Jennifer Johnson Is Sick of Being Single (12 page)

We stop when Jeremy says the color has cooked long enough, and they both get out of the bathroom so I can step into their slate-tiled shower and wash my hair. I use their Paul Mitchell products and really try to enjoy the moment, even though I can feel panic creeping up on me like a shadow.

I wrap myself in a thick white towel, and catch my reflection in the mirror. “Jeremy? Is it supposed to be…this red?”

The boys come in and the looks on their faces defy description. Horror is involved, but also curiosity and wonder.

“Don't worry,” Jeremy says, “it always looks totally different when it's dry.” I nod, but I can't help but notice he isn't smiling anymore. He grabs his hair dryer and sets out methodically drying my hair with long, hard strokes of a natural bristle brush. It's partly the noise of the hair dryer and partly the mounting expectation that keeps us all silent as he works.

I watch my hair get dryer and dryer.

And redder and redder.

Jeremy finally turns the hair dryer off and steps away.

My head looks like a maraschino cherry. A bright chemical-red cherry.

The silence of the hair dryer sends for Christopher, who bursts into the bathroom smiling and then claps his hands to the top of his head.

“Oh my God!” he shrieks at Jeremy. “What have you done to her?”

Jeremy is silent. He mumbles something about the product and maybe it was older than he thought, but still, he's never seen anything like
this
before.

“She's hideous!” Christopher cries. “You bastard!”

Christopher goes on telling Jeremy I ruined the best chance I ever had at happiness and he's personally responsible for chasing away the most eligible bachelor I ever managed to land and he's going to leave him for sure now, because Jeremy is always doing horrible, thoughtless things like this and ruining everything.

I just stare at the mirror.

I mechanically pack up my makeup kits and my cosmetic bags. I think I thank them, but I can't be sure. I don't remember the ride home or letting myself into my apartment. I'm on autopilot, it's all done in some sort of emotionally protective blackout.

I do, for some reason, call Hailey.

She wanted to be an aesthetician one summer and took classes at the Aveda Institute, which went pretty well until she realized she'd have to touch strangers.

“Go get Prell,” she says.

“I don't have time to get anything.”

“Then use dishwashing soap. Wash your hair as many times as you can with the cheapest dishwashing soap you have. Don't dry it in between, just wash it over and over. Use the hottest water you can stand.”

I take a deep slug of whiskey from a rarely used bottle above the refrigerator and grab an old bottle of Joy from under the kitchen sink.

Joy. How ironic.

I get in the shower and scrub my hair within an inch of ripping it out. I wash it over and over again, watching ribbons of vile red dye stream out in the water and swirl down the drain. All the while my cell phone is ringing like crazy, undoubtedly Christopher trying to tell me he's breaking up with Jeremy for ruining my hair.

I manage to shampoo my hair twelve times, and I nearly sear my scalp holding the blow-dryer so close to my roots as I'm drying it. When I'm done, I'm breathless, panting, squinting because I half don't even want to look in the mirror, but as I shake my hair out and comb it back, I'm surprised. The dishwashing soap must be able to take the paint off cars. It's not a hundred percent back to normal, but I no longer look like I work at the circus. So what if it'll be dry as a haystack tomorrow? I'm trying to look on the bright side, and I will, as soon as I find it.

My cell phone continues to ring like a four-alarm fire, but I know it's just Christopher calling to check in/apologize/worry/scream/console. I do my makeup lickety-split, all the while keeping one eye on the clock.
Hurry hurry hurry
. Then before I go I have to eat something because I'm
not
eating in front of Brad, so I decide to slam a Hot Pocket while standing up eating over the sink. It's not only not sexy, it's a mistake.

A big mistake.

As my stomach seizes and cramps, it becomes immediately clear the Hot Pocket is not going to be staying with me long. I sit on the toilet and pray for relief. I eat two Tums and two Imodium
AD
s—I don't know what the
AD
stands for.

Another Dimension? After Dinner? Absolute Disaster?

I don't know, but I stay on the toilet for a full five minutes, praying the entire time.

Please, God. I know we don't talk often, or ever, but I need to not have diarrhea right now. If you do exist and you are in fact master of the universe, it wouldn't take you any energy at all to seize up my bowels and make this stop, would it? Is it really asking too much to ask you to let me feel good for my date? This is an important date, God. After all, the way I've heard them tell it, you're a big fan of marriage and monogamy and families. Well, I'm trying to freaking work that out, God, so do you think just this once you could suspend my absolutely shit luck and let me stop shitting? Could you? Just once? In return I will stop judging all the women at work and I'll go to church on major holidays. Is that enough?

Apparently it is enough, and Jesus takes pity on my diarrhea or the Tums kicks in, because my stomach slowly starts to ease up. I try to think of Christopher's pep talk and hold that in my mind. I get my purse, my coat, and my car keys and I check myself one last time in the mirror. “Okay, Miss Sassy,” I say to the porcelain figurine in my window, “this is it. Don't screw this up.”

 

Against all odds, I get to O'Hooligans a full ten minutes early. Unbelievable. Crossing the parking lot I brace myself against the wind and feel my eyes tearing up against the cold air. Shit. My coat isn't really warm enough, it's my long black dress coat and it looks way better than my poofy down jacket, but it feels like it's made out of felt right now. I can feel the wind cut through it and I break into a jog.

Inside the warmth almost hurts. My cheeks burn and my nose runs as my body tries to readjust to the rapidly changing climate. I sneeze. Sometimes it's easier to stay in pain.

I situate myself at the bar and order a cosmo. I'm trying to take the edge off my nervousness by smiling so hard it hurts. I get friendly with the bartender, who's busy making drinks.

“I'm waiting for a guy,” I say over his blender. “It's our first date.”

He smiles.

Whrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
goes the blender.

He glops out a foaming concoction into a shamrock-shaped mug.

I look around for Brad and check the time on my cell phone. I realize I never even asked him for his cell phone number, and more important, he never asked for mine. What does that mean? Is that bad? That seems kind of bad.

A group of hearty midwestern girls shows up at the bar, each of them flawed in some major way that makes me feel a little more secure. One is chunky around the butt, and another has a tattoo on her ankle of a blurry lavender butterfly, and it shows right through her sheer tights. There's a girl with a horse laugh who has a wide, droopy nose that seems like a kindergartner could have made it out of Play-Doh and pressed it over her real nose. Not to be braggy, but I feel the littlest bit superior, because I'm sure I look better than all these girls, which makes me feel friendly toward them.

“Girls' night out?” I ask.

“Double-date night!” one girl shrills. Then I see a group of men coming in from the cigar bar and they descend upon the girls with a shout, and every man seeks out his individual partner. That's when I realize they're all
married.
Every one of them, even Play-Doh nose. They're all wearing these deliberate, smug wedding bands. “Time for dinner!” the girl says. “Bye!”

“Bye-bye!” I say with forced gaiety. “Have fun!”

Brad is now ten minutes late. Ten minutes. Ten minutes isn't that bad. If I say, “Brad was ten minutes late last night,” that doesn't sound bad. Nobody would feel sorry for me over that; even fifteen minutes and possibly twenty minutes are within the realm of okay. Anything could hold a person up for twenty minutes. Traffic, an unexpected phone call, a work situation, even just losing track of time. You could lose track of twenty minutes and not be a bad guy.

It's
twenty-five
minutes that's the real problem. Twenty-five minutes late is not okay. If I say, “Brad was twenty-five minutes late last night,” people would definitely be concerned. They would definitely have questions. Brad would have to have a really good excuse to get out of that one, like his toilet exploded or his cat threw up. And at thirty minutes late—I don't even want to think about thirty minutes. I really can't handle that idea right now.

I sip my cosmo, which is fruity and icy and delicious. It hardly tastes like liquor so I order another one. Two drinks before Brad gets here should probably be my limit. Maybe three? No, two. After three drinks, things can get fuzzy, and I don't want to be fuzzy tonight. I want to be here and alive and having fun, like all these other Goddamned people.

Crap.

I look around. Nobody is really watching me or anything, but I act as though they might be. I mean, if I was here on a date and I saw a woman alone at the bar I might say, “Look at that poor woman over there. She's obviously waiting for someone. Let's see if he shows up.” Then I would study her like Dian Fossey does in
Gorillas in the Mist
. What is her facial expression? How is she holding her posture? Does she seem agitated? Is she looking over her shoulder a lot, and possibly at the entrance? Is she trying to attract a potential mate? Where is this potential mate?
Is he fictional or just late? I decide I'm not looking over my shoulder anymore. I'm only looking at the bartender, the television, or my drink. I'd rather look like a skanky barfly drinking alone than a woman being stood up.

Now Brad is twenty-five minutes late.

I stare at my cell phone. I really want to call Christopher, but I know what he'll say. He'll tell me to leave and I don't want to leave. As soon as I leave, the potential fairy tale is over. This dream bubble has burst. As long as I'm sitting here, pretending to be oblivious to the time, then everything could possibly work out, right? Plus, if I call someone and whine about my stupid date, I just know Brad will turn up and hear me.
That's what I'll do!
I'll make a fake phone call and it'll be like when you get up to go to the bathroom so the food comes.

I flip my cell open. “Hello?” I say to no one. “Oh, hi!” I pause to let my imaginary friend talk. “Absolutely,” I say, “that isn't a problem at all. I was glad to do it.”

I smile at a guy who comes up to the bar next to me. He orders a drink.

“Really?” I say into the phone. “I'm flattered—that isn't necessary though. Like I said, I was happy to help.” I look back over at the door. I don't know how long I can keep up an imaginary conversation.

Then, as I'm holding my cell to my ear, presumably already on a call, it rings loudly. I almost drop the phone on the floor.

“Hello?”

“Hello, Miss Johnson,” Mr. Jennings says. “We need to discuss your account. Wondering when we can expect that payment.”

“I can't really talk now,” I say. I hate it when he gets through to me. Every time he calls me I store his number and save it as
DO NOT ANSWER
. I have seven
DO NOT ANSWERS
in my phone but
he's got all these new numbers now. It's like a game and he gets a point every time I pick up. I get a point every time my phone rings and it flashes
DO NOT ANSWER
.

“We really need to resolve this,” he says. “We're going to turn your account over to a collection agency if we don't get a payment from you.”

“The thing is, if I had any extra money, I would give it to you. Really. Right now is a bad time.”

“We can set up a payment plan.”

I glance at the old-timey clock behind the bar that has four-leaf clovers instead of numbers on it. Brad is forty minutes late.

“Can I ask you something, Mr. Jennings?”

“We have many payment options,” he says.

“Why do guys stand you up? I mean, in general, why does a guy say he's going to be somewhere and then leave you waiting around in a bar? Why did he even ask me out in the first place?”

“I'm sorry,” he says, “we're going to have to settle this…”

“No, I mean just as a friend,” I say. “What should I do?”

He doesn't say anything. The noise and laughter of the bar close around me.

“Do you have a daughter?” I ask.

“No,” he says after a pause, “but I have a younger sister.”

“Well, if a guy stood your little sister up, left her alone in a public place, what would you do?”

“I'd bash his face in.”

I'm impressed. I may even pay the bill.

“Look,” he says, “I can give you two weeks. That's it. Then it's out of my hands. I've been delaying the collection agency as it is.”

“Mr. Jennings,” I say, smiling, “you have unsuspected depth.”

“I'll call you in two weeks,” he says and then adds, “but be careful out there.”

He hangs up.

I can't believe it. My debt collector turns out to be a nicer guy than my date.

The bartender sets down an enormous ceramic elf in front of me. Seriously, it's the size of one of those garden gnomes, only this one is filled with liquor.

“You sip from the straw in his hat,” the bartender says. “There's over twelve different liquors in there, and it's on the house.”

I try to tell him I don't want to drink from a lawn decoration, but he sails down to the other end of the bar. I stare at the elf and the elf stares at me. He has a pointy green hat and a big knobby nose. I wait awhile, look around, and finally take a long sip of the fizzy orange liquid. It's not bad. Like a Dreamsicle and rum. I take another sip.