Barriers
“I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray,
I hear it in the deep heart's core.”
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray,
I hear it in the deep heart's core.”
-William Butler Yeats, The Lake Isle of Innisfree, 1892
I have been running since I was four years old. I started running from people soon after. Well, I didn’t always run from people. Fourth grade, when I had first joined my grammar school cross-country team, I hated running. Unless it involved running around my yard pretending to ride an imaginary horse, I wanted no part in it. Our second race, I waited in the woods for my friend, letting her catch up so we could run the rest of the way together. I had been in first place. Coach O’Sullivan yelled at us in his Irish brogue that he would be installing cameras along the way so we couldn’t stop anymore. He made us kiss the bird poop covered rock as punishment. My friend and I went to school together for twelve years. We were co-captains in high school for our cross-country and track teams. Today, we don’t talk. We used to be friends. But she let me down, like others did in grammar school, by spreading rumors and making fun of my awkwardness. I had a sneaking suspicion she made fun of my glasses, my awkward smile that made one of my eyes look smaller than the other. I never knew what I did to deserve any of these comments. I thought there were some classes or books I should have looked into about how to grow up the right way. I felt different and no one embraced it. So how could I? I hid. Summers in Otis. Weekday afternoons riding at the barn. And later, I ran.
Women were not allowed to officially enter the Boston Marathon until 1972. Kathrine Switzer entered unofficially in 1967 under the initials, “K.V.”. The race officials assumed she was a man and the crowd in the beginning covered her from view. Except from the view of Jack Semple. He ran down the pavement, screaming and waving his arms. He wanted this woman out of his race. He tried tackling her to rip her numbers off. Her boyfriend body slammed him onto the ground and they continued. She finished the race. The first woman to do so. Today, women run the Boston Marathon almost as fast as some of the men. World famous Paula Radcliffe is only a few minutes off the men’s time, which in the marathon world, is not much at all. Women fought to be allowed to run. They were running toward progress. They proved all the men wrong that told them their uteruses would fall out or they would die of fatigue. Women were born to run, just as men were. They are a permanent fixture in the running world, equal to men, running alongside them as the crowd cheers them up Heartbreak Hill. Everyone is running toward the finish line.
I hope to one day run the Boston Marathon. I never followed the running world until I was in my junior year of high school. I could have cared less about mile splits for the pros or who just broke a world record. I was running because my parents threatened to sell my horse. Running has always been my way of achieving something else. I’ve never purely run to run. Maybe that’s why I’ve begun to hate it. I thrived on the moments when running gained me the attention of the cute track boy. The front page of the sports section on a Thursday morning. Murmurs of admiration when I ran workouts and people stood at the fence to watch. A college scholarship. People’s reactions to my running kept me going. But I was running away. I avoided real life. I let running choose college for me. I let running dictate who I thought I loved. I let running tear my body apart. Injuries kept me in a constant flux when I knew I thrived on structure. I couldn’t settle. I struggled to find some permanence in someone or something. I was running to a moment where I could stop and finally live.
Mrs. Muldowney’s ninth grade English class was taking a two month excursion through mythology. She assigned us various mythological love stories and told us to act them out in front of the class. My friend’s group picked Daphne and Apollo. They stood at the front of the class in their bathrobes, my friend holding two healthy sized tree branches behind her back as one of the boys, playing Apollo, chased her around the room yelling, “Daphne!” She cried out to her father, who turned her into a laurel tree. She whipped the branches from behind her back and raised them over her head as she stood stock still in front of the blackboard. Everyone laughed as the boy playing Apollo fell on his knees before her. I laughed with everyone else, but I was busier thinking. What does a person run from and why do they do it? Surely Daphne, a mountain nymph, saw Apollo’s good looks, his charm. He could have given her anything she wanted. Why did Daphne run? Was it out of a knowledge of the possible problems that can come from relationships with the gods? But Daphne never even gave Apollo a chance to prove that maybe he could be different, god or not.
I had great friends in high school. We were each different, but always there for each other. However, they all had the astounding capability of being able to talk to boys and have boyfriends. I sat off to the side, awkward and shy in most of those situations. I really had nowhere to run in those moments. They were all growing up without me. Arie had her boyfriend Matt, who she assuredly told us she would marry one day. Rachel was busy talking to various members of her brother’s rock band. And I silently watched the boy at track practice, knowing I would not have the nerve to talk to him.
Rachel hadn’t exactly been my closest friend once we hit sixth grade. Those years of running around the playground together seemed years and years ago. She fit in with the rest of the twenty-six students. I did not. We were friends for a little while, in fifth grade, but she told me one day that I was too immature for her because I didn’t like boys. I went home and my mother just told me that Rachel was trying to be cool. We could still be friends. She was wrong. I lost my friends, one by one. They grew up without me. Not one seemed to remember sleepovers or trips to Roller Magic, they must have been considered un-cool by this point. I missed that memo, clearly. They all dated boys in the class, sometimes switching partners every other week. I thought it was ridiculous as we were only in eighth grade. I was made fun of. I was told I was one of the ugliest girls in the class. They spread rumors that I never even heard specifically. The eighth grade graduation dance came around and no one asked me to dance. I had straightened my hair and put on make-up for the first time. No one asked me except for one boy who felt bad because we were kind of friends. I went home and cried.
I hated high school the first year. I continued my awkward stage, even though I bought contacts and tried watching what I ate. I was still afraid to try and make any friends. I knew they would turn around and do exactly what everyone had done in grammar school. They would leave me. They’d lure me into a false sense of security. I’d tell them my secrets. I’d tell them my fears. I’d tell them my loves. Then they would leave me. Interestingly enough, Rachel was the one that stood by me, mending our lost friendship in the stark white of Ms. Shea’s art room. We put our differences aside and became our own group, eventually finding a few other close friends. But I always still ran from them, afraid to share anything close to my heart for fear it would be used against me.
I wanted to be close to someone, but my fears following me from grammar school held me back. My mother just told me that I was “more mature” and had a different set of priorities. I just saw myself as unattractive and inexperienced to the opposite sex.
“People think you’re stuck-up,” Rachel told me, on a cloudy afternoon that we sat in my room, watching old YouTube videos.
“Why?”
“Because you don’t talk. And when you do, it’s in class. And you always do your homework,” she replied, picking at the already chipped pastel polish on her nails. Rachel seemed to bathe in the light of being that flippant high school student with an outsider’s view on everything.
I silently glanced away. Her and Arielle were adamant about changing how I looked, pushing me to wear make-up and buy new bras. I wanted to accept their advice, but it wasn’t that easy. Rachel didn’t remember back to Kindergarten. I had my first taste of what boys were all about when I was only about five years old. I never told anyone about nap time, keeping the sight of Kevin, with his languid smile on his pasty lips for myself.
Kindergarten had never been my favorite time of the day. The room always smelled of lunchmeat. No matter how well our high tech lunch boxes were insulated, everything seemed to wilt in the ancient coat room. Cheese turned to a watery, egg shell colored mess and my bologna felt slimy as I took a bite. Mrs. G. cleaned the desks off with something that smelled like sharp lemons. It mixed with the lunchmeat odor and made me feel sick until Mom came to pick me up.
My best friend had mysteriously disappeared during that dreary afternoon. Her towel lay in a wrinkled heap next to mine. I heard a scuffling sound.
She crawled through the desk limbs, her big blue eyes lit with excitement. Always the dutiful student, I was still attempting to nap like a champ, despite not being tired.
“I have something to show you.”
She took my arm and began dragging me along behind her before letting go, assuming I’d follow on my own by this point. She took me to a corner in the back of the classroom, obscured by desks and chairs. Kevin was sitting in the corner. I never liked Kevin. I don’t know why. He made me feel nervous. His blue eyes never fully connected when he talked to you. Even as a child I knew when someone was really listening and when they weren’t. He sat there in his polyester navy blue uniform pants and light blue oxford shirt. He had a smug expression on his face as we inched our way toward him.
“Kevin has a surprise for us.”
Kevin unzipped his pants, the zipper making an awful ripping noise. He nonchalantly pulled them down, underwear included. I just stared. My friend smiled and inched closer.
“He’ll let you kiss it. He said he likes it.”
She demonstrated exactly what she meant. My eyes widened at the sight and I’m scurrying at the speed of light back to the safety of my horse towel. Our teacher was at her desk, lost in a romance novel somewhere else.
My heart thumped as I squeezed my eyes shut as tight as I could. I buried my face into my nap towel, smelling the moldy, lemon scented cleaner aroma of the carpet through its rough surface. I made sure everyone thought I was sleeping, but I wasn’t. I kept seeing Kevin. Way too much of Kevin. I knew it was wrong and I can’t honestly say why it affected me so much. I had always been a little more on the timid side, but this just put me over the top. I wanted to throw up that damn bologna sandwich. My stomach still turned as Rachel and I lay upside down on my bed, heads hanging off the side, the tips of our hair brushing the nubby mauve carpet. She would never understand.
Professor Saunders sat down and told us that we needed to pick a piece of art to write an ekphrastic poem about for our workshop next class. Moment of panic. Write about art? Then, I remembered back to fall of my freshman year in history when, flipping through the musty textbook pages in boredom, I stumbled upon “The Kiss”, by Rodin. Solid rock that curves and flows with all the love and nurture of real human beings. Paolo and Francesca. Two lovers, completely lost in each other, in their moment. I wanted that.
I see the Rodin statue and I think of Paul, and not just because of the similarity in names. I imagine him holding me, brushing my jaw line so softly that I can’t feel the rough edges of his callused hands. I like to think that we can sit in the same pose as Francesca and Paolo. I have my own Paolo now. Or, like every other romantic, I like to think I do.
Paul and I first met in Otis, on the Reservoir, when I was turning into a cross-country and track crazed “runner girl”. My life was becoming enveloped by mile splits and blisters that covered brand new white socks in permanent blood stains.
I saw him on my dock that first day and vehemently told myself that I didn’t like him. I really didn’t give him a chance. I was just being stubborn. Arielle happened to be with me.
“Why don’t you talk to him?”
I shrugged and squinted at her through my oversized sunglasses.
I eventually did date the track boy I thought would never notice me. Track runners have a phrase called “speed goggles”. Guys will date certain girls because they run fast, thus making them seem attractive. This boy had “speed goggles”. Or even if he didn’t, I really don’t think he was drawn in by my scintillating personality. He ended up asking me out because I was fast. I can unashamedly say that I said yes based on his looks. Nothing grounded our relationship. He was dull and my sarcasm went right over his head. Never failed. I had run harder to gain his attention, as well as some place I could call home. Running had brought me to the wrong place, in this case. Paul didn’t even know I was a runner when we first met. On that July afternoon, I wasn’t giving him a chance. But, maybe Arie was right this time around.
She kept staring at me before we both turned to look out at the setting sun and the rough lake that was being churned by the wind.
“Paul could be a perfect summer fling,” she said. Arielle was the relationship advice queen. She thrived on relationships and trying to solve any problems, from minor arguments to sex. She was good, too. I hated to admit she was almost always right.
“He seems fun and really nice. And besides, he’s easy on the eyes,” she said with a laugh.
“Arie, enough.”
He showed up, every day. Arielle would call and ask if I was spending time with him. And I was. Always after noon, because he slept late. He drove his boat a few houses down to my weathered gray dock. Any free moments were filled with him. He called me on a late August night. We had only known each other three weeks.
“So, um, do you like think we’re more than friends?” he asked in a lowered voice. Maybe his brother was in the next room, eavesdropping.
I simply told him that I thought we were. His response was “cool beans”. Who says that anymore? I didn’t want to laugh and make him feel more awkward. I was new to the whole scenario as well, so I just smiled into the phone and gave him another yes. I was ready to finally give him a chance.
Everyone else saw it, at least a week before the phone call. How he watched me a little too long while we stood on the dock, waiting to say goodbye as the sun set on our wind burned faces. Or following me on the jet ski and sitting in Dismal Bay, just dipping our toes in to make swirling whirlpools in the inky black surface. I could feel myself starting to change.
I let him hold my hand, his fingertips brushing mine, signaling that he wanted to lace his rough fingers with my bony ones. I never hesitated. We would fall asleep on the coach watching “Invader Zim”. His mom would angrily call and he hastily pulled his shoes on before hopping out the door. He would let out a low whistle as he sat down on the collected condensation on the seat of his quad. I watched him grin at me in the dim light from our back spotlight. He was always late for curfew.
He realized, like I knew he would, that while I let him hold my hand, I was never truly comfortable. We were lying on the roof of his parent’s camper pontoon boat. They were watching the stars on the chairs beneath us. He held my hand and I closed my eyes, listening to our even breaths as they synchronized with the breeze and the waves. I heard a fisher cat scream, a baby’s cry through the midnight woods. We just stayed there like that until his Dad made him drive the boat home.
“Why didn’t you kiss me last night?”
I turned my head to look at him, a little taken aback.
“I don’t know.”
“Don’t you want to?”
I told him yes. I thought that I really liked him. But inside, I was shaking. What if I was bad at it? What if I ended up not liking him after? What if I let him take this little piece and he ran away with it and hurt me? All these thoughts jumbled in my head. He finally took control of the situation. We were sitting in my boat one night and he pulled me to him and very gently kissed me. For the first time. I was sixteen.
I was letting go of childhood, whether I knew it or not. I was taking that first step to the next tumultuous six years. I wanted to run. But my dad wasn’t a river god, capable of turning me into a beautiful laurel tree. I shrank away from Paul’s touch. It was the one thing I wanted the most, but also what I feared above all else. I didn’t know if he would be different from my classmates. He could decide one day that I wasn’t worth the time. I couldn’t live with giving part of myself away only to have it ripped apart.
I look at “The Kiss” and think of how freely they hold each other, letting their bodies fall into place. Art tells people that love is something to be desired. It makes the impossible happen. Love emanates from cold, immovable stone. Love happens in the unlikeliest of places and at the unlikeliest of times. I think love happened on a creaky gray dock, covered in spider webs and lake weed, with the waves gently rocking it back and forth. Love happened with someone I never imagined it happening at all. I was realizing that my life was not a fantasy, it wasn’t perfect, and it most certainly wasn’t predictable. But it was mine.
“That’s a pretty drawing,” Grandma said. She was babysitting me and my brothers that night.
“Her name’s Laura. She’s a movie star,” I happily told her, in my squeaky seven-year-old voice. Little did she know that this beautiful person was secretly me.
I always had these mini fantasies when I was young. My neighbor Emily and I would sit in her room, dressed in our mothers’ old high school dresses and heels. Her crush of the moment was Nick Carter, that Backstreet Boy. Mine was always fictionalized. Made up with some name I thought I liked. I think it was Jason in third grade. We would concoct adventures where our men would rescue us and kiss us under the darkness of her bed at the end.
On nights I couldn’t sleep, I’d re-enact my own stories in my head. I wanted this. My love would help me rescue some people or we’d escape some major tragedy and he’d passionately kiss me, cradling me. I had seen clips on TV when Mom wasn’t looking. But who would really want me? No boys at school ever expressed interest. They had laughed at me, called me ugly, moved away when the teacher made them stand in line next to me. My imaginary boys loved me because I would always be this glamorous, perfect person. I was different in my stories. I was blonde with blue eyes. I could do anything. They wanted to be with me. I was strong and no man would run away with my love. But that’s what I really was afraid of. By letting Paul in with a simple kiss, I was giving him the chance to hurt me.
I let Paul kiss me that night, and many times after. But I wasn’t comfortable. I never really reached for him. And when I told him it was over two months later, I felt little remorse as I never connected to him. I never hated him. I was afraid of him. I didn’t want to let it go any further because he might actually begin figuring me out. He might learn my secrets. And then he’d see I had nothing exciting to offer him. He’d leave me. I made excuses. His nickname of “Addie-bu” was quickly gaining mocking remarks from friends and family. I crinkled my nose at it every time to show mock displeasure, even though I loved what it meant to both of us. So I left him before I could fall in love. I didn’t know I had already fallen.
What I quickly forgot once we closed up our lake house for the summer, was that Paul had been my escape. He let me run from the complications that waited for me back home. He made me feel special, beautiful. I didn’t have to pretend and live through my made-up stories. He thrilled me every time he kissed me under the flickering spotlight behind my garage. Mosquitoes buzzing in my ear alongside the shuffling footsteps of my sleepy father as he hurried to the screen door to spy.
That next year, all it took was one crooked smile and a rude comment about how I looked pale and I wanted him back those first few days of summer. We weren’t the same people anymore. I had taken that innocence and smashed it with my dumb excuses, ignoring him all winter when he tried reaching out to me through a brave phone call. I would hastily click the “ignore” button or answer just to be cold, unapproachable. I thought I had grown in those few months with him. He had given me that first push toward some confidence, but it was a false confidence. I melted with the snow and ice.
It worked for maybe three months longer than the first shot. Megan, my Otis friend since we were toddlers, had heard some interesting rumors from the boys.
“Did you hear what Paul said to the boys?” she asked me, carefully painting a line of red nail polish on her big toe.
“No,” I warily replied.
“He told them he’s just getting back at you, using you,” she said. “He’ll leave you by the end of summer after he gets what he wants.”
She looked up at me, searching my face for a reaction. I got up and walked out to the deck, letting the lake wind pick my hair up and I shut my eyes. This was a joke. He didn’t want me back because he still had feelings for me. This was revenge. I thought of how he had held me in the boat the previous night, holding me like a precious china doll and asking continually if I was ok. My lips were soft from his continually pressing to mine. I remember nodding and hugging him closer to me, finally attaining that closeness I had thought I wanted. It had been an act. He wanted to hurt me like I had hurt him.
I brusquely walked inside, rushed past Megan, and shoved my still wet polished toe nails into my running shoes and ran down the driveway and into the dusty lake drives. I heard the beep as Paul’s boat pulled up to my dock. My stride slowed. I heard Megan yell “hey boys” and then run down to the boat. They waited. I turned around and went down to the dock and ripped my shoes off.
“Hey babe,” he said, hooking an arm around my waist and pulling me into the boat. He put me on his lap and played with my hair as the music blasted and we cruised down the main drag of the lake. We were the kids of summer. He had just been acting tough, I told myself.
I never stopped running, physically. It had gotten me things I thought I wanted. I was known by pretty much every single person in my high school, as well as people familiar with the state cross-country circuit. I gained confidence. Running was where I could zone out for an hour and a half. People walking would make joking comments like, “There’s a speed limit here!” or “How many miles today?” One guy told me I would be a great marathoner one day. My favorite was when they asked me my mile pace and I could proudly say I run a seven minute mile for ten plus miles. The impressed look I received would be enough to fuel me for another five miles at least. I felt some importance in my running. I felt like I had finally gained a presence. Not to mention, I saw a change in my body. I saw myself as a more attractive athlete.
I pulled Paul into the running world. He joined the team at his school to try and impress me after we broke up for the first time. In the end, he found friends through it. He thanks me to this day for getting him involved. I still laugh at him because he would join me on runs in the summer and walk up the hills.
“There’s something wrong with you,” he would wheeze as we climbed the hill.
I just laughed easily, my summer training making the hill seem like a speed bump.
He tackled me onto the side of the road, ignoring the fact we were both sweating profusely. He kissed me as it started to rain.
“Nice try. You still have to run up this hill,” I said, un-sticking myself from his saturated body.
“Don’t be such a hard ass,” he said, taking off in a sprint up the last 50 meters of the hill.
I shook my head and ran after him. This time, I was chasing him.
Daphne was considered Apollo’s first love. Who has trouble remembering their first love? Their first kiss? Mine was perfect. Under a full moon, lying on the bench seat of my ski boat. I could see every star and hear every breaking twig. It was as clichéd as the movies make it. Paul likes clichés. But what I remember most is finally feeling something. I always thought back on it and was embarrassed.
The Kindergarten situation made me embarrassed. As I got older, I grew more and more self conscious. I was timid. I knew that there was some important connection to what had happened and that it was wrong. Later, in eighth grade, my looks made me feel worthless. I felt that since I was already crowned ugliest girl in class I might as well stop trying. Even Megan made me feel inferior in Otis. Her skin always bronzed in the sun. Mine did not. She had confidence as she ran about in just her bikinis. I covered up. I used running as a distraction. I threw myself into it because that would get me what I wanted. I thought it would give me confidence. That did not just happen. Somehow, Paul got me to trust him. He went slow. But he was persistent. I told him I was scared. Told him I had absolutely no idea what I was doing. He put a finger to my lips and told me to relax, everything was alright. I left Kindergarten behind. I left grammar school behind. I started growing up, slowing down while still moving forward.
My mother is very proper. Anything sexual is a taboo in our house. I used to punch my brother’s crotch during bath time when we were little and my mother put me in time-out on the cold, gray toilet seat. She told me punching Mike’s “private parts” was not lady-like.
She has a predetermined view of who I should be dating. Paul wasn’t a Catholic boy. He swore. He was rude. He was arrogant. She had a laundry list. She’s only looking out for me. Yet, I’m on my own, feeling my way through this life with my feet going first. She says she never wants to control who I date, but I still find it difficult to talk to her about him. I’m nervous even bringing him up sometimes, my stomach doing flip flops and my face grows hot. Never in a million years could I tell her about Kindergarten. I figured everything I did was wrong.
“What’s wrong?” Paul asked. I hadn’t realized I was shivering in his arms.
“Nothing,” I replied, looking up at the moon as he pulled the tartan blanket tighter around us.
“Love you,” he said, with a kiss.
I think back to that first kiss. I was scared in that moment. Scared of giving myself away. But no matter what, I would give anything to go back to that very moment. Daphne’s first and only love was in the forest around her. She scorned the idea of marriage and love towards a man. Apollo ignored this, implored her to look at him differently, “Stay. I am not a foe. Do not fly me as a lamb flies the wolf, or a dove the hawk. It is for love I pursue you. You make me miserable, for fear you should fall and hurt yourself on these stones and I should be the cause.” She ignores him and is turned into a laurel tree. Apollo fashions his wreath of victory from her branches, still admiring her every trait.
Daphne, however, was smart. She is someone I hate and admire. She knew that she would hold Apollo’s affections for only a short time. There would be no happily ever after. So she ran away. I ran away too. Well, I tried to at first. I was afraid of that same lack of permanence. My whole life had been filled with instabilities. Paul was like any boy. There would be prettier girls who did more exciting things. But what if Daphne had loved him back? What if Apollo really wanted to be with just her, forever? Wouldn’t she maybe want to give him a chance? I had started loving Paul back. At this point, he would hurt me if he left no matter what.
We spent one entire summer fighting. I let my brother and his friend put whipped cream all over the inside of his car. They even left him a signed note amidst the dripping dairy condiment. They signed it “Mike and DJ, the dudes you wish you could be” and “Addie, the girl you’ll never have”. Paul blamed me for the entire thing. We made up right before I left for college. He apologized for calling me some pretty awful names. I apologized for aiding in the defilement of his Subaru. Then we slowly managed to stitch our relationship back together. There were a few bumps, but nothing major until he left for school a year later, during the fall of my sophomore year of college.
Distance is hard for any couple. I let my imagination run away with me. I let overconfident “boy-talk” determine what I believed and why. I imagined wild parties. I imagined a girl I could never equal. Does he tell her she’s beautiful, too? Does he run his hands all over her body, his eyes glazed soft under their drunken haze? Probably. I know it. He closed his eyes and kissed her. Hard. I see her clutching at his shirt before she throws it on the floor. I think, for a moment, of Kindergarten. How she kissed him, this perverse look of curiosity on both of their faces. Their blue eyes sharp and staring from beneath lowered eyelashes. I can see him help her shimmy her too-tight shorts down. I shut my eyes tight and feel like I’m outside the door listening. I feel dirty with these thoughts. Unattractive. Abused. Wasted. Foolish. My insecurities eat at me from the inside. Our past flaws galvanize these thoughts.
I think what hurt the most was that feeling that he wasn’t thinking about me, missing me, like I missed him. Exteriors hide turmoil. Paul and I look “adorable” at first glance, holding hands or him twirling one of my stray curls between his fingers. Rodin’s statue was an original piece of an even larger project for The Gates of Hell which was based off Dante’s Divine Comedy. The background of the two lovers, Francesca and Paolo, states that they were the two members of an affair. Francesca was actually promised in marriage to Paolo’s older brother. He was sent to her with a message one day and the two fell in love, continuing to see each other in secret even after the marriage. Both cheating on their significant other. An onlooker to the statue wouldn’t know this without being told or reading it beforehand. They simply look completely enthralled by the wonders of passionate desire. But there’s always that back story.
Paul and I have our faults. I pushed him away, telling him that he was too immature or we couldn’t handle the distance. Now, I hold him too tight. He refuses to use a telephone to call at night. How long does it take to answer a two word text message? Not long. Our fights seem superficial later on. We both have flaws and they magnified when we pushed ourselves together.
Rachel sees my relationship with Paul better than anyone. When I first introduced them the second year that Paul and I were dating, he could not remember her name. He called her Sarah. Rachel wrinkled her nose in disdain. She has no qualms about making her displeasure known. She sarcastically called him “Eli.”
“Well, if you can’t get my name right, I can’t get yours right, ‘babe’,” she said, raising an eyebrow at his confused face.
She’s seen us through it all. She was the friend that turned down a jetski ride with a wink because she wanted me to go spend some time alone in Dismal Bay. She pulled out an old notebook and settled down on the dock, her bug-eye sunglasses lower on her face so she could watch us drive away over the top of them. She’s always been there. She’s brutally honest with me at all times, but she’s there. I distinctly recall her walking down a dark dorm hallway, mascara most likely smudged from the previous night, yelling into her phone, “Do you want me to come up there and kick his ass?” She gave me the poem “The Lake Isle of Innisfree” in my freshman year of college, when I was struggling with having her being so far away at Florida State.
Rachel admits that as a best friend, it’s her duty to not like the boyfriend. But she knows Otis. “And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow.” This is Otis. This is Paul. I’ve run and run and run. I’ve come back to this spot where it started and stopped. Otis. Innisfree, an island on Lough Lake in Ireland, is off on its own. Away from the crazy scramble of the rest of the world. It’s about a place where a person can just exist. Yeats’s poem comes from spending his childhood at this lake. Otis has been my childhood, my adolescence and my present.
I went to Otis a few weeks ago. The snow still shimmered on the ground and the lake was still lying dormant under its heavy coat of ice. I got out of my old Buick and looked to the doorway of 77 Lakeview Lane. There he was. Smiling his crooked grin, flop of hair reaching over his blue eyes. He swings me up into his arms and hugs me tight to his body.
“How’s my beautiful Bella? I missed you,” he says.
We are just two people existing, in our surroundings and in each other. Paolo and Francesca. We have a back story, but it is simply that. It no longer defines who we are other than our hurdling the barriers. I wish to be stone, frozen in time.
My car breaks down and he drives me back to school. I cry the next morning when he goes to leave, knowing a long month stands between me and his next visit. While I was in class, he had covered my room in hidden Post-It notes. I finally found the last one.
“I love you, babe. You are going to have a great day!”
I smile and cry more because he’s not there.
So what exactly do I run from? I ran from anything that I thought would hurt me. I took no risks until I met Paul. Our relationship is the curse of a first love. That memory of being those two awkward teenagers, hurting each other and growing up together makes it difficult to run away. We’ve hurt each other and we’ve healed. Daphne ran. The smarter thing to do. She ran and allowed herself to be turned into a laurel tree, escaping the possibility of any connections being made. Apollo still kept that little piece of her for himself, his love frozen in the admired action of victory. Rodin’s statue is really about an affair. Francesca and Paolo are perfect, frozen in time, hiding their tragedy. There is something permanent in each story. Paul and I can disintegrate, but I’m not afraid of the hurt. I’ll always have a piece for myself.
Running has worn itself out. It’s like a job now. My feet always ache, my knees crackle as I climb the stairs. Paul hates how much I run because he thinks I’m slowly killing myself. Maybe I am. A partially torn Achilles, micro tears in my hamstrings, a stress fracture on my fibula; the list is miles long. These injuries make me hate the sport. There’s no carefree joy in it anymore. There are just dollar signs for an education I’m not sure I ever wanted. I’ve come to the point where I’ve stopped running away. I’m not scared anymore. Forget the back story. I think Rodin’s statue is about love and desire in its simplest of natures. I think Daphne should have given Apollo a chance. I waited for Paul. I waited for him to fuck up. I waited for him to grow up. All because he waited for me. It’s time to start living life at something other than race pace. I don’t want to hit the finish line too soon.
