“It’s a honeymoon for blended families,” Nic explains.
I snort a suppressed laugh.
Nic gives me the stink eye. “Oh come on! What was I supposed to say? ‘I’m sorry, Jason. I know you would kill to have the girls live with you full time, and that we have this amazing opportunity that’s been handed to us on a silver platter. But I have to go see Italy, and I’m afraid that’s much more important than you getting to be a full-time dad, your daughters getting to continue in the school they love, and your ex-wife getting the dream job she’s been shooting for these past ten years.’ ”
“You still do all those things,” Mel points out gently. “And it’s great that you want to. But you have to insist on your honeymoon. You can’t let a man walk all over you.”
“Whoa,” Nic snaps. “Did I judge you when you got back together with Fred?”
“No,” Mel concedes, a little surprised by Nic’s outburst.
“Even when getting back together with him was a really stupid idea?” Nic continues.
Mel looks down at the carpet sheepishly. “Okay, I’m sorry.”
I open my mouth. “We’re not being judgmental. We’re merely pointing out—”
“Five words for you,” Nic tells me sternly, as she puts out her fist, thumb up. “Michael,” and then up come the rest of her fingers. “Ken, Greg, Paulo, Pierre. Did I ever say one bad word about them when you were dating?”
Well, that’s just harsh, bringing up my worst five choices in men so succinctly like that.
I shut my mouth immediately.
“Nic!” we hear Jason call from across the room. Nic smiles, and waves to him. “I have to mingle. Please, guys, I’m sorry I’m being a bitch right now, but I just need your unconditional support for the next two days.”
And she’s off. Mel turns to me sympathetically. “Pierre wasn’t so bad. You know, other than the bisexual thing.” Before I can respond, Mel’s eyes bug open. “Wow. I so need to leave you two alone tonight.”
I follow her gaze to see Scott walking into the room.
My jaw drops.
I’m not kidding, my jaw is dropped. I am stunned.
I have never seen him look so fucking sexy. Mr. Jeans-and-a-T-shirt is wearing a gray wool suit, with subtle pinstripes, a matching gray-and-white shirt, and a purple tie.
He has figuratively and literally taken my breath away. All I can think about is pulling off his jacket, undoing his tie, undoing those buttons, and getting him naked as quickly as possible, because he is just so spectacular, I can’t wait one minute longer.
I stare at him, dumbfounded, as he rushes up and kisses me on the cheek. “I’m sorry I’m so late.”
“It’s okay,” I say, barely able to put words together. “You look AMAZING.”
He smiles as he looks down at this outfit. “You think? I feel kind of silly in it.”
“Don’t,” I assure him. “You look … the best I’ve ever seen you.”
Scott smiles, and looks away from me in an uncharacteristically bashful way. “Thanks. You look really good too.”
I walk around him, my jaw still in dropped position. I put out my hand to feel his gray suit. “Seriously. I can’t get over how amazing you look. Have you always had this suit?”
“No. I just bought it today at Nordstrom. Britney helped me pick it out. I’ve been so busy with work this week, I totally forgot to go clothes shopping. When Britney called this morning to ask me what I was doing today, I told her in a panic, ‘I have this rehearsal dinner tonight, and I need to impress my date by wearing a great suit.’ So we hit the malls, and I got this.”
My mind is racing. He called me a date, but he was out getting dressed (and undressed?) with a girl all day? And he’s been working all week? Does this mean he hasn’t been having hot monkey sex five times a day with Slutella?
“Well, you look amazing,” I repeat to Scott. But I can’t help but be confused. “So you told this girl you were going on a date, and her response was to help you pick a suit to … impress your date?”
Scott looks up at the ceiling for a moment. “Man, that would make me an asshole. No. I’ve told her all about you. She knows we’re just friends.”
I plaster on my best smile. “Oh.”
“Hey, and if you think I look good in this, wait ’til you see the tuxedo I bought,” he tells me proudly.
“With Britney?” I accuse.
Scott knits his brows at me. “Are you okay? You’re acting…” He searches for the right word. “Weird.”
I shake my head, clearing the cobwebs. He’s right. I am acting weird. Yes, he looks fucking phenomenal in his suit, but that doesn’t change anything. As he just said five seconds ago, we’re just friends.
And my thinking about leaning in and kissing him right now is beside the point.
As it frequently is.
I hear Scott’s phone beep. He pulls it out of his pocket, reads a text, then laughs out loud. He quickly starts typing back as he says to me, “Britney wants to know if you and I want to go grab a drink with her later tonight.”
I feel like I’ve been punched in the gut.
Why do I stay friends with this person? I am never going to get what I really want. Never. So all that happens when I’m around him is that I end up feeling bad about myself, and like I’m not enough. I eat too much to deal with my self-loathing after seeing him. I drink too much when I’m around him just to drown out all of my feelings.
I’m not happy this way. I need to either make a move or quit seeing him. I can’t live with this beautiful creature in my life one minute longer without knowing he’s mine.
“Maybe a quick one,” I tell him. “We’ll see how the night plays out.”
Jesus, I’m pathetic.
Fifteen
Melissa
I wake up and see his face every God damn morning. Literally—I wake up, and I think I see him. Fred’s face staring at me, watching me sleeping. Something he used to do that drove me absolutely nuts that now I miss desperately.
And then his face dissolves, and I am looking at my old wall. In my old room. From my old life.
I don’t pretend to know how widows feel, but I wonder if they also go through this the first few months after their husbands die. I’m so used to Fred being around that every single morning I wake up thinking of him, then have to remind myself of our breakup. It’s like when I sleep, my brain tells me to go back to that time when everything was fine, and we were still together, and I was happy. Really happy. And then …
And then I wake up, and I experience the death of our relationship all over again.
It has happened every morning since we broke up, and this morning is no exception.
I sit up in bed and try to motivate myself to face the day.
God, he’s probably with one of those women right now. Waking up in their bed, belonging to one of them. If I had to guess, I’d say he’s probably with Svetlana. From now on, she gets to be the one who wakes up, rolls to her left, sees his naked form, and snuggles up next to him for another twenty minutes of contented shut-eye.
My God, the thought makes me so sick to my stomach that I want to run into my bathroom and dry heave.
“Are you up yet?” I hear Seema yell from the other side of the door.
I force myself to breathe, and try to fake my way through a normal voice as I yell, “Yeah.”
“I made coffee. Can I come in?”
“I’d love coffee. Yeah.”
Seema opens my door and walks in. “It’s already eleven,” she says, as she hands me my coffee: cream, no sugar. “Are you okay?”
“Not even vaguely,” I admit, as I take the coffee. “When is this pain going to go away?”
“Oh, honey. You’ll start to feel better in a few weeks. I promise.”
“A few weeks?” I stammer out. “I need to feel better now. I’m the one in the right here. He should be hurting every morning, not me. He should be alone, not me.” I look over at my silver chili pepper,
which I have put on my nightstand to give me hope for my future.
So far, it’s not working. I pick it up and look at Seema. “You know, I’m trying to tell myself, ‘Everything happens for a reason.’ But I just don’t see it.”
She gives me a hug. What more can she do? I hug her back. When we break away, Seema asks, “Are you going to be able to get through the wedding today?”
“I’ll be fine,” I say offhandedly, as I take a sip of coffee. My body immediately rebels. Any time I’ve put food in my stomach in the last few days, I feel like someone has punched me in the gut. This has led me to not bother eating at all, or eating two bites of food, then calling it quits.
I’ve lost almost ten pounds in a week. I know it’s water weight, and a very bad thing for me to do to my body. But I must say, at least I look good. Getting through Nic’s wedding day will be hard enough without feeling fat or being tempted to drink. My stomach has taken care of any chance of that.
I give up, and put down my coffee. “So how did the rest of your night go? How was Britney?”
“Very perky, and very blond,” Seema says, sighing a bit. “Just another painful reminder to me that a surfer-looking dude like Scott is never going to want an exotic-looking girl like me.”
“That’s not true,” I insist.
“It is true,” Seema tells me matter-of-factly. “You know, I was thinking about this last night, as I lay in my bed, alone as usual. I have met a few of the girls Scott has dated, and all of them have been white, and most of them have been blond. It’s not like I can compete.”
“That’s not true.”
“Clearly it is true.”
“He hit on you the night you met, remember?” I remind Seema.
“I thought so at the time,” Seema concedes. “But it’s probably just wishful thinking on my part.”
“Oh, please. I was there,” I remind her. “He hit on you that night. He was so obvious about it that your date was getting annoyed … what was his name?”
“Greg.…”
“Greg. Right.…”
“If it was so obvious, why didn’t he ask me out?”
“He did ask you out,” I argue. “He asked you to lunch.”
“Work thing. Doesn’t count,” Seema insists.
“Unless it wasn’t a work thing initially, but you turned it into one, so he didn’t push it.”
Seema shrugs.
“And Greg was a jerk,” I continue. “Maybe you and Scott should have gotten together that first night.”
“You of all people are telling me I should have cheated on Greg?”
“Please. Greg and you were only on your third date. He barely kissed you good night on the first date, and after date two you told me he was good on paper, but totally not your type. He was only your date that night because you needed an escort for the event. And I’m not saying you had to sleep with Scott the first night. But, if you had such chemistry with him, you should have shown interest. Or then, fine, if you didn’t want to flirt in front of your date, you could have called Scott the next day to ask him out to dinner.”
“I don’t believe in asking men for dates,” Seema declares firmly.
“Do you believe in showing any interest at all in them when they’re around?” I ask, raising my voice in exasperation.
Seema waves me off with her hand. “I show plenty of interest…”
“Really? What’s his favorite color?”
Seema furrows her brow. She doesn’t know. “Well, he knows yours,” I tell her. “And he knows exactly how you like your steak done. And what spice company to go to for the crushed garlic you like. Last week he bought you season four of your favorite show on DVD. Do you even know his favorite show?”
“He liked Damages a lot,” Seema tells me triumphantly. Then she mutters under her breath, “Why, I don’t know.”
“And then there’s that…” I begin.
“Incredibly well written,” Seema continues. “But who wants to spend that much time with characters you don’t like?”
“That’s another thing,” I exclaim, pointing my index finger at her. “Your constant criticism of the things he likes. When Scott is around, you make fun of his apartment, you make fun of his clothes, and you make fun of his choices in women. Who the Hell wants to date someone who doesn’t even seem to like them that much?”
Seema defends herself. “I complimented him last night. I told him over and over again how handsome he looked in his suit.”
“That was picked out by another woman who he was determined to introduce you to. I got a theory about that. Wanna hear it?”
“Not really…”
“He wants you to know he has other women interested in him,” I continue. “Beautiful women. Stunning women. Women who are so head over heels for him they help him buy clothes for another date! I mean, for Christ’s sake, woman!”
Seema seems jolted by my rant.
I gently back off. “Sorry,” I say quickly. “I am the last person who should be giving dating advice. I just…” I stammer.
I can’t help myself, I know I should shut up now, but …
“Scott’s a really, genuinely good guy. And I would love it if you two got together, because he makes you happy. But, I don’t know, he just also … he makes you really sad too. And I hate seeing you sad all the time. So, either let him know you’re available or let him go.”
I can tell from the look on Seema’s face that I have gotten through to her, but that she doesn’t know what to say.
“He has a girlfriend,” she mopes.
“No. He has a girl who’s been around for a few weeks. You could take her.”
Seema laughs. “I could take her?”
I smile and shrug. “What can I say? I’m trying to be a tough girl for the new chapter of my life. At least I didn’t say, ‘It’s on, bitch.’ ”
Seema laughs.
“Limo’s here!” I hear Nic’s voice yell from the living room.
Nic tears into my room as I drag myself out of bed. “It’s eleven o’clock! Why are you guys still in your pajamas?”
Before we can answer Nic throws up her arms and starts dancing around. “I’m getting married today!”
Sixteen
Nicole
“Come on out!” I urge Seema through the dressing room door. We are in the bridal area in the back of the church, a few minutes from my big moment. “I’m sure you look fantastic!”
“Unnhhhh…” I hear Seema grunt. “Just trying to lose twelve pounds in the next minute and a half.”
“What is that sound?” I ask in alarm. “Are you okay in there?”
“I’m fine,” Seema assures me through the door. “The zipper and I are just having a rather heated debate. Damn, I should not have dealt with my Scott depression with Twinkies, potato chips, and peach Bellinis.”
“At least you can eat,” Mel says from behind the door of the bathroom, which she uses as her dressing room. “Any little bite of food makes me want to hurl. I think I’ve dropped ten pounds in the past seven days. I’ve completely lost what little I had of a chest.”
“I’m pretty sure those pounds migrated to my ass this week,” Seema tells her through the door. “I’m happy to give them back.”
We are standing in the back room of a beautiful church in Santa Monica, and have just finished putting on our gowns. Our makeup is done, our hair looks great (I mean, I assume it looks great. I’m in a veil, how bad can it look?), our bouquets are on the table, and in five minutes I will become Mrs. Jason Washington.
“I’m sure you both look amazing!” I insist. “You looked fantastic at the bridal salon two weeks ago.”
“Two weeks ago, I was still happily in love,” Mel says through her closed bathroom door.
“You were never happily in love,” Seema points out from her room.
“Fine, I was mildly dissatisfied in love,” Mel concedes. “Which leads to stress eating and weight gain. Now I’m miserably in love, which leads to no eating, and rap
id weight loss.”
“Guys, we’re on in five,” I remind them. “Will you just get out here?”
Both girls walk out wearing beautiful satin dresses in my favorite shade of blue. I smile. The dress style was a perfect choice: the same cut somehow emphasizes Seema’s hourglass figure (damn, I wish I had her 36Cs) while also showing off Mel’s petite little body (I wish I had her runner’s legs).
“You’re both perfect,” I declare, beaming with pride. “And we found the holy grail of dresses: ones you can actually wear again.”
Seema looks genuinely horrified. “Honey, I’m thirty-two years old. I kind of hope no one asks me to prom at my age.”
I glare at her. “Be glad I didn’t put you in an orange micro-mini and white boots.”
“Fair enough,” Seema concedes, walking to the table to grab her bouquet. “All right, let’s get this show on the road.”
Suddenly, I get a queasy feeling in my stomach. It’s sort of like what happy people call “butterflies in the stomach.” Except it’s more like angry bumblebees buzzing madly and looking for a way out.
I think I’m going to be sick.
Oh my God. Shit. I’m getting married. For real. There’s no turning back after this. In ten minutes, I will be someone’s wife. I will never again be able to check the “Single” box on a government form. Suddenly, this decision strikes me as overwhelmingly life changing and permanent.
Very permanent.
Disturbingly permanent.
“You’re grabbing the wrong bouquet,” I try to tell Seema.
Only no words are coming out of my mouth, and I can’t breathe.
Seema doesn’t hear me. She takes the white lilies that Mel is supposed to carry, opens the front door, and heads out into the hallway.
I can feel my heart beating. I can actually HEAR my heart beating! Am I too young to have a heart attack? What does a heart attack feel like? An elephant landing with a thud on your chest maybe?
Oh God, and I think my vision is starting to go black.
I can hear Mel cheerfully say, “Here we go!” as she passes me on my right, takes the white rose bouquet meant for Seema, and follows her out into the hallway.
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