Arresting Grace

by Michael Joel Green

  I turned in my paperwork. The woman behind the Plexiglas instructed me to wait in the hall and someone would come for me shortly.

  Ten minutes later, I heard the door open. “Michael Green?”

  “That’s me,” I replied softly, shaking hands with an older, small Hispanic man. He escorted me into an empty room and asked me to sit in front of him as he read through my file, including the section that listed my BAC. “That’s really high,” he mentioned.

  “I know.” There was nothing else to say.

  He asked questions about how much I drank and when I drank. I told him the truth. I went out several nights a week and had two or three drinks. He spoke about the dangers of alcohol and signs of alcoholism and the purpose of the class, then handed me a yellow card. “Make sure you don’t lose that,” he said. “It’s the record you’ll need for the court. Bring it to class each week.”

  The class was twelve weeks. The first nine were three hours long; for the final three, I could leave after the first hour. Also, I was required to attend six AA meetings, one a week. I could go to any of the locations around the city. The man handed me a stapled sheet of meetings in the Santa Monica/Culver City area. I asked if he’d be the one leading the 541 group. He said no but that the leader was very good. His name was Walter. I thanked him and left.

  I looked at the card: The front was a log for the 541 meetings, the back a record of AA meetings attended. Welcome to my life for the next three months, I thought. Good thing I was staying in town for Christmas. Missing a class was a $40 dollar penalty and it pushed the exit back a week. I wanted to get out of there as fast as I could—and with as few penalty fines as possible. I asked if I could start in two weeks time. Jessie was coming to town on the 26th and leaving the following Tuesday night. I wanted to be the one to take her to the airport.

  Chapter Eleven

  A few years ago, I traveled with a group of friends to Puerto Rico. My friend TJ’s parents own a house on the southern coast. A month before we left, two of the women requested a meeting to plan the trip, including scheduling each day’s activities and meals.

  “Hold on a minute,” said one of the men in the group. “Some of us are more interested in relaxing by the pool with a drink in hand.”

  That week, those two went off by themselves, either driving into Ponce to see the architecture, sightseeing or collecting fruit to use for that night’s supper. While they were gone, the rest of us relaxed by the pool or the beach. The trip reminded me how differently people are wired. Some prefer to stay on the go constantly, whereas others enjoy turning off their minds for a few days and baking in the sun. I’m an almost 50-50 split, though in Puerto Rico I erred on the side of baking.

  Jessie and I were compatible in that regard. Neither was high maintenance and we often planned simple, low-key activities, ones that allowed us to relax, while still keeping busy. Our goals for her trip to Los Angeles were:

  Ferris wheel—She’d never ridden one, which I found hard to believe. Not riding a Ferris wheel was like not having seen “Star Wars” or eaten cotton candy or heard an Elvis song. It was part of Americana, something I assumed everyone had done at some point or another. I was determined to change that.

  Oysters—She asked me once, “What food would you want for your last meal?” I answered seafood. I could probably eat it every day. We had shared most types of fish, but never oysters. I was determined to change that, as well.

  Ceviche—It was predicted to rain all weekend, which meant we’d possibly be indoors most of the time. We wanted to cook a meal together. For her, it was a chance to laugh at how much of a bachelor I was, and how empty my refrigerator.

  Pinkberry yogurt—I’d recently lost a bet and owed her a travel-sized serving. (Our bets were never real bets; I think this was over a crossword puzzle answer. I might have lost on purpose, not an uncommon thing for me to do if it meant giving her a massage or sharing Pinkberry, her favorite.)

  Church on Sunday—Some of my favorite moments were the times we worshiped together. I was also excited for her to meet my friends. She’d heard me speak of them; now she would be able to put faces to the names.

  Dinner at Jason’s—A non-negotiable. He and Sherrill had invited us to their house Saturday night. I couldn’t wait for her to meet the kids. The parents, as well.

  Sonia—Another non-negotiable. Though I rarely saw her anymore, being at different church services, I felt an inexpressible debt of gratitude for introducing us. She would always have a soft spot in my heart for that.

  Jessie found an online recipe for ceviche that we wanted to try. The key to good ceviche is the ingredients. Without fresh fish, the best recipe in the world won’t save it. My co-worker Reilly, an avid fisherman and expert on where to buy the freshest fresh, recommended the pier at Redondo Beach and printed out a map for me, circling the specific stands to visit. I thanked him profusely. I could kill two birds with one stone—oysters at the pier and shrimp for the ceviche. He also told me about a Ferris wheel in Long Beach. It was larger, with a more enjoyable ride, than the one on the Santa Monica pier. If it was going to be her first time, I wanted it to be the best we could find.

  Unfortunately, weather doesn’t always take our itineraries into account. When I picked her up at the airport, the sky was grey and I knew we had an hour, two at the most, before the rain came. The Ferris wheel would have to wait another day. I handed her Reilly’s map and my GPS and asked her to navigate us to Redondo. She turned us the wrong way once, but we corrected course and found the pier, the skies growing darker.

  We found the stand Reilly recommended. More than twenty different kinds of oysters. We chose a plate of assorted ones; the man behind the counter shucked and loosened them for us. We finished them quickly, debating whether to go back for more, but decided against it. I stood in line for a pound of shrimp, while Jessie ordered us a bowl of clam chowder and fish n’ chips. This was quickly turning into a seafood-heavy weekend.

  L.A. drivers and rain don’t mix well so I took side streets and Sepulveda back into town, rather than chancing the freeway. Bypassing the trip to Long Beach had saved us time and we were able to go to Pinkberry on the way. Only one more stop to make—the nearest Redbox. Unfortunately, on Saturday nights, the Redbox isn’t populated with the greatest of movie selections. We found a horror/thriller film with Liam Neeson as the star (How bad can it be if it has Liam Neeson in it?) and rented it. Half the list checked off already and she’d only been there a few hours. We felt justified in relaxing awhile.

  I live in Palms, not the nicest of neighborhoods by any stretch of the imagination. Though I kept my place neat, it was still a dirty, stucco apartment on the Westside. I was slightly nervous about her seeing it and had been cleaning for two days.

  “It’s spotless,” she said. “Are you always this clean or did you do it just for me?”

  “You’ll never know,” I answered.

  “I’m impressed. It makes me want to show up sometime for a surprise inspection.”

  The ceviche needed prep time and a few hours to cook in the lime juice, so we started right away. She showed me how to de-vein the shrimp and passed me half of them. Before I got my hands dirty, I decided to put on some music. A while back, a friend had given me a basketful of old vinyl records, everything from punk to classical to new wave to jazz. I put on a Sinatra record I thought would be romantic and impress her. Honestly, I’m not a Sinatra fan. I’ve wanted to be, but for some reason the music doesn’t speak to me or move me. Same with jazz. As a musician, I feel I should like jazz. I’ve spent hours listening to Monk and Miles Davis, trying to understand and appreciate the music, but I can’t change who I am—I’m a rock ‘n roll guy and always will be. Jessie made fun of the Sinatra record, which made me happy in a way. I turned off the player and loaded my iTunes—the CD she’d made for me the last time I was in San Jose.

  “I recognize this,” she said instantly. “Much better.”

  While the shrimp cooked in the lime juic
e, I showed her my family photos, including a slideshow I’d put together a couple of years ago. It was the first time she’d seen pictures of my family or me as a child. She teased me for the bowl cut I wore in several of the photos. It was my father’s handiwork, the last time my mother let him cut my hair. By that time, the ceviche was ready. We set the table for dinner.

  Sometimes it’s difficult for me to sit during a meal. It’s unnerving, by virtue of the intimacy. My instinct is to eat quickly or hold a fork to my lips to avoid the feeling of being vulnerable and exposed. With her, I’d decided to face it—to eat slowly and enjoy her company. We all have areas of our lives that make us uncomfortable. That was one of mine. We were enjoying a blooming relationship; we’d set a romantic table. I think that was it—the romantic expectation. Would it live up to the expectation, or the better question: Could I live up to it? Would my conversation be interesting enough?

  The truth is all one has to do is speak honestly. Truthful speaking, no matter if the words are simple, will connect with the person one is trying to reach, and without fail. I knew this to be true but still allowed myself to become slightly intimidated. I’ve never been comfortable at hosting. It’s more enjoyable for me to dine at someone else’s home. When someone visits me, there’s an added pressure of sorts. Had I cleaned the windows thoroughly? Was my apartment nice enough? Only so much one can do in an old apartment in Palms.

  This was me. How I lived and where I spent my nights. She saw the chair I sat in when I talked to her on the phone. She saw the room that had been attacked by bedbugs a year earlier. I’d gotten rid of them but was still paranoid and kept powder sprayed on the floor by the bedposts. I wished I lived in a nicer place, but right now I didn’t. The best I could do was keep my place as clean and inviting as I could. From what I had to work with, I’d done a nice job. I did all the decorating myself, often joking that I’d traded in my guitar magazines for Pier 1 and Bed Bath & Beyond coupons.

  After dinner and dessert, we sat on the couch to watch the movie. She picked up my Bible and thumbed through it, commenting on how pen-marked it was, reading some of the notes I’d inscribed. I turned off the light and started the movie, which turned out to be a mistake, the only pockmark on a delightful evening. Neither of us enjoyed it. It was depressing with disturbing undertones. Fatalistic, if that’s not too harsh a description. Liam Neeson plays a mortician who kills people who are still alive. It seemed a movie that wanted to shock for the sake of shocking, rather than trying to say something important. I joked afterward that we should have rented a comedy. Though she laughed, I could tell the movie had upset her.

  I didn’t want its lingering remembrance to be the final impression of the evening; however, her friend Gretchen called at 1:30 and said she was on her way home. I carried Jessie’s suitcase to the car and drove her to Gretchen’s building. I walked her inside and to the elevator in the lobby, keeping my arms around her as we waited for it to arrive. It opened and suddenly Gretchen was standing inside. It startled us; she didn’t expect to see us and we didn’t expect her. I said goodnight to them both, whispering to Jessie that I’d see her at church in the morning.

  They were twenty minutes late the next day. I waited in the lobby, smiling to myself. I knew Gretchen was a party girl and they’d probably stayed up a few hours longer, chatting and drinking the bottle of wine I saw in her arms. When they arrived, I introduced Jessie to my friends Tom and Lisa, whom I wanted her to meet, and we entered the auditorium and found seats near the back.

  For me, the times we sat in church together were like small tastes of heaven. Two people, excited to know each other, wanting to further develop a relationship, but centered upon this truth: God is the object of our worship, not the other person. May that always be the case. It gives me a disgusting feeling to think about being in a relationship with a woman, but so wrapped up in each other that Sunday comes and we have no room to give to Him.

  After the service, I introduced her to those I knew sitting around us, including my friend Warren, a young and charismatic Chinese-American man who, every time I see him, greets me with a huge whump on the back and asks, “When are you getting married?” I like Warren; he’s a great guy and I would never think twice about it. However, I expected him to have more tact this week. I introduced him and he blurted out, “So this is the woman Mike’s going to marry. I keep asking him when the wedding is.” Fighting the urge to bury myself under the seat, I put my hand on the small of Jessie’s back and led her into the aisle. Robert and his wife Aubrey were standing nearby and I introduced them.

  Jessie needed to use the restroom. I showed her where it was and walked out into the courtyard. Vicki, my friend Brian’s wife, ran over, an excited look on her face.

  “Where is she?” Vicki asked.

  “In the restroom.”

  “You’re glowing.”

  I smiled. She wasn’t the first person to say that. Jessie stepped outside at that moment. She was all my eyes could see. We held each other’s gaze as she walked across the courtyard. I introduced her to Vicki and several others who wanted to meet her. In a moment of privacy, I whispered, “I didn’t know Warren was going to say that. Were you embarrassed?”

  “I think you were more embarrassed than me. It didn’t bother me.”

  The plan was for her to eat lunch with my friends, then meet Gretchen later that afternoon for a movie. We picked a nearby burger place and caravanned over—Jessie and I, Brian and Vicki, Nash, Damon, my friend Dan and his wife Christina. We found seats outside in the patio area. When the food arrived, someone asked me to pray. I was struck by the joy of the moment. Here were my closest friends, those who only wanted the best for me, there to meet the woman they’d heard me speak so glowingly of. I paused briefly to let the moment envelop me.

  “This is amazing, God. Thank you for this time, for friendships and meeting new people. We love you.”

  I ordered the bacon avocado burger and gave Jessie a strip of my bacon. After I finished, I traded seats with Nash so he could have a chance to speak with her. He was about to start law school (at age 39) and wanted to hit her up with questions. Nash spent fifteen years in the film industry as an assistant editor. He had turned down numerous job offers that could have launched him into an editor’s position because he disagreed with the content of the shows, usually on moral grounds. He and I have been on two dozen road trips together; we’ve seen each other at our best and worst. I’d do anything for him and I know he’d do the same for me.

  Dan and I, meanwhile, got caught up. I hadn’t seen him for several weeks. There was a moment during our conversation when he leaned back in his chair and Jessie came center into my line of sight. I stopped talking. Seeing her speak with Nash and the others, hair pulled back, smiling and engaged—it stole my breath.

  “You’ve got it bad,” said Dan.

  “Yeah, I know. Hold on a second, will you?” I needed to look at her again.

  After lunch, I drove her to the theatre to meet Gretchen and some of her friends. I waited until they arrived, then said goodbye. She called later that evening, saying she missed me.

  “I miss you, too,” I answered.

  I’d requested the next day off from work. It was drizzling in the morning and supposed to be that way throughout the day. Jessie and I agreed to both wear flannel, taking me back to my Seattle days. I picked her up and drove into West Hollywood to a breakfast spot where I wanted to take her—Doughboy’s on 3rd. We ordered a pancake filled with bacon and sausage, as well as a Spanish style omelet. An older couple sitting beside us spent most of the time reading the newspaper, hardly talking. We noticed them watching us occasionally. While waiting for our food, we played a game we had invented called “Would you date…?”

  She asked, “Would you date a woman who was taller than you?”

  “I’m not sure. If I did, I’d probably have to make it a rule she could never wear heels. Would you date someone who was missing a finger?”

  “Which finger
?”

  “I hadn’t thought that far in advance. Let’s say any finger except the thumb. It would be hard to overcome a missing thumb.”

  “I’d like to say I’m not that shallow, but I don’t think I could.”

  “At least you’re honest. Would you date a man who drove a Miata?”

  “No way.”

  “I don’t blame you. I wouldn’t either if I was a woman.”

  My phone buzzed—an instant message. I rarely checked my phone when we were together but did this time. It was from Brian: Vicki and I love Jessie!

  I showed it to her. “Can I reply?” she asked.

  “Of course.”

  I opened the keypad for her.

  “Thank you,” she wrote. “I really like you and Vicki, too.” She inserted a smiley face at the end.

  After the meal, I paid the check and she excused herself to the restroom. While she was away, I said hello to the older couple. The woman said, “Your girlfriend is beautiful. Just gorgeous.”

  My smile stood on its ends. “Thank you. She’s as beautiful on the inside as she is on the out.”

  Jessie reappeared and took my hand. We said goodbye to the couple and walked the few blocks to the car. “What were you all talking about?” she asked.

  “She told me my girlfriend was gorgeous.”

  “Oh, really? What did you say?”

  “I said, ‘Yeah, she’s pretty hot.’”

  “No, you didn’t. What did you really say?”

  “That you are lovely on the inside and out.”

  She leaned over and gave me a kiss. “That’s for your answer.”

  We decided to drive downtown to MOMA, The Museum of Modern Art. Upon arriving, we learned the museum was under construction and only one of its wings was open. However, admission was free as a result. We saw every exhibit we could, saving the photography exhibit for last. We separated briefly when we entered, though she soon called me over.