Simon comes home in a surly mood. He walks through the door with the determination of someone who has been dreading the very moment he is in. He hurriedly takes out the trash. He walks back in and mumbles, I tell him I have packed a bag.
“A bag? What for?” Suddenly, it is me who is ridiculous. I have packed a pair of pajamas for us both and underwear for him.
“I don’t need boxers.” This is something I ponder and quickly forget, but I do wonder how often he changes his boxers. I have also packed Boursin cheese, salami and crackers. We don’t have any money. I got fired from my last job after breaking my leg and Simon works 40 hours every two weeks. The reason I booked the hotel was for a romantic evening with him and because I had a free night at the Raphael Hotel off the Plaza. I love the hotel for its boutique charm, everyone always remembers your name during your stay and nothing is too much for them to do for you.
As we drive to our destination, I ask Simon again, what is wrong, did I possibly do something? He says no, again and adds this time “This idea isn’t as much fun as I thought it would be.” Where my heart should be, he has stabbed me, but that twinge of hurt has long ago died in me. I stare out the window of the car to the empty park, the snow is melting, now icy clumps in the grass. The fountains are not on, it is cold. Tomorrow there will be a storm, an Arctic blast of great proportions.
We check-in. Simon uses his credit card for our incidentals and I show them my free stay coupon. As we enter the elevator, in front of the maid we are sharing it with, I inform Simon of my thoughts on my bad idea.
“You know, no one is ruining this but you. I asked you to get the day off two weeks ago. You didn’t. We wouldn’t be rushed right now if you had. The only one who is making this a bad idea is you. I can enjoy myself just fine without you, if that’s how you feel.” He apologizes and says that I am absolutely right. I find no joy in being right.
Once we are in our upgraded room, I am in heaven. I do not want to go back out into the cold or to a poetry reading or listen to a “quirky and fun band.” I want a bubble bath, wine, cable TV and to relax. Simon wants to go back to his 39th Street gang and drink with his man-baby’s after his rough day of three hours at the theater. Being a concession stand worker is hard, serving that popcorn and making the occasional drink - you know. Simon and I agree that we will get me some wine for the evening and he will make the appearance at the bookstore reading for us both and he will come back when it is over.
The weather forecast is looking pretty scary so I avoid that channel. In fact, I turn off the flat screen in the sitting room and start a bubble bath. I will have a nice bath and then I will open the wine, I decide. I find my IPod and put it in the docking station on the bedside table and adjust the volume so that I can listen to an old time radio show while soaking in the luxurious tub. Philip Marlowe is solving another murder. Once done, I attempt to open the bottle of wine, which will not open. I cannot retrieve the cork to save my life and my typical attempt of placing it between my feet and yanking will not work because my leg has not fully healed and I will not tempt fate any further. I get re-dressed and go back down to the lobby and ask the manager to open it for me. Nick graciously opens the bottle of wine while he speaks to a future guest on the phone and splashes his shirt with the final tug. I will remember to send him a thank you card and $5.00 for dry cleaning, I tell myself as I limp back to the elevator with a large bottle of wine in one hand and a four pronged cane in the other. Hobbling back to my room, I decide to wear Simon’s pajamas. They smell like him. He can take them off me later. Because we have such a lovely room, I think that it is my duty to ensure we have used all aspects of the room. I sit down at the desk and use the hotel stationery to write my parents and cousin brief letters. I drink my wine out of the lovely glasses they provided. At the conference table, I set up my cheese and crackers, sipping the wine alongside. I get the extra blanket and pillow out from the closet and watch television in the sitting area until it is time to go to the bedroom.
At eleven o’clock I call Simon. He is still at the bookstore. He is telling me how funny the Hit Shitters are and what a great show it is. I tell him he shouldn’t even bother coming to the hotel if he is having so much fun. He assures me that he wants to be with me and he will be home soon. I am cold – but I want to be inviting when he arrives so I wear the hotel bathrobe with no clothes underneath. I lie in bed like this for a while but feel naked and alone – so I put back on his smelly pajamas. I fall asleep after polishing off almost a magnum of wine and see that he has texted me. At 12:45 a.m. he claims to have been cleaning up the bookstore. I type back ok. I fall back asleep.
At four a.m. I awake and I am definitely alone. The storm is eminent from the muted flat screen television. I turn it off, I look out the windows onto the empty street. Chinese lights are strewn on the bridge over Brush Creek for the New Year celebration Thursday. It looks gorgeous in this dark night, red and glowing, swinging softly in the wind. Most women would fill with terror right now, but Simon is not in a hospital. He is sleeping at our house, drunk. I am sure. I go back to sleep and wake up every hour on the hour realizing I am hung over and so glad for a two p.m. check out.
I talk to my friend Desi around eleven. She thinks I should check out early and go home before the storm hits. I don’t care about the storm, I am staying in this room until I have to leave.
“Do you think something happened to Simon?” She asks.
“No. He’ll call at the crack of one, when he wakes up.” I say dryly. I use the Keurig machine to make coffee. I take another bath and listen to the end of the radio show I started the night before. I place all the toiletries and anything that would not cause additional charges into the overnight bag I so stupidly brought with me. I read the registry of historical hotels and plan future vacations to nearby states. Arkansas, Minnesota, maybe Indiana. I am particularly enamored with the old Southern hotels and their grand entrances. I like the idea of somewhere donning the name Head in its title or Isle. I plan these vacations to classic locations alone.
Simon calls. “I know you hate me.” I don’t hate him. A less jaded, more sensitive me would have been fuming but I am mildly annoyed. But I don’t act that way.
“You really hurt my feelings.” Is what I say and I have no idea where that came from.
“I’m really sorry. I lost track of time.” I hang up the phone, this conversation isn’t worth having. I don’t care to waste the sound on my ears or the breath of my voice.
Desi meets me for lunch at the hotel around one-thirty. I suppose that is close enough to check-out time. She tells me that the streets are icy and it is very cold outside and I need to go home soon. I inform her that at worst case, I will just cross the street and stay with Cindy. (Cindy does not know this, but I think under the circumstances of the storm ‘n’all, she would be okay) At lunch, I tell her that my friend Sue and I spoke earlier, she thinks I should tell Simon that while I was at breakfast alone, some nice business man asked me out and I said yes. Desi thinks he deserves it and certainly doesn’t deserve me. I don’t know how I feel about that. I’d like to see other people but right now I’m not comfortable with my skin, I want to be back to my thinner, happier, less frumpy self before dating and yet, if I am with Simon, I will never get back to myself in that sense. Catch 22.
I leave after lunch. I don’t call Cindy and tell her my great idea to stay at her house, although, storm or not, I don’t want to go home. The hotel is offering $99 rates because of the snow storm and if I had $99 I wouldn’t go home. If I could I’d live at the Raphael. Everyone there just wants to make you happy. The whole city could freeze over and I wouldn’t care if I was at the Raphael.
“Ms. Jensen, here is your car.” I don’t know why I tell the attendant that I am broke, that my boyfriend stood me up for a romantic evening and all I have is one dollar to tip him with. He tells me that is okay. I tell him I wish I could live here.
I drive home and pull up to our house. The road is slick, the driveway is icy and my cane is slipping on the sidewalk. I make it up to the door and find that it is locked. Simon can be surprisingly thoughtful and since he is in the doghouse I dare think he wouldn’t forget that he has my car keys which hold my house keys, but he has. Inadvertently, he has locked me out. I find my gloves and put them on. I call the management company and tell them I am stranded on my porch. The cold air is sneaking into my bones and causing a fierce ache in my leg. This makes me crankier. Simon pulls up in my car and I cancel my cry for help to the management company. He nearly slips on the ice and I make no indication that I care. He opens the door for me.
“I didn’t know you didn’t have your keys.”
“They are in your hands right now.” I tell him and slam the door for effect. Again, that’s not how I feel. I feel bland, I feel nothing. He will do what he always does when he has ruined the occasion, sit and mope, stooping his shoulders further downward and staring at me with big dumb brown puppy eyes whenever I go by him.
“I’m sorry, I never intended…”
I cut him off. “You never intended to take the day off so that we might have time to check-in, get a cocktail and not be rushed and go to the show together, you never intended to come back because you would have rathered to get drunk with your friends, in fact, you didn’t intend to do shit.” I tell him and hobble away, my leg is stiff and aching and I hate whatever this storm is doing.
The rest of the day is the hum of different television channels in different rooms. The occasional news clip regarding the storm of the century comes on. “Updating you hour by hour” the weatherman says, but it’s just cold. There was to be snow at six p.m. but it only dropped in temperature, in the hours that followed the weatherman reported that there would be thunder snow and tomorrow with the high winds, we would have a blizzard.
All night I have been waiting for the storm to pass. I read a book in the bed with my faithful cat and tell her that next time she and I will go on a get-away together. Upper scale pet friendly hotels are all the rage these days. Why not? Bored with reading, I close the book before I break the binding. I turn off the light and lay in the dark. Waiting.
“A bag? What for?” Suddenly, it is me who is ridiculous. I have packed a pair of pajamas for us both and underwear for him.
“I don’t need boxers.” This is something I ponder and quickly forget, but I do wonder how often he changes his boxers. I have also packed Boursin cheese, salami and crackers. We don’t have any money. I got fired from my last job after breaking my leg and Simon works 40 hours every two weeks. The reason I booked the hotel was for a romantic evening with him and because I had a free night at the Raphael Hotel off the Plaza. I love the hotel for its boutique charm, everyone always remembers your name during your stay and nothing is too much for them to do for you.
As we drive to our destination, I ask Simon again, what is wrong, did I possibly do something? He says no, again and adds this time “This idea isn’t as much fun as I thought it would be.” Where my heart should be, he has stabbed me, but that twinge of hurt has long ago died in me. I stare out the window of the car to the empty park, the snow is melting, now icy clumps in the grass. The fountains are not on, it is cold. Tomorrow there will be a storm, an Arctic blast of great proportions.
We check-in. Simon uses his credit card for our incidentals and I show them my free stay coupon. As we enter the elevator, in front of the maid we are sharing it with, I inform Simon of my thoughts on my bad idea.
“You know, no one is ruining this but you. I asked you to get the day off two weeks ago. You didn’t. We wouldn’t be rushed right now if you had. The only one who is making this a bad idea is you. I can enjoy myself just fine without you, if that’s how you feel.” He apologizes and says that I am absolutely right. I find no joy in being right.
Once we are in our upgraded room, I am in heaven. I do not want to go back out into the cold or to a poetry reading or listen to a “quirky and fun band.” I want a bubble bath, wine, cable TV and to relax. Simon wants to go back to his 39th Street gang and drink with his man-baby’s after his rough day of three hours at the theater. Being a concession stand worker is hard, serving that popcorn and making the occasional drink - you know. Simon and I agree that we will get me some wine for the evening and he will make the appearance at the bookstore reading for us both and he will come back when it is over.
The weather forecast is looking pretty scary so I avoid that channel. In fact, I turn off the flat screen in the sitting room and start a bubble bath. I will have a nice bath and then I will open the wine, I decide. I find my IPod and put it in the docking station on the bedside table and adjust the volume so that I can listen to an old time radio show while soaking in the luxurious tub. Philip Marlowe is solving another murder. Once done, I attempt to open the bottle of wine, which will not open. I cannot retrieve the cork to save my life and my typical attempt of placing it between my feet and yanking will not work because my leg has not fully healed and I will not tempt fate any further. I get re-dressed and go back down to the lobby and ask the manager to open it for me. Nick graciously opens the bottle of wine while he speaks to a future guest on the phone and splashes his shirt with the final tug. I will remember to send him a thank you card and $5.00 for dry cleaning, I tell myself as I limp back to the elevator with a large bottle of wine in one hand and a four pronged cane in the other. Hobbling back to my room, I decide to wear Simon’s pajamas. They smell like him. He can take them off me later. Because we have such a lovely room, I think that it is my duty to ensure we have used all aspects of the room. I sit down at the desk and use the hotel stationery to write my parents and cousin brief letters. I drink my wine out of the lovely glasses they provided. At the conference table, I set up my cheese and crackers, sipping the wine alongside. I get the extra blanket and pillow out from the closet and watch television in the sitting area until it is time to go to the bedroom.
At eleven o’clock I call Simon. He is still at the bookstore. He is telling me how funny the Hit Shitters are and what a great show it is. I tell him he shouldn’t even bother coming to the hotel if he is having so much fun. He assures me that he wants to be with me and he will be home soon. I am cold – but I want to be inviting when he arrives so I wear the hotel bathrobe with no clothes underneath. I lie in bed like this for a while but feel naked and alone – so I put back on his smelly pajamas. I fall asleep after polishing off almost a magnum of wine and see that he has texted me. At 12:45 a.m. he claims to have been cleaning up the bookstore. I type back ok. I fall back asleep.
At four a.m. I awake and I am definitely alone. The storm is eminent from the muted flat screen television. I turn it off, I look out the windows onto the empty street. Chinese lights are strewn on the bridge over Brush Creek for the New Year celebration Thursday. It looks gorgeous in this dark night, red and glowing, swinging softly in the wind. Most women would fill with terror right now, but Simon is not in a hospital. He is sleeping at our house, drunk. I am sure. I go back to sleep and wake up every hour on the hour realizing I am hung over and so glad for a two p.m. check out.
I talk to my friend Desi around eleven. She thinks I should check out early and go home before the storm hits. I don’t care about the storm, I am staying in this room until I have to leave.
“Do you think something happened to Simon?” She asks.
“No. He’ll call at the crack of one, when he wakes up.” I say dryly. I use the Keurig machine to make coffee. I take another bath and listen to the end of the radio show I started the night before. I place all the toiletries and anything that would not cause additional charges into the overnight bag I so stupidly brought with me. I read the registry of historical hotels and plan future vacations to nearby states. Arkansas, Minnesota, maybe Indiana. I am particularly enamored with the old Southern hotels and their grand entrances. I like the idea of somewhere donning the name Head in its title or Isle. I plan these vacations to classic locations alone.
Simon calls. “I know you hate me.” I don’t hate him. A less jaded, more sensitive me would have been fuming but I am mildly annoyed. But I don’t act that way.
“You really hurt my feelings.” Is what I say and I have no idea where that came from.
“I’m really sorry. I lost track of time.” I hang up the phone, this conversation isn’t worth having. I don’t care to waste the sound on my ears or the breath of my voice.
Desi meets me for lunch at the hotel around one-thirty. I suppose that is close enough to check-out time. She tells me that the streets are icy and it is very cold outside and I need to go home soon. I inform her that at worst case, I will just cross the street and stay with Cindy. (Cindy does not know this, but I think under the circumstances of the storm ‘n’all, she would be okay) At lunch, I tell her that my friend Sue and I spoke earlier, she thinks I should tell Simon that while I was at breakfast alone, some nice business man asked me out and I said yes. Desi thinks he deserves it and certainly doesn’t deserve me. I don’t know how I feel about that. I’d like to see other people but right now I’m not comfortable with my skin, I want to be back to my thinner, happier, less frumpy self before dating and yet, if I am with Simon, I will never get back to myself in that sense. Catch 22.
I leave after lunch. I don’t call Cindy and tell her my great idea to stay at her house, although, storm or not, I don’t want to go home. The hotel is offering $99 rates because of the snow storm and if I had $99 I wouldn’t go home. If I could I’d live at the Raphael. Everyone there just wants to make you happy. The whole city could freeze over and I wouldn’t care if I was at the Raphael.
“Ms. Jensen, here is your car.” I don’t know why I tell the attendant that I am broke, that my boyfriend stood me up for a romantic evening and all I have is one dollar to tip him with. He tells me that is okay. I tell him I wish I could live here.
I drive home and pull up to our house. The road is slick, the driveway is icy and my cane is slipping on the sidewalk. I make it up to the door and find that it is locked. Simon can be surprisingly thoughtful and since he is in the doghouse I dare think he wouldn’t forget that he has my car keys which hold my house keys, but he has. Inadvertently, he has locked me out. I find my gloves and put them on. I call the management company and tell them I am stranded on my porch. The cold air is sneaking into my bones and causing a fierce ache in my leg. This makes me crankier. Simon pulls up in my car and I cancel my cry for help to the management company. He nearly slips on the ice and I make no indication that I care. He opens the door for me.
“I didn’t know you didn’t have your keys.”
“They are in your hands right now.” I tell him and slam the door for effect. Again, that’s not how I feel. I feel bland, I feel nothing. He will do what he always does when he has ruined the occasion, sit and mope, stooping his shoulders further downward and staring at me with big dumb brown puppy eyes whenever I go by him.
“I’m sorry, I never intended…”
I cut him off. “You never intended to take the day off so that we might have time to check-in, get a cocktail and not be rushed and go to the show together, you never intended to come back because you would have rathered to get drunk with your friends, in fact, you didn’t intend to do shit.” I tell him and hobble away, my leg is stiff and aching and I hate whatever this storm is doing.
The rest of the day is the hum of different television channels in different rooms. The occasional news clip regarding the storm of the century comes on. “Updating you hour by hour” the weatherman says, but it’s just cold. There was to be snow at six p.m. but it only dropped in temperature, in the hours that followed the weatherman reported that there would be thunder snow and tomorrow with the high winds, we would have a blizzard.
All night I have been waiting for the storm to pass. I read a book in the bed with my faithful cat and tell her that next time she and I will go on a get-away together. Upper scale pet friendly hotels are all the rage these days. Why not? Bored with reading, I close the book before I break the binding. I turn off the light and lay in the dark. Waiting.
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