Fiction

“You make it sound like we’re breaking up or something.”

He was then as he had been since they’d met: stymied. If what she’d said not five minutes before wasn’t a calling of troops to the battle of dissolution, then he didn’t know what was. Of course they were breaking up. Problem was she had a point. Two points, really. His response to her was always melodramatic. And they, intellectually, had never been together.

“I can’t help but feel like you’re being dismissive.”

“Well,” she said. “That’s not my intention.”

“What is your intention, then?”

Hearing these words, it occurred to him that the better time to ask her intention would’ve been three months, eight days before, when they’d met. Again, he was stymied. Disarmed. This woman had become a necessary diversion. She was much younger yet mature, thoughtful yet free, conscientious yet territorial. He could tell all of this right away. He was an excellent judge of people.

“What’s yours?” she answered.

Quarter Year Interlude 2

“I intended to know you.”

He sat up on the side of her bed. The room is dark, serene. It is a place of spiritualized tapestries, unpolished art, and aromatic candles. Calm overwhelmed him on his first night here, a month before. This was his third visit. The wicks were blown and smoking.

“I’d say you know me pretty well by now.”

“This, this is not about sex for me.”

“Because you feel . . . what is it . . . ah yes, a deep connection, but at the same time a certain level of guilt.”

“So this is it. You mock me now.”

He was paranoid from rise to rest. Always had been. So he allowed himself to think that perhaps she had mocked him all along. But that didn’t make any sense. Why would she take him this far, only to cut him loose, only to make him swim in self-consciousness? Far as he could tell, he had not been enjoying himself alone.

“You’re right,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

“I feel like I should be apologizing.”

“Why don’t we both apologize? You know, admit our mistakes, create a little space, and go from there.”

This sounded reasonable to him, and was another spin on what she’d been saying for days. He wasn’t down with it. Reason had checked out weeks before. He was in deluded protection mode.

“That’s a lovely idea,” he said. “But it sort of absolves you, doesn’t it?”

Quarter Year Interlude 3

“Absolves me from what?”

He didn’t know.

“I don’t know . . . from, from—”

“From hurting you?”

“No.”

“Oh. I see. You don’t want to admit that I’ve hurt you.”

“You haven’t.”

“Then what the fuck are we talking about?”

That was it. Right there. She had broken ground on getting to the core of his nonsense. When they’d set out, things were innocent enough. She had been forthright with him. At least, he thought she had. And he had been as forthright with her as he was able. They both revealed involvement. She said she had a fiancée. He was a painter. Abstract cubist. They had been together for six years, and were now at a crossroads. The fiancée wanted to try his hand at New York. She’d said no, that she was too poor, too old. She was twenty-four with a trust fund.

After her revelations, he told her that he was also involved. With a woman. He told her that this involvement had lasted for some time and was sure to run into the foreseeable future. She’d wanted to hear more than that. He’d told her she would in due time. Now, he was past due and angling.

“We’re talking about time,” he said. “Friendship.”

“We’re still friends.”

“Yeah, we’re still friends, except you don’t want to be around me anymore.”

Quarter Year Interlude 4

“It’s not that I don’t want to be around you. I just don’t think we can hang out without ending up in bed.”

“So we can no longer hang out because of your irrepressible urge to sleep with me?”

She didn’t answer.

“Well baby, you deserve some kind of medal. For years, no woman has added to the pantheon of bullshit excuses for rejecting men, and here you come along and make it look easy.”

She didn’t answer this either, but merely watched him with an eyebrow raised. Still lying on her back, she reached for her cigarette case. It was on the nightstand. The digital clock continually flashed an orange 12:00. The power must’ve gone out overnight.

“Listen,” he continued, voice lower. “We could just eliminate sex from the equation. We could be friends. Have drinks. Catch a movie. Eat popcorn, Junior Mints.”

She let forth a slow breath of smoke.

“You’re sweet,” she said. “But I can’t do that. It would be too difficult for me. And for you. Plus, I think we’ve passed that point, don’t you?”

“Maybe. Maybe not.”

“No,” she said. “I know you. You couldn’t handle it. You’re not someone who can manage moving backwards.”

Again, she had a point. Two points, really. He had never been able to alter his role in any relationship. He preferred destruction coupled with short-term memory loss. Also, she knew this and many other things about him, which was one of his more pressing problems.

Quarter Year Interlude 5

He watched as she put out her cigarette. For someone who claimed to be hit with sharp regret, she seemed awfully calm. Sliding on his pants, his shoulders were bound, tense. Graying stubble itched his face. She liked it, so he’d been shaving less often. While he scratched, she laid back, her dark hair fanning the free space on the pillows. Her fingers interlocked across her chest.

“You forget,” she said. “We went into this knowing it was temporary.”

“Temporary, I expected. But this, this is premature.”

“Premature for you. Because you see what isn’t there.”

Where his back had before been facing her, this turned him around. It was a discernible fissure. Her perception. His paranoid vision that there was something he had done, something he must salvage, thereby began to fade. She had one point here. He saw what was not there. What was there, in this moment, was her face. It had lost a level of brightness. She lit another cigarette while looking away, towards the open bedroom window. This lack of engagement pricked sharper than any of her words, stung more nastily than the upcoming weeks of uncertainty, to be followed by the surety that they would not see one another again. What she’d also revealed was his selfish tendency, his failure to rely on those who had already proven themselves reliable. She waited. He put on his shirt, found his shoes. He was no longer stymied, but resolute. Down, but encouraged by learning. He would know better for the next time.