“I mean, only if you want to. You know, for old time’s sake.”
“For old time’s sake… I like that idea. I like it very, very much.”
“Hold on,” I say. “Let me make sure my kids are all asleep and my door is locked.” I jump out of bed, totally awake now and tiptoe into the hallway, glancing into each of the bedrooms. My upstairs is kind of a square—a small square—with the rooms facing each other. Even though my kids are all asleep, I don’t think I can relax enough in my room, so I tell Ben to hang on one more second and I pad downstairs to the basement and lock that door.
I settle in on the futon, but it feels a bit strange to be surrounded by toys and my kids’ artwork on the walls. Once Nick moved out, I turned his desk into an art station. There are baskets of markers, stacks of construction paper and paints on the shelf. I turn off the light, so Sam’s finger paint masterpieces aren’t staring at me.
It’s so dark as I settle back down under a fleece blanket. Ben says, “You still there?”
“I’m here.” The anticipation of what we are about to do is so delicious, I can barely stand it.
“I thought maybe you chickened out. You can, you know,” he offers.
“I don’t want to—I never, ever do things like this. Not anymore at least. I deserve a little fun after everything I’ve been through lately.”
“Couldn’t agree more.”
“Maybe I should have a glass of wine first.” Or a shot or two of whiskey, I think. Perhaps I have a problem.
“Nah, I’ll relax you. Just breathe.”
I’m wondering if this will be more of a meditation session than phone sex, when Ben whispers, “You know what I missed most about your body when we broke up? The way you tasted and felt on my tongue. You were like silk. I could lick you all day long.”
I suck my breath in. This is way better than meditation. Ben doesn’t go so far as to say that he wants to do it again, but he doesn’t need to. I know that’s what he means. “That is…” and I trail off. I literally feel faint. All the blood in my head is going south. I’m throbbing in places I haven’t throbbed in for quite a while. “That is just yummy,” I finish. “Thinking about you doing that.”
“Yes, you were definitely yummy. I know you still are, Max. And oh, when I’d slide inside you after I licked you and you were so wet. Oh my god—you just surrounded me.”
I snuggle under the blanket a little more and run my hands down the thighs of my thread-bare flannel pajama pants. The fabric is gossamer thin under my fingers; I could just move up between my legs and probably feel everything right through them. It’s so dark, the only light the glowing screen of my phone. And quiet, so quiet. I have this overwhelming desire to just stay down here talking to Ben for the rest of my life. Just listen to his voice tell me what we used to be like—that’s all I need. I really think it could be enough.
I know it’s my turn to talk and suddenly, I can’t think of what to say besides, “So, what are you wearing?” We both laugh because that night, after we were spent, we made fun of the typical phone sex scenario. The “Hey, Baby, what are you wearing?” type dialogue.
“That’s like amateur phone sex,” Ben had declared back then. “We’re pros; we don’t need to make small talk.” He was right. There’s phone sex that’s just dirty talk between two people who could be strangers, and then there’s phone sex that’s like making love to someone with your voice. We didn’t need small talk back then.
But suddenly, I do. Suddenly I feel like Ben could lead me anywhere, could get me to do or say anything. I feel the force of my need for him like a tsunami crashing through my brain and it scares the hell out of me. I need someone who doesn’t make me feel like I can’t live without him, because what if I have to again?
“I’m wearing worn out gray sweatpants, no shirt. If you were here, you could easily see how you still make me feel. Your voice. The thought of you…”
I stare out into the darkness. My eyes are starting to adjust. I can see the outline of Nick’s old desk. If I squint, I swear it’s like his ghost is sitting there mocking me. Only he’s not dead, just an asshole. Still, his betrayal is lurking there, taunting me—Go ahead, try to give your heart to someone again. See what happens.
“I’m sure you look amazing,” I whisper, not too convincingly.
When I was a little girl, I loved lying in bed looking for dust motes floating in the air—at least looking back now that’s what I think they were. Back then, I was convinced they were magic specks of light that arranged themselves in different patterns just to amuse me. I try to search for some now in the darkness to replace that image of Nick floating through my mind. I can’t, though. All I can think about now is that if I go ahead and do this with Ben—if I reach down into my impossibly soft flannel pajama pants while his voice courses through my blood, I’ll be his forever no matter what happens. And, I haven’t even seen the man in over two decades.
No reason I can’t make him come, though, I decide and blurt out, “If you were with me, I’d take you in my mouth until you hit my tonsils.” But then, I laugh. “I just ruined that, didn’t I?”
“It’s an amazing visual, Max. I really don’t think there’s any possible way to ruin it.”
“I think I’m too old for this, Ben,” I say softly.
“You’re not too old, but maybe you’re not ready, which is fine. I’ve loved just talking to you, Maxie. You make me feel like I’m twenty-two again.”
“The hollow where your neck meets your shoulder,” I tell Ben suddenly.
“What?”
“That was the part of your body I missed the most when we broke up. I loved kissing you there. Sometimes I’d nibble lightly. Sometimes I’d suck on it a little and leave you with a hickey. Sometimes I’d just breathe you in right in that spot. I loved resting my head there.”
“I can’t wait to see you, Max. And now, I’m going to take a cold shower because I seriously need it.”
“Why don’t you take a nice hot shower and think of me while you soap up.”
“Excellent idea…” Ben trails off and I know my job is done.
“Night, Ben.”
“Night, Maxie. Sweet dreams.”
Chapter Six
TUESDAY MORNING I’m full of nervous energy after my conversation with Ben. His words play over and over in my brain—You were like silk—like an old record with the needle stuck in a groove. I can’t stop imagining what he might have done in the shower after we hung up. I love knowing that he was thinking about me, and the whole thing just adds such a layer of delicious anticipation.
Add in worrying about Trevor and his lunch detention, Sam starting Loving Arms, and of course my date with Ben, and I feel like I’ve downed more than a few double espressos. After I get the kids off to school, I go into the kitchen and get out my mixing bowl. It’s been so long since I’ve baked and it’s always calmed me. I take out the sugar, butter, flour, vanilla, eggs, cinnamon and everything I need to make Snickerdoodles, Emma’s favorite. I hope against hope that this will help me get in her good graces. I seriously can’t remember the last time my kids came home from school to the smell of home baked cookies. It’s a shame. I should bake them every week, at least, but I always get so caught up in running around—dropping off and picking up, going to meetings, running errands, doing laundry—the days just go by.
Even if the cookies don’t get me back in Emma’s good graces, cracking the eggs, mixing the butter with the eggs and sugar—just doing everything by rote without having to think—calms me and that’s worth something. Snickerdoodles were always my favorite to make, and when Emma was little I baked them for her all the time. I missed being a pastry chef terribly back then—Nick made me stop working when I had Emma—and baking for my little audience of one was a small pleasure for me.
When I first met Andi I’d bring her packages of warm cookies and bars—golden blondies, rich chocolate chip cookies, jewel-like Linzer tarts, and snowy meringues. I’m convinced that Andi’s
love of my baking cemented our friendship. She always encouraged me to start a cookie business back then, but Nick shot her down too many times. Whenever her family came to our house for dinner back then, I’d serve a homemade dessert and she’d say, “Max, there’s a gold mine in this.”
Nick would answer, “Really, Andi? Don’t you think that’s a bit unrealistic? She’d need permits, a professional kitchen, and she can’t even keep the house in order. How in the world would she run a business?”
Those were the only times that it seemed like Andi disliked Nick. She’d roll her eyes at me and mouth, “You can do it.”
After I put the cookies up to bake, I grab a paper off of the top of the pile of schoolwork on my kitchen table. I can’t believe how far behind I’ve already fallen in going through school papers, and it’s only the beginning of the year. It’s just relentless—homework, notes from school, lunch menus. Even Sam would come home from Happy Time with his little Thomas backpack stuffed with papers. I’m so glad that Loving Arms is green and sends everything out by e-mail. All he brings home now is his artwork.
I turn over the elementary school PTA Ladies’ Night Out invite and form. I know I’m not welcome at it anyway, so I write Business Plan at the top of the paper. Under it I list all of the cookies I would bake if I went into business: Marzipans. Petit Fours. Snickerdoodles. Almond Spritz. Lemon Bars. Linzer Tarts. White Chocolate Macadamia. Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip. Rugelach. Under the list I write, When Sam is in kindergarten, I can do this and I fold the paper up and stick it to the side of the fridge with a magnet.
Between the smell of cookies baking and my little pep talk note to myself, I’m feeling a little bit calmer. By the time I take the cookies out of the oven, I’m almost in a good mood. As I transfer them to the cooling rack, Daisy is at my feet looking at me expectantly. She’s actually grinning—her adorable doggy grin. I asked the vet about it once and she agreed that she smiles. I can’t resist that grin, even though she’s a chunk, so I grab a cookie and break off a tiny piece for her. I blow on it first, so it’s not too hot.
I eat the rest of the cookie slowly, savoring each bite. I can easily see myself growing old alone, just me and a menagerie of rescues. I always wanted to rescue more pets after Daisy and Charlotte, but Nick never let me. When I’m old, I’m sure I’ll have a house full of animals and after my children grow up and move out, I’ll bake cookies every day and break off little pieces for whomever is begging at my feet. Then, I’ll sit at my table and eat the rest of them by myself, drinking milk out of a chipped china mug and wishing that I still had my children at home to bake for. This seems so unbearably sad that my eyes well up with tears. I don’t want my kids to get big and move away and honestly, I don’t want to grow old alone.
Suddenly I have a vision of growing old with Ben. It’s completely ridiculous. I haven’t seen him in over twenty years and here I am envisioning us strolling hand in hand, gray and stooped, like the elderly couple across the street. Every night from spring through fall they walk around the block, holding hands. They’re the original owners of their house, and these houses are well over sixty years old, so they’ve got to be at least in their mid-eighties or perhaps even pushing ninety. I can just see me and Ben sharing a laugh and a whisper. I can even picture his face wrinkled and weathered, and the thought still excites me and fills me with warmth.
Strangely, I never pictured growing old with Nick. I just couldn’t imagine gazing at a paunchy, wrinkled version of him. I never pictured us as grandparents, cradling a newborn again. I could only imagine us in the present and past—remembering the nights of great sex or admiring him shirtless. I realize that all of my fantasies about Nick revolved around sex and his physical beauty. I never fantasized about us really reconnecting once our kids grew up and moved out. I never fantasized about traveling or just sitting on the porch swing drinking lemonade. I guess that’s what happens when you marry someone because you have undeniable chemistry and because they’re just plain gorgeous. Beauty fades, friendship and laughter don’t. And that’s the thing with Nick—I can’t really remember the last time we laughed together. I know we did when we were dating, but when we were married—not so much.
Maybe that’s why he had an affair. Maybe Sloane makes him laugh. Who knows, it might not just be her fabulous boobs (though I still think they’re fake). Maybe they just genuinely connect. I saw a Facebook picture of them that Sloane posted, which I thought was in terrible taste, but that’s Sloane—using every opportunity she can to rub her “victory” in my face and announce to the world that she won. It was right after I kicked Nick out and I just could not believe that she would slap me in the face like that—posting a picture of the two of them for everyone to see. She even marked it as “public,” I’m sure because she knew that otherwise I probably wouldn’t see it. I only stumbled upon it, because a mutual “friend” commented, “Stunning couple.” I unfriended her right away, but I had to admit, she had a point. They did make a stunning couple. Much better together than Nick and I ever looked. Of course she tweeted it too, and Andi told me that she saw it on TMZ. Andi felt terrible telling me, but she didn’t want me to hear it from someone else.
The picture looked like she took it herself, her arm outstretched. Nick’s head was touching hers, and he had his gorgeous smile on full display. Only I know that those magnificent choppers are actually veneers. I would bet that Sloane doesn’t know. Nick’s eyes were a luminous blue as were Sloane’s. In fact, they almost looked like brother and sister with their fine drawn features and their crystal blue eyes. Only their hair contrasted—Nick’s dark, almost black with just the perfect amount of silver at his temples, and Sloane’s icy blond. If she ever let herself go natural, the resemblance between them would be eerie. I always found those brother / sister couples a little creepy, I have to say.
Nick and I were a study in opposites. I’m short; he’s tall. I’m, shall we say, “curvy;” he’s as lean and angular as they come. I’m blond (naturally; not like bottle blond Sloane—or at least I was, before the gray hair set in); he’s dark. I have brown eyes; his are blue. Maybe if we had looked more similar, we would have lasted. He could have satisfied some narcissistic need to look at himself or a version of himself all the time. Okay, I know I’m really grasping. Sloane is, objectively, hot. She wanted my husband. He fell for it. End of story—the oldest story. And unfortunately, my ex-Facebook friend was right; they really do make a stunning couple.
Before I leave to pick Sam up from school, I go upstairs and pull a flowered box off the top shelf of my closet. I remove the lid and inside the box is a rubber banded stack of photos, along with ticket stubs, my graduation tassels and other artifacts of my youth. I carefully take the photos out and remove the rubber band. I flip through pictures of summer camp and childhood friends. As I get toward the bottom of the pile, hidden in the middle of college party photos, I find what I’m looking for. It’s a strip of photo booth photos. I’m sitting on Ben’s lap, my arms around his neck, our cheeks pressed together. We look so happy and young and innocent. More than anything, we look like we go together. It’s not so much that we look alike (his hair is dark, mine is light; his eyes are hazel, mine are brown), but there is a symmetry between our faces. Our smiles match—I think that’s it. Even though he’s got that sexy, crooked grin, and my smile is as big and open as they come, we both have dimples and our faces are the same shape. I stare at that picture and think about what our kids would have looked like. I can’t help it. So cute, I decide, and feel a bit sad that I’ll never have the chance to find out for sure.
I rubber band the photos, except for the strip of pictures of me and Ben, and put everything back in the box. I try to put it back up on the top of the closet, going up on my tip toes to try to push it on the shelf. I guess it’s easier to take it down, because I just can’t get it. Eventually, I grab a stool out of the bathroom, so I can slide it on the shelf—one more thing to get used to without Nick around—not being able to reach things. My b
oys will be tall enough to get things down for me and put things up soon and Emma’s tall enough now, if she ever decides to help me with anything again. I don’t need Nick, but I do need to believe that I have a chance with Ben after all this time.
I don’t know how I’m going to make it through school pick-up, homework and packing everyone up to go to Nick’s without losing my mind from the excitement of seeing Ben again, especially after our conversation. I can only hope that the drama of yesterday is over, and I have a calmer afternoon so I can head to our date with a clear mind.
Thankfully, the afternoon did go much smoother than the day before. Trevor came home happy and said that he didn’t even mind lunch detention that much anymore, because he got to sit in the office and listen in on all the phone calls and teacher conversations. Will didn’t have too much homework, and Sam adored his first day at Loving Arms. Even Emma seemed to be in a good mood, probably because she knew she’d be going to her father’s, but I liked to think it was the Snickerdoodles that did it. The kids were so excited that I baked. Andi was also pretty excited. I brought her half a dozen cookies, and she threw her arms around me and gave me a giant hug. I brought Sam’s new teachers a few cookies apiece too. Just a little snack and a little extra insurance that they’ll treat my baby better than his old teachers did. Even before I gave them the cookies they gushed about how wonderful Sam is—how smart and sweet. I actually felt pretty good about everything in my life for the first time in ages.
So, you’d think I would be calm and ready for my date with Ben, but staring at myself in the mirror only half an hour before I’m supposed to pick Ben up, I’m a nervous wreck. I’m sure, unlike Andi insisted, that I don’t look fabulous at all. Suddenly I feel that, just as I suspected, she was right about going to a boutique. I feel like perhaps I should have spent some money on myself, and I’m sure that I look like I bought my outfit in ten minutes and for under $30, which of course I did. I pull on a different outfit and then another one and another, but I don’t like any of them, so I go back to my new Target outfit. At least the cut of the shimmery tank enhances my cleavage, while the flowy fabric hides any possible flaws. And the skinny jeans make my legs look just that, skinny. So, this outfit it is. I search in the bottom of my closet for the silver jeweled ballet flats from Emma’s bat mitzvah that I know are in there somewhere. I thought I had more than enough time, but I’m really starting to panic. Perhaps I shouldn’t have tried on a million outfits.
Goddess of Suburbia Page 11