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Pieces Part Six
Yes, I am a few hours late, but since I haven't slept yet I'm not counting it as a new week. I would have had it done much earlier (say, Tuesday) but this is a longer scene. It's also much more emotional. Or possibly just whiney. I hope that I was able to properly convey things, but let me know what you think :)
Pieces 1-5
Pieces Six
I am going to meet Anna in half an hour. I am in Portland now. I know the place we are supposed to meet, and I will be early. It's a small coffee shop near Forgotten Treasures, her favourite used bookstore in Portland. The shop has changed hands, she told me, and is now a Starbucks. It was previously called The Regency Café. I'm still surprised that she is this close. I expected her to be halfway across the country, not just across state lines. I don't know whether she lives in the area, or if she is also traveling to meet me.
I am nervous about the meeting. My heart rate is increased, and my sweater feels overly warm. I don't think it shows. I worry that will scare her, or that, like Cash, she will see me as less than human. I don't like to accept that it may be true, yet I find irony in the fact that it is so difficult for me to show, or feel, emotion, when men aspire to this level of stoicism. Let them have it. I am sure that this is not what Cicero had in mind.
I find a place to park three blocks away. It suits me – the walk will give me an opportunity to scout out the area. I don't ant to believe that this could be some sort of set up, or that something could go wrong, but I do. If I can eliminate one source of anxiety, I should. Such is my rationalization for indulging hard-dying habits. It is fourteen eleven in the afternoon when I step out of the car. It is a Tuesday, and there is not much traffic, foot or vehicular at this time. It is raining lightly, and I open my umbrella, a standard black cane-handled model. It feels strange. There are three other people on the street. One is a woman in a red raincoat with the hood up, talking on her cell phone standing under the overhang of Jewett's Dairy Shop, across the street. A second woman has just entered Midtown Tailors, carrying several large bags in her left hand, her own black umbrella in her right. The third is a man, wearing a tan coat, looking into the display of a shop that I can't make out from this angle.
I pass him, and see two teenagers exiting the Starbucks, wearing black hooded sweatshirts with unfamiliar logos, their wide-legged black jeans trailing in the puddles. One of them, a girl of maybe sixteen years, looks up at me as we pass each other. Her nose and eyebrow are pierced, and she has streaks of pink in her hair. Her companion, a boy near her age and slightly taller, is talking about music and ignores me. I pass by the coffee shop the first time. A few more people head in and out of shops down the street, but none of them are remarkable either. There is a yellow Volkswagon bug, the new style, three spaces down from Forgotten Treasures. It has Washington plates.
There are several people inside the bookstore. Towards the rear is a woman, with dark hair, in a light blue raincoat. She is talking to a clerk. Is it her? It wouldn't be fair to catch her off guard like this, if it is. She was nervous enough about meeting me as it is. I turn back towards the Starbucks.
It is a cliché that you can't buy a plain cup of coffee anymore, but I order a grande of their house blend. There are a few others in here: another younger couple, in their mid twenties, sharing headphones and listening to something on an mp3 player while they chat and sip their lattes, and a lone man closer to my age wearing a casual suit and working at a laptop. I am still early, by seven minutes, and I don't expect Anna to be on time. I take an empty seat at a table set back some ways from the others, near a potted plant. It is should provide us some privacy, at least. I don't know at all what to expect from this. Her life could have changed; she could have changed, in the time I was gone. I know I still upset her, and that tells me that she hasn't moved on.
I can see out into the street from where I am sitting, and I see the woman in the light blue raincoat cross the street, away from here. She carries her tension in her shoulders, and her neck. Still. She isn't coming. I take out my cell and wait for it to vibrate. She is the only one I've given the number to: I want to use it as little as possible, to avoid piquing anyone's curiosity. I feel just a little more empty when the phone rattles quietly against the table, but I don't wait to answer.
"Hello."
"Daniel?"
"It's me, Anna." She must be sitting in her car. I can almost see it from here. I could just walk right over there, but I am not certain whether or not I should. I'm afraid that I will lose my chance if I rush this all on her, but it is difficult to remain patient.
"Where are you?" She sounds nervous. She still has three minutes to be on time, but she won't change her mind. Or rather, she already has. She could have called before now. She never had to come into town at all.
"I'm at the Starbucks."
"Right, of course." Flustered." Look, Daniel… I'm sorry, I'm just not ready for this."
"I know."
"I thought I would be okay, but… No. I just, I don't know what to think, or what to do. Or maybe, I guess we could just talk more like this for a bit?"
I shouldn't. I should tell her no, that she should call me later, at the hotel, on a different line. "If that's what you want."
"It will do. I don't know. How are you, Daniel? Tell me how you are."
"Right now?" She's searching for something.
"Yes. Tell me how you feel, right now."
How do I answer that? I want to be honest with her, so how do I feel right now? Uncalm. I hadn't realized that I'd become so tense. But that's not good enough. "Nervous…disappointed."
"You don't sound it." I can hear the hurt in her voice.
"I'm sorry."
"You still don't…. Do you still love me?"
I can't answer that. How can I?
"Daniel?"
"I'm sorry, I-"
"Why would you go through all of this to find me if you don't even love me? Do you know how hard this is? I have no idea what to tell Danny. That's our son. I told him you were dead. The government sent me a letter… But you'd already been gone three years. What do I tell him now? Tell me what to do. What do you want?"
"Anna… There's something wrong with me-"
"I know." Of course she does. Who wouldn't who moth have noticed me, or who I've talked to. Cash was certainly blunt enough about it.
"I don't want this to be all that I am, but I don't know how to change it on my own."
"I don't know if I can help you, or even if I should. Everything is… so complicated."
"You can. You are, You…" I'm not sure how to explain. She makes me want to be more what? More normal? More in touch with the world? Do I even know what I want from her?
"Its too much." She sounds so upset now. Part of me wants to go to her, but I can't make her feel better.
"Please just talk to me more." I can't connect to anyone else. I'm too detached. She's the only thing I care about here. I want to know more about her life, and its complications, and our son. We'd had a list of names. She was going to chose one once she'd seen him, but mine wasn't on it. Did she already know I wasn't coming back?
"Not now. Not right now."
"Alright."
"I'll call. I'll call you later, when I'm calmer, and we can talk. Just about things. I don't mean to be so irrational. I'm not being fair."
"You don't have anything to apologize for. I'm the one who's intruding here."
"Okay. I have to go."
"Take care of yourself, Anna."
"I will. Bye."
And she hangs up. I can imagine her, sitting at the wheel of her car, pulling herself together before she leaves. I feel guilty and sad as I put away my phone. My coffee is cool but drinkable, and I will wait before I go.
"Women trouble, eh?"
I look up sharply towards the man who had been typing when I came in. He was closing down his machine, but hesitates, and looks quickly away as I meet his eye. How did I not notice that he was paying me any attention?
"Sorry," he mumbles timidly, scrambling more quickly to pack up his things. I wish I could have seen the look on my face.
Pieces 1-5
Pieces Six
I am going to meet Anna in half an hour. I am in Portland now. I know the place we are supposed to meet, and I will be early. It's a small coffee shop near Forgotten Treasures, her favourite used bookstore in Portland. The shop has changed hands, she told me, and is now a Starbucks. It was previously called The Regency Café. I'm still surprised that she is this close. I expected her to be halfway across the country, not just across state lines. I don't know whether she lives in the area, or if she is also traveling to meet me.
I am nervous about the meeting. My heart rate is increased, and my sweater feels overly warm. I don't think it shows. I worry that will scare her, or that, like Cash, she will see me as less than human. I don't like to accept that it may be true, yet I find irony in the fact that it is so difficult for me to show, or feel, emotion, when men aspire to this level of stoicism. Let them have it. I am sure that this is not what Cicero had in mind.
I find a place to park three blocks away. It suits me – the walk will give me an opportunity to scout out the area. I don't ant to believe that this could be some sort of set up, or that something could go wrong, but I do. If I can eliminate one source of anxiety, I should. Such is my rationalization for indulging hard-dying habits. It is fourteen eleven in the afternoon when I step out of the car. It is a Tuesday, and there is not much traffic, foot or vehicular at this time. It is raining lightly, and I open my umbrella, a standard black cane-handled model. It feels strange. There are three other people on the street. One is a woman in a red raincoat with the hood up, talking on her cell phone standing under the overhang of Jewett's Dairy Shop, across the street. A second woman has just entered Midtown Tailors, carrying several large bags in her left hand, her own black umbrella in her right. The third is a man, wearing a tan coat, looking into the display of a shop that I can't make out from this angle.
I pass him, and see two teenagers exiting the Starbucks, wearing black hooded sweatshirts with unfamiliar logos, their wide-legged black jeans trailing in the puddles. One of them, a girl of maybe sixteen years, looks up at me as we pass each other. Her nose and eyebrow are pierced, and she has streaks of pink in her hair. Her companion, a boy near her age and slightly taller, is talking about music and ignores me. I pass by the coffee shop the first time. A few more people head in and out of shops down the street, but none of them are remarkable either. There is a yellow Volkswagon bug, the new style, three spaces down from Forgotten Treasures. It has Washington plates.
There are several people inside the bookstore. Towards the rear is a woman, with dark hair, in a light blue raincoat. She is talking to a clerk. Is it her? It wouldn't be fair to catch her off guard like this, if it is. She was nervous enough about meeting me as it is. I turn back towards the Starbucks.
It is a cliché that you can't buy a plain cup of coffee anymore, but I order a grande of their house blend. There are a few others in here: another younger couple, in their mid twenties, sharing headphones and listening to something on an mp3 player while they chat and sip their lattes, and a lone man closer to my age wearing a casual suit and working at a laptop. I am still early, by seven minutes, and I don't expect Anna to be on time. I take an empty seat at a table set back some ways from the others, near a potted plant. It is should provide us some privacy, at least. I don't know at all what to expect from this. Her life could have changed; she could have changed, in the time I was gone. I know I still upset her, and that tells me that she hasn't moved on.
I can see out into the street from where I am sitting, and I see the woman in the light blue raincoat cross the street, away from here. She carries her tension in her shoulders, and her neck. Still. She isn't coming. I take out my cell and wait for it to vibrate. She is the only one I've given the number to: I want to use it as little as possible, to avoid piquing anyone's curiosity. I feel just a little more empty when the phone rattles quietly against the table, but I don't wait to answer.
"Hello."
"Daniel?"
"It's me, Anna." She must be sitting in her car. I can almost see it from here. I could just walk right over there, but I am not certain whether or not I should. I'm afraid that I will lose my chance if I rush this all on her, but it is difficult to remain patient.
"Where are you?" She sounds nervous. She still has three minutes to be on time, but she won't change her mind. Or rather, she already has. She could have called before now. She never had to come into town at all.
"I'm at the Starbucks."
"Right, of course." Flustered." Look, Daniel… I'm sorry, I'm just not ready for this."
"I know."
"I thought I would be okay, but… No. I just, I don't know what to think, or what to do. Or maybe, I guess we could just talk more like this for a bit?"
I shouldn't. I should tell her no, that she should call me later, at the hotel, on a different line. "If that's what you want."
"It will do. I don't know. How are you, Daniel? Tell me how you are."
"Right now?" She's searching for something.
"Yes. Tell me how you feel, right now."
How do I answer that? I want to be honest with her, so how do I feel right now? Uncalm. I hadn't realized that I'd become so tense. But that's not good enough. "Nervous…disappointed."
"You don't sound it." I can hear the hurt in her voice.
"I'm sorry."
"You still don't…. Do you still love me?"
I can't answer that. How can I?
"Daniel?"
"I'm sorry, I-"
"Why would you go through all of this to find me if you don't even love me? Do you know how hard this is? I have no idea what to tell Danny. That's our son. I told him you were dead. The government sent me a letter… But you'd already been gone three years. What do I tell him now? Tell me what to do. What do you want?"
"Anna… There's something wrong with me-"
"I know." Of course she does. Who wouldn't who moth have noticed me, or who I've talked to. Cash was certainly blunt enough about it.
"I don't want this to be all that I am, but I don't know how to change it on my own."
"I don't know if I can help you, or even if I should. Everything is… so complicated."
"You can. You are, You…" I'm not sure how to explain. She makes me want to be more what? More normal? More in touch with the world? Do I even know what I want from her?
"Its too much." She sounds so upset now. Part of me wants to go to her, but I can't make her feel better.
"Please just talk to me more." I can't connect to anyone else. I'm too detached. She's the only thing I care about here. I want to know more about her life, and its complications, and our son. We'd had a list of names. She was going to chose one once she'd seen him, but mine wasn't on it. Did she already know I wasn't coming back?
"Not now. Not right now."
"Alright."
"I'll call. I'll call you later, when I'm calmer, and we can talk. Just about things. I don't mean to be so irrational. I'm not being fair."
"You don't have anything to apologize for. I'm the one who's intruding here."
"Okay. I have to go."
"Take care of yourself, Anna."
"I will. Bye."
And she hangs up. I can imagine her, sitting at the wheel of her car, pulling herself together before she leaves. I feel guilty and sad as I put away my phone. My coffee is cool but drinkable, and I will wait before I go.
"Women trouble, eh?"
I look up sharply towards the man who had been typing when I came in. He was closing down his machine, but hesitates, and looks quickly away as I meet his eye. How did I not notice that he was paying me any attention?
"Sorry," he mumbles timidly, scrambling more quickly to pack up his things. I wish I could have seen the look on my face.