A Great Big Love

by Alona Jarden

  Chapter 12

  Don

  Her smile… My God, her smile. I enjoyed it so much during that conversation. I enjoyed her so much and our conversation. The thought of having to go back to my empty house didn’t bother me, and it felt strange to be able to describe my time outside of it as enjoyable.

  I answered her many questions, tried to understand what was behind the protective walls she built around her, and dove so deep into her intoxicating look that I didn't notice I'd finished the chicken parts that were in my salad and loaded only green leaves with no flavor to my fork.

  "You don’t have to eat that, you know? I can see that you're suffering." She scoffed at me.

  "Why would you say that?" I grimaced exaggeratedly. "Maybe you haven't heard about the Bibliosaia tribe in Africa. There, your face is distorted when you eat something delicious."

  "Bibliosaia?"

  "Yes, yes. My facial twitching actually expresses the great deal of pleasure I’m having from this… food. Hmmm... Yummy!" I loaded more of what looked like my foods' food into my mouth and went on blurting, "My God, this is really tasty!"

  "You squint when you lie."

  "You're pretty when you laugh."

  "You'll be surprised to hear that you're not the first to say that." I was glad to see that she was loosening up even if only slightly. "But you should know that I don’t laugh like this often. Actually, you're the only one who causes me to bust out in such uncontrollable laughter."

  "Well, I guess it's a good thing that I'm going to be near you a lot in the near future, isn't it?"

  "The future?" Suddenly her uplifted spirit fell, and she got overwhelmed with thoughts I couldn’t figure out.

  "Do you have reservations about the future in general, or is it only in regards to me being there?"

  "I have no concerns with the future, Don, nor with you being a part of it. It's just that I was instructed not to make any long-term plans for the future."

  "By whom?"

  "Noel, my best friend. She said that for me to be able to walk the distance, I need to deal with one thing at any given time."

  "And when you're going to tell her about our thing right here, would you say that you had fun or not?"

  "I'll say I was having a great time."

  "So, what's the matter?"

  "You just reminded me that this dinner is just one thing and that there are going to be many other things that I'm going to have to deal with in the future."

  "Is that a problem?"

  "I don't know, Don. You tell me."

  "It's not!" I rushed to answer and smiled at her supportively. "Nothing is going to be a problem for us. Everything is going to work itself out very easily. You'll see."

  "And what happens when you get tired of eating tasteless salad?"

  "I sure hope we don't get to that, Michelle, as I'm sure it would be a particularly challenging situation to deal with."

  "Sure. You're making jokes, but I'm actually being serious. I don’t want to date a person in a fat state of mind. I really am planning to change my life."

  "You have nothing to worry about, Michelle. I'll walk beside you for as long as I meet the threshold conditions you set, and when I get tired of eating healthy, I'll find another fat woman to bother."

  "Moron."

  "See? It all works out easily, just like I said it would!"

  "I already feel sorry for her." She giggled softly.

  "You're already feeling jealous of her." I pointed my finger at her and changed my tone to a more serious one. "Michelle, I promise that if I become a problem, I will no longer be your personal problem."

  "And what about the fact that I can't date a moron? What do you have to say about that? Do you think you can be serious from time to time?"

  "I think I'd rather eat a tasteless salad than be serious from time to time."

  "You need to hear me, Don. I really like your sense of humor, I even love how you make me laugh, but I’m going the distance. I'm not going to give up on myself this time. I’m going to lead a healthy lifestyle."

  "And I'll be there to encourage and help you do just that."

  "What if that's not enough?" I wished she hadn’t been so doubtful of our relationship and, frankly, I began to tire of having to convince her and exhaled in frustration as she continued. "If you want to be by my side in the near future, you have to join my path or not be in it at all."

  "There, I joined it." I shoved a big pile of leaves onto my fork and into my mouth, then moaned with disgust. "Hmmm... Yummy!"

  All I needed to do was to divert the conversation from the issues that clearly freaked her out. She obviously didn't want to talk about the future and lucky for me, for the last three years, I specialized in focusing on right here and now, without thinking too much about the future or the past.

  "Can I clear the table for you?" The waiter asked after about twenty minutes, during which I miraculously managed to keep those weeds down.

  "Would you like to finish my salad too?" She smiled at me.

  "What an amazing woman I found, huh? Always thinks of others before she thinks of herself. An absolute win!"

  "You'll probably want to see the dessert menu now, right?" she asked hesitantly.

  "I wouldn’t mind taking a peek."

  "Well, there you have it, Don. Problems!"

  "I'm gonna give you a few minutes to think about this." The waiter gathered the dishes from our table and walked away.

  "You said you'll join my path, Don."

  "I did! I said I wouldn’t mind taking a peek. You've been peeking at my biceps all night, but did I say anything? No! I was being polite!"

  "Can you wholeheartedly tell me that you can take a look at the dessert menu and not order anything from it?"

  "Just as I can look at you laughing the whole evening and restrain myself from kissing you in front of everyone."

  "You're turning to humor again, and I really want to know the answer to my question."

  "And I really want to kiss you."

  "Don!"

  "Yes, my beautiful?"

  "Don, come on!"

  "Yes, my beautiful Michelle?"

  "Stop dodging and answer the question!" she insisted, and I signaled the waiter to come back.

  "Can you please bring me the dessert menu?" I asked aloud even before he reached our table.

  "I'm not letting you order any..."

  "I'm a man of action, Michelle, not of words. You asked me to answer your question, and that’s what I'm trying to do. I'll show you that I can take a peek and not order anything off that sweet, amazing, tempting, delicious, heavenly dessert list." I took the menu the waiter handed me, peeked rapidly at it, swallowed hard, and immediately gave it back to him. "Now if you can bring us the bill, I will be very grateful."

  When I returned my gaze to Michelle, she gave me the most wonderful astonished look.

  Even though she offered, I refused to share the cost of dinner with her. Since Sarah passed away, I hadn’t gone on any dates, and on the dates I went on before settling down with Sarah, I always insisted on my prerogative to pay the bill.

  I placed my credit card back in my wallet and took advantage of the awkward silence to re-play our date in my mind. Michelle had shown up, she sat down, she laughed, asked questions, and had a great time. She gave me an option to join her new path, and if she was willing to place that much trust in my hands, maybe it was really time for me to walk that path too?

  "I have a request from you, Michelle," I said as I walked her to her car.

  "What can I do for you, Don?"

  "Can you please be gentle with me?"

  "Gentle in what way?"

  "I see how you are. I see your self-confidence and how you know exactly what you're worth."

  "Are we talking about me?!" I got her trapped exactly where I wanted her to be.

  "You know what I'm talking about. All I ask is for you to be gentle with me, okay? If I agree to what you're suggesting and if I indeed get into
your car for a medium length canoodling session, I ask that you do things with the utmost sensitivity and good taste."

  "I'm sorry, when did I suggest we do that?"

  "You didn’t say the exact words, but I see how you're looking at me. In this time and age, there are things that need to be said aloud, Michelle."

  "Oh, are there now?"

  "Don’t get me wrong, I'm okay with giving it a shot, but I won't stand for any sexual deviations."

  "Why you ignorant—"

  "And no hands under any of our shirts! I don't know where you grew up, but I was raised not to put out on the first date."

  "I thought this was our second date," Her smiling eyes threatened to tear my heart in pieces.

  "Shit, I forgot about that. In that case, get in as quickly as you can." I opened the door for her. "On second dates, I'm willing to go all the way and will endure all kinds of deviations which I can't even begin to describe."

  "You're horrible, Don." She giggled.

  "Come on. Quickly. Get in, I'm right behind you!"

  "I have to say, moron, I had a great time canceling our date tonight." She immediately began the inevitable parting phase of the evening.

  "Me too."

  "Look…" She released an undefined sigh. "I'm aware of the fact that I'm a bit unbearable, and I can't guarantee that things will always be easy with me, but I promise not to freak out too often, and I promise not to overthink the meaning of every little thing."

  "Are you saying what I think you're saying?"

  "I'm willing to bet my life that I'm not."

  "Michelle?"

  "Yes, Don."

  "With a very uncharacteristic serious note, I have to say that I really like you."

  The very last thing I wanted to do was to let her get in her car and drive away without placing my lips on hers, but her expression left no room for doubt. That path she took so far, the one that got her to this point in time, left her full of fears and suspicions. It was obvious that one successful dinner wasn’t going to undo the sediment that was dragging in her heart.

  I stood there, outside my favorite restaurant, staring at the rear lights of her car driving away from me and waved her goodbye.

  My mother would always quote Sting to me when some girl I liked wouldn’t come around at a pace that seemed reasonable to me. She would say that if I really loved her as I claimed I did, I should let her go. The lyrics to Sting’s song says that if it was really love, it would come back to me, and if after letting it go, I found myself all alone, it probably wasn't the love I was waiting for in the first place.

  At that moment, as Michelle's car disappeared around the corner, I remembered how each and every one of the girls my mother advised me about never did come back to me. That doesn’t mean my mother was wrong. Looking back, she may have actually been right. They probably weren’t the love that was intended for me, but what if they were? Maybe, if I chased them more aggressively, I wouldn't have found myself leaving the hospital that day empty-handed.

  I stood all alone on the side of the road with Michelle's car disappearing in the winding street, and an impossible question weighing on me.

  What if by letting those loved ones go, I sentenced myself to heartbreak, and even though Sarah was amazing, could she not have been the one that was intended for me in the first place?

  Chapter 13

  Michelle

  On my way home, I tried as hard as I could to push the bad thoughts out of my head. It took no effort at all to identify which ones were good and which had no business driving me crazy, as I knew my destructive patterns of behavior so very well.

  In order to make the events of that evening clearer in my head, I'd have to conclude that something was fundamentally screwed up with Don.

  I tried to understand what was behind his strong desire to conquer my heart or at least to understand why I wanted him so much to succeed. It was hard for me to accept the fact that I was just being a woman, like any other woman. When did I turn into a person who really enjoyed being wooed and hearing flattering words about herself? I never liked that before, or did I?

  No one has ever courted me so blatantly and aggressively as Don did other than that douchebag, which means that no one had honestly tried to win my heart before.

  I parked my car in front of my house but still couldn't find the strength to come out of it.

  I hadn’t planned on that evening ending the way it did when I left my house. My plan was to go to the restaurant, make it clear to Don that him and I would never happen and return home full of remorse and sorrow for disappointing him, but none of that happened. I actually came back from a dinner I dared not even imagine experiencing with the reality that I’d had a great time.

  Since returning from the hospital, I'd made some significant changes in my life. I had added strides and a little exercise on a daily basis, stopped eating carbs altogether and switched to drinking water instead of sugary soft drinks, but it didn't seem to be enough. These were the simple changes to be made and beyond them, there was still a very long way for me to go before I would be able to implement the more difficult changes that needed to be made in my life, like mastering confrontations and making my voice heard with more determination and confidence.

  For years, I was afraid to stand up to others and speak my objective mind. It started with Noel. I was so insecure in our friendship that I avoided correcting her, even when she said some very obvious untruths during our conversations. It deteriorated after that incident with the guy from the university. Instead of telling him I knew he was a stinking pig, I just avoided walking through places I knew he would be sitting with his friends and did my best to keep away from him.

  I almost did the same thing earlier that evening with Don, but luckily for me, I didn’t. I intended to stay home and send numerous well-worded cancellation messages to him, but somehow I found myself going to the restaurant and confronting him face to face.

  "Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!!!" I screamed in panic when the door to my car suddenly opened.

  "Shhhhhh… Have you lost your mind?"

  My eyes almost popped out of their sockets as I saw Don standing outside my car, smiling and feeling really pleased with himself for startling me.

  "Have I lost my mind? Have you?!" I yelled at him.

  "Oh, I'm sorry. Did I scare you?"

  "I can't believe this." I tried to catch my breath. "I can't fucking believe this… What are you doing here? Are you... What are you… Seriously, are you following me?"

  "Well... I'm here, and you never gave me your address, so I guess we both know the answer to that question."

  "Dear God Almighty, Don." I gasped heavily. "I'm gonna need to calm down a little before I can handle your nonsense again." I gathered my stuff that was placed on the seat next to me and turned to him, feeling a little amused. "I'll rephrase my question, as madness such as yours probably requires specific formulation. Don, why did you follow me home?"

  "Since we came to our second date in separate cars, I was deprived of being the one to open the car door for you when you got home."

  "I see, but do you understand that this is not a normal thing to do? Do you?" I came out of my car and slammed the door behind me, finding his beautiful eyes smiling at me playfully and felt I was willing to stand in front of them for the rest of my life.

  "I take pride in not being normal, Michelle. That's the only thing I have going for me on second dates."

  "I thought it was your disturbed sense of humor."

  "I have my ways to get me some at the end of a date. Opening the door for my date is the most successful method of all."

  "So what I hear is that you're out on a lot of dates."

  "Hmmm… I choose not to respond to that right now."

  "For the reason it will incriminate you as a male whore?"

  "Not at all! For the reason it will reduce the intense urge you're fighting."

  "What urge?"

  "The one pushing you to invite me into your home f
or a drink or some fooling around."

  "You're an imbecile, and I have no idea as to what I'm going to do with you." A shiver of hysteria and fear passed through my body just thinking about his hands on some part of my naked body. "Listen to me, Don. I'm not fighting any urges, and you are definitely not invited to come in at this time of night to my house."

  "Sure I am, Michelle," He placed his hand around my shoulder and began to walk me down the pathway to the entrance. "Don’t you get it? We had an amazing date. We talked, laughed, and, most importantly, we both showed up!"

  "If that's how you measure the success of your dates, I guess it's safe to declare our second date as successful." I smiled in a way I never did and was amazed that his arm on my shoulder didn’t feel excessive.

  "I don't know what the fools you went out with before did, but at the end of every successful second date I go on, comes the artistic part."

  "Why am I not surprised? Did you prepare a magic show or something?" I turned to face him as I stopped before my front door.

  "Oh… I see that the good reputation of my act precedes me. In that case, I have no doubt that you've already heard about my bold performance in bed."

  "Now, wait just a—"

  "Stop!" He placed his finger on my lips. "I know what you're going to ask, and I have to stop you right there. Yes, Michelle. The rumors are correct. Some women actually called it 'the best show they had ever been to,' but I'm not sure our relationship is ready for you to see it in full."

  "Oh my God, you really are an idiot!" I didn't want him to see that the nonsense he was spouting just made me want to pull him closer to me, so I quickly opened the door and pushed myself to its other side. "Have a good night, Don."

  "You don't know what you're missing out on!"

  "I'm sure I can catch the next show." I heard myself giggling like one of those women in those scenes I never thought I'd experience.

  "Can I be bold and ask you for just one little kiss?" He puckered his lips and closed his eyes.

  "Maybe on our third date, dumb ass." I slammed the door in his face and immediately regretted it.

  "A verbal agreement is binding under state law, Michelle!" he shouted through the door. "You said 'on our third date' and that, ladies and gentlemen, is a promise to a third date!"