on not doing it again, pt 2

He shot me the look, eyebrow cocked, left cheek dimpled. His jaw clenched around a wry smile, legs outstretched  in the brown leather chair, relaxed and pointed at the same time.

When he’s like this, he reminds me of the pictures of his 20 year old self, brash and almost haughty, like after all this time, he still knows something you don’t.

He *always* knows something I don’t.

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When we met in August of 2023, I was DEFINITELY not doing it again. And I told him so outright: “sure you’re great I think, or whatever. but I’m hurt and hard and wary, dry and swollen all at once, heart-sick and faith-lost so… this probably won’t work.”

He nodded, “I know what that’s like.”

“Right okay so well maybe we should or maybe we shouldn’t can we keep talking we should stop don’t call me where are you should we meet in person I don’t even know if I like you I’m not sure I can do this,” I said, over and over and over.

I cried it and I texted it and I whispered it and I thought it loudly in my mind shouting at the ghost of him. As often as I could, daily even: “no no you don’t understand. I’m not doing this, again.”

He was unfazed: “I know what I’ve been looking for, and I’m pretty sure I know who you are to me. But you take all the time you need. There’s no rush. No matter what happens, we have the rest of our lives for it.”

Fuck.

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We did end up meeting in person, before I left the Midwest for Oregon in September of 2023.

We split my ticket to the Bahamas. I sneakily stayed gratis in the fancy resort room he was staying in while he completed pre-production at the restaurant he was setting  up.

When I first saw him in the garishly decorated lobby, sweaty and excited and in a little bit of a rush, I thought, “ew.”

In the elevator, I looked him up and down and said, “wait, you’re tall.”

When we went up to his room, and he put my bag down in the corner I thought, “well it’s true, i am safe with him.”

When I made him meditate on the bed sitting next to me so I could touch his hand with mine, using my fingers to sniff for danger or impending heartbreak or apocalyptic doom (I can learn a lot from a palm apparently,) I thought, “sigh, his hands are big.”

When we ate Chinese take out for dinner the next night, I caught him watching me, unbidden for a fraction of a moment.  Who-He-Really-Is flashed  like lightning in his blue eyes, and I froze, heart struck by the power of it. He looked like a wolf poised in hunt at the edge of the forest. Grit and power and a fortitude only a survivor of something would have shone out of him. Snared in the blazing heat of who he was and what he knew to be True, it felt like, all of the sudden, I had known him for a long, long time.

He tucked it away quickly, under a silly joke and a wide grin. My heart dropped back to normal and he became just a guy. A tall, freckled, sweet chef I could say goodbye to. Phew.

But as my flight from the Bahamas landed bumpily in Chicago, I texted him about how I had fun for the first time in many years and about how I was sad I was saying goodbye to him and about how mad I was that I was sad and about how terrifying this whole thing was and how mad I was that I was so scared and about how terrible it was that I had my period the whole time because really I just wanted to finally get fucked and forgotten after a few years of celibacy and how stupid this whole thing was and about when would I see him again because what if I was falling for him and we couldn’t keep talking so much if we were going to be across the country from one another my heart couldn’t take it, couldn’t take any of it, so what were we going to do?

I cried with the agony of it, landing in ORD, wrecked by the pain of watching well- built walls washed away by flood or mudslide.

Agony.

He responded, measured and solid, with a text that burned my insides:

“I love you too, Maura. And if you want to, we will figure it out. Together.”

Fuck.

I used to think love felt like getting what I wanted. Like getting your back rubbed exactly right or getting to pick what show to watch before bed. What I thought love was sounded like the finale of a Broadway musical, all wrapped up and, honestly, a little stupid. It was like cotton candy- basic, clitoral, beige, and controllable. That’s what I thought love was. (I was right. I would never be doing that again.)

Apparently, love doesn’t feel like getting what you want.

It doesn’t sound like directed harmonies rising effervescently out of the hidden orchestral pit. It doesn’t dissolve scentlessly on the tongue. Love has no sense, is no easy set of coordinates, is not the even tempered crumb of a perfectly baked sugar cookie.

Love is what happens when someone says, “I might not make it” and someone else says, “I think you will” and “I think we can.”

Love sounds like the sharp drone of the hummingbird wing narrowly missing your cheek, tastes like warm and nutty date cake - slightly savory with the hint of honey, full bodied and fat.

Love is the living magic of being as much separate as you are together, all at the same time. As much “you can do this” as “we could do it together.” As much quiet boulder as the lightning strike.

I responded to the Chef, sobbing and snotty and clutching my luggage:

“how did you know 😭😭”

“I’m so fucking furious !!!”

and then eventually,

“okay, if you think it’s a good idea, maybe we can figure something out together.”

“I think it’s a great idea, Maura. I’ll see you again soon.”

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Turns out, I don’t think you can even touch the part of you that someone else needs to know for love to grow if you haven’t broken enough.

A woman I admire, Autumn Brown, once described on “the End of the World” podcast that after her divorce, her voice completely changed. She was a studied vocalist, had pursued singing in her teens and twenties, but it wasn’t until she could see the Place Deep Inside Her that her true voice arrived. And it was the divorce she experienced, the world breaking jaw shattering pain of it, that showed her Herself. A few years later, she released her first album.

I think Autumn was right.

There’s no space for the Chef to say, “I love you too” if there isn’t the wide gaping cavern of sad-hope-terror-longing inside of me saying, “I don’t know if I can be brave again.”

Because if I hadn’t been falling for him, there would have been nothing for me to need to be brave for.

I’ve never been read for more filth than by the Chef’s honest responses to my texts.

And he would tell you, he’s never been more fully felt into existence than in the lapping waves of my emotions.

We did see each other again after that.  And again, and again, and again.

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Love is being heard.

When your teeth are chattering and your lacerations are seeping, love is what reads between the lines and responds to the unspoken plea, is the tree roots that weather the hurricane.

Love is the unmoored position of reluctant and unsteady, and steadfastly willing to try something new.

Impatient and furious. Present and kind. Ultimately, it is whatever is true.

Love isn’t anything, really.

It’s just what is, inarguably and inexplicably, when nothing else is left.

I had been dancing around our kitchen, juggling a scalding hot matcha and the dirty kitchen towels for the next load of laundry when he shot me the look.

I bounded over to the big brown leather chair, kissed his cheek and whispered, “oh my god it IS true that you’re my husband I think.”

It’s the lingering scent of American Spirits on his beard that does me in every time. That and the size of his hands.

“Well if that ring on your finger is any indication, I’d say that sounds about right,” he chuckled.

We looked at each other, our gaze well practiced at finding the Us behind our eyes and under our collarbones.

“I’m excited to marry you,” I exclaimed, shocked to feel that it was true.

“I can feel how right you were now, about us,” I teased, kicking my feet against his shins, “you were very very right.”

He tossed me his wolffish grin.

“I know.”

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In the face of the upside down wilderness of the great Empty inside of us, where we meet our True Selves bewildered and dusty, love is what Feels, and love is what Knows.

Love, against all odds, is what does it again.