The Sleeping Beauty Proposal (13 page)

This gives me pause. Maybe there really is such a thing as pure-method house building? Maybe Hugh told me about it and I filed it deep in my subconscious. Either that or Nick knows I was bullshit-ting and he has plans of embarrassing me at the Dylan contest.

Ha! Let him try. I'm not giving up that easily to a man who refuses to let himself be bested by a woman.

Steve has left the third message, also an invitation to the “It Ain't Me, Babe” Fifth Annual Bob Dylan Be-Alike Contest. Poor Steve is constantly inviting me to his “gigs,” as he calls them, though I rarely accept. I hate to disappoint him again by not showing up.

Also, I need to support Todd, even if that means facing off against Nick. Oh, well. Such is the sacrifice I am called to make in the name of sisterhood. If I have to spar with a mortal Greek god, then spar I must.

The fourth message is from Giles in Thoreau Publicity, looking for an interview.

And, finally, Hugh. I breathe deep, preparing myself. “Genie.” He is crisp, efficient. “I've just received some alarming news from Pippa, who's house-sitting for my parents while they're in Italy for the summer, something about a Mr. and Mrs. Michaels calling up from the States claiming that you and I are getting married.

“Now, lookit, Genie. I appreciate your support. I always have and I can't tell you what this Barbara Walters interview has done. My publisher expects another good run on all the bestseller lists and Miramax is speeding up the film production. I'm sure you're as thrilled as I am.”

I'm thrilled all right.

"Still ...”

Here it comes.The big warning.

“If your family is confused about whether I've actually asked you to marry me, I believe it is your responsibility to disabuse them of this notion immediately.”

You do, do you?

“I mean, having to explain the whole mess to Pippa, a dear old friend, was humiliating enough. Especially with
you know who
there.”

No.Who? I have no idea who
you know who
is.

“Because by now I'm assuming you've found out who
she
is and I would—
we
would—vastly appreciate your tact at the office. I'm sure you can understand, even if you are hurt. Really, Genie, it's better this way.Years from now we'll look back and—”

“Oh, bugger off,” I say out loud, before hanging up. If there's one advantage to this breakup, it's that I no longer need to obey Hugh's constant and frequent “corrections.” Life is too short to listen to a man tell me how to live it.

That's when it occurs to me that maybe being dumped by Hugh might not have been the worst thing in the world.

In fact, it might have been the loveliest parting gift ever.

Chapter Eight

Okay. I'm pretty sure there is no such thing as pure-method house building. I've searched the Internet and even asked my father and the guys down at Coolidge Hardware (who gaped at me like I was an alien invader). No one's ever heard of it.

I am screwed.

Then again, I do have the advantage over Nick in that I'm a woman. Most men, I've learned, can be easily distracted by a flash of leg, a bit of cleavage. They're like apes, really, a half a notch up the evolutionary scale when it comes to all things sexual. Show them the merest hint of a nipple and their brains instantaneously go to mush. It's not very feminist of me to say, but I seriously think Condoleezza Rice could solve the Middle East crisis with a decent boob job and a quality Wonderbra.

Which is also how I have come to justify my rather impulsive purchase of a Charlotte Tarantola mocha tank with its figure-hugging ribs for a whopping sixty-five dollars from Neiman Marcus. Pair that with a 7 For All Mankind miniskirt and my guess is he won't stand a chance.

Not that my goal is to achieve anything more than to throw Nick off guard. Certainly, I am not trying to impress him, much less seduce him, despite the glowing bronzer I applied in places sure to catch his eye and, therefore, initiate the brain-mushing process.

In my opinion, this is nothing more than war. A war against all egotistical men who are used to having their way (like Hugh) or who assume every woman will fall in love with them (like Nick). In my opinion, if Nick is bound to pick away at my pure-method -house-building story, trying to trip me up, then he will have to defend himself against my newly shaven and baby-oiled legs in Cole Haan slides. (A steal at one hundred dollars.)

Catching a glimpse of my reflection as I pass by the store windows in Harvard Square on my way to Club Mercury, it strikes me that I have never dressed this way before. Never. My usual summer outfit, even for club hopping, is the typical Bostonian student fare of a T-shirt and shorts with Teva sandals or, for fancy occasions, a gauzy, hippie skirt imported from Tibet.

I have to admit I feel a bit brazen these days. Confident. Reckless. There's a new swish to my hips, a smile on my lips. Fake it to make it, Patty says, a phrase that, until now, I've considered Amway hoo-ha.

However, that was before I faked my engagement and began appreciating Amway in a whole new light.

"Wow. Look at you!” Steve gets up from a table on the dais to plant a friendly kiss on my cheek. “Is this all for me?”

“Why not?” I say with a laugh, as my gaze sweeps the room searching for any sign of Nick and, of course,Todd.

“Let me get you a beer.We're still setting up.” He takes me by the hand and deposits me at a small round table that is way too close to a set of huge amplifiers. “Genie,” he adds, giving me another kiss. “I'm really glad you came.”

Yet another moment when it seems as if Steve hopes to romanticize our relationship. He's tried this in the past, mostly when he's had too much to drink. A confession of attraction here. A declaration of love there. My usual tactic has been to call him up the next day and josh him back to normalcy. His is one friendship I don't want to lose after seventeen years. It's a treasure.

At least, that's what I tell myself.

Now, in light of the number Hugh pulled on me, I'm rethinking this. Maybe sexual attraction is merely chemistry like Hugh said. Because I've tried to be sexually attracted to Steve, really. I mean, what could be better than falling in love with your best friend?

Unless you can't.

Steve is the guy who taught me how to drive in reverse around the Fresh Pond rotary, who took me out to Howard Johnson's all-you -can-eat fried clam nights and challenged me to finish more plates than he could. Later, he thoughtfully held my head by the side of the Southeast Expressway as I lost the contest—along with the contents of my stomach.

And it's not that he's unattractive. He's sort of sexy in a Boston rocker way with his dyed blond hair and tight black leather jeans.When he's singing onstage and the secretaries are screaming for “North Shore Rendezvous”—the Wily Coyotes' one hit—and begging to have his children, I have to ask myself, what do they see that I don't?

This is all the more odd considering that long ago I let him take my virginity.

“Look at that,” he says, gesturing toward a group of students in MIT shirts plugging their laptops into the amplifiers. “It's a Dylan concert and they're running GarageBand off their iBooks. Sacrilege.”

“The times, they are a-changin'.”

Steve hands me my Heineken and frowns.“Don't ever do that again. I'll have to kill you.”

“Get used to it.You're about to hear forty contestants sing that exact same line.”

“Forty-five, and the smart ones won't.They'll pick something more political like ‘With God on Our Side,' if they want to win.”

Ah, yes. “With God on Our Side,” Dylan's famous antiwar song with Joan Baez. Hugh's favorite, I remember, before I can stop myself.

Steve is leaning back in his chair, staring at me with a goofy expression.

“What?”

“I dunno.” He shrugs. “I was thinking how good you look. If you weren't such a feminist and I could be assured you wouldn't take it the wrong way, I'd call you hot.”

"Really?” I can't hide my smile. “Hot?”

“Don't get offended.”

“I'm not offended. To tell you the truth,” I say, brushing back my hair in what I hope is further evidence of my sexiness, “that's exactly what I needed to hear.”

“Yeah? Why's that?”

I hesitate, pondering if I should tell him about Hugh. Then again, next to Patty, he is my best friend. If I can't trust Steve, who can I trust?

“Because that's what Hugh said.That I wasn't—hot.”

Steve snaps his chair forward.“You're kidding me.Why would he say a stupid thing like that?”

His reaction is perfect, the exact antidote for what ails me.“It's a mystery. Hugh says I'm his best friend, the one person he can go to in trouble, but I just don't turn him on.”

A knowing grin plays on Steve's lips as if he's about to ask how it feels to walk a mile in his shoes. Instead he says,“Was this before or after he asked you to marry him?”

Bam!
A drum set falls over, causing me to practically cannon-ball out of my chair.

How did Steve find out I was getting married?

“Todd told me,” he explains, seeing my shock,“when he called Sunday night to ask if I would talk you into showing up tonight. Said he felt guilty about some fight you two had and then he dropped the bomb about your engagement.”

Whoa. Back up. I can't decide which is more mind-blowing— that Steve thinks I'm actually engaged to Hugh or that my brother actually feels guilty about fighting with me.

“So, what's the answer?” Steve asks.“Did Hugh say this before or after you got engaged? Either way, why in the hell would you still be engaged to a man who doesn't deserve you and doesn't treat you like you deserve?”

Steve's nostrils are flaring, a sure sign he's getting angry, and I can't say I blame him. It appears to him like I'm throwing myself at a man who abhors my body when Steve has been waiting in the wings, ready to love me warts and all.

Unfortunately, the room is getting crowded so it's difficult to discuss my sex life discreetly. Contestants have arrived in beards and wigs, microphones slung around their necks. We are in a sea of fat and tall, black and Hispanic, and even a few female Dylans. Not the ideal atmosphere for sorting through feelings of intimate inadequacy.

“Let's talk later,” I shout, trying to be heard above the “one-two -three” sound check. “Give me some credit, Steve.You might be surprised.”

“Why should I?” Steve is leaning over half the table, practically in my face.“I'd never say anything like that to you. I just told you you're hot. But would you ever consider going out with me? Hell, no.”

“Please, Steve.”

“Lots of women love me. I've got groupies. Seriously, I do. Women who follow the Wily Coyotes from gig to gig. So clearly I'm not some freak.”

“I never said you were a freak.”

“Yeah, but you act like I'm a freak.When I kissed you on the cheek, you flinched.”

That's a lie. “I did not.”

“What if I kissed you now? Would you push me away?”

“Of course not.”What's gotten into him?

Before I can figure out the answer, Steve curves his arm around the back of my head and pulls me to him, kissing me not on the cheek, but full on the lips. I don't dare pull away or, heaven forbid, flinch. I don't dare give him any indication that he is even the slightest bit unappealing. I am so supersensitive to the issue of sexual self-esteem now that I even kiss him back.

“Hi, kids.”

Steve lifts his lips off mine and says, “Hi, Todd. Excuse me while I kiss your sister.”

“By all means.”Todd waves his approval. “Nick and I will step aside until you're done.”

Nick?

I shove Steve so hard he nearly flies backward over his chair, banging his head against a pillar.

“What did you do that for?” he asks, righting himself.

“Sorry.” Keeping my eyes focused on the table so I won't have to see Nick's reaction, I say,“It was enough.You proved your point.”

“And I guess you proved yours.”

“Don't be so dramatic.”

“This is Steve Taylor,”Todd says to Nick. “Genie's friend from college. Lead singer of the Wily Coyotes, that band we saw on the pier last spring.”

Nick shakes Steve's hand and then spins around a chair to straddle it. He's so close, his thigh brushes mine. “Hi, Genie,” he says.

“Hi.” I quickly glance at him and then, seeing his dark blue eyes twinkling, look away. Oh, God. He's in a black T-shirt. I'm a sucker for men in black T-shirts.

"You look very nice,” he says softly. "That's a good color on you. Goes very well with your skin.”

The words are innocent enough, but his tone is not.“Thanks.” I pretend to search the crowded club for a waitress. “The service around here is lousy, isn't it?”

“No wonder he made a pass,” Nick adds, nodding good-naturedly at Steve.

My neck goes hot again.

“No. You don't understand Genie and Steve,” Todd shouts. “They have a totally fucked-up relationship. Like
When Harry Met Sally
only without the imitation orgasm.”

The word
orgasm
hangs over our table until Steve says, “You mean you actually watched that movie?”

“All part of getting laid, buddy, all part of getting laid.You're right, Genie. The service here sucks,” he says, watching a waitress buzz right past us.

“Excuse me, miss.” Nick does nothing more than flick his index finger and—presto—the prettiest waitress suddenly appears. “Could we get another round?”