Wait for Me (21 page)

“Yeah that's okay, but what's up? Are you sick?”

“I'm pissed off. Pissed off!” I screamed. I tried to calm down with two deep breaths. “I'm sorry. I really have to go. Don't worry. If Fred calls, tell him I had to do something for college.”

“Okay,” he said, obviously worried. “Are you coming back tomorrow?”

I didn't answer. There wasn't much to say. I wouldn't be coming back for the rest of my time on earth.

“See you,” I growled.

I darted onto the street like lightening. I didn't know where to go – last time I was in this state, I had simply boarded a train. But this time the only place I could think to aim for was my mother's house. I walked three blocks, hopped on a bus and stared at the nape of an old woman's neck for twenty minutes.

When I arrived, I hovered at the door for a few minutes, uncertain about ringing the doorbell. Then, as though she had sensed my dilemma, she appeared and I collapsed into her arms in tears. She stammered a few words, then led me to my room and made me lie on the bed. She covered me with a blanket and lay down too, hugging me tightly. I stayed there for a long time, soothed by her comforting whispers. They were words of sincerity and truth, and they were everything that I needed to hear. Eventually, I fell asleep, exhausted and utterly empty.

At 11 p.m., the doorbell rang and a few moments later I felt the weight of a different body next to mine. Without turning round, I recognized the clinking sound of Sabrina's pendant.

“Your brother called me from Hawaii – he's worried about you. Your mom called him an hour ago.”

The thought of Fred (for the thousandth time) on the receiving end of my heartache – I felt guilty and ashamed. Enough was enough. It was time to put an end to all of this.

“You didn't tell him about Adam, did you?” I turned.

She shook her head and stroked my hair.

“Sophie, do you want to talk about it? Did you have a fight?”

“It's nothing that you didn't see coming.”

“Did you have a fight?” she tried again.

I didn't answer.

“Tell me what happened. I can't help you if you don't talk to me.”

“You can't help me. Nobody can, except myself.” I closed my eyes. “Except myself.”

“It's okay Sophie, you don't have to talk. I'll tell you what – I'll stay here with you. I've told work that you're sick, and I got somebody in to replace me for a couple of hours. You want me to call and—”

“No, Sabrina. Go back to work. I want to be alone right now, in silence. It's the only way I'm going to get through this.”

A few minutes later, my mother came to the door to call for Sabrina. I briefly tried to initiate ‘camera brain', but all it showed was a motionless image of me and the bed, surrounded by darkness.

After ten minutes or so, Sabrina returned to the bedroom and lay beside me again. “Steph's here, she's with your mother in the living room.”

“I'm sorry,” I muttered.

“Listen, Sophie, Adam's here too. He's out on the street – he asked if he could come inside.”

“Tell him to leave. Tell him to leave and never come back.”

“Sophie, I would and you know it. I'd kick the living shit out of him if I could, but your phone has been off since this morning – he went to look for you at the parking lot and he's been to our place too. He wants to talk and he seems genuinely—”

“Sabrina, look at me, what do you see?” I asked, rising from the bed. “What do you see? Despair, pain, hatred, and it's all because of him. I don't give a shit about his guilt or whatever. Let him crawl back to where he came from, where he belongs… in the orifices of every hooker on the planet.”

Sabrina burst out laughing. “The orifices?” she mocked, and her reaction actually managed to rouse a laugh. A bitter laugh, but still…

“Did you have a fight?” she asked again.

I shook my head. “No, we didn't have a fight. I just realized that I'm a deluded moron, as you always implied.”

“So, you won't be seeing him any more?”

“No,” I answered. “And do me a favor.” I ripped off the necklace. “Give him this and tell him: ‘sensitive initial conditions, unpredictability and evolution'. He'll understand.”

Sabrina looked bewildered. “What the hell does that mean? Some secret code? How on earth do you guys communicate?”

“We don't. He fucks me and that's all there is to it, as you know.”

“Sensitive initial conditions, unpredictability and evolution?” she repeated.

“Yeah,” I turned away slowly. “Now, I'm sorry for dragging you into this mess. Please, send him away. You guys too. I need to be alone. Don't worry, I'll stay here with my mother for a few days and then I'll resurface.”

As always, I thought.

Sabrina hugged me. “Alright, I'll tell him now. I'm looking forward to it too. Oh, and just for the record, as soon as I saw him I gave him a real good slap. I've been waiting to do that for months. If Steph hadn't restrained me I think I would have tried to smash his smug face through the window of that stupid, shitty car.”

She made me laugh again. “I'm sorry Sabrina, I really am.”

“Don't mention it. Alright, I'll go and banish him.”

I nodded.

“Call me the second you need anything, don't hesitate.”

“Okay.”

I lay down to sleep. When I opened my eyes, I had no concept of night and day – it all felt like darkness. After some indefinite amount of time, I got out of bed and followed myself into the living room. My mother was asleep on the couch, with knitting needles and yarn on her lap. I watched her for a few minutes from the table, before deciding to wake her up.

“Sophie, how are you feeling?” she asked, rousing herself, dazed.

“I'm fine, Mom, I'm sorry.”

“Are you hungry?”

I shook my head. “No.”

“Sophie, do you want to tell me what happened?” she asked, clutching my hands in hers.

“Just another man who didn't love me – for a change.”

“Oh, then I'm sorry for him, he must be completely heartless if he doesn't love you. Come into the kitchen, I'll make you some eggs.”

I pulled a few strands from the couch to avoid the anguish on my mother's face. She went to the kitchen and returned with a plate of food.

“Sophie, eat… please,” she urged.

I nodded and took a delicious forkful.

“What's his name?”

“I don't want to talk about it.”

“Did he hurt you?”

All over.

“No, Mom, he just broke my heart.”

“How long were you together for?”

“We weren't.”

My mother began to sob.

“Mom, please, I feel bad enough already. I'll get over it, I promise. I just need a little time to take it all in. It'll only make things worse if you're reacting like this, you know?”

“I know, I know, I'm sorry.” She wiped away her tears and presented a warming smile. “It'll be alright, you'll see – what goes around comes around. I just can't understand why nothing ever works out for you.”

“Oh God, Mom, what did I just say?”

“I'm sorry darling, really I am.”

“I'll bounce back in no time.”

“Of course you will,” she took my hand. “You're just like your father. You never give up, even when you're losing the battle.”

“Yeah,” I hissed. How comforting.

Under her pitying gaze, I finished my meal in silence like an obedient child. She went to bed and I resumed my hibernation.

I spent the following days watching TV on the couch. My brother called me every evening to make sure I was okay. I told him that I had a brief romance with a guy I met at college and now it was over. Naturally, he got upset. He gave me the routine talk about how it was too soon to be getting involved with anybody, given what I had been through. Granted, he was a little more sensitive when he heard me crying. After four days with my mother (and her insistence on waking up as herself every day) I couldn't take it any more. A thousand words of reassurance later, I went home, leaving her to knit beside the ghost of Dad.

When I got back to the Bronx, I found a bag of clothes and a note from Sabrina on my bed.

He left this at the book store on Tuesday xx

I emptied the contents onto my desk. Four pieces of underwear, one of his gifts (which I threw in the trash), two pairs of socks, two shirts, a bathrobe, another one of his gifts (which I also threw in the trash, along with another pair of underwear), a toothbrush (which met the same fate as the gifts) and my hairbrush. It was all the stuff that I kept at Adam's sex nest.

I spent the whole day sitting at my desk, musing over the calendar. How long would it take to settle into a new routine? A day? A month? A year? I thought back to my last session with Dr Richardson, which took place the previous afternoon. I told him everything, with no exceptions. He waited until I was in the doorway before offering me another pearl of wisdom.

“Sophie, pain is an essential part of the road to happiness.”

What was he saying? That I had to just grit my teeth and bear it? Yeah, that much I knew – too well. But I was supressing it again, keeping it captive within. My complaints had become silences. It was the only way I could hold myself together. It seemed that some types of pain can be numbed, some can be accepted, some can even lead to improvements, but this type of pain was unmanageable and we simply had to learn to co-exist.

When Steph and Sabrina came home that day, the atmosphere was transformed. They had stocked up on drinks and invited friends over. By 11 p.m., the apartment was packed with people. People like me, regular people – the young and the hopeless. Steven and David came by too. He greeted me with a hug that lifted me off the ground and whispered in my ear: “Everything will be fine. You will be fine. It always works out in the end.”

“I know,” I replied.

And I
did
know. It would get better, it always did. Time is the great healer – scar tissue fades and we survive to love again. I only wished that someone could give me a rough time frame on this.

Day by day, I adjusted to the new routine: remember to breathe, wake up, fight the memories, eat, gift wrap books, eat, sleep, and fight the memories again. Day by day and night by night, habits began to mask the pain. My mind slowly learned to accept, or rather, to live with it. Once again, I reclaimed the reins to my life.

I didn't hear from him; I didn't try to get in contact and nor did he. Out of sight but not quite out of mind.

Around a month later, I was helping Miranda to choose some furniture for the new baby's room. We called in at the parking lot on the way home. I wasn't worried about running into him – it was midday and he was almost certainly at work, but I was worried about revisiting the place where it all began. As we entered the office, my brother sprang from his chair.

“Hey sweetie!” he said, taking Miranda's shopping bags.

I collapsed into the chair, exhausted.

“My god, you bought a lot of stuff,” he said.

“We did,” she replied, with the sweetest expression that pacified my brother.

“You could have had them delivered, rather than drag them across the whole city.”

“I did all the dragging,” I said, demanding credit for my superhuman strength.

“At least you've found your calling,” joked Fred.

“Ah-ha—”

“Sophie, are you staying to eat with us?”

“No thanks, I'm a little pushed for time. I wanted to take a look at that second-hand market a couple of blocks away, by the movie theatre, and then I have to go to work.”

It was at this moment that Adam appeared in the doorway. It took me a moment to recognize him. Almost always suited, that day he was sporting a plain blue t-shirt and a pair of jeans, which looked like they hadn't been washed for days. His hair was longer and disheveled, joining an unkempt beard. He looked as though he had stopped caring some time ago.

We greeted one another, timid and uncomfortable. Luckily, Miranda and her twenty bags managed to alleviate the tension a little, at least on my part.

“Take a seat,” said Fred, trying to move me with his eyes.

“No, don't worry,” Adam replied, coming a step closer.

I got up, freeing the chair, and slipped into the waiting room to scan through the latest Rover catalogue.

“So, I've put you down for an annual test this Thursday,” I heard Fred say, flicking through the diary. “But you'll have to leave your car here.”

“Okay,” he answered.

“Alright then, Thursday with Gustav.”

“Okay, I'll be here at eight with the keys,” he said, then looked at Miranda sitting in the chair beside him and smiled. “When's the little one due?”

“Four months,” Fred answered proudly. “And we found out it's a girl.”

“Congratulations, I'll have a present ready for when she's born.”

“Oh, you don't have to do that.”

“But I do, you're so good to me and I hate feeling like I'm taking advantage—”

I sniggered inwardly at the irony. How very true. My brother filled out an appointment card for the annual test and gave it to Adam, whose eyes were still fixed on Miranda's belly.

“Perfect,” he said. “Thanks. I'll see you Thursday.”

As he was leaving he stole a glance at me. “Bye, Sophie.”

“Bye,” I muttered, without looking up. Fucking asshole with his phony manners. I waited for him to disappear behind the gate of the building that I was never allowed to enter and said a quick farewell to my brother and Miranda. I stepped onto the sidewalk with Sigur Rós blaring into my ears. After two blocks, I reached the market and began to aimlessly amble around the stalls, interested in nothing. After a pointless loop, I bought a hot dog and landed in a nearby park to eat it. Spring had finally unleashed the sun and softened the bitter cold. The clear New York sky was stunning that day – bright and pure. I wanted to fly. I took off my shoes and sweater, and lay on the grass to relax with the dreamlike Svo Hljótt. Halfway through the song, my cell phone rang. The caller ID told me it was Steven. I sat up and answered.