I could spend the rest of the day analyzing that strange scene, but there’s work to do. In my e-mail this morning there was a welcome note from Matemarket reviewing the terms of my three-month free membership and going over the information included in my profile. This was the profile that Val had written for me—captioned “Just Moved to NYC, Ready for Fun!” For my screen name, Val has chosen NewGirl. I sign on to Matemarket intending to cancel my account immediately, but just as I’m about to push the button, an instant message springs up.
VixenNYC: Hey! You’re on Matemarket! I’m signed on too! Check out your photo! Met anyone yet?
It’s Val, probably on the site setting up her dates for next week. It might make more sense to play along until she loses interest in this latest amusing project and stops checking up on me. There can’t be much harm in keeping my profile active for a few more days. Who’s going to try to contact NewGirl based on a one-inch-by-one-inch photo and a few perfunctory statistics? She’s indistinguishable from all the other women up for romantic adoption, hundreds of them, like lonely puppies in an electronic pet-shop window, peering out from their photos with smiles by turns wistful, hopeful, provocative, desperate. Have you considered that the love you’re seeking doesn’t exist? I want to tell them all. Will you mind when the romantic candlelight dinners give way to takeout by the flicker of ESPN? And can you promise you’re the woman you say you are?
Outside, thunder, like the guttural growl of an earthquake, rolls through the city. A spatter of drops hits the screens of my two bay windows. I get up to close them, return to my computer, and call up my own Matemarket profile, scrolling down to the empty space that’s there to hold my optional personal statement. “Describe who you are and what you’re looking for,” it invites. I reflect for a moment and type, I don’t know who I am anymore.
The statement looks stark in its big white box. I can think of nothing else that might soften it, so I delete it entirely.
I can’t trust those I love, I type, and then, because it seems the wrong thing to confess on a dating Web site, I delete that, too. I try Everything I thought was true is false and I’m better off being alone for the rest of my life and have to laugh at my own bleakness. Good thing I mean what I say about being alone. What man in his right mind would want to get involved with me?
The rain is coming down hard now, crashing against my windows like buckets of water hurled by angry weather gods. I delete what I’ve written and start typing:
When I was seven, I decided I was going to marry my dad. He was my hero, always willing to play Barbies with me, and I liked the way he cut pears in horizontal circles, with a star-shaped cross-section of core at the center of each. My mother could never remember my doctor and orthodontist appointments, so my dad would leave his office to take me himself. I knew no one else would look out for me and keep me safe and love me no matter what. A few years later I’d gotten over the fact that my dad was taken and vowed to find someone just like him. And yet, when it was time to make my choice, I married a man just like my mother—irresponsible and distracted. The truth is I am not looking for a mate or even a date. I’m here because a woman I hardly know thinks I need to “get back out there.” I’ve been out there and see no reason to go back. If we only get one chance at love, then I’ve already
That’s as much as will fit in the box. I look my words over and imagine a stranger reading them and thinking what a peculiar, self-pitying person NewGirl must be. I press “Delete,” and the box returns to its original emptiness. I sign off Matemarket, leaving only my original profile, the profile Val set up for me. “Just Moved to NYC, Ready for Fun!” it says, with one statistic: “Marital status:separated.”
At Steve’s request, we were again supposed to meet at his usual post-workout spot, the stretching area, for our second appointment, but I find him at the bottom of the stone staircase that leads up to it. “I keep forgetting there are no dogs allowed up there,” he explains. The Jack Russell sniffs around at his feet.
“So you brought your dog after all this time. Where has he been? Vickie thinks you’ve been leaving him at your—” I cut myself off. I’m trying to honor Steve’s unfair rules.
“How do you know about the dog?” Steve looks momentarily confused. “Ah, yes. Of course. From following me.”
I try to greet the animal with a straight face. “Hi . . .” I drop my voice several notches, as one does before saying something humiliating. “. . . Snooky. Honestly, Steve, why would you do that? What living creature deserves a name like Snooky?”
I can tell even Steve finds the name ridiculous. “Vickie might call him Snooky. Between us, let’s call him Jack Russell. Jack for short. Vickie does not need to know this.”
I feel pleased to have correctly identified Steve as not a “Snooky” person. The dog appears pleased, too; he seems to prick up his pointy ears at his new name.
Steve continues, “Mind walking a bit? You’d think a five-mile run would wear this guy out, but it hasn’t made a dent.” True enough, the dog, frolicking on the end of his leash, doesn’t seem a bit tired—more as if someone had just plugged him into the wall to recharge him.
I kneel to retie my sneaker, then straighten back up and brush off my hands on my sweatpants. “Let’s go.”
Ten minutes later, Steve has led me away from the reservoir to a wooded path called the Ramble, which Val once told me has long been a classic cruising spot for gay men. I can see why: It’s shady and secluded, with lots of rocks to hide behind. Immediately another murder scene pops into my head: Steve strangles me with the dog’s leash and tosses my body into the underbrush, where it remains undiscovered for days. Weeks. Who would miss me—Vickie? Val? Sure.
“Nice weather,” I say, mostly to keep my mind off thoughts of my corpse decomposing unattractively in a clump of poison ivy.
“Of course it is. It’s only the first of June. By August it’ll be hell on earth,” Steve says from a few steps ahead of me on the narrow path. He stops to let Jack sniff at a tree. “Tell me about yourself, Iris. I don’t know much about you, except you’re having money problems and view yourself as the savior of Vickie’s marriage.”
“You mean your and Vickie’s marriage.”
“That’s what I meant.”
I hop over a stick. “We’re supposed to be talking about you, not me.”
“Why not? I think you’re very interesting.”
I put my hand up to smooth my new short hair, realize what I’m doing, and pull my hand away. I’m not on a date; I’m on assignment. I assume my no-nonsense moderator stance. “Vickie is confused about some of your advice.”
Steve is about to answer when his right arm suddenly jerks in its socket. Jack has run up ahead and is straining at the end of his leash. Steve starts moving again. “What’s she confused about?” he calls back.
“That no-criticism rule.”
“It’s not a rule. I only said when men feel criticized by their wives, they—”
“I get it. We both get it.” I address his back as the three of us continue our amble through the Ramble. “But how is she supposed to not criticize you?”
“That’s pretty much all she needs to do—not criticize. It’s not hard.”
“What about the dishes? When you even bother to do them, you put them in the dishwasher all jumbled together. And you don’t rinse them.”
He looks back over his shoulder at me and snickers. “What’s the punishment for that: jail time or a fine?” He sounds just like Teddy.
“That’s not funny, Steve. Why can’t you give her a break? Why can’t you just do it her way, if it would make her happy? How hard is it to rinse out a coffee cup?”
“I told you this kind of conversation is off limits,” Steve says. “These meetings aren’t about my behavior; they’re supposed to be about Vickie’s behavior. Why does it matter so much anyway?”
“Because! It just . . .” Too late, I realize I’ve never thought out exactly why dishwasher etiquette is so important
. “It just does.”
To slap the smirk right off Steve’s face would be unprofessional. Settle down, Iris. Act like a moderator. You’ll get more out of him if you aren’t confrontational. You can’t get angry. I breathe for a moment, and when I start again my voice is calmer. “You really feel very strongly that you may not be able to change your ways. It sounds like you feel Vickie should make all the concessions.”
“Not necessarily. But she’s the one so unhappy she hired a spy.”
“I’m not sure I understand. She’s unhappy with you, but you feel she should change?”
“You can only change your own behavior, Iris. You can’t change anyone else but yourself. And that’s only if you want to change. Why are you looking at me like that?”
There is something vaguely Joy-like in the way he is speaking. I replace what must be a disapproving scowl with that moderator classic: the Mona Lisa smile.
He continues walking. “Besides, men are always the ones making concessions, because women are always the ones with the demands: ‘Your track trophies are going in the basement.’ ‘I don’t like your friends.’ ‘I never said I wanted a baby.’”
I stop short, grab the back of his shirt, and pull him around to face me. “What did you just say? Vickie doesn’t want a baby?”
From behind us comes the faint shuffle of footsteps. Steve and I freeze, the way couples do when they’ve been caught bickering on the welcome mat on their way into a party. A handsome, shirtless man squeezes past us. He gives Steve an approving once-over before disappearing around a bend.
Steve and Vickie are fighting about starting a family?
“No other straight guy would tell you this, but we secretly think that’s kind of flattering,” Steve says once we’re alone again. “Is that how you feel when men stare at you, or does it really make you feel like a piece of meat?”
If only Michelle Heeley were here to realize the mistake she made in laying me off. Imagine the job I could have done on the organic bubble bath launch for Lizzie B Cosmetics, a client toward which I harbored no animosity whatsoever, if I can stay poised during a conversation with a man I can barely stand. Steve probably uses this charming-banter routine all the time to win over his conquests. “You know, Steve, Vickie told me this pregnancy is all she’s ever wanted. She was very clear about it. Why would she lie about something like that? Are you sure you heard her right?” He must think I’m pretty gullible, anyway, to fall for that kind of empty flattery. Men don’t stare at me. I’m unobtrusive, remember?
Steve kicks at a root in the path.
“I can’t imagine her saying she didn’t want a baby.”
He doesn’t look at me. “Sorry.”
“Then what did you mean by that?”
He doesn’t answer.
I remember something Michelle used to say: If you stay quiet long enough, most people will eventually start talking again to fill the silence. I prepare to wait him out.
Steve blows air out of his cheeks, making a whistling sound.
Ahead of us, Jack appears to have finally run out of battery power and is dozing on his side in the middle of the trail. Even sleeping, his legs twitch.
“This is getting complicated.” Steve kicks again at the root. “You know, I told you I’d meet with you once or twice, and this makes twice. I’d say you and I are square. I don’t think we should do this anymore.”
“Whatever makes you comfortable, Steve.”
“Then this will be our last meeting. Deal?”
“If that’s what you want.” Whatever made me think I could save someone’s marriage?
“I’d like to know why Vickie hired you in the first place, though.”
I smile vaguely.
“I assume she thinks I’m having an affair.”
“I see. Tell me how you came to that conclusion.”
“Isn’t that why wives hire private eyes?”
“Is it?”
“Are you trying to sound like a shrink?”
No, like a focus-group moderator. Turns out that while the Hayes Heeley method is all right for getting strangers to open up about bubble bath, in real, human discourse it sounds stilted and phony. “All right, then. Are you cheating on Vickie?”
I’m expecting the irate denial of a liar trying too hard. But Steve’s voice is calm. “I can’t answer that,” is all he says.
Art the mailman is in the middle of the day’s delivery, unlocking the bank of mailboxes in my front foyer with one of about ten thousand keys dangling from a ring the circumference of my thigh.
“For you.” He hands me a stack of catalogs and junk mail. “How’s job hunt?”
I make a face.
“I know. Economy not so good for everyone, right? Last guy who lives in your apartment, he lose his job, spend eighteen months looking. You think of moving to Jersey? It’s cheaper out there.”
“That’s where I’ll end up,” I say mournfully. “In New Jersey, right next door to that guy who used to have my apartment. More likely, in New Jersey, sleeping on the sidewalk.”
“Uh-uh. He doesn’t move to Jersey.” Art clanks shut the bank of mailboxes and locks it with his key. “He lands bigger job and buys a loft in SoHo.”
Inside my apartment, I flip on General Hospital for background noise and settle into my chair to go through the mail, hoping that hidden among the junk I’ll find a response from a potential employer. No such luck. But at least my Department of Labor check has arrived, so I’ll be able to eat for another week, and there are no credit card bills today, only catalogs, which I can’t help flipping through even though I’m in no position to buy anything.
Everything in Lands’ End looks downright grandmotherly. I switch to J. Crew, but the bikinis, flip-flops, T-shirts, and shorts just blend together. Why do these clothes seem so pedestrian? There’s not a thing in here worth going into debt for.
Vickie calls. I toss the catalogs into the recycle pile and tell her I’ve got a few things to report.
“I have news for you, too.”
“You go first.” I’m in no hurry to tell her I asked Steve the cheating question and blew my chance forever, because our meetings have come to an end. I can’t tell her I’m disappointed that I won’t be able to help her after all. That part is all for the best, I suppose. It isn’t fair that Steve was willing to offer pointers but not take any himself.
“That’s all right; you go,” Vickie says.
Deferring to me? How refreshing—on any other day. “It’s okay. You first.”
“Thank you,” Vickie replies. “Guess what? It worked! Your advice. His advice. About not criticizing him in any way! After I left your apartment last week, I thought, why not try it for twenty-four hours? I put a rubber band around my wrist, and every time I got the urge to criticize—and believe me, I got the urge a lot—I gave the rubber band a snap.”
My heart leaps. My plan may actually have worked, in just two meetings?
“I’ve managed not to say one mean thing to Steve for six days straight,” Vickie continues excitedly. “Can you believe it? It’s got to be some kind of world record!”
I can’t help but have the tiniest cynical thought. Was this some kind of scheme? Did Steve plan to use me to help to transform Vickie into a Stepford wife? Think about it. That’s my little voice talking. He said he would answer no questions and make no promises to change his own behavior. He only wanted Vickie to change hers.
“And guess what else? This morning, before he left for work, he made me toast! And brought it to me in bed! Without being asked! And he put exactly the right amount of butter on it!”
I’ll bet he did. It was part of his wife-coaching plan. Okay, so he changed his behavior slightly, just to keep her on track. He got me to tell her to act exactly as he wanted, and now, whenever she heels or rolls over on command, he’s going to toss her a little treat. Soon the toast will turn into flowers and the flowers into jewelry, until he’s got her so well trained she won’t notice that the rewards have st
opped.
“Now, he didn’t put the plate into the dishwasher afterward, but still! He hasn’t made toast since we were dating! So everything I said about why should I change? Forget it. I want more advice, and the sooner the better. Now, what was it you wanted to— Is that your call-waiting?”
Indeed it is. Saved by the bell. I say good-bye to Vickie and click over to the other line, thanking my lucky stars that I don’t have to admit my failures until later.
As it turns out, I’ve simply traded one messy phone call for another.
“Praise be to Jee-sus!” my soon-to-be-ex shouts in a revivalist preacher’s twang. “A miracle is in our midst! Our own Iris has answered the call! Brothers and sisters, I prevail upon each and every one of you not to follow the example set by sister Iris. I prevail upon you to hear the message. To accept the message. And most of all, brothers and sisters, to respond to the message.”
“All right, enough. Just mail me the tax thing and I’ll take care of it. Somehow.”
Teddy chuckles. “Don’t worry about that. I already forged your signature.”
He forged my signature. That’s just swell. I think about Vickie getting annoyed at Steve ten times a day. If it’s really only ten, she’s luckier than she realizes. I take a cleansing breath. “How much was the bill?”
“Bill? It was a refund. One thousand, two hundred sixty-three dollars and seventy-eight cents we overpaid last year. Amazing, right? I probably should have double-checked the numbers. Didn’t you tell me to do that?”
I did tell him, as a matter of fact. But there’s no need to dredge that up now. My imagination has already gone to work on the . . . please hold on while I do the math . . . six hundred thirty-one dollars and eighty-nine cents that comprises my half of this unexpected windfall. I’m saved! Saved, brothers and sisters! I want to jump up and down on my bed like a five-year-old. “When do we get the check?”
“I got it,” he says. “That’s what I was calling about.”
No, wait; I want to bang my head against the wall. “Ted, you have my address. Write me a check for my half. Then send it. What’s the big mystery?” I let the tirade fade out as Steve’s voice echoes in my head like a bad soap-opera flashback in which the heroine relives a dire warning she’s been given, even as she’s doing the very thing she’s been warned against: “‘Men just can’t take constant criticism from their wives . . . wives . . . wives. . . . They withdraw . . . withdraw . . .
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