White is the Color
White is the Color (of my true love's hair)
n.b. This is set a few months after the movie-Nate is in Boston, Andy’s “out” of the closet, and she’s still friends with Lily and Douglas. Andy without friends would be a pathetic Andy, and I don’t like to think about desperation driving Andrea to Miranda
Andy spotted her friends at a table in the back of the restaurant and wove through the crowd to get to them. After hugs all around, she placed a canvas bag on the empty seat next to the one she’d taken.
“Garlic presses!” She announced and stared down at the plate Douglas slid in front of her.
“I got you the chicken shawarma, they were out of the kibbeh,” he apologized.
Andy took some money out of her purse and gave it to Douglas, who pocketed it.
“I could use a press, let’s see,” said Lily and she slid her falafel and hummus platter to the side in order to rummage through the bag Andy had placed on the chair.
“Are you gonna eat that?” Douglas asked as he eyed Lily’s abandoned dish.
“Yes, I am ‘Mr. I just finished an entire lamb by myself!’”
“Ba-aaa-ah!” he replied.
“I’ll split my hummus with you Dougie. Do you want one of the presses?”
“I’m a nice Irish Catholic boy, pepper is as exotic as I get on anything I actually cook in my apartment.”
“And what do you actually cook in your apartment?” Lily asked as she quizzically examined a contraption that looked like a plastic weapon.
“Toast and Tea!” And he filched a wedge of pita from Andy’s plate and dipped it into her hummus.
“Never mind that, what’s the film tonight?” Andy asked between bites of her sandwich.
“This one!” Lily exclaimed, and she brandished a press that looked like a hammer.
“Garlic killer!” Douglas said in Lily’s direction. “It’s ‘Top Hat’ with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.”
“Oh goody!” Andy grinned, “I could use a romance after last time. Sorry Lily, but that gave me nightmares for a week!”
“Whatever!” Lily shrugged and grabbed her plate back from Douglas. “It’s one of Murnau’s greatest works, it set the genre, and all of the other vampire films are just rip-offs of Nosferatu; but if you want to see Ginger spinning with a bunch of feathers, then it’s your week, so knock yourself out!”
Douglas moved his hands up to shape them like claws and opened his mouth as if to bite Lily. She slapped his hands and continued the conversation.
“Speaking of romance, how’d your date with the gal from accounting go?”
“Not so good,” Andy winced. “Turns out Julie already has a girlfriend..”
Douglas and Lily grimaced.
“Sandy-“ Andy continued blithely, “who showed up at the cafe and promptly broke up with Julie.”
“Ouch!” Was the mutual response.
“Oh, but it gets better!’ Andy finished the last of her sandwich and started on the tabouleh. “After breaking up, they promptly got down to the ‘processing part’ of the conversation, which they weirdly felt I had to stick around for-in order to explain my ‘role’ in said break-up-a role which amounts to half of a bowl of soup with a woman who lied about being single. I’m sorry, but I refuse to process anything with a woman who I have not actually had an entire date with, much less a relationship! I am going to die alone with my twelve cats before the neighbors complain about the smell and the police break down the door to investigate.” Andy made a sad face.
“Don’t freak out sweetie,” Lily offered. “I think there’s a woman in my Greek sculpture class that is just right for you. She’s tall. She graduated from Bryn Mawr. She’s good at declined languages.”
“No, no more fix-ups! That woman who Doug introduced me to was the end of that!”
“Hey!” Douglas yelped, holding up his hands in defense. “Helen is just a forceful personality. She’s hot, she makes tons of money. She could have been your sugar-momma!”
“She lectured me over the entirety of dinner about how I was an idiot for not going to Stanford to study contract law and then shoved her tongue into my mouth during the cab ride to the theater. No thank you ‘Helen of Tax Law!’”
“Dating is not easy Andy. Trust me, I know, but you have to get out there and mingle or you’ll never find the woman of your dreams!” Douglas opined, and then added “The woman who will then have an incredibly hot gay brother, who will settle down with me, and we’ll marry in Vermont, and adopt a Jack Russell terrier-whom we shall name Bob.”
“She already found her dream woman and left her!” accused Lily.
“Lily!” Andy complained loudly. “Please don’t start with that. Who are you dating? What about that guy who took over your job at the gallery?”
“He’s already got a girlfriend. He’s already got three or four girlfriends, and I’m not interested in joining the crowd. Don’t try to avoid the issue. I know you still have a subscription to the magazine, I know you’re trying to get transferred to the fashion section, and I know you go by her building every single day just so you can see if her limo is outside waiting for her! You’re becoming a stalker. Stalking is scarier than twelve cats.”
“Nothing is scarier than twelve cats!” interjected Douglas.
Lily shot him a glare.
“Except not admitting that you’re still obsessed with your ex-boss!” he added.
“See, even Doug agrees. You have to do something to either get over her or to get her.
That’s it. We’re coming up with a plan!” Lily stated firmly.
“You’re wrong.” Andy countered. “I am not an obsessed stalker. It’s just that there are only so many kitchen gadgets that I can review before the readers and/or my editor figure out that I am not really a very good cook. Whatever I learned from Nate is barely covering the fraud that is my supposed expertise. And Robin Givhan won a Pulitzer Prize last year for her fashion criticism! It’s a legitimate industry and a perfectly reasonable column for me to move into once Cherie retires. They’re talking about buy-outs, and Cherie says she’ll take the package and move to Arizona.”
“And there’s no bloated and rotted bodies floating up in the river on that beat!” added Douglas.
“I told you to never mention that again! I just ate! Come on! Really!” Andy’s slapped her hand down on the table and her face was an expression of extreme disgust at the memory.
“And why do you go by her building all of the time? Are there just not enough Starbucks in Midtown Manhattan?”
“It’s the closest one to my gym and I prefer that subway stop, it’s less crowded.” Andy searched for the rest of her disappeared hummus.
“It’s a local, and your train is an express.”
“So, I change at 168th.”
“So you lie and you know it!”
“Dougie, help me, she’s being mean to me.” Andy pouted.
“I’m sorry panda-bear, but if you selfishly refuse to find me my husband, then I have to throw my vote with Lily. You’re officially a crazy stalker. Wouldn’t you rather just date that woman from Lily’s class?”
“No. I am not a stalker, and I am not going to date some random classicist just because she’s tall!”
“So ask the Dragon Lady out. What can she do to you? You already have a job and she can’t withdraw the recommendation now,” Lily offered.
“She’d just say no,” Andy admitted.
“And then you could move on and date an actual lesbian, instead of pining for a woman twice your age who is going through an ugly divorce-from a man-which is a pretty good indicator of her proclivities.”
“I used to live with a man, so that doesn’t mean that she doesn’t have feelings about other women.”
“You used to live with Nate because that’s the guy who hung around after you broke up with Annie, and he eventually hung around so much that he just moved in and you failed to notice it. You were not married to Nate. You would have married one of his grilled- cheese sandwiches before you would have married him. Nate was a rebound relationship that managed to drag out for three years.”
“Three extremely boring years,” Doug emphasized.
“Hey!” Andy complained. “Don’t pick on Nate!”
“I’m sorry, but his spiel on the evils of margarine was barely interesting the first time I heard it, and the sixth time it was excruciating!” Lily added.
“And then the butter-fat speech! Oh dear God, cats don’t care that much about butter!” Douglas said.
“Milkmaids don’t care that much about butter,” Lily smirked. “The point is that you need to take control of the situation instead of acting like a lunatic. The sooner you do something concrete, the sooner you’ll work it out of your system.”
“Oooooh! A plan. She’s gonna come up with a plan.” And Douglas clapped his hands gleefully.
“We’re all going come up with a plan, and Miranda Priestly is either going to admit she loves Andy…or take out a restraining order!” Lily ended.
Andy put her head down on the table.