F*ck Love

So cheesy, but I can’t help but love it. I point him to the door. “I’ll um … go to the bathroom.”

“Why?” he asks.

“Because. I don’t know. I feel like I shouldn’t be here.”

Kit scratches the back of his head. “Okay. We can talk about that later. Do you think they’re denting my door knocking that hard?”

I laugh and shove him forward. “Go!” I say.

I rinse my face in the sink and try to straighten my hair. I’m not really thinking about the person at the door until her voice catches me. Greer. I immediately look for a window to climb out of. I’m willing to fall to my death to not be here right now. Kit’s bathroom windows are sealed. I sit in the bathtub and try to cover my ears. It’s not my business, it’s not my business, it’s not my business.

But it is. A little bit at least.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were coming back?” she asks. Yeah, I want to know that too. I pick up his green soap and smell it.

“I didn’t know I had to,” I hear Kit say. “Listen, can we do this another time?”

Greer’s voice gets snippy. I’ve never heard her be that snippy with anyone.

“I’m dismissed, huh?”

“Greer, it’s not like that. You just came charging up here and put a dent in my door with your fist.”

“Fine,” I hear her say. “I just wanted to tell you that while you were gone, Roberta died. I didn’t want to text it.”

“For real? You could have told me.”

I can’t stop sniffing the soap. Like, I’m just holding it below my nose, and I’m sitting in a bathtub, and I’m a psycho.

“Well, now I did.”

“How?” Kit asks.

“She was run over.”

Oh God, I hope they’re talking about a dog. If I had my wine cork, this thing with the soap wouldn’t be happening. They talk for another minute, and then I hear the door close. Kit calls to me from the living room. When I don’t come out right away he knocks on the door.

“You okay?”

“Who’s Roberta?”

He tries the knob.

“She was our dog. Wanna talk about it?

“What kind of dog was she?”

“A poodle.”

I put down the soap. “You had a poodle named Roberta?”

“I’m a cool guy.” I climb out of Kit’s bath and open the door.

“I feel weird about being here. You have a girlfriend who happens to be my friend, and I live with your old girlfriend, and I’m way too saturated in this situation to be making out with you.”

“I’m sorry I’ve put you in a difficult position,” he says. “But I’m not sorry I kissed you. Or you kissed me. I’m not sorry.”

“You said that.” I try to bite my lip to keep from smiling.

“I’m not sorry. I just need you to know,” he says, again. “I’m no—”

I jump at him and press my hand over his mouth. He laughs and kisses the inside of my palm.

“I have to go,” I say. “It was nice kissing you.”

He hugs me tightly before I leave, and kisses me on the temple. “Let me find you. Don’t run.”

I walk home very slowly.

Four missed calls and eight texts from Della. What the hell am I doing?

Each night, right before I lock up the gallery, my screen will light up to notify me that I have a text. Kit, my notification will say. I become flustered when his name appears. I spend a few moments not looking at my phone and distracting myself with other things—an empty stapler, a painting I’ve seen every day for months will have a new speck of paint to observe, writing down that we need more trash bags. During this time, an ache will start in my chest and build like a bad case of heartburn. Except it’s not heartburn; it’s Kit burn. When I finally run out of things to do, and make my way over to my phone, I know what I will see. Each night he sends a picture of a different place in Port Townsend; one day it’s a statue of Galatea, the sea goddess, and the next what looks like an old, rusted elevator shaft the color of a robin’s egg. He sends one of the Rose Theatre, and on another day a grimy restaurant that serves the best hash brown casserole I’ve ever eaten. The old boat/bike sculptor—a hippie “fuck you” to conformity—sits on Main Street, a beautifully, scrappy eyesore. He sent me there yesterday. Though she’s in plain view, he wanted me to find her. Pay attention only to her on that particular day. I love it. Each night after my picture comes, I put on my coat, lock the gallery doors for the evening, and find the place where Kit is waiting. It’s a treasure hunt for Kit. And all that other stuff. That’s the essence of him. I wonder if Della appreciates that part of his nature, or if it goes unseen.

On one particular day, Kit sends me a picture of a courtyard of brown brick. It is grown over with fluorescent green moss, the floor a thick carpet of red leaves. It takes me thirty minutes to find it, though it was only two blocks away.

“You bastard,” I say, when I round the corner and see him standing against a wall, leaning ever so casually. “It’s hidden. That was hard!”

“Nothing worth finding is actually easy to find,” he says. “I know this from experience.” I pretend to not hear him and stop to look around. The beauty overtakes me. Of the courtyard, and him. And him in the courtyard. He’s wearing a plaid hoodie and ripped jeans, standing amongst all those leaves. It’s not an image I’ll easily get out of my mind.

“Why did you want to show me this?” I ask, though I already know. He’s teaching me Port Townsend.

“It’s a favorite place. A hiding spot.”

We don’t stay there. We walk back to his condo where he gives me a mug of mulled wine, heady with clove and oranges. Pulling me back against his chest, I sit between his legs on the couch, facing the window.

“Helena,” he says, into my ear. “You’ve been giving me a lot of attention lately. I like it.”

“Because you’re so starved for attention?” I laugh. Even as we walked toward his condo earlier, women turned around to look at him as he passed them.

“I want your attention,” he says. I close my eyes, glad he can’t see my face. I watch a couple of kids walk tightrope on a wall across the street.