If I listened very carefully with my ear against the wall, I could generally tell if there was someone else in the apartment with Eva.
As if nothing had changed, Eva came by the next morning and asked me if I was up for a walk. I wasn’t going to turn her down, though it was snowing lightly out.
“Everything’s so pretty,” Eva said.
It just looked like snow to me, though I didn’t argue.
And then later: “Does it bother you, Mel, that I still see Ron sometimes?”
It was one of those questions that however you answer you are in the wrong. “I never asked you to stop seeing Ron.”
“If you want me to, I’ll think about it,” she said.
I wasn’t happy with the turn of the conversation so didn’t say anything for awhile.
“Well,” she said, “do you want me to stop seeing him?”
“I think you should make your decisions apart from anything I might want or not want,” I said, hoping not to give offense.
“In that case,” she said, “I’ll see him as I do now from time to time.”
We finished the walk in a mutually sour mood. She had offered me a gift which I had not only declined, I refused to honor as a gift. It was a gift I would have been happier never to have been offered. When we parted, she muttered thank you or something like that and went into her apartment. Our relationship such as it was, was moving in reverse.
While Ron was in her life, I had, to my way of seeing, no obligation to her.
I didn’t see her for another week and my refusal of her offer to stop seeing Ron seemed to have offended her. Finally I knocked on her door and asked her if she wanted to go for a walk. “Not now,” she said. She had never turned down a walk opportunity before.
In protecting myself from involvement, had I lost a friend? I was always lonely, but now I was lonelier than I had been.
With women — it was so with my former wife too — it was always all or nothing.
I have a brother I barely mentioned before, a half brother (different mothers) who I don’t know very well and I hadn’t seen in a long time. People used to say we resembled each other, but if I saw him on the street today I doubt that I would recognize him. It’s not likely I would pass him on the street because as far as I know he lives in another state or used to. We were never close, but the potentiality, or so I thought) was always there. The reason I bring him up is that in dreams, in which I live so much of my life, he dovetailed with Eva’s Ron and the dream imagined him as my long lost brother and rival. I’ve been told otherwise but my impression was that my father preferred him. The connection with Ron has stuck with me, though I’ve tried to shake it.
I confess, without having a good reason, I instinctively dislike Ron.
I brought the subject of my brother to Klotzman’s door, tired of talking about my peregrinations with Eva. For awhile, Klotzman just listened, punctuated by the occasional nod.
“He is a kind of rival where Eva is concerned,” Klotzman offered. “Perhaps that triggered the association.”
“I don’t consider him a rival,” I said. “His relationship to Eva relieves me of what might seem an obligation.”
“That’s a position you are pleased to take,” Klotzman said.
“You don’t believe it?”
“I believe you believe it,” he said.
His superior tone was annoying me. “What are you saying, if anything?”
“I didn’t mean to offend you, Mel. If I did, I apologize. What I was saying if anything was that there are beliefs we hold as set pieces.”
“Are you saying that deep in my unconscious, I have doubts that I’ve shut off. I don’t think so in this case. The cliché response would be to be jealous of Ron.”
“Cliché responses are sometimes accurate. You admit being jealous of your brother.”
“That may be a set piece I don’t fully believe in.”
“But you still hold — am I right — That you’re grateful to this Ron person for being in your way?”
“Yes,” I said, “but not quite in the way you put it. I’m pleased not to have any obligation to Eva and Ron’s presence assures that.”
“And what would this obligation you’re pleased to avoid be otherwise?” he asked in his self-satisfied way, knowing I had no answer.
“We’ve been through this,” I said. “You know the answer.”
He crossed his arms. “Mel, do you know the answer? I think we’re talking about an irrational feeling.”
“As you’ve told me,” I said, “a feeling counts for what it is, rational or not.”
“Why do I feel we’re in a competition all the time?” he said. “I don’t mean to belittle your feeling whatever its source. I just think you ought to challenge your beliefs more. Maybe I’m wrong.”
The session ended in a kind of armed truce and I left, which was rare, feeling better than when I came in.
On the way out, Carol said to me, “When are we doing this movie you talked about?”
I thought she had forgotten my offer. “How about tonight?” I said.
“Oh, I can’t tonight,” she said. “I have a previous appointment.”
I thought of naming another date, but that seemed folly. “Some other time,” I said.
She glanced up at me with what seemed a wry smile. “Take care,” she said.
I mumbled the same and left.
When I got home Ron was leaving the building and we exchanged curt nods. It seemed to me in the extended period I hadn’t seen Eva, Ron was around somewhat more often, though I may have been imagining it.
I waited about a half hour then knocked at Eva’s door. She seemed ruffled when she answered the door and before I could say anything said, “I’m not going for a walk with you.” Still she didn’t close the door in my face and I asked if this was a permanent situation.
My question seemed to take her aback. “Look, Mel,” she said, “give me twenty minutes to get dressed and we’ll go.”
“Will you knock at my door when you’re ready?” I asked.
“In twenty minutes,” she said.
It was more like forty minutes but she showed up and we went out together like old times. We chatted freely for awhile on this and that, the states of our health, the weather, but nothing controversial. It had warmed up and she had on an attractive outfit. After awhile I commented that she was looking particularly good.
She said thank you as if surprised at the compliment, compliments not being my style.
Without warning it started to rain and we took shelter under a drug store awning, waiting for the rain, which was briefly torrential, to calm itself.
“Not a good day for our walk,” I said.
“I don’t mind getting a little wet,” she said. “It makes the walk into an adventure.”
It didn’t seem like much of an adventure to me, but I didn’t say that. She seemed in an unusually good mood and I didn’t want to quash it or I did and I didn’t.
The rain glistened on her face.
We waited a long time for the rain to lighten and when it did, we headed back.
I was uncomfortable being wet, but I bore it without complaint. I was caught in the throes of trying to figure out what I wanted.
When we got to her door, she said she had a nice time and would I like to come in for a cup of tea. I said I had to get out of my wet clothes first.