You’ll Never Blue Ball in This Town Again

by Heather McDonald

  Finally, I called Great Expectations, and even though I had more than two years on my three-year contract left, I insisted that they cancel my membership and remove me from the books, the videos, and the archives. Everyone was right, after all. It was stupid and a waste of money to join this dating service. I guess I had to experience it for myself. Nowadays, online dating is a much better option, but I don’t think I could even figure out how to upload my cute pictures onto a site.

  6 Conversations with Ben

  Ben and I met at a Starbucks as many unemployed people do. I was just fired from my first television writing job. It was pilot season. In the entertainment industry, this means that they’re casting for possible new TV shows. I had an audition for the role of—once again—the best friend of the lead in a sitcom about twenty-somethings struggling in LA. I had never called in sick during the eleven weeks I worked as a writer, so I did this one time. What’s the harm, I thought. No one is going to know I’m auditioning. That morning, I woke up, called the assistant, got his voice mail, coughed a few times, and made my voice sound as Demi Moore-ish as possible. “Hi, it’s Heather. I’m really sick, [sniffle sound] I don’t know what it is. I’m so sorry [and then I faked a cough that sounded like an oyster just popped out of my throat]. I can’t come in today. Please tell everyone.”

  As I always did for auditions, I had prepared myself well for all three of the unfunny scenes with the role of Missy. Missy was Carol’s best friend and worked in shipping and receiving at a plastics plant. If it wasn’t for Missy’s tabby-colored cat, Mr. Peepers, Missy would spend most Saturday nights alone. But after realizing that she’s not getting any younger, Missy decides to comb the personal ads for her Prince Charming.

  I was excited to read for the role of Missy because she was described as “attractive.” Now, “attractive” I could handle. “Extremely attractive,” I didn’t have a shot in hell of getting. If the role was described as “a character,” I knew I’d be the cutest one in the casting director’s waiting room.

  I arrived in the cramped waiting room of one of the trailers on the studio lot. The assistant casting director, who looked about twelve, came out with a clipboard and said, “The casting director had to leave for an emergency. Her King Charles cocker spaniel got diarrhea at doggy daycare, so you guys will be reading with me instead. Oh, and we’re only doing the first scene.” Suddenly, all the actresses were kissing this middle-school girl’s ass, saying, “Oh my God! What happened to her doggie? My sister has a King Charles puppy and he needs a hip replacement. ...”

  The only thing more uninteresting than hearing the details of dog surgery is hearing the details of human surgery. And the only thing better than that is any story about a slipped disc. Didn’t these idiots get it? None of us were even in the running anymore. The part was most likely already cast. Oh well. At least I still had my writing job, or so I thought.

  That night I got a call from the assistant at the TV show where I worked saying that I could pick up my things tomorrow and that I was no longer needed. I felt like such an idiot, but I tried to look on the bright side. It was pilot season and maybe I’d get to go on another sitcom audition that I’d waste all day preparing for and never get. Besides, writing on the TV show allowed me very little time to date, so it was for the best that I got fired. For some God-forsaken reason, we couldn’t leave until after ten p.m. every night, even though we weren’t working on anything. I’d be so burned out by the thirteen-hour days that by the time the weekend came, all I’d do was lay in my bed and watch episodes of Jerry Springer. It made me feel better that even though I didn’t have a man, at least I had teeth. I later found out that when the executive producer asked the assistant where I was, before he could even answer, one of the bitter, overweight, baseball hat-wearing, single forty-year-old male comedy writers said, “Well, you know where she is. It’s pilot season.” Thanks for throwing me under the bus, dickwad. No wonder the only woman he could get to accompany him to the Christmas party was a Russian hooker named Pineapple.

  I had some money saved, so I decided to write a script in between all the auditions that would come my way. My plan was to either book a sitcom or sell a script, whichever came first. How exciting! I imagined my script as a female-driven romantic comedy. After Julia Roberts got her hands on it, a bidding war would break out with Cameron Diaz because they’d both be dying to play the role of the hilarious, clumsy, type-A prosecutor who can’t find love until she meets him in the courtroom. He, of course, is the defense attorney opposite her on the biggest case of her life. Now, I can be a sellout. However, in my big-budget romantic comedy, I have to draw the line at the female lead running on a treadmill, being distracted by a cute guy, causing her to stop running, and thus falling out of frame. I do have some comedy morals, and if I see that scene one more time, I’m going to fall out of frame and kill myself.

  So on my first day of being an unemployed actress/screenwriter, I decided to take the pilot sitcom script for which I had an audition the following day to the Starbucks closest to my house on the corner of 7th and San Vicente in Santa Monica. It was a beautiful March day, a sunny, breezy 77 degrees. I put on my Lycra yoga pants and sports bra, since I would be walking an entire two blocks to get there, so I obviously needed the proper attire in case I was to break a sweat. I spent twenty-five minutes doing my hair and makeup. I never left the house without makeup, because I read in Cosmo that you never know where you might meet your future husband, so always look your best including your run to Starbucks. I put my yellow highlighter, lip gloss, and five dollars in my butt pack (yes, I wore a black butt pack; they are extremely convenient when wearing clothes void of pockets), grabbed the script, and began the first day of the rest of my life at approximately ten-fifteen a.m.

  I ordered my usual double-tall nonfat latte with one and a half Equals and a bran muffin and took a table outside. This time of the morning was too late for the workforce as well as the stay-at-home moms, who have to leave Starbucks by nine-fifteen to make their spinning classes, but it was still too early for the homeless people, so it was quite sparse. I felt great pride in finding my character’s name in the script and highlighting each and every one of her lines. I was extremely self-conscious. How can you not be at a Starbucks? I hoped people noticed I had a real script here, something that had been green lit and would be shot, though most likely it would never be broadcast. But still, I was in the mix people, and I wasn’t some poseur fresh from a Learning Annex class.

  I had my earphones in and was listening to Sade and doing what I always do when I hear any Sade song. I imagined myself hosting a party at a Tuscan retreat in Malibu wearing a loose white linen ankle-length dress while carrying a huge goblet of cold Chardonnay and walking around my blue-tiled infinity pool greeting all of my guests with light touches to their shoulders and friendly giggles. Just then, the coffee and the bran muffin kicked in.

  This combo never fails. When I got up to go to the bathroom, I noticed a really sexy guy talking to a woman. We clearly had eye contact as he completely checked me and my butt pack out as I walked right past him. Another reason I liked the butt pack was that it cut the length of my long flat ass in half, making it appear shorter and more pronounced. Upon returning from the bathroom a pound and a half lighter, I had direct eye contact again with the sexy Starbucks stranger and he smirked at me. He had a great smirk. I politely smiled back, sat down, put my ear phones back in, and continued to memorize my snarky remarks like, “His personal ad read entrepreneur [I practiced saying entrepreneur in finger quotes]. In case you didn’t know, that’s French for unemployed [finger quotes again, hilarious]. ...”

  By noon, the smirking stranger was still there talking to the woman, who appeared to be a platonic friend. He was casually dressed but still hip and stylish. I took out my earphones just as the woman he was with got up to go to the bathroom.

  “What script are you reading?” he asked.

  “Oh, it’s for an audition I have tomorrow, for a re
ally funny new show on the WB,” I said proudly.

  He was really good-looking. I could see between his wrist-watch and his shirt cuff that he was tattooed, but not just a tattoo, the kind of tattoo that is multicolored and all smashed together. He was “sleeved” as they like to call it in the tattoo biz. I don’t have a tattoo and have never had the desire to get one, but on certain guys they can be really attractive in a bad boy kind of way. He had a New York City accent, which has always turned me on. I don’t like English or country, only New York City. Along with the tattoos, he smoked. I’ve never smoked nor dated a smoker, but something about him smoking was again just sexy and it went with his whole persona. Think Mickey Rourke. Not Mickey Rourke from The Wrestler with the cheek implants, facelift, and bizarre outfit, but old school Mickey Rourke from the movie 9 1/2 Weeks, where he manipulated the crap out of Kim Basinger, blindfolded her, and fed her a shit load of food and then made her dress up like a man complete with a fake mustache. He kind of had that same vibe. I could also sense he had the way New York men take care of everything for you kind of attitude that you don’t see in guys from other cities. New Jersey was like this, too. Like Tony Soprano, although he was a bald, fat criminal, he was also caring, protective, and sexy.

  I told him that besides being an actress, I was also a writer. He seemed impressed, as he should have been. Just then, his female companion returned. He introduced himself as Ben and the woman as his assistant, Susan.

  “What do you do?” I asked.

  “I’m a stockbroker and investment banker,” he replied.

  This being 1998, the stock market was very good and on the rise. It was the dot-com boom, where the words Internet start-up company could make gold diggers this side of Silicon Valley cum in an instant.

  “Where is your office?” I asked.

  “Actually, right now I’m able to work out of my home, which is right across from the water. We were just taking a little break, since we start at six in the morning when the stock market opens in New York.”

  “That must be nice. I live just down the street and I love it,” I replied.

  “You are adorable, you know that? Isn’t she adorable?” he said to his assistant. “Look, she’s blushing,” he continued. It was physically impossible to keep my cheeks from not getting red. “Can I take you to dinner one night this week?”

  Absolutely, I thought. I loved his confidence, but instead I said, “Um, sure, I think.” As I wrote down my number on the last page of the sitcom script and tore it off, I acted as though I was reluctant about it. This in turn made him feel like he had accomplished something, which was my total intention. He and his assistant stood up to leave, and he said, “I’m going to call you.” He pointed at me and winked.

  “OK.” I said feeling like I had accomplished something. If my girlfriends and I went out to a bar or a party and I didn’t at least give out my number, I felt like it was a wasted night. Here it was a Thursday before noon and I already gave out my number. This unemployment thing was really working out.

  A couple minutes after they left, another woman said to me, “Excuse me, but did you happen to hear what that guy and that woman were talking about before you gave your number to him?”

  “No, I had my earphones in the whole time,” I said.

  “Well, I don’t mean to intrude, but you should not go out with him. They were talking about how he might have to do time in jail,” she added.

  “Oh my God. Well, thanks. I doubt he’ll call, anyway,” I said.

  “Well, in case he does, I’d watch out.”

  Wow, way to watch a fellow Starbucks’ sister’s back, strange lady. Too bad I didn’t watch out.

  I really didn’t think Ben would call, so I was surprised when I heard his voice-mail message. I was creeped out hearing about his possible jail incarceration but also intrigued. At the time, I went out with a lot of guys just for the sake of a two-course meal. I didn’t judge a guy so much on what he did for a living but more on what was in his wallet. If I wanted an appetizer before my entrée, it couldn’t be a big issue. Either he had to accept that I was having a salad before my shrimp scampi or we couldn’t see each other again. Ben said he wanted to take me to Ocean, a very nice hip seafood restaurant, on Tuesday night. I thought, Why not go? If I can have lobster tail for free versus Panda Express for $6.99, why wouldn’t I take full advantage of it? It just made fiscal sense to go on this date.

  At seven-thirty on Tuesday night, Ben called from downstairs to say he was in the lobby. I told him I’d be right down. I didn’t feel the need for him to come up. Besides, the apartment was a disaster as usual. As I walked out the lobby doors, he was sitting in a white Infinity sedan smoking with all four windows rolled down, the sunroof open, and Verve blasting, “It’s a bittersweet symphony that life ...” It was so loud that I had to get all the way up to the car for him to notice me. He immediately got out of the car wearing a very expensive-looking tan suede blazer over a white T-shirt and designer jeans and opened my door for me, which I so loved.

  Before we ordered drinks, he told me he didn’t drink. I asked, “Like you never drank or you’re in AA?”

  “I’m in AA. I’ve been sober for nineteen months.”

  Wow, I had never dated an alcoholic before. Well, I had dated many alcoholics, but they were still drinking, which made it OK. I had never dated someone in “the program.” Does this mean I can’t drink on this date, either? I wondered. Lobster is not going to be as tasty with an ice tea unless that ice tea is from Long Island.

  “Well, that’s great. Good for you. Do you mind if I drink?” I asked.

  “No, of course not,” he said. What I’ve found is sober guys are just as eager to get a girl drunk as drunk guys—maybe even more so. He also went on to say he was a heroin addict, too! OK, what am I doing? I thought. This guy smokes, has tattoos, is in AA and Narcotics Anonymous, and maybe going to jail. Is the free shellfish really worth it?

  The closest I ever came to dating an addict of any kind was when I went to a Gamblers Anonymous meeting to see my friend Mike get his six-month chip. I always referred to Mike as “the bitter comic” (because he was a stand-up comic and was extremely bitter). When the meeting concluded, Bitter Comic said his friend wanted to take me out. When I said I wasn’t interested, Bitter Comic said, “But he was in the NBA, he likes tall girls.”

  “Who cares that he was in the NBA? He just said he was a hundred and eighty thousand dollars in debt, rents a room from his grandmother, and his only means of transportation is a beach cruiser. What am I supposed to do, hop on the handle bars and hope for the best?” Bitter Comic later said the NBA player said I was a bitch for not giving him a chance. I suggested that the next time he sees a tall girl he is attracted to at a GA meeting he should refrain from participating in share time.

  But with Ben I was more intrigued than ever.

  Ben was so addicted to smoking that he had to get up twice to light up because you can’t smoke in restaurants in LA; then toward the end of the night, he lit up right at the table and hid it. All the while, I kept telling him how much I didn’t mind the smoke in between wiping tears from my irritated eyes and attempting not to cough. After a few martinis, I related what the woman at Starbucks told me about him discussing jail. He told me that he was very successful in New York and there was some mix-up with some stock tip, and basically it’s a white-collar crime, but if he did go to jail, it would only be for eight months to a year at the most, but he wouldn’t know for sure until his court date, which was still a few more months away. Phew, I mean it wasn’t like I was dating John Gotti. I had to give him credit for being honest, right? Google did not exist then and I wasn’t about to take the time to find a library, do all the paperwork to get a library card, and go through microfiche like Debra Winger in the movie Black Widow. It’s just a total stranger who picked me up in his car and took me to dinner. What could possibly happen? It wasn’t like I was going to fall in love with him. He was just fun.

  The
most attractive thing about Ben was how wonderful he thought I was. Finally, someone got it. He considered himself very spiritual and had read every popular soul-searching self-help book at the time. He presented me with Conversations with God, a book about conversations the author claims to have had with God, where God actually answered back. Inside the cover, Ben wrote me this incredible inscription with all these compliments that I had never been told before, probably because they weren’t true. The note was all about how intelligent and intuitive I was. Again, I was thinking, Finally, a guy who really gets the real me. He also recommended such books as The Artist’s Way and anything Marianne Williamson wrote. Williamson was Oprah’s Dr. Oz of the late nineties. She was on the show all the time, and then one day Oprah just never had her back. Good thing Dr. Oz got his own show out of it. Though I have always been Catholic and truly never explored any other religions, for some reason I always get approached to join other churches.

  In college, we had this big Christian speaker who was just named “Josh.” Prior to his arrival, there were big signs all over campus that only read: “Josh is coming.” I was like, who the hell is Josh, so I went. He was a very dynamic Christian speaker and I enjoyed what he had to say, but that was it. Later, a few other students who saw me there kept going out of their way to invite me to other things involving their Christian church, which I always politely turned down. One night I was walking to the library and I passed the Sigma Alpha Epsilon house. One of the guys, Jeff, who spotted me at “Josh” and who I knew from my communications class, asked if I’d like to come to a Bible study they were having there in a few minutes. I said, “Oh thank you, but I have to go to the library.” Then a girl approached with her Bible and Jeff said, “Sarah, this is Heather. She heard Josh speak. She’s going to join us tonight for Bible study.”