How to Be Single (32 page)

“Definitely,” Georgia said. Very casually.

She walked away from the coffee shop with a nice, relaxed stride because she knew Bryan would be watching her. But the minute she was inside her building she bounded up the four flights of stairs and into her apartment. No fire. No dead bodies. She walked quickly to her children's rooms. Beth was sound asleep. She breathed a huge sigh of relief and walked down the short hall and peeked into Gareth's room.

That's when time seemed to stop.

Gareth wasn't there. She raced to her room and was relieved to see him sitting on her bed, frightened but perfectly fine. It was what he said next that truly terrified Georgia.

“I called Daddy.”

Georgia took a deep breath, in a gasp. “What? Why did you do that?”

“I was frightened. You weren't here. I didn't know where you were.”

“But didn't you see my note? I left it on the pillow next to you! I said I was going to be right back.”

He shook his head, his little-boy fear turning into large droplets of tears practically jumping off his face.

“I didn't see it!” he wailed. “I didn't see it!”

Georgia grabbed him and held him tightly. She rocked him and kissed his head and tried to do whatever she could think of to make up to him for the last four minutes. She stayed there for what was probably ten minutes, possibly less, when she heard Dale burst in. Georgia put Gareth down and tried to head him off at the pass, running into the living room so he could see that she was home and everything was okay.

“I'm here, I'm here!” Georgia whispered emphathically. “Everything is fine.”

But Dale was not going to be placated so easily.

“Where the fuck were you? Are you out of your mind?”

Georgia took a few steps back. This was bad. Very bad.

“Seriously, Georgia, where the fuck were you?”

Georgia was dumbstruck; his fury and her blatant guilt left her with no words to use in her defense. “I…I…It was an emergency.”

“An emergency? What kind of emergency could make you leave your kids alone?
That's
the fucking emergency.”

It was then that Georgia started to cry. She didn't want to, she couldn't help it, but she did.

“I'm…sorry…it was just…”

“Was it some guy?” Dale walked toward her, menacingly. “Did you leave the house for some fucking guy?”

Georgia heard the way it sounded, heard her insanity in Dale's accusation. And she just cried harder.

“I'm sorry. Please. It won't happen again.”

“Damn right it won't happen again. I'm taking the kids, Georgia.”

Georgia immediately stopped crying, as if instinctively she knew that her full faculties were needed for this attack.

“What?”

“I'm hiring a lawyer. I want full custody. This is bullshit.”

Georgia let out a scream, but it also came out as “WHAT?”

“You heard me. It's over. The dropping them off with me whenever you have a hot date. The yelling at them all the time. The teachers say they look dirty, they're acting out at school. You obviously would rather be single and go out and get laid, so now's your chance.”

Georgia stammered. “You can't do that…you can't.”

Dale started to leave, but he turned back to point right at her. “You should be happy. You'll get to go out every fucking night of the week if you want to. Don't try to fight it, Georgia, send me a thank-you card instead.” And with that he walked out of the house. If he had looked to his left before he did, he would have seen Beth and Gareth standing in the doorway, having heard everything.

Georgia sat down at the kitchen table and started to let out a sob. She realized she had just endangered her children and now her own motherhood because of her desperation—the desperation that she had no idea how deeply she felt until it was too late.

O
n the plane from Singapore to Beijing, it felt as if Thomas and I were on the lam. Every moment we spent together now felt almost criminal; it was an act of rebellion against the agreement he and his wife had for their marriage. They were allowed to leave each other and their marriage for up to two weeks at a time. Now, he wanted more. It was like choosing to escape from a Club Med.

When he called his wife from our hotel room in Bali to tell her that he was going to be away a while longer, I had left the room. The whole thing really wasn't pretty. No matter how I tried to rationalize it, I was participating in something that was probably causing someone else anguish. I wasn't sure of this, because, as I said, I had left the room. When I returned, I couldn't help but ask him how it went.

Thomas, looking very serious, just said, “She wasn't happy.”

I didn't ask anything else.

So, now, going to Beijing, it all felt a little illicit, a tiny bit dirty, and somewhat dangerous. So of course some panic was to be expected. Right before we got on the plane I had taken a full Lexomil. But still, as we got up into the air, I began to feel a tightening in my chest. I'm not sure if Thomas was trying to distract me from a panic attack or if he was just trying to distract himself from his domestic concerns—but he decided to play the part of my research assistant on this trip. He had heard about my phone call from Candace, so I think he was also slightly concerned I wasn't getting enough work done. He began filling me in on what he had learned.

“This is a very interesting thing, I think, to find out about this woman drought. I think we must get to the bottom of this.” He glanced over at me, slightly worried. “The Lexomil should start working soon.”

There was a group of fifteen people, all together, chatting excitedly a few rows ahead of us. There seemed to be four couples and seven women traveling alone, all Americans. They were swapping photos and sharing stories. There were two others who appeared to be their guides. As I tried to slow down my breath and take my mind off my oncoming terror, I eavesdropped on their conversations.

I looked over at Thomas and whispered, “They're going to China to adopt children.” I nodded my head toward the group. Thomas looked up at them. I stared at the women who appeared to be without partners. They seemed so excited, as if they had won the lottery and were going to pick up their winnings.

“It's amazing, isn't it? They're choosing to be single mothers. I think it's very brave,” I said as my body started to relax.

Thomas looked at the women, and then back at me. “Do you want to have children, Julie?”

I tensed up again. “Well. I don't know. I think if I met the right person I would. I don't know if I could ever do it alone.”

The truth is, ever since I met Thomas I had been thinking about children. It was such a cliché, but it was true. I had met someone I loved and suddenly I was imagining having his children. I was embarrassed at how quickly I became so predictable. Of course, it was not a fantasy that ever got very far, since I quickly reminded myself that my beloved was already married. But it had engendered such startling new images in me: Thomas with me at the birth, us lying together in bed with a baby, or clapping at the child's first step. The idea of a man and a woman falling in love and raising a child together did right now seem like kind of a genius idea.

Thomas nodded. “You would make a very good mother.” He put his hand on my cheek. He kept it there a long time, and just gazed at me. I wanted to ask him if he wanted children. What his plans were for the future, for a family. He would make a fantastic father. But I reminded myself that none of those plans would include me. So I broke away and closed my eyes. I started feeling a little sleepy.

Thomas decided to get some investigating done before everyone started sleeping or watching movies. There was a woman who I guessed was in her thirties who was sitting across the aisle from us. She appeared to be Chinese and did not have a wedding band on. Thomas leaned over to her and smiled.

“Excuse me, do you speak English?”

The woman looked up from the book she was reading.

“Forgive me for asking such a question, but my friend here has been traveling the world talking to women about what it's like to be single in their culture. She's going to Beijing now to talk to Chinese women. I was wondering if you might have any knowledge of this subject.”

The woman glanced over at me. I tried to put on the most trustworthy face I could, no matter how groggy I was. She was quite pretty, and looked sweet; possibly a little shy. I wondered if she would be offended at this brazen question.

“I do, yes. I'm single and I live in Beijing.”

Thomas turned to me, as if to give me a little nudge.

“Hi, my name is Julie.” I leaned over Thomas and extended my hand to her. She shook it.

“My name is Tammy. Nice to meet you. What is it that you would like to know?”

“Well, there have been reports in the news, that because of the one-child policy of the eighties, and all the girls that have been adopted, that there is now a woman drought in China, and the men are having a hard time dating.”

Tammy laughed and shook her head. “Maybe in the countryside, yes, but not in the cities, not at all.”

“Really?” Thomas asked.

“Really. The men have it so good in Beijing. They can date as much as they want, and when they do settle down, they often have mistresses. The rich ones at least.”

Even with my Lexomil, I started to get depressed. “Seriously?”

Tammy just nodded her head, amused. “Yes, unfortunately. Your theory is not correct at all.”

I leaned back on my chair. This was not what I had wanted to hear. I whispered to Thomas.

“So we're going all the way to China to find out that the men here have a hard time committing and like to cheat?”

Thomas laughed. “This is not good news—for us, or for the Chinese women.”

I leaned over Thomas again to talk to Tammy. This would be my last attempt at conversation before I passed out. “So what do you do about this?”

Tammy shrugged. “I never date Chinese men. I think they're awful.”

“Never?”

“I haven't had a Chinese boyfriend since I was a teenager. I only date foreigners. Australian, German, American. But never Chinese. Never.”

Thomas was interested as well. “So tell me, where do you meet these men?”

“I work for an American company, so my last boyfriend I met at the office. But there's also a bar I like to go to, Brown's, where there are a lot of expats.”

“Brown's?” Thomas repeated. “Like the color?”

She nodded. “Yes, it's in the Chaoyang District. It's a lot of fun.”

Thomas looked at me. “So, to Brown's tonight? Yes?”

“Yes,” I mumbled, and then fell asleep.

When we got out of the cab at our hotel in Beijing, it was quite a scene. We were staying at one of the nicer places in the center of the city. In front of us, some very fancy woman had gotten out of her big black car and twenty to thirty photographers snapped away as she walked into the lobby. We walked inside, right behind her, where there were another dozen important-looking people waiting to greet her officially. Then they whisked her away into an elevator, for what I assumed would be some kind of press conference. When we finally were allowed to walk up to the reception desk, I asked who the woman was.

“The vice president of Spain.”

This, it seems, was the perfect introduction to Beijing. Things were happening here, from the high-rises being built everywhere you turned your head, to the influx of businesses trying to get a piece of this growing global power, to the vice president of Spain stopping by for a visit. This was the new China. And Thomas and I had a very important job to do. I had to go to a bar tonight and talk to women about dating.

It was a little sad. Our first night in Beijing and we were having beers at an English pub and eating buffalo chicken wings. There was a DJ who was playing “Get Right with Me” by Jennifer Lopez and the place was packed with foreigners of all shapes and sizes. I heard German, British English, Australian English, American English. There were some Italians in the bunch and a couple of French people. And yes, some Chinese as well. The crowd seemed to be mainly in their thirties, and everyone was having a good time dancing, talking, and flirting.

Thomas was still taking his job as assistant cultural observer seriously, and soon enough he was talking to some German men at the bar. I let him go it alone, thinking he might be able to get more information out of them than I could.

A young woman, around twenty-five, came up to me and handed me her business card. Her name was Wei and her card said she was a “tourist consultant.”

“Hello, my name is Wei. Where are you from?”

“New York,” I said loudly, trying to be heard over the music.

“I love New York,” Wei said, laughing. “I love New York so much!” She laughed even louder. She had long black hair that went straight down her back and she was wearing a short black skirt and tall black suede boots. She couldn't have been cuter.

“Do you know that show
Sex and the City
? I love it so much!” Again, with much laughter. “Me? I am Samantha. That's who I am!”

I raised my eyebrows, understanding exactly what that meant, but not knowing exactly how to respond. “Oh, wow. That's great. So you must be having fun being single.”

She laughed again. “Yes. I love being single. I love it. I am so happy not to have to be married and having babies. I love my freedom!” She laughed again and pointed to her card that I was now holding.

“If you need any help while you're in Beijing, anything, you let me know. I work for a travel agent. We help people with everything they need.”

“Thank you, that's very nice of you.” But not wanting her to leave just yet, I added, “So, are you here for business tonight, or just to meet a nice expat boy?”

Wei laughed again loudly. “Both! You are so smart!”

I laughed with her, trying to be polite, and asked, “So, are you not so interested in Chinese men?”

Now Wei stopped laughing. Her eyebrows furrowed and she pursed her lips.

“Chinese men are boring. All they care about is money. They don't know how to communicate. They don't know how to be romantic.” Then she shook her head in disgust. “No, only Western men. They are much more fun.”

Wei looked over and saw a tall blond man that she knew. She started waving and laughing. “Ben! Ben!” She turned to me. “What do you do in New York?”

“Well, I was a book publicist, but now I'm sort of…”

“Really? I am writing a book about my crazy life in Beijing. Just like New York!”

“Wow, that's great,” I said enthusiastically.

“I must go, but I'll come back, okay?”

“Yes, of course.”

Wei ran up to the guy named Ben and gave him a big laughing hug.

Just then, Thomas came back. “Julie, I have been working very hard for you. We have much to discuss.” He pulled up two available bar stools and we sat.

“I spoke to two German men who said they were here to meet Chinese women.”

I smiled, enjoying his enthusiasm about this subject. “Really? What else?”

“They said that they like Chinese women more because they are more devoted than Western women. With their German women, they said, it's too much about power and negotiation. But with Chinese women, they let them be men, they don't try and change them.”

My eyebrows rose again. Thomas shrugged. “I'm just telling you what they told me.”

“Well, this really is perfect then. Western men are here to meet Chinese women, and Chinese women are here to meet Western men.”

“Yes,” Thomas said, narrowing his eyes. “I'm very upset I didn't think of this idea. There is a lot of money to be made in this.”

Just then, Wei came back over.

“We are all going to Suzie Wong's next. It's much fun. You must come.” She then burst out laughing.

They say that to understand the Chinese people, you have to understand their language. So at Suzie Wong's, as Thomas and I sipped our Long Island iced teas in a little side room that we shared with two Chinese businessmen, Jin and Dong, we were given a lesson in Mandarin.

Jin broke it down for us. First of all, there are four different tones in the Mandarin language. So for each word, it may have four different meanings depending on how you say it, sometimes more. For instance, the word
ma,
said in a straight, flat tone, means “mother.” But said in a tone that sort of dips slightly and then comes back up, it means “troublesome.” When you say
ma
with a deeper dip, almost as if you are disapproving of something, it means “horse.” When you say it sharply, it means “to curse.” Now add to this that you have two different ways of learning the language, either with pinyin, which is when it is spelled out in Roman letters, or in the original Chinese characters. All forty thousand of them. These two men told us that in school it takes most Chinese people—who, by the way,
speak Chinese
—four to six years to actually learn the language.