The List

“I’d have to say… All of the Chrises – Pine, Hemsworth, Evans, Pratt – and Seth Meyers.”

“Seth Meyers? Are you kidding me?” I hush-howled at her. “Are we actually doing this, like, as an exercise? And SETH MEYERS?!”

“Ogh mah goh, yuz!” Megan sputtered, barely holding in her java chips. “He’s hot! And hilarious! They all are. I told you mine. Now you tell me yours! Who,” she asked, pausing momentarily to lick the whipped cream from her green plastic straw, “would be on your list? Like, no embarrassment, don’t hold back. Who would you pick?” She pointed her now-clean straw at my nose. 

My grin reached both my ears. “Oh, my god!” I groaned conspiratorially, dropping my head into my palm. I spotted two separate hipsters look up from their silver MacBooks and give us the stink eye. “Jesus, keep your voice down. We’re in a public place!” 

“Okay, I’m sorry. But this is, I swear, the best way to get to know people. Unclench – don’t be so uptight, girl! Who, who who?” she whisper-yelled, her question implying multiple question marks – one for every other name on my hypothetical “hall pass” list of celebrity sexual partners.

“Well, like Ross, I really need to think about this.”

“Do you have a laminated card in your handbag?” Megan snorted into her quarter-full Frappuccino cup.

“No, I do not, thank-you-very-much,” I shot back with a giggle. “But seeing as you only get five choices, you really have to consider who’s, you know, worth it. This smoke show isn’t for everybody, ya know.” I ran the backs of my hands down my middle and wriggled side to side in my chair. 

We were having our own comedy show, saying whatever came to mind to one-up the other. Bohemian Woman #1 cleared her throat and I shrunk in my seat.

“Maybe this is our cue to leave,” I said, lowering my voice again. 

“Nah, these people get what they get. If they wanted peace and quiet, they should have gone to the library! We’re fine,” she said with an air of total assurance.

“Ha. Well, okay, let me think… I’d have to say, I’d take a Chris… Probably Hemsworth or Evans, and –“

“Nope, nope, nope,” she cut me off brandishing her long-nailed index finger in my face. “Definitive answers only, please. You have to choose one. Which Chris do you want?”

“Christ, okay. Um, Evans. Seems like there’s less family drama there.”

“Well you’re sleeping with him, not marrying him, so who gives a shit?” Megan laughed at her own joke. 

“Good point, but I’m sticking with my choice!” I stopped to drain the rest of my long-cold latte from the white paper cup. “Okay, Evans, that’s one. And then maybe Ryan Reynolds –“

“Oooooo, super hot. Good choice.”

“I may be uptight, but I make good choices,” I jested back. “Okay, so Evans, Reynolds, and who’s that other Canadian hottie that was in all those movies with Emma Stone and hooked up with Eva Mendez?”

“OH. YES. Ryan Gosling! Another fantastic choice!”

“Yes, well,” I said, giving my best Drag Race eye roll and high society hand flick. “And the last two I know without needing to think about it: Chris Hayes and Rachel Maddow.”

Megan stopped rooting in her cup for chocolate chunks and arched an eyebrow that would make a Kardashian proud. “Wait, who are Chris Hayers and Rachel Maddow?” she asked quizzically. 

“They’re TV news journalists on MSNBC. And Rachel is a woman, if you hadn’t guessed. And openly gay! So she’d totally go for it if we ever met.”

Megan looked at me for a beat and then burst out with a low-pitched laugh from deep in her belly. “You want to fuck news anchors?! And you gave me a hard time about Seth Meyers?!” she cackled. “You’re out of your mind. And that’s fucking hilarious!”

“They’re my TV boyfriend and girlfriend!” I replied, grasping at my side trying to get my breath back. “Are you done yet? These people absolutely hate us.”

“Almost,” she said as she wiped tears from her eyes. “Oh, my god. These are the best answers I’ve ever heard! News anchors, for Christ’s sake! Don’t worry, your should-be-embarrassing secret is safe with me! My lips are sealed.”

“I mean, I don’t think it needs to be a tightly guarded secret,” I replied, having caught my breath. Then, as an aside, I said, “And Chris Evans has a gay brother, so I’m totally confident he would appreciate my open-mindedness and my decision to include out-and-proud lesbian on my list! Albeit a woman who is very open about her long-term relationship, but still. Nonetheless!” I said, my own pointer finger jabbing the air. Once again, we broke into hysterics. 

“Oh-kay,” I said as I struggled for breath. “My turn to ask a question. What’s your biggest fear?”

“Ugh, that’s deep. Let’s see… Well, my body is starting to fail me now that I’m in my 30s, so I guess I’d have to say getting older?”

“Oh, Lord!” I smacked my open palm to my forehead. “You are not old! We’re, like, almost the same age!”

“Yeah, but my pussy is drying out on me and I don’t get wet like I used to!” she yell-whispered. “The other night, I was lying in bed, masturbating, and it was, like, rubbing a dry bean between my labia!” She wheezed on, “I still came, but I was not juicy-20s-Megan! So a dry pussy and chronic heartburn. I think I’m on the verge of menopause!” 

By this time, we were causing a scene and anyone within a two-mile radius could have heard us bleating like a couple of hyenas. 

“What about you? What’s your biggest fear?”

I should stop telling this story and mention that despite what it might look like as you’re reading this, I didn’t know Megan well. I met her a week before when she hired me from a local Facebook group to babysit her kids. Me, an American girl living in South Korea teaching English. Her, an American military woman living on an Army base across town. I felt so drawn to her – like I’d found a little home away from home – but it seemed a bit too forward to admit any of that. I was enjoying this bananas conversation we were having and didn’t want to come off as a completely clingy nut job. I had a feeling I’d met a forever friend, but you can’t say that shit to people the first time you meet them. So I tried to play it cool while I auditioned her for a role she didn’t know she was trying out for.

“I’ll agree with you on the heartburn!” I dabbed my own eyes, making sure I didn’t flatten the work of my curl-sculpting mascara. “But for real, I’d say – how honest are we being here?” I chuckle a little bit, but I’m also serious. 

She sobered up for a second, pulling her eyes away from the last of the whipped mess in her cup. “Girl, there is nothing you can tell me that would scare me or make me dislike you. I work for the army and I’ve seen and met and worked with some shitty people. Hell, my family are shitty people. You can be as honest as you want.”

My tongue suddenly felt huge in my skull. “Well, I mean not to get too deep, but I guess I worry I’ll never amount to much. I don’t mean that, like, I’m not going to be famous someday or something like that because that’s stupid. I just mean… I don’t know that I ever want to get married, and I don’t need anyone to take care of me, but I guess I want someone to want to take care of me, you know?”

“Totally get that. And totally see that for you,” she said honestly. “Jesus, that got deep real quick!” she quipped with a smirk. “My turn again. What’s the most embarrassing thing that’s ever happened to you?”

“Oh, I can answer that with zero hesitation. Peeing in my pants at a youth group retreat when I was like twelve, in eighth grade. I had these sky blue, glitter-covered, lycra dance pants I bought from a clubbing store at the mall – do you remember Wet Seal?”

“Oh my god, I totally do! Absolute trash clothes in there!”

“Well, yes, But I was twelve and sheltered and had no idea. So bought them because they were like twenty bucks and wore them for a skit at a weekend retreat. I should also mention that I had issues all throughout my childhood with laughing so hard I would routinely pee in my pants. And I definitely did that night and it was… obvious,” I said between laughs. Megan was waving her hand at an imaginary bug as if to tell me to stop, but I went on.

“Basically, I walked out of the skit with my chair clutched to my ass because my pants were wet, my chair was damp, and I – I cou- – I couldn’t stop laughing! It was so embarrassing, but anyone really judging me for it! It was a funny skit! I played a skanky girl that got pregnant!”

By this time, Megan had stopped breathing again and was wheezing with laughter. “And do you still have this pee problem?” she gasped. 

“The last time was my senior year of high school, I promise,” I laughed. “At least I think it was!”

“Hoo!” she cried, emulating a deeply spiritual woman in a Pentecostal church. As she wiped at her eyes again, she said, “Oh my god. I haven’t laughed this hard in ages. I don’t think I have any stories to top that one.” 

Megan glanced at her phone and her eyes got wide. “Oh, shit. I told Lance we’d be back to the apartment like ten minutes ago. Are you ready?”

We picked up our purses – hers an enormous behemoth of a thing – and finally walked out to the parking lot, trying to stifle our laughter. I mumbled a half-hearted “sorry” to the yuppie girl who’d tried shooting laser beams at us from her eyes as we passed her on the way to the door. 

I knew something was happening – that this woman I’d met and thought I’d had nothing in common with (and on the surface, maybe I didn’t) was going to be some kind of a lighthouse for me – pulling me back to her until one of us died, may we rest in peace. I knew like that old woman knew about supermarket melons in When Harry Met Sally.

We walked toward her car. “You hungry?” she asked after she caught her breath again. 

“I could eat. I mean, I can always eat,” I said, trying not to sound too eager. 

“Okay, cool. We can eat at home. I’ll cook or we can order something in. Anything specific you want or that you can’t get in your Korean grocery stores?”

“You may as well have just proposed marriage to me. You’ll never be rid of me now that you’ve offered to hook me up!” I laughed, but I was also dead serious. I was down to the last dregs of the small bottle of Frank’s Red Hot I’d brought from home and would consider selling a kidney for a sandwich.

“This is going to sound so random, but is there any chance we can do Mac and cheese? Even just as a side,” I said. “I’ve been craving it for a few weeks and if I want it, I’m going to have to figure out how to make it the old-fashioned way, which I am not particularly keen to do,” I said with sincerity. 

“Oh, we can totally make that happen! Why don’t you call that news anchor guy and invite him?!” She cackled at her own pathetic joke. 

“I doubt he’ll take my calls or fly halfway across the world for a date with a woman who isn’t his wife and only has Mac and cheese to offer! But it’s a nice idea!”

We climbed into the tan Hyundai Tuscon and she threw her Mary Poppins bag into the bench seat behind us. As we drove out of the parking lot, I loved the moment I found myself in – completely sure I’d found the friend of a lifetime.