She hadn’t realized just how horribly affected she would be by having lost Monica to the ravages of mental illness. Rational thinking could not prevent her from feeling as though she could have, should have done something to fix Monica and that Monica’s failure was also hers. Toni recalled being feisty and stubborn as a tot but possessing a rather sweet comportment that the adults around her seemed to find adorable. She never had to work too hard at being the center of attention or gaining favor or being persuasive. Likability came easily, accomplishments taken for granted, but now that young adulthood was well behind her, her success at being an emotional alchemist had retreated considerably. She felt as if she had managed to sink into the world of the perpetually mundane.
What was it, Toni wondered, that had produced in her such a mediocre streak – nature, nurture, birth order, astrological sign? Insufficient familial strife to have created an urgent need to slay the dragon and emerge a victorious warrior who wears her battle scars proudly? She just couldn’t put it all together – at times had fleeting glimpses into her composite personal truth, but was never able to fully connect the dots into a cogent theme. Perhaps the person she had become was all she was meant to be; no greatness, no creative talents or skills, no noteworthy ambitions, no grand love affair.
She felt control slipping away as she toyed with making a simple, clean break from the suffocating stagnation that had become her life. The permanence of that solution felt elegant and effective. She would no longer have to suffer the ramifications of her ill-advised romantic choices and as such would ultimately be freeing herself from the indignity of a bitter, lonely existence.
Gene was absolutely correct in his assertion that Toni sought only to fill her void with activities designed to redirect her attention away from how horribly she was feeling about herself. Why it took the better part of a year for her to make that revelation, to ‘own’ that realization, remained a mystery but once she did, she was able to think clearly again and knew exactly what she had to do to put her life back on track. She came close to having a panic attack after composing her text message and hitting enter.
Love Finds Its Pocket
Kat arrived at the cafe before Toni, having paid the occupants of the same table at which she and Toni sat during their first ‘date’ together, to relocate to a different table; twenty dollars well spent, she thought. When she saw Toni’s reflection through the glass doors of the vestibule, she flew out of her seat and ran over to greet her, not caring a whit that she would be showing her hand before the betting even began. They both started to cry, quite demonstrably and loudly, to which one of the waiters responded by asking if perhaps they might be more comfortable sharing their moment outside as other customers were becoming visibly upset by their unabashed histrionics. They either did not hear him or chose to ignore his request as they looked into each others eyes and kissed as if they’d just been reunited after searching the world over, having come close to giving up on ever finding the other.
Toni came first, pressing against Kat as tightly as she could, grabbing onto her shoulder for support while burying her mouth at the base of Kat’s neck. Kat held Toni’s waist and back of her head, grateful that Toni had pulled away from the kiss as she was in the process of a lock-jawed silent scream so could no longer sustain lingual contact. A few of the straight male patrons stopped to stare, placing their napkins across their laps to ensure the continuation of public modesty. The waiter, overheard muttering something about classless dykes, fled to the back of the cafe to search out the manager. Their spasms ended long before they were either able or willing to disengage from their embrace and take their seats.
“I’m so glad you came – um, I mean I’m so glad you accepted my invitation. I’ve missed you so much. I’ve just been...” Toni could not continue speaking as her emotions were floating just out of reach.
Kat placed Toni’s hand in hers and suggested that perhaps they should take their seats and order before they were thrown out for public indecency. Although they had frequented that particular cafe in the past, Kat couldn’t bring herself to go in ever since she and Toni stopped speaking; the memories were too overwhelming so she simply avoided the place, opting for lesser coffee, pastries and other amenities in favor of not crying with whomever she happened to be dating at the time. The wait staff had changed considerably since her last visit, having been replaced by the overtly haughty and less collegial, which left Kat a bit cold, but since the quality of the coffee and dessert selections hadn’t changed, she settled in for a long discussion. One way or the other, she and Toni were going to exorcize their respective demons and find a way either to forgive each other or split for good, which for Kat would have required permanent geographical relocation for at least one of them.
“I don’t even know where to begin. My head’s a fucking mess. I haven’t been able to think straight for so long that I feel like I’m losing my mind. All I know for sure is that I can’t live one more day without you in my life and I’ll do whatever it takes to win back your friendship.
“Life without you is simply miserable. Everything I see or do or think about makes me wish that I could share those moments with you. I miss your insightful comments, the way you can analyze and deconstruct a situation down to its bare elements, how you can find humor in absolutely everything, how your eyes light up when you’re about to say something unbearably clever and how nothing ever gets you down for too long. I miss that tenacity in you, your resilience, your brilliance, your beauty. I miss your touch and how I long to have you hold me, to feel your strength imbue my being with pure love. I miss you every minute of every day and it hurts so fucking much it’s tearing me apart.” Toni paused to wipe away her tears. She turned away to evacuate her nose of its accumulated debris.
“Maybe I’m saying too much. I understand that you’ve fallen in love with someone else. I’m not sure I’ll ever want to meet him or spend time with you two – probably not; all I know is that I need you in my life and I’ll take you any way I can. We can just be friends without benefits – well, perhaps we should agree to ignore what happened a few minutes ago, but you know what I mean.” Toni stopped speaking when she saw that Kat had put her head in her hands, shaking it from side to side. “What!”
“Oh Toni – I am so sorry. I only hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me.” Kat paused for fear of how Toni might react to her looming confession.
“You don’t need to apologize to me. I’m the one who fucked up. I should have just let you know how I felt about you but I wasn’t in the right emotional head space to do that after Monica. I was a fucking mess and by the time I realized that you were the one for me, you had already moved on and found the love of your life. Sometimes life just sucks but I’m trying to make it suck less – for me that means reconnecting with you. That’s why I asked to see you today.
“Will you be my friend again?” Toni tried desperately to keep from crying.
“Oh Toni... What started out as a spiteful prank seems to have taken on a life of its own. I am so sorry to have done that to you. I never meant to hurt you.” Kat interrupted.
Toni’s face quickly changed from one of desperation to utter confusion. She had misunderstood what Kat was attempting to communicate to her. She wanted to be brave although her inclination was to run screaming out of the cafe and directly into oncoming traffic, preferably in front of a speeding bus.
“No, no, Toni...” Kat paused when she saw Toni clasp her mouth closed, eyes opened wide in what appeared to be the beginning phases of a dry heave. Kat placed a hand on Toni’s shoulder to help steady her.
“Toni, Toni, stop. Please, my love. Slow down and take a few deep breaths, okay? Please, just hear me out. You need to hear what I have to say and I don’t want you to interrupt or make assumptions or, god-forbid, vomit on me. Okay?” As she spoke, Kat relocated her chair to sit directly adjacent to Toni, put an arm around her and recommenced her explanation.
“By the way, I heard about your r
un-in with the potted begonia; I think your stomach acids killed it.” Seeing that her attempt to lighten the mood was d.o.a., she nervously cleared her throat and continued.
“First of all, I need to apologize for that night. I had a feeling that you would still be checking my Facebook page so I planted my plans to attend that event hoping you would show up. But in my mind, the night would have ended much differently, with us cradled in each other’s arms, making passionate love. I just wanted to make you jealous so that you would understand how badly I’d been hurt by your decision to have a fling with some dumb ass rather than come back to me, where you so obviously belonged.
“I was so hurt, so angry with you, Toni; I wasn’t thinking clearly. Anger was clouding my judgment.
“My actor friend, Alex, the best looking man I know, agreed to be my beard for the evening – he’s one-hundred percent gay by the way. I thought you would immediately have tagged him as super gay and realized that you’d been punked and then we’d laugh about it later that night, in bed.
“A few people came over to me to tell me that you were there but then left and were outside tossing your lunch into the potter by the door but by the time I got outside, you were nowhere to be found. The joke had backfired and I thought I would die, right there.
“I tried calling you several times. I texted you, begging you to call me so that we could work things out. I didn’t explain it in writing because the joke blew up in my face and it would have required a deeper explanation than a stupid text or email could have provided. I thought about going to your apartment or your job but didn’t want to come across as a stalker so I waited it out, hoping you would return my calls.
“When you sent that text telling me to leave you the fuck alone, I knew then that I had lost you. I’ve been floundering ever since. I even went over to Gene and Marcella’s place to ask for their advice and if they’d be willing to intervene on my behalf. Marcella just put her head down and Gene looked like his head was about to explode. He kept pacing back and forth; I’d never before seen him so agitated. I still don’t know what got him so upset. I thought maybe it was because I was asking him to choose between friend and family. I never knew he cared that much about our relationship.” Feeling that Toni had relaxed a bit, Kat stopped to take a bite out of her apple tart, the best she’d ever eaten – although she’d never admit that to Marcella. Her appetite was returning, which was a positive sign.
Toni knew exactly why Gene was so upset and now everything was falling into place. He was in a bad spot, keeping loyalties and having a strong opinion about how things should have been playing out yet being powerless to say anything to either one that might betray their confidence in him. He knew he’d have a much better chance at getting under Toni’s skin as she was an easier mark and also respected him implicitly. Threatening to cut her off was a drastic and offensive maneuver but he knew it would be effective. He wasn’t the type of man who could sit back and watch a train wreck unfold without doing everything within his power to prevent the collision from occurring.
Gene offered her one good swift kick in the right direction and if she were stupid enough to fuck it up yet again, he would simply disengage and then make himself conveniently absent whenever he knew Toni planned on visiting with Marcella. His counsel is actually what prompted Toni to send the text to Kat the aftermath of which he had the pleasure of learning after listening to a voicemail on his cell from Kat, the ringer of which must have been on silent at the time, as she thanked him for his intervention, saying that she owed him her life and would never forget his act of kindness in redirecting Toni back into her arms.
“Geeze, Kat – you staged that whole thing? You mean you weren’t in love with that guy? But I’ve been having nightmares about it ever since!” Toni’s world became heavy with the weight of the ramifications of her own actions, counterbalancing her reaction to something that had been merely a dumb prank.
Toni just wanted to start running and not stop until she was dead from exhaustion. Her self contempt was suffocating her. Such a waste of time, such useless, unnecessarily contrived manipulations whose destructive impact had brought her to the verge of collapse. Toni had always enjoyed being with Kat specifically because there wasn’t anything they couldn’t discuss – no subterfuge, no topics were off limits and any perceived slights could be tossed into the discussion arena and dispelled before having a chance to fester and choke either or both. She now knew that the last several months of her life were nothing more than a sham, the premise upon which she had been basing her decisions, a pointless mind-fuck; her whole life had become a fraudulent mess.
During the entire time that she sat there trying to compartmentalize the previous fifteen minutes of Kat’s admissions, wrapping her head around how she could have let the situation become so horribly ugly, her jaw was agape, her eyes unfocused, staring straight ahead. Kat had already dubbed that look of hers as her ‘zone of the void’ and under better circumstances she would have loved to share a laugh about it. As it was, Toni looked like she wanted nothing more than to find a rock under which to crawl, bringing with her yet another rock with which to beat some sense into herself and if that didn’t work, to simply bludgeon herself to death and put an end to her miserable existence. Kat dried the tears that had begun falling from Toni’s sad eyes onto her despondent cheeks and held her tightly, pulling her as closely in to her body as she could without crushing ribs, rocking her gently, repeating, ‘my love’, over and over again.
They left the cafe shortly thereafter, partly to avoid the evil glances that the wait staff couldn’t seem to stop shooting at them, but mainly because they were at the point in their conversation where they required more privacy than a public forum could offer so went directly to Kat’s apartment where Kat promptly stripped the clothes off of them both, carried Toni into her bed in which they fell asleep in each other’s arms until the next morning.
The next day and for the following two days, they stayed in the apartment, primarily in bed, making love with a desperate intensity while declaring multiple promises to never again be apart. Each time Toni woke up, she would make love to Kat until she passed out again, just to make sure she hadn’t dreamt the reconciliation and that they were actually back together.
“You crazy, insatiable girl. Not that I’m complaining mind you, but what has gotten into you?” Kat said on the third such occasion that Toni woke up, kissing Kat as if she hadn’t just made love to her mere hours before, her more amorous emotions having bloomed exponentially, deeper, more powerfully, intensely after each successive rest period. When she saw the tears forming in Toni’s eyes, recognizing the look that held such remorse, she made no more further attempts at humor and allowed the hours that followed to unfold however Toni wanted, knowing that every action would only serve to bring them closer together.
The surreal nature of those days leading up to their reconciliation had left Toni with an intimate understanding of her darker proclivities and although she didn’t want the basis of her decision to spend the rest of her life with Kat to have been made simply to avoid feeling empty and self-destructive, knew that being with Kat felt right – better than anything else in her world and that save for death, nothing would, should or could ever pry them apart again.
From Past to Repast
Toni was gently shaken out of her slumber by Marcella; it took a few minutes for her to process where she was. Her dream had been so vivid that she was able to convince herself she was in bed with Kat, engaging in the best make-up sex ever. Realizing that she was back in the hospital, still in the waiting room, waiting for the love of her life to finish being sliced and diced and pulled back from the brink of death, put her agony back on the front burner and she cried anew, once again into her mother’s accommodating arms. Antonia kept begging, ‘Prego, figlia mia, non pianga piu. Basta, bella mia, basta’. Marcella and her mother sandwiched Toni in a tandem hug, hoping their love would help soothe her inconsolable ache.
Antonia’s fe
elings of helplessness were absolute. She would have traded places if she could, would have died if that would have taken away her daughter’s pain. Toni had always been a very stable child, slow to anger, quick to forgive and always with a ready-smile for friends and foes alike. Seeing her in such a state of anguish was unprecedented; the intensity of it was tearing Antonia apart. She cursed the surgeons for taking so long to finish. The entire family started to wear their worry on their faces, no longer able to conceal their collective anxiety. To them, being a somewhat superstitious and suspicious lot, no news was translated as bad news. Three additional hours had passed and they hadn’t yet received even one update from Dr. Echeverria.
Gene practically picked Toni up by the scruff of her neck and demanded that she accompany the remaining crew for a bite to eat. Toni was a bleary-eyed mess and barely present. Antonia nodded in ascent when the suggestion was made that rather than try and sit through the standard proceedings at a restaurant, knowing full well that Toni was in no condition to be in a civilized, decorum-required pubic space, they should opt instead to walk over to a pizzeria around the corner on Lexington to pick up a quick slice.
The less formal nature of a pizza place, and that they could sit at a counter on stools that faced an exterior window, would provide a far more accommodating environment to a group of diners who looked like Christ had just died right in front of their eyes. Gene reminded Toni that Kat was absolutely not in any imminent danger of dying, a fact that made it impossible to justify the profundity of her demonstrated sorrow. He begged her to reflect on that.
Love Finds Its Pocket Page 21
