Trophy Husband (6 page)

I wasn’t always into video games. In fact,
it’s not really accurate to say I’m “into” video games, per se. I’m
not a gamer geek, though I did have a fondness for retro games
growing up, since my parents used to take Julia and me bowling on
Saturday and the Silverspinner Lanes boasted all the original
arcade games like Qbert, Frogger, and, of course, both Pac-Mans.
It’s just that, well, I developed a particular predilection for
shooter games after Todd left. I know – probably just a completely
random little coincidence. And, to be fair, the video game habit
didn’t kick in the second he dropped his Vegas voicemail
bombshell.

The first few months, all I did was cry at
night in Ms. Pac-Man’s fur, asking myself what I could have done
differently, what had gone wrong, how I’d let him slip away. Was I
not adventurous enough? Interesting enough? Pretty enough? Young
enough? But it wasn’t until I showed up for a Fashion Hound shoot
in jeans and a wife beater tee, that I knew something needed to
change. My videographer, Andy, took one look at me, and said, “We
need a change, and we need a change fast. I have never seen you in
monochromatic clothes before and your nails aren’t even polished.
You’re a damn fashion blogger.”

Then he told me when his last boyfriend had
dumped him for another guy that he turned to Halo rather than
self-loathing, and that made all the difference in the world.
“Look, it’s not like you and I are going to go out and shoot things
for release, and that’s why these games are perfect. It’s like
punching a pillow. Same idea – gets your anger out – but a hell of
a lot more satisfying.”

With my cheeks dry, all the tears sucked out
of me, Andy took me to the electronics store and I bought my new
therapy. A gaming console. At the end of each day, after I’d shot
my videos, dutifully answered every email, and sketched out ideas
for the next show, that little cluster of anger I’d been harboring
was banging around, begging to be let out. So I’d turn that sucker
on by ten most nights, and spend the next hour pumping bullets into
bad guys. I was trigger happy, delighted to dispense ammo into
whatever creatures came my way, gleefully, indiscriminately letting
bullets fly, talking back to the screen: “Take that, you cheating
scum.”

I don’t think I was talking to the game.

“What other games do you like?” the cute guy
asks, and something about the question startles me. Maybe because
it’s so normal, and he seems legitimately curious. Then, there’s
the simple fact that we’re having a conversation in the middle of
an electronics store.

“Scrabble, Trivial Pursuit, Monopoly,” I say
with a completely straight face since I know he wasn’t referring to
board games.

But he picks up the baton easily, raising an
eyebrow as he asks, “Clue?”

“Of course. And it was always Mr. Plum in
the library with the candlestick.”

“Interesting. Because Miss Scarlet was
pretty wicked with that rope in the ballroom, if memory serves.
What about Chutes and Ladders?”

“Let’s not forget CandyLand either.”

“What was your favorite candy destination in
that game?”

“The vintage game, right? Not that new King
Candy imitator?”

“As if I’d even be talking about that game,”
he says playfully.

I’m about to answer, when he puts his hands
together as if he’s praying and says in a whisper, “Please say Ice
Cream Floats. Please say Ice Cream Floats.”

I laugh, the kind of laugh I haven’t felt in
a while, the kind that radiates through my whole body and turns
into a huge grin. “Of course. I wanted to live at Ice Cream
Floats.”

“I was all set to build a chocolate and
licorice home in Ice Cream Floats. And this reminds me that I need
to stock up on the classic games too. But I don’t think they sell
them here.”

“I came here to stock up on a new camera.” I
pat the camera box. Then I dive into my best infomercial voice.
“Did you know that when a cat pees on your camera it can’t be
resurrected?”

He shrugs his shoulders confidently, quirks
up his lips. “Actually, I could fix your camera.”

I give him a quizzical look.

“I can fix pretty much anything.”

“Wow. That’s impressive.”

“Want me to try?”

“You really want to?”

“I do. Yeah,” he says, as if he’s digging
the prospect of repairing the damaged device. “I really enjoy that
kind of challenge. It’s kind of like a game to me.”

“The Fix-It game.”

“Exactly.”

“If you really want to, I’m not going to say
no. I have it with me – it doesn’t smell anymore, I cleaned it –
because I wanted to make sure to get the same model.” I reach into
my purse and hand him the plastic bag with Chaucer’s victim in
it.

“I can have it back to you in a day or
two.”

“Great,” I say, and smile, as I stand here
looking at his fabulous face.

“But I would need your info to get it back
to you.”

Correction: As I stand
here stupidly looking at his fabulous face.
“Duh. Of course.”

I give him my first name and number and he
programs it into his phone.

“It was fun talking to you, McKenna,” he
says, then extends a hand. “I’m Chris McCormick.”

We make contact, and I’m not going to lie –
there’s something about the feel of his strong hand in mine that
just seems…right. Maybe it’s the firm grip, or his soft skin, or
the way his eyes light up as he smiles while shaking my hand. I
don’t want to let go. I want to go all black-and-white movie and
have a simmering moment where his eyes smolder and, like magnets,
we can’t resist. He pulls me in, dips me, and plants a devastating
kiss on my lips.

The kind of kiss that can ruin a girl for
any other kisses for the rest of her life.

Chris McCormick is gorgeous, in a pure
California sort of way, like sunshine and blue skies, like the
ocean and its tides, but he’s too confident, too steady to be young
enough for my project. I bet he’s, gasp, close to my age. I need to
stay focused on my mission

“And if you want any more Halo tips, you can
find a ton on Craigslist,” he says.

“Craigslist!” I practically jump up and down
in excitement, reminded of my overarching mission to find a Trophy
Husband. “That’s it. Craigslist! Thank you so much. I gotta
go.”

I head to the front of the store, plunk down
cash for my camera, take a quick peek back at the Halo expert as I
do, because it’s a crying shame with that face, those eyes, that
hair. Then I scurry back home.

Once at home, I open my laptop, and hop on
over to Craigslist. Why hadn’t I thought of this sooner? You can
find anything there – new job, new couch, new BOYFRIEND. And I have
Hayden’s evil cat Chaucer to thank. If that dastardly feline hadn’t
peed on my camera then I wouldn’t have wound up in the electronics
store and I wouldn’t have run into Chris McCormick, the Video Game
Guy, with emerald eyes and a stunning smile, and I wouldn’t have
gotten the great idea to check out Craigslist, thanks to him. This
is brilliant. This is epic. Finding a man-boy will be a piece of
cake on Craigslist.

So I type the URL in and click on “Bay
Area,” while my blonde half-horse, half-dog, trundles on over and
parks herself at my feet with a heavy sigh. She’s probably counting
down the hours until it’s time for a swim in the San Francisco Bay,
her internal doggy clock permanently calibrated to the rhythms of
our day. I scratch her ears, then pet her head.

I start the Craiglist search with the Personals
section and type “trophy husband” into the search bar. Hmm. Only
one post with “trophy husband” in the whole Bay Area?

“
I am 50 years old and am a
successful stock trader. I am looking for a younger guy to share my
good fortune with. Send a picture for mine. Be between 18 and 30
years old. I often travel to Europe, Asia, and Moscow on business
and would love to bring you along. Must not have hang ups about
being showered with gifts and being a trophy husband. I am a bottom
as well.”

This is it? The lone ad for “Trophy
Husband?”

I soldier on and try “boy
toy” this time, and it returns several options. I tap open the
first entry because it boasts a promising subject line:
“Young guy looking for assertive older
womam.”

So the young guy didn’t exactly spell woman
correctly. But let’s hear him out.

“
Extreme satisfacktion for the
rite woman. Hansome male seek to belong to the woman who need to
have nothing but the finest at her cummand. If your fantasy is to
be in the company of a beeuutiful, intelligent and discrete, sexy
man than you is getting warmer.”

Our public education system is much worse than I
thought. After all, is it really that much to ask for one’s
potential next mate to be able to make a noun and verb agree? The
answer, evidently, is yes. I try the next entry.

“
Let me be your boy toy. I will
obey your every order and serve your every wish.”

At least
his
grammar is correct.
And his writing has a nice rhythm to it, so I click through to his
photo.

Ouch.

I am just going to pretend I didn’t see
that.

I squeeze my eyes shut. I remind myself that
I am not a prude. I am not a priss. I am not weirded out by sex, or
sexy people, or public displays of affection. But I am pretty sure
– and I wouldn’t have known this before because I have never seen
one – that I am not into penis piercings.

So I move on to the next entry, trying my
best to un-see what I just saw.

“I have a job, my own
place in the city and am clean and well-kept,”
the next one writes.

What, like a lawn?

I hit the home button on the browser,
returning to the safe haven of Google, then lay my cheek on the
edge of my desk, wondering yet again if I am out of my mind.
Because clearly I am not cut out for a Craigslist match. As much as
I’d love to end my streak, I also wouldn’t mind a bit more than a
fling. I’m almost embarrassed to admit this because I’m supposed to
be an independent woman – hear me roar – but I would really like to
have a boyfriend.

The word sounds so high school, but I don’t
care. I don’t want to be alone any longer. I want to be in love and
carefree and have someone to talk to, laugh with, make fun of other
crazy people in San Francisco with. Someone who would never even
think of leaving me with two mixers and a vintage white dress.

I can picture it perfectly – a night out on
the town, then we’d come home, turn on some torch music, he’d take
me in his arms for a slow dance. Touch my hair in a way that sends
sparks through me. Then a hand on the back of my neck, bringing me
closer, lips meshing with mine. He’d slide his hand down to the
small of my back, while laying a smoldering path of kisses down to
the hollow of my throat.

We’d slow dance and sway, the kind of dance
that’s not for anyone else to see. The kind that’s a delicious
tease of foreplay, where every subtle move, every brush of the
fingers, and dusting of the lips on shoulders, is the promise of
what’s to come. That dress straps will be pushed down, that zippers
will come undone. Clothes will fall in the floor in a heap, tugged
off quickly, as the dance moves to the couch and shifts into
something horizontal. Slow and tender and tantalizing, each move,
each touch turning me higher, sending me further into a dizzying
state of longing.

My breath catches at the thought. Not only
the prospect of kisses that ignite goosebumps all over me, but the
possibility of someone who wants only me. Who only has eyes for me.
Who wants to look at me, longing and lust in his perfect green
eyes, and then throw me down on my couch, strip me naked, and bury
his face between my legs.

Okay, so evidently, I both want a boyfriend
and the kind of oral plundering that makes you quiver, and roll
your eyes in the back of your head, and grab the guy’s soft, shaggy
hair, and shout his name over and over into oblivion.

Then curl up in his arms, safe and warm, and
know he’ll be there the next day and the next and even then
some

Is that so much to ask for?

Love, and a talented mouth?

I close out of Craigslist. I’m not going to
find what I really want there anyway.

I model for the camera a cute little ‘50s
style bateau neck blouse. Then, I step out of the shot, swap that
shirt out for a form-fitting black V-neck with one purple shoe
design emblazoned on the front. I step back in front of the camera
that Andy holds as he shoots today’s episode in my living room.

“What’s it going to be, my fellow fashion
hounds?” I point to the camera – the viewers. “You get to vote on
how I’m going to dress for my first ever date with a Trophy Husband
candidate. And be sure to watch the outtakes from my very first
phone call to a potential candidate.”

I pause for a second or two because this is
the spot where Andy will edit in a few choice clips from my
iCam-captured conversation with the Meter Boy. The clips include my
awkward ask-out: “So should we meet in the Golden Gate Park near
Shakespeare Gardens on Saturday?”

Am I the world’s biggest dork or what? I
couldn’t have just asked Meter Man out for a cup of coffee or a
glass of wine, or even, God forbid, something as simple as lunch.
Nope, I had to go nuts and ask him to meet in the frigging park.
He’ll probably bring champagne and strawberries too.

Anyway, after my three-count pause, I give
my traditional sign off, with a tip of the hat to my dog, who sits
dutifully by my side. “That’s all for today, you fellow fashion
hounds.”

Andy turns off the camera and I ask my usual
question. “How was it?”