Nights Like This

by Divya Sood

  When I arrived at the park, I walked slowly down the stairs towards the fountain. I did not want Vanessa to be watching me without my knowledge. I didn’t want her to realize how eager I was to see her again. The few short meetings between us had blurred in my mind. Even the humiliation of having called her and having had to remind her who I was had faded with the time that had passed. All I wanted was to see her again, to hear her sharp words, to wait for the moments when her tenderness spilled from her.

  She wasn’t at the park when I got there. I sat on the damp rim of the fountain and looked towards the beginning of Poet’s Walk. I remembered walks I had taken on that path, wondering about the whispering of statues that looked at me, believing that I was somehow destined to be a writer. I would rise to fame over words I had written longhand in obscure and not so obscure coffee shops, pages marked with dots and splashes of lattes and espressos. I wondered why I was thinking back to past failures, why I hadn’t opened a book to study all summer, why I was so lethargic as I followed the chosen steps of my life. But then I remembered why I didn’t write and how I detested the MCATs and everything fell into place as to why I was where I was.

  I noticed her when she was more than halfway down the stairs, her hair moving with her motions, her body soft and beautiful with the light of afternoon sun. When she reached me, she touched my face with the back of her hand, her knuckles grazing my jaw.

  “Hey, princess,” she said, “Waiting for me?”

  I looked up at her and wondered what she had been doing since I saw her last. Whom had she seen? Had she slept with anyone? Had she come to our fountain in Central Park? My mind raced as she took a seat next to me.

  “What have you been up to?” I asked.

  “Nothing,” she said.

  “How’s your writing coming along?” I asked.

  I don’t know what made me think of her writing but it came to me and I wanted to know if she had been writing anything, had been creative while my pages had stayed clean and unstained and cold.

  “Why would you ask me that?” she asked.

  “I don’t know, I just thought of it. Truth is, I want to write again and I can’t. I hate the idea of med school. I hate my job. I wish I could just write and be good at it and keep doing it.”

  I don’t think I admitted my truths at that moment because I was talking to Vanessa. I was at a loss to myself in regards to why the choices I had made so determinately were now falling short of all satisfaction. There was an all-consuming numbness that I wanted to shake from my body but it seemed that it was seeping deeper into everything that I did.

  Vanessa touched my hand as if to wake me from my thoughts.

  “Baby, you can’t write.”

  I looked at her. I was confused by what she was saying and more so by why she was saying it.

  “I bet even when you used to write, you wrote shit.”

  “What the fuck?”

  “I’m just saying, you’re not honest about anything to anyone. And I just don’t see you writing anything that touches you or anyone else.”

  “No, I never wrote sappy shit if that’s what you mean.”

  “No, Jess, we write as we love and I think you’re probably shitty at both.”

  “You know Vanessa, if I’m so fucking bad, why the hell did you call me?”

  I was on my feet, ready to leave when she took my hand and held it tightly.

  “Listen to me. Come away with me. Come with me and let me show you why you can’t write. Let me show you how to write. Let me show you how to love.”

  “There’s no fucking way,” I said as I thought of Anjali coming home to an empty apartment while I was gallivanting with Vanessa. I couldn’t do that to Anjali.

  “I want to show you how to write. I want to show you how to love. That’s all. It’ll be a fun ten days.”

  “I don’t get you,” I said, “I don’t get you. One day you want to show me how to love and another day you don’t remember me from the night before.”

  I started to cry. It all came crashing down on me—the anticipation I had felt while I waited for her, the fear I felt at loving her, the jealousy that there was someone else in her five-story walk up screaming her name—most of all, I cried for the confusion inside me whenever I saw her. I had never wanted anyone more sincerely in my life and I could not answer why. I just knew that I was meant to love this woman.

  I waited for her response. She ignored the fact that I had tears everywhere. I tried to wipe them away with my palms and felt foolish. She turned and faced me, pushed my hair behind my ears, looked in my eyes and narrowed her gaze.

  “Because you know what the hell you want? Because you’re so clear on what you do and why you do it? Shit, I like you. I really like you. But it doesn’t mean that everything in my life that was fucked up before you decided to vanish the day I met you. It doesn’t mean I trust you. It doesn’t mean shit except that I like you. I don’t even think you know what the fuck you feel about me.”

  “I do know I love you.”

  “You love me?”

  I stared at my feet. She held my face in her hands.

  “Come with me,” she said softly as if asking me to trust her.

  “I can’t,” I said. “I just can’t.”

  “Because you’re scared of your sugar mommy?”

  “I’m not scared of her. I love her.”

  “Then why the fuck are you here?”

  “Because I wanted to see you.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know,” I said.

  “Just come with me. We don’t have to fuck or even touch. I’ll even get us separate beds if you want.”

  If that were the case, maybe I could go away with Vanessa. I mean it was a platonic getaway. Who could grudge me that? Although if Anjali had ever even suggested going away with Ish I knew I would have gone crazy. But this was different, I assured myself. This was different.

  “Where?” I finally asked.

  “Just trust me on this. Come with me.”

  “Where the fuck to?”

  “Wherever. Just trust me and come away for ten days.”

  “What the hell am I going to do with you for ten days? I like you, I do. I say I love you and you don’t even respond to me. But you’re asking me to just go somewhere and even you don’t know where that is. Like I said, what the hell am I going to do for ten days?”

  She traced my lips with her fingers.

  “You’re not in love yet. You don’t know what love is. You’re going to fall in love with me. You’re going to abandon this city and learn what you want. You’re going to figure out who Jess is. What do you have to lose?”

  “What if I don’t want to fall in love with you? I don’t want to fall in love. I’m already in love. And what I have to lose is my girl. I’m not willing to lose her.”

  “Okay, don’t fall in love although two minutes ago you said you loved me. I’ll pretend to ignore that. I think you are completely fucked up at the moment but that’s okay too. We will fix all that. And as far as your girl, why would you lose her if we’re just two friends going on a road trip? I mean hell I’ll meet her if you want.”

  “My job,” I said.

  “I haven’t heard you say you’ve gone to work a day since I met you.”

  “What happened to keeping it at lays?”

  Vanessa laughed.

  “Oh, because that’s working out so well.”

  She was right. We were far beyond the deception of lays and entering the confused territory of “what is this, anyway?”

  “How the hell am I going to have the money to go?” I asked.

  “You have a rich bitch in love with you. Ask her for it. She’ll give it to you.”

  “Please don’t call her a ‘bitch,’” I said.

  Vanessa squeezed my hand.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “All I’m saying is ask her for the money.”

  I was uncomfortable with that suggestion. I also knew that, contrary to what I sa
id, I wanted to spend ten days with Vanessa, away from her life and mine. But lying to Anjali? Asking for money to go away with another woman? It seemed all sorts of wrong.

  “What does she do anyway?”

  “She’s a dermatologist. She owns her own practice.”

  “Shit, she could give you as much as you ask for and not miss it.”

  This was true. Anjali had more money than she knew what to do with. I had none. Even the little I made at work was spent without my knowing. Ever since I had moved in with Anjali, I had never thought about money as something I had or didn’t. Anjali always had money for me. But this time, it seemed like I couldn’t justify asking her.

  “What do you say?”

  “I want to quit my sorry ass job,” I said. “I want to quit and run away.”

  “So run away with me. Just ten days. It’ll change your life. I promise.”

  But how could I justify asking Anjali for money? Vanessa’s suggestion about the platonic friends dialogue wouldn’t ever be enough for Anjali to understand.

  “I can’t tell her you’re going with me. She would never understand, even if it were platonic. She would never believe it was platonic. I’d have to lie to her.”

  “All I’m asking is for ten days. After that if you never want to meet me again, even that’s okay. I just want a chance with you. To get to know you, and you to know me. And how far we go, what we do will be all up to you. I promise.”

  I sat there dumbfounded. I tried to think of Anjali the whole time but sometimes the heart wants what the heart wants and at that moment my heart wanted Vanessa. The problem with her platonic scheme was that I didn’t have it in me to resist her, to not touch her. And I had promised Anjali my whole being. But if I was strong and could just be good, what was wrong with going away for ten days? I deserved my escape too.

  “I’ll come with you,” I said.

  “We’re going to have a great time.”

  “Are you going to remember me when I call you?”

  Vanessa stepped closer to me and put her arms around my neck. She leaned in to kiss me and I pushed her away.

  “This is the shit I’m talking about,” I said. “I can’t and I won’t do this. I can’t. I promised.”

  “I want to touch you everywhere,” she said.

  “Are you listening to me?” I asked.

  “Yes I am. You made a promise. But I didn’t, princess. You can’t blame me for trying.”

  “If this is what ten days with you will be about, I…”

  She put a finger to my lips.

  “Okay, I won’t. Let’s talk about something else.”

  We were silent for a long while.

  “I want to read your writing,” I said mostly because I wanted to break the silence. But once I said it, I realized I did want to read her writing, to know the trajectories that her mind traveled, to perhaps penetrate her nonchalance towards life.

  She looked at me, confused.

  “Where did that come from?”

  “I don’t know, it just did.”

  In silence we started walking towards the steps. She took my hand and started swinging our arms gently back and forth casting shadows of longing on the ground ahead of us.

  “Jess, I write to take words out of my mind, to throw out some of my thoughts. I don’t write to do anything with it.”

  “But I want to read it.”

  “Before or after we fuck?”

  “I’m being serious. Why is everything about ‘fucking’ with you? Why is that all you pay attention to or talk about? Why—”

  “Because I’m scared too!”

  Her words resounded in the park and I saw a few pigeons leave the fountain. I wanted to say something but didn’t know what to say to her.

  “You’re scared of what?” I finally asked, afraid myself of her answer.

  “Of falling madly in love with you.”

  “But we’ll be friends,” I said foolishly, “Platonic and all of that.”

  “That’s the best fucking way to fall in love, Jess! Faster than any fuck I’ve ever known. Because when you go beyond the lay to the person and touch them in all the ways one person can touch another, body mind and soul, what do you think is going to happen?”

  “So if I don’t want to fall for you and you don’t want to fall for me, then what are we both doing here? Aren’t we crazy to be going away for ten days? Aren’t we just tempting fate or God or the Universe or whatever it is that keeps us?”

  She took my hand and held it quietly as if it belonged to her.

  “I don’t know, Jess. But it feels right.”

  She played with my fingers and I let her. Her palms were rough. I thought of Anjali’s palms and for a moment I missed their softness, the feel of her fingers across my waiting scalp, the feel of her thin lips upon my own.

  “I still want to read your stuff,” I said partly because I had nothing else to say, mostly because I wanted to stop thinking about Anjali’s kisses.

  “Okay, fine. Read it,” she said quietly. “If it makes you feel better, read it. But when will you start looking at yourself to understand why you can’t write, why you’re so fucking confused and whatever the hell it is you’re looking for?”

  “I don’t want to read your stuff for me. I want to know you,” I said defensively, “And I’m sorry if you can’t accept that because maybe if you did you’d realize a woman can love you beyond a good lay.”

  “Jess…”

  “Forget it. I don’t want to read your stuff, all right? Just forget all of it.”

  “I just want you to face the fact that you’re scared of something. And if you could know what and why, you could face it, fuck it and fix it. That’s all. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

  “Maybe you should do the same.”

  She faced me and held my hands at my sides. She waited until I looked at her before she spoke, making sure she had my full attention.

  “Maybe that’s why we work. We’re both scared and yet we both can’t keep away. Maybe ten days can fix all that. Maybe it can’t. But we can try. That’s all I’m saying.”

  I followed her silently down to the subway and then into a train. Our spaces were full of gazes and slight touches and implications of understanding. She pulled me to her and stared into my eyes.

  “Okay, here goes…” she said.

  “What?”

  “If you come away with me, I will allow you to call all the shots. You can ask anything, ask for anything and do anything. How is that?”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Because, I have a heart too. And it beats. And sometimes it beats to your name.”

  I pulled her to me and held her. I kissed the top of her head.

  “What was that?” she asked.

  “Shut up and enjoy it,” I said.

  “Come home with me tonight.”

  “You know I can’t spend the night with you.”

  “You’re really trying,” she said. “But let me ask you something. If it’s so hard for you to be faithful to her, to be with her, then why are you trying so hard to do it?”

  I looked away from her to the ad posted in front of me on the train. It was for a dermatologist. I wondered if Anjali would ever do anything as tacky as a subway ad.

  “Hello?”

  I turned back to look into her eyes.

  “I don’t really know the answer to your question,” I said, “but it’s just something I want to do. I may be a fuck up all around but I do love her.”

  Vanessa shrugged.

  The rest of the ride was quiet but my mind was full of voices and questions that I wanted answered. Who was Vanessa that I was willing to lie to Anjali for her? Who was Anjali that I wanted so badly to be faithful to her? Could Vanessa and I have a platonic ten days? Would I really ask Anjali for the money? I felt my head would explode.

  “Vanessa?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Where are we going?”

  “I’m dropping you home and then going
back to my place. Since you can’t spend the night with me, I’m spending as much of it with you as possible.”

  I felt tears in my eyes and I had no idea why. Except that I felt hopeless.

  She stayed with me until my stop and then got off and waited to take the train in the opposite direction.

  “I’ll wait with you,” I suggested.

  “If you want, sure.”

  She smiled slightly, a tired half smile.

  I leaned forward slowly and gently I touched her lips with mine. It wasn’t a kiss just a brushing of lips, a touch that sent a current through my entire body. I pulled back almost immediately. I wondered if she had felt it.

  She said nothing, did nothing except take my hand, kiss the flesh of my palm and let my arm fall back to my side. My skin was moist where her mouth had been. I closed my hand in a fist, my hand burning where she had kissed me. It was as if I were holding her slight affection tightly, never wanting to let go.

  When the train came, I watched her as she stepped inside, turned and blew me a kiss with a lot of melodrama. We both laughed. Until the doors closed we stood looking at each other, laughing and waving goodbye.

  As the train pulled away I felt as if a part of me was gone.

  How I would handle platonic I myself didn’t know.

  I walked towards home, towards Anjali and thought the entire time about Vanessa.

  Before I entered the lobby to our building, I reluctantly opened my fist, letting her kiss escape my opened palm.