“So,” I said, looking at everything but the bag. “How was work?”
“Okay,” he said in a distant voice, like a child who hasn’t decompressed yet after coming home from school. Chris worked for a top Madison Avenue ad agency, a job that was as cool as a real job could be. Most of the employees shlumped around in jeans, T-shirts and carpenter’s overalls. The rare occasions when guys showed up in a suit and tie brought the expected droll comment from passersby:
“Job interview?”
Invariably, the answer was a small, somber shake of the head and then the barely audible utterance “funeral,” even though it was rarely, if ever, the case.
Chris’s office resembled a teenager’s bedroom or something out of the Pottery Barn Teens catalog, with orange blow-up chairs, a white fluffy woolen rug, a boom box where he played his favorite CDs all day and a blue denim couch where he took naps or just stretched his legs to increase blood flow to the brain to boost creativity, or at least consciousness.
Some copywriters and art directors even used their offices as if they were their primary residences, especially after divorces, when it was no surprise to see someone walking in with a blanket and pillow under their arm. It was that laid-back.
Even though Chris didn’t shop much, he enjoyed coming with me to stores like Urban Outfitters where I always picked up whimsical versions of ordinary T-shirts and denim skirts, and he bought kitschy things for his office like copies of old-fashioned metal lunch boxes, a Venus-flytrap coin bank and a plastic-and-chrome clock that looked as if it belonged in a fifties-style diner.
Did I mention the teen-room design made sense because Chris had just turned thirty-two, (although he looked twenty-one) and he was almost four years younger than I am? Whatever.
Anyway, there was almost a carnival atmosphere at the agency most of the time—except when a client would call to say that there was a change in the marketing calendar because the CEO had to fly to London, and they needed to see a new campaign in two weeks instead of two months. Then laid-back employees snapped to, turning into frantic martinets who invariably came up with something brilliant to save their asses and careers.
“We got a new account,” Chris said, dropping his overstuffed army-green military-surplus backpack in the middle of the living room. He kicked off his boots and stretched his legs out on our new white duck Pottery Barn couch with the down-wrapped cushions. It replaced the couch shrouded in black cotton that Chris had found on Craig’s List offered for free to anyone who would pick it up in Staten Island.
Our new couch was the first piece of furniture that we bought together, not counting the cheapo coffee table from West Elm. Eventually, we hoped to buy chairs and decent lamps to go with the couch.
I raised my eyebrows.
“A liquid diet,” he said, unenthused.
“Another one?”
He closed his eyes and nodded.
“What’s it called?”
“That’s my job,” he said, frowning. “The client was toying with ‘skinny shake,’ but when they proposed it, the conference room went silent so they gave me a week to come up with something to make it fly.”
I screwed up my face. Would clones of Metrecal, the meal-in-a-can diet drink that my mother tried long ago, be reborn again and again? I remembered the commercials showing the likely candidates for the drink—two girls walking along a beach wearing sweatshirts to cover up their chubby bodies.
A new generation of suckers is born every minute, I guess, and that was what Madison Avenue banked on. It always amazed me that Chris made twice the money that I did by coming up with ways of selling products that nobody needed but everybody bought because they were convinced that they did, at least until something new came along to take its place.
“Striptease,” I said.
“Striptease,” he repeated, bobbing his head from left to right like a wooden doll with a spring-loaded head. Knowing Chris, it would take him a while to rule on it. “Striptease.” Still bobbing. He shook his head finally.
“Wouldn’t work for Middle America.”
“Wanna eat out?” I said, changing the subject.
“Whatever,” he said, shrugging. “Oh, Moose is in town,” he said, coming over and briefly nuzzling my neck before going over to the refrigerator. Moose was his college roommate. “Maybe we should set up a dinner.” I nodded.
I think the reason that Chris and I stayed together for going on a year now was that he was so easy to get along with. Sometimes to a fault. If I wanted to eat Indian food, he went along. Stay home and call for Chinese? Fine. Campbell’s tomato soup and saltines? A nod of his head. Sometimes I was tempted to just shake him:
“Tell me that you’re in the mood for Ecuadorian food, if there is such a thing, or god-awful brown rice and steamed vegetables. Why do you always have to be so accommodating?” But what was the point? Create tension because there was none?
I reached up and tugged on a rebellious lock of his hair, then pushed back the little-boy bangs that flipped right down again. Chris was cute, everyone who met him thought so. He was also smart—smart enough in his quiet, sure way to dream up campaigns that brought clients millions of dollars. He was also modest. I remember how he told me, just in passing one day, that he had gotten perfect SAT scores. No wonder he had gotten into Yale and Princeton, even though he turned them down to go to Bard, a small, artsy school for brainy types who didn’t fit the Ivy League mold.
We were a curious couple. I spent my days going through documents and public records, not to mention interviewing city and state officials to report on how an unending group of colorful characters tried to circumvent the law, all in the interest of telling readers the bald truth.
Chris, on the other hand, wrote the copy for print ads and TV commercials trying to seduce consumers by obscuring the truth or dismissing it entirely, to convince them what should and could be. Sometimes I was tempted to change places with him so that I could have fun dreaming up ways to get consumers into the stores to buy the newest condiment concoction or over-the-counter remedy for everything from PMS to acid reflux.
“Maybe we should change jobs,” I said. “I’ll come up with a campaign to sell black ketchup or Snapricot drink. You investigate the city parking violations bureau, and find out who’s on the take.”
“No thanks,” Chris said. “Reality sucks.”
“Reality sucks?” I guess I was in a dark mood because before I went shopping, I had to redo a column on deadline, which meant denying myself all food after eleven in the morning because I couldn’t spare the time to go to the cafeteria, and barely made it to the bathroom to pee. Because I have this low-blood-sugar thing, I have to eat every couple of hours—or “graze” as they say—otherwise I turn short-tempered and hostile—well, even more than usual.
“The award-winning copywriter who brought us the Nike Nirvana campaign declares that he opts for fantasy, illusion and role playing rather than the world as it is? Thank you for negating my whole career and my whole life.” Chris looked at me and narrowed his eyes slightly as if he was trying to figure out what I needed to hear.
“Do you want to eat a candy bar or take a nap or something, Jen?” he said, scratching the back of his neck.
“Candy is exactly what I don’t want,” I said, making my way toward the refrigerator for real food, even though we didn’t have much