“Yeah? Well, I give a shit about your future, too, which is why I try to get you to switch to green juice instead of donuts. It’s healthier, and you’ll live longer. Period. It’s not because I think you don’t look good, Abby. You look fucking amazing. It’s because I care about you.”
“Oh, yeah?” I’m confused and angry, and then the voices in the bar come back to me, making a new wave of nausea surge in my gut. “But you still want someone like Annalise. They said about her trading up and you were all, yeah, yeah.” I make my voice ugly and mimicky.
“Abby, if you actually believe that she traded up, then what the fuck did you do? You must think you traded down.” His voice cracks and he clenches one hand into a fist.
“I never said that!” I shout at him, horrified.
He shrugs, but his eyes are angry.
“I don’t think that!” I sob. “Can’t you tell from the way I praise you and love spending time with you? Can’t you see it? I think you’re smart and wonderful and clever and I lo—” I break off. “How can you think that about me? Anyway, you didn’t defend me in there. And you know what? They’re right, actually. I don’t have the willpower and drive and ambition to change myself like she did. And maybe that’s what you deserve, a person who can.”
I’m sobbing, and then I see a spot of yellow magic in the midst of the traffic: A lone cab, like a deus ex machina, there just in time to whisk me away. I grab for it like it’s the last life raft.
“I’ll let you know about the publicity tour events,” I choke out as I slide into the backseat. “I need a break before we work more on the next project. If we even do it, after all.”
“Abby! Don’t walk away from me.” His voice is hard. “You can’t say those things and just take off. Not after last night. We need to figure this out.”
“No. Just leave me alone,” I snap, my hand on the cab door.
He crosses his arms over his chest and looks mad. “Abby,” he says. “You are acting really stupid, do you know that? When you’re ready to talk to me, I mean, really talk? You call me. And you tell me exactly what you feel for Erik, and what is going on with him, and with me. Take your time, if you want, but not too much time. Because I don’t know how much more of this I can handle.”
He turns and walks away, and as I get into the cab, I see him shove his face into his hands and then shout, before he goes back into the bar.
***
It feels weird to be in my own house for breakfast the next morning; I’m so used to my drive to Boston’s. I miss our laughter over eggs and green goop. I miss typing on my laptop in front of his window, sometimes looking up to see the green dappled shadows and spangled sunlight. I miss sitting on the couch with him late evenings, drinking a cold beer and talking about things while our skin hums with the electricity of being near each other. I miss his mouth, his wicked smile, the way he made me moan in pleasure with the slightest touch of his fingers. God, his touch.
I’m a complete idiot, and I should call him and explain what’s going on in my heart, but for some reason, the words stick in my throat. I don’t know what to say, so I end up saying nothing. Also, I feel like he owes me a huge apology for not sticking up for me in the bar, and not saying that I’m prettier than Miss America when I stood there sniveling on the sidewalk waiting for that cab. And for calling me stupid. Stupid!? I have my pride.
Is that what he has, too? Did I make a mistake? Sometimes I feel certain that I did; other times I feel full of righteous indignation and anger. But still, indignation and anger don’t keep me warm at night, and I miss him badly for the next week.
There is a full schedule of author and model chats online, and we’re going to have some joint book signings. I don’t know how I’m going to muster up the courage to go and face him. He hasn’t called me since that night at the bar, and I haven’t called him, but we both need to be at these events. It’s important publicity and a way to connect with fans.
My stupid birthday is coming up, too, and I hate my birthday more every year, and I wish I could make it go away, but Liesl is probably going to plan something and I’m going to have to pretend to enjoy myself and—
The whole idea had me so nauseous and anxious that I want to vomit, and I call Liesl over for support. We sit on my front porch with coffee. When Marr waves from next door, Liesl gestures: Come over. Marr does and she sits next to me, so the three of us are sitting side by side on the steps like birds on a telephone wire.
Marr is wearing black jeans, heels, and a silver sweater. Her hair is up and she looks happy, and when she tells us about the man she’s dating, I can see her eyes shine with eager hope. “His name is Connor,” she says, her voice soft. “He’s a few years older than I am, and he’s got kids,” her voice trails off, “who sort of hate me right now because I’m not their mom.” But then she brightens up when she says, “Sometimes he brings me one single rose to work. Last week he made me chicken soup when I had Ebola.”
“You did not have Ebola!” I say, just as Liesl says, “Good thing you’re doing that reno, because all that plastic wrap could double as your germ bubble.”
Marr laughs. “You girls are fun,” she says. “But Abby, why are you so sad lately?”
I look at her, startled. “How can you tell?” We haven’t really talked in weeks.
“Your head hangs when you get out of your car, and you frown. I mean, trust me, I’m not turning into the stereotypical spinster neighbor with binoculars who knows everything about her neighbors… yet.” She grins. “Just your body language.”
I remember that Marr is a psychologist or something. I nod. “I am sad, I guess. My—the guy I was sort of—well, things are not good with him.”
Marr takes it seriously. “I’m sorry. Why not?”
I consider this. Why indeed? “It’s... complicated. We’re different, from different worlds. We don’t have enough in common, I guess. It’s—weird.”
Liesl answers, and she sounds mad. “You want to know the real reason? They both think they’re not good enough for each other, that’s the real problem.”
I snap, “That’s not true.”
“Oh, yeah?” Liesl confronts me, and now I wish I hadn’t told her about the night at the bar and everything we said, twenty-seven times, in excruciating detail. “Abby, you think you’re not pretty enough for him, and he thinks he’s not smart enough for you and that you’re still into your ex, and neither of you make the other one feel okay about it all.”
“That’s not true!” I repeat. Then I slump down. “Well, maybe it’s true. But it’s more complicated than she makes it sound.” I point over at Liesl accusingly. “Feelings are strange and intricate, and half the time I don’t know what the hell I’m even feeling, let alone what he is, or how to help.” I sigh in frustration. “And he probably does want someone cuter long-term, anyway. It’s true. And then I’ll be heartbroken when he tosses me aside.”
Marr interjects. “Feelings of inadequacy are hard to overcome, and the only way to do it is with honesty and trust. Abby, have you and—what is his name again?”
“Boston.”
“Have you and Boston taken the time to sit down together and talk about this? Your insecurities and whether they are something you can each overlook and accept in each other?”
I shake my head. “He wants to talk things over, but I said—I got in a cab and ran away. He said I was being STUPID!” I scream out the word.
Liesl immediately starts, “Well, you are—”
Marr cuts her off with a hand on her arm. “Well, do you think you’re too smart for him?”
I shake my head. “No. I don’t. In the beginning, I did think he was maybe a little not that brilliant. But I was wrong, and I don’t feel that way now. But I mean, let’s be honest, okay? I’m never going to be a supermodel, someone who’s as pretty as he is, and I just…” I shake my head and sigh. “It just sucks. It could never work with us long-term, I don’t think. I guess that’s what worries me.”
; They both put one hand onto each shoulder, and I smile. “Why does life have to be so hard sometimes? I know, first world problem and all. But still?”
Marr touches my arm. “Your problems are your world, Abby. I really think that you need to have a heart-to-heart talk with him about this and see where it leads.”
Liesl nods. “She’s right, Abby. Give it a chance, at least. Give yourself some credit. If you’ve been able to reach a point where you care for him and it doesn’t matter about the differences between you, at least allow the possibility that he feels the same way. Find out, okay?”
I shrug and clutch my knees to my chest. “It’s hard.” My voice is whiny.
Liesl snorts. “God, you can be one of those T-shirts that people protest over at the mall.” She makes her voice high and whiny. “I’m a princess! Math is hard!” Or, “Science is hard! When’s recess?”
Marr scowls. “They actually put that on a shirt?”
Liesl nods. “Yeah. And it makes me mad, because I’m into math, you know? And girls around here don’t need any more messages about being inferior.”
I clear my throat. “So, back to me?”
Liesl nudges me with her elbow. “Okay, princess, what’s your plan?”
I purse my lips. “Talk to him? About my… feelings?”
“Ya think?” Liesl rolls her eyes. “Jesus, Abby. If you weren’t my best friend, I seriously would like to punch some sense into you.” She looks mad. “But you’re the only one who can do that. So? Do it. Before it’s too late. If you keep being so wishy-washy, he’s going to move on. Do you want that to happen?”
“No!” I’m horrified.
“Then grow up.” She pokes me again. “I’m only saying this because I care. Seriously.”
“I will,” I promise. Then something else comes to me, and I don’t know from which dark recess of my brain the idea originates, but I blurt it out. “I feel like I don’t have a real home.”
Liesl frowns. “That structure behind us looks pretty convincing.”
I laugh, because she’s funny, and I need the break. But I protest, “No. I mean, this is going to sound strange. But ever since my mom died, I’ve been a little lost. When I was living with Erik, the loneliness went away for a while, but it came back. I feel like I don’t really belong to anyone, you know?” I hear the wistful tone in my voice.
Marr’s face looks solemn and she nods. “I do know,” she says, her eyes looking past us into the distance, and I wonder if she is seeing her ex-husband’s face, or Connor’s face, or a weird swirl of the two.
Liesl even looks lonesome for a second. She doesn’t talk much about her love life, and she hasn’t dated anyone seriously in over a year. I can’t imagine that even as confident and tough as she is, that Liesl doesn’t have endless nights where she craves the arms of a partner. “Yeah,” she agrees. “I get you. Home isn’t a place, it’s a feeling. But right now?” She puts one arm around me, and one around Marr. “You guys are home. We have to make home where we can.”
And this is comforting to all of us, I think, and the companionship feels good, like we’re a team arming ourselves against the arrows of the night. And when I see Marr smile, I realize that she’d have made someone a great mom, just as good at Erik’s mom. Life’s funny sometimes, and I hope she gets her dream. I hope we all get our dreams.
***
Writers are supposed to read all the time, according to the experts of the past and the present. Read everything, they exhort: The newspaper, pulp fiction, classics, the back of the shampoo bottle. You can’t write unless you read myriad words. I imagine all of these words inside me, starting out sharp-edged and distinct, like cut diamonds and rubies. Over time, they wear away at each other and rub each other into a brilliant, sparkling powder so fine that you can’t even hold it in your hands; the barest wisp of air catches it and makes it dance all around your face, a thousand sparkling stars in your eyes. It’s only then that you’re ready to write, when you have your own ethereal gem magic inside your soul. If you get tapped out, dried up, blocked, you need to rejuvenate your core with beautiful words. Read other people’s words until your own come out.
Lately I’ve been reading self-help books. There’s one called Love Yourself And Your Amazing Body by a new-age guru who wears a bindi on her forehead even though she’s from Dayton, Ohio and doesn’t have a trace of Indian heritage in her own well-loved corporeal form.
Another one is worse, because the author uses way too many exclamation points when she says something especially useless, like, “You’re worth so much more than you think, so just believe it, and good things will happen!!!” I believe she must, on some level, know that her suggestions stink, which is why she dresses them up with extra punctuation.
Sick of all this, I open the poetry book from Marr. I find the poem that Annalise recited, and smile to myself. People have these interesting wells of information inside them. I never would have guessed that Annalise loves poetry, but it suits her. I wonder if she and Erik lie in bed together sometimes, reading poetry to each other. I bet they do.
I flip through the pages, and find a page with quotes by a Sufi poet named Rumi. I was never interested in him before, but as I read, I become spellbound.
There is a fountain inside you. Don't walk around with an empty bucket.
Set your life on fire. Seek those who fan your flames.
Shine like the whole universe is yours.
The wound is the place where the light enters you.
If light is in your heart, you will find your way home.
I am not this hair. I am not this skin. I am the soul that lives within.
He’s old—from the 1200s. I can’t even fathom what the world was like then, especially in the Persian Empire. But his words hurtle through time and pierce my heart. I recite some of his quotes aloud to the empty room, because they’re so beautiful that they need form and sound.
As I sit with this book, I realize that Rumi is right. I’m more than my hair and my skin—I’m me, Abby. I’m smart, and funny, and damn, my books are selling well. I have an amazing life. I don’t have my mom, it’s true. And I’ll never be a supermodel. The first burden, missing my mom, that’s one that only time will heal. But the second? That one I put on myself, and I can take off my shoulders, too. All I need to do is accept that I’m pretty damn awesome just as I am. If my attitude can tip me over into Team Stunning? Then I need to have that attitude all the time, because I’m worth it.
I need to stop sabotaging my own self-image. I’m going to be different. I’m going to be the girl who deserves Boston because she finally deserves herself.
***
I have a book signing at a local bookstore. My nerves have me skittering around in my mind, but I put on a bold smile and stand up tall as the manager announces me to the crowd. There are about a hundred people here to listen to me, and it’s a thrill. They’re women of all ages, with a few guys scattered through the crowd. Sitting on folding chairs, standing in the back, they’re all looking at me. I take a deep breath and start talking, and they listen—and smile—and ask questions.
When I get this question from an earnest young woman with orange hair and half-inch studs in her ears, I don’t even flinch. “So doing this book, you had to spend a lot of time with fitness models and bodybuilding experts?” she says, her voice going up, even though it’s a statement. “Was that, like, difficult, to immerse yourself in that world? I mean, since you’re not a model yourself?” Her voice isn’t mean. She’s just curious. I can tell the difference, and if it were a few weeks ago, I might have started obsessing about how I’m not a model. But at the moment, I don’t care, and it feels magnificent.
I shake my head. “It’s always a challenge to immerse myself in a new world, whether it’s meeting fitness models or interviewing people who swim in shark tanks in the ocean. But it wasn’t more or less difficult than any other research. When you get to know people on a personal level, the external differences fade away. I was luck
y enough to work with people so talented and interesting that we found our common interests underneath our different exteriors. It’s all about respecting yourself even as you learn about someone else’s life and livelihood.”
This is true. Annalise is just a person, like me. She has her own neuroses and fears, her own goals and dreams. She’s not perfect; nobody is. So she’s gorgeous—that’s great for her. It’s just part of her whole package. But I’ve got a lot to offer, too—and I’m not worth less than she is because I’m not as pretty in the societally approved, traditional sense. I’m a pretty damn super package.
Because I feel this in me, I think it’s shining out of me, too. The diamond dust of Rumi is surging out of my pores, out of my smile, into the world. I like this new feeling, and as I consider the emotion, I recognize that it’s confidence. I’ve always had confidence in my writing and my intellectual skills, but this is something new. It’s a confidence in myself as a whole, an integer. The whole of me, Abby, is worthwhile, not just the brain part.
Nobody cares that I’m not a size zero. I don’t care. I’m flying.
***
A week goes by. I haven’t talked to Boston in person, but we’ve texted and messaged, although it’s all about the book. I’m trying to get up my courage to talk to him about the things that really matter. Baby steps. Although I have this new confidence in myself, I need to work up to The Talk.
Me: I’m attending a Facebook party for authors; I’ll send your link to your site, too. Sales are doing so well! I’m so excited.
Him: Yeah, me, too.
Me: I’m so glad this worked out so well for us all. Your pictures are fantastic.
Him: Thanks. They featured me in an article on Model Times, I linked to the book on Amazon and to your author site.
And his incorrect comma usage just makes me smile, because it doesn’t matter. Why did I ever think that was a big deal? It’s endearing; it’s just part of him. The whole of Boston is amazing, all the good and bad. I just want to see him again, and hold him, and laugh together like we do, and make plans, because when we’re together, I don’t care about the stupid little things at all. Because when we’re together, it’s like magic and we just—fit. At least, in my mind we do. Why could I never just say that to him?
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