Romance Is My Day Job

by Patience Bloom

  Manhattan or bust.

  • • •

  When I read about arguments in romances, they always go something like this.

  “How could you try to take over my father’s business and blackmail me into marrying you, you pig!” Louisa Toner-Cartridge tries to smack her boss, Lars Corporateraider, but he catches her delicate hand in midair.

  “Ah, but you like it.” Lars gazes down with his smoldering, dancing, coal-black eyes, then crushes his mouth to hers (crushing, it’s always crushing).

  A month after our twenty-four-hour lovefest, Gunther is visiting me in New Mexico. This new relationship is . . . well . . . I’m not sure what it is, but this is how our fighting goes:

  “You’re having issues with your father complex,” Gunther declares in the midst of our first argument.

  Yeah, duh. “I know. I’m not sure why my father has such a hold on me.” Maybe because he’s my father and he used to be a great dad. I’ve told Gunther all about my father. How years ago, he was a loving father, and I worshipped him. I could go into his office and bother him. He spent time with me, encouraged me, and showed me endless possibilities for adventure—mountain climbing, swimming anywhere, riding roller coasters, going on long road trips—and giving me endless advice about school, vocation, and matters of the heart.

  Starting when I was nine, my parents newly divorced, I lived with him and we were like two heartbroken peas in a pod. We made burgers, went to stupid movies, and played catch. Because he’d turned into an exercise junkie, he and I would run laps around the track and watch the sunset. As I grew tired, in that last lap, he would yell from across the track, “One more lap for Wonder Woman!” Later, in my teens, it was “One more lap for Duran Duran!” And then I’d sprint.

  Not only was he that funny dad who embarrassed me by doing the Steve Martin King Tut dance at our eighth-grade roller-skating party, but he was also the dad who prepped me for soccer by watching me kick a ball into a wall, remarking that I had a powerful foot. So many times, he told me I was special.

  In sixth grade, I prepared myself for utter mortification when Dad was invited to give a talk about mountain climbing. A hundred kids crowded into a classroom to watch the slides, which I thought would be deathly boring. I sank down in my chair and blushed like crazy, until Dad started talking, showing stomach-churning heights, Indiana Jones–type rappelling down mountains, and his own remarkable tales of the great outdoors. My classmates thought I had the coolest dad ever. So did I.

  I try to think of those times, not the other ones when he stopped looking at me after what had happened to me in Cleveland, the endless discussions we had of his wife’s rough life and how no one suffers more than she does, how the divorce ruined everyone’s lives, of our tortured family dynamic and how the world sucks in general.

  Though he drifted away from me starting when I went to college, my father showed rare moments of affection, such as when he recommended I watch the 1995 version of A Little Princess. My dad and his wife are huge movie buffs, so I figured it had to be good, probably containing subtitles.

  In the story, a father sends his daughter to a private school while he goes off to war. There, she creates a rich life for herself until the day she learns her father is missing. Because she’s lost her fortune, she is forced to do menial labor around the school—sort of a reverse Cinderella. Despite this, the daughter makes the best of life, imagines new worlds for herself, and builds a network of friends, never knowing that the old man next door has taken in an unknown soldier, injured from the war and suffering from amnesia.

  As events escalate and the daughter is about to be placed in an orphanage, the soldier hears the girl’s voice crying out in protest. He knows his daughter instinctively, and they are reunited in a moving scene. Every time I miss my father, I watch the movie and cry buckets.

  My father’s recommendation of this movie seemed like a way to convey love. Or so I like to think.

  • • •

  But even though I’ve explained it all to him, it doesn’t stop Gunther from harping on my sadness over losing the dad I once knew. “It’s all about your father. And it makes you highly manipulative, Patience.”

  “I know. I can’t help it. I’m sorry I denied you the option to order veggie pizza instead of pepperoni.” And this is where I start crying, because I can only stand confrontation for about three minutes. I always cave.

  “You understand that my dream about eating meat comes from a very deep place? I don’t think you listen.”

  “I know. I’m such a bitch!”

  He doesn’t come over to comfort me but goes into his corner to consider my transgressions. I retreat to the living room to wallow in my inferiority. It’s only a matter of time before one of us has to speak. All I want to do is lie on my couch and read the latest Miranda Lee novel, The Bride in Blue, where a quivery bride has to marry her fiancé’s asshole brother, who turns out to be unbearably hot. I’ll also eat.

  An hour later, he finds me weeping into a bin of yogurt almonds.

  “It takes a while for me to shift. I can then forgive,” he says, smiling a little.

  “Shift?”

  He takes me into his arms. The fight is over. Somehow I’m redeemed—from awful schemer to quivering, vulnerable new girlfriend.

  • • •

  One morning we attempt to drive to the top of the Sandia Crest. The mountains overlooking Albuquerque are my majestic old friends. When you fly into the city, the mountains greet you. They sparkle at sunset and shoot off brilliant light on the sprawling city. I love them. Until I try to drive up them. The road is winding and steep and as we ascend the peaks, my knuckles grow white.

  Gunther finds my trepidation amusing. He even fake-vomits—one of my phobias—out the window, which is the last straw. I turn the car around and, with a shaky leg on the brake pedal, navigate down the mountain. Funny how a week before, when my father was visiting, I was slightly more able to drive up this damn mountain but mostly wanted to jump off it.

  “Your father’s wishes are more important than mine,” Gunther says sullenly, looking out the window at our tragic descent.

  Well, duh. Who wouldn’t drive their father up a mountain to win his approval? But Gunther is traumatized.

  Love is supposed to be painful. This is what growing up means. Gunther is a tough customer, but underneath his criticism is the real deal. That’s love.

  “I thought about getting a ring,” he says as we drive to the airport.

  “Really? Wow.” Just what I was thinking.

  “But then I decided to wait.”

  “That’s probably smart,” I said.

  “One of us will have to move. Maybe you can spend the summer with me,” he says.

  Time in Manhattan. Time with Gunther to see if we’re compatible. My ticket is booked.

  • • •

  June begins on a high. I’m done with school for the semester and off to Manhattan for my first experience of living with a romantic partner.

  I set down my suitcase, Gunther and I hug, and we’re off to the races. He temps during the day while I do research on my master’s thesis (though mostly lie on the couch and read), and then he comes home, cheerful to see me.

  But our happily-ever-after takes a vicious turn on my birthday in July.

  Gunther is angry at me from the moment we wake up on my special day. But he has a surprise.

  “We’re going to the Upper East Side. A nice restaurant,” he says.

  Actually, I was hoping for a crappy restaurant, and the instant I see the menu I start to feel nervous, sick. Where are the mashed potatoes? The beige foods that bring me such comfort? What about pasta? A little mac et fromage? I don’t know what to order in this fancy joint. There’s salmon, but I’m not that into fish. Gunther would approve of my eating fish because of its health benefits.

  “I’ll have th
e grilled vegetables,” I say. Well schooled in fake eating, I can move things around on the plate, pick at a shard and take a bite of a leaf on a twig of a broccoli branch.

  Gunther stares at me, his face turning red. “You’re in an upscale restaurant. Why don’t you order something better, like the salmon?”

  “I just want the vegetables.” Maybe there’ll be cake. That’ll offset the pain.

  “I can’t believe this. We could have just gone to the Japanese place around the corner.” He gets more and more frustrated.

  “Okay, I’ll get the salmon.”

  We order and I am dreading that damn fish. I can’t really stomach the idea of eating a whole piece of orange fish. I figure I’m destined to puke my guts out by the end of the night. At least if I run outside, Gunther won’t have to witness it.

  The dishes arrive, and Gunther watches me closely. I am positioning my fork so that it picks off the least amount of salmon. I put a fleck of fish in my mouth and want to die.

  “You look like you’re going to vomit,” Gunther says.

  My legs start to shake under the table. In a rare moment, I have to flee a scene—not to barf, but to breathe out in the open air, to get away from the salmon and maybe end up in . . . I don’t know . . . Connecticut.

  I wait for Gunther outside and he exits carrying a birthday cake with my name inscribed. “I took a cab ninety blocks to get this cake and bring it to the restaurant, for you!” He’s yelling like Al Pacino in every movie.

  “I’m sorry.” I’m openly crying on a city street. So embarrassing, so New York.

  “You should have said you didn’t want the salmon!” he shrieks.

  “I did! But, I don’t know, I should have insisted. I just wanted the vegetables.”

  “You won’t let yourself be you and that’s what I object to,” he says a few minutes later as we get into a cab.

  There’s some truth to this, but how can a girl be herself when she’s wrong all the time? I don’t feel I can argue. Now I understand why Elinor Dashwood is so understated when it comes to love. After watching Marianne’s failed passion, Elinor wouldn’t want that for herself. I have to be more like Elinor.

  The summer ends two weeks later. By this time, Gunther convinces me that working out our problems brings us closer.

  • • •

  A new school year starts. In addition to reading as many romances as I can, my master’s work helps me think about making responsible decisions. I can’t give up everything for a guy. Even with the misgivings, my correspondence with Gunther deepens. We send chaste videotapes back and forth. In one, he mentions he has a Christmas present for me, “a little box.”

  I start to imagine myself as an engaged woman, like that heroine at the end of the romance novel. Finally. A few years ago, a psychic at a dinner party told me I’d meet Prince Charming much later in life. Well, that psychic was wrong. I am marrying Gunther, and I prepare myself mentally for opening that little box and finding a diamond sparkler. Even though I’ve started having panic attacks every day since hearing about that “little box.” Shaking legs and hyperventilation are normal.

  The holiday break arrives, and not a minute too soon. I pack my best clothes and fly to my new home, to New York City, where I am destined to move . . . as Gunther’s wife.

  He doesn’t meet me at the airport this time. I can take a cab or the bus, he says. Don’t I understand how taxing it is to meet a person at the airport? Of course I do. He must be nervous about proposing to me. Maybe he’ll surprise me anyway on bended knee at the terminal!

  But when I don’t spot him at the meeting place or baggage claim, I’m crushed. Thirty dollars later, I trudge up the five flights of stairs and knock on the door. He barely kisses me. I start unpacking and put my presents for him underneath the tree. Of course I check for a ring box. Not there. But maybe he’s saving it for a special moment. I prepare myself for the big event.

  I wait and wait. Days go by and it’s finally Christmas Eve. He hasn’t even touched me, which worries me. What’s happened to my Gunther?

  Finally, we exchange gifts and he brings out the pièce de résistance: an ancient teapot (I don’t drink tea) from China. He found it at a flea market in Chelsea. Maybe we can brew his favorite tea together.

  Inside the pot sits a long, eloquent letter on fancy paper all curled up, explaining his love for me, that we need to get to know each other, and that it’s too soon for marriage. The missive has all the earmarks of a rejection, and I take it to heart. I am thoroughly disappointed. Gunther is officially drifting away on parchment.

  It seems like the end of the world to leave Gunther on January 2, 1997, but when I get off the plane, the relief floods me.

  After confronting him, Gunther says I misheard about “the little box.” He claims he never intimated that he’d purchased an engagement ring and it must be my imagination, my desperate desire to marry him.

  A few days before Valentine’s Day, a year since I received those bright yellow roses, Gunther breaks up with me over the phone. I saw it coming when he yelled at me over the birthday salmon.

  The idea of moving without Gunther saddens me, but at the same time I feel weightless. At least I made it through to the end, didn’t run away when it got too difficult. In fact, most of my time with Gunther was difficult. I start to understand the truth: Gunther isn’t the one. He is a complicated person. So am I. He would leave me to die in a cave (the way Ralph Fiennes does to Kristin Scott Thomas in The English Patient), weep bitter tears of regret over my beautiful corpse, then find another redhead.

  On the edge of thirty years of age, I am moving home, with or without the promise of Gunther. Starting over yet again isn’t so bad. My mother and brother will be thrilled. My father and stepmother maybe not so much, but they like it when I come over to mow their lawn or help them clean windows. If I’m good, we’ll also have frozen yogurt. My family is worth a move back east.

  Saying good-bye to those desert sunsets isn’t easy. Those quaint one-story adobe buildings, the ridges of California-esque homes, and even the strip malls. My friends have a party for me. Chris and I reconcile for two seconds and bid each other a fond adieu—meaning we will never talk again.

  Gunther resurfaces around Christmas, a year after our terrible holiday break. He is desperate with love for me. I know I should delete the gushing e-mail, but my loneliness wins out. We make plans to see each other after our long separation. But when I see him again, I remember how he wasn’t there. Not for any of it—the master’s thesis, the master’s defense, the packing, the moving, the full-time teaching load, the three graduate courses I took, the lonely Valentine’s Day, the two-week Christmas disaster.

  Then again, he did give me a great gift. I would never have moved back east if not for him. So many things wouldn’t have happened if not for him.

  My desire for true romance evaporates as I focus on a fresh start in my career and an improvement in my surroundings. Dating duds is a huge waste of time—at any age. Though by this time, I’ve heard the whole “You have to kiss a lot of frogs . . .” thing enough to feel a little jaded. I don’t even want a prince right now. It’s perfectly fine if my love life is on the back burner, because romance is far better in books and movies.

  And besides, it’s all about me now.

  PART II

  Some people are settling down, some people are settling and some people refuse to settle for anything less than butterflies.

  —Candace Bushnell, Sex and the City

  CHAPTER SIX

  Romance on Paper Can Help a Girl Through a Long Dry Spell, and It’s Not as Messy as the Real Thing

  1997

  What a difference a few months make. Gunther is gone, I’ve moved from New Mexico, and now all my dreams are coming true. I’m almost thirty, overly educated, unemployed, and living with my parents in New Jersey (about forty minutes from Manhattan). My two cats
have already ruined the upholstery. What more could I want?

  I’m excited to start over, spend more time with my family, and find a career more in line with what I love: reading. Going into publishing would allow me to read full-time. There’s something to be said, too, for being home and having parents fuss over you. Mom and Don do what they’ve always done: teach, write, argue about history or who’s taking out the garbage, and throw dinner parties every chance they get. This is comforting to me since I’ve just uprooted myself. The only missing pieces are my brother, Patrick, who’s in Manhattan, and my stepbrother, John, who moved to Texas a few years ago. It’s just me and the parents.

  I adjust to the move quite well until full-throttle humidity sets in. I forgot how gross the tristate area gets in the summer! Every day it saps me of energy, but I stick it out through June and July. By August, I’m barely conscious, resulting in this conversation at the dinner table.

  “How about more potatoes?” My mother starts putting them on my plate before I even answer. I know she’s worried about me. And frustrated because I’ve lost about ten pounds since moving back east.

  “It’s too hot to eat,” I answer. This is a hint for them to turn on the air-conditioning. Apparently, old people enjoy sweating like dogs. We’ve had this tug-of-war all summer.

  “Don, would you turn on the air-conditioning?” Mom asks.

  The man argues for about two seconds, then does her bidding. They both don’t like the artificial air, but the ultimate goal is to fatten me up. Don draws a cartoon of my mother handing me—a string bean—a hamburger with a caption: “Bonnie’s Patience Is Wearing Thin.” In all of his drawings, my mother is wearing a pink bathrobe. You have to wonder what he’s thinking.