Look Closer(5)

? ? ?

Dozens of people with that last name in the greater Chicago area. But only one named Lauren. And it’s you. Your Facebook profile, in a tight white dress with an oversize fancy hat, like from the Kentucky Derby, raising a glass of sparkly and pursing your lips. Were you really that happy when you took that picture, Lauren? Or were you thinking all along, this would be an awesome profile pic for Facebook? Was it fake like it’s fake when people tell stories about something they did and make it sound a lot more fun than it really was? Do you worry more about how others see you than how you see yourself?

Thousands of friends, thousands of “likes” on your hundreds of photos, those tiny windows into your life over the last decade. The top of the Eiffel Tower, a safari in South Africa, drinks in Times Square, the polar ice plunge in Lake Michigan, a triathlon, some race that you did in mud, always surrounded by friends and handsome men, sun-drenched and happy, glamorous and sexy, fun and energetic and free-spirited.

You’re married to someone named Conrad Betancourt. But no kids.

And you don’t live in Chicago per se. You live in Grace Village, just west of the city. In the next town over from where I live, Grace Park.

You’ve come home, Lauren.

? ? ?

Deep breath. Calm, Simon. Use language games. Something. Deep breath.

Why don’t “monkey” and “donkey” rhyme?

Deep breath.

Why is it an unwritten but ironclad rule that we put opinion adjectives before size adjectives? Why must it always be “dirty little secret” and never “little dirty secret?”

And why size adjectives always before age? Why not “old little lady?”

Why can’t I say “an old little lovely lady?”

Deep breath.

? ? ?

It’s all coming back, washing over me again. It’s growing like a tumor inside me, poison flowing through my veins. I should stop right now. I should forget I saw you. I’ve put you behind me. You need to stay right where you’ve been, in my rearview mirror. I’m better now. I know I’m better. Vicky says I’m better. I can’t go back there. Everything’s fine.

Yes, that’s what I’ll do. I’ll put you behind me. I’ve put you behind me, Lauren. You are officially yesterday’s news, or nineteen years ago’s news.

Okay, that’s that. I’m going to forget I ever saw you today.





3

Monday, July 4, 2022

“Oh . . . my . . . God,” I whispered. Even though the whole reason I came to the club today, my first time in several years, was that I thought you might be at the Fourth of July festivities. Even though I’d been thinking about you since that day in May—who am I kidding with “that day in May,” it was Friday, May 13, at 2:04 p.m.—when I saw you on Michigan Avenue. Even though I’d tried to conjure up ways to “accidentally” run into you. Even though I’d literally rehearsed lines in a mirror like a nervous schoolboy.

Still, seeing you, Lauren, standing on the club’s outdoor patio, a view of the golf course behind you. It felt like something fresh and clean and right, as if I were seeing you for the first time.

I opened my hands, palms up, like I’d conjured something from magic. Because magic was a good word to describe it. “It’s . . . you.”

You were wearing a white sundress. Your skin was tanned. You were once again wearing those Audrey Hepburn sunglasses. Your hair was pulled up in back. You’d been laughing with friends, but I must have caught your peripheral vision and you turned, for some reason. I’d like to think it was the gods smiling down on us, some mystical inspiration that made you turn your head.

“It’s you,” you replied, removing your shades, squinting into the sun. You seemed less surprised than me. “Simon,” you said, like you enjoyed saying my name.

You broke away from your group, which did not appear to include your husband, Conrad. I appreciated that you thought our first meeting (our first one in nineteen years, at least) deserved some privacy, even if we were surrounded by a couple hundred people at the club’s Fourth of July BBQ and fireworks.

“What are . . . what are you . . .” I didn’t finish the sentence.

“Oh, I—I moved back into town,” you said. “Well, the Village.”

“You live in Grace Village?” I asked.

“Yeah, I’m married. I’ve been here a few years. You’re still in Grace Park?”

“Same house,” I said.

You nodded. “I thought you might be. I thought I might run into you here at the club. I remember your family were members here. I . . . thought about calling, just to maybe break the ice—”

I waved a hand. “Oh, no worries. That was . . . a long time ago.”

You seemed relieved, a real weight lifted, at those words. You smiled at me as if grateful.

I was supposed to be so nervous. I’d built this hypothetical reunion up in my head so much that I figured I’d be sweaty and jumpy, stuttering and stammering. But my nerves instantly fluttered away when I saw you, whatever lines I’d rehearsed vanished. It was just you and me again.

“You’re married?” you asked me, seeing the ring on my finger.

“Almost ten years,” I said. “Her name is Vicky.”

“Is Vicky here?”