Bottles

"Would you have felt comfortable being here alone with me...if all I did was just sit or stand, staring at the water?"

"That's so odd. No, I wouldn't have."

"But if I'm just fishing..."

"Then it looks totally normal. Wow. I...I don't know if I'm impressed or weirded out."

I laughed a little at that remark.

"But why not fish. I mean, you're here anyway."

"I tried for a while, but I don't know anything about fishing. I spent months dropping my line with a worm or minnow on the hook. I spent a lot of money on bait, never caught a thing, and came home with smelly hands. It just wasn't worth it. All I really wanted to do was sit and watch the water. And since I'm not a pretty lady, I can't get away with that unless I have props to make me look safe."

"Oh, and you think a pretty lady could get away with it?" Her voice was playful.

"I see you do it every week."

"And you don't think I'm dangerous?"

"As long as you don't hit me with one of those bottles, I think you're fairly harmless."

At the mention of the bottles, she abruptly turned her head back towards the horizon and remained silent for a minute, resting her chin on her hand. Then she said, "Well, as long as you keep up your harmless fisherman routine, I won't be forced to throw a bottle at you."

"It's a deal," I said. I expected her to leave, but she sat there for a while, until a few stars were making their nightly appearance over the water. I was about ready to leave, but I didn't want her to see me get the bottle, so I waited. Finally, she sighed and said, "Emily...my daughter...she gets nervous if I stay out while it's dark, so..."

"See you next week," I said, not taking my eyes off the water.

"Have a good evening, Ernie."

*******

Love isn't blind- not real love. Love says I take you, lumps and all. Love says you don't have to worry about rejection. It's a preemptive acceptance. So the lovers never need to hide their flaws. And they don't need to be afraid of what happens when someone sheds light on those dark corners of their life. "Perfect love drives out fear."

You would know me. You would know my flaws and my sins, my mistakes and my ugly parts. And you would love me in spite of all that. And I would love you the same. Love doesn't say, "I love you so you don't need to change," or "I'll love you after you change," or even "I'll love you because you'll change." Love says, "I will love you while you change- I love who you are and who you will be."

I couldn't resist another look. After our conversation, I wanted to know her better. I didn't even wait until I got home to open that day's bottle and read the note. I wished I hadn't. The guilt of reading her notes was one thing, but this one struck home.

I remembered Hannah, sweaty underneath me. I worked nights, so early mornings were our time together. She was pushing her hips up to meet my thrusts, her eyes wild with lust. As I got close, she pushed up on my chest with both hands. "Gimme some room!" she gasped. I straightened up as much as I could, letting her work her fingers between us. I held myself inside her as she rubbed herself the rest of the way to one last cum for the morning. She winced and cursed and trembled as she went over that edge. She rubbed her hands along her body as she writhed on the bed.

Once her hands were out of the way, I resumed my position on top of her and quickly drove myself to a very satisfying completion. As I pulsed inside her, I moaned and said something about my love for her. She rubbed my back and indulged me a minute of recovery. Then as she got up to get dressed. She said very nonchalantly, "You've changed, Ern. I don't think this is what I want anymore. I mean, you're nice and all, but...I think I just need to move on."

She had said it so simply, in such a matter-of-fact way. It was almost like she was talking about getting a new phone, or something. I tried to ask her what she meant, but she just shrugged.

"I don't know. I liked what we had at first, but you're different now and I don't think it's working for me."

I was stunned...but not surprised, if that makes sense. She had always been distant- that was my frustration with her. But a few days later, she made that emotional distance a physical one, too. She packed up the few things she had brought into our relationship 2 years earlier and left. She wasn't angry or upset or even the slightest bit sad.

"Don't take it too hard, Ern," she had said to me as she made a sandwich for the road. "You're a great guy. You're just not my type of guy. I'm surprised you put up with me this long. Guess the sex was really good for you, huh?" She had said that last bit with a mouthful of food as she walked out the door. "Take care!"

I hadn't tried to talk her out of it. Part of me didn't want her to go, but I knew it wasn't going to work. Hope had faded so gradually that I hadn't realized how far gone it was. I had thought she would change, I had thought the fireworks of our early days would transform into the warm glow of a loving relationship. It never happened. And once I realized that she didn't even want that, it was easy to let her go.

Well, easy to let her leave. I never let her go. I never let the idea of her go. In my more sober moments, I knew that I wasn't remembering and pining after her as she really was. Instead, I was putting her face on an idealized woman- pining after a true love and putting Hannah's face on it.

I had walked the four blocks to my house without seeing the world around me, letting my body's memory guide my steps. I put the bottle in the garage and started dinner. I wanted another week to fly by so I could talk to Macy again. And I wondered if that evening had been a fluke and if she would even talk to me again the next week.

*******

We did talk the next week. And the week after. And every Saturday evening after that. A few times she brought her kids with her, and Randy got the chance to actually "fish" (though still without bait). Emily was shy around me, but when I spotted a sea turtle surfacing nearby, she ran over next to me and let me point it out. We watched with wonder as its huge shell came in and out of view. But once it was out of sight, Emily ran back to her mom and looked at me only shyly. Randy, not one to let his sister get away so easily, said, "My sister thinks you look like Jesus."

I smiled and tried not to look over at Emily. "It's the hat, isn't it?" I said.

Randy turned and looked at me like I was an idiot. "No. It's the beard." Apparently, 8-year-olds don't get my humor...

Over the weeks, I learned that Macy was alone with her kids and that her friend would watch them every Saturday for a couple hours so she could get out. Her friend used to have Fridays off, so for a year before we met, Macy would be out there on Friday evenings and I would be out there on Saturdays. We both seemed to find that funny for some reason.

I told her about my job as a night watchman at a lab in town. I told her a little about my folks in the Midwest. There wasn't much else to tell- I worked and I went home, coming out to the pier to think on my night off.

I didn't have the courage to ask about the bottles. Macy, however, brought it up on a chilly December evening. We were in Florida, so it wasn't frigid, but it was cold enough to make me wish we were sitting closer, touching, sharing warmth. I did, however, brink a blanket for her, which she appreciated.

We sat quietly for a little while, as we sometimes did, then she said, "Ernie, you never ask about the bottles."

My heart skipped a beat and several thoughts rushed to my head. Should I have asked? Did it look suspicious that I haven't? Was she going to tell me everything? Did she suspect I had read them?

"Thanks for not asking."

"Well, I figured it was personal. You'd tell me if you felt like it."

"Are you curious?"

I smiled. "Ravenously."

She laughed at that. Then she sighed and looked out at the water again. "Some people write in a diary or on a blog. I just write some thoughts and throw them to the sea."

"Do you want someone to find them?"

"Oh, it doesn't matter. I expect it they would end up far away, and no one would know who wrote them or why."

"Why do you write them?"

She didn't answer at first. Her eyes wandered from the sunset to her toes, then back again. "I write my dreams...my heart's desires. Things I can't say to anyone else. I figure the waves can keep my secrets." I winced a little at that, thankful she wasn't looking at me when she said it.

She straightened up on the folding stool and wrapped the blanket a little more tightly around her shoulders. "Well, now you know the mystery of what I'm doing here," she said with a smile.

Shaking my fishing rod a little, I said, "And you know my secret, too."

She laughed and said, "You know, you really do look the part. The beard, the hat, the eyes..."

"The eyes?"

She blushed a little, then said, "Yeah, the eyes. They're this deep blue- like when I look at your eyes, I see past them and right back into the sea. It's...it's...I don't know," and she looked away, clutching the blanket.

I decided to venture a question. "Macy, is...is he out there?" I pointed towards the water with a nod of my head. "Randy and Emily's father, I mean?" That question earned me a long, thoughtful gaze. She looked at me with an expression I couldn't read. I felt like she could stand up, slap me and walk away or lean in and kiss me- neither would have seemed out of place. Turning her eyes back to the horizon, she answered me.

"Yes. Sort of. He went out there..." she nodded her head towards the water, "...with the army. He never came back."

"Oh, Macy, I'm sorry. Did he...die in the war?"

A look of disgust crossed her face. "We should have been so lucky. But no. He left to fight, then after his time was up, he came back long enough to pack up a few things and leave. Left us everything in the divorce if I didn't fight it, hasn't come back since."

"Bastard," I offered.

"Yeah. I know I should forgive him, but it was just..." she shook her head and growled.

"How long...?"

"Four years. Emily was born while he was away. He didn't even want to meet her when he came back. I got the impression that our marriage had been over long before that."

"Bastard," I said again, not sure what else could be said.

"Yeah. So no, the bottle aren't for him. Maybe...maybe they're for who he should have been...I don't know...that doesn't even make sense..." She shook her head and chuckled. I think she realized her last comment was more revealing than she had intended.

"It's OK," I said. "Most things don't."

"Most things don't what?"

"Make sense."

*******

"You owe me a story." It was a week after Macy had shared about the bottles and her ex-husband. She took me by surprise, walking up behind me almost an hour earlier than she usually arrived.

"Huh?"

"Your story- why you need to look at the sea and pretend to fish. What problems you're trying to make feel small."

"Oh, that's...that's only fair, I guess." I really didn't want to talk about Hannah, but I also didn't want to hurt Macy. "It's really nothing...I mean, compared to your story..."

"I wanna know, OK Ernie?"

I ventured a long look at her. Most weeks, I avoided looking at her- I didn't want to make her uncomfortable. But when she said that, I found her eyes and tried to see what was there. I expected courtesy, kindness, friendliness. I saw more. Not lust or even love, per se, but a genuine presence. She was there, she was sincere, and she was listening. How long since a woman had listened to me? Three years since Hannah had left, two years with Hannah, how long before that?

OK, so that wasn't entirely true. I had friends- married friends. Chester, Marcus, Leon- we were good friends, the kind you could run to when your world fell apart. But they were married, and their wives were (for the most part) wonderful women and good friends to me. And sometimes, when a group of us would be together, talking, one of them would look me in the eyes and really listen. But I also knew that many times I saw pity in those eyes- pity and a scheming plan to set me up with one of their friends who was likewise unlucky in love.

But that was different. It's hard to say why. There's a difference between a married woman listening out of friendship and an available woman listening out of...out of a different kind of connection, whatever it may be. Maybe it's that, with Macy, there was no predefined limit to our relationship. Potential- that was the word I was looking for. However unlikely, there was at least potential for more. You knew, when a woman was really listening to you, that on at least a subconscious level she was evaluating you as a potential partner. And it was nice to at least be considered.

I don't know how long my eyes held that gaze as I thought through those things, probably only a few seconds. Apparently not enough for Macy to get uncomfortable. I wasn't sure what she had just said- it was already buried under piles of other thoughts- but I figured I could get away with a simple, "Well, OK then..."

I told her about Hannah. I told her more than I intended to. I told her about always wanting to move towards her but never feeling welcome. I told her about my friends starting to warn me that I was going to be waiting in vain for Hannah to become what I wanted. I told her about the flippant and abrupt end to our relationship. I told her about feeling used- like I had just served a function for 2 years and then been tossed aside when I failed to serve that purpose. I told her about my friends and their wives and how our 13 year tradition of Saturday evening guy's time evolved into a couple's night, where I was welcome but out of place. I told her about feeling like every available woman my age was a jaded opportunist, too scarred to give love a shot.

I stopped when I started to feel I had tried her patience in going on and on. "Sorry, one thought just led to another, and...you know..."

"No...it's fine. I asked. And I'm glad you felt comfortable enough to share."

"Thanks, but maybe I should answer in smaller doses next time."

"Well, I'm sure it's been a while since you could really...talk."

"Yeah, it has. Thanks for listening. The waves usually don't let me get a word in."

She smiled, and seeing her face like that made me want to keep her smiling. Then she said, "I guess when you're that big, you don't need to worry about manners." She paused, then with a more serious tone asked, "Does it work?"

"Does what work?"

"What you said a while back...about the sea making your problems seem smaller. Does it work?"

I thought about that for a while. "Nah. Not yet, anyway. But I don't have any better ideas."

"Me either," she said softly.

Long after dark, I walked her to the end of the pier and to her car. Once she drove off, I trotted back to the sand and got the bottle.

*******

We didn't talk too much after that. It was like we had said everything that needed to be said for now. Macy would stand about 10 yards away from me, leaning over the rail. Then, week after week, she would hurl the bottle out to the sea, walk over to me, and sit down. She always took the stool and the blanket I offered her. We would chit-chat about small things- the weather, her kids, stories that came to mind. It was nice. I wanted more, but I also didn't want to mess things up. She obviously had some hard things to deal with, and I didn't want to complicate that.

One Saturday in early January, I was sipping hot chocolate from a thermos. I had brought an extra one. At the sound of footsteps behind me, I picked up the extra stool and set it up. But rather than heading to the railing on the far side, the footsteps came straight up to me. A young woman in a warm coat stood just next to me- I didn't recognize her. I smiled, nodded, and looked back out to the sea. She said, "Macy's sick today. I thought you should know."

I turned my head sharply and looked up. The woman looked at me intently, without an expression on her face, her hands in her pockets.

"Sick?"

"Well, not...like...sick. She's just got a cold. But she's not coming today. I figured you might want to know. You're Ernie, right?"

"Yeah. Is she...I mean, does she need anything?"

The woman smiled for the first time, "Oh, you're just too sweet." It felt a little condescending, but I was used to that. "She's fine. I'm going back there to help with the kids. I'm Denise...Macy's friend. She doesn't know I'm here."

"Oh. Well, tell her I hope she feels better soon. You can...if you want you can bring the kids out here. I can help entertain them."

"I'm sure you could."

Under her constant gaze, I couldn't help but feel like I was being evaluated.

"Why aren't you using any bait?"

"Huh?" I figured Macy had told her about that, but I was still thrown off.

"Randy talks about fishing with you, but when I ask him about worms, he doesn't have a clue what I'm talking about. I did enough fishing with my dad growing up that I know you don't have any bait around here- unless it's in that extra thermos."

God, what was with this woman? I looked at the thermos. "Just an extra hot chocolate," I explained. She looked at it, looked at the stool and blanket, then looked at me and raised her eyebrows, asking a wordless question that I didn't understand. After a minute of silence I realized I hadn't answered her question about bait.

"I'm just here to think and to watch the waves. The fishing pole keeps my hands busy and makes me look..."

"Less pathetic?" she offered.

"I was going to say less threatening, but you're probably right."

"I'm sorry, it's just...a guy your age, sitting on the pier every week, pretending to fish? It's kinda weird."

"No more weird than a woman coming out here throwing bottles into the ocean every week," I countered.

"Throwing what?" She looked at me in confusion.

"Nevermind. It's nothing. It's just...I see lots of things out her over the years. It's a stupid metaphor." Not a great recovery, but enough to forestall any more questions. The woman narrowed her eyes and crossed her arms, looking ready to say something else to me. But after a few awkward moments, she dropped her hands to her sides and said, "Well, I'm going back to Macy and the kids. You just...be good, OK? Keep...being nice."

Not sure how to respond to that odd farewell, I simply said, "OK...you too." As she walked away, I wondered why Macy hadn't told her about the bottles. More specifically, I wondered why she had told me. I felt the conflicting urge to run home and read all the notes and at the same time to lock them away for no one to see. After giving Denise enough time to be well on her way, I packed up my stuff and left before the sun even set. I glanced under the pier on my way past it, knowing there would be no bottle but checking anyway.

I sat on the step going down into the garage after I got home. I sat there and stared at the cardboard box filled with glass bottles. I thought for a long time, a beer in my hand. I ignored the complaints of my hungry stomach, not wanting to lose the thoughts I was pulling together. It was inevitable, really, probably since the moment she said "Hi" to me. I passed it off as curiosity for a while, then as courtesy, and then as friendliness. But there was no mistaking the feeling of wanting to be with someone.

She fascinated me, she drew me in. I wanted to know her better. I wanted to earn the right to sit quietly next to her on a chilly evening with my arm around her. I wanted to be the one to make her feel special and beautiful and safe. I wanted her to smile when she thought of me.