Conversations with the Fat Girl

  “Oh, for chrissakes, Kate.” Mom laughs.

  “I got your ‘Save the Date’ e-mail,” Kate says, turning to me.

  “Oh, Olivia wanted to invite you even though she thought you probably couldn’t make it. She already feels bad that you guys have to find a babysitter for the wedding,” I say.

  “I think I’m going to go to the shower,” she says.

  “Really?” I say.

  “What about the girls?” Mom asks.

  “They do have a father,” Kate says.

  “Is he okay with that?” Mom asks.

  “Why wouldn’t he be okay with watching his own children?” Kate asks.

  “He’s been working long hours lately,” Mom says as she looks through her drawers for a cake knife.

  “I’ll set up some playdates. Emily has a sleepover that weekend anyway. I’ll set one up for Bella as well, so he can have a whole weekend to himself,” Kate says, hands on her hips.

  “That sounds great. I’ve already reserved a suite, and we can drive together,” I say.

  “Drive?” Kate asks.

  “We are not flying, I can’t. I planned on driving. If you want to go with me, you’re going to drive, too.” My heart rate accelerates as I imagine flying.

  “Have you ever thought your fear of flying is just a ruse so you don’t have to travel?”

  “That doesn’t even make sense,” I say.

  “Sure it does.” Kate licks the icing off her cake.

  “I went to Washington, DC.”

  “Yes, you’re right, then. You’ve been everywhere,” Kate says, lifting each cake out of its respective box.

  “Can we get these cakes outside?” Mom asks.

  “We have to shop for clothes for the wedding and shower soon,” Kate says on her way out the back door, her cake in her hands.

  “We’ll plan for that sometime this week. I hear there are amazing shops at the Beverly Center,” Mom says.

  “So we’ll plan to go there on your next day off,” Kate says.

  “Sounds good,” I say, already dreading that day.

  “And don’t think we’ve let you off about your little friend out there. You might even get a breakfast invitation for that little stunt,” Kate says.

  Kate is known for breaking earth-shattering news after inviting us to breakfast. Mom and I found out that she and Vincent were getting married over bagels at Noah’s Bagels in Hastings Ranch. We found out about Emily’s impending arrival over scones and coffee at EuroPane. We found out about Bella over Charlie’s Breakfast at Green Street. Now we’ve learned: We never go to breakfast with Kate anymore unless she answers a battery of questions about her personal life first.

  The rest of the night goes off seemingly without a hitch. I catch glimpses of Domenic and try to make myself remember his face. I want to know it so in case he leaves, I’ll remember what he looked like. Those details that matter. The curve of his lips. The hooded eyes. The flips of that black hair. That leaning-back laugh. As the night darkens and the Girlie Meltdown Watch begins, we close the party.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Reading Stories in Feety Pajamas

  Domenic and I say good-bye to everyone and climb into my waiting car. I feel so relieved that I don’t have to go home alone again after one of these functions. I look at Domenic as he eases way back in his chair and leans his head on the headrest.

  “So? What did you think?” I ask.

  “Your family is great. They really are,” he says.

  “Thank you,” I say.

  “No, really. I mean, I like my family just fine. I wouldn’t change it for anything. But yours is nice. Real, I guess.”

  “A little too real sometimes.”

  “Yeah, that’s true. I thought I saw a red laser dot on my forehead when I didn’t eat all the meat on my plate.”

  “Russell is an ex-marine. Special Forces, no less.”

  “There are no ex-marines.”

  We drive in near silence all the way back to my house. Except for the embarrassing sign-reading thing I do every once in a while when I’m nervous or when I don’t like the deafening silence of perceived rejection. Every three minutes the silence is broken with,

  “Pottery Barn,” I announce.

  “Crate and Barrel,” I say.

  And on and on. Domenic politely nods or smiles, but never does the sign reading start another conversation. We pull onto my street and I see his car in front of my courtyard. A subtle reminder: He’s going home soon.

  “I’m going to head on home,” he says as we walk from my now parked car. I am oddly relieved. The whole idea of having someone close to me is so new that it’s absolutely exhausting.

  “Oh, okay,” I say.

  “What are you doing for the rest of the night?”

  “Cleaning. Unpacking the last bits.”

  “Sounds like fun.”

  “Thanks again for coming. It really meant a lot to me. And the gift—that was really great.”

  “Not a problem.”

  “Okay, well, have a safe drive.”

  “I will,” he says and begins to walk to his car.

  “Can I ask you another favor?” I yell after him. I don’t know if I’m yelling after him because I need something or if I just don’t want him to go.

  “Sure,” Domenic says, not missing a beat.

  “I’m going to Las Vegas for my best friend’s shower and I was wondering if you could stay here and watch the pup? She likes you, and she doesn’t like anyone. I’d stock the refrigerator with sugary sodas. I’d pay you.” Just having him here—standing in front of me is such a luxury. I want this new life—I want to drive this Porsche as fast as it can go.

  “You don’t need to pay me, but sugary sodas, yes. That’s a quality-of-life issue.”

  “Okay, then. I’ll give you a call and we’ll go through all of her routines and that kind of thing,” I say. Domenic gives me a small smile, hesitates for one second longer than he should, and then turns to leave. No hug. No hand on the nape of my neck. Nothing. What did I do at some point tonight to not even get a hug?

  Domenic drives off, and I get that feeling again. Right now, Mom is cuddling up with Russell in their den. Russell is futzing with the surround sound and Mom is reading a mystery. Kate and Vincent are putting the girlies to bed. They are reading stories in their feety pajamas. Emily is chewing and twirling her hair and Bella is sucking her thumb. Their hair is wet from their big-girl showers, but they still smell like babies. Vincent is wearing his glasses and Kate has her fluffy slippers on. Vincent is seeing if there is anything sports-related on television so he can catch a glimpse before Kate turns the channel to whatever sitcom she can find that features a large ensemble cast.

  As I open my front door, an empty house and an untrainable dog meet me. I have my bag of presents and the Tupperware filled with cake in my hands. Solo bounds out of my bedroom. I set my cake on the table and rest the bag of presents on the floor. I pet Solo but I just can’t stop feeling lonely. So I’m alone now? It doesn’t make me alone. I was just around an entire family of people who adore me. Mom gave me a series of facials with this amazing facialist in Sierra Madre. Kate bought me an outfit I will never wear—a time-honored tradition. Bella got me a purple felt hat and Emily got me a singing plastic watch. I have this little doll with huge porcelain feet made by Domenic, a doll that reminds him of me. This is not the booty of a lonely person. I tuck myself into bed and wish Solo a good night, as usual.

  I wake up the next morning to Solo itching herself at the foot of my bed. I unwind from my bedsheets. I’ve added turning on my laptop to my morning sequence. I will focus on getting my office organized today. I’ve got the computer and Internet hooked up. Now I just have to get the papers where they should be. My house is perfect. Everything looks amazing. Everything feels amazing. This house is everything I would have dreamed. There’s something so wonderful about seeing it all put together like this. I pad over to my laptop and check my e-mail. The first
one is from the M&M maven herself, Shawna Moss. It reads:

  Dear Maggie:

  It is v. great to finally hear from the one and only Maggie Taylor! Am I being repetitive? Sorry! Anyway, it is great to finally hear from you! I can’t wait to meet you because Olivia talks about you all the time. I feel like I already know you. I’m sure this shower is going to be so v. fun and if I can help in anyway please let me know. I hear I’m an amazing party planner! :o) By the by, us gals are trying to get in touch with the bride herself. She said she would call me with her mom’s phone number in Pasadena, but you know that bitch hasn’t! JK (just kidding—hee hee). She is probably so busy she forgot and she refuses to come into my office for some stupid reason, that girl! Do you have her mother’s number, by any chance? We are trying to find a hotel for the wedding where Olivia said there might be some extra rooms. Again, it’s great to finally talk to you. See you in Vegas, baby! Maybe we can all go grab drinks, I’d love to hear your side of all of Olivia’s crazy escapades.

  Can’t wait to meet you,

  Shawna Moss

  Taylor, huh? Ms. Shawna Moss can’t even get my last name right. I feel my IQ drop ten points and have this urgent need to end all of my sentences in exclamation marks! More importantly, though—no one gets calls back from Olivia? Even her new friends who are trying to book a hotel for her wedding aren’t a priority with Olivia these days. I am also confused that Olivia is talking about our “crazy escapades.” Olivia will have to debrief me so we can be on the same page about what exactly she’s said to these women. The “crazy escapades” I remember certainly aren’t the ones Olivia is talking about to her new friends. I remember one in particular. It featured Olivia and me in my little red piece-of-shit Chevy Chevette sitting under a street lamp eating Nachos BellGrande together on prom night. I know for a fact that Olivia hasn’t told that story to any of her new friends. Olivia hasn’t told any of these women she ever had a problem with anything. As long as they’ve known her, she’s had Adam. The perfect little couple who summer in Nantucket and know what kind of wine to order with fish. My curiosity is definitely piqued about what escapades this Shawna girl may have been hearing. V. Piqued! V. Piqued, indeed!

  I want the shower weekend to be about rediscovering my friendship with Olivia. I want to put aside all the chores and other distractions of the wedding. Read: Gwen. I imagine we’ll drive around Las Vegas and laugh and talk like we used to. Recalling those memories and making new ones are what I want this weekend to be about.

  I realize I haven’t spoken to Peregrine since our little run-in. How can I apologize now? How can I make her understand I already have a mother and what I need from her is to be a friend? I can’t think about it now. I just don’t feel strong enough. Not to mention I haven’t heard a peep from Ms. Beverly Urban since our interview. Is that good or bad?

  I am at work when Mom calls around ten thirty to confirm our shopping day from hell tomorrow. I hang up and dread it immediately. Once again, I will be in the Mother of the Bride section yelling out to anyone in earshot that my boobs don’t fit.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Let the Games Begin

  When I was in college, I started hanging out with a girl from one of my art classes named Karen Thomas. It seemed like Karen was a lot like me: studious, funny, and not internationally beautiful. Nothing set her apart, yet she was unnervingly confident. She always had a boyfriend and a line of men clamoring to go out with her. What was her recipe for success? Karen had this crooked, pigeon-toed walk, and she told me early on that she could only hear out of one ear. I believed these things were the key to her success, so I devised an elaborate scheme in which I tried to convince people that I, too, could hear out of only one ear. The pigeon-toed walk was easy, but it was hard on the knees. To this day, some people still speak only into my right ear out of respect.

  “Who was that?” Cole asks.

  “My mom,” I say.

  “What’d she want?”

  “Why do you care?”

  “I care because it took her ten minutes to tell you about it.”

  “Were you able to handle all one of the customers who shoved their way in?”

  “Cut the shit, Maggie.” Cole almost spits, he’s so pissed off.

  Cole has gotten worse over the past few weeks. Ever since our incident with the bouncer at Peregrine’s party, our conversations have been strained. I know he and Peregrine have talked about our big blowout. They’ve worked together for longer than we have. He’s mentioned it a few times and tried to engage me before this. I haven’t taken the bait. I don’t know why I do today.

  “Dial it back, partner,” I say.

  “Partner?” Cole asks.

  “Yeah, you’ve been after me for weeks now. Is there a problem?”

  “Problem? Me? Let’s see, you ask for too much time off, you’re pretty much always late, you fucking went off on Peregrine, who actually works for a living.” Cole moves closer to me.

  “You’re right,” I say. Thwack.

  Finally, the rock hits right between Goliath’s beady, little eyes. What comes after this job has always been the ultimate blue bucket. Conceding that Cole is right is just the first step toward passing it.

  Why am I here? I have a master’s in museum studies. I hemmed the skirt of a fucking Degas and I’m letting a playground bully who makes me constantly walk on eggshells take over my days. I had an interview at the Getty—an interview I nailed, by the way. I just don’t need this anymore. First Peregrine—now Cole. I’m sick of fighting. I’m sick of being bullied. But I’m also sick of being controlled by the what-if game. What if he doesn’t accept me? What if I get left behind? What if I’m not his favorite? It’s never worked for me. Not fighting back has never worked. No one has ever loved me more because I allowed them to abandon or mistreat me. I can’t put up with this fear anymore.

  “What?” Cole says. Even he is thrown.

  “You’re right.” I am calm.

  Cole is silent. He doesn’t know what to do with himself. Life is like a football field to him. He doesn’t know how to deal with it any other way. I just moved out of the way and cleared his path to the goalpost. He thinks it’s some kind of trick.

  “I quit. I’ve had it.” I untie my apron and burst through the back door. Cole is right behind me. My breathing is steady, but the flutters are starting. I can’t believe what I’ve just done, but I can’t deny how amazing and free I feel.

  “You can’t fucking quit.” He is so close to me that, for the first time, I actually feel like he may belt me one.

  “I just did.” I am so scared. This doesn’t even seem like my life anymore. I think of Marcus Aurelius. What would Marcus do? Right now he’s in a million tiny pieces somewhere in the Getty Museum. Marcus needs me, goddammit.

  “Just because I bust your balls sometimes?” Cole backs away and looks out into the coffeehouse.

  “You bust my balls all the time, Cole.”

  “I know, I know. I mean . . . you’re not quitting because of me, are you?”

  “No.”

  “Good.”

  “But you’re still an asshole.” I grab my long black sweater from the bathroom and fill out my time sheet one last time. Cole is watching my every move. I take my keys out of my purse and step right up to Cole, who is standing in front of the door. I refuse to sneak out the back door.

  “Excuse me.” I look up into his eyes unblinking. I cock my head to the right and sigh as he takes a full minute to “think about it.” Cole steps aside. I thank him. I walk out into the coffeehouse. I wave to Christina, who is refilling the sugars. She waves back. Now if I can just round up all the other Coles in my life, I may be able to quiet these demons.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  The More the Merrier

  My first real job was at the Gourmet Donuts in Pasadena. It was a match made in heaven. I worked nights after school to make a little extra walking-around money. Some people believe that if you work around a food long enough, it wi
ll become unappetizing. That theory is incorrect. Doughnuts became my life. I smelled like doughnuts. I constantly found wondrous flecks of glaze in my hair at the end of a long day. But as is always the case with greed, I was corrupted by the abundance of the doughnuts. I started to hatch a plan in which I could have all the doughnuts I wanted without being caught. I knew each employee was allotted a certain number of doughnuts per day. I also knew that certain employees never ate their share—amateurs. So I would sneak back to the magical tray loaded with all the doughnut rejects and swipe twice and sometimes three times my daily doughnut allotment. Three days later, Jennie, the morning manager, noticed that her allotment of doughnuts was missing. It didn’t take the owners long to follow the flecks of glaze in my direction. We parted amicably—me and the doughnuts.

  After a night of the deepest sleep I’ve had in months, I meet Mom at the gym for our thirty minutes on the StairMaster. After our big gym outing, Mom makes me her special kind of coffee and serves fruit and oatmeal for both of us at her house. I am glowing. That StairMaster couldn’t have been any harder, and I had it on the lowest setting. I used drinks of water as a ruse to catch my breath. But I just can’t deny how good I feel right now. I had forgotten what it’s like to be in touch with my body. When Kate and I were little we would roller-skate for hours on our street after school. I feel that young again. I forgot what playing feels like. As I sit eating Mom’s Irish oatmeal, I am bursting with the news of Joe’s, but I just can’t quite tell her yet. My speech isn’t perfected, and my courage is waning. My mom is my hero and I don’t know if I can deal with her disappointment right now. I didn’t have a chance to call Domenic, either, to tell him that I quit. I’ll tell him when he comes by to learn about taking care of Solo. He probably won’t hear it from me, anyway. Chances are he’s already heard every word.

  The dreaded day of shopping is here.

  Kate honks in the driveway about fifteen minutes later. Mom and I go out to meet her. I pull open the big, sliding minivan door. Emily and Bella are sitting in the way back to make room for me. They greet me with loud laughter and nonstop questions. Everyone knows I get carsick, so they try to make me as comfortable as possible in cars to avoid the possible risk of getting vomited on.