by Sarah Lassez
Though my newfound coolness seemed to have a positive effect on him, I still sensed distance. Now and then I’d catch him staring off at nothing, and in my mind it was an alternate life he was viewing, one without me and my neuroses. But, I’d remind myself, I wouldn’t have these neuroses if he’d been honest about Nadja in the first place. If he had told me about her, then when I’d found the first e-mail from her, it would’ve simply been evidence of her already spelled out existence. I would have told myself it was nothing I hadn’t already known, chided myself for being so ridiculous, and moved on. He was the one who’d created the situation with his secrecy; he was the one who’d given me reason to freak out.
And freak out was what I did. The second Wilhelm told me he was boarding the plane and had to shut off his cell phone, I called Erlin. The battle began.
“You don’t need to worry, Sarah. He’s faithful. He’ll spend time with her, but as a friend. Nothing more.”
This was what he’d been saying ever since I’d learned of the trip, but I needed daily reassurance that the future hadn’t changed. After three days with Wilhelm off in the land of temptation, I called in more troops. I figured if four more psychics concurred with Erlin, my trust would be fortified, and then, maybe, I could relax.
Three agreed that Wilhelm had no interest in the Aryan Temptress or her cunning ways. And whereas that’s certainly the majority, the truth is, it only takes one, one hairline crack in the crystal, one attachment with a virus, one moth let loose among cashmere…one psychic who makes a claim that haunts you. And that one, the dissenter, the rebel, the mutineer, was none other than sweet, soothing Southern Misty Mystical.
“Something needs to be healed in their relationship.” (Sumthin’ needs to be hee-eeled.) “There’s like this unfinished business with them? A connection, something almost karmic. I just—I don’t know what to tell you, hon. There’s no goin’ forth with this wound so open.”
Misty was my mothering psychic, the one whose lap I wanted to crawl into, yet her words had basically flung me to the ground, her once calming rocking chair now crushing my outstretched fingers. What was she saying? My voice splintered with fear. “Are you serious? Is it something romantic that needs to happen?”
“It’s hard to tell. I mean, the romance is there for sure, on her part. She’s completely in love with him.”
Fabulous. “Well, what—what does he think about that? How does he react?”
There was a short silence, during which time I managed to chew through all the nails on my right hand and then start in with those on the left.
“I can’t say for sure. I just can’t.” (I jest cay-ant.) “I can feel his intentions, to be good? But it’s hard for him.”
“So, you think I should be worried?”
“If you think you should be worried, I’d say you’re right on with that instinct.”
Way to sugarcoat it, Misty. I tried to think of another question, one that would open the door for Misty to proclaim, “Well, of course you’ll still marry,” but in the silence of my pause I heard a rooster crow—which, in Los Angeles, is actually very normal. Still, I read it as a sign of her betrayal and tearfully hung up the phone, no longer sure whom I could trust.
My one source of comfort, oddly enough, was Wilhelm himself. He called religiously, every day, and sometimes even twice. He missed me. Only on Wednesday was there silence, a collection of long dark hours when my mind went wild. But the next day I heard from him, and the next, and the next. There was nothing to worry about; he’d just been busy. Then, one afternoon he completely put my mind at ease by bringing up the Aryan Vulture all on his own.
“All I dealt with today was my visa. The whole day. I was supposed to have lunch with Nadja but had to cancel to deal with red tape.”
“Nadja?” I asked innocently. I was frozen, filled with fear of whatever he’d say next, as if a piano were teetering on a window ledge and I was the innocent schmuck standing on the sidewalk below.
“Yes. My friend from Germany who visited in L.A.”
Friend. He’s calling her just a friend. All is fine. Of course, he’d never officially admitted that his “friend from Germany” who’d visited in L.A. was indeed the Nadja he’d admitted to kissing way back when, but there was no bringing this up now. “Oh, right. That’s too bad. So, you’re not gonna get to see her at all?”
“No. I already saw her, so it’s not a big deal. It just made me mad that my whole day was spent with this visa.”
He’d already seen her. But if there were something to hide, he wouldn’t have brought her up on his own, would he? Of course not! “That does suck. How’s her boyfriend? Did you finally get to meet him?”
“No, they broke up. He got a little crazy at the end; she had to walk away.”
Oh, right, they broke up. Naturally.
I attempted to laugh, and said jokingly, “Oh, no! Wilhelm, remember that dream I had? What if she’s in love with you? What if now that she’s single she’s gonna make her move?”
To this he laughed as well, though just for a second. Then he wisely snapped into prevent-girlfriend-
from-going-crazy mode. “Don’t worry. We’re just friends. Nothing more. I don’t feel anything romantic for her. Not at all. And anyhow, I won’t have time to see her again. The rest of the trip is family, family, family.”
Thank God.
With that conversation a huge weight was lifted. I believed he was honest and faithful, but what was more comforting was that even if he weren’t to be trusted, it didn’t matter, since he wasn’t going to see the hussy again. All was fine! In fact, it was better than fine. The worst thing that could have happened did: He’d been alone with a boyfriendless Nadja, and yet he’d passed the test. From here on out I had nothing to worry about, no reasons to doubt, nothing left to snoop for. I was free! Just three more days till he came home, till life became wonderful once again.
A week of German food—everything boiled, involving cabbage or ending ominously in “wurst”—put Wilhelm in the mood for sushi, so the second his plane landed, we made plans to meet up at Chaya, our favorite restaurant. Enticed with visions of my magnificent boyfriend and spicy tuna rolls, both equally alluring, I was out the door in minutes and speeding toward the west side.
Beneath a beautiful Japanese painted ceiling, we were reunited. Wilhelm, being the thoughtful boyfriend he was, bestowed upon me a bag of gifts, the most important being the chocolate I’d coveted and prayed for almost as much as I’d prayed that the Aryan Cow would slip and tumble off the planet. Everything was ideal. I had my boyfriend back, I no longer had to worry about his loyalty, I had my chocolate, and now I also had a plate full of sushi. As I mashed wasabi into my little bowl of soy sauce, I asked how his trip had gone and listened to the tales of all his family outings and the nightmare he’d endured getting his visa renewed.
I chewed and smiled and made the appropriate commiserating sounds. Then he said the word “Nadja” right as I accidentally ingested a glob of pure wasabi. My nose shot with pain as if a nail were being hammered into it, and my eyes became tearing sinkholes. Water wasn’t helping, and all the ice was stuck at the bottom. Furiously I waved my hand in front of my mouth—the ridiculous and universal reaction to eating something fiery, as if somehow the miniscule breeze I was creating would have any sort of impact on the fact that my head was ablaze.
“Tell me about her,” I managed to squeak out once I’d found the ability to open my mouth again. I must add that I said this without a trace of jealousy, with genuine interest in this friend of his, actually happy that we could now talk freely and openly about her. I must also say that I expected only a few words about her—a brief overview of what they’d done—and then for him to move on to another topic.
What I got, however, was a distressingly detailed description of the time they spent together, an account that started with them meeting at her place in the city, where he left his car. Then they ventured off together in her little Audi. Gray, with black in
terior. She needed to buy something for her mother, so they went shopping together and found the perfect scarf. Gift secured, they slung back a few drinks at the bar where her sister worked, a place with an outside beer garden and rickety green chairs. Afterward they journeyed to dinner, where Nadja had coq au vin—which, may I just add, translates to “cock with wine”—and he had a salmon filet in a ginger emulsion sauce. They shared a slice of strawberry Grand Marnier cake.
As he described the cake—the most heavenly thing he’d ever had, with strawberries so flavorful that there was no way it could ever taste as good in the States, because fruits and vegetables in Europe are far superior—it occurred to me that it must have been getting late in the day, and his parents lived an hour from the city. But he didn’t go home then. No, some friends of hers met up with them, and the group then headed off to another bar. Okay. More drinks were had. People danced. And then, he said, because it was so late, he stayed at her place and left the next morning.
Maybe it was that my hand, still holding the chopsticks, was frozen in midair. Maybe it was that I actually hadn’t moved in quite a while, and one might also have deduced that I wasn’t breathing. Whatever it was, Wilhelm quickly realized that the last detail might not have been wise to share.
“In separate beds, in separate rooms,” he added hastily.
Suddenly the shock I’d been in wore off. My heart started back up and began beating so loudly I wouldn’t have been surprised at all had the man at the table next to us leaned over and said, “You there! Keep that pounding to yourself!”
I took the last sip of water, and of course now was when the pile of ice at the bottom of the glass freed itself, and shot into my face. Calmly, eerily calmly, I patted the drops of water with my napkin, and then smoothed the linen on my lap. “In separate rooms?”
“Well, sort of.”
Sort of? Sort of, in a situation like this, didn’t cut it. I was about to inform him of this when he began describing the layout of the room, a description that’s usually not necessary if there are indeed two separate rooms. But apparently, in the case of all things Nadja, it wasn’t that simple. No, he then started actually drawing the floor plan of the room on a napkin. An L-shaped room, a wall here, a wall there. The bed was from the seventies, he threw in, and beneath it was another bed that slid out, very cool. Then the dresser was here—
“Wait. You spent the night, in the same room, in a bed that was attached to her bed?”
“No. Not attached. We moved it to a different part of the room. And the room was mostly two rooms, because of the L.” Then with a deep breath he firmly added, “Sarah, I was drinking. I could not drive home.”
This last statement was intended to end the conversation. I was supposed to be thankful my responsible boyfriend hadn’t put his life and others’ in danger. It certainly wouldn’t have been appropriate to say, “I don’t care if you were drunk. You should’ve been a good boyfriend, gotten behind the damn wheel, and hightailed it outta there!”
For a second I think he figured he’d wrestled himself free. But honestly—when I pictured them sliding a bed from beneath her bed, and then going to great lengths to move it to another part of this crazy-shaped room—I wanted to laugh. There was no way that happened. Besides, if it was understood they were just friends and there truly was nothing more, they wouldn’t have needed to move the damn bed to a secure location. Hence, if they needed to keep the beds separated from each other, it was to avoid temptation, in which case a few feet of carpeted floor wasn’t much of a barrier, especially not after a night of bottomless steins of Bitburger and endless shots of Jägermeister.
Yes, clearly the Aryan Huntress had set a trap, one that involved a sketchy L-shaped room and a crazy bed from the seventies. I felt sick. I didn’t say anything; I didn’t move. I had to wait till the urge to puke passed. Wilhelm, meanwhile, observed me with concern, and then, perhaps thinking the danger was over, resumed eating.
“But,” I finally ventured, “you must’ve known you’d spend the night there, because you left your car at her place. It was planned.”
The skin around his widow’s peak caught the overhead light, shiny and smooth. Mr. Burns, I thought, what have you done?
And that was when I left my body. Suddenly I was hovering beside myself. This horrible mealtime conversation was happening to someone else, to that poor girl who looked just like me and was sitting in front of a half-eaten spicy tuna roll that had at some point been stabbed with chopsticks. I heard the distant claim, “We’re just friends.” I thought of all the e-mails he’d kept secret, all the bitchy comments she’d made about me. I noticed that Mr. Burns was talking again, but now all I heard was Misty Mystical, questioning his loyalty.
Until, that is, I heard the words “one-night stand.”
I snapped back into my body. “What? Repeat what you just said.”
“I said, we’re just friends. She’s someone I slept with once. Nothing more. Ever since, we’ve been nothing more than friends. That was a long time ago. Okay? Nothing happened recently. This is not a big deal. I’m with you.”
Now my heart was back to furiously pounding. I bypassed the water and went straight for the sake, surprised the thumping didn’t knock it right out of my hand. Okay, so way back when, they’d had sex. He’d told me they’d just kissed. Call me old-fashioned, but I actually consider the two activities to be different.
Somehow, I realized, I was speaking. “What one, what day that you spent the night there, this time?” Was I making sense? “On this trip. Which day.”
He paused, then said, “Wednesday.”
Wednesday. The day I never heard from him. The collection of dark hours. The night my mind went wild. No longer could I talk over the pounding in my chest, which had spread to my head and become a dull, throbbing sensation, so I sat there and sipped my sake. Refilled my sake. Sipped my sake. Was he really trying to say that spending the night with a girl he’d lied to me about—a girl he had kept secret and actually had sex with, a girl who’d shown her hatred for me in e-mail after clandestine e-mail, a girl he’d spent all night drinking with, on a trip that I as his girlfriend should’ve accompanied him on—wasn’t a big deal?
If there were cool girls out there who could have handled that, I was not one of them. He’d gone too far. Whether or not anything had happened between them was irrelevant. I felt betrayed and disrespected. The fact that I would always wonder was enough; the fact that I was even able to wonder was enough. I needed someone I knew was honest, someone I could trust without doubt, someone with whom I didn’t live in fear of what I might uncover. Wilhelm, I realized sadly, was not that person.
Right there, beneath the beautiful Japanese painted ceiling, I broke up with him. I told him it was over. I told him why. I told him I felt disrespected and betrayed and would not be treated like that.
His expression was that of suspicious disbelief, as if he were convinced someone had a video camera on him and soon there’d be the big revelation, the big “Ha! It was a joke!” Despite everything I’d just said, he wasn’t getting it. Until, that is, I stood up. Then he quickly began talking, justifying his actions, telling me this was crazy, asking me not to go.
Calmly I collected my presents—because, damnit, I’d earned them—and turned and strolled out the door. It turned out that even crazy codependent girls have their boundaries, and Wilhelm had just crossed one of them.
9
And She’s Down for the Count!
SOME PEOPLE HANDLE BREAKUPS WELL. I IMAGINE they’re the same strange souls who get their oil changed every three months, have their annual physicals annually, and don’t rear-end the car in front of them because they happened to be cutting their split ends while driving. Gina, for example, is one of those people. The second the words are uttered and the tearful good-byes are said, she’s spurred into action, embarking on a methodical search-and-destroy mission that involves removing any and all pictures of the ex and any and all evidence of the ex. House suffi
ciently ex-proofed, she cleans, for hours, and then drives to the store for the proper breakup accoutrements—tissues with aloe, food, wine, smokes, and chocolate bars—essentially preparing to hibernate in comfort. Once all is neat and tidy and the jagged edges of fond memories have been filed down, then she’s ready to mourn and grieve in her own little Virgo way. At this point she allows herself to collapse in tears. “Allows herself” being the key words.
Me? I’m a bit different. I break down because I have no choice. I break down in a messy house, and it gets messier by the second. I break down alongside photographs of my ex and end up wailing and clutching those photographs to my chest as if illustrating to the universe just how my heart had been broken. I break down wearing clothes he gave me, or wrapped in a sweatshirt he left behind, and I refuse to change for days. I don’t spare myself pain, I embrace it. It would no longer be appropriate to call me a human being. A “useless mass of pain and raw nerves” would be far more fitting, and this is only in the initial breakup stage, when my emotions are still somewhat muted by shock.
So, no, I didn’t handle the Wilhelm breakup well.
Three days into it and I was embracing my pain from the floor, though I had no idea how I’d ended up on the floor, since one delightful aspect of my states of extreme misery is a lack of consciousness. Not that I pass out, no; I’m simply not present at times. My crying jags are like supernatural events, essentially abducting me, and when I stop, when I finally manage to breathe without heaving, I find myself in situations of which I have no recollection—perhaps clutching a shoe or lying in the bathtub. So at this particular moment I’d just found the ability to breathe again and was on the floor with my head on a stack of magazines. In my hand, for some reason, was a little gold Buddha statue. With no motivation to move, I simply stared at the fibers of my Pottery Barn rug. Hello, old friend, I thought. Here we are again.
