by Micol Ostow
That is, if old times had been awkward and tentative.
The thing is that we knew each other inside out, and so there was no way, really, to completely step back from that. But at the same time, there was this huge, honking elephant in the room with us, otherwise known as our breakup. And one minute I wanted to jump into his lap, kiss him, and have everything be just like it was for the past four years.
And then I remembered “target practice,” and cool people like that guy Dave, or my friend Brett from comp sci—and Gabe, can’t forget Gabe. But then I remembered that Gabe’s with Kyra, and that nothing ever happened with Dave or Brett. And that most of my targets have fled from me screaming. (Literally. Screaming. I mean, do you have any idea what that does to the ego?) And I just don’t know what the answer is.
Anyway, we came back to my dorm making normal, polite-person conversation. I guess we had both decided that we were going to try to keep things on a healthy, nonweird level—at least for as long as we could. And I walked him around campus and showed him all of my favorite places, like making him try the flavored coffee syrups at Brew and Gold. He liked Woodman, saying that it was “refreshing” to be on an actual campus as opposed to a network of buildings that had been just sort of plunked down into the middle of a city.
We decided to go into Cambridge for dinner. Drew was tired and not up for heading back downtown, and, anyway, Harvard Square is really lively on a Friday night, and very quaint. We hit this great Indian restaurant I’d found. Drew had never tried Indian food before, so I got to order him one of those huge samplers and we both just gorged and laughed and drank lots of cheap wine despite our lack of IDs (real or fake). It was perfect. And easy. And comfortable.
From there we stopped by one of the few local dive bars that didn’t bother to card. We grabbed a table in the corner, and Drew got us some beers. The minute we sat down, though, I could tell he was having thoughts of the serious variety.
“So,” he began, “I think we need to talk.”
I immediately clapped my hands over my ears in protest. “No way. Nothing good in the history of conversation has ever come from those words.”
He laughed. “Relax, Claud. I just want to be honest with you. You should know why I came out here.”
“You wanted to surprise me,” I reminded him. “Just like Buji’s girlfriend was surprising him. It was a chain reaction of surprises.”
“Well, yes,” he said, “but it’s more than that. I probably would have come out here even if Buji hadn’t been hosting a weekend of love in our swinging bachelor pad. I wanted to see you. I’ve really missed you, Bee.”
“I’ve missed you too,” I admitted quietly, glancing down at the chipped wooden table. I wondered about all of the kids my age who’d been at this table before me, and how many of them had had “talks” like ours. Or talks of any kind. I wondered how many other people in the bar were on complicated dates, trying to navigate the course of relationships as they took their first steps toward independence. I bet there were a lot of us. We should have started a support group or something. God knows I could have used one.
Drew reached across the table and took my hand in his. “Bee, I have to say this: I still love you.”
My voice caught in my throat, and I looked away.
He stretched his free hand over and gently redirected me so that we were face-to-face again. “I still love you, and I want to be with you. I understand why you wanted to try things apart, I understand that you wanted to start college on your own, but for me, I’ve had enough. I’m not interested in other girls, and being in separate schools is independence enough. If we still love each other—which, I think we do—then I don’t know why we can’t be together. I know it’s distance, but it’s not like Africa distance. It’s four hours on the bus. The very reasonably priced bus. And I think we’re giving up too easily on something very special.” He paused and took a sip of his beer.
I realized that it was my turn to say something. “I, uh…I really don’t know what to say, Drew.”
His expression crumbled, and he pulled his hand back into his lap. “Do you not love me anymore?”
I shook my head slowly. “Of course. That’s not it, Drew. I’ve loved you for four years. Four weeks of separation isn’t going to undo that. And of course I think about you, and about what we had, and about maybe … being with you again. I’m tempted. I’m definitely tempted. But I’m not sure, honestly, that it’s the right decision.”
“Is there someone else?” he asked, his voice low.
“No. Definitely not. And even if there were, I wouldn’t be just … replacing you so soon after things ended. But maybe…maybe the point of college is to break out of your comfort zone, to try to stand on your own two feet.”
“You need a support system, Claud,” he protested.
“That’s true. I get that. And thank god I have that. You, Ellen … you’ve been great. And like I said, no one I meet here will ever replace any of you. But you both are one part of me, and school is another. And I think I need to spend more time figuring out what, exactly, school is to me before I can let worlds collide and overlap.” I looked up at him nervously. “Does that make sense?”
He sighed. “Unfortunately, it does. It’s not the answer I was hoping for, but I get you. But just promise me this.”
“What?”
“Just promise me that you won’t make any decisions right this minute. Let’s take the weekend to be together, no pressure, just like old times. And then we can see where we are on Sunday. Does that make sense? I mean, we owe it to ourselves to at least be open-minded.”
I considered his words and decided he had a point. Besides, at that moment all I wanted to do was wrap myself around him and disappear for a few days. So this did seem like a fair compromise.
“I promise,” I said.
Drew was as good as his word. When he finally woke on Saturday at noon, groggy from beer and fragmented sleep, he slipped back into comfort-mode. He slid out of bed and into the shower, with a quick kiss on the forehead for me, but without any mention of our conversation of the previous night. I adored him for that.
After we’d both dressed, we headed to the town center for brunch. I wanted him to see the local culture. Then we hit downtown Boston. Drew was completely charmed by the picturesque brownstones that lined the side streets of the shopping district. I indulged his sporting goods thing, and he was good-natured about my need to try on six thousand different pairs of shoes (of which, I am proud to report, I only bought one). We even stopped in at the Institute of Contemporary Art, which was actually sort of above our heads, I am sorry to say. We splurged on seafood for dinner at a place that used actual table-cloths. Drew ordered us each a glass of champagne and when they arrived, we clinked glasses wordlessly. After dinner, we stole back to campus for a quick power nap, curling up tightly together on my narrow single bed for a half hour or so. And then it was time for the concert.
The Tin Room was exactly as I had remembered it, which, given that I’d nearly blacked out my entire first night there, was a good thing. (I mean, remembering anything about that night was really a triumph for me.) And Gabe had been right about Mad Salad: très listen-able. The main room was filled to capacity, and we squeezed our way across the floor with our stomachs sucked in.
“This band is awesome,” Drew said, screaming directly into my ear. “How’d you hear about them?”
“My friend from the paper. He’s the music editor,” I said casually.
“Oh, that’s right,” Drew said, coming up behind me and wrapping his arms around my waist. “You’re the cool arts writer with the connections.”
It was stiflingly hot in the room, and Drew’s embrace suddenly felt suffocating. I shrugged him off as delicately as possible.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, not fooled for a minute.
“I, uh—do you want to get a drink?” I stammered.
Drew shrugged. “Sure. Where’s the bar?”
That, I
remembered. I grabbed his hand and tugged him in the direction of the back room, weaving our way through drunken rockers. “Two pints, please,” I shouted, nodding at the bartender.
“Hey, it’s you,” the bartender said, smiling. “Upchuck Betty.”
“Huh?” I said, appalled.
“I remember you, from the Rice and Beans show a couple of weeks ago. You tossed your cookies all over your boyfriend,” he said, still with the grinning and not paying any mind to my growing expression of panic.
“Um, he was not my boyfriend,” I hissed, praying that Drew was too engrossed in the music to hear our exchange. “He was my friends friend!”
“It was freakin’ hysterical, that’s what it was,” the bartender asserted. He slid two filled pint glasses, each frothy and foaming, down the bar toward me. “Now, sweetie, tonight our goal is to know when to say when, okay?” He winked.
I glared at him and thrust Drew’s beer toward him. Then I took my own and sucked down half of it in one gulp, which did not go unnoticed by my new best friend, Creepy McBeerslinger.
“What the heck was that all about?” Drew asked, eyeing the bartender suspiciously. Apparently he had heard our conversation. “Did you pull a Coyote Ugly here sometime, or what?”
“Or what.” I sighed. “I was here with Charlie, and we drank too much. Then she dragged over these annoying guys. But I was past the point of no return, and in my inebriated state I mistook one of them for a toilet bowl…. It wasn’t pretty.”
Drew chuckled, but it was a hollow sound and I suspected the bartender’s unfortunate use of the term “boyfriend” had gotten to him. I decided to play dumb. Besides, I hadn’t done anything wrong, anyway.
I lifted my beer to my lips again, but to my surprise, Drew covered the rim with his hand. “Easy there, ‘Upchuck Betty,’” he said, borrowing my charming new nickname.
“Thanks, Dad,” I snapped. What the hell? Since when was Drew so bossy? And when the hell had it gotten so cloying hot in here? “Let’s just go listen to the band,” I said flatly.
“Fine,” Drew intoned, marching off through the crowd.
“Oh, look, it’s, uh, the feminist chick again!”
Oh, god. What was this—scenes from my non-love life? I whirled around to see Cameron, meathead Troy’s let’s-get-physical friend, leering at me. “Hey, babe.” He winked. “Did Troy tell you I was going to be here tonight?”
“Hardly,” I said, frustrated. “He doesn’t exactly keep me apprised of your comings-and-goings.” Troy and Charlie were seeing each other pretty regularly, but we’d made a pact never again to mention our ill-fated double date.
Cameron shrugged, and shuffled his beefy body closer to my own. “What, you’re too good for me? Please. Troy says he’s seen you around, on campus, hitting on every guy you see. From what I understand, you’re a little bit hard up. You should be thankful that I’m willing to give you a test run.”
“Ew, I should think not,” I said, shoving his hand off of me and stepping as far backward as I could, given the crush. “Don’t you, like, go to Amherst? What are you even doing here?”
“I wouldn’t miss a Mad Salad gig,” he said, wrapping his free hand around my waist.
This was getting to be a little bit scary. The music was loud enough to drown out our conversation, and people were packed tightly against one another enough not to notice the fact of my being groped. All in all, it was a highly not-pleasant situation. One that I wasn’t sure I knew how to sidestep.
“What the f—”
I looked up, and suddenly, miraculously, Cameron was moving backward, apparently against his will.
“She’s not interested, man. Let it go.”
It was Drew. I thought I’d lost him to the wild thrashing going on in the main room, but here he was, my knight in shining Abercrombie. He grabbed at Cameron’s shirt with both hands. “Get gone,” he said gruffly.
Cameron paused and sized Drew up. The meathead did have about four inches on my ex. But there was something to the look in Drew’s eye that made him think twice.
“Whatever. She’s just a tease, man. I don’t know what you’re getting so worked up about. She’s not worth it,” Cameron grumbled.
“I mean it,” Drew said. “Shut your mouth and walk away.”
With one final sneer, Cameron slunk off as much as the crowd would allow.
I turned to Drew. “Thank you so much,” I gushed. “I have no idea what was wrong with that freak. I mean, we met that one time, but nothing happened and he was so overreacting just now, and, like, no one even noticed what was going on—”
“We need to talk, Claudia,” Drew said stiffly. It was the second time he’d said those words in as many days. I had a feeling this little conversation wouldn’t include many proclamations of undying love, however. “Is there anyplace around here that’s quiet?”
“Downstairs toward the bathrooms?” I guessed.
He led me to the lower level, which was all but empty this evening as there was no band playing on the second stage. We made our way down a rickety hallway to the general area of the bathroom. There was a small corridor off to the side that afforded us a slight bit of privacy and some distance from the bathroom “ambiance.”
Once we’d semisequestered ourselves, Drew flashed me a look of utter despair. He was breathing heavily. This didn’t bode well. Drew generally reserved his heavy breathing for moments of intense passion or fits of thinly repressed anger. So we were either going to make out, or he was about three sharp “ohms” away from going postal on me.
“What?” I said, hoping to stall for time and diffuse the situation somewhat.
“You tell me, Claudia,” he said. “What the hell is going on?”
“Nothing is going on, Drew,” I insisted. “Except for the fact that I ran into some people I know and you’re totally freaking out.”
“Yeah, I’m freaking out, because apparently the people that you ‘know’”—he made sarcastic air quotes with his fingers—“are a bartender with cute nicknames pertaining to your alcoholic tendencies, and a stalker who’s looking to sexually assault you in the middle of a concert! Who, by the way, claims to have been on a date with you? I mean, huh?”
“Well, okay, but it’s not like I was encouraging either of them!” I shouted. The strain of being so close to Drew all weekend and not knowing where we stood, the pent-up emotions, and the incredible heat of the club were all pressing upon me. I was ready to combust.
“Well what’s your deal, lately, that you’re coming to bars and drinking until you puke on your date? I’d be upset, you know, that you’re dating, but somehow I find it slightly more disturbing that you’re throwing up on your dates! Or going around with guys who clearly have, shall we say, expectations of you? I mean, is this why you don’t want to get back together? So you can puke on strange boys and beat off your more … aggressive suitors? Is that what your independence is all about?”
“My independence isn’t about anything, Drew!” I yelled. “I told you yesterday that I love you, and I meant it. I’m not looking to replace you! But being here, being away, on my own, is a chance to figure out who I am, just me, without any more outside influences.”
“So I’m an outside influence?” Drew asked, sounding appalled.
I lowered my voice. “In a good way,” I said. “I promise. But there’s a reason we each went to different colleges. We have different interests, and different sides of our personalities that we need to develop. We owe that to ourselves. I’m not saying this isn’t hard, or that I don’t miss you—of course I miss you. But we made promises to ourselves and to each other, and I just think it’s too soon to recant.”
Drew shook his head sadly, uncomprehending. “I don’t get you, Claud,” he said. “I understand wanting to come up to Boston, try out a new scene. But I don’t see why that means tossing aside everything we had.”
“It’s not—”
“And don’t tell me it’s not, because it is. You could be here, do
ing your own thing, and I could be at Columbia, but we could still be, you know, us. Together. But you’d rather …” He trailed off, gesturing ambiguously in the direction of the bathroom. “You’d rather be binge drinking with strange boys than be my girlfriend. And I guess that, really, is where we’re different.” He paused. “Because I can do my thing and still be with you.”
I looked at him, chin hanging practically to his chest. He looked so defeated. I wanted to pull him close to me, to stroke his hair, but I knew that wasn’t the answer. He was right: We didn’t want the same things. And therefore I didn’t have anything to offer him.
“I’m gonna go,” he said, finally.
“But—I have to—”
“You can stay,” he said. “You should stay. I think I need a little bit of time to myself.”
“Drew, I can’t let you go back to campus all by yourself,” I protested. That would have made me officially the Worst Ex-Girlfriend of the Year.
“Seriously, I want to,” he said. “We’ve taken that stupid shuttle enough times already this weekend that I could find my way back in my sleep. Just let me go back and relax for a little bit. Cool off.”
“If that’s what you really want,” I said, dubious.
“It is,” he assured me. “Come on, Claudia. If you follow me home, we’re just in for another two hours of awkward silence.”
“You have a point,” I admitted. It was annoying how Drew was always so logical. “But do you really think time apart will help you?”
“Let’s put it this way: It couldn’t hurt.”
“Okay,” I said. “In that case, you go and I’ll be home in an hour or two.” I fished my dorm key out of my back pocket and held it out to him. “Take this. But you’d better let me in when I get home.”
He laughed. “I swear. After all, won’t I need your meal card in the morning?”
I rolled my eyes. “Go. Now.”
He turned and loped up the stairs slowly. I leaned against the wall and watched him go, feeling a mixture of confusion, resignation, and plain old sorrow. Maybe Drew was right. Maybe “finding myself” was just some sort of euphemism for acting out a scene from College Girls Gone Wild. I mean, since when was a yak-o-rama my own personal declaration of self? Sheesh.
