Page 210 of Two Marlboros

“I will, I promise.”

His face relaxed and he let himself be overcome by the thrill of what he was about to experience. By now he was in California; I had stayed there, in the Big Apple.

“Goodbye,” he said, and grabbed the suitcase by the handle.

“Bye.”

The wheels of the suitcase began to clatter on the tiles. He proceeded backward and waved to me with his arm raised, just as I did. Finally, his hand lowered. He took the suitcase with the other, gave me one last look, and turned back to the check-in counters, proudly toward his destination.

My hand continued to greet him, then lost vitality and returned next to my body. I followed Nathan’s footsteps with a glance as long as I could; shortly thereafter he disappeared into the throng of people, I lost sight of his suitcase and his little blond head as well. I lost sight of everything.

I had to resist the urge to follow him, to run after him, because the more minutes passed without him, the more lost I felt. I ran out of air and felt the desire to get out, but I also told myself that I couldn’t do that, because if he came back for a header and didn’t see me, he might think I didn’t want him there beside me enough. So, I stayed, even though the airport was swarming with people and made me suffocate, because none of them were Nathan, because none of the suitcases were his. Every rumble of wheels on the tiles made me turn away, every ad I hoped was about him, every blond head made me miss a beat and then stabbed me, and I felt it, felt the pain of that stiletto sinking into flesh and slowly ripping through tissue, felt my body shake, felt the urge to scream.

I felt that sense of emptiness, the impossibility of finding in others what had been his alone, something essential, vital, an abstinence that I yearned to fill there, in that instant, at that moment, right away, but I didn’t know how - it wasn’t possible. I would have to learn to live without it, to feed on the memories,to wait until they were no longer so vivid and pulsating, to find traces of him in others. I felt the urge to buy a pack of Marlboros to keep him with me, but I told myself I would do it later, because what if he came back?

The stark truth came upon me like a downpour of icy water: no pack of Marlboros would return Nathan to me, just as no prayer had returned Oliver to me. I was alone, again, shifting my gaze to the right and to the left, in that miserable illusion that the situation could change, that Nathan could pick up the pieces of my broken heart and put them back together as if he had never broken it.

A voice inside me laughed heartily, as if mocking a dreamer who still hopes for a better scenario, and laughed again, until I hid my face in my hands and began to cry, and soon after to sob; another voice inside me begged the other to stop, not to destroy my illusions, to let me hope a little more and to spare me all that suffering, even if it was for a minute. I let the tears shake me for a time I could not quantify, my hands on my face hoping to feel a warm, familiar touch to comfort me, a touch that never came. When the sobs returned to being just dry, labored breaths, I removed my hands and opened my eyes again, which could only observe the emptiness before me. Nathan was not there. I had deluded myself again.

The aftermath of that cry carried away the laughter in my mind and a pinch of my illusions, until there was nothing left of either. All that remained was a wraith with a tear-streaked face, a man who once again had the task of wondering where he would find the strength to live another day.

My eyes glimpsed on the screen that the plane had taken off, and something inside me moved. In a whisper, slowly, I told myself that maybe he had reconsidered at the last minute, that like in the movies he had gotten up at the last moment, elbowedhis way out, left everyone stunned, and got off the plane running wildly to me.

I let a few minutes pass.

I sighed.

He hadn’t.

The first week after his departure I continued to hold on to some hope that he might be back soon. Maybe the work sucked, or the weather, or the local boys... instead, since my phone hadn’t rung once, I imagined that everything must have been beautiful, everything would have been as he had dreamed.

I hadn’t sought him out either; I wouldn’t have known what to say to him. The only words that seemed worth saying now laid in an increasingly remote part of my heart, and soon I would lock them away never to come out again.

Work returned to keep me good company. So did Ash, all things considered. He made an effort to be friendly with me, just as I made an effort to appreciate his attempts to be close to me, but it did little good. I felt myself sinking more and more each day into that apathy that had been my companion for so many long months, only it was much less frightening. I knew it by now, I knew how low it could drag me, and I also knew how to prevent it from doing so.

One day in December, just as I was about to go to sleep, I thought back to that picture in the drawer. I hadn’t opened it since I had made love to Nathan; there had been no need to. But when I saw Oliver’s face again, the instinct and the need rose in me to put that picture back where it had always been, where it belonged on the nightstand. So, I put it back there, and started talking to it again.

Christmas was now upon us. It would be the second one I would spend alone, the second with a broken heart, though for different reasons. My parents had suggested that I go back toBrighton for the holidays, hoping that the family hubbub might distract me a little. I had accepted and bought the outbound ticket, and almost hesitated to take the return one.

Although it was still a few weeks away, my thoughts flew to the end of the year, and to that silent deadline I had given to my feelings for Nathan. Not that feelings could really have a deadline, but I knew I could not continue that way forever.

At the stroke of the new year, I was going to put aside any hope of his return and lower the curtain on the flash fire that had been our relationship, which had burned just long enough for a few hours before crumbling and turning to ashes.

I would have begun to forget it. Or, at least, I would have tried.

The snow began to fall, and I watched it fall at the window, flake by flake, whenever I had the chance. It was slow and hypnotic, absorbing me and giving me no time to think about anything else but those little flakes that seemed to want to chase each other until they fell to the ground.

...Meanwhile the days went by...

39

American Boy

(?New Radicals - You get what you give)

The hot chocolate was smoking. I put my head on it and the steam stuck to my skin, creating a damp layer on my forehead and nose that I wiped off with my sweater soon after. The thermometer read fifty-five degrees, but it was raining outside, so I sat on the wooden bench by the arched window that overlooked the ranch porch, cup in my hands and gaze beyond the glass.

I snuggled into my sweater and blew on the chocolate, meanwhile I listened to the rain fall and watched it drizzle down from the porch roof, occasionally closing my eyes and letting out a deep sigh. I blew again and took a sip, but it was still too hot and scalded the tip of my tongue. I rested my head on the wall and glanced around the house that had given me hospitality for almost two and a half months. The furnishings were spartan: there was a large wooden table in the middle of the room, with two benches of the same material on the two longest sides, and behind it, on the right, a rather basic kitchenette with a sink and stove and a couple of work shelves. There was no need for a fireplace because the temperatures were never that cold in that area, so the leftover space was taken up with glass cupboards and shelves filled with plants and seedlings. The roof with exposed beams was my favorite part right away, because it created the rustic look I had dreamed of from the first moment I stepped out of the plane.

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