Lost Along the Way (3 page)

“I do mostly Off, Off, Off-Broadway stuff,” she said, trying to be coy.

“What does that mean?”

“My last play took place in a Brooklyn basement.”

“I see.”

“What about you?” she asked.

“I also work off Broadway.”

“What does that mean?”

“Wall Street.”

“So we're practically neighbors.”

“And yet we've never run into each other before.”

“Go figure.”

He checked his watch and pushed his drink away from him. She wasn't surprised that she had scared him off. What surprised her was that he'd stuck around for as long as he had.

“I actually have to run, I just popped in here to kill some time before my meeting across the street, but I feel bad leaving a pretty girl all alone at the bar when I know she's this upset,” he said, somehow managing to come off as charming and not sleazy in the slightest.

“Well, unless you want to take me to your meeting with you, I don't think you have much choice,” she said. “Don't worry about it. It was nice to meet you.”

“It was nice to meet you, too.” He reached into the inside pocket of his suit jacket and removed a business card. He wrote his cell number on the back and slid it on the bar toward her glass. “Have dinner with me. I'll be home by about six thirty. If you'd like to meet me, call me by seven. I'll make a reservation somewhere just in case.”

“You want to have dinner?” she asked.

“That's what I just said.”

“I don't even know you.”

“That's why I asked you to have dinner and not to marry me.”

Jane could not think of a reason why she shouldn't go. He worked in finance. He was wearing an Hermès tie. He definitely wasn't an ax murderer, so what was the worst that could happen?

“Okay. I'll call you . . .” Jane flipped the card over and found his name. “Doug Logan.”

“I hope you do. Although now I realize that I never even asked you your name. I'm sorry. That's very rude of me.”

“Jane,” she sang, now willing to flirt a little more aggressively.
“Jane Parker.”

“You don't seem like a Jane.”

“What do I seem like?”

“I don't know. I'll think about it and let you know tonight.” He left a fifty on the bar and yelled to the bartender, “Her drink is on me.” He nodded almost imperceptibly as he stood and grabbed his bag off the floor. “I look forward to hearing from you, Jane. Cheer up. Things will get better.” And then he left.

She should have realized something was off with him just from the way they'd met. He was too smooth, too confident, and too eager to get to know her when it was obvious that they had nothing in common. But at that moment she was just too tired to care. She was tired of going to cheap parties in Alphabet City and pretending to think the underground scene was cool. She was tired of pretending to want to be some scrapping, struggling artist. She wanted to have dinner with a guy wearing a nice tie who carried a credit card that wouldn't be declined. Was that really too much to ask?

They had dinner at a very chic restaurant in SoHo that she would never have been able to afford on her own, and five months later, they eloped at City Hall, with Jane's mother and brother, Gavin, serving as witnesses. Just like that, Jane had everything she wanted—and a whole lot more. Meg and Cara were angry when they found out, and after that, things were never really the same. The girls didn't like Doug for reasons that Jane couldn't understand: What do you mean you don't trust him? You don't have to trust him, you're not married to him! And Doug didn't like the girls for reasons that she fully understood: they don't like him, they meddle in things they shouldn't, they don't like him. It
wouldn't be the first time that a guy came between friends, and Jane was ready to deal with it if that's where it led. But it never got that far, probably because Meg was too busy tending to her perfect marriage and Cara was too busy being perfect in every way possible to care what Jane was doing with her husband in the city. They all silently agreed to let it go, and to ignore that yet another piece of their foundation had been eroded away by the passage of time. Because they loved each other they placed a patch over the tear and pretended that things were the same, every hole and rip and pull that occurred over the years continually covered by a myriad of patches made to look as if they were all supposed to be there.

Jane was ashamed to admit it, but back then she didn't care. Her feelings were too hurt and she was too insecure about how her life was evolving in comparison to theirs to ever let them know that she was devastated by how their relationship was changing. She wasn't strong enough to tell them how she really felt, and instead she got angry at them and cut them out of her life. She'd give anything to go back and do things differently.

Especially because they were right.

T
he phone rang again, forcing Jane to turn off both her current train of thought and also the ringer. Thank God she had a doorman to keep the photographers and reporters away, but she knew that the other tenants in the building wanted her to leave, and pretty soon they'd force her out. She couldn't blame them. No one paid these prices for Manhattan real estate to have to push through a bunch of screaming idiots with cameras and press passes just to get to a Starbucks for their morning latte. Jane had never understood the whole reality TV craze, and now that she was forced to live inside a fishbowl she understood it even less. Why anyone would seek out this kind of attention and scrutiny was beyond her, and Doug's story wasn't even national news. It was bad enough being hunted by every network in the tristate area. If she had to worry about reporters from CNN or
Dateline
being on her ass too, she might actually go insane. She threw herself on her king-size bed, covered in Frette linens and layers of Ralph Lauren blankets, buried her face in her pillows, and screamed. Her beautiful apartment, only a block from Central Park West, was exactly what she'd always wanted, and now it was a prison. She felt like she was living in a dream, like she couldn't figure out what was real and what had been entirely in her imagination. How could she fall in love with a criminal? How could she reconcile the fact that she loved Doug—and, if she was honest, even missed him—with the fact that he wasn't who she thought he was? Any time she felt a wave
of nostalgia or found herself wishing he were still at home in the apartment with her, she became so overcome with guilt that she actually hated herself. If she were a good person, she wouldn't feel any love for him now that she knew the truth. If she did, then what did that say about her? How could she miss him and hate him at the same time? How could she hate him without hating herself for building a life with him?

Jane pulled herself together and wandered into the kitchen, knowing that the cure for her splitting headache wouldn't be found in the bottom of a wine bottle but not caring at that particular moment one way or the other. She walked past her farmhouse sink, briefly ran her finger along the copper pots that hung from brass hooks above the center island, and removed a bottle of white wine from her refrigerator. She knew she was probably drinking more lately than she should've been, but it seemed justified. She fished the wine opener out of the drawer next to the stove and gently eased the cork from the bottle, the puckering sound it made once she set it free instantly easing her stress. She removed from a cabinet one of the crystal glasses she'd received as a wedding gift and briefly thought about smashing it against the wall. Instead, she decided to fill it to the brim.

Before she could take a sip, there was a knock at her door.
Shit,
she thought as she placed the glass down on her counter, then trudged into the foyer. She looked through the peephole and saw the stern, unpleasant face of her neighbor Mrs. Cooper peering back at her.
Shit,
she thought again.
I shouldn't have left my wine in the kitchen.

“This is getting ridiculous,” Mrs. Cooper said as Jane opened the door.

“I agree. So let's stop meeting like this, and next time wait for
an invitation before you come over, okay?” Jane said. Ordinarily she'd never be so rude to her neighbor, or anyone else for that matter, but these were not ordinary times.

“Jane, I feel bad for you, really I do,” the wrinkled crypt keeper said.

“Thank you for your condolences.” It was hard to believe that this entire nightmare had started only ten months ago. It felt more like ten years, and Jane was well aware that she was not going to be able to endure this new life much longer. She'd always thought of herself as strong, but now she had to admit that this was something she couldn't handle alone.

“However, your circumstances are making everyone else's living situations unbearable. I wish you'd stop being selfish and think about the other tenants in this building.” Mrs. Cooper had a silk scarf tied around her neck like an ascot. Jane briefly wondered if that meant she'd be able to choke her out without leaving prints.

“Selfish? You're calling me
selfish
? I married a thief who stole people's money, went to prison, and left me with basically nothing except a ruined reputation, a bunch of frozen bank accounts, and, now, agoraphobia. I have no friends left in this city, no cash in the bank, and nowhere to go, but you want to come over here and tell me that the press outside is an annoyance for
you
? You're right. I must be the most selfish person alive.” Jane remained defiant. Although if this were happening to someone else, she'd probably be annoyed by the disruption as well.

“I'm calling an emergency board meeting tomorrow, and we are going to vote on having you evicted from the co-op.”

“You can't do that. This apartment is the only thing I have left. Without it, I'll be homeless.” In what was maybe the one smart decision her husband had made in his pathetic life, he'd placed
the deed to the apartment in his father's name. Legally, the government couldn't touch it, which was the only reason they hadn't sold it out from under her. But that didn't mean the co-op board couldn't evict her.

“My husband is a lawyer, and he assures me that we can,” Mrs. Cooper said.

“Well, my husband was a wealth manager, and clearly he didn't know what the fuck he was doing, so I'm sorry, but that means nothing to me. It's not going to be enough to scare me out of here. Now if you'll excuse me, my wine is getting warm.” Jane went to close the door, but Mrs. Cooper shoved her flabby, bespeckled arm into the door frame. Jane thought about slamming it on her, but she realized that the last thing she needed was a personal injury lawsuit brought against her by her nosy neighbor and her lawyer husband.

“Jane, it's time you find somewhere else to go. Just for a while, until things die down. Don't make us do something we don't want to do.” Mrs. Cooper quickly removed her arm and clasped her hands demurely in front of her.

“Where would you like me to go?” Jane asked, finally beginning to crack.

“Don't you have anyone who can help you for a while? Give you a place to stay?”

“I told you I don't have any friends left in the city,” Jane said. She rubbed the back of her neck; the knots that had been there for much of the last year were hard as rocks. She had no idea how to get rid of them. It wasn't like she could call a masseuse.

“Well, I don't know anyone who is that alone in life. If that's the case then maybe you need to reconsider some of the choices you've made.”

“Yeah, tell me something I don't already know. Thanks for the pep talk.”

“I mean it, Jane. Go somewhere before the board meets tomorrow. Believe it or not, I'm trying to help you.”

“Thanks. As soon as the feds unfreeze my assets, I'll send you a fruit basket.”

Jane closed the door and leaned against it, rubbing her shoulders as if to keep warm. Her life was not supposed to turn out like this; this was not how things were supposed to go. She was a good person, she had married a good guy, she had finally gotten everything she ever wanted, and none of it was real. Not her friends, not her fortune, not even her boobs. And the truth was, she couldn't remember the last time she had anything real to lean on.

And then she did.

She didn't want to go running to her mother or her brother. She felt like she had burdened them enough since this whole thing started, plus the press would be staking out their homes, too, in the hopes of her making an appearance. But she had another option. There were two people on earth who knew her better than anyone else, knew the
real
Jane, the Jane before the marriage and the news reports and the public embarrassment that followed. Jane's instinct to seek them out after all this time didn't really surprise her—it only surprised her that she hadn't thought of it sooner. She had waited long enough hoping that things would get better, thinking that she could somehow hold herself together without anyone's help. The truth was, she couldn't, and the only people she trusted to help her lived less than an hour away.

Jane ran into her bedroom and threw some clothes into an overnight bag. She slugged her wine in four large glugs, grabbed
her large sunglasses off her bureau, snatched her purse off the floor, and walked quietly into the hallway. She half ran down the hall and exited into the stairwell, knowing that if there was one thing she could count on, it was that none of her rich neighbors would ever risk scuffing one of their Brian Atwood pumps by hoofing it on stairs when the elevator worked just fine. She descended ten flights to the thirty-first floor, which held the building's gym and laundry facilities, once again betting correctly that none of her neighbors would ever demean themselves by washing their own underwear or working out in a second-rate gym when personal trainers were available at private fitness centers all over the city. One thing she had learned was that people with money tended to be lazy, and if she wanted to be honest with herself, she'd admit it had made her lazy, too. So lazy she didn't bother to look at her bank statements, to question withdrawals and transfers and stock sales that didn't make any sense, or to wonder why the same employees seemed to work at her husband's bank for the entire time she knew him. No one new joined, and no one retired. She should've listened to the little warnings that rattled around her brain before quelling them with bottles of champagne, gold bracelets, and the convenient explanation that the firm must treat its employees really, really well.

But she hadn't, and now here she was, skulking through service elevators in a pair of Reeboks like a cat burglar in broad daylight. She turned the corner past the laundry room and found the service elevator. She pressed the button and waited, tapping her foot, for the elevator to open. Hector, the maintenance man, smiled when he saw her. Over the months since this nightmare began, the two had become friendly. He allowed her to sneak out
this way when she needed to pick up wine after the store stopped delivering, and she repaid the favor by supplying him with cans of beer that he drank on the roof when he needed a break from riding up and down in his movable box all day. She entered the elevator and stood silently as she rode it to the basement level, then exited through a small metal door at the end of yet another hallway into the underground parking garage. She used to have a car there, but that had been repossessed too, so no one ever thought to look for her in the garage. Regardless, she kept her head down as she weaved her way toward the exit, reached the street, and immediately hailed a cab. She smiled to herself for winning a small personal victory: the ass clowns with the cameras were still jamming the sidewalk, annoying Mrs. Cooper, trying to further ruin her life (as if that were possible), and she was nestled in the backseat of a taxi, blissfully speeding away from her Upper West Side prison toward freedom and the Triborough Bridge.