JACKIE ROSE

was born and raised in Montreal, Quebec, where she now lives with her husband, daughter and dog. After cutting her teeth in the publishing world editing a travel magazine, she decided to devote herself to writing full-time. Slim Chance is her debut novel.

When she’s not looking herself up on the Internet, Jackie likes to spend her time sleeping, shopping and musing about the meaning of it all. She’s also currently hard at work on her second book.

For Dan, my one and only love

Slim Chance

Jackie Rose

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thanks to…

Robyn Berman, for lighting a fire under me and keeping it burning. Sam Bell, my devoted editor, for all your help and encouragement, every step of the way. Rachel Pritzker, for being the absolute polar opposite of the mother-in-law in this book. Nelu Wolfensohn, for that whole roof over our heads thing. Riana Levy, Tara Cogan, Wendy Cooper, Kathy De Koven and Ilana Kronick, for being the very paragons of friendship, if not always virtue. Lorne Scharf, photo expert, for the back-cover shot. Rose and Issie Lipkus, for your endless smiles and support. Natalie Rosenhek—aka “Bubba”—for baby-sitting with a passion. Shoel Rosenhek, for getting me started with all those trips to the library. Jordy, for sending news of the world home from New York, London and beyond. Sarah, lover of ideas and pursuer of wisdom, for everything, always. Sandy Lipkus, for being the best teacher I ever had.

And, of course, Abigail,

for helping with revisions from the inside.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

CHAPTER 13

CHAPTER 14

CHAPTER 15

CHAPTER 16

CHAPTER 17

CHAPTER 18

CHAPTER 19

CHAPTER 20

CHAPTER 21

CHAPTER 22

EPILOGUE

1

If you’ve ever puked at work, it has probably been for one of two reasons—either you’re desperately, uncontrollably ill with some type of stomach flu or food poisoning, in which case you’re just glad to have made it to the bathroom on time and don’t really care if anyone hears you throwing your guts up, or else you’re sick in the sort of way you’d prefer to keep to yourself (i.e., violently hung over; just discovered you’re pregnant; fired, and so on). That afternoon, as I stared down into the bowl in the unforgiving light of the ladies’ room on the third-floor offices of Kendra White Cosmetics, The Second-Largest Direct-Selling Makeup Company In America, I realized that this situation definitely falls into the latter category, the sort of barfing where you pray for privacy while processing the certain knowledge that your entire life as you know it is about to change.

I can’t believe I said yes.

Until that moment, thanks to a healthy aversion to mayonnaise and an inherited ability to hold my liquor, I’d never suffered the indignity of being sick in public. Now, though, a gaggle of thick-stockinged co-workers fretted outside the stall door, gossipful glee disguised as concern. They’d seen me bolt for the bathroom. Now they waited for completion.

Please, just let me not puke.

But it was no use. My eyes filled with water, my knees hit the floor and the bowl became my whole world. In my day-to-day life at Kendra White, I make a concerted effort not to put my ass anywhere near these toilets. Now, my face was inside one.

An eternity passed, during which time I pretended I was in the Ally McBeal Unisex, so sterile, so sleek, so much fun…not at all like this abysmal pit, where ladies’ unmentionables are strewn all over the wet floor and the garbage can’s always overstuffed. Oh my God, is that a pubic hair on the seat?

“Are you all right, Evelyn? Do you need someone to hold your hair back?” Pruscilla Cockburn, my boss, wheezed from the other side.

“No, I’m fine,” I gagged.

“Well then, get a hold of yourself, dear. It’s only nerves! You’re going to make a wonderful wife. And what a fellow, that Bruce. He’s waiting just outside the door, you know. Gosh! Have you ever seen such a romantic proposal? Well I know I certainly haven’t—not even on A Wedding Story, and I’ve got every one on tape. I mean, can you imagine? Asking her at work? In front of everyone…?”

At this point, it was obvious she’d forgotten all about me, and was simply sharing with the others. What a hag. I had just suffered the worst sort of humiliation imaginable, my love life savagely ripped from the privacy of my own heart and put on display in front of everyone I hate most in the world, and all Pruscilla could think about was what a great story it would make at the coffee cart tomorrow morning. My entire life had just been turned upside down, and all they could think about was how it affected them. I turned away from the bowl and saw four pairs of feet, each in worse shoes than the next. Pruscilla’s were stuffed like sausages into worn-out red pumps. She always matches her shoes to her outfits—vast swaths of brightly colored fabric that go under the guise of “caftans” and “capes” in plus-size stores. They should be illegal, as far as I’m concerned.

“I’m okay. I’m coming out,” I sniffed, opening the door.

I should have seen it coming. Bruce’s proposal, I mean, not the puking.

That morning, for some reason, I read my horoscope, which is something I never do, seeing as how I’m usually far too late to read the paper, or even bring it in, mind you. Plus, I hate touching newsprint—it always ends up all over everything, especially my face. Not that I really believe in astrology anyway. Except for maybe the page at the back of Cosmo, since it’s a magazine, not a newspaper, and because once I used the lucky numbers and won $125 in the lottery. But I suppose that’s numerology.

Anyway, that morning, my horoscope was dead-on, although I had no way of knowing it at the time. The first sign that the planets were aligning against me occurred when I actually woke up early. Well, not so much early as just not late. And Bruce, dear that he is, made us breakfast. Three-egg cheese and mushroom omelets—with the yolks, of course; none of that whites-only shit for us—and coffee. It was unusual for me to lose my dietary resolve so early in the day (that usually doesn’t happen until right before lunch), but I knew that since it was Friday anyway, Monday would doubtlessly be a better time to start watching myself. Better not to spoil the weekend, and all the wonderful meals that might have been.

“Evie, you wanna go out for dinner tonight, just us?” Bruce asked, knowing full well we almost always go out Friday nights, just us. He probably thought he was being adorable for asking, but to tell you the truth he was verging on smarmy. Or maybe it was just that he’d already asked me three times. With our busy career-person schedules, Bruce doesn’t always see as much of me as he’d like, so I try to keep our weekly date sacred no matter what. That is, unless his mother, Roberta—known as Bertie to those who love her, or at the very least to those who don’t despise her, since not too many people can claim more than that—decides that she wants to have us over for watery soup and boiled potatoes, in which case we drop everything and run directly to the Fulbrights’ Greenwich, Connecticut compound for a meal that would make dinner with the Royal Family seem like a hoedown.

I was at the very least glad to hear tonight would not be one of those nights. One Friday a month with his mother is quite enough for me, though Bertie would have us over every week if I didn’t put my foot down. It’s my theory that these so-called family nights are really just an excuse for her to try and turn Bruce against me, since she obviously thinks I’m stopping him from fulfilling his true potential. And who could blame me? Bertie sets the tone with interview-style questions like “Bruce, do you feel that teaching second grade is a challenge for you, intellectually speaking?” (A: “As you know, Mother, it’s a school for gifted children, so yes—it is a challenge”). Or perhaps a confusing zinger like, “Evelyn, does being Italo-American give you an edge in the mail-order cosmetics industry?” (A: Well, I’m only one half Italian-American, Mrs. Fulbright, but no, I don’t think it really makes a difference.”)

Then we all sit back and enjoy the show while Bruce’s wicked WASPy sisters, Brooke, Wendy and, of course, Diana—each lovelier and thinner and perkier-breasted than the next—turn the emasculation of their older brother into a spectator sport, while at the same time taking an obvious mental inventory of every bite I manage to put in my mouth without gagging. By the end of the night, I’m ready to kill, ready to shake his sweet old dad and say “Wake up! They’ve got you by the balls, man! Get out now, while you’ve still got a good 20 years left!” But nobody seems to notice any of it except me, and Bruce and I spend the train ride home fighting.

But we’ll save all that for next Friday. Tonight, we’re free.

“I was thinking Luna,” Bruce continued. “I made reservations for nine.”

He knows I love it there. Luna is where my parents had their first date, a blind date. It was where they fell in love the second they laid eyes on each other. When I was little, and sad or not feeling well, I begged my mom to tell me the story over and over, and she would always oblige, sparing no details—what she was wearing, the food they ate, how my dad said she looked like Elizabeth Taylor, only with brown eyes and a bigger butt. I tried to imagine them there, sitting next to the steamy window on a dark winter night. Luna was also where they went to eat the night I was conceived. It was the last time they did it before my dad died, although she left that part out until I was a little older.

Bruce and I always save Luna for special occasions, never more than once or twice a year. And walking around Little Italy makes us horny and couple-y feeling, so it’s always a guaranteed good time. There’s something so nice about prancing around, arm in arm, flaunting our delirious happiness to the droves of miserable Manhattan singletons out hunting in packs, or, even better, those on obviously painful blind dates. It’s like we’re members of a private club of two, and it reminds me how being a part of something, no matter how troubled or even depressing it may be at times, is usually far superior to being a part of nothing.

“That sounds all right, sweetie,” I said, playing along. Our anniversary was coming up—six years. I figured that’s what he had in mind.

“Okay, so I’ll call you around lunchtime. Will you be in the office or are you planning to go out?” he asked.

“Um, I should be in all day, but I have a meeting around one.” In retrospect, I can see now that he was being unusually inquisitive, but since interest in my workday comings and goings wasn’t something Bruce normally displays, his clumsy attempts at making sure I’d be there were lost on me.

“Good, good,” he said. “Well, have a nice day, then. Call me if you leave work for some reason.”

So I was wide-awake, full of omelet and full of energy as I stepped out the door on September 24, a glorious autumn morning, and decided to bring the paper to read on the train, despite the fact that I was wearing my new winter-white three-quarter-length trench from Anne Klein (Marie Claire, September: “Revamp Your Fall Wardrobe with These 10 Must-Haves”). It’s about a 40-minute commute from our Park Slope apartment in Brooklyn to the midtown Manhattan offices of Kendra White. Normally, I use the time to drift in and out of consciousness. Yes, I’m one of those unfortunate sorts you see on the train or bus whose head lolls to one side like an idiot or whose mouth suddenly drops open. At least once a week I miss my stop, usually twice a week.

That morning, though, I read the paper alongside the other commuters like a real Cosmo girl, maneuvering the pages deftly, spilling my grande latte only once. There’s the usual something or other about Afghanistan on the front page… Better turn to the Entertainment section…oooh, it seems Madonna might be considering having another baby, just as I suspected. That’s good. She’s such a stylish mom… Bla, bla, bla, Leonardo DiCaprio broke his clavicle tripping over his feet outside a hot but unnamed L.A. nightclub…That little cross-eyed boy from Jerry Maguire has a new movie coming out…. Dreadful, I’m sure…Wonder how far off my horoscope will be for today….

Virgo (August 23-September 22) See the forest for the trees. Focus on partnership, communication, personal advances. Individual close to you confides, “I need you now more than ever.” Keep an eye out for details. Work situation may be stressful, but don’t lose your head. Taurus plays key role today. Spotlight on domestic situation, home, cooking. Financial prospects good. Be leery of Uranus, planet of sudden changes. Stay cool! This too, shall pass.

Oh for God’s sake, that could mean anything—they really do all sound the same. I can see why Morgan thinks horoscopes are for idiots who feel powerless over their own lives. How utterly ridiculous! As if planets could have any effect whatsoever on what’s happening down here on Earth. Except for the moon, maybe. Now that’s another story. And it’s not really a planet anyway. I’ve heard that since the moon controls the tides, it can also pull all the water in your body around every which way, accounting for things like PMS and unexplained weight gain….

I woke up only one stop too late. By the time I got off the subway, the front of my trench coat was covered in black smudges and coffee, more than enough to ruin my good mood for the day. Ridiculous—white coats are even sillier than white carpet. What the hell was I thinking?

Upstairs, comfortably ensconced in my gray-carpeted cubicle, I worked hard at online solitaire for a good two hours until I realized that I’d forgotten to forward out Pruscilla’s memo regarding that afternoon’s staff meeting. Oh God, no one even knows about it, and it’s Friday—half of them are probably out to lunch already.

As one of the legion of marketing assistants at KW, and, more specifically, as Pruscilla’s immediate underling, my responsibilities tend to lean more toward the administrative than the intellectual. A great way to put my four-year honors degree in philosophy (with a minor in psychology) to work, although, to be fair, I suppose my career does allow me to hone my existential angst.

After an hour of damage control and an hour and a half of lunch, I managed to round up most everybody in the department and assemble them in the boardroom. It’s not like it would matter much who was there, although pretty much everybody was. Pruscilla, Queen of the Universe and Director of Product Marketing for the East Coast, had called the meeting for no reason really, other than that she likes to call meetings from time to time to berate some of us for our laziness and impress others with her uncanny knack for finding typographical errors in promotional materials after they’ve been printed by the tens of thousands. The usual blame-laying and defensiveness followed, and I was getting quite sleepy, until there was a knock at the door.

And then someone walked in. A tall guy with rounded, wire-rimmed glasses and freckles. I stared at him for a few seconds until I realized that I recognized him. It was Bruce. My Bruce. Of course, my first thought was that someone had died. My mother? My heart flew up into my throat. His mother? My heart settled back down to its usual position.

“Wh-what are you doing here?” I stammered, already embarrassed. At this point, the ten or twelve women seated around the boardroom table realized with interest that Bruce wasn’t a courier. One of them whispered to me, “Isn’t he yours? He’s got roses!”

And he did. A gigantic bouquet of bloody-looking ones. I know red roses are supposed to signify romantic love and all that, but to me they’ve always seemed a bit on the cheesy side. Orchids—now those make a beautiful bouquet, or maybe lilies… I glanced around the room nervously. All eyes were on Bruce. Awe and jealousy and confusion hung thick in the air. Oh, Evie—give it a rest! Red roses are beautiful, and you know it! Most of the desperados in here would drop dead with shock and gratitude if they got even a single half-dead rose on Valentine’s Day, and here it was, a Friday afternoon in September, and my man was holding at least two dozen….

“Evelyn…” Bruce got down on one knee on the floor in front of me. Instantly, my cheeks start to burn. In my peripheral vision, I could see open mouths and stunned faces. None more stunned than mine, I’m sure.

“Evelyn, I came here today to tell you that I love you, that the past six years have been the best of my life, that I cannot imagine my world without you….”

Was he really talking to me?

“…From the day we met in the cafeteria at NYU, when we reached for that same pudding, I knew you were special….” Somebody behind me giggled loudly. Panic set in, along with elaborate fantasies of revenge.

I can barely breathe—how can she laugh? She’s ruining my moment. I will kill her, whoever she is, I will kill her. I will drill everybody later and find out who laughed. I bet it was Violet from Skincare. She never really liked me, even though I visited her twice in the hospital after she had those polyps removed. It really makes you wonder how some people can be so selfish and intrusive, especially regarding things that don’t even concern them. When it comes to their own amusement, jealous people will do just about anything to take the focus and attention away from those who deserve it….

All of a sudden, everybody laughed, shocking me out of my reverie.

“…which is why you finally agreed to let me take you out to dinner, and promised to throw out that hot plate and never try cooking in your dorm room again!”

Oh God, was he still talking? I had no idea what he’d just said. What the hell was the matter with me?

“So all that to say, that if it wasn’t for the New York City Fire Department, I might not be kneeling here before you today,” Bruce concluded. Everyone laughed again.

Bruce put the roses down on the table beside me and grabbed my hand. “You’re my best friend, Evie, and I adore you. I love you more today than I did yesterday, and I will love you more tomorrow than I do today. And that will be true for every day of the rest of my life…”

Tears suddenly filled my eyes. I blinked and they fell onto my lap. It was undeniably the sweetest thing I’d ever heard. But he wasn’t finished. Not by a long shot.

“…So I want to know, Evie…will you do me the honor of becoming my wife?” And just like that, he pulled out a little blue velvet box and opened it up. Everyone gasped.

But I didn’t even see it. The room started to spin.

For the next few moments, it was like I’d somehow been dropped into someone else’s body on the other side of the world, and everyone was speaking a different language. I couldn’t make sense of any of it. Where was I? Who was this guy with the glasses in front of me? He needed a haircut, that was for sure. Time stood still.

“Evelyn?” the man said.

“Evelyn?”

And then, just as quickly, it all came thundering back. It was Bruce, the love of my life. Asking me to marry him. I guess I must have been on autopilot or something because I jumped up and someone that sounded an awful lot like me shouted, “Yes! Yes! Of course I will!” He scooped me up in his arms and then the tears really started and I was laughing and crying and I couldn’t stop. Everyone burst up out of their chairs and began clapping and cheering. People from outside heard the fuss and came flowing into the boardroom, incredulous that such a spontaneous display of romance and drama could ever invade the unlikely weekday world of Kendra White. And it was all happening to me. Everyone was looking at me.

And then I was running from the room.

When I opened the stall door, four blank faces stared at me through overly made-up eyes.

“I’m all right, I’m all right. I just need to freshen up a bit,” I sniffled, managing a smile. “I’m just so excited. I mean, I guess I’m in shock. I never expected it, well not like this, anyway. I just can’t believe it.” It was the truth.

“Aw, it’s just like being tossed into a tub full of icewater, hon,” laughed Cheryl-Anne, who works in Sales Rep Training and looks the part. “You’ll get over it soon enough. When my Dickie proposed to me, I just about flipped my wig.” Chuckles all around—she really does wear a wig.

“It was New Year’s Eve, and I’d had more than one too many,” she continued unnecessarily. “I sure do like to have a good time, though, as you ladies already know. Remember the Christmas party of ’98? Oh, Lord—the buns on that copy boy. Anyway, when Dickie popped the question, the whole world started to spin, and I just fainted dead away. I was sick for two months after that. But I guess it musta had something to do with the morning sickness!” she shrieked and slapped her thigh.

Everyone hooted like it was the funniest thing they’d ever heard. As if a drunken, unwed pregnant woman falling flat on her face in the middle of Times Square were a legitimate source of amusement. How could they laugh? I’d seen pictures of her children. They were very disturbing.

“I think you’re right,” I managed in a weak voice. “It must be nerves.” Back to me now, please.

“I’m sorry, dear,” Winnie from Cosmetics said and grabbed my hand. “This is your day and here we are going on and on. You just have a good cry if you need to and don’t worry about a thing. You don’t have to go back out there before you’re good and ready.”

I hugged her and nodded. I didn’t really know her all that well, but at that moment, it didn’t matter. She was sweeter in one instant than my own mother had ever been, and I vowed then and there not to ditch out on the surprise 50th birthday party I knew was planned for her next Thursday night, although I normally try and get out of those types of things. Hell, I might even chip in for the present.

I straightened myself up a bit and faced the mirror.

Pathetic. I looked as bad as the rest of them. Puffy black eyes, puffy white face, puffy alien body. A distorted imprint of Winnie’s pink-and-tan face remained on my collar. My wrinkled, camel-colored CK jacket (Glamour, March: “15 Work Essentials You Can’t Live Without”) strained at the chest, buttons silently groaning. The size twelve felt like a size two. When did this happen to me?

But Bruce doesn’t seem to mind. He’s good that way. In fact, he never really says a thing about my weight, even though I’ve gained about thirty pounds since we met in my junior year. He just listens patiently as I rail on and on about it, fit after fit, diet after diet, year after year. Feeding me M&M’s all the while… Oh God, that’s it, isn’t it? He must actually like me fat.

Funny how it had never occurred to me before now. He must be one of those guys who gets off on it (Marie Claire, October: “Men Who Like Their Ladies Large”). But should that piss me off or not? I couldn’t decide. Was it wonderful that Bruce loved me no matter how I looked, or was he betraying me by fattening me up just to satisfy his own twisted sexual fetish? My heart began pounding again.

Courage, Evie. Pull it together—now is not the time to lose it. Bruce loves you, you love him, and it’s all gonna be okay.

Pruscilla caught my gaze in the mirror, sighed and looked over toward the door dramatically. Bruce was waiting outside. What to do? What to do?

I loved him. I really did. Besides, I’d said yes. How could I have let myself say yes if I didn’t really want to marry him? And if there was only one thing in this world that I knew for sure, it was to trust my instincts. Always listen to your inner voice—I’ve taken away at least that from years of watching Oprah (plus the fact that liquid diets don’t work in the long run).

Bruce was the best thing for me. Everybody knows it—Morgan, all my other friends, Mom, my grandmother. Bruce grounds me. He accepts me. He loves me. And even though he usually drives me crazy, we’re a perfect match. I’d be a fool to let him go.

So there really was only one thing I could do—plan a fabulous wedding. That, and lose about forty pounds.

2

Later that afternoon, Pruscilla Cockburn stood over me dictating her latest memo, shifting the ample burden of her weight from foot to foot. With each lumbering sway, a noxious waft of Kendra White’s “Honeysuckle Garden” perfume, discontinued since 1996, assaulted my senses. Through watering eyes, I squinted at my screen.

“Evie, please try and pay attention. I’ll start again. Date it for today.” Obviously. “And send it out to the usual team—all the Division Managers.”

I typed dutifully.

To: Marketing Department Product Division Managers

cc: Teresa Delallo, Fragrances; Alexis Desmond, Cosmetics; Sophie Swartz, Skin Care; Thelma Thorpe, Hair Care; Elaine Scarfield, Health and Fitness.

As per company policy, employee evaluations will take place during the last two weeks of October. Please schedule meetings for each of your senior team members during this period, and remind them to schedule evaluation meetings with their own staff. Self-evaluation forms and suggestion sheets must be distributed no later than by the end of next week. See me for the proper forms. Please try to keep these meetings short (no more than 30 minutes)…

“Do you think half an hour is long enough?” I interrupted, remembering my evaluation last year. Pruscilla spent the whole meeting extolling the virtues of a serious attitude. If I ever expected to be promoted, she’d said, then I’d have to start buckling down, taking things seriously. She never so much as glanced at my list of grievances (“Nobody else I know has to work between Christmas and New Year’s”; “Why can’t we have fat-free creamer in the coffee cart?”) and helpful suggestions (“Yearend bonuses should be scaled according to company profits and not employee salaries”). In the end, we ran out of time before I even had the chance to plead my case for a raise, which to my mind, is the whole point of these meetings in the first place.

Pruscilla glared at me and continued.

“…and do not engage in endless discussions regarding salary increases. Notify me regarding any employee whom you feel has met the requirements for a raise…”

“That’s good,” I assured her. “You’re definitely right about that. No sense in wasting time.”

“I’m not done yet,” she said. “I will be out of the office from October 16 to December 1, so all five Product Division Managers will need to see me within the next two weeks to complete their own evaluations. Please make an appointment with me as soon as possible, as my schedule is already quite full. Pruscilla Cockburn, Director of Product Marketing, East Coast Division.”

Pruscilla, gone for six weeks? This was the woman who’d notoriously used a personal day to clean out her desk. She hadn’t missed a single day of work in the three years I’d been there.

“You’re leaving for six weeks?” I asked, barely able to contain myself. My mind was reeling with the possibilities. I could come in late, leave early, take long lunches…

Wait a second…instead of just slacking off, this could be a great professional opportunity, provided I take proper advantage of the situation. After all, there’s supposed to be more to work than just getting away with things and looking busy (Cosmopolitan, September: “Seven Secrets to Job Security”). And everyone knows that the higher up you climb on the corporate ladder, the less you actually have to do yourself and the more you can delegate to others, not to mention perks like expense accounts and parking spots.

This was brilliant! Pruscilla would probably entrust me with everything. As chief note-taker at her biweekly brainstorming sessions, I know exactly how her mind works. Once or twice I even had the feeling she’d taken credit for my work. My gift for product names, especially lipstick, has gone completely un-appreciated (Prissy Persimmon, Sycophantic Cinnamon—those were mine!) and I also have a way with words, as my contributions to the wildly successful direct-mailing campaign of the Fall of ’99 can attest (“Why Buy Foreign Makeup at Department-Store Prices When You Can Have American Quality for Less, Delivered Right to Your Door?”). With her gone, I could make a real name for myself, maybe even get promoted before she gets back….

Pruscilla interrupted with a thoughtful wheeze, “I’m just taking some time off for personal reasons.”

“Are you okay?” I asked, trying to sound concerned. I was still pissed off at her for not giving me the afternoon off. True to form, Bruce had to go back to work anyway, but still—it isn’t every day a girl gets engaged, and it’s not like I was going to get anything done here. I’d spent the last hour staring at my ring and graciously fielding congratulatory visits from co-workers who’d heard about the proposal.

“I’m fine, nothing to worry about,” she replied in a singsong voice about an octave higher than normal.

“Well, I certainly hope so. Six weeks is a long time to be away from the office,” I continued, trying to play to her insecurities.

“Thelma Thorpe from Haircare will be stepping in to my position temporarily to make sure things run smoothly.” Shit.

“Are you sure that’s necessary? I can handle…”

“Not to put too fine a point on it,” she cut in, “but I need somebody I can trust to stay on top of things. As it is there’s going to be a lot more for you to do so you’ll have to try very hard to stay focussed, Evelyn. Especially since I’m sure you’re going to be preoccupied with your engagement for the next little while.”

Nice reversal. I had to hand it to her.

“Don’t worry about me. I’m up to speed on everything,” I said with a wave of the hand. “And you know I’m not one to get distracted easily. But can I call you if I need to after you’re gone? I mean, if there’s an emergency or something I can’t handle?” I had to know what she was up to, if she was leaving town or something.

“No…I don’t think so,” she said. What the hell was that supposed to mean? “At least not for the first month or so. But we’ll work out all the details later. For now, why don’t you go home early? You’ve had quite a day!”

Pruscilla smiled beneficently. I looked at my watch. Five-fifteen. Thanks a lot. I grabbed my bag and coat.

“But come in a bit early Monday morning, say around seven-thirty?” She was still smiling. “We’ll sit down and have a quick meeting when it’s nice and quiet.” Then she leaned in for a hug. “Congratulations again, dear.”

“Thanks.” An invisible cloud of Honeysuckle Garden all but consumed me.

The subway ride home was a long one. As the train lurched forward, my stomach bubbled and my mind raced, playing over the day’s events. Sure, my private life had been dragged kicking and screaming through the office like some kind of circus sideshow, but aside from that, I felt quite good. And the rest of the day had passed pleasantly enough.

Most days at work, I tend to keep to myself more or less, especially since there are really only a handful of people there I actually like. All in all, I think I’ve managed to maintain just the right combination of professional courtesy, friendly water-cooler approachability and social aloofness. That way, after I’m promoted, the respect I’ll need will already be in place. Without that, things can get pretty messy—I heard of one girl down in Accounts who, after a promotion, ended up having to fire her daughter’s godmother, a woman she’d worked side by side with for years. Eventually, she became so reviled by the underlings that she was forced to quit, and ended up playing the fiddle in the subway for spare change.

But today, anonymity shattered, I decided to make a show of it. At the coffee cart, I let Andrea, a bitter marketing drone who works in Fragrances, grab my hand to get a better look at The Ring. On cue, it sparkled brilliantly under the fluorescent lights. Inspired by her courage, two other girls skulking nearby came in for a peek.

“That’s at least a carat and a half, you know,” Andrea said. “I thought your boyfriend was a teacher.” The girls behind her laughed. It was well known that Andrea had been expecting Phil, her boyfriend of far too many years, to propose during Labor Day weekend on their romantic Caribbean cruise. But Phil, an actuary, had booked during hurricane season to save a few bucks. He ended up spending the rainy days in their cabin with his laptop, while Andrea played bingo and shopped for gold-plated chain by the foot.

“Oh, he is a teacher,” I replied coyly. “He teaches gifted children at a private school on the Upper East Side. He went there himself, actually.”

“Really? Must pay well,” she said, releasing my hand and reaching for a Sweet’n Low.

“Not really,” I told her, leaving her to wonder about Bruce’s mysterious and wealthy family.

So I’d managed to keep it together quite nicely, apart from that little thing in the bathroom. But Bruce was a pretty good sport about it. He always is when it comes to my dramatics. After I came out of the bathroom, there he was, surrounded by five or six women hanging on his every word, and looking remarkably pleased for a guy whose girlfriend had vomited at the thought of marrying him.

“…I wanted it to be old-fashioned and romantic, a real public declaration of my love, you know?” I heard him saying as I walked up behind him. His fan club quickly scattered at the sight of me and my puffy eyes.

“Are you okay?” he asked, stifling a laugh.

“Yeah,” I sniffed, and laughed myself.

“You know, if I didn’t think you could handle this, I wouldn’t have done it.”

“You mean ask me to marry you?”

“No, stupid, I mean ask you here at work!”

“Oh,” I replied, feeling a bit foolish. Loud shushing sounds came from behind the bathroom door, but Bruce didn’t seem to notice. “Of course I can handle it. I guess I just never expected my professional life and my personal life to collide in exactly this way.”

“I just wanted it to be something you’d remember forever. Like a story we’ll tell our grandkids, you know?”

“Well, good job, then. But I’m pretty sure I would have remembered it no matter what, even if we were, um, I don’t know…walking in the park or something,” I said, glaring at the crowd of women pretending to be fixing a photocopy machine nearby.

Bruce just laughed and hugged me. His shirt smelled good, and I buried my face deeper.

“But we never go for walks in the park, Evie. If I’d asked you to go for a walk in the park, you wouldn’t have wanted to.” True. Walks in the park are for old ladies and people without cable.

“You needed this, Evie. We needed this. Shake things up a bit, you know?” He held my tear-stained cheeks between his hands and kissed me. Not a long kiss, but it was more than just a peck. And then he looked at me with a face that, in an instant, said, “You silly, silly thing. Don’t you know that I’ll take care of you? And whatever problems we may have, we’ll work them out. These people, this job, the rest of world, none of it matters. What matters is us, so let’s forget all this crap and get on with it!”

Yes, let’s get on with it. Bruce has a wonderful way of forgiving me no matter what; it’s really one of the things I love most about him. So, once again, even though I’d behaved like a complete idiot, he managed to make me believe I was a completely normal person, and not the freak I truly was.

He kissed me again. Whether it was all the crying or the barfing or the seven cups of coffee or the kiss, I felt a little wobbly. I took it to be the kiss—even though it had been a long time since Bruce made me weak in the knees. He looked into my eyes and smiled. It was pretty obvious that he was pleased with himself. I guess he deserved to be.

We’d talked about getting married before. You don’t date a guy for six years and not talk about it. But I really, truly didn’t expect it to happen any time soon. For us, or for me, rather, it was more of an abstract idea, like “Of course we’ll get married one day. Then we’ll move out to the suburbs and buy our kid a pony.” But this time it was for real. And the more I thought about it on the ride home, the more I saw that it was a great thing. And on top of it all, for what might have been the first time in his life, Bruce had done something completely on his own. Made a real decision, without consulting me, his mother or anybody. He deserved to feel good. And so did I. Something was finally happening in my life, something real. Like I’d been asleep for years, content to play the woman in the gray flannel suit, only now the alarm clock was ringing.

The train was pretty crowded, and I hadn’t noticed till then but the man sitting on my right was leaning up against me. Out of the corner of my eye I could see that he was clutching a ratty pink Barbie backpack tied up with brown cord. His left knee bounced up and down frenetically as he tapped his heel against the floor. On one foot, he wore a filthy Reebok cross-trainer smeared with what was probably not rust-colored paint. On the other foot, a purple toe with a black nail stuck out of a dirty sock. Disgusting. I’m so sick of this shit. His bulging eyes darted from my hand to my chest then back down to my hand. My Ring! He was staring at my Ring!

Normally, in situations like these, which occur not altogether infrequently on the A Train, I get up and move. But today, the sight of this greasy interloper inspired within me the courage to take a stand for all peace-loving female commuters everywhere.

I looked directly at him and cleared my throat. Bruce would have absolutely killed me. The guy looked up suddenly and when his eyes met mine, he let out a shriek so loud that the force of his very bad breath blew my bangs up off my forehead (In Style, April: “The New-Fashioned Fringe: Bangs Are Back!”). With a gasp, I jumped back onto the lady beside me. But she was wearing a Walkman and I guess she hadn’t heard him yell, so she freaked out and reflexively pushed me forward into the group of stunned passengers. I reached out wildly for the man standing in front of me wearing a black trench coat (as it turns out, a very sensible color for a trench coat). But he just deflected me and used the opportunity to slide into my seat. I landed on my hands and knees on the floor of the car. The crazy guy, whimpering a little, just rocked back and forth, staring at someone else’s hands.

By the time I got home, Bruce was already there. I threw down my newspaper-stained, Pruscilla-smelling, mud-smeared, formerly white trench coat and flopped onto the couch and cried again. We decided not to go for dinner, not to call our parents, not to call our friends. We just stayed in and ordered a pizza. It may not sound romantic, but it was. We talked and talked, and by the time we went to bed, I felt like myself again.

I woke up before Bruce the next morning, something which almost never happens. He’s the type who claims not to be a morning person, because it’s such an unpopular way to be, but who actually gets up on weekends at the exact same time, almost to the minute, that he does during the week. He usually spends Saturday and Sunday mornings on the Internet researching obscure factoids for his students or doing the grocery shopping or reorganizing my closet, while I sleep till noon and then thrash about in bed for a half hour or so complaining about him making noise. Like Bruce, I suppose I have an internal clock, too, it’s just that mine must be permanently set on Snooze because I’ve been working full-time since college and waking up at 7:00 a.m. was as torturous yesterday as it was my first day of work. I think it bugs the crap out of him, my sleeping in—his early-morning antics sure piss me off—although he’d never admit it. Let him think I’m lazy. I am.

In that blissful moment of nothingness before I opened my eyes, before true awareness set in, the first thing I remembered was that it was finally Saturday. Thank God, no work. Maybe I’ll just go back to sleep for a bit. Then later I’ll go into the city. Yeah. There’s that Clinique Gift With Purchase thing on now at Saks…and I need some new pants for work. But I refuse to buy a size 14. Okay, so no clothes shopping till I’ve dropped 15 pounds, till I’m a 10. Serves me right, after what I ate this week, and last night, that pizza…wait a minute…the pizza…ohmygod…Bruce….

And it all came flooding back. I turned over and looked at him. He lay on his back, still asleep, his chest rising and falling. Bruce always seems different without his glasses on, like I don’t really know him. Still cute, though. He was whistling softly through his nose. Did I really say yes? Did yesterday really happen? Am I actually going to marry this guy? My heart began to pound as I replayed the scene at work in my head about 37 times. God, I can’t believe I actually threw up. With a psychic snort, Bruce turned over and faced the wall.

Just to make sure it was all real, I pulled my left hand out from under the pillow. The room was dark, but there it was, plain as day—The Ring. Turns out it was his grandmother’s. Mr. Fulbright had kept it for Bruce since she died, like, twenty years ago. Last night was nice, come to think of it. Bruce told me all about how he’d been planning to propose, and how his dad had been in on the whole thing.

“My grandfather gave her this ring in 1939, the night before he left to fight in the war,” Bruce explained as he held my hand. “Six months later, he came back and married her. And nine months after that, my father was born in an air raid shelter during the Blitz.” Over the years, the Fulbright Nativity Story has evolved into an epic tale, complete with evil Nazis and valiant R.A.F. pilots fighting to the death in the Battle of Britain, including Bruce’s grandfather, shot down three months before little Bruce Jr. came into the world.

I already knew the story, minus the ring detail. Bruce’s dad, whose name is also Bruce (Bruce Jr., actually—yes, that makes my Bruce, Bruce Fulbright III. God, that better not make me Mrs. Bruce Fulbright III), loves talking about the night he was born. The only time he’s ever animated about anything seems to be when he’s telling stories about the war and his parents and the horror of butter rations and all that. It was as if being born was the only thing Bruce Sr. had ever done with any style, and it’s been all downhill from there.

Poor Mr. Fulbright. With the exception of Bruce, the only respect his family ever shows him is when he’s telling his stories, now only once or twice a year, usually on his birthday. His perpetually self-involved daughters know better than to dismiss him on this, and even Bertie tries her hardest to refrain from seeming bored. And while Bruce doesn’t quite hang on his dad’s every word like he probably did when he was a kid, now he listens intently. I’m sure trying to memorize every word so that one day he can tell his own kids. Make that our kids, I guess.

“An insane woman tried to steal the ring—this very ring—off her finger while she was in labor,” Bruce continued, almost in a whisper. This was a new twist. Sounds like ole Bruce Jr. was getting a bit carried away.

“Oh, come on,” I said, incredulous.

Bruce raised his eyebrows and cocked his head to one side. “I’m just telling you what he told me when he gave it to me.”

I looked down at The Ring, imagining a stoic, placenta-splattered Granny Fulbright fending off crazies in the bomb shelter as she simultaneously struggled to birth a child and hang on to the only thing she had left of her dead war-hero husband.

It made me think about my mom and what she must have gone through having me all alone, especially since her parents had disowned her because my dad wasn’t Italian, or even Catholic for that matter. But then I wondered if Granny Fulbright would have cruelly refused to let her child go to school in California, even though she’d scored over 1300 on her SATs and had a partial scholarship to UCLA… Oh, no wait…that was my mother. And I was the one stuck at NYU, pissing distance from the house I grew up in. No, there would be no great collegiate adventure for me. But that’s where I met Bruce, so I suppose it had all worked out for the best. If you consider marrying your first real boyfriend the best.

So last night was pretty good. We talked a ton about the wedding, what we wanted and all that. And we really laid our cards on the table. Bruce is as far from a commitmentphobe as is humanly possible in this city (Glamour, April: “Is Your Man Afraid To Commit? Take This Test and Find Out!”), so the usual male worry of only being able to have sex with one person for the rest of his life doesn’t really seem to concern him. “Evie, I would have asked you two years ago if I thought you were ready,” he’d said while massaging my feet.

“How can you ever really be ready for something like this,” I mused, but he just looked at me, not understanding at all how marriage isn’t the most comfortable or logical step for some people.

No, Bruce’s marital stress comes from more of a mama’s boy place. He was worried, and rightly so, that his mother was going to give him a hard time about it, especially since his dad didn’t even tell her he’d given Bruce his mother’s ring.

“Especially since she hates me, you mean,” I said.

“She doesn’t hate you. She’s just a negative person sometimes. And she’ll think my dad went behind her back. I think she wanted to give the ring to Brooke, ’cuz she’s the eldest daughter or something I guess.”

“Oh great. Now Brooke will hate me, too.”

“Oh, Evie, don’t say that. She won’t.”

“Yeah right. Then it’ll be my fault when she loses it and has another one of her ‘spells.’” His sister is a frail, skittish girl with four full-blown nervous breakdowns under her belt and she’s barely twenty-four. “She’ll probably cry as soon as she sees the ring on my finger.”

And that’s a scene I can look forward to witnessing in person tomorrow night when we “stop by” to break the good news. Bruce’s dad was so excited about the whole thing that he made Bruce promise we’d come as soon as possible.

“I doubt it,” Bruce said.

“You just watch—she’ll be back in the looney bin by the end of the week,” I said, then instantly regretted it. Sometimes, I can go a little too far. It’s not that I don’t mean what I say, it’s just that I know that some thoughts are better left unsaid, especially when it comes to things like people’s families or haircuts. I think I get my big mouth from Claire, my grandmother. Only she gets away with murder because she’s old, and people seem happy to confuse her brutal honesty with quaint eccentricity.

“Sorry,” I mumbled.

“It was a relaxation facility, not a looney bin,” Bruce said, peeved. “They didn’t strap her down or anything.” He knows I know that—he’s only told me like a thousand times—but he can’t control himself either, sometimes.

Despite my occasional overstepping of boundaries, it’s this sort of honest interchange about important things like family that convinces me that Bruce and I may actually have a chance. And in my own defense, there is an upside: There’s no point in letting the little things fester into giant, repressed issues when a bit of well-directed hostility can bring stuff out into the open right away. And so we make a point of being very open with each other about everything, although it’s not a natural thing for Bruce to be like that. He’s much more reserved when it comes to saying what’s on his mind, especially if it involves hurting someone’s feelings, but I’ve been helping him to try and get over that a little bit.

It was in this spirit of openness that I admitted to Bruce later in the conversation that the idea of marriage makes me a bit crazy.

“It does? I thought the puking and crying meant you were calm and rational about the whole thing,” he laughed.

“I’m glad you can laugh about it already,” I told him. “That’s a good sign, I’m sure.”

“Yeah, well, I hope so. But I think we’ll leave that part out when we’re telling our grandkids the story.”

“Seriously, Bruce. I’m really sorry. I don’t know what came over me.”

“Don’t worry. Have another piece of pizza. And don’t be so hard on yourself.”

I wanted to tell him that I knew that getting married was the next logical step in our relationship, and that it was definitely the right thing for us. Because we love each other and that’s what’s important. And not to worry about me—that I was ecstatic and sure and positive and all that sort of thing. But I don’t think he wanted to talk about it anymore.

But there I was the next morning, lying in bed in a full sweat, feeling an awful lot like I had the day before in the bathroom. It was almost twenty minutes before my heart stopped thumping and I had psyched myself into a “Marriage is Good” place again.

After mentally planning my nuptial dietary strategy for a good half hour—wavering back and forth between invoking the Member for Life clause in the Weight Watchers contract and developing a simple starvation plan on my own—I was firmly back in the camp of, “I’m getting married and I’m gonna look like a million bucks!” Trying not to ruin Bruce’s first attempt at sleeping in in years, I snuck out of the bedroom and into the kitchen and put a pot of coffee on. There were so many people who had no idea what had happened, and it was too cruel to keep them in the dark any longer.

3

First things first. I had to call Morgan—it was outrageous that I’d been engaged for almost 24 hours and she didn’t know.

In high school, Morgan Russell and I were the quintessential loser odd couple—she, tall and freckly and skinny; me, dumpy and short and dark. By the time she came back from Berkeley, though, she was a bombshell. I, on the other hand, have remained vaguely potato-shaped over the years, although my skin has cleared up some. But Morgan is the kind of person who makes you not hate beautiful people. She’s just like that—smart, bitchy, funny, but still with enough hang-ups that it just gives you faith. She’s definitely no fun to shop with, though, not just because everything looks good on her, but because she hates it. She lets salesgirls dress her, and says things like, “Just give me what that mannequin in the window is wearing, in a size four.”

“Hello?” her husky voice whispered on the other end.

“Morgan? Wake up. It’s me.”

“What time is it? Did I oversleep?”

“No, no. It’s almost eleven. I just wanted to talk to you,” I said. “What did you do last night?” I asked, not really caring.

“I’m going back to sleep,” she said, and hung up.

I called her back.

“What do you want, Evie? I didn’t get to bed till seven.”

“You’re already up, or else you wouldn’t have answered the phone.”

“Your logic astounds me,” she said. I could hear her lighting a cigarette.

“So what did you do?”

“I went out with Billy, remember?”

“Oh, yeah. Did you have fun?” Billy is Morgan’s latest fling—thirty-seven years old, an architect, Ivy League, the whole deal. I get the sense that he’s a bit less uptight than her usual assortment of asshole Wall-Street types. She met him a few months ago at Lemon Bar, which to me sounds more like a dessert than a suitable place to meet men, but Morgan isn’t interested in finding Mr. Right. She gave up on that urban legend a long time ago.

“We met up with some of his college friends. Dreadful bunch. They’ve all got debating trophies stuck up their asses. It makes you wonder, you know? How a person you like can like people you hate?”

“I thought you didn’t like Billy, either,” I reminded her. Because of her bad instincts, Morgan had sworn off dating anyone she liked. After college, she had a string of bad luck with men she all thought were The One. The first guy, Tom, turned out to be gay, and was only dating her, he eventually realized, because something about her reminded him of Joan Crawford. Morgan didn’t find out her next boyfriend, Ryan, was married until after they’d been together for six months, and Matthew, the last guy, whom she was with for almost three years, was the most damaging of all of them—emotionally unavailable. After him, she decided it was best to stick with guys she was sure weren’t The One.

“I don’t like Billy. Not really, I guess. I mean, he’s okay. More fun than his friends, anyway. I think it’s because he’s from Detroit.”

“Detroit? How can being from Detroit make somebody fun?”

“He sort of has that sexy working man thing going on,” she said sulkily.

“Morgan, he’s not exactly blue-collar, he’s an architect for chrissake,” I said. “You’re talking like he wears overalls to work.”

“He actually did work at GM one summer,” she added.

“Oh, well there you go—you don’t like his personality or his friends, but he worked on an assembly line for one month and that makes him somehow more noble than the spoiled overachievers you usually date.”

“Now you get it!” she laughed. “Evie, it’s not that I don’t like him, I do—he’s just not someone I plan to get all crazy about.”

“Just because his friends aren’t your thing doesn’t mean he’s not a nice guy,” I said, trying to get back to the point. “I hate Bruce’s friends, and look at us.”

“I know, but I don’t really give a shit about Billy’s friends anyway. Come to think of it, I don’t really care if he’s a nice guy or not. If he can get me to forget about work and take me out for a few drinks and a good meal, and then not want to spend the whole night cuddling, that’s all I want. I don’t give a good goddamn about anything else right now.”

“Are we still talking about Billy?” I asked. “He’d want to cuddle with you if you had leprosy.” The guy is so bloody crazy about her that he turned down a better job in Philadelphia to wait around for her scraps of affection. And he is a nice guy, no matter how hard she tries to pretend he isn’t. I suddenly realized how much fun it would be if Morgan and I were engaged at the same time. If I could get her to see what a good idea marriage is, and if Billy didn’t scare her off too soon…

“He told me that he wants me to stop seeing other guys,” she sighed. So much for picking out wedding dresses together.

“Gee, what a surprise. What did you say?” I asked, knowing the answer.

“I told him to piss off and then let his best friend do body shots off my stomach.”

“Seriously, Morgan.”

“I said that he knew what I was all about when we got into this thing, and that I wasn’t really willing to date one guy exclusively—take it or leave it.”

“But you have been dating him exclusively. It’s not like you have someone else waiting in the wings,” I pointed out, pouring my third cup of coffee.

“I know, but he’s definitely not someone I want to get tied down to.”

“Why not?” Did she think getting tied down was a bad idea in general? Would she think I was making a bad choice?

Morgan sighed. “Evie, I’m sick of having this conversation with you. Why are you pushing me so hard about this?”

“Bruce asked me to marry him,” I blurted out.

Silence.

“And I threw up.”

More silence.

“Morgan?”

“We’ve been talking about Billy for ten minutes and now you tell me this? What the hell’s the matter with you?” she shrieked. “So old Brucie finally got around to it! I knew he would, you know. I knew it! I just had this feeling. I really did. Last week when you were talking about how you wanted to take a leave of absence in June as soon as Bruce finishes school and go trekking through South America for the summer and he just didn’t say anything. Aw, I knew it! It was either that or he was dumping you!”

I guess she realized then there might be a little more to the story. “You said yes, right?” she asked, in a much smaller voice.

“Of course I said yes. Why didn’t you tell me you suspected?” I snapped, relieved. It sounded like she thought it was a good idea. Morgan has always believed that I was meant for monogamy. She doesn’t think I have the emotional fortitude to handle dating more than one person. Know thyself, she says.

“Oh, come on. I can’t believe the thought hadn’t occurred to you. Tell me everything! Did you really throw up?”

“I did,” I said proudly, and told her the whole story. She particularly liked the part about me falling down on the train.

“It’s incredibly important to me that you think this is okay,” I admitted. The truth was, if she didn’t think it was a good idea, I’d almost be tempted to call the whole thing off, crazy as that might sound.

“Evie, you don’t need me to tell you that. It shouldn’t matter what I think, technically anyway. But I love Bruce, and I love you and I love the two of you together. You need each other. He wouldn’t know what to do without you. And you’re a much better person when you’re with him. And since you’re not breaking up anytime soon, you might as well tie the knot!”

“That’s exactly how I feel about it!” I knew she’d understand. “And I hope you know that this doesn’t mean things are going to change. We can still do all the things we planned, like our California road trip. Bruce doesn’t have to come.”

“You bitch!” Morgan laughed, impressed.

“Well, maybe we can all go together—you, me, Bruce and Billy.”

She snorted and said, “As long as they take a separate car.”

Morgan really is happy for me, which is good, since she’s the only one whose opinion counts. Whenever Bruce and I hit a rough spot, like when he wanted to get a cat, and I said I’d prefer to eat a cat, she knew just what to say to make me feel like I wasn’t being a bitch. There’s a very fine line between being right and being wrong, and Morgan helps me not to cross onto the wrong side. After all these years, she knows Bruce almost as well as I do, and isn’t afraid to point out what a jerk I can be, or how rare it is to find a guy you can trust.

Morgan’s a hell of a lot better at getting me to see the errors of my ways than my mom is, especially when Bruce and I are in a fight. Somehow, Mom has a way of getting Bruce to sound like medicine that’ll cure what’s wrong with me. It just makes me want to go home and flush him down the toilet.

Since I was still a little pissed off at her for last month’s whole therapy debacle (Cosmopolitan, August: “Does Your Mother Need Help? Tell It To Her Like It Is!”), and lest her reaction have the unanticipated side effect of me changing my mind, I thought I’d spare myself the trauma of a live scene and call her with the good news on speakerphone instead. I like secretly putting her on speaker. Bruce never used to believe me when she said something awful. At first he felt a bit guilty about it, but after he heard all the hideous things she says to me, he could no longer deny the pure entertainment value.

“Oh, Evelyn,” she sniffed, “I’m so happy for you.” Understatement of the century. She’s been dreaming about this moment for twenty-seven years. “I knew he’d get around to it eventually, but I was starting to wonder. It’s not like you’re getting any younger! Bruce are you there?”

She often has trouble choosing between the high road and the low road.

“Hi, Lilly. I’m here,” he said, stifling a laugh.

“Mom, wait till you hear how he proposed,” I said.

“Good, Bruce. You did good. So now you’ll officially be part of the family!” she said, ignoring me.

“That’s why I asked her.” Part of Bruce’s mission in life is to impress my mom.

“You got yourself a special girl, Bruce,” she continued. “You know that. Truth be told, though, she’s the lucky one. That’s what I’ve been telling her for years. But whether she’ll make a good wife or not, who knows?” They both cackled like hyenas.

“Ha, ha,” I said. “I’m still here, you know.”

“She’s going to make a great wife,” Bruce said, and squeezed my hand. “I have no doubt about that.”

“Well at least with Evie you can be sure there’s always gonna be enough to eat around the house!” she finished triumphantly. Bruce knew better than to laugh at this, although it looked like he wanted to.

“Aw, Lilly, you’re right. Evie is a great cook.”

Mom snorted. I don’t know which was more absurd to her—the fact that I might be a good cook (which I’m not) or the fact that her witless insult might accidentally have been misconstrued as a compliment.

“I’m pretty sure that’s not what she meant,” I said. Bruce snickered, and I shot him my meanest “you’re gonna get it later” glance.

“I just can’t believe it—my Evelyn, a married woman,” she said sweetly, and sighed. “After all these years…I just…I just…”

“You just what?” Enough already.

She somehow managed to compose herself, and continued. “I just never thought I’d be around to witness it.” I could just see her there, sitting at the kitchen table in her tiny apartment, her bottom lip trembling for effect with each tearful breath even though there was nobody around to witness it. She was trying to win Bruce back to her side.

“You’re really something,” I exploded. “Bruce is NOT impressed with this and neither am I. This silliness has got to stop. I mean, do you actually expect me to believe you thought you’d be DEAD before anyone wanted to marry me? Thanks a lot, but I don’t believe you!”

Bruce shook his head. “Now you’ve done it,” he said under his breath.

“Oh, Evelyn,” she sobbed, “being alone in this world is an awful, awful thing, and I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy. To go through life alone is a curse…a punishment. I’m just thankful that at least you won’t have to.” There was that pesky high road, with a healthy dollop of guilt thrown in for good measure.

I wasn’t going to let her see that I felt bad. “Well you don’t have to worry about me anymore, Mom. I finally tricked some poor unsuspecting slob into marrying me.”

“I’d resent that if it weren’t true,” Bruce said. I laughed silently.

“Evelyn, dear, please don’t joke,” she sniffed. “Marriage is a holy institution.” So now she was pious.

It just wasn’t worth the aggravation. “Jeez, Mom, I never said you should be in an institution, I just thought maybe you should go and see someone. I think I’ve heard more than enough about this whole therapy thing. God, I wish I’d never brought it up.” It was either tease her or lose it completely.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do with you,” she sighed, exasperated. “Bruce loves you so much, Evelyn. And you love him so much.” Was that a direct order?

“So?”

“Marriage is a blessed union,” she continued. “Your whole lives are opening up before you. And it all starts with a wedding. A wedding! Oh, your grandmother will be so delighted. She’ll just flip out. Bruce, you’ll be making an old woman very, very happy.”

“C’mon, Mom, you’re not that old,” I said.

“Acch, you know what I mean, Evelyn. She really will be so happy to hear the news. Bruce, call her right away. Right now.”

Claire, my father’s mother, is pretty much the only family I have, aside from Auntie Lucy, Mom’s twin sister, who lives in England with her lame husband Roderick. After my dad died, Claire took Mom in for a few years, to help out with me and to get her back on her feet. If she hadn’t been around, I don’t know how Mom would have survived, especially since her own parents wouldn’t have anything to do with her. It’s not that I don’t understand the impulse to reject my mother; I do, but what a bunch of assholes they must have been to leave a grieving widow out in the cold just because my dad wasn’t Catholic. I know she tried to make peace with them a few times; after her mother died, when I was eight, she even brought me over to meet her dad, but he wouldn’t open the door. So Claire just kind of became her surrogate parent, united in grief and all that, I guess.

She’s the quintessential cool old lady, painting and taking classes and teaching self-defense to other rich old bags on the Upper East Side. My grandmother has also always been the arbiter between Mom and me. If it wasn’t for Claire, I probably would have killed her by now, especially after she wouldn’t let me go out West to school.

“We’ll call her right now,” I said.

“A wedding, at last! It’s going to be a real celebration,” Mom went on, her voice rising. I could hear ice cubes clinking in a glass. “Just like a fairy tale!”

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Bruce interjected, sensing danger. We’d already decided that we wanted something very low-key, very elegant. I could just picture the big church wedding of my mother’s dreams—our worst nightmare.

“Well, whatever you want. As long as it actually happens, I don’t care,” she lied. “That you love each other, that you’re together, that you’ve opened your hearts to love—that’s the most important thing.” This from a woman who’s refused to go on a date in almost fifteen years.

Pruscilla worked me to the bone all week, to the point where all I wanted to do when I got home was eat dinner and go to bed. Okay—so that’s what I do every night. But this week I’d really planned to go for a jog every day after work and take at least three yoga classes at the Y (In Style, May: “Why the Stars Choose Yoga To Stay Fit”).

All this to say that I’d been engaged for over a week and had hardly told anybody yet. Not that I have a ton of friends; I prefer to limit my circle to a select few. Aside from Morgan, the only people I ever really hang around with are my roommates from college. Morgan doesn’t really like any of them too much. She thinks they’re all about getting ahead and giving it. I’d long ago given up on trying to integrate her into the group. Besides, they didn’t like her much, either.

When I did finally get around to sharing the good news, not everyone was as enthusiastic as Mom and Morgan. When I told Nicole, who might more aptly be called my arch rival than my friend, all she could manage after a weak “OhmygodI’msohappyforyou” was, “Didn’t you just tell me last week that you were ready to move to L.A. with or without him?” It was true, I had said that. But it was only because I’d just found out that day that I didn’t get that internship with The Tonight Show. It was a load of crap, frankly, because I knew I could write funnier stuff than the drivel they churn out every night. I didn’t even tell Bruce about it, but I assumed he’d move out there with me if I did manage to get a job like that.

After letting me know in her own subtle way that she knew that Bruce and I have our problems, all Nicole really wanted was to be reassured that she was going to be a bridesmaid. “Of course you will!” I assured her. She’s heavier than I am. Not a lot, but enough.

Annie couldn’t get off on Sunday afternoon, so we all agreed to meet her at work. The girl has the voice of an angel but the nose of a toucan, so getting work on Broadway (or even far, far off Broadway) was proving to be a little more of a challenge than her drama teacher had let on. Now she was waitressing at Grinds, an unpopular little café in the East Village. Over coffee and cheesecake (saboteurs, all of them!) the consensus seemed to be that I am a fabulously lucky girl to have found Mr. Right in New York City before the age of thirty.

“You really look different,” breathed Annie, almost dropping my slice of Double Chocolate Oreo onto my lap. “You’re positively glowing.”

“Oh, come on,” Nicole said, rolling her big brown eyes. “It’s not like she lost her virginity—she’s just getting married.”

“Well, I do feel different. Like all the work we’ve put into our relationship has finally paid off. My whole life seems clearer now,” I said matter-of-factly. “Everything’s changed. For the first time ever, I can see the years stretching out in front of me and I’m not completely terrified, because I know that Bruce and I will be together forever.” Annie’s eyes widened at the romance of it all.

Okay, so I may have been laying it on a little thick. But it was hard not to when Nicole was so obviously jealous.

“The only thing different about you will be your ass if you keep eating cheesecake like that. And you’re talking like you just won an Oscar. ‘And I’d like to thank the Academy for helping me accept the proposal, and to Bruce, for the ring, and to…’”

“Knock it off, Nic,” Kimby snapped. “This is a big deal.”

“Yes, please. If you girls are going to get into a catfight, at least let me get my camera,” said Theo with a wave of his hand. Kimby and Theo are from the same sad little town in Iowa. They’ve been virtually inseparable since senior year of high school, when they tied for Homecoming Queen. They still live together, unable to deal with New York alone, even though Theo is making it big as a photographer and Kimby’s tours of the Museum of the Modern Art have garnered much acclaim.

“I don’t see you turning any cake down,” I pointed out.

“Maybe not,” Nicole said with a grin. “But I’m not the one who has to look better than I ever have in my entire life by next summer.”

“Meow,” whispered Theo.

“Well then you can just give me back my Thigh Master, then, since it’s just obviously collecting dust at your place,” I said. That might have been a bit mean. She’d had it for about two and half years, and very little progress had been made, although this probably wasn’t the right moment for pointing that out. I’d already decided that I was going to have to be extra nice to everyone for the next little while (Martha Stewart Weddings, Fall: “How To Be a Gracious Bride-To-Be”).

Yes, sensitivity to my friends’ feelings would be crucial, now more than ever, especially since none of them had ever really managed to hang on to a boyfriend for more than thirty seconds, and in Theo’s case, maybe twenty. Nicole, most of all, would be the hardest hit, I predicted, since she hadn’t even had a boyfriend, yet alone been laid, since that brief (four-and-a-half-day) dalliance with her anthropology T.A. almost three years ago. And even though Nicole and I usually enjoy trading insults, this certainly wasn’t the time to rub my prenuptial bliss in her face.

“Oh, I’m just teasing you, Nic,” I said. “Everyone knows that thing doesn’t work for shit and that Suzanne Somers had liposuction anyway. Nobody has thighs like that naturally.” Nicole smiled wanly and had another bite of pie.

Even if I was the only one with a long-term prospect at this point, I’d spent five years watching them (except Nicole) flit more or less happily from man to man. On occasion, I’d even envied them their freedom. But now it was easy to see how they might be envying me. I was really going to have to try and be more compassionate.

Kimby took a sip of her grande skinny hazelnut-pumpkin latte and cleared her throat. “Let’s change the subject.”

“Yes, let’s,” Theo said, obviously disappointed that things weren’t going to get any uglier.

Annie returned from the kitchen with another round. “Fill us in about the plans. I need details!”

“Well, as Nicole so indelicately pointed out, we don’t really have that much time to pull this thing together if I want to be a June bride,” I said. “And things are already getting dicey.”

“You mean with Bruce?” Nicole perked up, hopeful.

“No,” I said, glaring at her. “Just with the plans. First off, the date we wanted was Saturday the tenth of June, but it’s booked everywhere….”

“Hotels? Churches? What are we talking about?” asked Kimby impatiently.

“My mom wanted a church…”

“Of course,” said Annie, a lapsed Catholic herself.

“…but Bruce and I insisted on a hotel or an inn. Thank God Bertie agreed, because they’ll pretty much be paying for the whole thing….”

“Uh-oh,” said Kimby softly.

“World War Three, anyone?” Theo said. Kimby bowed her blond head and looked at her lap, her narrow shoulders shaking with silent laughter.

“Yeah well, whatever, but she’s been on the phone all week trying to find a place. I don’t think it’s going to be all that bad, you know. Bertie may be a lot of things, but cheap isn’t one of them,” I finished defensively.

“Did she know Bruce was going to propose?” Annie asked.

“No…”

“Did she freak?” Nicole always wanted the gory details.

“It wasn’t as bad as we thought, really. When we told her she seemed totally confused at first, but then she made a big show of it. I think she was in shock, completely overwhelmed. Who could blame her? I’m stealing away her only son.”

“That’s one way to look at it,” Annie said. “But hopefully she sees it as gaining another daughter.”

“Not this bitch,” said Theo. “But your optimism is refreshing, Annie.”

“Well, she did force herself to hug me,” I continued. “Bruce doesn’t believe me, but I swear it was the first time the woman’s ever actually touched me. Can you believe that? I didn’t realize it till I felt her bony ribs. She was even crying a bit. I wouldn’t say it was exactly nice, because I was uncomfortable as all hell, I won’t lie to you, but it was…I don’t know…almost normal.”

I was censoring, but just a bit. The first thing Bertie did when we told her we were getting married was give Bruce’s dad The Look, and then she excused herself politely to go see to the roast. I was immediately pissed off for Bruce’s sake, but he seemed more amused by it than hurt, thank God. When she came back out of the kitchen a few minutes later, she was crying—that was when she hugged me—but she smelled like onions, and her finger was bleeding.

“I don’t think she was really all that surprised,” I lied. “Bruce’s dad knew about it the whole time, so he was probably acting like a freak for weeks beforehand. I’m sure she knew something was up.”

“Yes, but could she really have expected this?” Theo sighed. “Her precious Bruce, heir to the Fulbright Jam and Jelly empire, marrying a sloppy Italian wench from Brooklyn. Your mother got the prize in this scenario, my dear. Bruce is like your mother’s knight in shining armour—he fixes her toilet, he does her taxes, and he saved you from the shame of spinsterhood. This wedding is the answer to all her prayers. But what do you do for Bertie?”

“What?”

“I mean, what does she get out of you? Out of your relationship with Bruce? Nothing but a headache, I bet. You spare the maid from doing Bruce’s laundry, that’s about it.”

“That’s not true,” I pointed out. “Bruce does his own laundry. And mine.”

“How silly of me. Of course he does. Just remember though, Bertie’s got plenty of daughters already, so it’s not like she needs our young Martha Stewart over here to accompany her on afternoon shopping dates or to take care of her when she gets old. This is probably a living nightmare for the woman.”

I was incensed. “For your information, Theo, Bruce likes doing laundry. And Bertie called me the next night and we talked about what kind of wedding we want. So she’s obviously accepting this.”

“Don’t be naive. She’s got a few tricks up her sleeve, yet,” he said.

“What about his sisters?” asked Kimby. Bruce’s sisters were a source of endless amusement for all who knew of them. Even Morgan listened with bated breath to tales of their tantrums and addictions.

“His sisters were okay about it, I guess. They just sort of nodded and smiled. Except for Brooke…”

“Is that the oldest one?”

“Yes. She’s the one who wanted to go to help free Tibet until she found out that it was in Asia.”

Everyone nodded, remembering.

“Well, Brooke kind of seemed like she was about to cry at any moment, and she kept staring at The Ring!”

Annie slapped the table. “That jealous bitch!” she said, with an uncharacteristic touch of venom. “She thinks it should be hers.”

“Bruce’s dad, though—he’s the best. He’s just so happy for us about this. It’s like he has a new reason to live or something….”

Annie just wanted more details. “And what about the dress, and flowers, and…”

“She’s only been engaged for a week, for chrissake,” Nicole interrupted.

“Actually, I do have a few ideas,” I said, reaching into my bag. Thankfully, there’s an excellent magazine store in the lobby of the Kendra White building, so I’d already amassed quite a stack of reference materials. “Martha Stewart Weddings, Bridal Guide, In Style Weddings, Bride—I can’t get enough! I swear, I’m going to keep them all in business this year!” I said, and put the stack on the table.

Nicole rolled her eyes, but grabbed Martha Stewart Weddings before anyone else could. “What a hideous cake,” she said of the picture on the cover.

“Oh, please!” shrieked Theo. “It’s fabulous! Marzipan is so hard to work with. You just don’t get it—it’s supposed to look like Wedgewood china. You know, you could do something like this, Evie.”

“Let’s worry about the cake later,” I said wisely. “For now, let’s turn to the pages I’ve marked for bridesmaids’ dresses. Oh, you’re all going to be so gorgeous, I can’t wait!”

“Do I get to be a bridesmaid?” Theo clapped his hands. “I’d look precious in that one—I have a flatter stomach than all of you!”

“No, you idiot, you’re a groomsman,” said Kimby. “And don’t kid yourself, dear. My stomach is flatter than yours.”

4

The scale doesn’t lie—three bloody weeks and not a single pound gone. I stared down in horror at the number between my big toes. Even if I held my boobs up—nothing. I’ve almost completely cut out chocolate, and for what? Damn. But I suppose just not gaining any weight could be seen as a relative success. It’s been hell at work, after all. Hell. And we’ve had so many dinners out, with everyone wanting to celebrate and all that. So just getting on the scale right now was pretty brave in the first place, I think.

But now I cannot hide from the painful truth any longer: I officially had forty pounds to lose by August 18, our wedding day. Make that June 18—two months before the wedding, if I wanted to have my alterations done in time. I glanced down at the scale again. So let’s see, that gives me…about nine months. Plenty of time. But what about The Dress? How can I buy The Dress anytime soon in this state? They’ll be able to take it in, thank God for that, but I’ve at least got to be able to go dress shopping without feeling like a cow. That settles it. Starting today, I’ve got to get serious….

“Evie?” Bruce was knocking on the door. “I need the bathroom.”

“Get away!” I barked, and jumped down off the scale.

“What’s the matter?”

“Nothing. I’m not ready yet.”

“Are you on that damn scale again? You’ve been in there for forty-five minutes. I’ve got to take a shower. I’m gonna be late.”

I hid the scale back behind the cabinet. He’d kill me if he saw it out again. I put on my bathrobe, opened the door and swept past him in a fury. “You know, you could give me some privacy once in a while,” I yelled back at him. But he just slammed the door.

Later, when I was blow-drying my hair, he sat down on the bed beside me. “What?” I asked.

“I’m throwing it out.”

“No you’re not,” I informed him, and turned the dryer back on.

He pulled the plug out of the wall. “Yes I am. I can’t go through this again.”

“You can’t? What about me? I’m the pork chop…”

“Evie, you’re not fat and I’m throwing that scale out. I can see it in your eyes. You’re going to get crazy again.”

“But what if I promise not to?” I asked sweetly, and plugged the dryer back in. But he grabbed it out of my hand.

“You can’t promise something like that. You know what happens to you…”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I knew exactly what he meant, but I kind of like teasing him.

“Have you forgotten the intervention already? You almost lost all of your friends and I seriously considered tossing you into the East River.”

Bruce and apparently everyone else in my life labor under the impression that I have some sort of Dr. Jeckyl and Mrs. Hyde thing going on when I’m on a diet. I admit that I might get a little moody (and possibly even abrasive) when deprived of chocolate for too long, but who the hell doesn’t?

“If you’re referring to that day when you all managed to force me to eat half a cheesecake, of course I haven’t forgotten. And my third chin remembers it too, so thanks for nothing.”

“But you were so much better after that….” Bruce said wistfully.

“Because I fell off the wagon and my personality’s been dulled by a perpetual sugar high ever since.”

Bruce shook his head. “I’m not kidding, Evie.”

“I know. And I really do promise not to get bitchy this time, but you have to understand—I need to lose some weight. As soon as I do, I’ll feel better about myself, and that’ll counteract any nastiness you may experience. But I will try to be good. I promise. Just have a little faith in me, okay?”

“It’s not you I don’t have faith in, it’s the evil Mrs. Hyde who worries me.”

I threw a pillow at his head and returned to my blow-drying. I knew Bruce was only trying to make sure that things stay under control, but his attitude was starting to grate on my nerves a bit. His stress was contagious, and I wanted no part of it.

It’s all to do with his mother, no doubt. Bertie has officially gone into overdrive, and it has been getting progressively uglier with each passing day. The first crisis was finding the perfect location for the wedding. Every hotel, every inn she considers good enough has, of course, been booked solid for decades. After the banquet manager at one upscale hotel in the city (which I hesitate to name because of a pending lawsuit), actually laughed out loud and then hung up on her after she politely inquired about the possibility of reserving a Saturday night this coming June, Bertie called me in near hysterics. “If you were more sensible,” she’d spat, “you’d agree to a longer engagement. Everyone knows that you need at least a year and a half to be able to be able to plan a proper wedding. You can just forget about any getting a decent caterer or photographer. Why? WHY? It’s ridiculous—it’s not like you’re pregnant.”

I remained silent just long enough to let the possibility creep into her consciousness. After a moment or two, I could feel her panic. Poor thing. Better put her out of her misery.

“No, of course I’m not pregnant, but—”

“Well!” she shrieked. “Guess what? You can do it yourselves. Or tell your mother she can do it. I just can’t take it for another second.”

“All right. I’ll tell her. I’m sure her church up in Bensonhurst is available. I mean, it’s not like anyone in the old neighborhood actually gets married anymore. Her priest will be delighted. You know, he mostly does funerals these days. With a few streamers and balloons, the party room downstairs will look almost as nice as the ballroom at the Waldorf. We might have to clean it up a bit, though, because I think they still hold that doggie obedience school there every Tuesday….”

“Evelyn, that’s not funny,” she interjected.

“I’m serious. We don’t want a three-year engagement. Bruce doesn’t care about the best of this or that. He’d be happy if we ran off to Vegas and got married there.”

She knew I was right. Bruce probably would go for that type of thing. Of course, I would never agree to anything that tacky. But she doesn’t know that.

“Why can’t you just do it a bit later, like next fall? It’ll give us more time,” she pleaded.

“I suppose, if we absolutely have to,” I sighed. “But I hope Bruce doesn’t get impatient. He almost flipped out when I told him we were looking at well over two hundred people. And they’re mostly from your side. My side is less than forty. I just don’t want him getting cold feet about a big wedding. Do you?”

She’d already had three arguments with Bruce about various wedding details, and she could tell his patience was wearing thin. Even worse, how could she tell her friends from the gardening club and the children’s hospital foundation that her only son had eloped to some Elvis-themed wedding chapel on the Strip? My God, what would Mona Davenport think? Her daughter’s wedding last July was at the Plaza….

“Fine, I’ll keep trying,” she said. “I just want you to appreciate how difficult it’s going to be.”

“I know you’ll find something,” I assured her.

At least things would be calming down at work. Friday was Pruscilla’s last day, and Thelma Thorpe, her temporary replacement, was rumored to have the spine of a jellyfish. How these people work their way up is anyone’s guess. Monday morning, the woman could barely make eye contact, let alone tell me what to do.

“Er, um, just go ahead with what Pruscilla has planned, and I’ll check in with you later,” she said quietly, avoiding my steely gaze. If you ask me, Thelma’s wild shock of yellowy hair certainly doesn’t present the right image for the company, especially considering she heads up the Haircare division. She managed a weak smile, and looked down at the floor. Her skin was red and angry, as if she’d just been scrubbed with a nail brush.

“Don’t worry,” I told her. “I have a copy of Pruscilla’s Action Plan. Just call me if you need anything.”

“Thanks. And…oh dear…um…you have something in your…your face,” she said quickly, backing away.

I pulled out my compact. Oh God—a booger! Plain as day. It had probably been there all morning. That hag Andrea from Fragrances stared me right in the eye and told me it looked like I’d lost weight. No wonder there was so much snickering at the coffee cart. Before I could plan my revenge, Mom called.

“Evie, I have the most wonderful idea. Let’s go to Sternfeld’s tonight and try on wedding dresses,” she said immediately.

Crap, crap, crap! I’m not ready for this yet.

“I don’t know, Mom. Isn’t it a bit soon?”

“Oh, don’t worry about your tummy,” she said excitedly. “There’s still plenty of time to lose a few pounds before the wedding.”

“No, I mean why now? I didn’t plan to start looking for another couple of months. The wedding’s not until August, and we’re only in October. Don’t you think it’s a bit soon?” I hadn’t even had lunch yet and already my waistband was beginning to cut off all circulation to my legs.

“Absolutely not! I’ve been doing a little research on my own, and I’ll have you know that all the new bridal fashions for the summer are out right now, to give enough time for alterations.”

“Well, I guess.” I suppose it couldn’t hurt. Martha Stewart says that the mother-daughter wedding-dress-shopping experience is a memory every woman will look back on fondly over the years, remembering it as one of the most cherished moments of her pre-married life (Martha Stewart Weddings, Fall: “12 Timeless Bridal Traditions”).

“And Sternfeld’s is the biggest bridal store in Brooklyn—maybe even the world!” She sounded like a commercial, so excited she could barely contain herself. “I just know we’ll find something for you there. I called—they come in all sizes.”

I undid the top button of my pants and breathed out deeply. If she had been beside me right then, it would have been hard not to smack her. “Mom, could you lay off about that, please? It’s hard enough knowing I have to lose so much in so little time,” I hissed into the phone. “I sure as hell don’t need you telling me I need a plus-size wedding dress.” Laetitia Farkle peeped over the wall of my cubicle.

“Curiosity killed the cat, dear,” I smiled, my hand over the receiver, and shot her one of my nastiest glares.

“Satisfaction brought him back,” she whispered, and sunk back down behind the divider.

Idiot. What passes for wit around here would make Oscar Wilde turn over in his grave.

“Evie, I know you’ll lose the weight,” Mom continued. “And the lady at the store said they can do alterations as you lose. And even if you don’t—”

“Mom. Please!” I was trying hard to keep my voice down.

“Let me finish. The lady said they have styles that are flattering for every figure.”

“I know that already. God! I refuse to do this with you if you’re going to be mean about it. That means no ganging up on me with the saleslady, no insisting I try on something I don’t like, no embarrassing me whatsoever. Can you do that?”

“I can’t promise anything. All I know is that shopping with you for a wedding dress is like a dream come true for me. Who’d have thought? It’s actually happening for you. I wasn’t sure it would—” She was starting to sniffle, so I cut it short with a promise to meet her there at five.

Thankfully, Thelma had elected to remain in her own office across the floor instead of moving into Pruscilla’s, which meant my cubicle would be free from prying eyes for the next six weeks. So my first order of business on this Pruscilla-free Monday morn was to announce our engagement on seven different wedding Web sites, two of which offered free presents—one bar set and one wine-and-cheese backpack—to any couple who signed up for their online gift registries.

After lunch, I organized my dress folder, which was already overstuffed with pictures ripped out from magazines. I divided them into two piles: Dream Dresses and Just Okay. The Dream pile consisted mostly of Vera Wang ads (Vogue, September: “Gown Goddess: Why Society Brides Love Vera Wang”), along with a few runway shots of gaunt models draped in impossibly narrow but undeniably fabulous couture dresses. But I would definitely settle for anything from the Okay stack—delicate little spaghetti-strapped numbers with antique lace trains, strapless corsets encrusted with glittering Austrian crystals and fairy-princess gowns surrounded in yards of billowing white tulle. I’d been doing my research, and knew the importance of giving the saleslady an idea of my taste in order for her to help serve me best (Bridal Guide, October: “The Do’s and Don’ts of Dress Shopping”).

The afternoon flew by, and I snuck out early. On my way past the switchboard, I told the girls to transfer all of Andrea’s calls tomorrow to her boss’s extension. “She’ll be out all day at the Scents and Sensibility trade show, so send everything through to Teresa,” I told them. “She’s waiting for some important calls, so she didn’t want them getting routed to voice mail.” Andrea, whose cubicle is tucked away in a back corner, spends at least four hours a day on the phone gossiping with her friends. Once Teresa fields seventeen calls for her by noon, she should start to get the idea. It was a little mean, but so was making fun of a girl’s booger. And if it ever came out, well…who am I kidding? I’d be hailed as a hero—everyone hates Andrea.

By the time I met Mom outside Sternfeld’s, it had started to rain. We rushed inside and were met by a spindly old saleslady with a lazy eye and thinning hair. She introduced herself as Greta, and looked me up and down as best she could. “Let’s take our shoes off, ladies. We wouldn’t want to get the carpets dirty with all these white dresses everywhere!”

“Can she see anything?” I whispered to Mom as we chased Greta up a sweeping, pink-carpeted staircase with gold bannisters.

“She was the only one available tonight. I’m sure she’s fine.”

“I have a gift for helping brides find their dream dress,” Greta shouted back, as if she’d heard us. “It’s like what they call ESPN. I can tell just by looking at a girl which one she’s going to buy! Been working here near fifty years, you know!”

Mom grinned, pleased that we’d stumbled onto such a quaint character. At the top of the stairs, Greta directed us toward some ratty old slippers and a couple of overstuffed but thread-bare French-provincial-style chairs.

“Evelyn is very particular about fashion,” Mom offered loudly. “She’s brought some clippings from magazines so that you can see what she likes.”

“I may have a wonky eye, Mrs. Mays, but I can hear you just fine. No need to yell. And I think it’s best if we leave the pictures aside, for now. If fifty years has taught me anything, it’s that what we like isn’t necessarily what looks good on us. Now just you wait here while I see which room’s available,” she said and darted across the vast expanse of pink carpet and disappeared behind a maze of mirrored dressing rooms.

“Smooth, Mom,” I said as we sat down.

“Was I talking loudly?”

“You were yelling. I want to show her my pictures. I don’t trust her to choose something for me.”

“Be patient, Evelyn. Let’s give her a chance. I’m sure she knows her stuff,” she said, picking up an alarmingly old copy of something called Brooklyn Brides.

I slumped down in my chair and took it all in. All around the room, other pairs of mothers and daughters waited in chairs, whispering to each other and nodding. Some pored through the rows of plastic-wrapped gowns, under the watchful eyes of Gretas of their own. Everyone seemed perfectly coiffed, in their pastel twin sets and pearls. I looked over at Mom. Her damp black hair, dramatically streaked with gray for as long as I can remember, was plastered to her forehead, and she wasn’t wearing a stitch of makeup. She was slouching, and her beige cotton blouse—with an I Heart NY embroidered on the front pocket—was missing a button. I could see the elastic waistband of her pants. Why the hell does she need an elastic waistband? She weighs about 103 pounds. She looked like she’d made her own clothes. But I have to admit, even I felt a bit out of place in my bright tangerine pantsuit (Cosmopolitan, November: “Orange: The New Neutral”). Not only that, but I was definitely the fattest bride-to-be in the whole joint.

Greta interrupted my reverie with a hurried wave. “Come on, let’s get you undressed,” she said as we walked across the floor into one of the large dressing rooms. “Did you bring a foundation garment or are we going to build something into the dress?”

“Uh, I don’t know. Do I really need something like that? I mean, I plan to lose some weight and—”

“Oh, no! You’re not one of them, are you? If I’ve seen it once I’ve seen it a thousand times,” Greta sighed. “We’ll get you a smart dress that fits you NOW. Most girls don’t lose half the weight they plan to, and end up with gowns that need to be taken out later, at quite an expense I might add.”

I glared at my mom, who was nodding treasonously in agreement.

“And I’m sure your fiancé thinks you’re quite beautiful as you are, or else we wouldn’t be here!” she continued. “So now, all I need to know from you is whether you prefer something traditional or a little more modern?”

“Traditional. She likes traditional,” Mom said.

“I do not,” I snapped. “Something modern, please.”

“So you have a seat Mrs. Mays, and Evelyn, you get undressed, and I’ll be right back with a girdle and a few dresses.”

I don’t know which was worse—the fact that my mother had completely betrayed me, that a blind woman was going to choose my wedding gown, or that I was about to put on a public girdle.

“I’m leaving,” I said simply, and made for the door.

“Evelyn, there’s nothing to be ashamed of. I gave birth to you, for heaven’s sake. I know every part of you. And I’m sorry if you feel that I’ve put pressure on you to lose weight. You know I don’t mean it, it’s just that you have to learn how to control yourself. Besides, God made us in his own image, and He loves each of us, no matter what we may look like on the outside.”

Scratch that. The worst part about this was getting naked in front of my mother under fluorescent lights.

“Forget this,” I hissed at her. “This is a living nightmare, and you’re not helping. You said you wouldn’t do this to me. I refuse to even touch anything she brings back. All I wanted was to try on a few dresses that I like. But you won’t even let me do that! And I didn’t come here to be insulted, either.”

“Oh, lighten up. You’re getting hysterical. Greta didn’t mean to insult you.” So now it was Greta. “This is supposed to be fun, Evelyn. And who knows? Maybe she knows what she’s doing. Did you ever think of that?”

“Mom, please,” I whined.

“Nobody’s saying we have to buy a dress here. But we did make an appointment, and Greta hasn’t done anything but try to help. I’m sorry, but it never hurts to try. If you don’t like anything, we’ll leave.”

Before I could insist we do just that, Greta returned with another old woman in tow, both of them carrying as many dresses as their osteoporotic arms could handle. They hung them up on a rack.

“Thank you, Ingrid. That will be all. Now Evelyn, let’s get you into this foundation garment,” she said, extending something gray.

“I will not wear that.”

“It’ll help with your tummy,” Greta said, shaking it at me.

“Can’t she try the dresses on without it?” my mother asked. Finally.

“Well, I suppose so. But with your bust you’re definitely going to need something. I figured you’re around a size fourteen or sixteen.”

“I am definitely NOT a size sixteen! I’m not even a fourteen!”

“Hush, Evelyn, people will hear you,” Mom whispered loudly. I could hear muffled laughter coming from the dressing rooms on either side of us. Poor twin-setters. They were probably having trouble finding dresses small enough.

“Let’s not get bogged down by a number. Wedding dresses are made small. Most brides have to buy a size larger than they normally wear. That’s why they make most samples in a size eight,” Greta reassured me.

“How horrible. Imagine how all those poor size sixes must feel.”

“How ’bout we try this one, first,” she said, freeing a dress from its plastic bag. “I thought this one would suit you because of the sweetheart neckline—it will draw attention up to your face. And you have such a pretty face.”

It was hideous. The exact antithesis of every wedding gown I’d clipped out, dreamed about. Instead of thin, elegant spaghetti straps there were puffy, stiff sleeves dotted with rhinestone-studded rosettes. Instead of a smooth, sleek bodice there was a wide trunk covered in the tackiest sort of lace-and-pearl appliqués. Instead of an elegant A-line skirt, there was a shiny satin tablecloth covering so many crinolines that it stuck out at right angles from the waist. And it was stark white, almost fluorescent (Bridal Guide, Fall: “Why Off-White Is Right-On”).

Perfect. I’d show them. “Mom, I’d like to surprise you, if you don’t mind. Let me try it on, and then we’ll call you in.”

She seemed to like that idea, and obligingly trotted out of the room. Alone with Greta, I took off my clothes and let her help me into the dress.

The first time you see yourself in a wedding gown is supposed to be an experience you never forget. We’ve all heard those stories about the brides who buy the first dress they try on because they can’t get that heavenly, haunting first image of themselves out of their minds, and nothing else can compare. You’re supposed to feel like a goddess, a virgin and a model all rolled into one. But what I saw in the mirror was beyond horrible, beyond my wildest nightmare—a blur of bulges and rhinestones and flounces and fabric. A pregnant white hippopotamus, with sausage links for arms and shiny balloons for breasts. In the mirror, I could see Greta’s pointy face light up in a twisted yellow smile. She clasped her hands together and sucked in her breath.

“You see? I told you! I do have a knack for this!” she shrieked. “Mrs. Mays, Mrs. Mays! Come in and see!”

Mom pushed the door open and froze. Now she would see how wrong she was to make me do this, how evil Greta was, how horrid I looked, how ashamed I was.

“Oh, Evelyn,” she breathed, her bottom lip trembling. Tears welled up in her eyes. “You’re beautiful.”

At that moment, I made three very serious vows—to never go wedding dress shopping with my mother again, to lose more than forty pounds, and to go home and smack Bruce for making me go through all of this. If he hadn’t proposed, I would never have been publicly humiliated in so many different ways in so little time.

A few days after her little tantrum, Bertie finally got over her selfishness and came through with the wedding plans. Through a grand concession of my own—agreeing to give up my dream of a June wedding—we were booked in for August 18 at the posh Fairfield Inn on the Connecticut shore. It was absolutely perfect—a grand, white, colonial-style mansion with an elegant ballroom and a newly renovated Bridal Suite (Bridal Guide, Winter: “Finding the Perfect Venue: Five Features You Can’t Live Without”). Bertie’s friend Cookie had two of her daughters’ weddings there, so it passed the snob test, too. It had been reserved, of course, but by a brilliant stroke of luck, Bertie popped in on the very day when one Mrs. Pimbleton-Smythe called to cancel her daughter Sukey’s wedding, due to the unfortunate suicide of the groom-to-be.

Even Bruce liked the place when we popped in for a look, and whistled when he saw the four-poster bed.

“So this is where it’s all gonna happen,” he whispered into my ear while Bertie discussed the merits of veal versus roast beef with the event manager. “After all these years, you’ll finally be unable to resist my charms.”

“Yeah right,” I snorted. “I don’t know how we’ve waited so long. Oh, wait—weren’t those your charms I succumbed to on our first date?”

He snickered, and Bertie shot me a mean look. “Yes, Brucie dear,” I said loudly. “This is where we’ll spend the most romantic night of our lives. The only thing that could possibly make it any more perfect would be knowing that our guests had thoroughly enjoyed the milk-fed veal in the mushroom-cream sauce.”

The event manager raised his eyebrows and nodded in agreement.

Despite a few minor glitches, Bertie and I were getting on remarkably well. Thanks to her years on the Palm Beach charity ball circuit, she’s the type of person you really want on your side if you’re planning something big—she acts fast, she has good taste and she won’t take no for an answer (unlike Mom, whom I was very happy to leave out of the entire process). Bruce, on the other hand, wasn’t dealing well with his mother at all—and we’d barely been engaged three weeks. He almost lost it when he heard she wanted to have 150 people at the engagement party (tentatively scheduled for January 20), and threatened not to show if she invited more than ninety.

Mercifully, Bruce and I were to be spared most of the remaining meetings with florists and photographers, although we felt it was important to step in and approve any final decision, in case we wanted to veto something. But I have to hand it to Bertie; she knows how to get things done. She indiscreetly prodded the event manager at the inn into telling her exactly who else Mrs. Pimbleton-Smythe had hired for her daughter’s ill-fated nuptials, and then booked them immediately.

Although it was shaping up to be the event of the season, I have a feeling poor Sukey Pimbleton-Smythe would not have wanted to be a guest at our wedding. By all rights, it should have been hers, were it not for a few handfuls of Xanax and a very fine bottle of cognac.

5

The morning after Thanksgiving, I swore to Bruce that I didn’t want to see our families in the same room again until the wedding. And quite possibly, not even then.

“Your mother was a shrew,” I said, pouring myself a cup of coffee. “While you and your dad were watching football, she was lecturing my mom about the importance of buying a new dress for our engagement party. You didn’t hear her. She was cruel. Christ! Did you use the last Sweet’n Low?”

“I’ve never tried that stuff in my life. Just use sugar. It won’t kill you.”

“Are you trying to sabotage me?” I growled as I jealously eyed Bruce’s bagel.

“Evie, get a grip. It’s not a reason to be upset. This is not a big deal.”

“Oh, so you’re saying it’s okay for your mother to treat mine like she’s an embarrassment? It’s obvious she’s worried what her friends will think if my mom wears a ratty old dress. Like she’s the help, or something.” For all his intellectual wisdom, Bruce has a surprisingly limited understanding of the subtleties of class politics.

“No, I’m saying it’s okay to use sugar instead of aspartame for once in your life. And you’re putting cream in your coffee, for God’s sake. You think a teaspoon of sugar’s going to make a difference?”

“If you’d bought milk like you were supposed to—”

“That’s enough, Evie,” he snapped, slamming his Harry Potter book down on the table. “I’m not going to sit here and be your punching bag. If you’re upset about last night or your diet or whatever, we can talk about it, but I’m not going to let you insult me for no reason.”

“First of all, I’m not on a diet. It’s a lifestyle change. And as far as your mother’s concerned, if you’d been there to hear what she was saying, you wouldn’t have stood for it. I didn’t know what to do. She knows my mom can’t afford to buy fancy clothes and she was deliberately making her feel bad in front of everyone. Why do you think Claire came in to watch with you? You think she likes football? She probably had to leave the table before she said something horrible to your mother and ruined the entire dinner.”

“Well, you did a pretty good job of that yourself when you asked Rosita to sit down and join us. You think that helps? All you did was make everyone uncomfortable as hell, especially Rosita!”

“It’s just that dinner was already served, and there was nothing left for her to do, so I don’t understand why she has to eat alone in the kitchen when there’s plenty of room at the table for her. God, she’s been living in your house for like twenty years!”

I could feel the tears welling up. Maybe everyone was right—I think I do freak out when I can’t eat what I want to. Because I was honestly ready to fling myself into traffic, for absolutely no reason at all. And it had only been about eighteen hours since my last piece of cake.

Bruce sighed. “Evie, my mother just thought it would be nice to have a Thanksgiving with our families together. She’s really making an effort.” What a saint. “Both my parents want to get to know your mother and Claire better, so I don’t think it’s fair of you to try and make a big thing out of this. If she was snobby or bitchy or whatever it’s just how she is and you’re all going to have to accept it.”

“All? All? So it’s you against us, now, is it? The upstanding Fulbrights vs. the Italo-American Clampetts? And tell me, how should I comfort my mother? She looked like she wanted to die all night. I was the one who was embarrassed. And you should be, too.” The tears were flowing now, and I was nearly hysterical, but Bruce wasn’t biting. And why should he? I was being utterly ridiculous.

“Puhlease! You make it sound like your mother is some poor helpless soul who can’t defend herself. She drives you crazy ninety-nine percent of the time and now she can do no wrong. And you expect me to feel like it’s all my fault.” He paused for effect. “I’m sorry if you were that embarrassed by my family, Evie. I had no idea you hated them all that much. But you know what? You’re right. I was embarrassed—by YOU!”

He waited a few seconds for me to say something, but I just sat there and cried. Then he stormed out of the kitchen. He turned the stereo on loud in the living room. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Everyone was supposed to get along. Mom and Bertie should have been the best of friends by now, and Bruce and I should be picking out our china pattern. But all we were doing was fighting all the time. All of us.

Bruce’s dad even got into the act last night when Bertie suggested he be the one to tell half of their friends why they wouldn’t be invited to the engagement party.

“But Bruce doesn’t want a lot of people there, Daddy,” sister Wendy said sweetly.

“This is the first I’m hearing of this,” he said with uncharacteristic irritation. “Do you actually expect me to tell James and Cookie that they won’t be invited? We were invited to their grandson’s christening just this summer!”

“No, not James and Cookie, dear,” said Bertie, rolling her eyes. “They’ll be invited. But I don’t think there’ll be room for Phyllis and Harvey or Judy and Norman.”

Bruce Sr. was shaking his head. “I won’t do it. I just won’t. We’ve known them for twenty-five years. And what about Barry and Lynne?”

“Oh, there’s definitely no room for any work friends, Daddy,” said Brooke, looking up from her cuticles.

It was all a big nightmare. On the way home, after we dropped Mom off at her place, Claire started in with her usual advice.

“It’s gonna get a lot worse from here on in, kids. If you want to keep your sanity, you’re going to have to take hold of yourselves. Don’t let other people’s expectations get in the way. Engagement’s supposed to be a happy time, an exciting time.”

“But as you can see, Bruce’s parents are nearly impossible,” I pointed out between clenched teeth. Bruce sat silently in the back seat.

“Lillian’s no treat herself,” Claire said sharply. “Bruce, I’m just glad your mother had the foresight not to offer her another drink.”

“She wasn’t drunk,” I protested. “She was just nervous.”

Bruce snorted. I guess he finds it funny when I defend my mother, since I spend most of the time complaining about her. But just because she’s a bit of a lush or maybe not as sophisticated as some doesn’t give anyone else but me the right to judge her.

“Well,” I said, “I guess I’d drink too if I knew certain people would be judging everything I said and did for six hours straight. And what the hell was all that about Bertie’s charity work? And how she’s so happy and grateful that she didn’t have to work a real job, and how important it is to be there when your kids come home from school. What a witch!”

“Uh, Evie? I’m still here, remember?” Bruce grumbled as Claire pulled up in front of our place.

I suppose I was being a bit of a hypocrite about this—criticizing one’s mother should be the domain of blood relatives alone. But in-laws must form some sort of exception, shouldn’t they? Especially when they’re so wicked.

“Come now, Evie. Take it down a notch,” Claire said seriously.

“Sorry,” I said. “But it’s not like she doesn’t know Mom worked when I was growing up. And that she still works. Like there’s something wrong with working! She knows working isn’t a choice for some women. Some women just have to work!”

“Your mother did the best she could, Evie. For the hundreth time, you know she never meant to leave you out on the stoop that day. She had no way of knowing Mrs. DeFazio wouldn’t show up that aft—”

“I know that! I’m not talking about that!”

“Come, now—you’re getting hysterical,” Claire said, patting my hand.

“Would you mind if I come home with you tonight, Claire?” Bruce asked, managing to make me angrier than I already was.

She laughed loudly. “Brucie dear, you know there’s always a bed for you at my place. You’re a pleasure—a real pleasure. Evie, I wish I could say the same for you.” Bruce snickered.

Claire wiped the corners of her eyes and sighed. “But I’m afraid you’re on your own tonight, Bruce. You two go inside, talk it out. That’s what separates the good marriages from the bad, you know—not the fighting, but the making up.” She paused to think for a moment, then looked at me. “We had some doozies, your grandfather and I. And don’t believe that crap about never going to bed angry. There’s nothing wrong with going to bed angry. Nothing wrong with waking up angry, either, come to think of it. That’s going to happen. So long as you can agree to disagree, you’ll be fine. Respect each other’s differences. That’s the real truth of it,” she smiled, and winked at Bruce.

I hugged her and we got out of the car. “’Bye, now!” she said cheerily as I closed the door. She turned the stereo up right away, and we could hear the muffled strains of James Taylor blaring from behind as we trudged up the steps to the front door. We turned and watched her old Lincoln float off down the street until it disappeared out of sight.

By Monday, I couldn’t do up my pants. After a brief period of abstinence Friday morning, I’d spent the whole weekend in sweats, eating leftover turkey and, when that was all gone, cranberry sauce out of the tin. If I could have called in sick, I would have, but I’d just used up my last sick day of the year the week before when Morgan needed some hand-holding at the gynocologist’s following three inconclusive home pregnancy tests. It was the second time this year she’d thought she was pregnant, but, mercifully, it was not to be. She suspects Billy’s been poking holes in the condoms, although there’s been no real evidence of any tampering.

“Maybe you should go on the Pill,” I suggested.

“Yeah, right!” She cackled, tightening the lid on her cup of pee. “Me—on the Pill. I’d be pregnant and I’d have the clap.”

“The clap? Are you kidding me? Do you really think Billy would sleep around? He doesn’t seem like the type. I mean, you know him better, but I just thought he was really into you and only you, you know?”

She raised her eyebrows and looked at me like I should know better.

“Oh,” I said, the light dawning. “Who?”

“Peter.”

“Morgan, not again,” I groaned. Peter is Morgan’s boss. He’s an absolute jerk—gorgeous, married, rich and heartless. Morgan adores him, or rather, adores being thrown down onto his big glass desk and ravaged every once in a while after everyone’s gone home.

She shrugged her shoulders unapologetically. “After a few months, the sexual tension just builds to the point where we have to release it or it’ll become obvious to everyone.”

“Couldn’t you ask for a transfer or something?”

“Why would I want to do that?” she said, throwing her long red hair back over one shoulder. “I like Mergers and Acquisitions. Besides, I didn’t spend all those years busting my ass in business school just to let a prick like Peter get in the way of what I want.”

“Well, excuse the hell out of me, Madam Maneater,” I said.

“Gimme a break, Evie. I’ve been working my way up there for three years and it’s one of the top investment banks in the city. I’m not about to throw it all away!” She slammed her bottle of pee down on the desk in front of a frightened receptionist, and plopped down on a chair between two very unhappy women who appeared to be about ten months pregnant. What a piece of work.

I pictured poor Billy, sitting at home alone poking holes in condoms by candlelight, an uneaten dinner for two laid out on the table. Innocently believing Morgan was working late, as she often does. She probably just forgot to call, he assures himself.

I suppose love really is blind. Actually, in Billy’s case, love is deaf, dumb and blind.

I wonder if Bruce would do something devious like that. The condom, I mean, not the cheating. Probably not, on both counts. The idea of having kids thrills him, I know that. Plus, the thought of condoms brings out his softer side, if you get my drift. In any case, birth control sabotage isn’t his style. The only thing Bruce might consider poking a hole in would be the theory of relativity or something lame like that. Besides, he probably charts my cycle to know exactly when I’m ovulating, anyway.

I reached into the back of the closet and pulled out the black Anne Klein II Fat Suit (Allure, December: “Five Work Essentials To Suit Every Figure”). In a state of emergency such as this, I would never get on the scale. But judging from the snugness of never-fail Fat Suit—and the lines my underwear were leaving on my hips—things had gone from bad to worse. Better skip breakfast and break out the big guns. After work today, I’ll stop by the drugstore. Annie told me that Nicole dropped ten pounds in four weeks on a combination of ginseng ampoules and chromium supplements. I haven’t seen her, and I’m sure she still looks frumpy, but ten pounds, for her, that’s something. I bet she probably took laxatives, too. There must be something at Walgreen’s that’ll work for me.

At work, I studied the calendar. Let’s see…today was Monday, November 27. That gives me about nine and a half months to go until the wedding. Or 265 days. Thank God it’s a leap year—that’s an extra day which might come in handy.

I lost five pounds in a single day once, on the cabbage soup diet. But if I wanted to buy my dress soon, there was definitely no time to mess around. Besides, my metabolism ain’t what it used to be. When I was twenty, I lost (and then gained) ten pounds six times in a single year. It was so easy—all I had to do was cut out French fries and chocolate. But I’d been doing that for two whole months, and I’d gained God knows how much. Maybe there was something wrong with me, like some sort of fat-creating disease or something. It was a hopeful thought.

Pruscilla wouldn’t be back till Monday, so all week long, I devoted myself to researching that very question on the Internet. While Thelma flitted about nervously, preparing neat piles of color-coordinated folders on Pruscilla’s desk, I diligently studied the facts. Unfortunately, the facts were as follows:

Fact #1: An underactive thyroid may be to blame. Symptoms may include weight gain, irregular periods, flaky skin, depression, weakness, constipation and a puffy face. Eureka! Maybe this was the miracle I’d been praying for all these years.

Fact #2: I do not have an underactive thyroid. Or type-two diabetes. Or undiagnosed edema of any kind. No systemic medical condition is to blame. An emergency lunchtime visit to my doctor on Wednesday confirmed these findings. Not at all worth the $120 fee to rush the results of the blood test.

Fact #3: Pregnancy causes weight gain.

Fact #4: I am not pregnant. That is, unless there has been an immaculate conception.

Fact #5: In 1991, doctors at Stanford University Medical Center removed a 303-pound tumor from the right ovary of an otherwise healthy thirty-four-year-old woman. She made a full recovery.

Fact #6: There is no such tumor in either of my ovaries, also confirmed by my doctor. I do not even have a small tumor.

Fact #7: Obsessing over one’s weight can be a sign of anorexia. Might I be teetering on the brink of losing half my body weight?

Fact #8: After completing 14 self-diagnosis questionnaires, it appears the only eating disorder I might be afflicted with is something called binge-eating disorder. Symptoms include eating until feeling painfully full, eating alone due to embarrassment, eating when not hungry, and feeling disgusted and depressed after overeating. The prognosis? Weight gain and, eventually, obesity.

By Thursday afternoon, I had reluctantly drifted away from the hopeful expectations of the medical Web sites to the more familiar depression-inducing body mass index calculators of the diet sites. There, I was forced to concede that my symptoms, although severe, were not altogether uncommon. In fact, they were quite mundane. What I did learn is that my body has betrayed me in a way as cruel as any organic disease, as ferocious as any pathological malignancy. It seems the years of yo-yo dieting have taken their toll. The culprit? A wonky metabolism. The cure? None to speak of, although one thing has been known to help other sufferers—exercise. The time of desperation was nearly upon me; the only option, painfully clear.

I would have to join a gym.

What else could I do? If I’d learned anything from my research—aside from the fact that there were also downsides to thyroid problems and massive abdominal tumors—it was that I was verging on an unhealthy attitude regarding weight loss. I would have to accept that, despite all promises to the contrary, there is no quick fix, no magical ampoule full of ginseng that would make my ass fat morph into muscle. Only hard work and a healthy outlook could prevail.

As I stared at the daunting pile of color-coded folders Thelma had gradually been depositing in my In Box, I realized that I’d done nothing all week but pray for various horrible illnesses, research the best liposuction clinics in the five boroughs, and neglect my professional responsibilities. Pathetic. How could I expect to be promoted if I can’t even bother returning an e-mail or two? Bruce was right—I was in danger of losing it. Well, not anymore.

On Friday afternoon I left early since I figured it would be my last chance for a while, with Pruscilla’s return just one short weekend away. While I’d been embroiled in online research, Thelma had spent the better part of the week pulling her hair out in Pruscilla’s office, which was by now a complete mess. The tension in the air was almost palpable, and it floated out of the office and hung over my cubby. I didn’t envy her—she’d probably be in there all weekend. But it was hard to feel sorry for her. The simplest things seemed confusing for Thelma, even deciphering Pruscilla’s handwriting proved nearly impossible for the poor woman. But it was no trouble for me. I’d gotten quite used to it, in fact, and almost looked forward to typing her long-winded reports and memos (Pruscilla’s typing is slower than her writing), since it afforded me the rare opportunity to look busy while keeping my headspace completely free. I was getting quite good at drawing it out as long as possible.

The first week Pruscilla was gone, I didn’t mind interpreting for Thelma all of the purple little Post-its Pruscilla had left stuck to everything. But then she started bothering me twenty-five times a day with questions about how Pruscilla does this and how Pruscilla does that, and since I wasn’t put on this earth to save Thelma’s ass (and neglect my work besides), I developed a set of avoidance techniques to divert her ceaseless calls for help. Mostly, that meant pleading ignorance. For example, Thelma has no idea that part of my job is to coordinate the printing of all promotional materials. Nor is she aware that I have input all of Pruscilla’s notes and market-research data for all new product launches for the next 18 months. Best of all, she thinks most of my time is spent returning Pruscilla’s e-mail. If she wants to be a good manager, she’s going to have to learn a little bit about self-reliance.

As I got ready to leave, she yelled out, “Evie, Evie! Wait!” In her hurry to stop me, I could hear a flurry of papers swishing to the floor. But I pretended not to notice, and scooted down the hall to the elevators. If Thelma doesn’t get it by now, then there’s nothing anyone can do to help save her. Besides, if there’s one thing I’ve learned working at Kendra White, professionally speaking, it’s to form alliances with the right sorts of people, not to go down with a sinking ship. That, and never name a lipstick after a disgraced White House intern.

Although there are tons of gyms in Brooklyn near our place, I decided I’d be more likely to go if I joined one near work. Not too close to work, of course, in case somebody should see me, but close enough so that I can walk over during lunch if I want. Part of the Kendra White benefits package includes paying fifty percent of employees’ gym memberships—not that KW is such a saintly place to work; judging by all the fat ladies who work there, paying for gyms was a pretty safe bet—which meant I could afford something pretty nice. I remembered a place I passed by once when the subway station was closed because of a bomb threat and I had to walk to the next line.

It was still there. Mid-Town Fitness. Inside, it was the archetypical New York City health club—iron and granite decor, with a three-storey-high, half-block-long plate-glass window facing the street. Half a dozen Wall-Street types hung off a climbing wall off to one side. A battalion of machines crossed the length of the room, ten rows deep. Scores of pony-tailed socialites wearing diamond earrings bigger than the earphones on their Discmans walked, ran and stepped off the calories from the salads they ate for lunch. Up above, weight machines on a mezzanine. I scanned the room for a fatso, but the only person I could find who didn’t look like she’d been born there was the dumpy old woman spraying down treadmill consoles with a bottle of pink disinfectant. It was perfectly awful, but morbidly fascinating.

I was so enthralled by the moving sea of boobs and biceps that I hadn’t noticed a young red-headed tart descend on me from behind the front desk.

“Hi, I’m Missy. Can I help you?” she asked sweetly.

“Um, no, I don’t think so,” I said, turning to leave.

“Would you like a tour?”

What I’d like is to get the hell out of here. “I don’t think so.”

“You don’t sound so sure,” she laughed. “Have you ever been a member of our facilities before?”

“What do you think?”

She tried not to look, but her eyes inadvertently traveled down to the waist of my bulging trench coat. A single vein throbbed at the center of her forehead. “I’m gonna guess…no?”

“That’s right, Missy, the answer is no. No, I haven’t been a member here before.”

“Come on, it’s not so bad. Let me give you a quick tour. You’d be surprised how friendly everyone is,” she said, oblivious to my extreme discomfort, and started walking. “Let me show you the women-only section. If you’re shy or uncomfortable about a co-ed workout, it’s the perfect…” I reluctantly followed as she yammered on and on. The deeper we got into the bowels of the place, the uglier and heavier everyone became. I felt a little better. It seems the thin and the vain crowd the machines at the front by the window because they enjoy being gawked at like zoo animals by passersby.

“…and wait till you see our new eucalyptus and tea-tree-oil steam room! Have you heard about it? New York Magazine did a piece on it last month. Did you know that eucalyptus can clear your body of cancer-causing toxins? My hand to God! Our smokers really seem to enjoy it. Do you smoke? You can get a regular steam, too, if you prefer, but I don’t see why anyone…”

“Can I see the weight room?” I asked. Muscle, I’d learned, burns more calories at rest than fat does, if you can imagine that. So my plan was to get ripped.

“Of course! Of course!” she said, and trotted toward the stairs. “Our weight room is equipped with the latest air-pressure machines, free weights…”

Missy droned on. At the top of the stairs, I leaned on a railing to catch my breath and look around. Abs as far as the eye could see. Mostly men up here, thank God. Struggling with these ridiculous machines in front of skinny little girls would be worse.

“…of course, if you’re trying to lose weight, you’ll need at least three days a week of strength training, so we’ll customize a program just for you….”

Then I caught a glimpse of myself in one of the mirror-covered walls. My face was red as a beet, and I felt like how those guys lifting the huge barbells looked—like they were about to have an aneurysm. Could I really do this? I peered over the railing down at the floor below. Rows of well-conditioned pony-tails swayed from side to side as their owners marched silently onward with fists clenched. Would I ever look like one of them?

“…so if you opt for the deluxe membership package, you have access to both the cardio and weight rooms, along with towel service, of course, and—”

“Wait a minute,” I interrupted. “I don’t know if I can do any of this. I don’t know how.”

“There are three personal trainers on the floor at all times whose job it is to show you exactly how everything works and to make sure you have the right form!” Missy looked around wildly. “Jade? Jade! Come on over here, would ya?”

The fellow in question jogged over from the old bald guy he was spotting.

“Hey, Missy. Is this lovely young lady a new member?”

“She’s thinking about it. She’s never been to a gym before.”

“Hi! Jade Hollowell,” he grinned, and stuck out his hand. “Nice to meet you.” His eyes were so green and his teeth were so white, it was hard not to stare at his face.

I grabbed his hand and looked down at it. Veiny. “Hi. I’m Evelyn. Evie, actually. Evie Mays. Hi.” I am such an idiot.

“Jade’s one of our top trainers. He’s been with us five years,” Missy said slowly. She looked at me with knowing eyes. She’d brought out the big guns for the hard sell.

I looked down and realized I was still holding Jade’s hand. Oh God. I pulled it away quickly. “Sorry,” I mumbled. But he didn’t seem to mind. He just smiled.

“If you like,” Missy offered, “you can book private training sessions with Jade up to five times a week. Or with one of our other trainers.” She was a lot smarter than she looked, that Missy.

“I don’t know…”

“It’s more expensive, of course, but you get what you pay for,” she said. “People find they improve quicker when they have someone to answer to. Plus, he’ll help you get the most out of your workouts.”

“If you want to get serious, I’m your man,” Jade said, staring into my soul. Those eyes. It was like they could see the skinny person buried inside me.

“He really is good,” Missy assured me.

Jade shook his head modestly. “It’s just that I love my job,” he said. “I can’t help it. This is a great place, Evie, really low-key. Everyone here is super friendly. I personally guarantee you that you’ll love it.”

“Come on.” Missy reached out and grabbed my hand. “Give it a shot—you’ve got nothing to lose!”

“If that were true I wouldn’t be here,” I said, and Jade laughed. He actually laughed. At my joke.

“Working out is addictive, Evie, you’ll see. At least it is for me. You know, if I wasn’t here all the time, I’d probably be a much better actor,” he said grinning, and winked right at me.

Missy giggled.

“Where do I sign?”

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