Hedge Fund Wives

Feeling the tender spot around my eye, I uttered, ‘Are you serious?’

‘Yeah. I would have tried to protect you, but it happened too fast.’

‘Do you know why I shoved her? I mean it’s not exactly like me to engage in bar brawls.’

I heard John shuffling some papers, the sound of a drawer opening, and I knew there was something he wasn’t telling me. He always went into organizational mode when he was holding something back. It was his tell.

‘Spill,’ I said.

‘The girl who hit you…’ He paused, weighing his options.

‘Yes?’

‘She told you to put your girdle back on.’

‘Spanx. Girdles are for grandmothers. There’s a difference.’

‘I’m just repeating what the girl said. Can we not get lost in semantics, please?’

‘Alright, why were my Spanx off ?’

‘You tell me. You’re the one who took them off.’

‘Did I take them off…in public, in front of other people?’

‘Yes,’ he said.

Oh fuck.

‘You took off your stockings, too,’ he added, unbidden.

Doublefuck.

‘But I wasn’t wearing any underwear!’ The dress I’d worn was a little (okay, a lot) on the short side. Everyone in that club must have gotten an eyeful of my Britney Spears. For a moment everything went dark, and I had to move a pillow under my head.

‘Everyone must think I’m a lunatic. Why didn’t you stop me?’

‘Marcy,’ he sighed. ‘Of course I tried to stop you. But you wouldn’t listen.’

‘Did I slur?’ It was a masochistic question, but I needed to know everything.

‘There was slurring, drooling, stumbling, spilling, nudity, and fighting. Shall I continue or was that enough?’

‘John, help me out. I’m mortified!’

‘Well then that makes two of us,’ he said, and I realized that as stupid as I felt, John must have felt ten times more embarrassed. After all, I didn’t ever have to face these people again if I didn’t want to, but John had no choice; he worked with them every day.

I cleared my throat. ‘I’m sorry, honey. I know what a big deal it was to you that I make a good impression,’ I said.

‘Actually you sort of did,’ he grumbled. ‘Peter thought you were hilarious and Ainsley felt so bad after that girl decked you. They want us to all have dinner after New Year’s. Go figure.’

I’d rather let John control the TV remote for the next five years than have to go to dinner with the socialite and her husband.

I groaned dramatically.

‘Marcy, we aren’t in Chicago anymore. New York works differently. Deals aren’t made in conference rooms, but over cocktails and dinner tables. Zenith rewards rainmakers, the guys who are good at reeling in potential new investors. If I could do that, I could be pulling in much bigger bucks.’

‘But, John, we have plenty of money.’

‘My portfolio has outperformed all the partners’ expectations, and I’ve been rewarded for that, but I’m never going to move up the ladder if I don’t start bringing in new capital. And to bring in new money, we need to be out there meeting the people who have it.’

‘You want to rub shoulders with rich people. I don’t understand how this requires my involvement.’

‘I’d like for you to get us invited to more parties like the Partridge’s. Last night I met a Venezuelan banking scion and an Ecuadorian flower exporter. They want to set up a dinner and talk about Zenith’s investment returns. And why? Because they saw us with the Partridges and figure we’re connected. Marcy, despite, or maybe because of the crap you pulled last night, people here love you. You had tons of friends in Chicago. I know that if you set your mind to it you could get us invited to the right parties and fundraisers.’

‘John, you know I’m not big on schmooze fests. Can’t you just go out without me?’ I gulped down the glass of water on his bedside table since mine was already empty. My headache was getting worse by the second.

‘It looks bad for a guy to be at parties on his own. People will think I’m trolling for chicks.’

I spit my water back into the glass. ‘Say what?’

‘My point is that I want you with me. All you have to do is be your normal, charming, and hopefully not inebriated self, and I’ll do all the real work. We might have to throw a few dinner parties when our apartment is ready, but otherwise your actual input is minimal.’

‘I don’t know, John. I thought we agreed that we were going to focus on getting pregnant again. What I want is a baby, for us to be on diaper-duty, not schmooze-control every night of the week. That’s not at all how I pictured our lives here.’

‘So you’re telling me that you have no interest in making friends and having fun? Because basically that’s what I’m asking you to do. And I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to get pregnant again before you have a chance to form a social network. God forbid if anything happens next time, you’ll at least have some friends to lean upon for support.’

‘I’d rather lean on barbed wire than any of the wives I’ve met.’ I snorted.

He sighed with exasperation.

‘John, one woman wouldn’t shake my hand, another snubbed me because I don’t have an interior decorator, and just last night someone sneered at me because she didn’t like my dress.’

‘They can’t all be that bad.’

‘There are two nice ones,’ I confessed.

‘I know you miss Chicago, but it’s time you start trying a little harder to settle in.’

‘Umm, need I remind you of what happens when I attempt to settle in? I get blind drunk and moon people.’

‘How about you try skipping the tequila next time?’

‘Sober socializing? No, thanks. My couch is way too comfy,’ I joked.

‘You owe me after last night,’ he said, in a tone that suggested I not attempt to breathe any more levity into the conversation.

In the spirit of moving forward, I decided to make a concession. Also because I felt really guilty about having made such a total idiot of myself in, of all places, the Rose Bar in the Gramercy Park Hotel. It was the hot spot in New York; on any given night it was filled to capacity with the city’s most influential editors, wealthiest power brokers, and hottest model-actress-socialite-whatevers (the new ubiquitous hyphenate). If it were up to me I’d never set foot in there again, but if I ever wanted to get the baby I’d dreamed of having, it sounded like I had to.