by Dan Mooney
“Truce?” he asked plaintively.
“Are you sorry?”
“Absolutely,” he lied. How had she managed to make this his fault again?
“Okay,” she said, smiling. “Truce it is. I’m sorry too. I know how you feel about visitors, it’s just that you’ve been different lately, and we kissed last night and then I come home and you’re all extra-Denis.”
He smiled. Extra-Denis. He had been a little extra-Denis today. He was beginning to hate Sundays.
“Tea?” he asked, thrusting the cup at her to cover the awkward moment. He’d actually forgotten about the kiss. No wonder she was mad. It had been a long time since he’d kissed those lips, and now his memory of their latest kiss was blurred by alcohol. Thankfully, the worst of his hangover had passed. The sick feeling in his stomach had a new cause now. He swallowed as he led her downstairs to kick her out of his home.
Don’t do this. Don’t you dare... Not now, not when you’re so close.
And then he didn’t tell her.
Good. Please see that this is a good thing. Now is your moment. Now is the time to grow. To be better. Please get better.
Instead, they sat at the kitchen table and talked as if nothing had happened; there was no mention of Ned Reilly, no talk of the kiss, nothing said of the dancing or any of the nonsense he’d spoken when he was drunk. They just chatted about various things. Several times during the conversation he imagined he saw an opening to tell her, but each time he lost his nerve or got distracted by something. He realized he was famished. He hadn’t eaten all day; he’d been too sick, and now, with evening on them, it was far too late for a dinner. Far too late unless Rebecca Lynch was in your life, in which case, dinner could be at whatever hour she chose.
“Let me make us something to eat. You go watch cop shows, and I’ll work on dinner.”
“It’s nearly nine o’clock. You want to eat dinner at nine in the evening?”
She smiled at him and nodded. The Professor was right. She was unrelentingly stubborn. He decided to let it pass and watch some television. As he got up to walk to the living room, he saw them standing in a shadow in the hallway. All four of them. If you weren’t looking for them, you’d miss them, slightly obscured as they were, but definitely there, and they were watching her. Not him. He closed the door on them and moved to the living room.
The wonderful thing about owning a television is its capacity for absolute brainlessness. When one is in possession of a brain that works as hard as Denis Murphy’s does, then one needs to find the ways and means of cutting off its circulation from time to time, numbing it. One could forget that one’s house has been invaded when television is doing the thinking for you. Menacing clowns and depressed zombies are all well and good, but they’re no match for Emily Deschanel playing a socially awkward genius.
Denis watched Law and Order and Bones, and marveled at how crafty the bad guys could be, but how the good guy, through hard work and taking the road that isn’t always the easiest, could win out in the end. His brain went into standby mode, and he ignored the fact that four faces were pressed against the rear window of the house, looking in at him. He’d never seen them go outside the front door before. He’d always accepted that they liked being inside, and tolerated them for who they were. He would normally have paid it more attention, but the shining sedative in the corner was relaxing him. He didn’t even mind the ads, which normally he objected to on the grounds that they offended his principles. They offered perfect lives in exchange for money. Denis blamed advertising for a lot of his worries. In an advertising-free universe, people wouldn’t know what happiness looked like, and then they wouldn’t think him unhappy just because he didn’t behave like they did. It never occurred to Denis that he was stalling. It never occurred to Denis when he was avoiding something difficult. It hadn’t for nearly seven years now.
Seven years of avoiding... You’re an expert.
The smells from the kitchen snapped him from his reverie. He had never known Rebecca to cook anything, but the smell was wonderful. His stomach rumbled loudly. He had to take a look. While waiting for the meal to cook, Rebecca had also used his downtime as an opportunity to put on a dress and fix her hair up. She looked stunning. Denis stood with his mouth open. She had lit candles and poured wine. His kitchen had been transformed from a simple utility area where he performed basic domestic functions to a romantic scene lifted straight from some kind of Hollywood feel-good rom-com.
“Close your mouth, you’ll catch flies,” she told him with another victory smile.
“Sorry, it’s just... You look stunning. Again.” He was blushing, and he knew it.
“Sit down,” she said, gesturing to his chair. “Chicken-and-leek Stroganoff, with rice, and some naan bread. I used to make it in Australia. A friend of mine was a chef.”
Denis could only smile, although he felt somewhat disconcerted. He had always been proud of the fact that he did all the cooking, thinking that it was a skill he had to offer her. She had obviously enjoyed the fact that he liked cooking for her, and left him to it. And now this.
The romance was marred only by the fact that Rebecca had at some point opened the door, and sitting down, she placed herself with her back to the hallway. Four figures shuffled in and stood watching. Plasterer had his arms folded and regarded Denis with only the slightest nod. Penny O’Neill and the Professor stood behind either of his burly shoulders, both shaking their heads slightly. One in bitter disappointment, the other in a resigned sadness. Deano stood apart from them. Denis had a nagging feeling that this meant something, but he was distracted by a curl of hair that fell across one of Rebecca’s exposed shoulders. He leaned over and brushed it back behind her ear. She smiled beautifully. Plasterer bunched his fists angrily in the hallway.
“So...” she asked him coyly as they prepared to tuck in. “How much about last night do you remember?”
“Enough,” he told her, smiling.
“The dancing?”
“Obviously,” he replied, blushing a little more.
“You realize you used to be able to dance, but now you move like a robot.”
“Come on,” he said, feigning offense. “I’ve still got some moves.”
“Ha. I’m not so sure, Denny,” she replied.
“Don’t call me that,” he told her absently. She was goading him. Later on she’d try again, and talk him into a dance. He figured that’s where this line of conversation was going.
“You know, if you want another dance, all you have to do is ask. I have the entire Eels back catalog.”
She laughed, and the sound of it made his heart beat quicker.
“You used to listen to them all day,” she recalled with a smile. “And gangster rap, which you absolutely cannot pull off.”
“Yeah, right,” he replied mockingly. “I’ll have you know I’d make an excellent gangster.”
Plasterer raised an eyebrow from the hallway. He held his silence.
They ate quietly for a while, but it was clear to Denis that there was something she was waiting for, something she was holding back.
“Ask it,” he told her after a while of watching her struggle.
“You know me too well.” She smiled ruefully.
He nodded and waited while she hesitated again, pushing some of the food around her plate with her fork.
“Why do you want to be lonely so badly?” she finally said.
The question took him by surprise. He wasn’t lonely, but she didn’t know that he had four housemates before her, and would have when she was gone.
“I don’t,” he almost whispered.
“You block everyone out,” she pressed.
“I know,” he said, and started at his own voice. Had those words really come out of his mouth? Now Plasterer was shaking his head. His fists still bunched in frustration.
“Sometimes I t
hink you’re letting me in, and then just when I think I’m understanding you, I’m outside again, looking in at you, and you seem so unbearably lonely.”
“I’m fine,” he said, trying to assert himself. A strange voice in his head seemed to whisper, No, you’re not, but he ignored it.
“See, right now, you’re doing it again. Sometimes you’re so honest, and sometimes you just lie for the sake of it. I can stand the obsessive behavior, I can put up with the fear of shops and yellow T-shirts, but I can’t bear to hear you lie to me, and to yourself. It’s like you’ve been doing it for so long you don’t even know it, except sometimes I think you do.”
“What do you want me to do?” he asked.
“Let me in,” she replied, leaning forward intently.
“Do you remember the last day you saw me before you left?” he asked her suddenly.
“Yes,” she replied, waiting.
“I wanted to let you in. Really, I did. I couldn’t though. I couldn’t do anything. It’s like a weight inside your head. It keeps you stuck to the same place, and sometimes you can move around with it but you feel slow and sluggish. Some days you can’t move at all, or you can’t get out of bed, because this weight in your head, it just takes everything you have to keep breathing, to keep wanting to breathe.” He told her all this in a quiet, dispassionate voice.
She nodded and her eyes glistened.
“It was all I could do just to sit there crying,” he continued. “Every day, it took everything I had to get up, and some days I failed and just slept all day. I’d wake for an hour or two at a time, but I couldn’t get up, so I’d stare at the walls. I cleaned my room from time to time, just so I could feel like I had succeeded at something. Then you were there, banging on the glass door. You wanted to come in, but if I let you, I would have had to talk to you, and tell you things and comfort you, and I just couldn’t. I know it’s selfish—that’s who I am now. There are some things that I just can’t do, and it usually involves people. I can’t handle people anymore. I hate them. They hate me back. I have so few people left, and sometimes I wonder if I’d miss any of them if they all left. I think I’d be okay with it. I worry every day that if everyone left me, I’d be totally okay with that.”
There were tears now, but she held them back bravely. So many tears in such a short few weeks. Denis had none left, but it seemed everyone else had oceans of them.
That’s good though. Better than ever before. Well done. I’m... I’m proud of you.
“Do you still want me to let you in?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said, nodding, wiping her button nose on a handkerchief.
He sighed, suddenly exhausted. She didn’t know he was going to ask her to move out tomorrow. He was going to make her leave. The thought caused a lump in his stomach.
* * *
“Tell me about the people you have left. Tell me why they’re still here.”
He smiled in spite of himself. “They’re still here because they don’t give up. Mom, Ollie, Frank, even Thomas. And now you. Sooner or later, you’re all going to have to give up.”
“Who’s Thomas?” she asked curiously, wiping away the remaining tears.
And so he told her about Thomas, and his constant high five attempts. His relentless need to put his hand against Denis’s hand seemed to represent everything about Denis Murphy and all the people in the other universe. They pushed and intruded; he politely declined. The back-and-forth of constant battle that made up his day. He talked about the coffee shops and the newspapers and his fear that every person he encountered must think him the strangest creature they ever saw, and he despised that about them. Despised the curious looks and the pity, despised the knowing glances and the fake half smiles. He told her about his life now. His universe. Everything except his housemates, who he left out. They stood behind her, watching him, watching her.
He talked to her while mostly looking at them, only glancing back into her eyes every now and then until eventually he just ran out of words. Then there was silence, the words gone.
“Can we have that dance now?” she asked after he went quiet.
“Yes,” he told her. This time he wasn’t even drunk, but he didn’t care. Tomorrow he’d be kicking her out of his house, and possibly out of his life, so tonight, he would take what she would give. He didn’t play the Eels this time; he played Bell X1 and they danced around and around in a very small circle, his hand resting on the small of her back, his other hand holding hers. He couldn’t stop staring at it, her fingers entwined in his. Her breasts were pressing against his chest as he held her, and her head was tilted to the side to rest against his. His housemates had left the hallway in disgust, but back in a dark corner by the door he could make out the furry shape of Deano, hunkered down watching it all. He thought the fur ball approved, though he couldn’t tell why.
“I was lying earlier,” she told him quietly. “You dance beautifully. I’ve missed it.”
“I missed you too,” he said.
“I’d like a kiss now,” she said, tilting her head up at him.
He looked into her brown eyes and smiled at her. For a minute or two he held back; he wanted to kiss her, but he didn’t want the moment to end, both of them dancing by candlelight in his kitchen while the music played from the living room. It was a moment to savor, and he rolled it around inside his head and let it wash over him. But he knew she would only wait for so long. Rebecca Lynch most frequently got what she wanted. She leaned in, and he answered her invite.
When their tongues met, it was a journey back to a thousand kisses before, in the other universe. In bed, on dance floors, in the car, in the park, on the grass, standing at the stove, standing at the sink, on the couch, by the sea, so many kisses shared. They ran through his head in a flicker of memory like subliminal messages, and his hands answered the call, one of them cupping her chin, the other sliding up her back to the clasp of her dress. She pushed back gently and looked him in the eye. There was none of the usual twinkle of humor there; instead there was a question. Silently she asked him if he was sure. He returned her look, silently telling her that he was. She eventually turned and led him from the room, holding his hand, up the stairs and into his bedroom.
They kissed again, this time it was not a gentle kiss, but a kiss filled with need. It was almost forgotten; the kiss stirred something that had been dormant in him for so long, and he found himself remembering desire. Her dress couldn’t be taken off fast enough; he fumbled with the clasp a little, and she giggled, almost nervously as she calmly opened his belt. The kiss became more passionate; his hands were practically clawing at her now, and she wasn’t laughing but gasping at each opening, her hands pulling at his tie and shirt. They fell onto the bed, naked, and what little capacity for thought was obliterated. In this moment there was no Denis, there were no housemates, there was no dead sister, no dying friend, no Ned, no Mom, no Frank or Ollie. They were two, and they were becoming one.
It was hours before Denis woke. She was sitting at the end of his bed, still naked but with a small blanket pulled around her. She had opened the curtains on one of the two windows in his room, and moonlight spilled in.
“You okay?” he asked softly.
“Yeah,” she told him, turning and smiling. Her smile lit up her face like he’d never seen before. He drank her in, the desire to hold her again growing.
“You still snore like a champion,” she told him, laughing. “And you still have some of those moves you were talking about earlier too,” she added archly.
“Get back over here,” he ordered jokingly. And she did.
They made love again, this time more slowly, each movement between them gentle and considered. Afterward, she rested her head on his chest, kissing him every now and again.
“Did they hurt?” she asked sleepily, tracing the scars that ran across his chest and down over his stomach.
; “They hurt me every day,” he replied, stroking her hair. He lay there, holding her and staring at the ceiling.
“Elephant shoe,” he told her, but she was already asleep.
CAN’T GET ENOUGH
Stay calm now, this is not the end of the world.
For the second day in a row, Denis Murphy didn’t wake to the steady tones of his own alarm. He was slightly distressed, but he drew in a steady breath and let the panic roll over him until it began to pass, as he knew it eventually would. When you are a connoisseur of panic, you learn to know such things. It was Rebecca’s alarm that woke him, blaring out some ridiculous hip-hop anthem from her phone. Rebecca groaned in the bed, rolled over, tapped without looking on the screen until it went quiet and rolled back into him. She rested her head on his chest and sighed. He drew a deep breath and calmed himself again. Her head felt nice resting on him; it was worth the momentary flinch and the sensation that he was unclean. This feeling also passed.
“Morning,” she murmured sleepily.
“Good morning,” he whispered back, tentatively reaching out a hand to stroke her bare shoulder. He ignored the silent scream inside his head to stop and instead drew her closer to him.
“Your snoring sounds like someone ripping bedsheets,” she told him, her fingers once again caressing the scars across his chest.
“You hog the quilt,” he retorted playfully. “And you grip it like a vise. I had to practically drag it off you.”
“I get cold,” she said defensively.
“Me too,” he told her. “Thankfully you’re half a hot-water bottle.”
She laughed softly.
“Do you have to go to work?” he asked.
“Yes. I’d love to stay here, but I’m not about to call in sick to a job I only started a few weeks ago. You stay in bed, wait for me. When I get back we’ll order Chinese and download some old ’90s cartoons and just relax for the night.”