Chelsea Handler: My Horizontal Life: A Collection of One-Night Stands

We had completely opposite personalities. He would buy clothes, appliances, and supplies for the building and then, almost immediately, return them. This mentality drove me crazy. I didn't know men could be such flip-floppers. I had never returned anything in my life. If the item didn't work for me when I got home, then I would just throw my hands up and drop it off at Goodwill.

He always wanted the thermostat set at a minimum of seventy-five degrees; I would wake up in the middle of the night drenched in sweat and sneak out of bed to turn it below seventy. The next day, he would complain of a sore throat and tell me it felt like a meat locker. One morning I woke up to find him wearing a ski cap. So dramatic.

The worst things about him were his scrawny legs and the fact that I was pretty sure I could take him in a fight. He would cuddle so intensely with me in bed that when I'd get up to walk in the kitchen for a glass of water, he'd still be attached to me like an orangutan.

It wasn't the actual breakup that hurt so much. It was the fact that I had been planning on breaking up with him first but hadn't gone through with it because I thought he would be too devastated-only to come home from a weekend ski trip to Aspen and be blindsided. It was a complete blitzkrieg. I didn't appreciate the fact that I had been considering someone else's feelings while he was telling me to hit the road. While I knew that the relationship could never work long-term, mostly because we would never be able to wear shorts together in public, I kept secretly hoping that maybe some new calf-enhancing technology was about to hit the marketplace.

A couple months went by but the pain didn't seem to be subsiding.

Ivory called on Valentine's Day to tell me there was a costume party that night and attendance was mandatory. "It's at a warehouse downtown and it's a fund-raiser to help children with disabilities." Finally, something I had been lying about doing for years could actually become a reality. I had no desire to leave my bed, but I had to pull through for the kids. "We're meeting at the Compound to preparty," Ivory said.

The Compound was the apartment building where Lydia lived with all of her degenerate neighbors. It was kind of a Melrose Place-type building minus the pool and six-figure incomes. It was a fun place to hang out and party, but not a fun place to wake up. Lydia and all of her neighbors had slept with each other at one time or another, and it had become an official lazy Susan.

"I don't have a costume," I told Ivory.

"We can make you one."

I reminded her of months earlier when, on Halloween, Ivory and I had gone as bull dykes, wearing black mullet wigs, huge Levi's jeans, chained wallets, and black-studded belts. Our wife-beaters read, "We support Bush" and "Bush Rules." Since the party was after we had invaded Iraq, people thought we meant the president.

Not only did I learn my lesson that night about supporting George W. Bush in California, I learned my lesson about wearing something unattractive to a costume party. It was a clear opportunity to slut it out, and we had completely missed the boat. No one wanted anything to do with us. Even the friends we had gone to the party with were too embarrassed to be seen around us. Ivory and I spent the entire night sitting in a corner by ourselves; the only person who approached us was the bouncer to tell us it was last call.

"Oh, yeah, I forgot about that," Ivory said. "Go rent one."

"I can't. Bobby and Whitney's E! True Hollywood Story is on in ten minutes."

Ivory called minutes later to tell me her roommate Jen had an extra genie costume with a bustier that would look hot. "The pants are see-through, so wear full panties," she warned.

"I don't have any full panties, only my period underwear and those are too ugly."

"What color are they?"

"Red," I said. "Not from my period, they're just red."

They were nylon tummy tuckers and they sucked everything in when you were bloated. These weren't panties I wanted to show off. Generally, this type of underwear wasn't worn by anyone under sixty.

"No one will see them, it will be dark out, just wear something that covers your ass. Or wear a bathing suit bottom."

"What color are the pants?" I asked Ivory.

" Chelsea, just give it a rest. Be over at Lydia 's by eight and we'll get ready there."

Parking at Lydia 's was always a nightmare, so I called our friend Holden who lived around the corner and parked in his garage. Holden is like one of the girls. He's a sweet guy and we've all been friends with him for years. Holden's only fault is that he has a severe case of ADD. He's the type of person who asks you a question and then interrupts the answer with another question. This habit can be very annoying, especially if you're upset-which has resulted in many dramatic breakup scenes with his girlfriends involving clothes and furniture being thrown off balconies. Holden doesn't mind being yelled at, so that would help release the anger related to him not listening in the first place.

Holden didn't know about the party, probably because he wasn't paying attention when he got invited, so I invited him again. He didn't have a costume either, so I told him to wear one of his wet suits. Holden owns his own beachwear company, where he sells everything from scuba suits to surfboards. He keeps all his equipment at his apartment, and it comes in handy every time I decide to spend more time underwater.

When I got to Lydia 's place, all three girls were already dressed. Ivory was a sexy schoolgirl, Lydia was a sexy cop, and Jen was an M &M.

The genie costume was really cute and fit me perfectly. As soon as Jen saw it on me I caught a look on her face that said, "Take that off, I'm wearing it."

" Chelsea," Jen said. "I have an idea. You can be the M &M!"

"That's okay," I said. "You keep it. You like chocolate more."

"I insist," she said, grinning like one of those crazed cheerleaders after they've been hurled into the air. "And anyway, the genie's my costume in the first place. I brought it for you."

I put on the M &M suit. The top part was the shape of a pumpkin and formed a perfect green sphere around my body. It came with matching green tights that I wore over my red period panties. Jen's shoes for the M &M outfit didn't fit me and none of Lydia 's shoes fit either. The only shoes I had with me were the ones I had worn over. Black Adidas slides. This became my outfit.

"I need your panties," Jen said while checking herself out in the full-length mirror. You could see right through her genie pants, and she was wearing a leopard thong.

"I'm not giving you my panties," I said, "and can we please stop using that word?" There are three words that gross me out: "panties," "moist," and "slick." They all seem like words a child molester would use. Together.

"You need to give me them. I can't wear this outfit with a thong," Jen insisted.

"Fine!" I huffed as I took them off and put my tights back on.

"Don't you want some underwear?" Lydia asked.

"No, I'll just free-ball it." I wasn't in the business of borrowing other people's underwear and could not believe Jen was willing to wear mine.

"Do you want the green paint for your face?" Jen asked.

"No thanks," I said, shooting her a dirty look.

There's a fine line between being easygoing and being taken advantage of, and allowing someone to paint my face green would have been the latter.

"What's the matter? You look adorable," Jen said in the same voice you'd use talking to a girl who was going to her prom in a wheelchair.

Holden waddled up to me, wearing a scuba suit with a mask.

"I guess the two of us will be hanging out together tonight," I said.

The party had potential, but I never got into the swing of things due to my somber mood. Holden and I sat in a corner, making fun of people's costumes, and when we tired of that, I started making fun of Holden, who was sweating so profusely that he had taken down the top half of his scuba suit and was now topless.