“Buster…” That’s me. “When you walked by last night… it was like my body and my mind and my soul… I know I’m probably not supposed to say this to you but I have to say it because it’s all I can think about.”
I was right. This is an Everythingship. Not that we need a silly name for what we are. “I didn’t sleep a wink.”
You smile. “Oh come on. Yes you did. People always say that they didn’t sleep but everyone sleeps a little, at least a couple of hours.”
This is why I love you and I laugh. “Okay I was up most of the night, just sitting on my couch literally doing nothing but thinking about you…” Except for the part where I was listening to your husband’s show. “But I admit, four to six… that’s a little blurry. I might have slept some.”
You beam at me. “Good,” you say. “This is good because I slept a couple hours too, and, well, I like the idea of being in sync with you, Buster.”
It’s not my imagination. RIP Whitney and Eddie are sparkling for us—I windexed them for you—and you can’t touch me, not right now. You wave a hand—get back to work—and the day is long, it’s a sidewalk that will not fucking end—sorry, Shel—and the bass throbs in my head—Hare Mary, Hallelujah—because as it turns out, you are my true savior, the reason I’ll be in such great shape when my son comes to find me, the reason that for the first time in my fucking life, I feel excited about my future. Do good and you get good and the day ends and Oliver’s running out of wall space and you wish me a safe trip home as if there is any danger, as if anything could hurt me now.
Eventually, night falls.
I go for a walk up Madison and what a different world it is, knowing that we’ll be in that movie theater, at that diner, walking these streets until our bodies break down on us. I reach the library and take the steps to our love seat in the garden and whaddya know, Mary Kay. The door to the lowest level is open. You didn’t lock up. I walk into the library and there you are on the Red Bed, as promised.
Naked.
You want my hand on your neck and you want my other hand above your Murakami, not on it, not yet, and the silence is deafening, equal parts sex and love and after we finish we are mute. And then it’s time to play.
“Okay,” you begin. “We would need chain saws.”
“And a truck.”
“And a dolly.”
“A few dollies, Mary Kay. This thing is big.”
This is our plan. We’re going to steal the Red Bed. I squeeze you. “Do you know about secular hymns?”
You nuzzle your head into my chest and your hair is a scarf, a blanket, a godsend. “You mean songs about religion that aren’t quite about religion?”
“Yes.”
“Then yes, I know about secular hymns.”
“Well, I really like them. I think it’s because my parents were messed up about religion, a little Catholic, a little Jewish… and my whole life, music was the thing for me, the thing that made me feel connected to something larger, especially secular hymns, or songs that have that theme about the collapse into the dark and the climb back into the light, you know, where you remember that you can’t have the rise without the fall.”
You kiss me twice and then you speak into the hairs on my chest. “Hallelujah, Joe. I know exactly what you mean.”
I kiss you. “Being with you… it’s like it turns out that there really is a crescendo. And it isn’t just about sex…”
You hold on to me and you are perfect. “I know,” you say. “The sex is… yeah… but it’s like the magic is real, as if you really did pull a coin out of my ear.”
“I get it, Hannibal.”
Your hands are on my head, on my temples, and you purr. “Can I kidnap you and lock you in a basement, Clarice?”
“If you insist,” I say. “But a little hint. The best way to kidnap someone and lock them in a basement is to not give them a heads-up about your plan.”
You pinch my ears and I move my mouth along your body, down, down, down, where I pull a rabbit out of your hat, your Murakami, your soul.
30
You pulled it off. You took a “personal day”—I love that you didn’t call it a sick day—and you told me to be in the parking lot of Fort Ward at 11:00 A.M. We take separate cars—secret lovers—and I get here first—I wanted to make sure that RIP Melanda is still sleeping—she’s right where I left her—and it’s not the easiest way to start a romantic day in the woods, but when is anything good ever fucking easy?
I am leaning against Nomi’s dollhouse-roof shack when I see your car. The mere sight of you gets me going and I am wearing a backpack—I really am Cedar Cove Joe—and you were nervous that we would get caught but there are only two cars in the lot. One is a truck with a trailer—those people are out on their boat—and the other is a family truckster with Oregon plates. We are safe and you are in clothes that are new to me, there are stars on your tights—a galaxy in between them—and a long, soft black pullover, a mirror to my black sweater.
You say hello and you hear a branch snap and your pupils dilate but it was nothing, just the woods. You’re a little nervous—this makes sense—and I don’t take your hand—we’re in a parking lot—but I hold on to your eyes. “We’re okay,” I say. “And remember, if anyone does see us, we just bumped into each other on the trail.”
My words mean something to you and you nod. “Well, the bunkers are up the hill. But since you’re the first timer…” Hardly, my night with Melanda is unforgettable. “Do you want to take the long way or the short way?”
“What do you think, Mary Kay?”
You are red. Hot. In love. “Okay,” you say. “Long way it is.” You look up at the roof. “Nomi used to love this.”
“Right,” I say, wondering if the door is locked, if it would be too much for us to just go at it right here, in the shed. “She told me about that when we were doing the tech help session.”
“Come on,” you say, and you’re right, Mary Kay. We can’t have sex in a house that reminds you of your daughter and we are moving up the hill, on the paved path, and I wonder if the blanket I brought is big enough and you blurt, “Hey, do you believe in heaven?”
“Sometimes,” I say. “Do you?”
“Sometimes,” you say. “It’s more like you lose someone, you want to think that they found something new, something they couldn’t find here, you know?”
I picture RIP Beck in a clean, well-kept home finally finishing a book and I see RIP Candace writing songs about how she would do it all differently and I smile. “I hear you,” I say. “I think heaven is a great idea.”
“Who did you lose?”
RIPCandaceBenjiPeachBeckHendersonFincherDelilah. “No one yet. I’m lucky that way.”
“Yeah,” you say. “But let’s get down to it. Do you believe there’s more than all this or do you think that when we die… that’s it?”
“What do you think?”