The Hazards of Hunting While Heartbroken by Mari Passananti Page A

chariot,” he jokes, as he holds the door. He’s so engaging, and gorgeous, that his hokey humor doesn’t bother me at all. I slide into the back seat. “Where to?”
    In a moment of insanity, I blurt Angela’s address. I do this because Oscar seems so perfect. I want to remove the temptation to invite him upstairs and ruin the chance of something bigger, for one night of fun.
    “You heard the lady,” he says, and raises the privacy screen. He drapes his arm around me and before I fully process what’s happening, we’re kissing in the back of his limousine. It sure doesn’t feel like he’s out of practice. His hand rests on my knee before sliding up my inner thigh, and while the voice in my head is shrieking at me to push him away, my body over-rules it and I feel my legs open a little as he pulls his mouth away from mine to kiss my earlobes and neck. He pushes one of my spaghetti straps off my shoulder and his mouth moves down to my collarbone. The hand that’s not on my thigh moves up my waist.
    Fortunately we arrive at Angela’s before my resolve crumbles completely. He walks me to the entrance and plants what feels a lot more like a third date kiss than a first date one on me. Angela’s doorman, who has known me for three years, pretends to ignore the show and admits me without comment. I linger in her lobby until the black car disappears from view, then step back outside and hail myself a taxi. The doorman looks at me quizzically but shrugs, and within minutes I’m on my way home.



FIVE
    I am so hung over I want to die. I am mortified that my brain, which feels so swollen it could burst through my skull, cannot recall the entire conversation from last night. My memory gap starts around the time the second bottle of wine arrived. I have no idea what we talked about after dinner, but at least I know for sure there was no conversation in the car. It’s becoming more and more clear to me that I missed most of the decade wherein I was supposed to be learning the ropes of Manhattan dating protocol because I was with Brendan. Still, I’m pretty sure that drinking enough to lose parts of a first date can make the possibility of a second date somewhat remote. I hope I didn’t make a fool of myself.
    Both fortunately and unfortunately, my head hurts too much to obsess about how much I screwed up. I can kick myself later, after I guzzle a few liters of water and the Advil kicks in. I briefly fantasized about calling in sick when the alarm went off this morning, but I have three client meetings today. Besides, staying home wouldn’t buy me a day of rest. Carol has her assistant call sick employees at various intervals throughout the day, to make sure they’re home. She claims to have some “pressing work question,” but it’s always something that could wait. I make a mental note to cancel my landline, toss back as much water as I can stomach, and haul myself to the shower.
    The subway ride is fifteen minutes of pure hell. My head feels like it’s in a vice and someone’s breakfast smells of onions. I make it to the office by ten after nine, and brace myself for the barrage of questions about my date with the mystery admirer from across the way.
    I head straight for the kitchen, where I run into Marvin, who looks too traumatized to remember to ask about my love life. He’s frantic, red-eyed, and generally looks like he’s stuck his fingers into an electrical socket. “Someone stole our coffee maker!” he finally manages to splutter.
    I don’t immediately register what he’s saying so he elaborates. “It was there last night, and now it’s gone. I’m going to Starbucks. Do you want anything?”
    I ask him to bring me the biggest coffee he can carry.
    Carol struts off the elevator before Marvin can make it out the door. “Good morning, people!” she trills.
    She sounds happy. Friday mornings she does yoga. It normally tempers her mood swings for an hour or two. She steers Marvin back towards the