The Couple Next Door 4

It was a bright, beautiful Saturday afternoon, late in October, the kind that makes you wish you were sitting in the stands to watch a football game, watching your team win. I was sitting in an Adirondack chair in my back yard, sipping a beer, and slowly coming around to the conclusion that I was going to need to cut the lawn one more time before winterizing and putting away the mower.

I was also thinking about what, if anything, I should do about a woman at work, Lindsay, who was pretty clearly interested in me. So far we had only met to talk at a couple of Friday "teachers' happy hours" at a local restaurant; she didn't share my planning period or lunch shift, and we worked in different parts of the school, so I almost never saw her during the work week. I'm no Casanova, but, before I was married, I did all right with girls; my usual mode had been to wait for someone I found attractive to let me know she wouldn't mind being approached, and so what was happening with Lindsay was pretty familiar. As it happens, I had deviated from this strategy in the case of the woman who became my wife—my cheating, soon-to-be ex-wife, that is—which strongly suggested that being the pursuer in a sexual relationship did not, actually, work particularly well for me, and that a return to my natural approach might be in order.

Of course, it wasn't quite that simple. As we all know, in high school and college, when one of you decides it's over and wants out, it's usually no big deal to avoid one another, if there are hard feelings in the aftermath. In a work environment, it's different. Even though, as I've said, I didn't see much of Lindsay at school, I also had to work with people who did see her, and know her, and like her, and a bad breakup could turn out to be awkward, at best. Not that I had any reason to think that a bad breakup was unavoidably predetermined, except, of course, for the cheating, soon-to-be ex. Who, in case I haven't mentioned, lives next door to me. With her lover, a man-child whose arrested development my soon-to-be, etc., seems to think is a more attractive quality in a mate than, say, my own stodgy commitment to a helping profession.

So, as you can see, I had plenty of thinking to do to keep my mind occupied, which is probably why she (soon-to-be, or STB, as I think I'll call her from now on) chose that particular moment to interrupt me in order to remind me that, although we no longer live together, the planet might actually spin off its axis if I go too long without paying attention to her.

She came out onto the small back stoop, saw me, and waved, almost shyly. I looked at her, but didn't wave back. Pausing for a moment, she made a decision, and started walking over to me. "How are you doing?" she asked.

"Pretty well," I replied. "What's on your mind?"

"I know we're done," she said. "It's not what I wanted, but I get it. I don't know if this—" she looked at the house she'd just come from—"is going to last, but he and I do have some kind of a connection—"

I snorted.

"It's just that, if you don't want me anymore, then what is there to be angry about?" she said, her voice rising with frustration.

"He knew you were married—" I began.

"Yes, well, the thing is, I must have let him know that I wasn't feeling all that married," she said, resignedly. "I didn't proposition him; when it began, I wasn't even thinking about sex. He was just easy to talk to, and I needed someone to talk to. Then he let me know he was interested, and I didn't shut him down. And he doesn't look at marriage the way you do, which is, I guess, what it all comes down to. He didn't see me as a wife. He saw me as a person."

"Bullshit," I spat. "He knew you were a wife. He just ignored the rule, because abiding by it would have kept him from getting what he wanted. That's what rules are for, to tell us when something we want is out of bounds. People who don't recognize rules can't be trusted, and people who can't be trusted will always, eventually, find a way to fuck you over."

"I don't want to fight," she said. "I want us to be friends. I don't suppose you and he will ever be friends, but what's the point of hating him?"

"I don't hate him," I said. "I don't harbor any secret plans for revenge against him. But I know him, by his actions, to be a scumbag, and I have no desire, or incentive of any kind, to change my opinion of him."

"I just wanted to invite you to our Halloween party," she told me. "If we could have some fun together, I thought we could forget our differences."

"Fun as in, put on silly costumes and drink too much? Thanks for the invitation, but I'll pass," I said.

"Well, it's next Saturday night, if you change your mind," she said, a bit sadly. She looked like she wanted to say something else, but turned away and went back the way she'd come.

I guess it didn't surprise me that she thought that after a few beers the Scumbag and I might suddenly grin at one another, grapple together in a back-slapping man-hug, and let bygones be bygones. The reality, I suspected, was that if I went, we'd warily circle one another, until one or the other of us was ready for a confrontation, and I didn't like my odds if it happened at his house, in the middle of his friends. Not that I was scared of him—I was pretty sure he was more poser than killer—but I didn't see an upside, even if I did manage to kick his ass and walk away, unscathed. What then? I'd be looking over my shoulder every time I came home alone, in the dark.

Better just not to engage, I thought. Sooner or later, the couple next door, with no help from me, would either crash and burn, or get tired of looking at the same four walls, and leave our quiet little neighborhood for parts unknown. This last thought somehow decided me to ask Lindsay if she had any plans for next weekend.

It turned out that she was free, so I made a reservation for Saturday night at one of the nicer places in town. They didn't have a Michelin star, but there were tablecloths, and a wine list, and a farm-to-table menu that changed, according to the season. Lindsay said it was a place she'd been wanting to try, and I arranged to meet her at her apartment about a half-hour before.

She greeted me at the door, and seemed genuinely surprised at the flowers I'd brought her (I had asked a helpful florist for a "first date bouquet," and I thought she did a pretty good job). I refused her offer of a drink, and sat on the sofa in the small-but-neat living room of her apartment, while she went to the kitchen to put the flowers in some water. Looking around, I saw what appeared to be original paintings on the walls; when I asked, she told me that they'd mostly been done by artist friends of hers.

She was nicely but conservatively dressed, in a black sweater set over a grey tweed skirt, an outfit that managed to advertise her curves, while covering her waistline. I was aware that she was self-conscious about her weight, but, to me, she looked very pretty, and she seemed awfully pleased when I told her so.

We were both a bit nervous on the ride to the restaurant, which she covered by asking me about coaching soccer. It turned out that she knew quite a bit about the game, having roomed, in college, with a player on her school's team. She, too, had been an athlete: field hockey, which I admitted I knew next to nothing about, except that it was played on grass, instead of ice.

We got through the preliminaries of ordering, and I was steeling myself to lay my cards on the table, when she beat me to it.

"I know you're still married," she began, "and I can't really imagine where your head is at right now. I know that Lucy [a co-worker of ours] likes you, which is a strong point in your favor, and you do seem like a really nice guy. You're good-looking, but not the type who's always looking in windows to check his reflection. From what little I've heard you say, it was your wife who left. So, what I'm wondering is, are you the keeper you seem to be, and she's just batshit crazy, or is there more to the story?"

"She's not crazy," I said. "She had her reasons, and she didn't exactly leave of her own accord. I asked her to move out, when I was really angry with her, and, to her credit, she did."

"She had an affair with your next-door neighbor, I think?

"Yeah," I replied. "That's who she moved in with, and she's living there with him, now. She was lonely, and he was available—really available, as it turns out. To be fair to her, she did tell me that I wasn't paying enough attention to her. I thought she was just complaining, and I utterly failed to understand the intensity of her need, which I am not, to be brutally honest with myself, capable of supplying. I loved her—still love her, in a way—but what I need in a partner is someone who doesn't need all of me, all of the time. What worries me is that that's what makes me unloveable: that, in order to be loved, you need to be able to let everything else in your life drop, if it turns out that your partner feels she isn't getting enough of you, because I don't think I'm capable of being happy in that kind of relationship."

Lindsay said, "Wow. Thank you for your honesty." Then she frowned. "Have you told your wife that? I mean, exactly what you just told me?"

"To tell the truth," I replied, "I don't know. Not exactly in those words, but yes, I think I did try to say something like that, in our therapy session."

"What did she say?"

"I don't really remember. I do recall that it ended badly, with her telling me that her new lover was much better in bed than I ever was."

"Oh, that part you remember, hmm? Sounds like she got your attention there, at least."

"You think that's funny?" I asked.

"No. Yes. I mean, men. You're so hard to reach, and so easy to hurt. Don't get me wrong—I think you're right, the two of you were mismatched. But I also think you don't really understand what was going on with her."

"And you do?"

"Who knows?" she said. "I only have your side of things, which, as I'm sure you would admit, is not the whole truth. But yes, I think, if you've been reasonably accurate in the details you've provided, I have a pretty good idea of what it was like for her."

"So," I said, "I guess this isn't going anywhere. At least we can say we shared a nice meal."

She smiled. "Oh, no. No, I think there's a good chance this may go somewhere. I said I think I understand your wife, but I'm not like her. I have my own issues, which, if you agree, we can unpack some other time. And, in any case, you're going to need to . . . extricate yourself from your current situation, before we go much farther. But I stand by my original assessment: you're a keeper—for the right girl."

Not long after that, our appetizers came out, and we spent most of the rest of the time talking about the meal, and what we liked, and places we had been to, where we'd enjoyed the food, and other, relatively light conversational fare. I know that, as a general rule, you're not supposed to open up about your relationship with your ex on a first date, but this seemed an important exception, and I realized that I gained a lot of respect for Lindsay—whose intelligence and capacity for seriousness I had underestimated—as a result of her willingness to bring this up and talk about it, up front.

Too soon it was time to go. As I gave the waiter my credit card, I said to Lindsay, "I have two confessions to make: first, I've had a really wonderful time with you, and don't want it to end, but I know it's time to take you home; and, second, I don't want to go home, because my ex and her new boyfriend are having a Halloween party next door, and I don't think I can stand sitting alone and listening to them having a good time."

She laughed, and said, "I'll make you a deal: you can take me home, and come in for coffee—just coffee, and we sit and drink it in the kitchen."

"It's a deal," I said. And that's what we did. She did ask me what progress I had made with the divorce, and I told her that I had seen a lawyer, but had yet to have him file.

"It's going to happen," I told her. "But I don't want to rush it. I need my head to be fully clear before I give him the go-ahead."

"That makes sense, in theory," she agreed. "But do you think your head ever will be fully clear? Especially with her living next door?"

"I think so, even more so now that I have someone else to focus on," I said, smiling.

"Look all you want, but no touching until . . ." she smiled back.

I did get a sweet, lips-only kiss goodnight.

When I finally got home, the party next door was still in full swing. The Scumbag's driveway was packed with motorcycles, Screamo music was bleeding out of the open windows of the house, and the back yard was full of people, few of whom seemed to be in costume, unless they had all somehow decided to disguise themselves as underemployed clockwatchers. I saw lights on at the Wolfowitzs' house, across the street, and took a chance on calling. Paul answered on the first ring.

"Uh, Paul," I said, "it's—"

"Oh," he said, "it's you. I thought it might be the police. I called them ten minutes ago. That . . . guy . . . and his friends are keeping everyone awake. I don't suppose you want to go and talk to them about it?"

"Sorry, Paul, I don't think that would be a good idea. I just wanted to know if you'd called the cops already."

"It wouldn't hurt if you called it in, too."

"I will." And I did. Fuck the couple next door.

A few minutes later a squad car pulled up in front of the party house, and two uniformed officers went to the door and knocked. I saw them go in, and, a few seconds later, the music stopped. The cops left and, shortly behind them, a raft of undermuffled motorcycles went farting down the street.

The next morning, out my kitchen window, I saw their back yard was littered with empty beer cans and red Solo cups. There were even a few on my lawn, so I went out to pick them up; instead of bringing them into my house, I just tossed them over to their side of the property line.

STB came out on the back stoop just as I was finishing up.

"You've probably got ten dollars' worth of recycling here," I said.

She looked at me and lit a cigarette. "Did you call the cops last night?"

"Yes," I said, "but I wasn't the only, or even the first to call. You know what this neighborhood is like. People aren't going to put up with this kind of shit. If you want to host the motorcycle gang for a beer bash, get a trailer in the woods somewhere."

"It was just a small Halloween party."

"Did you invite any of the neighbors?" I asked. She looked at me. "I mean, besides me."

"Nooo . . . well, we didn't think—"

"You didn't think they'd fit in with the Scumbag's friends?"

"Omigod, will you just let that go? I have a headache, the house is a mess, and this yard . . ." she trailed off, looking around.

"Look," I said. "Remember what I was saying about rules? Well, there are rules for living in this neighborhood, too. If you abide by the rules, if you show people that they can rely on you, they'll accept you, and give you the benefit of the doubt. If you don't, well, today's the 31st, and I don't think you can expect too many children to be ringing your doorbell this evening."

"Fine. We'll save on candy." She flicked her cigarette. I remembered how, since we'd moved here, she'd enjoyed greeting the trick-or-treaters at the door, oohing and ahhing over their costumes.

"When did you start smoking?" I asked.

"What do you care?"

"You're right," I said. "It's none of my business." I turned around and went inside.

My conversation with STB had reminded me both that I needed to get some candy, and that I could use some help doling it out. I get along just fine with teenagers, but, although I like small children (and would like some of my own, someday), I never had the knack of talking to them, and knowing this about myself only seems to make my interactions with them even more forced and awkward. The candy was easy; for help, I called Lindsay.

She was actually excited to come over and help, because, as she explained, there were hardly any trick-or-treaters in her apartment complex. I offered to come get her, but she said it made more sense for her to have her car at my place, which was true, so we arranged for her to come over at three pm (the sun goes down before five pm, this time of year, and most of the people with younger kids try to make their rounds before it gets dark). When I asked her her favorite kind of candy, she just laughed, so I just went to the supermarket and grabbed a bunch of stuff from a store display. I also got some cheese and crackers, and a couple of bottles of wine.

Lindsay showed up on time, dressed as a witch, complete with green face paint, broom, and hat. When she came to the door, I just had to stare at her for a minute.

"What?" she asked, worriedly. "Is there something wrong? Is this not okay?"

"You are the sexiest witch I have ever seen," I said, meaning every word of it. It wasn't the dress, which was really just a shapeless black sacky sort of thing; her breasts and hips were discernible, but not emphatically so. It was something about the combination of her blonde hair, blue eyes, and the green makeup.

She laughed at me; it was a sound I was beginning to like, a lot. "How long has it been since you got laid?" she asked.

"It could have been five minutes ago," I replied. "I don't think it would have made any difference."

"Well, this"—she indicated her face—"is for the kiddies. After I leave you can go surfing for witch fetish porn, find one who's big and blonde, and you can pretend she's me."

"Is there witch fetish porn?" I asked.

"Rule thirty-four," she said. "As if you didn't know." When I just stared blankly at her, she laughed again and said, "Google it. Now, where's your costume?"

"I don't really—" I started to say.

She gave a little fake scream. "You have to have a costume!" Looking around, she saw a white straw Panama hat, with a wide brim, hanging near the door; I wore it to keep the sun off of my face and neck while working in the yard. "Go put on a flannel shirt," she said. "The jeans you're wearing are fine. You can be a cowboy."

When I came back wearing the shirt, handed me the hat to put on, and looked at me appraisingly. "You really need a moustache. Have you got any art supplies? Paper, markers, that sort of thing?"

I found a pad of heavyweight sketch paper, and some coloring pens that STB had, from a phase when she wanted to learn to draw, but had given it up. "Perfect," Lindsay said, and she set to work sketching and filling in a heavy, dark moustache. When she was finished, she tore out the sheet and gave it to me, saying, "cut that out, and tape it to your upper lip."

I went into the kitchen, and returned with it in place. She nearly collapsed with laughter. Getting out her phone, she said, "I have to get a picture of this!"

"Please don't," I said, helplessly.

It was too late; she was already holding the phone at arm's length. "Stand still," she ordered me. I heard the little fake shutter-click, several times. After checking to see she was satisfied, she slipped the phone back into a pocket of her dress.

"You are the cutest cowboy ever," she said, encouragingly.

I glanced out the window and saw that groups of parents and children had already started out onto the sidewalks. I poured a couple of bags of the candy into a large bowl, and set it on a table by the door, then got a couple of kitchen chairs and set them just inside the front door, which was standing open, so people coming up onto the porch would be able to see us sitting there. Lindsay took the bowl of candy and set it on her lap.

"Thank you for this," she said.

"Are you kidding me?" I asked. "Thank you. You are . . . pretty wonderful," I said, after searching for a better adjective, and giving up.