This Close to Okay(67)

Tallie had rebandaged his hands after his shower, and he didn’t think of suicide then. He didn’t think of suicide when they were wrapped in her blanket as they shared their post-orgasms cigarette on her deck in the rainy dark, either. He’d put Tallie’s sheets in the washing machine and started a load; he’d scrubbed the fire off him, smelled like her soap and his own deodorant. If he had to, he could go back home, surprise his parents with his existence. Let them know he was okay before leaving again, finding someone, something, somewhere to start new. He didn’t allow himself to think the someone could be Tallie. They’d begun so broken. He’d tell her everything before he left. He’d go to the hospital to see Lionel, maybe have lunch with her, but after that he’d head out. If she didn’t try to stop him, he’d leave.

He envisioned himself walking to the bridge and continuing to walk. To walk across it and turn around, walk across it again. Never wanting to jump, not once looking down at the Ohio and wishing he were in that glorious free fall, the wind whistling his ears. Or he could walk in the opposite direction and hitch a ride out, the same way he got to Louisville. Walking and thumbing down truckers, not worried about what could happen to him, because it didn’t matter. People had no control over what happened to them anyway. Everything was kismet.

*



(The happy sunflowers vased on the kitchen counter. A ceramic rooster: cream, green, and red. Silver hoop earrings next to a bright blue mug, a short fat spoon. A scalloped-glass sugar bowl.)

Tallie was wet-haired and blushing in her glasses, standing in front of him drinking the coffee he’d made for her. The steam fogged her lenses as she apologized.

“For what?” he asked.

“For crossing a line…whether you think so or not…I feel like I crossed a line with you, and that wasn’t my intent. You’re working through a lot of shit…a lot of shit you haven’t told me about, and so am I…and then Lionel and last night—”

“I’m a grown man, Tallie. Please don’t talk to me like I’m not,” he said. Maybe because she was a teacher and so used to talking to kids, it came naturally to her, but he’d had enough of it.

“I’m sorry. I don’t mean to. This is just an extraordinary weekend, and I’m trying to honor it. That’s all,” she said. She stared into her coffee as if there were an answer in her mug to a question she hadn’t asked aloud yet.

“I don’t think there was a line in the first place, so how did we cross it? Who made the rules? How can we know if we’re following them or not?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know anything, Emmett. I just didn’t want you to think I was, like…trying to take advantage of…anything.”

“Ridiculous. I could say the same thing, couldn’t I? Because I definitely don’t want you to think I was trying to take advantage of anything, either.”

“I don’t feel that way at all.”

“Neither do I. Are you upset with me?”

“No! I’m not upset with you! Are you upset with me?” she asked.

“Do I seem upset with you? Did I seem upset in your bedroom?”

“Did I seem upset in my bedroom?”

“Okay, well, we could do this all morning,” he said, smiling at the absurdity of their circled conversation.

“You’re sure you want to come to the hospital with me? I want you to,” she asked.

“Of course I do. I’d like to know Lionel is okay. And I’ll leave later today.”

“Going?”

“To my parents’. I sold my house.”

“You changed your mind about going back there?”

“I guess. I’ll stop by, but that doesn’t mean I’m staying.”

“Right. Well, thank you for making breakfast with your poor hands,” she said, putting her plate in the sink. They’d eaten sleepily, standing at the counter.

“Will you take a picture of yourself for me? You look pretty,” Emmett said.

“Wow.” Tallie covered her face, shy. “Thank you. And enough of that.”

“So yes?” he asked, lifting her phone off the counter and handing it to her. She held her mug, tilted her head a little, smiled, took the photo. Then took a picture of them together like puppied teenagers, their heads touching. “Send it to me?”

“You have to give me your number.”

“Obviously,” he said before smirking and telling her. He imagined the turned-off phone in his backpack receiving the message, saving it for later.

Tallie put their coffees in travel mugs, and Emmett’s heart clicked as he prepared to leave her house for the last time. He got on his knees to stroke the cats with the part of his hands that stung the least, to tell them thanks for letting him hang out with them over the weekend.

*



Tallie stopped on the porch and abruptly said, “Yeah, I don’t own a gun. I only told you that on Thursday so you wouldn’t mess with me.”

“Well, I believed you. And maybe you should get one. People are crazy,” Emmett told her. He used his energy to focus on not tearing up as he followed her off the porch, taking one last look at the gutters he’d cleaned and the cheery pumpkins on her steps, like little suns.

*