Lurking Behind Perfectionism

"Pookie? Baby? What are you doing?" wails Maureen from across the apartment. Although most people don't manage to put a whine in their voice until they are fully awake, Maureen manages it flawlessly. "Come back to bed."

I sigh, exasperated. She seems to think that she's the only one who wants human companionship at five in the morning. The problem is that some of us can't sleep late on Monday mornings.

Why?

"Maureen," I call tiredly back into the bedroom, "You know I can't come back to bed. I have to go to…" I trail off to let her fill in the answer for me. This is for two reasons, one of which is that I am absurdly tired and want to speak as little as possible. The other is that I suspect Maureen thinks I am being unfaithful. Not that that would bother her.

"Work," she fills in for me boredly. "Why do you have to work all the time?" is her next whine. "It's not fair."

I sigh again, this time more dramatically than before. Drama, at least, is something I know she understands. "Well, if you can think of another way for us to pay the rent, Maureen, please let me know," I rationalize calmly. Of course, when has that ever worked on Maureen?

"But Joanne!" she shrieks. "You don't even have to be there 'till, like, 'till after my head stops hurting. Ohhhh." She lets out a dramatic moan to emphasize the intensity of her hangover. Wait – was she even drinking last night? I don't remember. I do remember taking her out to an Italian restaurant in honor of what she called her "seven-twelfths birthday." Leave it to Maureen to find that to be an excuse to get drunk.

Since the coffee machine's explosion from two nights ago forces me to acquire coffee elsewhere today – and what have I ever done to Mr. Coffee anyway? Nothing – I decide to make something of the time I would ordinarily spend pleading with the obstinate machine for it to work, "just this once, please." In an act of pure goodwill and devotion to Maureen, I place two Advils and a mug of hot water on a plate and bring the whole thing to my beloved girlfriend.

When I reach the bedroom, she is propped against as many as seven pillows, her hair falling in her eyes as she tries to look as sick as possible. I – knowing Maureen – have my doubts about how much pain she is really in, but who am I to question her? Particularly when she's already touchy from my early departure.

After gulping down the pills and making a face – a melodramatic imitation of mine when forced to eat tofu or some other vegetarian concoction – she looks at me curiously. "Pookie," she begins curiously, "why do you always leave early? I know you don't have to be there 'till nine, and it's only five."

Her words call to mind the actual reason for my eccentric early rising, and I shudder. Maureen, whose eyes are sharp as an eagle's even at five in the morning, spots it. She narrows her eyes. "Joanne," she says in a tone reminiscent of Alexi Darling's, "I want to know why you leave for work five hours early. And don't tell me it's because you're seeing someone else, because nobody wakes up at this hour apart from you. And Mark." She gasps dramatically. "Oh my god!" she squeals. "You're seeing Mark, aren't you?"

"No," I tell her, but Maureen is hearing none of it.

"We could have a threesome!" she shrieks. "Oh, that'd be so awesome, like I could do one side and Mark could do – "

I growl at her fiercely. "Maureen," I say slowly, enunciating every word, "I am not having an affair with Mark. I am a lesbian. I am not bisexual like you. I am incapable of finding attraction in a penis."

She giggles. "I don't know why," she sing-songs, and I can tell that Maureen's Ode To The Penis is coming on. I interrupt her hurriedly, hoping to avoid that particular sermon.

"Okay, Maureen, you want to know why I leave for work early?" I ask resignedly.

She bobs her head up and down, rubbing the back of her neck against her many pillows and letting out a contented sigh. "Ooh, this Advil's really working," she tells me, adding afterwards, "Go on."

I reach out and tuck a strand of hair behind Maureen's ear. Satisfied, I then begin my story.

I was eleven.

Eleven, being not quite a teenager and not still a child (in one's own eyes), is an impressionable age. An eleven-year-old in a sheltered household will most likely turn out to be sheltered. An eleven-year-old coming from the other side of town, with jeans with holes in them and torn leather jackets… well, that one will grow up to be Roger. But that is a different story.

I grew up knowing that if someone told me something – particularly a grown-up – it was therefore true, and I should believe it. I was only about fourteen when I realized that my parents were lawyers, and why on earth should I take anything they said at face value? But at eleven, I was content with my unquestioning world. I was content with easy sixth-grade schoolwork and girls-only parties that began to interest me more and more (and boy-girl parties that slowly did the opposite).

Well, in my family, there were holiday dinners celebrated at my father's parents house almost every year. But one year, my mother's brother insisted that he meet me. I had never heard of him before. When my parents were running around preparing food and clothes and whatever, I practiced his name on my tongue so it would sound professional and flowing, as though I had been saying it all my life. Uncle Richard. Something about the name just sounded wrong. It wasn't a smooth name like the ones I had been hearing all my life, in private school and at home. It didn't roll off the tongue.

When we pulled up in Uncle Richard's garage, I was incredibly nervous. I was always sort of a shy kid, hating to deal with people I didn't know to be smart or like me in some way. Having been hearing my mother's scornful descriptions of her family all my life, I was less than excited to see what her brother was like.

Anything I might have expected based on knowledge of my father's family fell to my feet in ruins. Uncle Richard was pudgy, wearing a sleeveless white undershirt and shorts. He had curly dark hair poking out of the top of his head, and – worst of all, in my eleven-year-old opinion – he was profane. Every other word out of his mouth was a vulgarity of some sort. I was absolutely horrified.

Now, at eleven, I had superb table manners. I knew which fork to use, how to place my napkin on my lap and dab delicately at whatever spot where its services were needed, and I knew how to make polite conversation. But all of these lessons I had learned over the years were utterly disregarded in Richard's house, where frozen dinners were slapped down on our laps on the couch in front of the television, a football game was turned on, and we were expected to watch in complete silence. A bottle of beer was set in front of me. I took careful sips, being no stranger to the world of alcohol but preferring more refined tastes, like wine and champagne.

The weekend, thankfully, passed by very quickly. In the car on the way home my mother and father were passionately discussing all the revolting mannerisms possessed by Uncle Richard, and my father threw in the fact that he claimed his poker skills were far more than what they truly were. (On the first night of the holiday weekend, as I slept on the living room floor, I overheard what sounded like the beginnings of a poker game between my father, my uncle, possibly my mother, and several strangers.)

When at last I got home, my mother took me up to my room to have a heart-to-heart. "Joanne," she said carefully, "I know what you saw in Uncle Richard really scared you, right?"

I nodded, because it was true. Very true.

"Good," she said firmly. Startled, I looked at my mother quizzically, and she explained, "Well, Joanne, the behaviors you saw exhibited in Uncle Richard are a result of poor choices he's made in his life."

"Like?"

She had a look in her eyes. It was the look she had when, determined, she stormed through an aisle in a courtroom to present her case. It was the look she had when she insisted that the dishes should have been done by our cleaning woman, but voila – they weren't. And it was the look she had when she told me, "Well, it's just a few small things that'll get someone to grow up like that. Not showering, not brushing their teeth, and sleeping late."

"Sleeping late?" I repeated, horrified. I had always loved sleeping through the afternoon if I could help it.

"Oh, yes," Mother replied. "I know you like to do that, so maybe you should start looking into buying stock in Lay's potato chips. Those are Uncle Richard's favorite food."

That night, I went to bed at eight-thirty on the dot, and woke up nine hours later, at five, to make breakfast and take an energized jog around the block.

I never slept late again.

Maureen is unimpressed with my story. Her lips barely form the words "I don't believe you," but no sound emerges. Probably because my story is true, and I like to think that Maureen is a good enough girlfriend to know when I'm lying and when I'm not. (Although I must admit, as a lawyer, lying is among my many talents.)

So instead Maureen changes what she was about to say. "You're afraid of sleeping late?" she demands.

I nod. "And of not showering, not brushing my teeth, and eating potato chips."

She bites her bottom lip. "I see."

Another moment passes before she speaks, a reward in itself before her mouth starts opening and closing again.

"Well, Joanne, you're in luck," she says. "For the low-low-low-low-low-low-low-low-low price of sex twice a day for a month, I'll cure you."

I am astonished. "Cure me?" I repeat. "Curing" my fear has never crossed my mind. Believe it or not, I like waking up early.

Well, no. That's a lie. But it's not as uncomfortable as it is to wake up in the middle of the afternoon and discover that one has missed the entire day.

"Yeah," Maureen says offhandedly. "No problem."

I ask her how she plans on curing me, and she tells me patronizingly to go get ready for work; she has a lot of things to do if she is to treat my phobia. This time I am not unwise enough to ask exactly what she means, because this is, if nothing else, a reminder that understanding Maureen's mannerisms means not questioning her. Ever.

And so off to work I go, to face the prospect of undesirable cases with undesirable clients whose opponents' sides I would rather take. When I return home at four – after all, getting to work early means leaving early, the most enjoyable benefit of waking up ahead of schedule – I am baffled to discover that the lights are off and have been replaced with candles, which Maureen has used as a border around our bed. There she is, lying in the bed, my silent alarm clock placed tauntingly atop our armoire, the top of which only Roger and Collins are able to reach.

And I would be hard-pressed to invite either of the two men to witness a naked Maureen's wordless singing, spread out on the bed with those old manacles hanging from the headboard.

The most horrifying thing of all? Once I have been staring at my girlfriend for a good two minutes, she gets up, puts on her clothes, and tells me, "Services shall commence at eleven-thirty tonight. Don't be late, and Joanne, I've ordered Chinese."

When the delivery man arrives, however, Maureen's clothing is still translucent, hence my giving the bearer of my vegetable chow fun an extra-large tip. I regret the action, however, because upon opening the paper bag storing all our food, I discover among the rice and soup and noodles one jumbo bag of Lay's potato chips.