Misery Loves Cabernet Read online

  I put on my dinosaur head, then lift my big green feet up and down, slowly making my way to the front door. As I do, I hear a dinosaur roar, and the sound of big foot stomps crashing down.

  I open the door to Dawn, who is wearing a formfitting trench coat with the hem taken up enough to resemble a modest minidress. She wears dark glasses, and has unbuttoned the top button of her trench coat to make guys wonder if she’s wearing anything underneath.

  “Slutty secret agent?” I ask, guessing.

  “First of all, it’s sexy, not slutty. Slutty is when you unbutton your blouse to your navel, and your dress is short enough for men to see your garter belt.”

  “I stand corrected,” I concede.

  “And I stand here mortified,” Dawn responds. She walks around me, scrutinizing my dinosaur costume. “What the hell are you wearing?”

  “You like it?” I ask, so excited. “I got it for free from the costume designer on Drew’s last movie. I couldn’t wait to show it off. Watch, it makes dinosaur noises.”

  I happily stomp up and down in my costume. As I do, my feet trigger a sound like a T. rex advancing toward his prey. Then, when I stop, a thunderous dinosaur roar echoes throughout my living room.

  My face beams with pride as I look at Dawn. This is the coolest costume I think I’ve ever owned.

  Dawn puts her hands on her hips. “Put on your old cheerleader costume.”

  I clench my jaw, purse my lips, and narrow my eyes at her. “First of all, a cheerleader wears a uniform, not a costume. . . .”

  “First of all, the fact that you not only have that information, but choose to put it out there, is pathetic,” Dawn counters.

  I ignore her and continue my point. “Second of all, I wear that every year. And every year it’s the same thing: You and Kate make fun of me for having ever been a cheerleader.”

  “Yes, and it is the highlight of my Halloween, so for that I thank you.”

  “And every year I have at least two guys ask me if I’m wearing underwear, ten guys ask me to give them a cheer, four ask if I can do the splits, and at least one drunk guy ask me what naughty things I can do with my pom-poms.”

  “No, wait!” Dawn says, hitting me on the arm and laughing. “That’s always the highlight of my Halloween. You never know who the dork will be who thinks he’s not only come up with an original bon mot, but one that is so witty you’ll go home with him.”

  I roll my eyes and walk away from her to get my purse. As I do, my footsteps continue to trigger the sounds of dinosaur feet pounding on the ground.

  Dawn happily follows me, clearly amused. “Halloween 2006 was my favorite! I loved it when all the comic-book geeks kept whispering they wanted to . . .”—Dawn lowers her voice to a sinister whisper—“save you . . . save the world.”

  I glare at her. I have gotten to the point in my life where I actively hate that cheerleader uniform, even though becoming a cheerleader seemed like a brilliant idea at the time.

  Almost half a lifetime ago, when I was fifteen, I had this huge crush on Quentin Claiborne—the quarterback of our high-school football team. Anytime I talked to him, I made a huge fool out of myself. I never had an actual conversation with him. Instead, I would hang around his locker in the desperate hope that I would accidentally/on purpose run into him (kind of inevitable, since he had to go to his locker at some point). Once I had him in my sights, I would nervously talk at him in a streaming monologue until he politely got away from me.

  Then, one morning during my sophomore year, I was so busy monologuing at him, I didn’t realize he was opening his locker, and I walked right into the door. That led to a bloody nose, and a very guilty Quentin whisking me off to the nurse’s office, where I proceeded to get bandaged up as Quentin talked to Jane Kwikaz, the head cheerleader.

  The bitch had the audacity to have a—dare I say it?—normal conversation with him! It was insidious. They talked about mundane stuff like history class, parents, and the upcoming dance. She talked to him like he was a normal person, not the God that I knew him to be. And he seemed to like her!

  As I kept the ice bag over my nose, and glared at Jane for effortlessly moving in on my man, I immediately decided his fondness for Jane had nothing to do with her perfect body, her clear complexion, or perhaps the fact that she could hold a conversation like a sane person.

  No, no. The boy must have an obsession with cheerleaders.

  I immediately signed up for cheerleading tryouts.

  Don’t do anything you’re not comfortable with.

  The following fall, I was a cheerleader, and Quentin and Jane were going steady.

  Story of my life.

  Nonetheless, for two years I cheered my little heart out, wowing the crowds with creative little ditties such as, “You might be good at basketball, you might be good at track. But when it comes to football, you might as well step back. Might as well step back! Say what? You might as well step back.” (After hearing that cheer, Dawn’s response was to imitate my cheerleading moves exactly, only with her own ditty, “Hell no, you are not black! Say what? Hell no, you are not black!”)

  Overall, I kind of liked being a cheerleader, because, in high school, being a cheerleader was cool.

  And then you hit college. Tell the kids in your dorm you were a cheerleader in high school, and you might as well tell them you were homecoming queen. They’ll divide up by sex. The girls will tease you relentlessly, and the boys will look at you lasciviously, and ask you if you still have the outfit.

  And, by the way, this still happens at thirty. If I had a dollar for every man who asked me if I still had the outfit, I would have paid for the outfit five times over.

  But back to Dawn and my argument.

  “I’m wearing this,” I insist, reaching into my purse, and pulling out another piece of gum.

  “Who is going to talk to you tonight looking like Rex from Toy Story?” Dawn asks.

  “It doesn’t matter who talks to me. I’ve decided I’m taking a break from men for a while.”

  Dawn crosses her arms. “Mm-hmm.”

  “Don’t give me that tone,” I say, popping another piece of gum into my mouth. “I don’t need a man to validate my self-worth.”

  Dawn looks at me dubiously. “And what are you planning to use as a replacement? Your glamorous career, or your stellar fashion sense?”

  I take a moment to enjoy my gum before responding. “You know what? I’m not talking about this. I’m wearing the dinosaur costume. I don’t need to dress like a slut and hook up with some random guy just to boost my ego and prove I’m still of value to society.”

  My doorbell rings again. I open the door to Kate, who is wearing a slutty schoolgirl uniform. Her shirt is unbuttoned to her navel, showing off a brand-new red lace push-up bra. And her skirt is so short, you can see her matching red lace garter belt.

  I turn to Dawn and mutter, “Like some people . . .”

  “Hello, ladies!” Kate says, her face beaming as she walks in. “What d’ya think?”

  Kate proceeds to strut around my living room like an anorexic model during Fashion Week, walking across the room, giving the proper turn, and coming back to me. I’ve never seen her look so proud of herself.

  “Don’t you love it?” Kate says to us. “Say hello to the new Kate. She’s wicked, she’s fresh, and she’s not afraid to put it out there and be noticed.”

  “Neither’s Britney Spears,” Dawn says dryly. “And look at how that turned out.”

  Kate ignores her, and focuses on me. “Are you chewing gum?!”

  I sigh. “Yes, but . . .”

  Kate puts out the palm of her hand. “Spit it out.”

  Then Kate tells me something I need to write in my book later:

  Don’t chew gum. No woman has ever looked attractive or intelligent while chewing gum.

  Kate has a point, so I spit the gum out in her hand.

  “It’s nicotine gum,” Dawn warns Kate.

  “Yikes! Why didn’t you say so?�
� Kate says, immediately pushing the chewed gum back into my mouth. “Now go change into your cheerleading costume. I have a cab outside waiting for us.”

  “Unif . . . ,” I start to blurt out. Then I decide to pick my battles. “I’m going like this.”

  Kate looks at me disapprovingly. “Seriously, Charlie, what could be less sexy than a dinosaur?”

  “A dinosaur chewing gum,” Dawn answers.

  As Kate turns to Dawn to nod in agreement, I shake my head, grab my purse, and walk toward my door, causing the loud recorded foot stomps to start again.

  No one follows me.

  “What the hell is that?” Kate asks, alarmed.

  Dawn answers. “Every time she walks, the feet make that noise.”

  “Can’t you turn them off?” Kate asks, her jaw dropping.

  “I can, but I won’t,” I say. “The sound effects make the outfit.”

  “I was wondering what made the outfit . . . ,” Dawn mutters. “Come on, you’re both being ridiculous. Kate, put some clothes on. Charlie, take some off. The cab’s waiting.”

  “I can’t,” Kate says, her body deflating as she puts her hands on her hips and begins lecturing us. “According to Dream It, Do It, Deal with It, if I want to attract a man, I need to think sexy and put myself out there.” She pulls the book out of her little schoolgirl backpack, and opens it to a highlighted page. “Tonight, I have to be . . .”—she reads from the book, with the greatest degree of seriousness—“flirty, fun, and I have to strut like I mean it.”

  “The only women who can strut like they mean it are drag queens,” Dawn points out.

  “Don’t be afraid to be a size sixteen at a size eight party,” Kate continues reading. “Just put it out there, and the men will be panting.”

  “This from the woman who went to the Playboy party in college dressed not as a bunny, but as Christie Hefner,” Dawn retorts.

  “Exactly,” Kate says, as though Dawn has proven her point. “And where did that get me? Nine years with the same dull guy, only to have my life shattered when he proposed and I had to dump him.”

  “Wait, is your self-image so low that you think you’re a size sixteen?” I ask Kate disbelievingly.

  “Well, no,” Kate admits. “But I shouldn’t be afraid to be a size four at a size two party.”

  “Size zero party,” Dawn and I correct her in unison.

  Kate shakes her head. “Why do we live in L.A.? Seriously, I’ll bet if we were going to a party in Ohio right now, people there would think we were cute.”

  “We’re thirty. People there would think we were lesbians,” Dawn counters.

  “Maybe,” Kate concedes. “But cute lesbians.”

  My dinosaur outfit roars on its own.

  Dawn shakes her head. “Seriously, Boo, go change.”

  I sigh. “I can’t. The truth is, since I quit smoking, I’ve gained twelve pounds. I don’t fit into the uniform.”

  “You gained twelve pounds in six weeks?” Kate asks.

  “Can you wipe that absolutely horrified look off your face?” I ask Kate harshly. “The truth is, I ate and drank a lot the weeks leading up to turning thirty. Then, I had to be the maid of honor at my younger sister’s wedding, so all bets were off. And then I quit smoking. The fact that I have any clothes that fit should warrant praise, not judgment.” I grab my purse. “Now, I’m going as the dinosaur.”

  I walk out my door, and the girls reluctantly follow me.

  “And by the way, Dawn, a lot of people think my career is glamorous.”

  “Hippo poop,” Dawn says as she closes the door behind us. “How many of them have been covered in hippo poop?”

  About an hour later, I was really going to regret my choice of costume.

  And really regret that I did not bring along a carton of Marlboros.

  Four

  A lady should never arrive at a party empty-handed.

  The Halloween party at Robert Hazan’s house has become legendary in Hollywood. The producer of thirty-five films, Robert has a twenty-thousand-square-foot house right off of Mulholland, overlooking the city. Every year, Hazan employs his Academy Award–winning production designer to transform his house into a haunted mansion, complete with a cemetery out front. Inside, we see the curtains have been shredded, and coffins and cadavers litter the living and dining rooms (yes, living and dining rooms. Because doesn’t everyone need two dining rooms?)

  Also decorating the house are a variety of cheerleaders, naughty schoolgirls, and slutty nurses (or doctors, if I’m not being sexist). All of them thin, most with fake boobs.

  I’m the only dinosaur here.

  Which is a good thing. It’s nice to be at a point in my life where I have enough confidence in myself that I don’t have to try so hard to get noticed.

  “I feel fat,” Kate says as she looks around at the girls.

  “Parties like this are supposed to make you feel fat,” I say as I watch two girls in French maid costumes giggle hysterically at the witticisms of two men dressed in—wait for it!—T-shirts and jeans. “That way, you’ll drink to forget the feeling of self-loathing you’re having right now. Which means you’ll be easier to get into bed.”

  “Not all the men who come to this party want to get laid,” Kate says to me in all kinds of seriousness.

  Which makes Dawn laugh out loud. “Now that’s funny. You should do stand-up.”

  “I mean it,” Kate says, starting to pull out her book from her mini backpack. “According to Dream It . . .”

  Before she can get the book out of her pack, Dawn grabs it.

  Never let a man see you with a self-help book.

  Dawn whispers to Kate, pushing the book back into the backpack, then throwing the pack behind a nearby couch.

  Kate chooses not to argue, and instead follows Dawn and me as we make our way over to the inside bar, which has been built to look like a really gross laboratory. White tiled walls appear to have been stained with blood, and beakers filled with various colored potions are smoking all around us. I inhale the smoke of one of the beakers, hoping it will smell like Marlboros. No such luck.

  I pop another piece of gum into my mouth.

  The line to the bar is six feet deep, and people are already starting to push each other and jockey for position, so we decide to find drinks outside.

  We make our way out to the backyard, and pass a Dracula serving bloodred shots, an alien serving green shots, and a Wolfman serving what looks like the brown LSD at Woodstock swimming in a sea of blue.

  We’ve yet to find a bar serving wine, so, when Frankenstein appears carrying a silver tray with clear shots, Kate grabs one.

  Dawn says to us:

  Don’t do shots at the beginning of a party unless you want to wake up the next morning wondering where your panties are, and the name of the guy on top of you.

  “I’m not writing that in my journal of advice,” I respond. “My great-granddaughter is only supposed to be sixteen when she reads it.”

  “It’s not for your journal. I was just talking to Kate,” Dawn answers.

  “It’s only one shot, how much can it hurt?” Kate says, lifting the shot glass to her lips.

  Dawn turns to me. “Do you want to tell her about the Professor Whigman incident?”

  Any woman who says she’s never done anything she regrets because it made her into the woman she is today is either lying, or delusional.

  Dawn’s statement stops Kate cold. She lowers the shot glass from her mouth. “You slept with Professor Whigman?” she says to me, visibly shocked. “Is that how you got an A in English 101?”

  Now it’s my turn to be visibly shocked. “No!” I say, not meaning to raise my voice as much as I do. “I got an A in English 101 by reading Beowulf and the Canterbury Tales in the original Middle English, and with a stunning report. . . .”

  “Was it oral?” Dawn jokes.

  “Very funny.”

  Kate winces, then returns the still full shot to the tray of a passing mummy
.

  I suppose that’s for the best.

  As we make our way to the outside bar, we pass a huge pool that has been darkened to look jet black, and has shark fins zipping around ominously, an attempt to resemble the frightening opening scene from Jaws, a movie clearly before the time of the many drunk bikini-clad girls frolicking around amongst the fins.

  “Do you see those shark fins?” Kate says. “It would completely freak me out to swim in there.”

  “It’s only a pool,” I remind her.

  “Doesn’t matter,” Kate insists, trying to suppress a shiver. “When I was seven, I saw Jaws for the first time. I spent the next three summers making my older sister jump into the pool first, just in case there was a shark there, swimming about, that I hadn’t seen yet.”

  Dawn looks at her, pondering the ridiculous notion. “How would you have explained your sister’s death if there actually had been a phantom shark?”

  “I was seven, I wasn’t thinking clearly.”

  “I used to make my sister Andy go in first,” I admit, watching a fin slither by a girl in a pink string bikini.

  “It’s October 31,” Dawn points out, nodding her head toward the girls. “To me, that’s the horror of it. They must be freezing.”

  The attached Jacuzzi looks warmer. It’s about the size of a small lake, it’s been dyed bloodred, and it has more drunk bikini-clad girls with perfect bodies frolicking around.

  Kate juts her chin in their direction. “I think that’s the scariest sight I’ve seen all night. All those perfect women in such a small space: makes a girl want to let out a bloodcurdling scream.”

  The backyard has a fabulous view of the Los Angeles lights below, which almost compensates for the not-so-fabulous view of more naughty schoolgirls, cheerleaders, and nurses.

  It would appear that I’m the only woman here with a sense of creativity and confidence when it comes to fashion. Hah!

  “Oh my God!” Kate exclaims. “It’s Mike!”

  Kate immediately starts buttoning up her blouse to cover up her bra.