Sid
I pull the sheet up over my naked body.
Here, in the light of first dawn, my skin is as wrinkled and crumpled as the sheet itself.
Leo is lying face down on the bed, his sculptured back and round rump silhouetted in the pale light of the morning.
I pull at the loose skin on my stomach. It tightens momentarily, but then I release it, and I again am human crepe paper.
A wave of shame and repulsion pulses through me.
“Don’t.”
Leo opens one eye.
“You are perfect.”
I will myself not to cry.
Leo grabs me, spoons me, holds me until I quiet.
“How sexy to wake up to a wrinkled, weepy old man,” I whisper into the pillow.
“Stop it,” he says. His breath is on my neck. I can feel his heartbeat. “You are perfect,” he repeats.
“You are blind.”
“No, you are perfect just the way you are,” he says.
I want to roll over to face him, kiss him, but I have not brushed my teeth, and I am worried about my breath. No, I am worried
about everything.
“What do you see?” I ask the pillow.
“Everything you do not.”
“Stop being so philosophical.”
“Stop hating yourself,” Leo says, voice firm. “Don’t diminish yourself. Don’t diminish me.”
For a moment, there is silence, that buzzing sort of silence that grows louder the longer you are quiet, more deafening the
longer you remain in your head.
Is he mad now?
Why didn’t I just keep my mouth shut?
I almost ruined our first date, and now I’ve made good on my promise. Why am I so intent on harming happiness?
Leo’s hands and arms are wrapped around my body. I should feel safer than I have my whole life, and yet this feels like a
ruse.
I don’t feel as if I deserve this.
“Sid,” Leo whispers. “Sid. It’s okay.”
The roar in my head diminishes to white noise.
Is this the way my name should be uttered? One single simple syllable suddenly so rich with nuance, emotion, passion that
it becomes not just a name but a living, breathing entity.
I think of the very few times I had sex with Rebecca.
I never uttered her name with a quivering shudder.
And she never said my name. Ever. Sex was a job meant to have an outcome: children. Three preferably. To please our parents.
Sex wasn’t even quid pro quo for us: You do this for me, I do this for you, and—at the very least—some pleasure is derived.
No, sex was perfunctory, pleasure-free, a checklist like the duty chart Ron puts up every week in Zsa Zsa. You are thrilled
when it is over, not while you are doing it.
I never yearned for sex with Rebecca, and she never yearned for me. Neither of us was ever present during our most intimate
moments.
We eventually turned our fantasies into pathetic, fleeting affairs, finding our pleasure elsewhere, alone with faces and bodies we pretended were lovers.
My anonymous encounters were in hotel rooms during the middle of the day, parked cars, restaurant bathrooms. The guilt and panic set in—as they are doing right now for me decades later—when the rush of pleasure was over and I looked into the faces of my anonymous partners and saw—and felt—nothing at all.
“Sid?” Leo asks.
“I’m still here,” I whisper.
“Good,” he says.
I am still here. Somehow. Just before the hourglass has run out of sand.
I can feel the sun lift higher above the mountain. It shines on me, warms my bare arm, which is wrapped in Leo’s.
Leo’s closeness makes me uncomfortable. I am not used to it.
He is asking for me to see myself? But what do I see?
I stare at our intertwined arms.
The striations of gold on his tan skin, or the dark spots on mine?
A body that is taut, perfect, without an ounce of fat, or a body pocked by landmines left by a lifetime of war?
And yet I have survived. To be here. Right here. Right now. Have I made it to this point so that finally—for once—I can see myself clearly?
The sunlight glimmers.
This same light, this same mountain that watches over us in the near distance will still be here long after I am gone. Shouldn’t
I view myself—shouldn’t we all view ourselves—as eternally majestic?
“Sid?” Leo asks.
“Yes.”
“Come here.”
I roll over and face this majestic mountain of a man. He smiles and caresses my hair, my cheek, my lips, my chest.
Leo kisses me.
I shut my eyes.
This is the moment writers write about, lovers relish, the lonely dream of, this moment right here when two bodies become one, and nothing else exists beyond the sound of our heartbeats.
And when it is over . . . Oh! When it is over, the afterglow of being wanted, needed, desired is so overwhelming, I exist
in a half state somewhere between alive and dead, this bed and heaven, this bedroom and that mountain, this earth and another
realm.
Leo spoons me again, and the stunning simplicity of two becoming one overwhelms me. I have been lonely for so long.
“Don’t break my heart. I don’t think I can take it.”
I intend for these words to be said in silence, only to myself, but I let them come to life because I want this to be real
for once. I want Leo to understand the magnitude of this moment to me.
Leo pulls me closer.
“I promise.”
We have kicked the sheets off the bed. There is nothing to hide. The sun has now risen over the mountain and is shining unobstructed
through the bedroom sliders.
My instinct again is to pull the sheets over my body, run to the bathroom, dress quickly and escape.
“You’re not going anywhere,” he mumbles, as if he can read my mind. “You are perfect.”
Is this what it feels like to be seen for the first time in your life? Utterly, shockingly transparent and naked?
“You are beautiful,” he adds, as if he knows his words are as necessary as oxygen.
I am beautiful?
I push my face into the pillow to hide a happy tear.
I am beautiful.
“Blueberry pancakes okay?” Leo calls into the bathroom where I am taking a shower.
“Are you the perfect man?” I call back. “Or I am dating Dexter?”
“We’re dating now?”
Why did I say that?
“You’ll find out if I’m Dexter if you survive breakfast,” he says with a laugh. “I’m also going to cook some chicken sausage,
and, oh, I made some lemon curd that pairs perfectly with the pancakes and maple syrup. I’m starving!”
“Sounds amazing.”
I hear Leo pad away on the tile, but then footsteps draw closer again.
“You are going to kill me, aren’t you?” I ask.
“Not yet. I was going to squeeze some fresh grapefruit juice, too. The Ruby Reds are amazing this year. Is that okay?”
The water suddenly feels as if it’s turned ice-cold.
Leo’s question is worse than death for men of a certain age. If you don’t understand, Leo is asking—in the most polite way
possible—Hey, can you drink grapefruit juice, or are you on a statin?
I let the water pound my head.
Leo might as well ask if I’d like grab bars installed in the shower.
Suddenly, all the sexy has rushed down the drain.
“Hello?” he asks.
“Grapefruit juice is fine!” I say in a chipper tone.
“Really?” he asks. “Great! I’ll see you in a few.”
As soon as the bathroom quiets, I get out of the shower, dry off, wrap my towel around my body, find my phone and text Esther.
SOS! Need some help! ASAP!
Text bubbles immediately appear.
Oh! Let me turn down QVC so I can focus. I just ordered a Jaclyn Smith wig. They promised I’d look like one of Charlie’s Angels. I’m just hoping it’s not Bosley.
I just had sex with the Hot Jew!
You buried the lede! He’s a journalist! Was it good? Did you remember what to do? Is your back okay?
It was amazing.
Oh! I can die now. Wait. Is that why you’re in distress? Are you having a heart attack? I’ll be right over. Do NOT tell the
Hot Jew to get dressed!
No, I feel fine. Physically. But he just asked me if I could drink grapefruit juice.
Oy vey. The kiss of death. Wait. Can you?
Yes. That’s beside the point. The point is that in the light of day he realizes I’m an old man.
Honey, I think he realized that in the dark of night. That glint in your eye was not due to longing, it was due to your recent
cataract surgery. I mean, when he caressed your skin and thought he was at a petting zoo . . .
I GOT IT!
I consider flushing my phone down the toilet, but it begins to ring. I roll my eyes, take a deep breath and walk back into
the oversized shower with fabulous mid-century tile.
“What, Esther?” I whisper.
“So truly? Was it good sex?” she asks, her voice high with excitement. “I mean, I know you can’t compare it to any other encounters because you haven’t had any since call waiting was a thing, but was it as good as—say—Sherman’s coconut cake?”
“It was like a hundred pieces of Sherman’s coconut cake.” I smile.
Esther screams. “I have to tell Talia!”
“Thanks for nothing, Esther,” I say into the tile.
I start to hit End on the cell, but she says, “Sid! Wait!”
“What?”
“Sometimes fate is tossed directly into your lap purely by accident as if the heavens have experienced an unexpected bout
of palsy,” Esther says. “Don’t take this for granted. Don’t let your mind play tricks on you. He likes you, Sid. You like
him. You’ve waited your whole life for this. I beg you: Don’t fear the possibility of heartbreak. Instead, be terrified by
the possibility of regret.”
I place my forehead against the cool, damp geometric tile and gently bump my noggin against it.
“Thank you, my friend.”
“I’ll save you a piece of coconut cake.”
I hear the doorbell ring as I hang up.
I step out of the shower and walk into the bathroom.
Ding-dong.
I lean out into the hallway.
“Leo?” I call.
I move into the living room.
“Leo?”
“I’m out here!”
I follow Leo’s voice to the sliding doors, which are wide open on this perfect morning. I see him standing beneath his citrus
trees with a fruit picker to pluck the grapefruit.
“Can you get the door?” Leo calls. “Probably . Still decorating the place.”
“Okay!” I call.
As I walk toward the front door, I finally take stock of Leo’s stunning MCM house: It is like stepping directly into Slim
Aarons’s famed photo Poolside Gossip.
The man certainly has great taste, if I do say so myself.