“Dana, I swear, I felt like I was in a Norah Ephron movie. It was so spontaneous and romantic and he was just so...so, I don’t know...matter of fact. Hey, I like you. Hey, let’s hang out. Hey, I’m gonna kiss you now.”
“How was the kiss? Was there tongue?”
“There was until the bus came.”
Dana had been my best friend since grammar school and we still did everything together. Everybody loved her. She was one of the most driven and authentic people I knew and was great at her job. Dana worked as a public relations manager and had a natural ability for putting people at ease. She was also the spitting image of a young Jodie Foster, with piercing blue eyes and skin I’d been jealous of since the day I met her.
“How is my buddy Josh doing?” Dana and Josh dated briefly in high school, but they soon became more like brother and sister.
“Same old Josh. We had a blast. I hooked him up with a girl. Katie. You’d like her.”
“I love Josh.”
“Everybody loves Josh. He was in rare form this weekend.”
We merged onto the interstate. The Atlanta skyline glared at me. I felt guilty. I had been cheating on her after all.
“What’s Simon up to tonight?” Dana and Simon had been dating for the last three years and living together for the last two. Simon was one of the good guys. He was a handsome graphic designer and avid runner. He was crazy about Dana.
"He’s home watching the Cowboys-Broncos game."
“Oh, I’m taping Sex & the City tonight,” I said. “Wanna come over tomorrow and watch it?”
“Isn’t this week’s the one with Jon Bon Jovi?”
“Yep.”
“Then yes, definitely.”
“Thanks for picking me up at the airport.”
“Of course! I couldn’t wait to hear about your weekend.”
“Well, I have something else to tell you, but I need a margarita first.”
“Oh god. This has to involve Dalton.” She knew him way too well. She knew us way too well. Dana had been there from the very beginning of our relationship. She never once had a problem telling Dalton what a dick he was to his face and, oddly enough, he adored her for that. When things were good between Dalton and me, Dana loved him like a brother. When they were bad, she despised him. But she also knew how much I loved him, and she was always rooting for our relationship to work.
We arrived at the restaurant around ten and grabbed a table outside. Soon our regular order of frozen margaritas and cheese dip appeared. I told her about the phone call.
“He’s so fucking predictable.” She stirred her margarita with a straw. “He always does this.”
I nodded. “It’s the only thing I can depend on him for.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, how many times has he left me stranded at the airport? I mean, I could never even count on him to pick me up, which is why I always ask you. But anytime I’m experiencing a little happiness that doesn’t involve him, he shows up like clockwork.”
“Yep, every time,” Dana agreed. “And orgasms.”
“What?”
“That’s the other thing you could always depend on him for. Mind-blowing orgasms.”
“Like I needed that reminder.”
“Hey, maybe the hot waiter can help you out with that,” she laughed. “Aren’t you the least bit curious what the voice mail said?”
“Of course. I mean, I hope it’s not something bad and that everyone in his family is okay. I would feel terrible if something happened.”
“Michelle would have called you if it was an emergency.” Michelle was Dalton’s sister. We were good friends. She always took my side over his and would regularly apologize for her brother “being such an asshole.”
“Why can’t he just leave me alone?”
“Because you always take him back.”
“Not this time.”
“Why do you always take him back? You always say never, and then you let him right back in.”
“Because I don’t want to be alone. I hate being the odd man out. Party of three. Party of five. Plus, I keep thinking he’ll change. That we’ll change together. Grow together.”
“You really think Dalton’s capable of change?”
“Why not? I’m constantly rearranging my life for him.”
“And there you have it,” Dana said.
“What?”
“Think about what you just said. Your life revolves around Dalton. His needs. His schedule. His ego. Sam, I know you love him, but sometimes you just have to let go of someone you love for your own good.”
As usual, she was right. I had no response. No defense. So I ordered another margarita.
After dinner, we headed back to my apartment. Dana wanted to borrow a dress to wear to a work function later that week, so she came upstairs. My apartment was on the third floor of an old Ford factory where they used to make Model T cars. It was built in 1915 and converted to lofts in the mid-eighties. The building shared a parking lot with a grocery store that was known as “Murder Kroger” after a girl was shot and killed there. There was also a nearby liquor store and several retail shops underneath, including a nail salon, Chinese restaurant, and the infamous Model T Drag Bar. It was an incredibly cool place to live, and despite the Murder Kroger moniker, I always felt safe.
My apartment, however, was anything but cool. I opened the door and was assaulted by the heat.
“And I’m officially in hell.”
I sat my suitcase down and turned on the air conditioner. Dana made a beeline for my closet.
“Oh, I have something for you!” I shouted at her in the next room. I opened my backpack and took out the pashmina and a couple of bars of the mint soap. The smell took me right back to the flea market and right back to The Waiter. I smiled. Dana walked back in with the dress and hung it on the doorknob. I handed her the goodies.
“Oh this is beautiful!” She wrapped the black pashmina around her shoulders. “It’s so soft. And these smell amazing! Thank you! Okay, I gotta pee and then I gotta go.”
She sat the soaps down on the table and disappeared into the bathroom, still wearing the pashmina. I unzipped my suitcase. Right on top was my pashmina. Underneath was the denim dress I wore the day I met The Waiter. Every piece of clothing was now a piece of history. I took out my Steve Maddens. I thought of Josh and laughed. And there was the black pantsuit I’d worn to my job interview. If I got this job, I would be moving to Manhattan in a matter of weeks.
Dana came back in the living room. “Okay babe, I’m outta here.”
“Thanks again for the pickup!” I hugged her.
“Thanks for the dress! I’ll get it back to you this weekend. Love you.”
“Love you too. Tomorrow night, Sex & the City.”
Dana gave me the thumbs up as she headed to the elevator. I closed the door. I walked over to my entertainment center and turned on the CD player. Fiona Apple began to sing. She would keep me company as I finished unpacking. But first, I needed some iced tea. That’s one thing you can’t get in New York. Sweet tea was like water in the south, and I hadn’t had any in four days. I went to the kitchen and poured myself a glass.
As I walked back into the living room, I saw that Dana had forgotten her soaps and left them on the table. I was just about to call her cell phone to tell her when the downstairs buzzer rang. I immediately buzzed her back up. And then I went back to unpacking.
A few minutes later, Dana knocked. I opened the door. It wasn’t Dana. It was Dalton.
“So what,” he said as he stood there towering over me, “you were just never going to talk to me again?” His hair was longer than the last time I saw him. He was wearing a black t-shirt, jeans and Doc Marten boots.
“What are you doing here Dalton?”
“I need to talk to you.” He walked right in and sat down at the table.
“You’ve got five minutes.” I closed the door and leaned against it, my arms folded tightly in front of me as some sort
of subconscious shield. What I really needed was a bulletproof vest.
Dalton looked at my suitcase. “Where have you been?”
“New York.”
He picked up a bar of soap from the table and sniffed it. Then he stared at me, saying nothing. Fiona continued to sing about shadow-boxing in the background, which seemed eerily appropriate for the current situation.
“Talk,” I said.
“I’m in Atlanta,” he replied.
“I see that.”
“No, I mean, I’m working on a project here in the Atlanta office for a while. I’m not traveling.”
“So?”
“So I just wanted to see you.”
“You’ve seen me.”
“And tell you that I was sorry.”
“Okay then.”
I opened the door and motioned for him to leave. He sat there for a minute. Then he stood up and walked over to me. I couldn’t look at him. He put his hand on the back of my neck. I froze. He leaned down and kissed my forehead.
“I’m sorry baby,” he said. Then he left.
I shut the door. The smell of his cologne lingered in the apartment. That same fucking cologne he was wearing the day I met him. I stood there, trying to process what had just happened. And then I started to cry.
In a matter of minutes, Dalton had dredged up all the feelings I’d been trying so hard to suppress over the last month. And I hated him for it. Part of me wanted to believe that he was actually sorry, and for that, I hated myself.
It was now midnight and I was exhausted. I changed into my pajamas and sat down at the computer to check my email before going to bed, a bad habit I’d developed that I couldn’t seem to shake. In any case, I figured it would take my mind off Dalton and give me a head start on my work week. I grabbed my day planner and opened it, pen in hand. There, for the month of August, were twenty-eight consecutive days of hand-drawn smiley faces representing every day I hadn’t spoken to Dalton. If I were an alcoholic, I would have a 36-day chip. But tonight, I was thrown off the wagon.
I logged in to my work email. Most of the messages were junk that I deleted immediately. A couple were from Brenda, the bitchy account manager that hated me because I refused to flirt with sales managers at company outings and happy hours. “They pay your salary,” she would say. “The least you could do is show them some attention.” Her emails could definitely wait until tomorrow. Then I noticed an email from an address I didn’t recognize. The subject line simply said, “Hi!” I opened it.
Hey Red! Hope you had a safe flight. How’s Hotlanta? Let me know if you hear about the job. (You’re going to get it.) Enjoyed our morning stroll. We’ll talk soon.
P.S. Your lips taste like grape juice.
I read it again. And again. And then again. Then I got up and walked over to my suitcase. I picked up the pashmina and wrapped it around me. My morning moment had found me again.
I crawled into bed and turned out the light.
CHAPTER 7
◆◆◆
Friday afternoon at the office. It had been one week since my job interview and I still hadn’t heard anything. I would have been completely depressed if it weren’t for the nightly ICQ chats I’d been having with The Waiter.
It started with a phone call on Monday. After talking for over an hour, The Waiter suggested ICQ messaging to avoid the inevitable long-distance charges we were about to rack up. We exchanged usernames and our bedtime chats began, usually after he had gotten home from work.
During our Wednesday night chat, a message from Dalton popped up. It simply said, “Hi.” I simply ignored it and changed the settings so he couldn’t see when I was online. I was still pissed about him ambushing me. Plus, I wasn’t going to let him interrupt my catching up with The Waiter every night.
I had also managed to catch up with Josh. He and Katie had gone out again. Things were going well and they both couldn’t wait until I “got my ass back up there.” I couldn’t either. I was craving New York. And I was really craving The Waiter.
When I first heard his voice on the phone, I got that same giddy feeling as the day he kissed me. I hadn’t even known him for an entire week, but I liked him. I really liked him. I had learned more about The Waiter in five days than I learned about Dalton the entire first year we were together.
Around three o’clock, Bitchy Brenda stopped by my cubicle. “Still haven’t heard from corporate?” Brenda was in her early fifties. She was five-foot-ten with frizzy blonde hair. People in the office called her “Big Bird.” It was common knowledge that she was sleeping with half the sales team.
“No, nothing yet.”
“Maybe you’re just not cut out for New York.” She smirked and walked away.
My office phone rang. I picked it up.
“She’s a cunt.”
I laughed audibly. It was my co-worker Deb who sat directly across from me. I swiveled in my chair to look at her.
“Well, I couldn’t just yell it out, but she is a see-you-next-Tuesday,” she said quietly into the phone. “She probably sabotaged your interview. She knows everybody up there in corporate.”
It was true. Brenda made frequent trips to the home office in New York. And even though I didn’t report to her, she could certainly hold sway with the powers that be.
“You may be right. She does hate me.” My other line rang. “I gotta get this.” I hung up with Deb and took the other call. It was corporate. I didn’t get the job. They hired someone that already lived in New York. But they would keep me in mind for any open positions in the future, blah, blah, blah.
I knew exactly why I didn’t get the job. It was Bitchy Brenda. She had probably just heard from one of her contacts and - after not speaking to me all week - made it a point to stroll by my desk just now and drop a little condescension. I felt defeated. And I wanted to cry.
I turned back to Deb. “I didn’t get it. You were right.”
She got up and walked over to my desk. “Fuck that bitch. Let’s get outta here.”
It was pretty common for staff to leave early on Friday afternoons, especially in the summer. There were client events or happy hours or having to “drop off some artwork” for a customer. Most of these were excuses to hit the bar, which is exactly what we were doing. Plus, it was Labor Day weekend.
We decided to go to Manny’s Tavern. It was just ten minutes from the NationsBank Plaza where our office was located. When Deb and I arrived around four, it was already crowded. Manny’s was the closest thing to Cheers you could find in the south. Everybody knew everybody, and we were all regulars. The drinks were cheap but stout and the crowd was friendly but sometimes obnoxious.
I called Dana before I left the office and told her about the job. She said she’d meet us here after work. I needed all the moral support I could get. I knew that even if Bitchy Brenda had nothing to do with it, which I wholeheartedly believed she did, there was still a chance that I wouldn’t get the job. But I was so hopeful. Now I just wanted to drink myself into oblivion.
Dana arrived about an hour later. I was already on my second apple martini. “I’m so sorry, babe.” She gave me an extended hug. “You’ll get the next one. A better one.”
“And Brenda will get herpes.” Deb clinked my glass with hers.
“She’s probably already got it. Maybe that’s why she’s in such a bad mood all the time.”
“I think this calls for a girls’ night out,” Dana said.
Deb was in.
“I’m gonna need a nap first. I’m pretty tipsy as it is.”
“Give me your keys. Let’s finish this round and we’ll go pick up Simon. He can drive your car back. Then I’m picking you up around nine and we’re going out. I’m not going to let you sit home and mope.”
But of course, that’s exactly what I wanted to do. Instead, I took a two-hour nap and a long hot bath. I decided to channel my anger and disappointment into determination. I would blow off steam tonight and spend the rest of the long weekend scouring Monster.co
m and the New York Times classifieds for jobs. I would get back up on that work horse. I would get my ass back to New York.
Our night began with dinner at Ru San’s. It continued with stops at Leopard Lounge and Nomenclature Museum, two clubs in midtown that were within walking distance of each other. Leopard Lounge was the place to be seen drinking expensive cocktails, and Nomenclature was the place to listen to alternative music with alternative people. Around midnight, we headed to the Clermont Lounge.
The Clermont is an iconic Atlanta club that’s been around since the sixties. It’s referred to as the place “where strippers go to die.” That’s part of its charm. A strip club located in the basement of a run-down hotel on Ponce, and not even a five-minute walk from my apartment, the Clermont was known for two things. One, it had the best DJs in Atlanta, and two, Blondie - the legendary stripper that was so famous she had her own comic book. Blondie was also famous for crushing beer cans between her enormous breasts. But I suppose the real reason everyone clamored to the Clermont was because it was the one place in Atlanta where you could just be yourself. And enjoy everyone else being themselves. At the Clermont, the freaks were the beautiful people. And we were all freaks.
The music inside was pounding and everybody on the tiny dance floor - including the three of us - was dripping with sweat. But every time a song would fade out and we would think about taking a break, an even better song would come on that kept us dancing.
We saw Simon and his friend Sean walk in. Dana motioned that we’d meet them over at the bar. They had gone to the Braves game earlier and then to a few sports bars downtown. I’d met Sean once before. He was cute in a preppy sort of way. Not my type at all, but completely Deb’s.
“Alright, one more drink and I’m going home,” I said. “My feet are killing me.”
“That’s because you wore those heels,” Deb replied. “I don’t know how you walk in those things, much less dance in them.”
I leaned down to adjust the strap on my sandal. When I looked up, I saw Dalton standing by the entrance staring at me. He was talking to Dave, the bouncer.
The Waiter Page 4