Heart Berries: A Memoir(14)

There were multiple guys. I had made a point of spending time with a few of the writers on campus because they provided free editing and feedback.

“I’m just rebounding.”

“Casey was always a serious person. He’s sad. It would be unpleasant to be around, I suppose?”

“I think I was the difficult one,” I said.

“He said you wanted too much.”

I don’t remember following up with a question or if I used those moments to sell myself as an M.F.A. candidate. I just wanted to leave.

I drove straight to your house. I was angry. I knew that I wasn’t too much. A man had shown me that too much could be managed through kindness and recognition.

You opened the door with a goofy smile. Before I said anything you asked me to come in for a beer.

I sat at your kitchen table, and you spoke to me while you put a pizza in the oven, and you cut cookie dough. Your house was clean for a writing man’s home. You had new furnishings, which, no doubt, your mother bought you. Still, I cared what you thought about me.

“I make pecan sandies now,” you said.

You looked content. You moved with certainty and were familiar with your kitchen—cooking was your new hobby.

“Is this what you do to get over me?” I asked.

“Yes.”

You fed me and were forthcoming about adjusting to being single and missing my son. We sat across from each other. I let you tell me about other women. Time had passed, not long, but enough.

“She’s just nice,” you said.

“Yeah?”

“She puts the toilet seat up when she’s done peeing.” You seemed like you were bragging.

“Who the fuck would do that?” I said.

“Are you going to stay at the university here?”

“I don’t know. I’m working on a Preparing Future Faculty application to see if they’ll pay me to do my work here.”

“With Lily?”

“Yeah.”

Lily was my academic adviser, and she was priming me to be under her instruction. She had sent me her syllabus for a class in speculative fiction, and she wanted me to eventually work for the university.

“I was just out with her,” you said.

“Oh?”

“She was a little drunk and asked if I wanted to cuddle.”

“Wow.”

You laughed. “You’d be happy to know,” you said.

“What?” I asked.

“None of these women hold a candle to you.”

You drank your beer and smirked.

“I still want you,” I said.

You didn’t look shocked, but you looked concerned. You put your hand across the table, and I put mine on top of yours. We were both impressed with how comforting it felt to touch each other.

“Mountain Woman,” you said. My Indian name.

I let go and stood up. Not to threaten that I might leave, but I wanted you to see me. “I’m regulated now,” I said.

You approached me, and we made love on your counter. My tailbone bruised. Passion seemed so endless when we were in it. It seemed like, in those moments, we could have pushed each other into anything—into saying anything.

I told you that I loved you numerous times, and you reciprocated. I had forgotten the man you were before you saw me out of control. You had loved me like a man with the capacity to keep his promises and sacrifice for his family. You loved me completely, with a type of trust I didn’t realize was rare.

You were so different from Eric’s aimlessness. You were so different from the men who have cowered from me. You were different from the men who made a challenge out of hurting me.

We had full hearts for each other, still. While you were sleeping, I considered that I might tell you it was my entire fault. How could it be yours? When you’re like this?

We got up for class. Before I left I hugged you. I looked up and asked if we could be a family. You said that we couldn’t be a family, and you didn’t look at me when you said it. You told me you loved me. We both started crying. I thought you were being careful with me. I thought that you were guarding yourself—what pride you had left was worth a lot. You had a human being who put the toilet seat up for you. You had a person who wasn’t “all consuming,” like a black hole.

I went back. I went back more than once or four times or five. Every time, you were baking, or enjoying your quiet life alone. Once, you had a woman there. I still went back, later. You let me in every time. Eventually, I stopped asking if we could be together again.

Eric became less appealing, but we became more comfortable with each other.

“You don’t need to make noises,” he said, on top of me.

“What?”

“I just don’t want you to perform sex for me.”

And yet I did. He wrapped me in a Star Wars blanket and stared at the ceiling. We were both manic and unable to sleep.

“Do you want to drink?” he said.

He talked about his ex-girlfriend, and he said that he felt like he was going to have a breakdown. I talked about you, and he said that I wouldn’t ever be sane enough. He said that there was nothing I could do to convince you that I was not crazy, and why would I want to?

He asked me about the future.

That was our last night together, because it was enough. I realized that love can be mediocre and a safe comfort, or it can be unhinged and hurtful. Either seemed like a good life.