Notice

by Heather Lewis

  I shifted my weight so we were back where we’d been. I had to fight myself to stay slow. I put my hand down on her while I took my mouth away. She made those same sounds. Small cries that caught in her throat before they grew heavy, and by then she’d gone someplace she didn’t come back from.

  I couldn’t wait for her. The room was too small and her holding me so tight cluttered me. I pulled away. Put my shoes on and left her there. I left her lying on the floor.

  Once out the door I didn’t go back the way I came. I turned the other direction, which took me nowhere but out of my way. I walked and walked around the early evening of this town where nothing ever happened. I walked quite a ways along one side of the main street before turning and heading back toward my place, which meant passing her office.

  I told myself I wouldn’t look for lights or her car but of course I did. Saw the car but not the lights. The same as I had that other night. My thought was, what if I’ve killed her?

  I didn’t know where this came from and so I shook it away and then felt only tired. I was relieved when I saw that pharmacy with the neon drugs sign reminding me I was home.

  I climbed the stairs and my legs felt so heavy I had the urge to reach down and lift them.

  I knew it was Sunday, this was the one thing I was crisply aware of, so much so it hurt me. And while it was still pretty early I couldn’t imagine ever getting enough sleep. Ever getting enough sleep ever again. This seemed something she’d taken from me. Or something she’d made me see I’d never had.

  Twenty-One

  So I went to work the next day because, after all, I only seemed ever to go one or maybe two places. I went through the whole day reminding myself I had the next day off, and telling myself I’d skip seeing Beth.

  Still, around three, I took my afternoon break at that bar. I fueled up, and so I expected not seeing Beth was another promise to myself I wouldn’t be keeping.

  I’d left off using my car. I suppose I mistrusted myself with heavy machinery. Anyway, I’d left it at home and so after work I walked there, to her office, and this meant I was late.

  She was in the waiting room. Waiting. Actually, she paced. But when we went into her office I did the pacing, though not for long at all, which seemed curious to me. She seemed curious to me too, the way she acted.

  She was asking me questions the same as before. What struck me was how long it’d been since I’d heard her voice – in her conventional role, I mean. Saturday on the phone stood out. Other than that she’d spoken only in that way I couldn’t quite grasp because it stayed too far inside her.

  I realized quickly that I couldn’t make sense of this voice either – the everyday one. It was too thin. It gave nothing to hold on to. Whole phrases went by me and I answered none of her questions, which was at first unintentional.

  Soon, though, a disgust grew in me and with it an obstinacy when I understood what she was doing, that her intent was to proceed as if yesterday hadn’t happened, or the other night either. And while I grew angrier, disbelieving and impatient, I could not contradict her – this was the card she held. And either her recognition of it or my behavior made her nasty.

  Little by little she began to taunt me, to poke at the silence that had become my lone weapon. If I couldn’t say what she was ignoring, it looked like I would say nothing at all. But then quickly I told myself this wasn’t about principles. Not for me. What upset me was simply not getting the gratification I’d come for, and ascribing anything more was merely false and indulgent.

  It was true I’d assumed we’d just keep on. That it would be all we would do. And so now her trying to backtrack? I wanted none of it. And I hated her for it, and hated even more how I still wanted her despite it.

  From here I could see nothing to do but walk out. Maybe I thought she’d follow me or stop me. That then we would wind up where I wanted to be. But she did neither.

  I would’ve gone to the parking lot but I didn’t feel dressed for it, or up to it. I simply went home and once there I drank and drank until the phone rang and while I knew it would be her, still it surprised me.

  She said she only wanted to know was I okay and I told her sure I was. I told her this sullen and cross like I wanted her to go away but please not to. She stayed on the phone with me a long time and soon it became clear this was to be the bridge. The place where we’d talk in halfways and circles. The way for her to reel me back in, and for me to let her.

  Even her voice was somewhere in between and she played me and played with me until I’d begun playing with myself, let her hear me come close to coming. And I heard things in her that maybe were the same – changes in her breathing, only her breathing. Gaps.

  I liked this too much. Already I could see what it did to me. That no matter what it might seem like, or be like, always I’d be the one on my knees.

  For a little while though I could make believe she was the one who’d come crawling to me.

  Seeing things this way got me through the night and into the next day, which was my day off. Somehow our game on the phone tired me more than anything so far. This particular languor made me reluctant to attempt even the simplest things. I puttered around my apartment. Killed time. Killed the day until it was time to go to her office.

  I suppose I’d expected that after the phone call we’d wind up next to each other again, close. But this wasn’t what happened. She kept her distance and it annoyed me. It annoyed me especially when she suggested that at least on Tuesdays, when I didn’t work, I come see her earlier. “During my regular hours” – that was the phrase she used.

  This made me sick and angry all at once but I stayed silent, acquiesced by inaction, and consequently she had her way again. I stayed silent pretty much the whole time. She seemed so relieved to have made her one point and won that she didn’t even try to get past me. We put up with each other, I guess, and then I left.

  This uneasy balancing kept on for the rest of the week, leaving me swamped and achy. Despair I think is what you would call the thing getting in the way of everyday tasks like walking and eating. But on Friday all of it changed again without warning. She changed. Or maybe it was me, unable to keep my pose any longer. Maybe my face gave away my grief, or maybe it had all week long and I’d only now worn her down.

  I’d been staring over her shoulder, as I had been for days, when some small movement of hers caught my glance. She was holding her hand out to me and I was slow and out of practice but I took it.

  This was not the most comfortable position for either of us, stretched between these two chairs. They seemed actually further from each other than they used to be. We were still in a battle of wills. I understood that this time it should be me who went to her, and I both wanted to and couldn’t.

  I wanted very much to make it easier for both of us, but I couldn’t move. This wasn’t about stubbornness or anything resembling it, this was just deadness. A deadness I couldn’t shake or force myself through, and so I wasn’t forcing her either. It seemed closer to pleading, though without words.

  I suppose all the significant things between us happened this way – silently, or at least without speech. That I was speechless again at this moment felt nearly ordinary. Like a thing I was used to, or the thing I was most used to.

  She seemed unable to wait any longer. She pulled me to my feet, and I fell against her with all the same deadness. I could do nothing but lean.

  It felt better like this. I felt better. But at the same time I believed I’d given in. This seemed backwards to me and so I had trouble following it. I didn’t see how I should feel this defeated. I thought maybe she should.

  She was holding me kind of loosely. She stroked the back of my neck, and her fingers underneath my hair and running through it let me rest my head on her shoulder. She kissed my neck and murmured to me the same way, so softly and gently. And if she was using words I recognized them only as sounds.

  She kept on this way and the urge I felt was to cry. To finally let mysel
f do this because it seemed I’d needed to for a very long time. But having no knowledge of what I would be crying about stopped me. It bewildered me to feel something so strongly but without content. Unnerved me so, I wanted to pull away from her. Blame her for starting this unsettled thing roaming through me. Maybe I thought getting away from her would stop it.

  I must have made some small move in this direction because she tightened her hold, assumed a knowing firmness she seemed to reserve for my moments of doubt. I couldn’t help wanting actual words telling me things were all right. But I recognized it was too early for this.

  I concentrated very hard on her hands – where they were and what they were doing – because unless I did this I couldn’t remain standing. Now that she was moving toward what I’d wanted, I needed things to stay this way. Stay soft and sweet and aimless. Now I wanted to backtrack. And though this had been what she’d wanted, it seemed something we couldn’t want at the same time.

  Still, where things went wasn’t specific. It could never be that simple thing again of touching and comfort. But recognizing this meant seeing it never had been like that – mindless and guileless and building blindly somewhere.

  Part of my deepest trouble was knowing we’d known. Knowing she had. I couldn’t keep this in mind and keep food down, or keep on my feet. And just from knowing this much for this long, my stomach went swimming and my head, too, fell underwater, and so I landed in another of those floundering stupors.

  I knew what happened for her in these moments, that they were the ones she waited for. Fending off this knowledge took stamina, though, the last of mine I suppose, because I could no longer fend her off – if I’d ever been trying to or able.

  She’d gotten both her hands under my shirt, was stroking my back and I found myself unzipping her dress. From here I became nearly aggressive. That she seemed to want me this way, like me this way, does nothing, ever, to ease me.

  I took her to the floor and took her dress off, and the rest of her things. Then I fucked her. It brought me out of my daze and into some kind of command and it had everything to do with rescuing myself. It had nothing to do with giving her pleasure.

  That it had something to do with that for her, with pleasure, only confused me and so returned me to where I’d begun. Gave the game back to her, gave me back to her. I lay beside her, still fully dressed but out of my head again, which meant inside my body. And the things going on there, as usual, distressed me.

  Because of this I didn’t try anymore to affect what she did. I found myself looking up at her because she was on top of me now and looking down. This tormented me so completely but I couldn’t see why. I only knew I couldn’t get my breath and that to try to made this sound – a kind of sound I didn’t want anyone to hear.

  I tried to throw her off me, go back to where we’d just been, but I couldn’t do this or anything else but lie there gasping.

  She unbuttoned my shirt, which frightened me more. I tried again to kick her off me but my legs stayed as useless as the rest of me. She was running her fingers right down the middle of me. She began at my throat and stopped each time at my waist. I thought she’d maybe smothered me because I became very lightheaded. My breath couldn’t follow her fingers, couldn’t go below the place she touched on my throat.

  She didn’t stop, though. Instead she did this again and again. And then there wasn’t lightness in my head anymore but heaviness. I let it rest on the floor, only then knowing I’d been craning my neck the whole time.

  Once I let my head go the rest of me followed. She kept up the same way and I began to find comfort in it. Began not to want her ever to stop or go further.

  For a while it did stay this way. And I could let my breathing follow her fingers. I was breathing into my belly and not caring by now if I watched her. And I didn’t care when she unbuttoned my pants. I told myself I didn’t at all.

  I helped her undress me and once we’d done this she seemed to know to go back, to keep with what she’d been doing. I lay there the same way, and we were just as we’d been, except now she was kneeling. She had her knees between my legs and so it was plain that this place we were in wouldn’t last very long.

  I did my best to stay there regardless, stay with the comfort and not go beyond it. To keep to my body, keeping my mind at bay. And so when her fingers began to drift that bit further down, each time it helped me. And what I felt when she began saying things? It was all about wanting her close to me. Wishing myself able to hear and believe her.

  I had this need to hold her. I tried to prop myself up in order to do this. But I didn’t get very far and what she did was put her hand inside me. I felt her other arm go around my back and hold me up a short while before she leaned into me. Then we were both lying down and I was grasping at her and at anything else that might anchor me.

  Her mouth was close to mine and she kissed me. Her tongue took up so much room, left me wordless and hers. She let her hand come out of me. Did this as I came. Both her arms wrapped around me and I held on to her, too, and this kissing felt like all anyone could ever want or ever could need.

  It was all that we did now. And it seemed to go on for ever, until it stopped. Then, even with her there and still stroking my face, it was over too soon. And none of it felt like enough. And maybe not to her either because the restlessness didn’t seem mine alone.

  Pretty soon both of us were on our feet and staggering around looking for our clothes and clumsy in putting them on. And then, like always, we seemed so much further away from each other. Like maybe we didn’t know who we were, or who the other one was. Or who we’d just been.

  After she got dressed, Beth sat down. She stared out the window and I stared at her until it made me want to go to her and I knew I’d better leave. Still, I lingered. Stood there stupidly with my coat in my hand. I think I was waiting for her to say something.

  She did but, while it was what I should’ve expected, it wasn’t what I wanted to hear. She said, “I think you’d better leave now.” And her voice sounded flat and emotionless like it did each time she uttered these particular words.

  She wouldn’t look at me, which was true of the other times too, but this was the only time I’d wondered about her end. Saw it as anything other than disgust for me. Saw it as maybe my having some effect on her. That the things she evoked in me might be roused somewhere in her.

  Thinking this way kept me standing there, and I was afraid for her to look at me. Afraid for her, and of her, and of standing there long enough to want her again, or feel wanted by her instead of cast out and alone.

  Twenty-Two

  I got out of there. I went directly home, and once there tried not to think of the only thing I could think of, which was when could I have her again.

  It’d been a Friday, so I should’ve been going to work in the morning. I knew this much, though it didn’t mean I’d do anything about it.

  When the time came, I called in sick, not remembering until afterwards that I’d done this same thing the week before. I realized maybe I ought to begin worrying what they would think. I already didn’t make enough there and I hadn’t been making money any other way lately. Something needed to change.

  I lay in bed and tried to convince myself Beth only meant trouble. That the thing to do was get away from her. Some part of me knew this completely. But thinking about leaving her left me thinking about her. And once I’d begun that, the will to leave her didn’t last long.

  I told myself I had to keep seeing her. That it was merely practical. I tried to reorder my need, make it about legalities. This was so thin even I could see through it. Still I worked hard to stay on this plane. Not drift into thinking about how she could make me feel, when she wanted to, which didn’t seem often enough.

  I couldn’t face calling her. Spent the day – Saturday – avoiding this impulse. Finally went out to avoid it because I couldn’t stand that she might play cool and aloof and impossible. That this weekend might completely match the last one,
with me ordering myself around her, running to her and not knowing how I’d find her. I already had this sense that she took up too much of my life, or maybe all of it. And right when I needed badly for this not to be true I ran into Burt.

  This was not a hard thing to do. It was only a matter of going to certain places at certain times. And so I did these things believing I had no plan in mind. He was at that bar, with Jeremy. And I’d seen his car in the lot with the same guy waiting behind the wheel.

  They sat me down at their table. Began buying me drinks and all through this I had that same nagging sense of wondering just what they wanted me for. They weren’t talking to me really, not exactly. I was just there listening to them. Then they got up and we all went out and they gave me a ride home, which was good since I still wasn’t driving my car.

  This put me pretty much where I’d been, only later and drunk. My resolve was nowhere and so eventually I found myself calling her. She sounded sleepy and irritable and not quite surprised, so I couldn’t help feeling she’d won.

  I didn’t ask to see her. Not asking felt like the only way I could preserve some kind of pride. This seemed to confuse her, and since I hadn’t called with anything else in mind we stumbled around for a while with her finally saying, “Why don’t you meet me at noon.”

  She said it in that in-between way. We’d slipped back to that. Fallen back into playing each other. Playing with each other and ourselves. And it almost made me say where and, besides, her office seemed too small and not right. But we didn’t say any more, and I went to sleep feeling, well, happy’s not quite the word but secure maybe. Drunk anyway.

  *

  I woke up later than I’d intended and with that same sense of having made a mistake. I thought quite seriously of standing her up. Really wanted to, but the motive was flimsy, hard to determine, harder to act on.