I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti (9 page)

I’d since come up with a way to deal with this affliction when it hit me. I ask questions, making myself seem more like an
FBI interrogator than a potential girlfriend. As we dined on mediocre cod mare chiaro and bland chicken rollatini, I found
my tongue and interviewed Ethan about his family. He regaled me with stories about his three sisters and their families. He
seemed fond of his nieces and nephews and slightly in awe of the hassle his siblings had taken on in the raising of children.
“She and her husband toss them back and forth like footballs,” he said, describing his youngest, who was in a bit over her
head, having given birth to two screamers back-to-back. Ethan’s parents had a long, happy marriage. They met at Cornell, where
they both studied with Nabokov. His mother was a painter, and the two of them ran an art gallery together. The family home
in Detroit contained a teeny tiny Henry Moore sculpture that they kept under glass, Ethan told me. He went to Cornell, too.
I liked how Ethan seemed so obviously connected to his family; the affection he conveyed for his siblings reminded me of my
own, a complicated kind of devotion. After a few glasses of the Chianti del Cuore, or whatever it was we were drinking, I
was able to loosen the tight grip I was keeping on my silverware and napkin and give him the rundown on my family. My oldest
sister, Nancy, a psychology professor living in Orange County, is divorced and has one daughter I don’t see as often as I’d
like. The next is Carla, a yoga instructor and voice teacher; she is married to Ken, and they have a son named Max. Neither
of my brothers was married at the time; Nick was living in Japan (he brought his wife, Yuki, home from there), and Matthew
was a reporter for a newspaper in Connecticut (where he later met his wife, Elizabeth). Ethan listened intently enough, and
when the check came, I let him pick it up, even though he hesitated. The restaurant gifted me with a ceramic heart-shaped
box wrapped in red cellophane, which made Ethan crack a smile and further exacerbated my discomfiture, though I held on to
that piece of kitsch for years and years.

Ethan tried to end the date when our walk home took him to his block. I was not ready to release him.

“You can’t go home now, it’s only eleven o’clock. Come over for a bourbon and soda,” I implored.

Ethan refused at first but eventually agreed after I insisted.

Back at my apartment, I mixed our drinks. Ethan had never had bourbon with soda and lime (my drink of choice at the moment)
and complimented the concoction. I figured that might keep him in my audience a while longer. To further that goal, I ricocheted
back and forth from the sofa to the CD player, trying to impress him with the greatest hits from my collection while wondering
if my butt looked big in my gray-and-brown plaid Chaiken pants as I stood in front of my stereo changing disks. I hadn’t dressed
up too much for the date, wanting to seem casual, but there was nothing casual about my intentions. I wanted confirmation
that Ethan liked me. I wanted to kiss Ethan. I was getting nowhere. Ethan remained burrowed in his corner of the sofa.

“What does it take to seduce you?” I finally blurted out, foggy with alcohol and anxiety.

Ethan’s face erupted into a nervous smile that would become all too familiar. “I think we should just be friends.”

What does it take
to seduce you?

How was I all of a sudden channeling
Dynasty
’s Alexis Carrington? I never even watched that show. The words haunted me as I slept, lightly, that night. I awoke hung over
and full of dread.

“It was all going fine until I threw myself at him!” I exclaimed to Ginia, and later to Anne on the phone. (I couldn’t admit
what I had actually said.) The next evening I was sitting with Jen, recalling the horror for the umpteenth time, when the
phone rang. It was Ethan.

“I had fun on our date,” he said. “We should do it again.”

What?!

Between that call
and the next from Ethan, I got involved with a sexy fuck-up who graduated from Columbia University but whose present occupation
was drawing pictures of fish for a company that made T-shirts sold at resort areas like Paradise Island or Antigua. I never
cooked for him; we mostly hung around his East Village apartment and sang songs while he accompanied on guitar. The Rolling
Stones’ “Dead Flowers” was the one he kept returning to. “Send me dead flowers to my wedding,” it goes, “and I won’t forget
to put roses on your grave.” Eric didn’t hide the fact that he was still in love with his ex-girlfriend Evgenia. No doubt
he was thinking about her when he sang that song, but I sang along anyway. On less rueful nights, we lay in bed singing every
television commercial jingle we could remember. Eric was a bit of a sad sack, but he was soulful and bore the sharp edge of
a depressed, underachieving Ivy League graduate. I tried to lure him to Brooklyn with the promise of a home-cooked meal—God
knows he needed one—but he canceled at the last minute, griping about a cold-sore outbreak.

Ethan got in touch again, and we made a plan to watch the Oscars at my place. Though I was caught up with Eric and his dead
flowers, I still thought enough of Ethan to offer to make dinner. I consulted with Anne on what to make, and she suggested
something healthy, indicating that Ethan liked his food clean. I came up with this pasta mixed with cancer-fighting vegetables
and antioxidant fruit and nuts: penne, with a sauce of broccoli, sautéed in garlic, sprinkled with plump raisins and toasted
walnuts.

Healthy Penne

1 pound broccoli (or 1 nice bunch)

2 tablespoons olive oil, plus a little more for finishing

1 clove garlic, chopped

Pinch hot red pepper flakes

½ cup raisins

Salt

½ cup chopped walnuts

½ pound penne

Freshly grated parmigiano cheese

Wash the broccoli and cut into florets; discard the stalks. In a skillet large enough to hold the pasta and broccoli, heat
the olive oil over medium heat, then add garlic and red pepper. When the garlic is golden, add the broccoli, raisins, and
a big pinch of salt. Sauté for 15 to 20 minutes, adding a little water if the mixture gets too dry. Meanwhile, toast the walnuts
in a small skillet for 5 to 6 minutes over medium heat, giving the skillet a shake every so often. Watch them or they will
burn! Once they are toasted, remove from heat and set aside.

Cook the pasta according to the directions
here
. Drain and add the penne to the skillet with the broccoli, then add
a splash of olive oil and the toasted walnuts.

Serve in warm bowls. Pass the parmigiano at the table. (If you are lactose intolerant—Ethan was, but somehow cheese didn’t
bother him—you may substitute ¼ cup toasted bread crumbs for the cheese and it is equally scrumptious.) Feel more or less
virtuous that you had vegetables with your carbs.

Serves 2, with leftovers.

Titanic
won nearly every award, but, unlike Kate Winslet, I did not get a kiss at the end of the evening. All Ethan asked for was
a doggie bag.

I do not consider myself a woman who gets the things she desperately wants, and God may have good reasons for this. Nor am
I foolish enough to pursue what is undoubtedly impossible. But Ethan gave just enough to keep my hopes up. Calls and e-mails
arrived with regularity. Returning from Saturday brunch with my girlfriends, I’d be shocked to find a phone message from him
asking what I was up to. Electronically we’d bat notes back and forth, debating the relative merits of John Lennon’s versus
Paul McCartney’s post-Beatles solo work. I loved Wings, Ethan preferred Lennon, but he did like McCartney’s pre-Wings stuff,
so he made me a tape of Paul’s first two solo albums and wrote each song’s title on the sleeve, a romantic gesture if ever
there was one. Meanwhile, Eric dumped me, declaring definitively that he was still in love with Evgenia. I bought my first
pair of Gucci shoes and promptly stopped wondering why Eric couldn’t love me and started wondering if charging $457 to my
credit card was really such a good idea.

Ethan wouldn’t go away
. When summer came, he managed to appear at our Shelter Island house every weekend, even though he hadn’t bought a share.
When I analyzed this habit, I was forced to admit there could have been other reasons besides me that he might do this. It’s
an island, and an incredibly relaxing one at that. You have to take a ferry to get there, and the voyage gives you the sense
of leaving everything behind. Our house, a converted eighteenth-century rectory, was as magical as the island. It had a pool
in front and a trellis of wisteria in back, beneath which we ate lunch al fresco. The house was owned by a family of artists
whose paintings covered the walls. The furniture was cozy and the kitchen well equipped. The dining room table accommodated
as many as twelve. Usually we were eight staying in the house, and we often invited over other friends from the island or
the Hamptons for carefully planned and beautifully executed dinners.

We would arrive on Fridays and barely leave the compound except to grocery shop; we got the tastiest tomatoes, eggplants,
squash, and basil from a stand attended by no one, where the prices were written on a chalkboard and you slipped money through
a slot in a red padlocked box. We bought our fish from the Commander, a retired navy man whose shop, in the basement of his
house, sold fish fresh and fried, though mostly the Commander just seemed to be getting baked. The house was full of excellent
cooks, chief among them Anne, who would hang back and take a managerial role most of the time, then wow us with some imaginative
treat like lavender ice cream. Another new friend, Astrid, would whip up Spanish tortillas, cold borscht, or wonderfully marinated
flank steak. Her boyfriend, Robert, an academic from Poland, was the naked mascot of the summerhouse; he liked to delve into
everyone’s personal lives and gave good advice administered poolside as he sunbathed in the nude. Belinda and Jeremy, a journalist
and architect from Australia, were not cooks, though the one confection they contributed—barbecued bananas sliced down the
middle with chocolate melted inside—was one of the most memorable desserts in a summer chock-full of them. Most nights we
got so carried away with talking and drinking wine that we didn’t get dinner on the table before ten o’clock.

The first thing I ever made for Ethan on Shelter Island was a Sicilian recipe that originated with my grandmother: halibut
baked with a sweet-and-sour sauce of red wine vinegar, yellow onions, raisins, and mint. I was overcome by Ethan’s admiration
for this dish, which I interpreted as thinly veiled praise of me. He was still raving about it by the pool the next day.

Unforgettable Halibut

¼ cup olive oil

6 yellow onions, sliced ¼ inch thick

2 teaspoons salt, plus extra salt to taste

¼ cup red wine vinegar

2 tablespoons honey

¼ cup currants

1 cup fresh mint, chopped

3 pounds halibut, or 6 (8-ounce) portions of any firm white fish—cod, sea bass, snapper, or flounder will work well, too

Olive oil for brushing

Freshly ground pepper

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

Heat the olive oil in a large sauté pan over medium-high heat. Add the onions and sprinkle with 1 teaspoon salt. Cook onions,
stirring occasionally, until they are soft, 15 to 20 minutes. Add the vinegar and honey and cook for 5 minutes. Then add the
currants and ½ cup of the chopped mint, cook for a few more minutes, and taste for salt (add more if necessary).

Brush the halibut and baking dish with olive oil, sprinkle fish with 1 teaspoon salt, and cover with the onions. Bake for
15 to 20 minutes depending on thickness of the fish.