My Unexplainable Tears
A is doubtful. She questions my judgment. She picked me up from my apartment and drove us to the Thai restaurant on Fullerton Ave where we eat every time we see each other. Our routine is so fiercely established that we no longer discuss it, like birds that roost in the same windowsill each year, pissed if their habit is impeded in even the most minor way. We sat at the same table. The waiter brought us menus, but neither of us picked them up. We both ordered chicken pad thai. For A, extra limes. For me, a Thai iced tea. I barely touch my food. I talk. And talk. She listens and furrows her brow. The pad thai is not very good today. Chalky, lacking spice. I try to anticipate A’s response. Listen, I know I will regret it forever if I don’t, I explain. My curiosity overpowers me. I need to know the outcome even if I am hurt in the end. Partly because it may make an interesting story—with a little fabrication and revision. She understands. This will not be the last time we have this conversation.
I understand why A is concerned that I am spending the evening with Z or, more specifically, why she was alarmed that I described the date as an anniversary, even though I explain to her that Z used this term first, as a joke, a sheepish acknowledgment of our complex, shared history, and I merely repeated it to her unthinkingly in my audio message. My words are always betraying me like the edge of a dull knife slipping on the elastic skin of a tomato and nicking the side of my finger, and A does not want to help me bandage my wounds again.
Z and I cannot find the tree where we hung the hammock the afternoon we first met. The trees all look unremarkably similar. Better to not repeat the past, I think. He kisses me. A different kiss than our first. Wetter, softer. His lips are freshly cut aloe rubbed into my sunburned skin. But, in this metaphor, I guess he is also the sun, and my forgetful lack of sunscreen. At least I will be sun-kissed for the summer.
Days later, I sit at home writing, like always, wanting company. His company. A friend invites me to go for a walk and meets me at the corner of Milwaukee and Drake, and I am relieved by this affirmation that others remember I exist. Although, my friend confesses that she often hesitates to text me. She assumes I am busy. Sometimes I am. But I spend most of my time avoiding emails or text messages. And also online shopping. I cannot miss the SSENSE sale. 60% off! I don’t know why I find this remarkable; SSENSE is always having a sale. I am never shopping for anything specific anyway. Perhaps just the possibility of realizing a new version of my womanhood.
I recently bought a Comme de Garçons perfume without smelling it beforehand. The fragrance notes: patchouli, vetiver, oud. The website has a disclaimer to explain the oud is made from sustainably-sourced mold-infected agarwood extracted from Aquilaria trees grown in Southeast Asia. I read the Wikipedia page for agarwood in bed, rapturous. Agarwood forms from resin produced after bulbous, broad-headed Ambrosia beetles penetrate the tree, the resin a defense mechanism, a bandaid to seal these open wounds. The resin-soaked agarwood becomes intensely aromatic as it ages. Most harvested agarwood is induced nowadays. Aquilaria trees are now critically endangered. Farmers make holes in the tree with screws, cut away large swathes of bark with a hatchet, or simply beat the tree trunk with a hammer.
This image makes my new perfume feel more precious. All those trees are perforated with unnecessary holes so that I can smell like sawdust and wet soil. I wonder if I should feel guilty. This violence seems contrary to my sense of self. I believe I am kind, that I would never intentionally cause someone or something else pain, even a tree. My thoughtless consumption undermines my sense of self; I cannot recognize myself. And I am unable to sleep. I worry for a moment if it is because I am in bed beside Z, but I find the way he wraps his arms around me—like the velvet interior of a violin case enveloping its instrument—reassuring.
A couple weeks earlier, Z showed me an old photo from the month that we met and said, You’ve changed so much since we first met. Yeah, I’m not a blonde twink anymore, I replied, unsure how to articulate the unease this acknowledgment of my transformation caused. Maybe I became unrecognizable the moment the surgeon’s scalpel touched my forehead. My chin is weaker, less gloating. And no one compliments my jawline anymore. But it’s unbecoming to express doubt or regret, so I simply said, You’ve changed a lot, too. When Z wakes the next morning, he asks how I slept. Very little. He softens his voice, You should have woke me up.
And tell him I forgot A’s birthday, again? Even though I wrote it in my planner twice: in a list on the inside of the reverse cover and on the date itself. But I did not open my planner that week. Last year I got her a Persian cookbook with a picture of crispy, golden tahdig on the royal blue cover. I suggested we should make a recipe together, but we never did, and I occasionally think to ask her if she’s ever used it herself, but I don’t because I am afraid that she will admit my gift lacked a functional use, becoming sentimental clutter instead, merely proof that I remembered her birthday at least once. And I forgot Becky and Nick’s eight-year anniversary. Three years ago, I called ahead and paid for a pitcher of red sangria for their dinner at Cafe Ba-Ba-Reeba to surprise them. My thoughtfulness waxes and wanes, an atrophying muscle.
I left Z sitting on his balcony and climbed into his bed. I wanted to live here with Z, once. Tucked underneath the comforter, I noticed a spider on the ceiling directly above me. It was larger and darker than the ghostly white spiders that I sometimes find in my apartment. The spider was simply a spider, but I couldn't help feel that it’s presence was also a possible sign, even though I recognized I should stop searching for symbols in the banal, yet the spider was there above the bed, where we fuck and sleep and read, when it could be in any other corner of the apartment, above his fish tank, or behind the banana plant, and I hesitated to squash it with my book because I was reluctant to leave a bloodied stain on Z’s ceiling. Instead, I fetched a drinking glass from the kitchen, pressed the mouth of it to the ceiling, and dragged it slowly across the drywall until the spider lost its grip and dropped to the bottom of the glass. The spider began to scurry up the side of the glass. I slipped the parking ticket Z got the other day over the top and carried the glass to the living room, where I handed it to him. I asked him to release the spider on the balcony because I didn’t want to confront my other fear: heights. Another possible symbol, but I fell asleep too quickly this time.
On Sunday, I decided to stop at Mount Sinai Resale Shop. I was early for dinner at Becky and Nick’s apartment. They were at the grocery store, and I no longer knew the code to their front gate. There was a fundraiser auction for Palestine a block away. But I was two hours late. And I was broke; I had $9 in my checking account until the following Friday. Bad form, I thought, to attend a fundraiser late and without money to donate. I would see if Mount Sinai still had the dresser, a white Crate & Barrel dresser with pink acrylic handles. I almost bought the dresser the afternoon Z and I fought, starting the argument that would end our relationship. I circled the store, vaguely curious to see if it was further discounted. But the dresser was gone. A better outcome, I thought, since I could not afford it regardless and had no way of easily moving furniture. As I exited, a woman holding a white vase stopped me. Wow, you smell incredible, she exclaimed. She hesitated, as if she wanted to say something else. I smiled, elated. Thank you. I did not think about the dresser any further. Instead, I spritzed the perfume on my wrist and dabbed it on both sides of my neck before returning to his bed.
Image: Salman Toor, The Reader, 2022.