The Vanishing Half(35)

“I love this song,” she said.

“I know,” he said. “I hear you singin it.”

She wasn’t drunk but she felt lightheaded, swept up in Smokey Robinson’s voice, Reese’s arms around her. Then the lights flipped on rudely, all the couples groaning, and Reese let her go. She hadn’t realized until then how depressing Mirage looked with the lights on: the exposed pipes, peeling paint, wood floors sticky with beer. And Reese, laughing as their friends drifted toward the door, as if dancing with her had been as casual as helping her into a jacket. Somehow she felt closer to him and further away than ever.

Then one evening in July, she came home early from work and found Reese shirtless through the open bathroom door. His chest was wrapped in a large bandage, but there were red bruises peeking out, and he was gingerly feeling his ribcage. Her first thought was her stupidest thought: someone had attacked him. When he glanced up, their eyes met in the mirror, and he quickly yanked on his shirt.

“Don’t creep up on me like that,” he said.

“What happened?” she said. “That bruise—”

“Looks worse than it feels,” he said. “I’m used to it.”

She slowly realized what he was trying to tell her: that no one had attacked him, that it was the bandage he wore that was digging into his ribcage, bruising him.

“You should take that thing off,” she said. “If it hurts you. You don’t have to wear it here. I don’t care what you look like.”

She thought he might be relieved, but instead, a dark and unfamiliar look passed across his face.

“It’s not about you,” he said, then he slammed the bathroom door shut. The whole apartment shook, and she trembled, dropping her keys. He had never yelled at her before.

She left without thinking. She had never seen him so angry. He swore at bad drivers, he griped about his co-workers, he shoved a white man in a bar once who kept calling her darky. His anger flared and waned and then he was back to himself again. But this time he was angry at her. She shouldn’t have looked at him—she should have turned as soon as she saw him through the open door. But the bruises shocked her and then she’d said something so idiotic and now she couldn’t even apologize because he was angry. He’d slammed a door, not her face, but maybe that was out of convenience. Maybe, if she had been closer, he would have slammed her against the wall just as easily.

She was crying by the time she reached Barry’s. He just pulled her into a hug.

“He hates me,” she said. “I did this stupid thing and now he hates me—”

“He doesn’t hate you,” Barry said. “Come sit down. It’s gonna be all right in the morning.”



* * *



—

IT WAS NO BIG DEAL, Barry said. Just a little fight.

But all her life, she would hate when people called arguments fights. Fights were bloody events, punctured skin, bruised eye sockets, broken bones. Not disagreements over where to go to dinner. Never words. A fight was not a man’s voice raised in anger, although it would always make her think of her father. She would wince a little when she heard raucous men leaving bars or boys screaming at televisions during football games. The sound of slamming doors. Broken plates. Her father had punched walls, he smashed dishes, and even once his own eyeglasses, hurling them across the living room at the door. To be so angry that you’d make yourself blind. Strange, and yet so normal to her then in a way she wouldn’t fully realize until she was older.

She spent the night on Barry’s couch, staring up at the ceiling. At half past three, she heard a knock on the door. Through the peephole, she found Reese under the glowing porch light. He was breathing hard, his fists balled in the pockets of his jean jacket, and he started to knock again when she finally unlatched the deadbolt.

“You’re gonna wake everyone up,” she whispered.

“I’m sorry,” he said. His breath smelled sweet like beer.

“You’re drunk,” she said, more surprised than anything. She’d never known him to disappear into a bar when he was upset, but here he was now, swaying on his feet.

“I shouldn’t have hollered at you like that,” he said. “I didn’t mean to—goddamnit, you know I wouldn’t hurt you. You know that, don’t you, baby?”

You could never know who might hurt you until it was too late. But he sounded desperate, pleading with her from the step, and she cracked the door a little more.

“There’s this doctor,” he said. “Luis told me about him. You gotta pay him upfront for the surgery but I been savin up.”

“What surgery?” she said.

“For my chest. Then I won’t have to wear this damn thing at all.”

“But is it safe?”

“Safe enough,” he said.

She stared at the shallow rise and fall of his chest.

“I’m sorry too,” she said. “I just don’t want you to hurt. I didn’t mean—oh, I don’t even know. I wasn’t trying to act like I’m somebody special.”

“Don’t say that,” he said.

“Say what?”

He was quiet a moment, then he leaned in and kissed her. By the time she realized it, he was already pulling away.

“That you’re not special to me,” he said.