It was after sex, when there was still heat and mostly

breathing, when there was still touch and mostly

thought . . . it was as if the whole world could be reduced to the sound of a single string being played, and the only thing this sound could make me think of was you. Sometimes desire is air; sometimes desire is liquid. And every now and then, when everything else is air and liquid, desire solidifies, and the body is the magnet that draws its weight.

arduous, adj.

Sometimes during sex, I wish there was a button on the

small of your back that I could press and cause you to be done with it already.

arrears, n.

My faithfulness was as unthinking as your lapse. Of all

the things I thought would go wrong, I never thought it

would be that.

“It was a mistake,” you said. But the cruel thing was,

it felt like the mistake was mine, for trusting you.

autonomy, n.

“I want my books to have their own shelves,” you said,

and that’s how I knew it would be okay to live together.

avant-garde, adj.

This was after Alisa’s show, the reverse-blackface rendition of Gone With the Wind, including songs from the Empire Records soundtrack and an interval of

nineteenth-century German poetry, recited with a lisp.

“What does avant-garde mean, anyway?” I asked.

“I believe it translates as favor to your friends,” you replied.

awhile, adv.

I love the vagueness of words that involve time.

It took him awhile to come back — it could be a matter of minutes or hours, days or years.

It is easy for me to say it took me awhile to know.

That is about as accurate as I can get. There were sneak previews of knowing, for sure. Instances that made me

feel, oh, this could be right. But the moment I shifted

from a hope that needed to be proven to a certainty that would be continually challenged? There’s no pinpointing

that.

Perhaps it never happened. Perhaps it happened

while I was asleep. Most likely, there’s no signal event.

There’s just the steady accumulation of awhile.

B

balk, v.

I was the one who said we should live together. And

even as I was doing it, I knew this would mean that I

would be the one to blame if it all went wrong. Then I

consoled myself with this: if it all went wrong, the last thing I’d care about was who was to blame for moving in

together.

banal, adj. , and bane, n.

I am interested in the connection between these two

words, and how one denotes the series of ordinary

spirit-deaths that occur during a day, while the other is the full ruination, the core of the calamity.

I think we endure the banal —

“So how’s your chicken?”

“I’m so tired.”

“Lord, it’s cold.”

“Where were you?”

“Where do you want to go?”

“Have you been waiting long?”

— as a way of skirting around the bane.

barfly, n.

You have the ability to talk to anyone, which is an ability I do not share.

basis, n.

There has to be a moment at the beginning when you

wonder whether you’re in love with the person or in love with the feeling of love itself.

If the moment doesn’t pass, that’s it —– you’re done.

And if the moment does pass, it never goes that far.

It stands in the distance, ready for whenever you want it back. Sometimes it’s even there when you thought you

were searching for something else, like an escape route, or your lover’s face.

beguile, v.

It’s when you walk around the apartment in my boxers

when you don’t know I’m awake. And then that grin,

when you do know I’m awake. You spend so much time

in the morning making sure every hair is in place. But I have to tell you: I like it most like this, haphazard, sleep-strewn, disarrayed.

belittle, v.

No, I don’t listen to the weather in the morning. No, I

don’t keep track of what I spend. No, it hadn’t occurred to me that the Q train would have been much faster. But

every time you give me that look, it doesn’t make me

want to live up to your standards.

bemoan, v.

This is dedicated to your co-worker Marilynn.

Marilynn, please stop talking about your sister’s

pregnancy.

And please stop showing up late.

And please stop asking my lover to drinks.

And please stop humming while you type.

I’m tired of hearing about it.

better, adj. and adv.

Will it ever get better?

It better.

Will it ever get better?

It better.

Will it ever get better?

It better.

beware, v.

“My worse date ever?” I asked. “I don’t know. I’m always amazed when the other person doesn’t ask you anything

about yourself. This one date — once the autobiography

started, it wouldn’t stop. I actually sat there, thinking, Wow, you’re not going to ask me a single question, are you? And sure enough. Ten minutes. Thirty minutes. An hour. Only one subject. And it wasn’t me.”

“So, what did you do?” you asked.

“I just started counting. Like sheep. And when the

waiter asked if we wanted to have dessert, my date star-

ted to order, and I interrupted and said I had promised

a friend to walk his dog. What about you?”

“It’s embarrassing.”

“Tell me!”

“Okay. It was a set-up. And the minute I saw him, I

was like — the attraction level was in the deep negatives.

Like, I’ve seen sexier tree stumps. But of course you

can’t say that. I tried to be a better person. Then he

opened his mouth and I was completely repulsed. Not

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only did he talk about himself all night, but he also kept cutting me off whenever I had an opinion about anything. The worst part was: I could see he was enjoying

himself! So — God, I’m not proud of this. In fact, I can’t believe I’m telling you this. You promise you won’t think I’m a freak?”

“I won’t.”

“Okay. So there’d been this fly hovering over our

table. I kept trying to shoo it with my hand. After awhile I was focusing on the fly more than the guy. He was getting annoyed. So the next time it came close to my face I just . . . stuck out my tongue.”

“Like you were a frog?”

You nodded. “Like I was a frog.”

“And you caught the fly.”

“Yup. Swallowed it down. It was worth it to see the

look on his face. Dessert wasn’t an option after that. And I was so relieved. With all due respect to the fly and its right to live, it was completely worth it.”

At that point the waiter came over and asked if we

needed anything else.

And you said, “I think we’re going to get another

round of dessert.”

blemish, n.

The slight acne scars. The penny-sized, penny-shaped

birthmark right above your knee. The dot below your

shoulder that must have been from when you had chick-

en pox in third grade. The scratch on your neck — did I

do that?

This brief transcript of moments, written on the

body, is so deeply satisfying to read.

bolster, v.

I am very careful whenever I know you’re on the phone

with your father. I know you’ll come to me eventually,

and we’ll talk you through it. But I have to wait — you

need your time. In the meantime, I’m careful what songs

I play. I try to speak to you with my selections.

brash, adj.

“I want you to spend the night,” you said. And it was

definitely your phrasing that ensured it. If you had said,

“Let’s have sex,” or “Let’s go to my place,” or even “I

really want you,” I’m not sure we would have gone quite

as far as we did. But I loved the notion that the night

was mine to spend, and I immediately decided to spend

it on you.

breach, n.

I didn’t want to know who he was, or what you did, or

that it didn’t mean anything.

breathing, n.

You had asthma as a child, had to carry around an in-

haler. But when you grew older, it went away. You could

run for miles and it was fine.

Sometimes I worry that this is happening to me in

reverse. The older I get, the more I lose my ability to

breathe.

breathtaking, adj.

Those mornings when we kiss and surrender for an hour

before we say a single word.

broker, n. and v.

You knew I was lazy, so you’d be the one to find the

apartment. And I played along, partly because I didn’t

know how you’d react if I called one afternoon and said,

“You won’t believe the place I’ve found.” You wanted to

be the finder, so I became the second opinion.

The brokers nearly broke you. I thought it was sweet

and almost sad how desperately you clung to the hope of

finding civility — even enthusiasm — in the New York

City real estate market. But leave it to you, ten days into the soul-draining hunt, to find not only a decent apartment but a broker we’d end up becoming friends with.

By the time I got there, you’d already decided. And I

quickly decided to let you decide. You were already see-

ing the rooms as ours, and that was enough for me.

Well, that and a dishwasher.

buffoonery, n.

You were drunk, and I made the mistake of mentioning

Showgirls in a near-empty subway car. The pole had no idea what it was about to endure.

C

cache, n.

I decided to clean my desk. I had thought you were busy

in the kitchen. But then I heard you behind me, heard

you ask:

“What’s in the folder?”

I’m sure I blushed when I told you they were prin-

touts of your emails, with letters and notes from you

pressed between them, like flowers in a dictionary.

You didn’t say anything more, and I was grateful.

cadence, n.

I have never lived anywhere but New York or New Eng-

land, but there are times when I’m talking to you and I

hit a Southern vowel, or a word gets caught in a South-

ern truncation, and I know it’s because I’m swimming in

your cadences, that you permeate my very language.

cajole, v.

I didn’t understand how someone from a completely

landlocked state could be so terrified of sharks. Even in the aquarium, I had to do everything to get you to come

close to the tank. Then, in the Natural History Museum,

I couldn’t stay quiet any longer.

“It’s not alive,” I said. “It can’t hurt you.”

But you held back, and I was compelled to push you

into the glass.

What did it matter to me? Did I think that by making

you rational about one thing, I could make you rational

about everything?

Maybe. Or maybe I just wanted to save you from

your fears.

candid, adj.

“Most times, when I’m having sex, I’d rather be

reading.”

This was, I admit, a strange thing to say on a second

date. I guess I was just giving you warning.

“Most times when I’m reading,” you said, “I’d rather

be having sex.”

canvas, n.

We both missed our apartments, that first night, but I

think you were the one who came closer to genuine re-

gret. I’m sure if we could have afforded it, we would

have kept both places. But instead, there we were, in

three rooms of our own, which didn’t feel like our own,

not yet. You wanted me to think you were asleep, but I

caught you staring at the ceiling.

“It will be different once we paint,” I promised. “It

will be different when we put things on the walls.”

catalyst, n.

It surprised me — surprises me still — that you were the first one to say it.

I was innocent, in a way, expecting those three words

to appear boldface with music. But instead, it was such

an ordinary moment: The movie was over, and I stood

up to turn off the TV. A few minutes had passed from

the end of the final credits, and we’d been sitting there on the couch, your legs over mine, the side of your hand touching the side of my hand. The video stopped and the

screen turned blue. “I’ll get it,” I said, and was halfway to the television when you said, “I love you.”

I never asked, but I’ll always wonder: What was it

about that moment that made you realize it? Or, if you’d known it for awhile, what compelled you to say it then?

It was welcome, so welcome, and in my rush to say that I loved you, too, I left the television on, I let that light bathe us for a little longer, as I returned to the couch, to you. We held there for awhile, not really sure what

would happen next.

catharsis, n.

I took it out on the wall.

I LOVE YOU. I LOVE YOU. YOU FUCKER, I LOVE

YOU.

caveat, n.

“I will be the one to leave you” — you whispered it to me as a warning. Fifth date? Sixth date?

I was sure in my heart that you were wrong. I was

sure I’d be the one to kill it. But I kept that belief to myself.

cavort, v.

“It’s way too late to go into Central Park,” I protested.

“The moon is out,” you said.

“We really shouldn't.”

“Don’t worry,” you told me, taking my hand. “I’ll

protect you.”

I had always been afraid of walking through the park

at night, but soon there we were, well past midnight in

the middle of the Great Lawn, having all that space to

ourselves, feeling free enough to make out, but trying to keep on as much clothing as possible. Laughing at our

recklessness, feeling the grass and the dirt as we rolled playfully — me on top, then you on top, then me on top

— zippers down, hands everywhere — night on skin and

such nervousness. We sensed people coming closer and

got ourselves back together, riding the excitement until the excitement ended, then gliding on a little farther,

buoyed not by thrill but by happiness.

celibacy, n.

n/a

champagne, n.

You appear at the foot of the bed with a bottle of cham-

pagne, and I have no idea why. I search my mind des-

perately for an occasion I’ve forgotten — is this some obscure anniversary or, even worse, a not-so-obscure one?

Then I think you have something to tell me, some good

news to share, but your smile is silent, cryptic. I sit up in bed, ask you what’s going on, and you shake your head,

as if to say that nothing’s going on, as if to pretend that we usually start our Wednesday mornings with

champagne.

You touch the bottle to my leg — I feel the cool con-

densation and the glass, the fact that the bottle must

have been sleeping all night in the refrigerator without me noticing. You have long-stemmed glasses in your

other hand, and you place them on the nightstand, be-

side the uncommenting clock, the box of Kleenex, the

tumbler of water.

“The thing about champagne,” you say, unfoiling the

cork, unwinding its wire restraint, “is that it is the ultimate associative object. Every time you open a bottle of 65/223

champagne, it’s a celebration, so there’s no better way of starting a celebration than opening a bottle of champagne. Every time you sip it, you’re sipping from all

those other celebrations. The joy accumulates over

time.”

You pop the cork. The bubbles rise. I feel some of the

spray on my skin. You pour.

“But why?” I ask as you hand me my glass.

You raise yours and ask, “Why not? What better way

to start the day?”

We drink a toast to that.

circuitous, adj.

We do not divulge our histories chronologically. It’s not like we can sit each other down and say, “Tell me what

happened,” and then rise from that conversation know-