Shelly Oria - New York 1, Tel Aviv 0

4. Flowers Wilt in Sexless Air

It’s been a week now since Natalie left, and I’m gravely considering abandoning this righteous version of me, going back to the old one. Change, I’ve learned, is rarely a good idea. If only I could stop imagining Natalie’s purple eyes watching everything I do, there would be nothing left to consider, and I would be my old self again: immature, unreliable, self-centered. But those eyes, they’re the toughest audience a man can have. For now, I keep trying.

* * *

One problem: when Natalie left again, she must have taken with her any physical desire I’ve ever had. For the first time in my life, my body is numb with indifference.

When Martha comes over to visit, she looks at my window box with concern and says, Even your flowers can’t take it anymore. At first I assume she just wants my attention — I’ve felt that sort of thing from Martha a couple times before, back when she and Stuart were living with me — but then I look and see she’s right: the flowers in my window box are wilting. I still can’t do it. I feel inadequate, too selfish even for plants, too selfish to take care of anything more alive than a wall. My flowers are begging for the chemical sex releases to the air, and I can’t give it to them. I think: Maybe I can at least have sex with myself? But I cringe at the thought; it feels like I just threw up and someone is offering me candy. I think: I never should have gotten that window box, I’m too self-absorbed for gardening; I think: Selfish is the opposite of changed. Then I think, Well, when I bought it, I never knew Natalie would come back, then leave again; I had every intention to produce enough chemicals for many, many flowers. But then I think: My poor flowers; they don’t care about reasons, they just want to live.

While I am thinking all these thoughts, Martha is tidying up my room, folding clothes, spraying Lysol. It stinks of loneliness in here, she says and pouts, her nose a small wrinkled button.

I look at Martha and say, If you and Stuart are willing to go at it for my flowers, you can live here rent-free. She says, We don’t pay bills and we don’t pay for food. Deal, I say.

5. Charisma and the Average Woman

Three a.m. on a bleak Monday night, and Stuart is suddenly in my bedroom. She’s not coming back, he says. Jesus, I know that, what the fuck, I say. I meant Martha, he says. Martha’s gone? I say; we had a deal — what about my flowers? Then I feel bad for asking that first. I’m sorry, man, I say. But I’m not really; I can’t feel too much these days.

Then I feel bad for not genuinely feeling bad, and I know the night is over. I sit up in my bed. So what happened? I ask Stuart and realize: I am a changed man, a man who cares enough to ask questions; I cannot be unchanged.

* * *

Stuart says, You know how women are about charisma. I say, I’m not sure. He says, You know, the whole concept of audience — they need it, like, constantly. They do? I ask. Oh sure, he says. It’s all projections and shit, you know. If you’re not a good audience, they don’t feel charismatic. If they don’t feel charismatic, they’re not in the mood to fuck. Then there’s no sex, your flowers start to die, and you’re fantasizing about other men, and then they catch you and say, So the whole threesome business, the whole orgy business — all this time you were simply gay. Every time it’s the same bullshit, man, and I’m sick of it.

Charisma, huh, I say. Charisma, he says, and fingers my cheekbones.

6. A Call for Action

In the kale aisle a week later, Stuart and I are choosing our greens when Martha appears. Look, I don’t care what you two got going on, she says, that’s not why I’m here. How many times do I have to tell you, Stuart says. Martha rolls her eyes. I thought you might want to know, she says, looking at me: the fog’s not gone; they just pushed it over to the docks. It’s always something about the docks with you, Stuart says; not everyone is out to get the poor all the time , Martha. She ignores him. Natalie is stuck there, she tells me. I just thought you should know.

* * *

As I am throwing things into my large backpack, Stuart says, It’s probably not even true. I can’t take that chance, I tell him. We’d have heard about it, he says, if things down there really got so bad. I give him a look. You know very well if the government doesn’t want something reported, it doesn’t get reported, I say. Either way, he says, she’s not your problem anymore; isn’t that the point of breaking up? I tell him I won’t let anything bad happen to her. Stop it, Stuart says, you know the hero talk turns me on; why would you do that when you’re practically out the door?

7. A Whole Lot of Something Else

Closest I can drop you off are the downtown gates, the cabdriver says, no cars going to the docks anymore. I nod at him through the rearview mirror. I don’t understand how no one is talking about this, I say. He shrugs. It ain’t news when there ain’t nothing new about it, he says. It’s fogged like this before? I ask, but of course he’s not talking about the fog; he’s talking about the government moving problems instead of solving them. He looks at me to see if I’m being funny. Ain’t no fog in the Main City now, is there, he says.

* * *

When he stops the car, I can’t see the gates; everything ahead of us is a gray shade of white. I am still, my fingers not reaching for money. In my own apartment I couldn’t find Natalie without hurting her eye; why did I think I could save her? I imagine walking into something sharp, and dying, the blood pouring out of me invisible in the fog. No harm in changing your mind, my man, the cabdriver says; this wouldn’t be my first round trip today. You don’t understand, I say, still not moving. Sure I do, he says, you got a woman in there. He turns around and looks at me, squints to see better. Or maybe a man? he asks, and then concludes, Someone you love. I do, I say, but that’s hardly the point. The cabdriver chuckles — perhaps thinking I’m joking, perhaps laughing at me. For years I was a man who’d never give a massage unless he wanted one himself, I tell him, who’d never make a salad for someone unless he himself was hungry. But I’m trying to change, I say, my voice cracking on the last word. Then go home and make a salad for someone, the cabdriver says; hell, bake them a pie! This here is a whole lot of something else. Just give me a minute, I ask. It’s your dime, my man, he says, but let me tell you. I seen ready and I seen unready, and you sure ain’t in the first group.

* * *

The wheels make an awful sound when we’re U-turning, and I wonder if it’s the engine or some animal trapped underneath it.

8. A Full Garden

Every time the doorbell rings, I imagine Natalie ringing it. Victor, she says, I’ve heard rumors that you’ve truly changed; are they true? Nat, I say, shaking, you’re alive. I was never in the docks, Natalie says, or she says, Yes, I got away. She looks behind me then, and her eyes widen. Victor, it’s like a full garden in here. It’s not what you think, Nat, I tell her; I haven’t been with anyone in a long time. I believe you, Natalie says, and I believe you’ve truly changed. I nod, tears in my eyes. Sometimes at that point she says, Victor, I’d like you to meet your son, and behind her I see a child, a beautiful boy with my skin and purple eyes. I pull both of them close to me and we hug. Come in, I tell them, come in.

Wait with the babies, would you? By which I mean, make sure she’s on the pill. We have been divorced for a while now, but we were married for many years; that means I have no right to ask you to wait, but you have no right to refuse me.