a tale told by the haunted, full of sound and doppelgangers, signifying something

Two weeks ago. As my cell phone and I head eastward, downtown around City Hall, setting a course to purposely meet paths with the friend on the line, we see the first one. We come face to face just as he is about to open a door and head inside. He nods at me, I nod back, and as the door closes behind him, I erupt in a string of expletives my mother wouldn't appreciate, accusing the universe and all holy names for haunting me with visions of you. It takes Friend on the Phone a millisecond give or take a nano to figure out to whom I am referring.

Last week. My iPod and I weave our way in and out of the tourists and meanderers on 34th Street, and we run into the second. He is weaving in and out as well. Our paths slip past each other's, and with an accidental nudge, I look up, he looks down, and we smile with apology. His eyes are honest, and not unlike the color of the Tuscan sky at the summer solstice. I do not want to speak for fear that he will answer, and he will sound like you as well.

Then, this week. The dance floor. The line of his shoulders, the plumb line of his spine, his arms crossed and his weight balanced evenly in that posture you use when you are listening intently--only he can't be hearing me, so near we are the speakers. He is only watching, watching me with eyes I recognize each time the colored lights dance across his face. A resemblance so striking, the next morning I awake with a fitful paranoia that the semi-darkness had tricked my senses, and I have walked away from you yet again.

refrigerate until ready to use.

I am at home in the kitchen.

My ambitions range far beyond, and I am at home in environments many would not consider "homey", but these truths do not preclude my being at home in the room that, in the past half-century, has become emblematic of every horror perpetrated upon womanity over the previous two millennia.

I cook well, and often, though more often than not, rather messily. A good risotto needs to bless the range-top every now and again. My only reservation about cooking for the ones I love is that I wish my services not be received with the air of entitlement that has so often inspired my wrath at holilday get-togethers. (I am equally at home in debate.)

Yet this isn't the kitchen of my heart, for that lies thousands of miles from now or several years from here, give or take a you or a me or an us or a we.

Give or take a few truths that may never see the light that pops on every time the refrigerator door opens.

I was not alone when I took this picture, though that you cannot see.

I will not curse the camera for failing to capture my company. With or without photographic evidence,

on some days, I can stare at that door and see someday written all over it.

The Texture of Sushi

Salmon is cool on my tongue, and sweet. No matter how I try to remember, its smoothness is always a pleasant surprise, the creaminess of the fatty ripples a decadent treat.

You can never know what someone else is thinking--across the table, across the street, across the ocean. No matter the glimmers of light that beacon--occasionally, intermittently, consistently--another person's mind is always the darkness over the unbridged chasm. All I can know is the taste of the salmon, and the metallic coolness of my keys as I press my fingers against them to make sure I am there.

If your mind runs away, she tells me, grab your keys. Run your finger along the jagged edges. Look at the keychains. Touch them. Your mind will come back.

It is true. My mind travels, but when my senses call, it comes running.

I can never know another's thoughts, and why would I want to? If ever we could truly share a brain, we'd not desire so blindingly to share our bodies.

Perspective whispers in my ear: even and until then, there's no denying a shared acre of heart. In a world in which all I thought I could be sure of was the texture of sushi, that little assurance is a sweet surprise.

Maybe, After All

Oasis. (noun) 1. a fertile place in the desert, due to the presence of water.
Water: next in my series of poems, following Sky and Air. I haven’t yet a clue what it will say, but I know it will exist. Parallel: the existence of some people; me not having had a clue what I would say, now or then or someday; only knowing, somehow, doubtlessly, that they would exist.

2. any place or thing offering welcome relief from difficulty, dullness, etc.
It is possible that we don’t sense the dullness until the oasis appears. Desert and dullness both parch, but an emotional thirst can be repressed a good deal longer than a physiological. To be oblivious to its bluntness, to its rounding of your psyche like a soup spoon, is not so far-fetched.

“THERE’s a hole / there’s a hole / there’s a hole in the bottom of the sea…”
I’ve always had an affinity for nonsense songs, little me, singing them at the top of my little lungs, over and over until my parents’ ears bled peanuts and railroad tracks and hearts all-aflutter. Little me, sensing somehow, in some context, that nonsense made perfect sense.

ARE there ever songs that get stuck in your head, that play themselves a million times over in the jukebox of your mind, for no reason readily apparent?
MANY of them, I find, are prescient. Years later, they make meaning where before there was merely melody.
THINGS once ambiguous and immaterial take on sense and substance.
THAT I ever doubted their clarity seems absurd.
I never foresaw the need for an oasis; I never believed my life would require intervention.
WOULD you like to know when I figured it out? Only after.
LIKE months after. At my favorite table, in my favorite bookstore.

TO intend to write one thing, and have your pen be overtaken by a story you didn’t know you wanted to tell, about an oasis you hadn’t realized you’d visited, is to be jabbed repeatedly by a cold, blunt, soup spoon. At first, there is a chill. And maybe, you laugh. Because how could a dull utensil do any damage? You laugh.
SAY, for the first three drafts. Well...maybe four.
TO continue laughing, however, after you discover that something has pierced your skin, and indeed, gotten under it, is a sure sign of delirium. Or writeririum.
YOU realize it’s in deep when the pain seems a surer sign that something’s going right. Very right. There are thousands of words where before there was only a visceral impulse to run up onto life’s metaphorical stage and kiss the universe.
BUT you’d remained seated so long, nails dug painfully into your own thigh, that your fierceness had dulled into numbness.
I fear numbness now.

DON’T get me wrong. It doesn’t overtake my system, the way my textbook phobia of all things puncture-possible will have me hyperventilating in the fetal position. It’s a wonder I can even write metaphorical punctures, a miracle that I once pierced my own ear: testament to the veracity of the assertion that given sufficient motivation, any phobia can be overcome.
KNOW that my fear of numbness is more the pain of those first few taps of cold blunt soup spoon. A rhythmic chill and retreat demanding vigilance.
HOW I ever allowed myself to get to that place of oasis-desperation so thirsty it couldn’t acknowledge its own lack is beyond my present comprehension. A nonsense song yet to make any sense. Stuck in my head. On repeat. In hindsight, one message shimmering above the sand: don’t let it happen again. I detect the piercing need for a sharper reminder. Now I understand why some people get tattoos.

Wonder. (noun) 1. a person, thing, or event that causes astonishment and admiration. Initially, surprising to me that this is the first definition listed. Initially, I say, because contemplation yields sense. It is this wonder that births the next. Without it, no need for definition number two; without that which is a marvel to me, no words written. And that is why I thank you, I believe you believe, far too frequently. But I will not stop unless you tell me to. 2. the feeling of surprise, admiration, and awe aroused by something strange, unexpected, incredible, etc. It is a gift in return for which I ordain no amount of sincere gratitude to be excessive. As a writer, though, I loathe meandering unpurposeful repetition. Fortunately for me, an infinitude of ways to express wonder. I won’t run out any time soon.

(int. verb) 1. to be seized or filled with wonder; feel amazement; marvel.
I can write as long as I wonder. Writing can strike as long the iron-awe remains hot, lightning over the dark sea. 2. to have curiosity, sometimes mingled with doubt. Insidious doubt, electricity cackling through the undercurrent of my vast wonder—conducted to, pooling in, the hole in the bottom of the (my) sea. Awe and doubt: two sides of the same lightning bolt.

I fear your silence. Incommunication breeds numbness.
DON’T assume that because I fear numbness, I am blind to its power as a defense mechanism.
BELIEVE not q, then p. I see its power and therefore, I fear. Numbness can be cozy.
THAT is its threat. It lulls.
ANYBODY you ask can tell you ignorance is bliss: ignorance of your thirst quenches your fire. It
FEELS, at first, like a little death. Not the French le petit mort. No—that is far too pleasurable. But it requires the same surrender… I rethink… Perhaps it’s not so different after all, succumbing to the numbness.
THE relinquishment of responsibility halts the flow of electrical doubt—a reprieve from pain virtually indistinguishable from pleasure, in the
WAY falling asleep against the cool tile in the bathroom after grueling hours spent retching is the best you can imagine at that instant.

I do not wish to succumb to the numbness again. I must remain vigilant, even if means prodding myself with my own cold spoon.
DO you believe my doubt destroyed the moment of our mutual marvel?
ABOUT my inability to answer questions, to be verbal in my wonder, my silence indicating my incredulity of the incredible: I profess my responsibility, recognizing that I was the one who advanced to your soil, and also the one who started slapping mortar, laying bricks, doubting my welcome the louder you greeted me. I was given what I'd hoped for and was too stunned to properly receive it.
YOU know nothing of the depth of my regret. May you never. I wish my regret unwarranted.
NOW for the first time, I wish to be lightly informed of my unquestionably overactive imagination.

See how I redefine words for you.

Wall. (noun) 1. (and only.) a figment of my imagination.

Relativity, Speaking

Something about thirty has given me words I've never had before.

When I was younger, when I was more forthcoming, more trusting, very rarely did I do the writing. I did the talking, I did the nurturing, I did the giving. Unfortunately, I trusted the wrong people. Millions of words, lost.

I regret every single word I have not told you, but now I am a writer. I write--pictures, poems, stories, essays, plays. All full of images. (You, me, us.) All full of regret. Regret that I did not trust my instantaneous trust. Pre-emptive regret for the explaining I may never do.

Why never? Because. Just because. Because how long will it keep coming? Wells run dry at some point, and my well and your well--well, they're just not well-synched. My regret is your obliviousness. Two weeks for me is a day to you. My physics teacher spoke mostly Russian, but time dilation was one concept I didn't need explained.

Maybe, we were twins. We are twins. But we are separated. You are on a rocket, approaching the speed of light. I am here on earth. Your clock seems normal. To you. You expect I am living at the same velocity. You expect there is plenty of time. Will be plenty of time. But my life just keeps ticking, and in your place are words.

Won't you be surprised. When you return, all you'll find--in the place I once was, next to the place you never knew you had--will be a pile of scripts, a handmade book of poems, and this.

I ask myself: should that make me happy?

Snow.

Each room is brighter, aglow. It's the reflection, I know, off the snow outside--streaming in the windows, illuminating the curtains and corners and crevices. I see things I couldn't have discerned a day ago, notice things previously immaterial. Value them.



I don't want you to melt away--gone without so much as good-bye, darkness without warning.

Yet neither would I choose the sloppy gray--hopping, jumping, tip-toeing, fearful of where I might stick my foot this time.

To(o) Long

Keep your eyes on me.

Treadmill today. Eyes straight ahead. 4 miles. Left, right, left, right. Keep breathing. Left, right. Stay loose. Left, right. There's that mound of papers to read. Left. Two deadlines I'm behind on. Right. Turn up the iPod. Left right left right left--

That's right. Look here.

Blender. Here's the milk. One cup. Look for the peanut butter. Where could they have moved it? Oh, there it is. Behind the whipped cream. Of course. Tablespoon of peanut butter, scoop of whey, packet of hot cocoa--diet. Adds flavor; adds calcium. Blend on low. Shoot I forgot the ice cubes. Don't want it to be warm. Want--

I want you to see who it is.

Laptop. See if there is any email. There is always email. Respond. Talk mission statements. Production budgets. Grant applications. Revisions. Messages from students. Missed class. Missed a deadline. There's always a calamity. Who is it going to be this semester? Who--

Who it is that makes you feel this way.

Only the second week. Already way behind. Two sets of diagnostic exams. One set of essays. Ought to have them read by now. Ought to have feedback, comments. Organization, style, mechanics. Just so they know what to work on.

Just so there's no confusion.

Ironically, this post has no name.

Calling someone by name gets their attention, lets them know you are speaking to them. Calling me by name mid-conversation, mid-sentence, even, is like a well-placed hand. It gets me every time. If I’m yours to be gotten.

You do it sometimes when you know my mind is racing. It runs ahead; you bring it back. Without a break in the rhythm of your sentence, without distraction from the task at hand, you guide me back to here. To now. Much like I imagine your hand would.

I never liked my name as a child, fell into apathy as an adolescent. But years breed informality; old friends play the name game with ease. Today I find myself answering to diminuitives and nonsense names, as if the years had gone in reverse from the moment I entered college. They've softened me up for you.

You creep toward comfort, playing with my name, inviting me to play with yours. I find myself wondering what names we will decide upon, and when our hands might speak instead.

Hell, Hatchlings, and the Elegance of Longing

Longing may be elegant, but it also hurts like hell.

Long too much, too long, and you invite exhaustion. Emotional and physical. Quite a frustrating situation when it is longing that fuels your writing.

Because sometimes, you'd rather just curl up in a ball and read, rather than bleed regret.

There's more to be said, you know. But you also know now's not the time to say it. If you're sick, you can't donate blood. Of course, you also can't donate blood if you've recently been to Mexico, but that has no immediately obvious parallel in the extended metaphor.

Though, upon further contemplation, it could be about an incubation period.

When longing incubates, what hatches?

Toey, Revisited

Some people hate feet. How? Each toe is a wonder. As when a baby arrives and parents joyfully count each digit, thankful for their existence, each one. How can you love someone and not love their toes?

His beauty is his innocence, I realize. There is darkness but no shame. When you’re a little boy, no curiosity seems inappropriate. Everything beckons. I paint my toenails—sparkly and pink--and think of him.

“Inappropriate” is a word I use when I am too shy to explain the truth. It is the lazy way out. The cowardly. I never mean it. I would never use a word I didn’t mean on the page. But I will say it to avoid the long truth. Even a truth I want desperately to share.

He is still a child inside. But so alluring. He balances opposites. He shelters wonder.

I am three years old with a new baby brother and a cousin on the way. I rub my aunt’s belly. She leaves for a doctor’s appointment and I announce, “She is going to see the people that make the feet.”

His toes are those of my baby. I want to tickle them and kiss them and count them and name them. Each one.

"C" is for Clueless

Late 1992.
"He's looking."

"Who cares? He's not him."

"And he's looking."

"Also, not him. Do you think he knows?"

"Can you think of anyone else? There's like a hundred guys here."

"Right. So, do you think he knows?"

"Yes. No. Maybe. You act too cool."

"So I should be more obvious?"

"Yes. Try obvious."

Latest 1992
"Do you think I was too obvious? I mean, I nearly spelt it out for him."

"Boys need the actual spelling out."

"Not the nearly?"

"Not the nearly."

Early 1993
"He read me Yeats. So do you think he--"

"Uhhh...yeah."

"But maybe he was just, I don't know, in the mood to recite poetry."

"Right."

"Studying for an English exam?"

"Try again."

"You think he meant it?"

"For someone so smart, you're awfully dumb."

Later 1993
"That's it. Today or never."

A day later, 1993
"Detention. Yep. Detention."

"You're joking."

"No joke. It's a message. From the universe."

"What's the message?"

"Learn to spell."

2001
"So, uh, when did you figure it out?"

"What?"

"You know, that I adored you."

"Huh?"

"Adored you. Couldn't tell you."

"Now."

"How clueless were you."

"Pretty damn. So what about you?"

"What about me, what?"

"When did you figure it out?"

"Huh?"

2005
"So what did we learn from our fiasco?"

"Not nearly enough, apparently."

"Not nearly."

"But I couldn't be more obvious."

"Not nearly enough. Take it from me."

"You would be the expert."

"I am. Spell. It. Out."

"Next time the phone rings. I swear."

Souvenir

“Remember,” my mother says. “Don’t touch what’s not yours.” Everywhere we go. Home stores with rows upon rows of sparkling glasses. Other people’s homes with shelves of knick-knacks and whatnots. Department stores dripping exquisite ornaments from the branches of artificial Christmas trees. “Look, but don’t touch.”

I am a well-behaved child.
I don’t touch what’s not mine.

Eventually, “I don’t have to say it. She knows.”
But she says it anyway. “Don’t touch.”

Smooth fabrics, textured papers, juicy fruit-flesh.
I want to touch. At the MoMA, it’s a conscious struggle to keep my fingers off the Van Gogh’s. Gobs of thick pigment prickle out of the sky of “The Starry Night”.
I stand before it. I look. I buy a postcard and go home.

Can you regret it, not touching what’s not yours? Can you regret it so much, it hurts all the way down to your fingertips?

Sea Glass

I wake up slowly in the morning, the luxury of working afternoons. After a few months of this, I realize why I’ve always thought I hated waking up early. It’s not the hour that’s the problem—it’s the sharpness of alarm clocks, their automated disregard for the progress of my dreams. The night dreams and the waking.

Waking up slowly, I write scenes. I’d always thought they were fantasies, a luxury whose time-toll I could not afford. Or worse—by-products encasing empty calories, beer bottles tossed carelessly into the sea. But the images feel organic. With room to evolve, they writhe into the shape of drama—first people, then scenes. The scenes replay and I put words to them. Several times in one slow morning, I run the words, then whisper them, head still on the pillow, eyes still shut, until finally the scene comes to a natural end. Climax, dénouement. I open my eyes.

I write by hand. I like the feel of different pens, their sounds as they slide across the paper, the bleeding of the ink as it courses into the fibers. The words people love best are always written by hand.

Showers help when I can go no further. Water courses over the words, picks them up, tosses them, breaks them and rearranges, carries them along, smoothes them out. Running water has a presence and a rhythm that I can close my eyes and hear. And borrow. Later, I can read aloud.

Finally, I type. Tapping fingers have a different rhythm than running water, a different rhythm than coursing ink. The three meld. Always, I change things--words, details, actions. A guiding hand on the back inches closer to the hip. A shout becomes a whisper. Bitten fingernails, a bitten lip. The words I imagined saying, now to be murmured by someone else. But always, they’re mine. Still me. Still to be spoken. Still what would slip out if the phone rang too early, and I answered in my haze, and you asked.

Borrowed Words

It is as if I’ve always known you. The way the details fall into place—the tilt of your head, the line of your back, the crisscross of your arms folded in front of you. I watch you walk and know it is you. "Oh, THERE you are," I think. But I have never seen you walk before this day.

I think I am imagining things, the way I am imagining history to fill in the crevices—places you’ve been, places you’ve loved, the things you love to do. Songs you sing when no one’s listening, songs you sing in your sleep. Until they turn out to be true. This is more than imagining. “I know exactly who you are,” you tell me. I don't doubt it.

I have always known you. I know it, but somehow don’t believe it. Without you. I don’t believe it without you. With you, there is no question; without you, it is lost. Because I am afraid. What I don’t admit: I want someone to tell me it is more than just imagining. No one else can. The hints between two people who have known each other all their lives but only just recently met seem obvious to only them. No one else can really know this. No one speaks that language they share.

You’d tell me, if I’d ask. But I don’t. It’s not something I know how to ask. The words aren’t there. And in those moments when I could try, when you're listening, there's no need.

A heartfelt thank you to the insightful people from whom I borrowed the italicized lines. Cupcake and Brandon, if only I could sing on key, I'd serenade you both.

Writer-girl, Interrupted

Music reminds me of you. I’m almost afraid to hit play. Because what if a song comes on and it makes me wonder where you are, and I don’t know, and I really really start wondering and I have to go out of my way to find a way to distract myself to stop thinking about you so that I don’t have to spend my time thinking about someone who is not thinking about me?

Sure, I have no proof that you are not thinking about me. But I don’t have any proof that you are either. So I guess I will write in silence. Once I start typing, I no longer hear the music anyway.

Like that day that you called and I had been writing for so long, staring at the computer so long that when the phone rang I didn’t even realize what I was supposed to do with it. The music had been playing all along but I hadn’t been hearing it. Some part of my mind that I didn’t even know was awake took over and answered, but I could barely make sentences. You started talking, then thought maybe I had no idea who it was, because my tone of voice didn’t change, as it normally does, when I realize that it’s you and you can hear me smile from there. So you identified yourself. I knew it was you. I always know when it’s you. I just couldn’t make sentences.

The music was still playing and I didn’t even realize it had been playing all along until I started trying to explain to you that yes, of course, I know who it is, but I can’t speak, I can’t make sentences, I'm trying to mute the music, but all I can do is listen to you talk, just the sounds, not the words, I can't comprehend the words exactly, but I know what you are saying is meant to put me at ease and somewhere in the back of my mind I just want to keep listening. But I can't just keep listening. I have to react. I have to say something, because you are worried now, that I'm not talking, that I'm not laughing, that I'm not giggling like the little girl I was when first we spoke, when last we spoke, when every time in between. I can't just keep listening, but I can't seem to make sentences either.

It wasn't me listening to you that day; it wasn't me that answered the phone. Because if it had been me, the me that always wants to talk to you, she would have said something, she would have reacted the way you expected her to, warmly the way she always does when you say something light and silly and unforgettable, a future secret. It wasn’t that me. I know it because that me would have first been aware of trying to hide the excitement in her voice when she answered the phone so you wouldn’t know, because she’s too cool to let you know all the time, how happy she is to see your name on the caller id.

It was another me. The one who’d been far, far away, staring at the computer screen, not even hearing the music. Probably formulating some words that she wanted to write about you. She was writing about you somewhere in the back of her mind, silly boy. That’s why she didn’t smile through the phone when she heard your voice. She was writing about you.

My Muse Is a Son of a Bitch

My muse is a man. I appreciate those Neo-Classical visions of ethereal women with fabulous hair and gossamer robes, but they don’t speak to me. Not like he speaks to me.

He says anything he damn well pleases, but always pleasantly, always politely--unless of course he feels like channeling Batman on a given day, because then he speaks a bit more pointedly.

My muse, that son of a bitch, will not desert me. I have tried to get rid of him. Avoid him. Ignore him. I have tried to jot down the ramblings of other voices, hoping it would make him jealous. No luck.

Because nowhere in the “muse” job description does “jealousy” ever appear.

And worse, “modesty” is apparently on every line.

It must be pretty sweet, being a muse. Knowing you can make words dance.
Living as if it were simply part of the job.


That painting is: Jeune Homme Nu Assis (Young Nude Male) ~ 1855
By Jean-Hippolyte Flandrin

Subliminal Messages

When we drive cross-country, we rent a convertible. If not a convertible, why bother?

And it has a tape deck, so that we can alternate connecting our mp3 players. (Those transmitter things are annoying in big cities, where all the frequencies are already being used.) Whoever isn’t driving gets to DJ.

I want to hear you sing to me.

I take along my laptop, to download all the pictures we take with the digital camera. Of places and people. Of each other. Of us.

We buy a cooler and snacks and jars of peanut butter and marshmallow fluff. Eventually, we get bored on the road and have a food fight.

There are parts of you I wouldn't mind seeing smeared with marshmallow fluff.

I buy colored pencils; tape and glue and scissors; and two small notebooks. One for me, one for you. The one for you is a gift. You can’t touch it until home.

Everywhere we go, I buy postcards. Every place we eat, I keep the receipt, or a matchbook, or a placemat. Every motel we stop in, I steal stationery and take tourist brochures. (And the pens as well.) When it is your turn to drive, I cut them all up and glue them every which way into both of our notebooks. But I still watch you drive.

I like to watch you when you're not looking. I've done it before.

In my notebook, I write everything I feel, everything I see, everything I think. We travel so long, I have to buy another. I take them home with me for future reference. One day, I make a play of it all. (But don’t worry; some secrets are ours alone.)

Your notebook is different. Not random thoughts and endless babbling, but a piece of art. The postcards and the pictures and the paraphernalia are personalized. On every page I write a thought—a thought I think about you. While you are driving. While you are sleeping. While you are showering. Some of them I tell you; some of them are a surprise. But either way, you have something to remember this by.

Something you can touch.

One day, we watch the sun set into the Pacific, and it is time to go home.

You won't forget.

What It's Like to Be Me

“What I love about you,” he tells me, “is that you don’t make mistakes. With numbers. Your taste in men—not so good—but your math is flawless.” I study him and try to see what other girls see. He is my friend. I spend most of our time together running interference for him. He would argue this, but he breaks hearts. His eyes are clear and green. He is beautiful. He would argue that as well. The girls are not heart-broken to be separated from his naturally shrewd business sense or his artist's eye. Probably no contention there.

We hug warmly, his arms wrapped around me, his body against mine. People see us and assume the most. None of it is true. In private, he musses my hair—what remains of it after ordering the stylist to chop it off in a fit of post-adolescent frustration over guys telling me “don’t cut your hair.” It is short, pixie-ish. “You don’t need long hair to be sexy,” he tells me. “Wear your glasses. I love hot smart girls with glasses.” My fingers trace the tribal band around his upper arm.

We have no shame about changing clothes in the same room. His boxers are low as he pulls up his pants; fluorescent light bounces off the sharp lines of his bare hips. Aesthetically fascinating—so different from what's under the waistband of my jeans. His angles bring to mind the geometry of the architectural studies he sketches for homework. I wonder if he would rather be penciling curves.


We dance in the lobby of the local diner, to disco songs we sing off key. “Older sisters,” he confirms. “Girls like to see your feminine side, as long as that’s not all they see.” He dances just close enough to make me wish he’d get closer. He knows too much for seventeen. So do I, but that’s because my dance partners are always older. High school boys are afraid to look you in the eyes when you’re dancing. Not him. His eyes are golden-brown, and they match his hair.

He shows up on my back porch and asks me to his senior prom. I say yes. He shows up on my back porch and says we ought to be just friends. I say “I guess.” “But,” he asks, “you’re still coming to the prom with me, right?” I go, because I have a fabulous sequined dress that I want to wear again, and because he can dance.


His lips taste faintly of coconut. It’s not chapstick or anything; it’s him. Always faintly of coconut--sweet but still masculine. I watch as they draw back into a smile and I know without looking up that he is glancing down. That’s what he does when he’s about to cast aside inhibition. He will kiss me again and his eyes will shift to the greener side of hazel, and I will know what he is thinking.


“When you look at me like that, I think of chocolate.”
“Well, we are in Starbucks,” he laughs. “I’ll get you a brownie.”


I know his eyes are cobalt, but I can’t see them. We are on the phone, debating competitiveness and office politics and drive. I ask him leading questions; he makes me define my terms. A screech cuts through the phone signal and for a few seconds, we are kids, giggling, bickering in the school yard. “Was that you?” “No. You?” “Well it wasn’t me.” Boyish. Charming. Then back to business. I ask him questions requiring statistics, and gauge his facility with numbers. I put words in his mouth. He cuts in. I talk over him. He says: “listen.” And I do. I stop mid-sentence. It is a small submission I do not begrudge. He doesn’t call himself a writer, yet he always uses his words precisely. And I want him to talk some more, because the sound of his voice makes me squirm.

He pauses, making sure my abrupt stop is not just instinct. He wants to know it is a conscious decision to yield. I wait--willingly, because he seems aware of the crucial but delicate balance. Without my willingness, his power has nowhere respectable to go. Acknowledge my authority and I will want yours. He modulates his drive as well as he does his voice, something feral only flickering occasionally—in the silences, between his careful phrases, when I catch him off-guard. Always tantalizingly close, but clearly well under his control. I hear assurance in his voice as he speaks of ambition, and imagine how lamplight looks playing across the skin of his bare hips.