Life From Scratch (23 page)
“Your boyfriend is really cute,” she tells me. “I need to introduce you to mine. My brother set us up—you know, the one who works at the new private school in the Village. Anyway . . . ”
Laura’s voice drones on, gesticulating with a wet cup in hand so that I’m splattered with tiny drops of someone’s leftover beer. It’s the perfectly terrible premature end to a perfectly terrible night. As she’s rounding on the tale of her third date, the mention of her brother finally catches up with me, and I realize that the reason Adam looks like he’s there alone is because his date is the
host
.
He is dating Laura, the cat fancier.
This was obviously what she meant to tell me when we got interrupted at the door.
Quoting her Shakespeare—of course!—and taking her on indoor picnics God knows where. My ex-coworker with my ex-husband. I am at a loss for words over this thought, instantaneously hurt beyond belief that he has moved on and is dating someone else, even if I’ve come with a date too. I cannot believe that he has chosen to follow-up our marriage with Laura, the framer of cats and loser of undergarments. It will make me feel much less guilty when I go in her bathroom and raid her medicine cabinet for a leftover Ativan.
She might not have known that he was my ex-husband when they first met—after all, he never attended work events with me.
But he obviously shared the connection with her once he discovered she also worked at the library.
She could have told me when I called to RSVP, sent me an ooops-I’m-dating-your-ex-husband email.
And why the hell is she practically giddy over the idea of reintroducing me to my own ex-husband?
Have litter box fumes fried her brain?
And why, if he has really moved on so completely and is describing the end of our marriage as a relief, is he reading my blog all night?
I’m about to wipe the smile off Laura’s face about her fantastic new boyfriend when Gael pops his head around the corner and grins at me. Laura beams at him and gives my shoulder a small friendly rub, sort of the same motion a guidance counselor uses when she needs to break the news that applying to your first choice school is a waste of your time. She grabs her grocery store bag of garbage and continues her empty cup collecting, oblivious to the fact that I am not smiling back.
I give Gael a modicum of credit that he has torn himself away from the blond and does not seem to have her phone number written on his hand. “So, that’s your ex-husband?” he asks.
“Yes,” I say.
“I could tell. The whole boring lawyer thing. He has that act down very well.”
I laugh despite myself. I still linger in the doorway and Gael looks back towards the kitchen. “Are you hiding from him?”
“I am hiding from him, yes. I really can’t believe that we bumped into him here. He’s dating Laura.”
“
No,
” Gael says, holding out the vowel for so long that it becomes a growl in his throat. He’s practically giddy with the idea of the underpantsless cat fancier with my ex-husband. “How did that happen?”
“Someone introduced them. I don’t really want to talk about it.”
“Do you want his ‘coordinates?’ Is that how Americans say it?”
“Where is he?”
“He’s by the kitchen door. He is looking around a little confused. He can’t see you where you’re standing right now. He looks like he wants to tell you how it was all a huge mistake. That he misses the way you make
crèma catalana
and can’t stand cats—the musical
or
the pet.”
“You can tell all of that just by the way he holds his beer? I’ve never cooked for him.” I hope that this next part doesn’t make me look too unhinged and middle school. “I know that this isn’t very adult of me, but could you sneak me out of here?”
Gael, every inch a gentleman now that he’s finished flirting with the blond, waits until Adam has tracked back into the kitchen, still searching for me, to signal that I should head for the door. He promises that it will be okay, that no one should have to happen upon their ex-husband at a party when they’re not ready.
And here I was anxious about attending this party because I’d have to make small talk.
Who knew that it would be so much worse? But even though Gael repeats how idiotic they are several more times in the cab on the way home like a self-help cheerleader—the idea of a bar long since dropped—I can’t help but feel as if something has changed between us. As if he has finally gotten a whiff and can identify the ingredients that make up the meal. One-third of a cup of insecurity, two tablespoons of tongue-holding, four cups of doubt.
Even before I got a divorce, my least favorite part of a wedding was the cake. It's always dry. Always. And I recently read an article that said that most wedding cakes are not only baked months ahead of time and frozen, but that the cake part is actually just doctored-up Duncan Hines. Can you imagine? You're paying several thousand dollars for a cake that has instructions as deep as “Add oil and an egg?”
Instead of throwing the bouquet, we should create a new wedding tradition of throwing the cake. Since it's about as tasty as a bunch of carnations, and it would make for a gorgeous picture in the wedding album. A three-tiered, white-on-white wedding cake sailing over the balcony to the waiting bridesmaids. Splat.
There seem to be two kinds of people in this world—the fondant kind and the buttercream kind. There are those who want the fondant cake, and while it looks gorgeous, a fondant cake is more about the surface than it is about what's underneath. Fondant tastes like crap, and we all know that, but the couple accepts the fact that they are serving a disgusting-tasting cake to their guests in exchange for the ooohing and aaaahing about the cake that comes beforehand. Fondant cakes are gorgeous cakes. They are smooth and unblemished and even and perfect. Not a very realistic way to go into a marriage.
On the other end of the spectrum are the couples who put taste over appearance, serving a butt-ugly but delicious cake to their guest. Fine, buttercream-coated cakes can be pretty, and if the baker fusses with it enough, it can even look smooth and seamless. But the reality is that buttercream is never as pretty and perfect as a fondant cake. It doesn't scream “photo-op.” And it's a wedding—the best day of your life according to some—so shouldn't even the cake be exquisite, as least to look at?
Please don't ask me which type of cake Adam and I had at our wedding.
Chapter Ten
Crushing the Garlic
I rip up Laura’s change of address card the moment I get home. I write a long blog post about how husbands who don’t mourn the end of their marriage are heartless assholes. Arianna suggests that I should take it down; stop baiting Adam. But I leave it up and let it collect comments expressing agreement. Damn straight I’m right. A person shouldn’t feel relief when something ends after twelve years unless they’re being released from a POW camp.
Six days after the party without a phone call, and I am ready to write off Gael, too, when he calls to remind me of my promise to help him at the wedding. “I’m collecting on my promise,” he informs me.
“Really?” I say, stirring some rice into the melting butter at the bottom of my pan. “A wedding.”
“And you need to dress up. You need to blend.”
“So I should grab my big white gown out of storage?” I say dryly.
“Do you still have it?” Gael asks.
“Of course I still have it. In storage somewhere, but I still have it. Why?” I ask. For a moment I’m frightened that he’ll suggest that we head off to town hall.
“I didn’t know if that was the sort of thing you got rid of after a divorce.”
His statement makes me pause. I’m not sure how I decided what I would keep and what I would leave behind, but suddenly, my big, cream-puff-of-a-dress feels like an unlucky talisman for any future relationship. It’s like the literary monkey’s paw—I need to throw it out before it causes something terrible to happen.
Though fate doesn’t really work like that . . . right?
I still make a mental note to get rid of said dress on eBay and promise Gael that I’ll be ready to go by
, dressed in something appropriate and understated. My hair in something more professional-looking than a ponytail. I hang up and return to my rice, willing it to brown evenly.
I haven’t really given the task of helping him at the wedding much thought since he first proposed it. To be fair, we had just had sex when I agreed to go. I was in such a state that I probably would have agreed to anything—running off to the
Bahamas
, breaking-and-entering into my old apartment, cooking ham. Thinking about going to a wedding—even someone’s I don’t know—makes me feel a little numb. Most of my friends were already married before I went through my divorce, so it has been several years since I’ve had to hear someone say “I do.” In fact, this will be my first time facing a nuptial aisle since my own divorce.
Listen
, I tell myself,
it’s okay to be sad for yourself even in the face of someone else’s happiness. You don’t even know this bride. You owe her nothing except to hold some cameras and pass Gael his equipment
. If I have to tune out the “I dos,” and avert my eyes from seeing her big white dress, so be it.
Gael calls me downstairs at
. I’ve left my hair down, willing it into damp curls with a little gel. I’m wearing a standard black cocktail dress; knee-length. I add a string of pearls that my ex-mother-in-law gave me for my wedding. Gael has parked a van outside my front door, blocking the fire hydrant. The van’s back doors are open, revealing a series of boxes and bags.
“There is someone else doing the video,” he tells me. “We’re just taking the still shots. We have to be there at three, but I thought we’d get there a bit early to set up, so I could teach you all the equipment. Bridal party portraits begin at four.”
It feels like he’s all business, as if I’m just a woman he has hired for the day, one he doesn’t need to invest a lot of niceties in, since there is little chance that he’ll see me again. I feel myself respond with my own coolness, and I get into the front seat without speaking, fastening my seat belt silently and hoping I remembered to put on the waterproof mascara as opposed to my normal, black-river-creating make-up.
He is tense as we drive through the city, barely speaking except for an occasional statement here and there. It is annoying to drive in the city, the stopping and starting and people passing in front of the car. There is a small lot by the synagogue, and we pull in next to the catering truck. Gael gets out and unpacks the trunk, bringing all the boxes and bags into the dimly lit basement hallway. Steam escapes out the synagogue kitchen, and as the door opens, I glimpse white-aproned women squeezing something semi-liquid out of piping bags onto grilled toast. My stomach lurches.
He opens a bag and points at a disassembled camera body, rattling off the names of various cameras and their lenses. He shows me how to set up the tripod, insert the cable release so the camera can be ready for the ceremony. How to use the external flash. I am barely registering half of what he is saying, knowing full well how important it is to get this right. He is here to capture moments. This bride may need these photos later on to remind her why she married the groom in the first place. What if we miss the kiss at the altar? Miss the first dance? Perhaps it will change the entire course of their marriage when she is sitting on the sofa late at night, waiting for her husband to get home and desperately needing a visual reminder that she does still love him.
Sometimes I forget that everyone is not me.
And I had those pictures to remind me, yet I still left Adam.
One of the bridesmaids comes giggling down the hallway, clutching a glass of champagne in one hand and a make-up bag in the other. Her eyebrows raise as she catches site of Gael leaning over one of his open bags, and she gives another glance over her shoulder as she disappears into a stairwell, presumably on her way to the bride. I catch Gael looking at the swish of taffeta we can still see through the small, square window in the door.