Chapter 8
“Wait, Zach Jeffries drove you three hours to the hospital?” Eva asked as she sliced the seitan on her cutting board on Tuesday night. For our third class, we were making black bean tortilla soup and seitan fajitas.
Duncan stood at the stove, stirring the black beans that I’d rinsed this afternoon. “And stayed with you in the waiting room?”
“Pleeeeease let me tell them the rest?” Sara asked, taking a sip of her wine.
When my sister dropped me off on Sunday night, I told Sara everything—but made her promise to keep the kiss against the wall of the Mayfair Hotel to herself. Not that it was the equivalent of hot wild sex on the carpet or anything, but still, it was private and I didn’t want it blabbed to the class.
Eva gaped at me. “Omigod, you slept together all weekend and now you’re pregnant.”
“ Not even close ,” I said . We had just one kick-ass kiss .
One kiss that I couldn’t get out of my mind. On Monday, Zach texted me with How’s your dad? Hope you got home ok. Z.
I texted back He’s doing fine and so am I. Thanks again for all you did . I wanted to add something else, a little sappy X for a kiss or something, but I didn’t want to be a total moron. I didn’t know what he was thinking.
But I did know I was sunk. Because when very nice, everything-in-common cute vegan chef Alexander Orr had called on Monday morning to ask if I’d like to have dinner Saturday night, at his house, I made up an excuse. For Sunday brunch, too.
“Are we just friends, then?” Alexander had asked, kind of wistfully.
I thought of our meh kiss. Then of the way I turned to liquid when Zach just looked at me.
“Is that okay?” I’d asked. “We do have a lot in common, and you’re a really cool guy.”
“I guess it’ll have to be. Plus, you never know, do you?”
“That is so true,” I’d said. So true.
I stirred the soup, which smelled amazing.
“Clem said he kissed her so hot and hard that her knees almost buckled,” Sara announced.
I rolled my eyes. “Sara, is nothing private?”
“One kiss? Kind of a letdown from my version,” Eva said, giving her shoulders a little shimmy. “And what, you’re suddenly a priss?” Eva asked, turning the peppers over in the sauté pan. “At least tell us if you’re officially seeing each other now.”
I took a sip of wine. “Well, he had to go to New York on business. He’s not coming back till Thursday or Friday. But I’ll give you this piece of information: I kind of miss him.”
“Well, I think it’s all great,” Duncan said. “I mean, you hated him last week. It gives me hope.”
“About your ex?” Sara asked, slicing a red bell pepper.
Duncan sat down with a heavy sigh. “I can’t stand how much I miss her. I just wish she’d talk to me. But she won’t. I tried going to the club where she bartends, and she had the bouncer make me leave.”
I turned off the burner for the soup. “Maybe you need to let her go, Duncan. She sounds pretty sure.”
He looked miserable. “The day before she dumped me she told me she loved me. Then I come home and all her stuff is gone and she won’t talk to me. I even tried calling her best friend, and she hung up on me.”
“I wonder what went wrong for her,” Sara said.
“Me, too. I can’t sleep. I can’t eat. I can’t do anything. And I’m learning to be a vegan for a woman who won’t even talk to me.”
“Maybe we can find out what’s up,” Sara said. “Clem and I could go hang out at the bar and start talking about our jerk exes. She’ll chime in. Maybe. Worth a try.”
“No way I’m missing this,” Eva said. “I mean, who slams an ex better than me? Let’s go tomorrow night. Early enough so it won’t be crowded and we can set up the convo for her to overhear.”
Duncan raised an eyebrow and gnawed his lower lip for a second. “Don’t let her know you’re my friends. She’ll have that giant dude throw you out.”
“Clem, I think we forgot the tortillas,” Eva said, sniffing the air. Something was burning.
“Oh, shit,” I said, grabbing my oven mitts to pull out the cracker-like tortillas. “We can warm up some more.”
“We’re busy saving a man’s life here,” Sara said. “That’s worth a burned tortilla.”
The woman who wouldn’t be named was named Gwendolyn Paul, hated to be called Gwen, and worked at Ocean 88, a hot little nightclub with a tiny dance floor and a famous square-shaped bar that those semi-lucky to be chosen could shake their stuff on for a minute and get a free fourteen-dollar drink. Sara and I went there once, and the very hot male bartender nodded his chin at Sara and said, “Show your stuff, babe,” and she said, “Really?” totally game to get up there and shimmy for her free frozen margarita, and the jerk said, “No, not really.” He looked at me and said, “But you can.” I told him he was a pig and we left and never went back. My scathing email to the owner went unanswered, too.
That Gwendolyn a) didn’t like to be called Gwen and b) worked at Ocean 88 didn’t bode well. The woman had to be a total bitch. And not in a good way.
“If that jerkoff is there, I’m leaving,” Sara said. “I like Duncan, but I can only take so much.”
“If he’s there, I’ll get him back for you,” Eva said, pulling out her compact and lipstick and making her lips even redder. She fluffed her bangs, gave her lips a press, then snapped the compact shut.
“How?” we both asked in unison.
“Oh, trust me. I’m the master at making people pay.”
Sara laughed. “You scare me. Make sure I don’t get on your bad side.”
“Oh, you’ll know if you do,” she said.
Sara stood to the side of Ocean 88’s big window. “Clem, look in and see if he’s there. Do you remember what he looks like? Beefy with blond ponytail.”
I peered in. At seven o’clock on a Wednesday, the bar wasn’t crowded; Ocean 88 didn’t serve food, and the dance floor didn’t get going till at least nine. One very hot bartender with longish brown hair and a huge wooden cross necklace was filling steins at the tap. Another male bartender who looked like a grown-up Harry Potter, down to the round glasses, was pouring martinis for four middle-aged women. Across the bar, a couple had their tongues all over each other, and luckily, where Gwendolyn was unloading bottles of beer, there were three empty stools.
She looked just like her photo, but sexier. She wore a tiny black tank top and skinny jeans with high-heeled boots. Excellent cleavage, the kind that made you stare and order more drinks, male or female. I wouldn’t have thought she’d go for Duncan. He was somewhat cute, but this chick looked like she only went out with heavy-metal dudes.
“Jerk bartender’s not there,” I assured Sara, and we headed in, sitting in front of Gwendolyn.
She took our orders, and the second she was back with the drinks, I got the plan rolling.
“I just wish I knew why he broke up with me,” I said kind of loudish, tilting my stool to face Sara and Eva. “He just stopped calling. We were together for over a year and he just stops calling?”
“He owes you an explanation, something,” Sara agreed. “How will you ever move on if he keeps you in this weird limbo of no closure?”
That was diabolically good.
Eva took a sip of her drink. “You should be kissing the floor with gratitude that he did dump you. Anyone who’d just disappear on a relationship the way he did, no explanation, no nothing, has mental problems. He’s probably bipolar.”
“Or maybe he’s just confused,” Gwendolyn said as she placed Sara’s appletini in front of her.
Score.
“Confused?” I repeated. “Why would he be confused? I’m the one who doesn’t know what I did wrong or where we went wrong.”
Gwendolyn put a bowl of taro chips and salsa in front of us, which Eva immediately hit up. “Well, maybe an old girlfriend came back into his life and he fell in love with that person all over again.”
Oh. Sorry, Duncan. That was hard to compete with.
“Sounds like you’ve been there,” Sara said to Gwendolyn.
Gwendolyn took a swig of Pellegrino. “I was madly in love with this guy named John. Wanted to marry him—the works. But he dumped me for someone else. So I met this guy named Duncan, and though he wasn’t exactly right for me, I just fell into it, you know? And stayed for almost a year. But then John came back a couple of week ago, begging for forgiveness and wanting a second chance, and I couldn’t resist.”
“What wasn’t right with you and Duncan?” I asked. “Maybe it’ll help me understand.”
“Well, he’d have to change practically half of everything he is for me to be happy with him,” she said. “And that’s not fair. I’m a vegan. He’s not. I like to go out. He doesn’t. I can’t stand his conservative family. He can—and wanted to hang out with them a little too often. He thinks I should go hack to school. I don’t. He was always trying to change me. He’s who he is, right? And he’s fine. But so am I. you know?”
“Yeah, you are,” Eva said, stuffing her mouth with another chip. “What an ass this Duncan sounds like. Wanting you to change for him?”
Sara and I shot Eva a “remember whose side we’re on” glare.
“Well, to be fair,” Gwendolyn said, “I wanted him to change just as much. Go vegan. Blow off his annoying family. Lose the plaid bowling shirts. Lay off me.”
“It’s too bad neither of you accepted the other,” Sara said. “But I guess that’s how you figure out who’s right for you and who’s wrong for you. When it gets to the point where it just doesn’t work, you know it.”
Gwendolyn raised her glass at Sara. “Exactly.”
“But it took you a year to figure that out,” I said, now shooting Sara a “Stop agreeing with her!” look. “So you must have been really into Duncan, right?”
“Look, I know you want your boyfriend to come back,” Gwendolyn said. “But sometimes, two people are just too different. And whatever makes them click just isn’t enough.”
Who could argue with that?
I wanted to, though. I wanted that whatever that made Zach and me click to be enough to make a relationship possible. I was incredibly hot for him, but it was much more than that. There was real chemistry between us. There was growing up on farms—even if his family “farm” was a zillion-dollar ranch empire. There was talking to goats and chickens when we were kids. There was ambition. Determination. The world of cooking, albeit different ends of the spectrum. There was a three-hour drive to get to my dad in the hospital. Generosity and kindness.
So yeah, we were different. But there was something very real between us.
“Just sounds to me like this Duncan really loves you,” I said.
“I know, but it was hard enough for me to tell him it was over. Then he wouldn’t stop calling and texting and showing up here, and so I started getting pissed and ignored him.”
“Pathetic,” Eva said. “Kinda like I was when I kept calling and texting my soon-to-be-ex-husband when he dumped me for some bimbo.”
“Any chance of you two getting back together?” Sara asked Gwendolyn. “I’m just asking because it might give her”—she patted me on the shoulder—“some hope.”
Gwendolyn shrugged. “I don’t know. I doubt it. I’m seeing where things are going with John. Duncan and I are just too different.”
“But what if it’s not over for him ? ” Sara asked. “What if he’s ready to stand outside your window like that old movie with John Cusack and the boom box over his head? Can’t you at least put him out of his misery? Tell him the truth about your ex.”
“I guess I should,” Gwendolyn said.
At least we accomplished that much. “Maybe when you see Duncan again, you’ll realize you do love him,” I said.
Gwendolyn took a sip of her water. “I haven’t really missed him, though.”
Oh.
“Gwen, take over for me for ten?” another bartender said.
“ Gwen dolyn ” she shot at him. She turned back to us. “Oh, and that first round’s on me. Talking to you guys helped me clear up some stuff I wasn’t even too sure about. I think it’s pretty clear that Duncan and I are wrong for each other.” She headed to the other side of the bar.
“Oh shit, now we have to tell Duncan we helped her realize she doesn’t want to be with him,” Sara whispered.
Damn. We didn’t bother finishing our drinks. Eva wanted to flirt with the too-young-for-her guy doing shots on the other side of the bar, but I reminded her that he was good-looking, which went against her new plan.
“Good point,” she said as we headed around the bar.
I was about to pull open the door when I froze.
Zach. Walking outside, his arm around a very attractive red-haired woman in thigh-high boots.
Out of town till Thursday or Friday. Right.
Well, shit.
I flung open Ocean 88’s door to confront Zach, but three tipsy blondes in identical outfits (minidresses and stilettos) walked in, the last one checking her phone in the doorway. I took a step back, mentally and physically. “I think these chicks just saved me from making a total ass of myself.”
“No, I would have grabbed you before you made it out the door,” Sara said as we headed in the opposite direction Zach and the redhead had gone. “What were you going to say to him? ‘Oh, so you’re away on business, are you? And who’s this?’”
“Shit, shit, shit,” I said. “He told me he was seeing other people. And he just made it crystal clear. I have to forget he exists.”
Sara looked at me like I was nuts. “Or you could just go with the flow, Clem. You’re seeing Alexander. Sort of.”
“Not really. I must have been insane,” I said. “Me and a guy who’s opening a steakhouse. Who puts dead deer on his signs. Who lives for steak. I can’t believe I thought something was actually happening between us.”
“Maybe because he took a six-hour drive round-trip to a hospital so you could get to your dad right away?” Sara said. “And then paid for your family’s hotel rooms? And then texted to ask if your dad was okay?”
Yeah, no kidding. “Don’t remind me.”
“He’s been acting like your boyfriend, Clem,” Sara said. “I totally get why you’re upset. But you can’t confront him for doing what he said he’s doing.”
“I think she should chase the fucker down and karate chop him in the balls,” Eva said, turning around to peer down Ocean Avenue. “If you run, you can probably find him, Clem. Even in those crazy sandals. Wail him good for me.”
“Wow, remind me that I really don’t ever want to piss you off,” Sara said to Eva. “Also, Clem, how many times have you been out walking with Ty and he puts his arm around you because you just said something funny. Or because you got fired. Maybe Zach is madly in love with you and that chick is just a bud. You never know.”
Eva rolled her eyes. “Sara, you’re sweet. Really. So sweet I might puke. But give me a fucking break.”
“I’m just saying that chasing the guy down and confronting him over nothing isn’t a good idea,” Sara said. “And trust me, when I’m the voice of reason, you know you should listen. It doesn’t happen often.”
“But—” I started to say.
But shit. Sara was right. In the space of a minute, I’d gone from kind of stupidly crushed to being pissed at myself for being stupid again. The guy was a player. Period. A player with some redeeming qualities, but a player.
We walked down Ocean Avenue for a while, but when the zillionth hand-in-hand couple passed us, annoying us with their coupledom, Sara upped her chin at Freddy’s, a favorite little jazz bar. I shrugged and we went inside. The place was half-crowded. We sat at a round table, and Sara ordered us three dirty martinis.
I stared at the edamame in the silver bowl on the table. Dammit. What was this? How could I be so disappointed over a guy I was an idiot for liking in the first place?
“I’m gonna give it to you straight, Clem,” Eva said, sipping her drink. She nabbed the waitress and ordered tapas. “Zach Jeffries is a zillionaire who makes L.A. Magazine ’s most eligible bachelors list every year. He can have any woman he wants. You’re a challenge, so he’s interested. But if you’re expecting him to be your boyfriend—an exclusive boyfriend—you’re a dumbass.”
“Comforting, Eva,” Sara said.
“No, honest,” I said. “Necessary honesty. I need to hear this.” And I need to back the hell off of expecting anything from Zach.
“Damn,” Sara said. “I like Zach.”
Yeah, me, too.