“I’m glad.”
“About . . . ?”
“That you fell out of love with her.”
“Before that there was Amanda. . . .”
“Oh.”
“I fell for her when I was still in Barcelona. That’s when I e-mailed you about other women in my life. We had something going for several months, and then, just as suddenly, it was over. I never quite figured it out. Something she said, something I said, it never got untangled, and after a while we just didn’t care, so I figured it was a good thing it was over.”
“Somehow I got the idea you might be staying on after your Peace Corps commitment was up,” I told him.
“Yeah, I was thinking I might volunteer for one of the nongovernmental organizations, Population Services International or something, and I did for a few months. But the more I thought about it, the more I wanted to come back. I missed home, and I decided that I’d better straighten things out with the university, see how much credit they’d give me, and work on my degree. That I could probably do more with my life if I had more credentials. What about you?”
I told him I wanted to have my master’s by a year from June. Start my counseling career.
“Where did you have in mind?”
“I don’t know yet. I was off to explore the world when I ran into you,” I said, smiling, and ran my toes over his stocking feet under the table.
“Any reason you couldn’t explore it with another person?” he asked.
“None that I know of.”
We wheeled our table and dirty dishes back out into the hall, and Patrick put the Do Not Disturb sign on the door handle. Then he pulled the shades on another gray January day and found some music on the clock radio. We danced slowly around the room, my head on his shoulder, my arms around his neck, until after a while we weren’t dancing at all, just holding each other close, closer than we’d ever been before, and then we moved toward the bed. Patrick helped me take off my clothes, and I helped him take off his.
It was mysterious and wonderful, having known each other all these years, that this was the first time we had seen each other completely nude—the red hairs on Patrick’s body, the blond hairs on mine. Patrick’s frame was more muscular than I’d remembered it, but he was gentle.
“I don’t have condoms,” he told me.
“I’m on the pill,” I said, but, just to be completely safe, I found the pack Planned Parenthood had given me, tucked down in one corner of my travel kit. Dave had always used his own.
Then I slid into bed and into his arms. We explored each other—slowly, lovingly, taking our time—something we had imagined doing for a long, long time. I loved the tender way our hands touched and stroked and our mouths searched each other’s out. . . .
“I love you, Alice,” Patrick said.
“I’ve always loved you,” I told him.
When he entered me at last, in the same loving way, I didn’t care that he came almost immediately because I knew there would be another time, and another, and another.
We didn’t go outside until late afternoon, and then it was just to the drugstore to get some acid pills. Patrick wasn’t used to the gigantic breakfast he’d eaten and knew he’d have to go easy at dinner. We ate in the hotel dining room, but we disappointed the waiter by ordering only soup and salad. And then we were in our room again, in the bed again, and after we made love, we talked until late into the night about past and future and now and everything.
“You don’t know how much I’ve missed you,” he said, tilting his head back so he could see my face, brushing my hair back off my forehead. “I didn’t know how much I’d miss you till I was half a world away.”
“You liked being in the Peace Corps,” I reminded him.
“I did. And I felt that’s where I needed to be. But I also felt I was missing someone really important to me, and then I read that you were engaged. It really hit me hard.”
“You never felt that way about Jessica or Amanda?”
“No. Not in that way.”
We stayed one more night, and then I told Val I’d be down for a few days, and Patrick called home to tell his mom he was on his way.
As we lay together for the last time, Patrick said, “I’ll be at your graduation. Could you come to Chicago over spring break?”
“Of course,” I answered. “I’ll tell the whole gang I’ll be with you.”
“Aren’t you going to call Liz and Pamela?”
“I already have.”
“When?”
“While you were sleeping yesterday.”
“I didn’t hear?”
“You were dead to the world, Patrick. I picked your pocket, stole your credit cards, checked your iPod—I was one busy girl.”
He smiled and studied my face before kissing me again.
“Man, it’s good to be home,” he said.
14
SUMMER NIGHTS
In Oklahoma City, I rode around with Valerie in her rental car, but all I could see was the inside of O’Hare Airport and Patrick standing there with a bag over one shoulder, looking at me in that surprised, delighted way. I listened to her chatter about the building that was being remodeled for the museum, and all I could hear was sleet hitting the tenth-floor window in the hotel as Patrick and I snuggled beneath the covers. Val and I ate lunch together at a new Indian restaurant, where she raved about the mango lassi, and I smiled, remembering the plate of chicken wings Patrick and I had shared just before I caught my flight.
“Alice, have you listened to one single word I’ve said since we sat down?” Val asked, slowly waving one hand in front of my face.
I snapped to. “I’m sorry. Really. I just . . . I’m—”
“In love,” said Val. “I can see it in your eyes, your face, the way you move, the way you walk.”
“I know,” I said, smiling. “I’m being held captive by everything he said, he touched, he . . .”
“So what happens next? You’re going to finish out the semester, aren’t you?”
“Of course. I’m going to try to see him over spring break. And he’s coming to my graduation. The problem is that I’m broke—almost. If I don’t eat any meals or see any movies off campus from now till May, I could make it. But that’s all. Patrick paid our hotel bill in Chicago, and he said he’d pay my plane fare back and forth to Chicago, but . . . look at me! I’m a grown woman and I’ve been dependent on my dad practically my whole life, then Dave, now Patrick . . .”
“And you feel like a ‘kept’ woman? Is that it?”
“Exactly.”
“I can think of worse. If I had just reconnected with a man I love after all these years and he was loaded, I’d be tap-dancing down the hall.”
“Be serious, Val. I want my own income.”
“And you’re going to have it, sweetie, as soon as you get your degree and get the hell out of here! Be patient! Enjoy! Where does Patrick get his money, anyway? Wealthy family?”
I nodded. “His dad pays for his schooling—same as mine. But Patrick’s grandfather set up a trust fund for him that kicked in when he reached twenty-one. Gets so much a month, I think. Not a lot . . .”
“How much money in the trust?”
“I don’t know. Sorta not my business.”
She slowly shook her head. “And I’m stuck with you as a roommate till May. The woman who isn’t there.”
* * *
The University of Chicago is on the quarter system, and there was only one day of my spring break that overlapped with the break Patrick had between quarters. As the most expensive trip ever, I skipped a day of school for those two days and two nights, and there were only a few moments when we weren’t together, physically touching. It was worth the plane fare, Patrick said.
He claimed he couldn’t wait for my graduation to see me again, and so for one mad weekend, he flew back to Maryland, and I brought him home to see Dad and Sylvia. I’d finally told them about meeting him in Chicago after Christmas, almost afraid that if I
let them in on my joy, the dream would pop. Or that they would suspect I might have got him on the rebound, after my breakup with Dave.
But there we were on a surprisingly cool April day, coming through the doorway together, me in my thin white sweater and chocolate-brown pants, my hair blow-dried in a new careless way, curled up at the ends, and Patrick in a blue henley, a small U of C emblem on one side. When Dad came down the stairs, his own happiness taking over his whole face, I knew right away that he was delighted.
“Patrick! How good to see you!” he said, clapping him on the shoulder and simultaneously shaking his hand.
“It’s wonderful to be back. It really is,” Patrick said.
Sylvia came in from the dining room. “Well, look who’s here!” she cried, coming over to give him a hug. “Patrick, I’d recognize you a mile off. That hair gives you away every time.”
I generously let them have their fill of him, as we sat around talking about his two years in the Peace Corps, and how he had worked it out with the University of Chicago to let that, and a few additional courses, count as a year of study, so that he had only one more year to go for his undergraduate degree. (First time in my whole life Patrick was behind me in anything.)
As I listened to Patrick relate some of his experiences in the PC, I realized that these were things I knew nothing about, but they were the things that made up the Patrick I loved. And I loved this man—that I knew. Every detail fascinated me—the hedgehog he’d saved from drowning in his well; celebrating Easter by eating fish with his Malagasy family under a cashew tree; and the smaller children who had followed him about and regularly invaded his living quarters, who could not understand why he was leaving, never to come back. Not only was I interested in the life he had lived overseas, I cared.
We talked for another half hour, and then Dad said, “Well, we know you have only a short time to visit this weekend . . . ,” and this gave us our chance to say our good-byes and leave.
We stopped in at the Stedmeisters’ for another hour, another round of hugs, and then I drove him out to Great Falls, and we stood on the overlook watching the rush of water over the rocks. I leaned back against him and he wrapped his arms around me, chin on the top of my head. I decided that if I could be anywhere in the world at that moment, it would be just where I was then.
That evening, after a long, candlelit dinner at the Anchor Inn, we lingered at the table in front of a crackling fire and talked. The more I saw of Patrick, the more I noticed that he was the same and not the same. He was quieter, for one thing—more thoughtful. He’d seen a lot more of the world and wasn’t so quick to have an opinion on everything. He said I’d changed too, and not just my hair.
“What exactly?” I asked.
“Well, for one, you don’t react to little things that would have embarrassed you before,” he said. “Like lettuce between your teeth.”
“I’ve got lettuce in my teeth?” I cried, running my tongue around inside my mouth.
“Oops. Spoke too soon,” Patrick said, grinning.
“Okay. What else?”
“You’re prettier.”
“Really? Well, you’re handsomer too, but that’s only one of your many qualities.”
“What qualities would those be?”
“I thought we were talking about me!” I told him.
“We are. We’re talking about us,” he said.
I liked that even better. And then we got down to the serious stuff. Holding hands, I told him more about Dave, and he told me more about Jessica.
“What did she look like?” I asked.
“A little like you, only heavier.”
“What went wrong? Really.”
“We just argued a lot. Big things. Little things. Both control freaks, I guess. I figured if we were arguing that much then, it would get even worse the longer we stayed together. Not that we were engaged or anything. Part of the attraction, I guess, was that we were both far from home, a little lonely, and she—we—we were available. How about you and Dave?”
“He was, and still is, a nice guy, Patrick. But he wasn’t you—and you were away . . . ,” I said. “We simply cared about different things.”
What we wanted, I guess, was to be sure there were no lingering doubts, regrets—no troublesome baggage coming along into our new relationship. And when the flames had died down in the fireplace and it didn’t appear as though the management was eager to get them going again, Patrick paid the check and drove his rental car across the river to his hotel near the airport, and then I was in his arms again, and we stood for a long time in the embrace.
Lovemaking is different with every man, I suppose, and Patrick was different from Dave. Dave had been considerate, gentle, wanting to please me, and so was Patrick. But Patrick’s lovemaking was more urgent. He took a longer time getting me aroused, and every gesture seemed to have meaning for him.
“You’re beautiful,” he said of my breasts, cupping them in his hands.
I ran my hands over his chest, the fine red hairs like peach fuzz, and thought how lucky, how really lucky, we were to have found each other again.
* * *
When I graduated, Patrick had only that weekend to be with me, but we made the most of it. I don’t know—both graduations, high school and college, seemed more like beginnings than endings to me. Like I should be celebrating what was to come, not what had been completed. The minute high school graduation was over, my friends and I had made that mad ride to Baltimore to join the crew of the Seascape for the summer, and now I would immediately be starting courses for my master’s degree, so school wasn’t over for me, not at all. But Dad and Sylvia saw it as a celebration, so I joined in the mood for the day, actually more happy to see Patrick than to walk across the stage in that hot gown and accept a diploma.
Dad’s gift to me was my first car, a copper-colored Subaru—used, of course—all polished up with a big bow attached to the steering wheel. I knew I was getting a car and had given him an idea of what I wanted, but actually seeing a car that belonged to me—holding the keys in my hand—was a feeling I couldn’t have anticipated. The ability to just get in a car and go—anywhere at any time. No more bus and Metro schedules, no begging friends for a ride, no calling home to see if someone could come get me.
“Dad, you’re the greatest!” I said, giving him the kind of bear hug he gives me. “I love it, love it, love it!”
“Glad you like it, sweetheart,” he said. “And I would be lying to you if I said that Sylvia and I weren’t delighted to know that we officially have the full use of our own cars again.”
They had let me use theirs on and off all through high school, and occasionally during college, but now my Subaru would have its own place in the student parking lot, and I’d get a U of M sticker to put on the window. Sylvia took a picture of me in it to send to Aunt Sally.
Les and Stacy were there for my graduation, of course, and after I’d sat in my Subaru and stroked the seats and the dashboard, Les gave me his graduation present: A road atlas and a set of flares. And then, grinning, he handed me a book of coupons for two hundred dollars’ worth of gas. “No excuse now not to come visit Stacy and me,” he said, and I promised.
“You don’t know how much I appreciate this, Les,” I said, thinking of my near-extinct bank account. “You really don’t know!”
* * *
Moe and Liz had attended my graduation, and Gwen now had a new boyfriend. She’d started going out with a chem major named Charlie, who was studying pharmacology, and they made a good pair. He was funny and full of life, and crazy about Gwen, I could tell. It was good to see her taking time out of her overbooked schedule to cut loose a little.
The six of us drove into Georgetown that evening and ambled along the streets, looking in the windows of funky little shops. We stopped in one so Liz could buy a toy for her younger brother, and each of us bought one of the little horns we found in a bin. Gwen and Patrick and Moe discovered that theirs, blown together, made a minor c
hord, but when I added mine, it ruined it all.
“Gosh, Al, even your horn is tone-deaf,” Liz teased.
At one point in the evening, Liz, Gwen, and I were walking ahead of the guys, arms around each other, and suddenly Gwen said, “Alice, I’ve been meaning to tell you. Charlie and I were eating at the Noodle House in Rockville and saw Dave there.”
“Really? How is he?”
“We didn’t get to talk to him. He was with someone, a short brunette. We were just getting settled and they were getting ready to leave.”
“His girlfriend, you think? I hope?”
“Seemed to be. He was teasing her about something and they were pretty affectionate. He looked happy.”
“That’s the best news I’ve heard all week,” I said. “Now I’m happy.”
We had dinner in one club, and later stopped in another to listen to a guitarist, a nice mellow end to a great evening together. And then Patrick and I were back in his hotel, in each other’s arms, and only the occasional muted hum of a plane beyond the window interrupted.
* * *
Both Patrick and I were in school over the summer. We had to be in order for me to get my master’s degree by the following June and for him to get his undergraduate degree from the U of Chicago around the same time. I had applied for, and received, an efficiency apartment in the building reserved for grad students, and I was able to have it all to myself. Not only that, but I answered an ad from one of the physics professors to clean her house on Tuesday evenings when she was at the gym. I found I actually enjoyed the job. It gave my brain a rest and my body a workout, and I’d grown up knowing how to scrub a bathtub and use a dust mop. The seventy dollars provided some desperately needed pocket money for the week.
It was as though our two schools, Patrick’s and mine, conspired to keep us apart, however. My spring term ended May 17, and the summer term began May 28. Patrick’s spring term ended June 15, and his summer term began June 18. The only times both of us had free were weekends, which meant a mad dash to the airport after a last class on Friday and usually the last flight back on Sunday night—with no studying in between, of course—which meant we couldn’t afford many of these weekends.