The Paris Review - Fall 2016

Friday’s. “Be careful,” I said, as we stepped off the curb. It was one of those
cold nights when sounds seem loud and hard. We got to her apartment building
and along the edges of the parking lot were snowbanks shining blue in
the moonlight. “Let me walk you to your apartment.” My mouth was dry.
“It’s icy.”
The apartment was dark and smelled of ginger, and there was a ticking
sound. As she stood there, in the dark of her open kitchen, I tried to kiss
her. “No,” she said and swung her head away. But I tried again, and she did
not step back. This seemed promising to me. I kept my hands on her waist
and kissed her cheeks, her ears. I remembered when my mother would hold
both my wrists in one hand and slap me and I would try to duck and her
hand would strike my brow, my eyes, the side of my nose. After a minute or
two, Betsy put her hands on my face and kissed me in the practiced way of a
woman trying to make a man feel desired. Now I became nervous. I felt that
I had forced the situation into being.
“Should I go home?” I asked.
“Yes.”
After this night, we kissed regularly, but only after she had been drinking.
I would drive her to her building and say that perhaps I should walk her
to her apartment, and my mouth would grow dry as we walked.
Kissing her was wonderful. To stand for an hour in her dark apartment,
kissing, swaying side to side, made me so happy that I wanted to tell someone.
In the car, driving back to my apartment, I would speak out loud to myself.
“Is there anything better than kissing a beautiful woman?” I would say. “If
there is, God is keeping it for himself.”
At least once or twice a month we went to her apartment and kissed.
There were occasions, though, when for several weeks in a row she would
have dates on Friday night. I would feel very sad. My arms and legs would
grow heavy, and I would find myself blinking away tears. I felt sad and also
I would hate her. Although I was the one chasing Betsy, I felt that she was
using me, that to her I was simply a source of attention.
One day in the pantry at work, I came up to her as she was making tea
in the microwave. “I would like to take you out on a date sometime,” I said.
I murmured this.
Betsy looked at me. She didn’t say anything, then she patted my cheek
and left.
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