Confessions Of An Ex-Girlfriend. Lynda Curnyn

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      Then there was me. Neither student nor psychotic, yet stubbornly holding on to my rent-stabilized studio as if my very life depended on it. Now don’t get me wrong, it’s a great address—just a few short blocks from the subway, the Film Forum, the downtown bar scene, the Peacock, NYU and just about anyplace anyone wanted to be in the downtown area. And it was easy enough for me to bear up to my lack of closet and living space for the kind of location that drew looks of envy whenever I spouted my address at parties. Besides, with Derrick in my life, there was always that lingering hope of the one bedroom we would one day share, once Derrick realized the two-bedroom dive on the Lower East Side he shared with a foul-mouthed bartender just wasn’t cutting it. I used to fantasize about our dream apartment, complete with wall shelves displaying our combined, heady collection of film and literature titles. It was that hope that kept me sane, and safely apart from my in curably psychotic and old, or annoyingly young and transient, neighbors.

      But once Derrick was gone from my life, I fell out of my Safely Coupled category and into…Something Else. And that something else was yet to be determined, I realized, as I entered the building.

      “Emma!” came Beatrice’s shrill cry as I stepped into the foyer and found her at the mailboxes, arms laden with every mail-order catalog you could imagine, and an assortment of envelopes.

      “Hi, Beatrice, how are you?” I said in the usual singsong voice I reserved for small children and adults like Beatrice, who weren’t, as they say, all there.

      “Oh, I’m all right—”

      “Good,” I replied quickly, starting for the stairs.

      “—except for this crazy sinus condition. Every morning I wake up, stuffed nose, clogged ears. And my molars. Oh—” Her gray eyes opened wide behind her thick glasses. “It’s unbearable.”

      “I hear what you’re saying, Bea,” I replied, bracing one foot on the steps, preparing for flight at the first opportunity. Beatrice did like to get into a thorough discussion of her ailments, and I still hadn’t managed to figure out how to effectively avoid listening to her litanies. She’s lonely and it means a lot to her that I listen, I often rationalized after a good ten minutes hearing about everything from nasal congestion to hot flashes.

      But instead of carrying on with the details of sinus drainage, which I thought was sure to come next, she abruptly stopped talking, her eyes roaming over me from head to foot in a way that made me feel faintly ill. Beatrice, with her thick, squat body shoved, more often than not, into flannel shirts and stretchy pants, always looked to me like the butch half of a lesbian couple—except she was permanently sans her other half—and so her inspection, especially during this vague Post-Derrick Period of my life, was anxiety-producing. “You do understand, don’t you?” she said, her mouth dropping open as it did whenever she was captured by some thought.

      As I started to proceed up the stairs with a hurried wish that she feel better soon, she called out, “Wait!” and turned her attention to the mail in her hands. Shuffling through the catalogs, she pulled out a thick, glossy volume and held it out to me. “I thought you might be able to use this,” she said as I reluctantly took the catalog from her.

      I stared dully at the cover, which featured a tall, large-framed woman dressed in a flannel shirt similar to the ones Beatrice favored, and dark jeans.

      “It’s got great deals on styles for women like us,” she continued, staring up at me, a pleased expression on her face.

      Women like us? I started to get defensive, but thought better of it and made my escape. “Thanks, Beatrice. I’ll return it when I’m done.”

      “Oh, no need,” she replied, beaming a mouthful of brown teeth at me as I fled up the stairs.

      Confession: I’m not convinced a fish wouldn’t be happier with a bicycle.

      “Why aren’t we married yet?” I asked Jade later that night on the phone.

      “Because we’re strong women,” she replied.

      This answer was beginning to bother me. “What does that mean, exactly? That I’ve got metal in my head and can withstand numerous blows?”

      “What are you talking about?”

      “Maybe we aren’t looking hard enough.”

      “Oh, I’ve been looking all right.”

      “Oh, yeah. So how are things going with Ted Terrific?”

      Big sigh. “Turns out he’s more likely to be Ted Bundy.”

      “What?”

      She sighed. “He didn’t call.”

      Needless to say, I was shocked…and slightly horrified. Of every woman I knew, Jade was the only one who never got snubbed by a guy. Men always called Jade. She was my one last hope that women didn’t have to forevermore be left waiting by the phone. Good grief. What did this mean for the rest of us if Jade, the Über-Single Girl, was having trouble getting to date number two?

      Understanding all too well the frustration that followed such blow-offs, I offered the one thing every woman who has been left hanging by a man always needs: anger. “Clearly he’s an asshole.”

      “Hmm.”

      “Or gay. Or mentally deficient. I mean, what kind of moron goes out with a beautiful, intelligent girl like you and then neglects to pick up the phone, even just to tell her he’s happy she’s alive and he had the opportunity to spend a few hours in her presence?”

      “He probably couldn’t handle the fact that I beat him in two out of three games of pool.”

      “Wimp.”

      There were a few moments of silence, while we ruminated over the question of how Ted Terrific had taken a turn for the worse.

      “Maybe I was too aggressive,” Jade offered.

      “You’re kidding, right? Jade, I’m sure you did nothing—”

      “I did invite him up. I mean, not to sleep with him or anything. But I’d just gotten the new Jamiroquai CD, and I knew he was into the same kind of music, so…”

      “Did he come up?”

      “No. He said he had to get up early. Gave me this killer kiss in front of my building, then took off. It just doesn’t make sense. The whole night, right down to that kiss, was amazing. We had drinks, shot pool and talked like we’d known each other all our lives. We liked the same music, hated the same clubs. I couldn’t believe how well we clicked. How much we had in common. And the chemistry…forget about it! I wish he had come up, so at least we could have had sex before he disappeared. I’m sure it would have been nothing less than incredible.”

      In truth, I was stumped, but concluded that maybe we had just assumed things all wrong. “Maybe he’ll still call. What night did you guys go out?”

      “Last Saturday. As in the weekend before last. Granted, I did leave town on Thursday to go on a shoot for the weekend, but he didn’t know that. I came home on Sunday morning to no message.”

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