This is real parking karma at work.
Because if the unbelievably hot Dave Dybdahl thinks I’m cute, then maybe, just maybe, I could land a hot young thing, a delicious piece of arm candy, a boy toy. Maybe Dave Dybdahl, maybe someone else. Because Dave will be just the beginning of my new project.
I am going to score myself a Trophy Husband.
Chapter Two
My next order of business is to convene a meeting with the brain trust.
So I scurry back to the Marina district where I live now. I got the hell out of our tiny little apartment in the Mission as soon as I could. One week after Todd had eloped with the Pretzel Gymnast, I’d packed up the whole place, thanks to help from my sister Julia and my good friend, Erin. She gets double helper points since she carried those frigging mixers, which are heavy bastards, all the way to Good Will by herself. Then I moved in with Julia for a few weeks as I looked for my own place, one that wasn’t choked with memories of what I had thought was my big, epic, once-in-a-lifetime romance.
I found a new home fairly quickly, thanks in part to the sale of my video show, The Fashion Hound, to the media company Fashion Nation. I’m a matchmaker of outfits, hosting my own short daily show about where to find the coolest, funkiest, most unique looks, and how to pair them and not pair them together. The Fashion Hound took off online, and after several months Fashion Nation bought it and brought it into the fold. I still write and host the show.
The irony was the offer came in two weeks before the wedding. Todd and I even celebrated it together with a night out at a new restaurant in SoMa, and then dancing at a club, where we made out to the sounds of techno pop, and toasted to a big, fat payday for doing what I loved – video blogging about clothes.
Life couldn’t have been better.
I had the guy, the gig, the dog, and the dough.
I still have the gig, the dog, and the dough, so I suppose three out of four ain’t bad, and really, all things considered, Don’t Cry For Me Argentina.
Even though, you know, my heart was pretty much severed.
But I love my job, and that’s why I keep doing it every day, and besides the bigger house, I don’t live off the money from the sale. I live off what I earn every day, though obviously I’m grateful for the financial padding. I know I’m lucky in business. I know I have a lot of things – my health, a house, and security. Not to mention, the world’s most awesome dog. I wouldn’t mind, though, being lucky in love. Alone at night, in my quiet home, in my king size bed, I miss company.
I miss music and laughter, and nights wrapped up with another person when that person feels like the world to you, and you to him. So maybe a hot young thing can be more than just a way to settle the score. Maybe a Trophy Husband would never leave me, never hurt me, never make me give up my favorite restaurant in the whole wide world. Maybe a Trophy Husband is precisely the kind of boy who could love a girl forever and ever and then some.
The kind of love that makes the crooners want to sing in sultry voices.
“But that’s just between you and me, Ms. Pac-Man,” I tell my dog as I curl up on the couch next to her and send an email to Julia, Hayden and Erin, letting them know their presence is required at my house this evening for an emergency meeting.
* * *
That night we switch the location to Hayden’s house. She lives next door, which means we share a wall, an entryway, and a front stoop. Her husband, Greg, is out of town. They’re both lawyers – he’s a business attorney and she does patent law – and she’s holed up in her home office, finishing a legal brief that’s due for a client tomorrow, so I help her daughter Lena get ready for bed.
I adore her daughter for many reasons, including the fact that she loves clothes and fashion and is pretty much the best shopping partner ever. Sometimes, when Hayden and Greg need a break, I happily take Lena out for a girl’s afternoon and we try on everything on Union Street. And I mean everything. The girl has power shopping genes twined deep in her DNA, and I love that kind of relentless-ness when it comes to clothing racks.
Lena waits for me at the end of the hall, pointing excitedly in her room. Lena’s wavy brown hair is unkempt as usual, in desperate need of a brushing. But at eight years old, she’s already learning some of the secret tricks of women. She has pushed it back with a red headband that’s got big white polka dots on it. Very Marianne.
“By the way, I totally approve of the look,” I say. “But your mom said we have to get you to bed. The girls are coming over soon.”
“McKenna!” she shrieks, barely able to contain her excitement. “Look, look, look.” She grabs my hand and pulls me into her room and begins stroking their Siamese cat Chaucer, who’s curled around a stuffed teddy bear. Lena tucks her feet gracefully under her legs and keeps petting. She leans her face in to the cat, rubbing her cheek gently against his downy fur. “McKenna, do you think you can convince my mom to let him stay in the house tonight, just one night? You like animals, don’t you?”
“Obviously.”
“My mom doesn’t like this cat, but he’s making me so happy and I’ll make sure he doesn’t pee in the house. Please, please, please convince her.”
The trouble with Chaucer is he’s an equal opportunity whizzer. Hayden has told me all the stories of pet cleaning companies and furniture re-upholsterers she’s called in to fix the damage this cat has done. But he’s her husband’s cat, and Greg is strangely crazy about him, so Hayden is forced to put up with Chaucer’s predilection for pinpoint precise peeing. She manages by keeping the cat outside in their tiny backyard, which is adjacent to my very own tiny backyard.