Good Riddance(61)

“That’s your dinner party, playing the podcast? Without some kind of warning? You can’t just have a nice dinner?”

“No. Because if I don’t tell him, my sister will. She thinks it’s better if he gets a heads-up before the Concord Monitor and Union Leader call him for comment.”

“I’d be good at the warning part, as a neutral observer. I could signal: green light or red, play or don’t play.”

Why this persistence? I said, “I don’t need to add more awkwardness to what could already be the worst dinner party I ever throw.”

“Me, you mean? I’m the extra dose of awkward?”

“You know why? Because no father’s in a big hurry to meet his daughter’s ex–fuck buddy.”

There was silence at the other end. Do I wait or do I hang up? He settled that with an overly dignified response, gallant in the extreme but cold. “I’ll be sure to tell him I regret nothing except this.”

“Which is what?”

“The end of a friendship.”

“Not my fault.”

More uncharacteristic nothingness. Finally: “Well, good luck with your dinner party. I’m sure it’ll be great; I’m sure your dad will really appreciate knowing about the podcast. And here’s an idea: Invite Geneva. That’d make for a lively evening.”

He really had gone to the other side. I said, “I won’t dignify that with a response. For the record, I haven’t seen her since our vigil—you remember that, right? How you rushed from the set to keep me company in the emergency room in another lifetime? She must still be at her father’s. Maybe she died and they buried her on Long Island.”

Jeremy said, at last a note of charity detectable, “That doesn’t sound like the Daphne I know.”

“People change. And then they throw parties and don’t invite you. And next time they run into you, they give you back your key.”

“I don’t need—”

“And I want the yearbook, too.”

I didn’t actually care where that poisonous book was being housed, but what else did I have to repossess that would sound as finito? “Have I made this very clear: The dinner party will be fine. If you were there, I’d have to explain that we’re no longer seeing each other as . . . whatever we were.”

“Lovers,” said Jeremy before the line went dead.

Why did he have to use that word and pronounce it so solemnly?



On Saturday at exactly six, the doorman called to say that my guests had arrived and were on their way up. I opened my door to find three faces smiling at me.

“We just bumped into each other,” announced Jeremy, standing between my father and Kathi.

“Like when?”

“Just now,” said my dad. “He was leaving his apartment as we got off the elevator.”

“I bet.”

“Now, now,” said Jeremy. “Don’t be like that.”

“Jeremy thought I’d need his help tonight, but I said it wasn’t necessary,” I explained.

“I hope you’ll let me help,” said Kathi.

My lovestruck father added, “Nobody clears a table like this lady!”

I said, “Thank you, but I didn’t mean that kind of help.”

I was effectively blocking their entry, which prompted my father to ask if they had the right night. “Of course, of course. Come in! Sorry.”

“Daphne’s position is that I’m crashing the party,” said Jeremy.

What half-decent hostess wouldn’t lie, and say, “Not true.” I collected their coats and invited everyone to take a seat. They were dressed up, my dad in a suit and bow tie, Kathi in a short black dress, lacy stockings, and ropey pearls, unlike my jeans and a wrinkled shirt. “Cosmopolitans, anyone? Dad? A Manhattan?”

“Or a martini,” piped up my uninvited guest.

“And, of course, I have this terrific”—I checked the label of the bottle Kathi had brought—“gewürztraminer. Which will be perfect with the chicken.”

“Something does smell great,” Jeremy said.

“Drunken thighs. I hope I made enough.”

“Don’t worry. I’m not staying,” he said with a stagy pout.

When everyone had a filled glass, Kathi lifted hers. and said, “So nice to be together, and to meet you, Jeremy.” Because he was checking his phone, I punished him by saying surely he had plans, this being Saturday night, with Tina the part-time professor who lived downstairs.

Kathi said, “Oh, that must be nice, having a girlfriend in the building.”

This much was clear: She had no idea that Jeremy and I had been an item, which made sense. My father, ever protective, hadn’t wanted to explain that I was having fun of a horizontal nature, no strings, with the nearest male.

Jeremy said, “‘Girlfriend’ might be an overstatement. We’ve hung out a couple of times, but that’s really it.”

I said, “I wouldn’t call orchestra seats to Hamilton ‘hanging out.’”

The Hamilton reference threw Kathi ecstatically off course. We then heard how she’d seen it at the Public Theater before it went to Broadway. No one could believe she’d been that lucky. Just try to get a ticket now!