Thank god for that, I thought. I pulled the bread out of the oven and clattered the baking pan on the counter.
“Tonight doesn’t work for me,” I said.
“I’ll just sit in the living room and watch TV. You won’t even know I’m here.”
“I’ll know you’re here,” I said, louder than I meant to. “It doesn’t work for me, Michael.”
He studied me. “So what you’re saying is you want me to go home, is that it?”
“Yes!”
Silence. Michael pursed his lips. He looked out the window, jiggled the change in his pocket. “Fine,” he said and turned to go. But then he paused in front of the Post-it on the counter. “Who’s Patrick?” he asked, turning around, thrusting it toward me.
Oh shit. “No one,” I said. “A friend.”
“A friend?” he said. “I’ve never heard you mention anyone named Patrick.”
So what? I wanted to shout. He put a ring on my finger and now I had no life of my own? I had to divulge every aspect of my life, every thought, every person I talked to? But I took a breath and contained myself, kept my voice even.
“He’s someone I knew in high school. He lives in Florida. He got in touch with me and we’ve e-mailed a couple of times.”
“How’d he get in touch with you?”
“Oh for Christ’s sake, what’s with the interrogation?” Michael’s eyes flashed. “He found me on SearchForSchoolmates.com,” I said. “You know, that website where you find people from high school.”
“When did he do that?”
“All right, that’s enough with the twenty questions. You’re making a big deal out of nothing.”
Michael’s gaze bore into me, making me feel guilty, as if I’d done something horrible.
“Jesus, Libby,” he said, taking off his glasses and rubbing the bridge of his nose. “It doesn’t feel like nothing to me. It feels a little coincidental, actually, that you’ve been e-mailing some guy from high school and now you’re having second thoughts about our engagement. Does that strike you as odd? Because it does me. What would you think if you were me?” He looked at me, challenging me to dispute this. I could see how it looked to him: deceitful and sneaky. But right then I didn’t care.
“You’re blowing this up out of proportion, Michael. One has nothing to do with the other.”
“Then why don’t you just explain one and then the other,” he said and sat down at the table, arms folded across his chest. “Well?”
I bristled. “Well what?” All I needed was a spotlight shining down on me to complete the atmosphere.
“Tell me about this Patrick person. Tell me what’s going on with him. Tell me what’s going on with us. Tell me why it was so terrible that I announced our engagement. Tell me why you’re upset that I came over today. Take your pick of topics.”
“I don’t appreciate your tone, Michael.” He sat quietly, staring. “Nothing’s going on with Patrick. Nothing. He’s someone I knew in high school who got in touch with me.” All right, so I got in touch with him, but I wasn’t moved to set that record straight. “We’ve e-mailed a few times. End of story.”
Of course, it wasn’t the end of the story; it was just the beginning. But at that time I didn’t really think there would be much more to tell, and I did think that Michael was overreacting. Yes, I was stirring up feelings, but they were ancient feelings. And it wasn’t so much about Patrick as it was about me and how much I missed that kind of intensity and passion. It was exactly what Tiffany and I had talked about.
“Okay, so what’s going on with us?” he said.
“I don’t know.” Not the right answer, I knew.
Michael shook his head and looked at his hands. “Are we engaged or not?”
“I don’t know.”
His face darkened. His eyes flashed. I thought he was going to pick up something and throw it (nothing dangerous; that wouldn’t be Michael), but then he just slumped forward. “What do you mean, you don’t know? Either we are or we’re not.”
“You’ve been making all these decisions about us as if you’re the only one in this relationship. I feel out of control, Michael. You decide we’re going to get married. You decide when it’s time to tell everyone. You decide we need to spend more time together. These are life-changing decisions. These are things we should decide together.”
He got up and got a glass of water, drank it down and set the glass in the sink with a loud thunk. He stood at the sink, his back rigid.
“Maybe you need a break from me,” he said, turning around. He ran his hand over his head.
A break? Oh my god, I practically swooned with the relief that would bring. But I didn’t want to appear eager. “What do you mean?” I said.
“Maybe you need time to figure out what you want, if you want to marry me. Decide if you want your e-mail boyfriend or me.”
“Oh, Michael.”
“What? What am I supposed to think, Libby? It feels like you’re hiding something and I don’t like it. I don’t like any of it.”
“I’m not hiding anything.” Was I?
“Maybe, maybe not. But something’s going on with you and I don’t know what it is. I don’t even know how you feel about me anymore.”
“I don’t know how I feel about anything.”
“Great.”
“It’s all just overwhelming to me, Michael. Can you try to understand that, to see it from my point of view?” He apparently thought that was a rhetorical question. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I know how you must feel but there’ve been too many decisions made, too many changes.”
“I don’t know what you want from me, Libby.” He turned and walked away. I followed him. He picked up his overnight bag and his keys. “I’m going home,” he said. “When you figure out what you want, call me.” He opened the door.
What did this mean? “Will I see you Wednesday?”
“No,” he said over his shoulder.
“Michael—” I said.
He wheeled around. “What, Libby? What? I asked you to marry me and you said yes and now you don’t know if you want to anymore. What am I supposed to do with that? I love you but I need to be loved back.” I opened my mouth but he put up his hand like a traffic cop. “I’m done for tonight,” he said. “I have nothing else to say. I’m going home.” And he walked out, shutting the door quietly behind him.
Is there anything that makes you want someone more than when they don’t want you? I stood staring at the door feeling weepy and remorseful.
Was he saying if I didn’t marry him we were through? Was there no going back? When did marriage become so important to him? I hated the thought of him leaving without giving me the answers to these questions, without knowing what would happen to us, but I couldn’t bring myself to run out and stop him. What would I say if I did?
I looked around the house, at the order, the stillness. Was this what I wanted? To live in my perfect little house, alone? I walked from room to room in the solitude, knowing there would be no one there except Rufus, no sounds that Rufus or I did not make.
I ate a few bites of salad and nibbled on some cheese bread, and then cleaned up the kitchen, washing dishes slowly in soapy water instead of putting them in the dishwasher. I dried them and placed them carefully in the cupboard and wiped the countertops until they looked new, moving the offending Post-it as I worked. I straightened the junk drawer, tossing out nails, paper clips and little black rubber things I didn’t recognize. Then I went into the living room, straightened the pillows on the sofa and put the newspapers in a basket by the window.
Everything was in its noiseless order. I’d been alone for many years before Michael, and there had been long stretches when there was no man in my life at all, but now that seemed like a lifetime ago. I tried to remember how it had been. Mostly, I thought I’d been happy, enjoying the freedom of being single, not having to consider anyone else in my plans, sitting on the couch eating taco chips and salsa for dinner if I wanted, watching old mo
vies instead of sports. But I could also remember times when I’d sit looking around, unable to read, with nothing on TV, no one to call, and the silence had felt so lonely I’d go to the mall and walk around just to hear some noise and be with people.
I suddenly felt sad and lonely in my house. Was this how it was going to be for the rest of my life? Just me and Rufus in my tidy little bungalow? I’d already been married twice; two failures. If I let Michael go now, what were the chances I’d find someone to share my life with? Hadn’t I used up my share of love vouchers?
Ten
After my initial sadness I felt the cool breeze of relief: relief from having to explain myself, relief from making decisions, relief from worrying about Michael’s feelings. But I didn’t quite know what to do with myself. I flipped through a catalog, watched TV for about four and a half minutes and went for a walk. And then I came back, retrieved the Post-it and studied Patrick’s number. I turned it over, flipped it upside down and waved it around as if it were a birthday present I was savoring opening.
Should I?
What if I did and we said a cheery hello, excited to hear each other’s voice, and then ran out of conversation in seven seconds and had to suffer through an awkward silence before politely hanging up? Just because things were easy in the virtual world didn’t mean they would be easy in reality.
But wasn’t it also possible we could have an immediate connection and chat as if we were back in high school? Maybe we would laugh and joke the way we did back then. Maybe it would feel as if no time at all had passed. How fun would that be?
I wondered if Patrick was a different person from the one I knew. Do people change? Every young bride thinks so. Don’t we all marry with that bright shining light of what will be? Not what is, but what will be once the new hubby gets what it’s all about and realizes that sharing his every thought and wish and dream is fun!
Yeah, right.
That’s what I’d thought when I married the first time at twenty-two. And the second time at thirty-four. But now at fifty I finally understood: we all like to think we’ll change, that we’ll be more confident as we grow older, or wiser, more sophisticated, more tolerant, patient, understanding. But deep down we’re basically the same people we were when we were fifteen or twenty. And although maybe, with a concerted effort, we can change ourselves, we’re never going to change our partner.
So, should I call? Well, it was a fifty-fifty proposition: we’d either connect or we wouldn’t. I dialed the number. It rang once and then again as I tapped my fingernail on the desk. Suddenly I got cold feet and was about to slam down the receiver when a voice said, “Hello?” His voice. I recognized it immediately and blood rushed to my face.
“Hello?” he said again.
“Patrick?”
“Yes…?” He paused. “Libby?”
How’d he know?
“Oh, Libby,” he exclaimed, “is that you?”
“It is.”
“I’m so happy to hear your voice. Man, this is weird, isn’t it?” He laughed, a genial, familiar sound, even after thirty-two years. I could see the big smile on his face, but it was the face I last saw thirty-some years ago, not the new one in the picture he’d sent.
“It’s very weird. You sound so much like yourself. It takes me back in time.”
“Me too,” he said. “Little Libby Carson. Wow. Cool. So how are things?”
Unbelievably, I said, “Awful,” and as soon as the word was out of my mouth, I wanted to grab it and stuff it right back in. Couldn’t I have made a little small talk first?
“What’s going on?” he said, his concern reaching like a hug across the wires.
“Michael and I are fighting about this engagement thing. He sort of stormed out earlier.”
“Why are you fighting?” he asked.
“I’m not sure I want to get married. It was never in my game plan, so Michael’s not very happy with me right now.” What possessed me to tell him this? He’d sounded delighted to hear from me, probably thinking this was going to be a lighthearted “remember-when” kind of conversation, and here I was spilling my guts like a kid in confession.
Watch him hang up on me.
“Wow. Well … oh man, Libby, I’m sorry,” he said. What else could he say? I wished I could take it all back, hang up and start over. Why isn’t there a replay button in life? “Are you okay?” he asked.
“I’m okay,” I said. “Jeez, I haven’t talked to you in thirty-two years and the first thing I do is tell you all my problems.”
“It’s okay,” he said. “I’m not so good with my own problems but I’m dynamite with other people’s.” I chuckled with the lightness his words brought. “What are you going to do?” he asked.
Appallingly, tears came. I couldn’t speak except for small embarrassing mewling sounds.
“Libby?”
“Yes,” I said in a high-pitched, whiny, cry-baby voice. It was so incredibly embarrassing. I was fifty, for god’s sake. Fifty.
“It’ll be okay,” Patrick said. “It’s hard, but you’ll work it out.”
“Yeah, I know,” I said after regaining a scrap of composure. “I’m sorry to be dumping this on you after all these years, to be crying like a baby—”
“Libby,” he interrupted, “don’t worry about it, okay? I love other people’s misery. It makes me feel superior and I have so few chances to do that.” It felt good to laugh. “Look, if you want to talk, I can listen. If you’re not comfortable talking to me about it, that’s something else, but if you are, then don’t worry about it. Talk all you want. We’re friends.”
“We haven’t seen each other in a lifetime.”
“Well, so we took a hiatus.”
“Tell me about you,” I said. “What’s going on in your world?” I didn’t want to talk anymore. There was no telling what other stupidity could come out of my mouth with little or no provocation.
So Patrick talked and I smiled as I listened to the recognizable cadence of his voice, feeling like I was seventeen again, back in my lavender bedroom with Eric Clapton and David Bowie posters on the walls, idly chattering, making plans to meet before homeroom.
He told me about a kayak tour he’d done the day before. “Most tours take about four hours,” he said, “but this one took almost seven. Everything that could go wrong did. There’s a name for that, isn’t there? What’s that called?”
“Murphy’s Law,” I said.
“I’m renaming it Harrison’s Law,” he said. “I was already paddling the nine-year-old son when the father got a cramp and decided to walk back, so I had to tow his kayak in. Then when we got back the mom didn’t feel well and I’m helping her out of her kayak when she barfs all over it.”
I laughed. “At least she didn’t barf all over you.”
“Really.”
“Here I thought you had such a glamorous profession,” I said.
“Yes, very glamorous. Cleaning up vomit.”
He told me about the weather in Florida and about where he lived on the beach and about his dog named Chewbacca. The sound of his voice was soothing and I was happy just to listen. He told me how his son Ashley was working full-time, putting himself through school, studying filmmaking, and still found time for his wife and two kids. “There’s not a big call for filmmakers in South Florida,” he said, “but what the hell. It’s his life and he’ll figure it out. He’s a good kid with a good head on his shoulders in spite of the handicap of being raised by me.”
What if Patrick and I had stayed together and gotten married? Ashley could have been our son. Surely we wouldn’t have named him Ashley, though.
“You must have done something right,” I said.
“All I did was enjoy the hell out of raising him.”
“How is it that you were the one to raise him?”
“His mom got into drugs when he was little, so I took him. By the time she got it together, he was settled in with me and things were going pretty well, so we left it that way.”
>
“Do they have a good relationship? Your son and his mom?”
“Yeah, now they do. She cleaned up her act after a while. She’s doing good now.”
“Did she ever try to get custody?”
“No. She moved close, though, and spent as much time with him as she could. We were friends by that time and we worked it out between us.”
“How civilized,” I said, thinking of the broken relationships in my wake and the fact that I’d never spoken to any of my exes ever again.
“Yeah, I guess it is. But life’s too short to hold grudges.”
“God, you’re so reasonable. Were you always like that?” I didn’t remember this, but we were practically children when we were together. I liked his lightheartedness, his easy optimism. It was so different from what I was used to.
“I guess,” he said. “I’m not saying we can control how we feel, but I think we do have choices about how we let what we feel control our lives.” He paused. “I should shut up, shouldn’t I? I’m sounding like an evangelist.”
“Not at all. It’s a great attitude. How’d you get to be so mentally healthy?”
“Years of therapy,” he said. “Hey, I sent you a photo. Did you get it or are you just ignoring it out of respect for my feelings?”
I laughed. “I did. I love it. Your son looks just like you used to.”
“And I don’t.”
“Well, who does? You look great, though. At least in the picture.” He laughed. “And your family’s very handsome.”
“Send me one of you, okay?”
“I will.”
I had a fine, cozy feeling as I hung up, glad I’d called. Patrick’s perspective on life made me feel more philosophical about Michael. Maybe a separation would be good for us. Maybe a little distance would help us realize how important our relationship was. “You’ll work it out,” Patrick had said, and I knew that was true, one way or another. Maybe Michael and I would get married, maybe we wouldn’t. Maybe I would end up with Patrick instead. I laughed at this silly fantasy, but imagined seeing him again after all these years, gazing longingly into each other’s eyes, devouring each other’s face and then hugging excitedly, professing our long-lost love.
What More Could You Wish For Page 6
