Five Things I Can't Live Without (32 page)

After what had just transpired between us, I thought there was only one possible outcome. The car ride was the equivalent of a gangplank. But I fought to remain hopeful, to recognize the artificiality—fuck, the actual insanity—of the situation we’d just been in. When Dan and I made it out of this, we’d laugh about it.
Salsa class?
I’d say, poking him.
Next time we’re contemplating a breakup, let’s enter a shuffleboard tournament.

I was the one to unlock the front door; he was still playing the visitor. He followed me into the apartment, and we took our places on the couch as if prearranged. He was sitting against one arm of the couch, I was flattened against the other. It was the furthest apart we could be and still be on the same piece of furniture.

“I guess I should start,” Dan said. He rubbed his hand across his face, and I could see how exhausted he was. That felt like the most he’d let me in all week, and there was hope in that.

“Please.”

“I got your message. Christ, that was a long message.” He didn’t smile. “I listened to it twice. The first time—it was intense. I was so mad at you, dumping all your feelings in my lap, but I also hated hearing you hurt like that. My first reaction was that it was you being selfish again, same as always. It’s always about your meta-life, and your feelings. You’ve got more feelings than—” He shook his head. “But then I listened again a day later, and I thought, ‘Shit. If this girl actually does what she

says she’s going to do, that would be the fucking bravest thing. Whatever happens, I’d be proud of her, you know?’” At that, he teared up, and so did I. But I didn’t talk. I needed to let him finish. “I don’t have an answer for you. I know what I want, and that’s to be with you. But I don’t know if I can anymore.”

I broke down into sobs. Without looking at him, I knew he wanted to reach for me. He wanted to help me. And I knew, also without looking at him, that he was still sitting right where he had been. Finally I gathered myself. I had to tell him what I’d been realizing about myself, the whole truth of it, even though it was just as likely to make him go as it was to make him stay.

“Thanks for saying that. That it was brave, I mean. I’ve been writing for days. Practically nonstop. It’s been crazy, but it’s been good. I just picked a place to start, and at some point, I could see my own logic. I could see my own downfall. And I wanted to stop, because it was awful, but it was kind of weirdly exhilarating. It was like I was a safecracker, but I was also the safe, you know?” I looked at him, and he nodded. “When I left you that message, I was sitting outside this stranger’s house. I’d gone there with the idea that somehow, she was going to help me find a way out of this mess, out of myself. And it turns out, she might be this total fucking depressive hermit. Which isn’t the point, really. The point is that I went looking for her because I thought she’d be the magic bullet, just like I thought salsa class would be the magic bullet, and then maybe I thought leaving you that message would be the magic bullet, and halfway through, I finally got it. There’s no magic bullet.

“We both know I’ve got a lousy track record when it comes to working on things. When things get hard, I decide it’s because I’m doing the wrong thing. I’m in the wrong relationship, or the wrong job, and so if I go on to a new one, I’ll be happy. I say it’s that I don’t want to waste my time on something that’s not right, but I think what I’m really afraid to do is admit that something can be right and still not last forever; I don’t want to commit to something or someone all the way, and lose someday, in some way that’s completely out of my control. I always want to be the one choosing, and I always want a definite answer, and what I’m starting to realize is that the only way you ever get a definite answer is when it’s a no. Because if I say yes, someday it might turn into a no—a yes can always turn into a no, but a no stays a no, if you know what I mean.” Again he nodded intently. “I came up with this image while I was writing today about how I’ve always been someone who’d amputate her arm sooner than live with arthritis. I’d rather cut the thing off than accept that sometimes on rainy days—or worse, for no reason at all—it’s just going to ache. And I’d never realized that before, not in those terms.”

He was still just watching me, so I continued. “So my whole life, I’ve been asking whether whatever I’m doing, whoever I’m with, is right or wrong for me. And the irony is, the question is what’s wrong. Everything’s going to be wrong at least some of the time. Relationships are boring sometimes, and they can be tedious, and you wonder who the hell you are and who the hell he is. The question is: Can I live with that inevitability? Can I have strength and faith that someday, if I want it enough, I can turn it around?”

Being Dan, he waited me out. Fucker. “And the answer is, I don’t know. I’ve never really done it before. I’ve always acted like a victim of my thoughts and feelings, like there was nothing I could do once the love started to fade. But the thing is, I’m onto me now. I started to see through my shit this weekend. Like, after you left, I was overcome by emotion. I just loved you so much, it was overwhelming. I didn’t leave the bed for two days, I loved you so much. And what I now realize is, I created a whole drama to get the old feeling back again, to make things intense again, to amp everything up. But if you come back, that’s not how things will stay. Everything can’t stay heightened; soon we’ll be normal again. I don’t want to spend my time finding ways to make our relationship artificially high, avoiding us. I feel like I’m seeing you, and us, clearly, and I know I want to be with you. You said you don’t know if you want to be with me and I can understand that, but you should know that I do want to be with you.”

I was done. I kept my eyes steady on his and finally he said, “I do want to be with you. I just don’t know if I can.” He shifted his gaze away from me, then back. “Sometimes you really put me through it, you know? This was the worst, but in some ways, it’s also more of the same. I need to be able to count on you.”

“I want you to be able to count on me. I want to be able to count on me.”

“How do I know you won’t give up on us again?”

“Because I didn’t give up on us. I got to the edge, and I stared over, and I came back. All I can do is tell you that I want to do this, and that I’m determined to try. I’m not going to expect you to pull me back from the edge anymore; you don’t need to talk me down. That’s not your job. It’s mine. I get that.”

He sighed. “Maybe I’m just looking for guarantees here. And like you said, there aren’t any.”

“No. There aren’t.”

“Nora,” he said, his voice suddenly suffused with pain, “you hurt me. Do you get that? Do you get how much you hurt me?”

Truthfully, until he said that, I hadn’t. I hadn’t seen it in him the night he left, and I hadn’t known what to make of him tonight. I hadn’t wanted to assume anything about what he felt. “I didn’t really get it. But I’m sorry. I’m really, really sorry.”

We were both crying. I wanted to reach across the couch to him, but it still felt like crossing the Delaware. All this self-confession, and we were still so far away.

“I realized some things, too,” he said. “These past few days, I realized that I’m not always the easiest person, either. I can be stubborn and sometimes I’ve put you in a bad position by acting like everything in our relationship was fine, and that you were crazy if you couldn’t see it. I turned your doubts into a character flaw. And I don’t always let you know how much is going on inside me. I mean, I’ve been breaking apart this past week and you didn’t have any idea. I just retreated.” He paused. “So we’ve both got work to do. The question is, do we do it together or not?”

“You’re the one who’s not sure.”

He laughed. “Well, that’s new.”

I laughed, too. “I guess it is.”

“So, no guarantees.”

“No guarantees.”

He reached for my hand, almost experimentally.

Chapter 21

W
e were in our single-file rows facing the mirror, practicing the leader’s basic, then the follower’s. I was enjoying being part of the chorus line. We did it long enough that I could put more hip action into it and fancy myself a salsa queen. Dan and I smiled at each other’s reflection as we went back and forth, back and forth.

Then we moved into partners work. Dan and I faced each other and dutifully got into closed position. During the review of last week’s steps, somehow, magically, we were able to get it right the first time. But Roxy picked up the pace that day.

“Focus, people, focus,” she exhorted as she taught us three new combinations in rapid succession. She and Thiep executed the first, and she didn’t even break it down before she had us trying it. When she wasn’t demonstrating, Roxy was tapping what looked like a wooden cane against the floor instead of just clapping and counting off. I thought of it as her “get serious stick.” I’d had a course in college with a professor everyone knew to be a drunk; when he sobered up on week four and realized how much

material he’d missed on the syllabus, suddenly it was triple time. Roxy didn’t seem to be a drunk, but something had lit a fire under her.

Dan and I couldn’t keep up. We hadn’t fully mastered the first set of combinations before it was time to go on to the next. We tried to stay upbeat, but we felt like complete clods, which wasn’t either of our idea of a good time. In that class, I definitely saw the benefit of being a follower; it seemed like our success or failure was more dependent on him than on me. “It’s okay, it’s okay,” he said every time we faltered, but he was talking more to himself than to me. When your boyfriend turns into Rain Man, you know dance class has gone awry.

We weren’t the only ones messing up. Roxy finally slowed down, did another demonstration, then had us practice it three times in a row. Each time, Dan and I couldn’t seem to get past the second step of the combination. “You need to step back on that beat,” I finally diagnosed, trying to camouflage my rising frustration.

On our next time through, when the screwup came predictably on the second step, we stopped dancing completely, while the rest of the class twirled around us. Of course, they were all twirling completely out of sync with one another; it was impossible even to tell which was the right beat by looking at that class. But we were the only ones to stop moving.

“I’m trying,” Dan said, his face tight.

“I know. I’m just trying to help. Let’s do it again.” I offered myself up in closed position.

“Let me think a minute.” He raked a hand through his hair and looked around, trying to figure out exactly where the error was coming from. Again it was nearly impossible to tell by looking at everyone else.

Roxy appeared at our side. “Show me what you’re doing,” she said, clipped but not impatient.

We started dancing awkwardly, self-conscious at her attention. Once again, we were off on the second step.

“You’re going too early. You’re going on the four instead of the five.” Roxy was indicating me. “Let me show you.” I stepped back, and she stepped into Dan’s arms. “Now lead.”

And he could lead. Maybe Roxy was just making him look good, but they executed the combination on the first try. I watched, embarrassed. So it had been my problem.

Roxy said brusquely to Dan, “You need to lead more strongly.” She addressed me. “And you. You need to follow more. No pushing. It doesn’t work in salsa. You need to take what comes.” I nodded, chastened. “Now try again.”

“Let’s do this thing,” Dan said, smiling.

This time, we made it through. Our form was probably terrible, but we’d finally hit all the marks. We shared an exultant glance.

“Very good,” Roxy said. She raised her voice, “Everyone, again!”

The bar around the corner was crowded with college kids. No one was even checking IDs (not that we would have gotten carded). I spied a table, and said I would grab it while he ordered my drink at the bar.