There's Cake in My Future

by Gruenenfelder, Kim

  “Did he cheat?” Max quickly asks. “Did you cheat? Were you thinking of cheating? Have you ever thought about cheating with a woman? And, if so, have you ever thought about using any toys with her?”

  Red flag! Red flag! Abort mission. I turn my head slightly, yet maintain eye contact. “I don’t get it,” I tell him. “Are you gay?… Married?… Just weird?”

  “Oh, sweetie. Some days, all three,” Max says, brushing off my accusations with a wave of his hand. He hands me a clipboard with a form for me to fill out. “I think you are the perfect candidate for a reality show I’m producing: It’s kind of like The Bachelor meets Temptation Island. We’re shooting the pilot next week in Hawaii—all sixteen of you living in the same mansion. Sun, surf, a hot tub, and more mai tais and daiquiris than at a happy hour in Maui. One girl dropped out last minute and I need a hottie who doesn’t sound like a Laker Girl. Are you in?”

  I stare at him blankly. Blink a few times. Max smiles at me warmly as he puts his hands over mine and tells me in all sincerity, “Sweetie, during our chat last night you explained the difference between the words salacious and salubrious, and you used the word ‘twee’ in a sentence. I … LOVE YOU. I must find a man for you.”

  I stand up. “Thank you so much for the wine,” I say through gritted teeth. “It was great to meet you.”

  Max hands me his digital camera to show me a picture. “This is Chad. He’s one of the men who will be at the welcome dinner tomorrow night.”

  I look at the picture. My lips scrunch together like an accordion as I check out the photo. He’s so hot that Taylor Lautner would aspire to be his wing man.

  But, no. It’s not worth my dignity just to …

  “Click to the next shot,” Max tells me. “Sven is even yummier.”

  Sven is indeed even yummier.

  I slowly sit back down again.

  “Well…”

  “One fun twist,” Max tells me. “Half of the men and half of the women are gay—but you won’t know which half until day five.”

  I swear, at the end of one of these dates, I’m just going to punch the guy dead in the face.

  Thirty-four

  Nicole

  You know a private little joke that parents play on themselves? Bedtimes. Because no matter when you tell your kids they must go to bed, they can always stretch that out by at least thirty minutes—two hours on a weekend night.

  “Megan!” I find myself screaming Thursday night, “It’s nine o’clock. Go! To! Bed!”

  “Just one more minute,” Megan tells me as she madly types something on the computer in the family room.

  “Not one more minute. Now,” I say, trying to summon up a threatening voice that she knows has more bark than bite.

  “I know, I know, I know,” Megan says as she finishes typing. “Okay, I’m done.”

  “Great,” I tell her, trying to keep my voice on an even keel. “Now get upstairs, brush your teeth…”

  “Wait.”

  I sigh. I wonder what it would be like to get through a bedtime without at least one “Wait.”

  “What?” I ask her.

  “I forgot to do my math homework.”

  I let my shoulders slump down as I exhale a deep sigh. “Megan…”

  “I’m sorry,” Megan says to me quickly. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

  I heave another deep sigh to make my point, then give in. “Ten minutes. I’m not kidding.”

  “Thank you. You’re the best bonus mom ever.”

  Malika comes charging out of her room wearing a powder-pink bunny suit with light blue ladybugs on it. “Does that mean I can stay up?”

  “No,” I say firmly as I charge up the stairs. “I read you your books more than twenty minutes ago. What are you still doing up?”

  “I had to go to the bathroom,” Malika tells me.

  That kid gets up to go to the bathroom so many times in one night, you’d think she was a sixty-two-year-old man with an enlarged prostate. I shake my head. “Go quickly,” I tell her.

  Our home phone rings. I run into our room, check the caller ID, and pick up immediately. “Hey…” I say sweetly to Jason. “Are you almost home?”

  “I will be soon. I promise. Dave and I are just going out to have a quick beer and discuss a couple more things, and then I’ll be right home.”

  Nooooo … I think to myself. I’ve either been with the girls, chauffeuring the girls, or running errands for the girls all day. I love them, but I’ve been up and running since five-thirty this morning, and I was desperately looking forward to Jason coming home an hour ago to do the nighttime routine and give me a break.

  “How are the girls doing?” Jason asks.

  “They’re fine,” I say. “Bedtime’s running late, and I’m sure they were looking forward to seeing you before bed.”

  “Is that my dad?” Malika asks, appearing in my doorway.

  “Yes.”

  “Oh, oh! Can I say good night?” she asks me as she runs in, and throws her hand out to grab the phone from me.

  I hand her the phone and say, “One minute. He’s still at work.”

  “Hi, Daddy,” Malika yells into the phone excitedly. “Wanna know what happened on iCarly today?…”

  I walk out of the room to go check on Megan, who I overhear saying, “No, the answer is forty-two.”

  “Megan!” I yell, leaning over the banister and toward the downstairs. “Are you Skyping?!”

  “I’m just doing homework,” she yells back.

  “Turn off the Skype!”

  “Got it,” Megan says.

  I turn back around and walk into my room, where Megan is still monologuing into the phone. “And then Sam’s sister, who’s her twin, wants to kiss Freddie. But he doesn’t believe she’s not Sam, so…”

  “Honey, your dad needs to get back to work. Say good night.”

  “Night, Daddy,” Malika says sweetly.

  I reach out my hand to take the phone, but she hangs up. “Daddy said to tell you he had to go,” Malika says, handing me the now dead phone and walking out of the bedroom.

  Of course he did, I think to myself dryly as I put the phone back in its charger.

  “Can you lie down with me?” Malika asks.

  “Okay, but only for a minute,” I say, then head into Malika’s room.

  Where I spend the next twenty-five minutes lying in her bed, waiting for her to fall asleep (something she cannot seem to do without a grown-up by her side) and replaying the Eagles’s song “Wasted Time” in my head over and over again.

  After two false starts of slowly and silently sitting up, getting out of bed, then tiptoeing over to the door only to hear a bloodcurdling, “Nicole!” come out of Malika’s mouth, I am finally able to escape.

  I walk out of her room, and peer into Megan’s room. Her door is wide open, her light is on, and she is nowhere to be found. “Megan?!”

  “I’m done!” she yells proudly from downstairs.

  “Then why aren’t you in bed?”

  “I’m hungry!” Megan answers back.

  I head down to the kitchen. It’s now almost nine-thirty.

  I think the girls have a little experiment going to try to figure out which activity stalls bedtime the longest: nocturnal trips to the bathroom or to the kitchen. Megan is definitely a fan of the latter: she eats like a hummingbird, and by that I mean twice her weight in food every day.

  I walk in to see her eating a bowl full of Rise Krispies with milk. “Will you please remember to throw that in the sink when you’re done?” I ask her.

  “Okay,” Megan says with a full mouth.

  Then she silently eats her cereal.

  Something’s off. A stepmom can feel these things. “Are you okay?”

  Megan doesn’t answer me. Instead she nervously eats a big bite of cereal. I place my hand on her arm. “Honey, are you all right?”

  “Yeah. I guess. It’s just…” She looks over at me. “Is it true that when you marry a guy, it m
eans that he can put his penis in you anytime he wants?”

  The immediate answer in my head goes like this: “No, dear. You marry him so he can put his penis in you anytime you want.” But something tells me that in later years, I would pay dearly for my answer—in therapy bills.

  “Because, if that’s true, I’m a Thespian,” Megan tells me.

  The next hour went … Well, it didn’t go horribly. I think that’s the most any parent or stepparent in my situation can hope for.

  At eleven o’clock, Megan is finally in her room and I am avoiding writing by going through Facebook.

  Carolyn, my friend who got the money bag charm and then won the lottery, has posted pictures of herself and her boyfriend at the Hotel Gritti Palace in Italy. It looks exquisite from what I can see, and she looks like she doesn’t have a care in the world.

  I don’t mean to be jealous, but I am. I longed for that trip. I know what I have is more important than a trip to Italy. But it sure looks pretty.

  And soothing.

  And bedtime argument free.

  Jason’s ex, Jacquie, she of the typewriter charm, posts an impassioned speech from the governor’s office. I’m torn in my jealousy of her. On the one hand, I wish I was still following my dreams with the tenacity she has. But on the other hand, I get to spend time with her kids, so I don’t envy her too much, as I know she is wracked with the kind of guilt that only a working mother can have. (Sorry, dads—but, yeah, I said it.)

  And finally, a quick note from Mel:

  You know how Scott just told Seema last night that her shovel might not mean a perpetual life of work, but might mean something else? Well, what if my red hot chili pepper doesn’t refer to a hot sex life? What if it is just trying to tell me that I’m going to keep getting burned by men?

  I am about to write back to her to ask what happened, when up pops a friend request from Kevin Peters.

  I puff out my cheeks as I stare at the request.

  How the Hell did he find me? There are over a hundred other Nicole Eatons on Facebook. (I always thought I had a distinctive name until I got on Facebook.)

  I click on our two mutual friends: two friends from college, no parents from the school.

  I click over to his friends list: several parents’ names I recognize from school. Jacquie and Jason aren’t on the list, but I’m not sure if that means anything.

  Having done what little investigative journalism I get to do these days, I click back to the friend request, then stare at the screen.

  Okay, on the one hand, what’s it going to hurt if I’m friends with Kevin? Jason’s on Facebook with at least one ex (his ex wife) and probably way more. I’m not threatened by that, nor should he be threatened because I’m friends with an ex. I am not a retrosexual looking for a fling, I am a happily married woman, as my status clearly states and all of my photos show.

  On the other hand—he has been sneaking into my thoughts ever since I ran into him at the school the other day.

  It’s nothing bad. It’s not like I’m thinking back on my life with him and wishing I was with him instead of Jason.

  But, like just now … without meaning to … I let my mind drift back to the night in the haunted house. Our first Halloween. We had been dating for a few weeks, and were going to some local haunted house, a makeshift tent decorated by some high school students to raise money for a class trip or something. At some point I had accidentally walked ahead of him, and ended up in a graveyard filled with zombies trying not to be buried by the local villagers. I turned around to search for him, only to be confronted by a teenaged Dracula, who made me jump a foot. I backed up, ran into someone, screamed, and turned around.

  There was Kevin, giving me an amused smile. “Hi,” he said softly to me.

  “I…” I stammered, still jumpy. “I thought I’d lost you.”

  He smiled and leaned in to kiss me. “You’ll never lose me.”

  And we kissed in the middle of the phony graveyard. And all was absolutely perfect in my world until …

  Get your head out of the clouds, Washington. Until you dated for almost three years, and he wouldn’t put a ring on it. So when he he moved to New York, you “took a break.” And instead of calling you a month later to propose, he called to announce his new girlfriend.

  Which is good.

  Because if I hadn’t broken up with Kevin, I wouldn’t be married to Jason. And Jason is, by far, the hottest man I’ve ever been with.

  I am about to click the ignore button. After all, what good can come from exes being friends?

  Then I stop to reconsider.

  How is it going to affect Malika and Megan if I reject his Facebook request? It’s not like he’s asking me out; he’s just asking to be able to e-mail me. Am I overreacting?

  I’m overthinking this. I click the confirm button.

  I am immediately roped into chat by Kevin:

  KEVIN: Are you avoiding writing?

  My head jolts back in surprise. Why is he roping me into conversation? I decide to go with humor.

  NICOLE: Nice opener. Do you walk up to strange women in bars and ask them if their thighs really need that third glass of wine?

  KEVIN: Hah! No, I asked because I’m on here avoiding writing.

  NICOLE: Wait. You’re writing now?

  Since when does Kevin want to be a writer?

  KEVIN: Just a TV spec idea I had. Probably nothing will ever come of it, but writing is something I always wanted to do, I just never had the nerve to follow through on it. Probably why the women I fell in love with were writers: I loved living vicariously through them.

  Whoa, whoa, whoa. What the Hell is that? Flirting? Getting the past out of the way so we can have a clean start for our future? I stare at the screen, wondering how to respond.

  NICOLE: Well, good for you! Can I read it when it’s done?

  KEVIN: Sure. So, what’s up with you? You looked great the other day.

  NICOLE: Yeah—when trying to impress people I always go with pajama pants, no makeup, and unbrushed hair.

  KEVIN: You look better with no makeup. So, are you still with the Tribune? I haven’t seen any of your articles lately.

  Again, I am startled by what I’m reading on the computer and I don’t know what to make of it.

  NICOLE: No. Got laid off earlier this year, decided to take some time off to be with my new family.

  KEVIN: You remember Howard, my editor friend? He’s at the Globe now. Do you want me to see if they’re looking?

  NICOLE: Actually, he offered me a freelance gig after I was laid off, but I decided not to move to Boston. Thanks, though.

  KEVIN: Just a thought. You’re such a good writer.

  “Daddy!” I hear Malika yell from upstairs.

  “Your dad’s still at work, sweetie,” I yell back.

  I wait for the pause, followed by the predictable, “I had a bad dream! Can you come upstairs?!”

  NICOLE: I’m sorry. I gotta go. Malika just woke up. She had a bad dream, and I need to get her back to sleep.

  KEVIN: Okay, go. Let me know when you want that coffee.

  I look at the screen and debate. What would it hurt to go get coffee?

  Then again, something in my gut is telling me that’s a bad idea.

  “Nicole?!” Malika whines.

  “Coming!” I yell back. Then I type.

  NICOLE: Soon. Gotta go though. ‘Night.

  KEVIN: Good night.

  I click off Facebook, walk out of my office, and head up to Malika’s room.

  Thirty-five

  Melissa

  It’s not speed dating if you actually have dinner. Yes, I’m a bit defensive about this idea—it seems so nineties. But I have a friend who met her boyfriend through this service, so I’m willing to give it a shot.

  “Six at Six” is a dinner/dating service where twelve people meet for dinner at a lovely Italian restaurant and exchange conversation over food courses: predinner cocktails, appetizer, salad, soup, entrée, dessert
. Because you’re not limited to five or seven minutes at a time, you actually can have a conversation that doesn’t consist of saying “I’m a high school math teacher.” And “No, I haven’t seen that movie” over and over again.

  This extended conversation, it turns out, can also be a bad thing.

  “I think an addiction is an addiction, not a disease,” Bill, the man across the small table, spits out at me angrily. “I don’t decide to drink cancer.”

  I haven’t said a word since he started his tirade twenty minutes ago. It started with a diatribe on women with cats, quickly moved on to why he hates the Los Angeles Zoo, then segued into an attack on all things yogurt.

  “Uh-huh,” I say innocuously.

  And then, for the first time since Bill sat down, we have silence.

  Uncomfortable, lengthy silence.

  “You seem angry,” I say diplomatically as I lift my glass of sauvignon blanc up to my lips, then put down the glass self-consciously before drinking any.

  “You can drink that,” Bill tells me. “It’s your body.”

  “Oooooo-kay,” I say, taking a sip of wine.

  Bill eyes me disapprovingly. “That said, I don’t understand why you would intentionally put poison in your body, knowing your meninges can’t deal with it.”

  The words spill out of my mouth before I have a chance to edit myself. “Actually, it’s my liver that can’t deal with it.”

  “What?”

  “The meninges cover the brain and the spinal cord,” I tell him awkwardly. “It’s the liver that removes alcohol from your body.”

  Bill stares at me.

  I’m probably in trouble, but I couldn’t think of anything else to say to hold up my end of the conversation.

  Bill continues to stare at me in silence. Finally, I start talking again. “The liver produces an enzyme called dehydrogenase, which—”

  A bell rings.

  “Oh, thank God!” we both say in unison.

  A perky blonde walks up to the front of the room. “Our cocktail course is over. Gentlemen, please move to the table on your right, so that we may begin eating our appetizers. Ladies, stay in your seats.”

  Bill stands up and runs away from me as I take a big ole gulp of wine and prepare for the next guy, an older, darker-haired gentleman who didn’t bother trying too hard with his choice of clothes when he got dressed this morning. “Hi,” I say as he sits down. “I’m Melissa.”