Heather told them both to be there at eight. Mark arrived first even though he stopped along the way at a tiny bar near downtown. He drank two dark English beers that calmed his vague uneasiness, and jumped back in his old gray Civic. He drove aggressively, as always, amazed at the slow and incompetent drivers. He cursed and then promptly forgot why he had cursed.
Mark wondered why he had felt strange, and looked in himself, trying to decide if the butterflies were killed or merely stunned by the beer. He usually didn't got worked up about blind dates -- it wasn't worth it. It didn't matter what a woman was like, or how well they got along. They would end up hating each other, tonight or thirty years from tonight.
At the museum he parked and dutifully paid the meter even though he was certain the sign meant he didn't have to. Self-doubt would eventaully paralyze him, he thought. Once inside he started looking for Heather, that little instigator. She was reaching for a refill when Mark spotted her. He walked through the loose crowd and stood beside her.
"Where's Miss Perfect?" He pulled one of the plastic glasses off the platter and tried to act bored.
"Never said she was perfect, just pretty. And smart. You'll like her. Have I ever lied before?"
He stared at her in mock-amazement and she burst out laughing. The crowd around them was entertained. He wondered why Heather and he had never slept together then wandered off towards the restroom.
When he came back up to Heather she was hugging a tall blonde. They mewed "Hi-e-e-e" in sorority falsetto, and Mark caught a refrain of "Don't worry, you look so goo-o-od" as he approached their hugging and patting. Mark looked around the room until they were finished, and then turned to them and lowered his glass, as if surprised by their presence.
Jordan was beautiful. Then again, Mark thought that all women are essentially beautiful when not hiding beneath make-up, shoulder pads, and implants. Even so Jordan was exceptional. He usually ignored blondes with green eyes; they tended to be throw-aways. Jordan captivated him, though. She was tall and slim and barely covered in her little dress. Her features were lovely independently but the overall effect was not what you might expect. Jordan was one of those girls who sound better in a description than they actually look.
She was surrounded by an aura of imperfection, a perfume of oddity -- it followed her. Mark thought it was the same oddity you sense when you're not sure if that flawless creature across the room is really a woman. Too perfect in places, strange in others. The details are right but somehow you're not fooled.
Heather ran off to flirt with the crowd at large so the Mark and Jordan could talk. They walked and talked and discussed the new exhibit as well as they could. Mark liked her because she wasn't perfect: she walked a little slower than she might have, and sometimes looked as if she might be hiding pain. It made her more real to him, somehow. He thought about putting her in a hot shower and raining the warm water on her until the pain subsided.
He looked at her openly and drank more of his wine. Jordan thought Mark was passably attractive, and unusual. His suit was worn but tasteful, erring on the side of conservatism. His dark hair was pulled back and tied with a thick black silk ribbon, like an extra from a period piece. She could tell from the crimp in his hair that he always wore it like that. His posture was that of a total prick. As it turned out Jordan was a high school english teacher, and Mark was a graduate assistant at a university one hundred miles south of where they now stood.
Jordan found out about Mark and Heather's friendship, and Mark now knew that Heather and Jordan were roommates as well as friends. Jordan liked him because he didn't try to impress her, like the others predictably did. He made good conversation and moved with her around the room, discussed with authority the aspects of the paintings he was familiar with but admitted ignorance when he knew nothing. Between them they knew something about almost every piece.
Everyone noticed Mark and Jordan -- they were gorgeous together, a natural pair. The others knew they were lovers, that they shared a tiny flat somewhere in the arts district. Wives nudged their pudgy mates, recalling passion and beauty long since faded. The two shuffled through the room, steadily pulled at their wineglasses and stood very close when they stopped to discuss a work. By the end of the preview Jordan had taken his hand. She was surprised at his roughness. Mark didn't look like the type to work with his hands, but they showed evidence of hard use. There were small healing scratches and old barely visible cuts. His fingernails were very short. Mark noticed that his heart sped up a little when Jordan took his hand. She was confident and reached for him as if she had done it thoughtlessly a thousand times before. Mark had lost his nervousness. They were oblivious to Heather's careful observation. She had known they would get along. It was a fait accompli . . .
It was late when the three of them returned to the apartment where Heather and Jordan shared a bunkbed. Mark wasn't worried about the sleeping arrangements; he would take the couch. When he emerged from bathroom after brushing his teeth there was a double-wide pile of blankets on the floor, and Jordan was in it. She wore a long t-shirt and an almost-sad expression.
Mark was grateful that the pressure was off him. She was lovely, even in that t-shirt. He undressed and lay down beside her. They were familiar lovers, already used to each other. He held her as if she were a holy thing and drank deeply of her. He drew pleasure out of her like spiders pull silk out of themselves.
They couldn't finish. The pain he noticed before asserted itself and Jordan said they had to stop. She cried, still half-drunk, that she was sorry but did not move from on top of him. Her tears fell to fall and he caught them in his mouth. She fell asleep while he listened to her breathing become slow and regular again. He held her and was conscious of her light weight on him, her hard muscles, her small breasts, and his own aching. Later Mark waited a long while then carefully rolled her off and covered her with blankets and his arms.
The next day they held each other, enduring Heather's gentle teasing when she walked through the living room on her way to work. Mark and Jordan talked and kissed and finally got up in time for a late lunch. Soon he had to leave. They kissed again and he started the lonely drive home. The Honda hesitated a little then headed out of the parking lot and down to the highway. Jordan thought he looked vaguely bored as he left.
The little car pleased him. It was ten years old but still ran well. Cars were simple. If they didn't work it was almost something easy to figure out what was wrong, get the parts and fix it. Mark recalled relationships he had been unable to fix. Maybe relationships couldn't be fixed. When something goes wrong there's almost no way to track down the real cause through the dense forest of neuroses and hurt feelings.
He knew it was as good as it would ever get with Jordan. She had been witty and kind and beautiful -- from here on out it would have to be downhill. They would start to confide secrets and tell stories about when they were growing up, about pets that died, about family trips to Utah. He'd heard stories and told stories many times. By now he knew that it's really not about getting to know the other person, it's instead a form of extortion. "I tell you things, you tell me things, and by the time the initial attraction has faded we are mutual hostages, we know too much about each other. We purposefully let down our guard and get pregnant by this dangerous exchange: you can't leave me now . . . "
Mark got tickets to a play he wanted to see, and made plans to eat at a decent bistro. He canceled the dinner reservations, calling from a phone in her kitchen. Jordan was still in the shower.
When they finally got to the theater the house lights were already down. They walked over people in the darkness, and found their seats moments before the actors took their positions on the glowing tapemarks. Even in the intimacy of that close setting (the theater could hold maybe thirty people) Mark felt separated from her. And worse, it seemed their relationship was being acted out on the stage for everyone to see. The ponytailed actor strode around, using Mark's words and mannerisms. The female lead was willowy and undecided like Jordan. She was irrational, but lacked the emotionalism that usually accompanies such people. Mark wondered if Jordan noticed these congruities, or if he was imagining them. He wondered if he were delirious, drugged.
At intermission they headed wordlessly toward the restrooms. Mark saw the line for the women's room and laughed to himself. When Jordan eventually rejoined him they stood close but did not speak. They flipped through their playbills and retook their seats. The dreamlike blur did not subside.
Later, he tried to talk about the play to occupy the drive home. She wouldn't cooperate so he drove along in silence, and was alone for the rest of the half-hour drive to her apartment. Mark decided to drive home that night, to leave immediately so he would not have to hear her insincere (or apathetic) offer for him to stay. He drove on. Whenever he looked over at her she was staring out into the night that was locked outside the car. She yawned frequently. Mark knew what was happening and gave her a way out
"Are you tired? You can sleep if you want . . ."
She answered with exaggerated fatigue. She spoke in the voice you use to call in sick. He drove, and the highway was unreal, a foreign movie with no subtitles.
He pulled into her complex a little after midnight. The moon was shrouded and a cold breeze whistled around the old Honda's windows. Mark left the engine running so Jordan would know he wasn't staying. He set the parking brake and turned to her.
"Look, it's late and we're both tired. I'm going home." His face showed no emotion.
Jordan looked down at the floorboard as she spoke. "No, don't go. I don't want you to drive tonight. It's a long way . . . "
It was a long way home. Mark live out past the university and so he had to two hours to get to her, but it never bothered him. The anticipation was a drug and he drove quickly. He lost himself in their first hug whenever they met -- everything else would fade and for a moment nothing was around except the smell and feel of her hair, the strength of her body. His reaction to her scared him sometimes, and he wished he was not so aware of it. He wished she were not so aware of it. Mark knew that he would drive those hours just to hold her like that. Actually he would prefer to leave after he held her, because sincerity crept away after that. Their meetings were real but goodbyes seemed like acting, roleplaying.
"You want me to stay only because it's a long drive home?"
"Yes. I mean no. It's not . . ."
Mark waited for her to finish but she did not. He wanted her to need him with fierce intensity but she only yawned. He wanted to leave and never see her again, never think about her again. She broke the silence.
"Are you going to stay or not? I want you to stay." She was lying and he knew it.
Mark was lost again in the fever-dream feeling. He wondered why men and women talk to each other, eat together, sleep or bathe together. It's useless because there is no way to ever see or feel the same things, or to ever understand. People are like Catholics in musty cathedrals distilling hope from ancient, dead ceremonies. Faith is born out of paralyzing desperation. The priest knows it is all empty mockery, God knows, even the takers of the sacrament know (eyes closed, tongues extended, waiting). There is no choice but to continue the ritual.
Sometimes when they were naked and sleepy he thought they themselves were the only gods, that everything mortal was faraway and unimportant. That fantasy evaporated when Jordan would get up and go to the bathroom. Gods, he thought, don't have to pee. He was forced to remember where he was and who they were. Once again they were absurd little animals driven together and forced apart, sweating with frustration and fear, groaning promises to the walls of one in a million flats, mortgaged homes, and trailer houses.
They finally shut the door on the cold and she set the deadbolt. Mark undressed and went to her bed. She disappeared into the bathroom and later emerged wearing flannel pajamas that needlessly overstated her intentions. He wished she would talk to him but she climbed into bed, careful not to touch him. She turned away and fell asleep. How could they breathe and sleep so close to each other and still be marooned, isolated, dead? He wanted to hold her while she slept, but it would have meant nothing. He waited for morning.