The Ex-Mrs. Hedgefund by Jill Kargman Page B

forecasted downturns that we were headed for Bearland from Bull, there was no sign of humility or fear or slowing down for these hedgie boys. I only hoped that the world in which Tim rolled, especially given his friendship with assholic Mark, wouldn’t be a bad influence.

7
    â€œMy husband and I were happy for twenty-five years . . . then we met.”
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    A few weeks later, a production assistant from Law & Order finally called regarding my small-screen debut, but my excitement would have to be on hold, as they wouldn’t shoot my glamorous rigor mortis self for almost a year. As winter’s chill started to thaw, Miles and I took a fun trip to Disney World over April break while Tim was at a management directors conference in Duluth. It was something I’d sworn I’d never do, but it was actually fun. I’d never felt so thin. Everywhere I looked people were eating fried cotton candy. Like regular ol’ cotton candy was too healthy. They would dunk the pink plumes into vats of boiling oil, then dredge it out with tongs: hot fried sugar. Only in America. You could almost hear the people getting fatter.
    When we came home from our vacation, Miles started extended sports after school—two hours longer than the former school day. I had such a lump in my throat watching him board the bus at 7:55 a.m., knowing that I wouldn’t see him again until 5:00 p.m., and I needed wild horses to not be a loser mom who runs to the window and puts my hand on his tiny paw through the glass. I was going to be on my own now more than ever. It would be a season of working out, eating right, and feeling good. It was going to be a spring of Me Time.
    I blithely lied to Tim about my whereabouts whenever I wanted to see Kiki, which was every week. It was actually getting easier and easier to lie to him because he was traveling so much. When he’d check in on the phone, we’d talk mostly about Miles’s cute comments about school or how Tim’s meetings went, or which errands I’d run. So when he was in Chicago for two days, it was perfect timing for me to help Kiki move in to her brand-new loft in TriBeCa and get settled.
    She’d decided to swap her temporary uptown digs for a hipper new space, the physical move echoing her mental turning of a corner, the crisp white paint like a big, open, three-thousand-square-foot clean slate. It was younger, fresher, and far away from what she called “the reversible name, roman numeral set” uptown.
    â€œThose fucking gray flannel drones on the Upper East Side, I won’t miss those,” she said, raising her glass at Bubby’s after we’d unpacked the last of her gazillion boxes. “Stiff everywhere except their cocks.”
    I almost spat out my cheese grits (a last-hurrah pre-diet) but contained myself, looking both ways for eavesdroppers to her comments. “It’s like Kim Cattrall said on Sex and the City ,” she continued. “ ‘The higher the roman numeral after their name, the worse they are in bed.’ ”
    â€œNice, Keeks,” I said, semihorrified by a potential septuagenarian listener nearby. Kiki seemed to have a microphone implanted in her larynx. And while I loved her brashness, quiet lunches were kind of impossible.
    â€œHey, what time does Miles come home today? Why don’t you come with me to Williamsburg? I’m looking at this Tauba Auerbach drawing for the living room at Pierogi Gallery. Will you come with? Pleeeease?” She begged like a seven-year-old wanting ice cream, her blue eyes yearning and her beautiful face tilted to the side. I could often see why men fell at her feet when she switched on the charm and went from vixen PR viper to innocent pouty pretty girl; they were snowed by her confidence and power but then loved that she played the vulnerable beauty card for them.
    I looked at my watch. I had three hours. “I can come, but . . . how will I get