If He Had Been with Me

by Laura Nowlin

Sometimes I am disappointed with love. I thought that when you were in love, it would always be right there, staring you in the face, reminding you every moment that you love this person.

It seems that it isn’t always like that. Sometimes I know that I love Jamie, but I don’t feel it, and I wonder what it would be like to be with someone else.

My first reaction is a shocking sense of relief; if Jamie and I broke up, it would mean that he wasn’t the great love of my life; I wouldn’t have to feel guilty anymore that I sometimes think about being with someone else, wondering if it would be better, maybe even perfect with him.

I know that it’s normal to still find other people attractive when you’re in love; what bothers me is the melting, dizzy feeling that overpowered me when I saw him.

I can’t afford to have him as a friend.

“I think,” I say, “I think we’re supposed to experience as much beauty as we can.”

I loved him the very first morning I stood at the bus stop with him and every night I sat across a dinner table from him. It does not matter that one of us now knows; it doesn’t change anything.

After a few weeks, I start to feel better, but whether it is because of the pills or because spring has finally come, I am not sure.

I’m not allowed in the kitchen. I’m not supposed to know. But really, I’m always the first to know. My laundry starts to appear outside my door in a basket instead of already folded in my drawers. There are frozen prechopped vegetables in the freezer instead of whole heads of fresh cauliflower and bright yellow peppers and squash.

Perhaps he would ask me what books mean to me. I would tell him that it means living another life;

I know staying in bed for most of the day isn’t helping my argument that I just need to be left alone, but I can’t summon the resolve to do anything else. As long as I can sleep, I feel numb, and numb is good; numb doesn’t hurt.

“I thought if I broke up with him, no one else would ever love me like that.”

I want him to break up with Sylvie. I don’t want to watch him fall for another girl.

I want him to be in love with me.

I lean my head on his shoulder and sob, but it doesn’t last too long because I’m touching him, and he’s holding me.

“Can I tell you that I love you first?” Finny says. I begin to fall slowly, slowly down.

“I love you,” Finny says in my ear. I feel him touching me there, with his hand first, and then it isn’t his hand anymore. “Oh God, I love you.” He pushes into me just a little; it’s a warning. I bury my face into his shoulder. “Oh God,” he says. “Autumn.”

“I love you too,” I say. “I forgot to tell you.” The tears spill over now, and Finny begins to kiss my eyelids and my forehead again and again. “It’s okay. Don’t cry,” he says. His words rush together and blend with his kisses. He kisses my cheeks and my tears. “Don’t cry,” he says. “It’s okay.”

“Will you hold me?” I ask. He rolls off me and holds out his arms. I wipe my eyes and lay my head on his shoulder. His arms fold around me and he presses me close. “Like this?” he says. “Yeah,” I say. We’re quiet as our breathing slows to normal. I watch the light get brighter in the room. There are more birds singing now, a whole chorus.

I loved her, but I loved her differently from the way I’ve always loved you.”

If he had been with me, Finny would still be alive. If he had been with me, everything would have been different. But whose fault is it that he wasn’t?

But the temptation to be close to him one last time is too great for me to resist.