CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Bartender, Know Thyself
30
Bartender
Commandment(s) Broken:
3 − He shalt not steal my confidence
7 - He shalt not lie to me
“So this one is the gay one?” Olivia asked casually, as she flicked through the pictures Nick had taken of my weekend with ex number three, Dawson Summers. “I guess that could be considered lying. Definitely steals a woman’s confidence when her boyfriend finds another man more sexy than he finds her. Did you confirm it? I don’t want a lawsuit.”
“Pictures don’t lie.” I answered without looking at Nick.
He’d been right about Dawson, after all. If he’d been talking to me, I’m sure he would have made me admit it with a side of humility pie. But he’s not talking to me. Except in pictures, like the ones that made it really clear Dawson was not interested in me, or girls in general. But making wine lit him up from the inside out. “A man with a passion is a beautiful thing to behold. But he’s not out to his family, so I’m going to let the pictures speak and be discreet with the words.”
Dawson Summers had been easy to find. He worked the family bar in Queens every night. Everyone liked him and he liked everyone back. But his father was sick, so he rarely got out from behind the bar. And he wasn’t ready to come out of the closet either.
In order to get him to agree to a weekend, we had to pay for a fill-in bartender. It seemed worth it, because Dawson had deserved a break since way before I met him.
Olivia looked away from the pictures of Dawson to focus on me assessingly. “I’m impressed with your choices for your exes, Diana. It’s almost like you’re putting them in situations where you can’t possibly be fooled into forgetting how they broke your commandments.”
Well, yes. I was. I didn’t admit it aloud, though, just in case it backfired any time in the next few months.
“Wine University. I never heard of that,” Tandy said, looking at Nick. “Was it worth it? Should we try it? For fun?”
Nick shrugged. “It was okay. Not my kind of thing.” He added grudgingly, “It was right for Dawson.”
“Clearly.” Olivia stopped on a photo of Dawson and one of the wine making instructors staring down into a glass of wine with the concentration of Greek scholars. Their hands were almost touching. Nick had nuked the one where they were looking into each other’s eyes. That would have been trouble for Dawson when his father saw it.
“It’s a two part program,” I offered. “He’s going to finish up when the wine we made is done and we go back for testing. Tandy could go with him then. Write something up about his bar and his dream of doing his own micro-brews and local wines.”
I omitted the fact that his father spit nails every time he brought that dream up. Tandy could figure that one out on her own. “Dawson could use the break, and he was a good sport about the whole ex reunion weekend, even though I’m not his type.”
Olivia nodded to Tina. “Put it on the calendar.”
Tandy asked warily, “How come you don’t want to go on the follow up?”
I pointed to the pictures that were flashing by. “No spark. When this article comes out, everyone will know exactly how clueless I was to consider marrying a guy who liked guys.”
“There’s no humiliation in that story, Diana. We’ve all been there. You should forgive the poor boy. He just didn’t know.”
“I’m the one who needs forgiveness,” I said, looking right at Nick.
He took out his phone and started texting. I glanced at Tandy just in time to see her text back.
<<>>
I showed up at Mom’s for pot roast, wondering if I was going to have to explain to her why both Nick and Emily had bailed.
To my surprise, they were both there. Emily was setting the table like she usually did to help, and Nick was mashing the potatoes like he usually did when my mom served us pot roast.
I wanted to cry when I saw them, just like normal. But I didn’t want them to know I wanted to cry, so I pinched my hand and pushed back the tears.
“I brought wine,” I volunteered as I hugged Mom.
“And trouble, too.” Mom didn’t waste time with hello. “Diana, you know how I feel about The Plan, but I guess it’s like a bra. Some people want one and some people don’t. This Ten Commandments of Love and Marriage, though. You need to let them go. Most people can’t even follow the original Ten Commandments perfectly, why add another ten?”
She handed me a pen and a pad of paper. “Write them down for me. I want to see them.”
“I’d rather make the salad, like I usually do.”
“Write them down for me. I want to understand and I need to see them.” She waved her hands as if to erase a thought. “I would ask for the book but I don’t want to see that. Mothers shouldn’t know such things about their daughters. We’d never sleep.”
Where had this strange women hidden my real mom? The woman who′d made a point to read my diary every day while I was at school, and then carefully replace it in my drawer so I wouldn′t notice. “Then you can’t read my articles.”
She looked at me, surprised. Torn. She pointed to the paper. “Write.”
Ten Commandments of Love and Marriage
He shalt love me as he loves himself.
He shalt not kill my dreams.
He shalt not steal my confidence.
He shalt not covet my attention.
He shalt not skip date night.
He shalt not complain about me to others.
He shalt not lie to me.
He shalt not covet porn.
He shalt not cheat on me.
He shalt honor family above all.
I tore off the sheet of paper and put it up on the refrigerator door, pinned with the big strawberry magnet I’d given Mom for Mother’s Day when I was ten. “There. My ten commandments. I dare any of you to dispute them.”
Mom went to stand in front of the refrigerator. She started reading them aloud, but by the time she got to “steal my confidence,” she trailed off into silence.
Finally, she said, “The porn one is a little harsh. Men are visual creatures.”
“Coveting is more like an obsession than a little visual enjoyment.”
“I see. It’s a matter of degree.” She handed me a bag of frozen peas without taking her eyes off the list. “Nuke these in the baby microwave.”
I dutifully put the steam-in bag of peas in the little microwave reserved for quick dishes.
“When did you come up with these commandments?”
“I don’t know,” I answered evasively, an echo of my teen years.
Emily spoke up, “I thought you said you came up with them when you were sixteen.”
Mom moved away from the list at last, but didn’t say anything for a while, just crumbled bacon into dust over the salad. When she brought the bowl to the table she said, “What you must have thought of your father and me that summer.”
I pushed aside the memories of what I had learned they thought of each other. “They’re good commandments, Mom.”
“Yes, honey, they are.” She sat down across the table from me. “Look at me.”
I looked at her, feeling about six years old. By the time we got to dessert, I was going to be babbling, cooing and looking for a binky.
“These are good guidelines to help you find a man you can live with for your whole life, if you’re lucky enough.”
“Luck strikes more often when you have a plan.”
“Luck doesn’t strike at all if you wall it out,” she countered. “I didn’t divorce your father because he made a few mistakes here and there.”
“Like Dora?” I couldn’t believe Mom would defend the man who cheated on her with a woman who could have been his daughter.
She shrugged. “I didn’t say he’s not an idiot. He is. But not because he never broke my heart, skipped date night, lied, or said a few mean things that shook my confidence. I wasn’t perfect; I’d have been a hypocrite to hold him to perfection.”
“He cheated on you.”
“My friend Sally’s husband cheated on her and it made their marriage stronger when they worked it all through.” My mom sighed. “No. I didn’t mind all the years when your father was doing little things that sometimes broke my heart. I just couldn’t take it when he stopped noticing that he broke my heart.”
“How could anyone not notice when they break your heart?”
Mom’s smile trembled a little. “You notice what matters to you, sweetie. You ignore the rest.”
“But you were his wife. You were making his dinner. You were…” I trailed off, not wanting to go there.
“Your father didn’t think I deserved his best any longer. He was disappointed in me. Or maybe in himself, but it doesn’t really matter. I mattered to him. And then, one day, I didn’t.”
Emily asked softly, “How did you know it when you stopped mattering to him?”
The microwave dinged. My mom stood up to get the roast. “It takes a while. At first you don’t believe it. But then you know.”
For a moment I thought she would just leave the answer hanging with that horrible uncertainty as she fussed with the potholders and the big glass dish. But then she turned around and looked squarely at Emily. “Phil is an idiot. But he cares about you.”
“How can I be sure?”
“You’re fighting about your future, not digging a hole for your past. He’s just afraid of being a dad. Aren’t you afraid of being a mother? Isn’t that why you don’t want to work? Because you don’t know if you can be a good teacher and a good mother?”
Emily’s eyes widened at my mother’s bluntness. “No…I…hmmm.” She smiled. “I am an idiot.”
Mom put the roast on the table and handed Nick the carving knife. “We’re all idiots. Isn’t that what makes life interesting?”
Nick didn’t say anything. He just carved the roast and ate in silence.
The meat tasted like sawdust in my mouth. I was an idiot. I knew what I needed to do to fix things. Burn the book. Maybe in a ceremony with the three of us and some incense.
I would do it. As soon as I’d finished up with my last two exes.
<<>>
Nigel Boyington was the next guy on the list. He lived in Silicon Valley and did high level programming for a big game company. Nick and I were scheduled to fly out there. Or at least, Tina had scheduled us and I hadn’t heard that Nick had backed out of the gig.
I considered not trying to fix things between us until Nigel’s story and photos were under wraps. But after my mom’s pot roast and pep talk, I had to try. What can I say? I take after both my parents. I’m a double idiot.
I knocked on the wall, my double rap that signaled I needed him to come over and help me with some decision.
He didn’t knock back to say he would be there in a sec.
I got his emergency key out from under my dusty fake ficus. If he wasn’t home, I would leave him a note. If he was home. I would pretend I needed to borrow some milk and thought he was out. With Tandy. That would be a nice touch — a reminder that we are all idiots, including him.
He opened his door before I could jiggle it open with the uncooperative key. “I’m working.”
I babbled my planned excuse. “I need milk.”
“For what?”
I hadn’t planned for what I would say if he asked the obvious question. My mind went blank. I surrendered to the inevitability of truth. “Fine. I just can’t stand that things are messed up between us. Can you just forgive me and we can go back to normal?”
His expression was all stubborn unreasonableness. “Show me the page.”
“I’m going to burn the book. As soon as we’re done with Brian. Isn’t that good enough?”
He moved away from the door and let me come into his apartment.
He changed his tactics, softened his question. “Why don’t you want to show me the page?”
“Because it’s just silly. The kind of stuff we say that we hope no one ever hears. Haven’t you ever had thoughts about me that you wouldn’t want me to know in a million years?”
The question electrified the air. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up as I stared at him, unable to look away. Unable to blink.
I wanted the answer, but I didn’t. I could see there was something there unsaid inside him.
The silence grew, and so did the electricity, until I couldn’t bear it. “See. You have. We’re even. You don’t tell me. I don’t tell you.”
His voice was low and confident, with a hint of a laugh. “You want to know though.”
How inconvenient that he knew me so well. “I won’t ask.” I crossed my heart. “Cross my heart.”
He shook his head. “You will. Maybe not now. Maybe in a week. Or a year.”
In that moment, I hated that he was right. “You’re my friend.”
“And you don’t have standards for your friends. Only your boyfriends. So if I, your friend, don’t live up to your high expectations, you’ll keep me on as a friend. Right.”
“Of course.”
“Even if I never have a steady job.”
“Yes.”
“Even if I eat at the soup kitchen sometimes.”
“Yes.”
“Even if I quit this shoot?”
“You wouldn’t quit You know I need you.” Knowing someone well was a two way street for real friends.
“I won’t,” he conceded to my great relief. “But I can promise you I won’t take another job for you.”
“I know I push a little too hard. I’m sorry. I just want to help. But is that so terrible? Isn’t it nice to have steady money? To know where your rent money will come from? To be able to spring for pizza or bagels, or Chinese? Am I really such a bad friend to want more for you? You are a talented photographer. Even Olivia is impressed by you.”
He shrugged. “Hack work. Point and click and make sure your hands are steady.”
“That’s not true.” I picked up his camera and turned it over to scroll through the shots he had stored there. “Look. Here’s one of Henry and me. When I saw this shot I knew why it would never work with Henry. That’s not hack work.” I scrolled through more. “And this one? With Clay and Sophia? I think we should send it to them as a wedding present. You caught it — the moment that Clay felt something real for the first time in his entire life.”
He put his hands over mine. “Stop.”
I pulled away. “No. Look.” I landed on a picture of me. I was sitting in the coffee shop, a mocha in one hand and my pen in the other. I looked fierce and focused as I stared down at my notepad. “When did you take this?”
“A few weeks ago. You didn’t see me. You were focused on the perfect article. I think it was the first one. The Henry one.”
The picture caught me honestly, but with a lack of judgement that only a great photographer can manage. “You’ve captured me perfectly. You see things other people don’t see and then you make us see them in your photos.”
I pointed to the way the light played along my hair, giving me the tiniest halo effect. “See how you used the light to show me as you see me. As…” I trailed off as I met his eyes, which were deep and dark and had not the slightest halo effect in them. I swallowed, my throat suddenly dry. “That’s not hack work. That’s genius.”
He let out a ragged laugh and pulled the camera from my unresisting fingers. “It doesn’t feel like genius. Sometimes I see things I don’t want to see. Things I want to change.”
“Then change them.” It seemed like a simple answer. “I do it all the time. You just need to create a plan. Implement it. Change.”
“I’m not a plan kind of guy. You know that.” He pulled me to him in a friendly hug that no longer felt casual and his breath was warm on my cheek. “I go with my gut.”
I buried my face in his neck. “What does your gut tell you?”
“That if I kiss you the way I want to kiss you…”
I waited. Expecting his head to turn. His lips to find mine.
He let me go and stepped away. “I don’t want to disappoint you. And my gut says I will.” He opened his door as my cue to leave.
I hesitated. It seemed possible that if I left things like they were, I might never see him again. “You can’t disappoint me. You’re my best friend.”
He put his camera on the table. I could still see the picture of me showing in the view window. “I showed you mine, Diana. Now you show me yours.”
I couldn’t. It would confirm everything he just said. He’d never talk to me again. “Everything will change.”
He moved toward me and leaned down to brush a soft kiss on my forehead. “Everything.” Another on my nose. “Already.” He brushed his lips against mine and said, “Has.” And then he kissed me for real.
When he broke off the kiss, I was outside his apartment. “Goodnight, Diana.” He stepped away and closed his door.
I called through the closed door, “Are you going to California with me?”
He didn’t answer.
I realized I’d dropped his key somewhere inside his apartment.