Michael Rizza - Cartilage and Skin

“Don’t be,” I said. “It feels like ages ago.”

Feeling Vanessa’s hand on mine somehow enabled me to see a level deeper into her expression, which was only in part sympathetic and warm, for at a lower frequency, barely perceptible, quivered something imploring, naked, and raw. I had left her dangling alone for a moment, on the cusp of my words, and I felt the urge to draw her back to me.

“I have no relationship,” I said. “I have nothing to go to, and it’s a good thing.”

“What happened to you guys?”

“Fate, of course.” I tried to sound cheerful. “When love goes wrong, fate is always the culprit.”

“And when love goes right?”

“That might be fate too, but in that case, we don’t like to give her any credit. We say it’s all our own doing; we attribute it to our own truthfulness and trust and commitment.”

“Yeah, but some people credit destiny.” Vanessa had a slight smile on her face, which I now suspected to be a constant aspect of her countenance that had less to do with me than with habit. She removed her hand from mine, to push up her glasses and then pick up her spoon.

“That’s just how they explain it to other people,” I said. “When they are together, there are no dreamy illusions; they expect, even demand, honesty and fidelity and all that stuff. They know that they are the ones giving themselves. They’re the ones taking all the risks and stuff, not destiny.”

“Your cheeks are getting red,” Vanessa said.

“It’s the wine,” I said, conscious that I inexplicably kept using the word “stuff.”

“Me too,” she said. “It’s starting to catch up with me.”

Later, when the bill came, Vanessa once again seemed to have no interest in the cost. I over-tipped the waitress, who without bothering to count the money thanked me sweetly. I had an idea that even if I’d given her nothing at all, she would have acted in the same manner.

When we stood up from the table, Vanessa touched my shoulder, brought her face closer to me, and said that she’d be back in a minute. I watched her steer her way between the tables and chairs, which were mostly unoccupied, and disappear around a corner.

Three of the little dark-haired girls in their black attire were gathered by the hostess station near the front door. Most likely, they were ordinary young American women, but I imbued them with a disconcerting servility. Of course, I wouldn’t have been disturbed by them, or even have given them so much notice, if I hadn’t recently seen a picture of a goofy man astraddle a refrigerator. I imagined that with a simple plane ticket he was able to enter a region of the world where he could have all the slavish attention of these quaint creatures directed upon his lusts. The images of the two men, stupid and sloven, resurfaced in my mind, and they disgusted me.

Vanessa returned, and as we walked together, somewhere between our table and the coat rack, she momentarily took hold of my arm.

Back outside, the snow came down in a swift slant, the flakes small and quiet.

Just as I opened the car door to get in, Vanessa said to me over the snow-covered roof, “It’s not too crazy, us going out like this on the spur of the moment.” Then her head disappeared behind her side of the car.

I got in, closed the door, and said, “No.”

“It’s no crazier than Internet dating.”

“It’s not crazy at all.”

With the thin layer of snow coating the windows, we seemed to have hidden ourselves within a pale, fragile enclave.

Vanessa started the car, and the wipers cleared the front window.

“Are you okay to drive?” I asked.

“Probably not.” She smiled as the car started forward. “I’ll go slow.”

Although I didn’t know where we were heading, I didn’t bother to ask. I knew that eventually, before the night was over, I would end up back in my apartment. Perhaps in the morning, once I had collected my thoughts and calmly assessed my dilemma, I would run away. Vanessa was holding the steering wheel in both hands and staring forward. All the other windows were still covered with snow. Something in the silence prompted me to reach out cautiously toward her, but my hand only crossed half the distance and came to rest on the console. I wasn’t certain whether she noticed my gesture, even though she turned her head and glanced at me, seeming to smile not exactly at me but simply at the idea of my presence. I knew that I was getting prepared to leave behind my old life, but I didn’t know to what extent, or if at all, Vanessa Somerset would constitute any part of my new self. I wasn’t sure what I felt about her. On the one hand, she seemed so desperate that she readily allowed herself to find something strong and valuable in me, regardless if it actually existed or not; this made her somewhat transparent and flimsy. Yet, for all I knew, her openness was a natural part of every romantic relationship. There’s a fine distinction between need and neediness, and I had yet to discern which held sway over Vanessa. Nevertheless, on the other hand, I was a desperate man.

“Did you want to do anything else?” she asked. “I know it’s a weekday.”

“It’s not too late.”

“We can go someplace and talk. Get a cup of coffee.”

She drove me to a place that from the outside I never would have guessed was a coffee shop. The front door was thick, black, and wooden, with a metal hoop for a doorknob. Although books lined the walls, they apparently remained unused, for the dim light wasn’t suitable for reading. A chunky, young girl in a scarf and a brown, form-fitting sweater stood behind the dingy counter. Vanessa ordered some type of frothy, vanilla-flavored gourmet coffee with a chocolate biscotti on the side, and for the sake of convenience, I ordered the same thing.

“If you pay now, you can have a seat, and I’ll bring it to your table,” the girl said.

“Sounds like a plan,” Vanessa said, and then to me, she added, “I’ve got it this time.”

For the two cookies and the coffee, the bill was thirteen dollars and change. Vanessa gave the girl seventeen dollars: two fives and seven singles. She flashed the girl a smile, slipped her arm under mine, and directed me into the seating area, which was primarily occupied by high school or college students. I suspected that they took themselves for bohemians, radicals, and artists.

A hollow-cheeked boy with a disheveled mop of brown hair nonchalantly pointed one of his lanky fingers at my head and complimented my hat.

Vanessa thanked him on my behalf and released my arm when we came to a vacant table in the center of the room. I sat down. To my right, less than a yard away, a girl sat cross-legged on her chair. On my other side, a boy, who was apparently excited, had one knee on his seat and was leaning across the table. He accused another boy of possessing only opinions. This boy sat with his arms crossed and his shins pushing against the edge of the table. He retorted that not everything is an opinion. Strangely, the table between them, in addition to their debate, appeared to be contested ground.

“Even that,” the first boy shot back. “What you’ve just said, you see, that’s an opinion too.”

“It’s my opinion that not everything is an opinion.”

“Yes.”

“So, you’re saying that it’s a fact that everything is an opinion.”

“I never said it was a fact. Don’t put words in my mouth.”

Although Vanessa looked at the pair of boys as though they were performing magic tricks, I had to turn away before their stupidity made me dizzy.

Between the drabness of the walls, the water-stained panels in the ceiling, and the faint, stale mustiness permeating the air, I had a sense that the general attitude of the clientele emitted a palpable influence, like a contagion. This grunge appeared symptomatic of their belief that in order to be intelligent and deep, a person needed to look beyond appearances and refuse to be held captive by the sensibilities of the larger society. Surely, mental freedom might entail a spirit of repudiation, but such a spirit in itself wasn’t a guarantee of any poignancy, save for their own funk.