As James Seville unlocked the deadbolt to apartment #1503, he was brought back to a simpler, happier time. He stepped into the foyer, slipped off his loafers and put them alongside a pair of athletic shoes.
Then, he looked down the hall. James used to love this time of night, past ten thirty, when Zooey would shut herself in the study, guzzling matte tea as she chipped away at her dissertation… something about foliage in South America, the details were hazy to him. But James could still recall how she sat in her wheeled leather chair, back to the door with headphones on, eyes locked on her laptop. He’d sneak into the study, right up next to her and rub Zooey’s bare, tanned shoulders, which always made her giggle.
It was all he needed to carry her off down the hall, to kiss and love, and to make love. Afterwards, Zooey would whisper those three wonderful words in his ear and drift to sleep, her cheek on his chest.
But these moments could never last.
“I’ve got to get this done,” she’d say, or “I’m tired, babe,” and even when they did make love, Zooey seemed distracted, as if sex was something she still owed him. At first, James took the same advice he gave troubled couples at his office, and peppered her with little instances of affection. But her excuses became more frequent, almost daily, until James stopped trying. He knew Zooey had a lot of work to do. He knew she was tired.
So most days he came home, opened the study room door and rested his hands on her shoulders, then stared with her into the blue glow of the computer screen. “Don’t work too hard,” he’d say after a minute or two. He’d look around at the walls, which they had decorated together last spring with framed Ansel Adams photos, artwork by M.C. Esher, vinyl by John Denver, and a four foot long panorama of the Virgin Islands. This they hung this over Zooey’s workspace.
She called it her muse.
Soon, he began to feel helpless. After all the priceless moments they shared, after all the promises and honest laughter and tears, and all the years they spent alone, searching for one another – all of this didn’t seem to matter. They were still slipping into the same mundane existence as every one else.
But not today. Today would be different.
As James crept across the kitchen, these frustrations seemed distant and fuzzy. He made his way past the kitchen countertop and sink, which was filled with cereal bowls and cookie sheets dotted with pizza toppings.
He would do the dishes tomorrow.
James slid up against the study room door and pressed an ear close. He could almost hear Zooey pecking away at her keyboard, who, despite spending countless hours on Word, still had to stop and search for the Tab key. He could almost hear Leaving on a Jet Plane playing out her earphones as she slurped her coffee.
Zooey always slurped her coffee, even when it was full.
Carefully now, like a teenager sneaking in after hours, James turned the doorknob and stepped inside the study. Everything was arranged exactly as he remembered it – her chair up against the desk, back to the door, headphones plugged into her laptop, her laptop open to the last few sentences she had finished on her dissertation. James had even sprinkled her perfume along the top of her chair.
The only thing missing was Zooey.
“Hey,” he whispered, putting both hands on her chair. “How’s it coming along?”
“Winning the war,” she might have said.
Most days, that’d be the end of the conversation. But not tonight. “So I stopped by that jewelry shop off 72nd. You remember the place… Vartan's Fine Jewelry.”
This would get her attention. Vartan's was one of her favorite spots in Manhattan.
“I started looking at their rings, and I, uh—” James cleared his throat. “I found one I think you’ll like a lot, with a gold band and an opal on top. I know how you hate diamonds. We’ll stop by tomorrow together and pick it up.
“Babe, you have work tomorrow.”
“I’m going to take the day off. Don’t worry about it. I know you’ve been waiting a long time for this. I don’t know what took me so long.”
James hesitated, only now noticing that their panorama of the Virgin Islands was crooked, and straightened it.
“Listen… the day we agreed to get this apartment together, back in that Italian joint Illinois, that was the happiest day of my life. I fell in love so fast.”
“James, I—“
“But it hurt,” he pressed. “I mean, I started thinking about you all day long, and when we moved in here, I got scared. Maybe that’s why I never bought you a ring… I just wanted to make sure we were doing the right thing. But now I know for sure, Zooey.
“I know that I love you and there is no one else I’d rather have by my side. I’m sorry you had to wait so long.”
James looked down at the empty chair. “You’ve still got work to do,” he managed. “No, no, keep going. Tomorrow we’ll head to Vartan’s. Don’t forget—I love you, baby.”
With this, he walked out of the study and shut the door behind him, then headed to the bedroom. He stripped and put on a pair of striped-flannel pajamas that Zooey had given him for Christmas, then pulled back the comforter and slipped into bed. He kept his head propped up on a few pillows, his eyes fixed on the open doorway. Off to the left, he could see the light from the study.
And there he waited, hoping Zooey would close her laptop, turn off the light and come to bed.
3.
Get the Time Page 2
