Slightly Settled. Wendy Markham
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starts to ask, “What do you—”
“So what department are you in?” I quickly interrupt.
“Media.”
Mission accomplished. Line of questioning derailed. Celebratory sip of drink in order.
I take two sips, then ask, “Are you a buyer?”
“I’m a planner.”
“Oh.” I nod, fascinated. Well, not really. But I hope I look it.
Actually, Media Planning is a fun job. Relatively low-paying, but I’m not a gold digger like Kate, so what do I care?
“I’ve never seen you around the agency before,” Jack tells me while I check out his clothes. I’m no Raphael, but his suit looks good on him and it’s basic black; he’s wearing a white starched spread-collar dress shirt and a black tie with a white pattern.
“I’ve never seen you around either,” I tell him, hoping he didn’t catch me looking him up and down.
Maybe he did, because I suddenly feel like he’s looking me up and down, too.
Now I feel awkward. And drunk. Not to mention confused. Why is this Jack over here talking to me?
Cut it out, Tracey. I can almost hear Buckley’s voice. Why wouldn’t this guy want to talk to you? What’s wrong with you?
Nothing. Nothing is wrong with me. I just have to remember that.
Lately, Buckley has been trying to point out that Will really did a number on my self-esteem. The whole time I was with him, I felt unworthy. I’m trying, but it’s hard to get past that. I might have lost all that extra poundage, but I’m still carrying around a tremendous amount of baggage.
And now, here’s this guy coming up to talk to me; the kind of guy I’d normally be wistfully checking out from afar. It seems too good to be true.
Especially since he just appeared out of nowhere. If this were a movie, he’d have stepped into a dazzling pool of light, and a choir would have sung one big loud Hallelujah. But it’s not and he didn’t and they didn’t.
He’s just here, and I have no idea why. I mean, even setting all the usual Tracey insecurity aside, I’m still the lone Don’t at the party, and he’s…
Well, he’s so normal. Good-looking normal, with dimples and a real job.
Unlike Will, the actor. Will was good-looking, too, but he didn’t have dimples and he wasn’t normal. Ask Kate. Ask Raphael. Their hobby, when I was dating Will, was pointing out just how abnormal Will is. That he’s narcissistic and untrustworthy and selfish.
And closeted—or so they both suspected.
Kate, because she assumes every man who wears black turtlenecks and cologne and dabbles in theater must be secretly gay.
Raphael, because he and his constantly blipping gaydar think every man is secretly gay.
I try to think of something to say to Cute Normal Jack of the warm brown eyes and stable job.
“So…um, Jack…you just saw me standing here alone and decided to come over and talk to me?”
Okay, I agree, awkward silence was better. But I can’t seem to help myself. Three martinis and I start to blurt things. Anyway, it could have been worse.
He shifts his weight, doesn’t answer right away.
Uh-oh.
Maybe it couldn’t have been worse. Maybe he really wasn’t talking to me all this time. I look over my shoulders again, half expecting to see some supermodel standing there.
“Yeah, I wanted to meet you,” he says, obviously uncomfortable. “Oh.”
Something tells me there’s more to it, but who am I to pry? If Cute Normal Jack wants to meet the Queen of the Don’ts, so be it.
From there, the night unfolds in a series of highlights: Jack asking me to dance to an old song by the Cure; Jack meeting my friends; Latisha snapping pictures with my camera; more drinks; more cigarettes in the bitter cold.
Until now, I’ve felt that there are two breeds of men in New York: men who smoke, and men who think nobody should smoke.
Jack breaks the whole If you’re not with us, you’re against us mold. He’s not a smoker, but not only does he not seem to mind that I am, he comes outside with me, gives me his suit jacket to keep me warm, takes my lighter from me and lights my cigarettes.
He makes me laugh harder than I’ve laughed in a long time, especially when he sings along to a Billy Joel song that’s playing, acting like he’s doing a nightclub act and using a beer bottle as a microphone. I can’t tell if he really can’t sing or if he’s just pretending for the sake of the act—not that it matters. After all, Will had the voice of a choirboy but the disposition of an asshole.
Unlike Will, who never shared my sense of humor, Jack also laughs at all my jokes, proving that even in my bibulous blur, I’m not just amusing to myself.
He’s a good dancer, too. Not many guys are—not at fast dancing, anyway. Some are embarrassingly unable to get the beat; some don’t even try. Some try to hold on to you when you’re fast dancing with them, like they want you to jitterbug or something. But Jack just dances—not too close to me, and not too far away. He doesn’t try to spin me and he doesn’t have that goofy, intense, I’m-so-into-the-music look on his face.
Merry has that look, especially when the DJ plays Madonna’s “Santa Baby.” She pretty much does a spotlight solo for that song, which nobody else considers danceable.
Mental Note: Never, under any circumstances, dance alone, no matter how much you love the song.
“Man, I’d hate to be Merry on January second,” Brenda comments as my friends and I and Jack stand around watching her from the bar.
“Yeah,” I say. “She’s probably curled in a fetal position with pine needles in her hair.”
“Nah, by then she’s booking her flight to Punxsatawney and airing out the groundhog suit,” Jack says unexpectedly, and we all laugh.
“He’s a keeper,” Yvonne rasps as he flags down the bartender to order another round for all of us.
“Yeah, Tracey, how’d you hook up with him?” Brenda asks.
I shrug. “We just started talking.”
Another big plus: My friends approve. And he seems to like them, too. He’s even a good sport about Latisha, aspiring photographer, who insists on taking a picture of me and Jack together. He puts his arm around my shoulder and smiles, like we’re old pals. Or a couple.
He seems to know a lot of people who work at the agency, and he introduces me to them as Tracey from account management.
He’s too good to be true.
What’s the catch?
There has to be a catch, dammit. There’s always a catch. Men like this don’t just drop into your lap when you least expect it. Well, they certainly don’t drop into mine.
The crowd is starting to thin out. Brenda keeps looking at her watch, saying Paulie is going to kill her.
I don’t want to leave yet.
Or ever.
I’m boozy and blissful, leaning against the bar talking to Jack while the DJ plays one of my favorite U2 songs, “With or Without You.”
As the song heats up, Jack leans over and kisses me.
I kiss him back.
Everything falls away. Brenda and her watch, the music, the bar. There’s just me and Jack, floating in space. At Space. In front of a few hundred co-workers and, for all I know, my boss.
When