Knowing Is Not Enough (31 page)

“This is a nice surprise,” he said, putting his things on the next table.

“Is it?” I asked. The server returned with my drink.

“Of course.” He looked confused, pushing his chair back to look at me. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

“I don’t know.” I stopped to gather my thoughts. “It seems like we haven’t been on the same page for almost two years now.”

“I think it’s been a lot longer than that,” he said before taking a drink.

I smiled. “This is what I’m talking about—I say two years, you say more. Don’t you think we need to talk about
this?” I hesitated. “I feel like you’re angry with me.”

“I’m always open to talking. And—” he looked directly into my eyes “—I’m not angry. I’ve just given up trying to convince you of anything.”

That made me nervous, but I fortified my resolve with another swallow of wine. “I know you may not believe me, but I didn’t know you cared about me the way you did.”

He looked down into his glass. “That’s not true, Alex.” He looked back up at me. “Let’s take a little virtual trip down memory lane—do you remember in your dorm room you were crying about some guy—what was his name?”

“I cried about some guy every other month,” I admitted. “I don’t remember his name.”

Sanford snapped his fingers. “Larry—that’s his name.”

I wagged my finger, taking another hit of my drink. “Yup, Larry the loser.”

“Yeah,” he laughed. “Larry the loser. Well, after I dried the tears out of your hair and questioned your taste in men for the hundredth time I told you something. Do you remember what that was?”

My lies had become my truth. I knew how Sanford felt about me for all these years yet I’d continued to lie about it.
No more denying or lying allowed
. I took a deep breath, held it and exhaled the words, “You loved me.”

“No,” he said, “I confessed I was
in
love with you. And what did you say?”

I closed my eyes, wishing I’d said something other than the truth. “I didn’t feel the same way.”

The server returned to the table. Sanford raised his eyebrows, pointing to my glass. “Yes, I’ll have another,” I said.

“Two,” Sanford informed the waiter. When he cleared the table Sanford continued. “And even though my manhood hung by a thread, I asked you, if there was any way you thought you could ever be with me, and you said—”

“No, we’re friends.”

“Just friends.”

“Sanford, I was eighteen years old. I’m shocked you got
anything
thought provoking out of me. Those weren’t exactly my wonder years.”

“I knew that, which is why I decided the timing wasn’t right. Figured you weren’t ready for all this.” He pointed at his head. “Now you know why I get upset when you say you didn’t know—because I know that you did. You may not have been ready to hear it, but you knew.”

“I did know—and you’re right, I didn’t want you to love me. What we had was something better. Friendship.” I swallowed more wine. “I don’t know if you’ve been paying much attention, but the men I love don’t last very long.”

“I’ll grant you that, so fast-forward to last year, we hook up. It’s good—at least I think it is—”

“I felt so, too.”

“You couldn’t have—because you broke it off a month after we got started.”

I took in a deep breath. “In my head—”

“What?”

“Don’t interrupt, hear me out,” I said. “This is probably the most honest I’ve been with anyone, including myself, in a long time. Our relationship would have been ill fated if we’d stayed together. I felt that in my heart, and
nothing could have convinced me otherwise.”

Calmly he asked, “What are you basing this assumption off of?” He sat straight up in his chair. “Indulge me for a minute, I’m really curious, because it couldn’t have been from me—you have no experience with me. All I did was love you, care about you, and worship the ground you walked on, so it couldn’t have been me. Was it Larry? Jake, maybe? Oh,” he snapped his fingers, “how about this married guy you’re seeing? What’s his name—Easton?” My mouth dropped open. “What about him? Tell me which one of these trick bags did you lump me into?”

I cursed each tear that welled up in my eyes, betraying every emotion I wanted to keep hidden. “Maybe we should stop talking about this.”

“Be clear. This door will not be reopened without some work on your end,” He leaned toward me. “I am not meeting you halfway. I came
all
the way to get you. You shut the door in my face.” I started to say something when he raised his finger, shutting me down. “And it wasn’t the first time. You came here for a reason—right? You still committed to getting what you want?”

“I am,” I said, and then took another sip of wine.

“Then okay, Popeye, stay strong to finish without the liquid spinach.”

I smiled. “I haven’t heard you say that in a long time.”

Firmly, he said, “Answer the question. Where do I fit into this melodrama you got going on?”

I inhaled all the oxygen in the room and blew it back out. “That’s just it—you didn’t fit. You’re not familiar to me. Wait—maybe that’s the wrong choice of words. What I mean to say is what I felt wasn’t familiar to me.”

“The word you’re looking for is called
love
.”

“I didn’t care what it’s called, only how it felt.” I shivered. “Foreign and unfamiliar.”

“Running away from love is taking you further away from me—”

“You need to understand that what I felt with Jake and Easton—it was familiar. I knew who to be and how to be. Familiarity made my life work, wife, victim, other woman, alone. I know these roles—heck, I wrote the script. Pain—I can do pain, avoidance, denial—I got all of that in my cookie jar. Happy? I haven’t played that part before.”

“So where does that leave me? Because happy—baby, that’s all I got.”

“That’s all I need,” I said simply. “I’ve spent more time worrying about being loved than building my ability to love someone else. You’re all I need,” I said again, reaching out for his hand. “I am so sorry it took me so long to get over my fear, but I’m a lot stronger now, and I’m not afraid of loving you, but more importantly . . . I’m the woman
I
needed to be, to love a man like you.”

He signaled the server for the tab.

“I wasn’t the only one who started seeing someone,” I said.

The server put the bill on the table. “Yes, you were,” said Sanford.

I snorted. “I didn’t imagine the amazon from the modeling jungle.”

“You didn’t imagine Simone,” he agreed, “just me being in a relationship with her.” He put his money on top of the bill and held it up for the server to retrieve.

I didn’t let go. “So what was that kiss, her leaping into your arms and all that about, then?”

“All for show,” he said and shrugged. “I was and still am in love with you. Real love doesn’t go away that easily. I’ve loved you my entire adult life. You think I’m going to forget you in a few months?”

“I feel silly now, but yeah, I did.” The waiter came back to the table and took the money.

“Well—you were wrong.” Sanford stood up. “Keep the change,” he told the server.

I didn’t know what to say or do. I felt like an open sore. I’d never been this desperate in my life to hold on to anyone or anything. I couldn’t image life without Sanford in it. He was the only person who had always made sense. I stood up, sensing that our conversation was over and I’d failed to accomplish what I’d come here for.

Sanford put his own coat on before helping me with mine. We gathered our things in silence and headed out the door toward my car. “That you?” he pointed down the street.

I could feel it coming on. “Yeah, that’s me.” We continued walking until we reached my car. I nervously fumbled for my keys to open the door and popped the locks. I turned to Sanford. “Okay, then.”

He pointed. “I’m parked right there.” I looked down the street and saw his car.

“All right then,” I said again, opening the door and threw my purse and myself inside. He stood there for a second, and then walked away.
Just in time
. I put the key in the ignition, started the car, then turned up the radio and sobbed. It hurt—I couldn’t find the words to get him to forgive me. I draped my arms around my steering wheel
and hugged it for dear life. I tasted tears and snot running down my face into my open mouth. I didn’t care. I screamed I’m sorry—I’m so sorry—between choking down body fluids as quickly as I produced them.

I felt sick to my stomach. All the wine, tears and snot soured in me—it was coming up. I frantically pulled on the door handle. Locked. There wasn’t enough time. I threw up in the only thing I had, my purse, which made me cry even more. My expensive parting gift from the divorce—ruined. Just like my marriage, Sanford and me. I wailed some more, wiping my nose and face on my sleeve. The car windows were completely fogged up, preventing me from seeing anything or anyone outside. I only heard a single tap at the window. I cut down the music. My voice cracked, “Yes.”

“Are you going to open the door?”

Jesus, you are not doing this to me
. I quickly dried my face with my hands and wiped it on my pants leg. “Who is it?”

“Open the door,” he said.

I reluctantly popped the locks. He opened the door, jumped in and looked at my cracked, tore-up face. “Oh God, what happened to you?”

I started crying again. “You’re what happened to me.”

He looked around the car, puzzled in search of what was making his eyes water. “What’s that smell?” He held his hand up to his mouth. “Did you get sick in here?”

“A little,” I said, tears streaming down my face.

Coughing he said, “Okay, let’s get you outta here and into my car.”

“What about my purse?”

He turned his head from side to side searching for it.
“Is that where the vomit is?”

“Yes,” I said.

“I’m behind you. Lock your car up. I’m going back inside to get a trash bag for your purse.”

I did as instructed, and awaited Sanford in his car as I watched him put the purse in a big black plastic bag then ties it. He wiped down my steering wheel, closed the driver’s side door, and locked it before returning to his car and me. He pulled out more tissue from his pocket and dried my face then placed a tissue up to my nose. “You’re on your own with this one,” he laughed. I smiled and took the tissue from his hand to blow my nose. “All better?” he asked.

“Much,” I confessed.

He continued to look at me through those dark frames. “I’m not trying to upset you—I hope you know that.”

“I believe you’re not, but you
are
hurting me.”

He leaned back in the driver’s seat then reached his enormous hand over and placed it on my chest. “I always thought the biggest wall blocking me from your heart was betrayal, but it turned out to be fear. Leaving made me realize I can’t break down walls you’ve built, Alex. Only you can get rid of them and let me inside—you don’t need protection from me.”

I opened his jacket and put my hands underneath his shirt. I could feel his heart beating in between my fingers. “I love you more than life itself,” I said. “You are the one person I don’t need to safeguard my heart from and I know I’ve hurt you in the past, but if it takes the rest of my life showing you how deep, far and wide what I feel for you is—I’m willing to do that, because what scares me
now isn’t letting you in—it’s you wanting to get out.”

He pulled my hand from under his shirt and softly kissed the back of it. “Love never leaves,” he said. “It’s going to take more than a snotty nose and purse filled with vomit to get me away from you.”

I smiled. “Good to know. So how does this end?”

“Well,” he said. “Your happily-ever-after ends with you brushing your teeth.” He grinned. “Then making love to your man. How’s that?”

I leaned toward him as we pulled off. “Yeah,” I said and squeezed his arm a little tighter. “You in my life . . . for the rest of my life is all I’ll ever want or need.”

“That’s good . . . because
this is it . . .
me and you.”

“Yes,” I said. “Me and you.”

For over twenty years, Patricia Walker Chatman has worked in the human service industry. Her areas of expertise include Grant Writing, Program Design, Implementation and Management, Public Policy and Administration, Fiscal Management, Contract Compliance, Training and Development, and Quality Control. In 2010, Patricia accepted a Faculty Associate position facilitating Financial Management for Human Services and various Business Topics. She holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Human Resources with a specialization in Training and Development. A Master Degree in Public Policy and Administration, and anticipates completing her doctorate in Public Policy Administration, May 2014.

Knowing Is Not Enough is Patricia’s first novel.