Nicole
I'm home wearing my favorite stretchy pants, a pint of chocolate ice cream in one hand, and an entire bottle of red wine in the other. And I've already eaten my way through half the pint of ice cream, and this bottle is my second of the night.
Don't judge.
Desperate times calls for… some indulgences.
I'm almost through that second bottle of wine, and I'm lying on the couch watching an old romantic comedy. It's called "When Harry Met Sally" and it's one of my favorites.
It doesn't matter how awful of a day I've had; when that movie comes on TV, I'm captivated and my mood is transformed. Literally, there is always at least one scene that will have me laughing.
Like when Meg Ryan's character, who plays Sally, does the famous fake orgasm scene in Katz Delicatessen. She just keeps telling Harry that all women fake orgasms and he can't believe that. He says no way, that can't be true, because he's been with countless women and they've all had orgasms.
But Sally just kind of smiles and insists he's wrong and that what he's saying is a typical guy thing to say, you know?
They go back and forth like this until Sally sort of puts her foot down and proves it to him by having a fake orgasm right there in the deli. In front of the other diners, the waitresses, everything.
I always get a kick out of that because she doesn't seem embarrassed... she just launches right in. And she does it so well and is so convincing that when a waitress walks by she famously says, "I'll have what she's having." And of course she totally wins Harry over… together with the rest of us.
It's a great scene. And you know why? Because it's an honest scene.
I know someone who could stand to learn a lot about honesty: Palmer.
I take another swig from the wine bottle and lie back down on the couch. My body is warm and loose, and I have the distinct underwater feeling that I get when I've had too much to drink.
I watch as Harry's character finally says, "I came here tonight because when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible."
That line always gets me.
I don't know if it's the excessive wine, or my hormones, or both, but now I'm crying. Literally crying.
I can't help it. I'm even sniffling a little. I pull the sleeves of my sweatshirt down low and use it to wipe my eyes.
I feel stupid for crying, but it's uncontrollable.
The movie poses the problem—does sex mess everything up? Like can a man and a woman be friends without letting sex get in the way of things?
I sigh. What if I never slept with Palmer?
How would things be different, if at all?
Why couldn't I have just kept things professional?
Instead, I let down my guard. I was so stupid. I made myself vulnerable.
I was too available… even getting out of bed to see him in the middle of the night, and look what happened? What the hell was I thinking that night?
I was used. Plain and simple.
And the worst thing about it is that I was blind to it all. I didn't even recognize what was happening.
Just then, I hear a knock on the door. My head feels like it weighs a ton and is lodged in a fish bowl, but when I open the door, I play it off like I haven't been drinking a thing. But the person at the door is Kate, and she's not buying it. She knows me too well.
"Uh, oh… how many bottles of red have you had tonight?" she says in a mocking tone.
"None," I lie, and then backpedal. "Ok, well… maybe one."
Kate looks around my living room and spies both bottles.
"You mean two?"
"OK, fine, so sue me… I've had two, but I've also had a rough week so cut me some slack," I say.
Kate laughs. "Not this movie again," she says, looking over my shoulder and directly at the TV. “This must be the millionth time you've seen it, right?”
"Not a million," I laugh. "But OK … maybe nine hundred and ninety nine thousand."
"Sounds about right."
"Did everything go OK at the restaurant today?" I ask.
"Went great," she says, "But I did get a phone call?"
"A phone call?"
"Palmer called looking for you," she says. "He sounded pretty desperate."
Hearing his name makes me cry all over again. I try to hide it by looking away. I don't want Kate to see me like this, but nothing gets past Kate.
"Come here, babe," she says, putting one arm around me. "It's OK. Everything's gonna be fine."
"I'm so stupid," I mumble into her shoulder. "So, so stupid."
"Don't say that," she says, brushing the hair away from my face with her fingers. "You're one of the smartest people I know. I wish I had a quarter of your drive and determination."
"But look at me," I sob. "I'm a mess. I feel for a man who was the enemy, and he used me. I honestly believed me had something special. I believed we were falling for each other."
"Look at me," Kate says, pulling my face close to hers. "Forget about Palmer. There are plenty of fish in the sea."