You First: A Joe Goldberg Prequel (You, #0)(71)

But you didn’t. And of course you didn’t.

I am the asshole who didn’t show up. Sitting here wallowing in Sex and the City with new sad eyes. They should’ve called it Who’s a Bigger Asshole? Big or Carrie?

I turn off the TV. Fuck Dick for getting in my head. Fuck Big for getting in my head, and fuck little Miss Carrie Bradshaw for getting in your head, convincing you that all men are so afraid of commitment that you have to be the first one to push them the fuck away.

I grab my coat.

I’m a reader and that picture of you and the man in the yellow hat told a story: Prep School Cad Makes Drunk Girl Laugh.

But I don’t know the whole story and I jumped to conclusions. I assumed he charmed your skirt off and got into your pants, and for all I know, you threw up on him before it even got to that. You told me I’m not your boyfriend. I listened to you, as if any girl in Manhattan who thinks love is obsolete can be trusted when she’s on the verge of becoming a little less Forever 21.

I’m out the door and a dude talking to a plastic bag laughs at me and okay. You probably are in your bed that feels like mine with the man in the yellow hat.

Note to self: If she invites you to a party, you fucking GO.

I care about you, Vail. And I am better than Big. Did he ever walk nineteen blocks in the iceberg wind and make a right on the corner of 22nd and Fuck It? Would he ever stand on the corner pacing? Figuring out his next move? I don’t know what to do. Do I show up at your place empty-handed? Do I buy you a coffee? Do I sit on a stoop and wait for you to emerge in brunch gear with the man in the yellow hat?

I sit on a stoop. Everyone is lazy and cozy in this wasteland. Ides of March. March madness. What a terrible time of the year, and my thoughts are little black ants marching all over me, all over each other. I am the asshole who didn’t show up to your party. But you are the asshole who told me not to come to your party. Sitting there in your crown, letting the man in the yellow hat make you laugh, but then again…What else could you do? Your boyfriend stood you up on your birthday. But then again YOU TOLD ME NOT TO COME. But then again I sang for you, to you. But then again you got a lot of birthday calls.

Did you even listen to me sing? If I was bad, don’t you get that I was trying to be funny bad like Big in the mafioso-esque fucking restaurant?

I stand. I can’t do this to me, to you. Can’t collapse into full-blown Carrie Ranting Bradshaw. I have no business being on your street, same way Carrie had no business showing up at Big’s church. I am trying, Vail. I am here. I tore up that picture and it’s gone, but I can’t get it out of my head. It does tell a story. It tells the story of a birthday girl in a crown and the man who made her laugh. And it matters, the laughter. It’s right there in episode 2 of season 1. Big walks into the coffee shop where Carrie sits with her hair in pigtails. He slides into the booth and says it: After a while, ya just wanna be with the one who makes you laugh. Know what I mean?

Carrie knows what he means, and I know what he means. I check my phone. It’s 11:11 a.m. and fuck it. I’m me. I’m your boyfriend, the guy who rubs your feet in my SoHo loft, the home you found for me because again. I am yours. You are mine.

The end of the dwelling. Time to act.

I start with your home phone. It rings and it rings, but that’s girls. Girls screen their calls. And that’s what makes us boys into men. We speak into the machine knowing that you might be standing there listening, rating us like there’s an Olympics for fucking voicemail.

I clear my throat. “Hey, Vail! Hey, Cyn! Hey, happy birthday! Sorry I missed you last night…long story, but maybe I can take you to brunch or something. I hear birthday girls like brunch…. Maybe Eleven Madison? Or we grab and go from Magnolia? Or Veselka?”

The machine cuts me off because WHY THE FUCK WOULD IT LET ME KEEP GOING WHEN I AM NAMING RANDOM RESTAURANTS? I picture you and the man in the yellow hat camped out on the sofa. No. I have to stay positive. I call your cell phone and there you are but aren’t.

You went to Vail and all you got was this lousy voicemail.

I do a couple of high kicks so the nerves won’t come through in my voice and again I offer to take you to Eleven Madison. I crack a joke about how I can’t afford Eleven Madison after the money I blew on your gift, and I laugh. “Just kidding…. But also not. See, I did get you a gift or two and…” DID YOU FUCK THE MAN IN THE YELLOW HAT? “I’m sorry.”

Your Motorola cuts me off and I am going to find your cell phone and destroy it so you can’t listen to that message, but I can’t do that. Your phone is with you, Vail. Where are you?

I sit again. I wait for you to walk outside, to sense my presence, to feel me longing for you. I miss my old apartment. I miss Dumb and Dumber and my cardboard box and the way things used to be. I hate that you have two phone numbers, which means you got to reject me twice. A person is a person. One body, one soul, and there should only be one way to reach you. Seconds turn into minutes and you’re not calling me back but of course you’re not calling me back. When Big upsets Carrie, she hooks up with her version of the guy in the yellow hat, that artist slash bartender who sang Three Dog Night and drank too many margaritas. I have to have faith.

Carrie didn’t kiss the artist with the stupid tattoo. She didn’t have sex with him.

The one she really wants is Big.

I hit up the bodega and spring for a sack of daisies (the friendliest flower). On the way back to your place I ditch the daisies and run back to the bodega and buy roses (the sexiest flower). I’m good. The roses prove that I’m in this for the long haul, that I’m not going to freak out if the man in the yellow hat is in there with you. Your building isn’t fancy—you don’t have cameras—and I feel better already. I can do this. You’re going to hear my voice and rush to get dressed and order the man in the yellow hat to stay put until we’re gone.