When you hadn’t called back by 4, I tried again and this one went straight to voicemail. Hmm, popular guy. Is he off doing something naughty? No, of course, not. Ed was in India and you were in love. Maybe you were getting a massage. Unlike me, you’d always been able to wrangle a good one at the last minute without any logistical gymnastics. I was a little pissed though. My good mood was started to deflate and it was remembering that it was January outside.

So I started to pepper you with emails:

you online?

Saturday, January 6, 2007 4:35 PM

From:

“Amanda Long” <along@bizjournals.com>

To:

jmccalla@bizjournals.com

I’m starting to have Falls Church torpor. It’s like I either want to GO
OUT officially (and by that I mean watching the nuttiness of the
inauguration and getting un-Fenty photos for the back page) or go get my
jammy pants on.
I’m still in the talk me out of it mode, but damn I hate being so Rita. i
need a helicopter or a Samantha-magic nose.
Still no way you’ll go to Fenty, right? We could leave early and go see
Vandana.

————–

Then I left and walked around Target, circling the stupid faux World Market items it has periodically. I hate the vase I bought that day. I knew something was going down bad. I had no idea who to call. Robert went off to the poker night right next to your house, telling me NOT to worry.I called Lucy, she said the same thing.  They sounded so calm. I didn’t believe them. How could you bail on our slumber party? Sure we’d canceled last minute before –but that was the beauty of the friendship: We could call without leaving one another in the dark. I sat home alone and worried and talked myself out of driving to your house.

———–

Jan. 5, 2007: You and I were going on our third day of an epic match of planning ping-pong. D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty’s inauguration or  a movie night?  Agruments were waged for each plan, by both of us for each option. True to form, I’d switch as soon as you’d  come over to my side of the table, and vice versa.

We could go the young new mayor’s big-tent party, see the next generation of D.C. power out in the their latest Neiman purchases (and Loehman’s finds), guzzle silly cocktails for free,  enjoy a night of dress up (and a few  “you really clean up nicelies” from sources) and toast the young new editor (you).

Or we could play house in the nice, newly renovated big town home of your new serious boyfriend Ed, while he was away on business. We could look at his pictures and eat his good company crackers. Robert could drop me off slumber-party style (with my Twizzlers, workout clothes for the morning and jammy pants) and go to his nearby poker game.  I’d bring the DVD set of Facts of Life you’d bought me for Christmas and the Madonna in concert one. You’d bring the wine and the notes for the children’s book we were planning on writing: Growing Up Redneck:  A kid’s guide to forging permission slips, friendships with the liquor store clerk and bonds with mommy’s new friend. We’d save ourselves the frustration of standing in endless lines that were sure to crop up as a result of Fenty’s “everyone’s welcome” invite to the outdoor, tented ball.  Sure the “big-tent” thing sounded good metaphorically, but when you have to wait 45 minutes for a Pinot and be exposed on three sides to the January weather, that ballroom at the Marriott starts to sound pretty good, no matter what message of inclusiveness it fails to send. And knowing it was too late for even the wacky D.C. gov’t to change venues, Ed’s house sounded downright palatial.

But what if we stayed home and everyone else had fun or at least digital pictures? Don’t even try to say you weren’t thinking the same. If we had to hear about any shenanigans and not be able to chime in with our much better anecdotes about bickering council members in the bathroom or  PR types dressed for a rose ceremony on The Bachelor, there would be no gnawing on Twizzlers again without the bitter taste of regret. And everyone knows that regret and red food-colored strings of lawn chair fabric do not pair well.

So we stored our plans in the their usual place: hovering above, ready to be batted down by a single whim, raindrop or e-mail.

As of Friday, when you left the newsroom around 5, we were going with Edna over Adrian, private danceathons over public ones. You doubled winked (or for those sticklers to gesture accuracy: blinked) goodbye and mimed “call me.”

One hour later, that’s what I did. You picked up and exhaled a hello, then swore it was your last end-of-the-week cigarette, the only one you’d had since quitting this time. I said nothing and pointed the car toward 7-11 for my 15th Diet Coke of the day.  I’d just heard the weather for Saturday, unusually high temps were coming , making the thought of bare shoulders in a slinky dress enticing.  I was ready to resist the siren call of the suburbs (a mix of Wendy Mallick the Marshall’s spokeswoman on the loud speaker and Bravo reruns), curl my eyelashes, go out in the city and be seen! With a hottie!

You’d barely finished the “darlin” in “Hello darlin” when I let in on my case against the couch:

It’s going to be nice! Robert can drop us off! You’re the new editor — you have to make an appearance! You know you get closer to Clooney-dom when you’re in the tux.

I was so excited, I’d almost talked myself into going, so I put it all on the line, I forced a decision between Mr. Wishy and Mrs. Washy:

Me: If I need to make a last-minute trip to Loehman’s for a Calvin Klein sparkly thing that shows off the gams and plays up my gymnast chest, tell me now or get ready Peaksville, here we come.

You: It’s going to be a pig fuck.

I never found him. See, our plans, as always, that weekend had been fluid, so I couldn’t really say for certain that he was missing and therefore felt silly calling the authorities, or even our boss. I didn’t know his mother’s phone number, or last name for that matter. I did know she’d need a Valium if I called with that kind of question. His boyfriend was in India on business. So really, nothing to worry about. But I was convinced he was gone. I said it to myself repeatedly, doing my Saturday night laps around Target, with the loop running in my head: Something is wrong. Something is wrong. Something is wrong. I said it to my husband, who loved my friendship with John but had heard us cancel plans dozens of times. I said it aloud when I recoiled at the sight of the Saturday and Sunday Washington Posts stacked outside his door. But a couple of friends calmed me down, told me John has friends all over the place. I tried to conjure up my own inner optimistic: His boyfriend gave him the keys to his house and car — maybe he’s taken it to New York to see his friends (and ex!). Or maybe he’s just enjoying a weekend alone in a big ol house, with a real kitchen and real reading room (not like his solarium- — basically a walk-in closet with windows) and plenty of room to dance around in his underwear without his straight (and much better dancer, by the way) friend upstaging him and crashing the solo party. Good excuses and I didn’t believe a one of them.

So when I walked Monday morning ashen-faced into the office of the publisher, the one who’d just weeks before promoted John to editor, and told him, he said “This is real, isn’t it?” All too real.

The newsroom John spilled into every corner of was void of him that morning: No breezy voice mails to the publisher: “I’m still moisturizing, be in soon” or static-filled ones from the Metro, threatening to skewer the Red Line in print. No e-mails to the the rest of the editing team about how he’d found his groove and wanted to finish his column at home (or honest ones to me, saying he was at the gym with a new trainer, xoxo). Just the sound of a newsroom not asking questions. Too freaked out by the looks of the editors’ faces as we flipped through the lists of hospitals we publish, calling ER rooms. By the time calmer people called the police, I was hopefully grabbing photos of my desk of him to show them — this is what counted as hope then: a search for a missing person in need of a few pictures. A mutual friend, who would turn out to be one of the last people to e-mail him ( I was the last I know to call him! yea for me), drove my car and we headed to his condo.

The call came as we were taking what I used to call my John-cut to Connecticut Avenue (now I take the long way), the Mass. Ave. exit off Rock Creek. “Turn around,” the publisher said. As if it were that easy.

I don’t remember much about the drive back to work. I remember the cool window glass, wanting to stop and thinking I’ll never wear this outfit again. I remember calling Robert over and over again, getting his voice mail and feeling as if I were choking on the fact of John’s death. I had to tell someone who knew how much I was losing. And I had to tell someone, “See, I told you so.”

I don’t know if it was the condo supervisor or the police who got to him first. Someone found him in bed, where he’d been since Friday night.

I’ve been trying to put words to it since, in e-mails, melodramatic phone calls with his exes, interviews with obit writers and even a memorial Web site. I’ve failed to find the right words — that’s why I had to resort to dancing like Britney, Madonna, Belinda and Jennifer Beals during his eulogy — that and I would have combusted on the spot if I had to look at everyone or slow down for one second.

Instead of trying to make sense of it, I’m just going to start dumping out all my Dear John letters here — the ones to him and about him since he’s died. If it doesn’t make sense, then I’m doing a good job of keeping it true to its WTF theme.