Goldilocks and Goldicocks

Miranda’s one who got away, a cute G-man interpreter named Walker Lewis, was one of the few men who had a recurring role in our little self-created dramas.

Desperate to get laid before Brady arrived, Miranda had hot pregnancy sex with Walker without telling him she was carrying another man’s baby. When he showed up again a few months later and Miranda told him she had recently given birth, Walker Lewis was understandably curious about the timeline of her pregnancy. Relieved to learn the child was not his, Walker Lewis was game to reunite with Miranda.

Turns out, he was not quite as game as he thought. When Miranda started making the obvious joke: “Mommy’s coming!” as Brady cried over the monitor, Walker got a little freaked out and left. That was the last Miranda saw of him.

Recently, Miranda and I were indulging in some street food on a bench in Bryant Park while Samantha literally looked down on us.

“Would you sit down and eat something?” Miranda said between bites.

“Can’t,” Samantha said over her shoulder. “This outfit only works if I’m standing and not eating.”

Our people-watching turned up a familiar face coming toward us.

Miranda smacked Samantha on the ass and said: “Look, it’s Mr. Too Big!”

“I don’t get it,” I said. “You broke up with James because he was too small. This guy’s too big. Who are you, Goldicocks?”

“Yes, I want one that’s just right,” Samantha drawled. “Now make nice because this wall of flesh and I are supposed to be friends.”

It was true. After their sex life proved incompatible, Samantha had suggested she and Mr. Cocky just be friends. He was, allegedly, her first ever male friend. He was also the mutual friend who had set up the blind date between Walker Lewis and Miranda.

“How is Walker was doing?” Miranda pried.

“You mean Walker Lewis?” Mr. Cocky replied.

And just like that, we learned that Walker went by two first names, Walker Lewis. His full name was Walker Lewis Zmuida.

“I guess I was so desperately horny that I got his name wrong,” Miranda reasoned.

“Hell, I didn’t know Big’s name for six years,” I sympathized.

“And I bet none of you know my name,” Mr. Cocky said.

“Em,” Miranda said.

“Er,” I echoed, darting eyes at Samantha for help.

“Oh, you!” Samantha purred, playfully slapping at Mr. Too Big’s relatively tiny hands.

Assuaged, Mr. Cocky explained how Walker Lewis Zmuida, burned out from speaking five languages and traveling so much that he had not realized Miranda had a baby, used his State Department connections to transfer to Fish & Game…in New Jersey, of all places.

“But it’s the most densely populated state in the country,” Miranda opined. “What game could they have?”

“At least one flock of symbolic ducks,” Mr. Too Big answered, “and quite a few big-mouth bass.”

“I hear Jersey guys sleep with the fishes,” I quipped, wondering if I get a whole column out of that pun.

“They also have bears,” Mr. Cocky said, ignoring my joke and continuing with his story. Officer Zmuida had responded to a few calls about a bear—attracted by a bin of damp and aromatic duck food—that had rearranged some pool furniture before eating the small dog chained up next door. The frightened homeowner, a blond housewife we’ll call Goldilocks, started making eyes at him while her estranged husband tried to buy him off.

“Walker Lewis is my best friend,” Mr. Cocky told us. “I was already worried when he quit his interpreter job to go play Trapper Joe in the suburbs, but then he went into a fugue state about that damn bear.”

Mr. Cocky finally decided to get Walker Lewis some help. “I drove him to the mental hospital, also located in New Jersey,” he sighed. “The whole time he’s staring into the trees, yelling: ‘It’s the husband! The bear is really the husband! The husband is really the bear!’”

In the end, it wound up being Walker Lewis Zmuida getting shot with a tranquilizer dart.

“Poor Walker,” Miranda murmured, catching a glance from Mr. Cocky. “I mean, poor Walker Lewis!”

“The worst part is, no one knows what happened to the bear,” Mr. Too Big shook his head.

I couldn’t help but wonder: do women really want the forest ranger, or do we secretly prefer the bear? If Goldilocks deemed this porridge too hot and that bed too soft, maybe the comforts of a three-million-dollar mansion would also leave her unfulfilled. Was this Real Housewife of New Jersey on to something? Should we file for divorce and invite the law, in the form of an overgrown boy scout playing forest ranger, into our homes (and beds)? Or is it better to just live with the bear?