by Shayne Ford
“I hadn’t thought otherwise until he pointed it out to me the other day.”
“In what context?”
I sense the warmth of a blush creeping over my face.
I evade her eyes, perfectly aware that she could quickly pick up on my dishonesty.
“I worked late that night and fell asleep in my office. He found me there in the morning, all frazzled, in the aftermath of a nightmare,” I say without looking at her.
“Can you describe it for me?”
My eyes flick up to her.
“Um...”
She smiles reassuringly.
“You tell me whatever you are comfortable to share with me,” she says.
I appreciate the leeway.
“Yes...” I mutter, my mind flipping words.
“The nightmare,” she helps.
“Yes, the nightmare,” I murmur.
The truth is there were no dreams that night. No drowning nightmare. Not that night anyway.
I sift through my memory. A few nights before, the day I had lunch with Anna, I had a dream, but that’s not something I can share with her.
“I don’t remember,” I say, my lie so evident.
“No problem,” she says. “Tell me about your conversation with Allan.”
I relay everything that happened that morning, my mind playing the dream I couldn’t talk about in the background as if it got stuck at the forefront of my memory.
I saw that man in my dream.
I don’t know why, but more importantly, I don’t know how, my mind could draw such an intimate composite of his face, but it did.
I saw him as if he was real.
He was standing only a few feet away from me. And in my mind, everything made sense. Me observing him from such a short distance. The mysterious smile draped over his dark-green eyes. The magnetism oozing from his beautiful features. The perfect mix of charming and masculine.
His smile broadened as he locked eyes with mine, and I all but melted. I was so flattered by the attention that he had given me.
I grinned back at him, and that’s when I felt an invisible force pulling me away from him, violently sinking me into a block of water.
Abruptly, I stop talking about Allan as I relieve the powerful sensation spurred by the memory of my dream.
“Are you okay?”
I turn a blank stare to Lara.
“Yes,” I mutter, my train of thought completely shattered.
“He said he thought that he wasn’t enough for you…” she says, helping me to regain my focus.
I take a deep breath.
“Yes, he said that, and I told him that it was not true.”
“Are you happy with him?”
“Yes. Yes, I am.”
“What do you think it makes him feel that way?” she asks, nudging me to find my own answers.
I muse for a moment.
“I’m not there for him... Not in the way he wants me to be.”
I lift my gaze.
“I think that’s what it is. I shy away from the traditional role of a wife,” I say. “He probably thinks I’m self-centered, but I don’t think I am, at least not more than the average person.”
I pause again.
“He accused me. He said that I live too much in my head.”
“Is that true?”
I nod.
“Yes, it is.”
“Are you writing a book?”
I laugh softly.
“I’m nowhere close to writing a book. I edit books, which is not the same thing. It’s not my world I’m getting into. It’s other people’s worlds.”
She tosses me a questioning look.
“Fictional world, I mean.”
She nods and looks down at her notes for a moment.
“About this fictional worlds... What do you think about them?”
She smiles.
I breathe out a small puff.
“I love them,” I say.
“That’s what Allan has accused you for?”
“Pretty much.”
“Do you have one of your own?”
I stretch a melancholic grin.
“Mmm-hmmm. I think so... I’ve always had it.”
“Why do you need one?”
Her question takes me by surprise.
“It’s easier that way.”
“To cope with reality?”
I smile. And tilt my chin down.
“Yes.”
“How?”
“It feeds my imagination. It’s satisfying.”
“In what way?”
I shrug.
“I can’t say exactly.”
“Why does it need to be fed?”
I look at her intrigued while trying to come up with an answer.
“It’s always been like that.”
She looks at me in silence, waiting for me to continue.
“Since I was a little girl, I’ve absorbed the world differently than anyone I’d known. My senses have always been bombarded by the bits of information in ways unfamiliar to other people. And I’ve always perceived everything with heightened intensity. In time, it affected the way I felt about things, the reality always falling short, not measuring up to my imagination, so I created these worlds in which I placed the pieces of the puzzle whichever way I wanted or made sense to me. When I don’t do that, my brain switches to reality mode, and turns into chaos .”
“Give me an example.”
“I usually think about a million things a second.”
“Even now?”
I smile.
“Yes. Even now.”
“Can you be more specific?”
I tip my chin down, nodding again.
“I’m thinking about the answers you expect from me, the conversation I’ve had with Allan, the book I was reading this morning, and the fact that your blouse print has pink parrots hidden between the tree branches heavy with flowers.
Smiling, she looks down.
“Are there parrots on my blouse?”
I start laughing.
“Yes, there are. You can only see their heads, and their beaded eyes as they’re peeking from behind the flowers.”
She looks at me, bewildered.
And then she peels her jacket off and studies the print of her blouse.
“Yes, there are. I can’t believe I’ve never noticed,” she says, only half smiling.
“What else have you noticed?” she asks, raising her gaze.
“The armchairs upholstery seems newer than the sofa which makes me believe you recently replaced them or added them at a later date.”
“That’s true. I just bought them.”
“You must’ve made quite an effort to match the color of your shoes to your outfit, but picked them a shade off, the difference hardly noticeable to the average eye.”
Her mouth pulls open.
“Okay...”
“These are only a few things that I’ve noticed without putting too much effort in it. That’s the way I process sounds as well. My mind always looks for things that match and also for discrepancies as it connects the dots, and comes up with stories, meanings, and explanations.”
“You should write a book.”
A small smile tickles my lips.
“That’s what Anna said to me.”
“Okay, then,” she says, sucking in a short breath while trying to reclaim her focus. “I don’t blame you for spending so much time in your head. It must be interesting, to say the least,” she adds, slight humor threading through her voice.
“I guess... But it can be exhausting.”
“And sometimes it can ruin your relationship with someone else,” she says.
“That too.”
Her smile withers away.
“Your heightened perception comes with a lot of benefits, but also with drawbacks. Medication can surely lessen that intensity with which you sense everything, but that’s not something that I think you want or I would actually recommend.”
“No. I don’
t want it.”
She looks down for a few moments, gathering her thoughts.
“What steps do you take to function properly in the real world?”
“I try to ignore the sensorial input, but it’s not working all the time. That’s exactly what I’d done before you asked me if I noticed anything off in this room. It’s not that I no longer register these things. It’s just that I push them to the side and try not to focus on them.”
“How does it feel when you do that?”
“I’m okay for a short period of time, but I get extremely agitated if I have to repress it for too long.”
“You apply the same principle when it comes to relationships?”
“More or less.”
“That’s why you prefer to spend time on your own in your office even after you have intimate contact with your husband.
Silently, I flick my chin in agreement.
“How do you perceive Allan?” she asks after a few moments.
“Perfect. He’s perfect.”
“But not enough.”
“Those are his words, or rather how he feels about it. He’s everything a woman would want in a man. He’s smart, loyal, and wise. He’s caring and supporting. In many regards, I don’t deserve him.”
She raises her hand, stopping me right there.
“Let’s go back for a moment. Deserving something or someone is a self-limiting concept. Your judgment call has no basis. There is nothing inherently wrong with you.”
I tip my gaze down, a few moments of silence slipping by.
“I want him to be happy,” I say, feeling the sting of tears in my eyes.
She stays quiet. I eventually lift my gaze but avoid her eyes.
“What happens when you are with him?”
“Everything slows down in my head. It also gets grayer.”
“Can you be more specific on what ‘grayer’ means?”
“Um... I don’t feel much. I guess it has to do with my emotions.”
“You don’t feel much??”
“Yes.”
“And you try to adjust?”
“Yes. Something like that.”
“And then?”
“I overcompensate by spending hours and hours on my own. Sometimes, I can’t sleep. Then I try to read something if I can, or simply watch the people walking by. That’s when I have the hardest time to sit down and work.”
“Do you ever fight with him?”
I shake my head.
“Never. He grew up in a family that never argued over issues. Every matter was discussed in a civil manner. Sometimes we disagree about things, but we never engage in a power struggle.”
“Do you like that about him?”
“I do,” I say, sincerely.
She lowers her gaze and reads her notes again.
“You said at one point while you were referring to him that he was perfect, but possibly not for you. What would make him perfect for you, in your opinion?”
I muse over her question.
“Being more like me.”
“Why is that important to you?” she asks.
A small smile clings to my lips.
“Because I’m lonely.”
“I like this dress,” Viola says, grabbing the bowl of fruit from the table.
I glance at her over my shoulder as she slides into a chair.
“Do you think it looks better on me?” I ask.
Chewing on a slice of apple, she nods a couple of times.
“Mmm-hmm. The other one made you look too pale.”
I swivel my head to the mirror and study my reflection.
“As if this one is better.”
“It is. With red lipstick.”
I run my gaze down on me, taking in my fitted, black dress. It fashions a cut-out cleavage, and a wide band that goes around my neck resembling a chocker. An eye-catching rhinestone buckle adorns the front.
I spin on my heel.
“You really think so?” I ask.
“Mmm-hmm.”
My gaze dips to her mouth and then her outfit. A nude gloss coats her lips, a slim fit pantsuit emphasizing her silhouette.
“Why can’t I wear what you do?” I ask, running my gaze on her attire.
“Because it doesn’t fit your style.”
A chuckle rushes to my lips.
“My style? What are you talking about?”
She laughs as well.
“Exactly.”
“Are you making fun of me?”
She smiles playfully, the same way she used to do when we were kids. It was usually when she hid something from me, a toy, a book, and later on my phone so that I couldn’t talk to my then boyfriend.
“Are you insinuating that I don’t have a style?” I ask.
Her smile begins to fade away.
“No, no. You do...” she says seriously. “You’re more like a femme fatale lately.”
“As oppose to?”
She grins again.
“The way you used to be,” she says, giving me the runaround.
I look at her intrigued.
“The preppy wife. The suburban wife,” she says.
I clasp my hips with my hands, my chin tipping down.
“What do you mean?”
“Pastel, floral prints, cozy fabrics, flattering cuts, and not much else.”
Shaking my head, I shoot her a questioning look.
“Not much else what?”
She shrugs, her eyebrows lifting as her hand flicks in the air.
“I don’t know... You never tried to look too hot. You’ve always tried to tone down your looks.”
“You mean, I didn’t dress like a slut.”
Her crystalline laugh bounces around my bedroom.
“Am I dressed like one now?” I ask, briefly looking down on me.
“I didn’t say that. But this dress says a lot more about you.”
She tips her chin in my direction, and I slant my gaze down again.
“What does it say?”
I flick my eyes up.
“You make yourself available for, um... I don’t know. Something?”
“Like what?”
“I have no idea, but I’ve never seen you dressed like that.”
“It’s an art exhibition where lots of people come, and I want to fit in. Besides, I’m not a suburban wife. I live in the center of the city.”
“And you figured that one out only now?”
“Haha. Not funny.”
Her lips curve into a small smile.
“You’ve changed, sis.”
“I can say the same thing about you,” I mutter, tossing her a side glance.
She picks another slice of apple from the plate, her eyes roaming over my body.
“When I dress like that I’m usually looking for a man,” she says, chewing on the apple.
“A man? I’m not looking for a man. I have a husband.”
She lifts her gaze and dips it in my eyes and for a moment we both go quiet.
“Are things okay with you too?” she asks.
I tear my gaze away from her and spin back to the mirror. With one hand, I snatch the red lipstick from my purse.
“Yes. Why are you asking?”
Our eyes connect in the mirror.
“Mom told me that you went to see Lara.”
I muse for a moment.
“It wasn’t because of him,” I say. “I mean...”
I pause to apply the second coating of lipstick before I cap the tube and drop it into my purse.
“There were things I wanted to find out for myself,” I say.
She doesn’t say a word, which is unusual for her.
“We had an argument,” I finally say.
A questioning look rolls over her face.
“It was more like a talk, and I decided to go see Dr. Lara Jimenez.”
She stays silent.
“It wasn’t about us. It’s the same old story about me being disconnected, and basically, not having my shit to
gether,” I say, a trace of self-deprecating humor threading through my voice.
“Has she clarified the things for you?”
“Uh-huh.”
I put my coat on.
“She confirmed to me what I’ve known for a long time. It’s not him. It’s me.”
8
TESS
The cab drops us in front of the art gallery at 7 PM sharp. The street is busy, the cars pulling in and out.
A foggy, chilly evening drapes the sidewalks, and yet it can’t damp the people’s mood.
We slice our way through groups of men and women, meeting a few friends along the way.
The gallery displays a tasteful mix of beautiful art pieces. Paintings hang on the walls in the main room, the adjacent chambers hosting several sculptures.
The place brims with guests. Servers make the rounds, offering delicious bite-size appetizers and glasses of champagne to the visitors.
Viola and I drop our coats at a booth not far from the entrance and start mingling with the people.
“Mmmm... This looks interesting,” she says as we stop in front of an oil on canvas triptych.
Soon, people surround us, commenting as well. I tear away from my sister and walk into a different room.
The atmosphere is different in this chamber, and so seems to be the art. The place is quieter, the lights are dim, and the mood is darker than in the main room.
Also, there are fewer people.
A couple expresses opinions not far from me. Taking small sips of champagne, I slowly shift my eyes from one piece of art to the other. All masterfully done, the paintings and the drawings, earn my attention.
The theme is no longer abstract but somewhat realistic. Tones of gray, black and ivory replace the vivacious colors of the artwork displayed in the main room.
A woman’s nude catches my eye, her face out of the frame. Tastefully executed, the painting captures her beauty, sensuality oozing from her pores. An air of mystery surrounds her.
It’s easy to see the love of the artist for his model in the way he laid down the color.
A male voice resonates behind me.
“So… Do you like it?”
Startled, I swing my gaze to the side. A man stands next to me, his eyes trained on the painting as well.
For a moment, I study his profile and his good looks.
His brown hair rolls in soft waves, almost touching his shoulders. A slight stubble casts a shadow on his jawline.
He senses my stare and tosses me a side glance as well, smiling at me.