Chapter 3
Chapter Three
It was announced to me Friday morning, one-and-a-half weeks after the worst day ever, that Friday night was going to be outrageous.
And by outrageous, Elizabeth meant that she’d secured VIP passes to a much sought after “club experience” as she put it, which I think was the trendy way of saying “we’re going to a new bar. ”
I was very motivated to find a new job and new apartment, although Elizabeth hadn’t made any complaints against my presence. In fact, she’d gone so far as to mention that her lease was almost up, and she suggested we find something larger and continue to room together.
The idea appealed to me. Living with Elizabeth would be excellent prophylaxis against my natural reclusive, agoraphobic tendencies.
Even in my relationship with Jon we’d both recognized that I required a generous amount of space and alone time in order to behave with appropriate affection when we were together.
Maybe that was why he felt the need to cheat.
The idea struck me as one with merit. I tucked it away as a data point.
Over the last several days, I’d done a fair amount of practiced focusing on my present state of “lessness”—homelessness, joblessness, and relationshiplessness. Less was not more. Less was an unstable, uncomfortable place to be.
Jon was my first boyfriend. I went on dates with guys in high school and college, but they were all first dates. Jon was the first guy who didn’t seem put off by my rampant randomness; he seemed to bask in it. I wondered if he would be the only one.
The thought didn’t trouble me as much as it should have. In fact, it bothered me far less than the thought of never experiencing something like the smoldering warmth of awareness I experienced during my seven to twelve minutes with the blue-eyed security guard.
I’d spoken only briefly to Jon since the breakup, and I still needed to evaluate what I actually felt during our conversation.
He was mad at me; in fact, he was outraged, and he’d yelled at me for the first few minutes of our conversation.
He said he’d found out about my job loss from his dad, and he wanted to know why I hadn’t asked him for help.
I couldn’t believe my ears; it took me a few seconds to respond. “Jon, is that an actual question? And how did Mr. Holesome—I mean, how did your dad know?”
“Yes. It is an actual question. You need me, you are my girlfriend—”
“No—” I shook my head as if convincing myself.
“Nothing is decided. I want to take care of you. I still love you. We belong together.” He sounded resolute and a little sullen.
“You cheated on me. We are not together.” I was starting to become aggravated, which was the closest I came to anger.
I heard him sigh on the other end, and then his tone softened. “Janie, don’t you know that changed nothing for me? It was one time. It meant nothing. I was drunk.”
“You were sober enough to put the condom wrapper in your pocket.”
He half growled, half laughed. “I still want to take care of you—let me take care of you.”
“That’s not your role—”
“Can we be friends?” He cut me off, his voice somewhat gentler.
“Yes.” I meant it. I didn’t want to lose him as a friend. “Yes. We should be friends.”
“Will you let me take care of you?” His voice was pleading. “Will you let me help you?”
I thought about what he was asking; I knew he meant financial support. “You can help me by being a good friend.”
“What if I can’t be just friends?” I could sense his renewed annoyance with me as he spoke. “I can’t think about anything but you.”
It was my turn to sigh; I couldn’t think of anything to say. Well, more accurately, I couldn’t think of anything to say related to our topic of conversation, but I could think of plenty of things to say about the climate of New Guinea or the prehistoric ancestors of the African secretary bird.
After a moment of silence, he cleared his throat. When he spoke again, his voice sounded firm. “Nothing is decided,” he said again. “When can I see you?”
We arranged a time to meet on Saturday morning at a neutral spot, then we said our goodbyes, during which he told me again that he loved me. I didn’t respond.
I reflected on all that had happened. I didn’t feel an acute need to grieve the loss of him or the five years of our life together.
In order to be confident of my feelings, I made sure the invisible closet door in my head was open, the light was on, and the box was unlocked, but detachment remained.
I knew that my preoccupation with the trivial was a direct result of my mother’s death, as well as what my therapist called an already natural propensity to observe life rather than live it. He called it self-preservation.
My paternal grandmother, ever a fangirl of pharmaceutical products and medical intervention, insisted that I needed therapy when my mother died. So, I started therapy at the ripe age of thirteen.
I thought therapy meant sitting on a couch being shown inkblots shaped suspiciously like blobs of ink and being told I was angry with my mother for her affairs; angry with her for running off with her latest lover; angry that she had gotten herself killed in a motorcycle accident; angry that she had left me with my somewhat dimwitted—albeit well-meaning—father and my two siblings, both of whom were prone to criminal activity; and angry at her for cooking veggie tacos on the Tuesdays of my childhood instead of the hot dogs and potato chips I craved.
The therapist did all those things even though I hadn’t felt particularly angry; I just felt sad, enormously sad.
It was why, the therapist said, my brain always took a hard U-turn when I was faced with difficult or uncomfortable emotional situations.
Nevertheless, during that year, I also reluctantly learned strategies that worked.
I learned that when I was overwrought with emotional distress, small things could be a trigger, like finding a bathroom stall bereft of toilet paper.
The mundane became as insurmountable as moving Mt. Fuji.
However, I felt certain that I was doing my utmost to spend some time marinating in the end of my relationship.
The most emotion I could conjure over its end was a wistful melancholy over the possibility of losing Jon as a friend.
Admittedly, I also felt a twinge of regret when I realized I’d already bought him a birthday present.
Maybe that made me shallow.
Elizabeth thought I was in shock.
Whatever the truth was, I reasoned, once enough time passed, the truth would out.
I liked to think of myself as Launcelot Gobbo from Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice; even a foolish man will produce some wisdom, given enough time to drone on and on in unchecked soliloquy.
Since most of my time was spent in unchecked soliloquy, I held out hope for some wisdom.
The job search was in its infancy. Nevertheless, I sent out at least a hundred resumes, applied for every job on craigslist for which I might be the least bit qualified, and contacted all the temp agencies I could find in the Chicago area.
I was determined to be employed.
I had a meager savings account, but it wasn’t just the money at issue. I could not take a prolonged sabbatical from the working class because my temperament required that I be, at all times, gainfully employed.
The recognition that my temperament was less than ideal for appropriate integration into society was the reason I started tutoring elementary school kids in math and science every Thursday afternoon and evening.
Admittedly, it wasn’t why I continued. I continued for selfish reasons: the kids liked comic books, they were funny, and I liked doing it.
If left to my own devices, I would eventually become a hermit, sans my weekly tutoring on the South Side.
I knew the longer I was out of work, the more despondent I would become.
I even considered learning to knit. I think this last revelation is what led Elizabeth to insist that we spend some time being outrageous.
And, therefore, we were destined for an outrageous night at an outrageous club.
The only items she approved of in my wardrobe were my shoes.
In fact, she borrowed a pair of orange faux-crocodile leather wedge heels with a turquoise bow at the toe.
I wore a zebra printed spiked heel; the rest of my outfit came from her closet.
She said I owned the clothes of a radiologist and the shoes of an OB/GYN, which is like the medical doctor equivalent of saying that I dressed like a librarian with a propensity for fuck-me boots.
We wore the same shoe size, but she was at least a size smaller everywhere except her waist. She owned a mere two dresses that actually fit over my expansive derriere: an olive-green, button-down, Mad Men throwback, 1950s-style housedress and a cinch-waisted, almost backless, simple black dress that gathered and flowed nicely over her shoulders and hips but that merely stretched and puckered on mine.
The black dress ended mid-thigh. I looked at myself in the mirror, then gazed longingly at the olive green dress still hanging in the closet; it was knee-length.
Elizabeth met my eyes in the mirror and gave me a dirty look over my shoulder. She’d seen my attention stray to the closet.
She won. I wore the black dress. Even with the addition of thigh-high stockings to cover my bare legs I felt exposed and, if I must admit, a tad sordid.
We were able to enter the club with little difficulty, even though a long line of partygoers snaked around the length of the building. Elizabeth walked to the front and handed two large tickets to a man wearing sunglasses flanked on either side by two beefsteaks of man-meat.
As far as I could tell, the man in the sunglasses didn’t look at the tickets, but I got the distinct impression he was studying us behind his dark lenses. He nodded his head just once, and then moved to the side so we could pass.