Test-Drive

It was a hot night. I know that’s not why, that it’s not a good excuse. But why couldn’t it be just as stupid as that? I was that stupid.

It was a hot night and you were away at your five-hundred-dollar-a-week yoga class and I went to Samet after work on Friday because the kids were driving me nuts and I wanted to swim in the ocean. I was lying at a table at Naga Bar having dinner with a book, and so was she, so we started talking about books, then movies, then places we’d been. You’ve had the same conversation a million times. So have I. We were both still wearing our bathing suits, and sweating, so we went for a swim, and I went back to my room alone. Then in the morning she knocked on my door, and there were those two seconds, like we talked about in New York, and you were right, I saw through your eyes, and I could have said no, but I didn’t.

I promise I’m not going to apologize again. I just wanted you to know that you were right. I was shopping for a new life. I was latching on to people and places for a few days at a time. Test-driving.

We’d only been together for four months, and you knew things about me that it took me years to realize, even after you’d told me. So tell me this: why did I let you leave? How did I think I was going to live?