by Emily Giffin
"This weekend is going to be out of control," he says, sliding my tank top over my head, letting it fall at our feet. He unhooks my bra, cups my breasts and then my face. His fingers press the back of my neck.
"I'm so glad you're here," I say. "I'm so happy."
"Me too," he says, as he works on my button-fly.
I lead Dex over to my bed and remove his clothes, admiring his body from every angle, kissing him in new places. On the back of his knees. On his elbows. We have time.
We make love slowly, each of us stopping the other at various points until we can't stand it any longer, and then reversing in the other reckless, breathless direction. He feels more mine than he ever has, and I know why: he is not going home to her tonight. He will not have to wash off, or check for signs of our togetherness. I sink my nails into his back and pull him harder against me.
After we make love, we order food from the diner and eat burgers by candlelight. Then we climb back into bed, where we talk and listen to music, fighting through waves of fatigue so that we can savor our time together, not waste it sleeping.
Our only interruption comes around midnight, when Dex says he should probably phone Darcy. I tell him it's a good idea, wondering whether I should give him privacy or stay in bed beside him. I decide to go to the bathroom, let him do his thing. I run water so I can't hear any piece of their conversation. A minute later, Dex calls my name.
I open the door a crack. "Are you off?"
"Yeah. C'mere. You didn't have to leave."
I get back in bed beside him, find his hand.
"Sorry about that," he says.
"No problem. I understand."
"Just taking precautions… I figure she won't call now. I told her I was on my way home to bed."
"What is she doing?"
"They're all at the Talkhouse. Drunk and happy."
But we are sober and happier, all tangled up in my sheets, our heads resting on one pillow. When Dex sits up to blow out the candle burning on my windowsill, I notice that trimmings from his haircut have transferred from his neck to my white pillowcase. There's something about those tiny black hairs that makes me so happy I want to cry.
I close my eyes so that I won't.
At some point, we fall asleep.
And then morning comes.
I wake up, remembering the first morning we woke up together, the panic that gripped my heart on that Sunday I turned thirty. The feeling I have now could not be more different. Calm joy.
"Hi, Rachel."
"Hi, Dex."
We are both grinning.
"Happy Fourth of July," he says, his hand resting on my inner thigh.
"Happy Fourth."
"It's not your typical Fourth. No fireworks planned, no picnics, no beach. You okay with that?" he asks.
"Yeah. I'm okay with that," I say.
We make love and then shower together. I am self-conscious at first, but after a few minutes, I relax and let him wash my back. We stay under the hot water (he likes his showers as hot as I do) long past the point of wrinkled fingers. Then we are out in the world, walking down Third Avenue to Starbucks. It is a humid, gray day, and rain feels likely. But we don't need good weather. Happiness wells inside me.
We are alone in line to order, Marvin Gaye singing over the sound system. I order a tall skim latte. Dex says, "Give me the same thing in a large with, um… just regular milk."
I like that he abandons the Starbucks terminology, skipping the word "grande" and ordering his coffee as a guy's guy should.
The perky girl behind the register bellows our order to her colleague, who promptly marks our cups with a black marker. Starbucks employees are consistently, freakishly chipper, even during the worst of morning rush hour when they have to deal with hordes of cranky people waiting impatiently for their caffeine fix.
"Oh wait," the girl says, beaming. "Are these together or separate?"
Dex answers quickly, "We're-they're together."
I smile at his slip. We are together.
"Will there be anything else?"
"Um. Yeah. I'll have a blueberry muffin," Dex says and then looks at me. "Rachel?"
"Yeah. I'll have one too," I say, resisting the urge to order a low-fat muffin. I don't want to be anything like Darcy.
"So two blueberry muffins." Dex pays and drops his change into the tip mug in front of the register. The girl smiles at me, as if to say, your guy is not only hot but generous too.
Dex and I both add a packet of brown sugar to our coffee, stir, and find a seat at the counter facing the street. The sidewalks are deserted.
"I like New York this way," I say, tasting my foam. We watch a lone yellow cab drift up Third Avenue. "Listen… no honking."
"Yeah. It really is dead," he says. "I bet we could get reservations anywhere tonight. Would you like to go out?"
I look at him. "We can't do that."
Getting coffee is one thing. Dinner is another.
"We can do whatever we please. Haven't you figured that out yet?" He winks and sips his coffee.
"What if somebody sees us?"
"Nobody's here." He motions out the window. "And so what if they do? We're allowed to eat, aren't we? Hell, I could even tell Darcy we're going to grab a bite together. She knows that we're both stuck here working, right?"
"I guess so."
"C'mon. I want to take you out. I've never taken you out on a proper date. I feel bad about that. What do you say?"
I raise my eyebrows and smirk.
"What's that look for?" Dex asks. His full lips meet the rim of his cup.
"It's just that 'proper' is not the word that comes to mind when I think about us."
"Oh, that," Dex says, waving his hand in the air, as though I have just stated an insignificant detail about our relationship. "Well, that can't be helped… I mean-yes, the circumstances are… less than ideal."
"That's an understatement. Let's call a spade a spade, Dex. We're having an affair."
It is the most I have ever said about what we are doing. I know Hillary wouldn't give me any awards for forthrightness, but my heart still skips. It is a bold comment for me.
"I guess so," he says hesitantly. "But when I'm with you, I'm not thinking about the impropriety of our… relationship. Being with you doesn't feel wrong."
"I know what you mean," I say, thinking that there would be a few people out there who might beg to differ.
I wait for him to say more about it. About us. Our future. Or at the very least our coup this weekend. He doesn't. Instead he suggests we take our coffee home and read the paper in bed.
"Sounds perfect," I say, wondering what section he reads first. I want to know every single thing about him.
It rains on and off all day, so we stay in, moving from bed to sofa to bed, talking for hours, never checking the time. We talk about everything-high school, college, law school, our families, friends, books, movies. But not Darcy or the situation. Not even when she calls his cell phone to say hello. I study my cuticles as he tells her he just stepped out of his office to get a bite to eat, and that yes, he's getting a lot done, been working on a pitch all day. He mumbles "Me too" at the end of their brief conversation, so I know what he has just told her. I tell myself that many couples punctuate their calls with "I love yous" in the automatic way other people say "good-bye." It doesn't mean anything.
As Dex snaps his cell phone shut, looking chagrined, my cell phone rings. It's Darcy. Dex laughs. "She just told me she had to run. Sure she did! To call you!"
I don't pick up, but I listen to her message afterward. She bitches about the weather but says that they are having fun anyway. She says she misses me. That it's not the same without Dex and me. I will not feel guilty. I will not.
That evening Dex and I separate for a few hours so that he can go home and change for dinner, as he has only packed jeans and shorts and basic toiletries. I miss him while he's gone, but I like the way the separation makes our dinner seem more like a date. Besides
, I am grateful for the chance to primp alone. I can do the things that a guy you just started seeing should not see you do-pluck a stray eyebrow hair, strategically spray perfume (behind the knees, between the breasts) and apply makeup to make it look like you are wearing very little.
Dex picks me up at seven-forty-five and we cab it down to one of my favorite restaurants in Manhattan, Balthazar, where it is usually impossible to get a reservation unless you call weeks in advance or are willing to take a six o'clock or eleven-thirty seating. But we get in promptly at eight o'clock and are given an ideal, cozy booth. I ask Dex if he knows that Jerry Seinfeld proposed to his wife, Jessica Sklar, at Balthazar. Perhaps this is the exact spot where Jerry popped the question with the Tiffany ring.
"I didn't know that," Dex says, glancing up from the wine list.
"Did you know that she dumped her husband of four months for Jerry?"
He laughs. "Yeah, I think I heard that one."
"Soo… Balthazar must be the restaurant of choice for the scandalous."
He shakes his head and gives me an exasperated smile. "Please stop calling us that."
"Face facts, Dexter. This is scandalous… We're just like Jerry and Jessica."
"Look. We can't help the way we feel," Dex says earnestly.
Yeah. And perhaps that is what Jessica whispered to Jerry on her cell phone, while her unsuspecting husband sat guffawing at Must-See TV in the next room.
As I scan my menu, I realize that my opinion of Jerry and Jessica might be changing. I used to subscribe to the notion that he was a heartless home wrecker and she a shameless gold digger who coldly upgraded her Nederlander husband for a wealthier, wittier model the second the opportunity presented itself, which, I read, was at the Reebok Sports Club, the Upper West Side gym that Darcy also belongs to. Now, I'm not so sure. Maybe that was how it all went down. Then again, maybe Jessica married Eric Nederlander, whom she thought she loved by any relative measure in her life up to that point, and then she met Jerry, days after returning from her Italian honeymoon, and quickly realized that she had never really loved before, that her feelings for Jerry far surpassed whatever she felt for Eric.
What was a girl to do? Stay in a marriage with the wrong man, all in the name of appearances? Jessica knew the shit that she would get, not only from friends and family and her own husband, whom she had promised to have and to hold forever (not just a mere 120 days), but from the whole world-or at least those of us so bored with our own lives that we devour People magazine the second it hits the newsstands. Yet she went for it anyway, realizing that you only live once. She stuck her neck out in traffic, and like the frog in my all-time favorite video game, made it across the street, safely into the little box on top of the screen, or, as it were, into a six-million-dollar pad overlooking Central Park. Owning up to her mistake actually took real grit and courage. And maybe Jerry, too, deserved credit for ignoring the wrath of the world, following his heart at any price. Maybe true love just prevailed.
Regardless of what really happened with Jessica, Eric, and Jerry, my notions of rule-following in love are shifting.
"So, do you know what you'd like to have?" Dex asks me.
I smile and tell him that I am waiting to hear the specials.
After dinner Dex asks me if I want to go get another drink.
"Do you?" I ask, wanting to please him, give him the right answer.
"I asked you first."
"I would rather just go home."
"Good. Me too."
The night has cleared somewhat, and as we are dropped off on my corner, we see a few fireworks exploding in the distance over the East River. Blues and pinks and golds illuminate what feels like our own private city. We hold hands and stare up at the sky, watching silently for several minutes before we go inside and say good night to Jose, who by now thinks that Dex is my boyfriend.
We go upstairs, undress, and make love. It is not my imagination-it is better every time. Afterward, neither of us speaks or moves. We fall asleep, our legs and arms entwined.
In the morning, I wake up just as the light is returning to the sky. I listen to Dex breathe and study the sharp curve of his cheek. His eyes snap open suddenly. Our faces are close.
"Hi, baby." His voice is scratchy with sleep.
"Hi," I say softly. "Good morning."
"What are you doing awake? It's early."
"I'm watching you."
"Why?"
"Because I love your face," I say.
He looks genuinely surprised by my comment. How could he be? He must know that he is handsome.
"I love the way you look too," he says. His arms move around me, pulling me against his chest. "And I love the way you feel."
I feel myself blush.
"And the way you taste," he says, kissing my neck and my face. We avoid mouths, as you do after sleep. "And I guess all of that makes sense."
"Why's that?"
"Well, because…"
He is breathing hard now and looks nervous, almost scared. I reach for a condom from my nightstand drawer, but he pulls my hand back, and moves inside me, and says "because" again.
"Because why?"
I think I might know why. I hope I know why.
"Because, Rachel…" He looks into my eyes. "Because I love you."
He says those words exactly as I am thinking them, fighting a growing impulse to say it first. And now I don't have to.
I try to memorize everything about this moment. The look in his eyes, the feel of his skin. Even the way the light is slanting through my blinds. It is a moment beyond perfection, beyond anything I have ever felt before. It is almost too much to bear. I don't care that Dex is engaged to Darcy, or that we are creeping around like a couple of outlaws. I don't care that my teeth need a good brushing and that my hair is messy and limp around my face. I only feel Dex and his words and I know, without a doubt, that this is the happiest moment of my life. Snapshots flash through my mind. We are dining by candlelight, sipping fine champagne. We are curled up next to a raging fire in an old Vermont farmhouse with creaky floorboards and snowflakes the size of silver dollars falling outside. We are sharing a picnic lunch in Bordeaux in the middle of a meadow filled with yellow flowers, where he will give me a vintage diamond ring.
This might just happen. He loves me. I love him. What else is there? Surely he won't marry Darcy. They cannot do happily ever after. I find my voice and manage to say those three one-syllable words back to him. Words I haven't uttered in a very, very long time. Words that meant nothing before now.
Neither of us acknowledges what we said that day, but I can feel it in the air, all around us. It is more palpable than the thick humidity. I can feel it in the way he looks at me and the way he says my name. We are a couple, and our words have made us brazen. At one point, as we are walking through Central Park, he takes my hand. It is only for a few seconds, five or six steps, but I feel a rush of adrenaline. What if we get caught? What then? A small part of me wants that result, wants to run into an acquaintance of Darcy's, a coworker stuck in the city for work, going for a brief stroll in the park. She will play informant on Monday morning, telling Darcy that she saw Dex with a girl, holding hands. She will describe me in detail but I am generic enough that Darcy won't suspect me. And if she does, I'll just deny it, say that I was at work all day. Say that I don't even own a pink shirt-which is new, one that she has never seen. I will be wildly indignant, and she will apologize and then turn back to the issue of Dex cheating on her. She will decide to dump him and I will be supportive, tell her she is doing the right thing. This way Dex won't have to decide anything or do anything. It will all be handled for us.
We walk up to the reservoir, circling it as we admire all the views of the city. We pass a boy wearing head-to-toe army fatigues, walking an aged beagle, and then an overweight woman panting along in a slow jog, her elbows jutting out awkwardly. Otherwise, we have the usually populated path to ourselves. I listen to the gravel crunching beneath our sneakers as w
e walk in perfect rhythm. I am content. The reservoir, the views, the city, and the world belong to Dex and me.
Dark clouds are rolling in when we finally leave the park. We decide not to change for dinner, heading straight for Atlantic Grill, a restaurant near my apartment. Both of us are in the mood for fish and white wine and vanilla ice cream. After dinner, we dash back to my apartment in a downpour, laughing as we cross the streets midblock, splashing our way through the puddles formed on the sidewalks. Back inside, we strip off our wet clothes and towel each other off, still laughing. Dex puts on a pair of boxers. I wear one of his T-shirts. Then we play a Billie Holiday CD and open another bottle of wine, red this time. We stretch out on my sofa where we talk for hours, only getting up to brush our teeth and transfer to my bed for another satisfying sleep together.
Then suddenly, as it always happens, time accelerates. And just as being with Dex on our first night felt like the start of the summer, fearing the end of our time together reminds me of late August, when those daunting back-to-school commercials for Trapper Keepers would replace the ones featuring gleeful towheaded kids sipping Capri-Sun poolside. I remember the feeling well-a mixture of sadness and panic. This is how I feel now as we sit on my sofa on Saturday while afternoon bleeds into evening. I keep telling myself not to ruin the last night by being sad. I tell myself that the best is yet to come. He loves me.
As if reading my mind, Dex looks at me and says, "I meant what I said."
It is the first reference to our sacred exchange.
"I did too." I am filled with a deep longing, and am sure that our talk is coming. Our Post-Independence Day Talk. We are going to discuss ways to make this crazy thing work. How we can't bear to hurt Darcy, but that we must. I wait for his lead. It is his conversation to begin.
That's when he says, "No matter what happens, I meant that."
His words are like the sound of a needle dragging across a record. A sinking, sickening feeling washes over me. This is why you should never, ever get your hopes up. This is why you should see the glass as half empty. So when the whole thing spills, you aren't as devastated. I want to cry, but I keep my face placid, give myself a psychological shot of Botox. I can't cry, for several reasons, not the least of which is that if he asks why I'm crying, I won't be able to articulate an answer.
