If I Did It (5 page)

how many pies she thought we would need. Two days before
Thanksgiving, with all the travel arrangements in place, she called
to tell me that she wasn't bringing the kids to New York.
“What do you mean?” I snapped. “I changed my whole work
schedule for this! The network rearranged things so I wouldn't have
to go to Detroit so that I could spend Thanksgiving with my kids!”
“Well, we're not coming,” she repeated.
“Why? You've got to give me a reason!”
“I can't,” she said. “Just, you know—the trip's off.”
I couldn't believe it. This was the same woman who would call
me two and three times a day, to walk down memory lane, to talk
about feeling sad and lost, and here she was, telling me she wasn't
letting me see my kids over Thanksgiving—and not even bothering
to explain herself.
“We decided this in court!” I shouted. “In front of the judge!
You can't change the deal on me!”
“I don't like it when you raise your voice to me,” she said, and
hung up.
I was furious. I called my lawyer and he called her lawyer,
but by then it was too late. I didn't get to spend Thanksgiving
with my kids, and I ended up going to Detroit for the network, as
originally planned, which made them happy. Still, I decided I was
never going to let anything like that happen to me again, and
after Thanksgiving my lawyers called her lawyers and read them
the riot act. They agreed to let me have my kids over Christmas,
alone, just me and them, and I was immensely relieved and
immensely excited. I went shopping for presents, got tickets for
shows, and arranged to do all sorts of fun stuff with the kids. It was
going to be a nonstop party. I was going to make it a Christmas
they'd never forget!
I called my older daughter, Arnelle, and asked her to fly the
kids to New York, and I booked the three of them on a flight for
December 21.
I was excited, but I was still wary—still pissed at Nicole for
pulling that little Thanksgiving stunt. Later, I found out that she'd
had a fight with yet another guy—the guy that got her pregnant, I
think—and that she had been feeling needy and fragile and had
wanted the kids to herself. I wondered if she was going to keep her
shit together over Christmas, or whether she was going to try to
mess up those plans, too. And I wondered whether I was going to
get drawn into Nicole's bullshit and drama for the rest of my life. It
didn't seem right. I'd always been there for her when she needed
me, during the marriage and long after, and I suspected that her
inability to get her life in order was going to create endless prob-
lems for me and the kids. I didn't like it.
On December 21, I went to the airport to pick up Arnelle and
the kids. We were over the moon with happiness. We spent the next
day running around town, shopping and eating and having fun and
visiting with friends. I thought to myself, Being a single dad ain't
half bad!
Then next day, December 23, I got a call from Nicole. She
was crying so hard I couldn't understand a word she was saying, but
she finally pulled herself together and told me that she desperately
wanted to come o New York. “I can't he away from the kids,” she

said. “I miss them too much. Please, O.J. Let me come. I want to be
with my kids. I don't want to be alone.”
Now don't get me wrong, I was pissed at Nicole, but I've never
been much good at holding grudges. “Okay,” I said. “I'll have a
ticket for you at the airport.”
“Really?”
I guess she couldn't believe it was going to be that easy. “Yes,”
I said. “I'm sure the kids would love to have you here.”
“Thanks, O.J. I mean it.”
“There's one catch,” I said. “You can't sleep in the apartment
with us. Paula wouldn't like it. I'll get you a hotel.”
She didn't complain, she didn't say a word, in fact, because she
knew this didn't concern her in the least. Paula and I had been dat-
ing for several months now, and we were very happy together, and I
wasn't going to do anything that might jeopardize the relationship.
Of course, Nicole didn't know that Paula wasn't actually going to be
there over the holidays—she was spending Christmas in Florida,
with her parents—but that didn't make any difference to me. If I let
Nicole sleep in the apartment, it would have been disrespectful to
Paula, and that wasn't going to happen. Unfortunately, I had to call
Paula to tell her what was going on, and I kind of dreaded it. Paula
had taken the time and trouble to fix Christmas dinner for me and
the kids before getting on her plane to Florida, and this is how I was
going to repay her—by spending Christmas with my exwife?
“Paula, it's me, O.J. How are things in Florida?”
“Great. How are you? You sound funny.
”I'm fine.“
”How are the kids?“
”They're great,“ I said. ”But I sort of wanted to talk to you
about Nicole.“
”Nicole?“
”Yeah. She decided she wanted to be with the kids for
Christmas. She's flying in tomorrow.“
Paula got mad, and things went downhill from there. She
hung up on me, and when I called back she wouldn't answer. I
called back obsessively, and for a few hours I imagined how Nicole
must have felt when she was trying to get hold of me and not suc-
ceeding. I left messages—”I'm sorry. I can't do anything about it.
She's the mother of my kids“—but Paula didn't return my calls.
Anyway, to make a long story short, Nicole joined me and the
kids in New York and we had a very nice time together. We went to
Radio City Music Hall for the Christmas pageant, ran around the
city like tourists, and on Christmas morning we opened all the
presents Santa had left.
That afternoon, the weather was nice, so Nicole and I took
the kids for a long walk in Central Park. When we got back, we ate
leftovers and put them to bed. Afterward, Nicole and I packed their
bags for the flight home the next day, and when we were done
Nicole poured herself a glass of wine and came into the living
room. ”Thanks for letting me come,“ she said. She looked real sad.
”The kids had fun,“ I said.
”Did you?“
”Sure," I said, trying not to look at her. I didn't know where
she was taking the conversation, but I knew I didn't like it.

“What happened to us?” she asked, and she began to cry. “We
were so happy together.”
“ Us?' I said. ”What do you mean us? You left me.“
”I'm such a mess,“ she said, still crying.
”Look,“ I said, cutting her off. ” We had a few great days. Let's
not blow it. I have to go to work tomorrow, and I've got notes to
review, and the limo's coming at eleven to take you and the kids to
the airport.“
She finished her wine and left for the hotel, thanking me
again, and I went to review my notes for the next day.
At that point, to be honest with you, I really didn't want to
hear any more of her shit. Paula was still mad at me—it had taken
three days of calling before she even spoke to me—and I was in
no mood to listen to Nicole. We'd had some great times together,
sure, but the last two years had been torture. Nicole had been
erratic, moody, and worse, and it didn't look like she was getting
any better. I had vowed keep her at arm's length, and I'd failed,
but that Christmas I decided that things were going to change. I
was only going to communicate with her if it was about the kids.
I didn't want to hear about her personal life. It was her life. She
had chosen it. She had made that bed, and she needed to start get-
ting used to it.
For the next three months, I hardly talked to her. She called
once to tell me that she had decided to get into therapy, and that
she was very happy with the shrink she was seeing. This wasn't one
of those highpriced, Beverly Hills, you'reabeautifulperson
shrinks, she said this was the real deal.
”I'm beginning to see that I messed up a lot of things for us,“
she said. ”I'm sorry I blamed you for everything.“
”We both fucked up,“ I said, trying to be generous. ”I'm glad
you're getting help."
Of course, years later, when I was fighting her family for cus-
tody of the kids, my lawyers got hold of some of the therapy notes
from her many sessions, and the picture that emerged was a little
different. One thing that really pissed me off, and that they tried to
use against me, was about the kids, of course. She told her shrink
that after that Christmas visit I hadn't called the house in weeks,
and she wondered if I even cared how the kids felt about that. It was
total bullshit. I had called, but I called when Nicole wasn't around,
for obvious reasons. On several occasions, in fact, I spoke to
Nicole's mother, Juditha, and she puts the kids on the line, and I
talked to them at length—and my lawyers have the records to prove
it. The lawyers also explained, in court, that I had been deliberately
avoiding Nicole, whose constant phone calls were beginning to
affect my relationship with Paula Barbieri. I had told her, repeat-
edly, that I didn't want to talk to her unless it was about the kids,
and then only if it was an emergency, and I had even made arrange-
ments to have my assistant, Cathy Randa, shuttle them to and from
our homes—all because I wanted to avoid further drama.
It worked, too. We went several weeks without a single argu-
ment. In fact, the only argument we had during this entire period
related to the kids' vacation schedule. I had wanted to take them
away for a week in February, and I'd booked a trip in advance, but
at the last minute the school old me that it wouldn't he a good time

to take them out of class, and they asked me to reconsider. When I
called Nicole to try to change the date, telling her I needed to push
it back a week, she wouldn't budge. “It's got to be that week or
nothing!” she barked. I told her to kiss my ass and hung up.
Later, I found out that she had split with yet another
boyfriend, and that she'd been talking to Marcus Allen about it, in
great detail, hoping that Marcus would share those details with me.
Marcus wasn't sharing anything with me, however, so I was com-
pletely in the dark. The other thing she was telling Marcus was that
she was missing me, and that she wondered if he thought there was
a chance we might get back together. I didn't know about that,
either, because Marcus wasn't talking, but I never imagined that she
was still pining for me. I thought that it was all in the distant past—
it was for me, anyway—and I was struck by the way the tables had
turned. Nicole was the one who had wanted out of the marriage,
and I had tried mightily to save it. When it became clear that the
marriage was over, however, I found the strength to move on, but
Nicole seemed to be having second thoughts about her decision.
Now, these many months later, she had apparently come full circle.
I didn't know it, of course, but she was looking for a way back.
Late in February, clearly frustrated by my lack of interest in
communicating with her, Nicole found another way to reach me:
Every time the kids came over, they showed up with homebaked
cakes or cookies. “Mom, made these for you. They're yummy.” I
told them to thank their mother, but I opted not to thank her
myself. I just didn't want to talk to her. I was done. I had a new
woman in my life.
One day, the kids showed up with a CD. “Mom made this for
you on her computer,” they said. I listened to it and found that
every last song was a love song. I was flattered, I guess, and maybe
even a little moved, but that didn't change anything. Nicole and I
were finished. “Thank Mom for me,” I told the kids. But, again, I
didn't bother thanking her myself. I didn't want to get into it,
because I wasn't going back. And yes, I know this goes against the
popular conception—that I was still madly in love with Nicole, and
pining to get her back—but it's God's own truth.
One afternoon, I was packing for a trip to Cabo San Lucas,
and waiting for my kids to show up. They were going to have din-
ner at my place and spend the night, and I was going to drop them
back at Nicole's in the morning, on my way to the airport. When I
was done packing, I nodded off on the couch, and the phone rang
a short time later, waking me. I answered it without checking the
caller I.D., and it turned out to be Nicole. “I want to talk,” she said.
“I don't want to talk,” I said. “It's always a huge hassle. We're
not together anymore. I can't be listening to your problems all the
time.”
“I know, and I'm sorry,” she said. “But there's something I
need to say to you.”
“Okay,” I said. “What?”
“I can't tell you on the phone. I need to tell you this in person.”
“I can't talk right now,” I said. “I have another call coming in.”
This was a lie, but I wanted to get her off the phone.
“Will you call me back?”
“Sure,” I said, but that was a lie, too, and I didn't call her back.

An hour later, my kids showed up at the house, and they had
a package for me. I opened the package, which was from Nicole. I
found our wedding tape inside, along with a letter. In the letter,
which I didn't read till later, Nicole told me that she was learning a
great deal about herself in therapy, and that she had come to realize
that she was responsible for most of the problems in our marriage.
She also said that she still loved me, that had she had never stopped
loving me, and that she wanted me to know that she believed we'd
had a truly great relationship. I had always thought we had a great
relationship, so this wasn't exactly a revelation, and as I read
between the lines—or not even between the lines, really—it was
pretty clear that she was looking for us to reconcile.
I went out to join the kids, and I was surprised to catch sight
of Nicole, standing on the far side of the gate, looking toward the
house. I didn't know she had dropped the kids off—Cathy Randa
was in charge of that—but there she was, staring at me, and it didn't
seem right to ignore her. I went over to talk to her.
“So what are you doing here?” I said. “What's with the wed-
ding tape and stuff?”
“I thought you were going to call me back,” she said, avoiding
the question.
“I fell asleep on the couch.”
“Well, like I said on the phone, I have something to tell you.”
I was trapped. I sighed a big sigh and said, “Let's take a walk.”
We took a little walk around the neighborhood, the same walk
we had taken hundreds of' times before. It's a nice neighborhood,
quiet and peaceful, and we used o love o wander p and down the
streets, looking at the houses, chatting with the neighbors. This
time we weren't doing much looking or chatting, though—this
time she just wanted to talk, and what she wanted to talk about—
no surprise—was us getting back together. She repeated she had
come a long way in therapy, and that she was sorry about every-
thing, and she was wondering if I could find it in my heart to for-
give her. “I've always loved you,” she said. “I've never stopped lov-
ing you. And I've never told you I didn't love you.”
“That's not entirely accurate,” I said. “You always told me you
loved me, but you said you weren't in love with me.”
“Well, I was wrong. I'm still in love with you.”
“How can you be back in love with me?” I said. “We barely
speak anymore, and I've hardly seen you in months.”
“I don't know,” she said. “I guess I've been dealing with all the
stuff I was supposed to deal with, and everything's a little clearer
now. I really feel we could make it work.”
I couldn't believe this, even though I'd seen it coming. “You're
telling me you want to get back together?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“I don't think that's in the cards,” I said. “I think it might be
good for the kids if we tried to have a friendly dinner from time to
time, but that's about it.”
“You don't have to make your mind up right away,” she said.
“All I'm doing is putting it out there. All I'm asking is that you
think about it.”
“I don't understand you,” I said. “I'm the same guy you left.
I'm the same O. J. I haven't changed a bit.”