glares at me. “The red hot chili pepper.”
“But then what did See . . .” I start to ask, turning to see Seema holding up the shovel, then draining the rest of her peach Bellini.
Shit, shit, shit.
My friend Carolyn gleefully says, “Hey, I got the money bag. Maybe I should go buy a lottery ticket Tonight.”
“No, no . . .” I blurt out. “Didn’t you get the typewriter?”
“No. But why would I want the typewriter?” Carolyn asks, genuinely confused.
“Because you’re a journalist. I figured with all the layoffs, you’d want good luck getting a new job.”
Carolyn’s having fun with the pull, not taking it seriously at all. She shrugs. “Well, if I win the lottery, I’ll just start my own paper.”
“I got the typewriter!” Jacqueline, Jason’s ex-wife, cheerfully says. “Which is awesome, because I’m up for a speechwriting job for the governor.”
“You’re up for a job with the governor?” I ask her nervously. “As in the guy who lives in Sacramento?”
She’s thinking of moving Jason’s daughters to Sacramento? When was she planning on springing that news on us?
“It’s a long shot,” Jacqueline assures me. “The mayor put in a good word for me. Still . . .” She holds up the silver typewriter. “Nice to have a good luck charm.”
I open my hand, clenched tightly in a fist, and stare at the baby carriage.
A good luck charm. Yeah . . . that would have been nice.
I close my hand around the charm again, force a smile to my guests, and excuse myself to the kitchen. Once I’m in the sanctuary of Seema’s kitchen, I open my clutched fist once again to reveal the baby carriage.
A baby carriage. WTF?
I can’t have a baby! First off, I have no desire to ever touch diarrhea or spit-up. Plus, I like sleep. And I like spending my money on what ever I want. (What mother in her right mind would spend three hundred dollars on a pair of suede pumps with a college fund to worry about?) But the most important reason that I can’t have a baby is a nonnegotiable . . . I like being able to hyperfocus on my career as a newspaper reporter, a job which has stalled enough in the past year without a mewling infant on my hip taking away any shot I have of ever writing again.
It’s not that I don’t like babies. I do. I love holding them, playing with them, being an auntie, and then SENDING THEM HOME. It’s why I make such a great stepmother but would make a lousy mother.
I almost didn’t date Jason after I found out he had children.
When I first met Jason at a museum fund-raiser Seema had put together, I thought he was gorgeous, charming, and smart. Wickedly smart, which sort of surprised me for a former NBA basketball player, who was now an NBA assistant coach here in L.A. The first hour we talked, I was totally smitten. He was thirty-seven at the time (six years older than me, a bit past my comfort zone), but he was a very in-shape and smokin’-hot thirty-seven. As we talked and laughed, I started thinking about fate, and the silver heart charm I had pulled earlier that day, and how you just never know when the right one is going to come along.
Then he mentioned his two daughters, who at the time were four and eight. Damn, I thought to myself—I knew there had to be something wrong with him. Within minutes, I had politely excused myself and started scoping out other men at the party.
But I kept running into him: he was at the bar getting a drink when I popped by for a refill, later I turned a corner to see him admiring one of the Monets. At the end of the night, he was behind me in line for the valet.
He asked for my number. I told him I was seeing someone.
After the valet pulled up with my car, we stood by my open car door talking for so long, the valet actually asked us to move it along. Jason asked for my number again. I politely declined.
Then he asked Seema for my number. She called me right after she gave it to him to declare that I was an idiot, that she had overruled me, and that he was perfect for me.
When Jason first started calling, I used the accepted code of those not interested: I couldn’t do this weekend, I would be out of town. I was really busy with work during the week. My weekend was completely booked as my cat, Mr. Whiskers, had died, and I was planning his funeral. There was no Mr. Whiskers, and I’m allergic to cats. But I figured nothing turns off a guy faster than a crazy cat lady. (By the way, he was onto me. He sent flowers and asked if he could attend the ser vice.)
Despite my rebuffs over the next few weeks, I always stayed on the phone a little too long and thought about him a little too much the next day. So, after he asked me out for the tenth time, I agreed. I mean, for God’s sake, the guy wasn’t proposing, he was asking me to dinner. And what was wrong with dressing up on a Saturday night to gaze at an elegant man with poreless caramel-colored skin and clear hazel eyes?
During our dinner I discovered (to my astonishment) that this guy was a real guy. He actually pursued me: a rarity in Los Angeles. I was used to typical L.A. neurotic guys. Men who would call once every eight to ten days, with no rhyme or reason to when or why they would call. Men who asked me to go dutch at dinner. Men who were incredibly attentive until they got sex, then talked ad nauseum about how they weren’t sure if they had time for a relationship. (At which point they, too, would call at random times, although at least then I knew the reason.)
But this guy asked me out again before the first date was even over.
He knew what he wanted and— like everything else in his life— he planned to go after it until he won. If other men in Los Angeles are like toy poodles— yippy and useless— this guy was a Labrador: hardworking, loyal, a bit slobbery, and beautiful.
A month later, I agreed to meet his kids. And I fell in love with them immediately. Megan was a gorgeous eight-year-old (now nine) who cracked me up with a knock-knock joke and had fun polishing my toenails. Malika, four at the time, had the cutest voice I’d ever heard. There was (and is) nothing she says that I don’t want to repeat to all of my friends, because it’s just so damn cute.
That said, it took me a while to feel comfortable in my role as stepmother. And frankly, I screwed up sometimes. Like when I snapped at Malika for repeating the same sentence for the sixth time, or when I drove Megan to her school for her dance recital instead of to the auditorium the school had rented, thereby giving us all of four minutes to run from the parking lot to the correct stage to begin her dance.
This summer, the girls have been living with us full-time, per the custody agreement. I love it, but I am ready to rip my hair out. I seriously don’t know how mothers do this full-time. We can’t go out to dinner without Malika insisting on sitting next to me (never her father) and screaming in my ear the entire time. And I can’t insist she sit next to her father, because then I’ll look like a mean stepmonster.
Oh, and on the subject of food: what is it with kids and not eating anything? Malita is the picky eater to end all picky eaters. We had an argument last week because I used tomato sauce on my homemade pizza rather than “pizza sauce.” It wasn’t worth the fight— it’s just pizza— so I nuked her some fish sticks instead. The same thing happened with the gourmet mac and cheese I slaved over one night.
