At the mercy of Fuckmistress

Last night I went to a swanky (yes, swanky) baby shower in Roxbury (yes, Roxbury). It was for a couple who could not possibly get any more cosmopolitan. It was in a brownstone apartment with exposed brick walls and pottery barn colors and fabulous amazing furniture and chic cosmo women. It was great fun, and just what I needed to help pop me out of my recent struggle with ennui.

I shaved my legs, wore a dress and put barrettes in my hair and went to this event looking forward to standing in a poised manner, perhaps one hip just in front of the other, holding a glass of wine and discussing chic cosmopolitan topics with other sassy women. This is, after all, a very cool singlewoman thing to do, and it's exactly what I wanted to feel, given that I've spent a little too much time feeling sorry for my singleness and lost loves.

I make a grand entrance, of course, and one sweep of the room confirms that I will indeed be in the company of fabulous women wearing stylish summer dresses, holding wine, hips slightly jutting, laughing wittily at each other's commentary. Funky jazz. White Christmas lights in tree-plants. A table full of gorgeous appetizers.

And Fuckmistress.

If it had been a record and not a cd, the needle would have scratched across it. She was standing in the corner by the wine table. When we made eye contact I think my smile wavered. I don't think she noticed.

Now, Fuckmistress has been pretty strange lately. I sent her a note last March because she was acting all weird around me. Is it my fault she swooped in and won the attention of Fuckwit, my then-object-of-affection? No. But for some bizarre reason we always ended up taking the elevator at the same time, which forced us to endure an awkward silence or petty small talk. Either way, when the elevator doors opened, she would always, without fail, RUN out the doors. You’d think she was a race horse injected with steroids. It happened so many times that as soon as I got into the elevator with her I began to hope that this would be the time that she tripped over her feet on the way out and would end up in a heap on the lobby floor. I smiled sweetly at her the whole time, of course.

Anyway, this aggression was all in my head and I was nothing but sweet towards her. But she was so awkward around me that I felt like I needed to confront her about it because this office is too small to feel uncomfortable around someone I see all the time. So I emailed her about it and I came to understand that she felt like I knew too much about she and Fuckwit, and it put her on edge. Our little email exchange cleared the air. Apparently the air between us was so squeaky clean that she seemed to think we became best friends.

Anyway, just yesterday she told me that she was feeling much better than she was last spring. And when I ended up talking to her last night, she told me the same thing. I have no idea what this means, though I imagine she's made some sort of huge life decision regarding Fuckwit and now she's got some peace. Whatever. I really don't care deep down inside, but there's part of me that just is so DONE with the whole scene and I really don't want it in my face anymore.

So of course I go pour myself some wine, and of course I end up next to her and of course she starts talking to me because, of course, we are best friends. And while she's talking I grow agitated. I start to think about this woman's life and how she did so little to "win" the affection of the man I was so in love with at the time. While she droned on about her new yoga class I pictured what she must feel like now that she's got an affair to keep her entertained, that she can spend her nights imagining Fuckwit doing this and that to her, that she must feel so alive when he does that so and so thing to her, that she must love when they gaze all star-crossed loverly into each other's eyes and yadda yadda -- all the things that I used to fantasize about him. And now they are hers to fantasize about, not mine. And I really started to dislike her for it, for the first time since "Fuckmistress" forced herself into my world.

I decided on the spot that I didn't HAVE to be nice to her. That all this time I've been a big person about it, all full of grace and shit, but that I really don't have to extend myself into this sort of best friendship with her. It was sort of liberating, standing there nodding at her, smiling through sentence after sentence about her daughter, knowing that at any minute I was perfectly justified in telling her to roll up her yoga mat and shove it up her ass, and then walk away.

So I contemplated what life was going to be like for me now that I didn't have to be nice to people who, well, SUCK. And I imagined giving her the cold shoulder. It was fun.

Well, the party goes on and I manage to get away from her and it's the end of the night and I'm standing in a circle of chic women and lean against the table with the desserts on it and put my ass right in a pile of blueberry tart.

So now I am standing in a circle of chic women with blueberry tart on my ass.

Who notices? Who doesn't skip a beat and pulls a tissue from up her sleeve, turns me around by the arm, and starts to make swift swiping motions up and down my behind?

Yep.

Fuckmistress.

Fuckmistress was wiping my ass.

I realized that it's not that easy to not be nice to someone after they've wiped your ass.

But then again, it's also a bit of poetic justice now that I can call her an ass-wiping Fuckmistress.