Every Boy's Got One

me out of my column, otherwise. DON’T TELL Holly. She still thinks the only people who know what we’re really doing are the four of us.

And of course the entire art department at the New York Journal . But she doesn’t know that I know that.

Mark

PS Quit writing to me. I’m turning this thing off.

___________________________________________

To: Mark Levine <[email protected]>

Fr: Cal Langdon <[email protected]>

Re: You Dog

Your secret’s safe with me.

But seriously. Is this girl one of those cat people? For the love of God please tell me I’m not going to be stuck in a middle seat in coach next to one of those cat people. She doesn’t carry around pictures of it in her wallet, does she? Her cat? Because I will suffer an aneurysm midair if that’s the case—

AT THIS TIME THE CAPTAIN HAS REQUESTED THAT ALL ELECTRONIC DEVICES BE TURNED OFF AND STOWED AWAY UNTIL WE HAVE REACHED CRUISING ALTITUDE

Notes Holly and Jane

What do you think of him?

Oh my God, Holly. What is this, the ninth grade? You’re passing me notes? On the PLANE????

Well, how else am I supposed to talk to you with the stupid food cart in the way? And they won’t let us turn on our Blackberries. Come on, hurry up, while he’s asleep. What do you think of him?

He’s not really asleep. He’s just faking it so he won’t have to talk to me. I know because he’s still playing armrest war with me. Every time I put my elbow on the armrest, he puts his there, too, to block mine.

You don’t like him?

Holly, he’s never heard of Wondercat!!!!

Janie, he’s been doing foreign correspondence for the past ten years. They don’t get family papers like the ones that run Wondercat in places like Kabul.

But you said he moved back to the US a couple of weeks ago—

And you think he should have spent those weeks catching up on YOUR comic, as opposed to, I don’t know, FINDING A PLACE TO LIVE???

Well. He also made fun of me for bringing so many bottles of water on board.

You do have kind of a lot.

Excuse me. Nine out of ten people found dead after getting lost in the desert actually have water left in their canteens, they were just so concerned about conserving it, they didn’t drink enough of it to survive. It’s true. I saw it on the Discovery Channel.

Okay, okay. But what do you think of him???? Do you like him? He’s cute, right? I told you he was cute.

He seems very… smart.

The Blackberry thing. I knew it. I told Mark to tell him to put that thing away. I know nothing freaks you out more than guys who are smarter than you.

I can’t believe you just wrote that. First of all, it’s not even true, and second of all, in no way is Cal smarter than me. I mean, yes, he has traveled all over the world covering news stories about grisly wars and Ebola outbreaks and has written a book and stuff, but that does not mean he is smarter than I am. I mean, can he draw a cat?

Besides which, I happen to like smart men.

Right. Like Malcolm.

Oh, that’s low, even for you. I will have you know that Malcolm can do a 360-degree spin in midair and not lose his board.

You have got to stop dating snowboarders and musicians, Jane. You’re 30 years old now. You’ve got to start thinking about the future, and date people who will actually stick around for a change, instead of going off to their next X-Game or gig.

Maybe I don’t WANT a boyfriend who sticks around. Have you ever thought about that?

Then why did you cry so much those first couple weeks after Malcolm moved out?

I just felt bad for The Dude. You know they’d bonded.

Yeah, well, there’s that, too. The Dude needs some stability in his life. He might not bite people as much if he had a positive male role model in his life. The same could be said of you. Plus, financially, you’d be much better off with a partner who actually has steady employment. As a freelancer, you are paying a premium for health insurance. If you married a guy who had his own insurance— through, say, the paper—that’d be a big chunk of change saved. Plus you’d have security. And a 401K.

This is pretty funny coming from a woman who once spent an entire month’s rent money on a pair of purple leather pants.

Hello. Can we talk about things that happened in this millennium, please?

Fine. You know what? It’s very unfair of you to throw all that stuff about 401Ks and all of that into my face, when you know perfectly well that I HAD all that when I was dating DAVE, and you saw how THAT turned out.