By the Numbers (15 page)

I whisper, “You mean Karen Carpenter. Mary Chapin is alive and well and singing on tour.”

Patrick takes an angry bite of grilled lettuce and chews with great discontent. Karin ignores him. “Hey,” she asks, “where's Judith?”

“She texted back and just said, ‘family here, major chaos, pray for me.' I believe all the kids are home from college for the summer and it's too much so she couldn't make it,” I say.

“Bummer,” she replies.

The eight of us—Karin and her husband, Tom; Chris and me; Patrick and Michael; and my brother, Foster, and his wife/my college friend Judith—used to go out together all the time. Although everyone in the group is Team Penny, it's still like the band has somehow broken up, because without Chris, neither Tom nor Foster wants to hang out nearly as much. Judith's and Karin's husbands lobbied for Chris's attention, and he was a terrific sport, spending hours debating Tom's fantasy-football lineup while still showing equal enthusiasm for Foster's endless indecision over whether Callaway or TaylorMade was the better golf club manufacturer. Now we're much more splintered, and I don't believe the seven of us have been together more than a handful of times in the past year and a half. And when we are en masse, it's like our spiritual center is missing. Foster and Tom were beside themselves at the wedding, finally getting to see Chris again without having to feel somehow disloyal to me.

I hope that if and when I meet someone new, he'll be able to mesh with our group and we can regain a little bit of what we lost. Divorce doesn't just divide man and wife—it splits up the whole damn ecosystem.

“Hey, for my ‘About Me' section, why don't I say something about being a single woman looking for a kind, considerate, mature man to make our group whole again?” I suggest.

Karin stops chewing mid-bite and Michael drops his fork. Patrick's laughter begins as a sputter, but the more he tries to suppress it, the more it spurts out. After a couple of seconds, he is full-on guffawing, slapping the table, and dabbing his eyes with his napkin. Karin and Michael have joined in, too.

“What is so damned funny?” I ask.

Karin clears her throat. “Penny Candy, when you phrase it like that, you're basically asking an old man to have group sex with you and your friends.”

I consider what she's telling me.

“Maybe you should just write this section for me.”

• • • •

Men are winking at me!

Ha!

I'm unclear what winking means, but I assume it's positive and nonthreatening, and it's not like someone flashing his genitals at me on the train. (Karin assured me it's not that kind of Web site, so I consider this a win.) (And yes, her ‘About Me' section turned out nicely. She made me sound intelligent without being overbearing or closed off to having fun. Also, in no way would someone interpret my description as an orgy invitation, so that's a bonus.)

I wonder if I should hone my religion answer a tiny bit because I've already received an e-mail and apparently I'm not as ecumenical as I imagined. Should I specify “No Wiccans” going forward, or have I just heard from all of the fifty-year-old White Witches in the Skokie area?

Anyway, today was big. I made major strides. I have a live
dating profile on Match.com. Maybe I'll go on an actual date. Maybe soon my weekends will turn into something I actually look forward to?

Plus, I signed my listing agreement and faxed it back to Kathy, so my house is about to go on the market.

HA-HA, IT'S ALL UP FOR SALE NOW, BABY!

No, I'm not drunk—I only had two glasses of wine, but I did take an Uber to and from the city, just in case. (Tipsy, perhaps.)

If this is what moving on feels like, then . . . bring it on! I feel lighter and less encumbered than I have in a very long time. I feel like I'm about to start my second act in life and that there's this whole new world of possibilities out there for me. Probably not with a Wiccan, though. But best of luck casting your circles, Rowan Sage-river. I wish you really symmetrical pentacles, or whatever it is you're into, my magickal suitor.

I can't express how pleasant it is to lie here in bed and not be enraged. I wonder if some of my calm is because of the pillows. When I cleared them off the bed last Saturday night after the wedding, I never put them back. They've just been stacked on the window seat ever since. For the past week, every time I've gotten into bed without delay, I've thought,
Bonus month of my life back!

Before the wedding, I was holding on to everything so tightly—who knew that in letting go, I'd release all that built-up pressure? All that anger? I'm moving along with the stream now, literally going with the flow, instead of being lashed again and again by the water rushing past me as I cling tenuously to a limb.

I'm coming to accept that I can't change the past; I can only look to what's ahead of me.

And so far? That horizon is wide-open.

So, I'm alone and I've always hated to be alone, but I've found
there's a real peace that comes with the solitude. I've come to appreciate the stillness. Reflection is possible only in quiet like this. I should welcome the quiet now. I bet good times—boisterous times—are right around the bend, so I should appreciate the momentary tranquillity.

As I reflect on what I've accomplished today, I feel gratified.

I feel content.

I feel . . . so sleepy.

• • • •

“. . . marmalade.”

The Chianti is making me dream that Marjorie's standing over me, demanding to know where I keep my marmalade. Only she's pronouncing it mar-ma-LAHD. Yikes.

“
Penelope
. Where do you keep your thick-cut marmalade? I can't have my toast without my thick-cut marmalade.”

More of a nightmare, then.

Wasn't I dreaming about doing an audit with Daniel Craig a few minutes ago? I should get back to that dream. I will audit you anytime, second-best James Bond. I snuggle deeper under the covers, only to feel them being pulled back off of me.

I crack open one eye. Marjorie is indeed standing over me in the bright morning light of early summer. “Oh, good, you're awake. I can't find your marmalade anywhere. Thick-cut, Baxters if you've got it, but it must be orange. God help you if it's not orange. Where do you keep it?”

I blink and reach for my reading glasses. “Marjorie?”

Then I take off my glasses and rub my eyes.

“Which cabinet is your pantry? Couldn't find any in the icebox.”

“Marjorie?
” I pinch myself. Nope. I'm definitely awake. “Why are you here? Wait, am
I
here?”

“Oh, darling, it's too early for existential questions. I can't possibly ponder something like that until I have my toast, and I can't have my toast until I find the marmalade.”

“Did you look in the fridge door? That's the last place I saw it. Again, why are you here?”

She breezes out of the room. “Because Foster's wife is a
harridan
.”

Judith?

A
harridan
?

Judith is an accountant.

I hop out of bed and throw on my bathrobe, following Marjorie out the door. I pause in front of the guest room, which is now full to the rafters with my parents' things again. Questions race through my mind: Why aren't they in Florida? When did they get here? How did I not hear them come in? And what exactly is going on?

I hustle down the back stairway to the kitchen, where I find Marjorie spreading a microscopic layer of mar-ma-LAHD on her multigrain toast.

She holds up the almost-empty jar of Baxters. “Order some more, darling. We're going to be here for a while.”

October 1987

I
've made a huge mistake.

Massive. Colossal. Monumental. If errors were racehorses, mine would be the Secretariat of all blunders. What seemed like the best idea ever last night looks awfully different in the pale light of dawn.

Let's go through the checklist, shall we? I am now:

Unemployed
.

Unemployable in my field after having quit in such an unprofessional manner, namely leaving a rambling, drunken message on my boss's answering machine
.

Cheating on my lovely boyfriend.

My God, I am the Triple Crown of fuckups.

What was I thinking?

Sure, yesterday was a bad day, a terrible day, the worst day. And each day before that was no great shakes either.

Fine, I hated what I was doing and I could not see myself with Smith Barney for the long haul. But to be so flighty, so
impulsive, to simply take my ball and go home? Max is going to
murder
me. He can't stop “casually” mentioning to everyone that his kid's a stockbroker, even though I've yet to execute a single trade on my own.

Max is so cagey about his own past that all of his country club cohorts assume he made his money the same way they did—inheritance. They haven't a clue that he didn't finish high school, having lied about his age to start a union carpentry apprenticeship. (And a union member to boot? Bunky Cushman would die!) So having a child with a legitimately blue-blooded career is doubly important to him. Appearances are everything to him and Marjorie. But at some point last night, the tequila convinced me that my happiness takes precedence over his pride.

Oh, boy, Thanksgiving is going to be fun this year.

My head is killing me but not as much as my liver. I'm sure it's broken. My spleen, too. Is it possible to sprain your kidneys? My throat feels like sandpaper. Was I singing? I vaguely remember singing. I want to take a bath in Gatorade and then brush my teeth with an entire tube of Crest. Possibly some bleach.

Now my question is, what do I do next? I'm sure I can explain away not wanting to be a broker, and I'm certainly employable, given my grades and the various internships I've held, but doing what instead?

In the bed next to me, Chris stirs. I look down. I see pajamas were not an option. I wrap the sheet around me like a toga. This was definitely not a garden-variety slumber party. With an ever-so-slight curl of his lip, he appears to be smiling in his sleep.

Damn it, why does he have to be so masculine? So good-looking? He's still tan, so he's obviously been working on projects outside. His hair's been lightened by the sun, and the contrast
between the downy blond hair on the nape of his neck and the tawny skin is making me break into a sweat. His back is broader than the last time I saw him, and he has all these new muscles in his arms and shoulders and his obliques and lower . . .

Oh God, oh God, oh God.

I'm both sweating and freezing at the same time.

Once I shower and have some coffee—a lot of coffee, so much coffee—I can likely figure out the next professional steps. I will run the numbers and determine the best course of action.

I guess my larger issue is
what am I supposed to do with this naked man in my bed?

I need to get a grip here. Chris and I broke up for a reason. Sure, we had a nice run, but we were never a logical fit in the long term. When he went off to Southern Illinois, it didn't make sense for him to have to worry about some girl still finishing her senior year of high school, so we parted as friends. I'd read an article in
Seventeen
about how only fifteen percent of relationships started in high school make it through college. Truth was, there was nothing unique about us/our love to defy those odds, so I figured why fight them?

We did get back together the summer after his freshman year, but called it quits before I went to the University of Illinois three months later. We dated again after my freshman year, and it was like nothing had ever changed between us, only to end it again before the fall semester began.

However, after my sophomore year, everything changed. I think Chris expected us to pick up on our whole summer thing, and maybe I did, too. But instead of the cushy lifeguarding job I'd previously held for so many years, that summer I had an internship at an insurance company in the city. He spent the summer bartending and doing odd jobs for a roofing crew.

Our schedules no longer meshed, and our time together was all too brief. We found ourselves with less and less in common, and by the time the Fourth of July rolled around, we knew that was it for us. Or,
I
knew that was it for us. He still wanted to make us work.

Here's the thing: Chris is the fifth kid of five. His family is great, but he's the baby. Because of that, no one has particularly high expectations of him and I think he's taken this to heart. Ultimately, I can't see myself with a man who isn't always pushing himself to overachieve. So, regardless of how pleasant our time together was, how comfortable, how right it felt in the moment, why pursue that which would ultimately fail?

I missed him once we were done, though. I dated other guys, and none of them possessed Chris's natural affability. No one else has had his ability to put others at ease or to just make them laugh with one of his goofy impressions. My brother, Foster, who's two years my senior, was devastated when we broke up. He insists that Chris is the only “cool” guy I've ever brought home. More than once, I've noticed him rolling his eyes when Wyatt speaks.

I glance down at Chris's sleeping figure.

Shit, Wyatt, I'm so sorry. You don't deserve this.

I met Wyatt a year ago at a Young Urban Professionals mixer held on the top floor of the Hancock Tower. Did he take my breath away with his rumpled suit and Heat Miser hairdo? Has he ever once resembled a sleeping Adonis covered in a crocheted afghan when he's stayed here? Definitely not. He's a whole lot more pale and hairless, kind of like a baby mole.

Still, he charmed me in his own quiet way.

“Shrimp toast?” he said, frowning as he gestured toward the
trays of dubious-looking appetizers the waiters were circulating. “You realize the anagram for those is Mishap Trots.”

“I was unaware,” I said.

“Terrible habit, the anagrams, my apologies. Wyatt Chapin, hello. I'm an attorney with Drake Headley—which is Redhead Leaky. Try not to read anything into
that
,” he said, pointing at his ginger hair. “I almost didn't take the job there because of it. Anyway, pleased to meet you.”

I grinned and held out my hand. His shake was firmer than I expected, which was a pleasant surprise. “Hi, I'm Penny Bancroft. I'm in the training program with Smith Barney.”

“Ah, Math by Siren,” he said.

I laughed. “Some days it feels like that.”

“Are you enjoying the view?” he asked.

This time, I actually snorted. The whole tower was socked in with fog. Each window of the ninety-fifth floor, which normally affords an unfettered vista of the lakefront and the Loop, looked to be covered in pale gray cotton batting.

“I've never seen anything like it,” I replied.

We ended up chatting most of the evening. Did I fall instantly, irreparably in love like when Chris defended me to our heinous speech teacher? No, but I wasn't sixteen years old, either. Instead, our relationship slowly progressed from quick lunches to casual drinks after work to lingering over dinner. Eventually, we found ourselves in a committed relationship, spending weekends together with the
Times
crossword puzzle, which he always completed in pen.

Wyatt checked every one of my boxes with his position in contract law. He has a retirement account to which he makes the full contribution each month and an ironclad ten-year plan that
includes purchasing a home in the best school district and budgeting for vacations on foreign soil. He also wants a family, and we've discussed every parameter we'd need to satisfy before even considering taking any sort of step toward that goal.

He's arranged every aspect of his life by the numbers, and there's absolutely no margin for error. He's ideal and outstanding in every way.

What's wrong with me? Why can't I be satisfied with the best man for me? On paper, the two of us are an outstanding match. We have so much in common—even esoteric things, like believing that ham salad should always include relish and eggs. (These ingredients are both low in cost and high in protein. As an added bonus, the preservatives in the relish extend the shelf life and the eggs double the volume without negatively impacting the flavor. Everything about this combination is a win, and yet the few times Chris found relish mingling with his ham salad, you'd have thought he'd found a finger in his lunch.)

The kicker here? Chris doesn't even have his own apartment! He's still living at home in Glencoe! Who does that? Granted, we, um . . . didn't do a ton of talking last night, so I don't know his rationale, but it's weird. People our age are not meant to live with our families; we're meant to be on our own. What am I supposed to do? Ring the doorbell at his house and say, “Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair; I'm going upstairs to Chris's room to get freaky with him on his Chicago Bears bedding'?”

I can't.

This is so messed up.

Somehow this is Patrick's fault. He goaded me into this. Like a double-dog dare. That man is a terrible influence. The bad angel
on my shoulder. I will have words with him later, that's for damn sure. (I'm surprised he's not already calling me to dish. Is he in a meeting?) Regardless, I have to extricate myself from this bed, I have to wash every single one of last night's missteps off of me, and I have to figure out what I'm supposed to do with the rest of my life.

First up, I have to get Chris out of my apartment.

With the sheet wrapped around me so tightly I'm cutting off most of my circulation, I poke him in the shoulder. “Hey.” He shifts but doesn't wake. I poke him again. “Hey. You have to
go
. This was a mistake.”

He opens one of his denim-blue eyes, fringed in black lashes. “This was not a mistake. You. Come here. Right now.” Then he pulls me to him.

Well.

I can probably give him five minutes to state his case.

Not like I have to go to work today.

• • • •

“You're dumping Wyatt? No! He's supposed to fix me up with his friend next week!” Judith wails. “Can't you break up with him after I meet his buddy? Maybe in a few weeks? A month, at the most. Give us some time to get to know each other. Come on! I never went out with a lawyer!”

Karin comes up behind me and grips my head in her hands. “Do you see this shit-eating grin, Jude?”

With some petulance, Judith says, “Yes.”

We're hanging out in the Lincoln Park apartment I share
with Karin. Judith is here, ostensibly to help me figure out what I should be doing with my life. She and I met at U of I in a stats class freshman year and we bonded in our study group. Eventually we lived together on campus and I convinced her to leave her hometown of Cleveland and settle in Chicago permanently after graduation.

However, no one's into résumé chat today. All anyone, including me—especially me—wants to discuss is what's happening with Chris. Karin says, “This is the grin of someone who is done with Wyatt and his anagrams. Sorry, Jude. I'm sure she'll find a way to make it up to you.” Karin does not let go of my head. Instead she turns my face toward her and looks at me. “This isn't even the face of someone who wants to hang out with us right now. In fact, she's just watching the clock, waiting for him to get here so she can go in her room and shut the door and turn on her Al Green cassette really loud. FYI?
Not loud enough
.”

“No!” I protest, albeit weakly. “Chris and I will totally want to hang out with you guys.”

“Peddle your lies elsewhere, Pinocchio. Your nose is already so long you can't turn your head without scraping it on the wall,” Karin replies, finally releasing me. I shake out my hair, trying to smooth it back into place.

“Plus, I didn't ask Jude over here to discuss some guy,” I start to say.

“Some stud,” Karin interjects.

Do not squeal. Do
not
squeal. Do not
squeal
. Compose yourself.

Ahem.

I take a deep breath and try to keep the shit-eating grin from
returning. I do legitimately need Judith's advice. “You know where I've interned and what classes I've taken—what seems like my logical next step?” I ask.

Judith taps her index finger over her lip as she thinks. “What about teaching?”

I reply, “If I shift from stockbroking to teaching, I really will be disowned.”

“Do you want to go the CPA route?” Judith asks, as that's what she's pursuing.

“The idea of combing through box after box of strangers' receipts for the rest of my life makes me want to die,” I say. “At tax time, my parents bring every piece of paper in the house to the CPA because someone once told them to save everything. The poor guy ends up having to sort through postcards and their old shopping lists to try to make sense of their finances. No, thanks.”

“I don't think every client is like that,” Judith says.

“No offense, but your parents are kind of jerks,” Karin adds.

“None taken,” I reply. She's not wrong. Every time Karin sees my mother, Marjorie asks her if her mother is still divorced.

“If you want to stay in the world of finance, you could always be an analyst. Although, if you want to have a family eventually? Consider being an actuary. That's one of those jobs you always hear about having a decent work-life balance, as long as you don't go the consulting route. You liked our actuarial classes, right? And you interned at that insurance company after sophomore year. So you're aware there's a fairly steep barrier to entry with a hell of a lot of qualifying exams and—”