Cambridge is, in its way, another small town. But looking back to the start of the universe, and looking ahead to new ways to figure it out, is a wide world to me. Studying expands me, whereas sex had squeezed me to within a little pinpoint.
Jeremy had meant the whole world to me. I never want my world to be that small again.
Nick disappeared two days after I’d been sick in his office. So I continued to not see him, but this not seeing was worse. He really wasn’t there anymore.
CHAPTER 2
I could still taste my vomit and smell Nick’s shampoo. My body was electric with everything he’d stirred up in me. I’d run the whole way from the Sedgwick. I only wanted to get into my room and close the door. And brush my teeth. I desperately wanted to brush my teeth.
She stood in front of my building, framed between two columns. She fit there, in front of the blue door. I’ve always known she grew up here, but that was a long time ago. I hadn’t noticed before that she actually looked English.
“Darling!” she called.
I didn’t move.
“Polly!” She advanced. “Which window is yours? That one?” She pointed to one with a little stained glass suncatcher. “That one?” She pointed to one with a teddy bear looking out. The rest were anonymous from here.
I willed myself not to look at mine, behind its iron juliet balcony. I didn’t want her to know.
“Polly,” she said, the way all mothers say their kids’ names. Exasperated. Proprietary.
The quivering started in my stomach and radiated outward. I didn’t figure it for anger until she tried to hug me and I shoved her away, hard.
She wobbled, and backed up into sitting on the low wall along the drive. She looked up at me, some kind of puppy look, and I said, “I can’t, Mom. I can’t deal with you right now.”
“I’m sorry. I needed to see if you’re all right.”
“I’m all right,” I lied.
“Polly-darling-please…”
What did she mean by that? That I wasn’t all right? That I’d just pushed away a good thing, and didn’t have any control over my feelings or my body? That I was a freak and a coward and broken, and stupid for not realizing it until I had a good guy practically on top of me? Is that what she meant?
“I’m all right,” I repeated. “You could have called-”
“It’s about your father-”
“No!” I shouted. “No, absolutely not.” I started breathing way too hard.
She got smart right then. I think that even a year ago all this would have been a cue to hold me and rock me, or try to anyway. But there’s a difference between a hysterical little kid and a hysterical adult. I stood up straighter, hugging myself across my chest. I said one more “No.”
“All right,” she said, rising, smoothing her skirt. “Not now.”
She held a business card from a Cambridge hotel up to my face. I saw the name, which is what she wanted. She left.
My hands shook. It took me a while to get my key out of my pocket.
I got upstairs to the bathroom and scrubbed minty toothpaste all over the inside of my mouth. I spit.
I wanted to rinse my hands under warm water but the old sinks come with two taps, one very hot and one frigid. I let them both run and rubbed my hands quickly between them, attempting the effect of tepid, but all I got were two simultaneous extremes.
The recognition hit me hard. I numbly sat down on the closed toilet. I bent over in that position they show you on airplanes, the one where you get your head between your knees.
I wanted him so much. He was warm and gentle and the nicest person I’d met in Cambridge. He was a little older than me, which made me feel older. There was this wriggly feeling inside me of things unfinished.
But the cold water rushed just as hard. I had to stop him. I had to. I couldn’t do it again.
The two extremes didn’t cancel each other out. They didn’t add up to indifference. They just kept rushing, burning and frigid, right next to each other.
I got up from the closed toilet seat and turned off the taps.
In my room I meant to undress, but pushing my top shirt button through its little slit reminded me of him, of his hands, pushing that same button. And the next.
I wanted to try again. I wanted to tell him I was sorry and I’d do better next time. I’d mentally prepare myself. It was the surprise of it all that had done me in.
I took off just my shoes and got under the covers fully dressed. I undid my fly and slipped my hand in, rubbing around. It was a good feeling, right? It was good. I kept going, thinking of his hand on my buttons, and his mouth on my neck. The feelings kept rolling over me. His blond hair tickled my cheek.
Then his face lifted, and it was Jeremy. I screamed a little scream, I screamed and then I strangled it. I sat upright and retracted my hand. The rolling feelings had stopped.
This is why I have sleeping pills.
The winter dark here comes as early as four o’clock. I didn’t realize Cambridge was so much farther north than I was used to, but it is.
The next day, Wednesday, I made myself take a shower and attend a lecture. I used to feel silly that Liv and Nick, and even Gretchen, were all at Magdalene, and me at Peterhouse, odd one out. Now I was relieved. I made it through the whole day without running into anyone with expectations. I only had to breathe and smile and listen. I only had to be polite. The girls in my building who were my friends just believed me when I said I had stuff to do. Erika wanted my cello to join her clarinet and Claudia’s piano to make a trio, but she stopped asking when I told her that I really, really couldn’t.
My mother stayed away from me. I felt calmed by this because I wasn’t thinking.
Since I wouldn’t talk to her, she, I discovered, went after my lecturers and friends. On Thursday, Dr. Birch said something nice to me about meeting her. I smiled politely and made excuses to get away. I was so distracted imagining that Mom was stalking everyone around me that I didn’t think about what time it was. Liv had a class getting out, right by St. Peter’s Terrace. I almost walked right into her. The spokes of our open umbrellas jabbed at each other.
“Oh my gosh-what’s up with your mother? She cornered me coming out of the library yesterday,” Liv said. Tuesday was when I’d been sick; it was now Thursday. Nick was gone, but we didn’t know it yet. “She totally must have followed me. It was so weird…”
I must have looked appalled, because she reined herself in.
“I only mean-it was strange that she found me there, not someplace obvious like after a class or even at the museum. It’s not like she would have known when I would be at the library.”
Had she trailed Liv through town, waiting for the perfect, private moment? Mom would consider that courtesy. God.
“Anyway, she just asked me how you were doing, and she said she was glad you had me for a friend. I told her that you’re fine-you like England, you know lots of people. Nothing in particular.”
I’d saved up to buy all new clothes to bring. I hadn’t wanted anything from home to come with me. Not one thing. God. Couldn’t she stay back where she belonged? I felt faint. This was ridiculous.