The Perfect Man

Hayley adjusted the too tight dress she was wearing and tried to avoid eye contact with everyone around her at the restaurant. 

She tried to tell herself that their looks of pity were all in her head, that there was no way they cared enough to notice the girl at the hostess stand or assume that she had gotten stood up. 

Her phone buzzed in her hand, and Hayley flipped it up to look at it. 

Too quickly, she admonished herself. 

She could feel how pathetic she was, and she hated it. 

“SO sorry babe,” the text read. “Game ran late. On my way.”

“He’s almost here,” Hayley reassured the thin bodied, thick lipped, plastic smiling face of the hostess. 

“Once your entire party is here, we can seat you,” the 22-year-old squeaked. “In the meantime, you can have a seat here or at the bar.”

Hayley longed for a martini—the kind with bleu cheese olives that soaked up all the vodka and became a meal in their own right. But she felt the pull of her dress stretched against her stomach. She didn’t need the extra calories. And she didn’t want to drink alone.

Not on her anniversary. 

Forty-five minutes later, Jason finally burst through the front door. He was still wearing his Cowboys jersey. He smelled like beer.

He leaned over the hostess stand, and Hayley watched his eyes flicker over her body. The girl reciprocated his charm a little too willingly. Hayley caught the words “can’t let you in,” and “strict dress code.”

She was already hurrying over to handle it.

Hayley pulled her car keys out of what her friends lovingly referred to as, “The Mom Purse.”

“Peanut!!” Jason turned to her and beamed. 

He wrapped his arms around Hayley and lifted her off of her feet into his bear hug. They were causing a scene, but his pretty face always let him get away with this sort of thing.

Especially with Hayley. 

How could she stay mad at this labrador of a man who so clearly loved her? He made her feel small and protected when she was in his arms. She felt a surge of relief run through her, glad that he finally made it and proud to show the diners and staff at this stuffy joint that she hadn’t been lying. She had not been stood up.

She really was loved.

“I didn’t forget,” Jason insisted in a way that let Hayley know he definitely forgot. 

He gazed into her eyes with his lopsided, drunk smile. “Four years. Can you believe it, Peanut?”

Hayley frowned. “Five years.”

Jason blinked at her with zero embarrassment. “Wow! Time really does fly.”

Hayley handed her car keys to him. “I brought a change of clothes for you. My car is parked on the street. Third meter to the left.”

“You’re a lifesaver, babe.” 

He grabbed the keys from her and planted a sloppy kiss on her cheek. 

***

Hayley was once again alone.

But at least this time she knew where Jason was. He was in the bathroom, changing into the button-up shirt, slacks, sport coat, and dress shoes that she had brought for him. All items she had gifted him over the years for various birthdays and holidays. 

And all things he never wore unless forced to by her.

A server dropped off a steaming basket of fresh bread before Hayley could stop him.

It sat in the middle of the table in front of her, next to a delicate little pat of butter shaped like a rose. The butter melted softly from the steam wafting off the bread. Hayley’s mouth watered. She looked away.

“You are doing such a good job,” a woman’s voice purred.

“Excuse me?” Hayley’s head whipped back, and she saw that she had been joined at her table by a stranger. 

The blonde had to be at least ten years older than her, but her face looked like it hadn’t experienced a single frown line in its whole life.

“Your man. You’ve whipped him into shape. I mean, as much as anyone could have.”

“Can I help you?” Hayley asked a bit aggressively. She didn’t need some random lady’s input about her relationship. Not tonight. 

“I’m here to help you,” the woman said. She reached across the table and tore a piece of bread apart. Her nails were long, sharp, and cherry red. She took a bite, savoring it. “There’s something biblical about the kind of pleasure you get from eating freshly baked bread. Isn’t there?”

“I’m gluten intolerant,” Hayley said, looking away.

“Sure you are,” the woman grinned. Her teeth were blindingly white between cherry red lips. “But that’s not what I’m here about.” 

Hayley squirmed under the woman’s direct gaze. She broke eye contact and looked around. Hayley was unsettled to realize that everyone around them was moving as if in slow motion. And she couldn’t hear anything. It was as if this stranger had put noise canceling headphones over her ears, blocking out everything except their conversation. 

“Who are you?”

“Would you believe me if I said I was your Fairy Godmother?” the woman asked with a wink.

Hayley didn’t know what to believe. 

“I’ve been watching you, Hayley Becker,” the Fairy Godmother continued. “You are one of the most responsible young women I’ve ever seen. You handle everything. At work, for your friends, in your home. Where would Jason be without you?”

Hayley felt a warm glow of pride. Her efforts were so rarely directly recognized by anyone in her life. 

“You get no help,” the Fairy Godmother went on. “And this,” she waved her hand at the restaurant around them. “Is all you have to show for it. A boyfriend who forgot your anniversary dinner and showed up an hour late, empty-handed.”

“But he made it,” Hayley insisted. She cringed when she heard her voice crack. “That’s what—”

“That is not what counts,” the Fairy Godmother’s voice became a low, dangerous sounding growl. The shadows cast by the flickering candle on the table in front of them grew long and intimidating. Hayley sank down in her chair. 

The skinny woman with bouncy blonde hair in a strappy red gown sitting across from her couldn’t hurt her.

Could she?

“And you knew!” the Fair Godmother said. “That’s why you brought the change of clothes. You’ve been with him long enough. You knew he was going to forget.” 

Like a switch, her demeanor became friendly again. “And I can’t stand a beautiful, competent, intelligent woman like you getting anything less than the treatment she deserves.”

“But I love him,” Hayley whispered.

“I know you do,” the Fairy Godmother nodded with empathy. “And I can see that. I would never want to get in the way of a true love like this. That’s why I’m here to help fix it.” 

The Fairy Godmother pulled a small, ancient-looking flip phone out of her impossibly tiny purse. She slid it across the table toward Hayley.

Hayley didn’t touch it.

“What’s this?”

“Think of it as your ‘phone a friend’ option,” the Fairy Godmother told her. “And I’m the friend.” 

There was that wink again. 

“I’m giving you the ability to transform Jason into the boyfriend you want and the man you deserve.”

“I don’t understand.”

“It’s simple,” the Fairy Godmother insisted. “What if instead of nagging him all the time and telling him what to do, you could just type in a few commands and alter his personality?”

“That’s not possible.”

“I’m telling you it is. You won’t have to act like his mom anymore. You can start being treated like the love of his life. Like a real priority of his. Like a princess.”

Hayley thought about Jason stumbling into the restaurant, still in his football jersey. Thought about her buoyant, playful man who always managed to make her smile, even when he never helped clean their apartment, looked at other women when he thought she wouldn’t notice, relied on her to make sure the bills were paid, they made it to their plans on time, their date nights were scheduled. 

She thought about the small felt box she had found in his sock drawer when she was putting away his laundry. 

The way her heart skipped a beat when she opened it. The Pinterest wedding board she had secretly started making after their first date back in college.

And the cold terror that had unexpectedly gripped her when she thought about their future. 

The rest of her life spent taking care of this man whom everyone in her life loved but who always joked was practically a child of hers. 

Hayley reached over and picked up the phone. She flipped it open in her hands. 

“How do I use this thing?”

“There’s one number saved in the contacts,” her Fairy Godmother grinned triumphantly. “Just send it a text with the new personality traits you desire. The rest will happen automatically.”

Hayley looked down at the blinking cursor on the gray and black screen in front of her. 

She looked back across the table. The Fairy Godmother was gone.

Hayley heard the clank of forks and the chatter of the restaurant around her. A waiter refilled her water glass.

She would have assumed that the whole thing had been a hunger-induced hallucination, but she was still holding the very real flip phone in her hand.

A text message was open. Waiting to be composed. 

This was stupid.

Did she honestly believe some otherworldly stranger had the ability to alter her boyfriend’s personality?

Neither Hayley nor the passage of time had been able to succeed in that department. 

It was lunacy to expect this ancient device to exert that kind of power. 

And yet.

What did she have to lose?

If it worked, it worked. If not, well, Hayley would throw the thing out and laugh about this weird interaction when Jason came back to the table. They could have that nice anniversary dinner that she had been longing for.

It took her a minute to figure out the buttons, but eventually she managed to type into the text window, “punctual.” Send. 

Hayley giggled. This was ridiculous. She typed again, a little faster this time. 

“Sober.” Send. 

“Clean-shaven.” Send.

“Only has eyes for me.” Send. 

“Ripped body.” Send. No, wait. She was giddy with the absurdity of it all. What a weird prank for a stranger to pull on her. Hayley briefly wondered who was on the other end of the line. 

“Generous.” Send. “Thoughtful.” Send. 

Ah, fuck it. 

“Make him look like Brad Pitt in the 90’s.” Send. 

***

Jason shrugged the sport coat over his shoulders. 

He felt guilty. He shouldn’t have forgotten this big night. He knew that Hayley had been planning it for months. He wanted to make her happy. She was the woman he was going to be with for the rest of his life. 

She made him better.

Where would he be without her?

A wave of dizziness and nausea hit him. Jason collapsed against the wall of the bathroom stall. 

Shit. He had not realized how drunk he was. There was no way he was going to make it through this dinner.

Suddenly, his whole body was on fire. His face was on fire. His skin felt like it was peeling away from his face, and his head was going to explode, and he was in agony he ROARED IN PAIN AND POUNDED AGAINST THE BATHROOM STALL DOOR and just as suddenly as it all started. 

It stopped. 

Jason straightened up.

His head was miraculously clear. 

It was as if he hadn’t had a single beer that night. He felt his gut. Shit, it was as if he had never had a beer in his whole life. 

Somehow, he had completed an entire three-month Crossfit challenge in the span of 30 seconds?

Jason strode out of the bathroom with new confidence. He dropped a $20 in the attendant’s tip jar. 

Jason couldn’t hear the hushed murmurs that popped up around him as he wove through the tables in the dining area. His eyes were locked on Hayley.

Her jaw dropped.

“Oh!” The Fairy Godmother was back. This time, she was dressed in the black and white of a waitress’s uniform. She set a glass of red wine in front of Hayley. “I forgot to mention one little thing: Once a text is sent, it can never be taken back. You can’t un-send it. So, make sure you think carefully about what it is you really want.”

Hayley trembled as she watched the man who had previously been Jason make a beeline for her.

“Have fun, princess.”

Hayley shoved the flip phone deep down to the bottom of her mom purse.

She didn’t bother responding to the stranger.

She knew that by the time she looked up, the woman would already be long gone.