Chris Adrian - The New World

“Jesus, no,” she said. “Never. We thought we did, at first, but it didn’t take much not getting one before we realized we were upset about not having something other people wanted for us. So I sat us down in the chair, so to speak, and told us to stop being so stupid.”

“And Joe felt the same way?” Jim asked.

“Even more so,” she said. She waved her hand. “He had this spiel about the marriage being a baby. About how we were lucky because everybody else was just distracted from the important thing, which was making something together that would last and last and last. What do regular babies do, anyway, but use you, and grow up, and move away, and stop calling? Then it’s just the two of you again, and you’ve wasted all your time and love on these terrible creatures who are always going to love somebody else more than you. Ugh! He thought we were lucky because we got to skip that part.”

“You were lucky,” Jim said. “You had each other.”

“Well, I could take or leave the metaphor stuff,” she said. “ ‘Stop hurting the baby!’ he said sometimes, meaning ‘Don’t make me want to divorce you!’ Joe was the big-idea man in the business. He came up with the slogans and the business plans — I just cut the hair and recognized the bullshit. The part I liked was the idea that if we just tried hard enough, the baby would grow up one day, and unlike a horrible, selfish child, eventually the marriage would take care of us . And I suppose it did.”

“But that’s beautiful,” Jim said.

“It did the job,” she said flatly, “until now.” And then they were quiet until dinner.

Jane edged past the lady in the aisle seat, her phone in one hand and her bag in the other, turning and half-falling into her seat by the window.

“How do you do?” the woman asked, bobbing her head and smiling. Her yellow hair sat stiffly on her head, and curled on either side of her chin into two sturdy-looking handles.

“Good,” Jane said, trying to make it sound like It’s good to be alone on the plane or How good it is that we’ve decided not to talk to each other today . Jim was the one who liked to talk to strangers. Still, she smiled at the woman, because she wasn’t exactly trying to be rude. The flight attendant came over to ask if they’d like something to drink before the plane took off. Jane shook her head, but the woman ordered du champagne . Jane called her husband.

“You again!” he said when she answered.

“Haha,” she said. “I have a couple minutes before they shut the door.”

“How have you been since the last time we talked?”

“Would you stop that, please?” She had spent the whole taxi ride from Paris to the airport on the phone with him.

“Sorry,” he said. “Safe flight. I love you.”

“You, too,” she said. “Are you at work?”

“Leaving in a minute,” he said. “I’m just sitting here.”

“What time will you be home?”

“Not sure. I might spend the night if it’s busy.”

“Oh, don’t do that,” she said. “Please.”

“Why not?”

“Oh, Jim.” The flight attendant brought Jane champagne as well, leaving it on her armrest and backing away with a smile. If she drank it, she would have to pee in an hour, defeating the purpose of dehydrating herself all day for the sake of her window seat. Her seatmate raised her own glass. “Today is the twenty-eighth, you know,” Jane said.

“Is it?” he said, and then added, theatrically, “Is it?” Jane sighed. “I’m just kidding. I got us dinner reservations,” he said.

“No, you didn’t,” she said. “You always forget this one.”

“Yes, I did. And anyway, you always forget the other one.”

“I don’t care about the other one,” she said. “You were asleep for that one. I was being crazy for that one.”

“Well, I care about them both. And I did too make reservations.”

“Okay,” she said, deciding not to challenge him by asking where they were eating. “They’re about to close the door.”

“All right,” he said. “I love you. Safe flight.”

“I love you, too,” she said.

“I’m so glad I married you. Both times.”

“Me, too,” she said. “I’ll see you soon.” She hung up and turned her phone off, then picked up her champagne glass and leaned toward the window

“Is it your anniversary ?” her seatmate asked breathlessly.

“Yes, it is,” Jane said.

“Oh, how nice. How long?”

“Eight years,” Jane said, though in fact it was eight only for the one anniversary, and nine for the other.

“Oh, what’s that one? Macramé? Jute? Some kind of woven plant, I think. I can never keep track.”

“Neither can my husband,” Jane said.

“Or my husband,” the lady said. “But he’s very good with birthdays.” Jane did something not totally friendly with her lips and looked away, thinking that ought to signal the end of the conversation without being rude. But the woman said, “You must love him very much.”

“Sometimes,” Jane said automatically, finishing her champagne in one long draw, and closing her eyes after putting the glass back on the armrest. The lady didn’t ask for details, and Jane was much happier anyway continuing this conversation with herself: Sometimes I love him so much I can hardly stand it . Sometimes it felt like the only purpose of her life was to hurry toward him, and sometimes it felt like the only purpose of her life was to hurry away. And wasn’t it like that for everyone? she asked.

When Jim asked her to marry him — with a ring baked into some buttery naan at the Indian restaurant near her old Upper West Side apartment where they ate once a week during their long courtship — Jane might just have said No or Not right now or even Can I have some time to think about this? There were a hundred other options besides flight and silence.

She could have said, I need to be alone for a few days . Or I’m just going to go to the bathroom for a moment to cry . Instead, she stared at him for a strange, timeless instant, panicked and still. Her field of vision seemed to crumble away from the periphery. Jim was making a very hopeful face — she couldn’t hear anything he was saying, but the way his mouth was moving and the way his eyebrows were reaching sincerely toward the ceiling made him look like he was singing barbershop quartet at her. Then she understood that he actually was singing to her, and the reason that the three waiters on duty that night had clustered so close around him was that they were singing too. She couldn’t really hear the song (it was “Heart of My Heart”) in the restaurant, but it would keep her up at night and become the theme song of Jim’s icu stay.

She felt caught , as if Jim and these three nice Indian gentlemen had opened their mouths and poured not music but accusation out upon her, casting a spotlight on her hypocrisy, her insufficient affection, her cowardice and naïveté. The music finally stopped. Everyone in the restaurant was watching, gleeful with anticipation. Without saying a word, Jane stood, carefully folded her napkin upon her seat, and left the restaurant. She walked home and got straight into the tub. She was still hiding in the lukewarm water a half hour later when Jim, after he had settled the bill and explained to all his new Indian and non-Indian friends at Indus Valley that everything was perfectly all right, was hit by a taxi turning left off Broadway onto Ninety-Ninth Street.