The Love Letters of Abelard and Lily

by Laura Creedle

  “Yes,” I replied.

  Silence. Minutes passed, and I wept. I couldn’t help it. A woman sitting with a twitchy middle grade boy pushed a box of Kleenex toward me and moved away like I was emotionally disturbed.

  It took forever for Abelard to text back. I imagined him sitting on a bench under swaying pine trees on a mountain campus, staring at his phone, trying to make sense of me moving to Portland to become an organic farmer.

  “When do you leave?” he texted finally.

  “Next week,” I texted. Random. The time that popped into my mind.

  “Lily?” the nurse called.

  I had my book clutched in my hand. As I stood my phone buzzed, and I looked down to see his final text.

  “I love you.”

  I didn’t have time to text him back before I went back to see Dr. Brainguy. Just as well.

  The nurse didn’t take me to Dr. Brainguy’s office, or the bare room where I did the majority of my tests. She took me to the small room with couches and multiple Kleenex boxes where I’d met with the psychologist.

  I sat on the couch, The Letters of Abelard and Heloise clasped tightly to my chest. I tried to stop crying. Really.

  The doctor entered and sat in the office chair next to the desk.

  “Hey, Dr. Ferbenstein,” I said, trying to sound cheery. Trying and failing.

  “Dr. Ferbenstein? Lily, you might as well call me Dr. Doofenshmirtz,” he said. “It’s Dr. Brillstein.”

  I smiled weakly. I had to admire Dr. Brainguy for the Phineas and Ferb reference, but really, I wasn’t in the mood.

  “How about you tell me what’s up,” he said.

  “Oh, nothing. Just chilling out in your waiting room.”

  Dr. Brainguy leaned across a small glass coffee table that held a tissue box covered with gentle wave patterns, and he inhaled through two fingers. I guessed he really needed a smoke.

  “Lily, this kind of experimental surgery is a partnership between doctor and patient. And because this involves your brain and your emotional responses, I really need to know what you are feeling and thinking. If you have concerns about the surgery, it’s important—”

  “Oh, it’s not that. It’s just, well, it’s just my boyfriend.”

  Dr. Brainguy exhaled and leaned back in his chair. I expected him to get on with his busy day because—teenage girl, boy troubles, mystery solved. But he didn’t leave. He waited. Clearly, I was going to have to tell Dr. Brainguy a little bit more.

  “Okay, so my boyfriend has Asperger’s or some sort of processing delay. I don’t really know his diagnosis. I guess it’s ND. Neurodifferent, right?”

  “This is the young man with the interest in fractals? What’s his name?”

  “Abelard,” I replied.

  “Quite a name,” Dr. Brainguy said.

  “Well, his father is a medieval history professor. Which is weird, because my father was one of Abelard’s father’s graduate students before Dad decided to move to Portland and become a goat farmer, which isn’t even a thing he’s doing . . .” I shook my head. Best not to talk about my father. “So basically, we’ve both read The Letters of Abelard and Heloise, and we started texting each other quotes from the letters, and then we started seeing each other . . .”

  Most people have trouble following a Lily story, the kind of oral narrative that should have footnotes, but Dr. Brainguy appeared to be listening. Really listening.

  “Was that difficult?” he asked. “Attempting a physical relationship?”

  There was something so straightforward and honest about Dr. Brainguy, I didn’t even feel like blushing. Talking about my sex life with my brain surgeon should have been all kinds of awkward, but surprisingly, no.

  “We were working on it.”

  “Were? Did something happen?”

  “Abelard is in New Mexico with his parents at this place called the Isaac Institute.”

  “Oh yes, the Isaac Institute,” Dr. Brainguy said. “Quite a waiting list to get in.”

  “Abelard just got accepted.”

  “Ahh. So what did you tell him?” Dr. Brainguy ran a hand through his hair, ruffling his white streak.

  “Awesome, dude! You should totes go!” I said bitterly, and for some reason, repeating these lines started me crying again.

  “‘Totes’? That’s a far cry from quotes from The Letters of Abelard and Heloise. Doesn’t sound much like you.”

  I looked up. “Abelard didn’t think so either. He said he wouldn’t go to the school without me. ‘Absence is the tomb of love,’ he said.”

  I clutched the book tighter to my chest. Shut my eyes to keep the tears at bay.

  “So to get him to go, I told him that I was moving to Portland to live with my dad on his organic farm. My dad doesn’t even have a farm. He has a new family, and he doesn’t really want me there because . . .”

  I couldn’t continue because—weeping. Embarrassed that I’d told Dr. Brainguy that my father didn’t want me and that he would now go back to his office and write “unloved by father” on my chart. I’m sure he would conclude that all of my problems with boys and half the problems with my brain were due to an uncertain paternal attachment.

  Dr. Brainguy watched me weep. Maybe he was trying to decide if all this messy emotion made me a bad test case. Or maybe he was thinking that he might need to shove the electrodes in deeper and up the voltage. I didn’t care either way. My brain seemed massively unimportant at this particular moment.

  Dr. Brainguy reached over and gently lifted the book from my hand and began reading the passage I’d circled and starred.

  You cannot but remember (for what do not lovers remember?) with what pleasure I have passed whole days in hearing your discourse. How, when you were absent, I shut myself from everyone to write to you; how uneasy I was till my letter had come to your hands; what artful management it required to engage confidence. This detail, perhaps, surprises you, and you are in pain for what will follow. But I am no longer ashamed that my passion has had no bounds for you; for I have done more than all this: I have hated myself that I might love you; I came hither to ruin myself in a perpetual imprisonment, that I might make you live quiet and easy.

  “Well,” he said.

  I heard Dr. Brainguy set the book down on the coffee table. He shifted in his chair and sighed. I didn’t care if he was thinking that he might have to throw me out of the program because—emotional basket case. I didn’t care about anything. Really.

  “Lily,” he said softly, “this probably won’t help you, but if I had a child on the autistic spectrum, I would move heaven and hell to get them into the Isaac Institute.”

  He stood to leave the room. At the door, he stopped and turned.

  “Your boyfriend is a lucky young man.”

   Chapter 29

  Life just goes on, which is kind of stupid. I wished that I could put myself in suspended animation for a couple of weeks, just until I could think about something else besides Abelard. In a way, I was looking forward to the surgery because I had been warned that the anesthesia would leave me feeling groggy and disoriented. It might take several days of fine adjustment of the voltage levels on my responsive neurostimulation device before I felt quite like myself. I looked forward to a few days of feeling not quite like myself, because feeling like me sucked right now.

  Things were better in school. I don’t throw the term “ironic” around lightly, but sometimes it fits. Now that I was close to being done with school forever, everything was sunshine and roses and rainbow unicorns. Coach Neuwirth called me to his desk before a test and asked me if I needed extra time or a quiet place to work. He was actually kind of nice. It was disconcerting.

  On Thursday, Mrs. Rogers-Peña handed back our Macbeth papers. Mine had a 99 on top, plus a smiley face with stars on it and a Post-it note with the words come talk to me about this. I wondered why the Post-it note. I didn’t have long to wonder. She called me over after class.

  “Great paper, Lily,” she s
aid. “You should save this for your portfolio.”

  Mrs. Rogers-Peña had gotten new glasses. They were extra thick and chunky black, like she was planning on playing a scientist on TV.

  “Portfolio?”

  “Some colleges ask for writing samples. This one is stellar. You should save it.”

  “College,” I replied. I should have guessed. Mrs. Rogers-Peña was always college this and college that. Frankly, I didn’t mind, especially now that Dr. Brainguy had led me to believe that college was in my imminent future.

  “Are you all right, Lily? You seem a little—down.”

  I was tired of concealing the truth from everyone. I was tired of keeping the loneliness and sadness inside my head. I hadn’t even told Rosalind about Abelard, because I didn’t want to rain on her happy new love parade.

  “Abelard moved away,” I said. “I guess we broke up.”

  “You and Abelard? I didn’t know you were a couple.” Mrs. Rogers-Peña paused. I could tell she was curious but didn’t want to say anything indiscreet. Curiosity won out. “How did that happen?”

  “Well, after you asked me to apologize to him, we started texting each other quotes from The Letters of Abelard and Heloise because we’ve both read it. Weird, I know, but his father was my father’s graduate advisor. Anyway, he got a chance to go to an early college program for people with Asperger’s, and so . . .”

  I stopped. Tears welled in my eyes. I struggled to pull them back in. Cardinal rule number one for all circus freaks: Never cry in school. The blowback will be relentless.

  “I’m sorry, Lily,” she said. “Though I’m glad for Abelard. Have you thought about a long-distance relationship?”

  I shrugged. For all our talk, it was the feel of Abelard’s arms around me that kept me going. He calmed me. I didn’t know if I could stay focused if I knew we could never be together.

  “I wanted more,” I said.

  Abelard and I hadn’t talked since I’d told him I was moving to Portland. I was reading the last chapters of Anna Karenina when the soft whir of the phone announced Abelard’s text. I hesitated. Maybe Abelard had come back from New Mexico. I’d have to tell him that I hadn’t moved to Portland after all, which would probably necessitate another awkward lie, but then everything would go back to the way it was meant to be. Abelard would invite me to come over on Saturday, and maybe his mom would be out and we’d be alone for the whole afternoon . . .

  “Lily?”

  “Abelard.”

  Iris looked up from her homework. “Is that Abelard?”

  “Yes.” I stared at my phone, texting slowly as though issuing a magic spell that would reverse everything that had gone before. “Why do you ask?”

  “What’s up? Are you still in New Mexico?”

  “It’s just that he hasn’t talked to you in a while.” She dropped her feet over the edge of the bed and leaned over to watch me text.

  My phone buzzed with Abelard’s next message.

  “Yes. I’m in New Mexico.”

  Iris read the text upside down before I could pull my phone away.

  “Oh my god. Abelard is in New Mexico?” she shrieked. “Lily, what are you going to do?” she asked.

  “I was thinking of getting a couple of holes drilled in my head, just for fun.”

  Iris looked like she was going to cry. I felt bad. Maybe she was worried that something could go wrong with the surgery, worried that she’d find herself alone in this room come summer. My tendency to blurt out alarming stuff was probably reason enough to have a couple of holes drilled in my head.

  “Don’t worry about it, okay, Iris?” I said. “It’s not a big deal. The doctor says so.”

  She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. Sometimes Iris seems like she’s twenty-two, so I’m always surprised that she believes pretty much everything I say.

  “So what are you going to say to Abelard?” she asked. “Do you want me to look through The Letters of Abelard and Heloise for a quote that—”

  “No,” I shot back. Abelard and I were done with lovely prose, done with lavish statements of unending affection. Over, so quickly. I picked up my phone.

  “How is school?”

  “Excellent. They have an awesome robotics lab here. Better than the one at school. There’s a girl on my floor who reminds me of you. She’s funny and well-read.”

  A girl. So soon, another girl. I pressed the phone to my chest. In my mind suddenly this new girl was Emma Stone: funny and gorgeous with glowing green eyes and strawberry blond hair, and madly in love with Abelard because how could you not be?

  “Cool,” I replied.

  “Are you there?”

  “Where?” I texted back.

  “Portland.”

  Portland. I was supposed to be in Portland, living a magically special life with my father.

  “Yes. It’s just like Austin. Only: goats. And rain.”

  “It’s hard for me to text at seven. My schedule is different. I’m still getting used to it,” he texted.

  Different schedule. Was this Abelard’s way of telling me that he would rather be hanging out with the funny girl with the strawberry blond hair in the tricked-out computer lab than texting me? It hurt too much to contemplate.

  “Maybe we should call a moratorium on texting for a while,” I wrote back.

  Abelard didn’t answer for a long time. A very long time. And then finally: “Are you talking about breaking up?”

  “IDK, do you want to break up?” I sent back.

  An even longer pause.

  “Do you want to break up with me?”

  A thousand thoughts careened through my mind about how hard it would be to keep up the façade of Portland, of tending organic goats, or pretending to be happy every time he mentioned another girl, and how I was sort of terrified that I would awaken from surgery another person entirely, and how much I wanted to be with Abelard, to touch him, and that was never going to happen, and it all hurt too much.

  “Yes. I want to break up with you.”

  “What happened?” Iris asked.

  “The end.”

   Chapter 30

  Saturday. Iris told Mom that Abelard and I broke up. Iris was kind to me. Mom was kind to me. They both spoke in soft voices, stopped talking when I entered the room. It was more than I could take. I fled to Rosalind’s house. Mom gave me a ride.

  “I broke up with Abelard,” I said, standing on her doorstep. Not even waiting for that moment when we were alone, not caring that her mother was hovering nearby, listening.

  “I didn’t want to break up with him, but he had a chance to go to a really good early college program for people with Asperger’s, only he didn’t want to leave me, so I told him that I was going to live on a farm with my dad and raise goats, and also, I’m going to have brain surgery two weeks from Monday—”

  “Your father lives on a farm now?” Rosalind’s mother asked.

  “No,” I said. “I think he spent a couple of weeks on a farm once.”

  Rosalind opened the door to let me in. Richard sat on the couch looking uncomfortable. I was screwing up a date. Rosalind had a social life now.

  “Hi, Richard,” I said, waving awkwardly. I turned back to Rosalind. “You’re busy. I should go.”

  “Nonsense, Lily,” Rosalind’s mom said. “These two were just going to watch a movie. You’re welcome to join.”

  “Mom,” Rosalind said, “maybe you could make us some nice, soothing tea?”

  “Tea?” Rosalind’s mother said. “I’ll make a chai with almond milk. And bring out some cookies.”

  Rosalind’s mother scurried to make tea and find the cookies, although what she considered a cookie was more like some kind of compressed fruit and nut thing rolled in unsweetened cacao nibs. Like all the food in her house, the cookies weren’t bad as long as you divorced them from the idea of the real thing.

  “I should go,” I whispered. “And leave you and Richard alone.”

  “Too late for that.�
�� Rosalind rolled her eyes in the direction of the kitchen. “We were going to go to a movie, but Mom wanted us to stay in. She gave me some stupid excuse about a storm moving this way and driving at night in the rain.”

  I followed Rosalind into the living room and sat in an armchair. Rosalind sat next to Richard.

  “Did you say brain surgery?” Rosalind asked, fire in her voice.

  “Should I go?” Richard said. “I could walk around outside for a minute.”

  “No, it’s fine,” I replied.

  “Once again, brain surgery?” Rosalind repeated, a little louder this time.

  “It’s just a small device that they’re going to implant in my brain.”

  “Okay, so nothing important, then,” Rosalind said. “When is this non-important brain surgery happening?”

  “In a couple of weeks.”

  “In a couple of weeks?” She raised an eyebrow, pausing for dramatic effect. “You’re going to have brain surgery in a couple of weeks? So this is why you’ve been absent so much. When were you planning on telling me this?”

  “I don’t know.” I rolled my head toward Rosalind. Ever since my breakup with Abelard, even small movements, like forcing my neck to hold up my head, seemed to require too much energy.

  “So if you don’t like having a chip in your brain, can you have it removed?”

  “Supposedly,” I said. “Look, it’s not that big a deal. I didn’t come here to—”

  “Not that big a deal? I’m your best friend. We’re supposed to tell each other everything.”

  “You’ve been busy with . . . theater.” I glanced at Richard.

  “Not that busy,” she said.

  Richard twitched uncomfortably. Maybe we should have released him from the conversation.

  “Look, I just wanted to tell you about Abelard. I shouldn’t have come over to bring you down with tales of my unrequited love.”

  I stood to leave, but at that moment Rosalind’s mother returned with the three cups of tea and a plateful of cookies.

  Richard accepted a cup of tea but politely passed on the cookies. Apparently, he had been subjected to her “cookies” before.