”

  I don’t know what to say. How could I sell the Lonely Hearts Club Web site? That would mean that I’m giving up on the band forever. Sure, we haven’t played together in years, but other bands have been apart for years and then come back together. Wasn’t that always the plan?

  Only, I’m not sure what the plan is anymore.

  29 – Today

  Backstage at a downtown rock club is a dark and dirty place where the dried-up alcohol on the floor sticks to your boots and you’re ill-advised to sit down. The green room at The Today Show is an entirely different sort of place. It’s beautifully appointed, with welcoming couches and a water and coffee setup. There’s even a tray of delicious-looking mini muffins.

  “You’re going to do great,” my mother says, and smiles warmly at me. My father refused to come (“I won’t encourage this negativity” were the words he used), but my mother stands proudly as I nervously stuff mini muffins into my mouth. “We should live tweet the green room.”