While You Were Gone: A Thought I Knew You Novella (7 page)

Chapter 6

G
reg calls me—never the other way around. I text once in a while when I’m bored with reading or crocheting or watching realtor shows. But if I ever call him, it rings once and goes straight to voicemail, like he hits decline. Fast. He always texts back,
sorry in a meeting! Call you tonight!
Unlike other men, he actually does.

“Have you called your mom?” he presses one night, his voice in that late-night, low rumble that I feel in my legs and my toes. “You have one mother. Call her.”

Sigh. “I know. But you don’t understand. She’s a train wreck, and I don’t feel like I have room right now for two of those.”

“I do understand. What if you just called her and said hi. Like nothing happened?” He’s chewing something. An apple. A cracker.

“What are you eating?” I pretend to be irritated.

“Hobnobs. Call your mother.”

I’ve thought about it, truly I have. The thing is, Paula lives in that space between knowing there’s a problem and addressing it. She counts on her own volatility to keep people from calling her out on her shit. It works on Pete. It used to work on my dad. To be honest, it generally works on me. I don’t have the energy for her. I dial her number. No answer. I leave a message, surprising myself. If we’re being honest, I do it so I can tell Greg later.

I text him:
I called her. What do I win?

I wait, the phone in hand, for five full minutes.

My undying admiration.
Good enough.

Me: coffee or tea?

Him: Coffee. Tea? What is this, Britain?

Me: Hey. I’m a tea kind of girl.

Him: You’re something.

Me: Books or movies?

Him: Movies based on books.

Me: That’s totally the wrong answer.

Him: Board games or video games?

Me: Board games. I’m too old for video games.

Him: How old are you anyway?

Me: You never ask a lady her age. How old are you?

Him: God, you’re sexist.

Me: I thought you said sexy.

No reply
.

Me: When do you come back?

Him: Soon. I hope.

Me: Not soon enough.

“What are you doing this weekend?” If it was the eighties, I’d have the phone cord twirled around my ankle, and I’d snap gum in his ear.

He sighs. “A family reunion. I don’t want to go. Should I skip it? Drive to Canada?”

“Yes. This is what I’m suggesting! Tell me about your family.”

“Oh.” He hesitates. “Not much to tell. I’m not close with any of them. Just a bunch of elderly aunts.” He laughs. “But I’m coming back next week. Is that soon enough?”

“Barely. But yes.”

I sigh.

“Dinner?” I ask hopefully.

He’s silent for a beat. “Yes. Definitely dinner.”

I officially have a date. When we hang up, I wish I could tell someone.

I change my outfit seven hundred times like I’m sixteen. I settle on dark wide-leg jeans, a deep-V shirt, and one silly black kitten heel. The other foot is still encased in a clunky walking cast. Silver jewelry, earrings that swing. Light makeup. It’s one of those nights where everything just works. All the flyaways that I typically have to wrangle into place with a dryer sheet just behave.

God, I’m so nervous. I haven’t been on a first date in at least four years. I remember that first night with Scott, the furtive slip of his phone number against all convention while our respective dates waited in the food tent. I remember the way my heart raced so much I thought it would fly out of my chest. That was nothing compared to this.

I can’t eat. My good foot taps and patters against the tile kitchen floor, waiting. He texts me,
Be there in five!
I like how there are no games with Greg. He says he’ll call, and he calls. He says he’ll be there in five, and he’ll be here. He’s such an adult. Scott used to make plans and show up two hours late, dinner reservations be damned. He blamed it on his adult ADD, his inability to focus. He was distracted by the muse or scatting in his living room.

When the doorbell rings, I buzz him upstairs and wait. He knocks softly a shave-and-a-haircut tap, and I laugh to myself. By the time I open the door, I’m almost breathless from anticipation, and my stomach rolls with nerves.

Greg looks the way I remember. When he smiles, he’s all dimples and sparkling eyes, and I’m irritated with how crazy about him I am. It’s so unlike me. I like men
well enough
but never like this.

He takes a deep breath. “You look… great.”

“I would twirl but…” I point to my foot. He laughs. It’s deeply resonant and sounds better in person than it does on the phone. Or text.

We stand there, he in the hallway, me in the doorway, smiling at each other, and I realize that without a doubt he’s as crazy about me as I am about him. There’s a certain freedom in that—to be exactly myself. I can like jazz or not. I can like regular fizzy pop or raspberry. I can chew gum for two minutes and throw it away if I want.

I realize he has one hand behind his back.

I raise my eyebrows. “Whatcha got there?”

He brings his arm around, and in his hand is a small, blue, familiar container.

“Chocolate Hobnobs!” I clap. I’d jump up and down if I could.

He laughs. “Better than flowers?”

I place them carefully on the kitchen table, and when I look back up, his face is flushed, and his eyes crinkle at the corners.

I kiss his cheek. “Definitely.”

At dinner, our feet touch under the table. Our hands brush when he fills my water glass. I giggle in ways I don’t generally giggle at men. I’m both enamored and, from a bird’s-eye view, a tad disgusted with myself.

“Tell me about your mom.” I’ve had just enough alcohol for the question to be excusable.

He sighs and leans back against his chair. “Why? We were having so much fun without that.” But he’s smiling in a way that means he won’t really mind telling me.

“Because it helps me. My mother is… she’s never been a mother. That’s not true. She used to be. When I was little. She’d come to performances, do my hair, watch me with bated breath.” And pursed lips at every small timing error, but I don’t say that part.

He twiddles a fork between the fingers of his right hand. “My mother was sick. Schizophrenic, I’m pretty sure. Completely undiagnosed. I had no idea until I was in high school. I read an article in the newspaper about schizophrenia, and something clicked. I just knew. So I went to the library, in the days before the Internet, and looked up the DSM. I got chills. It was uncanny. She used to rant all the time. She was forced to drop out of college because her professors stole her research. The bank was stealing her money. We had to stay indoors. I was isolated, mostly friendless.”

“I’m sorry. I had no idea.” I open and close my mouth, unsure what else to say.

He shrugs. “It was a long time ago. I wish she had known she was ill, so we could get help. My father wasn’t in the picture. Either I never met him or he left before I remember, I suspect because she was sick. I asked her, but she’d rage. He was ‘part of it,’ she said. I didn’t know what that meant, but I knew enough not to ask.”

“How horrible. Did you have any support? Grandparents?”

He nodded. “I did. My grandmother was around, and don’t get me wrong, Mom was surprisingly competent. I wasn’t eating Cheetos for dinner. I just had… different rules than everyone else.”

He finally looks up, meets my eyes, and smiles. “I’ve never told anyone that before. Isn’t that weird?”

“Really? Why?” I reach out and slide my hand over his. It feels so natural. He stares at it for a minute then turns his hand over, and we sit like that, palm to palm. I stare at his hands and think about them in my hair, on my body. Large, square, neatly trimmed nails. I lace my fingers through his, he lets me, and I can scarcely breathe.

He stares at our entwined hands. “It always felt like a violation somehow. Once I realized she was sick, I did anything I could to help her. Then she died and…”

“You felt like you had to make it up to her?” I supply, thinking of Paula and all our missed opportunities. How would I feel if she was suddenly gone, leaving me unable to fix it?

“Yeah,” he says softly. “Like that. Plus, she left me money, and I was, for a very long time, exceedingly angry. I’ve been dealing with it, in my own way, for the past decade. I never knew she had so much money. She inherited it from an uncle. I… never knew. She was too paranoid to use it, I think.”

“Why were you angry?”

“Because we used to ration heat. She acted like we were two steps away from homeless. She hoarded money the way some people hoard cats or newspapers.”

“Have you talked to anyone about it? Like a therapist?” I turn his hand over and run my thumb up the center of his palm.

He takes a sharp breath. “Just you. Just now.”

“I’m sorry,” I say softly. “And I can relate, at least a little.”

“I know.” He smiles. “That’s why this is easy.”

He walks me to my apartment door, holding hands. At my door, he falters, like a teenager after a dance. “Wait. I feel like I need to tell you something.” He steps away, putting cold air between us, and I reach out, panicky, to pull him back.

“Just,” I start, and he looks away. “Just don’t. Come in. Please? No worries tonight. I’ve just had the best time. I’ve needed this.” I step toward him, closing the gap. It occurs to me that he might have a girlfriend back in the States. I open my mouth to ask and close it. I look up and down the hallway. I want to know but not.

“Ah, I should go.” But he doesn’t move. He leans toward me.

“Come in.” I tug gently on his coat. He sways forward, resting his forehead against mine, and we wait there, for the kiss I know is going to happen.

When I kiss him, his mouth is warm and soft and responsive, just the way I remember it, and I thread my fingers up through his hair. His mouth moves under mine, his tongue seeking me out. I pull away and hold his hand with my good hand, lead him into the apartment, and bump the door shut with my hip.