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Authors: Evan Marshall

BOOK: Crushing Crystal
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Chapter 4
T
he Michigan football team huddled during a time out, while I also decided what my game plan would be. I could have easily moved forty yards across the stadium bleachers without being tackled like a running back carrying the ball. But when I got to his section, I might have encountered unnecessary roughness. This guy very well could've been someone who just looks like Matt. Or worse, it would be him, and his beautiful wife and their two strapping sons.
I reminded myself that if I stopped right then, I could always preserve my version of our history. Frankly, the real version wasn't so great, but this installment could be downright humiliating. He could politely introduce me to his wife as an “old friend,” then entertain her with the story of his abrupt departure from my life.
“I don't blame you for a moment, darling,” she would say to Matt, pitying the poor soul for ever having to spend time with me.
“Seeing that raggedy old Prudence reminds me of how lucky I am to have a beautiful wife like you,” Matt would say to her at dinner that night as they toasted their blissfully perfect life together. She would return with something delightfully witty, never once referring to their love as “real.”
Still, I decided to go over and see what would happen. Jennifer calls this the “seduction of potential.” Lemon fresh Pledge. It
could
change your life. The game clock ran out on the first half, and streams of maize-and-blue people headed out for snacks and drinks. I slinked over to his section before I noticed Mr. Could-Be-Matt walking away from the group of guys he was sitting with, and toward the exit. I followed his trail, which ultimately led to the concession stand. As I stood on line, just five places behind him, I realized it was absolutely, without a doubt, him.
I wondered what I would say to him when he noticed me.
Oh my God! Imagine running into you here.
Too fake.
It's been so long!
Why not hang a “Look at my crow's feet” sign around my neck?
How
are
you?
Maybe. Save it as a last resort.
Are you married?
Definitely not.
I think of you every year on your birthday.
Swallow fatal amount of sleeping pills before uttering these humiliating words.
As pitiful as it seems—even to me—it was true that every year for the past fourteen, I remembered Matt's birthday. Perhaps it was because the first time we slept together was on his twenty-second birthday, our fourth night together in Fort Lauderdale. The day before, I'd driven to town with Olivia, Libby, Cindy and Eve to stock up on alcohol and purchase a small cake for Matt's birthday. I'd negotiated use of the hotel room until two that morning and planned to invite Matt over in the evening for cake and Jack Daniel's. At midnight, I would be the first person to wish him a happy birthday. That was the plan.
At around eight-thirty, I got a call from Libby. She was at the guys' hotel room and whispered, “You'd better call Matt.”
“Why? We agreed to get together later. What's up?”
“Olivia and I have been here for a few hours, and Eve and Cindy just walked in. Matt thinks you're blowing him off.”
“Why are Eve and Cindy there? I thought they were going for a walk.”
“Look out the window.” Pouring rain. “This was the closest place they could run for shelter. Anyway, Matt is doing a really bad job at trying to act like he doesn't care, but we can all see he's bummed out 'cause he thinks you're avoiding him.”
“You're kidding!” I exclaimed. After just four days I could already see that unshakable apathy was very much part of the persona Matt had cultivated. Even though it was clear he liked me, he'd still pepper his conversations with “whatever.” I couldn't help feeling just a bit giddy with the fact that he was showing visible signs of actually caring about me.
“Put him on the phone,” I told Libby.
“No way. He'd kill me if he knew I called you. You call back here in a few minutes.”
Blowing him off? I laughed. If he only knew I was actually writing his name in blue icing on a supermarket birthday cake.
“Hey, are we still on for tonight?” I asked Matt when I called back.
“Hey Prudence,” he said coolly. “Where've you been all day?”
“Well actually I've been shopping for birthday stuff for you. I thought we could celebrate together.”
“Shit,” he said.
“What an ingrate,” I teased.
“No, it's not that. Thank you, no, thank you really. It's just, well, when I didn't hear from you, I thought, you know. I thought you were, you made other plans so I told my buddies we'd go out drinking. I should've called. Shit. I fucked up. Okay, how 'bout this? Why don't I come over now and then I'll go out with my friends later?”
I didn't love the plan, but I was already completely in love with him so I accepted it. I rationalized that this would be an opportunity to show him what a cool girlfriend I would be.
He arrived a few minutes before nine in an orange mesh football jersey over a white T-shirt, and crisp 501 jeans. His brown hair was wet and combed neatly in a side part. At the door, he smiled so powerfully it seemed to have the ability to swing the door wide open all by itself.
“Hey,” he said. His head moved from one side of the room to the other as he scanned the rainbow of balloons strewn across the floor, and his cake on the table.
“Hi. Come on in,” I said, trying to seem very okay with how the evening was turning out. In reality, I was a bit embarrassed that I'd gone through all this trouble for a fifteen-minute round of drinks and slice of cake before Matt went out for his real celebration.
“This is sweet,” he said, looking at the cake. “I had no idea you were doing this for me or I wouldn't have made other plans.”
We had a plan, you idiot! Just last night, you kissed me against an illuminated Pepsi machine, and we said we'd get together tonight. What happened between now and then?!
“No big deal,” I said instead.
“No, it is a big deal. I feel like shit.”
Good! You should feel like shit. We had plans. What happened to our plans?!
“Don't worry about it,” I said. “More cake for me, right?”
“Yeah, I guess so. Listen, why don't I come back later and we can keep our original plan? Can I come back at around midnight?”
Sure, I'll just wallow in self-pity for the next three hours all by myself here.
“That's fine.”
Look how easygoing I am, Matt. Please love me.
“Yeah, that's okay,” I said lighter than the previous “that's fine.” I kissed him on his lips and told him to enjoy the time out with his friends. “I'll be here when you get back,” I said, the shining example of the most excellent girlfriend.
I turned on the news and poured myself a shot of Jack Daniel's. The top story that evening was the storm. Thunder roared outside and rain frantically tapped on the hotel window.
“Looks like heavy showers in Broward County this evening,” said a blond anchorwoman.
“Thank God for the news,” I said aloud to no one.
Twenty minutes later, there was an urgent knock at my hotel door. It was Matt, soaking wet and breathless. “Oh my God, look at you. Come in, come in,” I said, rushing for a towel. Drying his hair with the cheap white hotel towel, I almost inaudibly stated the obvious. “You're back.”
He smiled as if he wasn't going to say anything else, then grabbed my waist and pulled me toward him and kissed me. Matt waited a second, like he was contemplating whether or not to explain himself. After the hesitation, he smiled. “You know, I was sitting there at the bar, and then I thought to myself, what the hell am I doing
here
? So I ran back.”
You
ran
back? You didn't just casually stroll back to me, you ran. Okay, so it's raining which may have added some incentive for you to hurry, but it was me you were running to
.
“Well, I'm glad you're here,” I said before I kissed him. As our lips touched, I was returned to the present when a guy behind me on line stepped on my shoe
. I'm glad you're here,
I repeated silently. Maybe that's what I'd say when our eyes met at the concession stand.
Good to see you Matt. I'm glad you're here.
Too host-like?
Well hello there. I'm glad you're here.
Weird.
I'm glad you're here. It's good to run into you.
Not bad.
Hey, look who it is. Nice to see you, Matt.
Pretty good.
“Prudence? Prudence Malone? Is that you?” said Matt as he held a cardboard holder with four cups of beer.
Oh my God. He sees me. This is it!
“Hey, wow, I'm glad you're here. Look who it is.”
Note to self: have doctor increase dosage on Paxil. Clearly not working.
“Malone, my God! I almost didn't even recognize you. You look great, so cool.”
I didn't look cool before?
“Thanks,” I said instead. “You too. I mean you look great, not different or cool. Not that you don't look cool, you do. It's just that it's not a different look for you. I mean, you always looked cool.”
Shut up now!
“Thanks, Malone,” he laughed.
Great. As I crumble with social ineptitude, Matt is the picture of calm.
It's quite unfair how age makes men seem more sophisticated and does not detract from their good looks. From what I could tell, Matt was a little broader around the shoulders and chest. Probably the stomach too, but he looked rugged, not fat. He was wearing a thick gray Michigan sweatshirt with his Adam's apple peeking out from the neck like a periscope on a submarine I very much wanted to be on. I wished I'd been with him for all of the smiles that creased his eyes over the years. If I could've frozen the moment, and have him return to it with no memory, I would have run my cheek across his entire body like a cat simultaneously enjoying the pet and marking her territory.
Seeing him again, I remembered that Matt had only one dimple, and when he smiled the right half of his mouth opened wider than the left. When he smiled, his head automatically nodded a touch. As he kissed my cheek at the concession stand, I smelled the familiar mix of beer and ice cream on his breath.
“So how's it going, Malone?”
I love how he keeps calling me “Malone.” I never knew my last name could sound so sexy. Hell, in the reflection of his sunglasses, I actually look pretty sexy.
“I'm living in New York now, SoHo actually. I'm an accountant.”
“With?”
“Deloitte and Touche,” I said trying to sound nonchalant, but secretly feeling like trumpeting
I'm king of the world, baby!
“Excellent,” Matt said sipping his beer.
“I'm a partner there,” I said a bit too eagerly.
“Good for you,” he said like a proud uncle on graduation day. “Never thought you'd be slumming, Malone.”
Funny how the harder I always tried to impress Matt the less I actually did. He seemed thoroughly and completely underwhelmed with my professional status. This was our game. Competitive apathy. While we dated, I never won a single match, though I really worked at it. Desperately, in fact.
“How 'bout you? What are you up to?”
Matt said he lived in Los Angeles and wrote, directed and produced independent films that he proudly described as “iconoclastic” and “edgy.” I loved him as a hot jock. As an artist, he got my undying worship. The downside, of course, was that my living in SoHo and working in the financial mecca of the world didn't seem quite as exciting as it had thirty seconds ago. The closest thing to iconoclastic going on at my firm was when we anonymously sent a box of shredded paper over to the folks at Arthur Andersen right after the Enron scandal broke.
“I'm working on a film about the life of Louis Pasteur right now,” he told me. “Sounds boring, but if we get it right, it'll be pretty dicey stuff. You don't want to hear about this. Let me shut up,” he smiled. “Tell me more about what's been going on with you.”
When Matt looked at me, I couldn't believe it was just Prudence Malone he was seeing. His gaze was absolutely infiltrating, as if he'd invaded my entire being and knew exactly what I was thinking. But he couldn't have. Otherwise, he'd never have said that I didn't want to hear about his film. Or anything that he could possibly say.
Talk some more
, I silently begged him. I didn't want to be responsible for speaking. All of my breath was suspended in my chest, and I couldn't think of a thing to say.

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