I didn’t laugh with her. “Why do you say that?” I asked.
She shrugged apologetically, realizing she’d said the wrong thing. “Oh, I just meant that he’s charming. I imagine people like talking to him.”
“Well, I can’t speak for everyone, but I sure do,” I said. She was right, though—that was your magic. Everyone loved talking to you. You made them feel heard, cared about, listened to. I always figured that was part of why people who wouldn’t allow anyone else to take their photograph often agreed to let you do it. You made them feel seen. You made me feel seen.
I wandered through the apartment and couldn’t find you anywhere, until I heard your voice coming from the forbidden library. I poked my head in and you were talking to a woman I didn’t know. She had red hair that curled like a lion’s mane around a delicate catlike face. My stomach dropped when I saw you leaning against the bookcase, absorbed in whatever she’d been telling you.
“There you are!” I said.
You looked up, and there was no guilt on your face. Just a smile, as if you were expecting me to join, but I was late to the appointment.
“Me?” you said. “There you are! Rachel was just telling me about the restaurant she hostesses at. She said she can get us a deal—a discount on the prix fixe menu.”
I looked over at Rachel, who was clearly less happy to see me than you were. She’d fallen under your spell. “That’s really nice of you,” I said.
Rachel smiled a tight little smile. “Nice to meet you, Gabe,” she told you. Then she lifted up her empty glass. “Going to head back to the bar for a refill. But you have my number . . . for the reservations.”
“Thanks again,” you said to her, your smile beaming her way now, instead of mine. Then she walked out of the room.
I didn’t quite know what to say. I hadn’t caught you doing anything other than talking to someone about restaurant discounts. But why were you in the library with her? Why hadn’t you come to find me?
“Whatcha doing in here?” I asked, keeping my voice light.
You crossed the room and pushed the door shut, a grin on your face. “Scouting for someplace we could do this,” you said. Then you grabbed my wrists and held them above my head as you leaned me into the bookcase and kissed me hard. “I’m going to make love to you in this library,” you told me, “while the whole party is going on outside. And I’m not going to lock the door.”
“But—” I said.
You kissed me again, and my protests stopped. I didn’t care about finding you in the library with Rachel anymore. All I cared about was your fingers tugging down the waistband of my tights and the sound of you unzipping your fly.
I wouldn’t put up with that now, and I shouldn’t have put up with it then—you placating me with a kiss, erasing my concerns with an orgasm. I should’ve made you explain yourself. I should’ve called you out for flirting with someone else, for not coming to find me. But you were like a drug. When I was high on you, nothing else mattered.
“Shh,” you said, as you lifted up my skirt. I didn’t even realize I was making any noise.
I bit my lip so hard to keep from calling out as I came that when I kissed you afterward there was a smear of blood on both of our mouths.
I loved you so much—and didn’t doubt your love for me—but I’d never forgotten about Stephanie, and I think deep down I was worried that it could happen again, that you’d leave me for someone like her or like Rachel or a million other women you ran into on the subway or at Starbucks or in the grocery store. The seesaw of our relationship wasn’t always balanced. Usually we were even, usually we were equal, but once in a while I’d find myself down at the bottom, trying to spring back up, afraid that you’d jump off to be with someone else, and I’d be stuck without any chance of reaching equilibrium. But even if I’d said something in that library, I don’t think it would have changed anything.
Because it wasn’t another woman that I should’ve been worrying about.
xii
Those doubts didn’t appear often, though. There was so much more to us, so much about us that fit together perfectly. We both cared about each other’s passions—about the careers we dreamed we’d have one day. You watched every single episode of It Takes a Galaxy, the TV show I was working on then, and gave me your thoughts on how the different aliens modeled social situations for kids. You seemed so into it that I started asking what you thought even before the shows went into production.
I didn’t have any real power, then. Not yet. But I got to review scripts and storyboards and pass along feedback to my boss. I took that responsibility more seriously than I probably needed to. When I brought scripts home, you’d act them out with me so we could talk through them together. You always asked to play Galacto, the little green guy who looks kind of like a frog. My favorite was Electra, the dark purple one with sparkly antennae. It seems fitting, somehow, that reading an It Takes a Galaxy script is what helped you tell me your dreams. The show is supposed to help children communicate their feelings, but I guess it works on adults too. I remember the episode we were working on when our conversation happened. It was the beginning of November, and we were about a third of the way through the newest season.
Galacto sits in his front yard with his head in his hands. Electra enters.
Electra: What’s wrong, Galacto? You look sad.
Galacto: My dad wants me to play on the starball team, but I hate starball!
Electra: Does he know that?
Galacto: I’m afraid to tell him. I’m afraid he won’t want to be my dad anymore if I don’t like starball as much as he does.
Electra: My dad likes starball, but I don’t, so we do other things together. Maybe you could make a list of things you and your dad both like.
Galacto: Do you think that would work? And then I wouldn’t have to play starball anymore?
Electra: I think it’s worth a try.
Galacto: Me too!
“Do you think maybe Electra should like starball and her dad shouldn’t?” I asked, when we finished reading. “You know, flip the gender stereotype a little? Maybe I should suggest that.”
“I think that’s a great idea,” you said, looking at me a beat longer than usual. In that moment it felt like you loved not only my idea, but every aspect of who I was.
I made some notes on my script, then reread the scene silently. “Do you think Electra should name some things that she and her dad like doing together? Would that strengthen the dialogue?”
You didn’t respond to my questions this time, so I turned to look at you. Your focus was on a pigeon cooing on your fire escape. “I’m afraid I’ll turn into him,” you said.
I put the script down. “Turn into who?” Absurdly, my first thought was the pigeon.
You rubbed your hand against the stubble on your chin. “My dad. That I’ll have all these dreams and I’ll never achieve them. That it’ll make me angry and bruised and broken inside, and I’ll hurt everyone around me.”
“What dreams do you have?” I asked. “New dreams?”
“Do you know who Steve McCurry is?”
I shook my head, so you grabbed my laptop off the floor and put in some search terms, then turned the screen to me. I saw a National Geographic cover with a girl on it. She was wearing a headscarf and had stop-you-in-your-tracks green eyes. Her expression looked haunted, hunted.
“This,” you said, “is one of his photographs. We were looking at his work today in my photography class, and I felt it. In my heart, in my soul, in wherever you feel things deepest. This is what I want to do. This is what I have to do.”
There was a fire in your eyes I’d never seen before.
“I realized that if I want to make a difference, truly make a difference, like you’re trying to do with this show, I’m going to have to leave New York. My camera and I can do more somewhere else.”
“Leave?” I echoed. Of everything you said, it was the one word that lodged in my brain, glowing there like a neon Emergency Room sign. “What do you mean? What about us?”
Your face went blank for a moment and I realized my response wasn’t the one you were expecting. But really, what were you expecting?