How to Be Single (24 page)

“Wow, I guess you must like flowers,” Sam said, sort of awkwardly, looking around. For a moment Georgia saw a little bit of the insecurity she had seen on their first date. Her plan was already working; she had caught her enemy off guard. Georgia acted out an “embarrassed fluster” with the ease of Julia Roberts.

“Oh, those…it's a long…guys…you know, sometimes they get, you know…overenthusiastic. They're nice though, aren't they?”

“They're beautiful.”

“But yours are beautiful, too, oh my God. Beautiful. Let me put them in water.”

Georgia took Sam's minuscule bouquet and put the six sad roses in a vase. She couldn't have predicted he would have brought her flowers; that was just a little gift from the heavens.

“So how have you been? Good? Busy, I'm sure,” Georgia asked as she put the roses out on the counter.

“Yes. Definitely busy. But it's nice to be here.”

“I'm so glad you're here. It's hard making plans with so much going on for the both of us. It's amazing this was even able to happen. Please, have a seat.”

Georgia motioned to the stool by the counter of her beautiful open kitchen. He sat down as commanded and she gave him a glass of Shiraz. This time he would be the one sitting while she was standing. While she put the finishing touches on the meal, they laughed as she told stories of disastrous meals she had made in her day. So far, a great date.

Then Sam told a story about one of his kids. It was rather involved, about a parent of one of the kids on his son's Little League team. It was an amusing story, and he was telling it confidently. Georgia was laughing when the phone rang. Like clockwork.

“I'll let it go to voice mail. Keep going, please.”

“So the man went crazy, screaming and yelling, and he had this ice cream in his hand…” Just then, a desperate male voice came out of Georgia's answering machine.

“Hey, Georgia, this is Hal. Just wanted to let you know I had a great time last night. I hope I'll get to see you again soon. How about Wednesday? Are you free Wednesday? I can't stop thinking about—”

Georgia “raced” over to the machine. “I'm so sorry, it's…I thought I'd turned down the machine…” She adjusted the phone, then turned to Sam, an actual blush on her cheeks. “I'm sorry. Continue, please.”

Sam just looked at her, a little surprised.

“Wow. He's got it bad.”

“No, it's just, we went to this play that was really funny and it just was a great…never mind…it's not—please, what happened with the ice cream?”

Sam stood up from his stool and leaned on the counter, him on one side of it, her on the other. Suddenly, the counter seemed like a big desk and he was on a job interview. Or an audition.

Sam laughed nervously. “Right. So anyway, the coach told him that if he didn't calm down, he was going to kick his kid off the team for good. The guy took the ice-cream cone and just flung it right at the coach, like a two-year-old. Then his kid just ran over to him and said…”

Just then the answering machine picked up and another man's voice was heard, deep and commanding—the voice of a CIA operative or president of the United States.

“Hey. Georgia, this is Jordan. I really enjoyed our having drinks the other night and I was hoping I could see—” Georgia feigned surprise and irritation at herself.

“I'm so sorry, I must have turned the ringer off instead of the machine, this is so rude…” She went to the phone and fiddled with some more buttons.

“It's off now. It's completely off,” Georgia said sheepishly. “I'm
so
sorry.”

“It's fine. No problem,” Sam said. Georgia noticed that Sam was truly flustered at this point. He didn't even comment on this particular man's message, and Georgia chose not to explain it. She thought it was best to let the other man's desire hang in the air.

“So what did his kid say?” she asked sweetly.

Sam looked at Georgia and then back down at the counter. “Nothing. It was nothing.”

“Well, dinner's ready anyway.”

They began eating, but everything was different. For one thing, Sam was now really looking at her. Women spend so much time wondering how the men they're with feel about them; they'll analyze emails, replay phone messages. But the simple fact is that all you have to do is watch how he looks at you. If he looks at you as if he doesn't want to take his eyes off you for fear that you might disappear, then you are with a man who really likes you. And now, that was how Sam was looking at Georgia. At the pub he barely made eye contact. Now he was staring at her, hard.

Georgia had pulled off a feat that Wall Street brokers and economists would be in awe of. In just one hour, she had raised her stock by manufacturing “demand” out of thin air, and it looked like there might be a bidding war. She made herself seem to be the one thing that everything in our culture wants her to believe she is not: valuable. And all it took was a couple of hundred dollars' worth of flowers and phone calls from the gay couple down the hall. She watched Sam try to impress her with his jokes, nervously running his fingers through his hair. She smiled to herself when he touched her arm to make a point or she felt his eyes follow her as she went to get more wine. At the end of the date he only stopped kissing her when Georgia told him it was time to go.

Now, you may ask, did Georgia feel badly that it was all a lie? That she had to create an entire reality in order to feel good about herself? Did she feel badly that none of this was true? That she actually sent herself flowers to get some midwestern cornhead's attention? No. All she felt in this moment was proud. She saw reality and she refused to kid herself about it. With clearheadedness and foresight, she'd understood the power shift that had occurred with Sam and his new view of the world and then did something about it. She made herself into a “catch” and she felt that someone should give her a medal for it. Women are fucked, the numbers are against them, time is against them, and if their only recourse is to completely fabricate a personal life in order to jump up a notch in the brutal dating pecking order, then that's just fine.

Sam called her the next day. His voice sounded nervous, probably wondering if hot, sought-after Georgia would even take his call.

“Hey, Georgia. It's Sam.”

“Hi, Sam!” Georgia said, warmly. “How are you?”

“Great, great,” Sam said, trying to sound cheerful, but not too eager. “Listen, I just wanted to let you know that I had a really great time last night and I was hoping I could see you again soon.”

Georgia had already decided what she was going to do when this call came (which she knew it would). “Listen, Sam, I had a great time, too. But I just got off the phone with Hal, and we've decided to see each other exclusively.”

Sam cleared his throat. “Oh. Okay. Wow. Well, I'm really disappointed, I'm not going to lie, but I appreciate you telling me.”

She knew her decision was a risky one. She had cut off the only dating prospect she had. And, as I've made clear, we love the dating prospects. But at the end of the day, Georgia wanted to be with someone who didn't have anything to prove to himself, who didn't need to play the field, and didn't need competition to notice how valuable Georgia was. Besides, flowers are really expensive.

Unfortunately, Serena had let go of her apartment, something no one in New York should ever do, whether for a relocation, a marriage, or a baby. Only if you're dead, then maybe you can give it up. Even then, try not to.

But Serena did. So now she was hairless and homeless. As I had sublet my apartment, and Serena didn't have money for a hotel, she didn't really know what to do. So she called up the one person who would understand the depression into which she was about to plunge. She called Ruby and asked if she could crash at her house. Ruby, being Ruby, immediately agreed.

When I heard what happened, via a text message, I thought it might be best to do a conference call. I even asked Georgia to come by to make sure the two of them were going to be okay together. I worry sometimes.

Alice and I were still in Sydney, packing to take our trip to Tasmania. Ruby was sitting at her dining room table with Serena and Georgia. They were all on speakerphone and I shouted my disbelief.

“A guy who's not supposed to be having sex with anyone was having sex with at least five different women!?”

“Who were all more than happy to share him. THEY WERE ALL MORE THAN HAPPY TO SHARE HIM,” Serena shouted back.

Georgia just shook her head. “Wow. Now celibate guys are having harems. It's the end of the world.”

“Maybe they should just start euthanizing us all,” Ruby said, almost to herself.

Everyone gasped, even me, on the phone.

“What?!” I said, hoping that my connection had made me misunderstand.

“I mean it,” Ruby said matter-of-factly. “Just like with the dogs. Maybe the mayor's office should just start killing off all women who are ill-tempered, not in perfect health, have bad teeth, or whatever. To give the good candidates a better chance at finding a suitable home.”

We were all stunned into silence. Clearly things at the animal shelter had started to get to Ruby.

Serena finally asked, “You're the one I've decided to live with to cheer me up?”

Georgia said, “Ruby, I don't know you very well, so please forgive me if this comes out wrong, but if you don't pick up the phone and quit that volunteer job right this minute I will have to punch you in the face.”

“Seriously, Ruby, that was the worst thing I have ever heard anyone say in my entire life,” I added.

Georgia started to laugh. “I can't believe you actually said that.”

Serena started to giggle. “You actually suggested that the city start
gassing
us.”

Ruby threw her head down on the table and started laughing, starting to see how far she'd fallen. “Oh my God, and I still kind of believe it. I'm losing my mind!”

Alice and I were in our hotel in Australia, listening to them all scream with laughter.

Georgia took out her cell phone. “Gimme the number. Of the shelter. Now.”

Ruby did as she was told. Georgia dialed her cell phone and handed the phone to Ruby. Ruby began to speak.

“Hello? This is Ruby Carson. I'm a volunteer there. I wanted to let you know that I won't be coming in again. It's very bad for my mental health, thank you.” She quickly hung up as Ruby and Georgia burst into applause.

“I couldn't hear—did Ruby just quit her volunteer job?” I asked from the other side of the world.

“Yes. Yes, she did,” Georgia said. “Now we just have to get Serena a job and our mission for tonight will be accomplished.”

“Can you go back to your old job? With the movie star?” Alice asked.

Serena shrugged. “I'm sure they hired someone else.”

I piped in on my end. “But Serena, from everything you told me about them, they sounded really nice. You seemed to really like them.”

“It's true,” Serena said into the phone. “I've actually missed them a little. Joanna really was sweet to me. And Robert was really fun to be around.”

Georgia got out her phone. “Call them and find out. What's their number?”

Serena hesitated.

“Please, I'm not going to sell it to
People
magazine. I'm just trying to get you a job.”

Serena gave Georgia the number. Georgia dialed and handed the phone to Serena.

“Hello, Joanna? This is Serena.” Everyone watched as Serena listened to the voice on the other end. Serena's eyes began to light up.

“Well, actually, it's funny you ask. It didn't really work out for me at the yoga center. So I was wondering if you were…really? Oh. Wow. Great. Yeah, I'll come by tomorrow and we can talk about it. Okay. See you then.”

Serena closed Georgia's phone, looking puzzled. “They don't have anyone.”

Georgia clapped and said, “That's amazing!”

“Yeah,” Serena said. “But I don't know…she sort of sounded sad.”

“What?” I said, the sound having dipped out for a minute.

Serena leaned into the phone and said again, louder, “
She sounded sad.
”

Back to Australia

The flight to Tasmania was only an hour and a half long. I imagined it would be an island wilderness with kangaroos hopping around, and aboriginal tribespeople greeting us with their didgeridoos. But Hobart, the capital of Tasmania, is quite civilized. It's a quaint, colonial-feeling town on a picturesque harbor. Short sandstone buildings line the streets, renovated into pubs and shops. Sadly, I even saw a Subway sandwich shop there.

I had emailed Fiona before we left Sydney, telling her that we'd be coming. She kindly offered to meet us at the local pub to talk. I was still suspecting she had an agenda—being a New Yorker, I had to assume she couldn't be doing this just to be nice.