The Ex-Mrs. Hedgefund (16 page)

“Ah . . . starting over?” he asked in perfect English. “Italy is the best place to do that.”

On my date with Matt I hadn't mentioned Miles. Kiki had said I should wait till date number two to drop the mom-bomb. “No need to scare him too fast,” she had said. “Rope him in a bit, and then let him know, once he's invested.”

We never got to that point, obviously, but walking with Marcello I felt unedited and I talked forever about Miles, and then Tim, popping the cork on my emotional Prosecco. We walked through the little streets and watched the sky fall dark, and he asked if I wanted to come over.

In retrospect, I realize I must've been on crack to just follow him up the three flights, but for some reason it felt like a good idea. The alternative was being alone again, and I was suddenly not into that. We entered his apartment, which I thought for some reason would be a cyclone-hit mess, but it was surprisingly cute and clean, with huge arched windows overlooking a square and a little painter's corner with pots of brushes and an easel. After he closed the door I got that weird rush of being in a total stranger's abode. What was I thinking? He could be Gioffreddo Dahmer! Maybe he'd hack me up and make paint out of my blood and guts,
Red Violin
-style, and brush me onto a canvas.

He brought me some bubbly water, smiled, and plopped down on the couch. What if it was drugged or rufy spiked? It's poison! It was from a glass bottle, Holly. Okay, okay, he's fine. Not Teodoro Bundy. I was being paranoid, I realized, and calmed down a bit. But I apparently still was a little on edge, thinking of people saying, as I would,
“She went up there to his place? Then she's an idiot and it's partly her fault she got raped and hacked to bits!”

My imagination is a burden sometimes.

Marcello, as it turned out, was not a razor-wielding rapist-murderer. Not Carlo Manson. He was a sweet, honest man who had just broken up with a girlfriend, and we ended up talking about life and relationships for a few hours. I tried to extract little pieces of wisdom from him, but it all mirrored what I already knew, just in slightly different words.

“You trusted yourself to go,” he said. “You knew you could not stay and look the other way. As scary as it is to leave the marriage, it would have been worse still to stay and pretend you were happy.”

“You got it.
E vero,
” I said.

There was absolutely zero sexual tension. We shared only a mutual smile where we both knew we could have had a little
bacio
, but what was the point? It would just be a Band-Aid for two recovering lovelorn souls who were feeling a little small. How fitting that we had met next to a giant David, the underdog who later pulled through. Maybe we would, too . . . but not together.

“Good night, Holly. It was nice spending the day with you.”

“Likewise.”

I hugged him good-bye and left to go back to my room for my last night before Venezia.

 

 

 

When I arrived in enchanted Venice, it transcended my gargantuan memories. How many things are actually better than you imagined? I've heard people say it was smelly, that there are omnipresent rats, that it was a massive sewer. They all were wrong (then again, I was there in crisp October, not stinky July). Plus, I never saw one rat. Okay, I saw
one
, but it was swimming in the canal and my water taxi driver said, “Don'ta worry, they do notta eat the
turisti
.”

I got to my little hotel and immediately called Miles to tell him I missed and loved him. And while I could hear Avery's voice in the background, which made me puke-ready, I took comfort in the fact that my son sounded happy. After we hung up, I unpacked and settled into my room, which was way better than the nun's quarters in Florence—this time it was
bellissima
and my queen-size bed was actually long enough so that my cobblestone-weary feet didn't hang off the end. The large single-pane window was crisply Windexed and much bigger, so the muted splish-splash of the narrow waterway outside could be heard all night, lulling me to sleep like I was in a giant womb. I walked everywhere in Venice, through the charcoal alleyways lined with creepy mask stores. Carnivale must be a really big deal there to sustain so many of them. As a rabid coulrophobe (victim of a paralyzingly traumatic fear of mimes, clowns, and worst of all, ventriloquist dummies), I had goose-bump-laced, violent reactions to the white, spooky, I-am-a-murderer visages.

The next day I walked to San Marco Square and bristled with a bad case of the skeeves when I saw the hordes of pigeons (i.e., rats with wings). But then I remembered a photo of my mother standing in the very same spot at age eighteen, smiling by the domed wonder of the basilica in front of me. I got a tear in my eye when I thought of her, and how the pain of missing her would never subside. I wished she were there to coach me through this year. But I would summon her strength, as I knew she would have wanted me to.

My final day pre-departure was spent on a gondola. I scanned the striped-shirted men and when a cute old guy smiled at me and called me
bella,
it was game over. I hopped in and was amazed at how he expertly maneuvered me through the tiny canals as if we were a duck. I leaned back in the love seat clearly meant for two and drank in the rooftops and filled clotheslines. Considering that this city in its aqua maze had always occupied such a hallowed place in my imagination, it felt like a miracle to absorb the reality of that moment. This soaring above my own dream gave me something I never expected: the realization that I was not jaded. Things would be fine. Because I was not wounded and scarred enough to be closed off to the details, the visual balms, that make everything feel healed inside. It was as if this trip had peeled off a few pieces of that emotional Scotch tape, and plucked out one or two staples holding my heart together. And as Mario burst into “O Sole Mio” when we crossed under a bridge, I got the rush of knowing my hope was restored. Of knowing some things are better than we dreamed when we book a spontaneous ticket online, and that the lapping water at the shiny boat's side was a symbol that taking a risk can be this refreshing.

 

 

 

T
he trip was just what the doctor ordered, spiritual Prozac. Even though I was back in the saddle at home, doing volunteer work for Miles's school, I felt like I'd turned a corner. I was happily leading new prospective parents through tours of the hundred-fifty-year-old institution, which was not unlike Hogwarts, but sans capes and wands. It was a highly traditional, extremely rigorous course of study, complete with long white beards, plays by Ionesco, an organic chef in the dining room, and tweed aplenty. The school received a thousand applications for sixty spots. Two days a week I led wide-eyed couples through the mahogany-paneled halls, gesturing Vanna White style at the plaques that bore the names of two U.S. presidents, several accomplished writers, doctors, and an Academy Award winner. The couples all strolled hand in hand, probably thinking how lucky I was to be already “in,” when in fact these women would die if they knew how thoroughly un-perfect my life was.

I loved peering into Miles's classrooms throughout the day, like a Where's Waldo-style treasure hunt, from the science lab (in his white coat and safety glasses) to the gym, to social studies, where they were studying South America. After school we walked to the park for his soccer, and as I stood chilly on the sidelines, I got a call from Tim's friend, Lars Hartstreich, from EdgeCreek Capital.

“Holly, I'm so sorry about the news of you and Tim—” He sounded sincerely upset.

“Yeah, well . . . yeah. What're you gonna do? I never thought this would be me, but hey, if you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans, right?”

“Well, Emma and I are thinking of you, and if there's anything we can do, please let us know.”

“Thanks. . . .” I paused, signaling that it was okay to cut to the chase; he was clearly calling for something. Lars was a great guy whom I had always liked. But my defenses were still up from the breakup and I still felt antisocial vis-à-vis the hedge fund world, which was weirdly small.

“So I'm calling because I know you said you'd be willing to be a vice chair for the Bankers for Babies gala, and I wanted to confirm you're still on board—”

I drew breath to respond with a lame wriggling out of my commitment, but before I could speak, he continued.

“Holly, I know you've been through a lot, but you always bring so much to these events and we really hope we can count on you. We sent out the invitations a few weeks ago and didn't hear from you, but Emma and I would love to have you as our guest. Please join us. . . .”

“Um, okay,” I mustered, before I could think clearly. Shoot, what did I go and say yes for? I didn't want to go! It was all hedgie bores and their quasi-lobotomized wives. I had endured it every year, even serving on the gala committee for the last three, and wanted to shut the gilded door on that whole world. But they had been my friends for years, and I guess it was a knee-jerk reaction to still being included when I had been feeling so out to sea socially.

“Terrific. We'll send the car for you next Thursday evening, then.”

“Okay, thanks, Lars. Bye—”

Though I was dreading the evening, I was touched that Lars and Emma would still want me on board despite the fact that I was the jilted ex. I wasn't just a “plus one” arm-candy addition to Tim.

 

 

 

That night Miles and I worked on his diorama of all the planets in the galaxy. As the supposedly nontoxic model paints stank up our den, Miles broke my heart wide open. Talk about the Big Bang.

“Mommy, I know you and Daddy say you will not get back together. But are we still a family? Even with two houses?”

Spear through aorta.

I blinked back tears as the lump in my throat grew into invisible hands that strangled me, rendering me unable to breathe. I gathered myself enough to slowly answer.

“Sweetness, your daddy and I still love you as much as we ever have, and just because you see us separately doesn't mean you don't have a family that loves you. More than anything. You are my whole world. My galaxy . . .” I kissed his forehead and hugged him before he could see my eyes watering.

 

 

 

I
t was in a coffee bar, of all places, that I was first picked up. I was ordering a half pound of espresso malted milk balls when I heard a voice behind me.

“Those are dangerous little spheres, those things—”

I turned to see an older man, head full of gray hair, in a loden jacket, wearing small gold glasses.

“Oh, yeah, tell that to my thighs,” I joked, exhausted after a sleepless night and sprint to Miles's school for an early-morning mothers' breakfast, where once again I was floating alone as gaggles of preened yummy mummies discussed Thanksgiving plans and the price of the Printery at Oyster Bay versus Mrs. John L. Strong for engraving their holiday cards (I laughed remembering how, the year before, Mary sent her Christmas wishes engraved with a heart above the word “LOVE,” and above the word “PEACE” was a Mercedes symbol instead of a peace sign—classic). I had zero appetite, so I simply ate some pieces of fruit as I waited for my cue to leave and then sprinted to Oren's Daily Roast on Lex to have my daily candy fix and scratch that chocolate itch.

“You don't look like you have any problems,” he said, still making eye contact. “I, on the other hand, am older than you, and those are deathly,” he said with a wink.

After I paid and was headed for the door, he was a few steps ahead and held it for me. I thanked him and then found we were walking side by side, so we kept small talking: about the beautiful crisp fall day, the Christmas decorations that were going up earlier and earlier, and the crowd of people breakfasting at a nearby café.

“Who are these people who eat these long, leisurely lunches on a weekday?” he asked. “Don't you sometimes wish everyone had subtitles with what they do?”

“There are many people here who don't have to work, I suppose,” I offered.

We both scanned the mostly Eurotrashy crowd covered in fashion logos, Bluetooth earpieces, and leather. “But I wouldn't want to be them,” he said. “I need my work, you know?”

“What do you do?”

“I'm an artist. I paint.”

“Oh, cool,” I responded lamely. “I thought all the artists were downtown these days. Or in Brooklyn.”

“Yes, well, I lived in SoHo forever, but now I like it up here. Quieter. I'm an old man now,” he said, brown eyes gleaming. His light gray hair looked striking next to his dark Hershey's Kiss eyes, and as he sipped his coffee, looking at me, I suddenly realized there was a miniflirtation going on.

“No, you're not old . . . ,” I said, scanning him, realizing he was prematurely gray, as his face was handsome and young. Ish. Maybe he was mid-forties? Okay, late. “So what do you paint?”

I asked. “Landscapes? Cut-up faces, Picasso style? Or ‘abstract art'?” I added with finger quotes. Maybe it was Jackson Pollock- style splatters. Or Twombly-esque chalkboard art. I wondered what an almost-preppy-looking middle-age guy would paint. Turns out, I would soon find out.

“Why don't you come see? Any interest?” he said with a sip of his coffee.