Chapter 38: Trouble In River City

The rest of the day was as aimless as summer days are supposed to be. I read a little, I watched videos a little, I snacked a lot, I even studied Spanish a little, then I went to bed. A perfect summer day, except no Karen. Okay, a nearly perfect summer day.

On Monday it was back to the grind. Sleep until ten, get up, have coffee, goof around, go to work. I taught my class at hapkido, with another new student in attendance. After I changed, I biked home for dinner. After we finished, the phone rang. This time Mindy broke her own record in getting to the phone, then said with some disappointment, “Tom, it’s Karen for you.”

She said hi, had I eaten yet, oh, good, can you meet me down at Mayfield’s in a while? We set a time, though I was a little puzzled, since I didn’t think she liked ice cream all that much.

But I rode down and locked my bike outside and went in to wait. As long as I was there, it would be disrespectful not to get ice cream, so Rocky Road, single scoop, in a cone. The clerk handed it to me just as Karen walked in. I motioned to the cone with a raised eyebrow, but she shook her head. “It’s nice out, let’s walk.”

So we walked past the shop windows, still lit, though most of the stores were closed. She seemed to be having a little trouble getting to her topic, because she clearly had something on her mind. But eventually she found her opening.

“I talked with my mother last night, while we were doing dishes. She brought up the day you came over for dinner. She said again how pleasantly surprised they were to find out more about you. She likes you, a lot.

“My father does, too. He has a problem with some of my other friends who seem to have no direction, just living from one party to another, so it was like a breath of fresh air to meet you.

“He and my mother talked about you, after I’d gone to bed, and they both approved of you, and even admired you. That is very high praise, coming from them.

“My mother told me she had told my dad about what she had seen on your face, and what she’d talked about with me, and they agreed that if I was to have a boy in my life, they could hardly choose better than you.”

She paused to take a lick of my cone. I suddenly felt like I was walking across very thin ice that was starting to fracture and crack, and it was a long way back to shore.

She went on, “I told you she asked me if I was in love with you, and I had said I didn’t know yet. I think she was a little nostalgic, thinking back to her first boyfriend.

“Anyway, she and my dad talked about it for awhile, and I think they were reminiscing about their first loves, before they had met each other, and going over all the things they had done wrong and right.

“The upshot is that they want me to be happy, they’re fine, better than fine, with you around, but they both agreed that they didn’t want us to be exclusive yet. I asked her what she meant by that. She answered by asking me how you made me feel when you were around. So I told her. Not about the physical stuff, she doesn’t know about that yet, thank God, but just when we’re together.

“I told her, describing it as best I could. Your insight, and making me laugh, and sharing our ideas, and how we pick each other’s ideas apart, and how you make me tingle and feel safe all at the same time.

“It’s funny, I was talking about that and she looked like it was happening to her, like she was remembering her first time. Anyway, I’m rambling a little. She said she was so happy that I got to experience that.

“Then she asked me, how would I know if it was love, or like, or infatuation. How could I tell the difference, if I had nothing against which to compare it. If I were conducting an experiment, would I run just a single test before coming to a conclusion and publishing my results?

“I had to answer no, of course, no one would do that. She said, “Where are your comparisons, your baseline? How can you tell if this falls outside the curve, if this is your only data point?” I couldn’t answer her. Then she came to her point.

“She said they would be very happy for us to keep seeing each other, but I should agree to see other people as well, that we couldn’t be exclusive, not yet.

“I was a little angry with them, and I was surprised at how unthinking my response was. I felt like they were questioning my choice, that they didn’t trust me to make the right decision. I went to bed a little annoyed with them both, but when I woke up I realized that it was not an unreasonable suggestion.

“Tom, it’s a little difficult for me to believe that there’s someone else out there with as much insight and humor and basic decency as you, who also likes me for who I am and who I want to become, and not just for my body or my looks. I don’t think there could be.

“But they raise a valid point. If we wind up together, and we haven’t spent time with other people, checking them out as it were, then we’ll always have that nagging suspicion that perhaps we made the wrong choice.”

She turned and looked at me. “I don’t want to accept that logic, but there’s nothing wrong with the logic itself. So I’ll bite my tongue, and every so often somebody will ask me out and I’ll say yes.

“I do not expect to have anything more than a pleasant evening, and every so often I may like someone enough to accept a second date with them. But I don’t think it will go beyond that. So this is the science experiment I’ve agreed to conduct for my parents.

“And having agreed to do that, I would ask you to do the same thing. Ask some other girl out every so often. Go to the movies or a concert, someplace you’ll both like, talk to her, get to know her, have fun.

“And every time you do that, do what I am going to do: Ask yourself if this person makes you happier than me. I don’t know how long they’ll expect this experiment to go on, but it won’t be forever, and we’ll still get to see each other, just not exclusively.”

She stopped talking then, looking down as we walked, waiting for me to comment. And I was dry. Every response seemed inadequate, as I examined it and then discarded it.

I finally said, “This is what frightens me, Karen. You’ll go out with some guy who suddenly realizes what a true gem he has before him, and he will be relentless in pursuing you.

“He’ll be funny and caring and smart and adoring and handsome, have plenty of money, and he’ll charm the hell out of your parents, and you’ll be overwhelmed at his confidence and charisma. And he’ll look so much better than me, that I’ll look small by comparison.

“And yes, I know that’s a little paranoid and unfair to your intelligence and insight, but that’s how I feel right now.

“I’ll do as you ask, because I have no choice, but I won’t like it, and I’ll spend the next however long being a little scared every day, wondering if today is the day Karen meets the guy who’s better than me.”

She stopped and put her arms around me and laid her head against my chest.

“Tom, you are so special. I would not have chosen this path, but I think it’s the right path, and I think everything will turn out right in the end. You still make me happy, and you still make me tingle. I think this will be fine, you’ll see.”

We walked back to Mayfield’s, a little quiet, and she said goodnight with a kiss on the cheek. I rode my bike home, full of resentment at her parents, despair that I might be seeing the beginning of the end, and a little disappointed in Karen that she had caved so easily.

Okay, I was feeling sorry for myself, but that’s what I was feeling. I avoided everyone and went to my room and lay on the bed for a long time. Eventually, I turned off the light and tried to sleep.

The next few days were pretty depressing. My logical mind told me that everything would turn out fine, she still liked me, maybe even loved me, and I still made her feel good. My atavistic mind, lurking somewhere in my brain stem, kept telling me it’s over, she’ll find someone better, you’re not good enough.

These two spent several days fighting it out. In the end, it was a draw and both fighters returned to their corners, battered and a little bloody.