To See You Again by Alice Adams

Author:Alice Adams [Adams, Alice]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Women - United States - Social Life and Customs - Fiction, Social Science, Social Life and Customs, United States, Women, General, Women's Studies, Contemporary Women
ISBN: 9780394523354
Publisher: Knopf
Published: 1982-06-15T04:00:00+00:00

What demons, then, drove us so frequently to ugly rages, unspeakable recriminations? We would goad each other on, until Ran would say that no, he did not love me at all, he never had, I did not know what real love was. Or I would go on and on about my great and numerous Italian lovers, exaggerating wildly, until Ran would get up and lurch toward me, and slap my face—this happened more than once, and then I would hit him back, of course.

Too much drink was certainly a cause of trouble between us, that endless succession of bourbons-and-water, but booze was not a necessary cause, I wouldn’t think. Surely there must be at least a few blowsy alcoholic couples who get along affectionately, slurring their words of love?

No, with us there were at least two basic and seemingly irreparable causes of conflict, deep-rooted, unavailable to rational thought, or control.

To blame Ran first: one of our troubles was his basic mistrust-suspicion of sex, especially good sex, and ours was mostly excellent—hard to explain, but there it was, great sex. Although he never would have admitted it, being such a sophisticated man, a distinguished composer, Ran really believed all those Protestant-Puritan myths, especially strong in small-town Southern men, I think. He believed that sex weakened your intellectual processes: “Well, my dear, I fear that I must bid you an early adieu; I have to get a great deal done in the morning,” he would say, over my impassioned protests, my threats, and this was not something that we could ever talk about. He believed too that nice women, good women, didn’t really like sex; my evident sensual relish made me suspect, was probably proof of a bad character.

The other problem, maybe worse, was mine: my own unshakable, implacable self-dislike. Its causes no longer interest me; it was just a fact, like being tall. And we all know how it is with such people: anyone who claims to love us is either lying or soft in the head, inferior; at various times I accused Ran of both conditions, but mostly of lying. Even when he assured me, as he often did, that the happiest moments in his life had been with me, that he had never truly cared so much for any woman, and for so long, I was always sure that his heart and mind were still vividly inhabited by Gloria. I believed that even in our most tender moments he thought of her, and that to me he was simply being polite, saying what he felt the situation called for.

(But is it possible, Ms. Heffelfinger, that I was wrong, that I was indeed much loved by Ran? A heady thought: I can hardly take it in.)

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