Good Luck

by Whitney Gaskell

  “No, not necessarily. Not the way Mom is pushing it, anyway. He just wants me to get my shit together and figure out what I’m going to do with my life. His exact words were: ‘Now you’re not just wasting your time, you’re wasting my money.’” She mimicked her father’s low, gruff voice, and then rolled her eyes.

  I squeezed her arm. “I’m sorry, sweetie,” I said.

  “Don’t be. He’s right. I’m thirty-two years old. Really, it’s pathetic that I’m still so rudderless. I do need to get my shit together.”

  “Are you really okay staying here in Palm Beach for the next few months?”

  I wondered if, under the circumstances, maybe Hayden should head back to New York to look for a job. But I felt like I couldn’t voice this opinion, especially in light of my new financial independence. Who wants to be told they need to get a job by a lottery winner?

  “Yes, this is just what I need. A vacation from my life,” Hayden said, smiling suddenly. “A few months of sun and beach and a fling with exactly the sort of man my parents would hate before I head back to reality.”

  “Who, Ian? Why would your parents hate him?” I asked, surprised. I thought Ian seemed like a pretty sweet guy. He was polite, good-looking, and didn’t have an obvious drug problem or a wife and kids stashed away in the suburbs.

  Hayden laughed at my naïveté. “A twentysomething bartender who spends all his free time gambling in Indian casinos? Please. He’s not exactly the sort of guy they’re hoping I’ll end up with,” she said. She took one last look at her reflection in the mirror and then shook her head sadly. “I’d probably better not buy anything. If I’m going to take a few months more of vacation, I have to make my money last.”

  “Absolutely not,” I said firmly. “I’ll buy that dress for you. And the yellow one too.”

  “I can’t accept that,” Hayden said, frowning at me.

  “Of course you can. Look. I’m staying at your house, and you won’t even let me pay you rent. And I just got this huge windfall. More than enough for both of us. So let me share some of it with you. At least while we’re here,” I said.

  “It’s nice of you to offer, Lucy, but totally unnecessary,” Hayden said. Her voice sounded normal, but her shoulders had stiffened. I reached out and squeezed her hand again.

  “Let me do this. Just think of me as your sugar mommy,” I joked. “And you don’t even have to sleep with me.”

  Hayden laughed, and as she did, she visibly relaxed. “Good thing. No offense, Lucy, but you’re not my type.”

  “You’ll let me buy you the dresses? And help out in general?” I asked.

  Hayden hesitated, but then finally nodded. “Well…okay. But just so you know, I feel weird about it.”

  “Yay!” I cheered. “And you shouldn’t feel weird. I want to do this.” I thought of the check Maisie had returned to me, and a surge of bitterness rose up in me. This is what friends did: They offered to help out one another in need.

  It was odd, really. A month ago if I’d been asked which friend, Maisie or Hayden, I could count on in a crisis, I’d have picked Maisie every time. I’d thought of her as my rock, the one person who was always there for me. But when my life had imploded, when everything had been turned upside down and shaken like a snow globe, Maisie hadn’t been there for me. But Hayden had. Sweet, flighty, unpredictable Hayden.

  “Come on, let’s buy these and then go get an iced coffee. I need some caffeine,” I said.

  “Okay. Just give me a minute,” Hayden said, disappearing into her changing room. She emerged a moment later wearing the aqua-blue tank top and floaty white linen skirt she’d worn out shopping, the two new dresses folded neatly over her arm. She smiled shyly at me.

  “Thanks again,” she said, making an awkward gesture toward the dresses. “I know I shouldn’t let you buy these for me, but…” Her smile widened, and her green eyes shone with pleasure. “I so want them.”

  “It’s my pleasure,” I said sincerely. It felt good to do something nice for a friend, I thought. It made me happy. And if Maisie didn’t want my help, I wouldn’t bother her with it again.

  That night we had drinks at The Breakers, sitting at the aquarium bar with its spectacular ocean view, and then sushi at Echo. My alcohol tolerance was getting stronger. Another point in favor of the new Lucy, I thought. Old Lucy would have gotten sloppily drunk after three dirty martinis, while the new Lucy was just pleasantly relaxed, without a worry in the world. Actually, that wasn’t entirely true….

  “I hope I’m not turning into an alcoholic,” I said to Hayden, as we walked in to the Drum Roll and took our favorite seats at the end of the bar. Hayden waved at Ian, who grinned and winked at her. Then, finally registering what I said, Hayden let out an incredulous bark of laughter.

  “You? An alcoholic? Somehow I can’t see that,” she scoffed.

  “I’ve already had three drinks tonight,” I said.

  “So? It’s a Saturday.”

  “And I normally spend my Saturdays grading papers, or watching a movie, or reading,” I said. “Not glugging down dirty martinis.”

  “That was then. This is now,” Hayden said simply. “It’s about time you lived a little.”

  “I just hope I’m not living too much, too fast.”

  “I think you’re sublimating. You’re not really worried that a few drinks over several hours on a Saturday night has turned you into an alcoholic. What you’re really worried about is that Drew didn’t call you today,” Hayden said.

  Ian appeared with two mojitos and set them down on the bar in front of us with a flourish. Hayden blew him a kiss in thanks.

  “You think?” I asked.

  But I knew she was right. Despite my best efforts to convince myself that Drew was a fling and that the new Lucy wouldn’t sit around waiting for phone calls from a man she was casually involved with, I had still spent a good part of the day alternately staring at the phone and asking Hayden if anyone had called while I was swimming or in the bathroom.

  “Yes, I do,” Hayden said.

  “But I don’t want to be that woman, the one who sits around waiting for some guy to call and then getting pissed off when he doesn’t.”

  “Then don’t be that woman.”

  “I know. I just think it’s rude not to call someone you just had sex with,” I said, hating that my voice sounded so petulant. “It’s bad manners.”

  It was only when I heard Mal laughing softly that I learned he was standing right behind us and had overheard everything Hayden and I had just said. I swiveled around in my chair and scowled at him.

  “It’s also bad manners to eavesdrop on other people’s conversations,” I said severely.

  “I’m not eavesdropping. I’m just standing here innocently waiting to order a beer,” Mal said, grinning at me. He was sporting his beach-bum unshaven look again today.

  “Forget to shave?” I asked rudely.

  Mal ran a hand over his scratchy beard growth. “Nope. I have sensitive skin. I don’t like to shave every day,” he said. He placed one hand over his heart. “In fact, I’m a sensitive guy in general.”

  “Ha,” I said.

  “I am. At least I always call the day after,” he said, which made Hayden snort in appreciative laughter before she turned to talk to Ian.

  “Do you really?” I asked.

  “You sound like you don’t believe me,” Mal said, smirking as he accepted a bottle of beer from Ian’s outstretched hand. He took a swig.

  “I just would have pegged you as a love ’em and leave ’em kind of a guy,” I said.

  “You’re big on making assumptions, aren’t you?” Mal said. His pale gray eyes stayed locked on mine as he drank some more beer.

  “No, I’m not,” I said, feeling suddenly stung. “Really. Your love life is none of my business.”

  “And yet it seems to interest you so,” Mal said. He slid onto the empty bar stool next to mine. “In fact, we talk of little else.”

  To disguise my discomfor
t at his noticing this, I rolled my eyes. “Whatever,” I said.

  Mal snorted. “So tell me: Why do you assume that I’m the kind of guy who doesn’t call the day after?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  “Sure you do.”

  “Okay. Well. I think it’s a matter of quantity. That’s a lot of phone numbers for you to remember.”

  Mal snorted with laughter. “Have you heard of a nifty invention called pen and paper?”

  “Okay. Point taken.”

  “No, I’m not done yet. So this guy you got together with. The one who didn’t call you. Did you think he was the type who wouldn’t call the day after?”

  I stared at my mojito, willing myself not to blush. But I could feel the hot red flush creeping up my throat, spreading over my chest.

  “No,” I admitted. “I didn’t.”

  “There you have it,” Mal said triumphantly.

  “There I have what?”

  “You just proved that you don’t have the best judgment on this subject. You thought I was the sort of guy who doesn’t call the day after, and you were wrong. And you thought your…” He waved an airy hand. “Friend?”

  I shrugged. “Sure, why not.”

  “Friend,” Mal continued, “was the kind who would. And in both cases you were wrong.” He finished on a triumphant, almost smug note.

  I stared at him. “And your point is…?” I asked.

  “You should be sleeping with me instead,” Mal said.

  I spit out the mouthful of mojito I’d just sipped.

  “Sleeping with you?”

  “You know, that’s why I like you,” Mal said. “You’re good for my ego.”

  “Who’s sleeping with whom?” Hayden asked, leaning over to hear our conversation.

  “I was suggesting that Lucy here sleep with me,” Mal said.

  “You’re not her type,” Hayden said.

  “I’m not?”

  “Definitely not. She goes for preppy, clean-cut guys,” Hayden said.

  “Those guys are usually pricks,” Mal said.

  Hayden shrugged. “True, but what can you do? The heart wants what it wants. And Lucy’s heart yearns for Mr. Prep. You’d have better luck if you shaved and put on a pink polo shirt.”

  “Too bad. I don’t wear pink,” Mal said with a shrug. He took a philosophic swig of his beer. I looked from him to Hayden, not sure with whom I was more annoyed.

  “First of all, my heart does not yearn for Mr. Prep. It doesn’t yearn for anything. This,” I said, pointing to my heart, “is a yearn-free zone. And second of all, I wouldn’t be interested in Mal even if he were the last preppy clean-cut guy on earth. No offense,” I added in Mal’s direction.

  “Hey, why start taking offense now?” Mal said.

  “It’s not personal, really. But I just got out of a relationship with a guy who had a loose definition of what monogamy means. I wouldn’t get involved with another guy like that,” I said.

  “That’s true. Her ex-boyfriend was a prick,” Hayden said philosophically. She raised her mojito glass in mock toast to me.

  Mal’s gray eyes were suddenly not laughing anymore. “Why do you think I have a loose definition of monogamy?” he asked.

  “I just…well, it’s none of my business…but you do seem to be with a lot of different women,” I said awkwardly. I had been sort of joking—thought we were all joking around—but now I had the impression that I’d really offended him.

  “And I’m not having a relationship, monogamous or otherwise, with any of them,” he said.

  I shrugged, uncomfortable in the knowledge that I’d probably stepped over a line, even if I hadn’t known the line was there. “Whatever you want to call it.”

  “Not just what I call it, Sunshine. It’s what it is. I don’t lead women on.”

  I turned to Hayden, hoping she’d step in, make a joke, and defuse the situation, but Ian had reappeared at our end of the bar and was bent over, talking softly to her. She was no longer paying any attention to Mal and me whatsoever. I was on my own. I turned back to Mal and inhaled deeply.

  “Look, I’m sorry if I offended you,” I said. “Really, I am.”

  Mal looked at me for a long moment, then he grinned, and the tension was broken. “Don’t worry. I’m getting the impression I’m going to have to develop a thick skin if I keep hanging out with you.”

  I laughed, more with relief that the tension had passed than anything.

  “Besides,” I said, “you already told me I wasn’t your type.”

  “When did I say that?”

  “The other night.”

  “Oh.” Mal considered this. “It’s true. You’re not.”

  “Then why did you say I should be sleeping with you?”

  Mal shrugged. “Diversity?” he suggested.

  “Tempting—but no.”

  “Damn,” Mal said, grinning at me in a way that made me suddenly aware of just how close to me he was sitting. I decided it was time to steer the topic away from sex.

  “So, you give tennis lessons?” I asked.

  Mal nodded. “Do you play?” he asked.

  “I used to, years ago. I’ve been meaning to take it up again. Would you be willing to give me lessons?”

  I wasn’t sure whom this request startled more—Mal or me. I hadn’t known I was going to ask him this. Although once I did, I realized it was true: I would like to take up tennis again. It was one of those things I never used to have time for, between work and Elliott and life in general. But now I had all the time in the world.

  “Sure, anytime, except Tuesday and Thursday afternoons,” Mal said.

  “Why? What happens on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons?” I asked.

  Mal looked at me as though he was trying to decide whether or not to tell me.

  “I have another commitment,” he said obliquely. “But any other day would be fine.”

  I was suddenly dying to know what his so-called commitment was. Did it have to do with the elegant older woman I’d seen him having dinner with? But I knew I couldn’t ask him, especially not now, right after I’d insulted him by basically accusing him of being a slut.

  “How about tomorrow morning?” I asked instead. “Ten o’clock?”

  “Ten it is,” Mal said. He smiled at me, and I felt a keen sense of relief. I had no idea why it was important to me that I be on good terms with this guy. Maybe it was just the effect of the dirty martinis and mojito. And speaking of the martinis and mojito…

  “Maybe we’d better make it eleven,” I said, pushing my now-empty glass away with a frown. “I’m probably going to wake up with a headache.”

  “Hey, Ian,” Mal called out. “Bring Lucy a glass of water, will you? We need to get her hydrated for her tennis lesson tomorrow morning.”

  I laughed and accepted the glass of water Ian brought me. And it only then occurred to me that the last half hour, which I’d passed talking to Mal, was the first time all day I hadn’t spent obsessing about Drew.

  Fifteen

  I WOKE SUDDENLY THE NEXT MORNING, ALERT AND uneasy. And then I remembered the plans I’d made the night before. Tennis lessons! What had I been thinking? I didn’t even have the equipment to play tennis. I had an old racquet rattling around somewhere at my house in Ocean Falls, but I wasn’t sure where it was, not that I could get to it. And although I now had a wardrobe to rival Nicole Ritchie’s, I didn’t have anything appropriate to wear on the tennis court.

  But that’s what money does, I remembered. It solves problems.

  The thrill this realization brought me was still fresh. I wondered if I would ever get used to the idea that I could buy whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted.

  I drove to the Rushes Tennis and Country Club in Hayden’s car. I was going to have to arrange for my own car soon, I thought, and spent a pleasant ten minutes daydreaming about whether I should opt for a high-tech luxury car or one of the gorgeous old vintage ones I kept seeing parked along Worth Avenue. I thought br
iefly of my old yellow Volvo, which was probably still languishing in the mechanic’s shop in Ocean Falls. I’d have to do something about that. Arrange to pay the mechanic, have the car sold. And at this, I felt an unexpected pang. I’d miss that car, even if it had been clunky and unreliable.

  But I quickly shook off this regret. Who wouldn’t prefer a sleek new Jaguar to an old, worn-down Volvo? I had to stop thinking like a teacher on a budget.

  The Rushes was gated with a security checkpoint. I gave my driver’s license to the uniformed guard at the gate, and for a tense moment I worried that he might recognize my name. But he just checked that I was on the approved visitors’ list, wrote down the car’s tag number, and then with a courteous nod waved me in. I exhaled gratefully, only then conscious that I’d been holding my breath.

  The country-club grounds were immaculate. The grass was very green and precisely cut. The bushes were trimmed into twisting topiary shapes, and white and lavender snapdragons and purpled-edged petunias bloomed in artistic clumps. Golf carts zipped around, their drivers calling out and waving to one another as they passed by. I followed the signs directing me toward the clubhouse and parked in the visitors’ lot. The clubhouse was very modern looking from the outside—two stories of pink stucco shaped like a hexagon, with a glass-domed roof—and decorated tastefully on the inside, from the patterned sage rug, to the muted cream walls, to the sconces with black shades that glowed next to oil paintings of the various golf-course holes.

  The pro shop was just to the right of the entrance, and I headed straight for it. There were a few men browsing half-heartedly through a selection of sorbet-hued golf shirts. The sales clerk led me over to the tennis section.

  “What are you interested in?” she asked. She flourished a hand toward the racks. “We have just about everything you could possibly need. Racquets, clothing, accessories.”

  “I need it all,” I said. “I need something to play in, sneakers, a racquet. I even need socks. Do you have everything?”

  If the clerk was surprised, she had the grace—or the training—not to show it. She selected a few outfits for me: a white dress with black stripes down the side; a shirt and skirt in a bright ocean blue; a cherry-red skirt with a white sleeveless top.