Chapter One
“If she’s amazing, she won’t be easy. If she’s easy, she won’t be amazing. If she’s worth it, you wont give up. If you give up, you’re not worthy. … Truth is, everybody is going to hurt you; you just gotta find the ones worth suffering for.” ~ Bob Marley
*****
“Hi there,” said a young man with shoulder length brown hair that tousled in his face, covering one of his eyes.
“Hello,” I replied, waiting to see if he’d ask me for money.
“I wonder if I could ask you a question,” he said, “and video you for a psychology project I’m doing for school, if you’re cool with that?”
I raised my chin and looked him over. I lived in Portland at the time, newly retired after selling the electronics supplies business I had operated for nearly 20 years, and was sitting on a bench in Mills Ends Park, famous for being the smallest park in America. Or so the locals claimed, anyway.
He looked like a lot of the other twenty-somethings in the city, with a disheveled, grimy look that seemed like a purposeful affectation more than a genuine expression of being poor. I’d been warned about the young people begging all over the city and found it to be even worse than advertised. I had assumed he was just another one of the minions, so his approach intrigued me.
“Are you a Psych major?” I asked.
“No, no,’ he said. “I’m a junior in high school and it’s just for my psychology class that I took as an elective. We’re currently studying the life span in human development and I chose to focus on the elderly.”
He seemed to realize that I might take offense to that and I could see his pale face blush.
“Sorry,” he said.
“What for?” I said. “It’s not your fault that I’m old.”
He laughed, but it seemed forced.
“Anyway,” he said. “It’s only for 60 seconds.”
“What is?” I asked.
“Sorry, the video,” he said. “I’m asking people to limit their responses to 60 seconds.”
“Can I hear the question first before I agree to be on video?” I asked.
“Sure,” he said. I’m asking senior citizens to tell me about their first loves.”
I was taken aback by the question because I thought of her immediately, and I had done my best to try not to think about her for almost 40 years. By this point, I only thought of her occasionally, but it always hit hard and was unexpected. The littlest things would remind me of her, like when my kitchen got messy. Her kitchen was always so dirty, dishes, pots and pans, half eaten meals strewn about. Or when I put lotion on my hands, it would remind me of how I used to put lotion on her feet as we laid on the couch watching TV.
I don’t think the kid picked up on it, as I have a good poker face and have learned how to hide my feelings from people. Then again, don’t all of us? You don’t get to your sixties in life without scars, scars others can’t see. Scars you don’t want them to see.
I inhaled deeply.
“That’s more than a 60 second story …” I said. “What was your name again?”
“Sorry,” he said. “I’m Justin.”
“Don’t be sorry so much, Justin,” I told him. “I didn’t ask earlier.”
“Yeah, sorry about that,” he said, almost immediately realizing what he had done, making his pale face blush even more than before.
I smirked and angled my head to the side.
“I realize a story like that is complicated,” he said. “But I guess I’m asking people to just hit the highlights ...a thumbnail sketch, I guess. I think it will be interesting for people my age, who are just having those experiences - or haven’t yet - to hear from older people about what it was like for them, but through the perspective of experience and time.”
“How old are you?” I asked, laughing. “That’s pretty wise for a teenager.”
“Yeah, it was my idea,” he said. “But my teacher has helped me, I guess, refine it,” he added, smiling sheepishly.
“Okay, Justin, “ I said. “I’ll be a part of your project. You ready?”
“Yeah, “ he said. He pulled out his smartphone and tapped on the screen for a few seconds before holding it up. He moved back a few steps and centered me on the viewfinder.
“Okay,” he said. “Whenever you’re ready. I’ll give you this signal when you have about 15 seconds left,” while swirling his index finger in a circle above his head. Then he pointed at me, signaling to speak:
I didn’t truly fall in love until I was in my late twenties. Her name was Veronica and we didn’t have immediate chemistry, that’s for sure. But we soon fell in love, hard and fast. We were together, off and on, for over ten years, but we couldn’t find a way to do ordinary life together, drove each other crazy sometimes. Even after all these years, once in a while I still talk to her in my head and feel her presence. I don't have any idea where she is, though.
I stopped and looked up at Justin. He looked confused.
“That was, like, 23 seconds …” he said before hesitating. “I’m sorry, but I don’t know your name.
“It’s Jeremy,” I said. “That wasn’t long enough for you?”
He put his phone in his pocket and sat down next to me on the bench. He looked as if he would begin to speak, but then held back.
“It’s just …” he finally said. “Didn’t you tell me earlier it was more than a 60 second story? She sounds interesting. Your relationship sounds complicated.”
*****
“Nica, I just want to have some idea when you might get here,” I said.
There was a pregnant pause on the other end of the phone, but I had learned to wait these out. Otherwise, I ended up having conversations with myself and walked away more confused than ever.
“Jeremy, I expect you can live your own life without me,” she finally responded.
I felt the familiar piercing in my heart when she would say something insensitive. Nica, short for Veronica and a nickname she gave herself, was mostly a kind person. When she was not, she was distinctly unkind.
“It’s insulting that you would even say that,” I responded. “I’m not a child or some kind of parasite who doesn’t know what to do without you. But if you’re going to be an hour versus three hours, I can at least plan how to use my time.”
I heard her exhale into the phone.
“Nica, it’s just showing someone respect,” I continued. “I’m not trying to control you or restrict you or whatever. Take an hour, take three hours, but just give me some idea ... Not to the minute, for God’s sakes, but at least some kind of ballpark time?”
I reminded myself to stop talking. Nica waited me out for a bit, but then relented.
“Fine,’ she said. “Sevenish.”
It was my turn to exhale. I considered reminding her to let me know if things changed, but decided that might be pushing it. That was the funny thing about Nica; what seemed absolutely ordinary with other people became complicated with her. We had engaged in long and sometimes heated conversations about time, for example. On one level, I enjoyed that kind of thing - we both did. It was one of the things that drew us to each other. Street philosophers, systemic thinkers and learners, whatever you wanted to call it, we clicked that way. But, Jesus Christ, I thought, just give me some idea when you might be here!
“Thank you,” is what I landed on.
“Okay, goodbye,” she said.
*****
I always had a lot to do, but usually no single thing that was imminently pressing. I was helping manage a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm in Kingston, New York, but had started college at the business school at Indiana University. The second accounting class I took convinced me I’d chosen the wrong path so I dropped out and bounced around from job to job for a while, convinced by the romantic notions of literature and youth that this is how I would find my calling: truck driver, sous chef, telemarketing, selling real estate ...more than I could remember sometimes.
It was at one of these jobs that I’d met Nica ten years before when both of us were in our early twenties. We met at the shoe store where they make the sales associates wear referee shirts.
“Nice shirt, Red” she had said to me the first time we ever laid eyes on each other.
I had thick, wavy red hair that naturally went up as it got longer, creating a kind of pompadour style. I wore it longer like that when I was younger, but in those years I’d worn it clipper cut short because I thought it drew less attention. Like a lot of red headed people, I felt a kind of stigma about my hair color, what with strangers and friends alike calling me ginger and asking to touch it, stuff like that.
Though Nika worked for the same shoe company, she didn’t have to wear the referee shirt. She went from store to store setting up the displays and monitoring sales of the ancillary products like shoe laces, tee shirts, socks, and so forth.
“First thing I told them,” she shared with me once we started to get to know each other, “I’m not wearing that stupid shirt,” she said, reaching up to twist the collar like she was snapping her fingers.
We were not drawn to each other immediately. Neither was the others’ type, physically anyway, we confessed after we’d become intimate. I was usually drawn to women who were taller, like me, and brunettes because I thought they went better with my red hair. I’m tall and thin, six feet, two inches, and just assumed I should have a partner who matched that to some extent. I’d once dated a woman who was six feet tall and enjoyed that we could look directly into each other’s eyes.
But Nica was a full foot shorter than me and was more curvy, which was accentuated by her petite stature. I eventually grew to love her “gymnast thighs” as I called them, but it wasn’t what I was used to.
She had never dated a redheaded man, she told me, and didn't think that, generally, they were very attractive. That was Nica, in a nutshell. No filter sometimes. She also usually dated men that were at least ten years older than her. Younger guys, she said to me once, “bore the fuck out of me.”
The shoe store where we met was located just outside Indianapolis, Indiana, and our first date wasn’t exactly a case study in explosive chemistry, to say the least. We met at the Tegry Bistro, a sushi restaurant she had suggested after we discovered both of us enjoyed that kind of food.
But the conversation was stilted and choppy. We kept interrupting each other with meet and greet style interview type questions ...how many siblings, what were you like in high school, what are some things you like to do ...blah, blah, blah. And we sat upright at the booth, even pushing away from the table, not leaned in with “come to me” energy. After the date was over and we both went home, I texted her that I enjoyed our time together and liked her laugh.
“Thanks,” she texted back, and nothing more.
“Ouch, “ I remember thinking. “So much for that.”
In spite of this, we made plans for a second date, this time an alternative music festival a little further away in a small town called Franklin. Like sushi, it was a common interest and I think we both hoped that might lead to more of a connection. At first, I thought I’d make some excuse and not go with her, thinking it would likely be a waste of time. But mostly because I didn’t have other plans that day, I said why not. Tellingly, in terms of our mutual expectations, we both suggested we meet there rather than drive together.
When I arrived in the parking lot, I walked around looking for her car, a black 2007 Honda Fit. There seemed to be a lot of those, or small cars like it, and I was unsuccessful in my search. I had my hands on my hips and was looking to my left when I felt a soft hand on my right cheek apply pressure to turn my face in the other direction while another hand pulled roughly on my shirt collar and jerked my head down. As you might guess, I was a bit startled. But somehow the rest of my body remained still and, eventually, my eyes met hers at a closer distance than they had ever achieved, not three inches apart.
“Hey, you,” she said and leaned in to close the narrow distance between our faces. She planted a long, soft kiss on my lips, our mouths parting just enough to feel the tips of each others’ tongues.
I felt an electricity shoot through my entire body after we had pulled apart back to a lovers’ distance and was looking in her eyes again.
“It’s nice to see you,’ she said with a wry smile.
Just like that, she had totally transformed the energy between us. I would learn in time that this event was a harbinger of things to come in our relationship. In ways that were both healthy and toxic, Nica was the driving force between us, the impetus for our path, for better or worse. Her restless spirit and willingness to take chances thrilled me and nudged me out of my protective shell, but she was also like a black hole, sucking all the energy from the room, from our relationship. It was all about Nica and I sublimated myself to that dynamic. I couldn’t see how not to, and I had thought about it many times.
She was both incredibly freeing and confining to me. I loved her deeply and resented her deeply. I couldn’t imagine a practical way to either live with her or without her. We had talked frequently, too frequently really, about the depth of our love and our relationship, had spent more time talking about that relationship than actually living it. And though we had broken up more times than either one of us could keep track of - sometimes at my behest, sometimes hers - here we were together, still, almost ten years later. At least for now.
But for now, I figured I had about two and a half hours to get some of the items on my never ending to-do list checked off. Or maybe longer ...but for sure not less. Nica was never early but she was very frequently, even nearly always, late.
I sighed and looked out the window. I saw dark clouds mixed with sun and wondered if it might rain.
I thought of a couple more things...
Back on the second date. In addition to knowing who initiated the second date, I would be curious why that person wanted to go out again, since neither seemed very enthused after the first date. I think this may give some insight as to why the relationship was complicated and didn't last?
Earlier in the story, Jeremy lists the things that remind him of Nica (messy kitchen, rubbing lotion on his hands). This seems a little thin? After the first date, Jeremy tells Nica he likes her laugh. Maybe one of the things he remembers is watching a comedy they both liked and hearing her laugh? Or remembering an inside joke they both shared and hearing her laugh?
Jeremy mentions Nica was both incredibly freeing and confining. He loved her deeply and resented her deeply. Could some examples be provide? Or will this unfold as the story progresses?
I really like the revision too… looking back in the past to tell the story. One thing that jumped out at me though was the time lines.
I’m guessing the story is being told in modern day, and Jeremy and Nica met 40 years ago? After Jeremy and Nicas first date, they texted each other. Would texting have been around at that time? Maybe adding the year they met, or some kind of time line would help?