Bohemian

by Kathryn Nolan

The only people for me are the mad ones…”

It was exquisite. It was aching. It was scary and real. There was danger in that ocean—buried ships and the skeletons of pirates; red tide and great white sharks. And there was beauty in that ocean—an entire delicate ecosystem we might never lay eyes on. A world, free from the push and pull of societal pressures. I closed my eyes and let the thunder of the waves wash over me. When was the last time I sat and just listened…to anything?

I had done everything right. Went to Stanford for computer science. Made friends with the other nerds in my program, spending weekends watching Star Wars and bickering about Harry Potter characters. Barely had sex…and I mean barely. Which was exciting, since I spent high school never having sex—no surprise, really, since I was essentially a walking stereotype.

Our interaction had used up every element of “cool” that I had, which meant I’d need to go back to ignoring her for the rest of the day and praying she didn’t talk to me—just like every interaction with a woman I’d had since the time I hit puberty.

He’s me in man form

But the stars were bold and big and the ocean was roaring against the shore and I felt, so clearly, the rightness of the universe.

I wanted to be with those writers. I wanted beautiful words under a wild sky, sweet communion around a campfire.

“It’s like reverse-suburbia, this desire to live in such a rural place. Not only rural, but completely chaotic, uncontrollable. The waves aren’t calm and the water is freezing. The trees are gigantic. There are no box stores or chain restaurants or movie theaters. You’re just…completely vulnerable.”

You know, before coming up here my work days were like, I don’t know…” he blushed, thinking. “Something like: hit the snooze alarm. Get dressed in my tiny, cramped apartment, sit in traffic, totally zoned out. Um…be at my desk for nine hours staring at numbers on a screen. Meetings, annoying coworkers. A kind of constant, unending sense of bleakness,” he deadpanned.

Compelled couldn’t even begin to describe it. It was something hungrier and more primal than a mere compulsion. It was a need as basic as breathing, my need to touch her, to feel the muscles of her back flexing under the tips of my fingers.

The fireplace was lit and books lay in disorganized piles on the floor. And there, curled up in a giant sweatshirt and yoga pants, no makeup and her hair in a messy bun, was Lucia. I’d never seen anything more beautiful in my life.

I’m sorry we were interrupted,” he wrote, “because what I really wanted to do was fuck you with my tongue. I can picture it: your back arching off the floor, your wrists bound above your head. My hands, holding your thighs down as I licked you. Deeply. Thoroughly. The taste of you on my tongue for hours afterward, driving me insane. I wanted you to come. And you would have, as many times as I demanded.

She made me so at ease with myself. Things I had buried or things I didn’t like—they didn’t matter around her. As I fell in love with her, she helped me love myself.

I’d lived my life before in total darkness. This crucial moment: like millions of light bulbs flaring to brightness, painting my life in vivid color.

I wanted…I wanted this. Him. This gentle, respectful, intellectual demeanor covering up a man who couldn’t control his baser instincts.

Stay, I wanted to say, because a hot shower with Cal was suddenly something I wanted more than anything—more than hot tea. More than a good book. Even more than the look of black ink on a crisp white page. My heart squeezed painfully, a feeling I didn’t recognize. But I’d read about it.

A fire roared in the fireplace, casting Cal in a warm glow. He was sitting, staring into the flames. Whiskey in his right hand, journal in his left. Hair a little mussed, scruffy jaw, those glasses. He looked up and a riot of emotions crossed his face.

Dream. Fucking. Man.

I wasn’t sure what I’d done in this life—or another—to deserve this night, this week, this woman. But I was grateful.

Oh God, he’s perfect

And when our eyes met something happened. A bolt of lightning, an electric current; everything in the bookstore turned a pale blue. But Lucia glowed, brightly turquoise.

Craving, it said at the top, and then a short stanza: More than what the body needs It’s what the body wants Fundamentally changing Cell structures/blood flow Neat arteries growing flawed/messy Raw with damaging desire And a new pulse: thready, like a heart That’s crashing.

Isn’t this what we’re alive for? Why else were we put on Earth if not to enjoy the written word?

Absolute truth

“Big Sur is helping me discover there’s no better feeling than reclaiming something you thought you’d lost forever.”

In large white letters was a quote from Mary Oliver, a quote both of us knew, a famous quote, asking us what we would do with our “wild and precious life.”