Ghosts of Boyfriends Past

by Carly Alexander

Need to clean up wok mess, but right now just want to wallow in bed and hug pillow that smells like Judd. First, must replace Steely Dan CD with anything else.

  Saturday

  Bliss! My life is bliss!

  After the show last night we went to dinner with some of the cast at Mo’s Grill, south of Market. Great burgers—but the best part of the evening was the way Judd treated me. Like a queen. I think he enjoyed showing me off to his friends. “She’s an editor at Skyscraper in New York,” he told one of the actors. “Better watch what you say or you’ll find yourself written up in the gossip section.”

  Oh, right! Hate that he mentioned Skyscraper. Love that he’s proud of me. Thorny dilemma, but at least no dishpan hands. Still need rubber gloves!

  He told them I was staying on here, and they congratulated us as if we were getting married. That did it . . . saw myself in bridal gown. Will slip out Monday and buy copy of Brides magazine. Just curious.

  Can’t wait to spend today with him. Want to take him for coffee at Backbend, then shopping on Fillmore Street for kitchen items (remember rubber gloves). Suspect Stamata robbed him of spatulas and bowls when he kicked her out. Can’t wait to drag him into Sue Fisher King. This place could use a comfortable chair and a good reading lamp.

  Later

  Disappointing day. First, Judd slept till ten and putzed around till noon. Morning vanished. Then, he wanted to drag me to a high school basketball game. I resisted, he insisted.

  The school gym still smells of bad sneakers. I mentioned this and Judd started singing Steely Dan’s “Bad Sneakers.” Beginning to strongly dislike Steely Dan. Judd has a following of freckled girls with big hair. Very uncool girls, I think, with no visible piercings, but he seems to enjoy their admiration. Heard them talking about me in the ladies’ room. They think they have a chance with him (same thing I thought in high school). Sort of pathetic.

  A wasted afternoon.

  He’s in the shower now, getting ready for the show. Wants me to come see the show, which I don’t think I can sit through. I hear enough Shakespeare from Judd’s lips. Will tell him I need time to write.

  Looking forward to party after the show—his friends, Linda and Harvey. Not thrilled about being arm candy again, but imagine the people at the party will be closer to my age. At least, they won’t be trying to steal Judd for a prom date.

  Sunday, 2:20 A.M.

  Have just arrived at the apartment alone. Judd refused to leave his fucking friends at the party, which turned out to be a celebration of the fine qualities of Stamata. Harvey and Linda were her friends!!!

  I can’t believe Judd brought me there. What the hell was he thinking?

  Harvey was all: “Stamata really broke his heart. It was sad . . . so sad.” Then Linda tells me: “I’m sure he’s told you about Stamata? We’ve been so worried about Judd since she left. He was in bad shape, I tell you. But it’s great that he’s getting his feet wet again with you.”

  Getting his feet wet? What am I, a fucking puddle?!!

  Judd is so fucked, and he doesn’t even realize it.

  Searched through the medicine cabinet for some Tylenol and what do I find? Two prescriptions with Stamata’s name on it. He says it’s over, but she is haunting this place.

  Called Sugar to talk it out, but got her machine. Don’t want to leave a message that might let her know of my growing discontent.

  Everything will be better in the morning, right? Right?

  9:20 A.M.

  My life is shit.

  Judd came home around dawn and we had drunken sex. At first I didn’t mind when he kept saying that he loved me, but then it became clear that, at that point, he would have professed love for a ham sandwich if it had breasts. Besides, with the limp noodle he was sporting, it wouldn’t be long before he passed out.

  Have just read this journal, which reinforced that not only is my life shit, I can’t write worth a damn. Which leaves me without a career. Without a fucking destiny.

  I would cry if I had the energy. Need to get out of here. Go back to Mom and Dad’s house? Will Dad be there? Would rather not see him now. Don’t want to see anyone. What day is it, anyway?

  Sunday . . . Sunday!

  My flight was today. What time? Shit!

  14

  My hand trembled as I passed the ticket to the airline clerk. “You’ll be traveling with us to New York today?” she asked smoothly.

  “Yes,” I gasped. “Yes, New York,” I said, as if taking a sacred vow.

  “It’s too late for us to accept your baggage here,” she said. “You’ll have to do gateside check-in.”

  “No problem,” I assured her. I would hold the bag in my lap if I had to ... anything to get on the flight.

  “That’s flight Eighty-seven to JFK. You’ll be going to gate H-Twelve,” she told me, sliding a boarding pass across the counter. With quivering hand, I snatched up the ticket. “Don’t worry,” she said, “you have time. They’re boarding now, but the gate is just down that corridor.”

  I nodded, picked up my bags, and ran. My garment bag banged against my side with each step, and the handle on the Neiman Marcus shopping bag of dirty clothes was starting to tear, but I pressed on, running for my life.

  I was running from the image of Judd, red-faced and squinting, after I woke him up to tell him I was leaving.

  “I’m going back to New York,” I said. “I need to have a life.”

  He shook his head. “You have a beautiful life here.”

  “So did Stigmata. Or Stalagmite . . . whatever her name was.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” He sounded cranky.

  “You can read all about it in my book,” I told him, gathering up my stuff in a shopping bag. I still had to cab it back to the Nob Hill house and throw everything in my suitcase to make my twelve-thirty flight.

  “Madison, don’t leave this way. Look at me. Talk to me.”

  “I have nothing to say.” I turned away to open the door.

  “‘False face must hide what the heart doth know,’” he recited dramatically. “That’s from Macbeth.”

  “And here I thought it was from All My Children,” I said, pausing with my hand on the doorknob. “You need to stop using Shakespeare as a crutch. Could you come up with a few original responses once in awhile?”

  Looking back now, I smiled. I had finished off with a truly brilliant line. “This Elizabethan shit is wearing thin,” I’d told him. Sugar and Leo would laugh when I told them all about it, which I planned to do over many intoxicating coldies.

  It wasn’t until I was in my seat on the jet, buckling up, that the past few weeks flashed before me. Just weeks ago, I had strapped myself into a seat on a jet like this for a short visit home. Now, three men wiser, I was emotionally bankrupt, and probably a few pounds heavier from all the holiday treats.

  But as the jet raced along the runway and tipped gently into the air, I sucked in a breath, secure in the knowledge that I was on the right path.

  I was going back to New York, back to the friends who supported my insanity, back to a new apartment that would need a ton of work, back to a dead-end position I loathed, staffed with egotistical nut jobs. But hey, no one else in the office knew how to fix a jam in the copier quite the way I did.

  It was a fucked-up life, but it was mine—all mine, ha, ha!—and for now, it was just what I needed.

  Part Two

  Blue Christmas

  West 98th Street

  December 8, 2003

  9:10 P.M.

  15

  Damned cell phones! Mine had been bleeping since I’d gotten out of the subway at Ninety-sixth Street, but when I tried to retrieve the messages it kept powering off because the battery was low. And from the caller ID I could see one of the messages was from Leo’s cell, though I don’t know why he’d be calling me when I had just left him at Rockefeller Center. Probably wanted to announce that he’d mastered a triple salchow on the ice. I loved the convenience of cell phones, but sometimes the
frustration of dealing with wrong numbers and drained batteries and rude people shouting out personal details on the bus made me question their usefulness.

  At Rockefeller Center, the three of us had ended up back at Morrell’s for a fabulous dinner at a table in the rear, a safe distance from Mr. Middle-aged. From where I sat, if I leaned over the bread plate I could see the bottom edge of the Christmas tree, the lower branches glimmering in the night. There’s something magical about dining in view of the Rockefeller Center tree. I told Leo that we could be tiny statuettes in the snow-globe ornament he’d given me so many Christmases ago. Of course, he responded that I was full of fruitcake—or something not nearly so civilized.

  While we were dining, Sugar flirted with the two men seated at the table beside us, asking them how their wine was, commenting on the buttery chardonnay on Morrell’s list, asking them if she could borrow their sugar, then saying “Oops! I’ve got plenty of sugar—it’s actually my name!”

  Sometimes it’s truly a disadvantage to have an extroverted, Type-A friend. And Sugar was only going to get worse when the next issue of Playboy hit the stands. Our very own “sugar plum” was the featured centerfold fairy for the special holiday issue. As it was, people occasionally recognized her voice from the radio; once men began to recognize her other finer points—which apparently they’d shot with her bare nipples pressed against the glass of the radio station’s sound booth—Sugar’s ego would know no limits.

  Tonight, however, Sugar’s expansive flirtations worked in my favor. One of the guys turned out to be Frank Falcone, a writer for Newsday. Frank was cordial, knowledgeable about wines, and interested in me, of all things. Before we left the restaurant we made plans to meet for drinks this week. I’m not going to make the mistake of inflating my expectations (because it smarts when that balloon pops). At this point, let’s just say I’m encouraged by the possibilities.

  After dinner, Leo tried to talk Sugar and me into a quick round on the ice, but we declined. Sugar usually passed out around nine so she could be up at five in the morning to do her radio show—a real crimp in her social life—and I secretly wanted to get home and change into my flannel jammies and watch A Christmas Story on TNT. Okay, if I didn’t have a date, what was wrong with snuggling in with a Christmas classic? Hmm ... I wondered if Frank had ever seen A Christmas Story.

  I nodded at Ralph, the doorman, and took the stairs up to my third-floor co-op. I’d bought the one-bedroom in this historic, twelve-story building with the money I’d gotten when Dad passed away. I imagined he’d be happy to know I was safe and financially secure with a low-interest mortgage on, as the Times ad had called it, “a renovated prewar with hardwood floors and bright southern and western exposures.”

  Unlocking the door, I stepped into my retreat and pressed on the light. Ahhh ... I had to lean on the low bookshelves by the door to undo the petite buckles of my shoes—my daring black Chanel ankle-strap pumps with metal heels. They were so impractical for the cold winter months and incredibly unaffordable at seven hundred-plus smackaroos, but when I’d seen a shot of Renee Zellweger wearing them in Harper’s Bazaar, I couldn’t resist.

  Barefoot, I padded over to the phone, where the answering machine was blinking furiously with five messages. A smarter, more restrained woman would have waited until after her movie to hear the messages, but I had issues with delaying gratification—especially now that my cell phone was dead. I pressed play and listened as I unbuttoned my silk blouse and dropped my trousers.

  “Hello? I hope this is the right number. Madison? This is Henry.”

  “Huh?” I stepped out of my pants and ran to the machine.

  “Henry Dombrowski, yeah, me. It’s been awhile. So, hey, what have you been up to lately?”

  “Certainly not dating married men,” I yelled at the machine as I pressed the button to skip ahead. What was Henry doing calling me? I was going to call Leo and play Henry’s message—proof that I wasn’t imagining this old boyfriend thing.

  The next message was another male voice. “Hey, Madison, it’s Ryan. Ryan Wilkinson.”

  I smashed a hand onto the top of my head. Ryan! Old Navy Ryan. What the hell?

  “Your mother told me I should give you a call . . . Robin. But then, I guess you know who your mom is. Anyway, I thought I’d call and—”

  “Haunt me a little!” I said as I pressed down the button to skip to the next message. Was I losing it? Or was it reasonable to assume the next message was going to be an old boyfriend named Jacob Marley growling, “I wear the chains I forged in life”?

  I clicked onto message number three, my mother. “Hi, sweetie! Just wanted to let you know you might be hearing from Ryan, your old high school friend.”

  “Ugh!” I waited with my finger poised over the button, unable to cut Mom off for fear that she had some important bit of news she was saving for the end.

  “Do you remember him? Apparently he got married in the Navy, but that didn’t work out for him. Anyway, he asked about you and I told him to look you up since he’s living in New York now. That’s where he’s living. Or did I tell you that already? Oh. Anyway, that’s all. Hope you’re doing well. Clay and I may be coming your way after the holidays, but we’ll talk as that develops. Okay. Bye, now.”

  And . . . cut! The next message was Leo, at last. “Why aren’t you answering your cell? I’m in dire pain here! And they’re taking me away to ... what hospital?”

  I gasped, my heartbeat racing to emergency mode. Leo? In a hospital? I’d be really concerned if I didn’t hear his voice sounding so normal.

  There was shuffling, then heavier voices, then Leo went on. “Park View Hospital! I am calling you from a stretcher.” He lowered his voice. “And really, this would be an excellent attention-getting device if I didn’t have real pain. Meet me at the hospital as soon as you get this.”

  Already I was stepping back into my pants, zipping the fly, scurrying toward my shoes, hopping around like a crazed chicken. What the hell had happened to Leo in the twenty minutes since I’d left him at Rockefeller Center?

  As if Leo could read my mind, he tacked on to his message: “I fell on the ice. And don’t say I told you so. Oh ... gotta go. Come rescue me. Help!” He added in a small voice: “Help! Help!”

  As I struggled with the buckles of my shoes, I chastised myself for letting Leo go back on the ice tonight. Or maybe I should have stayed and skated with him. But I had thought the big attraction was the skate-rental guy, a harmless flirtation that Leo didn’t need me around for.

  Where the hell was Park View Hospital? I knew it was on the West Side, having seen a sign for it at some subway stop. Maybe the doorman would know.

  Downstairs Ralph jumped up when I appeared. “Ms. Greenwood, before I forget, this came for you today,” he said, handing me an oversized envelope.

  “Thanks.” Shoving it into my Kenneth Cole hobo bag, I told Ralph that my friend was in the hospital and I needed to get a cab immediately.

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” he said politely. “Let’s see if I can help you flag down a ride to Park View Hospital. It’s just down on Fifty-ninth Street.”

  With the help of his trusty whistle, Ralph plucked a yellow cab from the stream of moving traffic, and suddenly I was on my way, streaming down the avenue to rescue my fallen friend. I sank back against the seat, noticing the mail sticking out of my bag.

  The stamp was unusual—overseas postage, from Scotland. I ripped it open, knowing it was my annual Christmas greeting from Andrew, the innkeeper at the Newington Inn. This year’s card featured a photo of the inn, an old Victorian cottage with snow on the roof.

  Flipping the card open, I saw Andrew’s perfect script:

  Remember us? Cheap and cheery!

  Would love to have you visit again.

  Regards, Andrew

  The Newington Inn was a fine place, despite my toxic memories of my time there. How long ago was it? Five years. Five years ago I’d spent Christmas in Scotland.

 
; Well, almost . . .

  Part Three

  London and Environs

  December 1998

  16

  “Hello, luv.”

  It was the voice I’d traveled the Atlantic for, the voice of the man I loved. I pulled the phone away from the end table and sank back under the puffy duvet of the comfortable hotel bed.

  “Hello, yourself. When am I going to see you? London’s just not the same without you,” I teased, though I’d barely seen the city at all, having arrived at Heathrow at the crack of London’s dawn, schlepped with my friends to the very grand Kensington Park Thistle Hotel, and flopped into bed to sleep the morning away. Jet lag really walloped you when you traveled east, though I was glad to have made the trip with my buds and roommates, Leo, Jenna, and Sugar—all three of whom had decided, for various reasons, that this was the year to spend Christmas abroad.

  Sighing, I twirled the phone cord around my finger. “I wish you were here now.” I lifted the duvet, as if searching for him. “Why aren’t you here now? Get your butt over here!”

  “Can’t do it, luv. I’ve been hit with some unexpected business. A talent search for a new show we’re whipping up. It’s got me up here in the wilds of Scotland.”

  “Oh, no. No!” I squeaked, which is not a pretty sound for a twenty-six-year-old chick to make. Blame it on hoarseness from the transatlantic flight, along with major disappointment. I loved the glamorous sound of Ian’s job as a producer of popular TV shows for the BBC and abroad, but more than once, that gorgeous career had been a huge obstacle to our happiness. Yes, his job was beginning to piss me off. I mean, I had a job, too, but I had managed to get time off from the gallery, despite the incredibly bitchy reaction of my boss Katherine.