“Or we keep repeating our parents’ mistakes.”
He grimaces. “Or that. My parents have one of those marriages where they overlook casual infidelities, which is a different kind of toxic. Because they never actually overlook anything, they just needle each other. My brother became like my dad, and I became like my mom. My brother cheats, and I pick women who cheat on me. That was a fun day in therapy when I worked that out.”
“So is your brother still in New York?” I ask.
“They have a house up in Dobbs Ferry.”
I don’t ask who ‘they’ is. I watch something close up behind his eyes, and he looks away from me again. He has the chance to tell me the whole story, and he doesn’t. The jazz band keeps playing, but there is no room to dance.
After dinner,he offers to walk me home as we’re only about fifteen minutes from my apartment. It’s a warm night, the sky still violet-green from the summer sunset.
“I feel like…” he begins as we wander down the street past shops and restaurants.
“Yes?”
He looks into the distance. “I feel like I’m about to walk you home, and maybe I’ll give you a kiss goodnight. And someone will ask you how your date went, and you’ll say, ‘It was fine.’”
I smile and shake my head. “I’ll say, ‘It was nice.’”
“Nice. Okay.” He looks away, a distant smile on his face.
“Nice is good. Believe me. Nice is much better than I’ve been experiencing on dates recently.”
“That sounds like a low bar.”
I catch his eyes, thinking of that casual remark I made about us having no chemistry. Now I think about his stories, his worry about being cheated on. “Would you like me to tell you you’re sexy, Oliver?”
He laughs. “See, now you’re being patronizing.”
I consider this for a moment. “You know what it is? It’s that I don’t know how to do this. Last time I was dating, I was still drinking. And there isn’t much I miss about drinking, but I miss how easy it was to get to know people. Like, if you and I were in a bar, and we were a few beers in, we would be telling the real story of our divorces. I would go on a whole rant about Nick, and you would tell me about your ex-wife, and we would get out all the messy stuff. But when I’m sober, the messy stuff stays in. And most of the time that’s good, it’s really good, but when I want to get to know someone, I want to hear about their messy stuff, and I don’t know how to get there anymore.”
“You want to hear my messy stuff?” His hazel-green eyes are lit up in the fading light.
I feel vulnerable. “I want to know you.”
I wonder if he’s going to dodge the question. He takes a breath. “Alright,” he says. “We can try it.”
“Try what?”
He takes off his suit jacket and points to a large public library a few steps ahead of us. He gestures to the stone wall wrapped around the building at knee-height and spreads the jacket on the wall. “Sit down, and pretend this is a bar, and give me your drunken rant about your ex.”
I am startled into a laugh. “It doesn’t work that way. I’d have to be drunk. Or at least sit in a bar for an hour, drinking ginger ale and working up to it.”
“We don’t have time to get you to a real bar if you need to get home by eight-thirty. Just sit on my jacket so you don’t ruin your dress.” He doesn’t mention that this might ruin his jacket, which warms me inside. I was always too cynical for old-school chivalry, but now I’m realizing it feels amazing when it’s sincere. Ollie didn’t practice that line; he just means it. My insides feel fizzy and soft, like I’m filled with champagne.
We sit down together, and I consider what he’s asking me to do. What would I say about Nick if I was really being honest? If I were four drinks deep, midway through a night on the town?
“Okay,” I agree. “But you have to promise me your drunken rant, too. This can’t be one-sided.”
I watch his jaw clench for a second, but then he nods. “Okay.”
“Okay.” I take a breath. “Nick,” I say, imagining what would pour out of me if I was wasted. “Ilovedhim.”
I watch Ollie’s jaw tighten again, but he just nods.
“I mean, I thought we were on this romantic, once-in-a-lifetime journey, because he was loyal, and supported my sobriety, and was really sweet when we were together. But he never put me first. It was always his music. And it’s not like he was obsessed with money or fame. It was more like, he was good at guitar. He got gigs and made money. But nevergreatgigs, and never forthat muchmoney. And it’s not even self-sabotage! That would almost be better, if he was ruining things by fighting with the lead singers or something. It’s more like,he was good enough to be a replacement guitarist, but not great enough for a band to take him on tour. And that broke his heart, that he’d spent his whole life working on something and wasn’t exceptional. But it meant that whenever he got an opportunity, he felt like he had to take it.”
Ollie nods. “Because the next opportunity was going to be the one where he made it big.”
