A Little Bit Wicked (12 page)

“Kristi, I have some bad news. I had this lump biopsied, and, honey, I have breast cancer.”

In one paradigm-shifting, perspective-galvanizing, attitude-adjusting moment, the difference between drama and melodrama was starkly outlined. I put my life and career on hold and went to Houston, because once I got past the initial cancer-bomb stuff—all the information that has to be assimilated, decisions, logistics, private tears, and public transportation—I realized that
this
was my moment. All my life, I’d been on the receiving end of my mother’s endless tenderness and vigilant care. I’d never had the opportunity to be the one who’s
needed
—for her or anyone else—and until it was my turn, I never had an inkling of what a privilege it is.

Before Mom’s double mastectomy, we went shopping for gowns that would be easy to get in and out of and spent the day talking, reminiscing, just being together. The first month or so after the hospital, it was basically the two of us most of the time, and I’ll always
cherish the closeness we had during those weeks. The nurses taught me how to empty and measure Mom’s four surgical drains, tend the suture sites, monitor temperature and pain meds (which I was tempted to sample some days). Sterile fields had to be maintained with latex gloves and proper protocol, and everything was carefully logged in a binder. I bathed her as best I could and helped her in personal ways you wouldn’t want a stranger to help you. Believe it or not, we laughed a lot. We talked about things we’d never talked about before. We held hands. We prayed.

“How do you feel, Mom?” I asked her the first day she was more awake than sleeping, and she wrecked me by answering, “Grateful.”

A friend of mine had cancer when her daughter was in kindergarten, and she tells me that her five-year-old used to sit beside her on the bathroom floor, singing songs for her sick mom, and that seemed to make the little girl feel less afraid. Being allowed to care for my mom was a gift, the single greatest lesson, the best blessing—the most
rewarding
experience in my life.

I
want to run through the trees on a sweet summer day licking peach juice from a cardboard plate…”

Now there’s a first line for ya. That’s a Lippa line.

“I want to curl in a ball and feel free for a moment and not get caught up in some kind of net I always make…”

After I did this song at the Met, I got a lot of requests for it. I love that audiences are open to a quiet, contemplative moment in the middle of a high-energy, ninety-minute concert set.

“I want to drink coffee with half and half and sugar and skip the damn skim and Sweet’n Low…”

It so succinctly states where I am in my life at this moment. It says everything I want to say to (and about) Mr. Right and Mr. Writer.

“I want to dig down in my soul and lose my self-control and find
out what I’m not doing right…I want to love somebody now…I want to love somebody now…”

Hours after I sang it in the recording studio, it’s still drifting through my head, wrapped around me like a pashmina as I stand in line at Starbucks. People who hear it in concert tell me it lingers with them the same way.

“Tall soy chai latte, please,” I tell the girl when it’s my turn.

Skip the damn Sweet’n Low.
Lippa is a genius.

I nip someone’s discarded newspaper from a wire basket and take it to a corner table. In the arts section, an item catches my eye. There’s a picture of me and a blurb about the benefit concert I’ll be doing later this month for the 3 Angels Memorial Fund. I’m pleased to see the benefit getting some press because it’s such a worthy cause, but it hurts my head a little when the reporter describes me as “Broadway performer Kristin Chenoweth, who has been romantically linked with virtuoso violinist Josh Bell.” As if dating a virtuoso violinist is a much better classical-music credential than…oh, I dunno…a master’s degree in opera? Singing at the Met? Selling out Carnegie Hall? A publicist once told me they do that to counteract rumors that I’m gay. Or that Josh is gay. Or that classical music is gay. I don’t know. I can only say that it’s vaguely disturbing to see a fractured love affair listed in the arts section as if it were a performance credit.

I’m not unlucky in love. I consider myself extremely lucky when I think of the good, good men I’ve loved. I’ve had four First Great Loves, and the fact that I’m so willing to love again could be seen as a performance credit for them, I suppose. The problem is meeting men whose love won’t be overwhelmed by the logistics of dating me. If I did register on eHarmony, what would I say? “Bicoastal, type A Tony winner seeks same. Must love dog.” I used to sing every night in
Wicked,
“He could be that boy, but I’m not that girl.” Is it possible that any or all of these men were Mr. Right, and I am simply destined to be Ms. Not? I never saw myself as the runaway-bride type, but somehow it’s worked out that way.

The first boy I loved was Brett Breedlove back in Broken Arrow. This was high school, so I don’t really count it as a Great Love. More of a Warm-up Love, if you will. He was in a core group of guys who were friends with my core group of friends, so we all went out together, which is so much healthier for kids that age, I think. Perhaps the root of my runaway-bride/serial-fiancé issue is that Brett Breedlove simply ruined me for other men, spoiling me like crazy with flowers, listening skills, and love notes. Brett was the sweetest, most thoughtful boy in the world. Never pressured me to do anything I wasn’t ready for. He had model good looks, actually did some modeling, and didn’t like it if I messed up his hair when I kissed him. School wasn’t his thing. Neither was football. He loved to go shopping with me and even helped me coordinate my prom dress—a Madonna-inspired number complete with fingerless lace gloves.

“Oh, my gosh, Kristi!” Brett enthused when I came down the stairs. “You look exactly like Belinda Carlisle!” And then I knew I loved him, because that deconstructed Go-Go’s vibe is
exactly
the look I was going for. What guy
gets
that? Brett was a finely manscaped, Sharper Image metrosexual before the word was even invented.

Brett Breedlove and I amicably broke up after graduation, both knowing our lives weren’t headed in the same direction, and I had a summer fling with a soccer player. It’s good to have a summer fling between Serious Great Loves. Some relationships aren’t meant to be Great Love; they’re meant to be like a hot fudge sundae—enjoyable but not something you can actually live on. He’s got talent or intelligence or some other great little cherry-on-top quality that makes him a treat, but if you keep him around too long, things get soupy. I got a little too involved with a stage-crew guy I was fling-dating once. (Crew guys are invariably hot. It’s in the Equity contract: “Theaters have a fiduciary duty to uphold crew hotness.”) Anyway, this particular fellow was actually making some headway with me until I got a call from his pregnant girlfriend, which instantly moved him from “hottie” to “fudgie.” (Helpful Love Hint for all my young Galindas out there: if
you have to call another girl to find out where your boyfriend is, he’s not worth the ninety seconds off the life of your cell phone battery, much less whatever time he’s taking up in your existence.)

In college, of course, there was my first First Great Love, Shawn the “Wild Thing” baseball pitcher. If you’re wondering whatever happened to him, well, so am I. We never did the flying-dishes, bitter-words breaking-up thing. He struggled to deal with that terrible incident that happened during spring training, and as much as I loved him, I was wrapped up in my own thing, so I wasn’t a good helpmate. After I moved to New York with Denny, Shawn visited me in this strange new world, and it was obvious to both of us that he was not part of it. I still think of him fondly now and then (whenever I see a pair of adorably tight britches taking the pitcher’s mound, for example), and I wonder how things are going with his beautifully boisterous extended family, whom I loved. I heard through the OCU grapevine that he got married and became a daddy. He called and left a message wanting to catch up a few years ago, but after giving it some thought, I decided not to call him back. (I’m not that girl either.)

About nine months after I moved to New York, while I was doing
Box Office of the Damned,
a friend fixed me up on a date with Marc Kudisch. There were social faux pas on both sides. He asked me to meet him at his place, then answered the door dripping wet, talking on the phone, a towel around his hips. (I couldn’t help but notice that he had an incredible body, but, c’mon. That was rude.) He talked a lot and didn’t listen. When I did manage to get a word in, I blurted like a hick that he was the first Jew I’d ever gone out with, and he fell out laughing at me and made me feel like a yokel. We went to see the movie
The Mask
—his choice, not mine—and he paid for his own ticket, then looked at me expectantly. I paid for my ticket and sat in the dark, wishing the whole thing could be over. Talk about
Box Office of the Damned.
As we left the theater, he invited me back to his place for a drink.

Yeah. Right.

“Why not?” he asked, genuinely surprised when I said no.

“Because I’m tired,” I said, “and frankly, this has not been a success.”

But he called me the next day, apologetic and on his best behavior: “Look, I’m used to going out with women who want to pay their own way, level the playing field, whatever that is. I’m sorry, and I would like to see you again.”

He didn’t grovel or backpedal, offered no explanation or excuse; he simply suggested that we try again with a clean slate. And I liked that about him. That says a lot about a man, don’t you think? We went out the next day, had a wonderful time together, and started seeing each other pretty steadily. There was so much to love about Marc and so much that drove me crazy, often at the same time. When Marc walks into the room, it’s just a whole lotta Marc. He has a presence that makes him electric onstage but can be a little exhausting in real life. (The woman he’s with now is formidable. I salute her. And I like her a lot.) I kept going back and forth, telling Denny one day, “I’m madly in love with Marc” and the next day, “I’ve had it. I’m breaking up with Marc.”

Then he and I were cast together in
Phantom
in Boston. Marc blew me away with his raw talent and gung ho work ethic, and I loved that he loved the same things about me. We had a lot of respect for each other, and that’s key in any relationship. By the time the show closed, he was officially my second First Great Love. During the five years we dated, he grew exponentially as a performer. He wins the golden uvula for Most Improved Singer, that’s for sure, and I’d like to think I was a good helpmate to him in that area, not because I taught him anything, but because I challenged him, and not many people do.

I leased a rent-controlled apartment in a crummy old building and lived with Marc for three months while it was being fixed up, and that was absolutely not okay with my parents. Mom grudgingly got on my
side when she realized that living in sin at Marc’s place was safer than living by myself over in the work-in-progress place while all those strangers were coming and going with keys to my front door. Dad, on the other hand—well, there was some friction there. Marc and I talked about getting married, but I wasn’t ready for that, so I was stunned on New Year’s Eve when he proposed in the middle of a big party. At midnight. With a diamond ring in a glass of champagne. And everyone looking at me expectantly.

“Five! Four! Three! Two! One!”

“Wow…oh…Marc…oh my gosh…this is…really…”

He reached into my bubbly, fished out the ring, and put it on my finger. What was I supposed to do? I loved the man. I wasn’t going to humiliate him in front of all these people by hemming and hawing about it.
Anyway,
I thought,
why shouldn’t I be that girl? I
am
that girl, dang it, and he’s that guy.
I called my parents, and they came up to visit shortly after. Marc came over in paint-stained jeans and a torn shirt and argued bitterly with my dad about their could-not-be-farther-apart political views. Another song in
Wicked
is about “Loathing! Unadulterated loathing!” and this was kinda like that. A big blowup ensued. Drama, drama, drama. The next day, Marc tried to apologize, but Mom and Dad were unmoved.

“Sir, I know I screw up sometimes,” Marc told my father, “but your daughter makes me a better person.”

“Well,” Dad harrumphed, “
you
don’t make
her
a better person.”

My mom had made a beautiful quilt with our names and engagement date embroidered on the edge, and as she and Dad were getting ready to drive off, she clutched it against her heart and quietly told me, “Kristi. This? This can never happen.”

More galvanized than ever, I assured her that it was most certainly going to happen, and they could like it or stay home. It was horrible and jolting to have them drive away with gauntlets thrown down and ultimatums hanging in the air, but I realize now that I needed to grow
up and assert myself with my parents a little, and this definitely facilitated that. By the time they got home, they’d decided that if the only way to have me in their life was to have me plus Marc, they would learn to love him.

And they did.

I have to give Mom and Dad a lot of credit here. They did a complete U-turn for Marc and genuinely embraced him as part of the family. They’ve supported my personal choices with the same acceptance they showed me back in my “What would a bunny do?” days, wanting nothing more than for me to be happy and healthy.

Marc’s family was all for us, and I was excited to be part of that wonderful bunch. (Even after Marc and I broke up, I never could bring myself to let go of the Kudisch clan.) Once we became engaged, I felt it was important to learn everything I could about their faith because I fully expected to have a family with Marc, and it wasn’t possible in my mind to separate faith and family. Sarah Silverman irreverently suggests that the difference between Judaism and Christianity could be explained to a child as “Mommy is one of God’s chosen people, and Daddy thinks Jesus is magic.” I don’t recall the name of the comic who answered that with “Daddy has the blood of Messiah-killers on his hands, and Mommy is going to leave you in a driverless car when she’s taken up to the Rapture.” Neither of these meshed well with my anticipated parenting style, but I felt strongly that if we had children, they should know and respect both sides of the fence, so I embraced it the way I’d embraced the state of Pennsylvania. I bought and studied several books, including
What Every Christian Should Know About Judaism,
and was surprised to learn that there is no fence. Marc’s faith and mine, in large part, share common ground.

I wanted to give him a gift symbolizing this, so I went down to the diamond district to have a jeweler create a special gold pendant on a chain. I’d read that the Magen David had one triangle that strives up toward God and another that strives down toward the real world, and
in my mind, Jesus brings the two together, so I’d carefully drawn the six-pointed Star of David with a cross at the center.

“Can you do this?” I asked, sliding my little sketch across the counter.

The jeweler said he could have it ready for me the following week, just before the High Holidays, which was perfect because Marc was having a hard time. His father was dying of leukemia, and because I was wrapped up in all that
Charlie Brown
hullabaloo, I hadn’t been there for him the way I wished I could be. If anything, he was there for me, holding my hand through the Tonys and everything that came after. He understood what was at stake for me in that moment. He knew how hard I was trying to handle it right and was a bastion of tough love anytime I was in danger of being sucked up by an ego tornado. I thought this gift would be a lovely, hopeful gesture about our life together.

When I presented it to Marc with my whole heart, he lifted the lid from the box, inhaled sharply, uttered something that sounded like
guh-fwaugh?
and clapped the lid down.