Two Girls For Five Bucks

It’s 3:56 in the morning. I spent 4 hours lying in bed, thinking of all the things that I want to say to yet another someone who has disappointed me, until I couldn’t take it anymore. So I got up, and then I did the unspeakable…I put in “Must Love Dogs”…oh it gets so much worse…my mother gave it to me for Christmas and…wait for it…THIS IS THE SECOND TIME I’VE SEEN IT! Over the last 6 hours I have: cried, eaten an entire box of cous cous with peas and spray butter, checked my email obsessively, returned to the kitchen for 7 rice cakes with salsa and fat free sour cream, cried, and watched one half of a horribly unrealistic movie, and then it hits me…I am officially a 28 year old single woman living in New York City. What happened? How did I get here? I’m the wacky next door neighbor or the grumpy sister in all of those sitcoms. I’m the best friend of 3 moms whose kids will love me until they get old enough to start to wonder where my kids are and then they will think I’m sad. When I was little I went to a lot of giggly girly slumber parties. After we had all put on our jammies, we would convene with our sleeping bags (mine was a Strawberry Shortcake one) in front of the TV and go on and on about how late we were going to stay up. We’d solemnly swear that we would watch movie after movie, and then someone would ceremoniously press play on the VCR. Inevitably, by the end of the very first movie, all of the other girls would be asleep including the girl that tried to get me to do the hand-in-hot-water thing to the first few to fall asleep. As the credits rolled, I would look around, hoping against hope that one of the other girls would still be awake. They never were. So quietly, and feeling like the loneliest girl in the whole wide world, I would tip toe around all the sleeping bodies, press stop, turn off the TV, and try to find the path back to my sleeping bag in the deafening darkness. I have 3 friends who got engaged over the holidays. One of them, I knew was ready. One was trying to figure out the balance between her relationship and her career. She and I talked a lot about how it was ok to want to settle down and still do what you want blah blah blah. Evidently, she has succeeded where I failed. And the last one…the last one snuck up on me from behind. A few years ago she couldn’t at all understand why I was having a hard time making the decision to truly focus on my career instead of trying to figure out a way to marry the man that I loved, even though it meant maybe compromising my career a little bit. “I can’t picture settling down.” she said. “I just can’t ever see myself getting married.” she said. “My career is too important to me.” She said as she stapled more headshots to more resumes. And now, the friend that I was sure would be up at the end of the night with me…is not. Only Diane Lane and John Cusak are still awake (and just started living happily ever after, so I better finish this quick) It’s happening again. I’m that girl…only it’s worse now…the credits are rolling…everyone is settling down…it’s 4:44AM…and here I am again, pressing stop and tiptoeing back to my bed in the deafening darkness… Actually, who am I kidding. New York wasn’t even “deafeningly dark” during the blackout. And I can hear some drunk people fighting, so I maybe I’m not the last girl to go to bed after all. I guess we’ll find out soon enough…

- Daiva Deupree

If you have recently been broken up with, then please read the following:

Whether you are aware of it or not, you are currently waging a war for your dignity. Everything you do or say from this point forward will forever be labeled as “crazy.”

1. Do NOT contact your former lover under any circumstances.

There is absolutely no reason to contact a person who has recently ripped your heart from your chest and replaced it with a bottle of castor oil. Any attempts at goodwill communication will not result in the two of you getting back together. It will only result in you being pitied and eventually mocked. Examples of e-mails to avoid: “Hey! Just wanted to let you know that there is a documentary showing at the Brattle about Eastern European sex rings. I know you had read an article about that a while ago, so I thought maybe you would be interested….” “What’s Up!? My sister’s pregnant! Isn’t that crazy? She’s 14 weeks. Wow! Better her than me, right? Anyway, just seeing how things are going…” “HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!” “Hi, I was cleaning out the junk drawer and I found your birth certificate. When do you want to come by to get it? I’ll be home every night this week…” “Hey, I just wanted to see how your mom’s surgery went.” Please note that you will most likely not get any responses from the above e-mails but if you do, it will not read “I miss you, I’m coming over right now.”

2. Do NOT get drunk at a bar, go home with someone, and then throw up in a glass next to your bed prior to intercourse.

No explanation required.

3. Do NOT go on a walk or drive anywhere near your former lover’s home or work.

You will inevitably see your former “pudding love pancake” with their arms around their newer, hotter, and more successful lover. You may think you can handle this but you cannot. You will begin to scream and cry in your car, run a red light, go to the first Irish pub you can find, put several vodka tonics on your credit card (because you’re too fucking broke to pay for your binges). Your evening will result in #2. You will wake up alone, call into work sick, and then sit down at the computer and compose an e-mail from the above list mentioned in #1. When no reply comes you will repeat the cycle over and over again until you decide to go to grad school. - Cathleen Carr

I once dated a man who took his shirt off when he drove on the highway. I’m not talking about removing a top layer because he felt constricted, but rather every layer that found itself between his flesh and the air. He would do it without a word, as though this was a customary way of commuting on a beautiful, sunny day.

He lived about 15 miles outside of Chicago, so he had to drive into the city almost everyday. If you were one of the lucky commuters who’s schedule matched his, you could catch a smallish white man driving joyfully along the Eisenhower Expressway bare-chested and ready to rock. And rock he did. He often pulled a one hitter from the glove compartment and impressively managed to light, smoke, hold, exhale, and steer all under 10 seconds, just enough time to get the party rolling. He met my somewhat quizzical stare with bored nonchalance as he fired up the bowl and asked while choking on the smoke “want some?” I would always decline. The last time I smoked marijuana in a car, I was 16 and singed my eyebrows off. He was several years older than me and recently laid-off. But the ironic thing was, he broke up with me. And the even more ironic thing was, I cried. I thought we were having a great time. He’d drive around naked and high while I fed him jokes and impressions that made his inebriated sense of what’s funny giddy with delight. It was great. I was a comedic genius with this guy. His skinny face, covered in stringy dark hair, would twist and turn around his bloodshot eyes, as his laughing fit grew more and more intense, strangling his airflow and erupting his smoker’s cough. I was in heaven. When he broke the news to me that we were calling it quits after a month, I began to cry. “You’re really upset that I’m breaking up with you,” he asked dumbfounded. “Yes,” I defiantly replied like a child who is unsure where her candy stash has gone. What I didn’t tell him was that I was deeply offended. “Who the fuck does this guy think he is that HE can break up with me?” I thought while he blathered on and on about why it wasn’t working out. “He’s a loser.” I was being broken up with by a loser who weighed less than me. Hot tears of humiliation seared my skin as my wild wails of defeat echoed up and down Lincoln Avenue. If I couldn’t land a guy who was marginally employed, lived intimately with empty pizza boxes and dirty clothes strewn about the floor, then how in god’s name was I ever going to find a real man? Truth is, I don’t remember what his rationale was. He was probably high. I was probably drunk. It was the middle of the night and I had to be at my Starbucks shift in a couple of hours. I suppose I was the stifling cotton trapping his moist armpits, time for the shirt to go. I choose to believe that he took a page from Sting’s mammoth catalogue of informative and overly authoritative musings of love and life “If you love someone set them free.” Although I imagine he was really thinking about his fleshy freedom chest and singing, “You’ll forget the sun in his jealous sky as we walk in fields of gold” as he licked his lips expectantly while caressing the ornately decorated pipe in his pocket. He at least had the decency to keep his shirt on when he dropped me in the rain that morning. As I fumbled to unlock the door to the Starbucks, I could’ve sworn I saw the emergence of soft white flesh and the gentle glow of his one hitter igniting as his car disappeared into the grey dawn. – Cathleen Carr