Marrying Up
by Jackie Rose

Excerpt from Chapter 1

The Day I Died

It would probably go something like this:

Hastings, Holly. 1975-2060. Passed away of chronic liver disease on Friday, December 31, 2060, alone again on New Year's Eve, since she didn't have a date, and hadn't in many, many years. She was 85.

Miss Hastings, was born in Buffalo, the fourth child and only daughter of the late Louise McGillivray Hastings, a bookkeeper, and the late Lawrence Hastings, a schoolteacher, both also of Buffalo.

After completing a three-year degree in Journalism and Professional Writing in slightly more than five years at Erie County College,Miss Hastings took a job at this newspaper, which she believed would be an important stepping stone in her fabulous career as a writer. The single Miss Hastings quickly found her place among the many talentless hacks at the Buffalo Bugle, penning obituaries and taking classified ads for more than fifty years, until her forced retirement in 2052.

During college, Miss Hastings took up social drinking, which eventually evolved into full-blown alcoholism after a string of failed relationships. Due to her inability to write the Great American Novel, or even a Not So Great One,the mateless Miss Hastings never left the Bugle, as she had planned. In fact, she never left the Buffalo-Niagara Region. Hell, during the last five years of her life, she never even left her house!

Miss Hastings leaves behind nobody — not even a cat. The bulk of her meager estate will be divided among her many creditors, and her body will be donated to medical science,unless somebody claims it before noon tomorrow.

Well, that wasn't so bad, really. I've almost certainly — no, make that definitely — come across worse lives, written lamer obits for real, actual people. Haven't I?

Hmmm…

Okay, so even if I haven't, technically speaking, there's no cause for alarm just yet. The whole point of the exercise is to imagine the way things might turn out,you know,if everything stays the same. To see where my life is heading, worstcase scenario. But even if it all comes true, so what? Cats, after all, are pretty crappy compared to dogs, so if ever there were a pet not to have… And let's not underestimate the ultimate satisfaction of sticking it to the credit-card companies from beyond the grave.

I print my final draft, fold it up until it's a tiny little square and shove it way down into the bottom of my bag.

Okay, Holly. Back to work. No need to feel sorry for yourself. Despite the fact that I hardly have a thing to do except sit around and wait for someone to call,I try to keep busy.I hone my pitch for a story about the Buffalo fashion scene (don't laugh — we can't all live in New York or London or Paris, no matter how much we might like to, but that doesn't mean the rest of us are oblivious to life's finer things) and colorcode my files until at last the phone rings. Will it be a trumpet seller? A passport found? A grieving relative? My boss, Cy, telling me he finally needs my feature, A.S.A.P?

"Holly Hastings," I say into the receiver.

"Um, hi." A woman's voice. Very shrill. "I want to place an ad. In the personals."

"All right," I sigh."Go ahead."

"Okay. It's for the 'Women Seeking Men' section." Of course it is."Yup. Go ahead."

"Will you tell me if you think this is okay?"

"Sure." Poor thing. I knew she didn't have a chance, and I hadn't even heard it yet.

"Okay," she exhales purposefully. "This is what I have. "Cuddly thirty-five-year-old princess seeks knight in shining armor.I love babies,four-star restaurants and international travel. You're a gorgeous, tall, marriage-minded physician or lawyer,between thirty-three and forty.I'm five foot one,have brown hair and brown eyes."

"Oh, that's perfect," I say, taking it down.

"You think?"

"Definitely."

"Oh my God! I can't believe I'm doing this!" she shrieks.

"I'm so excited! Can you get it in for tomorrow morning? Before tomorrow night, I mean? Can you? I have an extra ticket to The Vagina Monologues at Shea's!"

"Sure thing."

"Great!"

I take the details and hang up.

Women Seeking Men. As if. Had she ever taken the time to actually read our little rag, she might have noticed that for every ten women seeking men via the services of the Buffalo Bugle there is only one man seeking woman.

It is all just so sad. Sad and funny. Sad that she dares to believe Dr. Right will call her by tomorrow night to begin with. Funny that she thinks a show about female sexuality and the c-word will make suitable first-date entertainment anyway. And sad again that The Vagina Monologues is not just a theatrical experience, but also a fairly accurate way to describe so many of our sex lives. Because only the rare, the proud, the few can claim to be involved in any coed, longterm, mutually respectful…er…dialogue.

And that's okay.

Just because it's sad doesn't mean it has to ruin your life. You see, some women wallow in singlehood the way pigs wallow in shit. But that's just not me. There's no shortage of far worthier sources of anxiety and self-reproach,like bioterrorism and ozone depletion and flat-chestedness. I also find obvious desperation of any kind profoundly futile, since I know that men — even the most uninformed,unenlightened, uninspired of them — unerringly pick up on that scent a mile away. In theory, therefore, there's no point in being miserable simply because one happens to be flying solo, while broadcasting your panic at the thought of it will simply ensure that things stay that way.

So even though the prospect of dying alone and poor and completely catless might faze some, I will probably handle it quite well; as a person who's experienced near-epic singlehood, I don't even know what it's like to be in a meaningful relationship, save for one long-term mistake and a few flings here and there, all of which ended in varying degrees of disaster and confusion. Truthfully,it has never really bothered me before. I've always trusted that fate will bring me together with the man I'm designed for,some day,some way.

Until now, I suppose.

I reach back down into the bottom of my bag and feel around for the little square of paper. For the first time ever, as I reread my pitiful obituary, twinges of doubt make inroads into the romantic certainty that has served me so well for so long.

What if he never comes? What if he doesn't exist? What if we never meet, and just pass each other by in the street over and over again until we marry the wrong people, divorce, grow old, get senile and die? More likely still, what if I screw it all up when we finally do find each other, and all that lonely, crazy, catless stuff really, truly happens?