Cupid's Christmas (Serendipity #3)(3)
She, of course, answers yes.
Now I’m doing a happy dance, thinking my Lindsay troubles are over. But after four dates—excellent dates, dates with wine, music and dancing—she stops returning his calls because of a musician she met on the subway.
When Lindsay started gushing about how much she was in love with that musician, I was sorely tempted to have her step into a pothole and break an ankle. Nothing serious mind you, but enough to keep her at home so she could have some thinking-it-over time. She was definitely in need of it, because she was way off track. That musician was scheduled to marry the second violinist and move to Paris.
The breakup was inevitable, but it didn’t happen immediately—it never does. Lindsay and that guitarist spent seven months together. Seven months of arguments and apologies, more arguments and more apologies, until one evening he stomped out never to return again. Even though that relationship was not of my making, I had to feel for Lindsay. Love is the most complex of all emotions. Hate is clean and uncomplicated, but love will turn you inside out and when it goes awry you’re left wondering what you did wrong. You always blame yourself even though the only wrong you’ve done is to give your heart to someone who was not part of your plan. The musician was never part of Lindsay’s plan, but that didn’t ease the pain of his leaving.
After the musician there was a banker, a wannabe model, a dentist, and a handsome lad who walked dogs for a living. None of them were part of Lindsay’s plan and they all went the way of the musician. The banker and dentist she simply tired of, the dog-walker moved away because the landlord raised his rent and he could no longer afford to live in Manhattan.
With Phillip, the wannabe model, Lindsay convinced herself that she was fully and completely in love. Yes, she knew Phillip was haphazard, but she told herself that he would eventually settle down. In time, he would give up thoughts of being a model and find a job suited to his talents. He would one day ask her to marry him and she, of course, would answer yes. She remembered how she’d let herself be goaded into argument after argument with the musician and she was determined not to let that happen again. When Phillip showed up hours late with an excuse so lame that a steel brace couldn’t make it stand, she accepted it. When he swiveled his head to turn and look at women with short skirts or cascading cleavage, she chalked it up to nothing more than harmless ogling. Then one day he left his cell phone on the desk and she happened upon the text from Krystal. Only then could she see the foolishness of her ways.
“How could you?” she screamed.
“She means nothing to me,” he pleaded. “Nothing.”
“Nothing? You’ve slept with this girl, that’s obvious!”
“One time. It was a one-time thing.”
“A one-time thing?” She picked up a bookend and heaved it across the room. “Get out,” she yelled, “…and don’t even think about coming back!”
In the time it took for him to ride the elevator down three floors and cross the small lobby, his modeling portfolio, the framed picture he’d given her and the gym bag he kept in the apartment had landed on 23rd street.
Phillip was just the last in a long string of romantic disasters. He is what he is and Lindsay was foolish to think otherwise. I can say for a fact, she was never in love with the man, but try telling her that. Her friend Amanda even warned her.
“Lindsay,” Amanda said, “Phillip is nothing more than a gift box, gorgeous on the outside, but totally empty inside.”
Lindsay of course didn’t listen, which came as no surprise. As I’ve told you the girl is an incurable romantic. If she would have backed off and let me handle things, she’d now be celebrating her fifth anniversary on a Mediterranean cruise ship instead of sitting in a third floor apartment painting her toenails.
Everything happens for a reason. If humans could accept that, my job would be so much easier. After Lindsay hurled all of the never-to-be-seen-again model’s belongings out the window, she broke into huge shuddering sobs and telephoned Amanda. That breakup was slated to happen anyway, but the timing was my doing. Since Lindsay had shown no interest in Christopher from 7B, he’d been reassigned to Amanda. That night Christopher was leaving the building as Amanda was coming in. When the plan works, that’s all it takes—a chance meeting, a fleeting glance and POW…love happens.
Eleanor
John hasn’t told his daughter about us yet. He doesn’t see it as a problem, but I’m not so sure. He claims Lindsay is an open-minded person who’ll be happy for us. But I’ve come to realize kids don’t always take kindly to their parents remarrying. My Son had a conniption when I told him.
I invited Ray and his wife to dinner that evening, thinking a pleasant visit and a full stomach would make hearing the news a bit easier. It sure didn’t go like I thought it would. Before I finished explaining what a fine man John is, Ray jumped out of his seat and started peppering me with questions like he was the lead prosecutor. “Don’t you see he’s after your money?” Ray kept asking. I told him I didn’t have any money for John to be after, but then he switched over to badgering me about John taking over our house. I was tempted to tell him it wasn’t our house. It belonged to his daddy and me.
Finally when I couldn’t take any more, I stuck my face in his and told him John and I were planning to sell both houses and buy a place of our own. Of course that opened up a whole new can of worms, and I’d never even mentioned anything about how we were thinking of buying that house in Florida. “Ah-ha,” Ray shouted, “You’ll sell the house, hand over the money and that’s the last you’ll see of that buzzard!”