The Opposite of Love (2 page)

Every call or interview that involved a white person was a powder keg of issues. If they rolled up on someone Latino, Lopez would take the lead under the assumption that he could get whatever info they were after from one of his own better than James could, and sometimes that was true. But when they interrogated a white guy, Lopez would fume with indignation if James offered to take the lead. If James let his partner go ahead, the chip on Lopez’ shoulder would lead the way and he’d goad the white guy, challenge him to disrespect him in the slightest way. If he did, Lopez would detain him, arrest him—didn’t matter what—it would be a win and Lopez would be satisfied. If the white guy showed respect, he’d often get away without damage but with a persistent dislike of either minorities or cops or both. It made James crazy to watch a partner confirm suspicions that he was a power-hungry, ignorant asshole by being just that. A badge in and of itself was no reason to respect someone, only a reason to comply.

“That was rough, man,” said Lopez.

“What’s that?” asked James.

“That kid,” he said, looking down at his lap. “Makes me think of my own little ones. If something like that happened…” He shook his head and trailed off, looking out the window as they drove up Green Valley Parkway. Lopez had three kids of his own and one on the way. It was pretty much all he ever talked about. James himself had experienced a close call in his thirties—broken condom, pregnancy, miscarriage—and that had been enough to have him running to the doctor to have his swimmers put on lockdown.

“Yeah,” said James. He turned into the parking lot at the corner of Flamingo and Green Valley and parked in front of a restaurant that served Chinese, Japanese and Thai food. “Lunch?” he said.

When they got back to the station and sat down at their desks positioned face to face (rather incestuously, in James’ opinion), James picked up the phone to retrieve his office voicemail. Urgent calls went to his cell, calls that could wait went to his office number. Cathy, the receptionist, was adept at discerning which was which.

“Perolo, Lieutenant Lennox. I have a message here from someone claiming to be your mother. She wants your cell number and Cathy says she won’t leave a message with her or your voicemail. And now she wants to talk to me. I won’t return the call. Just letting you know.”

James deleted the message and hung up. He stared at his computer screen, watching the METRO screen saver icon dance across the display.

A few weeks before someone calling herself his mother had phoned the station twice asking for him, asking for his cell number. James wasn’t sure if it was her or not; it could’ve been some stalker ex trying to harass him. He’d had to change his cell number twice in three years for that very reason. Even if it was his mother, he couldn’t begin to imagine what she wanted. Money? A place to stay? A relationship? He wanted to give her none of the above. She’d had her chance; she hadn’t done any of that for him.

Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn’t.

—Erica Jong

Chapter Two

After the accident,
Melanie trudged through the rest of the day in a fog, almost getting into a fender-bender while running errands. At four in the afternoon she just gave up and went home. Curled up on the couch with a glass of Merlot and a chenille blanket, she stared at the blank TV screen.

Melanie saw the baby flying through the air and was shaken again by the monstrous physics of it. Such a small, vulnerable, creature subjected to such a violent act. A grown man would have had a hard time surviving it.

Melanie had never been sure she wanted children, she just assumed that if she fell in love with a fantastic man, she’d want to have
his
children. But she hadn’t met that man. Or perhaps she’d met him and dismissed him, but no matter. No man, no kids, and perhaps it was for the best. How long would it take those parents to get back to normal? How long would it take that girl to forgive herself, or was that even possible? Would the driver ever be the same? So many lives had been incalculably wrecked through the death of one child.

Going over the events again, frame by frame, she contemplated her own reaction. She hadn’t cried, hadn’t really shown any emotion at all. There had been a death when she was in college—a guy in her critical thinking class with whom she often studied in the library. When a female classmate had told her about the car accident, Melanie had stared dumbly in response. Her throat constricted, preventing her from speaking—not that she possessed the words to—and a wave of emptiness closed itself around her midsection. Then Melanie had turned on her heel and walked away. Her reaction to the news had been as surprising as the news itself. The girl had probably assumed she wanted to be alone to deal with the loss, perhaps to cry. But that wasn’t the case. She simply could not be in that same spot any longer, as if the concrete under her feet held all the emotions associated with his death—the shock, the grief, the anger—and these things would be absorbed through her soles if she didn’t move away. The urge to cry, to hug the bearer of the news, the inclination to give or receive comfort of any kind was simply absent.

And today, after the accident, everyone had been crying. The girl, her parents, the man in the sedan, even the delivery truck driver had ducked his head to each side, wiping his eyes on the shoulders of his shirt. Melanie had felt ill for a moment, but she could be relatively certain that it was the sight of blood that caused it. As if it was simply distasteful or disgusting, like watching a televised medical operation, all that probing of guts and tendons. And there was the same hollowness in her stomach today as when the boy in college died, as familiar and intangible as a memory.

She wanted to call someone to talk about what she’d seen. Her sister Sarah had a master’s in psychology—although she’d never pursued a career—but Melanie didn’t dare go to her with this; she had two kids of her own and the accident would give her nightmares. At thirty-three, her younger sister Jen was still a boy-crazy, facebooking social butterfly, and Melanie didn’t think her lack of maturity would allow Jen to grasp the horror of it—or her sympathy for the sedan driver. The only person in her family she could go to for advice on this was her mother, but if she talked to her mom about babies—even a dead one—she’d assume Melanie wanted one and become intolerable.

Her friend Derek was a father, and he had the ability to deal with this kind of conversation. He’d probably ask her intelligent questions that helped her to make sense of things, and that was what she needed. Maybe she’d even smoke a little of his weed; it wasn’t something she did often, but the relaxation it offered might do her good.

Melanie was already pulling her phone from her purse when it began to ring. She didn’t recognize the number on the caller ID, but it was a 702 number, so she answered anyway.

“Hello, Melanie. This is Detective Perolo from Metro P.D. I hope I haven’t caught you at a bad time.”

“Oh. No, it’s fine. How can I help you?” She blushed thinking of the weed she was considering smoking.

“Well, the truth is, I wanted to see how you were holding up after what happened today. Sometimes it takes a while for things to sink in, and I wanted to make sure you’re ok.”

“I’m fine. But thanks for your concern. That’s nice of you.” Melanie was a little baffled by the call. Was this standard operating procedure?

“You’re pretty tough, aren’t you?”

Melanie bristled. Just because she wasn’t sobbing and smearing snot on the shoulder of a complete stranger didn’t mean she was completely callous. She felt defensive and struggled not to let it show.

“No, I’m… it was upsetting. But I’m handling things the best I can.”

“I understand. Sometimes it helps to talk to someone about how you’re feeling. Have you had a chance to do that?”

“No, I was just thinking about calling someone.”

“Well, if you like, I’d be happy to meet you somewhere for a cup of coffee. I’m a pretty good listener.”

“No, but thanks.” Melanie didn’t even stop to think about it. She was fairly certain she was being hit on, but she had no intention of going on a date to discuss her personal feelings with some cop.

“Ok, but if you need anything, you have my card.”

“Thank you, officer.”

“Detective.”

“Sorry.”

“No problem. Have a good night.”

Melanie sat across from Derek at his kitchen table. His tall frame was hunched forward and his shaved head shone under the ceiling light. They were both sipping their second cup of green tea from seventies-style coiled-clay mugs.

“I saw a baby die today.”

Derek came around the counter and hugged her tight to his chest, rubbing his palms over her back.

“Are you ok?”

“I’m fine. Really.” With the absence of tears, he’d taken her word for it.

Once Derek had gotten over the shock of the image she painted of the accident, they’d been able to talk about things intellectually, and as expected, his insights had helped her to stop trying to make sense of it all, to stop the bizarre thoughts she’d been having about how to fix it. Now the puzzle pieces weren’t scattered around her brain; they were arranged neatly and the picture was clear. But there was still one piece missing, and she feared it always would be.

“I guess the thing that gets me the most is the risk. I don’t understand how people can take that kind of chance.”

“What kind of chance?”

“Babies die all the time. SIDS, accidents, illness. But people are willing to take that risk in having children, knowing that they’re setting themselves up for that kind of pain.”

Derek ran a hand forward and back across his head a few times. “I don’t think most people believe anything like that will happen to their children. But even if they did, they’d have them anyway.”

“Why?”

“Because the benefits outweigh the risk, Mel. It’s that simple.”

Beside her sisters—and her father before he’d died—Derek was the only person who called her Mel. It was her great grandfather’s name, a man Melanie’s father had loved with a deep and wistful fondness, and he’d fought to name her Melanie just so he could call her Mel.

“What if Troy had died when he was a baby?”

Melanie regretted the question as the words left her lips. Derek winced. Troy was his sixteen-year-old son who often stayed across town with his mother. Derek and Troy’s mother shared custody and had an amicable but distant relationship.

“I’m sorry,” Melanie said. “That was insensitive.”

“No, for the sake of argument, let’s say that happened.”

“Ok. Would you have had another child?”

“You already know Troy wasn’t planned. But if I lost him, knowing what it was like to have him, I think I’d want another child even more.”

She cocked her head, raised an eyebrow at him.

Derek sipped at his tea and looked off toward the kitchen window that looked out at the back yard, although there was nothing to see in the dark. “Once you’ve had that kind of love for someone, it’s hard to live without. It’s the same reason people keep dating even when they’ve been burned in past relationships. Just because something ends badly doesn’t make the love you felt less necessary.” He looked back at Melanie. “You keep trying and you hope it works out next time.”

“Do you think that couple would’ve had that baby if they somehow knew it would die?”

“Probably.”

“I find that hard to believe.”

“Life is all about risks, Mel. No risk, no reward.”

“But your level of exposure can be minimized.”

“Now you sound like a businesswoman. That attitude doesn’t work in relationships.”

Melanie tore tiny pieces off the corner of her napkin. “You sound like my mother.”

“Oh yeah? What did she have to say?”

“Actually, I didn’t tell her about the accident. But she’s been on me lately about trying to have a relationship. She says I don’t have the right attitude about it.”

“I’d have to say I agree with her.”

“Thanks a lot, Derek.” She balled up her napkin and tossed it at him.

“Welcome.” He winked.

Melanie stared into her mug of tea and frowned. Babies didn’t die on purpose. In fact, survival was pretty much a solitary, single-minded goal: eat, sleep, stay warm and safe, repeat. The heartache caused by the death of a child was fathomless, but it was hardly intentional. Grownups were different; men were different. Men were capable of stunning acts of deception and manipulation. Infidelity, philandering, vacillating sexuality, and the endless stream of lies necessary to cover it all up. And it was always the lying that corroded the heart because it was face-to-face, it was personal, and it was intentional.

“Why do you think you’re not in a relationship?” Derek asked.

“Because I can’t find someone I can trust and respect.”

“You can’t find someone, or you can’t trust and respect someone?”

“Both.”

“Are you sure?”

“Maybe.”

“Are you trying to find someone?”

“Yes. Sort of. Not really.”

Melanie felt she’d seen it all. She’d even been in a yearlong relationship in college with a man who finally revealed that he wasn’t totally straight. It would have been one thing if he’d just told her, but it was another entirely to find him in a back bedroom at a frat party, pants around his ankles, a male underclassman blowing him. She’d had plenty of relationships back then, but a distinct pattern of distrust emerged with each betrayal.

What she hadn’t endured herself, she’d seen her friends go through with men who appeared to all be perfectly respectable. Everyone was falling in love around her, coming down with it, spreading it, celebrating it as the purpose for waking. And when that love was gone, when it was snatched away or found to have been fraudulent, the heartbreak was hard to stomach and the drawn-out breakups were exhausting to watch.

Sure, there were plenty of good guys in the world. The problem was that there was no way to tell the difference until it was all out in the open. The bad guys were good guys too, right up until the truth came out. But Derek had a point; what fascinated Melanie about her friends was their eagerness to risk it again and the swiftness with which they did so.

For her, each relationship was a lesson, a warning of what could happen, and a deterrent to risking it again. She vowed to abandon each failed road, and dismissed suitors at the first red flag, so as to avoid repeating her mistakes. After a while, there were just so few roads left to travel that she stayed home. She had all but given up on dating. The progression had been so gradual that she hadn’t noticed it herself, but her mother missed nothing.

Derek freshened their cups of tea and returned the kettle to the stove. He came around the breakfast bar and stood behind her, massaging her shoulders.

“Van Gogh once said, ‘If you hear a voice within you say you cannot paint, then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced,’” Derek said in a mock-philosophical tone that came off sounding like Dan Rather.

“Didn’t Van Gogh cut off his own ear?”

“That’s not the point.”

“But didn’t he?”

“His left earlobe, yes.”

“Why did he do that?”

“He was infatuated with someone who wasn’t giving him enough attention.”

“Ah, now we’re at the heart of it.”

“The point is, you can have a relationship and just enjoy it if you stop telling yourself you can’t. Every time you’re faced with a challenging relationship, you put up walls and head for the door. What would happen if you didn’t do that?” he asked.

“I could end up with nowhere to put my left earring.”

“Melanie...” He stopped rubbing her shoulders and sat across from her again. She was smiling at her own joke.

“I hear what you’re saying. I do,” she said. “And I know I should try. I just don’t think I’ve met the person I should be trying with yet.”

“You can’t know. No one ever knows until it either goes down in flames or they’re tying the knot.”