Confessions of an Ex-Girlfriend (34 page)

“Have you heard from him?” Jade asked.

“No, not since I bit his head off for having a good life without me.”

They were both silent for a moment, which made me suddenly feel bad. As if I should be feeling worse about the fact that Derrick hadn't called. To be honest, I did feel sadness, but the kind of sadness that comes when you've shared your everything with someone for two years and now didn't even dare speak to him rather than the sadness of someone who knows she's lost the great love of her life.

“I guess I'm doomed to be that angry girl he left behind in New York,” I said, trying to muster up some humor about the situation. “The Eternal Ex-girlfriend.”

Jade put down her glass with a thud. “Emma Carter, you are no longer an ex-girlfriend.”

I looked up at her, both confused and hopeful that she had found some better definition for me.

Then she smiled. “You are officially a Single Woman. And believe me, that's not such a bad thing.”

And with another bang of our glasses, we drank to my new incarnation.

Confession: I am an ex-girlfriend's best friend.

 

N
ow that I had moved on to the next phase of my life, I was able to let go of a few things. Like my anger. I even relented on my noncompliance with Rebecca's stance and managed to belt out a pretty damn good article on my mother's upcoming marriage to husband number three for Rebecca's special issue. Of course, our newest senior features editor was thrilled to receive it, and I was proud of my efforts. Still, I couldn't help feeling, with a certain amount of resignation as I watched her slip my article into her shiny leather satchel, that there were just some women who got everything in life. The great job. The great man. And others, like me, who didn't. And even as she promised me a quick read that evening as she headed out the door, all I could think about was Rebecca curled up in front of a fireplace reading my article while Nash looked on adoringly,
just waiting for her to finish up so he could carry her off to bed for a full-body massage followed by a thorough review of the kind of engagement ring she wanted. For I knew that would come in a matter of time. Just last week Rebecca told me that Nash had been at Tiffany.com. Not that she was snooping, she said, she just happened to notice that address line on his home computer while she had been surfing, signifying he had recently visited the site.

The next day, anxious to get her take on my article, which I'd fretted over for some reason the night before, I hovered by her new
office, wondering desperately where she was. Rebecca was
always
on time, and it was nearly nine-thirty already. I had even managed to convince myself that she'd called in sick in order to avoid telling me how bad my piece was, when I saw her storming down the hallway toward me, gripping her leather satchel in front of her, her eyes downcast. I stumbled toward the water fountain near her door, not wanting to seem too anxious, and proceeded to fill one of the paper cups there. When she saw me, sipping nonchalantly, she lifted her gaze to mine and I was struck by the well of sorrow I saw in her blue eyes. “Can I talk to you?” she practically begged, her mouth curling dangerously, as if she might even cry.

“Sure,” I said, crumbling my now-empty cup and tossing it in the wastebasket nearby. I followed her into her new office, and she immediately exercised her prerogatives as a senior features editor by shutting her brand-new door soundly behind us.

Then she dropped her leather satchel on the floor and sat down, gesturing to the guest chair across from her desk so that I would join her. She sighed, then—looking me straight in the eye—declared, “He fucking dumped me.”

So thrown off was I by the sound of an obscenity coming out of Rebecca's pretty little blueblood mouth, I asked dumbly, “Who?”

“Nash!” she all but shouted at me, her eyes bulging. “Who else?” And then, as if saying his name caused her great pain, her lower lip began to tremble.

“Ah, Bec, I'm sorry.” And I was. I couldn't bear to see anyone—not even Rebecca—suffer over a man. Especially after my own recent experience, which still stabbed at me painfully whenever I allowed myself the liberty to torture myself over it. “What happened?”

Her watery gaze sharpened suddenly, bolstered by a new, more satisfying emotion. Anger. “Well, last night he took me to Lutèce, which he knew I'd been dying to go to,” she began, swiping a hand under her eye to dash away the tear that threatened to fall. “He had the reservation since last week, and I'm thinking, this is it, he's going to ask me to marry him.” She smiled tremulously. “I was even going to tell you about it, but I was afraid of jinxing myself, you know? But I was so sure. I mean, he'd just been to
Tiffany.com, confirming his order—or so I thought. Apparently he'd only gone to check out a pen to buy for his boss's retirement gift!” Swallowing back the surge of anger that admission had so obviously caused, she continued, “What else was I to think? I mean, I had practically wallpapered his apartment in ads featuring their Lucida-cut diamond, which is Tiffany's newest style. You know the one I'm talking about, right? Square-cut?”

I did have a vague memory of some stunning, square-shaped diamond in a Tiffany ad I'd seen in a recent layout we'd done, so I nodded my head once more.

“Pretty amazing stone, huh?” she said, eyebrows raised.

“Beautiful,” I agreed, recognizing in her the kind of engagement-ring lust that drove women to marry lesser—albeit wealthier—men.

“Anyway,” she continued, harnessing her anger once more, “he takes me to Lutèce, and we're sitting across from each other at the most beautiful little table.” Her eyes welled up at this point, and though I was curious as to the kind of emotions the memory of silverware and expertly folded napkins could conjure up, I grabbed a Kleenex from the box on her desk and handed it to her.

“Thanks,” she said, taking it and giving her delicate little nose a rather indelicate honk.

“So we're sitting there, freshly poured glasses of Bordeaux before us, and I'm looking at him and he's looking at me and I'm thinking this is it, he's going to ask me. I mean, he even looked
nervous,
and idiot that I am, I'm thinking, isn't that cute? He's nervous. Maybe he's afraid I might say no!” She tossed her crumpled tissue onto the desk before her with leashed fury. “So I reach across the table encouragingly and say, ‘Darling, you look so nervous, relax.' So he smiles and says, ‘Oh, there are just so many things I need to say to you tonight.' Now my heart is beating so fast, I'm thinking I'm going to have a heart attack before he pulls out that ring, so I say, ‘Oh, darling, you know you can talk to me about anything. Ask me anything. We
love
each other, after all.'” This last came out on a squeak as Rebecca's tears sprang free and she practically howled with a mixture of sadness and bitterness. There was nothing I could do but reach over and grab her hand in heartfelt sympathy.

“And then,” she continued, once she'd contained her sobs again, “the bastard breaks up with me. Can you believe it?” she asked, looking up at me in confusion and sorrow.

In truth, even as I stared at this red-eyed, puffy-faced version of Rebecca, I couldn't believe any man would willingly leave such a paragon of good breeding and wifely suitability by the wayside. “Why?” I asked, in disbelief. “Did he give any reasons?”

“Oh, he had reasons. Lots of them. But all of them having to do with the fact that he's just an immature beast who wouldn't know a good thing if it bit him in the ass.” She reached over and tugged another Kleenex out of the box. “He's got things he wants to do, he says. He's not ready, he says. His mother—his
mother!—
still relies on him to take care of her.” She let out a snort. “As if Frederic Fekkai didn't already have
her
needs covered.”

I stared at her for a few moments, taking it all in. And then I did the unthinkable. I laughed. I couldn't help myself. It just burst out of me. It wasn't as if Rebecca's breakup didn't bother me, it did. I felt terribly sorry for her. And it wasn't even the image of Nash and his well-coiffed mother that did it. There was just something about the whole thing that seemed incredibly absurd all of a sudden. As if suddenly all the angst we spent over men—boys, I should really say—was completely ridiculous.

Vainly attempting to stifle my mirth, I watched anxiously as Rebecca turned to look me straight in the face. I worried that I seemed hopelessly callous in the face of her recent distress. Then I saw a smile crease her tearstained face. And suddenly she was laughing, too. The kind of guffaw I hadn't seen from her since the days when we traded barbs aimed at Patricia and her army of ladies-in-waiting.

When we had all but busted a gut and were wiping away fresh tears together—tears of the merrier variety—Rebecca sat back in her chair and sighed, fresh sadness carving lines in her face and making her look older. “This is not going to be easy,” she admitted. “In fact, this is probably the worst thing that will ever happen to me.”

Not by a long shot, I thought to myself, remembering ever more painful things that I had to deal with in my own Post-Derrick period. But I knew what she meant. Knew all too well the intense
feeling that immediately followed when the man you loved suddenly decided to call the whole thing off. It was as if your entire life had just shattered into a million impossibly painful pieces.

“It feels like the worst thing right now,” I said carefully, “but it won't always.”

When she looked up at me hopefully, I continued, “You're going to feel abandoned. You're going to feel bereft. Hell, you're going to feel like shit. But it gets better, believe me. Suddenly you'll remember that person you were before,” I said, as if realizing this fact myself for the first time. “You'll remember what it is that you want out of life.” Then I smiled. “And you'll go for it.”

She nodded her head thoughtfully, then turned to me. “And just how did you get so smart, Emma? I mean, is that what happened to you before you met Derrick?”

“Noooo,”
I said, with a small smile, “that's what's happening to me now.”

And then I did it. I confessed all. Told her everything, from the pitiful way Derrick announced his imminent departure from my life, to his new life with the Goddess of Good Dental Hygiene, to our last painful phone call.

When I was through, Rebecca sat looking at me in shock. “God, Emma, I can't believe you went through all that. And you didn't even tell me! How did you survive?”

I smiled, despite the fact that there was still a part of me that wondered the very same thing. “That remains to be seen.”

 

Confession: There are some things only good hair can cure.

 

And so it was that Rebecca and I became friends again. I even took her to Alyssa's gym, having joined myself now that I had used up all of Alyssa's
and
Jade's guest passes. Of course, Rebecca had her own gym—how else had she managed to maintain that perfect power-suit shape? But it was a good bonding experience for us, especially when I showed her how many demons a good StairMaster session could exorcise in the post-breakup stage. We even went out for drinks one night, and I got her tipsy enough to trade jabs with me once more about the psychotic world of wedding
planning that is
Bridal Best.
Of course, Rebecca was a bit more subdued about it. After all, she was management now.

So it went. I was now officially single, complete with gym membership. And officially thinner, as my membership included a session with Tom, a buff and beautiful personal trainer whom I even contemplated asking out, until he asked me to step onto the scale. Despite the fact that I trembled initially, moments later I was practically shrieking with joy. I had now lost a total of ten pounds! Ten! I was positively…trim! For me, at least.

I was also, officially, a writer of sorts. Once my article for
Today's Woman
was complete, I actually bought a
Writer's Market
with the idea that I would pursue other opportunities.

Sure, I was happier. I will not lie and try to play the disgruntled ex-girlfriend anymore. But still something was missing. Something that made me ache to call Derrick. Made me fret over the mistakes I'd made with Max. Made me resist taking up with Tom, the buff and beautiful personal trainer. And I might have fallen into some sort of malaise, had I not been momentarily saved by none other than St. Sebastian himself.

“Emma!” came his surprised and delighted voice when he caught me at home on a Friday night.

Well, if wasn't my prodigal hairdresser, I thought. “Sebastian, how are you?”

“Magnificent. How are you?”

“Good, good.”

“Are you in love?”

“Uh—”

“
I'm
in love,” he continued, not waiting for whatever lame answer I might come up with. “In love with life.”

Whew. I was worried for a moment that yet another of my friends had jumped the Singles ship.

“Oh, Emma, I have learned so much from my guru. You really should come to a session with me. I'm meditating every day now, and I can't tell you how much it's deepened my awareness of all things. In fact, they're starting a new session next week. You really ought to come.”

Uh-oh. I began to fear Sebastian was going to start peddling
spirituality to me. Your Unconscious Life Wiped Clean, in three easy sessions. “I, um—”

“So tell me, tell me, tell me—what have you been up to? How's your hair?”

Aha. Now I had uncovered the true purpose of Sebastian's call. “Still not blond.”

“Hmm. Maybe we can remedy that. What are you doing tomorrow afternoon?”

I smiled. Good old Sebastian. He always came through with some highlights whenever he was running low on cash. I guess his inner peace just wasn't paying the bills. Not wanting to miss out on this opportunity, I quickly agreed to meet him at his place on the Upper East Side, where I would surreptitiously dump a wad of cash on his dresser and in return receive the glossy golden lights I craved.

As it turned out, Sebastian was just what I needed. The next day, as I sat in a chair in a kitchen decorated in the kind of bold yet soothing color combinations that could make Martha Stewart swoon with delight, I was filled with that old satisfaction a woman only knows when she feels truly cared for. With my head half full of aluminum-foil-wrapped color and Sebastian humming a soft, soothing rhythm while he applied the finishing touches, I knew I had found something resembling happiness.

Once he was done with the foils, Sebastian set a timer and busied himself making us tea. As I watched him gently sift the tea leaves into a cast-iron container then pour hot water over the top of them, I studied his economy of movement, his grace. Wrapped in his relaxing presence, I realized that no matter what small task he did, he did it with the greatest pleasure.