Funny You Should Ask(63)

Gabe, however, scooped me up under my armpits and hoisted me back to my feet before I could complete my London Bridge impression.

“All right here?” Adrienne asked.

“Just dandy,” I said, feeling embarrassed and surly.

“You gonna give it a try this round?” Gabe asked.

The challenge in his tone sparked my mostly dormant competitive nature.

“Yeah,” I said, lifting my chin.

“That’s my girl,” he said.

I blushed. Fiercely.

Even though I was certain Gabe had already seen it, I turned my face away, doing an over-the-top impression of someone who was watching the door.

Adrienne was stretching again. Her lunges were so deep that her knees touched the floor.

“You ready?” she asked me, V-ing her fingers and pointing to her eyes and then at me and back again.

“Oh yeah,” I said.

I wasn’t.

Team Two lost three more rounds.

“This is bullshit,” said Red Clogs, whose name, I had learned, was Natasha. “Who picked these teams?”

Everyone pointed at Gabe. He shrugged, and took another drink of whatever was in his red Solo cup. From the smell, it was a delicate mix of whisky and whisky.

“At least I’m trying,” he said.

Everyone looked at me.

“Jelly beans,” I said.

“Okay.” Gabe put his cup down and raised his arms over his head before bringing them down and extending his elbows out and away. His shirt had ridden up, exposing his flat, smooth stomach. I stared. I didn’t even pretend not to. He stretched more, taking up space.

“I’ll go next,” he said.

Before he left, though, he put his hands on my shoulders and his face real close to mine.

“You can do this,” he said.

I hated this party.

He jogged out of the room and I heard him give a whoop of glee. Then he was back in the doorway, one hand on the doorjamb, the other pointed at me.

“He’s a piece of shit,” he said.

“Woody Allen?”

“Yes!” he said.

I felt a rush of satisfaction. I’d gotten it right. Of course, I had completely forgotten what came next.

About five pairs of hands were on my back, shoving me forward, and I stumbled toward the door, barely managing to stay upright.

“Go! Go! Go!” my team was chanting.

Right. I had to run into the next room and get the next prompt.

As I passed Gabe, he gave me a friendly, sportsmanlike slap on the ass. I punched him in the arm.

“Ouch,” he said.

“Baby,” I said over my shoulder.

Somehow moving helped clear my head. I raced to Ollie, who was standing in the living room, a piece of paper in his hand. It seemed as if he was the referee. Or something. I still wasn’t completely sure how the game worked. He showed me the next prompt.

Cary Grant.

I ran back to the bedroom, and before I was even through the doorway, I was shouting: “C. K. Dexter Haaaaaven!”

“Cary Grant!” Gabe pushed past.

When he came back, his eyes were fixated on me.

“Charming, not sincere.”

“Into the Woods!”

The rest of the round went like that, rapid-fire exchanges between me and Gabe until I ran back to Ollie and he waved the paper at me.

“You won,” he said.

I whooped like I’d never whooped before. It was so loud that it startled the dog, who was sleeping in her dog bed near the TV.

“We won!” I told my team, who burst out in cheers as if we’d just won the Super Bowl or some other big, important sports thing.

Gabe swept me into a hug, lifting me off my feet as he spun me across the bedroom.

“Wow,” Adrienne said, once he’d put me down. “You two really are the dream team, aren’t you?”





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THE PERFECT DAY


The Novelist and I used to play a game called the Perfect Day. We’d usually play this game on the few evenings when we could afford to go out for a nice dinner.

The Novelist had a very detailed, very specific Perfect Day that required more luck than money. He loved the beach, especially ones with those old-fashioned boardwalks. His Perfect Day would be at one of those boardwalks on the East Coast. It would be summer, hot but not unbearably so. We’d get a hot dog and a frozen lemonade, then, by some wonderful chance, the moment we wanted to get out of the sun, we’d walk by a bookshop. We’d duck in to find that they were about to host one of the Novelist’s favorite writers. One of the literary Jonathans, like Safran Foer or Franzen. It would be a small, intimate event that hadn’t been advertised at all. In fact, we’d be the only ones there. And the literary Jonathan would look out into his audience of two and say, “What the hell, let’s just go grab dinner together.” And we would. A fancy seafood restaurant where we’d eat lobster in those plastic bibs. The Novelist would get a funny picture of the two of them. They’d talk about books and the literary Jonathan would say something like “that idea sounds incredible. Here’s my personal email—send it to me when you’re done. We’ll get it published.”

My Perfect Day was different in almost every way, except it also involved walking around and finding a bookstore. Fitting, I suppose, since that’s where the Novelist and I met.