Telling Stories
It was two in the morning, and as the cab meandered its way across the island her stories simply slipped out.
We were four months in and I felt I knew her well, but there’s something different about geography. There’s something different about placing everything on a map.
She lived over there with a boyfriend for two years when she first came to New York. She didn’t know how he was paying the rent until his roommate went to jail for selling coke to NYU students. It had a view of the park and they used to fuck in the window on Sunday mornings.
The bar we just passed is where she met her ex-girlfriend. The one who promised not to leave and then left. They flirted all night and spent the next four days together, not leaving each other’s side even once. They never want back to the bar, but she remembers it all the same.
Eight months of bliss and misunderstanding.
On the other side of town she points out an old office, a coffee shop she worked at years ago, and another bar she got thrown out of for fucking in the bathroom. The pool table had a tear down the middle and it screwed up her shot every time.
As we get closer to home, I ask her what story she’ll tell about us. What will she say years from now when she drives by with someone else to a different apartment altogether?
She leans against me and is quiet for a long time. I kiss her hair, wondering if I’ve said the wrong thing. I fell in love when I lived her, she whispers, taking my hand in hers. I fell so madly in love I got drunk and told silly stories.
Is that it? I ask, holding her tighter.
That’s it, she says, kissing my fingers over and over again. That’s it.
