I step over to the big bag, give it a little push and commence to go totally ape shit all over it.
*
“If you’re a burglar,” Tiff calls from the kitchen as I come in the front door, “please don’t hurt me. I’m not wearing a bra.” If she hadn’t parked her Honda in the driveway I would have probably jumped a foot. I forgot she was coming over tonight. She steps around the corner, wiping her hands on a red hand towel, wearing blue sweat pants, a brown tank top and, yup, no bra.
“Have you no decency,” I ask, shooting her a mock evil smile.
She bobs her eyebrows. “Nope.”
“That works for me,” I say, following her back into the kitchen. Two months ago we would have done the hug and kiss greeting. Not doing it feels awkward. Doing it would feel even more so.
“How were your classes tonight, Sam?”
She doesn’t give a rip about my classes. She used to be a little interested; at least I think she was, unless that was just more role-playing. I was role-playing, too. Looking back now, I’m amazed at how easy it was to slip into pretending, to be both the performer and the audience. My shrink said that a couple pretending does not make for a meaningful relationship. Got that right.
I drape my jacket over a kitchen chair, move over to the sink, and begin washing my hands. “Classes were good.”
“You stay after to beat the bag?”
“Yes. Sorry I’m late.” I hope my tone hides the fact that I completely zoned about her coming over. We made plans for it on the phone just this morning, but when I got to my school, it escaped my mind, ffft, like that. It’s not that I have a bad memory, it’s just that my brain has been bouncing around like a ball on a spinning roulette wheel these last few weeks, and when it stops—sometimes it doesn’t—it lands on whatever my head is going through at the moment. It skips over other things, even critically important ones, like a booty call.
She shrugs. “It’s not a problem. I just got here, anyway.” She looks at me for a moment, somehow managing to get curiosity and disapproval on her face at the same time. Thing is, I don’t care about the disapproval part. I used to, at least until it became abundantly clear to both of us that we were the mismatch of the century. Still, we went on pretending for about three more months. Maybe maintaining the status quo was easier than facing a breakup. Married couples do that all the time. For me, I liked the idea of someone wondering where I was when I didn’t get off work on time, even if that person was just pretending. That seems nutso now but that’s where my head was at the time. Why we were attracted to each other is one of those mysteries of the universe. The physical attraction was a biggee and we both enjoyed the same kind of humor. We were an attractive and professional couple in our thirties so it seemed like a logical pairing. Of course, logic doesn’t always make things right.
Tiff works part time as a legal advisor with Children’s Services Division and part time with the Public Defender’s office, the latter being part of our conflict. The other part is because I’m a cop. Now, I like to think that I might—might—have eventually learned to tolerate her defending the kinds of people I arrest, but I know that she would never learn to tolerate that my job was to “oppress the already oppressed,” as she put it about twenty times. A lot of old hippies and young granola eaters say that stuff, wave their signs at protests, and call law enforcement the “Gestapo.” Some actually believe it while the majority just want to protest something and raise a little hell. Tiff is one of the believers, a hardcore one.
Tiff took the first step to end our “relationship.” One night, when neither of us had much to say to each other and the quiet was not a comfortable one, she came right out and said that we needed to stop this, that it wasn’t healthy for either of us. I knew she was right, but since I was still in my Lawrence Olivier mode, I protested, though not all that hard. There was no more pretending for Tiff, though, not even to soften it for me. The more she spoke, the more bitter she became. She didn’t shout or call me names, but spoke quietly using words that burned into me.
“I can’t deal with what you do,” she said. “I understand it on an intellectual level, I get that we need police, but it scares me. Not that you might get hurt—”
Gee thanks.
“—but I’m scared of what it will do to your psyche. It frightens me to think what being exposed to so much violence will do to you. I’m worried that you will become bitter and angry and a racist. I hate that cops have to put on that swagger and macho bullshit air just to survive their job. I think it’s only a matter of time before you’re that way.”
I started to tell her how weak and ridiculous her argument was, how she was charging me with a crime I had yet to commit, and how she was worried about my swagger all the while she was turning into the Thought Police. Also how—
“Sam?” Tiff says, waving the hand towel in my face and bringing me back to the moment.
“Huh?”
“I said I’m still painting my place.”
I’d already determined that since she’s got gray paint smears on her fingers and tank top.
She tosses the towel to me, a move that launches her unencumbered breasts into glorious motion.
Her breasts! The sex. It was the kind that’s so frighteningly intense that you’re convinced that it’s okay to die after because life couldn’t possibly offer you anything better. It’s also why we’ve been seeing each other for booty calls. “Friends with benefits” one of my students called it when telling me about his setup with an old girlfriend. Good name. Good deal, too. So far.
About three weeks after we’d stopped seeing each other she called to see how I was doing. I couldn’t tell if she really wanted to know or if she was just feeling me out for a conjugal visit. When it comes to sex she thinks like a man, which I’ve always thought to be a real solid attribute. Whatever her reason, I was glad she called.
“Got the den to do and that’s it,” Tiff says, as I lean against the sink drying my hands. I have to think for a second what we were talking about. Oh yeah, painting her place. When we were both in the glow of the first few weeks of our relationship, we talked about her moving in with me. Dumb, I know, but we were both enamored and blind. The idea was for her to spruce up her condo to sell. Apparently, she’s still painting. My friend, Mark, would argue that she hasn’t given up on us cohabitating, but that’s not it. She knows and I know that there’s just no way. I think she just wants different colored walls.
Tiff walks over to me and places a hand on my chest. “You look better tonight than you did last week. I’m thinking the sessions with Kari are helping.”
“So are the sessions on my heavy bag. Maybe even more than the shrink.” I touch the back of her hand and smirk. “And the sessions with you, too.”
She smacks my chest. “You’re impossible. No matter how down you feel you’re always up for that.”
“Cute pun. And you’re not?”
She moves toward the refrigerator. “When do you see Kari next?”
“Tomorrow at noon. Gotta do it; she’s got the power to release me.”
Tiff pulls out a plastic bowl, pries off the lid and sniffs
