David was once again sweetness and light. Not a mention of yesterday’s rage – and certainly no apology. ‘Hey, Larry loved you two!’
‘That’s funny,’ I said stiffly. ‘We barely opened our mouths. Has he found out about Mort Russell passing?’
‘Don’t know, but who cares now? You girls hooked him.’
‘Did he tell you he wants to make it as an animal movie?’
‘Details, details,’ he dismissed airily. ‘I gotta great feeling about this. Stand by for good news.’
When the phone rang again, I let Emily get it. Then I was sorry, because this time it really was Troy!
My heart gave one big, almost painful thump and my anticipation built and built as Emily went on for ages, filling Troy in on the dramatic events of the previous day. ‘It’s déjà vu’, she exclaimed at him. ‘I’m still waiting for the phone to ring. Same shit, different studio!’
I pottered around in her vicinity, waiting for Troy to finish being polite to her and get to the real business of the call. But on and on they went, and I stopped pottering, I was wearing myself out. So I plonked myself in a nearby chair until finally she got round to making winding-up noises. I half got up, my arm stretching for the phone, which is when Emily did something unfathomable. She hung up. It seemed to happen in slow motion, her finger hovering over the red disconnect button, then moving in for the kill. Completely at a loss, I goggled at her and at the phone, which should still be connected but for some incomprehensible reason wasn’t.
‘What?’ Emily looked confused.
‘Didn’t he ask… didn’t he want to talk to me?’
‘No.’ Then, still staring at me, ‘Oh shit.’
‘Oh shit’ was right. Troy’s message to me could not have been clearer.
‘Maggie, I didn’t…’ Emily squirmed and her manifest anguish belittled me. She pitied me and even though she’d commiserated on the end of my marriage, for a reason that I couldn’t articulate, this stung a lot more.
‘Maggie, I didn’t realize you were expecting… something from him.’
‘I wasn’t.’ My voice was barely there.
She was wrestling with some dilemma. With mortifying gentleness, she said, ‘There’s something you’re probably better off knowing. When I called him on Saturday, Kirsty answered the phone.’
‘You don’t know for sure that something’s going on with them.’ My defiance was pathetic. ‘And even if there is, he might decide he preferred me.’
‘You’re right.’
That did it. ‘I think I want to lie down for a while.’
‘No, Maggie, please…’
But I closed my bedroom door and redrew the curtains that I’d flung open with such anticipation less than an hour before, and climbed, fully clothed, between the sheets. This is what it’s like, I understood. This is what it’s like to be single and out there. I mean, I hadn’t really thought that Troy and I would end up together and that I’d stay in Los Angeles and live happily ever after. Not for more than five seconds, anyway. But I hadn’t expected it to be a for-one-night-only extravaganza either.
So much for living dangerously; it wasn’t half as nice as people made out. Unless the fault was in me. Maybe it was an acquired taste, like olives. I should probably just keep at it until I’d learnt to enjoy it.
Some time later, Emily tiptoed in. ‘I’m really sorry,’ she whispered. ‘How do you feel?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Humiliated?’
‘Yip.’
‘Rejected?’
‘Yip.’
‘Betrayed?’
‘Yip.’
‘Not good enough?’
‘Yip.’
‘Lonely?’
‘Yip.’
‘Ashamed that you lay down and gave it up so easily?’ I closed my eyes.
Lord, did she have to be so graphic.
‘Not ashamed that you lay down and gave it up so easily?’ She sounded puzzled.
‘Yes, ashamed.’
‘That’s what I thought. Didn’t think you’d changed that much. Have I forgotten anything?’
How about missing my husband? I thought, but didn’t say. Both losses had merged into one and I was grounded by their combined weight. For a while, when I’d been with Troy, I’d danced on Stardust. Now the glitter had fallen from the sky and all was drab and grey again. While I’d been caught up in Troy, I’d flirted with another life, with being someone else.
Now I was back to being me and I longed to scuttle back to the safe haven of marriage, where this humiliation would disappear. But I couldn’t even ring Garv – until I’d found out for definite about Truffle Woman, I’d felt that option was always available to me if missing him got too bad. Now that door was closed. Anyway, wanting to go back to Garv because another man had humiliated me was hardly a healthy reason.
‘Have you any idea…?’ I asked Emily. ‘Why… Troy… might do this to me?’
‘That’s just the way he is,’ she explained earnestly. ‘He likes the ladies but he’s too into his work, not interested in a relationship.’
She didn’t say that she’d told me so. She’s nice that way. Anyway, he’d as good as warned me himself when he’d said, ‘I am baaaad news.’ But he’d been laughing when he’d said it and, like an eejit, I thought the laugh meant that he was joking.
‘He should have left you alone,’ she said. ‘You’re too vulnerable.’
‘Too stupid, you mean,’ I muttered, hating myself for being so naïve, inexperienced, out of practice. I’d fallen for the oldest trick in the book – a man had been nice to me and I’d thought it meant something.
‘Don’t be hard on yourself – this is normal, you’re on the rebound! You’re on your own for the first time in years, you’re more than a bit lost, who could blame you for going looking?’
All of a sudden, I was furious with Troy. Him and his concern and his twizzlers and compliments about my hair and calling me ‘Irish’. To think I’d once thought he was ugly, with his long features and his hair-grip mouth. Someone with a nose that size had no right to go round breaking hearts!
‘That’s funny,’ I said stiffly. ‘We barely opened our mouths. Has he found out about Mort Russell passing?’
‘Don’t know, but who cares now? You girls hooked him.’
‘Did he tell you he wants to make it as an animal movie?’
‘Details, details,’ he dismissed airily. ‘I gotta great feeling about this. Stand by for good news.’
When the phone rang again, I let Emily get it. Then I was sorry, because this time it really was Troy!
My heart gave one big, almost painful thump and my anticipation built and built as Emily went on for ages, filling Troy in on the dramatic events of the previous day. ‘It’s déjà vu’, she exclaimed at him. ‘I’m still waiting for the phone to ring. Same shit, different studio!’
I pottered around in her vicinity, waiting for Troy to finish being polite to her and get to the real business of the call. But on and on they went, and I stopped pottering, I was wearing myself out. So I plonked myself in a nearby chair until finally she got round to making winding-up noises. I half got up, my arm stretching for the phone, which is when Emily did something unfathomable. She hung up. It seemed to happen in slow motion, her finger hovering over the red disconnect button, then moving in for the kill. Completely at a loss, I goggled at her and at the phone, which should still be connected but for some incomprehensible reason wasn’t.
‘What?’ Emily looked confused.
‘Didn’t he ask… didn’t he want to talk to me?’
‘No.’ Then, still staring at me, ‘Oh shit.’
‘Oh shit’ was right. Troy’s message to me could not have been clearer.
‘Maggie, I didn’t…’ Emily squirmed and her manifest anguish belittled me. She pitied me and even though she’d commiserated on the end of my marriage, for a reason that I couldn’t articulate, this stung a lot more.
‘Maggie, I didn’t realize you were expecting… something from him.’
‘I wasn’t.’ My voice was barely there.
She was wrestling with some dilemma. With mortifying gentleness, she said, ‘There’s something you’re probably better off knowing. When I called him on Saturday, Kirsty answered the phone.’
‘You don’t know for sure that something’s going on with them.’ My defiance was pathetic. ‘And even if there is, he might decide he preferred me.’
‘You’re right.’
That did it. ‘I think I want to lie down for a while.’
‘No, Maggie, please…’
But I closed my bedroom door and redrew the curtains that I’d flung open with such anticipation less than an hour before, and climbed, fully clothed, between the sheets. This is what it’s like, I understood. This is what it’s like to be single and out there. I mean, I hadn’t really thought that Troy and I would end up together and that I’d stay in Los Angeles and live happily ever after. Not for more than five seconds, anyway. But I hadn’t expected it to be a for-one-night-only extravaganza either.
So much for living dangerously; it wasn’t half as nice as people made out. Unless the fault was in me. Maybe it was an acquired taste, like olives. I should probably just keep at it until I’d learnt to enjoy it.
Some time later, Emily tiptoed in. ‘I’m really sorry,’ she whispered. ‘How do you feel?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Humiliated?’
‘Yip.’
‘Rejected?’
‘Yip.’
‘Betrayed?’
‘Yip.’
‘Not good enough?’
‘Yip.’
‘Lonely?’
‘Yip.’
‘Ashamed that you lay down and gave it up so easily?’ I closed my eyes.
Lord, did she have to be so graphic.
‘Not ashamed that you lay down and gave it up so easily?’ She sounded puzzled.
‘Yes, ashamed.’
‘That’s what I thought. Didn’t think you’d changed that much. Have I forgotten anything?’
How about missing my husband? I thought, but didn’t say. Both losses had merged into one and I was grounded by their combined weight. For a while, when I’d been with Troy, I’d danced on Stardust. Now the glitter had fallen from the sky and all was drab and grey again. While I’d been caught up in Troy, I’d flirted with another life, with being someone else.
Now I was back to being me and I longed to scuttle back to the safe haven of marriage, where this humiliation would disappear. But I couldn’t even ring Garv – until I’d found out for definite about Truffle Woman, I’d felt that option was always available to me if missing him got too bad. Now that door was closed. Anyway, wanting to go back to Garv because another man had humiliated me was hardly a healthy reason.
‘Have you any idea…?’ I asked Emily. ‘Why… Troy… might do this to me?’
‘That’s just the way he is,’ she explained earnestly. ‘He likes the ladies but he’s too into his work, not interested in a relationship.’
She didn’t say that she’d told me so. She’s nice that way. Anyway, he’d as good as warned me himself when he’d said, ‘I am baaaad news.’ But he’d been laughing when he’d said it and, like an eejit, I thought the laugh meant that he was joking.
‘He should have left you alone,’ she said. ‘You’re too vulnerable.’
‘Too stupid, you mean,’ I muttered, hating myself for being so naïve, inexperienced, out of practice. I’d fallen for the oldest trick in the book – a man had been nice to me and I’d thought it meant something.
‘Don’t be hard on yourself – this is normal, you’re on the rebound! You’re on your own for the first time in years, you’re more than a bit lost, who could blame you for going looking?’
All of a sudden, I was furious with Troy. Him and his concern and his twizzlers and compliments about my hair and calling me ‘Irish’. To think I’d once thought he was ugly, with his long features and his hair-grip mouth. Someone with a nose that size had no right to go round breaking hearts!
