“I have to use the bathroom,” I said as an excuse to see more, and in a voice that suggested that nothing here surprised me. I had no intention of letting Henry hear me be impressed. The bathroom was finished with Waterworks fixtures and glass tile in a muted sea-grass tone. Back when I was single, I tore photos from magazines depicting rooms I liked, and always, my bathroom choices had tile just like that. There was the smell of gardenia from somewhere, white gardenia, my favorite flower, and I could smell it but couldn’t see it.
My head was pounding as I opened the medicine cabinet to find it full of all unopened women’s toiletries, nice stuff from La Mer, La Prairie, the type of cosmetics I used in my old life, before my bathroom got taken over by Power Rangers. I wondered if this place was Henry’s second home. Maybe this is where his wife freshens up after a day of being driven around in her Escalade or maybe it’s where Henry gets to satisfy his insatiable appetite for women. It was so wrong for me to be here, and I closed the cabinet, letting the magnificent magnets suck it shut.
I brushed my hair and put on the makeup that had made it into my bag this morning but never onto my face. I brushed my teeth and felt the surge of confidence that comes with a nicely tailored suit and a decent haircut and a clear mind. It was time to leave.
When I came out, Henry was on the phone with a glass of champagne in his hand. I walked by him and waved good-bye to whatever the point of this visit was. Something about my being here now seemed a little dangerous. Was this a Henry love shack? Would he be capable of having such a thing? I thought of him dating his wife while engaged to me and answered my own question. He raised his finger in that “wait a minute” signal and I pushed the elevator button just as he got off the phone.
“So you have a pied-à-terre in Midtown to get away from the demands of your Upper East Side life?” I asked.
“It’s not that.”
“Is it the secret girlfriend Batcave?”
“Not exactly.”
“You see, Henry? I knew this about you. I knew it the whole time and it’s the only thing that kept me sane after you left me.”
“Knew what?”
“Knew that you were capable of something like this. A trysting apartment? Please.”
“What the hell?”
“I just knew you’d always fool around. You’re too funny. You’re too handsome. You’re far too good in the sack. Women do absurd things for you. I couldn’t have been married to you.”
Henry looked genuinely hurt, which was oddly appealing in a man wearing a $3,000 suit. We were both quiet for a moment.
“I’ve missed you,” he said.
“Stop it,” I answer with a catch to my voice. It was unsettling to feel someone be sweet to me when everything else in my life felt mean. I felt too vulnerable. “You’re about a hundred years late.”
“I never stopped loving you.”
“You need to cut it out,” I said, drawing my hand across my neck like I meant it, because I meant it. “Really. We’re better than this.”
I imagined that conversation more times than I have brain pathways. I rehearsed what I would say, how clever I would be with my pithy one-liners about my life being better without him. But when that moment finally arrived, and that did appear to be that moment, it was just no good. We stared at each other, like we were stuck on the same packed subway with no comfortable place to rest our eyes.
“Too much has happened. We don’t even really know one another. Maybe we never did,” I said.
“I know you,” Henry said. “I’ve never stopped knowing you.”
We then had a staring contest. I blinked first.
“So what is this place, and why did I have to come here?”
“Don’t you like it?” He looked hurt. “It’s everything that screams your name to me. It’s for your birthday next week.”
Henry remembered my birthday was next week when even I didn’t. Nobody thinks of my birthday. I looked around to see what he meant. What was for my birthday?
“The art, the fixtures, and the stuff from magazines you used to collect back when you cared about things like your clothes and how many threads were in your sheets. I just thought maybe you’d like to meet yourself again, the real you who takes charge and runs things, the woman who dresses like a hottie and is quirky and funny and completely sex-crazed.”
I waited thirty seconds before answering him. I wanted to get this right, and wanted to say all the rational things I had rehearsed when my mind was clear and not full of the smell of champagne and gardenia. “There are other things to care about now, Henry.” I swallowed hard. “I grew up, you know. I tossed the shit that didn’t matter, like the thread count of my sheets, back into the proverbial bin.”
“You didn’t have to grow up.” He took my hand in his giant, lovely hand.
I dutifully pulled it back, exactly like I should have. “What, like your wife? Staying a child her whole life because some sugar daddy takes care of her?” I knew I should stop. I was being mean and I’m not mean or maybe I’m becoming mean, but anyway, I had to stop.
“It gives me so much pleasure to take care of her,” he said. “I can take care of you too. You could become you again if you’d let me help.”
There was just enough daddy-ism in his tone to make me find him, for the first time ever, the tiniest bit creepy.