by Naomi Niles
“Mmmm, that is certainly tempting,” I said slowly. “But since I’ve already agreed to go on the date, I feel like I ought to go, just as a matter of principle. We’ll probably stare at our soup for an hour with one eye on the clock. I’ll make small talk about Tsar Nicholas, and he’ll say he loves Hank Williams, Jr. When I get home, he’ll text me and say he had a great time. I won’t respond, and we’ll hopefully never see each other again.”
“You do know a lot about Tsar Nicholas,” said Sam.
I shrugged. “Someone has to.”
We turned out the lights and returned to the kitchen, where Sam grabbed the broom and began to sweep. I pulled up Spotify on my phone and played the Blue Danube Waltz. Feeling inspired, Sam held the broom at arm’s length and glided through the room like a young lady making her formal debut. After that, we played the Nutcracker Suite and took turns dancing with the broom, who proved to be the best partner a woman could hope for: tall, swift, and silent.
Chapter Thirteen
Marshall
“Do you ever feel like maybe it was a bad idea to go out with this girl?” asked Sean.
“Haven’t we been over this already? You told me I had done the right thing.”
“I’m not talking about the methods you used. I don’t have a problem with that. Do anything you have to do. I just wonder if maybe you’ll end up regretting having spent so much of your energy on this particular girl.”
We were seated at the island in his kitchen cleaning some of the guns from his gun collection. Afternoon sunlight bleached the granite countertops and glistened on the rifle I held in my lap. Between us on the counter lay a red plastic bowl filled with nachos and a glass bowl filled with queso.
“Thanks for doing this, by the way,” said Sean. “I know there are a million better ways you could be spending your time.”
“Well, it’ll go faster if we do it together. Growing up, my Uncle Billy always used to make me clean the guns from his private collection. I hated doing it, but he paid me twenty dollars an hour, so I didn’t complain too much. It was just one of the many things about life in the country that I vowed I would never do again once I moved out on my own.”
Sean cleared his throat loudly. “To get back to the topic at hand, though: you have every right to use every means at your disposal to win the girl. But Lori doesn’t exactly strike me as your type. I worry that you’re going to end up being like the proverbial dog chasing a car, who doesn’t know what to do with it once he catches it.”
“I can think of a few things,” I said to myself. “Anyway, she’s about as much of a stranger to you as she is to me. What makes you think we’re incompatible?”
Sean hesitated. “I don’t know how to put this nicely—”
“What, you think I’m an idiot?” I smirked. “And that no intelligent woman in her right mind would go out with me?”
“She just seems like the sort of woman who spends her off-nights baking a crumble and reading one of the forty books she’s checked out of the library. Didn’t you get that vibe when you talked to her? When is the last time you opened a book?”
“I’ve read a few manuals on playing chess. My brother Zack was always the reader in our family, and the rest of us gave him a hard time for it.”
“See, and that’s the sort of thing I’m talking about. I can guarantee this woman has read a couple thousand books in her life. Even if she’s never been to college, she’s educated herself. So let’s say, just for the sake of argument, you sit down together on Saturday night. You’re both quiet for a minute, waiting for the appetizers. She looks up from her menu, and the first thing she says is, ‘I was reading Proust in the bath last night.’”
“Why the hell would she say that?”
“I’m just giving you an example of—”
“No, for real, who in their right mind starts a conversation like that?”
“It’s entirely possible that she could say something like that,” he explained in a loud voice, “if only to catch you off guard. Now, what would be your response?”
“I’d say who the hell is Proust?”
“See, and at that point, you’re already on her done-zo list because a woman like her is looking for a man who knows who Proust is.”
“Really? Is he that important?”
“To someone like her, yes,” said Sean, “and for the record, when someone says they were reading Proust in the tub, the appropriate response is to ask how they managed to avoid dropping it, because his books are huge.”
“Okay. Noted. I just feel like you’re making a lot of assumptions based on the fact that she wears glasses and talks like a semi-literate person. I wasn’t aware that she would be quizzing me on my literature and pop culture knowledge first thing when we sat down.”
“I’m not saying it’s the most important thing to a girl like her,” said Sean, “but it’s pretty important.”
“And that’s another thing,” I replied, my voice betraying a hint of impatience. “You keep saying, ‘a woman like her.’ ‘A girl like her.’ You’ve known her for approximately four minutes. When did you become an expert on what she likes and doesn’t like?”
Sean was getting exasperated. He had the air of a teacher who was trying to instruct an unteachable student. “I don’t know her personally, but I’ve known girls like her. You have to go in there prepared to impress. Start off the conversation by dropping a few casual references to Dostoevsky.”
“I am not going to do that.” My only exposure to Dostoevsky came from an episode of the British version of The Office where the dumb boss, trying to impress a client, keeps looking up facts about Dostoevsky online and awkwardly inserting them in conversation. “I’m not going all ‘David Brent’ on our first date.”
“Fine,” said Sean, throwing up his hands in surrender. “But when she finds out you haven’t been in a library since middle school, don’t come crying to me about it.”
Silence smoldered between us for a moment while Sean grabbed a handful of chips. “Anyway,” he added, “what did you do today before you came over?”
I told him about my trip to the tailor’s that morning, and how when I had mentioned the upcoming invitational, he mentioned a group of friends who got together and played poker at the Celtic Knot on Wednesday nights. “They play for money,” he had said, “and the cash prizes can be massive.”
“We ought to go check it out sometime,” said Sean. “Not that you need it, but it wouldn’t hurt to get some practice in.”
“I’ve been seriously thinking about it. We’ll go on Wednesday if I’m not doing anything with Lori that night.”
“Glad you’re so confident,” he muttered, and he went back to cleaning his gun.
Chapter Fourteen
Lori
Early on Saturday morning, I went out to IKEA with Sam and bought a new bookcase and a small table for the dining area. We loaded the furniture into the back of her van and spent a few hours walking around the Galleria. She had to remind me more than once that we were here to buy clothes; I kept drifting away at every glimpse of a bookstore.
“You think I’ll ever own a library of my own?” I asked her as we passed Barnes & Noble for the third time, and she tugged me away from the entrance. “I don’t mean just a bookshelf in my house but a whole room full of them.”
“I suppose if you save up enough money, and if that is your dream,” said Sam sagely. “While the rest of us are building cribs and saving up for our kids’ college funds, you can be assembling a wall of books.”
“You’ll come into the room one morning to find that the wall has fallen on top of me. Don’t mourn for me, though: I died happy. In fact, you can leave me there and let me be entombed by my books.”
“Deal,” said Sam, beaming at a passing toddler. “I don’t know if we could have afforded the cost of a funeral anyway.”
I tried on a few dresses before I found one that I wanted. I ended up getting a red fox-print dress with matching slippers and a blue ca
rdigan. It did nothing to dispel my librarian image, but since I was going on a date, I wanted to wear something I felt comfortable in.
When I invited Sam into the dressing room, she surveyed me with a look of uncertainty. “Well, if this doesn’t scare him away, then perhaps nothing well.”
“Is it really that bad?” I asked, turning and examining myself approvingly in the mirror.
“It’s not that it’s bad, per se,” she replied. “It’s the inherent schoolmarm-ness of the thing. It’s quintessentially you, is what I’m saying.”
“It’s perfect.” I ushered her out of the room so I could change and make my purchase. As we left Macy’s, I stared sadly down at my bag, wishing I could put it on right then and wear it out of the store. Foxes were some of my favorite animals, and I had long coveted a particular fox-print dress my aunt had linked me in an email, but had never been able to bring myself to spend the money.
I returned home, curled my hair, and changed into my new dress. This done, I stood surveying myself in the mirror with a feeling of satisfaction. Even if Marshall decided I was “nothing more than an old, fussy spinster trapped in the body of a young woman,” as Mom had once called me, at least I would be proud of how I looked tonight.
Jamal texted me at around five to let me know he was closing up the store. (“No robberies and no murders. See, you had nothing to worry about!”). I waited a few minutes before driving over to his house, where I found Sam already waiting, sitting in the kitchen clutching a mug of tea he had brought her from Paris and reading a primer on Foucault.
“Look at you!” she cried, closing the book with a snap when I came in. “When’s he picking you up?”
“He’s meeting me at the shop in a couple hours.” I sat down at the table next to her. “I was thinking about heading over there soon and setting up the table and bookcase, if you want to join me. You know I’m hopeless at following instructions, especially when they’re written in Swedish.”
“But we can’t set it up now; you’re about to go on your date. You don’t want to be all hot and sweaty when he picks you up.” She gave me a scintillating look from behind her mug. “That comes later.”
“Oh, stop!” I said, blushing. “If we end up even having a halfway decent conversation, I’ll be impressed.”
“You sure?” She reached out a hand and stroked my wrist. “No hanky panky?”
I shook my head firmly. “None whatsoever.”
She reached down and opened her purse, flinging a couple condoms across the table. I recoiled in horror as though they were slugs. “I know you don’t like it, but I think you ought to bring along some of these just in case. You don’t want to end up with a surprise baby.”
“No way.” I shoved the condoms back in her direction. In an exaggeratedly prim British accent, I added, “There will be none of that naughty business tonight.”
“Well, he’ll probably be carrying some anyway,” said Sam, returning the condoms to her purse with a defeated look. “Be ready for it.”
“I will be no such thing. You know me: my idea of a romantic evening is sitting on the couch reading a book of hot, steamy poetry.”
“And I am the opposite.” Sam made a salute with her teacup and laughed. “Yes, I’ve had multiple threesomes; ask me anything.”
“I have… so many questions, but I think I’ll table those for another night.” I rose from my chair and motioned for her to follow. “Speaking of chairs, are you ready for this? I really think we can get it done before Marshall shows up.”
***
We spent the next hour struggling to decipher the instructions and nailing the bookshelf together.
“I’ll be honest,” said Sam. “When you told me you wanted to add a reading shelf, I had a hard time imagining you parting with any of your beloved books.”
“I was hoping I could convince other people to contribute theirs, but I’m sure I could find some books of my own that I’ve already read or don’t plan on reading again.” Walking over to the soda fountain, I poured myself some lemonade in a clear plastic cup. “I still have a bunch of books that Mom sent me on the evils of the Catholic Church.”
“You should probably just go ahead and burn those.”
“I just might.” I pulled up Instagram on my phone and began scrolling through pictures of my bookcase. “Here’s a copy of The Dollhouse Murders that I’ll probably never read again… I tried re-reading the My Teacher Is an Alien! series recently, but it hasn’t aged well… I never cared much for The Virgin Suicides; it’s too literary… This is an old copy of Proust, but no one else will ever read it, so I may as well just keep it.”
“What a strange fate,” said Sam, peering over my shoulder. “Imagine becoming famous for writing a book that no one has ever read.”
“Hey, I’ve read it!” I said defensively. When Sam glared at me, I added in a quieter tone, “… parts of it.”
Sam set down the hammer and stretched. “Lori, I realize that you think this is fascinating, but please don’t spend your entire date talking about the books you want to throw out. If you show him your bookstagram even once, I will literally come over there and beat you over the head with a wet fish.”
“You realize when you say that, it just makes me want to give him a tour of my whole bookshelf,” I said in a tone of irritation. “I’m sure there are boys who would find it terribly interesting.”
“Marshall is not one of those boys, sweetie,” said Sam. “You can trust me on this.”
I don’t think she meant to discourage me, but I could feel my stomach tightening into knots at the thought. What if my date didn’t care about the things that I cared about? What if we didn’t have a single thing in common? What if I mentioned my favorite author and he started checking his phone, or, even worse, made fun of me? There were so many things that could go wrong, and one way or another I was bound to end up crying in the bathroom before the end of the night.
Sensing my distress, Sam came over and knelt down beside me. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to worry you. I’m sure he’ll be great and a nerd and super into books and you’ll make passionate love tonight and have a couple of really nerdy kids.”
“You’re not helping, Sam,” I said with a roll of my eyes. A couple of kids was the last thing I wanted, nerdy or not.
“Maybe not, but I think you’re more ready for this than you know. You can’t pretend you’re not even a little excited. Aren’t you looking forward to this? Even a little?”
Slowly and reluctantly, I nodded. “He may have tricked me into going on a date, but he is very attractive. Whatever his other faults might be, I’ll grant him that.”
“See? And isn’t there part of you that’s been wanting to sleep with him?”
“I don’t know about that…” I said quietly, though the sudden flow of blood to my face suggested otherwise. It was bizarre, the amount of attraction you could feel towards someone with whom you had nothing in common. Sometimes, it felt like my whole body was rebelling against me.
“You sure about that?” asked Sam with a shrewd look.
“Not entirely,” I said faintly. “And I hate it because it means there’s a part of me that isn’t governed by intellect or reason… a part of me that’s just pure want and hunger.”
“That just wants to be thrown down on a bed and fucked until you can’t move,” said Sam with a gleam in her eyes.
I resisted the temptation to cover my face in embarrassment. “That’s a bit less delicate than how I would have put it, but yes, essentially. I hate that that part of me exists. I wish I was all book.”
“Well, you’re human, too, and you’ll have to accept that. Sometimes we have longings we don’t know how to deal with and wish we could be rid of. But they’re there, and there’s no use pretending they’re not.”
“I suppose not,” I said sadly, throwing my hammer down in disgust. “I just wish there was a way of boxing off those icky parts of ourselves, those animal parts, and never having to look at them or think ab
out them. But then, they have a way of surfacing when it’s least convenient.”
“Well, anyway,” said Sam, rising slowly to her feet, “you won’t have to think about it again for another couple hours at least. It looks like Marshall just pulled into the parking lot.”
Chapter Fifteen
Marshall
Lori had just texted me to say she was on her way out. I sat in the car for a moment in the fading twilight with a tumultuous feeling like the inside of my stomach was in complete disarray. I had never been much of a prayer, but it was tempting to pray now.
Soon, the front door opened, and Lori came walking out. She was turned around, still talking to her sister. She looked positively radiant in a red fox-print dress that fell just over her ankles and a blue cardigan. I was reminded irresistibly of the women in those period dramas set in World War II that my mom was always watching who somehow found time to solve mysteries between hours at the munitions factory.
I was fumbling with my iPod when she opened the door and climbed in. “This may surprise you,” I said, “but I have no idea what kind of music you like. What are you in the mood for? Ella Fitzgerald? Stevie Ray Vaughan?”
Lori peered over my shoulder in surprise. “You have both of those on your iPod?”
“That and a lot more. My tastes have always been sort of—what’s the word? Electric?”
“Eclectic?” she suggested.
“That works, too. My brothers have a lot of fun trying to figure me out. ‘Why is he listening to Bon Iver and Kanye?’ ‘Why does he have an entire album of early twentieth-century blues?’”
“I’m gonna have to have a look at this playlist,” said Lori, sounding impressed. I handed it to her, and she scrolled for a moment in silence as we left the parking lot. It occurred to me that I didn’t yet know where we were going to eat.