Dance Me to the End of Love

(Author's Note: This chapter has a little more backstory, but no sex. The following chapters will contain sex. Lots of sex.)

SHE is standing at our front door. Her hair is long, relaxed curls flecked with reddish-gold, tumbling out of the colorful scarf in which it's lightly gathered. She has an elegantly mature, somewhat chiseled face, with high cheekbones that taper to a delicately rounded chin, a pert nose, and a small but expressive mouth—currently wearing a slightly pouty smile—highlighted by rosy-taupe lipgloss. Her eyes are hidden behind large, dark designer sunglasses. She's wearing a light, shawl-collar blazer over a tailored white button-down, rather conservatively buttoned-up, and french-tucked into cropped, very tailored, dark wash jeans, pulled together with a skinny black belt and black patent leather pumps. On anyone else, I would have cynically called it an "intentionally—and expensively—insouciant look," but for now, I freeze...

For What It's Worth

You two had gone to school together as long as you could remember, and became best friends in your freshman year of high school. That hadn't changed when you went away to college, as you both ended up at the same big midwestern state school [obviously, not by accident]. You were both middle-class, from the east coast—as you liked to say, "A little town just outside of New York. Stamford, Connecticut." You were used to ostentatious visions of wealth (actual wealth, or what appeared to be the trappings of wealth), but rich middle-America was very different. Suddenly, you were surrounded by blonde, white, corn-fed, girls and boys, whose last names coincidentally happened to match the names on the Chemistry building, or the Library, or giant agribusinesses and defense contractors.

Almost inseparable, the two of you would even introduce one another to people you met. You would say, "Well, she's obviously incredibly pretty, but you'd be a fool to mess with her 'cause she's also very smart." She was lighter-skinned, a little taller than average, with the thin-but-curvy body of a model. You were taller still, dark, and slim, with delicate features, expressive eyes, and a bright, welcoming smile. She would, in turn, describe you as "crazy smart, but also, y'know, kinda hot." You made a good team.

Within your first year you began to find your (individual, separate) selves, diverging both academically (she: communications & political science, with dreams of being a journalist / you: philosophy, then zoology, and finally, fine arts), and, gradually, in your choice of friends. Yet, you remained fairly close. Living down the hall from one another, you'd frequently get together over coffee or cocoa--the staples of college life--to "compare notes." (This was shorthand for discussing tidbits of gossip about classmates and campus events.) By the end of the year, however, she had clearly begun to gravitate toward a much-envied, visible, popular set, and you to a more obscure one.

By the time I arrived, the two of you were already in your junior year, well-established socially, in very different circles, but still friends.

Somewhere during this time [I learned, long after the fact], you and she were, briefly, lovers. This was a big secret. (It was also a dream you'd held, secretly, since the moment that you and she first met.) These assignations ended shortly after she started dating that basketball player. As the beautiful girlfriend of a guy on a perennial championship varsity team, she commandeered a bit of his limelight. And she relished it.

You and I were introduced, in passing, by a mutual friend, and then found ourselves in a photography class together, having a heated discussion over some (groundbreaking? pompous?) color images from the 70s. We quickly became "intellectual friends," and I fell in with the loose collective of artsy kids in your orbit. To say I "liked" or "admired" you, would ignore the simple fact that I had a huge crush on you (and I'm sure the rest of your circle did as well). For your part, you seemed like the natural, effortless leader of this ragtag cadre of somewhat talented, vaguely rebellious, mostly white, kids.

The group would often get together at night, sneaking into closed academic buildings, or onto the roof of a dorm building, to discuss "important stuff" until the wee hours. These discussions were frequently enhanced by [large, economy size] bottles of cheap wine; it didn't strike me until long after, that although you would always propose a toast of some kind, you rarely actually drank. (Of course, you knew exactly what you were doing, even back then.) Occasionally, you would expand one of these sessions into a small public forum, a discussion or debate that you would, of course, moderate. As your acolytes, we posted xeroxed signs advertising these "salons," as you liked to call them, sat in a cluster on the side, and were occasionally honored with the opportunity to participate.

Once, as you and I were leaving one of these events, the topic of which had been What is Gender/Sexual Identity in Art and Literature?, I turned suddenly and said, "Do you know how much I want to kiss you right now?" You flashed that smile, and said, "From the nature of your question, and—well, would I be wrong to guess 'a lot?'" {Pause.} Then you kissed me. It lasted maybe five seconds, and then we were walking and chatting again. It was the first, and last, time we kissed, like that.

<<For years, I could not understand how, or why, I lost contact with you within a few months after your graduation.>>

Her boyfriend had already been drafted into the NBA upon graduation; she went with him, and within a few years, they were married. She waited to have kids until she was in her 30s, ostensibly to pursue her career, but it really only served to bolster his image (one of the elite white players in the NBA at the time, who had a stunning, charismatic black wife). Still, she enjoyed this taste of semi-celebrity life.

As it turned out, his playing career was relatively short. But being handsome, photogenic, and well-spoken, allowed him to move easily into sportscasting. And, eventually (though rumors had circulated for some years before this), her husband abandoned her for a perky, twenty-something, aspiring sports reporter—white, midwestern, and blonde, like him.

Now in her mid-30s, she was left with two young children and a career that had never really materialized. Painfully, gradually, and unintentionally radicalized, she had the incredibly good fortune (as the two of you often did) to find her footing in the earlier days of the internet boom. She restarted (or started) her desired work as a journalist. Apparently very successfully.

<<Some years back, she went to work for a now-famous news website, where, within a few years, she rose to become the editor-in-chief, then CEO. Now she enjoys the limelight again, as an editorial writer, commentator, and frequent guest on cable news shows.>>