“He finally got married, didn’t he?” Andy said, shaking her head. “Of course, that’s it.”
Lily glanced at her, but Bear’s cries had escalated, and Skye had toddled in, also in tears.
“Not that I wouldn’t be happy for him under normal circumstances—I would—but I can’t stand the thought of him married to that lying, cheating bitch. What is it with the two of us? Some sort of weird, shared inexplicable draw to fall in love with people who hurt and betray us. Why is that? Alex and I had our problems, no doubt, but trust wasn’t one of them. Or does it really have nothing to do with us—it’s just that everyone cheats on everyone these days, it’s what the cool kids do, and any expectation otherwise is old-fashioned or unreasonable?” Andy took a deep breath and shook her head. “How old do I sound?”
“Andy—” Lily said, starting to speak, but Bear threw himself in her lap and almost knocked her off the chair.
“Mommy! I want to go home!”
Andy eyed Lily’s small but undeniable bump. She had so many questions, and yet her mind kept ricocheting back to Alex.
Bodhi appeared in the dining room and Lily practically threw both boys at him. She gave him the Look, the one with the laser-focused glare and the slightly raised eyebrows and the pinched mouth that said, You’re on kid duty and yet here they are, screaming and snot-covered and yelling for me. Why can’t I have a conversation with my friend for ten uninterrupted minutes? Is that really too much to ask? that every mother perfected within the first week of her firstborn’s life.
He gathered them up with promises of Hershey’s Kisses and sippy cups of milk, and for just a moment Andy missed Clementine. Being with her alone all week was difficult, and usually Andy loved Tuesday and Friday nights, when Clem was with Max, but seeing Lily’s and Jill’s boys made her want to hug her daughter close. She had been planning to stay in Connecticut that night and most of the next day, but maybe now she’d head back to the city first thing in the morning . . .
“I can barely believe you’re pregnant again! When did this happen? Was it planned?”
Lily laughed. “We weren’t trying, but we weren’t not trying.”
“Ah, my favorite.” Andy couldn’t help but invoke Olive. “Not not-trying is trying.”
“Well, regardless, we were pretty shocked. Skye and his sister will be eighteen months apart. I’m almost fifteen weeks already, but I was waiting to tell you until we knew the gender. A girl! Can you believe it?”
“I’m sure boys are great too—people swear they are—but there is nothing on earth as wonderful as a daughter. Nothing.”
Lily beamed.
Andy reached across the table and squeezed her friend’s hand. “I’m so happy for you guys. If someone would’ve looked into a crystal ball that year we lived together in New York and told you that one day you’d be married to a yoga instructor, living in Colorado with three kids who can ski before they walk, would you have ever believed them?” Andy didn’t say what else she was thinking: would she have ever believed she’d have founded, grown, and sold a successful magazine, gotten married and divorced, and learned how to be a single mom to an admittedly sweet and easy toddler, all by the time she was thirty-five? It was light years from what she’d expected.
“Alex. He’s not married, Andy. It’s just the opposite. He broke up with Sophie.” Lily shook her head. “Or she broke up with him, I’m really not sure how it went down, but they’re definitely not together.”
Andy leaned forward. “How do you know?”
“He called me when he was out west last week.”
“He called you?”
“Is that so weird? He had a week off work and was traveling through Denver on his way to ski with friends in Vail. I met him for coffee at a place near the airport.”
“Skiing with friends?”
“Andy! I didn’t ask for addresses and social security numbers of his entire group, but he made it clear that there wasn’t anyone along with whom he was romantically involved. Is that what you wanted to know?”
Andy waved. “Of course not. I’m just happy to hear, for his sake, that he’s not with her. How do you know they broke up?”
“He made it a point to tell me. Said he moved out about six months ago and lives in Park Slope now. Claimed he was dating around but wasn’t interested in anything serious. He was just very Alex, you know?”
“How’d he look?”
Lily laughed. “Like himself. Adorable. Sweet as could be. He brought books for the boys. Said we should keep in better touch and to call the next time we’re in the city. The usual.”
“Well, I’m relieved for him,” Andy said. “I’m sure it wasn’t easy, but it had to be a lot easier than getting married . . .”
“I didn’t tell him anything about you,” Lily said, looking guilty. “Did you want me to? I wasn’t sure.”
Andy had wondered but hadn’t wanted to ask. She thought about this for a moment and decided it was better having Alex think she was still happily married and settled into her new life. Not that she would allow herself to consider for a single second that there might still be something between them—that even all these years later, he might still get that same jolt when they bumped into each other or heard her name—because in all likelihood it wasn’t reality.
She still couldn’t help but ask. “Did he mention me at all? Ask anything about me?”
Lily looked at her hands. “No. But I’m sure he wanted to. You’re always the big white elephant in the room.”
“Thanks, Lil. You always know just what to say.” Andy forced herself to smile.
Andy glanced up and saw that Lily was staring at her.
“What? Why are you looking at me like that?”
“You still love him, don’t you?” Lily asked in a whisper, as though her grandmother, the only other person in the room, would be desperate to hear this juicy conversation.
“I think I’ll always love him,” Andy said truthfully. “He’s Alex, you know? But that’s all in the past.”
Lily was silent. Andy waited for her friend to say something, but Lily remained quiet.
“And Alex aside, I can’t imagine being close to anyone. Not right now. I know it’s been a year, but the . . . whole thing still feels so fresh. I’m glad Max and I are finally in a good place, at least for Clem’s sake. Barbara’s so thrilled that Max is free to date more ‘appropriate women’ that she’s practically become a new person. I never thought I’d say it, but she’s crazy about Clementine and is on her way to becoming a halfway decent grandmother. All the mayhem of the last year has finally settled down. Quieted. I don’t want to date anyone. Maybe one day, but not now.”
Again Lily gave her that look; Andy knew she was lying to her friend—or at least not telling her the whole truth—and Lily knew it, too. Of course she’d begun to wonder if she would ever meet someone, ever get dressed up for a date or look forward to a long weekend away with a man. She wondered if she would ever share the joys and pains of parenting, have someone to confide in, to cook dinner with, and most of all, she wondered if she would ever give Clem a brother or a sister. She knew the chances of all that were good, if she wanted it, although it might look different now: a future boyfriend would probably be divorced himself, and most likely a father. What single guy in this thirties would choose a mother and a toddler when he could start a family of his own with a much younger girl? But that was okay, too. When she was ready, Andy would join a single-parents’ group or list herself on Match.com or accept one of the few invitations to coffee she’d received from single dads she’d met at the Writer’s Space—the coworking space she’d joined—or on the playground. And hopefully one day she’d hit it off with one of them, and instead of planning a big white wedding or an elaborate Hawaiian honeymoon or decorating their very first shared apartment, they would navigate the introductions and the schedules of their children, their exes, the blending of two completely separate lives. It would be different, but it could be wonderful in its o
wn way. Andy smiled at the thought.
“What are you grinning about?” Lily asked.
“Nothing. Just envisioning myself married one day to a forty-year-old man with two kids and a receding hairline whose ex-wife hates me almost as much as Max hates him. Words like custodial and weekend visitation will fill our conversation. We’ll figure out how to stepparent together. It’ll be beautiful.”
“You’ll make a fabulous evil stepmother,” Lily said, standing up to hug her friend. “And who’s to say you won’t end up with some hot twenty-two-year-old stud who has a thing for cougars . . .”
“And toddlers . . .”
“He’ll love his cougar mama, and you’ll love that his biggest worry in life is the state of his tan during the long, cold New York winters.”
Andy laughed. “I could be a cougar mama to a golden-bronze man-boy any day. For you, Grams, if you’re somewhere listening.”
“See?” Lily said, helping her own grandmother stand up and motioning for Andy to walk toward the living room. “Life is just beginning.”
chapter 24
that’s all
The word counter on her writing program sent out a silent, blinking alarm: 500 WORDS! it blared in all caps, a festive purple and green message dancing across her entire screen. Smiling to herself, Andy hit “save,” removed her noise-cancellation headphones, and headed to the tiny lounge area of the Writer’s Space to make herself some coffee. Slumped at one of the two-tops and reading from a Kindle was Nick, a recently transplanted L.A. screenwriter who had penned an outrageously successful pilot for a thirty-minute comedy and was currently working on his first and eagerly anticipated movie screenplay. He and Andy had become casual coffee-room friends a few months earlier when she had joined the space, but Andy had been shocked when he asked her to see an indie film the week before last—so surprised she actually said yes.
Not that it had been graceful.
“You know I have a daughter, right?” Andy blurted the moment he finished describing the Iranian film he was hoping to see.
Nick had cocked his head full of floppy dirty-blond hair, stared at her for just a moment, and then broken into laughter. Merry, sweet-sounding laughter. “I absolutely did know that. Clementine, right? You remember showing me that picture of her on your phone from her music class? And the one your nanny sent of her with red sauce smeared all over her face? Yes, Andy, I know you have a daughter. She’s welcome to join us if you like, but I’m not sure it’ll be her kind of film.”
Andy was mortified. She’d asked Lily and Jill a thousand times how she would one day tell a date about Clementine—when was the right time, the right circumstance, and what were the right words to use—and both of them had insisted she would just know in the moment. This was probably not what they had in mind.
“Sorry,” she mumbled, feeling her face turn hot. “I’m sort of new at this.” Understatement of the century, she thought. It had been a year and a half since her divorce, and although the invites hadn’t exactly been rolling in, she’d turned down a few out of sheer anxiety and fear. But something about Nick’s kind eyes and gentle manner made her feel like it was okay to say yes.
It had been a perfectly lovely evening. She was able to bathe and dress Clementine before explaining to her daughter that she was going out to see a movie with a friend. Not that Clem understood enough to be upset, but Andy always tried to explain everything.
“Daddy?” Clem asked, as she did at least a dozen times a day.
“No, not with Daddy, sweetheart. A different friend.”
“Daddy?”
“Nope. Someone you haven’t met. But Isla will read you your stories and tuck you in, and I’ll be right here when you wake up in the morning, okay?”
Clem had rested her damp, sweet-smelling head against Andy’s chest, snuggled her lovey blanket to her face, and let out a long, relaxed sigh. Andy literally had to force herself out the door.
The date had been perfectly . . . fine. Nick offered to pick her up in a cab, but Andy felt more comfortable meeting him at the theater. He had already purchased their tickets and saved them aisle seats, so Andy bought popcorn and Raisinets and maintained a steady stream of perfectly acceptable small talk in the fifteen minutes before the movie began. Afterward they’d gone for dessert at a coffee shop on Houston and talked about Nick’s years in L.A., Andy’s new position as a contributing editor for New York magazine, and, although she’d pledged not to, Clementine. When he dropped her off, he’d pecked her lightly on the mouth and announced he’d had a great time. He even seemed to mean it. Andy quickly agreed—it had been fun, and way more relaxed than she’d expected—but she forgot about the date, and Nick, the moment she walked in her front door. She remembered long enough the next morning to text him a thank-you, but she stopped responding after a couple back-and-forths and was so totally consumed with Clementine and her most recent assignment and planning an upcoming weekend visit with her mom and Jill that she’d barely even noticed Nick was absent from the Writer’s Space the entire next week.
Yet here he was, still totally absorbed with his reading—enough so that Andy could probably slip back to her desk area unnoticed—and Andy felt instantly guilty. For what, she wasn’t sure. But for something.
Clearing her throat, she took the seat opposite Nick’s and said, “Hey there. Long time, no see.”
Nick looked up but didn’t appear surprised to see her. Instead, his face broke into a wide smile and he flicked off his Kindle. “Andy! Good to see you. What’s going on?”
“Not much. Just taking my five-hundred-word break. I was going to make some coffee. You want some?” She headed toward the coffeemaker on the kitchen counter, relieved to have something to do with her hands.
“I just made a pot. That one there is fresh.”
“Got it.” Andy plucked her mug off the shelf—a photo mug of Clementine blowing out candles on her Elmo first-birthday cake—and filled it with coffee. She fiddled with the milk and Splenda as long as she could, unsure of what to say once she turned around, but Nick didn’t seem nervous.
“Andy? Are you around this weekend?” he asked.
He was looking her straight in the eye when she rejoined him at the table.
She hated when people asked that without stating what it was they wanted. Was she available for front-row tickets to see Bruce Springsteen perform at the Garden? Yes, she could probably swing that. Did she have hours of free time to help Nick move from one sixth-floor walk-up to another? No, she was fully booked this upcoming weekend. Frozen and not knowing what to say, Andy stared at him.
“A friend of mine, an illustrator, is having his work shown at the National Arts Club. A private exhibit. A bunch of us are going for dinner afterward to celebrate, and I’d love it if you wanted to come.”
“To the exhibit? Or to dinner?” Andy asked to buy herself more time.
“Either one. Preferably both,” Nick said with an undeniably cute impish grin.
A million excuses ran through her mind, but unable to formulate any of them into speech, Andy smiled and half nodded. “Sounds good,” she said without the least bit of enthusiasm.
Nick looked at her strangely for a second but must have decided to ignore her halfhearted response. “Great. I’ll swing by and get you around six?”
Andy already knew that none of it would happen—not the swing-by, the inevitable Clem meeting, the date overall—but she felt totally incapable of explaining why. Nick was perfectly sweet, cute, and smart. He seemed into her for whatever reason and was pursuing her in a lovely, low-key, nonthreatening way. Just because she’d felt nothing when he kissed her and almost immediately forgot about him after their date didn’t mean they weren’t a good match. She could practically hear her sister and Lily: You’re not agreeing to marry him, Andy! It’s a second date. You don’t have to be madly in love to go on a second date with someone. If nothing else, it’ll get you back in the mix, help you remember what it’s like to be in the scene again. Go, re
lax, enjoy. Stop trying to orchestrate every detail. Who cares if it works out or it doesn’t? Just try.
Like it was ever that easy.
“Andy? Is six okay?” Nick’s voice snapped her out of her haze.
“Six? Six is great. That totally works.” She smiled widely and felt instantly ridiculous. “I better be getting back to work!”
“You just sat down.”
“Yes, but this article is due on Friday and I haven’t even begun editing it yet!” She sounded flighty and forced to her own ears. How awful must she have sounded to him?
“Will you tell me what it’s about?”
“Saturday,” she said, halfway out of the lounge. “I’ll bore you with all the details then.”
Her desk, when she finally reached it, felt like a respite. Andy tried to reassure herself that Nick was a super-nice guy who, if nothing else, would be a fun person to do things with. Why did she need to think beyond that? It was simple: she didn’t.
She managed to concentrate for the next hour, putting down another hundred words, and began to feel better about meeting her Friday deadline. Her new editor at New York magazine, a Vogue transplant named Sawyer, was an absolute pleasure to work for: calm, reasonable, totally professional in every way. He approved—and sometimes assigned—Andy’s story ideas, discussed in good detail what he’d most like to see her focus on, and then stood back while she researched and wrote, getting involved again only once she’d submitted copy in order to provide terrific line edits and ask thoughtful, substantive questions. Her current article was, coincidentally, an in-depth feature piece on the ways in which same-sex partners tried to differentiate their weddings from conventional weddings without alienating conservative family members. It would be her largest piece for them yet, and she was pleased with how it was shaping up. It provided her with a decent-enough salary—at least when combined with the interest she made from her cut of The Plunge’s sale, since she’d immediately saved and conservatively invested the principal—and the time to work on other projects. Namely, a book. Although she only had a hundred or so pages and hadn’t yet shown it to another human being, Andy had a good feeling about that one, too. Who could say for sure if she would ever really publish a roman à clef about Miranda Priestly? All Andy knew was that she loved being back in control of her own life.