Chapter 7
Seven
The Composition Book
What is it about love that makes us think we can tame it, when all the while it is taming us?
Gianna went to stay with friends while I moved out of our apartment, saying it was better “if we didn’t watch each other untangle.
” We’d had a few difficult heart--to--hearts, and the performance review that couples give each other before they split.
We came to the usual conclusions, that we’d “grown apart” and there was no point blaming each other.
She was less emotional about it than I had imagined, which gave me pause, since being unemotional was never Gianna’s thing.
Still, at the time, I stubbornly refused to believe my magic was solely at fault, that my time jump back to Nicolette’s arms had done this, that my grandmother’s warning about lovers not being able to love you twice had woven its evil spell.
Perhaps this was coming anyhow, I reasoned. People change.
As I loaded boxes into a small U--Haul I had rented, I let thoughts of returning to Nicolette become my salve, a numbing agent to the pain of leaving Gianna, the woman who, in a whimsical ceremony in a Pennsylvania forest, I had promised I would always love, and who’d promised me she would do the same.
I called Nicolette from a pay phone in Manhattan. She was in Canada, about to leave for the day’s shooting. I mentioned that Gianna and I had finally split up.
“Oh, I’m sorry, Alfie.”
“It was coming for a while.”
“That’s the worst.”
“I’m glad I have you to talk to.”
“Of course.”
“You know, I’ve been thinking. I’m pretty tired of New York and the cold. I can write from anywhere. I might move out to L.A. now.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. Would you like that?”
I regretted asking the moment I did.
“Sure,” she said. “I mean, that would be great. I’m not there a lot, you know. With shoots and everything. But—-”
“Right, right. I wouldn’t be coming for you. I mean, of course, I want to be with you. That would be the cool part. But I’m not, you know . . . I’m not saying . . .”
I waited for her to add something. She didn’t.
“Twice,” I mumbled.
The second time around, I never made the call. I told myself I would see her at the premiere, five months away. Better to talk in person.
?
During this time, I got myself in better shape.
I watched what I ate, lost some weight, and went to a gym five mornings a week to do weight work.
I know it’s a cliché, Boss, that people take better care of themselves after a relationship ends.
And it is strange that you’d rather make yourself attractive for the possibility of a love, than for one you already have.
I suppose all of it goes back to the grass is always greener.
I looked up that phrase once. Did you know it dates to a Greek poet in the first century BC?
That’s how long we’ve been making fools of ourselves.
As the premiere approached, I flew out to Los Angeles but this time with no return ticket.
That night at the hotel, sitting on the bed, I realized the last time I had lived through this day, Gianna had told me she was pregnant.
I’d gone to sleep thinking I was going to be a father and wore that idea through the next day’s festivities like a heavy gauze covering my eyes.
This time felt different. But not better.
To be honest, I felt kind of empty. As I rode in the car that the studio had provided, I tried to convince myself that meeting up with Nicolette after the film was over—-as I’d promised last time but never done—-would ease the sting of my collapse with Gianna.
I rubbed my arms through my sports coat, feeling my newly tightened muscles.
The crowd was the same as last time, as was Nicolette’s arrival in that silver lamé dress, parting the attendees like a speedboat through a lake. The cameras flashed incessantly. When we saw each other, we repeated what happened in the previous encounter.
She took my hand and gently rubbed her thumb across my palm.
“Hi,” she said.
“Hi, Nicolette.”
“I’ve missed you. Are you good?”
“Yeah. And you?”
“Everything’s great.”
This time, I preempted her leaning in and did it first, offering her previous words back to her.
“Let’s go make someone happy,” I whispered.
She blinked, as if confused, then pushed up a smile.
“I’ll see you after?” she said.
I saw her after. But not the way I’d hoped.
?
The movie finished, there was wild applause, and Nicolette and a couple of the other actors went to the front of the theater and spoke a few words to the audience.
Then they thanked Jaimie and Marisol, who sat up front and got a huge ovation, and “the real writer, Alfie Logan, who is also here.” I waved.
Afterward, there was the usual pandemonium of people pushing and cutting and greeting one another.
I tried to see where Nicolette was going.
I’d kind of hoped she’d find me, but with so much attention on her, I guess it was difficult.
I wiggled through the crowd to the front of the theater, where they’d told me I’d have a car waiting to go to an after--party.
But there were about fifty cars waiting.
Valet parkers were racing back and forth with keys.
I shuffled impatiently, reading the placards in the windshields, hoping to see my name.
Suddenly, I heard a small roar and saw more cameras flashing.
I spotted Nicolette being ushered to her limo.
She was waving with one arm, but the other was draped around the waist of a tall, bearded man whom I recognized as an actor, an action hero type, although I couldn’t remember his name.
When they reached the curb, there was sudden yelling from photographers, and Nicolette turned, still arm in arm with her man, and they smiled and posed until someone yelled “A kiss! A kiss!” and Nicolette reached her hand across his cheek and planted a long, wet smooch on his lips while flashes illuminated their perfect coupling, as if their love created daylight.
I’ll spare you the embarrassing details of my being discarded, Boss—-the canceled dinners, the unanswered phone calls, the personal assistant who eventually emailed me letting me know that Nicolette was “heavily involved in a new project but appreciated the invitation to get together and wishes you well.”
Eight months later, I read she was engaged to the action hero.
They were making a big--budget “futuristic fantasy” film together.
I laughed at the word futuristic because I had so badly estimated my future with her.
Then again, I had only really turned to Nicolette after messing things up with Gianna.
Maybe she never actually cared about me. Maybe I just misread everything.
Who knows? We invent all kinds of theories about how our hearts get broken, when we’re the ones who drop them on the floor.
?
Now, if you’re wondering if I ever contacted Gianna again, Boss, I did.
A few times. I called her on the phone. I showed up at the camera store where she worked.
She was never mean. But the spark was gone.
Just like Yaya had experienced with George.
I could see it in Gianna’s forced smile.
Her glances out the window. Her sentences like “I know things will get better for you, Alfie.” Always “you.” Never “us.”
In time, I gave up. I moved down to Australia, which felt as far away as I could get, and I stayed there for many years. I took on physical jobs. I lived near a beach. I never married again.
Looking back, the story is pretty simple. I ignored my mother’s warnings that the second time won’t always be better, and I did the “something stupid” my Yaya had worried about. Somewhere in heaven, I broke both their hearts.
I walked away from my one true love, Boss. And the lone caveat of my unique gift—-You cannot get someone to love you twice—-meant I could never undo the biggest mistake of my life.
I have cursed this power ever since.
Nassau
“What do you mean, you’re his boss?”
LaPorta was shaking his head in confusion, like a man whose key no longer opens his front door.
“Alfie’s been working with me for years,” Gianna said. “He’s my assistant. My right--hand person. He takes care of everything.” Her voice softened. “He’s kind of my best friend.”
“Since when?”
“Since we got out of college.”
“Wait. So you were in school together? That part’s true?”
“Yes.”
“What else?”
“We met in Africa as kids. We saw each other again in Miami. I did meet his grandmother once. Not the way he described. But the rest of it . . .”
She choked up. “Poor Alfie.”
“Why ‘poor Alfie’?”
“He’s obviously not well. I knew there was something wrong with his health. He’s been falling a lot. He’s always tired. But I didn’t know that his mind . . . I mean, his brain must be affected.”
She lifted the notebook. “Why else would he write all this?”
LaPorta squeezed his fists. No sympathy. Stay on the case. The two million bucks.
“Was he in debt? Did he owe people?”
“Alfie?” Gianna almost laughed. “Not a chance. He stays in my guest house. He drives my old car. I’ve tried to increase his salary a hundred times. He always says he has everything he needs.”
“What about your husband?”
“My ex--husband?”
“Yeah. Could they have cooked this up together?”
“No. No way.” Gianna shook her head. “Alfie never liked Mike. Never trusted him. He tried to warn me about him.” She paused. “I should’ve listened.”
“Why?”
“Why do you think? Lies. Other women. Spending my money. Take your pick.”
She flashed her eyes at LaPorta with a look that he recognized as weary heartbreak.
“When did you two divorce?”
“Ten years ago.”
“Was it bad?”
“Awful. Mike fought me over everything. He even stalked me for a while. I had to take out a restraining order.”
“You never married again?”
“God, no. Mike ruined that whole idea. Sadly, thanks to an idiot judge, he still has a piece of my business.”
“What business?”
“Photography.”
“That’s a business?”