Mojave Rain

He promised me coffee…not Starbucks (too stuck up he said), and not Dunkin’ (I have something better). He didn’t want to meet in the silvery light of a November afternoon, sipping drinks in the front seat of his Impala convertible. And he didn’t want to take a walk at any of the beaches that beckoned from Marblehead to Revere. No, for the first date he insisted on showing me his espresso machine and promised a perfect cup of Italian roast. He sang the praises of its masterful mechanism and offered to grind the beans for my pleasure. I didn’t have the heart to tell him I preferred tea, that my mother was British and I’d grown up on endless cups of Earl Grey and Scottish Breakfast, perfectly steeped, with a spoonful of raw honey. I didn’t share that my heart rocketed out of my chest when I drank coffee. Nor did I reveal that I’d never gone to a man’s house before meeting him first publicly. And I certainly didn’t add that the last time I even went on a date with someone I truly desired was two decades ago, when I danced to Springsteen’s “Love is an angel disguised as lust,” and wore skin-tight Guess jeans secured at the ankles with a row of my mother’s safety pins.

I did not tell him that his photos on the dating app hit every note, that he had that “edge,” that leading man, bad-boy scruff, pomaded, brooding-eyed glamour I’d always hunted for but never found…the full-lipped sneer that said, “I could throw you down—make you mine,” the glimmer in the murky eyes that promised a day spent in the cocoon of his man cave would be the perfect medicine.

And why did I need this panacea? Because, as I slipped into the driver’s seat and headed his way, dressed like the waif I once was in skinny jeans, silk shirt, and elegant high-heeled boots (rather than the Converse high tops of my youth), I knew that my soul even more than my body craved his presence, and that he somehow possessed the key—that possibility of erasure. And by erasure I meant the undressing of all my wounds so that if I dared allow him to unbutton my blue blouse, yank down my tight zipper, and slip his huge, square hands inside the skin-heated warmth of my jeans, cupping the curves of my most private self, I believed (the way old church ladies believe, kneeling at the altar, crossing themselves), that the past with all its markings would not just disappear from my wrists, neck, legs, arms, and even the side of my head where my husband’s fist had knocked me into total darkness (marked by a few stars just like in a kid’s cartoon), but that these wounds would no longer feel tattooed beneath my skin, sealed into the muscle, and fiber, and blood—the very cells of my being. The pain would finally go silent in my marrow. And I would feel free again.

I needed to be free. That’s why I said yes, to this crazy first date after only two weeks of texting. Yes, to pulling up to the old Victorian where he lived on the first floor. Yes, to the last quick glance in my rearview mirror and application of lip gloss. Yes, to walking up the flagstone path, cut through the cracks with dandelion clocks—just waiting for wishes. And yes, to hitting the buzzer and waiting, heart in my throat, as I finally heard his heavy footfall, thump, thump, down the hall and the door burst open. And there he stood, six foot three, broad as a linebacker, dressed in worn jeans and a gray ribbed sweater, his hair still shining wet from the shower, and smelling of a cologne I would never forget…something like cedar and longing, sandalwood, bergamot, lemon, and dark vanilla with a twist of the impossible….

”Hello, Miss,” he said, and that’s what he would always call me. Not my name. No, I never heard him say it, though I often wondered if he thought it…in the years that followed. He took my coat and hung it on an old wooden stand, next to his own and then I followed him through the shadowy rooms filled with bachelor debris (just as I imagined), even some candles burnt down to a puddle of wax on dessert plates left in front of the fireplace where a blanket lay mangled, still imprinted by the form of some previous woman. Obviously I was not the first, nor would I be the last, but I knew I would be the most memorable because already, for no reason I could explain, as I leaned against his kitchen table and watched him flip the switch on his gleaming coffee machine, I felt my heart go to him, almost against my will, with a cupid’s arrow ferocity, bullseye—this was the one. Yes, this was him. From the top of his dark head, one loose strand swooping over his brow, to the furrow of his focus as he slid the handle into position, filter loaded, and then watched out of the corner of his eye, taking me all in. Was I what he wanted or even expected? Could he tell I was nervous, that my throat felt dry, that my heart was hitting my ribs like a bird trying to escape its cage?

“I’m sorry,” I heard myself blurt out, “but do you have something different I could drink?” Oh why did I say that?

His face fell. “I thought you wanted to try my coffee?”

“I do but…espresso makes me feel like I’m having a heart attack.” I should have said that days ago, told him about my heart murmur. But he was already reaching up into a high cabinet, and as he did so his sweater lifted and I glimpsed the hard lines of his back. Now my heart was really murmuring, fluttering, wanting…What’s wrong with me? I thought. Calm down. Play it cool.

“I have a great Merlot,” he turned, holding out a dusty glass. “I used to bartend—you know the whole struggling actor thing.” I took it gratefully; I needed liquid courage more than he would ever know.

“Merlot’s perfect.” I watched him uncork the bottle in one, expert motion. Pop! The sound felt like a small gun going off in my gut and with it my mind burst out of the blocks, moving ahead to the inevitable…music thrummed from his bedroom, Depeche Mode, “Let me take you on a trip, around the world and back, and you won’t have to move, just sit still…” and I could see…feel…what would soon unfold. But first, the soothing small talk. The learning about him…the learning about me.

I held out my glass. He filled it from a bottle with a bold bear logo. I laughed inwardly, remembering how my teenage daughter had said, when I first shared his acting headshots: “You should call him ‘The Bear.’” He did have an imposing presence. And with his half-slitted eyes looking down at me he seemed fresh out of hibernation.

“Mojave Rain,” I smiled up at him, noting the name on the bottle, “Like the song?”

He shrugged. “Never heard of it.”

“I improvised violin on it just last week with a band.”

His eyes lit up. “You should play for me some time.”

“I will…” I trailed off, taking a sip and letting the warm, chocolaty notes burn down my throat and ignite my face. I always blushed when I drank wine, like a teenager with a crush, and I might as well be that…he was so everything, so absolutely the right storm cloud brewing in my desert. “Tell me about your acting?”

“I kind of fell into it, met this woman when I was lost…in my twenties.” He paused for a moment, as if conjuring her, some magnetic muse of the past, then downed the rest of his coffee. ”She believed in me…said I should try for film and stage. I had that ‘look,’ you know.”

Oh, yeah, I know…I flashed him another smile. But he didn’t seem arrogant, more like a man shouldering the weight of some gift he’d never asked for.

“I was a football player with a two-year college degree working at UPS when I landed my first role on Days of Our Lives.”

“My best friend’s mom was so addicted to that show; she expected me to know all the characters—talked about them like they were part of her family. Bet she loved you!”

Two glasses later, my empty stomach now full of merlot (I’d eaten nothing that morning due to excitement), I felt the rush of desire eclipse all my red flags: I don’t know him, it’s just a first date, only fools rush in… and then obliterate the remaining questions: Is it possible to love at first sight? To feel this much? To want someone you hardly know as if you’ve known them a thousand lifetimes?

It is possible, it is….

I leaned against him, felt my dizzy head go under his chin, my arms reach around his broad back, fingertips to muscles, and then the sorcery of his cologne enveloped me as his lips brushed against mine. And my mouth opened to receive the first real kiss I’d felt in years—maybe forever—the taste of bitter coffee and toothpaste and…a feeling I couldn’t quite describe. Like sunlight at a crossroads. Like the intersection of choices and stagnation. Like music and wine and the girl inside the tired woman laughing that it took this long to find her way home.

He took my hand. Led me into the bedroom. Laid me backwards on the bed. I closed my eyes in the vaulted dark. Rain pelted the windows now. Slowly, he unbuttoned my blouse. One, by, one—the silk parted, and his lips came down to own the delicate groove between my breasts. I felt my hands reach up, long fingers running through his hair, pulling him down, hard, my whole self—my electric body—arching up to meet him as the track switched to lyrics I once knew as a girl but now understood: “Precious and fragile things need special handling. My God what have we done to you…?”

Yes, what have we done? How did my inner compass—my shining truth—become so boxed up? Shut away. How did I lose direction—this girl who once clocked the 50 in such a blaze of determination she broke the high school record? This woman who knew she would study directing and light up the silver screen…how did she end up living out of her car, begging couches, begging bread? How did she sink her days into freeing her kids from broken glass and bedlam? But this must be her season. Now—as my rage amped to sexual voltage. Turned molten. Ablaze. Did he know he was holding a phoenix? Wings smoking. Sheets on fire. Arpeggio heart. Like improvisation—that moment when I seized the stage—string-sizzle, rosin-smoke, bow hairs flying. My song shot to the back wall. Standing ovation. Silence….

He watched me shimmy back into my jeans. Lace up my boots. Handed me the wine bottle—a souvenir. Kissed me at the door…twice. Watched me run to my car.

Then the deluge hit—heavens rent as if through a single hole. My windshield slammed with bucketfuls of sky. I drove, leaning forward, squinting against the madness. And then it happened—synchronicity—or perhaps by mysterious design. Mojave Rain crackling on the radio—the words beating time to the manic wipers. I sang—happy:

Can you run like the wind?

He’s got it all—

Gonna bet your soul…

Gonna get caught up in a downpour in the Mojave Rain…