Love from Amanda to Zoey

by Ian Mark

  I rapped my knuckles on Zoey’s door. She opened it immediately. I widened my eyes and snapped my head back, exaggerating my surprise at her quickness in answering the door. She widened her eyes and snapped her head back, exaggerating her surprise at my outfit.

  “Wow.” she smiled at me. She was wearing a dazzling silver gown, with four-inch black heels and a gold necklace. “Did I dress nicely enough?” She spun around in a circle. It was the last outfit she’d ever put on as a single woman. I hoped. I thought about which one of us would die first.

  “Wow,” I said. I stepped inside and kissed her.

  “May I ask the occasion?” She went and got her purse.

  “It’s not every day you take the most beautiful woman in all the five boroughs to dinner.” I grinned. She laughed at me.

  “You are such a loser.” She walked past me out the door. I followed like a puppy follows his new owner.

  “What does that make you?” I shot back as we waited for the elevator.

  “A generous citizen.” I laughed. She shot me a look. Her green eyes flitted over to mine, then back. She was happy. I made her happy. “Nice haircut.”

  Chapter 13

  “That really was an excellent meal, but I’m not sure why you brought me to such an expensive place,” she said after the tall, dark, and handsome waiter had taken our plates away. “I hope all this isn’t to make up for what happened.”

  I looked at her. She was intently focused on me. “It’s not.” I wiped my mouth with my napkin. I felt the ring with my left hand.

  “Okay…” She trailed off, waiting for an explanation.

  “My mother isn’t right about a lot of things.” I opened and closed the box with my thumb in the hidden recesses of my cheap suit. “But, uh, she was right about you.” Zoey smiled and opened her mouth to respond. “I’m not finished. Please, I’m, well, I’m trying to say something to you. Just wait.” She nodded.

  “A few months ago, I hated the world. I drank and smoked and partied to avoid the fact that I was unhappy. Now, I uh, well, I’m happier.” I cursed myself in my head for stumbling over the words so much. “Not all of that is because of you, but you are a big part of it.” Zoey seemed to understand what was about to happen. She put down her napkin on the table (the waiter was boxing up her leftovers for me to take home) and folded her hands.

  “These past few days made me realize something: I… um, don’t want to lose you. I can’t stand the idea of it.” TDH brought over the check. I thanked him. “I didn’t want to believe that my mother would set me up with, well, the girl that…” I trailed off. Zoey put her folded hands over her mouth.

  “Yes…” she said. She waited for me to get the words out.

  “The girl that I would want to marry.” She beamed from behind her hands. I got up and got down on one knee. The other people in the restaurant turned to watch. We had become a cliché, a good story they would tell to people who asked them how their dinners had been. I didn’t care. I took out the little black box. Zoey stood up. I opened the ring.

  “Zoey Mclemore,” I paused. In that moment, I could see everything. The tiny wrinkles on her beautiful round face as she started to smile even wider, the tiny bob in her head as she started to answer the question before it could be asked. I saw behind her, saw through her. I saw the shy, doesn’t-know-he’s-handsome, young busboy precariously balancing several plates as he navigated through tables to deliver food to a few tables over from ours. I saw the elderly lady that was turning around, unaware she was about to knock the food from the poor kid’s hands. I saw another waiter see the same thing I saw, and I saw the muscles in his leg twitch as he sped up to try and intercept the carnage. I saw TDH making his way over to our table, stepping on the red and gold carpet as he took the first of two steps up to our section of the restaurant. I saw his hand resting on the ornate wooden railing that helped patrons up the stairs and connected to a divider between our raised section of the restaurant and the rest of the building.

  I saw the faces of all the other diners, as they watched the young couple that would remind them of what they had once had, or what they one day hoped to have. I saw the families with their kids, and I saw them looking on, their wide eyes and round cheeks displaying their innocence and inexperience. I saw the tiny speck of chicken parmesan that had found its way onto Zoey’s gown. That slight imperfection that somehow amplified her beauty.

  But more than that, I saw the future. Or a possible future. I saw the excited aftermath, the triumphant kiss that would lead, after months of planning, to another kiss. I saw the cheering of the other patrons that would morph into the cheering of our families and friends. I saw my mother, bragging for decades about setting me up with Zoey.

  I saw our children, a little boy and a little girl. I saw them grow old before our eyes, as visitors remarked how much they had grown. I saw them go from children to thinking adults, saw them find others as we had found each other.

  At the same time, I saw a darker possibility. Her answer was certain, but what would happen after was not. I saw us moving in together, I saw her displeasure at the state of the bathroom and me complaining about her hair being everywhere. I saw the resentment, the anger that would build. I saw her nagging me about cleaning up, and I saw myself nagging her about nagging me.

  I saw us complaining to our friends, I saw my mother telling me she had never liked Zoey. I saw myself agreeing. I saw lawyers, and I saw tears. I saw an amicable separation, followed by years of writing checks to a woman I never saw. I saw that this was not the happy ending I had always wanted- I saw that this moment was a happy beginning, one that would take years of work and love and respect to nurture into a happy life, followed by the certainty of a sad ending. Because death is always the ending, not marriage, and death is always sad. I saw all this, and I considered. Is this what I wanted? I saw Zoey’s smiling eyes and her gorgeous body, but more than that I saw the wonderful person that lay beneath. The kindness, the sense of humor, the understanding. I saw the mother of my future children, and I asked her,

  “Will you marry me?”

  About the Author

  Ian Mark first dipped his toes into the writing waters as a high school senior when his essay equating college admissions with dating was published in Boston Globe Magazine. After a string of one-night standard applications he hooked up with NYU and spent the next 3 years immersed in Manhattan (and yes, sigh, occasionally Brooklyn) nightlife. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa and magna cum laude with a B.A in English and American Literature in 2015. Forgoing a lucrative career in… uh… Englishonomics maybe? Ian placed his degree somewhere he cannot remember and absconded to Pasadena, CA, where he hosts The Pasadonuts Improv Livestream every week and works as an actor in film and television. His writing has appeared in Hive Magazine, Outrageous Fortune, CelticsBlog, the Newton Tab, and Washington Square News.

  He grew up in Newton, MA, where he perfected the art of faking illness to skip school and read novels all day. After reading a thousand or so he began imagining writing his own. After a hundred more he jumped in the deep end. This is his first novel. He has no children or pets. Follow him on Twitter @TheRealIanMark