“It’s not catty. It’s practical.”
“Practical? All right, this I gotta hear,” said Tucker.
“If you’ve only got a first impression to go on, the most practical thing you can do is reduce the guy down to his basics. It’s no different than my grandmother’s method of putting up preserves. Very sensible. Boil the substance down and label it.”
“I see,” said Tucker. “So for you the only discernable difference between canning and courting is straining the guy in question and coating him with a thin layer of wax?”
“Technically yes,” I said. “Even though I got the impression that some of these guys were just weird enough to consider being strained and waxed a vaguely kinky form of foreplay.”
“Mom!”
“Sorry, honey. Forget you heard your Mommy say foreplay. But don’t forget what I’m about to tell you. There are a few guys in my little notepad that under no circumstances you are to go out with should they call you, starting with a man named Brooks Newman.”
Joy rolled her eyes. “Brooks Newman, what a character. I think he took the number of almost every woman he sat down with. Isn’t he the guy who gave you those other on-line dating sites for me to try? The ones you said are more ‘appropriate’ for me than SinglesNYC?”
“Yes, but — ” (Okay, so Brooks actually called them “duds,” and it was me who told Joy they were more “appropriate” for a girl her age. But what else could I do? I couldn’t very well tell my daughter she’d be better off on-line dating through two “dud” sites, could I?)
“Mom, I’m not in high school anymore. I can make my own decisions about my personal life. Don’t you trust me?”
I didn’t see any way to answer honestly without causing World War Three, so I didn’t answer. Not directly. “Okay, then, why don’t you just tell me and Tucker who you liked?”
“No. You’ll just shoot them down.”
“I won’t,” I said.
“Promise?” asked Joy.
My reassuring smile felt as though it were wilting into an anxious grimace. “I’ll do my best.”
“Okay, Mom, I’ll tell you who I connected with. But only if you tell me who you connected with.”
“I didn’t make any connections. Your turn.”
Joy narrowed her eyes. “I don’t believe you.”
“Believe me.”
“But Nan said we were supposed to make three. Those were the rules.”
“I know, honey. I just chose not to play by them.”
Joy flipped though the notepad. “What about Mr. Wall Street?”
I closed my eyes, trying to picture that meeting. “Nice kid. Strong head on his shoulders, handsome, pleasant, good sense of humor. Late twenties. I liked him — for you.”
“I liked him, too,” said Joy. “And he asked me to lunch.”
I smiled. “See. I was right, wasn’t I?”
“Okay, so we agree on one guy.”
Joy flipped through more notes. “I can’t tell what you thought of this one.” She pointed. “Mr. Weirdly Intense Painter.”
“Mars?” Oh, god, no. “Did you know he admitted to being arrested?”
“He was sort of intense wasn’t he?”
“Sort of intense? That man would win a stare-off with Charles Manson.”
“Who?”
“Never mind, honey. You didn’t like Mars, did you?” My teeth clenched.
“It wouldn’t matter if I did. He said he’d already made his connection.”
I exhaled with extreme relief. “He told me the same thing.”
“Yeah, but you know the weirdest thing about the guy wasn’t his intensity — I found that sort of a turn-on actually. The weirdest thing was he said he’d already made his connection before he even started talking to me.”
“Like I said, Joy, he did that with me, too. Don’t feel bad.”
“No, Mom, you don’t get what I mean. It’s not that I feel bad. It’s that it doesn’t make sense. I mean we all paid forty dollars each to supposedly meet as many people as we could in two hours, right? But I was only the second girl he sat down with.”
“That is odd,” said Tucker. “Who was the first? She really must have been something.”
“The first woman he sat down with was this tall redhead named Sahara McNeil,” said Joy. “She was sitting at the table to the left of mine and Mars just kept staring at her. It was kinda creepy, actually.”
There was only one tall redhead in that room. The one Bruce had left with — and I had wanted to strangle.
“How did you find out her full name?” I asked. “Did you talk to her?”
“No, one of the guys mentioned her name,” said Joy.
“Which one?”
“Let’s just see,” said Joy, smiling mischievously. She snatched my notepad back from Tucker and thumbed through it. “It wasn’t Mr. Slick…or Mr. Cabby/Musician.” Joy paused on that page. “I kinda liked Cabby/Musician. He invited me to see his band at CBGB Wednesday night.”
Tucker snorted.
“What?” asked Joy.
“Sweetie, when you’ve lived in Manhattan a little longer you’ll learn that every third or fourth straight little boy under thirty with a rock star complex gets his sucky band a call-in gig at CBGB. But look on the bright side — you’re sure to meet his colleagues, friends, and family, because that’s pretty much the only way these bands fill those Bowery seats.”
“Now you’re the one being catty,” Joy said.
“Bring earplugs,” Tucker advised.
With a sigh of annoyance, Joy went back to my notepad and kept flipping. “Here’s the guy — the one who told me the redhead’s name? It was this really cool dude named Bruce.”
My heart sank. Completely sank.
“I need an espresso,” I said.
I turned to put the coffee through the grinder. Funny how the hardest beans were no match for these sharp, little blades. When they whirred and spun, every whole little bean was aloofly chopped into unrecognizable bits — which is exactly what I felt was happening to me.
“Mom? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“Ohmygod. Look what you wrote here about Bruce.”
“Give me that,” I said reaching. Joy stepped backward.
“Mom…what does this mean?”
“Honey, it’s just a few scribbles. Give it here!” I lunged but the counter stopped me.
“What does it say, Joy?” asked Tucker. “What did she label Bruce?”
“Mr. Right.”
Nine
“He just made a good impression on me, that’s all,” I tried to tell Joy.
“Mr. Right?” said Tucker. “I’d say that’s a little more significant than just ‘a good impression.’”
“Did he make a date with you?” asked Joy.
I studied my daughter’s pretty, pensive face, dreading her reaction. I knew very well that a part of Joy had never given up hope that I would one day get back together with her father.
Her grandmother (my ex-mother-in-law) felt the same way. Madame’s offer to me of equity over time — in the Blend and the duplex — was not a sole offer. She’d made the same deal with her son, Matteo, arranging our future so that we’d both one day co-own this building and its business, which, if fortune smiled, I assumed we would both eventually leave to Joy.
With her strategic little deal, my ex-mother-in-law was clearly harboring the same hopes as my daughter — that I’d one day remarry Matt.
But I couldn’t live my life by other people’s hopes.
Not anymore.
Getting back together with my ex-husband was off the charts. Out of the question. I’d remain civil to Matt, of course — sometimes even more than civil. There were times when I actually enjoyed Matt’s company, but as a friend. Nothing more.
I was through loving Matt too much. Through being infatuated with his larger-than-life presence. Through letting him hurt me. And if part of that meant becoming romantically involved with another man — or men — then so be it. It was time I moved on.
Still, I hated the idea of hurting Joy. This whole night was supposed to have been about my trying to prevent her from getting hurt.