by Jane Porter
I get out of my car, smooth my long skirt over my knee-high boots, and pat my sweater flat and tell myself to relax, try to keep an open mind, and have fun.
And Ed is nice, surprisingly unflashy for being a CEO of a multimillion-(billion?) dollar company. During dinner he asks intelligent questions and then seems perfectly content to let me talk while he listens.
But finally I turn the table and ask questions, and Ed answers simply.
Ed’s from Marin, he’s thirty-eight, the middle of three sons, and his parents are still alive and together. He golfs a little bit, but his passion is tennis, and he does his best to follow the Bay Area professional teams.
“Your parents must be really proud of you,” I say as he lapses into silence.
Ed shakes his head, expression rueful. “My dad’s a little disappointed. Dad always wanted me to be a doctor.”
“But you’ve been so successful.”
“Everyone has their own definition of success.”
I look at him a long moment, trying to see who thin, balding megamillionaire Ed Hill really is. “And what’s your definition?”
He nudges his water glass with his finger. He doesn’t drink, abstains from alcohol. “Happiness.”
“Happiness?” That sounds too simplistic.
“Liking yourself when you open your eyes every morning. Gratitude that you’ve got another day.”
Gratitude that you’ve got another day. Liking yourself in the morning. I repeat his words as I drive home later that evening. It’s still simplistic, but it does work for me.
Ed calls me on Monday and thanks me for a lovely evening, and follows up by asking if I’d like to go to the Lakers-Warriors game with him on Thursday. It’s a huge rivalry, Bay Area versus L.A., and both teams-are strong contenders this year.
“Okay,” I say, after checking my appointment book to make sure I have nothing going on.
“It’s going to be rush hour,” he says. “What if I pick you up so you don’t have to hassle with traffic?”
“Oh—”
“I can pick you up at work if you prefer. Won’t go near your house.”
I blush, and he can’t see my blush over the phone, but I feel bad anyway. “It’s not that—”
“You don’t have to apologize. I understand perfectly. Women are always trying to follow me home.”
“They are?” And then I clap my hand to my head. Of course they are. He may not be handsome, but he’s megarich.
He laughs faintly. “I’m joking.”
“I’m sure they are,” I say, just digging my hole bigger.
“What time should I pick you up from City Events?”
“You tell me.” I’m eager to make amends.
“Five thirty?”
“Sounds great.”
I hang up and look at the phone and think, I don’t feel any sexual sparks here, but he is nice, and nice is what’s important. Nice is what you can base a relationship on. I just have to keep giving nice a chance.
Thursday arrives, and I’ve brought a change of clothes to work, and at five I sign off my computer, disappear into the bathroom to change and touch up my face and hair.
I’m not wearing anything fancy tonight, just jeans, boots, and a bright red blouse that ties at the waist. I drag my hands through my hair to give it a suitably casual but sexy date-night hair look. With gold hoops in my ears and a funky necklace, I’m done.
I look myself over one last time. It’ll have to do. This is who I am. What I am.
Josh walks me downstairs at five thirty, and as we emerge from the building, a black limousine is waiting at the curb.
“Nice car,” Josh deadpans.
“Yeah. That’s the life.”
And then the back door opens, and Ed Hill climbs out. “Ready?” he says to me.
I look at Ed, and. then Josh, and then the car, and back to Josh. Josh leans forward, hugs me, whispering, “It’s just as easy to fall in love with a rich man as a—”
“Ssssh,” I silence him, cutting him short, and leaving Josh, I head toward Ed, who is standing by the limousine, waiting for me.
That night at the game in the Oakland Coliseum we have courtside seats, two amazing seats just down from the Warriors bench. It isn’t until I’m sitting next to Ed and the television cameras keep panning over the front rows, lingering on the rich and famous, including Ed and me, that I understand the seduction of money.
Limos and courtside seats. Chauffeurs, chefs, valets, and personal trainers. Houses in Pacific Heights, Carmel, Jackson Hole, and Maui.
If I were Mrs. Edward Hill, I could buy anything I wanted. Travel anywhere I felt like. Get immediate attention by entering a room. Respect by pulling out my credit card.
I wish I could say I fell in love with Ed Hill and that my life finally turned into a fairy tale. But Ed, despite his kindness and his goodness and his luxurious life, doesn’t make me... happy.
I don’t open my eyes in the morning and think, I can’t wait to see him.
I don’t go to bed dreaming about Kim.
I don’t want to rush through work so we can be together at the end of the day.
Ed is hoping he’ll grow on me, and he is doing his best to spoil me, but it’s not going to work. I’ll never love him the way he wants me to love him. He’s a friend. Nothing more.
In late March I finally tell Ed what he doesn’t want to hear: that although I like him very much, my feelings are platonic.
Ed listens quietly and then asks one question. “Is there someone else?”
“No.”
“You’re just not interested in me?”
“Not the way you want me to be.”
And Ed Hill stops calling.
It isn’t until I’ve broken things off with Ed that I notice Olivia has actually relented, pulled back, no longer focuses on me with so much savage fury.
What changed?
Looking back, I realize she started easing up around the very same time I started dating Ed, and the closer I got to Ed, the nicer she became to me.
Coincidence? Or not?
Chapter Seventeen
The weeks pass, and April’s here.
I’m in the middle of hammering out the final details for Kid Fest, an annual event for disadvantaged kids and teens taking place later this month, when I’m summoned to the front by the City Events receptionist.
The only thing on my mind as I leave my desk is getting publicity for our Kid Fest sponsors. People who donate time, money, or material for charity events want their good deeds known. Not necessarily the most altruistic form of giving, but a fact of corporate American life. And I’m puzzling over how to get the media out for yet another nonprofit event when I round the corner and freeze.
No. Way.
Jean-Marc.
I very nearly turn around and run, but my legs won’t move and my chest feels tight and I just stare at him where he stands in the lobby, chatting away with our young receptionist.
I say nothing, but the smiling and blushing receptionist spots me and breaks off midsentence. Jean-Marc turns, looks toward me. I just look back.
He looks the same: tall, lean, sexy in that intense way European men have. He’s wearing old jeans that hug his narrow waist, and a dark gray cashmere V-neck sweater that hugs the hard planes of his chest, showing off taut pecs and chiseled abs, even as the deep V-neck plays up his arresting Gallic features.
He is and always has been disgustingly handsome. His hair, his pride and joy, is still a thick dark brown with that wave at the front that continues over the ears, and he has light brown eyes that in sunlight look almost golden.
I swear, the man used to stand in sunlight all the time.
“Cherie,” he says, moving toward me and clasping my shoulders and kissing me on each cheek. “Surprise!”
Yes, it is. And I can think of nothing to say.
“I was in the city to see friends and thought I’d stop by and say hello,” he continues, speaking in that deep voice that makes
vowels and consonants sound sexy. Wicked. The French are so unfair.
“Hello,” I say shortly even as I find myself wondering when it was I last saw him, and realize it’s been close to a year. He was already bunking down at a friend’s the weekend I moved out...
Glancing past his shoulder, I see the office receptionist, a young intern from one of the local universities, craning her head, trying to listen.
“This is where you work?” he says, gesturing to the huge colorful event posters lining the enormous brick wall.
“Yes.”
“Interesting.”
“Mmmm.” I just don’t see any point in continuing this conversation. I mean, what are we supposed to say? Months ago I needed him, missed him... loved him. But now I feel only weariness and bits of regret. Not for him, but for the girl I used to be.
It’s been such a long, hard year. Make that a long, hard couple of years.
I’m ready for easier. I’m ready for simpler. I’m ready to get back to my desk and get my work done.
“Do you have time for a coffee?” Jean-Marc asks, breaking the silence. “I saw a Starbucks down the road. I know how much you like that place.”
He’s being conciliatory, and he knows this and I know this, because Starbucks was always a bone of contention between us. Jean-Marc likes small European-style coffeehouses, and my love for Starbucks (and my Starbucks Visa card) irritated him beyond belief.
“I’ve got a lot of work to do.”
“Just a half hour, Holly.”
“Why?”
He looks puzzled, and for a moment I feel almost sorry for him. He went out of his way to come by the office today, and he’s suggested Starbucks, and clearly something’s on his mind. But what?
Yet he shrugs, one of his famous Gallic shrugs. “It just seems like a nice thing to do.”
Is that what this is about, then? Being nice?
I nearly spit in disgust. He broke my heart—crushed me just weeks after marrying me—and he wants to be nice now?
Maybe I don’t want to be nice. Maybe I want to be rude, hurtful, cruel. But nothing particularly rude, hurtful, or cruel comes to mind.
I get my purse and coat, and we take the elevator down in silence until we step out onto the street. Parked a half block down is his slate gray Citroen. I used to love that car. We pass his car, head for the Starbucks. We could have gone to Mr. J’s, but I see no point. That’s a cool, funky place, and it’s where I met Brian. I won’t ruin the memory by getting coffee with Jean-Marc there.
At the counter inside, Jean-Marc orders an espresso, and I get a white-chocolate mocha. With whipped cream. I look at Jean-Marc, daring him to remind me about the calorie content as he used to, but he doesn’t.
He takes our cups to a table, and we sit in the corner overlooking the sidewalk and parking lot. Just weeks ago the trees outside were nearly all bare, but little green tufts have begun to protrude from the branches, bright bits of spring green in tender shoots and tiny leaves.
“So what brings you here?” I ask after we’ve lapsed into silence for a second time. “You’re not getting married again, are you?”
He looks at me, surprised. “How did you know?”
He’s getting married.
I stare at him, jaw dropping, absolutely dumbfounded. Jean-Marc is getting married already?
“You didn’t know,” he says now, reading my shock.
I slowly shake my head, throat working, but no sound comes out.
He grimaces. “I know our divorce was final only a couple of months ago, but I met someone last summer, and she’s great. A really nice girl.”
There’s that “nice” again, and I’m so sick of it I could scream. But I don’t. Because I am nice, too. Even if I don’t want to be, even if I resent and resist everything the word represents.
“And she’s pregnant,” he adds, looking up at me.
“But you didn’t want kids,” I whisper, feeling strange, feeling torn. I don’t love him now, but I did. I wouldn’t marry him knowing what I know now, but two years ago I thought he was wonderful.
“I know.” He makes another face. “It wasn’t planned. Wasn’t what I wanted. Believe me.”
I do. Jean-Marc and I had some serious battles near the end, and the issue of children came up again and again. And sitting there with my white-chocolate mocha, I exhale, a short, hard breath that leaves my chest feeling hollow. Empty.
“So why marry her?” I ask carefully. “Why do what you obviously don’t want to do?”
He runs a hand through his thick hair, features tightening. “She needs me.”
And I didn’t?
“She can’t afford to raise a baby on her own, and she really wants the baby, wants a family,” So did I.
He sighs. “I can’t hurt her, Holly. She’s fragile. Delicate. I have to protect her.”
I bite my lip and look away. He couldn’t, wouldn’t, protect me, but he’ll ride in on his white stallion and rescue someone else.
“I just wanted you to know, to hear it from me,” he concludes awkwardly. “I wanted you to understand.”
Understand? He wants me to understand?
Is he insensitive or what?
I lean forward, hands wrapping tightly around my cup. “Once you loved me, Jean-Marc. You had to have loved me. What happened?”
“It’s complicated—”
“Explain it to me, then. I need to know. Where did the love go? What was it that I did?”
He lifts his head, looks up, his expression sympathetic. “It wasn’t ever you, cherie—”
“It was, because one day you loved me, and the next”—I snap my fingers—” we were over. The love was gone.”
He leans back in his chair, groans beneath his breath, shifting in his chair. “It was...”—and he looks at me and then away before plowing on—”your mother.”
My mother?
My mother, I silently repeat, staring at him, a dull pain in my middle, more of a memory of hurt than real hurt, since I don’t understand what he means, but I’m afraid anyway.
“What about my mother?” I force myself to ask, trying to sound natural, normal, despite the terrible tenderness filling me.
My mother has not had an easy life. My mother has battled alone.
I look at Jean-Marc and try to contain the rush of anger. He has no right attacking Mom, or any business criticizing her. What’s happened in my mother’s life should happen to no one, let alone a woman.
Women are just grown-up little girls, and little girls may appear delicate and fragile, but they also dream of Jedis and samurais, pirates and kings. They want adventure and excitement. They want life. But mostly, they crave happily-ever-afters.
My mother did not get a happily-ever-after.
And I see my mom in an old black-and-white portrait when she was five, and she has a big bow in her hair and dark spiral curls à la Shirley Temple and a stiff little dress on, pudgy knees, ankle socks, and black patent Mary Janes. My mother is smiling into the camera nervously, hopefully, as she waits for her big moment to come.
Her big moment.
I feel a massive lump inside my chest, huge and hot and tender.
Her big moment never came.
“She scared me.” Jean-Marc laughs a little, as if he’s making a joke.
I feel my lips stretch, and I don’t know what it looks like on the outside, but on the inside I feel as if I were twelve again, on one of those nights when Mom had a rare date and she invited her date home for Sunday night dinner, and her roast is tasty, her mashed potatoes light as air, and the table is set with an ecru lace cloth and two white taper candles and a plastic floral centerpiece that looks dusty even to me. But her date is stiff, and he can’t seem to get comfortable with the three little Bishop kids sitting around the table, staring at him. And Mom is trying so hard to make conversation, trying so hard to have a nice evening, trying so hard to be a woman and a mom, and that’s maybe the thing I remember most. She’s just trying so hard, an
d it’s too hard, and everyone knows it but her, and I want to go upstairs to my room. I want to go far away from the good person she is and from the mistakes she unwittingly makes.
“I know this is unfair, but I thought”—and here Jean-Marc breaks off, rubs his forehead, and smiles his charming, rueful smile—”I thought you were going to turn out like her. Become her.”
I stare at him, appalled.
Mom liked you, I want to say. She thought you were wonderful. She thought you were just what I needed. Prince Charming from a glorious French chateau.
I get to my feet, a jerky motion, and stare down at him.
Toad, I think—a big, green, horrid wart-covered toad.
I kissed him, and there was no prince in disguise, no Mr. Wonderful waiting to be freed from a witch’s evil spell.
Just a toad that will always be a toad. So much for the Frog Prince.
I grip my cup so hard, I crush the top half. “I’d love to be like my mom.” My voice trembles with fury. “Because she thinks the best about people, not the worst.”
And I walk out, quickly, not even bothering to slow down to throw my cup away.
I’m on the street, heading back to the office, when Jean-Marc races after me, catches up with me, but I don’t stop walking. I just keep going, heading for City Events and my desk and peace.
“I’m sorry,” Jean-Marc says, taking my arm, dragging me to a stop. “I’m sorry.”
“Sorry?” He’s attacked my mother, the one person who was always on his side, and he’s sorry?
“I hope you’ll accept my apology.”
Thank God this is over. Thank God this empty sham of a relationship ended when it did. I can only imagine the misery if we’d been stupid enough to have a baby together.
There are small blessings, I think, as I look him in the eye. As toads go, he’s still good-looking, still handsome and charming to those who don’t know him. But I do. And he’s not charming anymore. He’s not what I want or need. And he never was supposed to be my future.
“Sure, Jean-Marc.” I drag my purse strap higher on my shoulder. “Go back to your lily pad and don’t give it a second thought.”
“My lily what?” he asks, not understanding.