All You Could Ask For A Novel - By Mike Greenberg Page 0,31

have all the puzzles we used to sit on the floor and put together. I still have the stuffed animals Megan couldn’t dream of going to sleep without. I still have all the books I used to read to them in bed (Goodnight Moon, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, The Going to Bed Book). I would no sooner throw those away than I would old photos. They aren’t simple playthings, they are snapshots of moments in my life I will never have again, moments I never want to forget: my babies being babies, needing me for everything, wanting nothing more than to spend endless time with their mother.

So, just before I got underneath a long, hot shower to complete the task of sobering up so I could pick up the kids and take them to visit Lourdes and her toe in the hospital, I stopped to look at some of those books and toys. And, as I always do, I got a little teary. And then, as the shower spray brought me fully back to life, I started to laugh. And I stopped being sad about having to leave the photo shoot. Some things just matter more than others.

SAMANTHA

WHAT IN THE WORLD is wrong with me?

That’s what I was thinking as I allowed Eduardo to pour my third glass of wine.

Here I had been training nonstop, filling my body only with the purest fuel, the most natural and delicious and healthful foods in this tropical paradise: fresh fruits, vegetables, lean meats, gallons of water, steaming cups of organic green tea. But now this wine tasted so good, and felt so good going down, so warm in my chest and throat. And it mixed beautifully with the breeze and the saltwater smell of the ocean, and with the man who had known enough to select it and poured it for me so gracefully. There was something athletic in the deftness of Eduardo’s fingers, something very sensual in the care he took with the smallest of tasks. It reminded me of a cat, while Robert—and every other man I’ve been with—is so much more a dog, panting, eager, dopey, clumsy. I’ve always preferred dogs to cats, but now as I savored the wine on my tongue and felt the breeze in my hair, I found myself intrigued by the cat.

“It seems to me that women in this country apply so much pressure to themselves,” Eduardo was saying. He was sitting with his back straight and his tie perfectly knotted. “It is unfortunate. This country gives women freedoms they do not possess anywhere else in the world, at least nowhere that my travels have taken me, and yet instead of rejoicing in those freedoms it seems sometimes American women are strangling themselves with them.”

“In what way?” I asked, interested.

“In every way,” Eduardo said. “I see them here every single day. Beautiful American women on their honeymoons, on holidays, on family vacations. The women invariably seem to be enjoying themselves less than the men. The women are so concerned with their appearance, so concerned with their image, so competitive among themselves, at times I worry they are not enjoying themselves at all.”

“But you’re wrong,” I said. “I have been here for a month and all I have done is train, and I am having the most wonderful time.”

There was a mischievous twinkle in his eye. “Yes, but it seems to me your situation is a little bit different, is it not?”

“In what way?” I asked, even though I knew the answer. I was curious to hear how he would phrase it.

“Well, you are seeking to accomplish a very specific goal. In your triathlon, someone will be a winner, and all who finish will have achieved something special. The way I see these American women competing with each other and with themselves, there are no winners, there are only varying degrees of defeat. The expectations they place on themselves are unrealistic and, I believe, harmful. American women are more successful, accomplished, intelligent, and beautiful than the women of any other country, if only they themselves could figure that out.”

“Come on,” I said, “I’ve been to Spain, to Italy, to France, there is no way you can say that American women are more stylish and beautiful than European women.”

“I can say it, yes I can,” he replied, nodding slowly. “And I suppose I could also say that you just made my point for me.”

For the life of me I could not remember how we got onto the