Typical Trevor. He’s looking at the floor, shaking his head slightly. I reach for the ring and wedge it off, scraping my skin in the process. It sits in my hand.
“Trevor, I’m sorry, I don’t want to get married. I think we should break up. Seriously, this time. Yes, it has to do with her, but let’s look at us. We don’t have that spark. Let’s be honest, we’ve just been going through the motions lately.”
I’ve kept myself calm, even agreeable. But he comes at me with fire. His face has shut out anything friendly in it, and I get a flash of him as his litigator persona. “Maybe you’ve been the one going through the motions. I haven’t. I’ve been here. It’s been real for me. How long have you felt this way? Years?”
I honestly don’t know. My relationship with him has been aflat line, always fine. Something easy in my life. So yes, it has been years, but I never realized it until being with Erebuni. My lack of answer is answer enough. He runs his hands through his hair, makes some kind of angry grunt. “You came in here wearing my ring.”
“I hoped we could be together. I wanted to, but—it doesn’t feel right. I’m sorry, Trevor. The ring is beautiful.” Finally, I let it go, place it on his productivity journal.
He’s shaking his head no, no. The day is too beautiful for this, almost mocking in its soft streaks of clouds, the periwinkle water of the bay. Tiny white sailboats look like birds settled upon the water. But I need to press on. “We’d be okay together, but don’t you want to feel absolutely thrilled together?”
Trevor looks lost. No surprise. I’ve given him an entire jungle of surprises to get lost in. I figure, why not throw a couple more brambles his way. I say, “I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again. Katie is completely in love with you. She wants to jump your bones. You should, uh, give her a shot.”
That rouses him into something resembling panic, which turns on my alarm sensors, too. He says, “Katie. Oops. I invited her over to celebrate.”
I squint. “You. Invited.... Katie? To come to our reconciliation?” I don’t know where to start. That he was so confident I’d come running to him (I mean, I did) that he invited someone over to party with us. And then instead of spending the afternoon with me, his back-together girlfriend, he was going to friend-zone me so that we all get to hang out together with his coworker who is in love with him? What about—
“Didn’t you expect us to... you know?” I tilt my head suggestively. “Where was Katie going to factor into that?”
He has a hand out, defensively. “I mean, I don’t know.”
I am starting to think he does like her back. He’s just been with me out of some misplaced loyalty. I want to tell him that, but right now he doesn’t seem the most receptive to my ideas, like he might thrust it away just to contradict me.
He crosses his arms, then uncrosses them. “I wasn’t thinking. Who cares? She’ll be here soon.” He lets out a short, frustrated breath. “You mean it? We’re done?”
I nod. “We are.”
Then I hear a tapping at the door, and Katie emerges. “Knock-knock. Hope everyone’s ready to celebrate. I’ve got the Mt. Tam brie and a bucket of Hog Island oysters. Welcome home, mister!”
Katie, tall with long thick hair and black-framed glasses, wearing a quirky red-and-brown number that’d make Zooey Deschanel positively envious, enters with an air of euphoria. Trevor and I remain frozen in place. He was not kidding. He seriously invited her to come over at the same time as me. God, if I had any doubt in my mind that this was a bad idea (and I didn’t), it’s sure wiped away.
An instant later, Katie, shrewd as ever, reads our faces, and the smile on hers turns into a small O. “I forgot something in my car. The hot sauce, duh. Can’t do oysters without it. I’ll just... leave this—” And she places the goods on the coffee table and begins to back out, but before she can, I tell her, “No, it’s okay. I was just leaving.”
She cocks an eyebrow. “You were leaving.” She says it as more of a statement.
I nod. Then turn toward Trevor. “Bye, Trevor,” I say with an apologetic smile. He returns it with a capitulatory one, and we briefly hug. I can’t get over how hard and angular his body feels,so different from Erebuni’s, so clearly not what I want. Part of me is sad about our final hug—I mean, five years with him—but another part of me is so ready. Even if I never see Erebuni again, this is the right thing to do. Though I hope, so desperately, that’s not the case.
I walk toward the door, where Katie is glued to her phone, but when I approach I see it’s stuck on the lock screen. I lean toward her, and with a smirk, I whisper, “He’s single.” She gives me a look that’s a mix of bossy and grateful and says, “ ’Bout time.”
I shut the door behind me. It clicks, a slow, deliberate sound.
25
I have found it very late, and lost it very soon.
??? ????,???? ??????????:
—Armenian Proverb
Outside Trevor’s apartment,in the soft sunlight, a couple walks by hand in hand; she’s holding a grocery bag, and he’s resting a pack of sparkling water on his shoulder. They’re in Ray-Bans and smiling, tall and blond and tan. An ideal I once wanted. Could have had just minutes ago. Their clear adoration for each other makes me certain they don’t see me.
The Marina, for all its sweeping views and lovely old architecture, kind of sucks. It reeks of Trevor and his ilk; I need to get out of here.
I get in my car and close the door, waiting for the heat to become suffocatingly hot. Part of me wants to punish myself. I know I did the right thing, but I take stock of myself: I’m unemployed, broke off a five-year relationship, and worst of all, there’s no Erebuni. I know I can’t call her up and say, “Hey, guess what! I broke it off for real. I’m ready for you now!” I won’t do that to her.
The still heat becomes cloying, making the air thick and hard to breathe. Enough of this. I turn on my car and roll down the windows, a warm Marina breeze tumbling in. Then I pick up my phone and call Diana.
She picks up. “Happy Thursday?”
