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“What if I could promise you that we will never have to go through a nasty break-up?”
She always says inflammatory things like this when I’m in the middle of a good meal. I think it’s a form of
revenge, she hates losing my attention for even a moment. I cast one last loving glance down at my lobster risotto and then
I put my fork aside and look up at her.
“What?” I say, unwilling to begin this new dialogue, this latest twist in the road.
“No tearful goodbyes, no long relationship re-hash, if one of us decides to leave he or she is free to do so with no
recriminations. What do you think?”
“Are you trying to tell me something?” We started off the evening in great spirits so unless something went
wrong between the antipasto and the salad, I’m at a loss. But who can tell with women? Especially this one, whenever
I’m certain she’s going to turn left, she turns right.
“No, Ethan,” she sighs and wrinkles her brow at me, “I was just thinking that it would be a neat idea if
we had a safeword. Like they do in bondage situations. An instant out. See, we would agree on a word and if either of us
ever said it then the other one would have to leave.”
Bondage situations? Who is this girl, where does she come up with stuff like this? My risotto is going to get cold and
congealed if I don’t resolve this. “One word?”
“Yup.”
“Any suggestions what the word should be?”
“Yup.”
She’s not going to make this easy. I take a sip of my Reisling and I let its light fruity feel wash around my mouth.
Then I take another bite of the risotto. Pure heaven here, fresh lobster, not frozen, real arborio rice not generic short-grain,
butter and olive oil and garlic all combining with workmanlike craft. I glance up and she is watching me again, a slight
smile curving up one side of her mouth, her dark hair casting a shadow over her cheekbones. I can’t quite read her.
“I’m sorry,” I mumble, “risotto…”
“I know, ‘risotto must be eaten as hot as possible, cold or lukewarm risotto is so distressing as to be a crime
against nature.’ You go ahead and eat, sugar.”
I surrender to the pleasure of my meal while she picks around her braised lamb shanks. Her fork hovers and feints but rarely
lands. Usually I can’t abide a woman who doesn’t eat with gusto but she is my beautiful exception.
I believe exceptions to rules are purely a female invention. Women are always looking for a short cut. Take hair removal
for example. For centuries men have been shaving their beards, plain-old shaving, just a man and a sharp blade. There have
been innovations–electric shavers, disposables, rotating heads and multiple blades–but essentially shaving has
remained the same. But shaving isn’t enough for women–it’s just too simple. Women’s hair removal
involves everything from hot wax to some sort of green goop that comes from Australia. What’s wrong with the old razor
and a little shaving foam? It doesn’t seem to me that any of those other methods are the miracle cure, every girl I’ve
ever slept with has had bikini bumps and stubbly legs. Women are always looking for the miracle cure. That’s why I’m
certain this little word trick of Paula’s isn’t going to work. It’s an attempt at a loophole plain and
simple, and somehow I’m sure this loop is going to turn into a noose for me.
After the risotto, after the biscotti and espresso (who ever invented biscotti anyway--it’s just stale cookies), she
brings up the idea again.
“You and I are having such a nice time together. I hate to think about going through one of those bitchy little shout-fests
with you. Wouldn’t it be easier if we knew we never had to do that?”
“Paula, breakups are like death and taxes, they are kind of unavoidable.”
“I disagree, it’s all just a matter of fine tuning the process.”
“Tell me the word you have in mind.”
Paula looks around the room as if she is about to impart a state secret and then she leans over and whispers it in my ear.
“Odd choice.”
“It had to be distinctive, so one of us wouldn’t say it accidentally in conversation.”
I laugh. “I don’t think that word is likely to come up in conversation.”
“Exactly.”
Later that night, after a round of Olympic-quality sex, I start thinking about the word. Would she really leave if I said
it, would I leave if she did? After the restaurant, she didn’t say another word about it, as if it had already been
decided. Did I really agree to this? And I don’t even know what the word means exactly. I resolve to look it up in
the dictionary in the morning.
Paula is gone when I wake up. She has a habit of doing that. She says it is because she looks bad in the morning but I
imagine it is because she knows when I wake up alone in the morning I miss her. She collects moments of power the way some
girls collect figurines. But it’s nice to have the mornings alone, I can cook a decent breakfast before I head down
to the shop. One of the side benefits to owning an imported foods shop is getting the most luxurious items for cost. I have
thin slices of black truffles on my scrambled eggs and gooseberry jam on my brioche. It’s attention to detail that
makes all the difference, that makes life worth living.
I arrive at the shop and let myself in. I like this part best of all, me alone before the rest of the staff gets here.
I flick on all the lights, turn on the sound system and reassure myself that everything is just as I left it last night.
I forgot to look up the word. It hits me as I’m checking the cheeses aging in the cave. That damn word. She’s
too mysterious, sometimes. It wears on me. Each week in our relationship is like a puzzle. Last weekend instead of just
meeting me for dinner, she sent me on a scavenger hunt through the city. Eventually, one final clue, (ask the bouncer at
Renegade Jake’s) led me to a key which led me to a suite in a five-star hotel and my Venus, draped not in furs but in
velvet.
On the way home from work, I go to the library and settle myself in front of the unabridged dictionary. There it is, but
the definition doesn’t quite explain it. The word is more than it’s definition. It leads me to Babylonian mysticism
first, then Nietzsche which I believe was her intent. Beware of beautiful women quoting Nietzsche, didn’t she say that
to me once? Some conversation about how pure literature is never written. She’s looking for the pure experience, the
untainted, the unknown.
I’m not against the unknown. I’ve eaten things that would make most people turn green. Grilled cactus, alligator
meat, even a whole sparrow once when I was in Hong Kong. But the things she says sometimes, who can fathom it? Strange foods
can be tasted, digested, rendered normal after a time. I don’t think it’s quite the same with ideas.
As days pass, the idea of the word begins to undo me. I practice saying it to myself, first slowly, whispered in front of
the mirror. When I was a child, I was told that the true name of God had such power that it could unmake the world. This
word might unmake my world. But when given a word there are only two options, speak or go silent. I plan to remain silent
for as long as possible.
A few nights later, Paula and I are at Mata eating sushi. I believe ‘lite’ soy sauce is an abomination. Less
sodium. How uselessly cruel. Paula nibbles on California rolls and salmon sashimi, standard neophyte fare, dipped in that
pallid version of soy. I’m into the more hard core stuff, sea urchin, fish roe, octopus and squid—all slathered
with wasabi and dipped into high-test, full-salt soy sauce.
“Baby, you eat the grossest things,” she says. Paula doesn’t use chopsticks, she just pops the rolls into
her shiny vermillion mouth.
I’m never sure if she’s mocking me. I dip my pieces of nigiri sushi into my dish of soy sauce, fish side down.
There is so much wasabi in my soy sauce that my nose starts burning and my face gets flushed. Odd how Japanese horseradish
mimics the feeling of arousal.
“Why did you pick that word?” Maybe if I can solve that mystery, others won’t haunt.
“Are you still hung up on that? I like the sound of it. It has sibilance.”
“Not Nietzsche?”
“Of course, Nietzsche, always that. Nothing wrong with a little will to power.”
Talking to this girl, is like walking in a labyrinth, just when I know where I am going I find myself smack up against a
brick wall.
We go back to my place. I try to steer her toward the bedroom but she eludes my embrace. She pours herself a glass of tawny
port and leans against in the doorway, watching me with the cool gaze of a predator. I just want to go to bed, to make love,
fall asleep, and wake with a woman beside me. The simple things. Without thinking, the word leaves my mouth.
“Zarathustra,” I say and then suck in my breath, waiting.
She looks up at me with glittery dark eyes. She turns her head slowly, as if she is still hearing the echo of the word fade
through the room. “Bravo,” she says softly, and turns to get her purse. She stands up and I watch her, frozen,
struck dumb. I want to take it back. She heads to the door, her shoulders pulled back high, her long dark hair–that
hair I will never touch again–swaying against her back.
She reaches the door and turns back toward me. “Psych,” she says.
“What?”
“Ethan, please, nothing in life is that simple. I was just playing a game.”
“But I said the word.”
“I heard you.”
“I say the word, you and I break up, those were the rules.”
“You weren’t serious.”
Was I? Already the constriction around my heart at the thought of her departure is beginning to fade. But a deal’s
a deal. “I think you should go.”
She can’t tell if I am kidding or not. I don’t think I know myself. What normal red-blooded male sends a beautiful
girl like Paula packing. Even if she is a bit nutsy sometimes. Crazy girls are always the best lays. But I’m sick
of having my heart in a Cusinart.
“Goodbye, Paula.”
She comes over and kisses me on the cheek. Her eyes are bright with tears, she’s not playing a game now. She wipes
away the trace her lipstick leaves on my skin. Then with the saddest, sweetest smile, she turns and walks out, leaving me
with a broken heart and a craving for dessert.
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