The Zaftig Chronicles

Steven comes in this morning, hands me his credit card, and says, "Go shopping online. Anything you want." He promptly leaves back out of my office. I didn'y even get a chance to speak.  I was left sitting there with his card in my hand and a wicked smirk slowly appeared on my face.  SEPHORA ! SEPHORA ! I screamed in my head. As if I needed more girl shit , but again: SEPHORA ! SEPHORA ! So I ate Sephora . I won't tell you all how much I spent, because I don't want to hear the number again. He loved it. Is that some type of fetish for some men? Next week the goodies arrive. So he handed me plastic instead of cash; what's the difference, you're probably asking? Plastic is more personal: I saw his credit card number, his personal information. It's a deeper gesture.  Or at least I'll be telling myself that when I'm spritzing on the very sexual Gucci Rush .

I just got home. I spent most of the night in the emergency room.  Don't worry, it's not me who got hurt. Actually, it's Steven. He sprained his ankle. His foot missed the curb, and down he went. "Oh, I'm down," was his first response. He sounded so cute. I promptly made fun of him: "I'm wearing four inch heels and you can't even get over a little curb in flats?" He kindly informed me that men DO NOT refer to their shoes as flats, and then he grabbed his ankle.  Uh-Oh. He tried to get up and start walking, but the wince he made let me know that he needed to head to the ER. So I drove him. Once we were inside and he filled out the necessary paperwork, he made me promise to stay with him. "Stop being a baby," I said, "it's just a little sprain."  I stayed. He was discharged around midnight, and I had the pleasure of helping him into his condo. (Thank God for doormen). It was a sight: a 5'6" woman hauling a 6...

Saturday will be the first Sweetest Day in two years where I'm not expecting a pound of candy and a dozen roses. My ex treated this day in October like Valentine's Day. So that leaves me not excited about this day of diabetes-inducing sweetness that we're supposed to show to our significant others and loved ones.  Last year, Michael took me out for sushi. We ended up having sex in the ladies' bathroom (I tell you, those wide stalls are begging for sex to happen in them). I'm convinced this was the first sign of the end approaching. The year before, we'd done the whole cliché couple thing and had a candlelit, romantic dinner at an upscale restaurant in the North Shore. The evening continued to a fancy hotel that had a massage chair, a swimming pool and hot tub right in the room. We made love until the sun rose and exposed us like a secret. Apparently, the next year, he felt a drafty sushi restaurant would recreate the ambiance of the previous year.  Oh, and my q...

So, we had the duck, along with a really delicious orange sauce. The sauce was so good, we asked the waiter to make us a "doggy pint" to take home. Already, the sauce had dressed a chicken that Jan roasted, giving the skin crackly, crispy perfection. Fried mushrooms have pretty much soaked up the rest of the sauce. The sauce is truly food porn. Okay, about our date: Well, it was like last time, only with better food and a therapy session thrown in.  It started off simple -- "What can I do to you tonight?" he'd asked before the complimentary white wine had even arrived. "Nothing," I replied, "I'm just here for the duck." Dinner continued. First was a pine nut, romaine lettuce, and orange wedge salad that came with a tangy lemon and sesame seed dressing. Then it was a perfectly cooked roasted duck with the orange porn sauce, and the best tasting xiaolong bao  in all of Chinatown. Dessert was mango pudding. After we'd spooned the last of...

Sister is here. It's her eyes -- they look normal. Healthy. Thoughtful. Full of life, dare I say? I like her like this.  She came this morning, bearing lattes and donuts from a bakery near my house. I happily accepted, but Diana -- still here from last night's man-dishing fest -- declined and got the hell out of Dodge. Diana doesn't like my sister; she thinks she's as toxic as a moldy basement in July. And she can be. But I think this weekend is going to be fine. I'm going to be here for her. I'm going to be a doting little sister. I'm going to be happy. And so will she.   In other news: I checked my email, and He has sent me a "Date Proposal" for next Friday. "How about we go to __________, have the duck and end up looking out at the city below from you know where. I'd like to do it again. Use that same shower gel, please. And he couldn't tell me this at work, face to face?  What the fuck are we doing here ?  I've yet to repl...

And I'm wholly pissed about it. There's not much going on with Him. It appears we're both in the middle of some kind of crisis caused by things starting to get real. Feelings are blossoming. Our thoughts are invaded while standing at the Chinese restaurant waiting on comforting wonton soup. We're beginning to smell each other when neither of us is around. It's getting real. It's getting complex. It's getting human. So, being the fucked humans we are (and we humans sure love complication), the best thing is to pretend we're just casual. Nothing's happening here, right? Just fun...right?  Relationships like ours won't work. We'd be great sexners (new word alert!). Our sex would be intense and tantric, and we'd wake up in the morning and do the whole Ann Sather thing, but with better, more tart apple juice with our breakfast. I'd order bagels and onion & chive cream cheese, read the paper and talk about my formative years. We'd ...

I wear Clinique's Happy most of the time (even though I own more than forty perfumes), but when I'm going on a date, I prefer the number one man-eating perfume out there: Azzura . This stuff is powerful. No man can resist it. And when it's strategically sprayed in certain spots -- spots you know he will nuzzle and caress -- it's even more powerful. Such was my evening last night. Azzura not only roused him, it drove Him MAD. Azzura was delicately sprayed on the inside of my thighs, the back of my neck, both wrists; I placed a gentle dab on my cupid's bow. I took a Kleenex and sprayed it with this magical scent and wiped it across my breast. I even used a spritz it in my freshly-blowdried hair.  I then stood in front of a fan and let the air diffuse the intensity of the scent, so that I didn't go out smelling like a perfumery. (I don't recommend this amount unless you do the fan trick). What was left was a delicately scented woman, squeezing her thighs togeth...

I swear I'm going to be a good girl. I swear!   He's picking me up in twenty minutes and taking me out to dinner. I left work early so I could get home and prepare properly. So now I'm moisturized, smelling good, and feeling quite naughty. But I'm not going to be naughty. I'm not.  I'm going to be a good girl, dammit. I will....

I thought about Him all day.  That day in his office replayed in my head as I ate lunch, talked to clients, checked on my sister. Each time, I thought about his large, strong hands massaging my shoulders, kneading the tension away and replacing it with a more carnal tension; I thought of the how even his office chair felt erotic, as I became aware of the lower part of my body. I thought of how his breath was labored as he described his last sexual encounter. I pretended not to notice his erection. He asked, brazenly so, "Have you ever had multiple orgasms?" My face felt hot as I mustered up a nervous chuckle. I didn't answer. I avoided the question by sliding my freshly-pedicured feet from my pointy Anne Klein mules and pretended to massage them. At the time, I thought this action was simply defensive -- a way to counter his boldness, a way for me to gain control of the situation. "My feet are killing me," I lied. His erection remained. Days after the incident, ...

"Let's get falafel and some Stella," He says. I take a quick look in the mirror: frizzy hair, unruly eyebrows, a pinkish growth decorates my chin. All convenient excuses. "Um, I've too much to catch up on tonight, " I say, knowing full well I'm going to plop my ass in front of my computer, "researching" shoes and Googling my former college brethren (Oh, Samantha So-and-So's in PR now!). These are my obsessions these days. He lets out an exaggerated, disappointed-sounding sigh, as if I was his only hope for Friday night beers and Middle Eastern food. I can't help but feel unnecessarily important and wanted and attractive. Again, I repeat, unnecessarily. If only he could see this "together" woman, sitting at her computer with a bag of stale, chewy popcorn, a surprisingly sweet peach, and a can of gross Diet Coke, hunched over a pad and doodling a stick figure wearing shoes I can only hope are Prada. Doodling! I'm sure ca...