Winter

who was staring down into her glass of white wine, her legs crossed beneath a black dress that stopped just above the knees. He sat there for ten minutes, periodically glancing at her and waiting for the alcohol to kick in. She didn’t lift her head to look around the place and only spoke to the bartender when she needed a refill. He liked that she wasn’t wearing makeup and he liked even more that she didn’t try to look happy to be there. He stood up and began in her direction. Before, the room was loud — the speakers playing a raucous rock album and the people in the back standing at their high tables and chatting — but now, in the numbed steps he was taking, it was quiet and intimate and she turned to him when he got close enough to consider, her lips thin and neutrally positioned, her eyes like fresh olive paint. In his insomnia, he had given up shaving and the uneven landscape of his facial hair shined beneath the lamp above her seat. “Isn’t this type of place awful?” he said. “What type is that?” He removed his hand from her seat and sat down next to her. He rotated the bowl of peanuts in front of him by running his finger along the bottom of the bowl. “The type of place where everyone’s here for something but doesn’t admit what that something is.” “What is that something?” “A distraction.” “Is that why you’re here? “No.” He faked a laugh, loud and rhythmic. It was unlike his normal silent and static one. “I’m here because I can’t sleep.” “Right there with ya’.” The bed squeaked as he scratched his back. He missed the chance to let her leave and now fluid conversation is gone and they are stuck in the same bed, touching but disconnected, both looking at the white ceiling. She removes her hand from his chest and picks at a hangnail with her other hand. “What do you do for work?” “I’m a janitor. It’s a temporary job.” “Do you like it?” Now that it is over, the lamp, that has been on the whole time, seems brighter. His eyelids edge downward, ready to close, as ready as they have been since the last time he went to the bar. “It’s fine...quiet. What do you do?” She closes her eyes and folds her hands on top of the comforter. “I’m a waitress.” “Do you like it?” “Not really. I want to be the chef.” She asks him what time it is and he tells her he doesn’t know. He keeps the clock beneath the bed so he doesn’t look at it when he can’t sleep. They lie in silence for several minutes, eyes closed, listening to frogs croak outside, until a train, half a mile away, bundles down the tracks and overtakes the sound of the frogs, shaking the windows of the house. “I’m gonna go,” she finally says, when everything goes quiet. She dresses and they hug, and then he walks with her to the front door and makes sure to lock it behind her. He looks at the empty bed. He feels guilty and anxious. He grabs one of the cigarettes that is half out of the pack and smokes it, sitting up in bed with the ashtray in his lap. It calms his nerves but the nicotine aggravates his sinuses and his nose begins to run. He gets a tissue from the box on the dresser, blowing his nose with it, then matting it up for the trash. In the moment, the relief from the cigarette is worth the runny nose, but he knows the anxiety will come back and he’ll have to smoke again, and his nose will run and he’ll reach for another tissue.