Karaoke nights at Laura and Leslie’s had that homey, sprawling family reunion feel. Well, the sort of reunion you might have if the menfolk had been plucked off your family tree and kicked over the fence. And by the end of the workweek, that was just perfect. I’d missed the weekly shindig only once since I’d moved in six months ago, despite that first Friday night eye-opener. As a new neighbor, a.k.a. innocent victim, I was treated to the grand tour, complete with running commentary. Which is exactly how I’d come to discover their true feelings on TVs and penises: both were unsightly and arguably unnecessary.
Fresh from a viewing of an astonishingly diverse vibrator collection, Leslie had introduced me around in whirlwind fashion, and by the end of the evening, everyone had my number. (By that I mean they knew I wasn’t a lesbian and that I didn’t karaoke—no one actually had my number, no thanks to Leslie.) And despite these shortcomings, I’d been warmly welcomed ever since.
It was occasionally necessary to put up with Leslie’s matchmaking attempts and know-it-all attitude (we suspected she viewed her doctorate not so much as an advanced degree in one particular subject area, but more as the staff of a modern-day goddess of wisdom), but Laura’s cooking was amazing (although oftentimes overly optimistic), and there was never a dull moment.
I’d only just tucked my feet up under me in the most sought-after seating on the deck, ready to calm down with a cupcake, when Leslie walked up, trailed by a woman I’d never seen before. Leslie is a frosted blonde, her eyes smoke blue, and I suspected both colors were being helped along. She’s a professor of women’s studies at the University of Texas, smart and savvy on the clock, a little wacko during time off, and intimidating in every situation, probably because it’s impossible to know what to expect. Her companion was about a foot shorter with a pert face and tight, shoulder-length curls that looked like a tangle of copper wiring.
My eyes narrowed from the cradle of the purple papasan, and I shook my head ever so slightly in warning. I was starting to feel a little fidgety. As if we were all just pretending there wasn’t a crazy weird journal waiting for me at home. Waiting to psych me out. Trying to set me up. Leslie could afford to take the night off. I must have been sending out a shock wave of back-off vibes, because Leslie sailed past me, pulling her friend along in her wake. But it wasn’t long before she circled back.
“She’s cute, isn’t she?” Leslie said, holding a tortilla chip edged in guacamole, arching her eyebrows in question. “UT grad—does some sort of networking thing. With computers,” she added, around a mouth full of chip.
“I’d say above average for tech support.” I was feeling that particularly itchy combination of frenzied urgency and studied nonchalance and was ill equipped to deal with Leslie’s matchmaking schemes. “Let it go, Leslie. I’m not in the mood.” I took a long-awaited bite of cupcake and sighed as a bit of the craziness of the last thirty minutes fell away. It was like a little taste of normal in a world gone weird.
“You may have a ‘Plan,’ sweetheart, but life has a way of trumping it. And all the clichés are true: ‘it’s not fair,’ ‘it’s a bitch,’ and surely you’ve heard, ‘it’s what happens when you’re busy making other plans’?”
I nodded agreeably and started planning my escape, hoping she’d lose interest in our little chat given her abysmal chance of success in luring me into a lesbian romance and away from my Plan.
Everybody mocked The Plan, and it didn’t faze me one little bit. A certain journal, on the other hand, was fazing me big-time. I took another bite of cupcake and reminded myself that I knew, better than anyone, what I needed. I’d come up with the Nic James Life Plan, Version 1.0, when I was thirteen, and very little had changed since then—I was currently living out Version 3.5 and doing a fine job of it, if I did say so myself. Except for that damn journal. I polished off the cupcake and felt my nerves clamoring all over again.
When I was a kid my dad had always had big plans—huge, wild, exciting plans that honestly would have wowed anyone. We were going to explore every subterranean inch of New York City; we were going to ride wild horses and camp on the beach; we were going to follow rainbows and go on real-life treasure hunts; we were going to be mushers in the Iditarod. And the plans and promises got wilder every summer. I believed in all of them and was disappointed again and again. There were always reasons we couldn’t go—the timing, the money, a mysterious dog allergy—and one by one, each idea faded from our conversations and daydreams, only to be replaced by a fresh new one. I had stopped believing at thirteen and vowed to escape into books. Definitely not the sort where kids were having adventures—I wasn’t ready for such flagrant unfairness—I martyred myself with one of my mom’s dog-eared romances.
And so began my love affair with Jane Austen. Pride and Prejudice appealed to me from the very first pages because I admired Elizabeth Bennet as much as I commiserated. I was comforted by the idea that if a person was clever and sensible—maybe a little charming—things could, even without any bona fide adventures, turn out all right. And while that certainly wasn’t my ideal—I had a clipboard list of ideas and dreams and things to get done—as a backup plan it wasn’t too horrible.
So I’d made my Plan and promised myself that I would follow through—I would do things. And if I didn’t, well, then somehow I’d make it work on my own terms. But I wasn’t about to go haring off in pursuit of a man at the bullied urgings of “Mr. Darcy” and a lesbian version of Mrs. Bennet. So I just let Leslie’s jabs roll right off me as I awkwardly stood and moved casually toward the buffet table.
Still, she seemed smugger than usual tonight, and I couldn’t think why. I was inching even farther away when it hit me: Could she know about my journal? I’d left her and Laura with a house key over Christmas when I’d headed home to Houston—could she have had it copied and then used it later for a little casual snooping? Could she even now be using it in an elegant yet unethical scheme to prod me into a little lesbian experimentation? I turned to stare, slightly horrified and a little overawed. God, I hope it hasn’t come to this.
I grabbed a tortilla chip, vigorously crunching as my thoughts raced over opportunities, possibilities, and unlikely scenarios. They all screeched to a halt at the sound of Leslie’s voice, at the need to listen for clues.
“I don’t plan to stop introducing you to the fabulous women who pop over here—you’ll just have to buck up your willpower.” Her knowing smile started the warning drums in my head, making me wonder: Just what does she know? How to make words disappear without a trace? How to really mess with a person’s head? Was it possible I’d been too hasty in assuming Leslie’s innocence? Well, I suppose technically speaking, I’d really only assumed ignorance and incompetence....
Leslie winked as she walked away, sending me into a veritable tizzy.
Laura snuck up behind me as I stared, wide-eyed with worry, at the fajita buffet sprawling over the white mosaic patio table that had been crafted literally from the broken pieces of Leslie’s short-lived marriage (or at least her wedding china).
“Did you try the tofu?”
A ponytailed brunette perpetually outfitted in workout clothes and athletic footwear, Laura owned a fitness store right off the running track snaking along Lady Bird Lake, and as far as I could tell, her life goal was to exorcise a person’s every self-indulgent tendency before shoving them bodily down the path toward total fitness. Odd that she’d partnered herself with the greatest lover of Hostess Ho Hos the world had perhaps ever known. Their relationship was one of life’s great mysteries.
“Maybe I’ll try it later,” I stalled, sidestepping away.
“Are you chicken?” Evidently she’d forgotten that I didn’t do dares.
“Well, I’d like some chicken,” I tossed back at her, filling a tortilla with black beans, guacamole, and pico de gallo. Honestly I just wanted a drink, but didn’t think the cupcake I’d wolfed down could hold its own against the alcohol. I grabbed a hard cranberry lemonade and headed for my still-vacant chair. Once the sour-sweet buzz of the lemonade began to swim through my veins, the karaoke would start to sound a lot better—this I knew from experience. And maybe if I was really lucky, the liquor would make a magical journal seem like a good thing.
Despite the nip in the air and because of the knot of nerves in my stomach, I stuck it out for another couple of hours, and through it all, there was Leslie, blithely mingling with her Shiner Bock and her outside voice. Solid alibi ... should any further suspicions arise.
Now, with everyone either going or gone, I was just trying to work up the gumption to face my journal with the headache drumming behind my eyes. I’d almost rather karaoke ... Almost. My buzz had definitely faded, and a certain magical journal was once again a blight on my well-ordered life.
As I was prepping myself for the papasan extrication process, Leslie sauntered into my field of vision with a stack of leftover containers. She hovered a moment over the remaining cupcakes on the table before selecting one and peeling back the wrapper. Excellent. Leslie was infinitely more predictable with her mouth full.
I watched, slightly envious, as her eyes closed on that first decadent minty bite. “Mmmph. It was a good crowd tonight. Did you see Ginger up there, braving it out?”
“The redhead? I did.” I knew exactly where this was going and figured I’d rather duke it out with the journal, much as I’d been dreading it. I stood awkwardly and haphazardly folded the blanket that had, at least for a little while, been a refuge.
“You can’t be a karaoke voyeur forever, Nic.”
I heard myself snort, but I refused to take the bait.
“Come on, Nic. Just try it once,” Laura urged softly from her crouch beside the karaoke machine.
Before I could respond, Leslie was turning toward me, one hand propped on her jean-clad hip. “It isn’t about the singing at all, is it, Nic? I think you can’t put yourself out there just for the hell of it and take a chance, go crazy, and have a little fun. Karaoke is not, after all, in ‘The Plan.’ ” She made the air quotes look more like a dance move from “Thriller.” “Or maybe you really do suck—I guess we’ll never know.”
Feeling that this was all a little uncalled for, I simply stared before finally bumbling out with, “You’re a real ... peach, Leslie.” In my head it came out as “bitch” and felt so right.
“And you’re the pit, my dear.”
And here we go... . Rubbing my arms against the pervasive chill, some of which I knew was mental, I headed for the buffet table to retrieve my stoneware platter on my way back home.
“Ease up, Les,” Laura warned.
“I’m just trying to make a point here,” Leslie backpedaled. Her voice softened slightly, and a little of the tension eased out of my shoulders. “You’re the pit to my peach because while I’m out there on display—for better or worse—you’re hiding from everyone, following a preprepared, preemptive, preposterous plan that doesn’t make room for anything. I’m getting the nicks, the cuts, and the bruises, but I’m also getting the nibbles.”
Don’t think about it. Don’t picture it.
“Nobody’s making a cobbler out of you, honey,” she tossed off before popping the last of the cupcake into her mouth.
“And the bad news is ... ?”
“Honestly? You’re starting to remind me of Tattoo from Fantasy Island, but with you it’s ‘De Plan, de Plan! ’ Let me just say, it’s not a good look for you.”
I couldn’t help it—she had me smiling a little now.
“I say screw ‘De Plan,’ and have a little fun. Chances are everywhere, Nic. Reach out, grab one by the horns, and ride that baby. Sure, you might be thrown, things could get ugly, but you’ll get up with a flush in your cheeks, a smile on your lips, and the courage and confidence to try the next big thing.”
“Cowgirl up.”
I glanced at Laura and shot her my best “not helping” look.
Leslie stepped closer to me, and there was no escape.
“What about Elizabeth Bennet, hmm?”
Now she had my attention, in a what the hell? kinda way. “What about her?” I said warily, a little weirded out at the P&P mention, given my current situation.
“She was a wild woman, and she ended up with a man women still fantasize about.” Overly smug, she snapped the lid on the leftover guacamole.
“A wild woman? Really? Are you referring to her snarky attitude, her scandalous walks in the rain, or her refusal to accept a shoddy proposal? Because if that’s all it takes to keep you off my back, I can handle any one of those.”
“Well, that was plenty two hundred years ago. I hate to tell you, but you’ve gotta up the ante a little, sweetie.” She tried for an apologetic smile, but it slid away from her, pushed out by ill-concealed glee. “Keep your eyes on the prize, chickie.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” I muttered, desperately wanting to add “Mrs. Bennet,” but too chicken to pull it off. I grabbed the platter, slid the remaining cupcakes onto the table, and skirted around her on my way toward the gate. “Thanks for a lovely evening.”
“Come on, stay for a while, Nic. If you leave now, things will just get awkward.” Laura’s voice slowed my retreat but didn’t halt it.
“Inconceivable,” I answered, still moving. Too late ... things had gone way beyond awkward.
“Start small!” Leslie called after me. “Try sleeping naked tonight! I think it’s a safe assumption that that would be new and different.” The last part was muttered, but I could hear it ringing through the night air, just like I could feel the grudge starting to build in my chest. Little by little, I was moving away from the color and light, navigating the pavers into darkness.
Confidence bolstered, I called back, “You know ... Elizabeth Bennet was content simply to be witty and charming. Meeting Mr. Darcy was just a sexy coincidence.”
“Oh that we all could have such ‘sexy coincidences,’ ” Leslie drawled, a regular Southern belle. “But you gotta play to win, sweetie. And a couple little changes could make all the difference.”
“You are pulling out every cliché in the book,” came Laura’s murmured reply, but it barely registered.
Mental snapshots of my journal suddenly flashed in my mind like before and after photos, triggered by the echoing finale of Leslie’s rousing little pep talk. Heedless of the perils of lumpy lawns and nighttime critters, I ran the rest of the way home, in a sudden manic dread over the possibility of “a couple of little changes” and who or what might have made them. Leslie would assume I was spooked by the very idea of sleeping naked. And with that funky little journal in the house, who could blame me?
The quiet at home was a little creepy, and the fact that my ears were tingling with cold and Leslie’s parting words didn’t help engender the feeling of normalcy I was really kind of desperate for. Plunking the platter down on the counter, I ignored the blinking message light on my answering machine and squinted toward the bookcase. If I was willing to ride out the metaphor to the point of ridiculousness, imagining that the journal was Mr. Darcy, then was this whole thing somehow my very own sexy coincidence? The possibility was a little bit terrifying, a good clue that maybe I needed to dial back on the Pride and Prejudice complex.
It occurred to me that maybe I should come up with some sort of game plan before I braved another look at the journal. Like what to do if nothing had changed versus what to do if everything had. But with my mouth drying up and my stomach roiling with nerves and the liquor from the cranberry lemonade, I couldn’t think. Strategy eluded me, right along with common sense. I wanted to look ... but I didn’t. I wanted everything to be normal, and yet, perversely, a little mystery held a certain appeal.
Squaring my shoulders, I stepped out of the light in the kitchen and moved into the dimness of the living room. It felt like high noon in an old-time TV Western, except that I was facing down a wordslinger closer to midnight. My fingers curled in and out of fists, and I gulped big breaths of air, as if I could somehow load up on normal before stepping into a bizarro world of unexplained and unsolicited matchmaking.
I cautiously reached between the preselected cookbooks and snagged the leather-bound volume with my index finger and thumb. Hotfooting it back to the kitchen, I dropped my catch on the table and sat down to face the situation head-on—whatever that might entail. With a burst of courage, I flipped back the cover. The journal’s little doorknob thwacked loudly against the table, unleashing a new wave of nerves. So much for all my carefully built-up calm ... there was no going back now.
Seeing the first page still intact, complete with rewritten journal entry and underlined words, gave me a fleeting moment of confidence—just enough to catch my breath. These words, at least, hadn’t disappeared.
Spurred on by my thunderous heartbeat, I cautiously turned the page—and saw only white. Until the few remaining words came clearly into focus. At which point the curse words were falling off my tongue like an avalanche as I started to panic.
I really hadn’t expected a second message. One could have been written off as a fluke or ... something. But two was a definite situation. Particularly with Leslie off the hook with her airtight alibi.
Willing myself to pull it together, I read the remaining words.
cleavage
is
as cleavage
does
Every bit of tension suddenly came crashing down in the face of sheer ridiculousness. Oh, I was still panicked all right, but at that moment I was simply bowled over by the unpredictability of the situation. There I was, dealing with someone who had the mind-boggling ability to send private messages by erasing selected words in a seemingly unremarkable journal, and he / she chose to use this power to spout off on cleavage and issue a call to romance? It was like I was dealing with a teenage techie with a crush. Although I had to admit, the element of ridiculousness made things feel a little less threatening and more just odd. Number one, I had no cleavage worth discussing, and number two, I’d learned long ago that it was impossible to strong-arm a romance because romance was like dandelion fluff, floating out there, everywhere. And while we all chased it, grabbed hold of it, and hated to let it go, it was fickle and flighty—and impervious to even the most careful planning.
The little dandelion analogy had come to me during a particularly loopy marshmallow-crème-by-the-jar sugar high right after the demise of my only really serious relationship. I met Ethan my first year in the MBA program. Like me, he was an engineer with big dreams, but unlike me, he had no plans on how to reach them—zero. I suppose you could say the detailed nature of my Plan (and his inclusion in it) freaked him out a little. As did my “freakish obsession” with Jane Austen—his words. So he’d dumped me, and truly, I’d been a little relieved to be dumped—saved me the trouble of dumping him. I didn’t want a guy with no plans—I wanted a guy who had big dreams and the motivation to go after them. After that, romance had gotten postponed indefinitely. And Pushing Daisies had taught me that a to-do list wasn’t nearly enough. The man I wanted would come with the schematics and tools to hotwire a Norwegian RV. I’d been content to wait.
But clearly someone—or something—wasn’t. Someone besides Leslie.
I shivered, both from the chill in the air and the realization that, like it or not, I had a problem ... a Big Problem.
I stared into the darkness of the living room, my imagination casting me in the starring role of a B-movie thriller. Who knew what was lurking, waiting ... watching ... ready to comment.
I stood quickly, the backs of my knees pushing my chair back in a loud screech. I lunged toward the light switch, flipping on the overhead light before tussling with the lamp beside the sofa. Right now I needed lights on and voices of reason. I glanced over at the blinking light on my answering machine and decided to take a chance.
My heart beating wildly, I played the message.
“Hi, Nic, it’s Beck. I thought that since the pair of us is in a boyfriend slump—yours by choice, mine, not so much—maybe we could meet up for coffee or go troll for guys. They can all be for me. Call soon or I’ll be left to my own devices—not pretty, I warn you.”
I let my eyes shutter closed. Beck wasn’t exactly a voice of reason, but she was available, and I needed a little distance from the evening’s Snowball’s Chance in Hell. She answered on the third ring, and I determinedly stepped away from the knife drawer—I wasn’t that far gone yet.
“Beck? Hey, it’s Nic,” I said, plowing over the frog in my throat. “Still want to meet?”
“Definitely! How about Central Market? Good coffee and a full gamut of guys.”
“I’m sticking with tea tonight. Meet you in the café in fifteen?”
I didn’t respond to the muttered “party pooper” accusation.
Hanging up, I stared down at my generic jeans, nubby sweater, and ballet flats, getting a “parent or guardian” vibe. In the interest of avoiding further name-calling, I darted back to my room for a quick fix, flipping lights on as I went, hurriedly trading my brown sweater for a sleeker black one and my flats for heeled boots. A wave of the mascara wand and a slick of lip color, and I was hurrying out the door.
Then I remembered.
The journal was still splayed open on the table with all that cleavage wisdom gracing its pages. I couldn’t just leave it there. The little Pandora’s book definitely needed to be relocated, and later, we needed to have a few words. Or not. I suppose that was always an option. I slid it back onto the shelf between Persuasion and Sense and Sensibility, figuring that couldn’t be any worse than shelving it with the cookbooks.
My life had gone seriously wacko. The whole evening suddenly felt like a Vaseline-edged dream, and I desperately needed a squeegee.