You Think It, I'll Say It(21)
“But you are not the only one,” Thérèse says in her beguiling accent. “I now train for a triathlon.” She holds up both her arms—despite the chilly temperature outside, she is wearing a tight sleeveless black top—and flexes her biceps.
“Impressive,” I say. “When is it?”
“April. You run, yes?”
“I do run. With my brother.”
“Maybe someday you and I run together.” She raises both eyebrows, in the playful manner of a woman aware of how attractive she is.
When it becomes clear that she’s waiting for a response, I say—I make sure to say it pleasantly—“Maybe so.”
She then turns to attend to a couple on another of the bar’s three sides—there are only twelve seats around the bar, most empty on this Tuesday night—but instead of admiring her small, toned ass and graceful stance, as I usually would, I feel a dismal sorrow. She ruined it. It happened so quickly, but now it’s finished. Though she asked me out with a casual deftness that allows us both to pretend she didn’t, she did. And I’m certain that the intermittent rhythm of interacting with Thérèse while she’s on the clock is far more enjoyable than her unbroken attention on a date would be.
It’s also true that if she were less fluent in English, I’d probably have asked her out, weeks ago, in spite of everything; we could coast longer on each other’s mystery. But the language barrier is negligible. If I did ask her out, I don’t doubt that after the initial exuberance, I’d be quietly bored, politely restless, possibly subjected to reading yet another book about men who fear commitment. And Thérèse is young and lovely. She deserves better.
It is, I assume, due to her confidence that she doesn’t comprehend until after I’ve signed the check and am standing that I’m not going to follow up on her overture; I won’t try to confirm a day or time for us to run together, even tentatively. First, she’s expectant, and then, as I say, “Have a good night,” there is some shifting of her facial features, some new resentment and understanding.
Back in my apartment, in bed beneath the covers, I imagine her naked on her knees. Her long hair is loose and swaying as her head bobs. But afterward, as I roll away from the wet spot to go to sleep, I know I won’t return to her restaurant.
* * *
—
My favorite moment in all of Strauss’s writing is the finale from “Der Rosenkavalier,” she writes. His lush late Romanticism mixed with dissonance makes it so evocative and thrilling, to the point that even though I’ve listened many times, it still almost brings me to tears (okay, maybe not almost). This version is a trio, all sung by women. Amazing, no?
* * *
—
“Do you remember Alicia Thompson?” Mark asks. “My year in high school, tennis player, smoking hot body.”
“Wasn’t she prom queen?”
“That’s the one. So I ran into her yesterday in the elevator at the hospital. She was bringing her dad in for an echo. Let’s just say when it comes to looks, she peaked early.”
“Has she been in St. Louis all this time?”
“She’s married to a dude from Nashville, and I think they were there for a few years. Or Memphis? Anyway—back when she and I were seniors, she used to date Joe Streizman. Right after we graduate, they break up, and at a party at Tina Hoffer’s house, Alicia and I end up alone in the basement. We’ve both been drinking, and she’s full-on plastered and very touchy-feely. We’re sitting really close together on this couch while she tells me about the breakup, all weepy and shit, then she leans in and whispers right in my ear—well, this is the eternal mystery—she whispers either ‘Hug me’ or ‘Fuck me.’ No kidding, it sounded like ‘Fug me.’ Maybe she didn’t know what she was asking for. Obviously, I should have just said ‘What?’ But here I am, seventeen years old, with a rock-hard boner, and my logic is, if I hug her and she said, ‘Fuck me,’ I’ll get another chance. But if she said ‘Hug me’ and I fuck her, I’m a rapist.”
“I take it you hugged her.”
Cheerfully, Mark says, “Biggest mistake of my life.”
“When you guys were in the elevator yesterday, did you ask her which she’d said?”
“Sure, in front of her dad. Why not?” As we head south on Big Bend, he adds, “I want to be like the Clintons. I don’t want to be like the Gores. I want to ball other women but stay married.”
“Anyone in particular?”
“There’s this girl butcher at Whole Foods with a bunch of crazy tattoos. What’s that rule for how young is too young—it’s half your age plus seven, right? So if she’s, what, twenty-eight, we’re good to go.” He pauses, then says slowly, “I don’t think she’s twenty-eight.”
That ostensible rule means Thérèse needs to be twenty-seven, which she also isn’t. But Mark knows about neither Thérèse nor Bonnie, and in any case, I don’t anticipate crossing paths with Thérèse again.
I say, “Aren’t open marriages just a stopgap until divorce?”
“Oh, I don’t want an open marriage.” Mark looks at me with distaste. “Where’s the fun in that?”