Too Good to Be True. Kristan Higgins
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Anything other than my actual plans.
“Hi, Grace!” Kiki said, popping into my classroom.
“Hi, Kiki. Sounded like fun out there.”
“We’re reading Lord of the Flies,” she informed me.
“Of course! No wonder you were laughing. Nothing like a little pig killing to brighten the day.”
She grinned proudly. “So, Grace, did you find a date?”
I grimaced. “No. I didn’t. It won’t be pretty.”
“Oh, shit,” she said. “I’m so sorry.”
“Well, it’s not the end of the world,” I murmured bravely.
“You sure about that?” Like me, Kiki was single. And no one knew better than a single woman in her thirties that hell is going to a wedding stag. In a few hours, my cousin Kitty, who once cut my bangs down to the roots when I was sleeping over at her house, was getting married. For the third time. In a Princess Diana–style dress.
“Look, it’s Eric!” Kiki blurted, pointing to my eastern window. “Oh, thank you, God!”
Eric was the guy who washed Manning Academy’s windows each spring and fall. Though it was only early April, the afternoon was warm and balmy, and Eric was shirtless. He grinned at us, well aware of his beauty, sprayed and squeegeed.
“Ask him!” Kiki suggested as we stared with great appreciation.
“He’s married,” I said, not taking my eyes off him. Ogling Eric was about as intimate as I’d been with a man in some time.
“Happily married?” Kiki asked, not above wrecking a home or two to get a man.
“Yup. Adores his wife.”
“I hate that,” she muttered.
“I know. So unfair.”
The male perfection that was Eric winked at us, blew a kiss and dragged the squeegee back and forth over the window, shoulder muscles bunching beautifully, washboard abs rippling, sunlight glinting on his hair.
“I should really get going,” I said, not moving a muscle. “I have to change and stuff.” The thought made my stomach cramp. “Kiki, you sure you don’t know anyone I can take? Anyone? I really, really don’t want to go alone.”
“I don’t, Grace,” she sighed. “Maybe you should’ve hired someone, like in that Debra Messing movie.”
“It’s a small town. A gigolo would probably stand out. Also, probably not that good for my reputation. ‘Manning Teacher Hires Prostitute. Parents Concerned.’ That kind of thing.”
“What about Julian?” she asked, naming my oldest friend, who often came out with Kiki and me on our girls’ nights.
“Well, my family knows him. He wouldn’t pass.”
“As a boyfriend, or as a straight guy?”
“Both, I guess,” I said.
“Too bad. He’s a great dancer, at least.”
“That he is.” I glanced at the clock, and the trickle of dread that had been spurting intermittently all week turned into a river. It wasn’t just going stag to mean old Kitty’s wedding. I’d be seeing Andrew for only the third time since we broke up, and having a date would’ve definitely helped.
Well. As much as I wished I could just stay home and read Gone With the Wind or watch a movie, I had to go. Besides, I’d been staying in a lot lately. My father, my gay best friend and my dog, though great company, probably shouldn’t be the only men in my life. And there was always the microscopic chance that I’d meet someone at this very wedding.
“Maybe Eric will go,” Kiki said, hustling over to the window and yanking it open. “No one has to know he’s married.”
“Kiki, no,” I protested.
She didn’t listen. “Eric, Grace has to go to a wedding tonight, and her ex-fiancé is going to be there, and she doesn’t have a date. Can you go with her? Pretend to adore her and stuff?”
“Thanks anyway, but, no,” I called, my face prickling with heat.
“Your ex, huh?” Eric said, wiping a pane clear.
“Yeah. May as well slit my wrists now.” I smiled to show I didn’t mean it.
“You sure you can’t go with her?” Kiki asked.
“My wife would probably have a problem with that,” Eric answered. “Sorry, Grace. Good luck.”
“Thanks,” I said. “It sounds worse than it is.”
“Isn’t she brave?” Kiki asked. Eric agreed that I was and moved on to the next window, Kiki nearly falling out the window to watch him leave. She hauled herself back in and sighed. “So you’re going stag,” she said in the same tone as a doctor might use when saying, I’m sorry, it’s terminal.
“Well, I did try, Kiki,” I reminded her. “Johnny who delivers my pizza is dating Garlic-and-Anchovies, if you can believe it. Brandon at the nursing home said he’d hang himself before being a wedding date. And I just found out that the cute guy at the pharmacy is only seventeen years old, and though he said he’d be happy to go, Betty the pharmacist is his mom and mentioned something about the Mann Act and predators, so I’ll be going to the CVS in Farmington from now on.”
“Oopsy,” Kiki said.
“No big deal. I came up empty. So I’ll just go alone, be noble and brave, scan the room for legs to hump and leave with a waiter. If I’m lucky.” I grinned. Bravely.
Kiki laughed. “Being single sucks,” she announced. “And God, being single at a wedding…” She shuddered.
“Thanks for the pep talk,” I answered.
FOUR HOURS LATER, I was in hell.
The all too familiar and slightly nauseating combination of hope and despair churned in my stomach. Honestly, I thought I was doing pretty well these days. Yes, my fiancé had dumped me fifteen months ago, but I wasn’t lying on the floor in fetal position, sucking my thumb. I went to work and taught my classes… very well, in my opinion. I went out socially. Granted, most of my excursions were either dancing with senior citizens or reenacting Civil War battles, but I did get out. And, yes, I would (theoretically) love to find a man—sort of an Atticus-Finch-meets-Tim-Gunn-and-looks-like-George-Clooney type.
So here I was at another wedding—the fourth family wedding since The Dumping, the fourth family wedding where I’d been dateless—gamely trying to radiate happiness so my relatives would stop pitying me and trying to fix me up with odd-looking distant cousins. At the same time, I was trying to perfect The Look—wry amusement, inner contentment and absolute comfort. Sort of a Hello! I am perfectly fine being single at yet another wedding and am not at all desperate for a man, but if you happen to be straight, under forty-five, attractive, financially secure and morally upright, come on down! Once I mastered The Look, I planned on splitting an atom, since they required just about the same level of skill.
But who knew? Maybe today, my eyes would lock on someone, someone who was also single and hopeful without being pathetic—let’s say a pediatric surgeon, just for the sake of argument—and kablammy! We’d just know.
Unfortunately, my hair was making me look, at best, gypsy beautiful and reckless, but more probably like I was channeling Gilda Radner. Must remember to call an exorcist to see if I could have the evil demons cast out of my hair, which had been known to snap combs in half and eat hairbrushes.
Hmm. There was a cute guy. Geeky, skinny, glasses, definitely my type. Then he saw me looking and immediately groped behind him for a hand, which was attached to an arm, which was attached to a woman. He beamed at her, planted a kiss on her lips and shot a nervous look my way.