Lizzy gets back on the highway. She’s not settling. She doesn’t have to stay with Greg. She makes enough money—just—to live on her own. Her life would be full without him. It’s not as if she needs a man. She happens to like Greg. Love him, actually. Really, she does. She wouldn’t stay if she didn’t. Right? Of course not. The question is, does he love her?
By the time she pulls into her driveway and gets out of the car, she fully intends to wake Greg and get an answer.
In the bedroom, she switches on the overhead light. Greg groans, pulls the comforter over his head, and turns toward the wall.
Lizzy sits on her side of the bed. “Can we talk?” she asks.
He rolls on his back and covers his eyes with his forearm. “What’s up?” He sounds resigned, as if he’s doing her some huge favor.
“Why do you stay with me?”
“Aw, Liz. Not now.”
“It’s important to me,” she says.
He exhales. “You always come back from your group like this. Get some sleep; we can talk tomorrow.”
Blue veins streak the underside of his arm. “I always come back like what?”
“Like … wound sort of tight.”
“You’re right, I do. Isn’t that the point of the groups? To listen to others? To learn? Isn’t that why you go to yours?”
He yawns. “Yeah. I learn. I like to listen. But I don’t leave with questions.”
“Why not? I mean, I would think when you listen to other people and what’s going on in their relationships, it would bring up questions about ours.”
“Well, it doesn’t,” he tells her, irritated.
“I don’t get that.”
“Look, Liz, we’re different. That’s all. I get different things from my groups.” He rubs his eyes. “Can we talk about this some other time?”
“I just have one question,” she says.
“Fine. One.”
“Why do you stay with me?” She tosses her earrings from one hand to the other. He’s right, she’s tense, very tense, and he could make it better. All he’d have to do is reach over, touch her, tell her he stays because he loves her.
“We work well together.” His voice is weary.
“What does that mean exactly?” she asks.
He moves his arm away from his face and slaps the mattress. “Liz, come on. It’s past midnight. I answered your one question.”
“Just tell me what it means. That we work well together.”
“We enjoy each other’s company.”
“Like you’re enjoying mine now?”
He sighs. “Look, we go out to dinner and have fun sometimes. That’s all I’m saying. Now can I please go to sleep?”
The hook snaps off her earring and little black beads race along the floor. It’s a cheap piece of jewelry, easily replaceable, yet she begins to cry. Greg doesn’t seem to notice that she’s broken her earring, that she’s in tears, that his answer was woefully inadequate. She can’t have lived eighteen years with this man and settled for a few fun dinners.
“Are the women you watch prettier than me?” It’s a childish question, but she doesn’t retract it. Instead she bends down, grinding a bead with her thumb into the floor.
“Not all,” he mumbles.
“Not all?” she asks.
“What do you want me to say? Just tell me, because whatever I answer isn’t going to be right for you.”
It’s true, it seems as if his answers are never what she wants to hear. She leaves the broken earring and curls on top of the comforter. “You know how when you love someone, you think they’re beautiful because you love them?”
“Jesus, Lizzy, please, can we go to sleep?”
“Do you think I’m beautiful?”
He slaps the mattress again. “Yes, I’ve felt that.”
“But you’ve never told me.”
“Correct,” he states.
“And you can’t tell me now?”
“Correct.”
“But you have felt it?” she asks.
“Yes.” Another exasperated sigh.
“And you say that you’re becoming more open and honest from your groups?”
He shoves down the covers and swings his legs out of bed. His feet smack the floor.
“So you’re just going to leave?” she asks.
“I need to use the bathroom. Is that all right with you?” He sounds nasal and defensive.
As she watches him stomp away, she looks at his slender hips and imagines him jerking off. She shudders, then stands to unwrap her scarf and is hanging it on her closet door when he comes back in.
“So why aren’t you interested in me?” she asks.
“It’s not about you,” he yells.
“Of course not. It’s about you, and you…” She pokes a finger at his chest. “You, you, you.”
He slaps her hand away.
She swats at him.
He grabs her wrist. “Stop it,” he tells her.
She shoves him with her free hand. He shoves back. She stumbles, almost falls, but regains her footing. She pushes him again. He thrusts the heel of his hand into her chest. Her head jerks back and hits the framed painting on the wall. She hears a crack.
The picture tumbles, and the glass shatters. Her hands flap idiotically, frantically. There’s a pinch at the back of her head. She reaches to massage it and feels something sharp. She tugs it out, then stares at the red stains, the color of strawberries.
“Lizzy, are you all right?” He glances at her hand, at the piece of glass.
She doesn’t know. She feels okay, just a little off-center. Her hand grazes the back of her head. It’s wet and sticky.
“Let me see,” Greg says. But he doesn’t look because the sight of blood makes him nauseated. She wonders if she’s going to have to watch another person vomit tonight.
“I’ll just get a washcloth,” she tells him. But when she takes a step she gets dizzy, and the door looks as if it’s turning. She steadies herself by putting a hand on the dresser; then she sits, slowly. Between a few pieces of glass are two black beads from her earrings. She thinks of collages and ice chips, of how her floor looks like a piece of art, and how in her pocket are the numbers of the women in her group. Is this the kind of situation in which she should call two other people?
Lizzy squints, narrowing her vision, focusing only on the glass and beads.
“I’m taking you to the hospital,” Greg says.
She puts her head between her knees and breathes. He sits next to her and caresses her back. She closes her eyes, comforted by his touch, happy he is taking action.