by Jana Casale
They stopped at a bookstore, and she bought The Possibility of an Island. It ended up horizontal in her bookshelf over the Noam Chomsky, but she did read it.
They walked back to his apartment, and she skipped a little. There was the sound of passing cars on the busy road silencing into the quiet of his road as they turned the familiar corner. There was a fence post they passed, the white of the paint chipped and blurring as they walked. He lifted her over a puddle. She laughed and looked back at everything behind them growing farther and farther away as she tried to balance herself over his shoulder.
They had sleepy sex when they got home, and the room was hot and dusty. Afterward she held her legs up in the air.
“I hate my legs,” she said.
“I don’t,” he said.
She went to turn on his fan. The floor, the pine boards so emblematic of the room and the blue of the walls. Her hand pressed up on the windowsill and the cool air of the window fan as she turned it on.
She lay down back beside him with her face on his chest.
“I just wish it could be like this forever,” she said.
“I think it can be,” he said.
“You think it can be this good forever?”
“Yes,” he said.
“But how?”
And John said something back, but she couldn’t hear him over the fan.
CHAPTER 21
Christmas
“When I was a little girl I was obsessed with how Jim Henson died. My mom told me he died of pneumonia and it always scared me because she’d say that he died ’cause he didn’t take care of himself. She told me that that’s why you should always take care of yourself and it scared me ’cause…I don’t know. Maybe then I realized you could die from something without even knowing that you could. Like if you didn’t watch out you could just die just like that without even knowing,” Leda said. She took a deep breath into the phone and could hear her own breath for a second, sounding distantly not her own.
“I thought he died of strep throat,” John said. “My mom told me the same thing, but she said that it was strep throat. I was terrified too. Every time I’d get sick I’d think of it.”
“Really? I always thought it was pneumonia. How weird that we both had the same random experience. What are the odds of that?”
“It really is strange.”
“I have this memory of myself sitting on the washing machine in the basement and listening to my mom tell me about it.”
“I don’t remember when they told me, but I remember my dad saying that sometimes artists live in their own heads and are so preoccupied with their work that they don’t take care of themselves enough,” he said.
Leda was quiet for a moment. She was lying in her old bed at her parents’ house. Her feet were balanced on the head of her childhood bear, who sat proudly pressed up against her bed frame. “Do you remember the song ‘It’s Not Easy Being Green’?”
“I do.”
“I loved it. Even as a kid I think I had some sort of connection to it.” She rolled to her side and looked up at the window. It was gray out in the bleak way winter always seemed to be. “There was this episode of Sesame Street where this lady came on, and she sang it. Do you remember that?”
“I only remember the Kermit version.”
“This was some famous singer. She made it so much sadder.” Leda thought about that woman and her face, but she could only remember her red lipstick and her hair. “I should try to find a video of it. I bet there’s something online.”
“Yeah, probably.”
“Do you think we love each other ’cause we’re both afraid of the way Jim Henson died?” Leda asked him.
“I think it’s possible. Then again, maybe everyone has heard some version about Jim Henson dying, and we’re all scared.”
Leda considered this for a moment. She kicked the bear up into her reach and held it. Its black eye was worn at the center. She touched the coarseness of the scratched plastic and tried to remember how it got like that.
“No, I think it’s just us…I should go to bed. It’s really late. Merry Christmas, John.”
“Merry Christmas, Leda.”
John graduated that spring. His parents invited her to a celebratory dinner at a fancy restaurant. She wore a dress that was more see-through than she realized. It wasn’t until she got there and went to the bathroom that it became apparent that her bright purple underwear and gold lace bra were showing through. She could even make out her belly button, which looked squished in the fluorescent light of the restaurant bathroom. I look like a crazy lunatic. And my belly button is disgusting, she thought, and felt extremely self-conscious for the rest of the night. His mother was a thin, unforgiving woman and Leda knew it would be unlikely she wouldn’t notice. At dinner she said something like, “It’s no wonder that John likes you so much,” which Leda couldn’t help but assume was in direct reference to her dress and squished belly button.
That summer John got an internship in web development at an ad agency that wasn’t far from her apartment. Leda would meet him on his lunch break. They’d walk together to a small sandwich shop or to the pizza place and then sometimes to the café afterward for coffee. One Thursday they found a journal on the side of the road. From reading the first few pages they decided that the person was female, went to college, and worked as a barista at Starbucks. Many of the entries were devoted to her crush on a fellow barista named Chazz. From what Leda could tell Chazz was aloof and unresponsive to many of the girl’s flirtations, which included spilling straws in front of him so they’d have to pick them up together and asking if he could see her bra strap through her shirt, to which he responded, “No.”
A few pages of the journal were devoted to future wedding plans. The girl was a decent artist and drew beautifully detailed pictures of floral arrangements. Leda especially liked one centerpiece of sunflowers and snapdragons.
The last entry was dated on Thanksgiving. Leda read it out loud to John as they walked back to his internship.
“Listen to this: ‘I’ve met someone. His name is Ori and he’s super cute! He has red hair and dimples. I never thought I’d really want to date a guy with red hair, but here I am dating Ori. We went on our first date last Friday, and I’ve heard from him every day since. It’s so weird to hear from a guy every day like this. With Ronnie I’d only hear from him like the hour before the date. This is so much better! I have to say though—and this is the part that bothers me—I was really bored on the date. It’s not so much that Ori is boring or anything. In fact he’s really funny, but it’s just that I always get bored with every guy. I got bored with Ted, and Ronnie, and now Ori. I’m starting to think there’s something wrong with me. I like him a lot, but I just found myself daydreaming and kind of wishing I was home. It’s like I know I’d be having more fun on the couch in my pajamas watching Desperate Housewives. I want to be with him, and I can’t wait to see him again, but I just feel like I know I’ll be bored and feel alone. Is this my life? To die alone, is that my destiny?’ And that’s the last entry.”
“Wow, she has problems.”
“I don’t know—” Leda flipped back to the sunflower and snapdragon page. “I think she’s just thinking too hard.”
That fall Leda decided to apply to MFA programs for creative writing. When she told John he said: “I think that’ll be perfect for you.”
She only applied to schools in Boston so that she could stay close to him, and she filed her last application wearing a bathrobe. She and John had sex that Saturday morning and that Sunday she bought a pair of boots that she’d later return because the toe box pinched her toes. The lady at the store asked:
“So why are you returning these?”
And Leda said: “They’re too tight on my toes.”
The lady at the store said: “Show me where.”
Leda pointed
to the spot where they were tight on her toes.
“That’s just the toe box. I can fix that,” the lady said, and took the boots to the back of the store. She came back seconds later and said, “Try them now.”
Leda tried them, but they were still too tight.
“Well, have you tried wearing them around the house to stretch them?” the lady said.
“Yes,” Leda said.
“Here, let me try it one more time.” And the lady disappeared to the back of the store again. Eventually, after two more attempts at taking them to the back of the store, the lady gave up and Leda returned the boots, but the return didn’t go through and she had to have a lengthy battle of calling the store and then the credit card company and eventually she got it straightened out over three months’ time. The week after she finally was refunded for the boots she got an acceptance letter to the program she wanted to get into most, and she cried out of utter elation.
“Leda, I have to tell you something.”
John called her early that morning. She’d been woken up by her phone going off over and over again on her nightstand. At first she thought that he was talking about this fight he’d had with his mother the day before.
“What happened?” she said.
“Google wants to hire me.”
“What? What are you talking about?” Suddenly the vision of his mother and the fight all fell away. It became starkly morning, dusty and bright.
“I applied to this job like two months ago, and I thought there was no way in hell I’d hear anything back, but then this morning I got this e-mail from their recruiter saying they want me to do a phone interview.”
“Are you serious? That’s incredible!” she said.
“The only thing is, the job is in California.”
“California?” She could hear her voice on the word, but the sound was like a spark, her life sizzling away at the ignition. She could see John then in her arms little and pocket-sized with blond hair. Disappearing into the C, rolling away at the i and the a. “Are you gonna go to California?” she asked.
“I can’t go without you,” he said. “Would you go with me?”
“Like, live with you in California?”
“Yes.”
“What about grad school? And my mom?”
“I don’t want you to give up grad school, but this is such a huge opportunity for us. I mean, if I got this job, my career would be set. We wouldn’t have to stay long, just a year, maybe less than a year, and then move back here. Just to get it on my résumé. Could you defer your acceptance?”
“No, they don’t allow it.” Leda sat up in bed. It didn’t seem right to be lying down for this conversation anymore. “What would I do out there?”
“You can write. I’ll be making enough money to support us.”
She imagined herself sitting at a desk and typing away as John walked around with a briefcase and maybe a pipe.
“Well, when is the interview?”
“It’s tomorrow. If it goes well, they’ll fly me out for an in-person. Look, we don’t have to decide anything right now. I just found out and was excited and wanted to tell you. There’s still a really good chance that I won’t get it.”
“I want you to get it, John.”
“Yes, but I’m not going without you. I just want you to know that.”
Leda leaned back in her bed. She could feel the bed frame pressed against her. It hurt her shoulder blades, but she was too distracted to really care. He wants me to move in with him. And it feels like dying, she thought. “Where in California?”
“San Francisco,” he said.
The next day Leda went to a coffee shop at the same time as John had his phone interview. She sat by the door and watched different people shuffle in and out as she drank a flavored latte that she had mistakenly ordered. She’d meant to just order a regular latte, but the girl at the counter had misheard her. A cute guy came in holding a newspaper. His hair was black and curly and he had just enough facial hair to be attractive. She watched him in the sort of bemused, distant way she often did when she saw attractive guys now that she was with John.
“I can’t believe you’re even considering not going. Your boyfriend wants you to move in with him. He wants to take you to California. CALIFORNIA!!!!!” Anne texted.
Leda looked at the text for a while. She tried to think of what to say back, but it was hard. She started typing “What about my mom?” and then “What about grad school?”
The boy with the facial hair and newspaper was staring at her. She smiled, sort of, to be polite, but then looked back at her phone. She checked her e-mail: “Neiman Marcus Style Guide” and “Save the Whales” and then “The Republicans Are Trying to Ban Abortions.” She tapped the abortion e-mail.
Leda,
Republican lawmakers are trying to ban abortion after 20 weeks—
“Is this seat taken?”
She looked up from her abortion e-mail. The newspaper-facial-hair-guy, she thought, but it wasn’t the newspaper-facial-hair-guy. It was a frumpy-looking man with disheveled hair. He had on a sweat suit and was holding a briefcase that was held closed with a bungee cord.
“Umm, I was just leaving, so actually you can have the whole table.” Leda felt sorry to dash the man’s hopes like that, but she’d learned over the years that being polite toward the disgusting men, who probably would have never begun to consider hitting on someone who was as disgusting as they were, wasn’t some duty she was required to perform. For very long she’d tried to be polite whenever one of them would approach her. She’d assumed that they were lonely or sad, and that she could at the very least converse with them for a second, but over time she realized there was something universal in the pursuits of all men. That whether it be a handsome, misogynistic jock who thought he was a smooth talker, or a smelly man with a bungee briefcase, they all just wanted from her.
“But wait—” the bungee man said. “I want to tell you something.”
Leda stood up and started to head for the door. Suddenly the man reached out and grabbed her arm.
“I just want to tell you something,” he said.
A fear swelled up in her like a burning. She could feel it in her ears. A ping. His hand was tight on her elbow. It was dirty and his fingernails were black with grime.
“I just want to tell you something,” he said again.
Leda yanked back hard and managed to pull her arm loose without much trouble. He reached for her again, but she stepped back. She wanted to scream at him. She wanted to say: “Fuck you! Don’t fucking touch me, ever!” But instead she didn’t make eye contact and leapt for the door.
When she got home she entered her building through the basement so she could throw her coat in the wash, and as she leaned over the machine to turn the dial to the hottest cycle she whispered, “Don’t ever touch me,” quiet enough so no one could hear.
John flew out to California that Monday for the in-person interview. He called in the morning when he got there, and his voice sounded shaky and nervous.
“This is crazy, isn’t it?” he asked her.
“No,” she said, “this is a great opportunity,” but her voice broke on “tunity,” and so she figured she was probably little comfort to him.
After she got off the phone, she ate a bowl of cereal but didn’t realize until she’d nearly finished that the milk had started to clump. She dumped the rest down the sink before discovering that her disposal had broken so she had to scoop up the bits of cereal and milk chunks with a paper towel. The rest of the day she waited to hear from John. Her afternoon class had been canceled, and she didn’t feel like going out. She watched a terrible Lifetime movie about a woman who had been beaten and raped and then got pregnant by her rapist. It was called What She Does. After that, she tried to read Proust, but she only managed a few pages. She ate chocolate. She burned
reheated mac and cheese. At three John called and told her the interview had gone really well and that he’d hear back in the next couple of days.
“That’s fantastic!” she said, and even though she meant it, she felt so dizzy as she said it. She took a bath but was too restless to relax. I can’t do this, she thought. The next hour and a half she spent cleaning out her refrigerator, and as the sun started to set, her apartment dimming in the way it had so many evenings before, she suddenly had a whim to listen to the version of “It’s Not Easy Being Green” she remembered from childhood. She looked for it for nearly an hour, but no matter what she Googled and how she worded it, she couldn’t find the version she was thinking of. She’d close her eyes and see that woman singing with such sadness and red lipstick, but she could never find it. Eventually she found a cover by Andrew Bird that she settled on, and she listened to it on repeat a dozen times. And I think it’s beautiful, and besides, that’s all I want to be. After the twelfth time she heard it, she stood on her bed and sang it out loud, certainly loud enough for her neighbors to hear, although she didn’t worry that they might be bothered. She said, “green.” She said, “green.” She said, “green.” “Important like a river,” she said. “Why wonder?” she said. That was the last time she’d ever listen to the song. Later in life she’d hear it from the kitchen, muffled by the sound of the microwave, but that would be it. She wouldn’t remember the moment either, standing on her bed, or how loud she was. She’d never say those words again. She’d never wonder why. At 8:37 she texted John: “I’ll go to California with you.”
PART 3
CHAPTER 22
San Francisco
Leda graduated on a Tuesday, and the Thursday after, she was deciding which underwear to take with her to California. It wasn’t until then that she realized just how many unattractive pairs of underwear she had. Most of them she wouldn’t have dreamed of wearing in front of John, but now that she was moving in with him, it dawned on her that he would be seeing all of her underwear, the big ones, the torn ones, the period-stained ones. It also became obvious that she really didn’t own that many pairs of sexy underwear. Sure, she had her date-night lace ones that were overpriced and caused yeast infections, and her cute girly cotton ones with little floral designs or sassy taglines written across the butt like “Foxy” or “Night In” and her favorite, which said “Genius.”