The Rules Of Attraction Part 21

'I don't want you to be hurt.'

290.

"Yeah? Well, is there . ..' I stop. 'Can you do anything about it?'

He pauses, then, ;No, I guess I can't. Not anymore.' 1 tell him. 'But I want to know you. I want to know who you are.'

He flinches and turns to me and says, raising his voice at first and then letting it drop softer, 'No one will ever know anyone. We just have to deal with each other. You're not ever gonna know me.'

'What in the h.e.l.l does that mean?' I ask. 'It just means you're not ever gonna know me,' he says. 'Figure it out. Deal with it.'

It's quiet, it stops snowing. From where we lay we can see the campus, lit, postcard-perfect, through the trees. The tape clicks off, and then automatically turns itself over. He finishes the Jack Daniel's and walks away. I walk back to my room, alone. Gerald has left, leaving me a long note, describing how much of an a.s.shole I am. But it doesn't matter because there was something fun about tonight, in the snow, drunk, not with the Korean guy.

291.

LAUREN It happens quite suddenly, while we're at the Winter Carnival in town.

Earlier we had a half-hearted attempt at a snowfight on Commons lawn (actually I threw a s...o...b..ll at his head; he didn't have enough energy to make one, let alone throw one at me), then we drove in the friend's MG to town and had brunch. After making out on the ferris wheel and smoking pot in the funhouse, I tell him. I tell him while we're waiting for fried dough. I could have told him the truth, or I could have broken it off with him, or I could have gone back to Franklin. But none of those options seemed likely in the end, and there was a good chance none of them would have worked out. I stare at him. He's stoned and holding a Def Leppard cocaine mirror that he won by throwing baseb.a.l.l.s at tin milk bottles. He smiles as he pays for the fried dough.

S: What do you want to do when we get back?

Me: I don't know.

S: Should we buy the eighth or rent a movie or what?

Me: I don't know.

S: What is it? What's your problem?

Me: I'm pregnant.

S: Really?

Me: Yes.

S: Is it mine?

Me: Yes.

S: Is it really mine?

Me: Listen, I'm going to ... 'deal with it' so don't worry.

S: No. Don't. You're not.

Me: What? Why not?

292.

S: Listen, I have an idea.

Me: You have an idea?

S: Let's get married.

Me: What are you talking about?

S: Marry me. Let's get married.

Me (unsaid): It could be Franklin's and there's always the possibility it could actually be Sean's. But I was very late and had been carrying for a long time and I cannot remember when it was Sean and I met. It could also be Noel's, though that's unlikely and it could also be the Freshman Steve's, but that's even unlikelier. It could also be Paul's. Those are the only people I've been with this term.

S: Well?

Me: Okay.

SEAN Lauren and I decided not to go to brunch today since there were bound to be too many eyes, too many people wandering around trying to figure out who left with who from the party last night, the dining room would be 293.

cold and dark in the late morning, people finally realizing who they spent the night with, staring at their soggy French' toast with regret; there would be too many people we knew. So we went to The Bra.s.serie on the edge of town to have brunch instead.

Roxanne was at The Bra.s.serie but not with Rupert. Susan Greenberg was there with that a.s.shole Justin. Paul Denton was sitting in a corner with that d.y.k.e Elizabeth Seelan from the Drama Division and some guy I didn't even think went to Camden. A teacher who I was sure I owed at least four papers to was sitting in back. A townie who I dealt For was by the jukebox. Paranoia fulfilled.

Lauren and I looked at each other after we sat down and then cracked up. Over b.l.o.o.d.y Marys, I understood how much I did want to marry her, how much I wanted her to marry me. And after another drink, how much I wanted her to have my son. After a third drink it simply seemed like a fun idea and not a hard promise to keep. She looked really pretty that day. We had smoked pot earlier and we were high and starving. She kept looking at me with these eyes that were wildly in love and couldn't help it and I was feeling good staring back and we ate a lot and I leaned over and kissed her neck but stopped when I noticed someone looking over at our table.

'Let's go somewhere,' I told her, as she paid the check. 'Let's leave campus. We can go somewhere and do this.'

She said, 'Okay.'

294.

LAUREN We went to New York to stay with friends of mine who had graduated when I was a Soph.o.m.ore. They were now married and had a loft apartment on Sixth Avenue in the Village. Sean and I drove down in his friend's MG and they put us up there in an extra room in the back. We stayed at their place since Sean didn't have enough money to stay in a hotel. But it worked out just as well. It was a big s.p.a.ce, and there was plenty of privacy and room, and in the end it didn't matter since 1 was still vaguely excited about the prospect of actually getting married, of actually going through the ceremony, of even becoming a mother. But after two days with Scott and Ann, I became more hesitant and the future seemed more distant and less clear than it had that day at the Winter Carnival. My doubts grew.

Scott worked at an advertising agency and Ann opened restaurants with her father's money. They had adopted a Vietnamese child, a boy of thirteen, the year after they married and named him Scott, Jr., and promptly sent him off to Exeter where Scott had gone to school. I would wander dumbly around their loft while they were both at work, drinking Evian water, watching Sean sleep, touching things in Scott, Jr.'s room, realizing how fast the time was going by, that the term was nearly over. Maybe 1 had reacted too quickly to Sean's proposal, I would think to myself, while in Ann's luxurious, sunken tub. But I'd push the thought out of my mind and tell myself I was doing the right thing. I didn't tell Ann I was pregnant or that I was going to marry Sean for I was sure she would call up my mother and have this confirmed, and I badly wanted my mother to be surprised. I watched television. They had a cat named Cappuccino.

295.

The four of us went to a restaurant on Columbus the second night we were in New York: Talk centered around John Irving's new book, restaurant critics, the soundtrack from Amadeus and a new Thai, restaurant that opened uptown. I watched Scott and Ann very closely that night.

'It's called California Cuisine,' Ann told Sean, leaning next to him.

'Why don't we take them to Indochine tomorrow?' Scott suggested. He was wearing an oversized Ralph Lauren sweater and expensive, baggy corduroys. He was wearing a Swatch.

'That's a good idea. I like it,' Ann said, placing her menu face down. She knew already what she wanted. She was dressed almost exactly like Scott.

A waiter came over and took our drink orders.

'Scotch. Straight,' Sean said.

I ordered a champagne on the rocks.

'Oh,' Ann said, deliberating. 'I'll just have a Diet c.o.ke.'

Scott looked up, concerned. 'You're not drinking tonight?'

'Oh, I don't know,' Ann said, relenting. 'I'll be daring and have a rum and Diet c.o.ke.'

The waiter left. Ann asked us if we had seen the recent Alex Katz exhibit. We said we hadn't. She asked about Victor.

Scott asked, 'Who's Victor?'

Ann told him, 'Her boyfriend, right?' She looked at me.

'Well,' I said, could not bring myself to say 'ex.' 'I've talked to him a couple of times. He's in Europe.'

296.

Sean downed his drink as soon as it came and waved to the waiter for another one.

1 kept trying to talk to Ann but felt utterly lost. While she was telling me about the advantages of low-sodium rice cakes and new age music, something flashed in me and pierced. Sean and I in four years. I looked across the table at Sean. He and Scott were talking about Scott's new compact disc player.

You've got to listen to it,' he told Sean. The sound,' he paused, closed his eyes in ecstasy,'. . . is fantastic.'

Sean wasn't looking at me but knew I was looking at him. 'Yeah?' he nodded.

'Yeah,' Scott went on. 'Bought the new Phil Collins today.'

You should hear how great "Sussudio" sounds on it,' Ann agreed. The two of them had been big Genesis fans at Camden, and had forced me to listen to 'Lamb Lies Down on Broadway' one night when the three of us were on c.o.ke my Freshman term. But what can you do?

Sean sat there impa.s.sive, his face falling slightly. And though it was at that moment I realized I did not love him and never had, and that I was acting on some bizarre impulse, I was still hoping he was thinking the same thing I was: I don't want to end up like this.

Later that night I dreamed of our new married world. The world Sean and I would live in. Mid-dream Sean was replaced by Victor, but we were still smart and young and drove BMW's and the fact that Sean had been replaced didn't alter the dream's significance to me. Not only did we vote in this dream but we voted for the same person our parents voted for. We drank Evian water and ate kiwi fruit 297.

and chomped on bran m.u.f.fins; I turned into Ann. Sean who had become Victor was now Scott. It was unpleasant but not unbeatable and in some indefinable way I fell safe.

The next morning over a breakfast of bran m.u.f.fins and kiwi and Evian water and wheatgra.s.s juice, Ann mentioned something about buying a BMW and I had to hold back a scream. It was clear that this had not been my best term; it was clear that I was losing it.

At night Sean would lay beside me and I'd be thinking about the baby, something Sean would never mention. He would complain bitterly about how pathetic Ann and Scott were and I would get strange, unexplained urges to call my mother or my sister at R.I.S.D.; to call and explain to them what was going on. But this, like my questioning of my relations.h.i.+p with Sean, vanished.

The last night we were in the loft he turned to me and said, 'I can remember the first time we . . .' He stopped and I knew he wanted to say f.u.c.ked, went to bed, did it, f.u.c.ked on the floor, but he couldn't bring himself to say it without extreme embarra.s.sment, so he said quietly,'. . . met.'

I looked at him sharply, 'So do I.'

He was sweaty and his hair was sticking to his forehead. I was smoking one of his cigarettes, our faces blue because of the television set. The sheet was pulled down, just enough so that I could see the hair below his waist. I was wearing a T-s.h.i.+rt.

'That night at the party,' he said.

His face got sad, or did it? Then the expression left. When he touched me, my whisper was deadly and clear and all I said was, Tm sorry.'

And he asked me, 'Why didn't you tell me you were in love with this guy?'

'Who?' I asked. 'You mean Victor?'

'Yes.'

'Because I was afraid,' I said, and maybe at one point somewhere I was.

'Of what?'he asked.

I sighed and didn't want to be there and without looking at him spoke. 'I was afraid that you'd leave me.'

You want him to like me?' he asked, confused. 'Is that what you said?'

I didn't bother to correct him, or repeat myself, so I said, 'Yeah. He likes you.'

'He doesn't even know me,' he said.

'But he knows of you,' I lied.

'Great,' he mumbled.

'Yes,' I said, thinking of Victor, thinking how can one know yet still hope? I closed my eyes, tried to sleep.

'How do you know it's not . . . his?' he finally asked, nervous, suspicious.

'Because it's not,' 1 told him.

This was probably our last real conversation. He turned the TV off. The room went dark. I lay there holding my stomach, then running my fingers up, then down, over my belly.

They have the s.e.x Pistols on C.D.,' he said. The statement hung there, accusing me of something.

I fell asleep. We left the next morning.

298.

299.

PAUL Just another night. December and in Commons watching TV before it's light out on Sat.u.r.day morning, still slightly drunk and shrooming with Gerald. There had been nothing to do last night. The movie was The Barefoot Doctors of Rural China or something and the party seemed hopelessly lame.

Victor Johnson was there and even though I found it disgusting that Rupert Guest and him had given Tim's Secret Santa a vial of s.e.m.e.n and a douchebag and were getting a kick out of seeing Gerri Robinson crying in the bathroom after she opened it, I still couldn't help flirt with Victor and we shared a joint and he kept asking me where Jaime Fields was. I had heard from Raymond that Victor had been inst.i.tutionalized, which meant I had a better than fifty-fifty chance of getting him into bed. When he offered me a bottled beer, I thanked him and asked, 'So what's going on with you?'

He said, 'Fantastic.'

I asked him, 'Where have you been?'

'Europe,' he said.

'How was it?' I asked.

'Cool,' he said and then with less enthusiasm, 'Actually it was just okay.'