The Trophy Wives Club Page 8

  “See? You think you’re all victim here, but that’s exactly the reason you married that type of guy. You’ve got an excuse for everything.”

  “You don’t even know me.”

  Lindsay smooths a lock of hair between two fingers. “Here’s the one piece of advice I will give you.”

  “Am I asking for advice?” I look around me. “I don’t think I asked for any advice other than how I can get more money.”

  She ignores me. “Whenever you feel tempted to blame Jay or say his name? You need to think of another route because that won’t fix anything. It will make you feel better for a moment, but over time it will drain you and everyone who has happened to stick around this long. You become people poison.”

  I hold up my hands. “Whatever. “I turn toward the door.

  “Stop! You want help with the settlement; that’s the only reason you’re here.”

  “Bingo.” This feels like the times in grade school when I’d meet Joey Belingheri behind the bleachers and buy candy for class.

  “You want my real story. The whole truth and nothing but the truth, not Bette’s edited versions.” Lindsay looks down at her feet and twists her foot to gaze upon her stiletto before she looks back. “If you’ll commit to us, to this group”—she points back at the door—“for two more weeks so you can see how these women can help you, I will tell you everything. You think you’re going to be fine on your own, but Haley, we know better. Even if you think we’re beyond strange, give us a chance, won’t you?”

  “Why?” I narrow my eyes, trying to muster as much severity as I can. As I said, I look like Gwyneth Paltrow, so I’m not exactly frightening. “I’ve had my life ripped away from me and have no choice in the matter. My mother is trying to set me up with a window salesman, and the simple fact is, he’s too good for me. Do you have anything that can make me feel happy about that? And is it legal?”

  Lindsay looks back toward the room again and puts her arm on my shoulder for a moment. “Let’s go get a coffee. I’ll tell you what you need to know.” She halts. “If you promise to come back next week. And the next.”

  “You’re blackmailing me? With Bible study? Is that even allowed?”

  She shrugs. “Take it up with God.” She shimmies out the exit and turns around like a runway model. “You coming?”

  I sigh. “I’m coming.”

  Just as I get to the doorway, the door swings open, and my worst fear comes to fruition. It’s Hamilton Lowe, lawyer to the dogs. My dog, in particular. The one who knows that my husband hates me so much that he spent hard-earned cash to get away from me. I feel as though I’m standing here naked as he looks me up and down.

  “Haley”—he shifts unnaturally—“what are you doing here?”

  “Nothing,” I whisper. “I’m at church. Is that against any stipulation in the contract?”

  “Of course not,” he says in far too cheery a voice. “I’m just happy to see you here, that’s all. Maybe slightly surprised.”

  “The Trophy Wives Club. You invited me, remember?”

  He looks to Lindsay, and his smile disappears. “Of course, I didn’t think—”

  “Come on, Haley. Hamilton is one of those never-been-married types who is too good for rabble like us.” Lindsay clasps my wrist.

  “Lindsay,” Hamilton says smoothly, “I said I was sorry. Aren’t you ever going to forgive me? It’s your Christian duty.”

  Lindsay narrows her smoky blue eyes. “Probably not. If I were you, I wouldn’t be preaching on duty, Hamilton. You don’t want to pass by the hallway now.” She leans in close. “You might get a little divorce on your sleeve. It’s in the air, you know.” Lindsay’s eyes flash for a moment, and she takes her hand and brushes Hamilton’s lapel. “A scarlet A would look mighty fine there.”

  “Ladies.” He nods, his gaze landing squarely on me. “Haley. Always a pleasure.”

  “Pompous, arrogant—” Lindsay says under her breath as she exits, then rests her gaze on me. “Sorry about that. We have a personality clash. These things will happen, you know.”

  “What was that about?” I can see Hamilton’s frame through the glass cutout in the door, and his straight, upright gait slows as he turns and looks back toward me, though I know he can’t see anything out here in the dark. “I thought I was the only person who saw through Hamilton’s charms.”

  “Hamilton has charms? They must be lost under his cloud of righteousness.”

  “You really don’t like him.” Delicious. Maybe I spoke out of turn when I said Lindsay had issues. I know, at the very least, she has good taste.

  “Hamilton found out about our group. We’re like AA. We don’t publicize ourselves, and you have to be recommended to the group via a flyer to come. They’re numbered.”

  See? I didn’t just imagine the underground AA thing. “It’s as secretive as all that? What are you afraid of?” Currently, I’m afraid of it too. Is some whacked-out husband going to come in shooting first and asking questions later?

  “We’re not afraid of anything. There’s a divorce care group, and we started out there, but we found out we didn’t really fit there. We would mention how the divorce came to be, and get these blank stares like we were from another planet. The age difference was one thing. The financial settlement another.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “We were younger for the most part—than the other divorcees.” She pauses. “Thinner.”

  “Ah, the other women didn’t like you in the group.” I roll my eyes.

  “No, it was more that these men who were down on their luck and anxious to get back in a relationship were working it hard. Bette suggested a few of us start a new group. So we could get healthy without getting a spouse.” She giggles.

  “Underground church. Very cool.”

  “Not really. Nothing we do is all that cool. Hamilton had tried to stop our group, which of course made us women bond. It’s not like we had a great love for men at the time anyway. But Hamilton said the church shouldn’t support women who have left their covenant of marriage. And he was totally serious! The unforgivable sin, you know. He, who makes men rich when they abandon their covenants. It’s disgusting. The pastor made him repent and pass out numbered flyers at his work. Since then, he acts like all of us have cooties and he’s doing the devil’s work with the flyers. But so far, you’re the only one, so I can’t see that it’s bothering him too much.”

  Hamilton meets a woman in the hallway, and I watch them meet and flirt like they’re in fifth grade. “Run, girlfriend, run!” I say to the closed door.

  Lindsay scans me under the orange parking lot glow. “You’re probably part of his penance, and now he has to feel guilty all over again.” She starts to laugh. “Payback really is a female dog.”

  “I thought you said the class didn’t accept man-bashing.”

  “Hamilton Lowe is different. He’s a toad. One of those self-righteous, religious types who believe women are to blame for all things inherently evil in the world, and men are their innocent victims. I suppose it’s not his fault for all the lies he believes daily. We’re all harlots, you know. I think he lives to tell you the story of Eve eating the forbidden fruit first.”

  My eyes are as wide as saucers. I don’t think the level of my anger against Jay quite rises to the heights of how Lindsay feels about Hamilton. Of course, that might help me in the long run, but even when Hamilton Lowe was asking me to sign my husband’s rights back, he was never anything but polite. Maybe that’s my problem. Maybe I’m too swayed by polite. Jay was always polite too, as he politely told me what to do and even where I could find my things after he’d tossed them out of the house.

  Chapter 5

  Hop in.” Lindsay chirps a BMW. I climb in, remembering just for a moment how luxury feels.

  “Nice car. You get this in the settlement?” I ask.

  “Not that it’s any of your business, but yes I did.”

  “You don’t pull any punches, do you? I thought peo
ple who went to a Bible study were generally nicer.”

  “If you want nice, wait for Bette. I’m having a bad day, but what can I say, I felt for you. Bette didn’t get you. She’s a great leader. Sweet and sincere as they come, but sometimes, she forgets what it’s like on the outside because she really does see only the good in people. There’s a lot of bad people, even in the church. Heck, sometimes especially in the church, but you can’t let that dissuade you from seeing the good in life. We live in Southern California! Some people are neck deep in snow right now. We’re getting our full count of vitamin D all winter long. Know what I’m saying?”

  “Not really, no,” I say, not feeling an ounce of gratitude and really bearing no guilt for it either.

  “Convertible weather all year long; the Pacific Ocean with buff men in shorts; South Coast Plaza, the mother ship of shopping; Hollywood; entertainment capital of the world…these are a few of my favorite things!” Lindsay breaks into song.

  “You’re really a warped person, aren’t you?”

  “I so am! And don’t act like you’re not. Everyone acts like they’re not and it just makes them more fun to tease. Remember this, no one ever actually graduates from the seventh grade. In our heart of hearts, we are the tiny, self-conscious geeks we were then, everything is just a façade.”

  “Your point? This conversation is making me question my sanity.” Not that I have a great deal of it.

  “My point is, no one really cares what anyone thinks. They only care what everyone thinks, and they dive into the pool that is the majority. You’ve got more of a brain than that, Haley, and that’s why you don’t fit in. The same reason I didn’t fit in with all the wives whose lifetime job it is to ensure that their husbands come home at night because they can’t trust them on their own.”

  “So what happened with you? If you have it all together. Why’d you marry a man who would kick you to the curb?”

  She settles back into her driver’s seat and extends her lanky limb to the stick shift. “Stupid choices. Some days I felt as dumb as a hamster. I just kept spinning on my wheel, hoping I’d get to a new place where I felt like all the other wives, who had it all together. I’m so grateful that ride is over.” She gazes absently at the road.

  “Are we having a conversation? Or are you just talking to yourself?”

  She laughs. “Sorry, I was thinking that seeing you shows that the old feelings don’t go away. I can go right back to that place where I feel out of control.”

  “There was this one time,” I share. “When I felt on top of everything in the house. I felt like it was always clean when he came home, like I could stage a great dinner party at a moment’s notice and knew what fragrance to put on, but inevitably, something was wrong. The hand towels in the guest bathroom weren’t right for the event. That moment was fleeting. The right woman would have known and done it right.”

  She nods. “When I would look at my girlfriend, and I would see her husband come home from work, he was genuinely happy to see her. She’d have some bowl of slop in the slow cooker, and he’d beam like she’d made him a three-course meal naked. That is when I knew something was missing, and I would never get it right. It’s all good until you know what you’re missing. That’s why the Bible says not to compare, I suppose.” Lindsay gives a sneer. “She drove a Hyundai and lived in fifteen hundred square feet—that was the size of my closet. At the time, I thought how jealous of me she must have been.” She snickers. “I came to find out she and her husband were praying for me to find unconditional love in Christ.”

  “When I noticed those happy couples around me, I thought it was just an act. They were better actors than us.”

  “Okay, we’re getting way too depressed. Let’s get a nonfat mocha!” she says with glee. “With whipped cream.”

  “Because we can.”

  “Because we always could and didn’t know it.”

  The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf is close enough that we should have walked. I imagine if Lindsay weren’t wearing stilettos, we might have, but she locks the car door with a punch of a button, and we enter the empty shop.

  “Two nonfat mochas. With whipped cream,” she says as though she were placing her order for contraband. “Large. And don’t skimp on the whipped cream.”

  The baby-faced guy behind the counter is rendered speechless and motionless while Lindsay speaks. I hadn’t really noticed how truly beautiful she was until I watched this poor kid’s reaction. His hand is suspended midair, his mouth awestruck as he tries to remember her order.

  “Mochas. Nonfat. Whipped Cream,” Lindsay repeats slowly. I imagine she’s used to this.

  I take out my wallet, and Lindsay pushes it toward my purse. “It’s on me. It’s the least I can do.” The cashier finally recalls his brain and punches in the order, holding out his hand for the cash. Lindsay hands him a credit card. “Keep a record of everything,” she tells me. “Every expenditure. If you have to, put the cash in an envelope and don’t use credit. The payouts will feel huge until you start to live. Rent. Cha-ching. Grocery store. Cha-ching. Hair salon. Cha-ching. Cha-ching.”

  “I’m going back to my natural color,” I tell her.

  “I don’t even remember what mine is.”

  “Do you ever want to be married again?”

  The cashier jumps to attention. Lindsay ponders the question, focusing on a box of Ceylon tea. “Yeah, I think when I understand God more. When I’m healthier. Maybe.”

  “What do you mean understand God more?”

  “This whole unconditional love thing, I’m still working it out for myself. People have higher expectations than God. If I can find someone who understands I’m not perfect…maybe…yeah, maybe. I wouldn’t rule it out, but I would have to rework my entire notion of marriage, and I’m not ready for that.”

  “Bette never married again?”

  She shakes her head. “It’s too bad, really. She’d make a great wife. She’s a widow you know. Not divorced.”

  “No, I didn’t know.”

  “This is Trophy Wives Knowledge, so you can’t use any of it.”

  I look around me, wondering exactly who I’d tell. “Didn’t you tell me I was friendless?”

  “Let’s get a table.”

  “Why doesn’t she want people to tell their real stories?” I ask.

  “Bette is afraid of the truth sometimes. It’s not her fault. She fears if she gets in touch with her anger, it will start all over again. She’s worked hard to look at life through rose-colored glasses, and it’s for real, but she hates conflict and wants her little chicks to fly again.”

  “It doesn’t seem like the group would be that much help with her in charge.”

  “She’s at her worst when we get someone new. She wants to teach everyone else how to live. She means well, but avoiding the emotions doesn’t help most of us. The only way out is through the valley, unfortunately. We have to go in. We all come with a lot of anger, Haley. You’re not alone.”

  “Did Bette’s husband die recently?”

  “She was a widow at thirty-four.”

  “She’s upset by that?”

  “Well, yeah. Believe it or not, most women consider that a tragedy. Just not us.”

  “I’m just clarifying, that’s all.”

  “She’s made peace with God that it was his time to go. She doesn’t believe in remarriage, so she’s devoted her life to making sure other women appreciate the men in their lives.”

  “Do we have to appreciate the ones who aren’t in our lives?”

  “She teaches a Bible study for ‘real’ married women, for people with healthy issues that can be solved. And then ours, which is for those of us in the process of rebuilding our self-esteem and our ministries.”

  “We’re the troubled children.”

  “Precisely.”

  “I was always the good kid at home. How utterly ironic.”

  “Probably too good. You didn’t learn to voice your opinion.”

  “I voice it no
w,” I claim.

  “A day late and a dollar short.”

  “True, but in my defense, when you live with someone who doesn’t care what you think, you begin to question everything.”

  “So you have to get healthy. That’s the point of the group.”

  “I’m healthy. I just lost 175 pounds of ugly.”

  “You’d be surprised how much ugly stays with you until you give it over to God.”

  “What’s with the God stuff? You really believe that?”

  “I know it’s true, Haley. He loved me until I could love myself. I’m not good at explaining it. I’m only saying give it a shot before you decide it’s like all the other self-help hocus-pocus.”

  Our drinks are called out, and the cashier goes beyond the call of duty and brings them to our table in tall glasses. He’s probably ensuring his view won’t leave anytime soon with a plastic cup. “Anything else?” He smiles.

  “How old are you?” Lindsay asks.

  “Age is just a number. I like older women.”

  “Well, if I see any, I’ll let you know.”

  “I brought you a biscotti. It’s on the house.”

  “Do you see this ring?” She holds up a gigantic cushion-cut diamond ring in a gleaming, pavé setting.

  “You’re married. It figures.”

  “I’m not married.”

  “Cool,” he says as though it’s a come-on.

  “I’d love to tell you about my relationship with the One True God. Jesus is my husband now. That’s why I still wear the ring.”

  He claps his hands together. “Enjoy the cookie.”

  Lindsay lifts her glass. “Cheers to your new life and learning to embrace it.”

  I lift my glass, reluctant to cheer something so miserable. She nudges the glass again, and I lift mine. “To a new and undefined future.” I feel a lump rise up in my throat, like a whole, dry biscotti.

  She holds up her ring again. “Jesus will be faithful to me always. A soft place to fall. That’s what you need, Haley. A soft place to fall, so you can trust again, and He is forever faithful.”