The Difference

Since last week my days have been…different. 

As a creature of habit, I started this day the same: Three eggs and two medjool dates. Eat them standing at the counter. In silence. The way I like it. Popping my bubble of peace with any needle of conversation is the same as kicking my knee out from behind as I lift piping coffee to my lips and nails rake a chalkboard. Might as well walk under a ladder and open an umbrella inside because once that bubble pops, forget about it. Day’s a wash. So as far as mornings went, this one was perfect. I even heard birds singing outside my window instead of leaf blowers for once. Or maybe I just have been hearing a different pitch. I’ve been attentive to the details of my day lately.

I left for the gym after that. 

On the way, I listened to a song she said she wanted me to hear. She gave me a list of them last night. I missed my turn. I had an urge to cruise up the PCH, ocean to my left, open road in front, destination unknown—forget about work, the laundry pile, existence outside of this sudden spark of uninhibited whim. Last time I felt like this was when I woke up one day and decided to get on a plane with one bag and leave Philadelphia behind me. 

I listened to the rest of her songs at the gym. The workout felt like a massage; an hour went like ten minutes. I emerged outside feeling like Rocky when he kicked it into fifth gear, left those kids in the dust and ran up the art museum stairs, triumphant fists held high. There used to be a poster hanging in the foyer of that same art museum to promote Philly WIC, (Women Infants and Children); A picture of me as a baby in my mother’s arms, breastfeeding, along with her fifty coworkers. I remember the first time I was old enough to run up those stairs like Rocky, I went in and saw the picture, and recognized my mom in it with her boob out. Wished I hadn’t seen that, but I did. Now, every time I watch that Rocky scene, I see that poster, myself running up those same stairs, so long ago. I should give my parents a call later, see how they’re doing. I wonder if they’ll hear the difference in my voice. 

My car was on the other side of the parking lot. That’s alright, nice day for a walk. Chin up, chest out, spine like a lightning rod. My stride had a glide to it. If I were in a movie, Motown would be playing. I felt good, suspicious even. Looked like life decided to give me a pass today. 

As if winding up its curveball, it stopped and said, you know what? Nah, Let him have this one, and lobbed me a free-bee: No rolled ankle on the cracks in the pavement, didn’t hit my head on anything at the gym, didn’t step in dog shit, my car started up just fine, no call from my boss about that yelp review saying I called them a “dick with ears that don’t listen” when they debated the check. Instead, the morning rotated its fist vertically and gave me a thumbs-up. I nodded, hesitating to look up in case the other shoe was on its way down because nothing this good ever lasts. But it’d been a week since I woke up like this, so maybe it would (I hoped).

 On the way home, I replayed the one she wanted me to hear first and forgot all about LA traffic when I found myself bumper-to-bumper. I wasn’t angry to crawl two miles in twenty minutes for once. My east coast tucked deep into my back pocket; I didn’t yell at anyone. Didn’t feel those furious little piranhas eating away my patience. Didn’t even throw up a hand when the guy cut me off. 

I noticed the sun as if I’d never seen it before. Rolled my windows down and let it grab my arm like a warm oven mitt fresh off the baking tray. Face out, I closed my eyes to let it kiss my cheek. Golden light on my eyelids made me think of her hair. Fallen bangs across her forehead, swooping behind her ear like silk curtains. Not a strand out of place. She radiated this effortless elegance and I admired that. 

The car behind me beeped. 

Relax, dickhead. 

I looked up at the green light and eased on the gas. 

My heart beat like a fist pounding from the inside out. But I’m not anxious. Which is a first. I always seem to find something to worry about. But not today, which was…different. My skin buzzed like the first drops of summer rain back home. Shoulders relaxed. I don’t know what ten hours of sleep without nightmares or getting up to piss feels like but I imagine this is it.

Ireland made me feel like that. 

Waking up beside the rolling green hills outside my rented cottage near the coast. Serene. Never knew I could feel that word before I went there—October morning rain, embers of last night’s fire at my back. Standing at the yellow dutch-style door, top half open, steaming French roast in my mug, brisk air in my lungs— Cerulean sea on the other side of the cliffs glowing under streaks of morning sun as it broke through the haze. Dead ringer for the hue of her eyes now that I thought about it. To drop dead at that moment would’ve been fine. 

She felt like Ireland. 

I drove past a neighborhood with homes I couldn’t afford in three lifetimes. Fresh cut lawns wafted in and I remembered the boy. The one who laid in the backyard, eyes in the clouds, splitting blades with his fingernail. It's Spring. Winter in the past. Honeysuckles and quick passing thunderstorms in the future. Those arrive in June along with the lightning bugs. 

A transfer student from the front of the class turned around and smiled at him the other day. It was all he thought about since. He wondered if he needed permission from her father to ask for her hand—stupid. Too young. Too fast. Take it easy, kid. Baby steps. Maybe speak to her first. Would she still like him after she heard that his voice wasn’t as oiled up as Frank Sinatra’s? Puberty hadn’t made landfall the way it did with most of the boys his age. Maybe it would crack and come out like a rogue trumpet note as he said hello and he’d never speak to her again. 

Same day, his father waited in the parking lot. He got out of work early and thought it might be nice to surprise his son and pick him up for once, and not have him take public transit. 

It was. 

He asked him what he was so giddy about. The boy suppressed his grin and looked over at the girl getting into her mother’s car. She didn’t see him. It didn’t matter. His little secret.

On the drive back from school, he thought about the time in first grade he had a thing for this eighth grader; black hair, blue eyes, knockout. She used to wave and smile at him in the hallway. She even said she liked his eyelashes. The boy’s mother said those spider legs would come in handy with the ladies one day, someday, after all the other boys stopped calling him a girl for having them. He knew her birthday was coming up. He looked up the birthstone for September, a sapphire. And he knew just where to find one. 

When his dad got home that evening, he met him at the door. “Wanna take me to Toys-R-Us?”

“Nice to see you too, son.”

“Wanna take me to Toys-R-Us?”

“Heard ya the first time.”

Their eyes locked in a stalemate. 

“Lemme ask you something,” he said. “What kind of car do I drive?”

“A Bronco.” 

“You sure?”

He looked over his father’s shoulder at his truck in the driveway. 

The boy looked confused. 

“It’s not a yellow car with a taxi sign on the roof?”

“No?”

“Bingo.” 

He put his hands on my hips and tried to sound as serious as he could about the matter. “Just to look. Please, dad. It’s important”

“Not as important as a shower. I just got home. I’m dirty. I’m tired. I’m hungry.”

“Real quick. In and out. Please.”

He bit his lip, holding back a smile. “Real quick. In and out. Just to look.” 

His dad grabbed his keys off the hook.

The boy didn’t want some stupid toy. He needed that friggin’ ring from the gum-ball machine with a “sapphire” in it. He watched his father wander back out front for a smoke and tap his watch. The boy took out a handful of quarters he’d been saving, ran over to the gum-ball machine, saw the ring was still there from last week, and got to work—a red one, a green one, one without a stone, just a plastic gold ring. He had one quarter left and prayed to any god that’d listen. Please, he thought, sticking last quarter in the slot. Please, just give me this one thing. I swear, I’ll take out the trash in the snow this winter and not drag my feet or sigh out the door. I’ll go to bed on time without debate. I won’t say bad words. No more spitballs in class. I’ll eat the goddamn vegetables. 

He turned the latch and the plastic ball fell into his palm. 

THE BLUE ONE. 

He tucked it into his pocket as his dad rounded the registers and found him at the front of the store. 

“Find what you’re lookin’ for?”

 The boy nodded, shoving the ring inside his pocket. 

He gave his son the eyebrow. His dad always knew when he was hiding something but he let it lie. “Come on, kiddo. Your mom’s got dinner going.” 

“What’re we having?” 

“Food.” 

The next day, he waited for his woman in the hallway, pretended to walk to the bathroom at the same time she exited for recess so it’d seem like a coincidence. Instead of asking her to marry him then and there, tell her to give him fifteen years until he grew up enough to love him back, he just said, “Happy Birthday,” and gave her the ring. She kissed him on the cheek. Stars flashed. He’d been knocked out before. The time he’d fallen off the monkey bars and hit his head. Funny how opposite things can make you feel the same. 

The following afternoon, he saw her kissing a boy from her class, her own age, behind the shed in the school yard. The sight was an uppercut to that soft spot just under his sternum and a subsequent upheaval of vomit landed him in the nurse's office after a classmate had claimed the boy was dying. Worst part was, she didn’t have the ring on. He knew that he had lost her forever. Never had her to begin with. 

When his father asked him what was wrong at the dinner table that night, he said nothing and took out the trash without protest. He stood on the curb and looked up at the moon, wishing he was old enough to smoke cigarettes because in the movies, these are the moments they seemed to be suited for. 

His father came out front and lit one up beside him. “Hurts don’t it?”

The boy shrugged. 

“One day, somebody’s gonna walk into your life and bang. Shit’s different. I know what happened.” 

“How?”

“You don’t think I know things?” He said in his Goodfellas voice. He smacked his son’s cheek. “You should get your heart broken next week. I need the garage cleaned out.” 

That was it—the knocking inside my chest. Him, the boy. My old friend. Moved away without a proper goodbye. I forgot how much I missed him. I never thought I’d see him again so I did my best to forget. Little things remind me of him but I let it pass like clouds. Cast those memories away like a message in a bottle because it hurts to remember him sometimes. How innocent and naive. That hopeful soul. The one who believed he might never grow up. Who assumed he and his best friend would name their sons after each other, instead of burying him at nineteen. Who bought a girl three times his age a twenty-five cent ring from a gum-ball machine and thought he had a shot at forever. I’d even forgotten what his smile looked like until I found it glancing back at me in the side-view mirror. 

I’ll hope he stays but I won’t ask him. 

I want to tell him I miss him. I don’t. He knows. 

I want to tell him I’m sorry. I’m already forgiven. 

I don’t say anything. 

Savor these small moments through his eyes, everywhere and everything, happy he’s here. 

I was about to turn onto my street a minute from home when I went back to the moment in which everything became different. The night she walked in. That’s all it took to give me back eyes that notice life’s details and find them beautiful, lungs full of ignorant bliss. I couldn't explain it. I didn’t want to. Some things are better left misunderstood. And even though I was told never to stare a gift horse in the mouth, I knew I’d find a way to pay her back. She didn’t know it and neither did I, but since the day she was born she has carried the key that would unlock a caged bird and he’ll remember how to fly again.

 Sirens wail to my left. I expect to see an ambulance and prepare to yield. What I saw instead was the other shoe—a black Ford F-150, barreling through the red light, a caravan of cop cars in pursuit. Even if I floored the gas or the brakes, he’d still T-bone me going sixty. Not enough time or space to do anything but blink. In that sliver of darkness I saw the light of her smile, the one that made all the difference.