Page 102 of Bad Words

“Oh, yeah, it’s a cool museum,” I said.

“You’ve been there? How was it?”

“Um, thought-provoking.” I hesitated. “It felt sort of ghostly to me. Not in the sense of anything paranormal. But there’s something about the architecture, or maybe, like, the pilgrimage aspect of taking the ferry out there, that put me in this mindset of … I don’t know. Being more aware of the people who passed through a hundred and fifty years ago than any of the people who were physically there with me. Maybe that’s just the sign of a good museum? I don’t know. I’m not sure if that makes sense.”

“No, for sure!” Emily took a drink of wine. “That sounds so interesting. I’m excited to check it out!”

I asked about her parents, who were vacationing in Florida. She asked about my siblings, and I described their jobs. I kept waiting for some engine to start, something that would propel us into some different territory, but I couldn’t describe that other place. If someone had asked me what I wanted from her, from this, I wouldn’t have been able to answer, and so I sat there feeling as though my restlessness and dissatisfaction were completely unfair to her.

After we’d finished eating, she reached out and took my hand. I smiled instinctively.

“I listened to that band you mentioned,” I said. “Hannah and the Peach Trees. I liked their first album.”

“No way!” she said. “What’d you think?”

“Cool sound. I liked how that distorted guitar keeps punching into the first half of the album, and then the second half has that rougher edge.”

“Oh! Yeah. What’d you think of the lyrics?”

I hesitated. “I’d have to listen again. With the filter on the vocals, I didn’t hear a lot of them. Are they—do you listen to them for the lyrics, mostly?”

“Yeah, their lyrics are so good.”

Oh, God, I thought, why am I having such a bad time?

I looked at her hand in mine and tried to focus on it. The little tattoos on her knuckles. I’d asked her about those last Friday.

I squeezed her hand and let go. “Hey, I’m sorry, I should be getting home.”

“No, totally fine! Me too. Um—”

We sidled around the table and bundled up in silence before moving toward the door together. “Listen,” I said once we’d exited onto the sidewalk, “I … I don’t think we should see each other again.”

“Oh.” Her lashes fluttered in surprise.

“Sorry, I just—”

“Did I do something? Or, like, say something, or—?”

“No, not at all. I think you’re really cool. And beautiful. It’s just…” I balked. She was going to get upset, or angry. What was I doing, ending things with somebody so completely my type, because of—what? Some inarticulable feeling of discontentment? I could have gone on another date like this, a dozen more, and told Arthur they’d gone well, and I wouldn’t even have felt like I was lying.

What did I want, if it wasn’t this?

“Hey. Parker.” Emily raised her hands. “It’s okay. I know this is sort of a weird time, with the book coming out so soon.”

“Right, yeah. I really am sorry. I probably shouldn’t have said yes, with everything that’s been happening.”

“No worries.” She opened her arms. “Hug it out?”

I hugged her, then watched her go with an immense, miserable feeling of relief.

By the time I arrived home, Arthur had shut himself in his room, and I could hear the guttural exclamations of a video game bleeding beneath his door. I stripped off my drizzle-dampened outerwear, took a long, hot shower, and slid between my bedsheets, and as though I’d always known I was going to get home and do exactly this, I navigated to my text messages and opened my conversation with Selina.

January 10. Her curt, inexplicable signoff. City is OK, really. Good luck with your brother.

I began to type.

What do you think of the Lispector?