The Girl He Used to Know(6)
Probably because no one has ever loved me as fiercely and unconditionally as she did.
I look over at Nate. “Did you ever fall in love with a girl who was different? Not just from any girl you’d ever dated before, but from most people in general?”
Nate signals the bartender for another beer. “Marched to the beat of a different drum, did she?”
“She marched to the beat of an entirely different band. One you’ve never heard of and under no circumstances ever expected to like.” When Annika would frustrate me, which was pretty often, I would tell myself there were lots of other girls out there who were not so challenging. But twenty-four hours later, I’d be knocking on her door. I missed her face and her smile, and I missed every one of the things that made her different.
“She must have been hot because that kind of thing never flies when the girl’s just average.”
When John F. Kennedy, Jr.,’s plane crashed into the Atlantic a few months before Liz threw in the towel and went back to New York without me, his image—along with his wife’s and sister-in-law’s—had been plastered all over the TV screen for days. Because I had no interest in celebrity news, I’d never realized until then how much Annika looked like Carolyn Bessette Kennedy. They shared the same bone structure and blue eyes, and hair so blond it was almost white. They both possessed the kind of striking beauty you’d notice in a crowd. When I ran into Annika at Dominick’s, the resemblance had been even more pronounced. Her hair is shorter than it was in college and now it lies smooth and straight, but she still wears the same color of lipstick, and when my brain registered that fact, a certain memory thawed the ice in my heart a little bit.
“Annika is beautiful.”
“So the crazy didn’t matter.”
“That’s not remotely what I said.” The words come out more harshly than I intended and there’s a beat of awkward silence as we both take a drink.
I’d be lying if I didn’t admit, at least to myself, that the way Annika looked did play a part in my initial attraction and my willingness to look past a few things. When Eric pointed at her that day in the student union, I couldn’t believe my luck, although I did wonder why such a hot girl was sitting all alone. It would have been easy to dismiss her the way the others had, find someone else to play with next time. But I sought her out again and again because I felt beaten down by the trouble I’d gotten into at Northwestern and bitter from the boulder-sized chip I’d been carrying on my shoulder ever since. I wasn’t feeling very self-confident and losing to a girl didn’t help. I cringe at the memory, and it is only now, ten years later, when I realize how much energy I wasted fighting the inconsequential battles that really aren’t meant to be fought. Annika didn’t know it at the time, but she was exactly what I needed in order to believe in myself again. And in time, I realized she was so much more than just a pretty face.
“You gonna see her again?” Nate asks.
Whenever I think of Annika, my mind returns to the way we left things and the same unanswered question. It’s like a pebble in my shoe, uncomfortable but not unbearable.
But it’s always there.
I take another drink of my beer and shrug. “I haven’t decided yet.”
* * *
When I get home from the bar, I pour a whiskey and stare aimlessly out my floor-to-ceiling windows as the sun goes down. When the whiskey’s gone, I play Annika’s messages again because I’m officially drunk and I’ve missed hearing her voice. Not returning her call seems juvenile and petty, and maybe I’m just feeling sorry for myself because the last two women I’ve loved decided they didn’t love me anymore. By the time Liz filed for divorce, I didn’t love her anymore either, but Annika’s a different story.
I reach for my phone, and when her answering machine picks up I say, “Hey. It’s Jonathan. I can meet you for coffee on Sunday morning at ten, if that still works for you. See you then.”
Maybe Annika called because she’s finally ready to remove the pebble from my shoe once and for all. Aside from that, I want to know—despite how I feel about the way our relationship ended—that she’s okay. Though I sensed by the way she carried herself that she’s doing fine, at least on the outside, I need to know if she’s still shouldering the weight of it on the inside.
Besides, it’s not like I’d say no to her.
I never could.
5
Jonathan
CHICAGO
AUGUST 2001
When I arrive at the coffee shop, Annika’s standing on the sidewalk shifting her weight from side to side, bouncing on the balls of her feet. She stops immediately when she sees me.
“Good morning,” I say.
“Good morning.” She’s wearing a sundress, but unlike the clothes she used to wear, this one fits her body. My eyes are drawn to her narrow shoulders and the hollows at her throat and collarbone. “Are you ready to go in?”
“Sure.” She takes a step toward the doorway, hesitating when she sees the size of the crowd packed tightly inside the small coffee shop. She picked the venue, but I’m the one who chose the time and maybe she would have preferred to meet earlier or later to avoid the rush. If memory serves, this particular location has a spacious outdoor patio, so maybe it doesn’t matter. Instinctively, I stretch my hand toward her lower back to guide her, but at the last minute I pull it away. I used to be one of the few people whose touch Annika could tolerate. In time she grew to love the feeling of my arms around her, my body becoming her own personal security blanket.