Love and Other Words(9)

“What about you? What’s your favorite word? I bet it’s tungsten. Or, like, amphibian.”

He quirked a smile, answering, “Regurgitate.”

Scrunching my nose, I stared at him. “That is a gross word.”

This made him smile even wider. “I like the hard consonant sounds in it. It kinda sounds like exactly what it means.”

“An onomatopoeia?”

I half expected trumpets to blast revelatory music from an invisible speaker in the wall from the way Elliot stared at me, lips parted and glasses slowly sliding down his nose.

“Yeah,” he said.

“I’m not a complete idiot, you know. You don’t have to look so surprised that I know some big words.”

“I never thought you were an idiot,” he said quietly, looking toward the box and pulling out another book to hand to me.

For a long time after we returned to our slow, inefficient method of unpacking the books, I could feel him looking up and watching me, tiny flashes of stolen glances.

I pretended I didn’t notice.

now

wednesday, october 4

I

feel like I’ve torn open some stitches overnight. Everything inside is raw – as if I’ve bruised an emotional organ. Above me, the ceiling looks drab; water stains crawl along the spidery cracks in the plaster that radiate from the light fixture in the ceiling. The fan circles lazily around and around and around the frosted globe. As they turn, the blades cut through the air, mimicking Sean’s rhythmic exhale while he sleeps beside me.

Chh.

Chh.

Chh.

He was asleep when I got home around two this morning. For once, I’m thankful for the long hours; I don’t know how I would have sat through dinner with him and Phoebe when all I could think about was Elliot showing up at Saul’s yesterday.

I had this momentary clench of guilt last night on the bus home, when the chaos of my shift was slowly ebbing from my thoughts and the run-in with Elliot pushed its way back in. In a panicked burst, I wondered how rude it was of me to not introduce Elliot to Sabrina.

So fucking quickly he comes back, front and center.

Sean wakes when I move to rub my face, rolling to me, pulling me close with his hand curled around my hip, but for the first time since he kissed me last May, I feel like I’m betraying something.

Groaning, I push away and sit up, propping my elbows on my knees at the side of the bed.

“You okay, babe?” he asks, moving close behind me and resting his chin on my shoulder.

Sean doesn’t even know about Elliot. Which is crazy, when I think about it, because if I’m marrying him, he should know every part of me, right? Even if we haven’t been together that long, the big things should be placed right up front, and for most of my adolescence, it doesn’t get much bigger than Elliot. Sean knows I grew up in Berkeley, spent many weekends up in the wine country of Healdsburg, and had some good friends there. But he has no idea that I met Elliot when I was thirteen, fell in love with him when I was fourteen, and pushed him out of my life only a few years later.

I nod. “I’m good. Just tired.”

I feel him turn his head beside me and glance at the clock, and I mimic his action. It’s only 6:40, and I don’t need to start rounds until 9:00. Sleep is a precious commodity. Why, brain, why?

He runs a hand through his salt-and-pepper hair.

“Of course you’re tired. Come back to bed.”

When he says this, I know he really means Lie back down and let’s have some of the sex before Phoebs is up.

The problem is, I can’t risk the chance that doing that with him will feel wrong now.

Fucking Elliot.

I just need a couple of days of distance from it, that’s all.

then

thursday, december 20
fifteen years ago
I

’d never spent Christmas away from home before, but early December that first year at the cabin, Dad said we were going to have an adventure. To some parents, this might have meant a trip to Paris or a cruise to somewhere exotic. To my dad, it meant an old-fashioned holiday in our new house, lighting the Danish kalenderlys – a Christmas candle – and enjoying roast duck, cabbage, beetroot, and potatoes for Christmas dinner.

We arrived around dinnertime on the twentieth, our car bursting with packages and newly purchased decorations, followed closely by a man from town with a gold tooth, a wooden leg, and a trailer carrying our freshly cut Christmas tree.

I watched as they wrestled with the mammoth tree, wondering briefly if it would even fit through our front door. It was cold outside, and I shuffled my feet on the ground to keep warm. Without thinking, I looked over my shoulder at the Petropoulos house.

The windows glowed, some of them foggy with condensation. A steady stream of smoke rose from a crooked chimney, curling like ribbon before disappearing into blackness.

We’d been to the cabin three times since October, and during each visit Elliot had come to the door, knocked, and Dad let him upstairs. We would lie on the floor of my closet – slowly being converted into a tiny library – and read for hours.

But I’d yet to visit his house. I tried to guess which room was his, to imagine what he might be doing. I wondered what Christmas was like for them, in a house with a dad and a mom, four kids, and a dog who looked more horse than canine. I bet it smelled like cookies and freshly cut pine. I decided it was probably hard to find someplace quiet to read.