The Presence of Absence by Simon Van Booy

Author:Simon Van Booy
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: David R. Godine, Publisher
Published: 2022-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

6.

We thought we were old then, but that’s because we were young. One day, long after I’m gone, Hadley will convince herself that she is young. This will happen when she’s old, and the actual hours we spent together in Paris are but a tiny fraction of the time she has spent there since, in memory.

5.

What an evening it was turning out to be. Making love at dusk with seagulls circling. The wind outside moving leaves and lifting our hair, as though searching for something. Then in the restaurant, the lobster⁠—oh, what things it must have seen in the depths before coming red and hot to our table like an angry thumb. Then, listening to my wife; her seriousness about things she would soon realize were unserious.

When the waiter came to remove our dishes, I noticed someone across the small dining room watching us. He was about my age, and sitting with a blond in a lilac wrap dress and boots that reminded me of Peter Pan.

I insisted on dessert and ordered the only two things I knew my wife would like. Immediately I realized my mistake: I should have asked for cookies and the crème caramel, both of which she would never want again. But it would have looked odd to change the order, so I let it go.

My wife’s hands were resting on the table then. I reached over and enclosed them. I had known those hands for so long. Watched them wrinkle over time like sheets of delicate paper, written on by life. Within one hour she would receive the worst news imaginable. The final knot in a string of disasters that held together each decade of her life. Then I realized someone was standing over us. It was the man who had been staring.

“Sorry to interrupt . . .” he said, glancing blankly at me before turning his attention fully to Hadley. “But I simply had to come over.”

His dining companion, the blond woman, was also turned toward us, grinning with perfect Hollywood teeth.

“Oh my god,” said my wife, pushing back her chair to stand. “Alan?”

“I know,” said the man. “What are the chances? After all these years.” They embraced.

Hadley seemed genuinely surprised. “I can’t believe you recognized me.”

Instinctively I rose and the man shook my hand vigorously, as though congratulating me for winning a prize.

“Max, this is Alan, my neighbor from growing up. Can you believe it?”

His mouth was now open with surprise and delight. Then he motioned for the woman to join us.

“Hi!” she said, striding over in her tall boots. “I’m Daphne.”

The man had thinning hair, but the excitement in his voice was vibrant and boyish. Perhaps he had only recognized Hadley after acknowledging the attractiveness of a stranger. I think Daphne could see that, too, which was why she introduced herself with just a name. I learned later she was the man’s ex-wife, and they had dinner every Friday when he drove out from Dumbo to pick up their teenage sons for the weekend.

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