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Then one starry night, the teenage couple were making out in the back seat of a car. They’d been together for six months, and she was convinced they would be together forever.
He pulled her in closer as his hand stroked her hair. “I love you,” he said.
It was the first time he’d ever said the words, and she was delirious with joy. And finally on the verge of proving her mother wrong. “Would you love me the same if I was flat-chested?” the girl said, secure that the boy’s answer would be yes. “Or if I had brown frizzy hair or was twenty pounds overweight?”
The boyfriend didn’t answer. Not right away, at least.
“Yeah,” he said after a few moments. “I mean, yeah. Of course. I’ll love you forever. I promise. No matter what you look like.”
A wave of relief swept over her. He loved her, and he’d love her no matter how much she weighed or what she looked like. He promised.
But she couldn’t quite make herself believe him. She couldn’t move past the fact that he had to take a moment to picture her twenty pounds overweight before he answered. It was the hesitation her mother had warned her about, and she couldn’t let go of it. Maybe her mother was right after all.
The relationship went rapidly downhill after that. The girl still loved the boy, and she was ninety percent sure he genuinely loved her back. But that ten percent of doubt came to define one hundred percent of the relationship. She questioned and tested and doubted the boyfriend until he couldn’t take it anymore.
And thus it was that their happily ever after turned into never forever within two months of that first “I love you... I mean, yeah. Of course. I’ll love you no matter what.”
The girl had no idea at the time that her first romance would become the prototype for all her romances to follow. As she moved through college and adulthood, she learned that to love a man was to doubt a man. To hear “I love you” was to hear a silent “but” at the end. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t make herself believe in the happy endings of her princess DVDs. Her teen and adult years had taught her that Snow White would never have gotten that life-renewing kiss if she’d been entombed without makeup. Prince Charming would have sent Cinderella straight back to the attic if she’d shown up to the ball wearing a dress designed by rats. And Rudolph would have flown off into the snowy sky alone, yelling, “Good luck guiding your own goddamned sleigh tonight, motherfucker!” when he realized Santa was a looksist prick who was only nice when there was something in it for him.
The girl was no longer a girl, and she no longer lived in a castle filled with fairy princesses and Prince Charmings. She was a grown woman who lived in the real world, and in the real world, a man would only love her if she was thin and pretty. She was so convinced of it that, anytime a man told her he loved her, she couldn’t make herself believe him. There was no way out of it, no hope for real love, because even if she found it, she’d have no faith in it.
CHAPTER 30
Ian
Clara had just invited me into her most sacred private world, sharing some of her deepest and most traumatic childhood memories. She’d told me about being abandoned by her father before she was even born, and about her mother watching the only man who ever loved her die. She’d told me about husband after husband coming and going, and about father after father loving and leaving. She told me about her fragile first love and her first crushing breakup.
And all I could think in return was:WereRudolph and Santa in some kind of relationship I don’t want to know about? Is there a second verse that never gets played on the radio?
“So do you understand why I say it’s me who ruins all the relationships?” she said.
“No,” I said. “I don’t. I mean, I get that your mom burned through a lot of father figures and that you witnessed a lot of unhealthy endings. But I still don’t understand what any of that has to do with you ruining relationships. And I really don’t understand where Rudolph fits in.”
“Where Rudolph fits in is that when Santa sees him for the first time, he comes right out and tells Mr. and Mrs. Donner that they’re bad people for producing such an ugly fuck of a son. Rudolph’s no different from the fairy princesses girls grow up watching. Have you seen a Disney movie lately? There are princesses of every race and culture and size and shape except one: ugly. Or even average, for that matter. I mean, is it any wonder that some of us grow up so pathologically insecure about our appearances that we think no one will ever love us if we’re not beautiful? From the day we’re born, women are taught that even Santa—Santa—will tell us to piss off if we’re not good-looking.”
I still wasn’t sure I was following. “Rudolph’s a boy.”
“This isn’t about Rudolph!” she said, getting frustrated with my stupidity. “It was just an analogy! God, I’m sorry I ever mentioned him. The point is, American folklore teaches girls the same thing my mother spent eighteen years teaching me: the only thing a man will ever love us for is our appearance. But then you get this other lesson, which is that if a man only loves you for your appearance, he doesn’t really love you. And you know what? I believed both lessons. Completely. It was a perfect catch 22.”
At last, I was starting to understand what she was trying to tell me. I was also finally starting to understand a question from an eleventh-grade English test that I’d gotten zero out of ten points for.
In a hundred words or less, define a catch 22 and provide an example.
Original answer, courtesy of Ian Dunning, sixteen:A catch 22 is a fish found off the coast of Nova Scotia. An example is a carp.
Actual answer, courtesy of Clara Zapata, late twenties:A catch 22 is a dilemma in which two pieces of logic that are mutually dependent upon one another also contradict each other. An example is a woman who believes that the only thing a man could love her for is her looks, while also believing that if a man only loves her for her looks, he doesn’t really love her.
“I think I get it,” I said.
“Really?” she said. “You’re not just saying that so I won’t drag Herbie and Yukon into the conversation?”
“No,” I said. “Really. I understand.”
She picked at her fingernail, seeming deep in thought. “When I look back now at Jack and Braden and Will, I can see that they were good guys who actually loved me. But I scared them away with my own stupid insecurity.”
The more she talked, the better I understood. I understood so well it hurt. Clara Zapata was the female Ian Dunning. Looks were to her what money was to me: the only thing anyone would ever love us for. It was about the most depressing moment of my adult life.
“Do you want to hear something funny?” she said.
