Fat Chance (13 page)

I'
m up hours later, mulling over the night before. There seems to be more than just a kinship between us now, but whenever I'm emotionally involved with someone, my vision is blocked and I can't scope things out. Was Taylor coming on to me? Or is he just naturally flirty? He wants my help and being attentive can only help him secure it. Safer to feign disinterest, I decide, and continue playing consultant, rather than starstruck fan. It wouldn't be the first time I was way off base.

As I'm about to go downstairs for coffee, I open the door and spot a folded blue note wedged under it.

Ugh! Two fewer days together. The gardener, the pool man, two maids, a security guard and Jolie would be my only company. What better motivation to work out. I grab my sweats and am about to change when I see the flickering red light of the answering machine—probably the office, a world that I was happier forgetting at the moment. I press Play and sit on the edge of the bed.

“Mah name is Tex, I'm a big-time jerk in New York. I'm thinking about starting a new career as a food critic, but I don't have friends at work to go out with anymore and damn, it can take forever to write a review if you're only ordering for one. So I wondered now if you could help me get my buddy back. I'm not good at that kind of thing. I'm used to pushing around copy, organizing stories, not my own life. Have your people call my people.”

Had Alan Barsky sneezed on him? The impersonation virus was spreading. Tex had always had a humorous touch. He knew how to tweak a situation, to soften it. He spent his days dissecting people's work. If he couldn't handle
them
he'd have been lobotomized by now. I dial his home number to answer his recording with one of my own.

“Before I'd even consider helping you get your lunch pal back, I'd have to know more. What's so special about long lunches out anyway? Think about brown-bagging it sometime.”
I'd resist making a crack about Sharon preparing lunch.
“Instead of food, splurge on an expensive haircut, say, or a well-cut Italian suit. Put yourself behind the wheel of a sports car. Live out
your
fantasies, Tex, and see if they hold up. Let's compare notes.”

I exercise for two hours. Muscle burns more calories than fat, and I worked religiously to convert.

 

I have the jitters about taking his car.
It's only a car.
But the alternative is to stay housebound and for what? I ease it out
of the garage, lurching a bit at first, and head for Rodeo Drive, probably the world's most exclusive place to shop. Behind the wheel I'm feeling like a Judith Krantz heroine,
sans
poodle.

I stroll into Giorgio's and examine a luscious pink cashmere cardigan with a matching camisole—but HELLO, the Manolos—then I drop the sweater like it's hot. American Express has probably sent out a nationwide alert on my name. Instead, I pay cash for a pair of gorgeously obscene red ribbon string bikini panties, so scant that I can tuck them in the change purse of my wallet—probably just the point. Equally brief, I must say, is the measly Cobb salad posing as an entrée that I have for lunch in a salad boutique down the street.

I eye the Rolls Royces as I walk. From close range, this world doesn't look as crazy as it appears from New York. Could just two weeks out here distort my perceptions that way?

I walk back toward the car, eyeing the passersby, when my eyes fix on a familiar sight. It
couldn't
be. Absolutely not. Nuh-nuh-nuh. But indeed it is, and he's waddling into Bijan with a curious look on his face. Bijan? Maybe the world's most expensive men's store where you shopped by appointment only?

I stand outside and wait. Where was Tamara when I needed her? Forty-five minutes later, he emerges, hands clutching two glossy shopping bags. I'm on his tail, surreptitiously narrowing the distance between us. I'm inches from his back, about to tap him on the shoulder when Wharton spins around suspiciously.

“Maggie, my word! I don't believe it. What a coincidence.”

“Bill!” I smack his shoulder affectionately. “I guess business is better than I thought. What are you doing in these parts?”

“I took a day off from the editorial convention in Palm
Desert,” he says, guiltily. “I decided against a lecture called ‘Catastrophes in the Newsroom.' Too real life.” Proudly he opens the bag to show me ordinary-looking ties he has just bought in mottled shades of yellow and green.

“Unusual,” I say, “amazing,” then leave it at that for lack of anything else to say.

“And who's paying for
your
shopping?” he says, noticing the yellow-striped Giorgio bag. “Me or Mike Taylor?”

“Got a gift certificate to Giorgio's with my last purchase of Red.”

“How are you doing out here?” Wharton asks, narrowing his eyes.

“Not bad. It's a change though, isn't it?”

“Nice for a week,” he says, then lowers his voice conspiratorially, adding, “but I wouldn't want to live here, would you?”

“I miss the city,” I say, realizing that I mean it. “We're different stock, you know?” Are his eyes getting moist?

“Can I give you a lift? I hired a car. It's right down the street. Or we could stop for some decadent dessert, how about it?”

“Thanks, but I have to get back. I'm parked nearby.”

We stroll down the street, and I stop in front of the car.

“Yours?”

“A loaner.” I have to admit I'm enjoying his incredulity. “Well, I gotta run. See you at work in another week and a half, Bill.”

“Yes, well keep enjoying yourself.” He walks ahead, then suddenly turns and calls out. “Any restaurants you recommend?”

“Morton's is great, so are Jar and Spago.”

“Spago? I couldn't get a reservation!”

I watch him amble off. Decadent dessert, indeed. Diet saboteurs come in all guises.

The click of the front door sends my heart racing. Does the house come with a defibrillator? Taylor slips the overnight bag off his shoulder, and tosses his leather jacket onto a chair. He's wearing a white T-shirt and jeans. He walks toward me, flips down on the couch, extending his legs over the arm. He drains my iced tea.

“So how's my favorite rocket scientist. Spaced out?”

“Cloud nine,” he says, eyes closed.
Okay, not very original.
“What did I miss?”

“I went to Rodeo Drive and ran into my publisher. I had a great time driving your car, and I even thought about making off with it and heading to New York…you wouldn't press charges, would you…? Let's see, what else… I accidentally tripped the alarm when I opened my window. Security came…I was questioned by two gorillas with tattoos…now at least I know how to disengage it so I can get unfiltered air…. Other than that, nothing much.”

“Where's Jolie?”

“
Je ne sais pas.
I haven't seen much of her.”

“Our time's getting short,” he says, smiling slightly. “How about we go over some of your—”

“There's a folder on your desk with a year's worth of my columns and some journal articles. Enjoy your afternoon.”

He hangs his head down off the side of the couch, pretending to be dead. “Can't I get the Spark notes?”

I give him a withering look.

“I'll fail the final without them.”

“How could I look Spielberg in the eye again?”

“Well, if I ever finish we can celebrate 'cause there's a party tonight—the one that was supposed to have been two days ago. Wanna go?”

“If you'd rather just see your friends on your own, I'll be fine here—”

“The party's at ten,” he says, jumping up and messing my hair. “You're going.”

 

I'm about to start some research for another column when I look up. Taylor is standing there with a pathetic look on his face. What was I thinking? Did I really expect him to start wading through one hundred and fifty-six columns? More likely he'd hand them over to someone at the studio who would boil everything down to three paragraphs.

“Yes?” I say, feigning ignorance.

“Let's go over some of these,” he says, shaking his head. I welcome the juicy excuse to leave my own work behind and follow him to his office like a compliant puppy. There are two couches, facing each other. Should I sit facing him, or next to him? This isn't psychotherapy, so I sit next to him, and for the next hour and a half, we go over some of the main points of my work.

I'm pretty proud of what I've done, now that I read it all again. There's a column on portion size with the basic premise “Forget about dieting—if you want to lose weight all you have to do is slash portion size.”

“Look at the palm of your hand,” I tell Taylor. “That's about the size your steak or chicken breast should be.”

“What?” he says, staring at his hand in disbelief.

“You wouldn't believe what the rubber food models we used in nutrition class looked like. An appropriate portion of mashed potatoes is smaller than a B-cup bra,” I tell him. That gets his attention.

To give him some historical perspective, I offer these tidbits:

“When McDonald's started out if you had a burger, fries and a twelve-ounce Coke, it came to 590 calories. Today, if you order an Extra Value Meal, which consists of a Quarter Pounder with cheese, Super Size fries and a Super Size Coke, you're taking in a whopping 1550 calories, about the total number that the average diet offers in an entire day.”

And another example—“Back in the 1950s, what was considered a family-size bottle of Coke held 26 ounces. Today, a single-serve bottle is 20 ounces.

“America has increased the amount of food that they eat, thanks not only to jumbo restaurant-size portions but also to mass-quantity-size items bought from stores such as Costco and Sam's Club in order to save money. Except, while you keep your wallet fat, you keep your waistline the same way.”

“So what do you do, order in?”

Spoken like a true movie star. “No, people in small-town America don't order in. You divide up the three-pound salmon, for example, into four- or six-ounce portions, cook one and freeze the others. In a restaurant, you and a friend share one steak, or ask for an extra plate and cut away half of the portion to take home. Instead of the second half of the twelve-ounce steak, have a large green salad or fruit salad for dessert.”

“Gulag diet,” Taylor says glumly.

“No, just reorienting yourself.”

To offer more evidence of how America has changed, all you have to do is compare the average weights of men and women from the early '60s to today. Back then, the average man weighed 168 pounds and the average woman 142.
Today, the average man weighs almost 180, and the average female 152.

We move on to a column called “Forget About Fat.” This one talks about being more concerned about the number of calories you're eating rather than the grams of fat because I'm convinced Americans think that the words
low-fat
on a package gives them a license to eat all they want.

“So you pig out on regular chocolate chip cookies instead of the low-fat ones?” Taylor says.

“No, you eat the yummy ones, and enjoy every bite. You just limit the number you eat. It's better than eating twenty low-fat cookies because you're not saving calories at all, you're just sacrificing flavor.”

Then I look back at a column that I did on consumer products growing in size in recognition of Americans' widening waists. Taylor gives me a blank look. He's oblivious, as are most people who've never had a weight problem. We start with the size of seats in Ford's Lincoln Navigator that were roomy to begin with, but were widened by an inch in the 2003 model. In addition, the area between the driver and steering wheel was opened up as well. The seats also got wider in Ford's 2003 Focus compact.

“Mattress sizes are growing, too,” I say. “Simmons increased the size of the box springs under its queen-size mattresses to 66 inches. The wider mattress is dubbed the Olympic Queen.”