Looking for a Love Story (4 page)

Then he laughed and said, “Look at you! You’re a fox! She’s smart, and she’s a fox!” And for the first time, I got the full force of Jake Morris in Happiness Mode. Up to that moment I’d been overcome by his looks, and, okay, he was sexy as hell. But when I stood there watching those sparks of pleasure that just seemed to be exploding around him and realized I had caused them … that was when I fell in love.

CHAPTER 4

The problem was what to do next. I’d never learned how to flirt. It wasn’t a skill that was prized in my home, where the mantra was the old seventies slogan that everyone attributes to Gloria Steinem although she wasn’t the one who said it: “A woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle.”

Like most feminists of her era, my mother was determined that her girl child not fall prey to the myths of romantic love that had kept women in shackles for so many generations—her words, not mine. “Just remember, Francesca,” she said, when I was five and she was dismissing the entire Disney Girl oeuvre, “Snow White was an idiot who ate an apple without washing it first, and Cinderella jammed her feet into glass slippers, which had to hurt like hell, so she could find a guy to save her from having to scrub toilets. She should have hired a lawyer and taken the bitch stepmother
to court. Even better, she should have become a lawyer and fought for herself.”

When it came to my mother’s romantic life … well,
romantic life
wasn’t the right term,
sex life
was more accurate. Alexandra preferred to have occasional flings with commitment-phobic men who got out of her hair in the morning before she had to worry about making them coffee—or introducing them to Pete and me. Not that she had to worry about that, because Pete and I were out of the house and in college before our mother started dating again. Alexandra was never quite the free spirit she intended to be. She believed firmly that all women had the same right to sexual fulfillment as men did, but she felt there should be no subterfuge involved. A woman in the throes of a lust like the one I was now feeling for Jake Morris should feel free to express her feelings and ask if they were reciprocated. An enlightened man would respond in kind. Simple.

Well, there was no way in hell I was going to inform Jake that I wanted to tear his clothes off with my teeth. As for a more subtle way of conveying that sentiment—well, that’s what flirting is for, and we’ve already covered my total cluelessness in that department. As I stood in the darkness of his big studio and watched him laugh, I knew I was doomed. After these pictures were taken I was never going to see him again.

He stopped laughing and held out his hand. “Let’s get started,” he said. “Come sit.” He led me to a stool that had been set up in front of the white backdrop and put his hands around my waist to help me onto the seat. Beautiful strong hands with long slim fingers.
I have to do something to keep him
, I thought. But I couldn’t think of a damn thing. Jake backed off and picked up his camera.

Now we’ve all seen the cliché of the Photography Session as Seduction in TV shows and movies. You know the scene I’m talking about: The photographer starts clicking away with his camera
while he’s urging the model to lean toward him and lick her lips and let herself go, baby. Then she’s leaning and licking and letting go while the camera is clicking faster and he’s telling her how beautiful and sexy she is, and before you know it, his voice is getting husky and her eyes are getting glazed and they’re both really turned on. Well, here’s the thing about a lot of clichés: They’re based in fact. At least, that was my experience. You have a guy who’s drop-dead gorgeous giving you the kind of undivided attention you’ve never gotten from a man before, and you’re following his lead the way Ginger Rogers did with Fred Astaire and … I’m sorry to be unenlightened, but that’s a turn-on.

I thought—hoped—for a second that Jake was feeling the same thing I was. All of sudden, he stopped shooting pictures, and I was pretty sure our eyes connected. I thought he was having trouble swallowing like I was. And breathing. But then he started taking my picture again. I was so disappointed, tears started welling up.

“What’s wrong?” he asked. “Are the lights bothering you?”

I shook my head.

“We can take a break, if your eyes are tired.”

I looked at him. He was standing in the dark, but a beam of light had spilled over him as if he were in a spotlight. He looked like a superstar.

I knew the shoot was almost finished.
I have to do something
, I thought. In my desperation I decided to give my mother’s approach a whirl.
I’ll tell him I’m attracted to him. What have I got to lose besides my pride, dignity, and self-respect?

“I don’t know how you feel …” I began; then I stopped. “What I’m trying to say is, I’m very …” I stopped again. Because he was staring at me. The studio was dark and we were all alone because his minions had gone out for lunch, and Jake Morris was staring at me. I knew he knew what I’d been about to say next—before I’d chickened out. I waited for him to do something or say something,
but he kept on staring. Suddenly I couldn’t handle the suspense another second, so I started to sing. Yes, the silence got to me so I sang: “Just you wait, ’enry ’iggins, just you wait!” It’s the opening line of one of Eliza Doolittle’s songs from the show
My Fair Lady
, which, for those of you who are not up on your American musical-comedy history, was the wildly successful Broadway show based on George Bernard Shaw’s
Pygmalion
. I kicked off my high-heeled shoes and attempted a little soft-shoe. Now Jake looked stunned, but not nearly as stunned as I was. I couldn’t believe what I was doing; it was like having an out-of-body experience. And I don’t know what I would have done next if Jake hadn’t started to laugh. Then he put down his camera, walked over, and put his arms around me.

“Smart, foxy, and unhinged,” he whispered, into my sexy new hairdo.

“But in a nice way,” I added.

Then he kissed me. And while I’m not going to go into details, he was, and is, one hell of a kisser. Personally, I could have kept on with that scenario for a while—like maybe the rest of the day or the rest of my life. But after a second he murmured, “Everyone will be coming back from lunch, but my loft is near here.”

“Define
near,”
I murmured back.

“Two doors down from this building, on your left, and up one flight. We can be there in five minutes.”

“I’m not sure how long it will take me to change.”

“Don’t bother.”

IT TOOK US
much less than five minutes to get to Jake’s loft. And again, I’m not going into details except to say that we would have stayed there all afternoon if it hadn’t been for his five-o’clock photo shoot back at the studio. He raced through it, while I raced
uptown to pick up some clothes and a toothbrush—and congratulated myself because Jake wasn’t the kind of man who stocked spare toothbrushes just in case. In fact, in every way I could think of, Jake was perfect. I stayed over that night. And every night afterward until my clean underwear ran out. And, yeah, I was stunned by that too. I’d never done anything like that before in my life.

From then on, Jake and I were inseparable. And when I think about that time, I know it wasn’t quite real. Or at least I wasn’t. My book was about to be published and the advance buzz on it was good, and it seemed like Jake had about a million friends—acquaintances—who wanted to meet me. We were always going to drinks or brunch or dinner with someone. I’m not wild about social stuff but Jake loved every minute of it, and I loved watching him love it.

Jake asked me to marry him two weeks before my pub date—when we’d been together for four and a half months. We’d gone to a party my publisher was throwing to introduce their hot new writers to the press. The bash was held in the Campbell Apartment in Grand Central Terminal—a space that had been the wildly luxurious office of a mover and shaker in the twenties and was reborn as a party venue during the remake of Grand Central. I’d been so excited I couldn’t eat any of the hors d’oeuvres at the party. That had been happening often—being successful and in love seemed to kill my appetite, which had resulted in a fifteen-pound weight loss. I was daring to hope the sturdy thighs were history. Also, you should know that I had taught myself to put on false eyelashes. And for this party I’d bought a pink dress that cost so much I had to breathe into a paper bag when I looked at the bill. But I can say it without reservation: On that particular night I was a fox.

After the festivities ended, Jake took me to the food court in
Grand Central so I could eat. While we were standing in line at the Feng Shui Chinese food station he looked at a spot over my head, drew in a deep breath, and said, “I’ve been married twice.”

“Really?” I tried to be casual, but my heart started imitating a trip-hammer. He’d never said the word
married
before. Or anything that even suggested it.

“I bet you want a big wedding.” He continued staring at the spot.

“Define
big,”
I said carefully. I was concentrating on not passing out.

“More people than two. See, I’ve had a couple of blowout weddings. The first took place in the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. It cost about as much as the national debt, but less than our divorce. My lawyers added a wing to their office after I got through paying them. I think they have a memorial plaque with my name on it.”

“Oh,” I said. The food court had stopped spinning, but the trip-hammer in my chest had now gotten so loud I was afraid he’d hear it.

“My second wedding took place in Southampton at my ex-wife’s home. Well, her palazzo, really. That divorce was much tamer, but I lost a fully reconstructed 1967 Lincoln convertible in the settlement. I think weddings are jinxed for me.” He finally looked at me. “If I were to get married again, I’d want to do it quickly.”

“Like when?” I managed.

“Three weeks from now. City Hall. Thursday at eleven-thirty.”

So my book hit the stores, and a week later I was married. One thing about me, when I decide to turn my life upside down, I don’t mess around.

•   •   •

I’D BEEN SITTING
on the bench for my entire stroll down Memory Lane. Now I stood, turned away from the apartment where I’d grown up and started back to the East Side. Remembering the early days with Jake had made me anxious to get home. And to be honest, it also made me just plain anxious in general. For one thing, I wanted to see if Jake was back yet. Not that I was worried—after all, I had the whole Talk thing figured out now—but for some reason I started counting in my head all the times lately that Jake had disappeared without saying where he was going. The number was high, a lot higher than I’d realized. At the entrance to the park I set a nice brisk pace, and as I walked I promised myself I was going to turn over a new leaf. No more sitting at home feeling sorry for myself. Tonight I’d go to Andy’s awards dinner with my husband and make him proud of me. I’d be charming and witty and fun. I picked up the pace some more. From now on, I told myself, I was going to start counting my blessings—and top on the list was Jake.

I had to slow down because I was having a little trouble catching my breath. It probably wasn’t a great idea to try to power walk through Central Park when I hadn’t done anything more strenuous for the past month than take the elevator downstairs to our lobby to get the mail. I checked my watch; it was later than I thought. If I didn’t get home soon I wouldn’t have time to get dolled up. And I owed Jake that. Since there’s no way to hail a cab in the middle of Central Park, I picked up the pace again—a little slower this time.

WHEN I ANNOUNCED
to my mother and my brother—who was actually in the country at the time—that I was going to become Mrs. Jake Morris, they were happy that I seemed to have found a
man who wasn’t: (a) debt ridden, (b) seeing his shrink seven days a week, or (c) an imbecile.

However, on a long-distance call from California, Sheryl asked me a question I have never answered: “Does Jake really know you, Francesca?”

I dodged. “He says he wants to marry me, so he must.”

“But your father always used to say that you were … high maintenance.”

“Daddy said that about me?” I tried not to sound dismayed, but Sheryl picked up on it anyway.

“I think that was the wrong word. What he meant was, you’re like your mother.”

Oh, please, no
.

“You’re like her when it comes to serious things like wanting to be a success and being ambitious. But sometimes you get confused about whether you want to be like her or like me. That makes you a little … needy. Does Jake know that?”

“Trust me, when you meet Jake, you’ll love him as much as I do.”

I knew I was ducking her question, but I had no intention of letting Jake see me in Bottomless Pit Mode before we tied the knot. Did Sheryl think I was nuts? I wanted to marry the man, not send him running in the opposite direction.

Meanwhile there had been big changes, both in my mother’s life and in Pete’s. When I say big, I mean huge. My mother, the lawyer for victimized wives everywhere, was getting married again. His name was Lenny. His politics were impeccable—he’d been a Freedom Rider during the sixties—and he was a fellow workaholic, a shrink who worked in a storefront clinic in a high-risk neighborhood. He had no interest in possessions—including his home—or in having fun. In Alexandra World, he was the perfect man.