7. Oh, oh, oh: If you are going to cry in a restaurant, do not make it a luxurious four-star spread. Make it, like, Long John Silver's. Because shouldn't everybody be crying in Long John Silver's?
8. If you've been dating for three years (and unhappy for at least one), do not take this moment to point out his cruel indifference, because a) he will accuse you of exaggerating, and b) you might actually hear what he thinks, for the first time in a long time. He might uncork a surprising and bone-deep dissatisfaction, and it might spill onto the table, along with your red wine. And what he thinks is that he's done trying. He can't do this anymore. He's, christ, how to even begin? You need to move out. And then the fucking fish is gonna show up, and you're gonna realize — goddammit — that you badly wanted steak.
9. Crying in restaurants can't always be stopped, but it can be prevented. Let me explain. Your relationship is over. Your clothes and books have been dumped into cardboard boxes, which are still labeled with Sharpie from when you moved into this house. At this point, it is a bad idea to go out with this man again, at least for a little while. And baby, "a little
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Crying in restaurants is like being a celebrity.
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while" is not four days. "A little while" is weeks, maybe months. It's a bad idea to have a super-fancy dinner to celebrate the end of your relationship — because you are priding yourselves on being a different kind of couple, one that throws a party instead of a funeral — because you will show up in a slinky top bought specifically for him and he will say, "Have you been self-tanning? Your back is all splotchy." Then, later that night, when you've had enough champagne to hold his fingertips underneath the table, he will mention (by the way) that he has plans with someone from the bar tonight. You don't mind, do you? And you're off, crying in restaurants again. For this, you both deserve a special congratulations. This fucking meal cost $400.
10. Don't yell. Yelling is tempting. Lord, it feels good. Breaking glasses feels good. Reaching inside his chest and tearing out his heart feels good. (Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom as romantic metaphor. Who knew?) But you can't do any of this. Even if, a week after that super-fancy dinner, you see him at a bar where he knew you would be, only this time, he is accompanied by a twenty-three-year-old golf instructor who looks like a Disney character. Maybe Belle. Maybe Thumper. If he comes to your table, sighs and sits down nervously, and you begin to yell ("Are you on a fucking date?"), he will redden and shift uncomfortably and whisper things like, "Okay, okay, simmer down." Only he doesn't say normal annoying things like "simmer down," he says extra-annoying things like "Okay, okay, throttle back." By the way, who says "throttle back"? Astronauts. He is not an astronaut. He is a business-systems analyst who is wearing a light blue Mexican wedding shirt you once gave him, which you would like to take back now. By ripping it through his nose.
11. If you do yell, notice something. Notice that everyone is paying attention to you, but not looking at you. They are whispering about you, but scared to make eye contact. In this way, crying in restaurants is like being a celebrity. And you know what? It totally sucks.
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He will remember you fondly, for the most part. You will do the same.
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12. But you won't yell. It's not in your character. Somewhere inside your brain, you're throwing a cast-iron frying pan straight into his skull, but here, in this world, you are taking a deep breath, lighting a cigarette and saying, "I don't know what to do. I'm so fucking sad. I just love you is all." (Ugh. Why did you say that?) It will take you a long time to stop saying these things, these sort of minor-note, self-pitying things meant to redirect this story back to where it used to be.
And it will take you a while to realize you don't want the story back where it used to be. It will take you a while to stop text-messaging him when you are drunk, and to stop emailing him stories about your day and sending him postcards on a whim and buying him presents when you are out of town, because this is the kind of person you are. It is almost a habit. But eventually, you will realize that he is not the person who should get these dispatches, at least not from you. He is someone who will get on with his life, who will fall in love with other women and move them into the home you once shared, and who will be gracious enough not tell the world about all the times you staggered home drunk, vomited in the bathroom, tripped and fell, not just literally (ten times? fourteen?) but figuratively, because you were not the person you wanted to be back then. He will remember you fondly, for the most part. And for the most part, you will do the same.
13. I don't know what advice to give you about crying in restaurants. I used to think it was just me, my sensitivity, my tendency to wear my tear ducts on my sleeve. But now I think that, all along, I was trying to say something. I never could get out the words. Maybe because I kept ordering onions and making jokes. Maybe because I refused to excavate my murky, unarticulated interior. Maybe because I spilled wine, and blamed it on alcohol. And so I guess it eventually fell on him to do it. Because one of us had to, didn't we?
Three years, at least one of them not what we wanted it to be. It was all that crap that happens to a couple: swapping out sex for television, staying too late at bars while the other one waited at home, seeing insignificant flaws as major character deficits (my tendency to squeeze the toothpaste in the middle of the tube; his tendency to buy extravagant things and not use them). So now, I just feel grateful someone was there to hear me say the things that had been rattling around inside me for too long, silenced by fear and booze and inertia. I'm done. I can't do this anymore. And I could get on with my life, and move to New York, and make out in subways and under highway overpasses, and I could think about falling in love again someday, someday when I'm ready for it, and I could look back on that evening not as a tragedy, There's no need to cry, even. Though feel free to cry anyway. I certainly did. n°
Next month: the sixth and final chapter.
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Range of Desire by K.G. Schneider
In the military, I learned to love women and guns. |
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| ABOUT THE AUTHOR: |
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Sarah Hepola has been a high-school teacher, a playwright, a film critic, a music editor and a travel columnist. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, The Guardian, and on NPR. She writes the Scanner blog for Hooksexup and lives in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. |
©2007 Sarah Hepola and hooksexup.com
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