Strange Are the Ways of Love

17

She was just barely aware of the rain. The water poured down on her as she walked, plastering her clothes to her skin and soaking her hair, but she remained only vaguely conscious of it. She noted the rain, accepted it and forgot it. There were too many other things to be aware of, too much to think about and try to understand. The rain was the least of her worries.

Everything was happening so quickly. It seemed as though that was the story of her life: things always happened before she was ready for them and ended before she had quite begun. Everything happened so quickly, so suddenly, and she was always just a little bit behind; just a little too slow to catch on, just a little too young and a little too frightened for each successive event.

But she was beginning to catch up. Finally she could feel herself growing older and moving faster, and everything was slowing down to wait for her. That was the way it had to be and the way it would be from now on.

She was going home. She had been trying for so many years to go home but there had never been a home for her, not since her mother died.

Home with Mike.

She started walking faster, thinking that Mike might not be at the apartment, that he might have left after what happened, that he hadn’t slept in days and that it was cold and raining outside and that he had to be there, had to be asleep in her bed and waiting for her.

She had to get home to him.

And he had to be there. He couldn’t be out walking tonight, not on a night like this, not when he was so tired and so worn out and when she needed him so much because she loved him. Now, finally, unalterably, she knew that she loved him.

And suddenly she thought of Laura.

Laura had told her to forget her. Now, yes — but later she would be able to remember her, to remember all that was good about her, to remember her as someone who had taught her who she was and where she was going.

All at once she was standing on the corner of Seventh Avenue and Barrow Street with home only a few doors away, only a few seconds from where she stood. She began walking faster and faster, then breaking into a run, running all the way to her building with the pavement wet and slippery under her feet and the rain pouring down on her.

She opened first the outer door and then the door to her apartment. Mike had to be there. She tiptoed inside, water dripping from her clothes to the kitchen floor, thinking that Mike had to be sleeping in her bed. She walked softly to the bedroom door, too frightened to open it for a moment. Then slowly she turned the knob and opened the door.

He was asleep in her bed with his face pressed into the pillow. His clothes were folded on the chair in the corner and he looked so peaceful in bed that it seemed almost a shame to wake him.

Soundlessly she left the room and closed the door. In the bathroom she removed her clothes and dried herself with a towel, went back into the bedroom.

He was still asleep. She slipped under the covers very slowly, very careful not to wake him, not yet. She drew the covers up over her and moved close to him so that she could feel his warmth without actually touching him. And then she moved her head near his and put her mouth very close to his ear.

“Mike?”

Then, a little louder, “Mike?”

He turned and opened his eyes. At first he didn’t seem to believe she was really there, and then his eyes opened wider and he started to say something.

With a little cry she went to him.