32 Days in May: A Novel

by Betty Corrello

Drugs and women and fast cars. All the usual, predictable ways rich men avoided therapy.

“Too old for love?” I ask. “Too old for heartbreak.”

“It’s so unfair.” This comment is directed at his coffee mug. “You’ve just existed all these years, and I only get to have you now.”

“Claiming your territory?” I quip in a whisper when the subway makes a sharp turn and his fingers flex and tighten around the curve of my ass. He makes a hum in the back of his throat, bobbing his lips down to my ear. “I don’t care if people know you’re mine. I know you’re mine.”

All I wanted to be was a new whole version of myself—instead, I kept breaking apart. Now, months later, I realize maybe that’s the point. Maybe that’s what being alive is. You don’t get to resurface, new. You break away; you start again; you molt old skin, altogether too tight and wrong, and while scars fade, they never disappear. At least not right away.

I want to kiss every part of him, make him feel good and loved. I don’t need to know everything about him in order to know I want to love him.

“Okay. So, when I tell you that just because you feel like your life is over, please consider . . .” He bobs his head side to side. “Please consider that maybe it’s not.”

We’re moving in slow motion, like two turtles fighting over a single piece of lettuce.