Deborah Lipp

Because I haven’t told it before.

I miss the times when we were together, when we were really being together, but I suspect, in our ten years, those times cumulatively make up three or four. The rest was breaking up, or being together but not being able to get together, or making and cancelling plans, or catching sneaky kisses in elevators.

I loved those elevator kisses.

I hear his voice in my head, even three years since I last heard it. He had a deep rolling voice that hit me like a shot of whiskey; burned the core and then moved through me, warming the fingers and toes.

I miss listening to the things he said, his infinite opinions about the world and the theater and politics and cooking and actors and things that mattered and things that didn’t matter. He taught me a trick for opening a jar and every time I open a jar I hear him.

I miss the presence. He had an aura, a weight, a just being there, sitting on the couch or in the next room or in this room, not talking. Like he generated more heat than other people. No one else ever feels that way to me. I miss that weight.

I miss the idea of the relationship. When I think about other relationships, the idea of it, the abstract, was something important or meaningful or anxiety-producing or delightful. But this one relationship, when I had it, in those moments, was peaceful. I could tell myself that I had Bob, and that was a soothing thing to hear. Even when we were apart for weeks because of scheduling, the in-between times were filled with that peace.

Which he stole from me every chance he got. Maybe it’s a mistake to love an abstract, and I think he wanted both less and more. He wanted me to have more, and he wanted to give me less and so he withdrew it all. What a martyr he imagined himself to be! Abandoning me because I deserved better. Bearing the burden, he could tell himself, of being the bad guy, to spare me. I cannot roll my eyes enough to express the bullshit. Because there was something so crazy there, so pathological, that I cannot even type up a plausible explanation for blogging purposes. He just walked. Just like that.

I miss the gin rummy.

The sex was amazing, fantastic, and my desire for him was constant and infinite, but I don’t miss the sex. If he was here now, I think I’d make him a cup of coffee, and sit across from him and look at him while he drank it, and then sit in his lap. I think about that more than I think about jumping his bones, although undoubtedly I’d jump his bones.

I don’t regret a minute.