The Good Life

Chapter SEVENTEEN



Honesty really was the magic answer. The Summer of Jake and Roxie: Part Two was a spectacular, 5-star, A+, top-of-the-box-office hit. There was the kind of romance that created butterflies in my belly, laugh-out-loud comedy, edge-of-my-seat excitement, porn star quality sex scenes and a great soundtrack, as well. We both knew this romance had an expiration date, but we didn’t talk about it. We were too obliviously happy to think about anything except when we could touch each other again.

It was nearing the end of August when I got The Phone Call. Jake and I were entwined on the couch watching a Tigers game and trying to throw popcorn into each other’s mouths when Hope called.

“Listen,” she said.

“Listening.”

“J.D.’s cousin’s boyfriend finally asked her to move in with him.”

I sat up straighter. This was intriguing. That kind of scenario could mean a hand-me-down apartment, and those were the best kind to get.

“Listening more closely.”

“The Village. Rent-stabilized. One block from subway.”

This was good. This was very good. The most important thing about any Manhattan apartment was its proximity to the subway. The Village was an excellent neighborhood, too. Rent-stabilization was just a cherry on top.

“How long do I have?”

“Ten minutes?”

“Shit.”

“Tomorrow morning.”

“Okay. I’ll call you.”

I hung up the phone and saw that Jake was giving me a suspicious look.

“That was a vague conversation,” he pointed out.

“Yeah.”

“And a vague response.”

“Yeah.”

He sat up straight, which caused me to fall off of him and onto the other end of the couch.

“Something you need to tell me?”

“Hope found an apartment.”

“Oh,” was all he said. He looked disappointed, and I felt a little bit of disappointment myself. “You sure you can’t go to school here?”

I fought the urge to laugh at his question. I could probably find a program around here, but I don’t need a culinary education to work at Olive Garden.

“Are you sure you can’t take pictures in New York?” was my rebuttal.

He didn’t reply. I don’t blame him. That was kind of a shitty thing for me to say.

“It doesn’t mean we can’t still do our day-to-day,” I said hopefully. “I can be done with school in less than a year. I can visit. It could be like a month-to-month lease. I promise you won’t be a liability.”

He patted my knee. “Sure, we’ll figure it out.”

“I need to see the apartment first. It could be infested with cockroaches the size of baseballs, and the toilet could be in the shower.”

“Then find a different apartment. I don’t want to be the reason you are stuck in Ann Arbor. I said I want you to be happy, and I meant it. I’m not gonna be mad at you. I promise. Do what you need to do.”

“I need to see this apartment.”

“Okay then.”

“I’m going to look up flights for the morning.”

“If you wake me up, I’ll drive you.”

I didn’t wake him up to drive me because I’d booked a return flight for later that evening. I drove myself and left my car at the airport. I did leave him a cute little love note on the nightstand though, letting him know I’d be home later.

I took a cab from LaGuardia straight to the apartment where Hope and J.D.’s cousin met me. When I walked in I knew I had to have it. It was tiny, as most of them are. But it was a cozy, homey kind of tiny and not a buried alive in a wooden coffin kind of tiny.

It was neglected. The hardwood floors were scuffed and dull. The paint was peeling and stained with cigarette smoke. The small kitchen counter was probably older than my parents. But all I saw in it was a blank slate. I could make it beautiful.

As is the norm for me, I got a little ahead of myself. As I stood in the doorway I was already imagining myself doing homework in the galley-style kitchen like a scene from Julie and Julia. I could speak with a French accent and boil lobsters, and Jake could laugh at me when the lid popped off and I went running from the kitchen … oh wait, Jake wouldn’t be there. And if I went running from the kitchen, I’d trip over the couch or run straight into a brick wall. But the point was that this apartment could be my future. My life was like a brand new notebook and this was the first page. This little apartment in The Village would be where my story began.

I celebrated my new apartment with a shopping trip down Broadway. J.D.’s cousin needed a few weeks to get completely moved out, but she said I could start bringing things in right away. I spent the afternoon at Crate and Barrel, Urban Outfitters and Anthropologie. I was so excited to have an apartment of my very own for the first time ever. Being able to buy window treatments and placemats and a shower curtain without having to ask anyone else’s opinion was fun and liberating.

Not that I wasn’t thinking about Jake. It bothered me he hadn’t called yet to see how things had gone, but I hadn’t called him either. It was probably for the best if we distanced ourselves a little now so when the time came for me to move – and for us to distance ourselves a lot – it might be easier. I knew I was going to miss him like crazy, but I kept telling myself if it were meant to be, it would be.

This was New York, my soul mate. I belonged here. And that was what I kept telling myself. Any time I felt a fresh batch of tears coming to my eyes, I put another item into my shopping bag. It’s not called retail therapy for nothing!

Once I lugged all of my shopping bags back over to the apartment and stored them in a closet, I took a walk to explore my new neighborhood. The apartment was two blocks from Washington Square Park, in the same area as NYU and Peanut Butter and Co where we’d had lunch last time.

I made my way over to the park. It was a beautiful day and, just like last time I was here, the ambiance of the city made me feel at peace. I sat on a bench near a dog run to people-watch for a bit and enjoy the sunshine.

I felt good to be home, but I couldn’t deny the fact that something wasn’t right. A few weeks ago, when Jake and I had sat on the bench outside of Zabar’s, I’d had one of those rare moments in life where everything was perfect. The sun was shining. I was in my favorite place in the world. There was great food in my hands. I didn’t have to worry about money for a little while. I knew I had people in my life who loved me. My split with Caleb had ended up amicable. And to top it all off – I was drinking a Zabar’s coffee!

Theoretically, I should have been feeling the same thing in Washington Square Park. The sun was still shining. People still loved me. My divorce was completely over and no hard feelings were left behind. I had my own apartment. I was starting school to do something I really wanted to do. I was in my favorite place in the world. There were even puppies around! Puppies! But it wasn’t one of those moments, and I knew it wasn’t the absence of coffee. It was the absence of Jake. It couldn’t possibly be one of those moments without him in it.

My phone rang. Finally, I thought, thinking it was Jake. But it was my dad’s number on the screen.

“Hi, Sunshine,” he said cautiously. He sounded sad. My heart started beating faster at the sound of his voice.

“Is something wrong?” I asked, my voice shaking a little.

“It’s your mom,” he said. His voice squeaked a little at the end, which scared the shit out of me. “She’s being prepped for emergency surgery in a few minutes. She has an aneurysm in her aorta.”

I wasn’t sure what an aorta was, but I thought it had something to do with the heart and I knew for sure than an aneurysm was a very bad thing. I stood up and started walking quickly toward the street to look for a cab.

“She only has a few minutes and wanted me to call you and Adam. I’m putting her on,” he said.

“Hi, Buttercup.” It was Mom. Oh my God! Could this be the last time I ever talked to her? It was so sudden. I wasn’t prepared! This was one of those things I hadn’t prepped for. Not that I’d never thought about it happening, but I’d be a seriously crazy person if I had a speech prepared.

Even so, you’d think with my expertise I’d be able to come up with something better than a high-pitched, “Hi, Mommy.”

“What are you doing?” she asked, like it was a normal day and a normal phone call.

“I’m, um, in the city,” I told her. “I found an apartment of my own.”

“Excellent news!” she said, sounding genuinely happy about it. “I knew you’d be better off without him.”

“What did they say about this surgery?” I asked. My voice sounded like that of a little girl. I got that panicky feeling in me again where I wanted to kneel down and cling to her legs and beg her not to go. “Is it risky?”

“Well,” she said with a sigh, “not having the surgery is a sure death, so whether it’s risky or not, it’s the only option. They’re coming in just a minute, and I’ve still got to call your brother.”

“Okay, Mom,” I said breathlessly as I was still running toward the street. “I’m on my way to the airport right now. I’ll probably be there by the time you’re in the recovery room.”

“Okay, love, I’ll see you then. And just in case I don’t –”

“No!” I interrupted. “You will!”

“I’m really proud of you, baby girl.”

I couldn’t even say anything because I was crying. It was the face-all-squished-up kind of cry.

“I love you, Mom,” I managed to squeak out before the call ended.

Oh God! What do I do? LaGuardia, JFK or Newark? Who had the next flight to Fort Myers? Why didn’t I just buy one of those phones that I could talk to and ask questions?

I sat down on another bench to gain composure and search for flights on my Blackberry. My fingers were shaking as I tried to type in the search bar. Then I had to watch the hourglass go round and round and round as my dinosaur of a phone took its sweet time to load a page. Damn you, hourglass! I hate you! I wanted to take my phone to a field with a baseball bat like they did with the copy machine in Office Space.

Once I knew which airport to head to, I stood up, signaled a cab and climbed in. All the way to the airport I searched on my phone for aortic aneurysms and felt worse by the second. Most of what I read was probably a bunch of nonsense, but I wasn’t thinking clearly enough to realize that. All I was seeing were words and phrases like “50% mortality rate” and “highest cause of death” and “one of the riskier surgeries.”

By the time I got to the airport, I could hardly breathe. Everything seemed to happen in a blur. The lovely people of JetBlue got me a seat on a flight that started boarding about five minutes after I arrived at the ticket counter.

In line for the security check I bit off every one of my fingernails.

Once I was on the plane I Googled more about Abdominal Aortic Aneurysms until it was time to put my phone into airplane mode.

It wasn’t until after we were in the air when I realized I hadn’t called Jake or Adam. I didn’t know if my parents had been able to get in touch with Adam, or if he’d been in the operating room at the time. I didn’t know if he would go to the airport straight from the hospital or go home first. I could have called him to bring me some clothes since all I had with me was my purse.

I should have called and let Jake know what was happening and that I wasn’t coming home tonight. Not only because he was almost like my boyfriend, but also because my mom was almost like his mom. But it was too late for any of that now. I was not about to use one of those airplane phones.

I tried reading on my Kindle to pass the time on the three-hour flight, but I was too worried about my mom to concentrate. Once I reread the same paragraph four times and still had no idea what I’d read, I gave up and ordered a drink instead. It was too bad the flight attendants didn’t serve Ambien. All I wanted to do was close my eyes and not open them until I was in Florida with my mom.

Three hours and three cocktails later, I landed in Fort Myers. I took a cab to the hospital and found my dad in one of the waiting areas. The poor guy looked like a deflated balloon in his button-up tropical print shirt, khaki cargo shorts and flip flops, with his messy hair and red eyes.

I ran into his arms and he hugged me tightly. I didn’t know what he would do without Mom and I tried not to think about it.

He told me he’d talked to Adam for a while on the phone, and Adam had calmed him down by telling him how advanced this procedure was. It used to be a very risky surgery, which is probably why I’d read all that terrible stuff during my Google search.

Once at the hospital I didn’t know what to do with myself. They didn’t serve alcohol in the cafeteria (I asked). My fingernails were already bitten down to ugly little nubs. I tried calling Jake to tell him what was going on, but his phone went straight to voicemail. All I could think to do was look up viral videos on my phone to show Dad. We watched about ten videos just of cats. Cats can be pretty funny.

Adam arrived about an hour after I did. What a relief! He was much better in stressful situations than I was. He was the calm and reasonable member of our family, and also the one most likely to take charge. I felt relaxed just by his presence. The fact that he was calm made Dad and me calm, too. Right away Adam took control and said he was going to the cafeteria to get us snacks and drinks. Why didn’t I think of that?

Shortly after Adam left the waiting room, I caught a glimpse of a guy in the hallway. All I could see was the back of him, but I could tell he was built like Jake. I felt a stab of pain in my heart.

I so wished Jake was here. Even if he left today, though, it would take at least a full day to drive down, and that was if he didn’t stop at all. He would have to stop and sleep at some point. The earliest I could hope to have his arms around me again would be two days from now! And that was only if he was willing to make the trip. He might not even want to.

For the first time in my life I truly understood the meaning of the word “yearn.” I had always thought of it as being a lame word used in romance novels by virgins with tiny boobs or men with six-pack abs who wore cowboy hats. But nope, it was me; former bad girl, lover of high heels and frozen Cokes, who still had a crush on Pacey Witter and had never had sex with a sexy stranger in front of a fireplace while snowed-in at a log cabin in the woods. It was I who felt the pain of the yearn.

Another thing that caught my eye about the guy in the hallway was that he was carrying a black tote bag that said Love Pink in big fuchsia letters. I recognized the bag because I had the same one – yep, another free gift with purchase. It took a real man to carry around a Victoria’s Secret tote bag, and I thought to myself that whomever he was carrying that bag for was one lucky chick.

When the guy poked his head into the waiting room and smiled at me I nearly peed my pants! He looked identical to Jake! I wondered if he’d let me take a picture of him so I could show Jake his Florida doppelganger but I didn’t have time to ask him.

“Hi, baby,” the guy said softly. He set the tote bag down near my feet. “Sorry it took me so long. I couldn’t find a parking spot. We left in a hurry, but I packed a few things for you.”

It was Jake!

I jumped out of my seat and grabbed onto him and held him tighter than I have ever held onto anyone before – even tighter than I held my parents’ legs when I was little.

“How did you get here so fast?” I asked while my arms were still wrapped around his neck in a choke hold.

“I came with Adam,” he said into my shoulder.

“But Adam, he came on a plane, right?” It was a stupid question. It’s not like he borrowed George Jetson’s car or arrived in a spaceship.

“Yeah.”

I let go of him and stood back to get a good look at his face. “You got on a plane?” I still needed clarification.

He shrugged like it was no big deal. “Some things are worth facing your fears for,” he said quietly as if it was the most simple and obvious answer.

“You did that for me?” I asked sheepishly.

“Of course.”

I hugged him again as the tears filled my eyes. “I love you, Jake. I’ve loved you forever and I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.” I didn’t even care that Dad was sitting right there, and Adam had just walked into the room with fountain sodas, candy and snack-sized potato chips. I didn’t need to keep him a secret anymore. Why would I ever want to keep such a sweet thing a secret anyway?

“I love you, too, Little Girl.”



The surgery was a success. The doctors said my dad saved her life by making her go to the doctor for her back pain. They never would have found the aneurysm otherwise, and they were certain it would have burst had they not repaired it. I could have very easily lost my mom without warning!

We were allowed to see her once she was out of recovery and, besides being a little groggy from the medications, she seemed like her normal self.

When she saw Jake she asked, “Did you fly here?” Ha, I guess I get it from her.

“Yes,” he answered.

She looked at me and smiled because she knew he hadn’t done it for her.

Dad and Adam stayed to help her eat dinner but they didn’t need four people in that tiny room so Jake suggested we go get something to eat.

Everything I was feeling for Jake was suddenly so strong. I was overwhelmed by the amount of love I felt for him, but underwhelmed by the various ways I knew how to express it.

I wanted him to know, to really understand, how much it meant to me that he’d come to Florida. But I didn’t know the right words to say. It seemed like so many adjectives and phrases were overused these days. I was one of the guilty over-users.

I went over some words and expressions as Jake drove the rental car down the coast. Amazing was definitely overplayed, that was out for sure. Fabulous reminded me of a commercial for gum. Outstanding, super and excellent were all words a teacher would write on a well-written term paper. Magnificent made me think of shopping in Chicago. Phenomenal was the way I would describe a red-carpet look at the Golden Globes, and he was way more than a pretty dress or a classy up-do. Extraordinary was a word I’d used just last week to describe a flourless cake I’d made. He wasn’t even on the same planet as those words! I needed something more. I needed a word used to describe something that couldn’t be described!

I was seriously going to invest some of my divorce money in Google.

We were seated at an outdoor table at the nearest sports bar and had just ordered beer and wings when I told him about my problem.

“I want to tell you how much this means to me, you being here. But I don’t know how to say it. Every word I can think of doesn’t come close.”

“Don’t worry about it. I know you were happy I came.”

I shook my head. “See? That’s the thing. I am happy a lot of the time, and for the most simple reasons. This day, and what you did for me, made me way more than happy. I can’t even say it. It’s like not describable.”

“It’s really okay,” he said.

“I found a word. It means something incapable of being described in words.”

“What’s the word?”

“Ineffable.”

“Ineffable,” he repeated. “Okay.”

“I thought it could be a special word that we reserved for only the most special of times and this is definitely one of them.”

“You say that like there’s going to be other special times.”

“I hope there are,” I said.

“Those are big words for a day-to-day girlfriend to say,” he said.

I looked down at our hands on the table. “I don’t think day-to-day is enough for me anymore,” I said honestly. I nervously bit my lip and only slightly glanced up at him. “I need more. I need,” I paused because, even though I knew for sure it was what I wanted, it was still difficult for me to say, “I need forever.”

“You and me?” he asked. “Forever?”

I shrugged, feeling shy and fearing rejection. “I mean, if it’s too much for you we can do day-to-day still. I don’t want to scare you off or put too much pressure on you.”

He laughed out loud. “It’s funny how you think I’m the one who is scared. You and me forever – I can do that.”

“You think I’m the one who is scared?” I asked.

I was thankful he didn’t say “duh.” I’d always hated that expression. He just smiled.

“Maybe I am,” I said thoughtfully. “But some things are worth facing your fears for, right?”

He smiled and nodded. “So? Are you ever going to tell me about this apartment?”

The apartment! I had forgotten all about it. How crazy that I woke up this morning in Michigan, flew to NYC, found an apartment, went shopping, and had dinner on the Gulf of Mexico. All in one day!

I shook my head. “My mom almost died today. Life is too short to be selfish. I spent way too many years without you, and I don’t want to spend another one. I don’t even want one minute without you.”

I laced my fingers into those of my best friend and knew he was where I was supposed to be. New York was just a city. I could visit it often if I needed to. But my heart was with Jake, and that’s where it needed to stay.

“I’m not moving to New York,” I said firmly.

“Yes, you are,” he insisted.

“I’m not. I can take cooking classes at a community college or something. I don’t need New York. I need you.”

The waitress dropped off our wings and the conversation stopped as we started eating.

“Do you want to know a secret?” he asked, a few wings later.

I nodded.

“I heart New York,” he admitted.

I smiled. It was a very easy place to heart.

“And the truth is,” he said, “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about that pastrami sandwich.”

I laughed out loud.

“You might need me, Rox. But I need to live by that deli. For at least one year.”

I dropped the wing I’d been holding. The bone made a clink on the ceramic plate. I knew I had buffalo sauce and blue cheese dressing on my face, but I was too stunned to grab my napkin. I knew what he was saying, that he was willing to come with me, to leave his jobs, his business behind, to be with me. I loved him for it, but I couldn’t let him do it. I shook my head. “I can’t let you give up everything for me.”

“I’m telling you the truth. I loved being there. I can take a sabbatical. We’ll give it a year and see how it works out. If it’s not working, we’ll reevaluate. Now tell me about this apartment. How close is it to the deli?”

Very slowly, a smile started to appear on my face. First, it was just the corners of a slanted grin, but soon it morphed itself into a huge toothpaste-commercial kind of smile. “Really?”

He nodded. I was so happy I accidentally let out a sound I hadn’t heard since I was eleven and my parents took me to the set of the All New Mickey Mouse Club during our vacation in Orlando. (Yep, Justin and Ryan, I saw them first).

“This is going to be …” I paused while I thought of a word that was good enough for us, “epic.”