To See You (4 page)

“We thought we were gonna get some skinny New Yorker here,” he drawled. “No such luck.”

I refused to hang my head in shame. I was a good person, as good as anyone. I’d always been stocky, and my mom’s cooking didn’t help. At that thought, I made a mental note to visit my parents in the nursing home.

Their being older than my friends’ parents didn’t help either. Mom and Dad didn’t do all the active stuff other parents did with their kids. Instead, we enjoyed family movie night with popcorn and candy. It’s probably why I went into the movie business like I did.

“You got it, my man. No such luck,” I said to the cowboy, keeping my tone light.

I was used to pricks like him. Been dealing with them since puberty, when some kids lost their baby fat and others didn’t. I did have a few years in college where I’d slimmed down due to playing a lot of ultimate Frisbee on the lawn with my roommates and hitting the weight room. But after graduation I moved out on my own, and frankly, I ate when I was bored or lonely.

And even when I wasn’t. The fact was, I enjoyed food. It reminded me of home.

I buckled up and pulled out my phone to check my messages.
Look at that . . . I don’t even need the seat-belt expander. So take that, asshole.

“What’d you do? Eat the island of Manhattan?” my seatmate said with a mean-spirited chuckle.

This asshole wasn’t going to let it go.

Neither was I.

“Excuse me, I have to grab something from my bag,” I said to the grandmother next to me, who unbuckled her seat belt and stood in the aisle with an embarrassed smile on her face as I grabbed my headphones and laptop.

What with the close quarters, I hadn’t planned on working, but this guy warranted my headphones. I squeezed back in my seat, Grandma sat back down, and Cowboy muttered another grumble. I opened my laptop on my lap, plugged in, and set about ignoring my flying partner.

For a second, I thought about making some changes to myself. I could go to Weight Watchers or some shit, but why? At home I had friends, women, and coworkers who didn’t dismiss me.

Only two people had done that recently. The second one, I couldn’t give two shits about. But the first one mattered. I’d gone and hurt her, although unintentionally, so maybe I deserved the tiny bit of shame Charli had made me feel when she first stepped on the plane.

It was exhilarating to watch her come alive in front of me, let go of her preconceived notions for a moment and talk to me like a real person, even sharing her inner thoughts with me. I’d wanted to reach out and brush back the small wisps of hair that had worked their way free from her bun and tell her to follow her dreams.

But I didn’t. Instead I’d gone and made a mess of it.

I felt a jab in my shoulder and looked toward the culprit, reluctantly pushing back one of my earphones so I could hear his nonsense.

“If you’re gonna sit there and watch that gay-love shit,” he growled out, “I’m getting off the plane.”

Confused for a second, I looked back to my screen. On it was a scene from an old movie I’d worked on . . . two men having a tense romantic stare-down in a club. Mushroom jazz blared in the background as their eyes warred with each other. It had recently been nominated for an MTV award, so I was re-watching it.

“Shut the fuck up, dude,” was all I responded and went back to the screen.

I’d had enough of him.

Sadly, I didn’t get enough of Charli.

One Week Later

I
pushed through the revolving door, rain dripping off my jacket as I made my way into the Royal Hotel. Shaking my hair out, I took in the obnoxious grand lobby, all marble and brass, but this was where Janie worked. Despite its staid atmosphere, the Royal seemed to be the place to meet people lately, although I never met anyone worth meeting.

“Hey there, Char.” Craig the bartender greeted me as I grabbed a stool at the bar. “The usual?”

“Hey there, and yes, please.”

He poured a generous amount of red wine and set the glass in front of me. I heard Janie before I saw her—her loud heels clicking the floor.

“Hiya, girl!” Janie bent down from her gargantuan five-foot-eleven frame, her jet-black hair cascading over her shoulder, and kissed my cheek.

“Hey, J-babe.” I pinched her cheek and she swatted my hand away.

“Don’t touch! My makeup is perfect; had it done today in the gift shop.”

“It does look good, love the eyeliner. Is it glittery?”

“You know it!” Janie batted her long eyelashes at me, her glossy red lips forming a perfect smile.

Craig set a vodka gimlet in front of Janie, and she tossed him an air kiss and an exaggerated wink.

That was Janie, all kisses and hugs and PDA, no matter who it was. Her last boyfriend couldn’t deal with all the attention bestowed upon him, let alone everyone else she knew. Now she was single and doing a bang-up job of feeling up every man she met . . .
up and down
. I was surprised she didn’t hurl her Bond-girl body over the bar and into Craig’s arms.

“Fab haircut, Charleston.”

I rolled my eyes at the mention of my formal name.

“Love it. It’s so chic and in, whatever.” She ran her fingers through the ends of my dark blond hair.

“It’s just a few long layers, but yeah, it does feel better. Lighter. Who knows if I’ll be able to style it by myself.” I took a sip of my wine, the burgundy liquid warming my belly. “And I got stuck in the rain, trying to get a cab, so it probably resembles a rat right now.”

“It’s got this whole ratty-yet-seductive Selena Gomez thing going on,” Janie said. “But not dark, of course. It’s good. The color is perfect, blond honey and chestnut. Blech, I hate that it’s natural, you bitch.” She whispered the last part, still twisting her fingers in my hair. “You know what? You should hook up tonight!”

Unfortunately, that part she didn’t whisper. She always went straight to the hook-up thing.

Always.

But it had to be hooking up with the
right guy
. The Wall Street one or the surgeon from the Upper East Side or the guy we knew in college who invented a million widgets. I didn’t know who or what the hell I wanted, yet I continued to buy into Janie’s mindset.

Did I even deserve anyone like that? How could I be worthy of someone? Would someone feel worthy of supporting me in what I really wanted to do?

And what the heck
did
I want to do? I didn’t have a clue.

I took a long sip of my wine, needing to soothe the ache in my belly.

Watching my mom flit through life after my dad passed, unable to move on while only obsessing more over me, that was no life. Hearing her talk about life before my dad—the bands, the excitement, and her fellow groupies—that was her passion, her mission, a manifesto of sorts that she abandoned when she fell for my dad. To me, that life seemed so strange, to flit and float around after musicians, but it was still her life.

Then I found myself in a front-row seat, watching her after my dad passed. Her life before, during, and after him was like scattered pieces from random puzzles, none of them fitting with one another.

But me, I wanted something different. Not her before or after or anything like her life as I ever knew it.

“Please. I haven’t hooked up since months ago, and that guy wanted to use a butt plug on the first date. No, thank you.”

Janie took a seductive sip of her drink through the stirrer straw and waggled her eyebrows. “Seriously, Char, you may like a butt plug. With the perfect guy.”

“Maybe . . . after I know a man for more than a dinner.”

“Eh, knowing a guy is overrated.”

“So, what’s going on with you?” I quickly changed the subject, steering it far away from butt plugs.

“Well, my boss is a dick but this job pays well, so fuck it. He’s got me running all over town for some traveling-dinner thing he wants to sponsor as part of New York Restaurant Week. He’s practically salivating to be the sponsor hotel. I’m going to blow up like the Goodyear blimp with all the places he has me eating.”

“Aw, poor baby. Did you have to shove down brunch at Balthazar and burgers at Minetta?”

“As a matter of fact, I did. And I haven’t gotten laid in weeks. Must be all the extra pounds.”

“La-la-la, I’m not listening. You’re a beanpole, and I have to work the spinner bike like it’s a stripper pole. Although I lost some weight last week when I was home.”

Janie brought her thumb to my cheek and caressed my skin, her demeanor immediately changing. That was the thing about her—she was bitchy and bossy and self-centered, and dramatic. Maybe some would say narcissistic, but she was good to the core.

“How are you with all of that? I should be checking in more, but last week when you first got home, you seemed cool. Should I be bringing soup or whatever? Matzah ball? Mishmash? I’ll call my
bubbe
and ask where to get the best.”

Her soft, shiny, poker-straight black hair (thanks to the salon and those foul-smelling chemicals) whisked around my face as she came in to hug me tight, squeezing the ever-loving life out of me. I shoved her off after allowing her to hold on to me for an extra second.

“Gram was ninety-two,” I said, “and I’m fine. She lived a big, long, full life. And no, don’t bother your
bubbe
. She’s probably involved in a week-long Mahj tournament, and doesn’t need to worry about soup.”

“By the way, if I start to play Mah-jongg, call the loony bin.” Janie constantly worried she would turn into the stereotypical Upper-East New Yorker like her mom.

“Of course. But seriously, last week it was my mom making me nuts, and she’s still at it. Can you believe she’s still trying to fix me up with Garrett, my half-Asian distant cousin? She’s so obsessed with me making a life, settling down. I think she forgets what it was like when she did it. She’s like a heat-seeking missile when it comes to marrying me off. Sometimes I’m afraid to go home for fear he’s hanging around on my stoop, waiting for me.”

Janie lifted an eyebrow. “Maybe you should move?”

I burst out laughing. Hiccups ensued and happy tears rolled from my eyes.

“Move? No way! I would never leave my rent-controlled place. Ever. But this is just so strange with my mom. She lived a nomad’s life before my dad, and now she’s so determined to see me settled . . . with your type of guy. Are you two talking? Working together?”

The thought of moving was laughable enough, let alone doing it for a guy like Garrett, and Janie knew it. I’d fought like a bride in Filene’s Basement to get that condo. I would die there.

Alone—probably.

And that was pretty much how the rest of the evening went. Laughs, Janie rubbing up against multiple men, and more laughs.

Later, I crawled into bed, fluffed my pillows, and turned on Lucy.

I scanned my in-box for work stuff. Warm weather was quickly approaching, so the next few months would be a flurry of articles and features on flat stomachs, staying hydrated during outdoor summer exercise routines, and staying bikini-ready.

My team was champing at the bit to get a feature story. Poor Maggie, my newest intern, had sent me twelve pitches, not one of them original. The subject lines ranged from
Legs and Lunges in Central Park
to
Staying Swimsuit Fab on the High Line
. We’d done those articles every summer. They were filler, stuffed onto the pages of
BubblePOP
when we didn’t have anything better—which was less and less often with me. I was upping my game.