I walk for hours, down West Broadway, over to Park Place, and finally landing on West Street where I dart into the Winter Atrium. It’s a huge reprieve from the cold, and if I had my wits about me, I probably would’ve heard Leo mutter, “It’s about time,” from a few feet behind.
The Atrium is truly spectacular, and I’ve always wanted to visit, but never had enough time to venture to this side of the city. Its architectural beauty definitely provides an upside to this waste-of-time trip and, for a second, I forget why I’m even in New York. As I make my way over to the garden area that overlooks the Hudson River, my heels click click click LOUDLY on the mosaic tile floor of the scarcely populated lobby. I get the weird sense that my shoes are making me the target of some young person’s shoe envy or an old person’s shoe mockery, so I pause and scan the room to see if anyone’s looking at me. As I turn around in a circle, Leo darts behind one of the massive palm trees scattered throughout the Atrium, just missing my glance. I shrug off the weird vibe and press on, cursing my love of impractical footwear for the remainder of my walk of shame to the garden area. I immediately forget about my shoes when I get to the overlook and see the sunset. It’s beautiful. Although…it would be more beautiful if the two love-struck assholes next to me weren’t making out so hard. From behind the palm tree, Leo watches intensely as I glare at the kissers, roll my head back, look up at the Heavens, and shake my head in total frustration. Badly needing a drink, I interrupt the assholes and ask where the nearest bar is. They send me to P.J. Clark’s on Vesey Street “cuz it’s like totally awesome!” I’m like, you two can go fuck yourselves.
Finding P.J. Whatever’s isn’t as easy as the love-idiots said it would be, and I’m irritated with myself for choosing a hotel in the financial district as opposed to the garment district. I know where a hundred bars are there! “Oh finally, there’s Vesey!” Rounding the corner, I stop dead in my tracks.
“What the?”
Confused, I look around in a million different directions and then ever so slowly, images of my close encounter with Leo from last February flash through my mind. My head snaps to the left. There’s the intersection! Then to the right. There’s the curb! Then straight across the street.
“Holy Shit!” P.J. Clarke’s is the bar Leo goes to after work! I take my gaze across the street from Leo’s hang out and recognize the small restaurant where Slutty Co-worker and I spent time stalking him.
“How am I here right now!? Grandpa, talk to me!”
From a block behind, Leo folds his arms across his chest and leans against a building. He’s realizing it wasn’t my intention to find him.
“Oh, God!” Hastily, I grab at my wrist and check the time. Five o’clock. “Shit! Shit! Shit!” He might be in there RIGHT now! I squint to get a better look inside, but the bright sunset against the window makes it impossible to see anything. I quickly grab a coin out of my pocket. If it’s heads, I’ll go in, tails I’ll hail a cab. “Heads! D’oh!” I check my hair and makeup in the nearest window and turn sideways to get a look at my butt and waistline. “I’m so glad I didn’t eat lunch.” Leo stirs, runs his fingers through his hair, and wonders what to do next.
“Here goes nothing.” Thinking that he might actually be looking at me through the window of P.J. Clarke’s, I find it hard to walk across the street correctly. My arms and legs won’t function in a way that makes me look calm, cool, and collected, and I literally stumble towards the bar like a zombie from an episode of Scooby Doo. Seriously, I look like a fucking idiot who forgot how to walk. A cab rolls by and for a second I consider calling for it, but then I hear ten thousand voices in my head screaming “QUITTER!” so I don’t. Someone or something put me at this intersection for the second time in my life, and I can’t ignore its will. I have to see this through. I have to have faith. Once inside the door, I make a beeline for the closest available barstool and immediately pretend to look for something in my purse, so that I don’t have to look around. If Leo’s here, he’s gonna have to make the first move. I used up all of my courage getting across the street.
“Mind if I sit here?”
My disappointment rivals Leo’s anger as we focus on the guy asking the question. He’s a total player from Leo’s office. The kind of guy who bangs a different girl every night of the week…like the one’s Buckley’s was full of the night I met Leo.
“It’s a free country.”
“Whatcha drinking?”
“Anything.”
“Hey, Rocko, couple of manhattan’s over here!”
“Sort of cliché, don’t you think?”
“What, a manhattan in Manhattan or a bartender named Rocko?”
My slight smile makes Leo clinch his fists.
“Both, I guess.”
“Got a name?”
“Maude.”
Player boy makes a smelly fart face, and I can barely contain myself.
I’ve come up with some awful fake names before, but Maude takes the cake.
“Yo, dude…I thought you were taking a sick day! Come on over and meet Ma… this great gal!”
Not interested in meeting one of Player’s player friends, I stare at the television and drink my drink.
“I already know her.” That voice.
“Oh yeah, and just how well do you know this pretty lady?”
“Better than you ever will, now get the hell away from her.” Leo.
As soon as Player meanders away with his tail between his legs, Leo takes his seat. Everything wonderful that I remember about him washes over me like a tidal wave. I take a deep breath and muster up every ounce of courage to speak.
“Hi.”
Just silence and an ice cold stare.
“You and Player…friends are you?”
“We work together, that’s it.”
“Are you really sick?”
I’ve dreamt about this moment for a year and a half, and these aren’t the questions I dreamt about asking! First I can’t walk and now I can’t talk!
“No, but when I heard you were gonna be in town, I needed some time to think.”
“You heard I was gonna be in town? Who the? Ahhhhh.” Damn that woman.
“She called me in the middle of the night, told me where you were staying and stuff. I don’t know why, really.”
He’s acting just like he did that night at Buckley’s. I should too. Focus, Chrissy! Be cool, stay interesting, channel beautiful. It worked for you then.
“I’m sorry, she shouldn’t have done that.”
“So…why?”
“Why am I sorry she did that?”
“Why are you here?”
Shit, what’s my story again?
“I…umm…just doing some Christmas shopping and…felt like having a drink and…ended up here.”
Good job, idiot. It doesn’t get anymore uncool and uninteresting than that. I wonder if it’s too late to count on my looks.
“I knew you’d say something like that. I’m outta here. Merry Christmas, Chrissy.”
So much for my looks.
“Okay! Okay! Okay, that’s not true!”
I grab his hands to pull him back. They’re still as strong as ever, but there’s no trace of rock yard on them anymore.
“I’m sorry…I’m nervous, and well, you didn’t email me after I emailed you back. I thought you got scared or maybe met someone new. I guess since I don’t know which one, it’s hard for me to tell you why I’m here. I kinda have an answer for each reason.”
“You have an answer for everything, don’t you?”
Not wanting to prove him right by answering, I stay quiet.
“I never got the email.”
“What?”
“Never got it. I assumed your situation prevented you from responding. Your situation was always the reason for not getting back to me quickly.”
“Not this time, Leo. I don’t know what happened to the email, but this time there’s no situation. I promise.”
Man, those eyes.
“I know. S
he told me about your divorce when she woke me up at three this morning.”
There’s no trace of delight on his face. I was stupid to think he’d be happy to hear about it after all this time. Time to lower my desire-killing force shield and let him get it over with.
“Did she also tell you about the yoga studios?”
That was my attempt to recapture cool and interesting, but he shot back, “Yeah, but I already knew about those. My mom mailed me the newspaper articles.”
Wow, she’s on my team? Maybe I stand a chance here. Force shield re-activated.
“Chrissy, why are you here?”
“I don’t know how to explain it.”
“Try.”
“My friend Kelly, you never met her…she’s really sick.”
My voice unintentionally cracks and my eyes become teary as I say the words.
“She’s dying.”
He looks uncomfortably apologetic for being so mean.
“I’ve been spending a lot of time with her, well not really with her, as much as with her front porch, but the time on her porch …well, it made me realize some stuff.”
“I know about Kelly too.”
“Wow, is there anything that woman didn’t tell you on the phone?”
“She didn’t tell me why you’re here.”
Hard as it will be to receive the total rejection that’s gonna ensue after I put my heart on the line, I have to do it. He did it for me.
“Fine, Leo. Here it is. I dream about you… about us. I dream about all of the things we talked about. The conversations play over and over again in my head, they won’t go away! I dream about the way you touched me, about how you wanted to protect me…wanted to give me everything I ever wanted. I never stopped loving you and…”
“And what?”
“I’m in New York to see if we still have a chance.”
“A chance at what?”
He’s really making me pay.
“Please don’t do this. If you don’t feel the same as me, then fine, but don’t treat me like you hate me, Leo. That’s the one thing I never wanted to happen.”
Nothing but a cold stare.
“Look, I know once you end up on your bad side, it’s almost impossible to get back to good, but I’m putting myself so far out there by telling you all of this. Shouldn’t that count for something!? Jesus, I’m so afraid of--”
“Of what? Of feeling like you made me feel after I put myself out there for you? You messed with my head, Chrissy! YOU FUCKING DESTROYED ME!”
I’m not sure if it was the heads that snapped in our direction when he yelled or the pure force of his voice that made me grab my purse and run out of the bar and into the now dark and snowy streets of Manhattan.
“Chrissy, wait!”
I whirl around. Half surprised to see him coming toward me, half mad that he’s not done making me pay for what I had done to him.
“No, I knew this was gonna happen! It was a mistake to come here!”
He abruptly stops coming towards me. His feet are firmly stuck to the ground right outside of P.J. Clarke’s. Neither of us notices the dozen or so curious heads that flock to the window to watch our romantic tragedy play out in front of them.
“I never stopped loving you either.”
“You still love me?”
He barks out a noise that sounds like a mix of total frustration, lust, and anger.
“Yeah, but I don’t trust you, Chrissy!”
“Then why did you email me? Why did you make me think you still cared?”
“Because I did care, but when you never replied, I forced myself not to anymore. I’m so over all of your games.”
“I wasn’t trying to play games, Leo! I just couldn’t understand how one night with you could unravel all of my years with Kurt, and I needed time to figure it out! I didn’t know how to protect you, him and me all at the same time, so I lied, and every lie meant another lie! I didn’t want to do it, but I didn’t know how to put an end to it without something like THIS happening!”
“But you didn’t have to protect him! HE NEVER PROTECTED YOU!”
Borderline begging, “I had so much to learn, and I’m sorry that I strung you along in the process. I promise, if I could go back in time and do it all differently, I would, but I can’t!”
“You’re right, you can’t. I love you, Chrissy, and I don’t know how to stop loving you, but I’m sorry, I gave you too many chances already. I’d be a fool to go down this road again.”
“Or maybe you’d just be a fool in love.”
With snow piling on our hair and clothes, we stare at each other forever. My eyes pleading, his agonizing, and the twenty-four or so eyes inside of the bar darting back and forth between us wondering what’s gonna happen next.
“God knows how much I miss you, but now I’m like you were the entire time we were together. I’m too afraid to put myself out there, even for you.”
“Leo, please…”
“I’m sorry about your friend Kelly, it sounds terrible what’s happening to her. She’s the one you should be with right now, not here with me.”
And then he turned and disappeared into the night.
I hear a pair of eyes from the window loudly proclaim, “Damn, that ain’t right!”
Once Leo’s out of eyesight, I mentally toss my desire-killing force shield onto the snowy street, turn, and walk aimlessly in the opposite direction.
Farewell so long
‘Cause I was wrong I guess
Farewell so long
‘Cause I was wrong I confess…
All I got was just this broken heart from you
(Farewell, Rosie Thomas)
Merciful
February, 2001
After Leo told me to take a hike, I checked into a hotel in Greenwich Village, the part of town where I knew I wouldn’t run into him, and I spent Christmas and New Year’s alone. I missed being at work, but I wasn’t ready to go back to Slutty Co-worker’s and Megan’s hopeful faces and burning questions. I got massages, facials, manicures, and pedicures, and I did yoga twice a day. I shopped my ass off and bought so many new clothes that I had to buy another suitcase. I ate the best dinners at the best restaurants and I watched a new movie every night. If it wasn’t for the knife piercing through the middle of my heart, it would’ve been the best vacation of my life. I checked in with Courtney and Nicole to see how Kelly was doing, and I did it as if I was doing it from home. They didn’t need to know about the latest shenanigans of Chrissy Anderson. Well, that and they’d just ask me to bring them goodies back from New York. I was in no mood to play Santa Claus. Neither of them had an update on Kelly’s condition, Craig hadn’t answered the phone or returned calls for weeks. As my plane took off from JFK nearly two weeks after it landed, I looked down at the World Trade Center buildings and blew Leo a kiss. Then I put in my earphones and fell asleep with nothing but thankful thoughts of knowing such a passionate man.
“Okay…that’s NOT what I thought was happening this whole time! I thought you guys were like TOTALLY doing it all over New York!”
“Me too! I thought for sure you guys got back together! What the hell happened?”
Staring blankly at Slutty Co-worker and Megan, I think to myself, yep… those are exactly the hopeful faces and burning questions I wanted to avoid.
“Oh, hunny, I am sooooo sorry I called him!”
“No, it’s good that you did…I wouldn’t have seen him otherwise. I would still be dreaming about stuff that’s never gonna happen.”
“Are you okay?”
“Not really. You should’ve seen him. He was so handsome. I still love him so much.”
“I know you do.”
“I blew it, didn’t I?”
“Yeah, but there’s gonna be someone else. He’ll come around at the most inopportune time and when you least expect it, kinda like Leo did.”
This is why I love Slutty Co-worker so much. She tells it like it is and then she lets you cry it out
on her shoulder.
“Hey, was that yummy Italian boy with Leo when you saw him?”
And then she makes you laugh.
The rest of January is quiet, and I barely notice when it turns into February. Business is chugging along at a better than expected rate. God Bless all those New Year’s resolution idiots who sign up for a six-month membership because “I’m really gonna get in shape this time!” I’m not worried about them dropping out either, because Slutty Co-worker does an excellent job of keeping men engaged, and smarty pants me hired a totally hot yoga master dude to keep all the flighty women from quitting. Yes, we have quite a nice little racket. The only hard part about any of it is keeping the two instructors off of each other!
My lunches and dinners with Courtney and Nicole commenced upon my return from New York. I never mentioned the trip to them; they’ve had enough of my love life. Every week we reserve a table for four, order the missing friend a drink and do our best to pretend she’s with us. We rarely bring up old times because it’s too painful, and we don’t talk about anything interesting because they don’t watch reality TV. The time I spend with my best friends has become the time when I contemplate life. They talk about doctor stuff, and I quietly ask myself, “Am I doing exactly what I want to be doing because I could be dead tomorrow.”
Aside from doing the man I love, the answer is always yes. I’m passionate about my yoga studios and Megan’s clothing line is a huge success. It’s already in nine department stores nationwide. I’m so busy spending time on projects that I love that I hardly notice the money that rolls in as a result. I suppose I should buy a house, but I can’t bear the thought of leaving my cottage. I’m not ready to leave behind the few good memories I have there with Leo. That, and I guess I want him to know exactly where to find me in case he changes his mind about giving me a second chance. I shouldn’t hold my breath, though. Megan got word from her friend’s ex-boyfriend that I messed him up real bad by going to New York and now he’s binge dating to get over me. It hurts like a mother fucker, and the pain would probably send most candy asses straight to therapy, but I’m smart enough to know that only time can heal the wounds I opened up on the streets of New York. What I’m going through right now is just a normal girl problem. Confusion and lies are what drove me to seek therapy and I don’t have those things in my life anymore. I’d like to see Dr. Maria, but that’s only because I miss her, not because I need her. My grandpa’s been very quiet, but that could be because I haven’t asked him any questions. He’ll be back when I need him.
The Life List (The List Trilogy) Page 40