Photographs of Graves

I know that if I was in some romantic comedy from Hollywood I probably would have shouldered the pain, swallowed back my tears, and exclaimed happily that we'll spend this last month together to its fullest then, of course, I would eagerly wait for him to return. Hell, if I were in a romantic comedy I probably would have found some way to go with him, suddenly taking up Arabic with a passion and stowing away on his flight, maybe have a romantic run into his arms down the streets of Bagdad or the Gaza Strip – depends on where he ended up. We would survive together in Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Egypt, whatever, then later get married and live happily ever after as good little reporters.

But this was not a Hollywood romance. I am not Jennifer Aniston or Angelina Jolie or Reese Witherspoon, therefore lack that distinctly Hollywood heroine trait of undying love and optimism in the face of adversity. Instead I gave into my id, and for a good week of that precious month I acted angry and miserable and, when I could, avoided Theodore Graves as if he had done me some terrible ill. I even threw a tantrum once or twice in the safety of my bedroom, screaming into my pillow or throwing somewhat resilient things like tissue boxes and my indestructible Nokia phone at the wall. In short, when I was at work I was an icy, workaholic bitch, and when I was at home I was a petulant toddler. Three precious weeks left with the man I love and it seemed like it would be a miracle if he still loved me by the end of it.

What saved me from that fate was beer. A lot of beer, all consumed in one night. After about a week of my unbearable attitude around the house Marion came up to me, watching me while I sulked and pushed my mashed potatoes into a thin spread over my plate. Then, with a heavy sigh and a frown, she dropped an ice-cold bottle of beer in front of me. Not the clear, fruity Smirnoff, but dark, rich beer with beads of ice water dripping over the glass. The label was something in Polish that I didn't recognize. I stared at the drink, mind numb. Deftly Marion twisted off the cap, sat down, and pulled out a second beer for herself. Her red hair was loose, face drawn. She wore yoga pants and a loose green t-shirt with Che Guevara printed across its front. She twisted off her own cap and took a long draw.

“You're miserable.”

“Yeah.”

“Drink. We need to talk.”

I did. I drank more than I meant to, which meant that the bottle was gone in a good five minutes. She had another one waiting for me. The point was clear: by the end of this conversation, I was supposed to be hammered. Smashed. Drunk as a skunk. I didn't know why yet, but whatever it was she didn't think should be done sober.

Marion was only marginally less indulgent, but I knew from past experience that she was a woman that could hold her licker with the best of them. I wasn't in her weight class. I wasn't anywhere near it. After two glasses of the thick brew my nose began to burn and my head reeled. She, who was at least half a glass behind me, looked unfazed. She watched me evenly, drumming her fingers on the table.

“So. Your mother is dead, you're in a new country, your best friend is hundreds of miles away, and your lover is leaving you. What do you do?”

I sat mutely. The lights pulsed over my head, spinning weirdly in opalescent whiteness. I blinked.

“Arden.”

“I don't know,” I replied finally. I shook my head, but everything just became more blurry. I drank more beer.

“Well, now is the time to figure it out,” she said, her tone unrelenting. She pressed her palms down against the table. She wasn't hostile, but she was definitely forceful.

“You could go home. Be with your family. Forget about everything and everyone that happened here. No one would blame you,” she continued. “Or you could stay and finish the last couple months of your internship. Don't reapply. Stay with your friend Zoe in France. Again, forget about everything and everyone that happened here.”

“Or I could stay,” I finished. “Reapply to the internship and continue forward as a journalist until the end of the year, at which point I'll either go back to Xavier or transfer to a school in Europe, depending on if Morrow wants to keep me. Don't forget everything and everyone.”

“Even if you do that, you still haven't decided on Theodore.”

“If I stay, I'd be staying with him.”

“It doesn't have to be that way.”

I gave her a questioning look, my mind not keeping pace with hers. She shrugged.

“You love this job. I can see it. Well, not in the past week or so,” she sighed, “but overall. Graves isn't all that's keeping you here. He doesn't necessarily have to be part of the package. The question is, do you want him to be?”

I gave her a dark look, feeling one of those tantrums welling up inside me. Call me a loose cannon, but sometimes I leapt to anger without thinking, sometimes when alcohol was involved. Especially when alcohol was involved. I slammed my fist against the table. Marion had to seize our beer to keep it from sloshing out onto the table and my dinner plate clattering from the ripple effect.

“Dammit, Marion, of course I want to stay with him. If he was going to be staying around it wouldn't even be a question. Just... God Marion.”

I dug my fingers into my hair, my eyes swimming. Looking back I'm not quite sure if it was from the alcohol or tears.

“It's just not fair. It never is. We just fight all the time. It's usually my fault. Hell, I'm not like that, Marion. I don't know if I can just sit and wait for him to come home. I'm too damn selfish to let him take off on me like that. Which is stupid, because we're all journalists and that's what we do: take off.”

I barked out a bitter laugh. “I can't even look him in the face and I'm in love with the guy. God, I'm stupid, aren't I?”

To her credit, Marion didn't agree that I was stupid. She didn't try to refute it, either. Instead she remained silent, offering me my beer again. I accepted it gratefully and took another long pull closer to oblivion.

“So, you still haven't answered my question, Ari. We can dance around the subject and talk about feelings as much as you like, but what are you going to do?”

I sat in silence, my sluggish brain working through the impossible question. Maybe it was the alcohol that made me able to finally sort it all out. It wasn't a neat solution, but damn, it was the best thing I'd come up with in a week.

“I'm going to stay,” I said slowly. “I love it here. Besides, Ana needs me. I still don't know what I'm going to do about Graves, though. I don't know. I should talk to him.”

“Yes you should.”

“I shouldn't avoid him anymore.”

“No, you shouldn't.”

Nodded in satisfaction, her knowing eyes finding mine. She had known what I would decide all along, she was just waiting for me to figure it out. Who would have thought that what it would take for me to see sense is a drink?

The next thing I knew I was stumbling across a dark street in Amsterdam, wind and rain slapping my face as I squinted and staggered through the harsh weather. Marion's arm supported me, leading me on as we trudged toward our final destination. I think I sobered a little during that walk, though I was soaked through by the time we stopped moving and dripping water like a drowned sewer rat. We were at a door, and I was shivering from the cold, and Marion was ringing the doorbell.

And then Graves was in front of me, dry and surprised and dressed in comfortable pajamas. As his face swam in front of me I could make out the dark circles under his eyes. Hollowly I thought that he needed to sleep.

Marion pushed me forward and I tumbled into his chest. He caught me, hands pressing against my cold, wet hair.

“Present for you, Theo. One Arden Murphy, slightly damaged,” Marion reported. I noticed that she had been smart enough to wear a rain poncho, though that still didn't spare her much from the miserable weather. At the time I thought that was why she retreated so fast, vanishing into the pouring rain. Graves brought me inside and shut the door, the pounding rain diminishing to a soft drumming sound.

Graves took my wet face between his hands as I made a large puddle by his front door, looking me over with unreadable eyes.

“She's done a number on you, hasn't she?” he asked softly, stroking my face with his thumb.

In response, I promptly got sick all over his floor. Like I said, not designed for Hollywood.

He didn't get angry. He didn't even reject me. Dimly I remember apologizing and trying to help him as he cleaned up my vomit, and soon after I was dressed in a warm oversized t-shirt and tucked away under blankets. He hugged me as I continued to drip and all of a sudden the floodgates opened and I just started crying. I cried and cried for a long time. The weirdest thing? After a while, he started crying, too. Not like me, with my snot and sobs that made me sound like a dying walrus, but with salty tears. We sat like that for a long time, holding each other as we cried all our problems out. Then he kissed me despite my mangy wet hair and the alcohol on my breath and the snot running out of my nose, and I kissed him back. That was all that had to be said. No words were needed. We went to bed and the next morning I was curled up in his sheets.

I immediately got up and ran to his bathroom, vomiting into his toilet. A throbbing headache brightly announced the hangover that was to come.

But it was the best miserable day I can remember. It was Sunday, a day that the office wasn't even open, so Graves and I spent almost all of it in bed. No sex. I don't think I could have handled it, given my already pounding skull. But instead we just lied there, sleeping a lot and thinking a little.

He turned to me once, cupping my face in his cheek. He kissed me on the forehead and smiled, his tired eyes lighting up a little. He looked boyish.

“I'm never gonna give you up,” he whispered. I smiled, too.

“Thanks.”

“Never gonna let you down...”

I barked out a laugh and kicked him under the covers. His fingers shot into the crook of my neck, sending me into a fit of laughter as I tried to twist free of his tickling fingers. He laughed, too, continuing to sing softly and off-key.

I finally pushed free, my head breaking in two but overall feeling better than I had in days. I held tight to his wrists, staring him in the face.

“Did you seriously just Rick Roll me?”

“Possibly.”

“In bed?”

“Definitely.”

I snorted and shoved him again, sending him toppling out onto the floor. He got up, laughing, and attacked, grabbing me around the waist before I could escape. As I flailed he continued singing, his voice loud and painfully, willfully horrid.

“Never gonna make you cry, never gonna say goodbye, never gonna tell a lie and hurt you!”

As he sang and I laughed, I already know he'd broken Rick Astley's promise. He'd already done all of those things. But at that moment it was okay. For one second, even though my head beat like a dying drum and his singing made me wish I was deaf, I was okay. He was okay. He and I? We might be okay, too.