Before I can finish he marches past me and I hear the water start running on full blast.
“Is everything OK?” Shutting the dogs in the living room, I hurry down the hallway to find the bathroom door wide open and Nate stooped over the sink, washing his face.
“Yeah, fine.” Face dripping, he looks around for a towel.
Which is when I realize that in my mad rush to tidy up the flat, I totally overlooked the bathroom. Through the steam my eyes do a quick sweep and fall on several soggy towels I’ve left lying on the floor, together with the different products I used, all with their tops off. There’s even my Bic razor just lying there on the shelf, full of shaving foam and bristles, I notice, feeling a wave of mortification.
I have a flashback of Nate’s spotlessly clean bathroom, with his pristine white towels rolled up and stacked neatly on the shelves, like something out of Elle Decor.
Oh God, he must think I’m a total slob.
“I’ll get you a fresh one,” I say, quickly scooping up the towels and shoving them into the laundry basket. I open the linen cupboard, but it’s empty. Shit. Where are all the towels? Then I remember. I’ve got about five hanging over the back of my chair in my bedroom. “Er, sorry, we seem to have run out.”
“Don’t worry, I’m practically dry now anyway,” he says, a little tetchily. “Ready?”
“Nearly. I just need to finish my makeup.” Having wiped off my ill-fated attempt at smoky eyes after realizing I looked like Ling-Ling the giant panda, I need to apply a bit of mascara.
“You’ve had an hour. What have you been doing?” He laughs, but I detect a twinge of irritation.
Or maybe that’s just my twinge of irritation, I realize, resisting the urge to reel off the long list of everything I’ve been doing in a mad panic so I won’t be late. Instead I say brightly, “Do you want something to drink while you wait?”
“Just some water will be great.”
“I don’t have any bottled. Is tap water OK?” I start heading toward the kitchen.
“You don’t? Well, in that case, no.” Nate wrinkles up his nose. “You know me—I only drink mineral.”
“Oh, of course.” I nod, feeling a bit stupid. We’ve moved into the tiny hallway and I’m suddenly aware it seems much more cramped and poky than usual.
“Shit. What’s that?” He bangs into a carved wooden mask hanging on the wall.
“It’s from a tribe in Ethiopia,” I say, hurriedly straightening it. “My roommate got it. I think it’s supposed to scare away evil spirits.”
“No kidding.” He studies it with a raised eyebrow.
“OK, well, I’ll just grab my bag and then we can leave.” The sooner we get out of here, the better, I tell myself, pushing open my bedroom door. I dive inside and scramble around for my mascara. I’ll put it on in the cab on the way to the party.
“So this is your room?”
I turn to see Nate standing at the doorway, glancing around, taking everything in.
“Er, yeah, this is it. It’s a bit small . . . and there’s not much wardrobe space,” I add hastily, catching him looking at the piles of clothes on the back of the chair, “but I like it.” I continue hunting for my mascara.
“It’s very . . . colorful,” he says, choosing his words carefully.
“Well, I’ve always loved color.”
Shit, where is that mascara? I look at my makeup strewn all over my dressing table. It’s got to be here somewhere.
“You’ve certainly got a lot of stuff considering you only moved to New York a few weeks ago.”
I look up from my dressing table to see Nate staring at my bookshelves, which are crammed with pictures, magazines, old sketchbooks, and my collection of seashells, which I haven’t got round to finding a place for.
“What’s this?” I watch as absently he picks up a magazine and peers at it, frowning. “You’ve done some kind of quiz. . . .”
Suddenly it registers. He’s found that quiz. I feel a flash of embarrassment. “Oh, that?” I say, trying to sound casual while hastily taking it from him. Yesterday I would have probably shown it to him, had a giggle over it—after all, Nate would probably find it cute—but now . . .
Out of the corner of my eye I spot my mascara on the bed and pounce on it.
Now everything’s different.
“It’s just a load of rubbish,” I say dismissively, and chucking it in the wastepaper basket, I grab my bag. “OK, let’s go.”
The party is already in full swing by the time we arrive. Well, I say “full swing,” but in reality it’s just lots of people standing around drinking vodka martinis and talking TV. And by “talking TV” I don’t mean chatting about who they think is going to win Dancing with the Stars, but discussing the ins and outs of production, escalating budgets, and viewing figures.
Apart from me, it appears that everyone here is in the industry, and whereas on the way over I’d been imagining a really glamorous party, it’s actually a bit dull. In fact, at one point, while struggling to keep up with a conversation about production scheduling, I find my mind wandering and I catch myself wondering when we can leave. I quickly remind myself that I’m in New York at a TV party with Nate. A few months ago this would have been my dream scenario, and now I’m wanting to go home, put on my pajamas, and curl up in front of Oprah. I mean, Lucy!
I force myself to focus on the conversation.
“As I was saying, it’s all about having integrity,” intones Brad, a short man in a shiny suit, who keeps putting his arm round my waist under the guise of moving me out of the way of servers and then letting his hand linger. Not that Nate notices. He’s too busy trying to pitch his new idea for a game show.
“Totally,” says Nate, nodding, his face earnest.
I mean, please. He’s talking about a game show, not an award-winning documentary.
“If you’ll excuse me,” I say politely, trying to extricate myself.
“Why, what have you done?” chuckles Brad, highly amused at his own bad pun.
“Always the joker, Brad,” Nate says with a smile, playing along with the locker-room humor.
“Anyway, tell me,” says Brad, flashing Nate and me a broad smile, “how did you two meet?”
“In Italy. We were both studying art,” I explain. At the memory of Venice I feel a familiar tingle.
“Oh, really? So are you an artist?”
I pause, briefly thrown by the question. “I was, for a little while,” I say quietly.
“Then she realized she needed to live in the real world and get a proper job,” laughs Nate.
His words sting. “Something like that.” I nod, forcing a smile, but deep down it’s as if something suddenly breaks inside me, and at the first opportunity I make an excuse about popping to the loo and leave them laughing.
Making my escape, I wander to the far end of the room. The party is being held in an amazing loft in Tribeca, all exposed brickwork and pipes, with über-trendy furniture dotted around like art. Speaking of which, there’s some amazing artwork on the walls, all of it no doubt original. According to Nate, the owner is someone high up at one of the networks, which doesn’t mean much to me, except that working in TV seems to make people very rich.
After a few aborted attempts at trying to mingle, I find myself outside on the balcony chatting to one of the waiters. His name is Eric and he plays guitar in a heavy-metal band. After twenty minutes of telling me all about his recent gig and how he spent the whole evening head-banging next to the speakers, he has to leave to serve canapés and I make my way to the loo.
This time it’s genuine—I really do need to go—and finding the door unlocked, I push it open, only to see a couple of guys with their backs to me, one of whom is bent over the sink. It’s pretty obvious he’s doing coke, as when I walk in, he springs up. It’s Brad. And with him, I suddenly realize, is Nate.
“Oh!” Feeling a mixture of shock and embarrassment, I stand there frozen for a moment as they turn round and see me. Then I
remember myself.
“Sorry,” I blurt, before backing out.
“Excuse me, Brad,” says Nate, who quickly follows me out into the hallway. “Where are you going?” He looks at me, his brow etched.
“I’m tired. I think I’m going to go home.”
“I’ll come with you.”
“No, it’s OK. You stay. You’re obviously busy.”
Nate frowns. “Oh, come on, Lucy, don’t make a big deal out of it.”
I look at him and suddenly I see someone I don’t know. This isn’t long-haired, pot-smoking, easygoing Nate. This is uptight, exercise-obsessed, workaholic Nate, who says coffee is bad for you and yet who’s in the toilets at a party with a slimeball in a shiny suit doing God knows what.
“That’s not the point. You’re the one who’s always going on about being healthy. I mean, you won’t even drink tap water,” I say, thinking back to earlier.
“That’s totally different.”
“No, it’s not.” I shake my head. “You’re being a hypocrite.”
“And you’re making a scene,” he shushes me, glancing around at the other party guests to see if anyone has overheard us.
I stiffen, but stop myself from retaliating. “Look, I don’t want another row. Let’s forget about it.” I start to put on my jacket and turn to leave, but Nate follows me out.
“Lucy, wait. Let me say good-bye to a few people and I’ll come with you.”
“It’s OK. You stay. I’ll catch a cab home.”
He shoots me a look as if to say, Don’t do this to me in front of all these people. “Just give me five minutes.”
I end up giving him more than twenty as I wait in the doorway, watching him working his way around the room, getting involved in conversations, laughing at jokes. At several points I come close to leaving without him, and part of me wishes I had, because by the time he finally joins me and we climb into a cab, neither of us is in the best of moods.
“We always stay at yours—why can’t we stay at mine for a change?” I ask, as he gives the driver his address.
“What? You’d rather stay at your place than mine?” He throws me a look across the backseat. Whereas before we’d be cuddled together in the middle, now we’re sitting at opposite ends. It wouldn’t take a body-language expert to see something is up.
“What’s wrong with my place?” I feel a beat of irritation.
“Well, you can’t really compare the two, can you?” He laughs lightly and raises an eyebrow.
If I was irritated before, now I’m annoyed. “No, please, go ahead. I’m interested,” I say, folding my arms expectantly.
He lets out an impatient sigh. “OK, well, one’s a penthouse with a view of the park, and the other is a four-story walk-up with a view of graffiti.”
“I happen to like it,” I retort.
“Well, I don’t.” He shrugs.
“Well, I don’t particularly like your place,” I fire back.
“What’s not to like?”
“All that white, for a start. I like splashes of color.”
“Splashes of color?” Nate snorts. “Your apartment looks like a paint factory exploded in there.”
I let out an indignant gasp.
“And as for all that voodoo stuff—”
“What voodoo stuff?” I demand hotly.
“Like that mask.” He pulls a face.
“That’s not voodoo!” I exclaim. “Anyway, at least there are interesting things in there. Your place is so minimalist there’s hardly anything in it, apart from that epileptic machine.”
“It’s an elliptical,” he corrects brusquely, “and by the way, it wouldn’t hurt for you to start using one.”
“And what’s that supposed to mean?”
“Well, it wouldn’t do your thighs any harm, would it? If you want to get rid of that cellulite.”
I inhale sharply. It’s like a punch to my solar plexus.
“And you put a hole in my rug,” he continues with a swift uppercut.
“What?” I’m still reeling from the last comment.
“I have security CCTV cameras as part of the alarm system.”
Damn, I thought he might have CCTV. What else has he taped?
“That’s a really expensive rug.”
“For Christ’s sake, it was an accident,” I gasp.
“Like the juicer?” He glares at me.
My jaw sets defiantly. “Well, I’m sorry I’m not as perfect as you. With your showroom apartment.”
“Your place is a mess. There’s crap everywhere.”
“I’d rather be messy than anal.”
“What? So I’m anal because I don’t leave pizza boxes lying under the bed?” he cries indignantly.
Shit. He saw them. I forgot to ask Robyn to move them!
“No, because you fuss about how to stack the dishwasher, or which way to put a spoon in the cutlery drawer. You’re so anal you even iron your pineapple boxer shorts! Speaking of which, what thirty-year-old wears pineapple boxer shorts?”
He scowls. “Look, this was obviously a huge mistake.”
“A mistake?”
“You and me. It isn’t working out. I want to break up.”
“You want to break up?” I cry in astonishment. “I want to break up!”
He stares at me in disbelief. “What? You’re breaking up with me?” he retorts. “No, I’m the one breaking up with you.”
“God, you always were a jerk!” I declare contemptuously.
“You really haven’t changed, have you? You’re still pigheaded!” he yells.
“And you have changed. You used to be fun!” I yell back.
“Life’s not all about having fun, Lucy. You need to grow up.”
“I am grown up!”
“You have purple hair!” he says scornfully.
“At least I have hair!” I fire in return.
There’s a sharp moment of silence and he visibly winces.
“’Scuse me, where are you both going?”
In the middle of our breakup we turn, breathless from arguing, to see the driver looking at us in the rearview mirror.
“I’m not going anywhere with him,” I say, throwing Nate a furious glare.
“And I’m not going anywhere with her,” he shoots at me with a scowl.
For a moment there’s a standoff in the back of the cab, both of us stubbornly refusing to move. Until, with an impatient huff, Nate grabs the door and gets out, slamming it firmly behind him.
Chapter Sixteen
So that’s it. Nate and I are finished. Our great love affair is over.
It lasted the grand sum of a week.
“Well, strictly speaking, it lasted less than a week,” points out Robyn blithely. Then, seeing my expression, she adds quickly, “Ten years and less than a week.”
It’s Sunday morning and Robyn and I have taken the dogs for a walk in the park near our apartment, which basically means we’re sitting on the grass in the sunshine eating ice cream, while Simon and Jenny snuffle around by our feet.
“I still can’t believe it,” I say, taking a defiant lick of my ice cream.
“You mean about breaking up or what he said about . . . ?” She trails off and gives me a look that says, You know.
I told Robyn about the argument and she nodded supportively and enthusiastically yelled, “Go, girl,” at all the right moments. When it came to his comments about my thighs, she sharply sucked in her breath and went completely silent with shock. Which for Robyn is a first.
“Both,” I answer, biting off another large chunk of my double-chocolate fudge whatever-it-is in an act of rebellion. “And to think I was in love with him for all those years.”
“Better to have loved and lost,” remarks Robyn sagely.
“I haven’t lost him,” I say indignantly. Simon stops snuffling in the grass and cocks his ears, looking startled. “I broke up with him!”
Robyn looks confused. “I thought he broke up with you,” she says uncertainly.
r /> “Well, he did, sort of,” I admit grudgingly. “We broke up with each other. After we’d had that big argument in the cab.”
“Well, at least you agreed on something,” she says brightly.
Robyn never ceases to amaze me with her determination to see the positive in everything. Whatever disaster befalls her, she’s never negative. She could get wrongly arrested for drug smuggling in Thailand, be sentenced to life in prison, and then get thrown into a jail where no one speaks English and she’d probably say how it was a wonderful opportunity to have some “me time” and learn a new language.
“I suppose so.” I nod doubtfully.
“Are you upset?”
I stop to think about it. Am I?
“No,” I say, after a pause. As I say it, I feel a twinge of surprise. I thought I would be more than upset. I thought I would be devastated. After all, wasn’t he supposed to be my soul mate? The man whom I couldn’t live without? The person who completes me?
Er, no, Lucy, that’s Jerry Maguire.
“Well, that’s good,” Robyn is saying cheerfully. “A breakup is one thing, but heartbreak is another.” She rolls her eyes as if to say she’s been there, and I nod in recognition.
Only this time I don’t feel heartbroken at all.
“I’m stunned, I suppose,” I confess. “And disappointed. He’s not who I thought he was. But then I suppose I wasn’t either.” I look down at my ice cream. My defiance has melted along with it. “I was in love with the idea of him. An ideal of him. Of who I thought he was. Of who he used to be.”
I’m thinking out loud now as my mind mulls over everything. Last week seems like a dream, a huge blur, a rollercoaster of emotions. It all happened so fast that I never really paused to think about it. I didn’t want to stop and think about it. I was falling madly in love again and it was so exhilarating. Seeing him again, discovering he still loved me. We both got carried away. We didn’t even pause to think that maybe we were falling in love with different people. Caught up in the lust, the moment, the sheer thrill, it was like diving into the ocean.
And now, finally, I’ve come up for air.
“I was in love with the romance of it all, of getting back together with my first love. I think we both were,” I say eventually.