losing my lunch

The right CD was vital today. I picked well and toggled between the three perfect songs as I walked across the Hawthorne Bridge. I was meeting my ex for lunch. Lunch is a very civilized thing to do; it can easily become emotionless and obligatory. It was his suggestion and, of course, I accepted because it would be perfectly harmless. Afterall, I’m completely over it, right? Of course I'm not, and the headphones are a dead giveaway. They’re a crutch for when you need a soundtrack to cover over the reality. Today I needed the perfect pump-up music to delude myself. If I admitted the “truth” (that I am of course not over him) I’d have to cancel. And there was no way I’d cancel--I was dying to see him. The music put the deliberateness in my steps, confidence pulled on as easily as my jeans and black wifebeater (god I hate that term, but it’s what I wore). It had been his...yes, yes, we’ve established I am not over him. Moving on... It was hot, my little planet felt shifted, the sun was a spotlight, and I was squinting in anticipation. A biker who looked nothing like him was riding toward me. I knew it was him. Months of being apart erased in 20 seconds. It felt like nothing had passed between us and that was surely a very, very bad sign. We hugged long, both of our bodies thinner from the wear of seperating--tactile evidence that something had passed.

He must have felt the heat too, because he suggested shade. We sat under a huge maple tree near the river and ate sandwiches--his with vegetables and hummus, mine roast beef on rye. We set them down between bites and covered whole topics--my family, his, his work, mine--before picking them up again for another bite. It went on like that for about an hour until we’d finished the sandwhiches that had actually begun to stale in the ninty-degree heat. We’d discussed everything within bounds, then, just before we had to part, I stepped out. “Do you miss me?” I asked plucking grass to avoid his eyes. He stopped putting his shoes back on. “Yes, very much. I think about you all the time.” His pause lasted until I looked up from my grass patch. “Do you miss me?” He asked, looking directly across the regulation space between us. “Yes.” I replied. I didn’t qualify it. I just looked back. There was nothing else I could say out loud.

I don’t remember much else about what happened after that. I was busy thinking out the possible conversations that might have come from my reply as he kept talking. I couldn’t hear the reality over my imagination. Looking back now, maybe that was the problem with us all along. I think he said something about doing the best we can with all this; figuring out what was best for us. The word best was in there for sure, but I couldn’t hear him. I was stuck in my reply; frozen in my yes and the trailing hopefulness still foolishly attached.

I don’t know what I think or feel about it all, even now. In a lot of ways lunch with him feels like eating street food in Latin America, I can’t tell if it was a good decision until it moves through me. Right now I’m still swallowing hard and hanging onto my belly. I’d like to say we did well, it was good to spend that time with him, and we might do it again sometime. The truth is, I don’t know. For now it’s hard enough just to try and take in the reality and see if I can hold it down until morning.