The Opposite of Loneliness: Essays and Stories (7 page)

“Onstage. In a play.” I didn’t say anything. He sat up. “You’re not serious, are you?”

I reverted, pulling my head inside my sweatshirt in mock retreat.

“I hate her!” My voice came out muffled. I popped back out. “I hate her, I hate her.” I smiled, and it worked: the intensity of the moment vanished as fast as I’d created it.

We lay there in silence for a while, but it was ruined. I knew the way Danny thought and I knew this only made him like me less and like her more. For the second time that day I wanted to hit something but I still couldn’t help myself. I rolled over and kissed at his neck.

“Remember that T-shirt she was wearing yesterday?”

“Who? Olivia?”

“Yeah.” I paused. “Did you give it to her? I thought you had that shirt.” He sat up again, serious this time. Cupped my hands in my lap.

“Listen,” he said, his eyebrows raised. “I love you, okay?”

“I know.”

“I don’t want to convince you.”

“I know,” I said. “I’m sorry.” The crickets droned and I stood up to shake sand off my back. “I just—love you.”

He looked at me and tucked my loose hair behind my ears.

“I love you too,” he said. But I never got my answer.

The Yahtzee happened that night. After the play. I went for a third time despite Danny’s genuine suggestion that I sit this one out. In the hour beforehand, I walked to the Penny Patch, the old candy store in the village by Wellfleet Harbor. I ate a small piece of chocolate fudge, a small piece of penuche fudge, and three saltwater taffies and decided I was being ridiculous about the whole thing. Danny and I had gone out to dinner. We’d had sex in the bottom of a romantic dune crater. We’d been dating since we were twenty-four. I’d gone to Minnesota with his parents; he’d come to my grandfather’s funeral. Olivia was strange and loud and a tomboy and they loved her because she was one of them, drinking beers and wearing dumb hats. Tomorrow I would pack Danny inside my car and we’d zoom off on the freeway and back inside the walls of New York.

The fact that I had to watch it a third time was almost comical. The approach this time ended up as a complex and detailed imagining of exactly what Danny and Olivia did together offstage. Wishing each other luck before their first entrance. Squeezing hands behind thick black curtains on the side of the theater. Rapidly changing costumes at intermission and catching glimpses of each other’s underwear.

When the show was over, I acted extremely cool. Involving myself in the standing ovation and congratulating Olivia when she came out the side of the theater. I even winked at Danny, which he thought was funny, or pretended to. The cast and crew were hopped up on nostalgia—and the whole thing felt a lot like the last night of camp. We grouped up in cars and headed to the Beachcomber, where the local alcoholics and bad bands were as prominent as promised. I actually got a bit drunk off gin and tonics and Danny must have been listening at the dunes because he paid a lot of attention to me. The morning hovered over all our actions with a kind of euphoria. I decided I hated Cape Cod as much as I hated its summer heroine, and the hours until I could cross back over its metallic bridge ticked down with each exceedingly dizzy hour.

The six of us ended up at Ricky’s just like the night before. Danny, the bearded Noah, the delicate Eric, Olivia, and me. We had to do the whole ordeal with the square penis again, running up the stairs and kneeling before Ricky lumbered up to kick us down. Everything felt very exciting and very immature at the same time and I genuinely fluctuated between resenting my hidden worship of their rural hipsterdom and declaring (internally) that their fun was a little too intentional. Eric forced us into the kitchen, where we were supposed to engage in “slap shots”—a game he insisted was hilarious but involved taking a shot and promptly getting slapped. Ricky didn’t understand and the rest of us were too tired for that kind of thing so we ended up sort of loitering and looking in cabinets.

“Game,” said Noah, opening and shutting the refrigerator for no reason. “Game!”

“Yes!” Olivia agreed. And it was settled. Danny and Noah went to set something up and Ricky pulled Eric out to clear the table and assemble some kind of smoking situation. I went to place my wineglass in the sink but stopped when I realized Olivia was still standing there and we were alone together for the first time. I looked at her.

“Do you want another drink?” she asked, casual.

“No thank you,” I said. Still standing in place. It was silent, awkward.

“Did you like that wine?” she said finally, twisting a ring.

“It was fine.”

“Really? I thought it was kind of sweet.” We looked at each other for a beat and I walked over to the sink to place my glass in its wet bottom.

“Here,” she said, and I placed hers next to mine. It was all very intentional, very clean. And I knew in that instant that Olivia cared deeply about Danny, or she would have left the room. I’d been watching her all weekend but I realized she’d been watching me too. The understanding was empowering.

“You were very good in the play, you know.” We circled. “Your physicality was really spot-on.”

“Thank you,” she said. “Danny told me you used to act.”

“I did, yes. It just wasn’t that fulfilling in the end. I needed something more . . . permanent. That’s not the right word.” We looked at each other again and Olivia’s face broke into a massive smile. The fullest smile I’d seen her make all weekend.

“What?” I’d been going for condescension.

“Nothing. Just—there’s a lot of Danny in you. The way you talk. Your expressions.” For some reason it felt like an insult and I had the desire to smash her face into a wall again. “I mean, you were probably smart to do something else. It’s stupidly hard, especially these days. And let’s be honest, none of us would be up here if we were actually going to make it.” It was a strange thing to say.

“Danny’s going to.” My response was immediate. “I know Danny’s going to.”

I’d surprised her. She looked at me sideways because she could tell that I meant it. “I mean, he’s really talented, don’t you think?”

“Of course,” she said. Still trying to figure me out. “He’s fantastic.”

“Isn’t he?”

I smiled. And it seemed like things were shifting. Danny was on my team all along, he had to be, and looking for proof was not the point. Maybe it was the wine or the exhaustion, but for some reason I believed in Danny in that moment like I’d never believed in him before. I raised my eyebrows and left the kitchen.

When we came out, they were setting up Yahtzee. Eric had taken out the pieces and Ricky was scrambling around for pens. Noah was rolling a spliff.

“You know when I was in Taiwan, those monks I was staying with played this game like all the time where they had these dice and these cups and I never really understood how it all worked but they would bet all this crazy shit, like bags of rice or like chickens,” he said, licking the joint as he rotated it between his fingers.

“Dude, you gotta stop talking about Taiwan. You’re becoming the kid who went to India.” Danny tore off a scorecard and placed it in front of him.

“I didn’t go to India.”

“That’s not the point.” He looked toward Olivia and they shared a smile.

“Noah spent last summer in Taiwan,” she said to me. “If you’re lucky, he’ll show you his album of eight million photographs later . . . but it will be hard because you can’t
really
understand unless you’ve been there.”

“Oh fuck all of you,” Noah said. He’d finished rolling and everyone was finally gathered around the table.

“Here,” Olivia said, pulling a chair back for me. I sat down but I didn’t like that she was talking to me now like we were friends.

We started playing. Things began slowly but sped up as we sobered. Apparently their late nights often ended in a game, and their strategies for when to count a three of a kind were beyond me. It was competitive. Danny, Olivia, and Nick were peering over at each other’s scorecards and keeping track of who was on track for the thirty-five-point bonus.

“Fives, fives, fives,” Noah chanted, using his palm to cover the top of the red plastic cup and shaking. He spilled and we stared. He got a single five and scooped the rest of the dice back to roll again.

“Fives, fives, fives!” He got another five.

“I’m literally going to kill you if you do that every time you roll,” Danny said.

“But it works!”

“Fuck off.”

He rolled a third time to reveal two more fives and stood up to high-five Eric. “Aye yi yi! Five-sa fives!” Danny swiped up the dice for his turn and ended up a lucky but last-minute small straight. Still, he was losing and he didn’t like it.

The game meandered on and stories began to take over. It was getting late but going to bed meant good-bye so we pushed forward. My anger had begun to fade to apathy as the prospect of tomorrow loomed nearer and I could get in the car and be done with the whole ordeal.

But that’s when I saw it happen. Noah was telling a story about a production of
Othello
in this Queens warehouse where a castmate filled his water-glass prop with vodka as a prank before he walked onstage, forcing him to take small shots throughout his climactic scene with Emilia. Ricky was eating it up and everyone watched him as he mimed his narration with his whiskey and Coke. Even I was laughing, but I turned an eye toward Danny as he finished his last turn. If it had been a second earlier or a second later I would have missed it, but for some reason I looked back at him at that moment and saw his hand dart up toward the table and switch a two to a four. Just like that: rotating the die on its side and sliding his hand back to his lap. It was subtle. Quick. But it said everything. Absolutely, absolutely everything.

“Yahtzee!” he shouted. Standing up and grinning right at Noah. “Yaht-zeeee!”

“Bastard,” Noah said.

“Dannyyy,” Olivia whined.

“He always wins.” Eric took a final hit off the joint. “You suck.”

Danny beamed and moved his shoulders side to side in a little dance.

But everything was so instantly, remarkably different. I was shocked. Literally incapable of comprehending what I’d seen. I felt stabbed, like the air was forced out of my chest, and I looked at him aghast, hurt, shut behind walls. It was unfathomable to me. The game didn’t matter. The stakes were so low. There was no part of me that would—could—ever consider doing what he did. But it was so easy for him. The easiest thing. And that, I realized, had been there all along.

I’ve wondered sometimes if things would have turned out differently if I hadn’t seen him turn the die. If I’d lingered a few more seconds on Noah’s bearded laugh or taken a sip of my drink. Or if I’d chosen to say something. Stand up, wide-eyed, and make the public accusation. Embarrass him, force him to grovel in front of his darling and her cohorts.

But the articulation of his crime would have been meaningless; he would never have understood just how deeply that tiny turn of his wrist had pierced me. Just how utterly I’d been reduced. Mocked. Betrayed.

I didn’t say much for the rest of the night. Sat stiff in my chair and even stiller in our bed when he stroked me. He asked me if something was wrong just before we fell asleep but it didn’t seem worth it.

“Are you still upset about Olivia?” I nearly laughed. Olivia was nothing, I wanted to say. It was a carnival. That’s all.

I woke up at sunrise to a dead-low tide, placed my skirts and flats in neat piles inside my bag, padded down the staircase, and walked out the door into the now crisp Cape Cod air. The drive to New York felt short and I didn’t stop until I reached the city and walked in the door and padded up the staircase and turned off my phone to sleep for a long, long time.

* * *

I remember trying to explain to my mother why the Yahtzee was so essential but she didn’t understand. We were getting lunch on Bleecker and I was trying to convince her I was doing
okay.
She’d driven up from Pennsylvania but all I let us talk about was my sister’s sister-in-law and the Oscar nominations. It was pouring rain but it stopped by the time she paid the check and the restaurant’s awning dripped outside the window. We had plans to spend the afternoon at the Met but the prospect seemed unbearably exhausting. I imagined myself holding a brochure and walking from room to gigantic room with waning focus. I’d read descriptions on marble walls and realize I’d stopped comprehending. I’d begin to look for benches. I’d become dehydrated. Outside, the sun would blare and crowds of people would wait, sunburned, to get inside. I’d want to go home and sink into bed or at least sit down for more than two minutes. But I wouldn’t be able to. And it would hurt me. Frustrate me. The waiter came back to pick up the check and a cupcake passed by with a sparkler candle flicking.

Cha-cha-cha, I thought. Cha-cha-cha, cha-cha-cha.

In years to come he would whisper it at parties as the cake paraded by or mouth it across a restaurant table at a sibling’s birthday dinner. On our wedding night, Danny winked at me when the cake came out and we both knew what he was thinking. My mother always said how amazing it is that things seem so absolute when you’re young. But the sand slides down in chutes until the dune craters are all full. Inevitable, the magazines write, and we shake our heads with somber nostalgia for the grass and its crickets. We always will.

The Emerald City

To:
[email protected]

From:
[email protected]

Date:
Jun 16, 2003 at 10:56 PM

Subject:
melting! (the Green Zone hit 108°)

Laura darling,

I stopped carrying my gun today. To be honest, we don’t really need them. It’s like we’re all inventing our adventure—crawling through the Baghdad gardens like the seeds are mines, like the bruised pears might blow our damn legs off. Wolf still carries his M-9 on the boulevard, belting it to cargos like his comic book idols. (The nerds in the Coalition Provisional Authority are keen on the war glory stuff.) I’m no wannabe soldier, though; I don’t have to tell you that. Not joining the Army is just about the best decision I ever made. I stopped romanticizing this place long before the juniper trees blossomed and they reopened the Green Zone swimming pool. I eat Afghan bananas in an office in a palace in a peace zone for God’s sake. Outside, it’s just a bunch of bodies slamming against stones, lurking in desert hidey-holes until their human fuses explode.

I’ve been thinking a lot about you, if that means anything. There’s this river here, Laura, this river that bends through the irony of Saddam’s old statues and monuments and other marble tyrannies. The Arabs call it “Dijla” but every Bible reader east of Persia knows it’s the Tigris—pouring through the sand straight from Mesopotamia. Probably the first thing to get a name when Civilization started pointing and writing. Well when it’s hot and the guards don’t have a captain around, they let some of us down to sit on the blast walls by its bank. Wolf and Michael bring beers and laugh about the Texans or talk about college. But when I look at water, I think of New Hampshire. The way you smelled like blueberries and pine when we’d sit on that dock.

I’m so self-indulgent, Laura! But I suppose you’re used to forgiving my poetry. God knows the soldiers would crack up if they read this. It’s funny enough that a skinny architect ended up redistricting Iraq. But it’s nice doing something that (theoretically) helps the world. I was sick of designing parking lots and industrial boringness. But you know that.

Truth is I don’t know what to say, really. The Green Zone’s hardly exciting these days, especially not for us civilian office slaves contracting for the CPA. Perhaps I should just pretend to be your lost lieutenant, sniping terrorists with your picture at my breast.

Mostly, we just battle time. Sweating through zip-off pants and moving like moths to the air-conditioned pockets of this place. They finally moved my department out of the hotel offices and inside occupation headquarters in Saddam’s old palace. (Now it’s all diplomats and policy snobs.) I’m still living in that trailer, though. But despite the heat, it’s not so bad. I’ve set up this shelf and managed to buy a coffee maker off a friend who works in the kitchen. There’s a Pleasantville quality about it all—the matching trailers lined up with manicured grass and palm trees. Even the roads are surreal—Hummers driving at slow-motion speed, obeying the zone’s 35 mph cap.

My work’s the same. I’ve officially been promoted to Deputy Secretary of Housing Reconstruction and Redistribution, but titles don’t mean much around here. I’ll finally have my own translator though (thank God). I think the Iraqis are starting to realize the permanence of things. Last week, Wolf and I checked on the Shi’as we moved into one of the In-Zone complexes and hardly any families had unpacked. This woman boiled chickpeas on a suitcase counter, forbidding her children to unzip their duffel bags. She was just stirring this pot, stirring and stirring and shaking her head. Wolf gave the kids Tootsie Rolls, but she threw them back at him. I looked her file up later and it said her husband died in the bombing.

These people don’t get it, Laura. They don’t get that our trailers won’t leave come September. Then again, I’m not sure the CPA really gets this either. I’m starting to think we’re here for the long run. Which is hard when I tend to garrulous musings on blueberries and pine.

Look, Laura, I’m sorry if this is weird. I know we said we’d leave things ambiguous—but when you didn’t show up at my good-bye party, I wasn’t sure what to think. If you want me to stop writing, I will. Really, I will. Just know that I’m thinking about you. Know you’re my tether outside these walls.

Is Manhattan hot? Have the Japanese invaded or is it still too early in the summer? I’d tell you more about this strange country if I could, but I’m caged up. They’ve built us this greenhouse and won’t let us out.

Anyway, my fan died, so I should probably sleep before I melt. I swear this whole desert’s going to melt into glass by August. But don’t worry about me, Laura, really don’t. It’s safer than the city in here, I promise.

Your long lost soldier CPA officer, Will

* * *

To:
[email protected]

From:
[email protected]

Date:
Jun 24, 2003 at 12:39 PM

Subject:
greetings from kebab-land

Laura!

I’m eating a kebab right now and it’s raining outside. This juxtaposition is just about the best thing to happen all month. CPA turned the palace ballroom into a chow hall, so I’m writing to you from quite the elegant milieu. My romanticism pees itself in places like this—you know how I get around high ceilings. I picture Saddam and his sons roaming the naves at some dance. Perhaps stopping at this very spot to smooth out a beard or straighten a robe. We joke that the ghosts of Husseins haunt the hallways at night, creeping out once they lock the marble doors at nine.

I’m in a great mood, Laura. Perhaps the best since I arrived. I was worried when you didn’t reply last week that you weren’t going to, so when I saw your name in my inbox this morning, I was ecstatic. I know you said not to talk about it, but I’m glad we’re staying in contact like this. I miss you, and having someone on the outside is more important than you can imagine.

There’s other good news: they assigned me my translator last week and I finally feel like I’ll be able to get some work done. Relocating Iraqi families is hard enough without memorized Arabic phrases and awkward insertions of ana asif, ana asif, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.

Her name’s Haaya and she’s amazing. Her dad was an official of the Iraqi Ba’ath party in the 80’s, but her mom’s “a soviet.” When she was twelve, government men killed her father and brothers while she watched from upstairs—punishment for siding with Kuwait. After that she lived in Russia—but two months out of Moscow University and she’s back in the desert—whispering English into turban-less ears.

She doesn’t wear a hijab or burka or even long sleeves. She just glides through the palms like she grew them, moves through the palace like it’s hers. I didn’t even know how much I needed her until she appeared. I can speak now. I can hear now. I can talk to the slum men and the landlords and the vendors selling pita—hear their housing concerns without consulting ten dictionaries. It’s just nice having someone to talk to outside the confines of my keyboard. Wolf and Michael are great, but they know more about post-conflict reconstruction policy than anything else (except maybe combat video games).

Haaya studied art history, so we indulge in humanities stuff together. She explained about the buildings and statues and I explained about the designs. Did you know that before the Ottomans, mosques had no ceilings? I like that. It seems more natural to pray in the open air. Haaya prays five times a day despite her bare arms. She has this little mat in her backpack and just excuses herself from meetings. Last night we went to the orange trees and watched the Helipad landings. (She knows the guard who minds the orchard.) I told her about you while we peeled citrus rinds. You’d like each other, I think.

Arghgfljshdfg, Laura! There are so many places I still want to go, so many things I still want to do! Leaving the world of corporations and nine-to-fives has inspired this sort of naïve expeditionism in me. (My computer’s telling me that’s not a word, but I swear it is.) Have you ever been to Asia? I think we should go to Asia. Asia or Africa. Remember when we used to talk about going on a trip? It was a while ago, but still. I know we agreed not to talk about the future, but they’re going to let us out of here eventually. Maybe the US will invade India and we can eat kebabs in their castles. :)

In a strange way, I feel guilty being cheerful. Look at me, eating fruit as I watch the soldiers land and walk single file from their high school hallways to concrete labyrinths and exploding highways. (I know we didn’t look that young at 19.) There’s a rumor around here that GIs have been leaving their trackers in trashcans while they sleep away their duty parked in fields. The army’s a mess and the government knows it. The CPA’s trying to do as much as we can via remote control—peering over the Green Zone walls. Haaya was the one who got me thinking. Realizing that our impact could double if they’d actually let us see Iraq.

Oh God, the CPA leadership must have mastered telepathy—Paul Bremer is walking over with his lunch. (You’ve probably read about it in the news, but he’s been top dog around here since May.) Time to pretend I’m analyzing zoning plans! Take care! I miss you! Tell me more about your job, Laura, your last message was so short!

Thinking of you,

Will

* * *

To:
[email protected]

From:
[email protected]

Date:
July 5, 2003 at 1:12 AM

Subject:

Laura!!

Happy Fourth of July! I’m juts home now from the green zone party! It was so American but I loved it so much because it love this country so much, I really do. They had it at the swimming poot to raise morale or something and Haaya taght me to Muslim dance, but I cant remember the name of it! It’s so hot again, everyone young was swimming all day and they shipped in barbeuqe which made me think of home. I have to tell you Laura I love our country I do. I know we mess up invading and every thing but we are just a bunch of guys trying to share democracy around the world is all it comes down to. You don’t see americns blowing up planes do yoU?!? Look, I love you so much Laura I know I’m not suppost to say that but I thought about you and don’t worry really I’m ok here, very safe etc. You should have heard the air force singing the national anthem . . . that’s how it should be sung, I know it. This one man—he started crying when he heard it, this one old man who had all the badges from Vietnam he started crying when he heard that cong.

I’m so sleepy I’m about to sleep literally but I thought to send this so you know I’m thinking about you. Write me back I read your letters a hundred timse when you write me back.

Will

* * *

To:
[email protected]

From:
[email protected]

Date:
July 19, 2003 at 10:23 PM

Subject:
last two weeks

Laura—

I’m sorry I didn’t write you sooner but things have been crazy around here. I’m sure you’ve seen it all on the news (the media’s eating it up) but I’ll tell you the story sans public opinion concerns. The insurgent truck crashed through the defense and into the Canal Hotel at around 4:30. I was outside (about a half mile away) but every window on Yafa Street shattered in unison. Everyone heard it. I guess curiosity killed precaution because the streets started flowing with smoky, squinting eyes. It’s messed up, but people were relieved when they found out it was only UN headquarters. 22 are dead but they got it wrong about the wounded—more like 200 than CNN’s 125. With their High Commissioner for Human Rights (ironically) suffocated in rubble—rumor has it that the UN’s going to be out of here by August. I wouldn’t be surprised.

I started carrying my gun again. It’s stupid, but I do it anyway. There was this woman, Laura, and her arm was literally hanging to her body. She was supporting it with her other hand and just walking. Walking away from the hotel, wide-eyed and stricken dumb. She was walking, Laura! Not running, not screaming, just pacing her way down Yafa like the slow-moving cars. I go to sleep seeing that woman’s arm and then I wake up and strap my M-9 to my belt. Deep down I know I’m just being stupid. It’s not like a gun can stop a car from blowing up.

Everyone’s on edge. I caught Wolf reading the CPA safety booklet at lunch and Michael keeps jerking his head into stillness like he’s heard some unheard bomb. Haaya’s the only one who seems unfazed. (“This is a war.”) We’ve been spending more time in fieldwork and less time in the office. We finally finished screening and documenting the peasants who poured into the Green Zone apartments in the aftermath of occupation. Groups of fourteen and fifteen are crammed into two-bedroom units, but in-zone space is sacred compared to the slums outside the walls. Problem is, now everyone’s suspicious of anyone and everyone whose skin isn’t pale. The new housing we’ve been fixing was ready for move-in the day of the crash—but Bremer pushed us back three weeks. It’s probably for the best, anyway. People are teeming to get inside the walls and background checks have half the office with headaches.

There’s more bad news. Reports of Sunni massacres have started leaking in via civilian slums. Apparently the Iraqi
police are behind it. (DO NOT share this information with anyone.) This is why we need to redistrict! If we concentrate the Sunnis we can get the GIs into effective patrols—the CPA notion that desegregation will “address the crisis at its roots” is an ignorant pipedream. This isn’t goddamn Jim Crow, it’s 1400 years of holy war! It’s Sunni men, pillowcased and shot by the Tigris at four am! The Iraqi police patrol by day and ride with the Mahdi army once they finish evening prayer. With access to residence rolls by block, their work is practically done for them—(even I can tell Sunni from Shi’a by last name).

Haaya and I watched the helipad again last night. The orange groves behind the palace have become a routine for us. The days are starting to blend together and it’s these moments that get me out of bed. The winds come at night and if we focus we can smell salt from the Caspian. Haaya’s been teaching me Arabic. Burtuqal, orange. Nakhla, palm tree. Jundi cheb, boy soldier. Every night, more and more troops fly in and ship out. We watch the lines and line up our peels on the grass. She told me about her family’s death for real on Wednesday and I told her about Kyle’s overdose and the time I almost dropped out of school. Companionship is everything, Laura. (The heat seems to foster clichés, but it’s true.) Wolf and Michael started bunking together, they don’t talk much, but they play those combat games on their laptops when they can’t sleep.