06 August 2017 nonfiction "Dinner With Max's Mom"

I’m not used to writing about people when I’m happy with them. it’s just not something that comes as naturally to me as writing about ended relationships, or missed connections, or people I’ve come to understand as gone from my life.

But tonight I’m missing you terribly, and I’m picturing that night I had dinner with your mom while you were at work.

I’m sitting there, pushing around pieces of feta and whole cherry tomatoes that I retrieved in bulk from the salad bar, and with a sudden courage, I turn my face up to your mom and ask her “What do you think will happen when I go to California?” Because time is winding down and I’m starting to wonder myself how I’m supposed to just give up something I’ve fallen so deeply into.

Who can know what the future holds, right? And after she’s asked me exactly what I mean and I’ve qualified the question by explaining what I stand to gain and learn from California, she tells me more about how you’ve never brought a girlfriend home so quickly, and how you don’t like to be touched, and how the night before graduation, the one that was supposed to be our last night together, she knew you really liked me because you fought hard to be able to sleep in your dorm room with me one last time. She explains that she understands we will be heartbroken for a while when I leave, and that she is confident in your ability to hold on to people, even when it seems like they’re supposed to drift away.

Something lights up in my head, and I start to understand that yeah, you have had the same friends for a while, you’ve made time to keep friendships going even when things get busy. I don’t want to simplify myself into being another person you’ve created a place on the shelf for, but there’s something kind of beautiful about this side of the metaphor of collecting people. It isn’t that you collect people to be of use to you, you just seem to collect them in general, the way I’ve learned to collect strange little details and stories, storing them away so I can dust them off later and enjoy the unique way they still fit in.

Our food arrives, and I’m glad to have ordered what I did because I’ve learned to love mushroom sauce, and the chicken isn’t so big that my continuing this conversation with your mom will slow down my eating to an unacceptably slow pace.

Your mom tells me she really likes me. And that if you come out to California to see me and decide not to come back, she won’t like me so much anymore. We laugh, then she says that in all seriousness, she can tell that I make you truly, genuinely happy. The way she loves you and wishes entirely for your happiness reminds me of the way my mom loves me. You should know that’s powerful, because my mom means everything to me for the way she’s loved me.

I guess what we found in those two months kind of was like a fairytale, wasn’t it? Neither of us knew or expected it, but from the very first night we met we decided that we had found something worth keeping in each other’s company. I’d relive all the times we’ve spent together a thousand times if I could.

Your mom tells me it will be hard when I leave, and that situations like this are difficult, and relationships don’t always last through them. But regardless of what happens, she is so glad to have seen you get the same kind of happiness that she’s seen in her own life and with Eli and Cassie. It means a lot to me that I can be something so special for you, but I hope you know that I’ve always felt like the luckier one.

The next night your mom and your dad and I visit you at work, and we play a couple rounds of pool, and I drink a few beers, and you and I make eye contact when you’re breezing by my side of the bar to unload beers or some equally exhausting task. We make matching funny faces, you know that thing we do sometimes, and your dad sees, and he looks at me and then you and then he laughs, a kind, surprised type of laugh that lets me know it really is true—you don’t get like this with other girls.

I’m happy to be the girl for you that the two bartenders you work with say they’re glad I’m your girlfriend because I’m beautiful, and I’d fly home right now if it were possible, even if I would only get to kiss you once. I’m in love with what we’ve found, and even if things only get harder from here, I hope you know that I’ve been documenting memories of us because I never want a single moment we’ve had together to disappear.