on all sides. I have no choice but to drive forward.
He leans against the passenger-side window, his eyes half-closed as he studies me. I hate the feel of his eyes on my skin.
He says, “Are you cheating on Joel?”
I try to stay calm because of the baby. “Get out of my car.”
“Answer the question first. It’s not like you haven’t done it before. I know you cheated on Douglas.”
His words, so unbelievable in the middle of the afternoon in my car on the way home from the supermarket, hang in the air between us. I shake my head. If this could happen, then anything is possible. My life officially makes no sense.
Then I actually think, Wait a minute, maybe there’s an opportunity here. Maybe I should tell him I did cheat, and then he will tell Joel and we’ll break up, and when Joel hears later that I’m pregnant, he’ll think it was from the other guy. And then because there was no other guy I’ll be like the virgin Mary. It would be an Immaculate Conception. I would have conceived this baby with a night of sex that had never happened. I would be redeemed.
The idea seems brilliant, providential. I have found the answer and, in some way, the truth. My grandmother would look at me with love and approval in her eyes for the first time. I’d be above reproach. My mother wouldn’t be able to touch me with her sarcasm. I would have achieved purity. My child and I would bask in God’s light. We would be blessed.
Then the car behind me honks, and I come to my senses.
I shout at Weber, “No, I did not cheat,” and shove him out of the car at the next light.
I DIDN’T lie to Weber. I never cheat on my boyfriends, but I do sometimes hasten the end of a relationship so I can go back to having fun. The boyfriend-girlfriend scenario feels good at first. It is a comfort to know that someone is looking forward to seeing me at the end of the day, to know that I have a hand to hold, to know that someone likes me and has strung that feeling across a series of days, weeks, even months. But eventually the structure of the relationship and the sameness of the boyfriend makes me antsy. I start to think about going out at night, dream about it, and at that point the relationship is as good as over.
I always go back to wanting the same thing: to visit the Green Trolley and sit next to some strange man at the bar. I want to sip beer and flip my hair and feel my eyes come alive under his gaze. I know who I am in those moments. I recognize my reflection in the eyes of men who are interested in me. They have to be strangers, and it only lasts the first night, but it is the most wonderful night. I love every part of that night. I walk through the door of the Green Trolley, a bubble of anticipation lodged in my chest. I am usually wearing my favorite jeans, which hug my hips in just the right way, and a tight T-shirt. I glance over the room, separating the people I know from those I don’t. I walk slowly to the bar, take my favorite seat at the end and order a Corona Light with a lime from Charlie, if it’s a weeknight, and Leonard if it’s the weekend. And then it’s as simple as finding someone new to talk to. I start a conversation. I introduce myself with any or all of the following information: name, age, occupation, where I live, political party, religious orientation. I have had some stimulating conversations about God at that bar, and about the meaning of life. Sometimes I make up my answers, sometimes I tell the truth. It really doesn’t make a difference. Either way, the information is brand new. It has the crisp authoritative sound of fall leaves crackling under footsteps as it comes out of my mouth.
And then, in the middle of one of my sentences, or at the end of a fully realized thought, expected and yet unexpected, there is a kiss. A delicious first kiss. When I pull away, the man looks at me as if I’m beautiful and amazing and the best thing he’s ever seen. And in that moment I am all of those things. I am flush with self-confidence.