Come to the Edge_ A Memoir - Christina Haag [49]
…
We meet for lunch at Café Madeleine on West Forty-third Street, and he whispers, “I miss your ears. I miss your hair, your freckles, your laugh.”
I leave school one day, and tied to my bike I find red roses and a postcard of a French courtesan. On the back, unsigned: YOU RULE MY WORLD.
We’re at the Palladium. As we dance, he moves to shield me from a photographer I haven’t noticed. Unlike mine, his eyes are peeled for that sort of thing. In the picture, I am laughing. I think it’s a game. The caption reads, “Mystery Woman.”
Headed to Martha’s Vineyard in a small plane, we hit a winter storm. Buffeted by high winds, we’re rerouted to Hyannis. With no place to stay, we arrive unexpectedly at his grandmother Rose’s fourteen-room house. It’s late. On our way up the dark staircase, we run into his aunt Pat in a Lanz nightgown. She’s in her cups. Then his uncle appears. Neither knew the other was there. Upstairs, we find a bedroom that’s used only in summer. We push the twin beds together and lie under the thin coverlet, as the wind rages. In the morning, before we leave for the Vineyard, we walk on the breakwater as far as we can go. The waves slap the sides and he steadies me on the wet rocks.
On a warm day, he bikes from Manhattan to Park Slope with tiramisu from his favorite restaurant, Ecco, melting in his backpack. We eat it on my brownstone roof, homing pigeons cooing nearby, and watch the light fall over the faraway city.
…
A morning: He kisses my forehead and tells me to sleep in, tucking me into his king-size water bed. When I wake up, he’s gone.
After seeing Ronee Blakley at the Lone Star, he gives me the first of many driving lessons. In this, he is both brave and patient. I’m a born New Yorker, and driving is not in my skill set. With the Scotch from last call warm in our throats and Al Green in the tape deck, I sit on his lap, and we drive his Honda in circles around the Battery Park lot for what seems like hours. The stars are white and cold, and we laugh as he explains over and over how the engine works, what it does. And I learn somehow. I learn well.
But there are weeks I don’t see him. Things are not resolved with his girlfriend, and they’re not for me either. After one stretch in March when we haven’t spoken, John appears at a performance of Buried Child. I am Shelly and spend much of my time onstage in a patchwork bunny jacket peeling carrots. A friend who is there that night tells me that John wandered the halls alone at intermission humming to himself.
Afterward, we meet and cross Broadway to McGlades, a bar where the Juilliard actors and dancers congregate. It’s awkward at first, until after a beer or two, he suddenly reaches across the table. Half out of his seat, he takes my head in his hands and pulls me closer, the table wedged between us.
“I was going to leave right after the play. I keep trying to forget you, but I can’t. I can’t let go.” His words come so quickly. He looks worried.
“What?” I say.
“I’m obsessed with you. I can’t stop thinking about you.”
“What?”
“I’m obsessed. You make me an emotional person, and I’m not.”
“No, John …” I laugh, taking his hands from my ears. “I can’t hear you.” I hold them between mine over the table, and we smile knowing something has been laid bare.
“You’re funny,” I say.
“Why?”
“You’re a funny boy. You can only say that covering my ears.”
He sighs, but he doesn’t look away. “I’m scared.”
“I’m scared, too,” I say, but we’re both smiling.
As if to assuage me, he kisses each knuckle, then turns my palm over.
“I can’t stop looking at your hands. There’s a poem … have you seen Hannah and Her Sisters?”
Yes, I tell him.
“When I saw it, I kept thinking of you. You look like the actress. Your hair. When Michael Caine’s in the bookstore and he gives her the book—”
“I remember. ‘Nobody, not even the rain—’ ”
“ ‘—has such small hands.’ ”
He leans back and his eyes close. I touch his cheek. “What are you thinking?” I ask, but he shakes his head.
“What is it?” I make him look