Match Made in Manhattan

by Amanda Stauffer

  “Are you just being ridiculous though? What’s so embarrassing about him?”

  “I . . . I have no idea. I’m being such a bitch,” I sulk. “I know I am. I’m sorry.”

  “Al, you can feel however you feel, you don’t need to apologize for that. Certainly not to me.”

  “Yeah, but I’m being ridiculous and unfair. And I know that if you were telling me this very same story, I’d say, ‘Well that’s a no-brainer. If you’re embarrassed by him, stop seeing him.’”

  “So why don’t you stop seeing him?”

  I up my speed arrow and meditate on this for a second. “I don’t know? I guess because he’s handsome. And smart. And he’s a really good conversationalist, so our dinners are interesting. And he likes food almost as much as I do, so we get to eat really well?”

  “Don’t forget the guitar thing,” she adds.

  “Well, obviously the guitar thing.”

  “You want me to be a test pilot?”

  “I was thinking about it . . .”

  “Invite him to Ashley’s ‘summer-come-early’ soirée next weekend. It’ll be a lot of people, but they’re either going to be your really good friends, who you know won’t judge you for bringing him but will also be honest with feedback; or strangers, who you don’t care about anyway.”

  “Yeah, I’d been toying with that idea as well. I guess I’ll ask. I’ll tell him to bring friends. Never know, maybe he has cute single friends?”

  “Uhh, you were right about him having cute single friends,” Cassie says as she hands me a plate that Saturday night.

  “You brought me spare ribs? And a cupcake! I should date you.”

  “That bad, eh?”

  “No, I was just kidding. I mean, at least, I don’t think it’s going badly. . . . Do you?”

  “No. The opposite. Hang on. Nicole!” she calls to Nicole across the roof-deck. “Can you come here for a second?”

  Nicole joins us. “What’s up?”

  “Okay, time to dish,” Cassie says in a near-whisper. “I thought we should tell her what we were saying about James.” I instinctively glance over at him. He’s standing in a small circle with Ashley, Blaire, and Ross, the friend that he brought. One of them is mid-story, and James is smiling, nodding.

  “Yeah! Totally!” Nicole exclaims. “You ready?” she asks, as if she’s bracing me for a letdown.

  “Yes. Please, tell me.”

  “We think you’re crazy,” Nicole says.

  Cassie nods vigorously. “Yeah, really crazy.”

  “Me? Wait, why?” I smile, anticipating their praise of him, secretly looking forward to this kind of affirmation, some kind of affirmation, which I’d been craving the past two months.

  “He’s wonderful,” Nicole says matter-of-factly. “He’s really attractive, and he’s really gracious and polite, he has nice friends—”

  “And he’s really smart, and he’s clearly very into you,” Cassie adds.

  I can’t help but smile.

  “So we don’t get why you’re so . . . paranoid about him.”

  “It’s not that I’m paranoid,” I counter, “it’s just that . . . well, he’s not . . . quite as . . . calm? . . . as the people I’m usually interested in. Or used to dating.”

  “Yeah, and look how well those relationships worked out,” Nicole says.

  “I know, but . . . he’s just not always normal. You know, he like, yells in my ear and kisses my eye . . . and the other night when we were out at Middle Branch,” I confide sotto voce, “he took the olive from his martini and stuck it over his tooth so it would look like he has a black tooth!” I grimace. “It’s . . . like . . . weird.”

  Cassie laughs, “Noooo, he’s being funny. He’s trying to make you laugh. And you love it when guys make you laugh. You always say they have to be funny.”

  “Yeah, but there’s, like, smart-witty funny, and then there’s I’m-making-you-laugh-because-you-don’t-know-how-else-to-mask-your-discomfort funny.”

  “You are being so hard on him,” Nicole castigates. “Look at him.” She gestures her arm across the deck. Horrified, I lunge at her arm and push it down to her side.

  “Don’t let him know we’re talking about him!”

  “Fine. But look at him! He’s, like, the stud of the party! Every friend you have here is charmed by him.” I glance over and see him gesturing, if a tad wildly, while explaining something to Ashley and Blaire, who actually appear captivated.

  “I think what Nicole’s trying to say is go easy on him,” Cassie says. “He was helping Ashley ferry trays up and down the stairs. I went down to get more rum and he was in the kitchen alone, loading her dishwasher.”

  Two days later we’re having dinner in his apartment (that dreamy Italian takeout again), when he asks, “So what’d you do last night?”

  “Huh?”

  “Well, I saw you on Saturday, and now it’s Monday, what’d you do yesterday?”

  “Uhh . . . a couple things?”

  “Like . . . ?”

  I lick my lips and stutter, “I, uh . . . I—”

  “—I got out of work, went to the gym, played guitar, and went to sleep. In Connecticut. Your turn. Come on, this is an easy one,” he says in an educator’s tone.

  “Yeah, okay. So . . . I got out of work, I tutored, and,” I hold my breath, “I went on a date?”

  “Whoa,” he says quietly to himself. “I wasn’t expecting that answer.”

  “Sorry? I don’t really know if we’re supposed to talk . . . about these things? I don’t know where we stand, so I figured I should still . . . keep options open? But when you asked me just now, I didn’t feel like I should lie?”

  “No. No, that’s okay,” he says, nodding to himself. “You’re right, we never talked about it.” He reaches over and puts his hand on top of my left hand, which rests on the table. “Do you . . . prefer to—ah, you’re making me self-conscious. Let’s drop it.”

  He clenches his jaw and loosens it, clenches it and loosens it.

  “Don’t be self-conscious on my account,” I say softly. “You want to finish your sentence?”

  “Nope. I take it back.”

  “Okay,” I shrug.

  “Except . . . I also think we should talk about this.” He nods slowly, as if to himself. “Do you prefer to keep things open?” I wince, not sure what to say. “Let me clarify. I’m not seeing anyone else. I would like it if you didn’t see anyone else either. But I obviously can’t force you,” he adds quickly.

  “Okay,” I say, nodding slowly, trying to process this.

  “Ohkaaay let’s leave things as they are? Or okay you won’t see other people anymore?”

  I keep nodding, chewing this over. “Ohkaaay the latter?”

  James invited me up to his house in Connecticut for part of the weekend, and after riding the train together from Grand Central early Friday evening, we’re sitting at a beachfront restaurant, enjoying the tides rushing in beyond the window and picking at a platter of oysters.

  “So, my parents . . . nah, forget it.”

  “What?”

  “No, nothing.”

  “Come on.”

  “No, I was going to . . . now I’m feeling self-conscious.”

  I roll my eyes. “Come on, what is it?”

  “My parents live just five minutes from me . . . and I was wondering if you wanted to meet them for drinks tomorrow night?”

  “Oh.” I pause, surprised and flattered by his invitation. “Actually . . . I can’t stay too too long tomorrow. Like, until lunch maybe?” I hesitate. “I’ve got some college friends coming into town tomorrow night, and since you mentioned you had a thing anyway, I told them I’d be back and ready to meet up early evening.” I’ve never had someone arrange a meet-the-parents so soon. It’s touching, and maybe a little strange? But I’m not going to be “that girl” who breaks plans for a guy.

  “Do you . . . want to meet my parents another time?”

  “I . . . guess if you want m
e to?”

  “Would I be asking otherwise?”

  I smile and reach for a wedge of lemon, not sure that this merits a response. “So. What’d you do the last couple of days?”

  “I played half a round of golf after work Wednesday, met up with some friends for drinks yesterday. Work was boring . . . you?”

  “Work-wise, same old same old. I’ve been at the Armory every day this week, trying to avoid the office, which is crushing my soul. Otherwise? I tutored, had drinks with Dave, I dunno.” I shrug.

  “Dave, as in, your ex?”

  “Yeah, but, I think I’ve said this before, we are 100 percent utterly and truly platonic. He’s a friend. I’ve known him forever, and I promise you it’s not . . . untoward or anything. I remember our conversation from Monday night.” I nod encouragingly. While I haven’t closed down my Match account, my inbox is starting to fill up with unopened messages and winks. To say that I’m in a serious relationship with James would be an overstatement, but it at least feels like the start of a committed one.

  “Does he know about me?”

  “Yeah. I actually told him about you last night. So, now he knows.”

  “Wait. So, my parents know all about you. They’ve known about you for weeks. Maybe months. They’re ready to meet you. And you just told your ex now?”

  “Look. I don’t think of him as an ex-boyfriend, so I don’t . . . divulge information on a faster or slower timeline than I do with regular friends.”

  “But you had your other friends meet me at Ashley’s, so they obviously know about me.”

  “Yeah, but if you remember, I didn’t think of us as exclusively dating until Monday. I obviously liked you, or I wouldn’t have kept seeing you, wouldn’t have introduced you to friends . . . but I wasn’t going to go around talking about you as ‘my boyfriend’ when . . . I mean, you know, I thought we were still seeing other people.” I pause. “But I don’t tell Dave, or anyone for that matter, about every single date I go on.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Besides, I did tell Dave. Wasn’t that the whole point of this? So, there’s really nothing to be upset about.” We look at each other, and he looks like he’s mulling this over. “I’m sorry. I am. I’m sorry if you’re upset. But I wasn’t trying to be inconsiderate, or to pretend you don’t exist. Dave knows. Right?”

  Almost instantaneously, as if a light bulb went on in his head, he brightens. “Was that our first fight? Uh-oh, first fight? Maybe? I think that was our first fight.”

  “How was that a fight?” I can’t tell if he’s joking or not.

  “Well, I have been placing more importance on this relationship than you, and my feelings were hurt, and you disagreed with me and—”

  “That wasn’t a fight. That’s a differing of opinions.”

  “You can call it whatever you want, but you’re disappointed in my reaction.”

  “I’m not disappointed. It’s sweet. I was just trying to explain why I hadn’t told Dave sooner.”

  “It’s fine,” he says, as if he’s soothing me. He reaches across the table, pulls my head in, and kisses me on the forehead. “First fight,” he whispers to himself.

  Later that same evening, we sip nightcaps of bourbon from crystal-cut glasses before the crackling fireplace in his living room, which feels straight out of a Ralph Lauren catalog: brass-tacked leather armchairs, red-checked flannel throw pillows everywhere, overlapping animal skin rugs, an iconic Louis Vuitton trunk serving as the coffee table. When he opens a guitar case in the corner and crosses the room toward me, strumming as he sits, I know I’m toast. The cozy-classy lodge ambience permeated with the wintry scent of burning embers, his faint music drawing me to him like the Pied Piper—I’ll be eschewing the Pants Speech tonight.

  April 24 at 12:31 p.m.

  Subject: FW: James Hathaway added you as a friend on Facebook

  So I see you’re hard at work today, too? ;)

  I actually just polished off a lengthy Word document chock-full of Florence recs, but now I’m pulling a you (Kidding. Kind of) and getting all self-conscious about sending it, in my case because it is ridiculously detailed and I think you might have just been being polite when you said, “Yes, Alison, I’d love to hear your advice on what to see & do when in Italy next month . . .”

  Cheers,

  Alison

  April 24 at 1:08 p.m.

  Good afternoon!

  Thank you for confirming me as your Facebook friend. Just so you know, I was not being polite when I said I wanted your list of Florence-related recs. I feel like you’re an expert traveler, plus, you lived there! Please send me the email!

  So, I hit a major wall 20 minutes ago but was able to drive through it with a 3rd cup of coffee. You wore me out this weekend. 8:45 will be my bedtime tonight as long as it isn’t too light outside!!

  The last 45 minutes of sleep we were able to get Saturday a.m. was one of the top 5 moments of the weekend. . . . That’s a compliment, BTW.

  JRH

  April 24 at 4:55 p.m.

  Funny - I’m having trouble comprehending how “I most enjoy spending time with you when you are passed out” is a compliment. . . . What were the other 4 highlights of the weekend?

  Also, my Word document o’ travel advice is attached. I lifted a few sections from a similar document I created for friends honeymooning across Italy last summer. I opted not to delete the sappy romantic suggestions, because I figured you can enjoy them by yourself, snap some photos, and Photoshop me in. Nothing spells romance like a good Photoshopped JPEG.

  April 24 at 5:56 p.m.

  1.

  Intimate activities with you by the fire Friday evening

  2.

  Waking up next to you

  3.

  Dinner (everything except our first fight) and ice cream Friday evening

  4.

  The anticipation of seeing you again after you left

  5.

  Run/shower/breakfast Saturday

  The last 45 minutes of sleep yesterday a.m. was wonderful but was technically not part of the weekend. I liked it because it was so unplanned and totally mellow, comfortable, etc.

  Yours,

  Jamie

  April 26 at 8:45 a.m.

  Good morning!

  Thanks again for accompanying me to the office party last night. I can’t imagine that was any fun for you, but you were a very good sport. Plus, today at work everyone keeps telling me how I’m dating up.

  I hope you’re hanging in there. I know I slept like a rock when we got home last night, but I vaguely recall waking up to you reading by the lamp more than once in the middle of the night. How many hours do you think you slept?

  Jimmy

  April 26 at 12:02 p.m.

  Hmm. I’d venture to say 6 hours? I think that’s a PR for me in terms of our sleepovers, though. Mental high five! I’m proud.

  Ooh! Did I tell you (I think I did) that my firm got an increased allowance to let me move forward with finishes analysis (i.e., paint, varnish, shellac, etc.) in unexamined spaces in the Armory? A very welcome respite from the dreariness/oppressiveness of the office! Happy day.

  I have to swing by there at some point today or tomorrow. If you weren’t kidding about wanting a personal tour on Saturday, I can try to arrange clearance for us with the security guards?

  Cheers,

  Alison

  “Sooo, don’t get all . . . freaky or whatever,” James says, lifting his martini. “Oh, cheers, by the way.” We clink glasses. “But . . . I was staying in Connecticut last night and my dad had to work late, so I had dinner with my mom. Somewhere near the dregs of the second bottle of wine—”

  “Ooh, I’m impressed, maybe secretly jealous, that you and your mom can polish off two bottles between you! That’s all fine and well for me and my BYOB-ing gal pals, you know, but my mom has the tolerance of a flea.”

  “No, my mom can kick it back like the best of them. See? I told you she’s cool. Anyway—”

&
nbsp; “Anytime we try to wine and dine my mom, we wind up calling it an early night before she makes it through glass two. Actually, it’s kind of cute; she always tries to deny her lightweightedness, but then always winds up whispering to the hostess on the way out that her children got her drunk.”

  “That’s cute. Are you going to let me finish my story?”

  “Nope,” I say smiling defiantly. “. . . Okay, fine. Go on.”

  “Anyway, somewhere near the dregs of the second bottle, I told her that I thought you might be The One.”

  I blink.

  “And . . .” he leads.

  I blink again and faintly smile.

  “And this is the part where you say, ‘Really, James? That sounds so nice. That makes me happppy.’”

  “Really, James? That sounds so nice. That makes me happppy,” I imitate.

  “Come here, you.” And he kisses me somewhere between my cheek and forehead, dangerously close to my eye once again.

  Over brunch at Cowgirl in the West Village on Saturday of that same week, he reprises the subject. “So, when I brought up my conversation with my mom on Thursday, you . . . didn’t say anything.”

  “Oh?” I dip a forkful of eggs into my ketchup.

  “Way to be coy again,” he says.

  “I’m not trying to be coy. I’m sorry. I just don’t know what to say to that? It was really sweet.”

  “Well, why don’t you reciprocate the sentiment?”

  I understand and nod okay.

  “Are there things you want to change?” he queries.

  “Want to change?” I echo. “Well. Now that you mention it . . .”

  “Uh-oh. What do you want to change about me this time.” He rolls his eyes, pretending this is a constant cycle.

  “No. Nothing. But . . . I just want you to be . . . more considerate. Like, a little.” I quickly add, “Not a lot. And no, I’m not angry.”

  “Considerate how?”

  “Well . . . a few times recently you’ve broken plans. Or pushed them back to really late. I know,” I look him in the eye, “that it comes from a good place. And I know that you have to get work done and that you want to see me. I just wish . . .” I sound it out slowly, trying not to frighten him or elicit his “this is a fight” routine, “. . . that you could plan a little better. Like if you know you’re going to have tons of work one night, just say so. And we can meet up late-night, or just not see each other that night.”