Mommy Tracked

by Whitney Gaskell

“Do you think it would be rude to just not open the door when he gets here? To pretend that I’m not home?”

  “Yes. That would pretty much define rude.”

  “But I can’t let him see me like this. It’ll scare him off.”

  “I thought you weren’t interested in him. I thought you said you didn’t even want to go on this date.”

  “You are not helping!”

  “I’m sorry. Look. When he gets there, just open the door a crack and tell him you’re really sick and don’t want to infect him with your germs, and ask if you can reschedule the date.”

  “Like when my hair grows out?”

  “I told you not to let Jean Luc touch your hair when he’s upset. Once, when he was sulking over this teeny-tiny little pimple on his chin, he gave me a horrible hippie, center-part haircut. It was a nightmare. I looked like Mama Cass. I can’t imagine how bad he’d be in the middle of a breakup,” Grace said.

  “Come over and look at my head.”

  “Do you want me to? Maybe I can fix it.”

  “No, that’s okay. I put some hair gel in it and pushed it back with a headband.” Anna sighed heavily. “I know it’s only hair, and it’s not the end of the world. It’s just…my head looks like it’s covered in pubic hair.”

  Grace let out a shriek of laughter. “Pubic hair?”

  “Yes! It’s short and frizzy. Pubic hair,” Anna repeated darkly. “I can’t let Noah see me like this. I just can’t. I’d better go. I have to call my mom and tell her I don’t need her to babysit tonight after all.”

  The doorbell rang promptly at eight o’clock. Potato began to shriek as though Nazi storm troopers were invading the house. The small fawn pug skidded across the tile floor and threw herself against the door with a thud, barking wildly the whole time.

  “Potato! Stop that!” Anna hissed, trying to ignore the nervous fluttering in her stomach.

  For as much as she’d protested to Grace that she didn’t want to start dating anyone, there had been a definite spark between her and Noah. And a part of Anna—a larger part than she’d been aware of until just this moment—wanted to see what that meant.

  Anna glanced in the direction of Charlie’s room, listening carefully. He was already tucked into his crib, fast asleep, and the doorbell and Potato’s yapping hadn’t seemed to wake him.

  Right, Anna thought, steeling herself as she walked to the door. Time to get this over with.

  She’d considered wearing her trusty baseball cap, but then thought it would be harder to pull off her flu excuse if Noah caught a glimpse of her. Sick people don’t walk around the house with a baseball cap on. Still, she’d carefully pinned back her crazy bangs and put on the one robe she owned that wasn’t covered in coffee stains. Just in case.

  Her heart was pounding when she reached the door. She pulled it open just a crack, only as far as the safety chain would allow, and peeked outside, trying to keep as much of her rash-covered face and insane hair out of view as possible. Potato, still huffing with outrage, stood on her hind legs and danced like a circus bear.

  “Anna?” Noah leaned over to one side to peer through the crack at her. Anna jumped back before he could see her. “Is everything okay?”

  “Hi! Yes, everything’s fine,” Anna said, too brightly, before remembering she was supposed to be sick. “Well…actually, no. It’s not fine. I’m sick.”

  “What’s wrong?” Noah sounded concerned.

  “Nothing too serious. I’m just running a fever, and I have a sore throat, and…um, the chills, and the sniffles,” Anna said, wondering if that was enough symptoms to sound contagious—or was it too many?

  Oh, God, she thought. I sound like I’m making it up. Probably because I am making it up. “It came on suddenly. I woke up feeling fine this morning. And then after lunch it just hit me. Wham!”

  “Well, do you need anything?” Noah asked. “I could go get you some medicine.”

  How sweet is he, Anna thought, her resolve going mushy for a moment.

  “Or maybe I could come in and fix you something to eat?” he continued.

  “No!” Anna bellowed, before she got ahold of herself and remembered her fictitious sore throat. People with sore throats don’t shriek. She lowered her voice to a husky whisper. “I mean…no. Thanks. I’ll be fine. I have some cough medicine; that should do the trick.” Then, not remembering if she’d listed a cough as one of her phantom symptoms, began to fake-cough into her hand for effect.

  “Oh…well. Okay,” Noah said.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said. “So, so sorry. I tried calling your store this morning to tell you. I left a message with your clerk. Didn’t she give it to you?”

  “I thought you said you just started feeling bad this afternoon.”

  “What?” Anna asked, feeling a stab of panic. What had she said?

  “You said that you just started feeling sick this afternoon. So how would you have known this morning that you would need to cancel our date?”

  Now Anna thought he sounded a little angry. She wanted to peek back out at him, but she was afraid that her calamine-covered face would repulse him, maybe even cause him to stumble over backward off the porch and then race off so fast, he’d leave a dust cloud behind him, like the cartoon Road Runner.

  “Um,” she said. “I, um, wasn’t…really…feeling all that great yesterday, um, either….” Her voice trailed off guiltily.

  Crap, Anna thought. This is why I don’t lie. I’ve always sucked at it, and I always end up getting caught.

  “I brought you these flowers.”

  A flash of an enormous bouquet of tropical blooms appeared in the door crack.

  “That’s so nice,” Anna said, feeling even worse for her lies. She wanted to open the door, wanted to thank him properly, but she couldn’t. She just couldn’t. “Would you mind leaving them there by the door? I really don’t want to expose you to my germs.”

  “Right.” Anna could hear a rustling as he propped the bouquet by the door. “Well, I guess I’ll just be going, then,” Noah said coldly.

  “Oh. Okay. Bye,” Anna said. She peeked out the door and saw that Noah had descended the two front steps and was starting down the walk. But suddenly he turned.

  “You know, if you didn’t want to go out with me, you should have just said so. You could have saved me the trouble of coming out here,” Noah said. Now he sounded hurt.

  Anna cringed. She couldn’t let him leave thinking that she’d blown him off.

  Anna fumbled with the chain, opened the door, and rushed onto the porch. Noah was already striding angrily down the walk, practically bristling with righteous indignation. Potato streaked down the front steps, chasing after him like a shameless hussy.

  “Oh, no! Potato, get back here! Noah! Please wait,” she said.

  Potato threw herself against Noah’s legs with a soft, furry thump, and Noah grunted and stopped. He peered down at the sausage-shaped dog, who was wiggling ecstatically by his feet, as though not sure what it was.

  “It’s okay. Potato won’t bite. Well, unless you’re a jelly donut,” Anna said.

  Noah looked back at Anna. “You named your dog Potato?”

  “Long story,” Anna said. “Look, Noah…I can explain about tonight. I wasn’t blowing you off. At least not the way you think,” she said haltingly.

  Noah paused, but then shrugged and started back up the walk. Potato pranced along at his feet and looked adoringly up at him. Feeling self-conscious, Anna wrapped her robe tighter around her and then crossed her arms, gripping her waist. When Noah reached her and looked at her for the first time, the anger suddenly disappeared from his face.

  “Oh, good God!” he exclaimed, visibly starting. “What happened to your face?”

  Great. Just great. Just what every girl wants to hear on a first date, Anna thought. This was why she’d sworn off blind dates back in her pre-Brad days. She’d always dreaded the possibility of being met with a fleeting look of disappointment. Actually, this was wor
se than disappointment. Noah was peering up at her as though she’d sprouted a second head.

  “Poison ivy,” Anna said shortly, immediately regretting her decision to not let Noah leave mad. Anger was vastly preferable to out-and-out repulsion. “It’s on my face and my arms and—well, everywhere.”

  Noah seemed to be working to regain control of his emotions. “Oh…that’s…wow, that really sucks.”

  Anna sighed and lifted her hands to hide the rash from his view. “Please don’t look at me. I know it’s awful.”

  “No, it’s not that bad,” Noah said. He was a bad liar too. “Really, it’s not. So is that the reason why you canceled dinner?”

  Anna nodded. “I’m sorry I lied,” she said, her voice muffled by her hands. “But I couldn’t go out in public looking like this.”

  “That’s okay.” Noah laughed ruefully. “At least you weren’t just blowing me off. And it’s really not that bad.”

  “Yes, it is. It’s awful.” But Anna looked up reluctantly and lowered her hands from her face. She scratched absentmindedly at a particularly itchy patch on her right arm.

  “No, it’s really not.”

  Is that the third or fourth time he’s said that? Anna wondered, and she remembered reading an article about how when people lie, they tend to repeat themselves. Which meant…disaster. Well, try to look on the bright side. At least now I won’t have to tell him about my whole nondating policy. It’s not like I’m ever going to hear from him again after this.

  But then Noah surprised the hell out of her when he said, “Look, have you had dinner yet?”

  “No. I was just going to scramble some eggs or something.”

  “Why don’t I go pick up a pizza and we’ll eat here?”

  Huh? Isn’t this the part where he’s supposed to make his excuses and hightail it out of here, never to be seen again? Anna looked at him doubtfully. “That’s sweet, but…honestly, I really don’t want you to see me looking like this either.”

  “Hey, I can handle a little rash.”

  “I don’t know…”

  “I’ll tell you what. We can eat outside, if you like.” Noah looked at the postage-stamp-size front yard. “We’ll have a picnic out here in the dark.”

  “Well. Okay. But let’s eat in the backyard. I have a little table and chairs out there,” Anna said. She knew this wasn’t a great idea, that this was no way to have their first date. But at the same time—and this was the kicker—she didn’t want him to go. Especially since he was sticking around even after being confronted by a rash-covered date. It must mean that her gut instinct was right: he really was a nice guy.

  “Great. I think I saw a pizzeria back around the corner.”

  “That’s right. Angelo’s. It’s excellent,” Anna said.

  “High praise from a restaurant critic. I’ll be back as soon as it’s ready,” Noah said, turning to go. But then he stopped and glanced back at her, his eyes narrowing as he studied her. “Did you do something to your hair? It looks…different.”

  The pizza was delicious, especially when accompanied by Anna’s mushroom pâté, which, Noah pronounced, was the most delicious thing he’d ever tasted. They ate out on the back deck, which was lit only by the citronella candles Anna kept out to ward off mosquitoes. She was hoping that the flattering effect of candlelight would extend to rash-covered skin.

  Anna had found a dusty bottle of red wine in her pantry and mounded the pâté on a plate with an accompaniment of rosemary crackers while she was waiting for Noah to return with the pizza. She’d also hurriedly changed out of her robe and into her favorite jeans and a coral cotton sweater and made sure that her bangs were still secured by the barrettes. Unfortunately, the gel she’d put in her hair to slick it back had also made it crunchy and just a tad sticky, but still. It was better than the crazy bangs.

  And by the time Anna and Noah downed a few slices of pizza and made a respectable dent in the bottle of wine, Anna had stopped thinking about her hair. Hell, they’d been so busy talking and laughing, she’d even forgotten to scratch herself. In fact, Noah was so charming, smart, and funny that Anna—who firmly did not believe in the Prince Charming myth—was trying to figure out what was wrong with him. All men had something wrong with them. It was a law of nature.

  He’d never been married. (Commitmentphobe? she wondered.) He was close with his parents. (His mother probably hates all of his girlfriends.) He didn’t have any siblings. (Only children can be self-centered.) He jogged and played tennis. (Athletes were always assholes.)

  They talked about their favorite music (Anna liked eighties’ new-wave pop, Noah loved seventies’ Southern rock), books (Anna’s favorite writer was Maeve Binchy; Noah had read everything Tom Clancy had ever written), and movies.

  “Dirty Harry,” Noah said immediately. He sneered suddenly. “Do you feel lucky, punk? Do you?”

  “What’s wrong with your eyes? Why are you squinting like that?” Anna asked, amused.

  “Don’t you know a master Clint Eastwood impression when you hear it?”

  “Oh, is that what that was?” Anna teased him.

  He grinned at her and popped a cracker in his mouth. “So, what’s your favorite movie? Let me guess—you’re the arty sort. French movies without proper endings, right?”

  “Ummm…” Anna considered lying and saying Howard’s End, or something similarly highbrow. But, again, she was a horrible liar. “Pretty Woman,” she admitted.

  Noah groaned. “What is it with women and that movie? I mean, it’s about a hooker falling in love with her john. That’s not romantic—it’s gross.”

  “It is romantic! Richard Gere rescues Julia Roberts at the end! After she’s given up hooking.”

  “For about five minutes. And presumably before he finds out that she gave him chlamydia.”

  “How can you say that? It’s a classic redemption story!” When Noah just rolled his eyes, Anna exclaimed, “I can’t believe you! It’s like you haven’t even seen the movie.”

  “I haven’t seen the movie,” Noah admitted.

  “You haven’t seen Pretty Woman? How is that possible?” Anna exclaimed.

  “It’s a chick flick. And it’s not exactly a classic. Like, say, Dirty Harry.”

  “Actually, I have to admit: I’ve never seen Dirty Harry.”

  “What? And you’re criticizing me?” Noah asked with mock outrage. “Okay, that’s it. On our next date we’ll have to rent Dirty Harry.”

  Our next date. Anna felt a thrill of excitement at the words. So her hair and rash really hadn’t scared him off.

  “Only if we also rent Pretty Woman,” Anna countered.

  “Okay. Deal. It’ll be a double feature.”

  They smiled at each other. Potato, who had been snuffling around at their feet, hunting for dropped pizza, suddenly reared up and placed her feet on Noah’s leg. She grinned at him, her pink tongue lolling out one side of her mouth and her wide eyes blinking coquettishly.

  “I think your dog likes me,” Noah said, reaching down to rub Potato’s belly.

  “She likes everyone. Especially people who slip her pieces of pizza under the table.”

  “When did you get her?”

  “Three years ago. Right after I got married. I got custody of her during the divorce.”

  Noah whistled. “Divorce. That’s tough. I’m glad I’ve never gone through that.”

  “Have you ever come close to getting married?” Anna asked. She leaned back in her chair, feeling a little tipsy, in a comfortable, loose-limbed way. Enough so that she felt bold enough to wander onto the minefield of asking a date about old loves. But the candle was glowing, casting small circles of warm yellow light onto the table, and one of her neighbors had put on an old jazz album. Strains of the music drifted toward them. It all lent itself to an atmosphere of intimacy.

  “Yeah. I’ve come close,” Noah said.

  “So you’ve been engaged?”

  Noah hesitated, just long enough to pique Anna’s intere
st. Could that be the fatal flaw she’d been waiting for? Was there a woman in his past who he’d never gotten over? Maybe someone who had broken his heart? Anna leaned forward a little, and her breath caught in her throat while she waited.

  “Yes, I’ve been engaged. In fact…more than once,” Noah said.

  More than once?

  Anna furrowed her brow. “You’ve been engaged twice?” she asked.

  “Um…”

  His obvious discomfort was even more worrying. What had he done—left his brides at the altar? Anna had a sudden vision of two women, one blonde and one brunette, dressed in Vera Wang bridal gowns, standing side by side, sobbing quietly into their bouquets moments after being told that their groom was a no-show.

  “Actually…more than twice,” Noah finally said, sounding a little sheepish.

  Three jilted fiancées? Three empty reception halls, three lists of gifts that had to be returned, three sets of nonrefundable honeymoon packages to Bermuda? One fiancée might not have been his fault. Two could have been a run of bad luck. But three? The only way a guy this attractive, smart, and funny could have discarded three different fiancées was if he’d been the dumper.

  Aha! Anna thought grimly. That’s it. He’s a serial monogamist, like Hugh Grant’s character in Four Weddings and a Funeral. I knew he was too good to be true. I knew it.

  “More than twice?” Anna repeated.

  Noah looked down at his wineglass, twirling the stem in his hands, while Anna waited for the explanation. Surely he’d have an explanation, however lame it might be. But she wasn’t prepared for what he said next.

  Noah cleared his throat. “Actually…four times.”

  “What?” Anna thought she hadn’t heard correctly. Because she could have sworn he’d just said “four times.” Which was insane. No one got engaged four times. Well, no one other than Elizabeth Taylor. It was ridiculous.

  “I said, I’ve been engaged four times,” Noah said again. And as flabbergasted as Anna was by this news, she noticed that Noah didn’t look her in the eye as he said it.

  seven

  Juliet

  Obviously, you have to dump him,” Juliet said, a few nights later. Juliet, Grace, and Anna were having dinner at The Tortoise and the Hare, which Anna was reviewing for her column.