Lee Nichols - Tales Of A Drama Queen

She checks her watch. “It’s twenty after, sweetie.”

So I lolled around watching Davey and Goliath reruns and missed an open house. So what? It’s only Sunday. I’ve been in California less than twenty-four hours. I’m supposed to have accomplished something by now?

It’s not like I don’t have goals. Of course, I have goals. They are, after much soul-searching:

Apartment.

Car.

Job.

Man.

And, of course, the complete obliteration of Iowa, by Act of God, Hanta Virus or Crème Brûlée. I’m not particular.

I have assets as well as goals, by the way. I got $1,100 for my Vera Wang wedding dress. Was going to sell it on eBay, but began weeping when I wrote the header: Vera Wang Wedding Dress: Never Worn. Sold it to a local wedding boutique, instead, for their first offer. I would have talked them up, but it cost Louis $4,800, and I wanted him to suffer. If he ever learns how cheap I sold it for, I mean. Which he won’t.

So $1,100 plus the roughly $4,000 in our household account, which was by all rights mine. Plus the triple-wick candle and instant ear thermometer, and so on.

I’m flush. A single girl in Santa Barbara with five grand and change. It’s a monster stack of cash, burning a hole. The future lies before me, full of abundant promise and happy surprises, like an endless sale rack at Barneys.

Monday. Would prefer to remain wallowing in self-pity, comforting myself with treacley Facts of Life reruns and family-size pizzas, but I’m afraid to appear as encroaching houseguest. Normally, I’d go shopping to kill time, but I need to conserve my monster stack of cash—my credit card companies have all fallen victim to some sort of computer virus. Technology. Just goes to show you.

I muster myself into a feel-good outfit and head downtown. Window shopping is just as satisfying as buying.

Except Santa Barbara didn’t used to be such a retail Mecca. When I was growing up, there were three local boutiques, the best of which specialized in sequins and appliqué. Now there’s Nordstrom, Bebe, Aveda and Banana, plus a Gap and Limited for when you need a single strap tank for the week that it’s in. Across the street is Bryan Lee (très L.A.), and down toward the beach are vintage shops catering to girls half my age—but I still manage to find a YSL suit I can squeeze into.

Fleeing temptation, I escape into the newish Borders Books, grab a Vogue and settle into a purple velvet chair.

A feature on Antonio Banderas takes a while to get through—kept having to pause and take deep breaths. Maybe my new man should be Latino. There are lots of Latinos in Santa Barbara. Suspect they are good family men, too.

I turn to the last page, “The Ten Best Satchels in America,” and compare them to my ratty old Coach tote. Everyone else is carrying satchels this year. Not tatty ancient totes. I want Vogue’s number one pick—the Fendi. It’s only $1,650. I wonder how much I’ll get paid at my new job. Louis billed three hundred an hour, last I checked, which was years ago. Surely I’ll make enough to afford a simple handbag.

I return Vogue to the rack and grab Cosmopolitan. I haven’t read Cosmo since college, but I’m single now. This month promises “A Dating Diary,” “How to Perfect Your Stripping Skills on Virtual Boy-Toys” and some advice I could really use: “Land That Man, Ace Your Job and Look Your Sexiest Ever.”

Standing in the check-out line, I read “Ten Girlfriend Goof-ups” and discover I’ve girlfriend goofed in every way. I could have kept Louis if I’d cooked hearty dinners, wore sexy underwear, feigned interest in his work and allowed him time “in his cave.”

“I can help who’s next,” the cashier calls. He’s California cute, with dark hair and a tan. That’s one thing about Santa Barbara—it’s packed with beautiful people. Dumb, but beautiful. I know. I grew up here.

“Do you have a girlfriend?” I ask Surfer Boy as I hand him the magazine.

“Uh, yeah.” He looks nervous. “That’ll be $3.79.”

I dig in my repellent, prehistoric, possibly-infectious Coach tote for my wallet. “I’m doing a survey. Does she cook you hearty dinners?”

“She makes pot roast sometimes.”

“Uh-huh.” I give him a five. “Does she wear sexy underwear?”

His eyes light up.

“Give you time in your cave?” I ask.

“Huh?”

“I don’t get that one either. You think you’ll ever break up with her?”

He doesn’t hesitate. “No doubt.”

See? Cosmo is wrong. All the peek-a-boo bras in the world wouldn’t have saved me and Louis. Which means it’s not my fault. It’d be Louis’s fault, but he’s clueless. That only leaves one person: The Iowan Floozy. I consider throwing Cosmo in the trash, punishment for misinformation, but decide against. Floozy probably has perfect stripping skills. I need a virtual refresher.

A five-day crying binge, interrupted briefly with bouts of piggery and compulsive TV watching, and I’m ready to look at apartments.

I make several appointments for walk-throughs, feeling like the heroine of my own Lifetime Television movie. Against all odds—puffy eyes, bloated ankles, damaged brain cells—Elle Medina finds herself an apartment. But can she find love amid the rubble?

No. But she can sure find rubble. Thirteen apartment impossibilities later, and I’m back where I started.

“You wouldn’t believe these places,” I tell Maya one evening before she heads to work. We’re in the bathroom. I’m sitting on the toilet, downing a beer. She’s applying makeup.

“Like what?” she asks.

“Like a shack, with a toaster oven for a kitchen, mildew in the bath and heinous red carpet. Guess what they’re asking.”

She shrugs. I tell her she needs more eyeliner.

“I don’t know,” she says. “$700?”

“No, they want…well yeah—$700. It’s insane. Remember that set we built for the school play?”

“We didn’t build a set. We built one doorway.”

“That doorway was architecturally sounder than this place. I’d pay $700 a month for that doorway and be getting a better deal.”

“It was a nice doorway.”

“Then I saw a fantastic place in Hope Ranch.”

“Oh?” She lifts a brow. Hope Ranch is home to Santa Barbara’s nouveau riche—the old riche live with Oprah, in Montecito.

“A guest house. Beautiful white couches. Landlady wearing JP Tods. The ad was a misprint—they want $2,600 a month. Then there’s the place that smelled like cat pee, and the one where I’d have bathroom privileges. Since when is sharing a bathroom with two teenage boys a privilege? And all the places that won’t rent to you if you’re unemployed—which I’m not, I just don’t happen to have a job. And the places that won’t accept dogs and the—”

“You don’t have a dog.”

“Not yet.”

“Ellie…” she says, washing her hands and leaving the bathroom.

“Well, how can they hold my future dog against me, but not give me credit for my future job?” I follow her to the front door. “Seriously, I don’t think I can find a place.” I point to the mess I’ve made of her living room. “I may be permanently ensconced.”

She looks slightly alarmed. Possibly at my vocabulary. “Maybe you need a roommate. Then you could afford something better.”

“I don’t know, living with a stranger. It’s too bad you don’t have an extra bedroom here.”

“Yeah,” she says, as she closes the front door behind her. “Too bad.”

That evening, with Maya at the bar and Perfect Brad working late, I decide to clean their apartment. Because I’m a good houseguest. Plus, if I clean I can snoop in their drawers.