I used to be a romantic, I tell her, as I take another long drink from my ice water. Condensation has built around the sides of the glass and as I sit it back onto the table, it rolls onto where a coaster might be, had we been in a better restaurant. Instead, we’re in the back of a Spanish eatery, in a booth. The cushions of the seats are the kind you imagine in your head to have rips in them and when place your hand on them to adjust your seating find that your prior inclinations about the chairs turned about to be completely true. This one in particular had been worn to the point of exhaustion. Yellow cushion pushed out and if you tugged on it, the cushion would crumble in your hand as stale bread might. Smoke clogged my air from the constant chain smoking taking place particularly in front of me, behind my date.
“What happened,” she asks, as she smiles that distant smile. She sees in my eyes that I have problems that cannot be fixed with a smile and a hug, although I sometimes dream of just those things. She knows that my life hasn’t been easy and that is what has changed me, and although I seem to get along alright in society, there are nights that I cry myself to those few hours of sleep that I get before I wake again and cry more. She sees more in me than I ever saw in myself. She sees less in me than the one that I used to know knew that I knew that I had in myself but was never sure about. I know this because she said it. Over and over again the words would pour from her lips as though they were numb and she couldn’t hold in the liquid that I needed more than her. My date smiles a bit stronger when she sees the smile in my eyes, mistaking my memories for a brush of adoration. No my dear, I am sorry, but you missed your chance. I was once strong and full but now I am weak and hollow. There is a place in my chest that I can sometimes still feel sharp broken pieces of heart pressing against and even though I asked the doctor if there was some way that he could help me with that. If only he could surgically remove the love I still feel for the one I used to know that he would know how I felt and I would know what I knew long ago, that I know nothing.
I want to tell her about the past. I want to say that someone long ago had broken my heart and shattered my soul as though it was a dinner plate and she honestly didn’t feel that she needed to clean them anymore so instead of cleaning them one last time and getting it over with, she threw it against the wall with her words. White lies will wear weary women down and brute strength is weakness. I want to tell her to run. Get up from your meal of enchiladas and beans, no rice, just like the one I used to know liked it, and sprint out of the door, as fast as your short legs will take you and I won’t chase you. I won’t blame you. I won’t cry because I am used to it. Pain has become a cold friend which with whom I am very acquainted with. I will merely sit where I am, ask for a check and take another drink of my ice water. Because honesty as they say is the best policy, but I don’t happen to own any stock in that policy so I tell her the same thing I have told all of the other in between girls while picking up my glass again and dousing the pins that stab my spirit.
“I have changed.”