The Blonde Theory (14 page)

“Oh, baby, what am I going to do with you?” Colin asked with a laugh, shaking his head like he would at a child who had just said something adorably amusing. He glanced at my breasts again—perhaps to verify that I was indeed not a child but instead a grown woman—then raised his eyes back to mine and smiled at me, apparently satisfied with his substantiation of my womanhood. “You should know this,” he said, his voice playfully chiding. “Men like to take care of women. I can’t ask someone out who has enough money to buy her own apartment. That would just be embarrassing.”

My throat constricted as I had a sudden flashback to Peter leaving me, telling me that men didn’t want a woman who was successful. With some difficulty, I gulped, trying to get rid of the lump in my throat. I blinked a few times, then tried to smile.

“Like, I totally see your point,” I forced out. I wasn’t going to get up on my pedestal like I had with Scott the other night. I was going to ride this one out. “That would be, like, intimidating.” I was going to say
emasculating
but figured that your typical dumb blonde wouldn’t know that word.

Colin’s face darkened a bit. “I didn’t say I was intimidated,” he said a bit defensively, but not unkindly. “Just that it wouldn’t make any sense to ask one of those women out. You know what I mean. Obviously.”

“Like, of course,” I said, nodding enthusiastically. “Being a bartender and all. I
need
a guy.”

“Right,” Colin said warmly, leaning forward, placing his left hand on mine, and looking into my eyes. “I like to feel needed. Guys like that.”

“I know,” I said softly. Apparently mistaking my sudden quiet for flirtatiousness, Colin licked his lips, took another sip of his prosecco, draining the glass, and smiled at me. “Are you ready to get out of here, baby?”

“Yes,” I said, daintily dabbing at my own lips with my napkin, which I placed on the table. I took a deep breath and looked Colin up and down—dark hair; perfect, chiseled features; a straight smile that wasn’t unkind. He was handsome, no doubt about it. But he wasn’t for me.

Too bad. Seriously, too bad. He had seemed so promising.

I sighed to myself and got up from the table. Colin, playing the role of perfect gentleman to perfection, quickly scrambled to my side of the table, where he pulled my chair out for me and pushed it back in when he was done. Then he smiled at me and placed a strong hand on the small of my back, sending a little shiver up my spine. But whether it was a shiver of desire—because he was so cute—or of apprehension—because he’d really thrown me with his words about successful women—I couldn’t tell. I shook my head and told myself to stop worrying. I knew I would never see him again. As pleasant as he had initially seemed, I knew this wasn’t the kind of guy who could or would ever appreciate me for who and what I really was.

For a moment, as we walked through the restaurant in silence with his hand still lightly on my back, I wondered what was wrong with me. I think some part of me had believed that I could win over a man like Colin with my charm and then reveal to him that I actually had more brains than he had initially believed. But that was crazy, wasn’t it? Because the guys who were attracted to dumb blondes—like cute, funny, successful Colin—would never be attracted to a woman like the real me.

I knew I shouldn’t have been depressed. After all, he had shown himself to be shallow. He had even spent a large portion of the meal staring at my breasts. He wasn’t exactly a golden catch. But still... there was a part of me that wasn’t quite getting all the reasons he was undesirable.

I shouldn’t have felt sad and rejected. But I did.

Outside the restaurant, Colin surprised me by stepping in front of me, leaning down, and kissing me tenderly on the lips before I even saw him coming. It felt right, even while it felt foreign. I hadn’t kissed anyone in longer than I cared to admit. And Colin wasn’t Peter. That’s all that mattered in that moment. So I kissed back and let myself get lost in him for a moment as he looped an arm around me and pulled me closer, while his other hand lightly cradled the back of my head.

When we finally broke apart, I felt a bit dizzy. I blinked a few times to get my balance and regain my shaken composure. Colin smiled at me slowly.

“Do you want to come back to my place?” he asked softly, reaching out again to tenderly thread his fingers through my hair. “I live close by.”

I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, running through all the reasons why I shouldn’t.

“Yes,” I said softly, my lips still tingling. Colin grinned and looked down at my breasts again, and I suddenly realized that I couldn’t. I absolutely, definitively shouldn’t and wouldn’t. I shook my head, took a step backward, and then said, “No. I mean, I’m sorry, but I can’t.”

Colin’s face fell.

“What?” he said, shifting his gaze up to my face again. “Why not? You just said you could.”

“I...” I paused, ready to feed him an excuse about having to bartend later that evening or something. But I stopped myself. “I just can’t. I’m sorry.”

And I truly was. I was sorry that I couldn’t forget who I really was. I was sorry that I couldn’t overlook all the reasons that I shouldn’t go home with Colin. I was sorry that I would never be the right woman for someone like him. And I was sorry that he would never be the right man for someone like me. I was sorry because I had no idea where I fit. I wondered if I actually fit anywhere. Maybe I didn’t.

“Thanks for a lovely evening, Colin,” I said, as he stared at me slack-jawed, apparently unaccustomed to being turned down. “I had a really nice time.”

“But...,” he began, glancing frantically from my face to my breasts, as if he didn’t exactly know where to address his protests.

“Good-bye,” I said softly, then turned to walk away up Third. I could feel his eyes on my back. But for once,
I
was the one who didn’t turn around.

There was something about that that felt really good.

In the next two nights, I went out with Marco, the Prada buyer, and Douglas, the airline pilot.

Marco seemed interesting at the outset. He was broad--shouldered and slender around the waist, with curly blond hair, deep brown eyes, and tanned skin. Clad exclusively in Prada, of course, he looked every bit the classic style icon when I met him at Ruby Foo’s for sushi and cocktails. He kissed me on both cheeks, European-style, and spoke with a thick Italian accent, although his English was nearly perfect. He had been living in New York for seven years and loved it, he said. His eyes sparkled with warmth when he talked about his job, which consisted mainly of supplying New York stores with the latest in Prada apparel.

If he hadn’t stepped outside five times during dinner for a smoke and continually called me “dahling” in a way that sounded like old cheesy Hollywood, he would have seemed a lot more attractive. But even that, I could get past. After all, I smoked when I sulked, so it didn’t bother me that much in general (even though Marco smoked like a chimney that never went out). As for the repeated
dahling
s, I could write them off as misguided European slickness.

But it was his intense fascination with models that got under my skin. I’m sure that it was immediately obvious that I—five foot six, thirty-five years old, and certainly not model-lithe—was not indeed one of the women who walked the catwalk for a living, yet Marco spent much of the meal telling me stories of his escapades with models in Italy and all of the many reasons why models were the best women to date.

“In New York, though, I’ve had to expand my dating selections a bit and date nonmodels, too,” he said, as he paused between bites of his bacon-wrapped date perched on an endive leaf. “Thus, the women like you. Not models, exactly. But still good looking.”

“I’m... glad?” I finally responded, not sure quite what to say. I looked at him quizzically.

“You should be flattered,
bella
,” he said, leaning across the table seductively and staring into my eyes. I blinked and looked away. “My standards are very high.”

“Lucky me,” I said drily.

The next night, there was Douglas, the airline pilot. Like Marco and Colin, he was cute and successful. And the date started off well enough. But somewhere around the time I launched into the full-fledged bimbo act (“So how does a plane actually fly?” I asked, wide-eyed. “It seems too heavy.”), Douglas launched into a strange soliloquy of his own.

“I used to fly in the navy,” he said cheerfully, once he’d downed his first amaretto sour. (I was trying to refrain from thinking that it seemed like a girlie drink—but then he asked for extra cherries and a cocktail umbrella.) “And man, every time I landed my helo, I was Tom Cruise, baby.”

“Helo?” I asked.

“Oh, that’s navy talk for helicopter,” he said, puffing his chest out proudly. “Toughest birds to fly, baby. Just like
Top Gun
.”

I paused for a moment.

“But doesn’t Tom Cruise fly a fighter jet in
Top Gun
?” I asked, keeping my eyes wide and vacant and tossing my blonde hair for effect. Douglas paused and stared at me, his chest deflating a little bit.

“Well sure,” he said, then shrugged. “But he should have flown a helo. All the best guys do that.” Then he paused and continued, apparently undeterred. “Anyhow,” he said excitedly, “every time I landed my helo on the deck of my frigate—that’s a ship—I always sang the
Top Gun
theme song out loud.”

“But shouldn’t you have been concentrating on your landing?” I asked blankly.

He just stared at me. “Well, it’s not like I can land without music,” he said, looking at me like I had suddenly sprouted a third eye or something. “Obviously.”

“Obviously,” I repeated. He stared at me for another moment and then burst into song.

“Highway to...the danger zone!” he shouted. All around the restaurant, heads swiveled to stare at him. “I’ll take you right into...the danger zone!” he continued singing, belting out Kenny Loggins at me. Then he stopped and grinned. “Want me to take you into the danger zone, baby?” he asked, apparently trying to be seductive. It didn’t exactly work.

“Um, no thanks,” I said blankly. I had no idea what he was talking about, but I figured it couldn’t be good. Especially if it involved more singing. Thanks to Douglas’s solo, my ears were already feeling like they were in the danger zone, thank you very much.

“Now I fly for Blue Horizon Air,” he said, grinning at me. “Small private company. Private charter jets. And I still sing every time I land my aircraft. I think of myself as an older, suaver version of Tom Cruise now.”

“Oh... do you?” I asked finally, not sure what else to say. After all, I supposed he resembled Tom Cruise a little bit—dark hair, dark eyes, a wide smile, nice features. But he was starting to sound like a lunatic. Then again, it was debatable whether the original Tom was playing with a full deck. So maybe there were more similarities than I had initially thought.

“Yes,” he confirmed with a nod. “And it totally works. I’ve only crashed twice.” He held up two fingers and grinned.

My eyes widened.

“You’ve... you’ve crashed twice?” I asked.

He nodded cheerfully. “Yes,” he confirmed as if it were the most normal thing in the world. “No fatalities, though. It’s not like Tom Cruise can say the same. I mean, he’s got Goose on his conscience.”

“Huh?” I asked.

Douglas rolled his eyes at me. “Goose!” he repeated. “You know. Anthony Edwards? His buddy? You know, in
Top Gun
? Tom ejected? Goose didn’t? Goose died?”

“Oh,” I said, staring at him, thinking that surely this was some kind of a joke. “Of course.”

“Harper,” Doug said with a sigh, tilting his head and looking into my eyes. “You’re such a good listener.”

Needless to say, after the dates with Colin, Marco, and Douglas, I was left feeling pretty demoralized. They hadn’t been horrible, exactly. But I had had to suppress everything that made me who I was—my intelligence, my job, my background, even my personality—to sit there and listen to their weird takes on the world.

The thing is, none of the guys had lied in their profiles. They were exactly what they said they were. But I had looked at them on paper—a successful mortgage broker, a successful Prada buyer, and a successful airline pilot, all of them very good looking—and assumed that they would be normal, maybe even somewhat desirable, although the fact that they had deliberately chosen the dumb-blonde version of me didn’t bode well, I supposed. I had assumed that these were the kinds of men I was missing out on by walking around with a formidable brain in my blonde head.

But if I was missing out on men like these, was that really such a problem?

Then again, maybe the abysmal failure of all three dates was just a fluke.

Chapter Ten

T
he day after my date with Douglas, I met Jill and her husband, Alec, for lunch, the
Top Gun
theme unfortunately still lodged in my head, where it was playing on an endless loop. I was in a cheerful mood by the time I arrived at Jill’s apartment, despite the fact that Alec would be there, too. I didn’t exactly dislike Alec, but there was something about his uptight and often condescending nature that made me ill at ease in his presence. But, I reminded myself, Jill was happy with him. She had chosen to marry him. I had to check my judgment at the door. It wasn’t my business.

“Harper, come in!” Jill was all Park Avenue princess in her pink short-sleeved sweater, black A-line skirt, string of white pearls, and perfectly highlighted blonde hair slicked back in a black headband. I stepped across her threshold, and she hugged me. “Alec and I can’t wait to hear about your dates!”

I’d been so busy going on these dates that I hadn’t had time to fill the girls in on the details—except through occasional short missives sent via e-mail while I waited on clients to arrive.

“We’re going to talk about this in front of Alec?” I asked in surprise, hugging her back.

“I’ve told him all about The Blonde Theory,” Jill said with a smile as she pulled away from me and shut the door behind us. “He thinks it’s funny. In fact, I think he has some advice for you. I thought it would be fun to get a guy’s perspective.” Her eyes twinkled mischievously.

“Oh,” I said, a bit bewildered. I hadn’t exactly figured Alec for the advice type. But perhaps I had misjudged him. However, I had the vaguely uncomfortable feeling that Alec’s advice wouldn’t necessarily be something I wanted to hear.

Jill led me into the dining room of her enormous apartment. She had already set the rectangular glass table, and she gestured for me to take a seat.

“I have a tray of sandwiches in the other room,” she said cheerfully. “I’ll just call Alec and we can start.”

Alec rounded the corner a moment later, and I stood to greet him. He looked even shorter than usual today, which, I supposed, was due to the fact that I was still in my heels, while he was in socks. I deliberately slouched as I got up to exchange chaste kisses on the cheek with him, European-style. He was short with brown, thinning hair, a narrow face, and a broad nose. He wore thin-rimmed glasses and, as always, was in a shirt and tie, even though he wasn’t working.

“Harper, you’re looking nice today,” he said politely after we had greeted each other. “It’s good to see you.”

“You, too, Alec,” I said as we sat down.

“And how’s the practice going? Any interesting cases lately?”

I smiled. Alec did know how to make polite small talk well; I had to give him that.

“Just the usual, mostly,” I said. “But I’ve been working hard. How about you? How are things at the hospital?”

Alec told me a bit about his new partner in the practice as well as some hospital politics that were affecting turnover among young doctors. We both looked at Jill with relief when she appeared in the doorway of the dining room with a tray of sandwiches. I suspected Alec didn’t care about the ins and outs of my office any more than I cared about his. At least he didn’t treat me like a leper because I was a lawyer, though. He had always treated Jill’s friends with respect. I had to say that for him.

“So Jill has told me about the whole dating experiment, Harper,” Alec began once we were all munching on Jill’s perfectly prepared finger sandwiches, complete with crusts cut off. “What is it you’re calling it? The Blonde Theory?”

“Yes, that’s the name,” I replied cautiously. I didn’t know what he thought of the whole thing, and I wasn’t entirely sure I wanted to find out.

“It sounds fascinating,” he said, and I relaxed a little bit. “A great social experiment, indeed. Jill told me about your first date with that ophthalmologist. And you’ve been on a few more since then?”

“Yes,” I confirmed. “Three of them.”

I quickly filled them both in on the dates with Colin, Marco, and Douglas, ending with the whole
Top Gun
issue. They were both laughing hard by the time I concluded with my own off-key rendition of “Danger Zone.”

“The problem is, these are guys who I thought would be my type, even though it’s not like I had planned to actually continue dating any of them,” I said with a sigh after I had sufficiently slaughtered the song. “But they’re turning out to be more or less empty and shallow.”

“What exactly
is
your type?” Alec asked. He leaned forward, looking truly curious. I thought about it for a moment, because I had never really put my type into words.

“Well, I suppose he’d have to be intelligent and somewhat successful,” I began. “You know? Sort of like an intellectual equal? I don’t know that I could date someone who wasn’t smart and didn’t have a good job.”

I don’t know why, but I unintentionally thought of Sean, the cute handyman, the moment the words were out of my mouth. I hurriedly pushed the thought away. That was random.

“Fair enough.” Alec nodded thoughtfully. “What else?”

I considered it for a moment. “And I usually like guys a little older, a little more mature, I guess,” I said after a pause. I thought about it some more. “The guy would have to be a good conversationalist. I like bantering with a guy who has some wit and intelligence. So he has to be able to joke around with me in an intelligent way. He has to have a good job, too, not because I need him to be making money, but because I don’t ever want to be in that weirdly unbalanced situation where I’m supporting the guy, you know?”

“Okay.” Alec nodded.

“I’m not saying the guy has to make as much as me or more than me,” I explained. “Just that I can’t date someone who feels threatened by what I do.”

“Okay.” Alec nodded again. “So all these guys you’ve gone out with seemed to fit your requirements, no?”

“Yes,” I agreed. “On paper, at least. But then they turned out to be...I don’t know. Just not my type at all.”

“Maybe you’re wrong about what your type is,” Alec smirked. Well, at least it looked like he was smirking. I wouldn’t put it past him.

“I think I’m just meeting the wrong guys,” I retorted quickly. Then I muttered, half under my breath, “Although it’s certainly easier to meet them and keep them interested when I’m acting like a ditz.”

“Alec has a theory about that!” Jill piped up excitedly, grinning at me and then nudging Alec. He took a thoughtful bite from his finger sandwich while I stared dubiously at him, waiting for whatever his great revelation would be.

“It’s a theory some of my friends and I came up with a few years back,” Alec began, then hastily added, “before I met Jill, of course.” She smiled, batted her eyes at him and reached over to squeeze his hand. He smiled back at her before refocusing his gaze on me.

“Guys come up with dating theories, too?” I asked, momentarily trying to envision Alec trying to test something like The Blonde Theory. Hmm, I just couldn’t see it.

“Well, not quite like you girls do,” he said, rolling his eyes at me. “It was just that one night over drinks, I was talking to some of the other single doctors about something we had all noticed.”

“And?” I prompted.

“And it doesn’t have a fancy name like your theory,” Alec said with another smirk. “But I guess you could call it the Star of the Relationship Theory, if you have to have a name for it.”

“Star of the Relationship?” I repeated. Jill nodded enthusiastically. I guessed she had heard the theory before. I squinted at him and tried to prepare myself to take in whatever it was he had to say.

“Yes,” Alec confirmed. “It’s the theory that every relationship has to have one ‘star,’ so to speak, and one person who’s willing to step aside and let the other one have the limelight the majority of the time. And most men like to be the one in the limelight.”

I looked back and forth between Alec and Jill.

“And in your relationship?” I asked slowly.

“I’m the star, of course,” Alec answered instantly. Jill hesitated for a split second, then nodded and smiled broadly at me.

“Meaning...what?” I asked slowly, feeling vaguely offended on Jill’s behalf, even though I wasn’t quite sure what he was saying yet.

“Meaning that I’m the one who earns the money, makes the big decisions, calls the shots, has the important job,” Alec said smugly. I looked quickly to Jill, expecting her to look angry and offended. After all, wasn’t Alec putting her down a little bit? Dismissing what she brought to the relationship? But she was just smiling tightly at him. I wondered if she was purposely avoiding my gaze.

“How does this apply to me?” I asked finally, staring down the gloating Alec, who looked very proud of himself.

“It sums up your problem in a nutshell,” he announced proudly. “See, you have a good job, you make a lot of money, you’re not afraid to make decisions, you can take care of yourself.”

I paused.

“So?” I asked after a moment. I was beginning to understand where he was going with this, and I had a tight feeling in my chest as he continued.

“So,” he continued dramatically. “No one wants to be with you because you’re always going to be the star.”

“Alec!” Jill chided quickly, shooting me a nervous look. “Harper, he didn’t mean that
no one
wants to be with you. Right, honey?”

“No, of course not,” Alec said a little too quickly. I narrowed my eyes at him. “I just mean that it’s harder for you because men know right away that you’re going to be the one wearing the pants in the relationship.”

I shook my head. “I’m not like that,” I said in frustration. “I don’t boss guys around. I don’t take control in the relationship.”

“It doesn’t matter.” Alec shrugged. “As long as you appear to have it all—great career, good head on your shoulders, lots of money, and so on—you’re going to have problems because guys are going to see you a certain way. It’s as simple as that.”

“Which is why The Blonde Theory is working!” Jill concluded dramatically. She grinned at me. “Doesn’t it all make sense?”

I stared at her for a moment, then shifted my gaze back to Alec.

“So what are you saying?” I asked, trying to ignore the panicky feeling rising in my chest. After all, it wasn’t as if this was news to me. Alec was just putting into words my entire dating experience, basically. But there was just something about hearing someone say it—especially a man—that made me feel a bit ill. “Are you saying that I’ll never find anyone by being myself?”

“No,” Alec said with a dismissive shrug. “I’m just saying that it will be hard for you. Really hard. Which is why acting like a ditz is such a good idea. You don’t threaten guys right off the bat.”

“That’s not exactly the way I plan to meet the right guys for the rest of my life,” I muttered.

“So why are you doing this, then?” Alec asked.

I looked at him for a moment, suddenly unsure of what to say. Why
was
I doing this? Was I really learning anything new? After all, I had always known instinctively that it would be easier to date as a ditz, so it wasn’t like I was paving new ground.

“Just to see,” I said softly.

“See what?” Alec pressed.

“I don’t know,” I mumbled. “To see how things change. To see what it feels like when guys aren’t intimidated by me.”

“They’re not
intimidated,
” Alec said, sounding almost defensive. I wondered for a moment why he seemed to be taking this so personally. Was
Alec
intimidated by me? Was this his way of putting me in my place, so to speak? “They just don’t necessarily like a woman who has it together as much as you do. They know you’ll never need them or respect them the way they want.”

I glanced at Jill, who was nodding in agreement.

“See, Harper, I told you it would help to get Alec’s perspective,” she said cheerfully after a moment of silence, apparently choosing to gloss over the tension in the room.

“Er...yeah,” I said tightly.

Alec looked at Jill and then back at me, a serious expression on his face. “If you want my advice, Harper, it would be to learn something from this Blonde Theory and act more approachable in the future,” he said almost condescendingly.

“You’re suggesting I just spend the rest of my life acting like a ditz?” I asked flatly, staring at him.

“Not the rest of your life.” He shrugged. “But until you find a man.” He chuckled a bit. “No offense, but it’s not like you’re getting any younger.” Just when steam was about to start shooting out of my ears, his pager went off. Saved by the bell! He took it off his belt, where it was clipped, and glanced at it.

“Work call,” he said tightly. He glanced at Jill. “Sorry, honey. I have to call the hospital. I’ll be back in a second.”

He stood and strode quickly out of the room. I heard his footsteps disappear down the hall, where he closed to the door to the bedroom. I looked after him for a moment, then shifted my gaze to Jill, who was looking slightly embarrassed.

“Sorry, Harper,” she said, not quite meeting my gaze. “Some-times he says exactly what’s on his mind, and it doesn’t exactly come out right.”

“No, I think it came out just the way he intended,” I said drily. I had to admit, he was probably right about a lot of what he’d said. I just didn’t particularly like it. Nor did I like the smarmy, condescending way that the message had been delivered. I didn’t much like the way he’d talked to Jill, either, come to think of it.

We heard the bedroom door reopen, and in a moment Alec came striding back into the dining room.

“Sorry, ladies,” he said, leaning down to kiss Jill on the cheek. “That was the hospital. I have to get going. There’s an emergency rhinoplasty I need to do right away.”

“But you’re off today,” Jill said, looking up at him with a wounded expression on her face. “We were going to meet my aunt and uncle for dinner.”

“I’m sorry, honey,” he said with a helpless shrug. He reached down to ruffle her hair. She looked moderately appeased, but still troubled. “Duty calls. We’ll have to reschedule.”

“Okay,” Jill sighed obediently.

“Nice to see you again, Harper,” Alec said, turning to me. He reached out a hand and I shook it, thinking how odd it was that he insisted upon this formality with me, like we were two guys in a Wall Street boardroom. “Good luck with your Blonde Theory.”