Exes and Ohs

by Beth Kendrick

  But I would die before I explained all this to Alex. I didn’t want him to get the wrong idea. Or any idea at all. Anyway, I’d done it for Leo’s sake. Not his.

  So I restricted my remarks to, “Mind your own business.”

  “What happened?” he pressed.

  “You want waffles or not?”

  He held out his hand. “I want waffles. Give me your keys. I’ll make a Ralph’s run.”

  “What’s wrong with your car?”

  He showed me the mangled Audi key again. “I don’t think I’ll be getting much use out of my car tonight.”

  “Daddy? Who are you talking to?”

  Alex glanced down the hall. “Gwen’s here. I’m showing her what you did to the bathroom.”

  Two huge eyes peeked around the corner, then Leo barreled down the hall and surgically attached himself to my legs.

  “Hi, Miss Gwen! Hi!”

  I looked down at him. “How’s it going?”

  He widened his eyes and smiled angelically. The only thing missing was a little golden halo. “Good.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “You’re being a good boy for your daddy?”

  “Uh-huh.” He nodded emphatically.

  “Really.”

  “Oh, yes. I’m very good.”

  Alex snorted.

  “So you’re not tormenting Daddy just a little bit?”

  “Nooo.” He motioned for me to lean over, and when I did, he whispered, “Daddy doesn’t know time-outs.”

  “That’s all going to change,” I promised him. “No more playing Daddy for a sucker.”

  “Hey!” Alex objected.

  I gave him a look. “The kid destroys the bathroom, climbs out on the roof, flouts all discipline and bedtime attempts, and you promise him waffles. What would you call that?”

  He shrugged. “A performance incentive.”

  “Just get to the store, chairman. And while you’re gone, this kid is going to clean up the mess he made.”

  Leo’s grin vanished. “Clean up?”

  “That’s right. There’s water all over the floor, and it smells like a French—”

  “It smells like Mommy,” Leo supplied, cutting me off just in time.

  “Well, you’re going to clean it all up. And then, when you’re done, we’ll make waffles.”

  The grin reappeared. “Waffles!”

  “That’s right. So get crackin’, buddy.” I pointed him in the direction of the bathroom. “Grab a towel and start mopping. I’ll help you.”

  “This really isn’t necessary,” Alex said as Leo started down the hall.

  “Oh, yes, I forgot; you’re the man who doesn’t need any help.” I turned toward him. “Listen. You have a choice. You can either take Leo to the store, where I guarantee he’ll have another meltdown in the candy aisle because he’s overtired, or you can go grab some Eggos while he cleans up his own mess and learns to take responsibility for his mistakes. Which sounds like the better option to you?”

  He folded his arms. “You want blueberries in those waffles?”

  I smiled sweetly. “Blueberries sound delightful. And don’t worry about my brakes.”

  His gaze went steely. “You are getting new brake pads. I’m making you an appointment with my mechanic for Monday morning, and you better show up.”

  I knew when it was time to back down. “If you insist.”

  “I do.” He looked supremely frustrated. “I may not have mastered time-outs yet, but brake pads I can deal with.”

  “Miss Gwen, I dropped the toilet paper in the bathtub,” Leo hollered down the hall.

  “Coming.” I started for the bathroom, calling back to Alex, “It’s been a little slice of heaven.”

  And the sick thing was, I kind of meant it.

  The Eggos went over big. I tried to explain that placing the frozen disks in the toaster was, in fact, easy, but both Leo and Alex persisted in treating the finished product as some sort of culinary miracle. Even the fake maple syrup elicited oohs and ahhs.

  There they were, two males in a state of carb-loaded bliss, Leo with syrup smeared all over his chin, and Alex studying the directions on the package as if they were hot new stock tips.

  “I think it’s somebody’s bedtime,” I announced.

  “It’s your bedtime in Fiji by now,” Alex told Leo.

  Leo licked a dot of syrup off his wrist. “What’s Fiji?”

  “It’s an island near Australia. Which is in a different time zone.” He stood up and offered his hand to Leo. “Which means you should have gone to sleep a long time ago.”

  “But I did a good job cleaning up the bathroom and the hall,” Leo said proudly.

  “Yes, you did. But you’re still overdue for bed.”

  Leo clomped off toward the stairs with his dad. “But who lives in Fiji? Is it cold there?”

  “Actually, it’s very warm,” I heard Alex reply as they left the room. “You’d like it—you wouldn’t have to wear much.”

  They seemed to have the bedtime routine down pat, so I left them to what Harmony would have called “the bondy thing” and tried to use hot water and all-natural, eco-friendly cleanser to wipe up the syrup spills on the counter.

  I checked my watch. Still plenty of time to head back to Westwood and meet up with Cesca at the sports bar. Or just curl up with the TV remote and a big bowl of ice cream. If I listened closely, I could actually hear HBO and Ben & Jerry’s Phish Food calling my name from across the hills.

  But I dawdled. I sat down on a dainty white stool in Harmony’s dainty white kitchen, and admitted to myself that I didn’t want to leave. A big part of me wanted to hang in limbo here, suspended in the gap between what could be and what had to be.

  There was a certain safety in this situation Alex and I had created—we were free to let our imaginations run wild, because we could never take action. Desire without risk. Attraction without disappointment. An intoxicating alternative to our real lives.

  I piled the last of the pink-rimmed china into the sink. My fear of being alone had railroaded me into someone else’s light, white house. None of this was mine: not these dishes, not the father and child upstairs, not the sense of love and security I felt tonight.

  This was wrong. Regardless of the current state of Alex and Harmony’s sleeping arrangements or compatibility, they had decided to be a couple. Who the hell did I think I was, making waffles in her kitchen?

  I had to stop telling myself to leave; I had to actually leave. So I did. I slipped out into my car, careful not to slam the door, and sped away.

  I left without saying good-bye, and I knew it was the right thing to do, both for Alex and for me.

  I was nobody’s fallback. I deserved to come first. I deserved to be in a relationship where nobody ever had any doubts, or baggage, or overly fertile ex-fiancées. This was L.A.—I should be looking for a relationship that was soft-focus and well plotted, just like a movie. Right?

  Right?

  When I returned to the apartment, I found a mess the likes of which had not been seen since El Niño hit the California coastline. Cesca’s clothes, my shoes, and rainbow-colored Sweetarts were strewn all over the kitchen and living room.

  I had read enough true-crime books containing the sentence “The killer entered through the window of a first-floor apartment” to fear the worst. But when I reached for the phone to call 911, I saw the yellow Post-it note stuck to the refrigerator.

  A Post-it in response to my Post-it? Touché.

  Gwen—

  Had a great time tonight. Taking a quick detour to Vegas, baby, Vegas! Be back Sunday. I’ll play a few hands of blackjack for you.

  C.

  P.S.—took your wedding dress with me!!!

  She had drawn a little smiley face next to the p.s. This in and of itself was as shocking as the contents of the note. Cesca DiSanto did not do smiley faces. She had very strong opinions on this matter; even e-mail “faces” composed of colons, parentheses, and dashes were verboten.

&nb
sp; I checked the fridge’s interior for alcohol of any kind before I reread the note. We had a splash of chardonnay left, so I uncorked it and swigged right from the bottle. Mike Jessup would be proud.

  I slammed the empty wine bottle back on the countertop.

  Cesca. Mike Jessup. Vegas. My wedding dress. Put those things together, and you had yourself a nightmare straight out of Edgar Allan Poe.

  What to do? Who to call?

  Cesca, obviously, on her cell. But she wasn’t answering her phone. Oh God. I was going to have to hire one of those professional “deprogrammers” who rescued cult members.

  The cordless phone rang. I snatched it up.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey, G-dog! What up?”

  I frowned. “Mike?”

  “You know it. Is C. around?”

  “Isn’t…isn’t she with you?”

  “No. Why would I be calling you if she was over here with me?”

  “That’s what I was wondering.”

  “’Cause, like, if she was here, then I’d know that she wasn’t there. ’Cause I’d be able to see her. Get that?”

  “I get it,” I snapped, “but I’m confused because she left a note for me saying she was headed to Vegas. With my wedding dress. I assumed she went with you.”

  His voice leaped up about two octaves. “What? She’s in Vegas? And she took a wedding dress?”

  “That’s what I said.”

  “G-dog! How could you let her do that?”

  I threw open the cabinet doors in search of more wine. “I’m not her warden. Besides, I wasn’t here.”

  “I’m disappointed in you,” he informed me.

  “Then I’m hanging up.”

  “No! I’m sorry!” He always backed down. One of the things Cesca liked most about him. “Let’s put our heads together and figure this out.”

  I grimaced but held my tongue.

  “If C. went to Vegas…with a wedding dress…then…”

  “Yesss?” I prompted, waiting for the epiphany to dawn.

  “Oh my God! She’s gonna get hitched!”

  I rolled my eyes. “Ya think?”

  “Yeah! That’s it! She’s getting married.” There was the muffled sound of head scratching. “But who’s she marrying?”

  “Well…” I tried to break this news as gently as possible. “She might be marrying my date for the night. Paul something; I forgot his last name. He’s a police officer. She hadn’t met him before tonight, but I guess they hit it off.”

  He took a moment to mull this over. Then:

  “Chicks are whack, man.”

  I thought about how I had spent my evening. “No argument here.”

  Mike was silent for so long that I thought we might have lost the connection. But then he piped up again. “That’s it. I’m going to Vegas. And you’re coming with me.”

  18

  I agreed to go to Vegas because my concern for Cesca exceeded my irritation with Mike.

  Just barely.

  We took my car, bad brakes and all. I couldn’t deal with the thought of five straight hours in Mike’s rusty VW death trap. It was bad enough that I had to tolerate five straight hours of his conversation.

  “So,” he said as I merged onto the 15 Freeway. “Tell me about this Paul dude. Could I take him?”

  “Probably not. He’s a police officer.”

  “Is he good-lookin’?”

  I debated sharing my Baywatch theory with him, then decided against it. Mike had never been my favorite person, but I knew what it felt like to be dumped with spine-jarring suddenness. “Um…”

  “No way can he be as good-lookin’ as me.” He checked out the redhead going ninety in the Corvette next to us and rummaged through the grimy duffel bag he’d brought.

  My stomach growled. I checked the dashboard clock and realized that my lunch and dinner had consisted of a solitary Eggo. “Got any food in there?”

  “Naw. Just the essentials.”

  I knew what that meant. “This is a no-smoking car.”

  He reclined his seat back and flopped around like a toddler. “Aw, man.”

  We hadn’t even been on the road a full hour. I was starving, he was jonesing…damn that Cesca.

  His hand snaked over to the stereo.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” I swatted his wrist away.

  “We need some tunes. I got Warrant right here.”

  I sped up to pass a fleet of trucks. “No.”

  “Poison?”

  “No.”

  “Europe?”

  “Double no. Triple no.”

  We finally settled on Guns n’ Roses’ Appetite for Destruction. When Axl and the boys reached the final chorus of “Paradise City,” I turned down the bass and told Mike to try Cesca’s cell phone again.

  “I’m sure that we’re just jumping to conclusions. Silly, unwarranted conclusions,” I said, doing my best P.R. spin. “She’s probably off on a girls’ weekend with, you know, some of the wild psychologists we work with.”

  He turned the stereo off. “With a wedding dress?”

  Why? Why had I told him about that?

  “Maybe she’s going to sell it to a casino chapel,” I supplied. “Or, I know! Maybe one of her friends is eloping!” Hey, this was good stuff. Even I was starting to believe this.

  He contemplated this for a minute. “But if she took off with her friends, wouldn’t she have invited you?”

  “Well…” I coughed. “How the hell are you planning to find her out there, anyway?”

  “Oh, I know where she is.” He said this so matter-of-factly that I wondered if he had tagged her with a homing device, like a panda in a nature preserve.

  “You frighten me.”

  “She’s at the Monte Carlo.” He nodded smugly. “Every time we go to Vegas, she’s all up in that place. She’s got a fetus for that place.”

  I cleared my throat. “Perhaps you mean a ‘fetish’?”

  “A fetish. Whatever. That’s where she’ll be. And then, after I whup this police officer dude, her and me are getting married.”

  I checked the rearview mirror. The freeway behind me was dark and empty. No headlights. I could do a 180-degree U-turn over the median and head back right now.

  My cell phone rang. Dear God, let it be Cesca.

  “Can you get that?” I asked Mike. “I’m going eighty-five.”

  “Sure.” He picked my phone up. “’Lo?”

  He listened intently for a few seconds, then said, “Well, she’s here, but we’re on our way to Vegas right now and she’s driving…Uh-huh…Uh-huh…the Monte Carlo, okay? Sure…right, see you there.”

  I pounced as soon as he hung up. “That was Cesca? Is she okay?”

  He turned the stereo back on. “Nah. It was some chick named Harmony. She wanted to talk to you, but when I told her we’re going to Vegas, she said she’ll meet us there.”

  I slowed down to seventy. “She’s meeting us where? Vegas?”

  “Yeah. Says she needs to talk to you. And I gotta tell you, she sounds freaky deaky.” He leaned over, filling my personal space with his ashtray breath, and gave me an elaborate wink. “What’d you do to her?”

  The red taillights in front of me went blurry as panic set in. “Nothing! I did nothing! Why? What did she say?”

  “Not much. But she sure seemed pissed. I guess she’ll meet us at the Monte Carlo tomorrow morning. She’s flying in from Mexico or some shit. Listen, can we stop for a burger now?”

  I’d slammed back not one, not two, but six Diet Cokes by the time we vroomed into Sin City. The dashboard clock read 3:45 A.M. We’d made horrible time because someone had to stop for a snack, a cigarette, or a restroom break every thirty minutes (well, okay, the restroom breaks were mine…stupid Diet Cokes). The floor mats were littered with CD cases and fast-food wrappers. The lyrics of “Livin’ on a Prayer” were permanently tattooed on my brain.

  I floored it down the Strip, made an illegal left turn into the entrance of th
e Monte Carlo, yanked the parking brake, and handed my keys to the valet.

  The sudden stop jolted Mike out of his peaceful nap. “It’s probably cheaper to self-park, ya know.”

  “Get out or you sleep in the garage.” I slammed the door and headed to the trunk for the overnight bag I’d packed.

  “Jeez.” He blinked his bloodshot eyes at me. “Crank-ee. And you know, your brakes don’t sound so great. Might want to get them checked out.”

  I hoisted my bag over my shoulder and shuffled into the lobby. Even in the middle of the night, the hotel was blindingly bright and bustling with activity. Metallic cha-chings emanated from the casino down the hall. Scantily clad cocktail waitresses finishing shifts clicked by in their high heels.

  I slapped my credit card down on the reception desk and asked for a room. The cheaper, the better.

  “How many beds?” inquired the chipper brunette behind the counter.

  “Two.” Mike Jessup tossed his duffel bag down on my foot.

  I glared at him, then turned back to the reservations clerk. “One bed will be fine, thank you.”

  Mike put both hands up. “Whoa. I think you’re aces, G-dog, but I don’t think the big C. would like it if—”

  “Forget it. We’re not sharing a room,” I hissed. “Get your own.”

  “But I can’t afford a room,” he whimpered.

  The last of my I’m-okay-you’re-okay veneer evaporated. “Listen to me. I just spent all night driving you out here in my car, paying for gas with my debit card, looking for my roommate, and now I am going to get some sleep in my bed, in my room. Figure something out.” I pounded the counter for emphasis.

  The reservations clerk took a step back.

  His eyes widened. “But—”

  “Sir, I’d do as she says,” the brunette advised.

  I smiled. “Thank you. Listen, is there a Francesca DiSanto registered here?”

  She frowned at the computer screen and punched a few buttons. “I don’t see her name. Does she have any other traveling companions?”