But I Forget
Two people who didn't understand each other
[Another little story from life. This one’s for the sweetheart who found me online and invited me to come scar his white skin red and blue. It doesn’t work that way, love, it’s no good if it’s planned, and besides, I’m a lot more interesting in writing than in real life. But still: here’s a little story with teeth. Not much happened, but what’s here is true. Might be a coda to this.]
But I forget:
We sit on a low brick wall beside a border of tidy azaleas.
Moths cluster the rectangles of the street lights.
“Give me your hand.”
I hold it out like a handshake.
He accepts my grip but rotates my hand to get the back of it up. I resist; he overcomes my resistance. Still holding me in place, he bends as if to kiss the back of my hand.
For two or three seconds, I am happy without shadow. He is touching me, he is grappling with me, he is engaging me strength against strength.
I am weaker, I realize, but not unarmed. Filled with joyful challenge, I swoop forward to bite his hand.
He lets go of me and scoots a foot or two away.
I look at him through a haze of desire and puzzlement. What has happened?
He looks back gravely. “You shouldn’t do that. Someone will hurt you one day.”
We talk a while longer and talk other nights and I am so enamored of his presence, so completely happy to be given any attention, that it takes me a while, days or weeks, to realize he never tries to touch me again.
If I had known to sit still for just 30 seconds — I think, six months later and a year later and three years later — I would be happy. And I lie crying, nauseated with grief. I imagine long conversations, explaining. I didn’t know. I’ll do better. I’ll keep still.
But after more than 30 years, I’m not so sure.
Would I wish that joyful, fierce young eagle never to have been?