Spooning Read online

  Home. Changed. Cabbing. I had managed to hail a cab within the eight-minute time frame despite the freezing rain, but then the cab got stuck toward the east side of Central Park behind a car and carriage accident (the horse was all right).

  “Mum, we might be here for hours,” the cabbie told me. I didn't have hours! “You might want to walk, love.” Feeling his good intentions, I took his advice. For five extra bucks, he gave me his old umbrella.

  It took me twenty-three minutes to walk from the edge of the park to Hampton's Heiress. My feet were numb and I'd ruined my knee-high boots, stepping through the week-old snow banks. The chocolate brown suede was stained with white salt remnants. My mother would have said I was inappropriately dressed, but who bothered with tights and a winter coat and such when you were supposed to be inside at a warm restaurant, looking cute no less? My knees had taken on a raw pallor, and as I stumbled across the threshold, I huffed into my frozen hands hoping to thaw my Santaesque nose. My internal homing device steered me toward the back of the restaurant where Mr. J. P. Morgan was chatting with a homely brunette.

  “Hey!” I threw out teetering on my frost-bitten feet.

  “Beautiful!” he exclaimed. Bye-bye, homely brunette! “I've been waiting for you.” Oh, the love! Should I bother to explain my tardiness, ruddy nose, ruined boots? Nah. A group of his friends approached and prepared to encircle. Must not lose body contact. I didn't need to worry though, since he had moved behind me and draped his arms over my shoulders, nestling me into his chest cavity. Sheer bliss. This was an intimate move, right? He was demonstrating our closeness to others, showing his ownership, and I was just fine being placed up high on his trophy shelf. I reached both arms behind me, back around his waist, and ran my thumb along the inside of his jeans' waist. He had the softest lower back. There was that dimple right where we humans used to have tails. Why hadn't Cosmo expounded upon that region?

  “Be back in a sec, Charlie. Gotta run to the bathroom.”

  “See ya!” I watched him make his way through the crowd. Cute butt! And when he came back, I would see that gorgeous crooked smile—a smile all for me.

  At first I was impressed with myself. Despite frozen inner thighs, here I was holding court with Mr. J. P. Morgan's boys. We were joking and laughing … getting on so well that I didn't notice Mr. J. P. Morgan's absence at first. About twenty minutes later, my phone vibrated. It was Mr. J. P. Morgan.

  “We decided to leave and are cross town at Gladiators.” Huh? Who was we? Why wasn't I part of we?

  “Come meet me,” he said. I thought I just had. “Or just go to my apartment and get the keys from Tony and I'll meet you back there.” Oh, feeling better. A formal invite.

  Still cold and with my ego slightly bruised, I decided to meet him in bed. When I got to his apartment building, Tony, the doorman, looked me over a few times. I smiled, figuring that he just didn't recognize me in my frozen state.

  “It's me,” I threw out casually. No glimmer of recognition. “Charlie. C-h-a-r,” I began.

  “I know how to spell ‘Charlie,’” he barked in a foreign accent.

  “Oh.” I paused to shove some of my well-deserved McDonald's French fries into my mouth. (I'd made a quick stop at the McDonald's on the corner before strolling into J. P.'s lobby— I'd missed dinner after all.)

  “You're not on the envelope,” he stated. To gain access to another's apartment, New York doormen tended to write frequent visitors' names on the envelope of extra keys.

  “I'm not?” Hmm. Food for thought. I was preferring the French fries though.

  “You just saw me the other night!” I exclaimed. “Look, he just called me.” I struggled to pull out my frozen cell phone and scrolled through my list of calls received.

  “Never mind. Here,” he conceded, handing me the tiny packet of keys. After that inquisition, I figured I would just hold on to this extra set for future use.

  I pushed open the apartment door into a still darkness. I fumbled to find a light switch, finally turning on the matching table lamps next to the couch. For a bachelor pad, the boys' living room was quite nice. Though there were a few errant pizza boxes, the pillows on the couch were plump, the paintings on the walls were framed, and the plants were all alive. I wandered down the hall and turned into the first bedroom. Immediately I zeroed in on no less than five framed pictures of a stunning brunette. As my right arm began to tingle signaling an impending heart attack, I realized that I was in a room- mate's bedroom, not J. P.'s. I ran from the room and stepped into the one next door. No incriminating pictures—then again, none of me either … yet. Maybe I would have to send him a personalized Christmas card. Crawling into his barely made bed, I munched on the few remaining fries. I buried my cold toes under his down comforter and my numbness soon turned into a raw slumber.

  The next morning I awoke to something brushing my nose. Ready to kiss Mr. J. P. Morgan's fingers, I realized that my lips were touching cardboard. I rolled over to find myself alone in bed, next to an empty French fry container. Mr. J. P. Morgan had never come home.

  “It's a happy day. A happy day,” I repeated as my nose began to leak. It was going to be a horrible, no good, very shitty Christmas.

  By Thursday I was still struggling to put the incident out of my mind (Note to self: Have sworn off French fries forever!) and I braved the windy hollow of the city streets on my way to Wade's apartment for a night of reality TV viewing. By the time I arrived and took off my layers, Wade was beating out the reality shows for the group's attention.

  “Cookie swap? What's that? Wade, what are you talking about?” asked Tara in her typical sneer. She was bending over backward to embrace her inner-city gal and had a very low tolerance for the domestic traditions of suburban moms. Truthfully, the fact that she had been participating in the Cooking Club at all was somewhat shocking.

  “Each Cooking Club member chooses a cookie to bake for our December meeting,” Wade explained.

  “I call Toll House!” Syd shouted, interrupting.

  “No, you have to go beyond the typical chocolate chip cookies.”

  “But I use applesauce instead of butter. Now that is creative!” “No chocolate chip cookies!” Wade declared. “Each girl chooses a unique cookie and bakes a dozen for each of the other girls. And right before Christmas, we exchange our specialty cookies at the meeting. Hence, the name Cookie Swap!” It was so annoying that Wade was a kindergarten teacher. That didactic—and never mind slow—tone got on all of our nerves. It made me wonder if her five-year-olds winced during reading time.

  “Look,” I said. “There are six of us, that means we each would have to bake six dozen cookies—that's 432 cookies in all!” Where was my dad? He would be proud. “We can't bake that many cookies in the shitty little Barbie doll stove in our apartment. We'd be baking for weeks!”

  “And what am I going to do with six dozen chocolate, peanut butter, sprinkle, whatever cookies from all of you guys?” asked Skinny Sage. For once Sage had a good food point. I could see even the nonanorexics beginning to quake over the sticks of butter to be used in thirty-six dozen cookies (approximately two sticks per recipe means twelve sticks of butter per six dozen cookies—equaling seventy-two sticks of butter in one room at the same time). That sure was a lot of fat!

  “Girls, cookies freeze quite nicely. Throw them in a Ziploc and you can thaw them for guests over the holidays,” Wade assured us.

  “When am I ever going to have an army of cookie-eating fiends around?” Sage groaned. Again, she had a point, if not a waistline to watch.

  After numerous figures and fat calculations, Macie finally made a sensible suggestion. She figured that we should each bake only one dozen of our chosen cookies so that we would each get two cookies from one another's batches. Now that was doable. I could rationalize an eating binge of twelve Christmas cookies—144 cookies was a whole other matter.

  “And,” I added, seeing Skinny Sage's still-doubtful look, “any extras can be donated to Wade's little
terrors! They'll be gobbled up during snack break.”

  “They are children, not terrors,” Wade replied. It was her meek attempt to humanize her job, but all was lost as we began to dream of sugarplum fairies enlightening us all to our fantabulous cookie-baking potential. I knew my heartbroken self would be all over any of those “extra” cookies at our next Cooking Club meeting.

  By this point, I was starting to suspect that Mr. J. P. Morgan and I just might be over. It was a girl-gut thing. I had felt the blow-off coming with the blustery winter winds. But now that it was here, it had been gentle—more like a retreating tide that leaves behind those foul-smelling mudflats. Tara had recommended that I remain stalwart and try a new blow job technique; Syd suggested that I try to “talk about it,” but the “it” was the vague part (Tara again seconded her take-action plan); Macie just gave me the sympathetic “it sucks” nod. She was always one to admit defeat and move on. I, on the other hand, found myself groveling in the same old rut.

  Later that week when he still hadn't called, I recognized that I had to start facing reality. I quickly put the kibosh on any extraneous depression-fueled eating—tough to do when the Diva's test kitchens were producing delectable holiday treats around the clock. In an attempt to shelter my waistline from such an assault, I began to write a letter to Santa wishing him, willing him, more like threatening him, to bring Mr. J. P. Morgan back to me in a red velvet bag. I didn't care if Santa went ballistic and swept through J. P. Morgan's apartment door (no chimney there), knocked him cold, and dragged him to my apartment in his overloaded sleigh with all the gifts for the other good boys and girls. I just wanted him back and snug in my bed. I had begun describing to Santa what went wrong, but it got a tad X-rated. I couldn't disgrace myself in front of lovable ole Saint Nick by going porno on the old guy! I scrapped that note, and tried to think of who else might possibly understand my pain and grant me my one wish this holiday? Ann Landers? The president? And then it hit me. Why the goddess of love connections, breakups, and makeups herself: J. Lo, but of course. I found a fan club address on the Internet and wrote:

  Dear Ms. Lopez (aka J. Lo)

  Merry Christmas! Feliz Navidad! Now I know you get letters like this all the time, but desperate times call for desperate measures. You know how it is. I am hoping that you can help me. Here it goes. I want my boyfriend back. I don't care if you drug him with your lyrics, entice him with your perfumes, lure him with your provocative clothes, or hypnotize him with your acting abilities (you could pretend you're a hypnotist). With your wealth of resources and with you being a believer in dreams, I hope you will answer my prayers. I thought we, he and I, were bouncing along all right until now.

  We finally slept together a few weeks ago. You might think I was holding out since we began seeing each other in September, but I'm really not hung up on the morals thing. He had a problem at first with premature ejaculation and we got over that together. Then finally we had a passionate night with no leakage, but I erroneously decided to experiment with some Lova- Rubba-Cumma. You know, the sensual heating oil? Well, it didn't go so well and let's just say I won't be using that product again.

  We finally sealed the deal on a night when the stars aligned and the angels sang (go ahead and use that for a song if you want). Now I know that orgasms through sexual intercourse are rare for any woman. I don't believe, nor do I trust, those girls out there who say that they have an O every single time. They are totally lying. Sex is an all-hands-on-deck type of deal. My mind, my body (nonbloated days), my senses (alcohol always helps), and my mood all have to be on the right page or this ship doesn't sail. But he was a talented soul and, by God, I had my first, non-self-induced, New York City, bona fide sex- induced orgasm even though we were in the missionary position (I figured we'd get experimental the next time). My head spun, my mind fluttered, my body convulsed, and I squealed. I'll spare you the upside-down, head-rushing details, but it was a crescendo like I had never had before. I heard my entire life score in under thirty seconds! I now truly understand what you mean by “sunlight at night.” In my post-wow tizzy, I realized that he would make an amazing older man, one I would be proud to claim as my husband when we celebrated our golden anniversary.

  Sadly, we have not had a next time, and I am doubting whether we will even reach the paper anniversary. He ditched me after inviting me out to meet up with him at a bar the other night (could that have been an accident?) and since then no phone calls, no e-mails, nothing, nada. So what is the problem? I am truly stumped. I honestly cannot pinpoint the one mistake I made. And I must say he was totally into it. He licked my toes and proclaimed that they tasted like Creamsicles (I think it was the cheap nail polish). Unless he is taking an acting class at night and testing out his new “coldhearted I-hateyou ex-boyfriend” scene on our relationship, I don't know where I screwed up. You can probably hear my angst in this letter. Jennifer, can you, will you help me? Please, I need your advice and inspiration more than ever.

  Sincerely,

  Charlotte Brown

  That night, I found myself in our kitchen preparing to cook the hell out of my cookies for the f'ing Cookie Swap. It was the last thing I wanted to do, but it took my mind off of a certain someone. They say cooking can be great therapy. There's something about mashing, cracking, beating, and balling. It's choco-thera-chippy. But I had to release all my tension through the wrists because our kitchen posed a bit of a challenge. It was basically a five foot wall comprised of a sink, what we called the Barbie stove, and some cupboards. For years when I was a kid, I had begged my mother for one of those EASY- BAKE Oven things. I wanted to whip up mini chocolate cakes (even though they tasted like rubber most of the time) and frost it with the pouch of white sugar. I dreamt of mixing and baking, basting, and broiling … okay, so my eight-year-old aspirations were not that sophisticated, nor were they ever fulfilled. My mother would not acquiesce. She was adamant about the fact that a toy oven would attract bugs. So she stomped all over my youthful dreams of cooking, and I fully blame her for my lack of skill in the kitchen today. Heck, I could have been the host of Sunshine & Sensibility, not the Diva. (I decided I'd throw this little zinger out to Mom on the phone tonight—payback for her snide comments about my homemade Christmas gifts.) But now, I had the Cooking Club to give me that all-important second chance at developing skills in the domestic department. It's never too late!

  I spun in a pathetic twirl as my new favorite song blared through the stereo for the umpteenth time:

  Shot through the heart [fist pump, fist pump]

  and you're to blame, baby,

  you give love a bad name.

  Crouching down, I faced our miniature Barbie stove head on; so like that EASY-BAKE Oven I'd once dreamt about. This cookie project was going to take me hours. I'd already had to run out once to Bed Bath & Beyond to buy new cookie sheets; the hand-me-downs from my babysitter were too wide for the Barbie oven. Plus, I could only bake one sheet at a time. With flour in the air and in my hair, I mixed the brown gooey batter and even managed to separate the yolk from the white goopy part of the egg. I've never really been a fan of eggs, yet they appear in every recipe known to man.

  My egg thoughts sent a new jolt of sorrow to my heart. I had dreamt about Mr. J. P. Morgan making me eggs once. My daydream went something like this: we would wake up after a late night out, me groggy and barely human, and he sweet and sexy, whipping breakfast up in the kitchen. My mother used to warn me, “Don't sleep with anyone before you marry them!” since I was such a bear in the morning. But Mr. J. P. Morgan wouldn't mind. He would wake up really early and begin to cook. Then he'd appear with a tray of scrambled eggs that he had dutifully concocted with a fork and a smidge of milk and pepper. He'd sneak in a spoonful of butter, not worrying about my cuddly hips. I'd smile sweetly with my eyes half opened and the eggs would soon be forgotten in lieu of a helping of morning sex.

  The reality, however, was nowhere close, despite my poetic and imaginative scene setting. One morning, I ha
d awoken to the smell of eggs—a smell, I confess, that I didn't even really like. Truth be told, I don't even like the taste of eggs (I just thought they'd look so pretty and sunny on a breakfast tray). Mr. J. P. Morgan's nose had twitched in his sleep and two nanoseconds later, he had left our love nest, jumping out of bed and leaving the covers thrown back and my nakedness exposed to the apartment. He had returned about twelve minutes later (about the time it takes to get the sports scores off the news broadcast), shoveling his roommate's leftover runny eggs into his mouth. I'd tried to smile sweetly with my eyes half open when he offered me a bite, but due to my squinted eyes, my mouth half missed the fork, and runny eggs dripped onto my boob. Tantalizing, right? I tried not breathing through my nose. I'd learned early in life that if you cut off the olfactory glands, your taste buds go numb. When he'd gone into the bathroom to shower for work, I hurriedly spooned the rest of the eggs into the pot of ivy his mother had hung above one of his windows. Interestingly, that plant had begun to die just about the time our relationship peaked. Coincidence? I think not.

  Now at last, my first cookie tray was in the oven. Since our stove did not have any modern gadgets such as a timer, I had to rely on my watch: nine to eleven minutes. I settled on ten minutes and vowed to check the cookies at 4:17 P.M. Just as I was sitting down at the table with an issue of Us Weekly, my door buzzer sounded. The pathetic whine meant that someone was a-visiting. Since NYC is not a drop-by kind of town, I figured it was Syd, she always forgot her keys. I buzzed her up, cracked the apartment door, and returned to the kitchen to stare at my cookies through the yellowed oven window.

  “You never stared so intently at me,” laughed a familiar voice.

  Holy shit! Mr. J. P. Morgan. I quickly tried to brush the hair from my eyes and felt the cookie dough from my fingers sticking to the too-long roots of my blondish hair. My heart pounded.