The Idea of Him (3 page)

Wade walked up to our corner, kissed me behind my ear, whispering, “You look
hot,
” and slapped Murray's back. I didn't feel hot and I doubt he meant that. He said it because he always did want me to do well and didn't like to see me stressed. I quickly sipped my last fourteen dollars of broth, eager to get out of the booth and over to the bar before Wade and Murray got into their exclusionary boys' club banter.

“Thanks for the soup, Murray. I'll see you tonight, Wade,” I said to them, as I stood and smoothed my knee-length black skirt. “Wish me luck making an insanely insecure woman feel satisfied.”

“Knock her dead,” Murray answered.

Wade raised an eyebrow at my tight skirt and looked at me tenderly. “You look gorgeous. You always knock 'em out.”

I whispered to him, “Thanks, honey. But I don't. You're blind.”

“You do.” He brushed my cheek. “And I'm going to go to my grave making you believe that.”

I crossed the room to go meet Delsie at the red-paneled bar wondering why both my boss and my husband were being so awfully nice to me. It was only when I had a clearer view of that bar that I noticed at first a spectacular pair of bare legs belonging to a beautiful young woman. Her snakeskin sandals wrapped around her ankles, mimicking the reptile that had been gouged to make them. She was sitting alone and scarfing down the famous Tudor Room line-caught tuna tartare served in a martini glass before her, when Georges whispered something
amusant
into her ear. She tossed her shimmering blond curls over her sexy belted white Ralph Lauren jacket, where they flowed down into a V-shaped back and brushed against the top of a very round bottom.

Without even saying hello, Delsie started in with this: “I can't do a speech for Murray one more time at another one of his charity ventures. I know I agreed, but now I want to back out. He wants me to whore myself out for every goddamn cause he's attached to.”

“Whoring yourself out?” I asked.

“Yes.” She was now extra pissy because no one was allowed to challenge her opinions either—a charming trait apparently shared by every patron in the room. “Whoring out. That's what I said and, funny as it may seem to you, that's what I meant.”

I breathed in a slow breath. “Delsie. Let's just review why you agreed to do the speech, because ‘whoring out' has the connotation of maybe you're being used or maybe this wasn't your choice. You hired us for more visibility, so we got you the keynote speaker at the Fulton Film Festival media lunch, which is a very prestigious affair. Yes, it raises money for journalism schools but . . .”

She looked at me sternly, as though she was considering whether to call Murray over to reprimand me.

I went on, giving her a pitch I'd given so many times. “You're getting paid a large speaker's fee as a professional to MC the event, Delsie. And it's an important celebration that will only bring you recognition in a media spotlight I know you care about. You will be impressive, don't worry about that.”

She backed down a tad. “Who's coming? Anyone important?”

“Who isn't coming?” I responded. “Anyone important who cares about the future of this city. The Fulton Film Festival brings a bunch of first-class films here over the next month, so you are boosting New York's culture and getting a lot of good press while doing so.” I may have successfully delivered the gist of this very pitch, but I was not anywhere close to present during it. My mind and eyes were drawn to the young woman down the bar. She was looking right at us—something in her eyes made me shudder.

Her bare legs glistened like the maroon curtains that draped the front windows, filtering the harsh noonday light now bursting through the storm clouds. The soaring height of the glass walls made it feel like we were on top of the world, looking out over all Manhattan, even though we were at street level. This young woman took a long, slow sip of her iced tea, no hint that she was secretly uncovering the madness that would detonate around all of us in due time.

I glanced over at Wade, who gave me an encouraging little wave, the kind he gave Lucy when she went blank last fall on her three Carrot Number One lines for the
Vegetable Play
.

I pressed ahead, bolstered by all the times I had to push powerful clients onto a stage. “I'm not sure there's a downside, unless you don't like hanging out with movie stars.” I then stared into Delsie's needy eyes. “You need more culture in your portfolio if you're going to crack Manhattan, be somebody in this room. I assure you this is good old-fashioned PR for a nice Carolina woman like you.”

I couldn't help but remain half in, half out of my pitch as my gaze locked once again on the man-eater down the mahogany bar. She looked like she was maybe twenty-eight, but I figured she was really a poised twenty-five-year-old. I stealthily neatened up my blouse and the belt around my waist. My outfit was much like hers—a pencil skirt, no stockings, high Stuart Weitzman sandal heels, and a Tory Burch white blouse—but the sex appeal differential was enormous. My five-foot-four-inch height didn't exactly make for sexy, lanky legs. I did have nice, thick dark hair that fell a little below my shoulders and a passable pretty thirty-five-year-old face, but more because of my unusual blue eyes and dark hair combination than actual head-turning beauty.

The woman down the bar then bit her thick, tomato-red lips, which matched the red lacquer walls, and walked over to us with great purpose.

She interrupted. “Excuse me for overhearing. I'd just like to say that Allie Crawford is known to have more innate PR business sense than anyone in this room.” She brushed her body ever so slightly against Delsie's shoulder, whispering, “
Including her boss, Murray Hillsinger
. If you're interested in doing something high profile, then I'd follow her advice and do whatever she wants.”

“Um, thank you . . .” This was all I could get out as she strode back to her barstool perch. At this point, I didn't even know her name or have any idea why she wanted to help me.

Georges came over to address the beauty once again, her brown eyes sparkling back at him. He whispered something into her ear. At first, I assumed he might be having a little fling with her, but then I sensed that they were going over something. Out of his left blazer pocket, he took a casino chip and placed it discreetly in her purse. I saw a tiny piece of the chip, the top of a section with “Five” written on it, as in Five Thousand Dollars.

Also, as in the same goddamn chip that fell out of my husband's shirt pocket the evening before.

4

Party in the House

The next night's cocktail party had started like any other, with me determined to perform my wife and mother roles as best I could given the impending frenzy about to descend on my apartment. Wade liked to throw little get-togethers every month at our place to coddle
Meter
magazine advertisers and potential story subjects. Each party featured a brand-new cast of wannabes, has-beens, and already-ares. Our small apartment couldn't accommodate a large crowd, so guests were on some lists, off others—every one of them anxiously trying to figure out the invite formula. Very smooth, very smart, very manipulative, very Wade Crawford.

I wanted to spend the whole night in bed with my kids and find time to be alone with my Blake and decipher why his friends were still excluding him. I had no desire to face this party and people who cared nothing about me, a hostess who couldn't facilitate their upward mobility. All heads would be turned toward the glow of Wade the Sun King who might put them in his magazine. I grew up with people who might have had less money and power, but they certainly had better manners and knew to say hello and thank you to the wife.

Before the party even started, I thought about asking Wade if he knew the beauty at the Tudor Room who had helped me. He'd say he'd never seen her before, but when I would ask why she had the same casino chip he had tried to hide from me, he would refuse even to understand my question. I knew him so well this way. He'd walk down the hall and make it seem like nothing, when I sensed it was definitely something. He would then say his crowd often went to Atlantic City with Murray and various clients. First, I had to comprehend more on my own in order to be armed with a comeback for his denial.

Wade rummaged through his color-coordinated closet to find just the proper outfit to telegraph that he was festive, but relaxed. He brought out a hip lavender tie with a sky blue shirt and asked, “Does this look inviting?” He pulled me into him, “Will it get me laid with my beautiful bride?”

“Yes, Wade. Exactly that,” I answered, noting that he seemed more desperate these days to get his look right. “Your purple tie is what does it for me.” Was he trying too hard to act solicitous or was I imagining things?

“Purple's my favorite,” Lucy said, as she entered the room and hugged his thigh.

“Mine too, kiddo,” he said as he ruffled her hair, dragging her along with him to the mirror. For the finishing touch, Wade slipped on his black, “downtown” blazer with the little antique gold buttons. “Now come here and kiss me good night.”

I saw my chance and raced back to the kids' room, where I found Blake punching his thumbs into his Nintendo DS with extra hostility.

“What's with Jeremy today, honey? Did he respond or did you even explain to him you wanted to go this time? Did you use the money I gave you for your snack?”

“Mom. They went to get Doritos in the machines without me. I'm not going to ask why. It's obvious. They didn't want me to come.”

“Well, honey, I . . .”

“Mom. They didn't want me to come. You can't say anything that is going to make me feel better. After social studies, when I ask them to wait before going to playstreet and when I'm packing my bag, they always run out.”

“That is just so mean, honey.” I kissed my hurt little boy's nine-year-old forehead and wished with all my heart I could take this blow for him.

“And don't call his mom and tell him to be nicer to me like you did last time.”

“I won't, I . . .” Of course that is exactly what I wanted to do.

“It makes me look like a snitch. She told him to play nicer and he told everyone I told on him, so don't do it again. For real, Mom. Don't.”

“I love you, honey. I'm here to talk if you want.”

“I said I don't want to.”

I gently closed his door, mumbling to myself, “A mother's only as happy as her unhappiest child.” Pained but resigned to let him stew, I ran into the kitchen to place thirty Trader Joe's hors d'oeuvres on cookie sheets and into a warm oven. With the downturn having hit ad revenues hard, Wade's magazine company had slashed his budget for home cocktail parties to almost nothing. They would only pay for a scant two college students, a mediocre bar, and the cheapest hors d'oeuvres from the frozen section. For every event, I had to fork out for flowers and a few extras with our own money. When I protested that these parties didn't quite fit into our tight monthly budget in expensive New York City, Wade countered that he couldn't make
Meter
successful if he couldn't continue to network as he wished, and any and every time he wished.

The cut-rate bartender and server from the Columbia University Bartending service were late, and the wine and club soda cases were stacked in the cramped kitchen hallway untouched. Six thirty. It was getting awfully close to the seven o'clock game time and I realized the guests might actually arrive before the two servers did. I struggled to push the cartons a few inches across the floor so that I could maneuver around them and open the oven door.

In the oven, dozens of frozen miniquiches and spinach phyllo pies started to sweat off freezer burn as I pulled a chair up to the cupboard so I could reach above the fridge and get down two bottles of vodka. This being a New York apartment, table and shelf space in the living room were too valuable to use for cumbersome bar bottles when company wasn't around.

Why I was the one about to break my neck reaching for a vodka bottle and stressing that our tonic and limes were low for
his work party
while Wade was lying around oblivious in bed tickling Lucy at 6:49 was a question most wives know the answer to.

My red silk blouse had started to show lovely little sweat stains around my armpits with all the aerobic activity I was performing in the kitchen. At 6:53, the server and bartender finally arrived from the Columbia campus, apologizing and blaming the poor subway service.

Back in my closet to select another shirt, I heard Lucy screaming with laughter and jumping high on the bed. Wade was trying to swing a pillow into her legs midjump so she'd flip down on the bed sideways. This always ended in tears. No matter how many times I begged them not to play this game, Lucy always wanted more.

“Wade, can you talk to Blake before the party? Jeremy and those mean kids are . . .”

Wade wasn't listening. He was counting the timing of Lucy's jump so he could slam her with the huge pillow as she pulled her feet up in midair.

“Wade. Are you listening?”

“Got you!” he yelled.

Lucy went flying ninety degrees sideways with the force of the pillow and was in full hysterics now. “Again, Daddy!”

Wade turned to me. “I got her. I told her we'd do it until I got her. Now I'll go talk to Blake, but he's not going to want to discuss it, I promise.”

“He could use some boosting from his father, so please go talk to him quick. I'm running around here like the Tasmanian Devil. I'm sweating, I look like hell . . .” I tore my shirt off and rummaged through my closet for another blouse that, by some miracle, wasn't creased.

As I threw on a tight black sweater, Wade the design guru peeked back in and made this unwelcome suggestion: “That traditional red blouse was good with those spiky shoes. If you change to that more contemporary black look, you're going to need a clunkier heel.”

When I shook my head at him, he walked over to me and kissed my forehead gingerly. “Sorry, honey, I know you try, but the outfit's just not working. But I love you and if I wanted to marry a clothes designer, I guess I could have. Tonight, though, I need you to cope on the outfit because there's a ton of fashion advertisers coming.”

Where I grew up, everyone wore shoes that sensibly confronted the environment, not the Fashion Nazis of Manhattan. What the hell did my crappy little hometown of Squanto on the Atlantic teach anyone about decor and style? My family resided in a small colonial home about five blocks from the docks where salt water and sand pervaded every room. We lived in winter boots or sneakers or flip-flops. I didn't have a pair of heels until I went to Middlebury College, and I think I wore them five times total before I hit the judgmental shores of Manhattan.

“Which heel did you mean?” I yelled back at him. “And do you mean a sling-back sandal or a real shoe? Could you just come back here and show me? I've got to get Lucy settled now that you wound her up. If Blake won't talk, make sure he's doing his homework.” I was sure Blake was still on his Nintendo, and not ready to study at all, but I couldn't really blame him, what with the students from Columbia now furiously clanging in the kitchen outside of the kids' room.

“Which shoe exactly?”

But Wade was long gone.

“I wish Daddy would stay,” Lucy whimpered, with a whiplash mood swing to the dark side. This was the downside of their lovefest: she always craved more. I flashed momentarily on an image of my father walking out the door to his two prized fishing boats to cater to some wealthy summer tourists, past my outstretched five-year-old arms, off and gone, leaving me for days. When he came home and flashed that smile framed by his salty beard, it was as if he'd never left me with a mother who spent much of her day passed out from drinking in front of the blue glow of her television game shows.

My father's charm, much like my husband's, was so irresistible that I couldn't help but forgive him the instant he reappeared at my bedroom door. No wonder Wade got whatever he wanted from me: I had had no practice staying angry with the man I adored most in the world.

“Blake's just fine,” he announced. “Like I said, he doesn't want us micromanaging all his friendships. Fourth grade is time to handle some stuff on his own.”

As always just before the parties started, Wade stood in front of the mirror once last time to admire his sporty frame. He flipped his tie over his shoulder while he smoothed down the front of his shirt. Working intently on his cool media master aura, he delicately brushed a piece of hair up over his brow.

Wade came from a small eastern town too, but, as an upper-middle-class accountant's son, and an arrogant one at that, Wade's lofty career aspirations seemed to be met anytime he damn well felt like it. His self-assuredness was another one of those interlocking parts of our relationship. Watching him in action helped inspire the part of me that feared I couldn't achieve anything quite well enough.

“You know everyone's name on the list, right, Allie?”

“I don't know, Wade. I hope so.”

“This is important.” He rubbed my ear. “C'mon, babe. I know you're freaking out about Blake's bruised feelings and Lucy's caterpillar costumes and that you are juggling a ton at work, but I rely on your uncanny ability to execute. Do me this little favor? I'll owe you one.”

“Sure, Wade. I got it handled.” I wanted to help him out, but I was so fatigued that night. I gritted my teeth and carried on anyway, oblivious to the tsunami rolling my way.

“That's my other best girl.” He kissed me quickly on the lips. “Now, Lucy, be a good girl, and I'll sneak away to read you a book at bedtime.” She held out her pinkie and he looped his around it, beaming his love into her little face. Then he went into the living room to make sure the candles and music were setting the proper cool mood to match his look. I stood up and went down the hall to overcoddle and infantilize Blake some more—anything to delay my entry into the hordes of guests who would soon be shamelessly clamoring all over my husband.