“He asked me to marry him.”
“Mazel tov! Where’s the funeral?”
“I said no.” I pushed my mug toward him, and he swung a teabag into it. “It’s too soon.”
“It is, it is.”
“Why do I feel like crying?”
“I want to tell you something you don’t know. Do you remember that boyfriend you used to have?”
“Carl?”
“That one. He used to call here all the time. After you broke up, I mean.”
“What?” The teapot whistled just as I said it. “Why?”
Dad turned off the heat. “He wanted to know if you were all right. And I didn’t like the guy. I didn’t like what he did. I was mad at him. But he was very upset.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Why should I? He was wrong for you. If I told you how much that stupid ass cried for you—you with your good heart?—you’d just try to comfort him.”
He poured hot water into my cup, and the water went from clear to pale yellow, releasing the waxy florals of chamomile.
“I don’t have the energy to be mad at you,” I said.
“Have the energy to realize it’s hard to say no to someone you care about. Even for Carl the schlemiel.”
I dunked my teabag, pinched it, and put it to the side. Carl had put a stake in my heart. I’d thought I’d never get over it.
And Dash? What had he done by moving too fast? Whipped the rug out from under me, from all my view of how things were and should be, and I was going to make contact with the floor. Hard.
“I’m afraid he’s going to leave me.”
When I said the words, my face tingled and crunched. That was my hard place, and by refusing him, I’d angled my body to hit harder and faster. My mouth filled with gunk, and my eyes burned with tears. In a second, I couldn’t breathe unless I gulped.
Dad was there. He held me right there in the kitchen for a good ten minutes while I sobbed as if I hadn’t been proposed to. I sobbed as if I’d been dumped.
forty-seven
Vivian
Are you up?
It’s 2am. Of course
(…)
(…)
You have a game tomorrow. You need to sleep
I can’t
(…)
(…)
I’m sorry
No. I’m sorry
forty-eight
Vivian
My phone lit up. He was calling. The thing to do was to answer it. Talk to him. Tell him I loved him and accept his love even if he felt half-heartedly trapped into expressing it.
Or not.
Who was I to doubt him?
I was the sensible one, that’s who. I started saying things to myself as the phone vibrated in my hand. Bad things.
I was an object.
When he got to know me, he’d dump me.
He couldn’t hear me crying, and I didn’t want him to. I rejected the call.
I’m not functioning well. I can’t talk
He didn’t answer for a long time. And why should he? He was the one who had put his heart on the line, and I was the one who was protected and fortified. Not only had I rejected his proposal, I’d rejected his call.
I’ll walk the bases with you tomorrow
You don’t have to
The next text came right after.
Your tickets are at the will call if you still want to come to the game. Otherwise, I’ll see you another time
Another time.
Simple and polite. Nonspecific. Not demanding. Move along. Nothing to see here. Nothing but nothing. I couldn’t call him and reassure him. I’d already said I couldn’t talk.
Good night
I hit Send and started on the next text before the first even went through.
I love you
Both messages were delivered. The screen said so, but nothing came back. I had no way of knowing if he even saw them.
I tried to sleep and failed. My brain was too busy winding guilt around justification, knotting me into a braid of righteous self-reproach.
I should have just said yes.
But I couldn’t have.
I fell asleep, sure I’d lost him, and woke up an hour later when the birds started whistling. Dash was the first thought on my mind. I didn’t look at my phone. I was afraid of what I’d see.
I was tired. Tired of all the limits I’d put on myself. Tired of the box I’d built around my heart. I wanted to change but didn’t know how.
Padding into the kitchen, gunk in my eyes and sleep in my veins, I found Dad already up. I loved him. I loved him more than my heart could even fit. The way he bent in front of the fridge so slowly, careful not to twist his joints, made me doubt what I’d decided during the walk across the house.
“Dad,” I said.
“Good morning.”
“Would you be mad if I moved out?”
He stood cautiously, closed the refrigerator, and leaned on it. “Mad?”
“Disappointed. Or whatever. Maybe the question is, ‘How would you feel if I moved out?’ But not far. As close as I could afford.”
He laughed quietly. “I’ve been meaning to ask you the same thing.”
I hadn’t even considered the idea. This was Mom and Dad’s house. This was my home base. My life was in this single-story O-shaped modernist masterpiece, and even if I was gone, it had to be here.