When Joss Met Matt (14 page)

“No, I can't. I'm just gonna break his heart someday. I know I don't want the same things he wants.”

“How do you know? You have to talk to him.”

“Do you know that I gave up study abroad for him?”

“What?” I was confused by the sudden change in subject.

“I was supposed to go to Italy. In the fall. And I just—dropped out. I never even told him.”

“He would have wanted you to go,” I said. “He would do anything for you, Meg.”

“I know. That's the problem.” She sighed. “He would have wanted me to go, and I would have gone, and the whole time he would have been missing me, and I would have been happy, but at the same time, I wouldn't have enjoyed myself. I would have known he was home, waiting for me, and I would have felt guilty if anything had happened while I was over there. I mean, what if I met someone? How could I break his heart? I mean, it's Matt. I love him so much. How could I forgive myself if I ever did that to him?”

“But you're thinking about doing it now,” I reasoned.

“Because now I know I have to,” she said. “I don't think I love him as much as I should.”

“But maybe you love him enough for now.”

“Enough for now is not enough,” she said, and the words rang in my ears like bells.

“Meg …” I was at a loss.

“I know,” she said. “I'm sorry. I have to go.” She disconnected.

The call from Matt came the next morning.

“You know why I'm calling,” he said as a greeting.

“Yeah.”

“What am I gonna do?”

“I … I don't know.”

“Fuck me …” He sighed. “You still coming up to Door County next week?”

“That's still on?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“Matty, you don't have to do this.”

“Why not?”

“Maybe you should just skip it.”

“No, I need this. Really. You coming?”

“Yeah, I'll be there.”

“Thank you.”

Matt did a good job of pretending to be fine when we were all up at the cottage the following weekend. Everyone knew about Meghan, of course, but he was willing to make us all feel better about it. There was something in his eyes, though—I could see it.

The cottage was crowded and noisy, and everyone had a fantastic time. Except, of course, for Matt.

On the second day, we took a paddleboat out, just Matt and me, and when we were far enough from the shore, he finally let down his guard.

“I couldn't talk her out of it,” he said.

“I guessed that.”

“She just kept saying she loved me too much. What the fuck does that even mean?”

“She told me she knew she'd break your heart one day,” I said.

“Yeah, well, apparently today's the day.” He gave the edge of the boat a solid kick.

“Oh, Matty …” I tried to stand, but the boat wobbled in a terrifying way and I had to drop back to my seat abruptly. “Sorry.”

Matt threw his head back and let out a loud bellow. There were no words, just a giant sound of frustration. Then he slumped down in the molded seat and sighed. “I want to hate her.”

“You don't?”

“Nope.” He plucked a dried leaf from the bottom of the boat and tried to throw it, but it just fluttered toward the water.

“Do you want me to start hating her?” I offered.

“I just want her back.”

“I'm sorry.”

“What can I do to get her back?”

I stretched out a hand to rub his head. “I'm afraid this might be one of those awful situations where you have to let her go. If it's meant to be …”

“I don't want to let her go.”

“I know that. But if you chase her, she'll just run.”

“What if that's all bullshit? Why should I let go of something I love? It doesn't even make sense.”

I didn't have an answer for that.

“This sucks,” he said.

We bobbed on the lake in silence for a while.

“Just let me know if you want me to start hating her,” I offered at last.

He winced. “I don't want anyone to hate her. It's Meghan. I love Meghan. You love Meghan.”

I did. She was wonderful, and I would have thought she was The One for him. But, I was willing to at least say I hated her if it would help him feel the tiniest bit better. “Well, you know my offer stands.”

“I know.”

I hesitated, but added, “All of the offer.” All my self-coaching about outgrowing Sorbet Sex was out the window. If there was anything I could do to soothe his broken heart, I would do it. Though, the offer felt shallow once I'd said it aloud.

He nodded and looked away from me. “I don't think I want that right now.”

“Okay.” My stomach turned. It was as trivial as I'd imagined.

“You know it's not you, right?”

“You don't have to make me feel better, Matt. This is about you.”

“But it's not you.”

“I know.”

“Okay.”

I focused on the shore, and realized we'd drifted quite a ways. “I think I'm getting a little seasick.”

“We can go back.”

“Thanks.”

We paddled our way toward the dock and my queasy feeling started to lift. I don't know if I was really seasick or if the conversation was making me uncomfortable. Either way, I was glad to head for shore.

Matt seemed reluctant to go to bed that night. He stayed at the fire pit until his eyes were glazed and his focus had drifted to somewhere near the rocks that surrounded the fire. One by one, the others left the fire with, “I'm tired, man, I'm going to bed,” or “Okay, that's it for me.” I was nearly asleep myself, curled up on the chaise I'd claimed as my own over the years. I even had the same fleece blanket. It was plaid and smelled like a wood-burning fire with a tinge of lake.

“Joss, come on, let's go to bed,” Kerry said, hauling herself up from a canvas chair.

“I'm coming,” I promised. I was cozy and drowsy, and I knew that pulling the blanket off would invite in the night air. I wasn't eager to do that.

“I'm too tired to wait,” she said. We were sharing a room, being the two single girls on the trip.

“Go,” I told her.

Matt stood and reached for the bucket of sand near the fire. He poured it over the glowing embers, plunging us into a deeper dark. “Come on, Joss,” he said softly.

I got to my feet and swathed myself in the blanket as best I could. The loss of firelight gave me pause before I was willing to negotiate the path back to the cottage. “I can't see.”

He came around the pit and found my shoulder with a fumbling hand. “There you are.”

“I'm here.” I yawned.

Matt's hand navigated up to rest at the back of my neck. Then, he kissed me in the dark with the sound of the crickets all around us. It was a hard, closed-mouth kiss.

“What are you doing?” I asked when he stopped.

“I don't know.”

“You're not ready for this,” I said.

“Maybe not.”

“I'm not gonna be something you regret, Matt. That's not how it works.”

He let out a soft laugh. “The student has become the teacher.”

“You bet your ass.”

He pulled me close again, but just gave me a hug that time.

“Come on, let's get you to bed,” I said, charitably opening my blanket cocoon to put an arm around his back.

“Thanks.”

“This is not an entirely selfless act, you know. I'm exhausted.”

He laughed softly again and squeezed my arm. “Me, too.”

“Good.”

We made our way to the cottage, stumbling a few times in the pitch black.

“I'm sorry I kissed you,” he said just before opening the door.

“It's okay. You've done worse things to me.”

When he laughed that time, it was an authentic one. “Great, thanks.”

“I'm here for you, Matty.”

Six weeks. Matt's devastation took six weeks to ease. It was mid-August, and I'd gone on my first date in months just days before he called me. It was a fine enough date, but there was no spark and he didn't call me again. I didn't mind. I was just happy to have gotten a date under my belt after the long hiatus.

After the trip to the cottage, Matt had made a few failed attempts to win Meghan back. It had ended in tears for both of them. In the end, she'd decided to do her semester abroad after all. I don't know how she managed to get in the program so late, but she did. It seemed that an ocean and half a continent would finally be enough to give her the distance she needed. When Matt asked her if there was a chance for them after she'd had her time alone, she finally found the words to drive it home for him: “I don't know what I want, Matt, but I know that I can't stay with you. You love me too much. You make me want to give things up for you, and I hate that about myself. I couldn't live with it if I started to resent you in a few years. I'm walking away while I still love you. That way, this will always be a wonderful memory.”

By then, I actually was starting to hate her a little. Just a little. It wasn't anything about her personally, it was about the way she had taken his heart and crushed it between her fingers. He was devastated. Even when he finally understood her twisted logic, he was miserable.

Watching him suffer through that breakup was like watching an educational video on the Kübler-Ross model of grief. Shock and denial gave way to bargaining and anger. Depression lasted longer than the rest, but in its place came resolve. He wasn't going to let her be the only one to walk away with good memories. Once he came to accept that she was a closed chapter in his life, he could even talk about her without looking like a kicked puppy.

When the phone call came, I was surprised. I knew he was getting over Meghan. I had seen it with my own eyes, but I thought Sorbet was over, too. I'd assumed he thought it was too tawdry to follow Meghan. But then he called.

“I need you tonight, Joss.”

“Oh. Really?”

“She can't be the last one anymore.”

“I'll be there.”

The sex was somber, if such a thing is possible. More about comfort than vindication. The last step in letting go. I kissed his face the whole time, fighting the urge to apologize for not being Meghan.

After, we lay together in the slanted light of the streetlamp that was entirely too close to his window. The apartment was a summer sublet near the campus of his law school. The day he moved in he started looking for a new place. Preferably away from the squalor of the campus. Four-and-a-half years of student housing was enough—no real adult would be expected to put up with the nonsense that plagues the rental properties filled each year by college students. I've seen toilets at the top of the basement stairs, rooms so small that a hanging rod suspended across the room served as a closet and left the clothes dangling above the bed, and a kitchen with no sink. Matt's proximity to the streetlight was minor in comparison to some of those, but it didn't seem minor when the light gave the room an orange glow like a sunrise.

“How do you sleep at night?” I asked.

“Here—” His voice was strained as he hauled to his feet and crossed the room to the windows. After a bit of fumbling, he brought the shades down and the room was dimmed to a late evening glimmer. “Better?”

“Yeah, thanks.”

He came back to the bed and slid under the sheets with me, kissing the exposed underside of my upraised arm.

“Do you feel better?” I asked.

“You know, I kind of do.”

“Just kind of?” I was disappointed.

“I was only expecting to feel nothing. No change. That would have been enough.”

“But you feel better?”

“Yeah, I do.” He kissed me, and I seized the chance to catch my fingers in his short hair and keep him close for longer. My self-imposed exile from the dating world had left me hungry for the contact of another person's lips on mine. And Matt was still the best kisser I'd ever known. Something about the way he moved—I could never put my finger on it, nor did it matter when I had free rein to collect evidence from the source.

“Well, then I guess I kept up my end of the deal,” I said when I finally let him go.

“And then some,” he agreed.

“Good.” I stretched one foot across to rub against his shin.

“I'm sorry about Martin,” he said.

“It's okay. I didn't really need you after …” And while I'd learned I could get through a breakup without Matt, I still wished he'd been available at the time. But he didn't need to know that.

“I guess that's good.”

“Yeah.”

Matt rolled onto his side to look at me. “Are you gonna stay tonight?”

“Of course,” I said. “I thought that was part of the deal.”

“Just asking.”

I let a short silence stretch out before I spoke again. “Can you do something for me?”

“Yeah, sure. What do you need?”

“Look … it's been a while since I shared a bed with anyone—can you just … spoon me?”

He laughed, but moved closer and let me fit my body into the shape left by his. “Like that?”

“Yeah, thanks.”

He shifted a few times and made some sniffing sounds. “Your hair is in my face.”

“Sorry.” I twisted my hair and pinned it under my head.

“Thanks.” He put a hand on my hip and I felt his body settle into the mattress.

I sighed, enjoying the feeling of a warm body at my back. “We might need to work this into the contract.”

“Yeah, I don't know about that. I might be able to get it excluded on grounds of curly hair.”

I reached down to pinch his leg and he laughed, knocking my hand away. “You don't have to do it for long,” I promised.

“I'll deal.” He kissed my shoulder. “Thanks for being here.”

“Of course. What are friends for?”