“And he was wearing black tie at the gym?”

“Very funny. No. But guys like him don’t date women like me. This is friendly, not a date. Trust me. I know. I was there.”

“Sometimes romances start out that way. Don’t rule it out. Besides, I don’t trust your interpretation. You don’t know shit. All you know is your parents telling you that you’re not deserving, you’re not worthy, and no one will ever want you. Believe me, tapes like that play so loud, you can’t hear anything else. Even when it’s clear otherwise. I’m telling you, if this guy has any brains at all and eyes in his head, he knows you’re smart, funny, a good person, bright as hell, good looking, have fucking unbelievable legs, and he’d be the luckiest man in the world if he got you. So maybe this guy is no fool.”

“It’s not a date,” she insisted again.

“I’ll bet you five bucks it is,” Harlan said firmly.

“How will I know if it is?” She looked confused, while Harlan pondered the question.

“Good point, since your radar is out of whack and you have no decoding skills. If he kisses you, obviously it’s a date, but he won’t if he has any manners, on a first date. He sounds smarter than that. You’ll just know. If he asks you out again. If he looks interested. If he makes nice little gestures, touches your hand, looks like he’s enjoying you. Oh fuck, Victoria, just take me with you, and I’ll tell you if it’s a date.”

“I’ll figure it out for myself,” she said primly. “But it isn’t.”

“Just remember, you owe me five bucks if it is, by any of the aforementioned criteria. And no cheating. I need the money.”

“Then start saving, because you’re going to owe me five bucks. It’s not a date.” She was sure of it.

“Don’t forget your new nose,” he teased her. “That could swing the vote.”

“I hadn’t thought of that,” she said, laughing. “The second time he saw me, I had bruises all over my face and two shiners, and I wasn’t wearing makeup.”

“Oh my God,” Harlan said, rolling his eyes. “You’re right. It’s not a date. It’s true love. Double the ante. Make it ten.”

“You’re on. Start saving.” He gave her a brotherly shove as they both left the kitchen and went back to their rooms. She had a stack of papers to correct. And the mystery of whether Collin White had asked her for a date would be solved soon enough. They were having dinner in five days. He hadn’t asked her out over the weekend, which made her wonder if he had a girlfriend. She had been through that with Jack Bailey, and hoped it wasn’t another situation like that. But this was nothing. She was sure. Just dinner with a friend. And it was less scary that way anyway.


Chapter 23


Five days later, on the day Victoria was supposed to have dinner with Collin White, she had to do one of those painful duties that sometimes went with her work. The father of one of the students had died suddenly of a heart attack on a ski slope in New Hampshire, and she had to go to the funeral, along with the headmaster and several other teachers. The family was devastated, and the youngest son was one of her seniors. There were four children in the family, and all of them had gone to Madison. It was a family that everyone loved, and she went to the funeral as part of a group with Eric Walker and a number of other teachers. It was very sad, and the eulogies were extremely moving when each of the children got up to speak, and everyone cried. Victoria’s heart went out to her student. She put her arms around him and hugged him afterward, when they all went back to the family’s apartment on Fifth Avenue. She had taught his older brother and one of his sisters too, in her seven years at the school, and liked them all. The oldest sister had gone to Madison before Victoria got there, and she was married now with two kids. Their father had been relatively young and in good shape, and his sudden death had been a terrible shock to all, and most of all his children.

It was a sobering experience, and Victoria spent the rest of the day quietly, and she tried not to think about it when Collin came to pick her up at seven. But she told him about it anyway, and he said he had an uncle who had died suddenly. It had been terrible for the family, but he said it was a great way to go, healthy, in no pain, just gone, after a great life. He made a good point.

She met him downstairs, and they took a cab to a restaurant he knew and liked in the Village. She had heard of it and it was hard to get in. The Waverly Inn. It was lively, and the food was good, the atmosphere was wholesome, fun, and the food mostly American. They both ordered steaks, and she had to fight herself not to order the macaroni and cheese to go with it, which he said was great.

“I’ve been on a diet since I was born,” she confessed when she ordered steamed spinach instead. “My parents and sister are thin and can eat whatever they want. Apparently I inherited my great-grandmother’s genes. She was a ‘big’ woman, as they say. I’ve been fighting that battle all my life.” She found it surprisingly easy to be honest with him since she viewed him as just a friend. Her clothes were loose on her now, so she could talk about it, without the usual shame and guilt over what she’d eaten. She’d been good for months, and it showed. She was determined to get down to a size ten by the wedding, and she was close. And after that, she’d have to stay there, which was like circling in airspace with a 747.

“People are so obsessed with that these days. As long as you’re healthy, what difference do a few pounds make? Crazy diets. Thirteen-year-old girls on magazine covers who wind up in hospitals because they’re so anorexic. Real women don’t look like that. And who wants them to? No one wants a woman who looks sick or like she’s been liberated from a refugee camp. All through history, women are supposed to look like you,” Collin said simply, and he looked as though he meant it, and not like he was trying to butter her up. She stared at him in disbelief. Maybe he was crazy. Or liked big women. It made no sense to her.

They had an interesting conversation about art, politics, history, architecture, the latest books they’d read, the music they liked, the foods they hated. Brussels sprouts for both, and cabbage. She said she had tried a cabbage soup diet with great results that reversed immediately. And then they talked about their families, and Victoria told him more than she meant to. She told him about being named after Queen Victoria because her father thought she was so ugly and it was a great joke, and she told him about the remark that she was the tester cake and Gracie the perfect recipe. Collin looked at her in horror when she said it.

“It’s amazing you don’t hate her,” he said, looking sympathetic.

“It’s not her fault. It’s them. And she looks just like them, so they think she’s perfect. And she is gorgeous, I have to admit. She looks something like your sister, in a smaller version.” It was a standard of perfection Victoria had never achieved and knew she never would.

“Yeah, and my sister hasn’t had a date in a year, so that’s no guarantee of happiness either,” he reminded her. Victoria still found that hard to believe. “People who say things like that to their kids shouldn’t have them,” he said seriously.

“True. But they do anyway. Anyone can have kids, whether qualified or not, and many people aren’t. My father thinks it’s funny when he makes cracks about me. I did a couple of years of therapy a few years ago, and then I took two years off. I went back last summer. It makes a difference. Intellectually at least you get that it’s about their being flawed, not you. But in your gut, you remember all those things they said when you were five and six and thirteen, and I think you hear it in your head forever. I tried to drown those voices in ice cream,” she confessed. “It didn’t work.” She had never been as honest with anyone in her life, and he seemed completely nonjudgmental about it. She really liked him and hoped he was being sincere, although she was leery of everyone now after the experiences she had had with dishonest men, like Jack Bailey and a few others. Her dating life had not been a happy one thus far.

“I have a strange relationship with my parents too,” he admitted. “I had an older brother who was the perfect son. Perfect athlete. Perfect student. Perfect everything. Harvard undergrad, captain of the football team, Yale Law School, top of his class. He was a fantastic kid and a great guy, and a wonderful brother. He was killed by a drunk driver on Long Island on the Fourth of July weekend, right after he found out he had passed the bar, the first time of course, with flying colors. It took me three times to pass it. And I kind of lumbered along in the middle of my class. Duke and NYU did not cut it with my parents, compared to Harvard and Yale. I’m not a jock and never have been. I keep in shape and play some tennis and squash, but that’s about it. Blake was the golden boy. Everyone loved him. He was my older brother. I was always in his shadow as a kid. And the world stopped for my parents when he died. They never recovered, either of them. My father retired, and my mother kind of withered up. No one has ever measured up for them since. And I sure don’t. My sister kind of skated under all that because she’s a girl. But they figure I’m a bad trade for Blake. He wanted to go into politics eventually and probably would have done well. He was kind of Kennedyesque, with a huge amount of charisma and charm. I’m just a regular guy. I lived with someone a few years ago, and it didn’t work out, so now they’re wondering what’s wrong with me that I’m not married. As far as they’re concerned I’ve been kind of a poor second best all my life, or I don’t qualify at all, compared to my brother. It’s rough being around them and feeling like you never measure up. He was five years older than I, and he died fourteen years ago. I’d just graduated from college, and I’ve been a disappointment to them ever since.” He hadn’t had the tough childhood she’d had, but he had had a hard road for fourteen years and she could see it in his eyes, that terrible feeling that you’re not good enough to be loved by the people you love most, and eventually by anyone else. She knew it well. “I’m not as ballsy as you are. I’ve never gone to therapy and I probably should. I just accepted the mantle my brother left behind. I tried to be him for a while, and I couldn’t. I’m not him. I’m me. Which is never good enough for them. They’re sad people.” And he wasn’t, which was the good news. But he had lived with the same toxic messages she had, for different reasons. And from some of the self-help books she’d read, she thought he might have survivor guilt in some form.

“I always feel like my parents should be holding up a sign, ‘We don’t love you.’ It would be more honest.” She smiled at him, and he laughed. The visual was so perfect, and exactly what he felt about his parents. Their life experiences were amazingly similar and dovetailed well. They had a lot in common, given difficult relationships with their parents, which they had striven to survive well, and remain healthy people. Both of them felt as though they had made important discoveries about each other by the time the evening ended. He put an arm around her on the way back in the cab, but he didn’t try to kiss her, which was a plus for him. She hated being pawed by strangers who thought you owed it to them because they paid for dinner. He didn’t do that, and she respected him for it. And before they got back to her building, he asked her if she’d like to have dinner again. He said he hoped she would, and apologized for broaching such serious subjects with her on a first date. But for both of them it was real life, and a relief to share it with someone who understood.

“I’d love to have dinner with you again,” she said sincerely, and he suggested that Saturday night, which in theory dispelled the worry that he had a weekend girlfriend, unless he was seeing her on Friday, Victoria reminded herself. Jack had done that. But Collin was not Jack. He was great.

He kissed her on the cheek and saw her to her elevator, and said he’d call her the next day. She was smiling when she walked into the apartment, and Harlan beamed from ear to ear when he saw her. John had already gone to bed.

“I owe you ten bucks,” she said as she walked in, and beat him to it.

“How do you know?” He looked intrigued.

“Fantastic conversations, great evening, great guy. Arm around me in cab on way home. Touched my hand twice at dinner. Doesn’t care if I’m fat or not, he likes ‘real’ women. And invited me to dinner Saturday night.” She was beaming, and he reached over and hugged her. Harlan was always hugging and kissing her. John was always a little cooler with her, it was just his nature, and he was less comfortable with women. He had a horrible mother who used to beat him, and put him off females forever. Everyone has their scars.