Page 70 of Playing to Win

“What are you going to do about it?”

“There’s not much I can do about it. Get through the next few days and never see him again.” That thought stabs like a blunt knife in my chest.

“Well, it may be the vindictive journalist in me, but don’t you have a well-read blog? If it were me, I wouldn’t let him get off so easily.”

“I couldn’t blog about it. It’s my life too.”

“I’m not Yoda, Izzy—take or leave my suggestion. Bet it would make you feel better, though. Otherwise, go get yourself a tub of Ben & Jerry’s and a bottle of wine and stew Bridget Jones–style. Anyway, I have to go to a meeting. I was just checking in. Mummy asked me to call because she’s too proud to call herself when she doesn’t agree with your, how does she put it…?”

“Life choices,” we say in unison.

“Thanks, Anna.”

“For telling you I told you so?”

“Erm, more the other stuff. It’s just nice to hear from you. I’ll see you soon.”

“Be safe, sweetie.”

“You too.”

* * * *

After speaking with Anna, I wash my face and go out for a run. I had intended to clear my head but for the two hours I’m running, I just keep thinking, Brooks will be standing in the studio waiting for me to dance now. And, Brooks will be sitting in the bistro asking Angie to make him a breakfast shake. Or, I wonder if he fucks the other woman as good as he does me.

Did it ever mean as much to him as it did to me? Didn’t he feel like the earth stopped spinning when we were together? Like we were no longer part of a mundane routine but we were starting something different, new, and exciting; something remarkable?

I don’t know how to answer my own questions or put an end to my chaotic thoughts. So I find myself here, in Walgreens, taking Anna’s advice.

“That’ll be nineteen thirty-five,” the cashier tells me as she bags up my bottle of New Zealand sauvignon blanc and a tub of Ben & Jerry’s.

I pay her and walk back to my borrowed apartment. By the time I’ve showered, it’s noon, a perfectly acceptable time of day to fill my body full of toxins and watch P.S. I Love You on my Mac.

While I’ve always preferred the book—it had me a blubbering mess from page 40—and I am one of those people more than a little angry that the movie was set in New York rather than Ireland, I’m dripping tears into my melting pot of ice cream within the first ten minutes. Subsequently drowning said tears with large gulps of sauvignon blanc, which are traveling straight to my head. Perfect!

When Brooks calls for the fourth time, I don’t send him straight to voice mail, I turn off my phone altogether. You choose another woman, I choose Ben, Jerry, and Gerard Butler all at once.

As I watch Hilary Swank playing a young widow, dancing around her apartment in her dead husband’s clothes, singing along to the TV through her hairbrush, with drips of Ben & Jerry’s decorating my white string vest, I ask myself what on earth I am doing. I didn’t lose someone who loved me enough to marry me. No, sir, I dodged a bullet.

My resolve wanes when Hilary Swank receives the first love letter, written by her husband when he was dying and signed P.S. I love you. I blubber away, opting to drink directly from the wine bottle, rather than topping up my glass.

Halfway down my bottle of sauvignon blanc—now room temperature—I start to think my sister is right. Why should I be the one in tears? Why should I be crying over spilled milk? Brooks is like the worst kind of milk—full-fat dairy. He deserves to curdle and smell like cheese.

I take another mouthful of wine from the bottle wedged between my crossed legs, then place it on the coffee table. I minimize the P.S. I Love You screen and pull up my blog.

In the blog title box I type: “BROOKS ADAMS: HOUND DOG.”

Ha, that’s funny.I take a much-deserved drink of wine and start to type.

I’ve learned a lot about Brooks Adams over the last week or so. Like, how he has two left feet and his hips move as if they’re stuck between steel girders. How he has tantrums when he can’t get his own way and needs anger management when he’s hungry.

In the last couple of days, I’ve also learned how he can lure women in, put them under a spell. He can be the guy singing country tracks on his guitar and the man who likes black-and-white movies.

My biggest discovery came last night, when I realized Brooks Adams is a lying, no-good scumbag.

I take another large gulp of wine before writing the next part.

I fell for the act. Shame on me. But once Brooks had left his mark on me, he turned to another woman, or his otherwoman.

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