Starting From Square Two. Caren Lissner

method to meet men, anyway,” Hallie said. “No more of these horrible blind dates. Both of you will think I’m a genius when you hear my idea.”

      “You said something about this last week,” Erika said. “Tell me already.”

      “I’ll tell you soon,” Hallie said. “I promise. I’m working on it. You’ll both love it.”

      Gert didn’t know whether to look forward to it or dread it.

      Erika was tapping away at the keys of the computer in Marc’s trophy room.

      “My new screen name is Baltimora,” she announced. “It’s in honor of the group that sang that ‘Jungle Love’ song in the eighties, which was on the radio when the alarm went off this morning, so now it’s stuck in my head. And boy, this’ll drive Challa crazy.”

      “I want to write some,” Hallie said. “You said I could write some.”

      Gert walked over to her window and pulled down the shade.

      “The two of us can argue with each other!” Erika said, cracking up. “We’ll both say that we’re flight attendants who gave oral sex to Ben on his business trip to Texas, and that he was the best customer we’ve ever had.”

      “That’s mean,” Gert said, wondering why she was trying to give Erika the benefit of the doubt. “What if you were married to him and living your life, and some girl kept writing this stuff to you?”

      Hallie and Erika got silent.

      “Gertie,” Hallie said.

      “Gert,” Erika said, “if I had married him and was as happy as this girl seems to be, I would not need so much freaking attention that I’d write a Web site about myself every day. She needs to appreciate what she has instead of rubbing our noses in her syrupy slop.”

      Hallie and Erika switched off writing messages, and they laughed hysterically. At the end, the exchange said:

      THIS SITE IS STUPID AND P.S. LEARN TO SPELL. BEN IS A LITTLE “TO” SMART FOR YOU.—Baltimora

      Hey, leave them alone. The two of them are happy. Ben told me so when we did it in the bathroom on Continental flight 221 to Houston.—XSGIRRRL

      WAS THAT TO “BUSH” INTERCONTINENTAL AIR PORT? GET IT—BaLT.

      We’re lucky Ben has so many business trips. He showed me this site to tell me how annoying his wife is. Don’t get me mad, honey, or hack hack hack!—XSGIRRRL

      “They could file a harassment complaint on you,” Gert said.

      “It’s a public forum,” Erika said. “There’s no law against calling someone annoying on their Web site. Besides, the worst that can happen is that Challa feels as bad today as I do every day.”

      Gert suddenly understood. Erika wanted to jar Challa a little, make her less smug. Deep inside, Gert couldn’t help but know what Challa’s life was like. When she’d had Marc she never thought about being alone, about how hard it could be. Now Gert saw women walking with their husbands or complaining about their boyfriends, and she wanted to shake them and say, “Do you realize what you have?”

      “I’m going to go back to using the Internet cafés to send these next time, anyway,” Erika said. “They’re less traceable.”

      Gert was still pretty concerned about what Erika might do next.

      Chapter

       4

      I am definitely too old for this, Gert thought.

      I am too old to have get-togethers with friends who sit around and make “boy lists” like something out of a Judy Blume book, and rate every guy we ever dated on a scale of one to ten. I’m too old to wake up every Sunday morning and look out my window at all the couples getting into their cars to drive to the suburbs to visit their in-laws while I’m going to stay home in my pajamas reading the newspaper.

      “Hey, I know what we can do,” Hallie said on her couch, flipping through Cosmo. “Let’s take the Purity Test.”

      “You guys gave me the Purity Test last week,” Erika said. “I got an F.”

      Gert was on the far end of the couch, looking at the photos in Entertainment Weekly. Hallie’s wicker basket of magazines was always a good distraction.

      Hallie laughed. “Let’s play truth-or-dare, then,” she said.

      “As if there’s something you haven’t done,” Erika said, stretching out on the rug.

      “Speak for yourself,” Hallie said. “I guess you want to go first.”

      “Maybe I want to do a dare instead,” Erika said, pulling a low-fat Pop-Tart off the table.

      “Well, we’ll just play ‘truth,’” Hallie said.

      “You always pulled this in high school,” Erika sighed. “Okay. Give me a ‘truth.’”

      “How many naked male members have you seen in your life?” Hallie said. “Not counting relatives.”

      Gert couldn’t help but think of her own answer. It was a pretty low number. But she’d never really minded….

      “Come on,” Hallie said. “How many Johnsons have you seen au naturel?”

      Erika said, “Less than…ten. No, wait. Less than eleven.”

      “Gert?”

      “It’s Erika’s turn,” Gert said. “We don’t all have to go.”

      “Everyone has to answer in ‘truth,’” Hallie said.

      “According to rules, which Hallie just made up,” Erika said wryly, polishing off half of the Pop-Tart.

      Gert thought about adding on a few but decided to go with honesty. “Less than…three.”

      “You guys are hedging,” Hallie said, exasperated. “How are we going to learn each other’s secrets if we can’t be honest?”

      “Well, you answer it,” Erika said. She shot Gert a smile. It felt nice to be liked by her.

      “I’ve seen nine and a half,” Hallie said simply.

      “Nine and a half?”

      “Yes.”

      “But—”

      “No follow-up questions allowed,” Hallie said. “I answered mine. We have to move on now. Rules are rules.”

      Heading home on the subway, Gert heard cars honking and an ambulance in the distance.

      She thought of some “truth” questions she’d really like to ask Hallie and Erika.

      Did you resent me while I was married? Are you worried because there’s a possibility with Todd? And about Todd: Am I supposed to feel okay when I see him this weekend? How have you dealt with being alone? How can you be happy if you’re not with someone you love? Hanging out, eating your favorite foods and trading “truths”—is this what passes for happiness when you’re single? If neither of you ever fell in love again, would you find a way to compensate with other hobbies and activities—grow a new limb?

      Gert had thought about asking them directly. But they seemed to only want to play games and joke around. Everything was a joke to them. She didn’t want it to always be this way. Maybe if she got Hallie alone again they could really talk. It wouldn’t happen with Erika around.

      When Gert picked up her mail, she wasn’t surprised to see mostly junk mail. Her personal mail had slowed to a trickle since the advent of e-mail. She still got magazines, since she hadn’t had the heart to cancel Marc’s two-year subscriptions. But today, there was something in a fancy beige envelope. It was partially hidden inside the curled Macy’s circular.

      Gert