Nora Goes Off Script

by Annabel Monaghan

I text Kate:

who

There will have to be boundaries of some sort. I don’t want to walk in here tomorrow and find him smoldering at my dishwasher.

I go for a slightly longer than usual run and find that I have burned off zero percent of my nervous energy.

“We don’t have to do this.” He says this, but now his hand is on the inside of my crossed ankle. He’s studying the line he’s drawing up the length of my calf. The feel of his fingers barely touching my skin as they reach the back of my knee makes me catch my breath. “I think we do,” I say, almost in a whisper because I don’t trust my voice.

I love that buried deep in that sentence is a hint of the future tense.

With Leo, it’s not about either of us. It’s like there’s this third thing we’ve created. We step into that space and the rest of the world is gone.

For two hours every afternoon, we are apart and it’s excruciating.

As we walk to the car, he’s laughing. “I knew it. You’re so into me.”

“He’s only been gone twelve hours, and he says he’s coming back.” “Do you really think he is?” I’m mopping my face with my sleeve and clinging to her words. “Why would he say he’s coming back if he didn’t mean it? He’s going to be back a week from yesterday. That’s not even a week.” “It’s too long,” I say, slumping into her lap.

As long as I can keep getting men to leave me, I’ll be a huge success. Shouldn’t be a problem.

He’s all apologies and explanations; he finally knows what he wants. “I know what I want too,” she tells him as he holds her hand. “And it’s not you.” I get up from my table in the tea house and sit on the daybed. “And it’s not you,” I say out loud. It feels good, this rebuke. I imagine the sting on his face. The surprise that I would have moved on, me in my little life. “And it’s not you,” I say again and start to cry, because of course it’s not true.

My mom asks, “He’s not going to star in the movie, is he?” “No, he turned it down. They cast Peter Harper.” My mom claps her hands. “Peter Harper! Darling, you must have an affair with him too!” “Marilyn, honestly,” my dad says.

I’ve read that quote a million times, the one about knowing when to let go of things that were not meant for you. Leo was not meant for me. I mean, look at him. We had a moment, and it was perfect. Can’t I just leave it at that? Encapsulate the memory and protect it? Maybe the whole thing was just a dream, anyway.

movie. My parents are what we could have been if he’d just come back.

I realize that Leo and I are the only two who didn’t say good-bye. I guess that’s just our thing.

I have two thoughts that I can’t shake. First, that dance floor is going to wreck my lawn for the summer. And second, that the best things come back. Sometimes it’s right after the commercial, sometimes it takes longer. But time and sunshine bring growth, and life unfolds just the way it’s supposed to.