The Bachelor by Andrew Palmer

Author:Andrew Palmer [Palmer, Andrew]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2021-07-20T00:00:00+00:00

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I picked Sadie up from Des Moines International, and after her nap we set off walking on the same route we’d walked before, two weeks earlier, though this time it was slightly warmer, the clouds thin, the light both brighter and softer. In the woods by the river she pointed out invasives—garlic mustard, black locust, tree of heaven—and a little farther on we stopped to look for eagles, once again unsuccessfully. I hadn’t walked this path since the afternoon before the concert, and everything was different now. Emptied of anticipations, I no longer occupied the center of the world. The scenery was pretty or not pretty in turn, but it was no longer mine. It was only scenery.

As we walked through marshland filled with dead reeds and foxtails that reflected silver-gold in the sun, Sadie, interrupting the thread of our conversation, asked if everything was okay.

“Excuse me?”

“You seem a little down.”

I feigned surprise at her show of concern but actually I was grateful: I’d been hoping, almost expecting, I realized now, she’d give me a chance to open up to her. Instead of talking about Maria, though, whom I’d been unable to banish from my thoughts, or about Jess and our ill-fated night, I found myself talking about Ashwini. I told her about our sort-of-breakup and then, prompted by Sadie’s questions, went back to the beginning. I talked about how for a long time I’d been too afraid of Ashwini to speak to her. Whenever I saw her at friends’ apartments she’d come across as cynical, knowing, a little mean. I didn’t want to be the object of her judgment. I worried that if she got to know me, sooner or later she’d sort me into a category of young New York writer to be mocked and dismissed (which I’m sure, I told Sadie, says a lot about my state of mind at the time).

Finally, though, we found ourselves sitting next to each other on a couch at a phone bank for Obama. After we’d done enough winning hearts and minds of voters in battleground states, we got to talking. At first she didn’t deviate from my conception of her. She talked about how she expected Obama to win and for his presidency to be a disappointment, a slightly more palatable continuation of Bush-era policies and political realities. Nothing would fundamentally change, she said. In some ways, things would probably get worse. (Not that she had to worry too much about it: she could move back to Canada whenever she wanted.) But then something happened that changed her for me. The host of the gathering had made apple pie, and when Ashwini took a bite her face transformed completely. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone experience pleasure so fully, I told Sadie. She gave a little moan and after she’d finished chewing raved about the pie to our friend, gesticulating wildly. It was the first time I’d seen her excited—and she was more than excited, she

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