Then she was gone. And since then it’s been numbness all the way.
I sit at my desk, write my pieces, and go home. I barely notice the frosty responses I get from some of my female colleagues who obviously heard my blow-out fight with Margo that day we argued at our desk and took Margo’s side. I don’t even have the energy to respond to Brad’s snide comments—it’s that bad.
I tell Melissa to table the TV network meetings indefinitely and keep up the dating vlog with Davina as my partner, but it gets harder and harder to feign any kind of charm or interest in my dates, and Davina’s idea of good on-camera chemistry is having the other person laugh at her risqué humor. Sure I go through the motions, make believe I’m still the Owen everybody knows, but the truth is that work actually feels like work now, and I’m starting to use the word ‘life’ with more negative connotations than positive.
My phone blows up with texts every day. Messaging Manny that ‘I’m not feeling it tonight’ can only keep him away for so long, and every time I see another girl’s name pop up on my screen, I just toss my phone away without reading it.
Even my own apartment just feels like an extension of memories with her. I can’t stand in the kitchen without remembering that moment she was bent over it, can’t sit in my chair without remembering how she turned up that night in that dress, can’t sleep in my bed without remembering how she looked while she was sleeping.
The longer it goes on, the more the memories sour. The more I cringe when I remember what I said to her. The more I hate myself for telling Melissa those things in front of her. The more my dating vlog feels like a pathetic reason to have done those things. Nothing makes you more empathetic to other people than losing them.
I’m at home drinking whiskey in my chair one night, zoning out in front of some Netflix marathon, when I’m startled by the sound of thunder. The muffled sound of someone shouting ‘Dude!’ over and over again. I wince as the thumping continues.
“Dude!”
“Alright, alright!” I shout, as sensations attack me at once. My whiskey-dry throat, the cramp of sitting motionless for so long in a sofa-chair, the fatigue of the work week catching up to me. I put my glass down, get up, and walk to the door.
“Dude!”
“Alright!” I call again, just before I open the door to Manny.
He pushes through like a bull at an open gate, marching into my apartment before turning around and spreading his arms.
“Where the fuck you been, dude? I came to check for your dead body, man.”
I close the door and rub my eyes. “I’ve been working,” I mumble, as I move past him back into the living room, directly seeking the whiskey bottle.
“Damn!” Manny says, as I try to extract the last drops from the bottle hopelessly. “You look like shit.”
“Thank you,” I moan, dropping myself back into the chair.
Manny looks at me as if he’s watching the most tragic ending he’s ever seen, then shakes his head slowly. “I knew it,” he says. “I told you this would happen.”
“Keep going. You’re saying all the right things, Manny.”
He frowns. “What do you want me to say? That you were right? Look at you, do you feel like you were right?”
I screw my face up at him. “You don’t even know what happened.”
“Oh I know what happened,” Manny says, as he stretches himself out on my couch, sneakers and all. “You went and fell in love is what happened.”
“I didn’t fall in love.”
Manny laughs hard. “You still telling yourself that? Dude, the longer you keep that up the worse it’s gonna get.”
I stand up and move toward my liquor cabinet. “You know, if you were a real friend you would’ve brought food,” I say, as I start pulling out bottles looking for one that isn’t empty.
“Oh sure,” Manny says sarcastically. “Comfort eating yourself fat is really gonna win her back.”
I stop sniffing at a strange brown liquid I don’t recognize to say, “Who says I want her back?”
“You serious, bro?” Manny says, looking at me in confusion. “You’re sitting around your apartment avoiding my calls and drinking alone while you watch Starsky & Hutch reruns and you still haven’t realized that much, even?”
I take a sip of the brown liquid, wince hard at how disgusting it is, then take a bigger swig anyway before carrying it back to my chair.
“What is there to realize?” I say adamantly. “I’ve got a hundred women blowing up my phone every day. I’m in a city of the most beautiful girls in the world. I got a good body, a great job, money in the bank, and gas in the tank. The fuck do I need her for?”
The bravado lasts about as long as it takes for Manny to sigh loudly and ask, “What happened?”
I stare the bottle in my lap, take another sip of the disgusting, abrasive liquid, then level with my best friend. “She got a job in New York. And she took it.”
Manny nods. “Uh huh. And what would she say happened? ‘Cause I sense there’s some pieces missing.”
I shoot him a look to show I don’t get what he means.
“Two sides to every story, bro,” he says, stretching himself out a little more on the couch. “That’s what you say happened. What would she say?”
I shrug. “She’d say… I dunno…she’d probably say something like…I didn’t take her seriously. Didn’t take us seriously. And that staying here would be holding herself back.”
Manny laughs again. “That sounds about right from where I’m standing.”
I shake my head and swig again, the brown liquid already doing weird things to my sense of balance. “I don’t care, alright? It’s done. We’re done. I’ve got a dozen other girls ready to take her place. I’m sure she’s better off in New York anyway.”
Manny looks at me with pity, then bounces off the couch and heads out of the room.
“Whatever, I’m outta here. Glad you’re not dead, dude. You decide you wanna talk, you know how to reach me.”
“Wait. Where are you going?” I ask quickly.
Manny looks back, and I can see the deep disappointment in his eyes. “I don’t know who you are, but this ain’t the Owen I know.”
“What are you talking about? Yes I am. I’m here, bro. I’m ready to get out there and get some tail, set some places on fire! Let’s go.” I try to stand but I’m too dizzy to get more than a few steps before sitting back down.
Manny shakes his head. “You think I’m gonna go anywhere with you in this state? I’ve got better chances with a celibate priest as a wingman. Besides, dude, you’re lying to me.”
“I’m not lying.”
“Yeah you are. You’re sitting there, looking like a country song, every symptom of lovesickness, telling me you don’t want her back. Like I said—the Owen I know wouldn’t lie to me like that. And if you can lie to me, then fuck knows what you’re telling yourself. So I’m outta here. Let me know when you get your shit together.”
My alcohol-slowed mind can barely think of a response before I hear the door slam, and then Manny’s gone, leaving me with nothing but the realization that—despite everything I thought I knew—he’s absolutely right.
20
Margo