Flaw Salad

We walked in silence for a while. I’d asked something too big, and I cast my eyes groundward as we moved along the sunny street. He seemed so tall beside me, and I couldn’t bear to look at him, to see that forward gaze, that set jaw, that closed-lipped certainty that remained, even after all this time, an indecipherable cocktail of truth and affect.

Shame, like the shadowy fingers of a cartoon ghoul, wrapped itself around me as I waited for him to respond.

Could he love me anyway?

Dark impulses lurked beneath my surface—a desire to hurt, to whip sharp language into exposed, fleshy weakness—and I needed help to overcome. I’d asked him to help. I’d asked him to stay.

Restaurant patios lined the sidewalk, and a murmur of casual dining scored our conversation. Through my pain and his pauses, I caught flashes of the banalities of life. Counting others’ accomplishments, or failures. Plans for what’s next. Commentary on the dish, the weather, the matinee. Everyday chatter, and I began to wonder if it could ever really be so simple.

We lumbered forward, and my spine sank lower. My shoulders hunched toward my feet. I waited.

Finally, he took my hand.

“I want you to know,” he said, “that you are not your problems.”

He wrapped his arm around my shoulders and pulled me toward him. He pulled me upward.