Part I

What is it about what's going on with me that I can feel at once so at peace and yet so anxious? I don't know what it is.

Maybe it's Max.

Maybe it's just that this morning, I watched him dressing. He thought I was asleep. I lay there in his bed and thought ... how did I get here?

But then a moment later, my alarm went off and we were bumping into each other, trying to get ready in a place that was really not set up for two people who weren't used to sharing their space with another adult ... and I thought ... how did I get here?

I mean, on the one hand, I was ... God ... I was in love with a man who made me feel like love had been invented just for him to give it to me and for me to give it back to him. It is an amazing feeling. On the other hand, I'd given up my autonomy ... my space ... my alone-time ... my independence.

I was driving in to work this morning, he was on my mind. I was smiling. And then I pulled in the parking lot and I didn't want to let go of the way he made me feel.

I was driving home from work this evening, he was on my cell. I was worn out from work. He couldn't understand why I hadn't gotten eggs at the market when he'd specifically asked me to and he'd wanted to have eggs for breakfast the next morning. I said, well, you asked me when I was driving yesterday and I suppose I forgot. I couldn't very well write a note while I was in rush hour traffic, could I?

Boy, I tell you this ... if he gives me that pouty, spiteful little uppity "tsk" of his one more time, I might ram a dozen eggs down his throat.

"I'll throw together a green salad for tonight, Max. That'll take care of dinner. Tomorrow's Saturday. We can always make do with some toast, right?  And then we can put together a proper shopping list and go to the grocery store together."

"Salad? Again? I would prefer a more ... substantial meal."

"Then cook it. You've got two hands. What'd you do for dinner before I moved in? Why's it got to be my responsibility?"

There was a silence ... but then again, I was navigating traffic, so I had an excuse. Right?

"You're tired. I can hear it in your voice, Anna. We'll discuss this when you get home."

"I am tired, Max. It's been a killer day. You know what I really need tonight?"

"Tell me."

"I need you."

When I pulled into the parking lot about a half-hour later, I thought about what I'd said to him and got the giggles. Okay, so I needed him and I wonder how hard he had to bite his tongue to keep from saying ... well, then you're done for, but what about me? What about dinner because I'm hungry, remember?

Because, you know, love's grand and all but sometimes a man needs food, right? Oh the travails of the trivial aspects of having to make a grown-up home life and all. No more running in with two minutes to spare, pouring Buck's dog food in a bowl while I was pouring milk over cereal in another bowl for me and rushing around trying to get the stink of work off me and then taking Buck for a walk ... and then just doing as I pleased, whether that was going out or staying in. Nope. Those days were over.

Now I had to be a grown up. Now I had some man who seemed to depend on me for mundane things like making sure he ate and that his ... er, guess that's now 'our' ... our place was clean and nice.

I hoped he wasn't backing the wrong horse. I've never been much in the domestic category. But, Lord, did I want to somehow prove to us both that I could do this. It's harder than it looks when you're on the other side of romance. Not that the romance was gone ... it's just that somehow, officially living together made everything different. Different.

And I'm not too sure that I really wanted it different. But this time, for this man, I was going to try my best.

Guess that's why I pulled back out of the lot, went to the grocery store, got some eggs for him to have for breakfast and even got steaks and potatoes for that night's dinner. Eh, so I'm a sucker for him; is that a crime?

There are moments when I still feel my insides shake when he looks at me. I keep thinking that feeling's going to go away; that at some point, it's all going to be ordinary and boring.

We were grocery shopping. I sent him to get strawberries because he has this knack of picking out the sweetest ones. He's also really good with cantaloupe. So he's got melon-picking-out duty, too.

I was down the way, looking for the right onion. And I caught him out of the corner of my eye. And then I just stared at him as he examined the strawberries. He still fascinates me ... and watching him just fed that fascination. The way his hand would hover over a basket and he seemed to have a simple enjoyment out of having a life that included this kind of simple activity of sniffing strawberries and examining baskets to select the one he thought was best. He happened to look up at that exact moment and turn to find me.

There was this look he got in the second before his eyes focused on me.

I've never been this important to anyone. My whole life. I don't know that I quite know what to do with that feeling of being important to him. That important.

He had some annoying habits.

Well, I say annoying. But I mean, they're only annoying because ... well, I guess they're just plain annoying.

Before I moved in, he had a woman who cleaned his house twice a week. Twice a week! Can you imagine that? He's one man. He needs that kind of maintenance of his tiny one-bedroom apartment?

You know what it really is? She cooked for him. She'd do his shopping, make his meals, put them in the freezer, all carefully labeled by day of the week and microwaving instructions. When he traveled, she'd spend that time doing the "heavy" cleaning. Heavy cleaning? What the hell is that, I'd asked him when he told me that. He didn't have a clue.

I didn't either.

Anyway, he had figured she should stay on, even after I moved in. I was floored. I mean, there's two of us ... what? We can't keep one lousy one-bedroom apartment clean?

Well, that meant chores, right? Chores like real adults do. Except he hadn't really had to do household chores ... maybe ever, but certainly not for a while. Imagine that discussion with Max? I made this list of various mundane chores we should split up. Laundry. Cooking. Dishes. Vacuuming. Dusting. All that kind of rot.

Oh, but, he didn't want to do laundry. So I said, fine, I'll do the laundry if you clean the bathroom. He'd given me that 'tsk' of his and said he would have the woman come back and clean the bathrooms ... that if the bathroom or the carpets or the dusting were his responsibility, then he chose how to get them cared for and it was really not my business how he got them accomplished as long as he saw to it being done.

We had a bit of row about that ... about keeping house in general. He didn't think much of my domestic abilities and couldn't for the life of him figure out my objection to a maid.

A maid!

Jesus.

Who lives like that?

Who had the money to blow on that? I mean, I guess I could see when it was just him, but now he's got me freeloading off him since I don't have the money to help pay rent at his place and still keep mine. So I am awkward enough about not paying my own way in this new living arrangement and I don't want to feel like he's just going to wake up one day and realize that I'm costing him a whole lot more money than he considered. You know the utilities have to be higher, right? It's why I've taken to doing most of the cooking. Like if I give a little extra in that way, it sort of makes up for him having to foot so many of the bills ... so I don't feel like a total sponge.

Anyway, he hates cleaning. Well, who doesn't? He always says he's going to get to the bathroom but then lo and behold, he gets called out of town on the very day he's set aside to clean. I think he does it on purpose. He thinks I've got to stop nagging.

Me? Nagging?

He may be right but if he is, then it's still his fault. And I'm turning into my mother and this is a very bad thing.

His most annoying habit is how he goes through towels. He doesn't want to use a towel more than twice. I swear, I cannot figure this out. I have tried to negotiate some kind of towel détente since I'm having trouble keeping up with laundry duties with all those towels but he is so stubborn about the frigging towels. Plus, he insists that the bedding be changed at least twice a week, which is what he got used to with the maid. I am seriously thinking of making him do the laundry because I'm amazed at how much laundry he generates with habits like that. Although if I did, he'd just send it out. He already sends his business shirts out because he doesn't think I know how to iron them properly.

He better not make another comment about that, frankly. If it were me and I didn't like the way my roommate did the ironing? Well, damn, I got nothing wrong with my hands so I'd do it myself. And I'd not harp on me about it.

I'm not the only one doing some nagging lately.

He had to fly to San Diego. I took him to the airport because he was leaving on a Saturday and I wanted to be with him until the last possible moment.

This place is a shell when he's gone.

Although, I will be honest ... Buck and I sometimes feel like when he's gone, we can party down. We kind of relax back into our old, looser ways ... there's a part of me that feels like I'm still on approval with Max. Like this is the demo period and he'll take me back to the dealer if I don't live up to whatever expectations he has of me.

So when he's gone, even while I'm sad-mad with missing him, I also let things go around the place. I do crazy fast pick-ups and cleanings when I think he's due in but in between, Buck and I just chill like we used to when I lived alone.

For instance, he doesn't want Buck up on his furniture. I think this is Max's prerogative because it's his stuff and his place. So I've trained Buck to stay off of it. But when Max is gone, I'm not quite so strict. I've even let Buck sleep on the bed with me some nights. He curls up at my feet.

Buck has a sense of these things, see. When Max is there, he doesn't think for even a fraction of a second about hopping in bed at night with us. It took Max one very terse growling command and Buck never tried it again. But when Max is gone, Buck seems to sense when I don't mind the company.

The funniest thing about Buck and Max is that Max is developing this odd thing about Buck. You see, Buck's a herding dog. And his instinct is that Max and I are the herd he has to watch over. So he does. Intently.

Me, I'm used to it. I'm used to the way Buck watches me, stays near me, checks on me. Max, though, finds it very annoying. His dog, he says, guarded him but didn't drive him crazy with it.

But he tries to have a good sense of humor about it most of the time.

A lot of nights when we stay in, I will be in the bedroom, reading, because Max is watching sports on television in the living room. Or I'll be writing on my laptop and Max will be in the bedroom working on some files he's brought home from the office. So, Buck must choose, see, which of us he will watch over. Me or Max. Me or Max. You can see it in his bright little eyes. He can't quite figure it out, which of us he should guard. So what he does is try to watch over us both. He trots between the rooms we're in, just to keep tabs on us and to be sure we're not being chased by some fox or other predator.

The last night Max was home, it was one of those times when I was in the bedroom reading and he was in the living room watching soccer or something. Buck started out in the bedroom, resting on the floor at the foot of the bed. And I was reading, engrossed, quiet. And his ears flicked up ... probably some noise on television or outside. And up he jumped and then he trotted down the hall into the living room. He sat there and watched Max for a while. Then he lay down beside the couch where Max was sprawled.

And then ... I heard his toenails going "tick, tick, tick, tick" down the hall and I knew he was coming back my way. He sat in the doorway, staring at me. Then shifted down to lay on the floor and watched me.

Now, see, this didn't annoy me or bother me or pester me in the least.

But it did Max.

I could tell when he was at the end of his rope with this because Buck was about halfway down the hall, heading back toward Max to check on him ... when Max suddenly barked out, "Stay!" And I heard no noise whatsoever from the hall so I knew that Buck had frozen in place.

It made me laugh. I could both picture Max's pissed off scowl as he stared at the game and Buck's intense unease at being told by his master to stop doing what he thought was his primary purpose in life. Okay, so that aspect kind of irritated me, too. I mean, first of all, poor Buck! He was just following his instincts and he loves us, so of course he wanted to be sure we're okay. Second of all, what harm was he doing?

You know?

So I waited a few minutes, sneaked down the hall, picked up my dog and carried him into the bedroom. I plopped on the floor next to him and read. As long as I was touching Buck, he stayed right there with me, no matter how anxious he got about whether or not Max was okay in the living room by himself.

When the master of the house came to bed that night, he found me laying on the floor with my dog and gave me this long-suffering sigh. I rolled my eyes at him when he turned to go in the bathroom.

But that night as we snuggled down to sleep together, I told him I would like him to be more patient with Buck. That we hadn't all been living together all that long and Buck was still unsure, still adjusting. He just needed to give him a break.

When we were at the airport that morning, before he left, it was so tough. I whispered to him as we sat there in the car before he got out. I told him to come back safe to me because I wasn't ever going to make it without him in my life.

He said he felt the same way about me.

"Then we have a promise right?" I said. "That we'll each be safe."

"Yes, cara," he said softly. He took my left hand in his, rubbed over the ring finger, looked up into my eyes. "We have made a promise. We should make others, as well. Will you think on this while I am gone?"

I slid my hand away from him. "We've made the important promises, Max."

"There is so much more that I wish to be for you."

"You're everything to me, Max. Everything." I saw him hesitate, as if he wanted to say more. I felt distinctly uncomfortable with letting him. Not then. Not when he was leaving. "You'd better go. You'll miss your flight."

As he walked away, I flashed on how he'd been at Marie and Bud's wedding reception. When it came for the tossing of the bouquet to the unmarried women, I'd enticed him outside with me ... I'd said that I had something much better to toss his way.

I am not marrying kind. I know he is. I don't know how to resolve this. So I try to find ways around it. Like not letting myself ever be cornered into some element of facing the issue head on.

He's too smart, too observant not to have caught what I was doing. But he's also a kind man to me. He pretended not to know what I was up to ... that I didn't want to make the choice between getting in the cattle call of the "hoping-to-be-married" women or embarrassing him by just refusing to participate out in the open. So he let me slip outside, so that we could both save face by pretending it was simply a passionate assignation.

I hid in the shadows on the other side of a wall. I watched him, my head peeking around the corner. He came out on the veranda that faced a wide green expanse of lawn leading to the water's edge. He slowly scanned the area, looking for me.

When I stepped out and beckoned to him, in that fraction of a moment before I slipped back around the corner to wait on him, there was look of pure man, pure aggression about him. I leaned against the brick wall, my hand on my heart, my eyes closed ... and I thought about the wonder of him.

About how poor my life would be if he were not in it anymore. How I couldn't even contemplate that.

I opened my eyes when he leaned in over me. Our mouths were so close but he simply hovered. His lips were slightly parted. He just looked straight down my cleavage. And then he bent to place a long, lingering kiss at the pulse point at the base of my throat.

How is it that he can fire me with one gesture like that?

It's just that he does something like that and I know exactly ... exactly ... what he'd like to be doing to me or having me do to him or having us do to each other. There is a level to our passion that I've never experienced before.

I shoved him with all my might and we ended up with his back against the opposite wall of this little alcove we were in. I whispered to him, all sorts of things that he made me feel ... that I was going to love him forever ... but I don't quite know where that statement came from ... I didn't even realize I'd said it at first. Not until I'd just slunk down to my knees before him, both of us trying to get his zipper down and his gathering hardness out ...

He was inside me; I was loving him. His hands were on my face ... one slipped down to my throat to feel himself there ... I felt outside myself and this was when I realized what I'd said to him ... this 'forever' bit ... It wasn't that I didn't mean it, because it was the truth, it's just that I didn't want to tell him that because I didn't want him to think this meant ... that this meant ... meant ... Oh.

What a moment that was. When he came, I wasn't the least ashamed to have said that, to have been caught up in what we had. But I am pragmatic; I wasn't looking for marriage, at least not the traditional kind that we were celebrating at that wedding that day.

When I looked up at him after tucking him in, he was slumped back against the wall and he was looking at me with such openness and such love for me. I just knew; he accepted me as I was and he loved me. Like I felt about him.

It would work out. Because we would make it work. Love conquers all.

Max got back from Los Angeles two days before my birthday. I actually didn't think he'd make it back. I actually didn't think he even knew it was my birthday because I never told him.

I don't know why that is, but I just felt awkward about telling him. It was like I was hinting for a gift or something. Which I would never do. I swear, I'm so horrible about accepting gifts from men! What an odd quirk to have, eh?

But he made it back and that's how I found out that he'd known. And when he got to the apartment, I was so touched because he said he'd come back on purpose to be with me that weekend.

Not only that, but he had made all these plans and arrangements. He slid out of bed on Saturday morning and took a shower as I couldn't quite wake up. When he came into the bedroom, dropping his towel, making me smile at the sight of his body ... he said, none of that now because you need to go take a shower ... we have some place to be soon.

When I came out of the shower, he had his suitcase open on the bed. I felt my heart drop because I thought he was leaving on yet another last-minute business trip but he gave me this cute little "tsk" and said, get dressed. Wear jeans, he said, and nothing underneath them.

I teased him about that and he blushed. For about a half-second. He tossed me my jeans. He opened one of the drawers where my clothes were and tossed me a t-shirt. I need a bra first, I said and he just gave me this look over his shoulder that made me wet. Then he continued digging around in that drawer and pulled out two more t-shirts, putting them neatly in his suitcase.

What else, he asked himself.

The whole thing was charming. He was deciding what I'd wear, just bringing along what he thought I should have because he didn't want to have to tell me where we were going or what he had in mind. And I like surprises if I trust the person giving them so I didn't ask any questions and just went along with the fun. On the way out the door, he told me to grab a jacket. We dropped Buck off with Johnny and Max drove up into the hills.

I did have to attempt to trick him into giving me a clue about where we were going but he was much too clever for that to work. It was fun for both of us to play like that so we kept it up the whole way there. And then he turned down a shady road that ended at this wonderful, charming inn nestled in the side of a hill way in the boonies with woods all around us.

We checked into our room and I thought Max was going to pounce on me when the door closed but he just tossed our bags in, took my hand and gave me that high and mighty look of his as he tugged me out of the room. Damn. He makes me hot.

He took me hiking. He led me down the hill and up another. The trail meandered around. He pointed out different plants and told me what they were and how they might have been used in his age.

I didn't have a clue as to what he was doing. But I rather enjoyed watching his ass moving in front of me. We crested the hill and I could hear the distant sound of running water. A stream, I asked him. He smiled and said it was my surprise. We hiked downhill until we were close enough that I figured around the next curve, we'd see the stream. I pictured it as shallow water running over pebbles worn smooth and glossy by the water's action.

He pulled up short. I bumped into him. He turned, finger to his lips and nodded with his head down the path before us.

A deer. A young one. She stood there staring at us as we stared at her. Max moved me in front of him so I could see better. He put his arms around me, his mouth near my ear telling me to stay very still and see what she would make of us.

I found myself looking at him instead. I turned my head, very slowly and then just looked at the side of his face. At his soft smile. At the way his eyes puckered up in enjoyment at seeing the deer. How seeing him in this manner endeared me to him.

The next moment, I found another reason to love him. For no discernable reason, the deer bounced off, crashing through the trees. Max turned to look at me. I felt ... precious to him. He suddenly seemed almost shy. And he just hugged me. His lips pressed in on my temple and he just held me like he'd never quite get over that I trusted him enough to stand there being loved by him.

He knows, I know he does, that I still get so scared of all this. That I've maybe still got it in me to bolt away, like the deer. But he loves me anyway.

And I adore, more and more, this man who has a side of him that is hard and ruthless and relentlessly protective but who also has a side that smiles at the sight of a free bird on the edge of a battlefield and at a young, jittery deer alone in the forest.

"You're everything to me," I said softly. "Do you know that?"

He looked down at my hand and then picked it up in his. When he looked back up at me, my insides did the roller coaster dip and curve ... God, what I feel for him in a moment like this where he wears his sexual dare on his sleeve and is unashamed to let me see the depth of his vulnerability where his love for me is concerned.

Leading me off the path, he picked his way gingerly until he was where he wanted to be. He drew me before him and backed me up against a sturdy, smooth-barked maple.

"Did you do as I asked?" he said, his mouth against my neck as he leaned in over me. "If I ask you to remove your jeans, what will I find?"

"Me."

"Will you be wet?"

 I trembled. He bit in, a tiny nip, upon my neck. "Yes."

"Show me."

"Here? You want me to strip? Anyone could walk down that path and hear us ... maybe see us even. You would dare this?"

"For you? Yes."

"I don't understand."

"Your fantasy ... wasn't it at some level a desire to have me love you someplace we could be discovered?"

My breath left me in a pant. Our eyes met. I unzipped, lowered my jeans. He ran his hands down my body until he felt the bare skin there. And all I can say is that it was sweet and gentle and tender, the way he touched me.

I felt him. Him. The man who is pushing me toward the outcome he most desires with me. The man who knows what he wants of me. The man who wants to leave me with no option but to take his hand and let him guide me to where he simply knows we should be.

But as romantic as that may sound, the practical aspect is that I just can't believe he wants me to just go along like I have no mind. What kind of outcome is that?

My hands were on his face. I was watching him as he moved inside me. There was always a part of me that marveled to be let in like this ... let inside his secrets. He asked me if I loved him ... I said I loved him like nothing else mattered.

And I meant it.

He woke me early on the morning of my birthday. He was whispering a love poem in my ear ... in Latin. He said it was my first gift of the day. I said it was all I needed because I knew he'd waited to do this on purpose to start my day off nice.

We ended up spending the entire day in the room.

I don't quite know how it all happened but somehow we got on the subject of childhood ... oh, wait, I remember now how that happened. He asked me why I hadn't told him about my birthday. I asked him how he found out; he just tutted and rolled his eyes. I pinched him; he admitted he'd gotten my vital statistics early on in the game. It's how he knew my phone number and where I worked and all sorts of other little things.

Max has begun to catch on to this way I have of trying to divert his attention when I don't want to answer a question. Most times, he lets it go. But sometimes, he just won't. This was one of those times.

So I sighed and said I wasn't really too into my birthdays because I've learned that if you make them too important, you'll be disappointed. He looked at me as if he wished to slay every dragon that had ever burned me or slashed me with a talon.

And from there, I told him about a few birthdays from childhood. About the way it felt to get knocked around by life when you're that young. About what you give up when you learn how to protect yourself from someone who should have been protecting you instead.

I hadn't ever meant to tell him that. I've never told anyone things like that. It stays buttoned up inside me because I don't want it to matter any more. But somehow, telling Max is what made it not matter so much. Isn't that odd?

We just talked. About growing up. About how you always think your family's normal until you're an adult and you might find out that other families actually like being around each other.

It was odd things I told Max. I told him how my father convinced me when I was 11 years old that I'd been adopted; how he kept saying that's why my coloring was so different, especially my eyes. And I also told Max how when I was an adult, I'd once reminded my father of doing that to me, and he said he didn't have a clue what I was talking about. I couldn't believe that he didn't remember ... I always have figured that that sense he implanted in me of feeling I was all alone in the world if I didn't belong to that family that had raised me, that this was the source of so much of my insecurities about never being good enough to ever belong. And the person who'd inflicted that on me didn't even fucking remember it? Jesus.

Maybe I told Max about that because I felt like he would not think badly of me to learn that about me. But when I told him, I felt shy and tried to change the subject by asking him if he could close his eyes and still see the way home, to his childhood home. Every step, he said.

He asked me about New Orleans, about where I'd grown up. He'd never been there, to my adored city. I told him all about the place, all the things about it that are so great, so beautiful, so mysterious. About the Quarter, about Uptown, about the Garden District. About the attitudes and the joy of life and the sophistication and the sheer beauty of sunlight in the lacy balconies and towering oaks. About St. Charles Avenue. About festivals and celebrations and debauchery and decadence. About grace and charm and a certain Old World cachet you find no where else in this country.

As I talked, he asked me many questions. His eyes glittered as he told me how much he loved seeing my enthusiasm. And that he would give so much to go there with me. He said he wanted to see the cemeteries and the churches and the grand homes and the levee and every other place I loved.

I promised him that I would take him there some day soon. 

And then I asked him to tell me about the one place he'd want to take me if it were even possible to imagine taking me somewhere in his world, in his time.

 He asked me if I'd want to go back to his childhood or to his adult years. I looked down at him, lazing against me on the bed. His legs splayed; his face relaxed, his arms behind his head. I bet you were the biggest handful as a little boy, I said, smoothing his hair back from his face. He chuckled and said he hadn't realized until he'd had his son just how he must have made taken years off his parents' lives.

Not to mention endangering their sanity, I teased him.

He reached a hand over and just stroked over my belly. His eyes unfocused. Somehow, I knew, if only for a second, his thoughts were with his boy.

"What was the best thing about being a father?" I asked him.

"My son," he said softly.

"Would I have liked him?"

"Yes," he looked in my eyes.

"There are things ... about your beliefs ... about your family and the afterlife ... and someday, I want to know. But right now, Max, it is simply too hard for me to ask."

"When the time is right, cara, you'll ask and I'll answer. I want you to know, if you ever wonder about this, that I am not seeking a substitute for that life. I am seeking the life I am meant to have now."

"Okay." I felt my face get warm. "Am I that transparent?"

"Not very often," he said, a deep chuckle coming from him. "You can be the most difficult woman I have ever met."

"Oh? How I must try your patience. Perhaps you should find a more docile woman, Maximus."

"Never. My life would be far too boring. No, I prefer a woman of spirit." I was about to thank him when he got a mischievous look on his face and added, "As long as she obeys me in the end, I do not mind playing the game of allowing her to believe she has some power."

"Max!" I pounced on him, pretending outrage. 

He let me wrestle him flat onto his back. He mocked me, however, asking me if I really ever thought he wasn't always going to get his way and how cute he thought I was when I was all worked up with him. I told him I found him totally delicious when he was being an ignorant ape of a male chauvinist and that the day would never come when I didn't get my way with him.

"I would give you anything," he whispered, stilling me by going totally still below me. "If you would let me, cara."

"I know, Max." I said as I dipped down to kiss his sweet lips. "But you already have. And I have everything I want or need. Everything. And all because you love me. That's all I ever need you to give me. Don't you know that?"

He didn't say a word. So I kissed him and made him kiss me back. And then I held him. And I felt bad. Because I didn't know anymore how to reconcile the way I felt about him with the way I wouldn't let myself give in to wanting too much. If I wanted too much, you know, I wouldn't get it. I never had before; why would this be different?

What I wanted was to learn from him. Really learn. He had a way about approaching life that I liked and admired. That doesn't mean that I always agree with him or that, lord forbid, that I always understand him. But I liked the example he set for me.

Sometimes, he would say something like that to me ... that I was teaching him new ways of looking at the world he had found himself in. It made me feel more protective of him when he would say that and I would think about how hard it must be for him to have found himself here and how he must struggle every day to adjust without giving up too much of himself.

I don't want him to change yet I know he needs more adapting to this time. Well, maybe his annoying habits could be modified, but even those are him. It's a funny thing, isn't it, loving someone so much that even idiosyncrasies are nothing so much as extra flavoring?

That's been the difference I see in living with him. It is stressful. It is. And it's hard. Really hard. No matter the benefits, it's hard. Every day. But I would never have learned what I have about him any other way. I would not have let him learn about me.

It still feels so fragile. So fragile. For every time I think we make progress, I tamp down the next thing that makes me think we've taken two steps back or that we may have to face that love isn't always enough to bridge the distance between romance and making some kind of life together. That sometimes things don't work out despite everything you do and want and try. And there's this feeling I have that maybe showing each other so much of ourselves might have been too much, too soon ... that maybe we should have taken more time to build a better foundation or something.

But I don't know. I'm stubborn and so is he. It's that stubbornness, I think, that makes us keep going into the future. That and the fact that he's not letting go of my hand and I'm convinced that even when we blunder, we have to be learning.

And then there are the things that only a man like Max can ever make me feel. I love to watch him sleeping and feel how fierce I am about keeping him safe. I love to wake up to find him watching over me with such a soft smile on him because I feel like maybe just maybe I can grow into becoming the woman he deserves.

Late into the evening of my birthday, I woke from a sex-stoked nap to find him holding me and he was staring into a candle he'd lit and placed on the bedside table. I studied him in the flickering wave of the candle's orange fire.

When his eyes dropped to mine to find me awake, he looked so serious for just that moment before he could adjust his face into a soft smile. It made me momentarily nervous, like he was about to tell me bad news. But then he nodded toward the candle and when I looked, I saw a small box next to it. It was a deep blue jeweler's box; too big to hold a ring, I noted right off and breathed a sigh of relief.

"For me?" I asked him, smiling back at him.

He nodded his head as his hand caressed my breasts. "To show what I wish for you today, cara."

I sat up and picked up the box. Held it to my ear and shook it; grinned at him as I heard a rustling noise inside. He told me to open it. "I will, I will. I just wanted to enjoy this moment, Max. You got me a birthday present! It makes me feel ... loved."

"You are loved. Deeply. Truly." 

It was a necklace. From Tiffany's. I tried not to feel like he'd spent way too much money on me. I have got to do something about this quirk with men giving me gifts. The necklace was sophisticated, simple and lovely. But it was never as lovely as the sentiment. It was a silver lariat of fine mesh chains. At the bottom, three colored gemstones.

He touched each stone in turn, saying, "Amethyst ... stained purple by the tears of Dionysus. Peridot ... called by the Egyptians, the gem of the sun. Rubellite ... the stone of love. Imagine them as they lie in the warm embrace of your breasts."

I asked him to put it on me. Even as he worked the clasp, I fingered down to where the stones hung between my bare breasts. I touched each one in turn. He kissed my shoulder after he fastened the clasp. He crawled to sit before me and to look at me sitting there amidst crumpled sheets, in candlelight, wearing nothing but the necklace he'd given me.

The look on his face did me in. I crept over to him and he pulled me up into his embrace. His lips found their way over the stones, pressing them into my skin.

"The way you do that," I whispered to him, "... it makes, I don't know, it makes me feel something as you do that ... Do you suppose these stones have magical powers? Especially the rubellite ... you said it was the stone of love ... is it possible to love you more than I do?"

I looked down when I felt him look up at me. He had the most tender smile for me. He was so pleased I'd liked his gift this much. I cupped his face in my hand.

"You think I'm silly wondering about magic, don't you? But you know, where I come from, people do believe in the mystical power of elements ... including gemstones. I wonder what power these three are supposed to have ... I bet you stoical Romans never ascribed to such mystical things..."

"You are wrong, Anna. We did ascribe powers to the stones we wore. It was mostly superstitious nonsense but ... well, I am a superstitious man ... there is no harm in 'hedging one's bets' as you say today now, is there? Can anyone have too much good luck?"

"No, that's true, isn't it? Where would you and I be if not for luck? We wouldn't have even met."

"So, they are beautiful near your heart ... and they also have their own effects. Let's just say ... I believe in talismans...things can be imbued with power, Anna ... if we just believe..."

"I do believe. I believe in you, Max."

I wonder if I suspected that he wasn't telling me everything? I wonder if I had set myself up for him to do that?

The pub was quiet when I dropped in after work. I was meeting Max; for once we'd found that our rhythms about dinner were on the same beat. We were going to meet up for a drink at the pub, see friends then run out to a little Italian restaurant with low lights and wonderful ravioli where we could make eyes at each other and play footsie under the checkered tablecloth.

Uma and Andy were messing around behind the bar when I first came in. Bud and Marie were off in some corner booth with their heads close together. I hadn't actually seen them since they'd come back from their honeymoon. They looked tanned and in love.

I was fingering the necklace Max had given me and thinking about the 'stone of love' and how it symbolized to me that Max and I were going to find our way ... and it surely wouldn't be anyone else's way but we were fine with that.

Andy finally got his head out of his boss' neck long enough to notice me. I ordered a Chardonnay. He told me he liked my necklace and I told him Max had given it to me for my birthday.

Uma grinned at the stones as I held them up and told Andy what they were. And what they each stood for, in the 'Bible According To Maximus.' She just shook her head in amusement when I gushed just a bit over the sweet sentimentality behind the stones' meanings. She said something like she guessed Max didn't leave any stone unturned.

"Huh?" I said, sipping my wine and glancing at the door to see if he was here. He wasn't. I looked back at Uma. And then I heard what she'd said. "What am I missing?"

She was busy watching Andy's ass as he was cleaning the bar top down from us. Her voice was absentminded as her mind was on one track just then. And it wasn't me. "Well, just that you know how Romans are with assigning meaning to everything. They believe jewels have special powers. Wearing them as talismans gives them power over the wearer. Like to make them healthier ... or in the case of these, to ensure you will be in the mood to marry him and that it will be a happy marriage."

"Huh?" I said. When she kept looking at Andy with that goofy look on her, I tapped her elbow. 

She looked at me. Then looked at the necklace with a soft smile. "Well, let's see if I remember this correctly. If it's a talisman, then the idea is the stones will bring something to the wearer, or guard them from something. So, amethyst, right? That's to bring deep love, humility, stability and probably a few other things I don't remember right off. And peridot ... it symbolizes happiness ... it was believed to discourage betrayal and to encourage friendship and marriage. Ah, and rubellite. The 'stone of love' ... it's supposed to be an especially powerful influence on love and friendship, lending to permanence and stability. So you take them all together ... and I'd say the General is hoping the stones will work on you."

"Work on me? As in ... marriage? He's given me a talisman to get me to marry him?"

Uma, she knows me. She got that tone of voice. All that soft musing and romance in her body language flushed away when she heard me say that. And, of course, she knows how I feel about getting married and all. She may be changing to become more open to it for herself, but I've told her I'm not. She thinks I will be convinced otherwise because I am at some point going to want more with Max.

"You okay? He wouldn't not have told you about ... Oh, bloody hell. I shouldn't have said that, Ann. I'm sure it was just ... just him being ... romantic. He's very romantic, isn't he?"

I could tell she was trying to cover. I bet I had steam rising from me. "So, he's trying to trick me, is he?"

"No. No! Ann ... no, it's just ..."

"It's like you said, isn't it? He is going to have his way. I just don't get this. Why the fuck does he have to push like this? He cons me into moving in with him by ... well, none of your business. And he must know I don't want to get married. That it's not in my plans."

"Give him a break, Ann. He loves you. It would be natural for him to want ..."

"What about what I want?"

"What about what he wants? Is that important to you?"

I frowned at her. Her eyes darted away from me. "Shit. He's here. Ann, whatever you do, don't over-react."

So I have not over-reacted, have I?

I was very nice about it all. In fact, I was determined to never let Max know that I knew the other meaning of the stones and his giving them to me as a talisman. I just started watching him more carefully. I was beginning to catalog how maybe he was manipulating me and I was letting him.

But keeping things like that inside, they just eat away at you. And they end up coming out somehow no matter how hard you try.

The thing I kept arguing with myself about was that ... that I was pretty sure he was doing this out of love of me. But I didn't think love was even a good enough reason to trick somebody.

So there I was on the razor's edge ... I had this man who loved me and whom I loved ... and he'd done something I thought was wrong ... but he did it out of love and maybe because he was trying to be careful with me, being smart enough to know that if he asked me right out front what I saw for us in the future, that it'd be too early to get an answer he could live with.

But if he knew that much about me, then didn't he know enough to know I wasn't going to change my mind? If he knew that much, shouldn't he have been the one to break this off between us so that he could go find the woman who be easier for him, who'd want what he wanted, who'd build the life he wanted?

Why would he stick with me?

He said he was hedging his bets ... but didn't he know I was a losing gamble?

So I had this jumble inside me. I felt guilty because I must make him crazy. I felt angry because he made me crazy. I felt scared because it seemed I was watching everything we had blow away in the face of the gathering of reality. I felt hyper-aware because I was going to stop letting him manipulate me. I felt weak because I was thinking I had to fight for my autonomy. I felt lost more than anything.

But when the end came, it was with a suddenness that provided a thunderclap of a resolution. 

It started as a pissing match having not a thing to do with the necklace and with feeling like I was being tricked by him. It started with yet another argument over how many towels he uses. I know, I know. Believe me, I know just how inane an argument it was. Yeah, because I was right there and I've had to live with the knowledge of it.

But this had been a long time coming between us, I suppose. And in the end, now that I survey the damage from the other side, then I have to admit ... this was never even about the necklace. That was just the thing I focused upon.

Have I mentioned ... yes, I think I have ... how hard it is to live with a man? It is. I've been too independent for too long. Adjusting was hard. I never really did, I suppose. I never felt like it was "our" place because it was his place.

And things moved so fast with Max that I never seemed to be able to find the brake handle and bring this to a slow enough speed that I felt like I could help steer it. It's not his fault; it's my failing, my weakness that has allowed that to happen.

Okay, so anyway ...

About a week later, my edgy mood had begun to work on Max. He kept asking me what was wrong and I kept assuring him it was just work. And then I came home one night in tears because my pointy-haired boss had ragged on me because I'd opened my mouth to offer a suggestion in a meeting with his fellow managers.

Max sat at the table, eating his dinner while I told him what had happened. He'd already spent an hour getting me to cry it out, wipe my face and put it behind me. But I couldn't. I was just over my limit. I wanted him to care about this, about how it made me feel and about how I wanted to quit but I couldn't.

"You could quit," he said after swallowing a mouthful of carefully chewed stew meat.

"I cannot just fucking quit," I snapped back.

"Anna, there is no need to be angry with me. I am not the cause of this problem."

"Don't you care? This man is the world's worse boss and I'm stuck there. A little sympathy, a little indication that you care would be nice, Maximus."

He gave me his infamous "tsk." "Of course I care. You know that. What would you have me do? Shall I go down there and yank his chain? Show him what sort of trouble I can make for him? I have had the urge to do that for some time now. He has no concept of the value you have. I am inclined to educate him on this."

"Jesus, Max. Don't you think I'd love that? But you can't do that. But what you can do is just ... just ... I don't know ... just act as if you can understand why I hate this and that I hate feeling powerless."

"Then resign your position. Find another if you must. Or simply let me care for you. There is no need for you to work unless you wish to."

"Oh, Christ. Do you hear yourself? I don't work because I wish to. I work to make a living and because I want a career." 

And I had this moment just then ... even in the midst of trying to make a certain point with Max ... where I thought about what I'd said ... I had a career? No, this job was not a part of any career I'd ever wanted. This job was a paycheck. Why was I settling for that? What was it going to take to get me to recover from the shell shock of losing a job and get me back on my career track?

"That is your choice. I will support you in any choice you make. But if this job is what has made you so ... difficult this week, then I want you to turn in your resignation."

I watched him eat. Like that was the end of discussion. Like he hadn't just been ... less than perfect.

We spent the whole rest of the evening being irritated with each other.

I didn't feel any better about him or work the next morning. But I still kissed him goodbye when I left for work. And I still went to work. I avoided my bastard of a boss the whole day, kept my nose down, did my work ... and got out of there.

Max had called to tell me he'd be late coming home from work that night. Something about a business meeting with his boss and the government liaison for their chief contract. And when he came in, I could smell on him that he'd been at a bar. There was a lingering scent of smoke and a slight taste of whisky on his breath when he came in and kissed me. He said he hadn't had dinner and wondered if I'd make him something.

"I'm kind of busy right now with all this laundry you make for me," I said. "Surely you can rustle up your own grub just this once?"

He came up behind me where I stood at the washing machine. Put his arms around me. Nestled in. His mouth seeking my neck. "Let us not have harsh words tonight, cara. I have thought of what you said last night ..."

"Max, you know, tonight's not the night to sweet talk me into cooking you dinner."

He stilled his movement but he didn't release me. I felt him swallow. "If you resent caring for me and for my home ..."

"Your home?" I said. He released me and I turned in his arms to look at him. "This isn't a home, Max. This is a tiny one-bedroom apartment. And I'm doing my best to pitch in and keep it going ... but I never signed up to become your maid or your wife."

"What?"

"You heard me. If I have to wash another load of clean towels that you refuse to use because you have this ..."

"Do not continue to snap at me over the towels. That matter has been laid to rest."

"That's because you're not the one doing the fucking towels twice a week."

He backed away from me. Started to say something. Instead, held up his hand and then walked away. I stood there waiting on myself to calm down. But if there's one thing about him ... man, it gets to me how he just walks away instead of dealing with me.

I went in to find him pouring a drink of amber scotch in a tumbler.

"Don't you ever again try your voodoo magic on me, Maximus," I said as I tossed the necklace ... my necklace ... at him.

His head jerked up. His eyes watched the necklace skitter across the counter and bounce up against the glass he was filling. His jaw worked. But he didn't say a word. Just picked up his glass and looked at me. His face was hard and impenetrable. But now that I look back on it, I think maybe there was something else in his eyes. Something like hurt. I hate that I did this. I do. But I did and I have to admit to it.

"Uma told me all about what the stones really mean to you. Don't do this kind of thing to me. If what we have isn't good enough for you, then ... well, then you should tell me and I can make it easy on you."

I decided to wait him out. I stood there, looking at him, refusing to back down. His jaw worked. His chin came up.

He said, "You are upset. Think carefully what you are saying."

"I think I've said what I needed to say."

He walked past me and I heard the television snap on. He flipped channels until he settled on a rugby game. I watched him from the kitchen. His body was rigid. And I did think about what I'd said. And how I was feeling. And I knew the problem was in me. But I still was angry and I didn't honestly know that I could say exactly what I was angry about.

It wasn't until later ... until I realized it hadn't been the necklace that had started this or the towels ... it wasn't until then that I also realized that I wasn't really angry. I was scared.

I went in the bedroom and tried to read. I tried to calm. I tried to meditate. I distractedly watched Buck trotting between Max and I, intent on watching over us ... and visibly agitated by the vibes we were both putting off.

And then I heard Max yell at Buck. Order him to stay. That if he so much as moved an inch, he would put him outside on the balcony where he would not disturb us again.

"Leave him alone," I said, coming into the living room, intending to pick up the dog and take him back in the bedroom with me.

"The dog must learn. If he cannot stop staring at me and this incessant insanity of constantly moving back and forth between us ..."

"Max, get off it. It's his way. He is just being true to his nature. You need to get over it."

"He needs discipline."

"He gets discipline. From me. I have trained him and you cannot say I haven't. You expect too much from him."

"I have given him an order. Do not touch him. He must learn to obey me."

"Because you're the master?"

"Yes."

"Don't be ridiculous. I'll just take him back to the bedroom with me and he won't bug you again."

"He must learn to obey me. Leave him."

"Max ..."

"If he moves, if he disobeys me, then I will put him on the balcony."

"No way. It isn't safe."

We looked at each other. And at just that moment, Buck moved. He walked just a few steps toward me. It happened in slow motion, I think.

Max rose from the couch.

"Don't you dare put him out there," I said softly.

"Oh, really?" He looked at me; crooked an eyebrow at me. Picked up the dog. Opened the balcony door. Put Buck outside. Closed the glass door. Looked at me. Wiped his hands against each other. Tilted his head in defiance.

"I told you not to do that," I said.

"The dog will be fine out there. It will teach him."

I looked at Buck. He looked in at me. This was a dog who had been with me long enough and through enough with me that I felt intense loyalty to him. And what Max had done hurt my feelings in a way I didn't understand. And it lit a cold fire of anger, real true anger, inside me.

"Fine," I said, turning from Max.

He must have heard it in my calm, firm voice. That this was all wrong. "Fine?" he asked me.

"Yeah. Fine." I looked back at him as I walked down the hall. "Love me, love my dog, Max. If he's not worthy of being in your apartment, then I'm not either."

"Do not be ridiculous."

"I'm not."

I pulled out a suitcase, tossed in what would fit. I took my overnighter and dumped in all the toiletries it would hold. I carried them to the front door. Max sat in a chair in the living room and just watched me. I grabbed Buck's leash, stepped out onto the balcony, snapped it on his collar and led him to the front door.

Max never even said a word. Never tried to stop me.

That's how I left him.

With a suitcase, an overnighter and my dog. 

Thank God, I'd followed Dino's advice and had not given up my apartment. At least I had a place to go to crash after I'd burned.

I can't believe it ends like this. But I know he's not the kind of man to come after me. And I'm not the kind of woman to go crawling back.