Ms. Taken Identity

by Dan Begley

  I’ve hit her from several angles and she’s not sure which piece of information to respond to. She opts for the one I hadn’t expected. “Does that mean you write, too?”

  “Who, me? No. Are you kidding? My cousin and I just talk a lot, since her fiancé left her after she dropped out of school. And put on the weight. I just read her stuff. Actually, I represent her, too. I’m trying to help her get something published. It’s tough out there, you know. Though you probably don’t, since, of course, you are who you are.”

  She nods, serious-faced. “I still remember those days. I wasn’t always who I am.”

  “But you are now.” I give her a wink—a wink!—and now I realize where all this is leading. “Which reminds me. She’d absolutely kill me if I told her I ran into you and didn’t get an autograph.” I slide the book over to her. “Would you mind?”

  “Of course not. What’s your cousin’s name?”

  “Bradley.”

  “Bradley?”

  “That’s right. It’s short. For Bradjolet.”

  “‘Bradjo-what’?”

  “Bradjolet. It’s French. Her father’s a chef. Just put ‘Bradley,’ though. That’s what everyone calls her.”

  You can tell she’s trying to untangle the French from the chef from the Bradley, and it’s not really working, but I’m not helping, so she just smiles politely and writes a note.

  “How’s that?” she asks, passing the book back.

  I read what she’s written and nearly choke. “Perfect.”

  She checks her watch again and this time says she absolutely needs to go, since Brent is probably out in the car having a heart attack. We shake hands again.

  “I really enjoyed talking with you, Mitch. A lot.” She gives me one of those deep, lingering gazes, and hasn’t let go of my hand. “So let me give you something.” She reaches into her purse and hands me a card. “This is my office in Chicago, and my e-mail. And here’s something else.” She scribbles a number on the back. “My cell phone. If your cousin has something you think I should read, give me a call.” She gives me the once-over again. “Or if you just want to come to Chicago sometime, on me, I’m sure we could find something to do…”

  I’m not making it up: that’s how she ends our conversation!

  “Uh, yeah, sure. I’ll keep it in mind.”

  With that, she puts on her shades, picks up her coffees, and breezes out the door, and I’m left with an autographed copy of The Cappuccino Club and the cell phone number of the most popular chick-lit writer in the country. Just my usual Saturday morning at Starbucks.

  I sit back in my chair and take another look at what she’s written: “Bradley, Never give up. Listen to your heart, and write with it. Katharine Longwell.” Are you kidding me? How gullible is this woman? I’ll be laughing about this one for weeks. But my mind’s still humming, still kicking around ideas, not ready to let it go, till… I bolt forward so quickly that the guy next to me flinches. Suddenly they’re with me at the table—Vanessa, Gisella, Sasha—Sirens all of them, clamoring for my attention, whispering honeyed temptations into my ear: Do it, do it, do it.

  Do what? Do what? Oh my god, you don’t mean… that?

  Yes, that!

  Outrageous. Unthinkable. Absurd. And yet…

  I mean, how hard can it be? Katharine is no Rhodes scholar, yet she does it and makes a fortune. And look at everything I have going for me. I’m a writer. I have an “in” with a famous author who said she’d read it. I have a built-in pseudonym with Cousin Bradley. This is perfect! The only thing I’m missing is a plot, but who cares? Give me two weeks to work on some cockamamie scenario about engagement rings and shopping sprees and bridesmaid dresses and impossibly dreamy guys, and voila! Hello publication. Not exactly the way I’d dreamed of getting my name (or my cousin’s) into print, but like the Stones once sang, you can’t always get what you want. So chick-lit it is.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Bradley and I shoot baskets on Sunday, and afterwards I show him the book and tell him my plan. He thinks it’s funny but not hilarious—he doesn’t have an ax to grind with these people like I do—though he does offer a few words of advice: Baby steps before the masterpiece, little grasshopper. We both agree my first step is to research chick-lit, sniff out its essence, capture it in its pure, undiluted form, before I turn it all on its Prada-loving head. So I’m off to Bookzilla.

  I grab copies of all the chick-lit books that have sold at least a billion copies. How do I know they’ve sold a billion copies? Because if I’ve heard of them, they must have. I prefer to be a gentleman about this and not name names (though Katharine I already have, but you know why), but I will provide summaries, from which you might be able to tell which books I’m talking about, since, by some coincidence, you may have a friend who’s read one of them and spilled the details. One is about a chubby British girl who keeps a diary, listing all the calories she’s consumed and cigarettes she’s smoked, and she cheers herself when she’s good, and scolds herself when she’s bad, and pursues a guy at work, who turns out to be an ass, and winds up with a guy who wore a bad sweater the first time they met. Another is about a chubby American girl whose ex-boyfriend writes an article about what it’s like to be involved with a larger woman, which pisses her off, but she decides she wants him back, but he’s not interested, but his father dies so they sleep together, and she winds up pregnant, but now he’s with someone else, and oh, what to do. Another is about a young fashion assistant who dreams of working for The New Yorker, but she’s stuck working for the boss from hell, who wears a certain style of designer clothing (which is in the title) and treats her like dirt. Those are three of them. There are others.

  For the next few hours, I sit at a table in the café and pick these books apart, and it’s like I’m back in high school, sophomore year, dissecting a frog, only without the safety goggles or formaldehyde smell. I pull back the skin and expose a network of handbags and bitchy bosses and decadent desserts, observe the way it’s all put together, then go deeper, prodding and poking, till at last I get to the vital organs and the heart of what makes this monster tick: hunks. Of course, along the way I see plenty that’s not for the faint of heart, appalling and nauseating sights that, if you’re not expecting them, can turn your stomach and make you gag. But I stick with it, so that by the time the store is closing, I have a model of the chick-lit heroine and the plot she finds herself in. I’ve cracked their code and discovered their Magdalene, who turns out to be ten pounds heavier than she’d like to be. And just in case I’m found out by any keepers of the chick-lit grail secrets, and my notes tampered with or destroyed, I’ve boiled it down to six Fs for easy recall: female fantasy fulfillment = food, fashion, fucking.

  I get back to the apartment and decide nothing should begin tonight, though I do clip the author photo of Katharine from the back cover of The Cappuccino Club and tape it on the wall for inspiration. I feel good knowing Auntie Katharine will be watching over me.

  I’ve given the class a Hemingway story for today: “Hills Like White Elephants.” It’s a spare, tightly written piece, and the students do a good job catching the drift of what’s going on, but unlike the fiasco we had with Updike, I want them to give intense scrutiny to craft and technique, crawl into Hemingway’s skin, figure out why he made the shadow “warm,” the hills “white and long,” the country “brown and dry.” Because they just as easily could have been something else (lots of words in the dictionary, last time I checked).

  I’ll admit it’s heady stuff, so I’m not surprised when I get a knock on my office door a little later. What I am surprised by is who it is. Molly.

  “Busy?” she asks.

  For you, always. “I’ve got a minute.”

  She swaggers in and plops down before I ask her to sit. She’s almost wearing a skirt. And a top.

  “What’s up?” I ask.

  She smoothes the fabric of her skirt, which quickly turns into tanned leg.

  “So where do I stan
d in this class?” she asks.

  “How so?”

  “In terms of a grade.”

  “Ah, it’s way too early for that. We’re only a couple weeks in.”

  “But based on everything so far.”

  “Okay, fine. Based on everything so far… one paper, which was an A; homework assignments, which you do; and you speak up in class. I guess I’d say your grade is pretty good at this point. But a lot can change between now and the end,” I add ominously.

  “So it’s an A?” she says, ignoring the last part.

  I make a face that I hope conveys the fact there could be some doubt on the matter, but I don’t think it does.

  “Good.” She crosses her legs left over right, and Sharon Stone pops into my mind. Basic Instinct Sharon Stone. She flashes me a piece of paper. “Can you give me a hand with this?”

  It’s one of the fliers that’s plastered all over campus, announcing the Shakespeare San Diego Program over winter break. Students need to nab a faculty sponsor to write a letter of recommendation, but freshmen have to make a strong impression and move faster than most (though I’d be willing to bet that’s Molly’s specialty, making an impression and moving fast). Ordinarily, I’d rather not give her the time of day, but this I’ll do, since both of us will know for all eternity that she came crawling to me for help. (Smug? Petty? Who, me?)

  “So when do you want it?” I ask.

  She arches her brows suggestively. “When do I want what?” she says coyly, as if we’re talking about something else.

  “The recommendation letter, Molly. The letter.”

  That one makes her laugh. “Oh, Mitch, sorry. You’ve got it all wrong. I already have one from Professor Anderson. He’s the one who suggested I apply.”

  Professor Anderson? The chair of the department? The guy I can barely squeeze five minutes out of to discuss my dissertation?

  “When did you talk to Professor Anderson?” I grill her.

  “Actually, I do talk to him, every Tuesday and Thursday. I have him for Poets of the Harlem Renaissance.”

  But that’s a junior seminar! I start to object, then cut myself short. Because that’s exactly the reaction she wants, so she can gloat about the special consent form and dean’s signature and whatever the hell else she coaxed out of half the administrators on campus to get into the class.

  “Wonderful.” Shoot me. “So what do you need from me?”

  “Just your phone number. They may call to ask you how I’m doing in class. Reference sort of thing.”

  “Whatever.”

  She pulls out a little black book and I rattle off the number, then make it clear I’m busy and have plenty of work to do and this conversation has come to an end. She stands and lingers in the doorway.

  “You know, your campus number would have been fine. But this is cool, too.” She puts a hand on her hip, a little extra arch in her back. “Not accidentally on purpose trying to tell me something, are you, Mister Samuel?”

  She winks and breezes on her way, and I slam the door till it falls off its hinges. In my mind, anyway.

  When I get back to the apartment, I ditch any plans that might require an ounce of brain, like coming up with a lesson plan, or reading for my dissertation, or putting the cap back on the toothpaste. This is all about getting in touch with my inner chick. So I watch Oprah.

  I’m hoping for something that’ll build on yesterday’s time at the bookstore, maybe a show called “A Male Writer’s Guide to Further Understanding the Ways and Habits of the Chick-lit Heroine.” Of course, I’m asking a lot there, so I’ll settle for a makeover episode. But what I get is Jay Leno, and Jay talks a lot about comedy and kids doing comedy, because he’s written a book about how to be the funniest kid in your class, and he brings out a group of precocious kindergartners who giggle a lot and pick at their clothes and do stand-up bits, which include a couple of haltingly told knock-knock jokes about poo. Cute, but not exactly the show I was looking for, to be honest.

  And maybe it’s the disappointing Oprah that leads to an unproductive evening with the writing. I can’t seem to get anything going, since those topics—Jay Leno, kid stand-up comics, poo jokes—weren’t high on the list of chick-lit plot devices I gleaned yesterday. Even so, when Oprah gives you lemons, you make lemonade, so I sit and wrangle with it, and the best I can come up with is that my very witty heroine is slightly overweight, so she becomes addicted to fashion to help her feel better about herself, which causes her to go into debt, which causes her fiancé to get angry and break up with her, which makes her eat lots of ice cream and run the credit card up even more and sink into despair; but then she gets her scrappy on and decides to go off to comedy camp, where she becomes the world’s most famous knock-knock joke teller and meets a Hugh Jackman look-alike who loves a size-twelve woman who can make him laugh, and they have lots of sex and live happily ever after. I think I have everything I need in there, but the plot strikes me as a bit ridiculous, even by chick-lit standards. (I think.) Which means my evening is a total waste.

  I go to bed that night feeling not quite so rosy as I did yesterday at this time. I thought I’d have a few chapters done, or at least a draft. But no need to panic yet. I’ve only been at it one evening, and I figure even the real chick-lit aficionados like Katharine Longwell need at least a week or two to crank out one of these things. I fluff my pillow, get comfortable, and cheer myself with the thought that tomorrow is another day. Yes, things will be better in the morning.

  But they aren’t.

  Nor are they any better in the afternoon, or evening, or night, nor on Wednesday or Thursday or Friday, despite the fact that I’ve revised my methods, expanded my field of research, become more inclusive, so that instead of just watching Oprah, now I’m watching Dr. Phil and Rachael Ray and Ellen and the Oxygen and Lifetime and Hallmark networks, and everything on Bravo, and shows like Grey’s Anatomy and Ugly Betty and America’s Next Top Model, and any movie with Meg Ryan, all the while eating my Chunky Monkey and M&Ms; and I’m paging through Glamour and Allure and Marie Claire and Town & Country and W and Cosmo (no Molly article, yet) and reading articles called “Put the Oh! in Your Orgasm” and “Blow His Mind with These Down Under Tricks” and “Seven Saucy Secrets to Spice Up Your Booty Call,” and I’ve been into mall stores and boutiques called White House/Black Market and bebe and Bronx-Diba Shoes and Claudia Milan and Ylang Ylang and Aeropostale and Harari and Lucky Brand Dungarees and Satine and Anthropologie and BCBG Max Azria, where I’ve seen metallic sweater dresses and floral halters and linen flounce skirts and lace dot camisoles and raw-edged capris and fringed denim shorts and halter jumpsuits and silk charmeuse shirts and bra top dresses (with hidden bralette shaping) and paisley tunics, and shoes, lots of shoes, such as slingbacks, sandals, stilettos, platforms, pumps, slides, wedges, and boots—ankle and mid-calf and knee high—and I’ve seen purses and clutches and totes and pochettes and slouchy hobos and saddlebags and satchels and baguettes, and I’ve smelled perfumes and held diamond rings, all the while thanking the clerks for their patience, since I’m only a stupid guy taking notes, trying to find the perfect gift for my girlfriend, but all of it to no avail, so that by Saturday night, as I lay on the couch with my empty ice cream cartons and candy wrappers and new love handles, I don’t have a single useable page of the novel. And I am a total wreck.

  So what’s the problem here? Oh, sure, my characters look the part, in their Balenciaga minis and Jimmy Choo shoes, with their Lancôme brush-on lip shine plumper stashed in their Louis Vuitton purses. But get up close, stand next to them, and poke them with your finger, and you’ll notice something odd: they don’t flinch, they don’t poke back. They’re mannequins. They’re like those Indians in the old westerns who speak slowly and drop all the articles and use bad grammar: “I tell white man he have nothing fear from buffalo rider.” Wooden, stilted, one-dimensional.

  And the reason I can’t make them breathe or move or talk is that I don’t understand the real people they�
��re supposed to be like. Women who take surveys to find out if they’re more like Jen or Angelina, or know that wrap dresses tend to slim a curvy figure, or that skirts in twill or gabardine give shape to a saggy butt, or that bows are in but sparkly brooches are out, or how to apply Enjoue Beaute Skin Glow in Pearly Pink or Giorgio Armani Luminous Silk Foundation in No. 5 to get Eva Longoria’s smoky eyes or Kirsten Dunst’s flushed cheeks. Who are these people? They may as well be from another planet, and if you’re saying, “Actually, men are from Mars and women from Venus,” then you’re precisely the type of woman I just don’t understand.

  Women like Hannah, or Skyler, or any of the women I’ve ever dated, or hung around, or liked, they don’t say things like that, or care much about wrap dresses or lip plumper or bows or sparkly brooches or Jen or Angelina or skin glow or Eva’s smoky eyes. And I guess I’ve always known such women exist—one hears rumors—but I haven’t exactly made the effort to get to know them and their habits and mannerisms. It seemed like a good and honorable thing, to have missed out on all their frippery. But now I’m paying the price.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Bradley and I are watching football Sunday afternoon, and even though the Rams have won and the Chiefs are winning, and big, I’m not enjoying any of it. Bradley notices and asks me what’s wrong, so I tell him.

  “Don’t sweat it, man,” he says, like we’re talking about a hangnail. “You just need to spend some time with my sister and her dancer friends.”

  At first I think it’s code for something else, and I expect him to repeat it and make finger quotes around “sister” and “dancer friends,” or at least one of them, and then explain the true meaning. But he doesn’t. He just goes back to watching the game. Then I remember: he actually does have a sister and she does have dancer friends. Still...