“When I was five years old?” I say. “My mother drowned in a flood. But at least I remember her.” I can’t even believe I’ve just said it. Not even Mr. and Mrs. Skiba know about that.
“Rough, huh?” he says. I nod. Eat some more salad. “Hey, listen to us. Pretty heavy-duty conversation for a first date, huh?”
Is that what he thinks this is? A date? Because it isn’t and he better not be getting any big ideas. I go, “I wonder if my tire’s ready yet.”
“Only one way to find out,” he says. Slides off his seat, gets up from the booth. When we pass Hoss Cartwright on our way out, I smile at him and nod, almost forgetting that he’s only cardboard. What do I think? That we’ve just eaten at the real Ponderosa Ranch instead of at this restaurant? Not that the Ponderosa is even real. In the scenes where they go outside, the trees in the background all look fake. Hey, come to think of it, the Cartwrights’ cook, Hop Sing, was Chinese, too. Or Japanese. I always get those two mixed up. My tire is ready when we go back. “No, no,” I tell Orion when he offers to pay for it, but when I realize I’m six dollars too short, he has to chip in the rest. What I’ll do is pay him back next time he comes in for his shirts, and if he gives me a hard time about it, I’ll insist.
Back at One-Hour Martinizing, I hold Orion’s sports coat while he puts my wheel back on, tightens the bolts, and lowers the jack. “Well, I had a nice time,” he says. “Watch out for nails now. See you on Friday.”
Friday? Wait a minute. Is he asking me out? “What do you mean?”
“My shirts,” he says. “Didn’t you say they’ll be ready by Friday?”
“Oh, right,” I tell him. I’m relieved and disappointed—a little of both.
Later on at my apartment, I put on TV and it’s weird because Dynasty’s on and there he is: Dr. Nick Toscanni, otherwise known as James Farentino. It’s just a coincidence, I guess, but just the day before at the dry cleaner’s, one of our customers, Mrs. Chudy, said to me—I forget what we were even talking about, but she said, “My dear, there are no coincidences. That’s just God’s way of remaining anonymous.” And I was like, to myself not to her, yeah? How do you know? But hey, maybe she’s right.
Anyways, after Dynasty gets over, I put on my pajamas and get ready for bed. In the dark, I lie there wide awake, thinking about Dr. Orion Oh. Is it some kind of weird omen that first I told him he looked like James Farentino, and then there James Farentino is on my TV? Except I can’t remember Orion Oh’s face, exactly; all’s I can picture sitting across from me in that booth at Bonanza is James Farentino. I’m jumpy, sort of, and I start thinking about Orion Oh kissing me, and me kissing him back. It gets me kind of excited, and I reach under my pajamas and start touching myself—something I’ve only done once before when I was in the tub, except I got embarrassed and stopped doing it. This time I keep going, though, picturing other guys I think are sexy. Tommy Ianuzzi from high school, Andy the UPS guy who teases me when he comes into the store, Little Joe Cartwright . . . James Farentino . . . It feels too good to stop so I don’t. I close my eyes and press my lips together and it’s coming, it’s coming. And then, oh god, I’m there. I’ve just given myself orgasm number three. Priscilla gave me my other two, but I didn’t even think about her at all while I was touching myself. It’s kind of confusing because, given my experiences with both Albie and Priscilla, I kind of thought I might be a lesbian. Which, maybe I am. But maybe not. Maybe I’m . . . what do they call it? AC/DC? Which, in a way, is a good name for it because sex is kind of like electricity going through you—in a good way, I mean. Well, whatever I am, if he asks me out on Friday when he picks up his shirts and I give him his six dollars back, maybe I won’t say yes but maybe I will.
Except he doesn’t ask me. I’m waiting on someone else when he comes, and Mrs. Skiba takes his receipt, gets his shirts, and rings him up. “No more flat tires?” he calls over to me, smiling.
“Nope,” I say, strictly business. And it isn’t until after he’s left that I realize I forgot to pay him back.
But the next week, when he comes in with more dirty shirts, he’s also got a pair of dress pants that’s got a stain. “Salad dressing,” he says. “Think it will come out?” I tell him we’ll try. “Hey,” he says. “Do you like Woody Allen?”
“What?” I go.
“Woody Allen. He’s got a new movie out. I was wondering if you’d like to see it with me this weekend.” I tell him yes, okay. And after he leaves Mrs. Skiba says something about how I look like the cat that ate the canary, whatever that’s supposed to mean. Why am I the cat, not the canary?
The movie is Manhattan. It’s kind of a coincidence that it’s about Woody Allen having a relationship with a younger girl. A high school girl. I’m not sure how old Orion is, but I turned twenty-two last month and he’s what? Thirty, maybe? Meryl Streep is in the movie, too. She’s Woody Allen’s snotty ex-wife who left him for a woman. AC/DC, I think. Except I relate more to the younger girl than to her. Mariel something. She has a pretty voice and a nice body. Nicer than mine, that’s for sure. In some of the scenes, she’s walking around in just a shirt and her underpants. I could see myself having sex with her, but not with Woody Allen. Yuck. Why would she want to? Probably because it’s his movie. In real life, I bet she’s got a boyfriend who’s younger and cuter. Near the end of the movie, after Woody’s broken up with her and she’s going off to Europe, Orion reaches over and puts his arm around me. Which I like. And which, come to think of it, my father used to do with my mother sometimes when they were sitting on the couch watching TV together. When the movie’s over, I get up to leave, but Orion wants to stay and look at the credits, so I sit back down. It was okay, not great. Or else I didn’t totally get it. Like, why was it in black and white? You’d think that for tickets that cost six dollars each, you’d at least get a movie that’s in color.
Walking out of the theater, it makes me feel a little stupid when Orion starts talking about what a genius Woody Allen is. He asks me if I’d be up for ice cream. And where does he drive us to? Friendly’s! But it’s kind of nice being a customer for a change instead of the scooper. We get cones at the take-out window, then go back to the car. And just when I’m thinking about how I don’t have any business going out with someone who’s so intelligent and sophisticated—someone who’s got the word doctor at the front of his name—he takes his first lick of the cone and his ice cream falls off it and into his lap. It strikes me funny—nervous funny—and I try not to laugh. But then he starts laughing, so I let it out. And when he puts his empty cone on his forehead and says look, he’s a unicorn, I laugh so hard that I’m kind of snorting. “Sheesh, how old are you, anyway?” I ask, and he goes that he’s twenty-nine going on six. So I was close. Albie would have thrown a fit if he did something this spastic, but Orion just thinks it’s funny. And he’s a psychologist, for cripe’s sake. His father never even wanted him.
When he drops me off back at my place, he doesn’t try to kiss me or anything, but he asks for my number so he can call me again. I tell him yeah, that would be nice. And two nights later, when the phone rings and I know it’s not my brother’s time to call, I run so fast to the phone that I stub my toe on my stupid coffee table.
For our second date (I don’t count the time he helped me with my tire and took me to Bonanza as a real date), he picks me up on Sunday morning because he’s taking us on a hike. His hair is still wet from his shower, and when we get in the car, I can smell his clean smell, which I like. And recognize. It’s Irish Spring soap. I buy Irish Spring, too, when it’s on sale. Otherwise, I buy the store brand. I like those TV commercials for Irish Spring, where the people talk with Irish accents like my ancestors must have talked with. Our great-grandparents on my mother’s side were Irish immigrants, Donald told me once. She was a maid at some rich family’s house and he delivered coal there, which was how they met. It’s funny how people meet. Orion and me, for instance. If he got his shirts washed, starched, and pressed at the Troy Laundry instead of wher
e I work, we’d still be strangers.
On our third date, Orion does kiss me, and two dates later we make out. I like it—his lips on mine, his tongue in my mouth, his hand up inside my blouse. “Okay?” he keeps asking, and I keep nodding yes. It’s more like what I’ve done with Priscilla than what I used to do with Albie. Mostly what I did for Albie, I mean. He never really cared about how I was feeling. But with Orion, it’s more like . . . what? Sharing, I guess. Like, when we went out to eat earlier that night and got one dessert with two forks.
The first time he asks me over to his apartment for dinner, I’m nervous. But he seems a little nervous, too. Not slick or anything. He pours us some wine, and when he hands me my glass, his hand is shaking a little. He goes into the kitchen to check on what he’s cooking, and I look around. His wall-to-wall carpet has lines in it, which means he’s just vacuumed, probably because I was coming over. He’s got nice furniture and nice posters in metal frames. Arty posters, like the stuff at the museum I go to. The door to his bedroom is open. It’s a little messy in there, which I kind of like. It makes him less perfect. Not that I keep a messy bedroom, just the opposite. I like to keep things neat, everything in place. But his kind of reminds me of Donald’s old room. “Time to eat,” he says. “Come on in.” He’s got a round oak kitchen table which he’s already set. His plates are that Fiestaware I’ve seen in shopping circulars. The napkins are cloth, not paper. Classy.
Dinner is salad, pasta, and these rolled-up meat things that have cheese and herbs and chopped nuts inside. Braciole, he calls them. “Want a little more gravy?” he asks. That’s what he calls tomato sauce: gravy. He says he’s had the braciole simmering in it all afternoon, which is why they’re so tender. And I’m like, oh my god, this is the best food I’ve ever tasted. While we eat, he starts telling me about how he’s a runner—that he runs three miles a day during the week on his lunchtime and five or six miles on the weekend. And about his work—about the students who come in to see him. Kids who have just broken up with their boyfriend or girlfriend, overachievers who have just gotten their first C−. “But then there are the tougher cases.”
“Like what?” I say.
He says some of the kids he counsels are trying to survive some serious childhood trauma. “A house fire that took someone’s life, a really bad car accident. Or physical abuse, sexual abuse—incest in particular.”
I drop my fork when he says that, and I’m furious with myself. I don’t want him psychoanalyzing me like he does his patients. “Whoops, clumsy me,” I say, trying to laugh it off. But he’s just looking at me, not smiling.
“Did I hit a nerve just then?” he asks me.
“What? No!” But he’s still looking at me. Still not saying anything. My mind is racing. I told him about my mother, didn’t I? Yeah, I did. “Well, kind of,” I say. “When you just said that thing about childhood trauma. I started thinking about the flood. The one my mother died in.”
“Ah,” he says. “Do you ever go back there? Find yourself reliving that night. Because there’s something called post-traumatic—”
“What? No.” Stop looking at me! “I don’t . . . I wouldn’t say I relive it. I just think about it sometime. That’s all.”
“Have you ever seen anyone about it? Gone to a therapist?”
“Me? No. I don’t need to do that.”
“How about when you were a little girl? Right after it happened. Did anyone take you to see a counselor?”
“A shrink, you mean?” I shake my head. “Gee, you’re not going to make me lie down on your couch and tell you about my childhood, are you? I thought this was a date, not an appointment!” I was trying to make it sound like a joke, but it comes out kind of snotty.
He tells me he’s sorry, that he hopes he hasn’t made me feel defensive. “And you’re right. I’m off the clock. The doctor is out.” He’s smiling.
I smile back. “By the way, this meal is really delicious. You’ll have to give me the recipe.”
It works. He starts telling me about how he doesn’t really follow a recipe. That he cooks “intuitively” the way his nonna did.
“Your what?”
“My grandmother. A little of this, a little of that. More wine?”
“Yes, please,” I say and slide my glass over to him.
By my third glass of wine, I’m feeling warm and relaxed. Happy to be here with him again. And it’s not just the wine. It’s also because, except for when he asked me that thing about childhood trauma, he makes me feel safe or something. In a way, it’s like being with my brother, Donald, who I could always trust. I start telling him about Donald, how he could be funny sometimes. How he used to wiggle his ears to make me laugh. He says oh, he can do that, too, and I tell him no he can’t, and he does it. Not as good as my brother, though. When he did it, his forehead didn’t move the way Orion’s does. When I tell him I need to use his bathroom, he says sure, go ahead. It’s right off his bedroom. “Just excuse the clutter,” he says.
After I flush the toilet and wash my hands, I pull back his shower curtain and sure enough, there it is. A bar of Irish Spring. He uses Prell shampoo, too, I see. I’m tempted to peek inside his medicine cabinet before I leave, but I don’t. I’m not a snoop.
When I go back to the kitchen, I see that he’s already put dessert on the table—slices of ice cream with nuts and cherries in it. There’s also a bottle of some bright green liquor on the table, and he asks me do I want him to pour some on my ice cream. “No way,” I tell him. “Liquor on top of ice cream? That’s like when one of our dry cleaning customers who comes from Maine told me that people up in Maine drink Moxie with milk in it, and I was like bleagh.” He laughs. Tells me he finds my “unvarnished honesty” refreshing. Which, I’m pretty sure, is a compliment.
When we’ve finished with our ice cream, Orion says he’s gone to the video store and rented us a Sissy Spacek movie so that I can see my “doppelgänger.”
“My what?” I go. My double, he says.
The movie is Coal Miner’s Daughter. After we start watching it, he puts his arm around me like he did when we went to see Manhattan, and I rest my head on his shoulder. “She won the Oscar for this,” he says. “She’s got dark hair here, but she’s actually a strawberry blonde with freckles. Like you.” He reaches up and touches his finger to my nose. “So what do you think? See the resemblance?” I don’t but tell him I do, a little. “Except you’re much prettier,” he says. Which is funny, because I’ve just been thinking how much prettier she is than me.
A few minutes later, he turns my face to his and starts kissing me. And a few minutes after that, neither of us is really watching the movie anymore. Then, out of the blue, he goes, “You know, Annie, I’d really like to make love to you tonight, but only if you’re ready. I don’t want to pressure you.” And out of the blue, instead of telling him I’m not ready, I tell him I am. Am I? Or is it the wine? The Fiestaware and the smell of Irish Spring? I’m confused. I can feel my heart beating fast and I’m not sure if it’s from excitement or fear. Or both.
We leave the dishes on the table, and holding my hand, he leads me into his bedroom. We sit on his bed and start kissing again. He unbuttons his shirt and takes it off. Pulls his undershirt over his head. This is the first time I’ve seen him with no shirt on—his chest with the little brownish nipples, his belly button (an outsie) at the bottom of his hard, flat stomach. I like what I see. He unbuckles his belt. “You’re trembling,” he says. “You sure about this? Because we don’t have to if you’re not sure.” When I tell him it’s okay, that I am sure—which I’m not, really—he holds my hand against his warm chest muscles and starts massaging the back of my neck. I touch my fingertips to his wrist and feel a pulse. Calm myself to its steady rhythm. “Excuse me,” he says and reaches over to his nightstand. Takes out a condom, rips open the foil with his teeth. While he’s putting it on, I lie back on the bed, crawl beneath his green plaid sheets, and undress myself. It’s kind of like walking out to the end of a
diving board just before you jump off. . . .
With Kent, and later with Albie, I had to go someplace else until it was over. But with Orion, I stay right here in the moment. His hands are all over me, massaging my shoulders, my back, the insides of my thighs. His fingertips are fluttery against my clitoris, and it feels as delicious as the meal he’s made. I don’t deserve someone like him, but Orion doesn’t know that. . . .
I don’t have an orgasm or anything, but when he gets on top of me and enters me slowly, it feels good. No, better than good. I’ve never really understood before why a woman would want a man inside of her, but now I get it. With each of Orion’s thrusts, I want the next one, and the next. I lift my legs and put my heels against the small of his back to take him in even deeper. We rock together, slowly at first, and then faster, and then crazy fast. His fingers are pressing hard against the back of my shoulders. His breath starts coming out in quick blasts against my neck. Then, abruptly, he stops. Shudders. He stays on top of me until I can feel him lose his hard-on. “Phew,” he says and rolls off. For a minute or more, we just lie there, side by side, not talking. Then he takes my hand and squeezes it. “You good?” he asks.
“Uh-huh. That was nice.”
“Yeah, for me, too,” he goes. “Do you know what I love about you? Why I think I may be falling in love with you?” Wait. He’s falling in love? With me? He must mean me because I’m the only other one here. He says something about my lack of pretense, and something else I don’t catch because I’m thinking about something Candace, the woman who cuts my hair, said the last time I was at her shop: that most men are scared to even say the word love. That they think if they do, it’s somehow going to put a hex on them. But Orion’s just said it. I heard him with my own ears. And who knows? Maybe I’m falling in love with him, too. Only I’m not even sure I know what love is. What does it mean when you say you love someone? And who have I ever really loved? Mama, that’s who. And Daddy. And Donald. But Mama most of all. And maybe now Orion.