The One That Got Away

There are way too many ingredients in shampoo products. I read the back of the bottle eight times, and I am still not sure whether or not it is in English. Could the four hours of sleep I get a night be slowly deteriorating my reading comprehension? I blame Meredith, the tiny human I am holding, the same one-year-old who is tugging on my V-neck sweater and exposing my breasts in the middle of Target. Deciding on the ideal shampoo for my rarely styled hair was not worth giving the eighty-year-old man at the other end of the aisle a free show. I haphazardly toss the only bottle with a sale sticker in the shopping cart and readjust my sweater. As I set Meredith down in the cart and buckle her up, an uneasy awareness washes over me that it is suddenly much too quiet. Where is Frankie?

“Dana?” someone calls, but I am frantically searching for my four-year-old daughter, and I don’t register that he is talking to me.

“Excuse me,” I say, pushing past the stranger to where Frankie is hiding under a mannequin’s skirt across the aisle. Her light-up Paw Patrol sneakers are the only identifying feature. I scoop her up, despite her squirming and squealing, and place her in the bucket of the cart.

“Dana? Is that you?” That is me, I realize. I have a name that’s not just one of a dozen variations of Mama.

The stranger's voice doesn't sound so unfamiliar anymore. Now that I am coming down from my panic, I realize that I know this voice indecently well. A girlish giggle escapes me when I lock eyes with none other than Matty “Dimples.” His smile is exactly as I remember it. Those beautiful, perfectly symmetrical indents still disarm me.

“Hi,” I squeak.

“Hi,” he replies. Except he says it in the kind of sexy way where the whole world stops to hear.

“Are these yours?” He smiles at my shopping cart. I follow his gaze to my wide-eyed children, remembering where and who I am.

“Yes! Frankie and Meredith,” I say, patting the girls on the head. “I made them.”

I made them?

“I could tell,” he says, gesturing toward our matching chocolate brown ringlets.

I used to love it when he ran his fingers through them. Oh my God, get it together, Dana, you’re a married thirty-five-year-old woman. Less sexually frustrated housewife and more strong, independent MILF energy.

“How are you?” I ask.

“Same old same old. It looks like you have your hands full.”

Normally, I would be seeking a way out of this conversation. I hated the implication that the only interesting part of my life was my children. It was possible to love my girls deeply and still have an existence outside of raising them. But this was Matty “Dimples” Martin. The first boy I ever loved and the only one who ever made me swoon. Our romance lasted only a few months, and the breakup was mutual and cordial, but heartbreaking just the same. He was going to travel the world, and I was starting graduate school. We would be holding each other back if we stayed together. But I still cried over him for months.

Obviously, I had moved on, but I couldn’t deny that he had occupied my mind a time or two. Did he ever achieve his dream of becoming a screenwriter? Was he married? How many famous actresses had he had sex with? When I daydreamed about encounters like this in the past, his life was always glamorous.

“What do you do?” I wonder aloud.

“A little of this, a little of that,” he shrugs.

Well, that was annoyingly vague. How much can I pry without coming off as obsessive?

“Are you still writing?”

“Writing? Wow! I forgot about that.”

Forgot about it? I thought incredulously. It was only his supposed dream inspired by his dead grandfather. He made me suffer through dozens of his grandfather’s poems. He would recite them from memory, then blubber over the fact that his grandfather would never witness his success as a writer. But now that I think back, I don’t remember Matty sharing his own work with me. He had me convinced he was a genius, but I never saw him write. And for someone who was so determined to write a screenplay, I don’t recall him having any interest in films. Come to think of it, his favorite movie was The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie. Which is admittedly a hilarious film, but your favorite movie at 21 years old? Why did I never question that?

“Do you live here?” He asks.

“We don’t live in Target,” interrupts Frankie, reminding us that she is here too.

He laughs, “Of course, how silly of me! Do you like shopping with Mommy?”

“Mommy’s hair is falling out,” she says matter-of-factly. Another reminder that kids are always listening. She must have overheard me complaining to Dave this morning. My hair was breaking like uncooked spaghetti. Hence, the shampoo run.

I stumbled over my next words. A sane individual would have laughed off Frankie's comment like she was just being a silly kid. But I don't want to teach Frankie that thinning hair was something to be ashamed of, or that she had done something wrong when she was only telling the truth. So I took it upon myself to explain to him the various hormonal changes women go through postpartum. In a particularly cringey moment, I describe how many times I sweat through my bed sheets in one week. When I finally finish my lecture, he stares dumbfounded.

“Do you have any help?” He sounds genuinely concerned. Too concerned. Like he wants to know if I need medical attention, or worse, if I need to be restrained and held involuntarily for a few days. Actually, I don't think I'd mind that last part so much. I could use the sleep.

Before I can respond, Dave comes barreling around the other end of the aisle yelling, “Two for one lube! Can you believe it? Do you think we'll need that much?”

He is too busy waving the bottles around in celebration to notice I'm in the middle of a conversation.

“Dave,” I warn.

“I'm serious. The bottles are insanely small,” he says, misreading my stern tone for disbelief.

“My finger is swollen,” I hold up my ring finger like a child with a boo-boo. “This is my husband, Dave. Dave, meet Matt,” I add, gesturing to Matt.

The light bulb goes on, but this man I married is never embarrassed, so he just laughs and offers Matt his hand. “Hey man, sorry for the excitement. I just love a good deal.”

“Who doesn't?” Matty says, shaking his hand.

Meanwhile, I am imagining myself turning into a puddle on the floor and slipping away.

“Dada!” cries Meredith. Her adorable face lights up as she looks at her father. Even I can’t help but swoon when he lifts her out of the cart and spins her around until she giggles.

“It was good to see you, Dana,” Matty waves goodbye as he slips away.

“Bye,” I say quickly

“Who was that?” asks Dave.

“That was the very last person who needed to hear about my lubricant needs.”

“Well, in that case, I’m glad I scared him off.” He puts his arm around my shoulder and pulls me in for a kiss on the head.

“Me too,” I smile back.

“Ok, let’s go home and lube up that finger!” He shouts as he makes his way towards the checkout line. As I watch him steer the cart one-handed with our oldest child while holding our baby in the other, I can’t help but feel like the luckiest woman in the world.