You always look like you’re about to cry. Do you know that?
I usually am about to cry, I say.
Put your arm around me if you want.
Okay, I say. I sit up. I move the weight of my arm around her without letting it fully rest on Lennox’s shoulder. I don’t want to burden her with it. I strain to keep it there, in position, a slight hover on her skin. My hand there. There.
It’s like I want to take a picture of you every second of every day.
You’re drunk, she says.
So are you.
It’s like you love me or something.
I just get you, I think. Maybe it’s a Florida thing.
Why’d you leave? she says.
My dad—I wanted to see him more. I had shit grades but design school let me in. Wonder why, I say, sipping my drink.
Does the shoe stuff get annoying?
You have no idea.
You like it here? I miss the sunshine.
I’ll never go back, I say. I can be alone here, surrounded by people. Best combination.
That’s kind of sad.
Can I tell you a secret? I say.
Anything.
I used to—I think I once saw you on the Internet. When I was some dumb kid. You had a webpage, right? Pictures, diary entries?
Yes, oh my god. Her face scrunches. That is so embarrassing!
Yeah, I saw you there. Maybe I did love you a little, yeah.
That’s so cute, she says.
I scoot closer to her. I look at her, steady, really try to see her. I don’t laugh this moment off. I want her to see me, too.
And by cute, I mean creep, she says, pinching my nose.
Careful, I’m a bleeder.
The bartender says our last round is on the house. I can tell Lennox is used to this. He pushes over a receipt on which he’s drawn a sketch of Lennox—square jaw, apostrophe eyes—a ballpoint pen masterpiece in which she looks perfect, alone.
Once, I did mention it. To Clarissa. My favorite specials on the black box. Misty’s dance teacher, Jaqueline. Ren Stevens on the Disney Channel. Winnie Cooper in her cat-eye glasses. Every girl who’s ever worked her hair into a pencil twist. Ms. Dyke Hoochie. Dr. Frank-N-Furter. Linda Perry. Leonardo DiCaprio just before he freezes to death; the way he looks like he’s wearing lipstick.
That would change if you ever had sex with one, she said. And, like, how do you even have sex with one?
It’s a nickel-slapping kind of rain, a silver bounce to it. It is not cold enough to snow. Outside the bar, under the awning, we shiver. I rub my gloved hands up and down Lennox’s arms.
Call me a cab? Can you call cabs in Brooklyn? she asks.
Would you come home with me? I say. Even five drinks in, I don’t know how I possibly say it.
Okay, she says. Sure.
I’m close.
I start to run. Slowly at first, and then faster. A neck-throbbing run. We run from the sharp pings of freezing rain and we run to keep our blood from freezing. We run for Lennox’s hair. I run to keep my hands from trembling. She runs to show me how well she can run in heels. I run because I don’t want the time to talk, for her to take back what she’s just said, or for me to do the same.
We run under the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, a relief from the rain. We run beneath that hollow ribbon of orange light, the echo-swish sound of cars; we run around skateboard ramps made of milk crates, crookedly parked cars, browned, dimpled mattresses. We run past the people who live under here—gimme some sugar!—we run wet and dizzy until my breathing can’t keep up, until I barely know where I live, until I round a corner and find the doorway of my gate and push in the key, lean into it, release. We run up the stairs, into my living room, where we shake our clothes off. They slop on the wooden floor—the garments pooling out with a steam to them. I push her onto my bed and run my fingers through the hair by her ear, and she’s moaning before I even kiss her.
You know what you’re doing? she asks.
I think so, I say.
You think so?
I think I can manage.
Have you fucked a woman before?
No. I regret the truth as soon as it comes.
Lennox is silent. She stares at my ceiling, covers her face with her hands. She laughs a little, the sound muffled.
Sweetheart, you’re sweet. But I can’t be with someone who’s never fucked before. Are you for real?
I mean. I—
I’ve fucked at least four of my friends. You haven’t?
No. I shake my head. I don’t have friends like that.
Whatever’s happening here, she says. Let’s pretend it’s not happening.
In the Keys, my parents take me deep-sea fishing. I drug myself with Dramamine, because I know how this will go. I always get seasick, but my father is a fan of exposure therapy, excess of anything until the fear passes. I have used wristbands, medicines, oils, the horizon. Still, I am sick for days.
Back in the condo, my father watches the Sunday game. The rest of the family is back out on the boat, but I can’t move.
I thought it’d be different by now, he says, shaking his head. Sorry, Kira Kukamonga. He calls his bookie, and I rest my head in his lap. The shoulder pads on television spiral in and out of my vision. The noise is too much for me. This is MadMan46, let’s go two-thou on the Steelers, he says into the phone. He strokes my hair. Hangs up and slams the cellphone into the table.
I stare at the hammerhead shark mounted above the TV. The eyes are bulging; the mouth looks like it was painted with birthday cake frosting. It’s the same shark David has mounted to the wall in his apartment, the shark he swore he once caught.
Daddy, I want to tell you something, I say.
This quarter’s almost over, he says.
I’m dating a girl, I say.
What’s that? he stares into the television. His knees bouncing under my head. He leans with the play. Go baby, go!
I’m dating a girl, I say. She’s coming to town for New Year’s—she’s from here. Maybe you could meet her.
What’s that? he says.
I want you to meet her, this girl I am dating. She’s coming to town.
She hot? he asks.
She is.
She can come around then, he says, eyes still on the screen. But I wouldn’t mention this to your mother.
For my tenth birthday, my mother bought me a Barbie doll who could talk. All I had to do was type her dialogue into a computer program, plug Barbie in, and on she went. I typed and typed.
Leonardo, baby, take me to dinner?
Yes, anything, I said, stroking her ponytail with my thumb.
Leonardo, be my man?
It’s because of that boy in Titanic, my mother explained to my father, smiling. She loves him.
Leonardo. Leonardo. Leonardo. Leonardo. Sometimes I didn’t feed Barbie any questions. Sometimes I just wanted to look at her while she called me that.
I’m finally picking up the rest of my things from David’s West Village home; it’s been five months since our breakup. David is ten years older than me, but he has never used the kitchen of his studio apartment, he never learned to cook, so he uses this area for extra coat racks and shoe storage. I open his oven to look for my clothes. His sink is clogged, full of bong water.
On the counter, next to a sock, two wine glasses. Lipstick prints. I smudge the color with my finger and rub the waxy red on my own lips. My clothes are scattered around the apartment, and I’m surprised by how little I feel. I feel distant, like I’m observing the artifacts, the evidence, of somebody else’s relationship, somebody else’s life.
Downstairs, I wobble with the bags of clothing, my purse, a backpack full of toiletries. I drop everything into the snow and hail a cab. I tell the driver to take me to my parents’ apartment on Mercer Street.
In the cab, I call Lennox. I did it, I say. Finally. Nothing left.