“Cheating!” Lara shouts as she brings her head up quickly. “Cheating! Can you believe this?!” And down again goes her head.
“Thanks,” I say with a coy smile to the bartender as he sets the stiff drink next to a pile of Lara’s hair.
See, sometimes riding out that bump in the relationship leads you right here—a pathetic victim of infidelity, knocking them back with your BFF in total despair.
“Here, babe,” I say, tapping her shoulder. “Drink up. It’ll cure everything.”
“Yeah, right,” she says into the bar.
“Okay, it helps. It doesn’t cure.” I shrug, then take a sip of her drink.
“Turning to the bottle doesn’t solve troubles, Jackie.” She looks up to give me a dry expression—an expression I know all too well over the years from when she’s rebuked me for turning to Captain Jack or the likes of JD when I’m feeling low and desperate.
“Then why the hell are we here?” I take my cosmo in one hand and cross my legs. I hike up the shimmery aubergine tube top I threw on for happy hour.
“It helps, I guess. Eases the pain.” Lara pulls cautiously and listlessly on her cocktail. “But drinking is not the answer, Jackie.”
“Okay, okay,” I say, flicking away the issue with my wrist. “I don’t need a lecture about my occasional drinking habits.” I roll my eyes. “But don’t deny this is the kind of place to be—the thing to do—when you find out your asshole of a boyfriend is two-timing you. The nerve!”
“Right you are there.” She raises her glass and takes another sip.
“How do you know, anyhow?” I ask. I scratch at my platinum blonde pixie cut with a freshly filled, Barbie-pink acrylic nail.
“That Nathan’s cheating?” She looks nonplussed.
“Yeah. Is it a hunch or did you catch the bastard? And how long has it been going on?”
Lara fishes in her handbag, shaking her head, and withdraws a crumpled piece of paper. “Read it and weep.” She returns to nursing her drink.
I open the wrinkled paper and my jaw drops. “No!”
“As evident as the Earth is round.”
“He left you this?” I’m so thunderstruck I can’t believe I’m actually able to form words.
“That’s what I woke up to this morning, Jack,” she says without any luster in her voice. “The asshole writes me a note to tell me that he’s been seeing someone else and will be all moved out while I’m away at the office. Can you believe that?”
“Shit,” I whisper, setting the note on the bar. But before I do I notice there’s print on the opposite side.
“What?” I say under my breath. I smooth out the note, squint, then look at Lara, tapping it roughly with a stiff finger. “A receipt?” I gasp. “He left you a fucking breakup note on the back of a receipt?”
“That’s not even the worst part,” she says, squiffy. “It’s a receipt for the new flashy, copper, something-super-special pan he’d been wanting but didn’t have the cash for.”
“Huh?”
“I know, I’m a sap.” She takes another pull of her cocktail.
“No, he’s an ass!” I wag my head in sheer disbelief. Any of my own problems or complaints about Andrew are minor infractions compared to this doozy. “Honey, how could you focus on anything else all day?” I ask in surprise. “I would have…like…” I furrow my brow. “I would have had an appointment with the noose or something!”
“Thanks,” she says dryly.
“Seriously. You poor thing. You should have called me, not gone to work. I mean, you have sick days, don’t you? This definitely qualifies as a sick day.”
“Going to work was all I could do not to face the pain.” She takes a strong gulp and wipes at her lips with a cocktail napkin. “The reality.”
“I’m so sorry, Lara.” I give her arm a squeeze. “Should we go over there and key his car or something?”
“Ha!” Her drink sloshes about its glass from her excitement. “I don’t think that’s the wisest of moves, or very mature.”
“Screw maturity!” I cry. “Let’s give this asshole what he deserves. He gives you a receipt,” I wave the receipt about, “for something you bought him, you give him vengeance.”
“Jackie.” She rests her hand on mine and gives a small smile. “I love your passion to stand up for a friend, but let’s slow down here. No one’s going to key anyone’s car, all right?”
“Well,” I huff, tapping my nails on the bar, “I think you’re missing out on the perfect revenge opportunity.”
“I just want to get on with my life, Jackie, and put him behind me.”
“Without revenge?” I really can’t believe this. The things I’ve done to guys in the past who’ve cheated on me, or broken my heart, or stood me up on a date, or said something really uncool when I was in the throes of PMS!
“It’s kind of ironic, isn’t it?” Lara asks with a snicker. “How I was once a mistress, and now I’m the victim, the one being cheated on?”
“There’s nothing ironic about it,” I state adamantly about the once-upon-a-time affair Lara had with a married man. “Nathan turned out to be an asshole, but this has nothing to do with irony.”
“Bad luck?”
“Exactly! Bad luck, that’s all.”
“Bad luck, irony, or whatever,” she says with a flutter of the lashes, “it doesn’t make it hurt any less.”
She stares down silently into the swirl of the bright pomegranate-shaded beverage that doesn’t seem to be doing much help here.
“I really thought I was headed for a happy ending,” she says finally. She tosses up her hands, fatigued. “I thought Nathan could be…you know? The one.”
“We’ve all been there before, honey.” I give an understanding grin, feeling myself soften at the conversation, no longer consumed by fanciful images of getting revenge on Lara’s behalf.
“I really, honestly, truly thought it could work out—that we were headed in that direction,” Lara bemoans.
“Except for the whole part about you having second thoughts since he’s moved in,” I point out.
She nudges forward her glass and makes a ho-hum motion with her head. “Yeah, well… It was nice to pretend…dream…”
“On the bright side,” I say, my voice rising an octave in pep, “at least you have an easier decision to make now. You don’t have to give your relationship a second thought. He’s done!”
“Thanks,” she says, her voice thick with sarcasm.
“Some day, girl. Some day.” I give her a warm and encouraging pat on the shoulder and consider Emily’s advice to help a friend in a similar situation—talk to Lara about my own second thoughts with Andrew. Although, in this situation, now that Nathan’s a cheating bastard and there is no choice for Lara to make, I’m not really much help here. So rather than trying to dispense some shifty-at-best advice, I say, “Your true love is out there somewhere, Lara. I just know it!”
“Well, right now I’d rather not think about any men.” She slumps her chin into her palms.
I raise my hand to the bartender and am about to order Lara another drink when she quickly puts her hand on top of mine. “I’m good.”
“You sure?” I make an inquisitive expression. “Drinks are on me. I’m ready to help you, dear. You need it.”
“You being here helps,” she says, dabbing at her mouth with her napkin.
“I can help out in another way, too…”
“No.” Lara draws a line in the air with a hand, the napkin fluttering along. “We’re not going to find the girl and go key her car. I don’t care—”
“No, silly.” I whip out my credit card and click it on the edge of the bar. The bartender snatches it, and I toss back the remains of Lara’s drink. “I’m talking about a replacement. We all helped Emily find a man. Well…actually she kind of found Gatz on her own, but anyway, that’s not the point.”
“Uh-uh, Jackie,” she says, drawing another line with her hand. “No dating games for me, thank you.”
“Not that way,” I say in my best convincing tone. “I mean that I bet we can find you a really nice and eligible man if you just put on something slinky and hit the bars, the clubs. Have some fun out… Hell, I’d love to be your wing gal! I’m so in need of some fun!”
Lara stands and slings her handbag over her shoulder as the bartender hands me the padded folder with my receipt and credit card. “I won’t find my winner that way, hon,” she says. “I can promise you that.”
“That’s how I met Andrew!” I state while scribbling my signature on the receipt. I hurriedly thank the bartender and grab my belongings. Lara’s already headed for the door.
“You got lucky. One in a million, babe,” she calls out as I trail sloppily behind, my oversized Prada handbag loosely hanging open and off one shoulder, my card and receipt and the bartender’s pen in one hand. “One in a million.”
“Oh, shoot,” I say under my breath, turning back to the bar. “Your pen.” I wave the pen at the bartender.
“Keep it cutie,” he says with a wink, flipping a hand towel over his shoulder.
“Aww, thanks.” I put a hand on my hip, slightly sticking my hip further to the side.
“She’s married!” Lara calls out loudly.
I roll my eyes, turn on my high-heeled toes, and make a trot to the door. “Thank you!” I call out, waving goodbye behind me.
I link an arm with Lara’s and lean into her as we exit the bar. “Can’t a girl still get compliments when she’s married?”
“Not when the bartender looks like that and when you’re dressed like that and tipsy and…all cute and bubbly and stuff.” She wags her head. “Uh-uh.”
“I can be sweet on a guy for you, Lara,” I say in a low voice, trying to sound serious and not burst out laughing over her protectiveness. “Let me run back in there and grab his number. You’ll have a date in no time!”
“No more men for me for a while, Jackie,” she says, walking us to the edge of the street, her grip firm.
“Well where’s the fun in that?” I jam the receipt, pen, and credit card into my handbag.
“Not everything in life has to be fun, Jackie. Life is not a party.”
Lara hails a distant cab, and I shrug my bare shoulders.
I don’t know about that. What’s the point of life if there isn’t a party going on or one to be had soon enough?
Chapter Five
“That was a great idea, Jackie!” Robin says. She strokes Bella’s head, which is sticking out of the top of the chic Louis Vuitton dog carrier that’s set on its own seat in The Cup and the Cake.
With Andrew off on an overnight business trip to LA leaving me all alone, and with Robin busily planning her upcoming wedding to Bobby, I jumped at the chance to lend a friend a hand and help tick off the florals on her wedding to-do list.
“I was only going off of the list of wedding flowers you had pre-prepared, Robin,” I say.
“But you knew my vision!” Robin looks like she’s glowing, and not just the pregnancy glow. She’s looking at me like I’ve discovered the cure for cancer or something, because she’s so happy with my suggestion at the florist’s this afternoon. “You have an eye for this.”
“Simple is…simple,” I say with a light laugh. “Besides, you’re the artist.”
It’s true. Robin’s a book cover designer by trade, and in her rare free time, she paints and sketches. I appreciate art and design, in particular interior design, but could never imagine being able to make a craft a trade, like Robin.
“Well, I love it!” Robin gushes.
Rose, Robin’s two-year-old daughter, who’s sitting in the antique high chair that Sophie keeps on-hand for her tinier customers, is loudly banging her collection of small, colorful toys on her tabletop.
“Hydrangea with roses and some eucalyptus greenery,” Robin says, going all starry-eyed over her chosen wedding florals. She puts a hand to her cheek in a rapt gesture.
Robin’s wedding to Bobby is going to be so beautiful. She wants something not at all complicated, but still very pretty, obviously. No big shindig, like Claire’s wedding, but not too understated, like mine.
Andrew and I had a courthouse ceremony. It was super simple, with no frills whatsoever. I didn’t even wear a traditional wedding dress. Neither of us wanted to make a big deal over our wedding, and I think a tiny part of Andrew didn’t want to deal with any potential ridicule that could come as a result of him robbing the cradle, as some may say. I didn’t care either way—big shindig or simple ceremony and fête afterwards. So long as I got to become Mrs. Andrew Kittredge. Our New Year’s Eve party was the perfect reception, and looking back I wouldn’t have done it any other way. Simplicity at its best.
Robin’s wedding is going to be easy and sweet and sentimental. She and Bobby are getting married in April in their backyard, so long as the familiar April showers of Seattle stay at bay. A ceremony and reception at home, with an intimate group of close friends and family. I think it’s a really smart idea, seeing how Phillip will be just a tiny thing and Bobby and Robin have such a gorgeous home in Phinney Ridge, a family-friendly neighborhood in north Seattle.
“Wait,” Sophie says, having joined the conversation soon after Robin and I downed our first beverages. We’re now already working on seconds as we discuss deeper the Nathan-Lara issue. “I don’t understand.” She abruptly shakes her head, her curled brunette bangs and long, silky ponytail wagging along. “She honestly had no idea that Nathan was seeing someone else? No inclination?” Robin and I nod our heads. “Yet she was still feeling wishy-washy about their relationship?”
When Robin and I weren’t gushing over her wedding details during today’s car rides, we talked the Lara and Nathan issue to death. We’ve got to help her out some way, but keying cars is apparently not allowed, and Robin told me on the way to the florist and on the way to the café that I am not permitted to call Nathan and give him a piece of my mind under any circumstances. (Dammit.)
“Yup!” I say to Sophie enthusiastically. “I didn’t believe it either, but over a couple of cosmos during happy hour girl time, Lara gave me the whole story.”
Lara, like most women, couldn’t have fathomed that the wedge that was driving its way between herself and Nathan was another woman. She thought perhaps the reason they’d been steadily growing apart was because of work-related stress; kerfuffles that can mount when you share a home together; or petty disagreements that combust into relationship-doomers. Sometimes comfortable relationships can turn down that road—that edge of the cliff. Sometimes an affair to remember turns into that affair you’d rather forget. Sometimes you have to let go and move on.
Sure, at first Nathan and Lara’s relationship was great. They spent nearly all of their free time together, and whenever they were at home, it was all about being together. Dinner together, movies and TV together, walks around the neighborhood together, even apartment projects and to-do lists together. It’s what my women’s magazines call young love, or “the honeymoon stage.” Everything’s new and fun, and you kind of feel like you’re on top of the world and impervious to anything bad, sad, or potentially mood-dampening. Oh, it sounds so familiar!
Then come the routines, the humdrum and makes-you-want-to-kill-yourself-sometimes days. It’s when that usual walk through the neighborhood or the late-night rerun of How I Met Your Mother with greasy, take-out burgers is no longer fun and exciting and viewed as valued and enjoyed time together, but becomes your life. Your predictable and mundane life.
All relationships go through this dip down into boring routine, as my women’s magazines also point out, but if there isn’t true love and hope to fall back on, then you’re kind of where Nathan and Lara are. The charm’s worn off, the love isn’t really there or it’s fizzling out, and then what? You’re staring at each other over a cold plate of spaghetti that you’ve prepared together in silence, perhaps in an effort to rekindle that spark you used to have when you made meals as a couple in the beginning. Neithe
r has anything to say—or anything they want to share, especially if they’re off giving it to another woman—and that mind-numbing slump slowly but surely becomes your life, your relationship, your…drowning moment.
“They even talked about doing something to change things,” Robin says to Sophie, thumping the table with one hand. “Said Nathan told her he was fine with the way things were, even if they were a little boring.” She looks to me. “I got that right, didn’t I, Jack?”
I nod in approval.
“Damn,” Sophie mutters. Her hands fall into her aproned lap. She sinks her slender shoulders forward, then says, “And Lara? She told him she wasn’t fine? Before she discovered the affair?”
“Yup,” I jump in, fiddling with the wrapper of the carrot and ginger spiced cupcake that Sophie insisted we try—a tasty new recipe of hers. “Lara said she confronted him several times about being unhappy, and each time he said he was fine with the status quo.”
“Status quo.” Sophie makes a squished face. “Yikes.”
“Yeah,” I say with a scoff. “Status quo. Any guy who uses those words to refer to your relationship…beware.”
“I’ve heard that line before. No bueno for sure.” Sophie shivers, then absentmindedly smooths out her teal apron, running her hands up and down her long legs. “Poor Lara. Just when she thought she’d scored with this one—”
“He turns out to be a chump,” Robin finishes with a full mouth.
“Well,” Sophie says in a high-pitched tone. She sits up even taller in her seat. “All we can do is be super supportive and hope and pray she gets out of this one without too many scars.”
“I still think we should go find the bitch and key her car,” I say, picking at the crumbs on the table.
“Do we know who this bitch is?” Sophie looks from me to Robin.
“Language, please,” Robin says. She abruptly covers Rose’s ears, a piece of cupcake awkwardly in one hand. A small dollop of frosting is now on the side of Rose’s forehead, some of it caught up in her wispy, gold tufts of hair. Robin thumbs at the icing and licks it, making a small smile as she swallows the sweet treat.
When Girlfriends Let Go Page 4