Ginny Blue's Boyfriends Read online

  Apparently Nate forgot whatever he wanted from me because moments later I could hear his off-key singing permeate the air. Heading downstairs I wandered into the tiny U-shaped kitchen of my two-bedroom rented condo and popped some bread in the toaster. Thinking about Nate depressed me, so instead I concentrated on Jackson Wright. Transference of anger is a good thing, I often think.

  So ... yeah ... Jackson. As I’ve said, he’s an old classmate with whom I snuggled naked but didn’t actually consummate anything worth noting. Of course it consumed me at the time, though I hid my feelings, and once or twice I felt kind of melancholy over the whole damn thing, but I was a kid. It was really nothing. I moved to California and attended a junior college while Jackson headed to Eugene and the University of Oregon. When I was back in the Portland area for vacations and the like, and he was home, we would often run into each other. We have always been kind of on again/off again friends. Nothing earth-shattering.

  But then Jackson moved to California and, through me, was introduced to my circle of friends. Jill was particularly smitten with Jackson until he paid her absolutely no attention and/or made some clever, albeit slightly cruel comment about an issue tender to her psyche, which pissed her off. I’ve never quite heard the full extent of it. He’s actually managed this with all my friends. Daphne can’t say his name without curling her lip. None of them got all that involved, as far as I can tell, although there was talk of actual thumping bedsprings with CeeCee before the disillusionment. It’s amazing how Jackson keeps cropping up like the proverbial bad penny. When my friends and I meet at Sammy’s on Saturday mornings—a loosely formed complaint club—someone invariably makes a comment on Jackson. Reliving the Jackson fallout every week would be excruciating, except that our Saturday morning meetings often have a tendency to be postponed. If someone can’t make the Saturday meeting, which is almost always, things fall apart. I made a silent vow to be better about seeing my friends. Jill, Daphne, and CeeCee were sometimes all that stood between me and despair over the male sex.

  My roommate, bedmate, and what currently felt like cellmate, whose footsteps I’d heard on the stairs, suddenly joined me in the kitchen. Nate’s dark hair was damp and he was wrapped in a white terrycloth bathrobe.

  “Hey,” he said, heading to the refrigerator as I buttered my toast.

  “Hey,” I answered.

  We’re known for our scintillating conversation.

  “I’m heading to work,” he added.

  “Me, too.”

  “What are you doing today?”

  I swallowed a piece of toast with difficulty and murmured, “Nothing much. Gotta check with the caterer for that Waterstone Iced Tea job.”

  He grunted acknowledgment. Nate has about as much interest in my career as I have in his. I left without another word. I was in my Explorer and scooting east on the 10 freeway before he’d picked up—hopefully—his shorts and begun to dress.

  It was an exceptionally brilliant late October morning in sunny southern California. You could actually see the Hollywood hills and almost make out the Hollywood sign. I was heading toward the downtown business district and suddenly remembered how Jackson had once said that he wouldn’t be able to stand Los Angeles if it weren’t for the rare, bright morning of clear air that surprised Angelinos and tourists alike. He was right on that one. He’s been right on a lot of things. Probably why “Wright” is his last name, I thought sourly. It’s infuriating how right he is and, because he’s a man, you just have to be careful how many times you point out this fact. I never would tell Jackson he’s right, but then, luckily, I hadn’t seen him in a long while so it was a moot point. I never told Nate he’s right either, although that’s because I wondered if he truly ever was.

  I nearly slapped both of my faces right there. Good grief. Nate was a good guy. A great guy. I was the one having the problem.

  Better not to dwell on that and send my self-esteem into a tailspin. Instead I soaked in the pretty day. LA is something else. People either love it or hate it. Weather’s good, weather’s better, weather’s sometimes too smoggy. Big deal. I’ve spent the last ten years living in Santa Monica after my final anemic semester. Currently, I’m debating on signing up for a film editing class at USC. Don’t ask me why because I have no answer for that. I’m a production manager for film and television, which sounds a lot more glamorous than it is since I’m basically the person who keeps the job moving forward and who gets screamed at by the actual producer if something goes wrong. I am not the producer, therefore I am not the person in command. Nor am I the director, who is the person with attitude and therefore the real power behind the throne. I guess you’d say I’m midlevel management; top-level stress. This puts me about two levels above a PA, that is, a production assistant, which is synonymous with “the person everybody else shits on.” I’ve been that person. I know of what I speak.

  The caterer I was meeting was one everyone raved about, but also one I’d never actually met. The meeting wasn’t all that important, but I’d wanted to escape from Nate and I figured I might as well get it over with.

  Cars tore along on all sides of me. We were moving at a nice clip. The 10 can back up but it’s not as bad as the 405, which is a nightmare at damn near all hours and I avoid it like the plague. I’ve actually been stopped cold on the 405 more times than I’d like to count. Once, the only thing that kept me sane was watching the couple in the Nissan next to me screaming at each other in fury one moment, making out the next, and then having sex, she on his lap, her head thrown back and screaming in ecstacy while he bounced around beneath her. All before we moved forward. Afterwards I wished I’d had a cigarette. The hell of it is, I don’t smoke.

  Maybe I should take it up, I mused now, throwing a glance to the silver BMW convertible on my right. The girl behind the wheel wore sunglasses and that bored “you can’t impress me” look refined by southern Californians. A cigarette dangled from her lips. Very sexy, really. My eyes water from smoke, though, so I don’t think I could pull that one off. And let’s be honest, smoking is bound to take up too much time. When I think about all the smokers I’ve witnessed searching for lighters and matches, or cupping their hands around the ends of their cigarettes to keep the breeze from blowing them out, it actually raises my anxiety level. I worry for them. What if they don’t get it lit? What if they break out into some kind of nicotine-deprived fit? What if they turn their frustration on me? No, it’s really not worth it. And I’m basically cheap anyway, so I would never be able to stand the expense. Oh, and if I were called back to set, just as soon as I lit one and then had to stub out the end before I even took two drags ... That would just plain hurt.

  I do so need a vice, however, and alcohol consumption is not cutting it. I’d love to indulge in wild, illicit sex, but I seem to be totally disinterested in nearly every man who crosses my path these days. This worries me slightly.

  My cell phone chirped. I snatched it up in mid-tweet. “Talk to me,” I said.

  Jill stated flatly, “Goddamn men.”

  “Is it Ian?”

  “The fucking asshole!”

  The fucking asshole was Ian Cooper, Jill’s boyfriend. He used to be the man she cooed over while she walked six inches above the floor, stars in her eyes, little red hearts zinging rapturously from that beating, lovestruck muscle in her chest as she floated along in a haze of drunken joy. During this time they were inseparable, so we collectively named them “Jill-Ian,” which unfortunately may now be difficult to completely eradicate. But Ian had, as it turned out, made a grave error in the game of love. He had lied. Deliberately and with malice aforethought, at least according to Jill. He had taken another girl to Belize exactly one week before he started sleeping with Jill. Ian had patiently pointed out that this shady event had occurred while he and Jill were still technically friends, and he had also added that he and said girl had not actually had sex on that trip. It was, again according to Ian, one of those unforeseen disasters in the making: a vacation plan
ned and prepaid while the romance was still hot and heavy, only to then loom over them like some Sword of Damocles as the relationship sped rapidly down, down, down. The two ex-lovebirds had, of course, gone on the trip anyway and had enjoyed a perfectly terrible time.

  Here’s the lie: Ian told Jill that he took this jaunt with a guy-friend named Worth rather than risking the fallout from Jill. Unfortunately, she learned of the lie six months later when Worth, who did not live in LA, came for a surprise visit and was not properly cued by Ian. When asked by Jill, “How was the trip to Belize?” Worth answered with a snotty, “I hate foreign countries. And I especially hate South American countries. I wouldn’t go there if I was flaccid as a cooked noodle and it was the only place on earth selling Viagra. If I’m going to leave the country I’m going to Hawaii!”

  If I’d been there when this conversation took place, I would have pointed out that Hawaii wasn’t exactly leaving the country. Jill, however, was too incensed to pick up on this nuance, and from all accounts, Worth is a snobbish moron who, luckily for him, possesses enough money to make up for his horrifyingly midget pea brain—a harsh but true fact of social life in greater Los Angeles, which is undoubtedly where Worth is from. In my opinion he is simply Worth Less. I do not know his last name and do not plan to learn it. My mother would point out that I was nicknaming outside of the Ex-Files, but the name just begged to be used. Besides, I don’t strictly follow my own rules.

  Jill, outraged by Ian’s deception, accused him of lying about the trip straightaway. Trapped, he shrugged his shoulders and admitted it. He’s been the fucking asshole ever since.

  But they still sleep together.

  I said, “What’s he done now?”

  “He’s bought me a ring. A diamond ring,” she added significantly.

  My jaw dropped. “An engagement ring?” The subject of marriage turns my palms clammy. I have this conviction that it will never, ever happen to me, and though I’m fairly certain I will never want it, one never knows... .

  “I think so.” She inhaled and exhaled shakily. “I just—want to strangle him.”

  “That doesn’t sound like a ‘yes.’ ”

  “What the hell is he doing? I can’t marry anyone. He knows that. He’s just doing this because he wants to make a point.”

  “Pretty dangerous point to make if you don’t mean it.”

  “Stop being so sane. You know how I hate that.”

  “Do I sound sane? I don’t feel sane. And everything you’re saying is insane.” I shook my head and tried to concentrate on traffic. The girl in the BMW lackadaisically stubbed out her cigarette in the ash tray as we hurtled merrily along at an easy 75 miles per hour. You had to love the 10 when there was no traffic. “What do you want to do?”

  “Blue?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Blue, are you there? Blue?”

  The phone went dead in my ear. There are mysterious blank zones on the 10 that cut off cell phones with a distinct click. It’s as if there’s this roguish god, watching, chuckling, touching a magic finger into cell-phone-space and breaking the connection. I glanced upward, expecting a grinning Cheshire cat face to emerge from the puffy clouds, high in the sky. God, it’s a nice day, I thought, and I’m sure my mind would have drifted to Jackson again if the cell phone hadn’t gone through a series of aborted half-rings. Jill was trying to call back and unable to get through.

  Good. I really didn’t feel like talking any longer. Jill has already received two previous marriage proposals. She’s clocking them in at about one per year. The last time I came close to that, if you discount my current live-in relationship with Nate, was when I was dating Dave the Devout, and I was so afraid he would somehow suck me into his obsessive God thing that it makes me shudder to even remember those days.

  Jill is about thirty pounds lighter than I am. She is thin, thin, thin, and would never believe it if you told her she needs to gain weight. The hell of it is: she looks pretty good by today’s unhealthy standards. She’s a few inches shorter than I am and a whole lot narrower. She’s cute and smart and pugnacious and when I’m standing next to her I feel like a water buffalo. We definitely attract different types of men, but hers always seem to be ready to tie the knot.

  The phone was still in my hand. I fiddled with it. Maybe I should call Daphne for moral support. She’d been going through a romantic dry spell recently and needed tons of reassurance. Her problem is she always hankers after the wrong kind of guy. She’s like a magnet for losers. Currently she’s hankering after some guy she works with at Starbucks. Both Daphne and Mr. Starbucks are aspiring actors. Bad karma, I say. Never date an actor. Period. I suppose you can turn that around and make it sound as if I don’t want anyone to date Daphne either, but that’s not entirely true. Daphne is better than most actors. Less egocentric. Less needy. But then, I’ve done the dating-the-actor thing. I’ve even dated a so-called “famous” actor. It just doesn’t work. Too weird. I was at a party once, not long after Mr. Famous Actor and I broke up, and all I had to do was mention that I’d had a relationship with him and the guy I was speaking to suddenly started choking on his shrimp roll and was outta there faster than you can say Chinese Take Out. No one, but NO ONE, wanted to be the guy directly after Mr. Famous Actor. I’ve had to eighty-six that relationship from my personal history just to get guys to talk to me. As far as I’m concerned, Mr. Famous Actor is not a member of the Ex-Files.

  I punched out Daphne’s number then hit the “send” button. A moment later I cut the connection. What was I thinking? I didn’t want to hear her moan about the Starbucks/would-be-actor guy again, did I?

  I set the phone down.

  The girl in the convertible removed her shades for a moment, then studiously put them back on. I did the proverbial double take. It’s Carmen Watkins, I thought, shaken. Carmen and I had met in college and she’d always been wealthy and snobby and gorgeous, apart from a rather prominent nose that she’d clearly had fixed in the intervening years. I’d truly thought the girl in the car was much younger than I was. It was a terrible shock to realize she was thirty-two as well. No way! She looked twenty-two.

  How could she?

  I’m not normally affected by the southern California overindulgence in plastic surgery but seeing the effects on Carmen got to me way down deep. Wondering if I needed therapy, I called Dr. Dick’s number.

  His receptionist answered on the third ring. “Offices of Dr. Richard Malcolm,” she said smoothly.

  “Hi, it’s Ginny Bluebell,” I said. Hearing my own name is easier now. For years I’d wondered if my mother had saddled me with this moniker from some primal need, maybe fueled by the same urge animals feel when they’re about to eat their young. But then, her last name is also Bluebell, so she was stuck, too. But Virgin-ia? No wonder her hair went when she caught me in bed with Jackson.

  “Is he in?” I asked.

  “He’s with someone right now,” she said. Was her tone as smug as I imagined? She’s never liked me. Probably because I, like many of Dr. Dick’s screwed up patients, I’m sure, tend to lose myself in a fantasy while on his couch. He’s just so great to look at. Tall, with long legs and pressed, light-blue denim jeans, a white shirt rolled up the forearms, serious blue eyes, dark, slightly wavy hair ... he’s gorgeous. Movie-star gorgeous in fact, but, well ... normal. Or as normal as any therapist can truly be, I suppose. I’ve tried for months to reveal my deepest, darkest secrets, but in his office I confess that all I manage to do is devise truly convoluted plots to get him into bed with me. He’s the guy with whom I’d really love to indulge in wild, illicit sex, but he appears to have scruples. He doesn’t want to screw around with one of his clients/patients. I’ve thought of quitting him, but that wouldn’t guarantee I’d ever see him again. Though I secretly and lustily drool over him, he seems genuinely disinterested in me.

  A true conundrum. One that could send me straight to the Zoloft if I had any around, which I don’t, because Dr. Dick won’t prescribe it to someone a
s “frightfully well adjusted” as I am. Go figure.

  “Would you like to make an appointment?” the receptionist asked briskly.

  “Umm ... no, not now. I’ll call back later.”

  She didn’t even respond. Just hung up. A true bitch, but she gets high marks for style.

  The caterer—and restauranteur—I was supposed to be meeting was named Liam Engleston. I knew him by his reputation: wonderful food, but high maintenance to the point of ionospheric. I was really doing this as a favor to the crew members who regarded him as some kind of gastronomical deity, but it worried me slightly because I’m not good at stroking egos, and even worse at frozen-smile groveling. Plus, we have a minimal budget on the job for feeding the production crew. Craft Services provides Red Vines and candy bars, and those are available all day. Gourmet/schmourmet. Chances were the lunch and possibly breakfast would be too rich for our budget, but at least I could say I’d tried.

  I strode into the building that housed Engleston’s restaurant, my fatalistic attitude all over my face. The restaurant was in the heart of the business district which meant it catered to the Suits. Spying several Suits twirling through the revolving door and riding the escalators to the mezzanine/restaurant level, I did a quick mental check of my own outfit. Not good. The business people were all as buttoned down as Wall Street bankers in this part of town while I was dressed in my jeans and turtleneck. I rode the escalator to the restaurant with an underlying feeling of anxiety. It was a rather stark atmosphere of black leather booths and ultracool, high-tech lighting. Glassware sparkled over the bar. Nothing about the place read “cheap,” so when Liam Engleston appeared I was already ready to say thanks, but no thanks, and vamoose.

  He shook my hand and passed a quick look over my getup. His nostrils flared ever so slightly.

  “Ms. Bluebell,” he greeted me with a stiff English accent, offering a handshake as warm and welcoming as an Alaskan cod. His lips had a way of curling around his words that had me somewhat mesmerized. I had to force myself not to stare. He wasn’t attractive in the least but I was fascinated anyway. It was kind of like stopping to watch a car wreck.