“Do you have something to write with? You might want to take notes as we go through this.”
To her credit, Gretchen is incredibly impressive. She sped through Princeton with honors, founded her own marketing firm, and volunteers with homeless New Yorkers. She has a robust group of friends and isn’t particularly interested in having children, so she’s not clamoring for a boyfriend to father a brood—she wants a life partner. It strikes me that Gretchen is the type of woman who would call her divorce a “conscious uncoupling.” I scribble notes in the margins of her document as she talks, partly so I won’t forget the specifics of her match, but mostly so I can regale Caroline with the complete breadth of Gretchen’s insanity later over a bottle of wine. I can’t help but feel like the more checklists and addendums and figures she includes, the less of a chance that anyone will meet her standards. Not even her freakishly successful exes did, or else they wouldn’t be exes.
But a rigorous checklist doesn’t guarantee that you’ll be happy. Jonathan is movie-perfect, with his gleaming white teeth and sharp-cornered business cards—and yet he still betrayed me. So, I don’t have much faith in Gretchen’s checklist. I’ll do what I did for Mindy and Eddie—find someone not terribly objectionable, set them up, cross my fingers, and collect my paycheck.
Gretchen is in the middle of telling me how self-aware she is when the waiter comes by to ask if we’d like refills. I hesitate; she declines. She waits for him to leave, then smoothes her hand over the packet and flips it shut.
“I want to explain to you why this list is so important to me.” Her tone changes; she’s a hair quieter, a little more serious. “When I was just about your age—you’re twenty-two, aren’t you?”
I nod, carefully watching her expression.
“I know. I looked you up before we met. I’m sure you did the same,” she says, winking. “When I was about your age, I was dating my boyfriend from Princeton. He wanted me to follow him to Harvard, where he was going to law school. I thought it was very flattering that he asked me to come with him, and I knew he had a lot of potential. So I said yes, and shortly after, he proposed.”
So, apparently Gretchen could be lovable. Good to know.
“This was years before Facebook and Instagram and people posting ring photos the moment they get engaged. People were more private about everything back then. I realized I felt nauseous at the prospect of telling my friends and family that I was going to marry him. He wasn’t the right guy.”
“What did you do?” I glance down at the ruby solitaire on her ring finger. She follows my gaze and twists it lovingly.
“I told him I’d made a mistake. I couldn’t marry him. And he went off to Harvard in the fall, and I went to Honduras to teach English.”
“Wow.”
She sighs. “That’s why this list is so important, Sasha. It can’t just be any man. It has to be the right man. The most compatible match possible. Otherwise, sharing a life with someone isn’t worth it.”
I feel bad for judging her list. I don’t know what to say.
She sits up straighter, not that I had even thought such a thing possible. “My broken engagement taught me another lesson, too.”
“What’s that?”
She flexes her left hand over the table and admires her ruby ring. “A woman should never rely on a man for a piece of jewelry. Every woman should treat herself to something beautiful, if she can afford it.” She lets that sink in for a moment, then opens the packet again. “Now, I’d really like to address some of the more nuanced points in Figure B . . .”
When we emerge from the bar an hour later, she points me toward the F train off to the right and heads in the opposite direction back to her own apartment. I was nervous about the meeting running over into the time when I should be date-sitting for Eddie and Diane, but I just make it. I slip my phone out of my purse and intend to call Eddie, but Adam’s name burns bright on my screen. My cheeks flush instantly. He left a voicemail; I can’t recall the last time Jonathan did that. I hit play and his warm voice fills my ear.
“Hey there. I just wanted to thank you so much for last night. Is there any way I can push my luck and see you two nights in a row?”
My first instinct is to gush yes and hop the express train to meet him. Then I check myself. Girls are supposed to play hard to get, or something like that. But that feels like bullshit. I don’t want to play by the rules anymore.
“Hey,” I type. “I had the best time with you last night. As for tonight . . . it may be your lucky day. I’m coming from Carroll Gardens, but I’ll be back in Manhattan in forty-five if that works for you?”
I read it over once, twice, then press send. I feel shaky. Cold. Frantic for his response. I walk quickly down the sidewalk, as if speeding up could somehow cosmically make his response come any faster. Guys never write back right away. But what do you know, a minute later, my phone dings, just like I wanted it to. My heart leaps into my throat. It’s Adam.
“Brooklyn? Then meet me outside the Nassau Avenue stop in Greenpoint. There’s something I want to show you.”
Of course, there’s a problem. Date-sitting for Eddie means I can’t get on the subway because I might lose cell service and won’t be available to take his calls. And walking to Greenpoint will take forever from here. So instead, I hail a cab. I can expense it to Bliss later.
Nestled in the cushy backseat, I dial Eddie and he picks up with a congested, “Hello?” I wish I could pass him a tissue.
“Hi! It’s Sasha. I’m just checking in with you about your date with Diane tonight.” Cheeriness works its way into my voice naturally; I might actually be getting better at this job.
“Well, I’m all set for the date. I’m just a block away from the bar. It’s still on, isn’t it?”
“Definitely. She can’t wait to meet you.”
Eddie makes a noise that sounds like harumph. I didn’t realize that people actually harumphed in real life.
We chat logistics. I’m sending them to a Mets bar, which I figured would be an ideal place for Eddie to feel comfortable. It’s not remotely Bliss-approved—it’s not upscale, it’s just drinks, and there’s no complicated adventure for the clients to enjoy (the purpose of the adventure, I’ve learned, is to break the ice and give clients something to talk about aside from why they’re so desperately single that they’ve hired Bliss in the first place). But I know they’ll love the Mets bar.
I text Diane that Eddie is at the bar, and she writes back a few minutes later that she’s almost there. I’m relieved. Later, I repeat the process with Mindy and Gordon.
“Hey there, dollface,” Mindy answers when I call. “How’s your day?”
I freeze, swallow, and fixate on telling her strictly the parts she can hear. “Oh, you know, the usual. Just met with a new client.”
“She’s so goddamn lucky to have you.”
“Aw, Mindy, stop. Anyway, I’m so excited for you to meet Gordon. . . .”
The rest of the ride to Nassau Avenue is peaceful, and I spend an embarrassingly large portion of it thinking about Adam: exactly how he touched me last night, the sturdiness of his body next to mine as we slept, the proper greeting for when I see him today (a hug? A kiss on the cheek? A kiss on the lips? If only I, an actual matchmaker, knew the rules to dating). I decide on a kiss on the cheek.
When I get out of the taxi, I spot him leaning against the wrought-iron fence around the subway stop. He’s dressed in slim jeans and a white T-shirt with a black leather jacket folded over the crook of his elbow. If only he had a cigarette dangling from his lips, I’d mistake him for James Dean.
“I can’t believe I get to see you twice in one day,” he says, looking me up and down. “I’m a lucky man.”
I want to appear cool and calm in front of him so badly, but I can’t. I eke out a sheepish, “Same.”
His fingers graze my hips and encircle the small of my back, pulling me close for a real kiss. The embrace feels like cozying into an old sweater. Adam smel
ls earthy and spicy and masculine. I could keep kissing him forever, but he pulls away. He grabs my hand and interlaces his fingers through mine. We begin walking.
“So, I wanted to take you to the Brooklyn Night Bazaar,” he says. “Have you been?”
“No, what is that?”
“And you call yourself a New Yorker. I guess the southern transplant will have to show you.”
We stroll a few blocks down the street, past a baseball field with patchy grass and a two-story bar twinkling with lights that glow pale gold in the dusky purple evening sky. The streets are vaguely familiar. I might have been drunk here during sophomore year, when Caroline and I spent every weekend traveling to a new corner of Brooklyn in search of cool apartment parties hosted by fashion majors and dudes who swore they were on the verge of finally finishing their EDM EPs. But it’s early now—that kind of crowd won’t start flocking to this neighborhood for another few hours—so we have the streets mostly to ourselves.
We arrive at a brick warehouse that stretches the width of the entire block. The bouncer outside asks for our IDs, peers at mine for an extra half second, then stamps our wrists and waves us forward. I’m used to being carded, but Adam is clearly not. Inside, the warehouse is bustling with hundreds of people. The perimeter is lined with vendors: I spot signs for vintage clothing, handmade jewelry, artisanal popcorn, craft beer, a tattoo artist, Ping-Pong, laser tag, and more. A rockabilly band sets up in the far corner.
“This is awesome,” I tell him. I like the way my hand feels in his and don’t want to let go.
“I thought you’d like it,” he says, a self-satisfied smirk spreading across his face. “I figured you’d seen just about every cool date spot in Manhattan, so I thought this might surprise you.”
We weave through the booths, admiring handmade jewelry and sharing a bag of sesame-wasabi popcorn that tingles across my lips. He holds up a garish 1950s bowling shirt to his chest and turns to face me.
“Dashing, right?”
He looks downright ridiculous.
“I mean, if you miss the clothing of your childhood, go ahead and get it.” It feels dangerous to poke fun at his age, but I have a hunch the joke will land.
“Oh, ouch! Excuse me, I forgot you were in diapers when Clinton was sworn in.”
I stop riffling through the rack of vintage Levi’s. “Not quite.”
“You were, what . . .” He pauses to do the math.
“Not even conceived yet,” I fill in for him.
He places the loudly printed bowling shirt back on the rack. He groans. “Right, right.”
I study his face. There’s a boyish softness to his eyes, but his forehead is faintly creased and weathered. He looks away, sheepish, and I can’t help but imagine that I’m the youngest person he’s ever been with. He’s certainly the oldest person I’ve been with.
“Let’s play Ping-Pong,” I say, leading him to the far corner of the warehouse and away from this treacherous conversation. “I can kick your ass at it.”
“Oh, really.” It’s not a question.
“Want to make it interesting and bet on it?”
“Fine. The winner gets a kiss?”
“I was planning on getting one from you anyway,” I flirt back.
He lets out a loud, deep laugh that cuts through the buzz of the crowd. “Cocky, huh?”
The Ping-Pong tables are around the corner in a room splattered floor to ceiling with colorful graffiti. I’m so not cool enough to be here. Adam fishes a five out of his wallet to give to the attendant, and she sets us up with a bucket of Ping-Pong balls and two rubber paddles. I serve the ball across the table with a hearty thwock; he lunges sideways to hit it back.
“Looking forward to collecting that kiss,” I call across the table.
When I beat him, he leaves his paddle on the table and walks over to my side to embrace me. He tucks a lock of hair behind my ear and strokes my cheek with one finger, tilting my chin up to face him. He’s close enough that I can feel the heat radiating off his skin. When he finally leans in for the kiss, I want to melt into his arms. There’s a nagging voice in the back of my head that reminds me how wrong this is on so many levels: he’s my client’s former match; I met him through Bliss; I’ve been single for exactly one week and three hours; and this is most definitely a rebound. But who said a rebound had to be a meaningless fling?
We’ve paid for a half hour of Ping-Pong and still have twenty minutes to go, so we bat around the ball for a while. He gets better at returning my serves, but not by much. When I win another round, we turn in our paddles and balls and head back to the main part of the warehouse. I like strolling with him through the crowd. It feels so easy and natural and right to be half of a pair with him.
We move on to the remaining few vendors. He slows by a table of druzy pendants and starts chatting up the artist, a forty-something woman in round tortoiseshell glasses. He asks if she makes the pendants herself, where she learned to make jewelry, if she’s sold at the Brooklyn Night Bazaar for long. The whole time, his thumb rubs lazy circles on the inside of my palm. It’s comforting.
Eventually, we head for the exit. Outside, the sky has turned midnight blue. We walk through blocks of warehouses and low brick buildings. We end up by the waterfront at the Greenpoint Pier. The entire Manhattan skyline is lit up across the East River. It’s a spectacular display, with the lights from the new World Trade Center, Empire State Building, and Chrysler Building reflected a million times over in the rippling water.
“It’s gorgeous, isn’t it?” he asks, coming up behind me and wrapping his arms around me.
I lean my elbows onto the railing and try to commit this moment to memory.
“Breathtaking.”
“Just like you.”
When we kiss, he dips me way back, like we’re in a goddamn Nicholas Sparks movie. I get a head rush, and it’s not just from the dip. It’s from the sweet vindication of knowing that I’m capable of being treated right, not just ignored, cast aside, and betrayed. This is the moment when karma comes back in my favor. His hands roam my body and hold me tight.
Scientists should package Adam up and sell him to girls who have recently had their hearts broken. Why the hell would Mindy ever pass him up?
As if on cue, my phone rings in my purse. I bet it’s either Eddie or Mindy—either way, I don’t want to pick it up.
“Going to get that?” he asks, sliding his fingers out of my hair.
“Mm, no.”
I kiss him again, but the ringing continues. It cuts off abruptly as he starts to kiss down my neck. The ringing picks up again.
“It’s okay, you can get it,” he says, straightening up but keeping one hand tucked into the back pocket of my jeans.
“All right, all right. I’m sure it’s work.”
Sure enough, it’s Mindy. He glimpses the caller ID and chuckles.
“Go ahead, talk to her.”
I hesitate. I, of all people, know what it’s like to be abandoned for a work phone call. I take a few steps away from him and that glorious waterfront view.
“Hello?”
“Sasha! You. Are. A. Genius.”
I heave an enormous sigh of relief. “I am?”
“I had the best time ever with Gordon. He’s so cute. So smart. So British! Ugh, that accent, it kills me.”
“I know, he’s pretty fantastic, right?”
“Has he said anything about me?” She sounds nervous.
“Not yet. I’ll get the scoop tomorrow.”
“Oh. It’s so hard to be patient. I’m not even desperate for him to like me or anything, because I know I’m amazing and I can walk away if he’s not interested. But I . . .” She hesitates. “I could maybe see this going somewhere. Maybe.”
“That’s great, Mindy.”
“But don’t stop setting me up with other guys. I want to renew my package for next month. Two more dates, all right?”
“Sure, let’s keep your options open.”
Adam lean
s back on his elbows against the railing and shakes his head quietly, grinning.
“Amazing. ’Night, doll, talk soon! Ciao.”
I test out the word. “Ciao.”
I slip my phone into my bag and turn back to Adam, embarrassed without quite being able to put a finger on why.
“How was Mindy’s date?”
“She sounded happy on the phone. Sorry, is it weird for you to hear about Mindy?”
“I traded up.”
He’s perfect.
Back at his apartment, we manage to keep our hands off each other long enough to pop open a bottle of wine and settle onto the couch. The clock under the TV reads nearly midnight. Conversation flows easily in a way it never did with Jonathan. It turns out that casual conversations are much easier when you don’t have to memorize a glossary of financial terms first—who knew? He listens to my stories about the ridiculous things I hear guys say on Tinder, my travels across Europe during my semester abroad, my failed tryout for the cheerleading team when I was a freshman in high school. He lights up when I tell him about my background in journalism.
“Did you read the short story in this week’s New Yorker?”
“Oh, er, no.”
“Oh, really?” He looks caught off guard. He leans forward to find the exact page he’s talking about in one of the magazines on the coffee table. “Well, anyway, this writer’s a really big deal.”
I half pretend to skim the story. I feel like I did back in my sophomore year of college, when one of my English TAs was young and cute and I wanted to impress him. Adam’s eyes meet mine, and I feel like I have to be honest with him before I get any more invested than I already am. I fidget with the corner of my cuticle so I don’t have to look him in the eye when I explain myself. Sharing the secret means the two of us can share its pressure now.
“You know, I’m not . . . technically . . . allowed to date anyone I meet through matchmaking. Company policy and all. It’s kind of bullshit, but I just thought you should know.”
Playing with Matches Page 17