In addition to my policy of saying yes, I started expressing exactly what I wanted from other people as a way of making amends to myself for having been voiceless with Brandon. Never again would I abandon myself in a sexual situation. But to keep that vow, I had to start speaking up in nonsexual situations. I want to hang out this weekend, I e-mailed my friends, instead of the safer we should hang out. When a coworker, Anna, responded with a plan to see a Rusted Root concert at House of Blues, I filled in the blank calendar square. My voice, expanding into the void, began to shape my life.
Then I sent another e-mail. There’s a group of us going to a concert, and I want you to come. I hit send, and then laughed. Did I really just send an e-mail to John out of the blue? John was the guy from Skadden, the one I’d used to test Brandon. The e-mail was a voice lesson. Right before I’d hit send, I’d smiled at the line: I want you to come. I’d never said that to any man before.
I had no hidden marriage agenda, no secret hope that John and I might hit it off. He just popped into my head. After hitting send, I got back to work without compulsively checking my e-mail for a response. Honestly, I didn’t care if he joined us or not.
After I’d canceled dinner with John back in the fall, I thought I’d never hear from him again. But six weeks before Brandon and I broke up, John offered me an extra ticket to see Puccini’s Turandot at the Lyric Opera. When I told Brandon about it, he of course was unperturbed. At that point, I wasn’t testing him—we’d already brunched at the Peninsula. But then, three days before I was supposed to go out with John, Brandon called me at work to ask if I had plans for the evening. It was a Wednesday night in the snowy dead zone of early January—my plan was to swaddle myself in flannel and curse Chicago weather patterns. He asked if I wanted to see Turandot that night. His parents’ season tickets. Fourth row center. In our typical dysfunctional way, neither of us mentioned that I was seeing the same opera on Saturday night with John. I smiled through the conversation because Brandon was showing me that he cared about me. About us. Maybe he felt a little bit threatened by John.
Three nights later, I watched the same opera from the second balcony with John and his two friends. After the opera, John’s friend Michael drove us all home, the CD player blaring “Nessun dorma.” From the backseat, I listened to Michael and John discuss the best dessert places in Chicago. All night I’d been thinking John was more attractive than I remembered, but then it crossed my mind that he might be gay.
Asking a potentially gay guy to join an outing to a concert: low stakes.
I’d love to see the concert. Let me know what time.
Six hours before the concert, I went to group in a foul mood. Embracing my new life, the way I was doing it, was exhausting and expensive. Concert tickets, a new sleigh bed, sushi dinners for one—none of it was cheap. I was so tired of all of it, I was so frustrated. I yelled at Dr. Rosen. Lots of fuck you’s and this doesn’t work and why can’t you admit you can’t help me? Nothing Dr. Rosen or the group members said got through to me. A single thought pounded through my mind: I hate how fucked up I am.
After group, I stormed back to my office, dreading the concert where I’d have to paste on a smile and be social. Six o’clock came and went. I remained at my desk. Then it was almost seven. I was supposed to meet everyone, including John, in twenty minutes. I called Rory from my office and cried as the sun melted behind the Chicago River, leaving my office dark save for the glow of my computer. No one was around other than the cleaning crew. “I’m sick of saying yes.”
“Can you go for an hour? Just one.” Rory stayed on the phone until I agreed.
Before leaving work, I went into the bathroom to check the damage from an hour of crying. All of my makeup had washed off. I didn’t have a brush, lipstick, or anything resembling a beauty product in my possession. I finger-combed my hair into a bun that I hoped looked sexy and devil-may-care, not like proof of my ongoing existential crisis. On the walk to the bar, I found an old Burt’s Bees lip gloss in my coat pocket, which felt like the universe throwing me a sparkly mauve bone. There were lingering patches of snow on the ground, but you could smell spring preparing her entrance. The closer I got to the bar where we were meeting, the better I felt. I remembered that I was okay. And I could go home to my sleigh bed after one hour.
Anna and the others were huddled around the corner of the bar. Someone slid an oversize square plate of cheese and dried fruit toward me. I stuffed creamy Roquefort and smoked Gouda into my mouth. John walked in ten minutes later. A flicker of worry: Would I have to babysit him? As he made his way to the bar, I took in his confident stride, his calm smile. He greeted the coworkers he barely knew and side-hugged me. He smelled like fresh air and clean clothes. This guy could take care of himself; I could leave whenever I wanted.
“Sorry, I’m late.” He leaned toward me so I could hear over the din at the crowded bar. “I just bought a new bed and had to wait for the
