The Friends We Keep (11 page)

31

 

We stood on the sidewalk just outside the excellent French restaurant that Kelly had suggested. I knew when I met her at a one-day conference the week before that she had good taste. I know Tiffany's Atlas Collection when I see it.

I shifted, right foot to the left. “So, thanks for having dinner with me,” I said. “The food was great.”

Kelly continued to look at me expectantly. “You're welcome,” she said. “So . . .”

“So . . . Well, thanks again.” I stuck out my hand to shake hers. She kept her hand at her side and I let my own fall.

“That's it?” she asked.

Oh, boy. Teri hadn't coached me thoroughly; what was I supposed to do now? “Excuse me?” I asked.

Kelly gave me a significant look, the kind that mothers give their kid when the kid is supposed to be saying “thank you” for the slice of American cheese the guy at the deli counter just gave him.

“Am I going to see you again?” she asked.

I took a deep breath. This was not going well at all. “Well,” I said, “you see, I had a nice time tonight.” I paused. “But, well, I'm just not sure you're, uh, that we're . . . right for each other. At this point in my life.”

Ah, the tongue-tied attorney! Kelly didn't find anything charming or even pitiable about my awkward explanation. She spoke her words carefully, as if not quite believing their meaning.

“You're saying that you're not going to call me.”

“Well, uh, yes,” I admitted. “I guess that's what I'm saying.”

Kelly leaned toward me; I involuntarily took a step back.

“You bastard,” she hissed. “You scumbag! How dare you insult me this way!”

Teri definitely hadn't prepared me for this kind of reaction. “What?” I asked, hands suddenly in the air as if to ward off the blow that I wouldn't be surprised was coming. “No, no, I didn't mean to insult you, I just—”

“Oh, just shut up,” she spat. “What an idiot I am going out with a creep like you!”

“No, no, you're not an idiot,” I said, though right then I was thinking,
Hey, this woman is crazy
. “I just thought . . . Look, please, my sister told me—”

“You told your sister about me!”

Oh, crap, John, just shut up and run for it. “Well, not about you in particular. How could I?” I pointed out reasonably. “This is our first date.”

“And clearly our last!”

An older couple came out of the restaurant just in time to hear Kelly's pronouncement. The woman startled; the man looked at me sternly. I smiled feebly and the couple walked on, though the man looked over his shoulder twice before reaching the curb. Let me tell you, I didn't relish the idea of being arrested for “bothering” my date. I doubted it would help my reputation as a defender of abused and downtrodden women.

“Yes,” I said, lowering my voice almost to a whisper, “well, be that as it may, could you please stop shouting? Please just let me explain.”

Kelly folded her arms across her chest and the word that came to mind to describe her was “pugnacious.”

“Oh, you'd better explain, mister. And it had better be good!”

“Okay. Okay. You see, I went out with this woman recently and, well, she was very nice, but I just didn't, you know, click with her.” How to put this next part so as to avoid being the recipient of a mean right hook?

“Go on,” Kelly urged, glaring up at me.

I did, but first I took another small step away from her. “Well, at the end of the night I hailed her a cab and before it drove away I told her that I'd give her a call.”

Kelly made a sound like the bark of a small, pissed-off mutt. “Let me guess. You had no intention of ever calling her.”

“Well, no,” I admitted. “But I didn't know what else to say. I mean, I didn't want to hurt her feelings or embarrass her, so—”

“So, you lied.”

“Well, yes. I guess I did. Anyway, I was telling my sister about it and she really lit into me. She told me that women prefer honesty. She said that women don't want to hear the white lies men tell at the end of the evening. She said that it was disrespectful. So—”

“So,” Kelly interrupted, “you thought you'd try this honesty thing with me, is that it?”

“Yes,” I said, grateful for her understanding, hopeful that I might yet make it home without blood oozing down my chin. “That's it exactly. But,” I said, with one of my trademark charming smiles, “I'm getting the distinct impression that honesty wasn't the best policy in this particular situation.”

Big mistake.

Kelly roared, “Don't try to make a joke out of this!”

My hands went up again. “I'm not, I swear! Look, Kelly, I'm sorry I upset you. Really, I am. But what was I supposed to do, tell you I'd call and then not call?”

“Well,” Kelly said, “it would have been far better than telling me right to my face that you don't like me!”

God, I thought, I haven't prayed to you since grade school but if you get me out of this intact I'll write a big fat check to the old parish.

When I spoke, it was very, very carefully. “I didn't say that I didn't like you. You're a nice person, really. You have . . . great jewelry. It's just that—”

“It's just that you're not that into me, I know, I know, I've heard it before. It's not my fault—”

“It's not!”

Kelly bared her teeth. “Don't interrupt me! It's not my fault, it's all yours. It has nothing to do with me, I'm a fine woman, I'll make someone a lovely wife. God, I hate men!”

I spotted a cab. It was idling at a red light. If I ran really fast I figured I could duck in its backseat before the bullets caught up with me. “Maybe,” I said, “I should just go—”

“Oh, you'd better go, mister!” Kelly shouted. “And the next time you're just not that into a woman, have the courtesy to lie to her, okay? When you don't call, we get the message. There's no need to humiliate us face-to-face.”

“Okay,” I said. “Again, I'm sorry—”

“Save your breath.”

I did. I saved my breath for the dash to the cab. And once sprawled on its backseat I made a vow to never, ever take Teri's advice again. And when I dropped off that check with Father Imperioli the next morning, I just might inquire about becoming a monk.

32

 

I have to tell you. Being verbally attacked in public by a woman I've just bought dinner for is not my idea of a good way to end an evening. I can see if I had groped her or insulted her mother or done something objectionable like pick my nose. Sure, scream and yell all you want. Kick me if you need to. Go right ahead.

But all I'd done was to be honest.

For the millionth time (this is probably not an exaggeration) I found myself wondering what women wanted from men. Truth, lies, or an artful combination of both?

When I was just dating around through my twenties and thirties, with no intention of becoming serious with anyone, the rules were clear. I stuck to seeing women who didn't expect anything from me but a good time. Sure, there was the occasional woman who declared she didn't want anything serious and who then, after sex, morphed into a clingy creature, but they were few and far between and, frankly, I never found it hard to extricate myself from their desperate grasp.

Now that I was taking my love life seriously, I couldn't seem to do anything right.

I began to wonder if it really was too late for me to marry. Had I inadvertently become . . . the bachelor uncle? The guy with nowhere to go on holidays, the guy who depends on his happily married siblings to invite him for a home-cooked meal? The guy with no one to clip his ear hair, with no one to care if his nose hair grew offensively long, with no one to care if he took his Centrum Silver or developed prostate cancer?

One thing was clear. Men needed women. Let me be specific. I needed a woman. And preferably before I became a monster, the old man with no female companion to keep him from sliding in grotesquerie.

33

 

“What do women want?” I asked. “I really want to know. What do women want? This is not a rhetorical question. I need an answer.”

“Could you be more specific?” Sophie asked. “What do women want when? On a date, in a relationship, in general?”

I shrugged. “I don't know, in general I guess. From men, what do women want from men?”

“Sex.”

Sophie rolled her eyes at Eva. “Respect. And love, of course.”

“And sex. Unless they're lesbian and then women have no use for men at all.”

“Eva!”

“Well, come on, Sophie. You can get respect from your assistant and love from a puppy. Sex, well, of course you can get it from a variety of sources, but I'll stick to men.”

“You two,” I said, “are no help at all.”

Sophie reached across the table and patted my hand maternally. “I'm sorry, John. What's wrong? Did something happen?”

“Yeah, something happened.”

I told them about the disastrous confrontation with Kelly. “I mean, one woman tells me that women want honesty from men. Another woman tells me that women want men to lie to them. All the time? Only in special circumstances? I tell you, I can't figure out you people.”

“‘You people'? Women can't be lumped into one convenient mass, John,” Eva said. “I know it's difficult but you just have to take each one of us individually. Incredible concept, isn't it?”

I glared at Eva. “I know that, I'm not stupid. I'm just looking for some general guidelines, something I can actually use. But maybe it's ridiculous of me to even try to understand women. I don't know.”

I became aware of Sophie eyeing me keenly.

“What?” I asked her.

“There's something else bothering you.”

“Yeah, there is,” I admitted. “But just forget it. I don't want to dump work stuff on you.”

“No, John, tell us, please. Maybe talking about it will help.”

Why not? “By now,” I said, “you'd think I'd be used to watching women make lousy choices about their lives.”

Eva raised an eyebrow. “Like men don't make lousy choices?”

I ignored her attempt to drag me into some stupid argument in which she would try to paint me as a misogynist slob.

“One of my pro bono cases,” I said. “This woman's been her husband's punching bag for years. And every time I think we've convinced her to take the guy to court, every time we've got her all set up with temporary housing, every time we've got her emergency financial assistance and counseling, what does she do? She drops the charges and goes right back to the creep. It happened again and I swear, I'm tempted not to even try to help her next time—and there will be a next time. It's massively frustrating.”

Sophie clutched my arm briefly. “You won't give up on her, John, I know you won't.”

“Don't be too sure.” I was aware of my voice having a sepulchral tone. “My time and resources are limited. I'd rather spend them on someone who'll actually accept the assistance and try to make a better life for herself. You don't give a new liver to an alcoholic who's determined to continue drinking when there's an otherwise healthy candidate waiting for one. You assess the risks and the chances of success and you act from there.”

Eva nodded. “It makes sense. But assessing the winners and losers in a medical crisis isn't the same as assessing someone's capacity for emotional or psychological growth.”

“Of course not,” I agreed. “I'm not a psychiatrist. It's a big crapshoot for me to draw the line on a case. I don't walk away easily, believe me.”

“I'm sure you don't,” Sophie said, ever the encouraging one.

“By now,” Eva said, “your instincts must be honed. I'm sure you can spot a loser more easily than when you first started out.”

“Yes,” I said, “but I don't use the word ‘loser' when talking about victims of domestic abuse. Every client is of equal importance.”

“Even the ones who can't pay?”

“Absolutely. It has to be that way.” I waited for Eva to start slinging accusations of unethical tendencies, like she'd so enjoyed doing back in college. I really, really wasn't in the mood for that kind of thing.

But for some reason she dropped the argumentative tone and said, “That's admirable.” Maybe it was the look of apprehension on Sophie's face, her fear of an impending argument that persuaded Eva to back down.

“Does anyone want to share a dessert?” I asked, thankful for the peace. I might not have learned anything useful but at least nobody had come to blows. “Alberto's pastries are killer.”