A Previous Engagement (29 page)

“Have you been here before?” He asks the air, still buried in the menu. I shake my head silently, but it doesn’t seem to matter that he can’t hear or see me. He excels at conducting a one-sided conversation, which is useful because I often have trouble thinking of something to say to him. “How did you find it?”

“Phantom Gourmet said it has a comfortable ambiance,” I answer, staring at the back of Mark’s menu. Ciao Bella’s “contemporary, artistic décor” is just as advertised, but sitting near the window makes me feel a bit exposed to the pedestrians trudging through the snow on Newbury Street. Granted, the street is mostly devoid of foot traffic in January, so it’s not so bad.

Ciao Bella, on the other hand, is warm, friendly, and busy. The perfect place to conduct an abrupt—and possibly awkward—breakup conversation. The server takes our order uneventfully, as though we are any regular couple out to dinner. Mark asks for the Veal Parmigiano and a glass of wine. I request the Chicken Marsala and a Diet Coke, then pass on the salad, as usual.

“Are you ever going to try something new?” Mark asks. Picking on my eating habits is another of his Cons, but I try to shrug it off this time. Stick to the plan, Grace, and you’ll make it out alive.

“Why? I like Chicken Marsala.”

“Right, I know.” Mark takes my hand across the table. “But you always
order it.”

And what’s the problem with that?
I want to say. “So?” I say instead, the epitome of eloquence. Bernsie and I have this argument all the time. Keeping with tradition, I use my standard defense against Mark. “At least I know I’ll enjoy my meal.”

“All right.” I hate when he uses that patronizing tone, a prominent feature of the Con list—emboldened and underlined, obviously. It’s enough to push me over the edge tonight.

“Mark, we have to talk,” I blurt out with completely inappropriate timing. I planned to wait for dessert, because bad news pairs best with tiramisu, but he’s getting on my nerves. It’s time to end this before it gets messy.

“I know,” he grins devilishly. He—what now? “I have a surprise for you.” Con.

Son of a bitch. My own sudden outbursts are surprising enough for one evening. Maybe for one week. This is not the plan. This is not the
freaking
plan!

Mark’s surprises are never a success. Last week, he showed up unexpectedly on my doorstep with flowers. Of course, since I couldn’t see him behind the gigantic bouquet, I panicked. Swinging my arms about in my best Jackie Chan-inspired moves, I karate chopped him, obliterating the bouquet into a million tiny, colorful petals. A month or so before that tragic episode, Mark brought me to see a movie without letting me read the review first. It turned out to be pretty gory, which grossed me out, and I vomited into our popcorn. Sure, I appreciate all of Mark’s romantic gestures and sweet surprises; I just don’t handle them well.

Before I can tell Mark to save it for his next girlfriend, my whole life flashes before my eyes in a series of Dewey-decimalized library shelves, color-coded file cabinets and alphanumerical binders. He settles on one knee, offering me a square velvet box. He’s talking, but I can’t hear him because my brain is swimming in a hot tub, complete with bubbling jets and whirlpool. As he opens the box, my vision blurs. Mark grins, waiting for me to say something, and gives me the sappy
I-love-you
face he saves for important moments.

“Um, well…Uh…” I only realize I haven’t said any real words when I see Mark hasn’t moved. Nothing is going as planned, which disturbs me on a level normal people do not understand. “Mark.” I say his name with reproach, sending a slight twitch through his left eyebrow.

“What do you say, Grace?” He holds the open box up a little higher, as though my eyes will like its contents from a closer angle. The overhead lights reflect off the gold. I turn away.

“No,” I whisper in stunned disbelief. To my horror, he doesn’t get up or even look upset. Instead, Mark still grins broadly, flashing those beautifully-aligned, pearly Pro-column white teeth at me. He really is a good-looking guy, with that square jaw and the playful glint in his eye. His dark hair, his golden eyes, and
that damned sexy smile
.
I once thought I could love him. It never happened.

Good looks aren’t enough for me. I need personality and passion; someone who’ll take risks without being too risky; someone who’s confident without being cocky; someone who won’t try to “fix” me. Not only is Mark lacking several of these imperatives, but he also has a number of inexcusable Cons, not the least of which is his poor performance in the bedroom. Suffice it to say I only like my surprises in
one arena.

I swallow hard and look him in the eye. “I can’t marry you.”

“What?” Mark asks through his smiling teeth, frozen under the glares of several restaurant patrons. “What did you say? That’s not what I—”

“I said I can’t marry you,” I string the words together with great difficulty, motivated only by the desire to cease the unwarranted stares. “I don’t love you, Mark.”

Now,
now
he gets what I’m saying, rising to his feet and snapping the velvet box closed in one fluid movement. “You also don’t listen very well.”

“I’m sorry, Mark. I wanted to tell you.” I pull off a stray thread stuck to my cloth napkin, keeping my eyes averted. The table shakes as Mark sits in his chair, slamming the ring box down and drumming his fingers loudly against the table. “It’s not going to work out between us.”

When I look up at him, Mark’s face is distorted in an unsettling grimace. I feel bad, I do, but I can’t think of anything to say. Speechless, par for the course when the situation doesn’t go my way, I gawk at him.

“So what finally did it?” he says abruptly, locking his eyes with mine. Oh, he’s
angry
. “What does your list say? What’s my inexcusable con
,
Grace?”

I squeeze my feet tighter around my handbag on the floor. My trusty Book of Lists hides within it, the Mark Preston list safely concealed in its pages. No one reads my lists. No one. The thought is enough to lower my defenses for a moment. “How did you know about that?”

“Bernsie told me,” Mark says, narrowing his gaze. I’ll make a list of
Reasons to Kill My Best Friend
when I leave the restaurant. If
I leave the restaurant. “What does it say?”

“Nothing. It doesn’t—”

“Grace, after six months, you have to give me a reason. You can’t just dump me because the mood strikes you. Now spill.” Mark swigs the remnants of his wine glass. Then he stares right through me.

Swallowing, I squeeze my eyes closed and try to find the courage to answer him. He’s got a point. All dump
ees
want a reason. As a frequent dump
er
, I should’ve thought of that. I’ll add that pointer to
Things to Say During a Breakup
later. For now, I’ve got to come up with something.

My eyes pop open as the perfect answer settles on my tongue. Mark’s expression changes at the sudden movement. I have his full attention.

“Well, Mark,” I square my shoulders. He raises one dark eyebrow in expectation. “You snore.”

****

An hour later, Bernsie is eating Mark’s dinner. Loudly. With her mouth open.

“This is amazing
,
” she says blissfully. To Bernsie, everything is amazing. I’ve tried to explain that overusing a word dilutes its meaning, but she insists. Usually by telling me that my bad attitude is amazing
.
For the rest of the night, I’m choosing my battles wisely.

“Shut it, Bernsie,” I say coldly, throwing one of Coco’s squeaky toys at her. The dog goes ballistic, leaping across the room in a white, hairy blur to fetch the purple squirrel, or whatever it is. Coco is an eight-pound something-or-other Bernsie brought home from the Animal Rescue League about a year ago. She looks more like a monkey than a dog—Con—but she’s sometimes useful for torturing Bernsie—Pro. For example, right now, as Coco returns and tries to drop the slobbery toy rodent into Bernsie’s food container.

“Coco, stop,” she says sternly, maneuvering away from the yipping dog. “Go play with your hippo over there.”

“That thing is a hippo?”

“Whatever. Coco, no!” Bernsie struggles with her precious pet for a few moments before shoving a mangled rawhide into the dog’s mouth. Content, Coco settles into the couch and chews away. “Sorry.”

“It’s all right,” I say, wringing my hands in my lap.

Even with my Mark-dumping objective achieved, the chaotic circumstances still bother me. After I admitted the truth to him, he stormed from the restaurant, leaving me to awkwardly ask for our food to-go and pay the bill. I’m too bothered to eat anything, Chicken Marsala or otherwise. Instead, I’ve surrendered it all to Bernsie’s incredible bottomless pit. Honestly, I don’t understand how this girl can eat anything she pleases and stay so damn thin. The mere thought of dessert makes my butt expand to a new jean size, so living with Bernsie’s voracious appetite is sometimes an intimidating Con, but always a Pro when you’re cleaning the fridge.

But I’ve been forbidden to track the
Pros & Cons of Bernadette Shaw
since about ten years ago. It’s a long story.

“Stop doing that.” Bernsie sits up straight, waving her fork at me in an idle threat of violence. “No internal listing in my presence.”

I sigh heavily. “Speaking of which, could you please stop telling all of my boyfriends about the lists? That’s three in a row now. It’s getting old.”

“Well, I think they should know what they’re dealing with. You’re completely neurotic. And a borderline psychopath.”

“Ouch,” I say, blinking. “That’s a little harsh.”

She casually waves off my indignation. “So talk to me.” She sets aside the empty Styrofoam that once contained Mark’s dinner. Coco tries to sneak up and steal it, but Bernsie pushes her off the couch. “How did it go? What did Captain Ego say?”

“I think he took it well… Better than I thought.” I tell her the important points, assuring her Mark did not overturn the table and punch the host on his way out the door. He’s not violent, and he’d never do those things, but Bernsie’s got an overactive imagination. Reaching into my pocket, I pull out the velvet box, left behind in his irate rush toward the door.

“That’s good,” Bernsie says, unconvinced. “Ooh! What’s that?”

I toss it to her and she catches it before Coco can snap it out of the air. “He was in the process of proposing when I freaked out. I panicked, Bernsie. I didn’t expect that.” I exhale, dropping my head into my hands.

She pops the box open and immediately starts giggling.

“Come on,” I straighten up. She doubles over with laughter, as she closes the box and tosses it back to me. “It’s not funny. I was humiliated.”

“You’re about to be even more humiliated.” Bernsie wipes away a tear from the corner of her eye, her giggles finally subsiding. “Open the box, Grace, and really look at it.”

“Cubic zirconia?” I venture, staring at the blue velvet lid nervously. I don’t want to look inside and make my night seem any more real. I can’t face the diamond, or imitation bling, inside this box. But Bernsie insists, leaning over to smack my knee. “Fine, fine. Stop hitting me.”

Wincing, I lift the lid and peek through one half-opened eye.

“All the way,” she says. Another giggle escapes her lips.

When the box top pops up, it takes a moment for my eyes to register what’s inside. Expecting commitment jewelry, my brain can’t process anything else, especially not the shape of a shiny new key.

“What is this?” I breathe out the words, half to myself.

“It’s a key to his apartment, you idiot. He wasn’t asking you to marry him.” She suppresses another round of chuckles, pulling down the corners of her mouth with force.

“He wanted me to move in?” I stare at her for a moment, twirling the golden key between my fingers. “I am an idiot.”

“Don’t beat yourself up too bad, Grace. You still needed to break it off, just maybe not as frantically as you did.” She shrugs as I drop the key back into the box, stunned to total silence. “So what now?”

“Back to singlehood,” I sigh, lying back against the chenille pillows that Bernsie’s mom made. They’re soft and squishy, like little pink, puffy marshmallows. I love them. I’m staying right here. “Maybe I’ll take a break from my lists.”

Bernsie snorts in disbelief. And who can blame her? I’ve said this many times before and have yet to follow through. I can’t help my need for the lists, what they signify to me, and the control they help me exert over my surroundings. I’m drawn to the bulleted, numbered, alphabetized organization of thoughts.

I think more clearly with a list in hand, whether it’s picking which stock to buy or deciding what to cook for dinner. I’ve made lists comparing my top colleges, my top job prospects, my top apartment picks, my top TV shows, my top bridesmaid dresses just in case
,
and my top haircuts. That’s how I chose to attend Boston College, work at Creative Celebrations, live in this Brighton apartment with Bernsie, watch
American Idol
, keep a magazine clipping of that gorgeous Alfred Angelo gown, and request this adorable pixie cut from my list-selected hairdresser. Is it a lot of work? Sure. Is it worth it? Always.