With or Without You Read online

  I felt oddly ineffective as I dug through the packaging materials, letting the Styrofoam peanuts spill out of the box and onto the floor. Finally, with what seemed like Herculean effort, I had the box half-emptied. Inside was a pot. I could see it through the last thin layer of packing plastic. Once I cut through the final skin of bubble wrap, I exposed the large earthenware urn with painted designs around the rim, now faded with age. The top of the pot was covered and tightly sealed with some heavy-duty substance. I touched the surface to discover more clay, layers and layers of clay, followed by a thick coating of glaze. There were no cracks in the pot or in the covering. I let my fingers wander over the clay, feeling the smoothness of the glaze, broken by indents where designs had been inlaid.

  With even more effort, I pulled the urn entirely out of the box and set it on the table, knocking the cardboard box to the floor. Then, momentarily forgetting Byron even existed, I took a step back to look at it and realised where I’d seen pots like this before: at ARTSI, the Art, Research, Translation, Science Institute where I work. Although the museum portion of our institute is smaller than places like the Getty or the LA County Museum of Art, our private funding has provided us with several lovely pieces from antiquity.

  Byron stood at my side, amidst the abundance of tiny white Styrofoam packing peanuts. ‘Who’s it from?’ he asked curiously.

  I bent down and dug my hand inside the box, feeling around for a letter. Byron took a step forwards and flipped over the top of the box. There, imbedded beneath more layers of clear packing tape, was a packing slip. I picked up the stainless steel scissors again and cut through the surface, then pulled out a folded piece of paper.

  While Byron watched, I stared at the letter through squinted eyes, not wanting to go in search of my reading glasses. ‘It’s from my great-aunt,’ I said, softly. ‘She willed it to me.’

  ‘But what is it?’ Byron insisted.

  All the letter said was that the pot was mine, willed to me by my great-aunt Rose. The lawyer’s letter was carefully typed, and attached to it, with a paper clip, was a faded handwritten note. I brought the note closer and tried to decipher my aunt’s barely legible scrawl. Byron continued to investigate the pot, touching it, stroking it. I wanted to tell him to keep his hands to himself, but I just didn’t have the energy. Not until he said, ‘Shit, Nellie, it looks like a port-a-potty. Something you’d bring with you when you go out camping.’

  ‘It’s an urn,’ I said, my voice hostile. ‘My aunt knows – I mean, knew – I studied things like this, that I would never be able to have something like this for myself.’

  Actually, no one really has things like this for themselves. Not any more. All ancient artefacts of this quality are in museums. It’s always been a cause for some heated arguments in my family. My great-aunt was an avid traveller and collector, an adventurous archaeologist who funded her own excavations and occasionally kept the best treasures for herself. When family members urged her to give up her prized loot that lay scattered around her cavernous mansion, she said, in a voice roughened by years of smoking, ‘Nonsense. Everything is stolen. The Elgin Marbles. The Rosetta Stone. Some of the most beautiful artwork in the world was taken by thieves in the night. Why should I give my art to museums? Should the museums give back all of their stolen art? And give it back to whom? The creators are long dead. Wouldn’t they want the person who would most appreciate their artwork to keep it safe?’

  I was still reading the letter when Byron’s cellphone rang. He slid it out of his briefcase and checked the ID, then quickly tucked the phone away again, unable to hide the guilty look on his face as he did so. I knew without thinking that the call was from Gwen. I knew without understanding exactly how that the whole monologue he’d given me for the past half-hour had been a fantasy.

  Without looking at Byron, I turned on my heel and headed down the hallway.

  It was time to start packing.

  Byron didn’t seem to expect that. I don’t know why – I don’t know what he thought I’d do after he told me we were through. He watched me the way people watch accidents here in LA. Not offering any help, simply gazing as I grabbed a few different belongings and shoved them into my suitcase.

  I stalked to the dresser and filled my small embroidered jewellery box with the few scattered gold earrings, antique brooches and delicate golden bracelets that lay on the glass top. I left behind any gift he had ever given me, taking only those items that were of family value or given to me by friends. Byron meant nothing. History meant everything.

  ‘Listen –’ he started.

  I wheeled on him again, tossing the jewellery box into the bag and fastening the suitcase shut. ‘I don’t want to know what you did, or why you did it. I just want you to get out of my way.’

  ‘Look,’ Byron said next, and I had to physically push him away as I moved down the hall, glancing into our home office but deciding not to stop for the books. I could have them sent later, or have movers come and pack them for me. I paused only to pick up my laptop. I carefully zipped the machine into its sleek red case – a gift from my ultra-hip best friend Nora – then slipped the bag over my shoulder and hefted up my suitcase again. I took both bags to the front of the apartment. Byron continued to trail after me, sputtering gibberish.

  ‘You can’t just walk out of here. Talk to me. We need to make a plan. Who gets what. Who moves out. We need to discuss the situation, like adults.’

  I whirled around on him. ‘Discuss it? Discuss what? You are breaking up with me.’

  He hesitated, looking at me in alarm. But once I started, I found myself unable to stop.

  ‘Why are you freaking out now? Because I’m angry? Did you need to control the whole situation, Byron? Couldn’t you have at least let me experience it in my own fucking way?’

  I’d never sworn at him before. After working for so many years in a museum – before college, during college and after – I have hardly ever raised my voice from that hushed tone reserved for keeping other people quiet. A library voice. It suits me. Now, I found great pleasure in raising the volume.

  ‘But where will you go?’ he asked as I pushed past him.

  ‘Don’t,’ I told him. ‘Just don’t. Don’t pretend you care.’

  I still felt ill at the fact that he’d been on me hours before. Knowing the whole time that we were through, he’d still wanted one last fuck – I shook my head. I couldn’t even bear to think about it. I had my suitcase and my laptop, and now I needed to leave.

  ‘You tell Gwen when she calls again that you’re all hers.’

  ‘Gwen,’ he said, still trying to pretend that there was nothing there. ‘Come on, Eleanor –’

  ‘Stop,’ I said, a coldness building inside of me.

  He did. That guilty look I’d seen before flickered across his face once more. In a flash, I remembered all the different times she’d called. Work, he’d always say. But hadn’t I wondered? Hadn’t I told myself not to go down that route, not to worry? Even when I’d heard gossip at his office, people talking when I walked past, hadn’t I pushed that out of my head, as well? Late nights at the office. Calls he’d go outside to take. It all made sense now.

  I turned to leave, and then spun back around to face him, unable to keep myself from adding a parting shot, ‘And, let me tell you, Byron, from what I know about Gwen, this little fling you’re having will be over within the week.’

  He didn’t deny it this time. He simply stared at me. For the first time, I looked into his grey eyes and saw nothing. Not storm clouds. Not silver skies. Not paintings by an abstract artist. Instead, I saw an empty hollow. A cement sidewalk. Then, I continued, my voice steady but loud. I could feel my back molars clenched together and I relished the thought of chewing up each word and spitting it out at him. Words can hurt. I’ve always known that. I’ve never doubted their power. ‘I’ve seen people like her in action, Byron. They like danger. They like creating chaos. Think about it. What did she talk about when she fucked you? Did she
whisper about how dangerous your liaison was? About what might happen if the two of you got caught? She’s a calculating, conniving cunt.’

  I saw in his washed-out grey eyes that I’d hurt him. It gave me a spark of pleasure that was an entirely new sensation. Joy at someone else’s pain. Who would ever have thought this sort of thing would give me happiness. Bitter happiness, perhaps. But an evil glee, nonetheless. Byron came a step closer, dullness falling away as his own anger was revealed. What did he have to be angry about? The fact that I was right? He caught me by the shoulder and held on.

  ‘You’re wrong.’

  I shrugged him away and moved down the hall. ‘Gwen likes the unattainable. Fucking you while you were mine gave her what she needed. Come on, Byron. You’re a second-rate lawyer who’s come pretty far without a lot of talent. You dress nicely and you have great hair. Really you do. But what else have you got?’

  I’d hit him where it hurt, and I could tell.

  Bravo, I said to myself.

  ‘Bitch!’ Byron yelled, grabbing at me again. He missed and came forwards, his open hand swinging, catching hard on the side of my head. Had he meant to hit me? I don’t know. I’ll never know for sure. But I stumbled from the blow and turned on him, hissing, ‘I always thought deep down that you were nice. That’s the one thing I always thought.’ It’s why I’d stayed. I was nice, and he was nice, and that little fantasy was gone like smoke. I was at him, now too, dropping the suitcase, my hands not outstretched and clawlike, but balled into fists. If I were going to fight him, then I meant to do it for real.

  Byron stepped back, grabbing my wrists to hold them away from his body. Adrenaline coursed through me. With almost no effort at all, I got free and picked up my suitcase, but it was too heavy. I swung my computer bag instead, aiming for his head. In a movie, I’d have connected – I knew exactly how that would have felt, the satisfaction that the impact would have given me. In real life, I missed, and in the after-swing knocked the urn from the hallway table. The pot should have hit the thick creamy carpet and bounced, rolling gently to a stop against the wall.

  It didn’t.

  Nothing was going right. My computer case, heavy with the PowerBook inside, swung the pot hard enough so that it slammed directly into the wall. And shattered.

  Chapter Two

  I don’t know how I got to Nora’s house. I have no memory of the drive, zero recall whatsoever. Somehow I managed to climb into my little red Toyota Prius, to place my suitcase and laptop on the passenger seat and back out of the tight parking space without hitting any nearby parked cars, a feat that’s not so easy even when one is in total control. Apparently, in my dreamy state, I was able to pause at the mandatory stoplights decorating Ocean Boulevard, to weave my way through the congested evening traffic, a bumper-to-bumper carpet with everyone jostling to get home at once. I’m probably lucky to be alive, although ‘lucky’ wasn’t a correct description of how I felt. People on the verge of breakdowns should not be allowed near motor vehicles. There ought to be some sort of test, like the blood/alcohol exam. If you are 1.98 per cent upset, you should have a designated driver.

  Honestly, I don’t even remember leaving the apartment. Once the ancient urn broke, my memory seemed to have gone with it. All I know is that I sort of ‘came to’ outside Nora’s pink stucco Spanish-style Venice Beach bungalow, and that I found myself pounding hard on the window of her bedroom, knowing full well that Nora generally wakes up long after the sun goes down.

  In order to gain access, I’d have to compete with her high-end headset and whatever newly fashionable band was playing on her NanoPod. Nora knows what’s hot. She always has. It’s why she’s often invited to guest write a Top Ten List for our local alternative weekly, why she was profiled in one of my favourite women’s magazines, why her hair colour changes as frequently as her mood. Upbeat? She might be sporting violet or fuchsia spikes. Pensive? She’ll go for dark forest green. In love – or, more likely – lust? Crimson, as you might guess. At this point, I don’t think she even knows what her true colour is any more.

  I pounded harder on the window, praying that she was there by herself and not in bed with some drummer who’d stopped by to jam at her club the previous evening and ended up going home with her for a midnight snack. I knew that she’d be shocked to find me standing there in the plum-coloured dark, rumpled, angry, broken. I looked down to discover that in my haste to leave the apartment, I had managed to put on two different shoes – one flat, one with a slight heel, both sensible but mismatched nonetheless – and then I cupped my hands against the glass and peered hard inside.

  Yes, she was in there – but as I stared into the dimly lit room, my heart sank. I wasn’t competing with her headset alone. As I’d feared, she was on the bed in a clinch with a musician I recognised as one of her favourite playmates. There, on her low Japanese-style bed, were two specimens of sexual beauty: Nora and her man, a rumpled rose-hued sheet doing nothing to hide his fine muscular ass and strong back. He had several scrawling tattoos decorating his arms, and next to the bed was a battered guitar case, stickered all over with decals of skulls, roses, devils and angry messages.

  So she hadn’t fucked the drummer. She was fucking the bass player.

  In true Nora style, the pair had on matching headsets, which was why she hadn’t heard my pounding. A different sort of pounding took over now – the sound of my own heartbeat in my ears. Unable to look away, I watched as my friend moved sinuously beneath her most recent conquest. Was she moving to the beat of the music? Or to the pulsing rhythm of her own libido?

  Why couldn’t I look away?

  Dean pushed up with his powerful arms, and I stared, transfixed, as he thrust his hips forwards, his unbelievable ass looking like an advertisement for some new workout device. I could see now why Nora opened her bedroom door to him. God, they were sexy. At any other time, I would have turned my head, hurried off to lick my wounds in some dark corner. But I wasn’t myself at all now, and I simply stood and stared, witnessing what I knew was a deeply private act, yet one I found myself drawn to view.

  Was this art in motion? In my opinion it was.

  Dean moved like a machine, up and down, and then he swivelled his hips and the sheet fell the rest of the way onto the floor. I now saw that Nora wasn’t entirely naked. She had on a pair of fishnets the colour of a dark-red wine. The stockings made her legs look endless and, when she suddenly wrapped her legs around Dean’s waist, I noted the high-heeled patent-leather shoes she was wearing. I recognised the pair – had been with her when she’d bought them, marvelling at the way she strode around the store in the four-inch heels. Had she put them on for this moment, playing a sexy dress-up game for her man, or had the two been so desperate to connect that she hadn’t had time to take them off?

  I’d never done a striptease for Byron, didn’t own a pair of fancy stockings. Was that why I was standing out here, looking in? If I’d been more adventurous, would we still be together? Did Gwen like to play dress-up games? I worked hard to shut the door on those mental queries. I couldn’t deal with those thoughts at a time like this.

  Dean rotated his hips again, and I could almost feel him move against me, as if I’d magically taken Nora’s place on the mattress beneath him. He was strikingly handsome, with his long rock ’n’ roll hair loose down his back, his jaw like rock. I couldn’t see his eyes, but I knew that they were almost black, as dark as his hair. He and Nora moved together, and I imagined that they were listening to the same band on their headsets. Wouldn’t be a group I would choose, I was sure. They weren’t listening to Sting, were they? No, something about the way they were moving told me that they’d be tuned into Nine Inch Nails or Nickleback. A hard sound to match the intensity of their motions.

  As Dean pounded forwards, I sucked in my breath, wishing I were the one on the mattress beneath him. Wishing I were as free as Nora with my sexual whims. But could I ever be in such an erotic scenario without feeling as if I were playing a role? Nora likes
to share her sexual stories with me – but this was different. I was watching for myself, seeing her throw her head back, seeing her headset come off with the motion, then seeing her large eyes open as she met my own gaze and shrieked.

  Oh, damn, I thought, ducking back down.

  Only moments before, I’d wanted her to see me, but now everything had changed. What to do? Nora had just caught me staring at her while she made love, and I had no excuse as to why I was there. My mind raced as Nora hurled herself across the room and raised the window with a ‘What the fuck is wrong with you?’ howl that died when she saw me standing there like some pitiful alley cat. The only thing missing at this point was a sudden rainstorm. Then I’d be truly bedraggled.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said, knowing I sounded like an idiot.

  ‘Oh, Christ, Eleanor. I didn’t realise it was you. I just saw a shadow against the glass and thought there was a peeping Tom out there.’

  Even in my haze, I registered the thought that Nora had decided to confront a peeping Tom rather than call the cops. That’s her style.

  ‘You OK?’ she continued, asking the question before she could stop herself. At no other time in our friendship had I banged on her bedroom window. If I were OK, I would not have been standing in her side yard. We both knew that. Still, I shook my head.

  ‘Of course, you’re not.’ She could tell that from where she stood, peering out at me, beautiful as always in spite of her shock, confident in spite of being more than halfway naked. Concern showed fully in her face. In my everyday life, I’m as predictable as one might imagine. To find me breaking any sort of social rule meant something had gone wildly wrong in my world.

  ‘Come in,’ she said. ‘You have to come in.’

  I nodded this time and, for a split second, I imagined climbing in through her bedroom window and collapsing on her mattress, curling myself into a fetal position and letting every bit of sorrow pour from me. I saw myself crying until my eyes were as pink as Nora’s stucco bungalow and my shirt was wet from my tears. Pulling myself into the window would have been a reverse of what Nora had done to escape her bedroom back in high school. She loves to tell the story of the time she got locked out and had to sleep under the window box, praying that she’d be able to sneak in undiscovered once her mother had brought in the morning paper.