How to Meet Cute Boys (26 page)

“I’m a ’ho,” she said, giggling.

“Yeah.” I sighed. “Me, too.”

Confused to the brink of insanity? Bashing your head in with that mercurial Magic Eight Ball? Does he love you? Love you not?
Stop playing with toys! Stop murdering daisies! Use the Filly Wheel of (In)decision! Psychic energy was steeped into the paper
by paranormal experts, and it has all the answers.—B.F.

I called Max at home every night for the rest of the week. We were going to have The Talk—the Are-We-or-Are-We-Not-Breaking-Up
Talk—whether he wanted to or not. Putting it off at this point was just too painful. He never answered his phone, though,
so I kept hanging up before his answering machine beeped. He was obviously avoiding me, and finally, with no other options,
I called him during work hours on his cell. It felt like defeat.

“This is Max,” he said.

“It’s me,” I said.

“Hey,” he said. He sounded a million miles away.

“Look, I think we have to talk.” I was trying to break it to him gently.

“I know.” Oh, so he was ready for it …

“Today?” I asked, trying not to sound too desperate.

“I can’t do it today.”

“Tomorrow then.”

“Can’t do it tomorrow either.”

“When then.”

“Friday?”

“Max,” I tried to keep the frustration out of my voice, “that’s three days from now.”

“I can’t do it before then.”

“All right. Fine.”

“My house, six o’clock?”

“Okay.” I tried to think if there was something more I wanted to say, but then he said, “See you,” and hung up. I sat there,
staring at the receiver. He didn’t sound happy to hear from me. At all.
Did he actually expect me to just disappear?
I wondered.
Could that really be what he wants?
But it didn’t seem possible. I mean, he’d never said anything about us being over. Was I just supposed to assume that we
were?

I spent the next few days trying not to lose it completely. But I couldn’t pay attention to anything. I walked into walls.
I stubbed my toe. I gave myself a bruise in the middle of my forehead when I distractedly opened my car door and slammed it
into my own face. I cried—
a lot
. Curtis was away on a business trip, and so Kiki had time to discuss every conceivable outcome. We talked every day for so
long my phone kept running out of batteries. She generously predicted that one of two things would happen. (A), Max and I
would talk it out and everything would be fine. The less preferable, but more likely, (B), I’d break up with him and he’d
be destroyed and would want me back by Christmas. The key, Kiki said, was not to be wishy-washy. I had to go over there and
lay down the law. Tell him he couldn’t treat me so cavalierly anymore if he really wanted me in his life. It was my only chance
to get through this feeling remotely good about myself. But even with Kiki’s cheerful reassurances that it would all work
out in the end, the week dragged on forever, and I was overcome with the chill of impending doom. It was like that feeling
you get just before you crash your car—you see it coming, you see it coming, you see it coming, and it’s taking so long you
should be able to do something to stop it. But you can’t.

On Friday I didn’t put on mascara before I left for Max’s house. Melodramatic, sure, but I was in a melodramatic mood. I packed
up the gifts, too. Into the trash bag went the Polaroid camera he’d given me to celebrate our one-month anniversary, along
with the funny pictures I’d taken of us to document the occasion. In went the teddy bear hugging the red heart he’d tucked
into bed with me one morning before he left for work—he’d probably bought it at Sav-On, but at the time I thought it was delightful.
In went the Super Very Good sunglasses he’d presented to me for our trip to Palm Springs. In went the many CDs he’d burned
for me, with covers from the albums carefully scanned, printed, and placed in the jewel boxes. And in went all the clothes.
The bag was stuffed to bursting. After barely a five-minute conversation with Max in weeks, the presents hurt. They were like
promises he didn’t keep.

I pulled up in front of Max’s house and wiped my sweaty palms on the legs of my jeans before grabbing the garbage bag full
of presents. I took a deep breath and tried to remind myself that I was there to play hardball.
There will be no more of this,
I thought. No more waiting. No more guessing. No more wondering what he was going to do, or if I was ever going to hear from
him again. It wasn’t like I was putting all this pressure on him. It wasn’t like I didn’t have my own life. Whatever his problem
was, he’d have to get over it because I simply wouldn’t be able to take the silent treatment from him anymore. It had become
physically intolerable.

For the first time since our first date, I rang the doorbell. Max usually left the door open for me and I’d wander in and
find him upstairs listening to music. But this time, that seemed too informal, so I rang the bell and some shaggy-haired guy
answered. At first I thought I was at the wrong house. Then I realized he was one of the roommates.
Of course,
I thought.
Now he’s home
.

“Hey,” I said, trying to act casual even though my eyes were puffy and I was carrying a giant green Glad garbage bag.

“Can I help you?”

“Oh. I’m Ben. Um. Is Max here?”

“Uhhhh … I dunno.”

There was a three-foot bong and an open bag of Pirate’s Booty on the table behind him.

“Could I check?”

“Uhhhh … I guess so. It’s …”

“I know which way it is.”

I suddenly realized the roommate had no idea who “Ben” was. He had never even heard of me.

I walked past him and up the stairs to Max’s room. Inside, the curtains were drawn, even though it was still early. It took
a moment for my eyes to adjust. Then I realized Max was lying on his bed, facing the wall.

“Hey,” I said, putting my bitter bag of stuff on the floor by the drum set. Suddenly I wished I hadn’t brought it. Seemed
like I didn’t want to work things out. But I did. Desperately.

“Hey.” He didn’t turn over.

I took my old reliable stool in front of the drum set.

“Max?” He ignored me. “Are you going to look at me or what?”

He rolled onto his back. His eyes flicked over in my direction. Then he looked at the bag. Then he looked away.

“So …” I said. “I haven’t seen you around much lately.”

Long pause.

Then he said, “I’ve been busy.”

“Okay, but I think when you really want to be with somebody you kind of make the time, right?”

No response.

“What’s going on, Max?”

The question hung in the air, until he said, “I don’t know, Ben. You tell me.”

“Well.” I took a deep breath. “Look, I really want things to be okay. Okay? But that’s kind of hard when I never see you,
right?”

He didn’t respond.

“I just feel like I’m in this totally alone. Like you’re not even with me anymore.”

Nothing.

“Is it something I did?”

Still
nothing.

“Max? Isn’t there
anything
you want to say?”

“What do you want me to say?”

I wanted to scream,
I want you to say that you can’t live without me! That you’re sorry! That you’re making a mistake!
But all I could say was, “I just want you to say something.”

He said, “Something.”

And this was when I lost it.

“Okay, fine,” I snapped. “You know what? I can’t take it anymore. Seriously. If this is how you’re going to act, then I’m
out of here.”

I stood up. My hands were on my hips and I knew how it looked and I didn’t care.

But then I gave him one more chance.

“Max, please. Say something besides ‘something.’ Talk to me.”

“Jesus Christ, Ben—” He sat up, and looked at me. His eyes were red, but not from crying. He was mad. I was surprised. I had
no idea I was making him angry. He said, “What do you want from me?”

“What do I
want
from you?” I asked.

“Yeah. I mean, I already told you,
I don’t want a girlfriend
.”

It was like being punched in the stomach. “You do,” I said.

“I don’t.”

“But …”

His eyes said,
But what?

“What about us, about all the presents—” I stammered. “What about
everything
. I mean, I thought we both felt the same thing. I thought this was … you know … going somewhere.”

He shook his head. “I like hanging out with you,” he said. “But it’s not
going
anywhere. And I was happy with that. You’re not.”

“But I
am
happy,” I heard myself say. “I am. And if you’ve been happy, too, then maybe we’re not as far apart on this as you think—”

He interrupted. “The fact that we’re having this conversation at all means we’re far apart,” he said. I stood there dumbly.
Then he said, “I don’t want to do this.” And he lay back down on the bed.

“Max,” I said. “We can work this out. Talk to me.”

“.”

“Don’t act like this, come on.”

“.”

“
This
is how you want it to end?”

“.”

“Fine, Have it your way.”

I threw the bag down on the floor and was out the door so fast I didn’t even have time to cry.

The first tear hit the pavement outside. Like rain, but smaller. Then a flood.
He never even saw how destroyed I am,
I thought. I couldn’t decide if this was good or bad.

For the next several weeks I lurked around the neighborhood looking for him. In coffee shops. At parties. The grocery store,
even though he rarely cooked. The bookstore, even though he didn’t like to read. I got dressed up to go to the gas station.
I felt self-conscious leaving the house if I had a pimple, or if my hair didn’t seem right. On a good hair, blemish-free day,
I’d manufacture reasons to go out. Maybe we’d bump into each other. He’d say he was sorry. He’d have answers.

I never ran into him.

I thought I saw him everywhere, though. I’d see his expression on an actor’s face on TV. His haircut walking away from me
on the street. His back at the prescription counter at the drugstore. I’d do a double take—usually it was someone who didn’t
even remotely resemble him. Those were the absolute worst. The ones that made me feel like the biggest fool.

My friends were getting sick of me.

“Do you think I broke up with him, or did he break up with me?” I asked Kiki at least once a day.

“You broke up with him,” she’d say. “He was just torturing you, so you walked out. It was the right thing to do—you had to
get out of that house.”

“But I didn’t
want
to break up with him. So then didn’t he, in fact, break up with me?”

“No,” she’d say. “Because even though you didn’t say it exactly, his terms were not acceptable to you, and you made that clear.
And you
did
want to break up with him, you just don’t know it yet.”

Then I’d ask her, “Do you think he’s cooler than me?”

“That’s ridiculous,” she’d say.

“But he knows all those cool musicians … He owns a clothing company … Entertains Japanese hipsters …”

She’d tell me that in the end it wasn’t about who was cooler. That deep down nobody ever felt like they were cooler than anybody
else anyway, and I was just feeling insecure. Then she’d reassure me, again, that I wouldn’t regret leaving the way I did.
I tried to make myself believe her.

But as the holidays loomed, I started to miss Max more and more. I tried calling Ashton a couple of times, but he didn’t call
back. There was nothing much to do but sit around my apartment and brood, envisioning other scenarios, with different outcomes.
In one alternate universe, just after I walked out Max came to his senses, grabbed the bitter bag of presents, raced out of
the house, and shouted, “Ben! Wait!” He put the bag down on the pavement, stood before me, and said, “I can’t lose you, B,”
and kissed me. It was a kiss that said everything he couldn’t, and I forgave him instantly. In another, I walked into his
room without the bag, acted like everything was fine, and, after a brief moment where everyone knew everything and all was
understood, Max stood up, put a record on the turntable, lit a cigarette, and asked me what kind of food I wanted to order
in. I smiled, and the tension between us evaporated like morning fog.