Then We'd Be Happy Read online

“The burgers here are awesome,” Tanya tells me.

  She knows what I like.

  We talk about our search for the perfect burger and

  how each place we found eventually closed, sending us off

  to renew our quest.

  “Could this be the one? The new one?”

  Tanya curls her lower lip and shrugs.

  “Maybe,” she says.

  I wonder if that’s why she invited me here—to share

  her find and confirm its superiority over all others—but

  she doesn’t give me time to ask.

  “So,” she says, “how are you?”

  THEN WE’D BE HAPPY

  I tell her about my new job and the house in Sunnyvale,

  my issues with Marty. She laughs and so do I because now

  it seems funny to me. It didn’t before.

  And that’s how it goes. We talk and eat our burgers

  (they are damn good, but maybe not the best) and then we

  part on the sidewalk with another brief hug.

  117

  One of Her Moods

  SPENCER AND I ARE sitting on white plastic lawn chairs in

  the backyard with the last two bottles of Bud from the

  fridge. I don’t know where Marty is. Working, maybe, or

  hanging with his pal, Fredson (who is not, I suspect, a

  good influence).

  “I thought you’d be over at Naomi’s place,” I say.

  “She’s in one of her moods.”

  “I thought she was always in the mood.”

  “Not that kind of mood,” Spencer says. “She’s

  depressed.”

  “Really? Why?”

  “Ask her. She’ll give you a million reasons.”

  “I find that hard to believe. A girl like her.”

  “You don’t know her like I do,” he says. “She gets

  totally down on herself sometimes. Hates her job. Hates

  her apartment. Hates her roommate. Hates herself.”

  “She needs you to go cheer her up.”

  THEN WE’D BE HAPPY

  “Right. She gets like this, there’s nothing anyone can

  do.”

  I say, “I bet you could.”

  “Dude, I just talked to her. She complained about

  everything. I couldn’t get off the phone fast enough.”

  Spencer kicks back, takes a long pull from his bottle.

  “She was really bringing me down,” he says. “I don’t

  think I’ll be calling her for a while.”

  119

  What Happens Now?

  I KEEP THINKING HOW great it was to see Tanya again. I

  didn’t think she’d be so easy to talk to. Like old times.

  But, really, what was that all about? What happens

  now? Am I supposed to call her, ask her to go out again? I

  think about it every day, every time I have a break.

  I take out my phone, and I put it back in my pocket.

  Don’t be too eager.

  Don’t be a fool.

  Don’t get your hopes up.

  Stop! Just do it. Just call her already.

  No. No. She’ll break my heart.

  Coward!

  Then I find the fancy square envelope in our mailbox.

  There’s an embossed card inside and gold letters

  requesting the honor of my presence as Tanya Alvarez and

  Trevor McKesson pledge their love to each other or some

  such horseshit.

  Strawberry Rhubarb

  THE REFRIGERATOR IS EMPTY, as usual, so I head over to

  Marie Callender’s on El Camino. Instead of sitting at the

  counter and ordering a slice of my favorite strawberry

  rhubarb pie—something I do when I want to treat

  myself—I get a whole one and take it back to the house.

  Everybody else is still in bed.

  I cut myself an extra big slice. Call it breakfast.

  Damn! That Marie makes a flaky crust.

  I decide I’ll have another slice and then I remember

  what happens to pie (beer, corn flakes, bread, eggs, milk)

  in this house.

  You see where this is going, don’t you?

  That’s right, I’m eating this whole pie in one sitting.

  Fuck you, Marty Watson! Fuck you, Spencer Talbot!

  I don’t even want the last piece but I eat it anyway.

  I do not feel proud of myself.

  Then I stretch out on the sofa and take a nap. It’s 9

  a.m.

  Horseshit

  MY MOM IS NOT working today so we’re able to have one

  of our kitchen conversations where she imparts her unique

  brand of wisdom. She assures me that, no matter what I

  may think now, a wedding invitation is not horseshit.

  “You should feel flattered,” she says. “The fact that

  Tanya wanted to have dinner with you means she needed

  to be sure.”

  “And now she is. Great.”

  “Look, I did the same thing before I married your

  father. I still remember the boy fondly, even now. It’s

  been forty years and I still think about him sometimes.”

  I still don’t get how all this is supposed to perk me up,

  and I guess my mother can see that. She gets up, pours

  herself another cup of coffee, and offers me more as well.

  “I’ve had enough,” I say.

  She looks at me and shakes her head the way she often

  does. Then she has another thought.

  “Don’t tell your father,” she says.

  Chump City

  I am the mayor of Chump City.

  Nita’s Ex

  I ASK NITA ABOUT her ex and this is what she tells me:

  “He was this happy-go-lucky guy when we met. Kind

  of shy. A little awkward. I always liked that.

  “He would say, ‘Let’s get high,’ so we would.

  “I liked weed back then. Now, not so much.

  “So, anyway, it was this social thing. We’d get high

  together or with some of our friends. Whoever we were

  with when he’d say, ‘I know, let’s get high.’

  “It wasn’t about escaping our stupid lives or easing

  some gnawing existential emptiness. Not at first. And it

  never was for me, but it was different for Ben.

  “After a while he didn’t want to go out anymore.

  “‘Let’s just stay in,’ he’d say.

  “I knew what that meant. It meant let’s get high by

  ourselves. More for each of us.

  “I started saying no.

  “He’d shrug and light up.

  “‘Suit yourself,’ he’d say.

  THEN WE’D BE HAPPY

  “I knew it was a mistake to marry him but I was

  pregnant and I let him talk me into it.

  “‘Don’t you see?’ he said. ‘This is just what I need to

  get myself together.’

  “For a couple of weeks there I thought we had a real

  shot at being happy.

  “I didn’t know some of his friends were doing harder

  stuff. I guess he did tell me about some guy he knew who

  had tried heroin. Once, he said. But Ben always swore he

  would never shoot up. For one thing, he was afraid of

  needles.

  “‘Well,’ I thought, ‘that’s good.’

  “Then I guess he got one of his friends to do it for

  him, so he wouldn’t fuck it up—his biggest fear.

  “When I found out, I let him know how disappointed I

  was.

  “He said, ‘I’m disappointed in myself.’

  “I thought he was done, and that’s what he led me to

  believe, but he kept d
oing it, I guess. He overdosed and

  actually died at one point, but the medics were able to

  revive him.

  “I felt bad about leaving him, but I couldn’t hang

  around after that. He keeps telling me not to give up on

  him. He just got out of rehab, not for the first time. It’s

  good he keeps trying.”

  125

  Whatshisname

  I’M IN THE BACK part of the kitchen by the big double

  sink, skinning and gutting twenty pounds of calamari,

  when Spencer comes around the corner.

  “That guy you saw Naomi with, what did he look like?”

  “I don’t know, tall?”

  “Would you recognize him if you saw him again?”

  I stop what I’m doing and wipe off my hands—they’re

  starting to itch as they often do when I handle calamari.

  “Maybe.”

  The chef calls out an order and Spencer calls back, “Be

  right there!”

  We go to the pantry window, and Spencer points out a

  guy in the dining room.

  “That him?”

  I can only see a partial profile as the guy turns toward

  Naomi, who seems to be giving his table extra attention.

  She touches his shoulder in a very familiar way before

  walking away with maybe a little extra sway in her hips.

  THEN WE’D BE HAPPY

  “Hey, I’ve got an idea,” I say. “Let’s ask Naomi.”

  I think Spencer would like to go out there right now,

  but he has to hustle back to the line. He throws two

  salmon fillets on the grill. Then he’s back.

  “You think he looks like her?” he asks.

  “No, I think she’s much prettier, don’t you?”

  “Ha-ha. Word is she called him Jason.”

  “So?”

  “So I don’t see any family resemblance, do you?”

  “Again I say: So?”

  “So Jason is not Naomi’s brother.”

  “Right, because her brother’s name is Peter.”

  “Jason. You said it was Jason.”

  Shit! I promised Naomi I wouldn’t tell Spencer and

  now I’ve made the same slip she made with me.

  “No,” I say.

  “Yes, you did. You both did.”

  “Look, there must be a million guys named Jason.”

  “So that’s not the guy you met?”

  “Her brother lives in Boston, doesn’t he?”

  “Right, so who is this guy?”

  I don’t answer, but I don’t even know who I’m trying

  to protect. Naomi? Spencer? Both?

  127

  Scorched

  I’D REALLY LIKE A grilled cheese sandwich for lunch, but

  the frying pan is dirty. Scorched, actually.

  “Look at this,” I say. “What do you suppose this was?”

  “That? It was Hamburger Helper,” Marty says. “I sort

  of forgot it was cooking.”

  “So… Were you planning to wash this?”

  “Yeah, I’ll get to it.”

  “How about doing it now?”

  “I’ll do it later.”

  “But I’d really like to use it now.”

  “Then you wash it.”

  “Why should I clean up your mess?”

  “Tell you what,” he says, “you can leave it dirty when

  you’re done and I’ll clean it when I need it.”

  I’m too angry to speak. I start to clean the pan, or try

  to, but then I discover we’re out of bread. Fuck it.

  Something Blue

  REAL WEDDINGS AREN’T LIKE the ones you see on TV.

  The minister never asks if anyone has any objections.

  That’s probably not a surprise to you, but this is my

  first one.

  “They stopped doing that a long time ago,” Nita tells

  me, brushing stray strands of hair (black now, not pink or

  blue or fire-engine red) from the corner of her mouth.

  “Why? You want to stop the proceedings?”

  I shake my head, eyes front. I can feel Nita looking at

  me, though. I’m pretty sure she’s shaking her head, too.

  She may also be smiling; I can’t be sure. (I tend to amuse

  her in ways I can’t quite fathom.)

  Anyway, I’m just here to bestow the honor of my

  presence on Tanya Alvarez and Trevor McKesson, as

  requested. The whole business strikes me as surreal,

  though. I keep wondering when, if ever, Tanya has been in

  a church before, and what, if anything, she has on under

  that long white gown.

  AL RISKE

  Totally inappropriate, I know, but it wasn’t all that long

  ago that I was fucking her on a regular basis. Now, here

  she is giving herself to this guy in a way she never gave

  herself to me.

  130

  You Blew It, Buster

  NITA AND I ARE in a motel on Highway One near Half

  Moon Bay. The room is dark. The window is open. We

  can hear ocean waves in the distance.

  “You like that?”

  “Mmmm…”

  “You want me to do it some more?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “What are you going to do for me?”

  A truck rumbles by on the highway, and in the silence

  that follows I realize my mistake.

  “You don’t have to do anything,” I say. “Just enjoy it.”

  Waves crash. That’s all.

  Nita says, “You blew it, Buster.”

  “You don’t have to do anything. I like doing it.”

  “Well, that’s what I thought.”

  “I just wanted to see if I could get you so turned on

  you’d do anything.”

  “I’ll remember that.”

  AL RISKE

  “I just say whatever comes into my head. I never know

  if I’m going to say something wrong.”

  I hear her fumble with her purse and stuff on the

  nightstand, then see the flash of her lighter, the glow of

  her cigarette—the same kind Isla Fisher smokes in that

  movie with Ryan Reynolds.

  “It’s okay,” she says.

  “They say you shouldn’t be held responsible for

  anything you say in the heat of passion.”

  “I know.”

  She puts out her cigarette.

  132

  Marty Moves Out

  MARTY IS MOVING OUT of the house in Sunnyvale.

  That’s the good news. (Much as I like the guy, he’s a

  pain in the ass as a roommate.)

  The bad news? My share of the rent just doubled.

  Marty is moving in with the mysterious Fredson. No

  surprise there. But get this: Fredson is bankrolling Marty’s

  new venture.

  What new venture, you ask? A drive-up espresso

  stand—Espresso Ecstasy—in a parking lot on El Camino.

  Marty scoped out the location, kept tabs on commuter

  traffic, talked to suppliers, and put together a business

  plan. The bank turned him down. Fredson did not.

  I still have no idea what Fredson’s first name is.

  Fortune

  “YOU WILL ALWAYS GET what you want through your

  charm and personality.”

  Interview

  I TAKE THE FORTUNE cookie as a good omen, because I

  have an actual job interview for an actual teaching job.

  My feelings are decidedly mixed, though.

  The opening is in a small town in the Central Valley.

  Farmland.

  “You have to start somewhere,” my dad tells
me.

  I know, I know…

  I drive out there and the countryside is beautiful, the

  town charming. It has one of everything: a school, a bank,

  a church, a restaurant, a doctor, a dentist.

  The principal, Mrs. Hughes, is a middle-aged blonde

  who dresses like Hilary Clinton. I’m perfectly calm and the

  interview goes well.

  I’m perfectly calm until I start the drive home.

  Then I start shaking so bad I have to white-knuckle the

  steering wheel to steady myself. It’s already August. School

  will be starting in a few weeks.

  The Other Guy

  NAOMI FINALLY GIVES UP.

  “Okay, okay,” she says. “Jason is not my brother.”

  Spencer folds his arms and waits.

  “But I wasn’t cheating on you; I was cheating on him.”

  I’m sitting in the backyard—feet up, beer in hand—

  while Naomi and Spencer talk it out in the house. They

  know I’m right here on the other side of the screen door

  but make no effort to lower their voices. I look away, look

  up into the giant Japanese maple spreading its branches

  over the yard.

  “Say what?”

  “Jason and I have been together for two years, but he

  travels a lot and I get lonely.”

  “So I’m the other guy.”

  “Yes.”

  “And… what the fuck, Naomi?”

  “I know. I’m sorry. I can’t choose. How am I supposed

  to choose?”

  THEN WE’D BE HAPPY

  Suddenly all is quiet.

  The silence continues so I finish my beer and go inside

  for another. I don’t see Naomi and Spencer, but I can hear

  them in the bedroom.

  Not their voices but the sounds they make.

  Did not see that coming.

  137

  Nita Tries Humor