Stupid optimistic metaphors.
ANXIETY IS EXHAUSTING and a bit paranoia inducing. When I roll out of bed Saturday morning, I feel as if I have woken up on a similar but slightly different planet, the lone victim of a vast conspiracy. I’ve heard nothing from Marisa, but that seems ominous rather than reassuring. Susannah came home late last night and has already left again for her group therapy session, and so I find myself alone in my kitchen, looking suspiciously at my coffee mugs, as if Marisa has planted all of them in my house.
I typically have Pilates class on Saturday mornings, so after I take Wilson outside and feed him, I drive to the gym. But when I get there, the door to the Pilates studio is locked, the studio dark. That’s when I recall my instructor, Heidi, texting last week to say there wouldn’t be any class today—she was going camping or something with her boyfriend. I stand outside the locked door, annoyed and frustrated that the universe seems to be conspiring against me. And just like that, I decide that’s not how I’m going to react. Instead, I head to the nearest row of open treadmills and spend half an hour running in place, knees pumping, arms slicing the air, pushing myself so I am sucking air and darkening my T-shirt with sweat. I try to empty my mind of Marisa and of meeting with Teri and just focus on running until the display shows me that thirty minutes have passed, and then I slow for a few minutes, letting my breathing and my heart rate drop to something approximating normal.
I feel good on the drive home, focusing on the road, the next curve, the faded ROMNEY-RYAN sticker on the car in front of me. The radio is off and I drive in silence. In the afterglow of my run, I feel more certain of my course. Every turn of the wheel is deliberate and smooth, an accomplishment, progress. I’m steering away from the insanity of the past few weeks and onto a saner path. Whatever moral code I operate under is a far cry from when my mother called me a good son; it’s cobbled together and inconsistent as hell and maybe even a lie. But I try. That I fail isn’t as important as the effort. I tell myself that enough for it to even seem true. Regardless, I am calm and at peace with whatever awaits me on Monday.
The sight of Marisa’s red Audi convertible parked in my driveway vaporizes my moment of zen.
My front door is locked, and when I pull out my house keys, they are shaking in my hand. I jam the key into the doorknob and throw the door open so hard that it bounces off the doorstop, vibrating like a tuning fork. Across the den in his bed, Wilson lifts his head up, then scrambles out from underneath his blanket and races over to me, immediately rolling over so I can scratch his belly. “Okay, boy,” I say, absently scratching him as I scan the den, the kitchen. No one. “Where is she?” I ask Wilson.
Someone, a woman, says, “What?” I look up and see my sister standing in the hall outside my bedroom. She’s wearing a Millennium Falcon T-shirt—my Millennium Falcon T-shirt—and a pair of gym shorts.
“You’re home early,” she says.
“I … Pilates got canceled,” I say. “Why are you wearing my shirt? What are you doing here? I thought you had group.”
Susannah grins. “I bailed.”
“You bailed. Why did you—?”
Marisa walks out of my bedroom. Her legs are bare, and I’m willing to bet her ass is too. Right now it’s covered, just, by a tight black T-shirt with Get Up the Yard slashed in white across the front. “Hi,” she says, head lowered, smiling.
I stand there, staring. Wilson, forgotten, whines at my feet.
“Yeah … so,” Susannah says. “Sorry?”
With a soft grunt the air conditioning kicks on, air whirring out of the floor registers.
“Seriously,” Susannah says. “I’m sorry. I thought you wouldn’t be home for a while.”
Marisa steps forward and puts her hand on Susannah’s arm, watching me the whole time. She leans her head against Susannah’s shoulder. She’s still smiling.
“This is Marisa,” Susannah says brightly. “Marisa, this is my brother, Ethan.”
“Nice to meet you, Ethan,” Marisa says. Still looking at me, she takes Susannah’s hand and raises it to her lips and kisses it.
Wilson whines, louder, a growl building in his throat. Susannah glances down at him. “Dude, he’s gonna pee everywhere,” she says. “Might wanna take him out.”
I find my voice. It sounds like it’s been locked in a basement and beaten for a week, but it works. “Get out,” I say.
Susannah frowns. “Hey, look, I’m sorry I didn’t ask before bringing her over here. It just, like, happened—”
“Fuck you,” I say, and the words unlock a white heat that’s been building in my chest ever since I saw Marisa’s car in my driveway. The shock on Susannah’s face is genuine, and I ride it on a fresh wave of anger. “Just fuck you. And you”—I point my finger at Marisa—“you get the fuck out of my house.”
Marisa lets go of Susannah’s hand and walks down the hall toward me. Her gray eyes are locked on mine, and now she’s grave and imperious and definitely not wearing anything other than my sister’s T-shirt. Her voice low, she says, “You don’t mean that.”
“Wait,” Susannah says. She looks from me to Marisa and back again, and I see comprehension unfold across her face. “Oh, shit.”
“You’re upset with me,” Marisa says. She bites her lower lip. “You’re angry. But you don’t want me to leave. You want to punish me.”
“I—”
She’s in front of me now, so close I can smell her. Vanilla and pepper. She reaches out and takes my hand. “You want to,” she says. “I know
