Page 67 of What It's Like in Words
We kissed, and he started removing layers. It’s a fucking desert in here, Enola. He walked down the hall to the kitchen, and I noticed his T-shirt. It was gray cotton and clung to him; the curve of his biceps, the depression at the base of his neck. There was a tag hanging. I gotthe nail scissors and cut it off for him. He moaned that he couldn’t return it now. Karen had bought it for him. All right, honey. Have you put the turkey in the oven?
It’s a chicken, but yes.
What did you stuff it with?
What do you mean?
He laughed and told me to put my feet up. Have you got an onion? A lemon will be overpowering. He said that he would pour me some wine, and when he handed me the glass, he pretended to be annoyed but his eyes were gleaming. He put Christmas music on, and I stared at the tree, the colored lights blurring the green. I used to lie beneath the tree when I was a child and imagine a magical world; Mum and Dad argued more over the holidays.
After we ate, and the dishes were piled in the sink, we lay on the sofa; his heart was beating fast, always fast, beneath the soft gray cotton. The air smelled like roast chicken and my eyelids kept trying to close. But then, in the stillness, the late sun illuminated the dust in the air, and I had this sensation—like my brain was creating the memory alongside experiencing the moment—and, in that second, I understood the versions of us that existed like strings on a harp: where we met in the pub; where we watched the sunset; where we walked among the gravestones. I even understood the alternative ones: where Dad spoke at our wedding; where our child was born; where I never took the bus that night and we never met. But then the sensation vanished in the way that a dream did when you woke from it. I lifted up and studied his paper face, tried to hold it in my mind.
What?
Nothing, just… déjà vu.
That isn’t real.
I rested back on his chest and circled the mole on his forearm. He asked me why I liked that mark so much. I told him that it looked like a planet. He said that all moles looked like planets, and I said that wasn’t true. His was unnaturally cylindrical. He kissed the top of my head and said: Well, that’s because it’s not actually a mole.I lifted up, and he laughed at my reaction. It’s a pencil mark from school. A girl called Tracy stabbed me with an HB in English class.
No way! You’ve been lying this whole time!
You got me.
I told him the story of when I was bitten as a baby. Mum was looking at nurseries, she left for a second, and then wham! I moved his fingers to the ridge on my skull. See? He said that explained a lot. We fell silent. He hummed “White Christmas,” and I listened to the vibrations in his chest. But then his breathing changed. I traced down his body. His fingers scrolled my thigh. We stood from the sofa and walked to the doorframe. I placed my palms on the wood. He lifted my skirt. His zipper dragged down.Oh god, I want him. I will always want him.
Fuck, honey…
His breath rattled in my ear.
Afterward, he kept his hands on mine. His mouth hot on my neck. I loved him more than I had ever loved anything. I wanted nothing but him. His smell covering my skin. His pulse under my hands. I wanted to swallow him, to drink him, to absorb him until I was more him than me. I wanted to make him happy. I wanted to reassure him. I wanted to please him. I wanted to serve him. I wanted to love him. I wanted to beg him to love me. But there was nothing else to do. No new depths. No new tricks. No new tool for worship. Before I could talk myself out of it, the words formed like mud.
I love you.
There was a kindness in the pause that followed that made me think he might tell me that he loved me too. But he wouldn’t. Of course he wouldn’t. And so, with the weight of my words between us, he gave his answer.
Don’t be silly.
And just like that, the moment became the memory.
OKAY,HONEY.IUNDERSTAND.
I bet you do.
I hung up and threw my water glass against the bedroom wall. I drank the contents before throwing it, but the shards went everywhere—the floor, the bed, the corners of the room. I knew that I would be finding pieces weeks later: the damage.
Ruth ran in from the kitchen. Oh my god, are you okay? She looked at the smashed glass and then at my phone. Her pitch dropped. What did he say?
That he understood.
Of course he fucking did. She told me not to move and left the room, returning moments later with two cups of tea. She handed me mine the way she always did, with the handle first so that I wouldn’t burn my hands. We sat for a moment among the ruin, and then she said: Maybe your first impression of him was the right one.
What do you mean?
You didn’t like him.
I don’t remember that.
We were figure drawing, and you said he was rude and unpleasant. And, Enola, the thing is, sometimes the good bits of people aren’t the rule, they’re the exception.
