TWENTY-TWO

WHY DONT YOU BORROW OUR CABIN?” Kendra said to me at work. I was complaining that the city was feeling claustrophobic lately, but in truth it was our apartment. When Tobias wasn’t out taking photos he was in the chair editing them. Lately I felt disappointed when I’d come home and find him there—which gave me a sinking feeling every time. “My parents never use it. You could just go up there this weekend and clear your head.”

I thought about drinking wine by a fire, locking my phone away, and listening to the wind or trees or whatever nature sounded like—it had been far too long. It was November and the beach was the last time I’d left the city. “That sounds amazing,” I said.

“Great, I’ll bring the keys tomorrow.”

I came home intent on telling Tobias my plan. I thought he’d be happy to have the weekend to himself—and that it would be good for us to spend some time apart.

I walked in the door and the Mambo Kings were playing—salsa music I loved. I could smell the garlic and oil and a mix of spices only Tobias could wield.

I dropped my bag down and tossed my shoes off. His back was to me over the stove, and he immediately turned around, a wide grin on his face.

“My queen,” he said. “Welcome to paradise.” He put his hands on my waist and guided me to the counter, where a blender full of margaritas sat with two waiting salt-rimmed glasses. “We couldn’t get to Mexico, so I brought Mexico to us.” He held out a glass to me.

“Yes, please.”

He filled mine up and then his and then held his glass out to me. “Viva margaritas,” he said.

“To us,” I said.

Instead of taking a sip I hooked a hand into the collar of his T-shirt and pulled him in for a kiss.

He set his drink down and lifted me off the counter stool, winding his hands down my back and tugging me in closer.

“I’m cooking,” he said against my mouth.

“Not anymore.”

It had been almost three weeks since we’d had sex—a record number for us, and one I knew was indicative of something wrong in our relationship. We put a lot of emphasis on sex—or I did. It was good, really good, and when we were in that space together I felt as sure as I ever did about our rightness. When we were out of it I felt fractured, disconnected.

Tobias moved his lips to my cheek. “There are three different kinds of fajitas on that stove,” he told me. “Not a chance.” He grabbed my butt and then gently nudged me away from him as he went back to the food. I didn’t feel rejected, more amused. We were back in the love bubble. I slurped my drink and watched him work.

After we ate, when we were full of fajitas and tequila, I told him the Berkshires plan. Except I didn’t tell him I wanted to go alone. I said I wanted us to go together.

“That sounds perfect,” he told me.

I was thrilled. It felt like we were on our way to reconnecting, that we had set aside the hostility of the last few months and we were moving beyond it, and I knew this trip would be the reset button we needed. We had done so well in the Hamptons, I wanted us to have a little bit of that back—that fun and spunk and spontaneity that I thought defined our relationship. Home had gotten to be so pressurized—money, jobs, life. I wanted us to go somewhere where all that wasn’t hanging over our heads. Where we had more space and clear air. I would have the conversation Kendra and I had rehearsed the week before. In the space and open air, out of the city, Tobias would hear me. We’d figure it out.

That weekend we rented a car and went up to Lenox. Tobias drove and I rolled the window down. It was early November and still fall—crisp and cool, not yet biting—and the leaves hadn’t completely fallen. Upstate was a wash of gold and red and orange, and I reached out to put my hand over Tobias’s.

He lifted his thumb and rubbed my pinky. As soon as we left Queens behind us, I felt myself exhaling.

Jessica called. I hit ignore.

“You need to get that?” Tobias asked me.

“Nope,” I said.

He turned to me and winked.

Kendra’s parents’ cabin was up a hill that looked over a field of sheep and cows. It was small, one bedroom, one bath, with a little kitchen nook, a fireplace, and a screened-in porch. We had brought up groceries and wine, and I unpacked our provisions while Tobias went about building a fire.

Jessica called again. I missed it. My phone was now tucked into my purse, on silent, as it would stay for the rest of the weekend.

“Do you want a glass of red?” I called to him.

“Open the Nero d’Avola,” he said.

I found the wine opener in my bag. Kendra had said the cabin was fully loaded, but I didn’t want to take any chances. Forgoing wine for the weekend didn’t seem like it would help things.

Tobias went outside to gather wood from a pile by the side of the cabin, and I took the Gruyère and Gouda and grapes I’d bought and put them on a cutting board with some crackers and almonds—the spiced kind from Trader Joe’s I knew Tobias loved.

When he came back in I poured two glasses and brought one out to him, balancing the cheese plate on my wrist.

“Here, I got it.” He took the cheese board off me and set it on the mantel. I handed him a glass of wine and we settled down in a chair in front of the fireplace as he built the fire.

“Can I help?” I asked, sipping.

He cocked his head at me in that way he did that told me he thought I was crazy but he was charmed by it. Head tilted forty-five degrees to the left, one eye closed. “I don’t know, can you?”

“I’ll blow on it,” I said.

He arched his eyebrows at me. “Oh, you will, will you?”

“Maybe,” I said. I took another sip. I let my eyes find his over the glass.

“I think you should stay right there,” he said. He stood up and came over to me. He slid his hand onto my thigh and brought his lips up to kiss my cheek.

I pulled him down into the chair with me. We picked up where we’d left off over margaritas. I took his shirt off and ran my hands over his shoulders and down his back. He pulled my sweater over my head and kissed the hollow of my collarbone, the space between my ear and shoulder that drove me crazy.

All we needed was to stay this close. Right up against each other, without any space between us. If we did that, we were good. It was just the world—with all its loud chaos, its demands and people and air—that made us fight, that made us separate, that was driving us apart.

Tobias pulled back and looked at me. He hovered over me, so close I could smell the wine on his lips.

“Did I ever tell you about what happened after we met that day on the train?” he asked me.

He hadn’t. We had spent some time talking about the beach—our other beginning—but not that one.

“I got off at the next stop. I walked the rest of the way. I had to call Matty.”

“Why?” I asked.

“Because,” he said. “I had to tell someone I had met her.”

“Who?”

“You.” He cupped my chin and brought his lips to brush over my eyelids, my cheekbones, the pad of my lips.

“Stay close to me,” I told him.

“Always,” he said.

He kissed my ear, then dropped his lips into the dip of my collarbone. I took his hand and led him into the bedroom.

Afterward we played Monopoly and drank two bottles of wine. Tobias made us pesto pasta with grilled chicken. I knew we needed to talk, but we needed this night more. We needed to remember what made us special and different and together. I wanted to make love and pasta and hold him in my arms.

We’d talk tomorrow, I reasoned.

Tomorrow.