This is a dream. Or a joke. These are the two options cycling through Benny's mind, the only ones he will consider. Because this just doesn't happen in real life.
Amnesia.
It just doesn't happen. It's a cliché, insipid bullshit, the kind of thing you find in lousy paperbacks or Lifetime movies.
But he can't stop it haunting around the outskirts of his train of thought. It's the only explanation he can come up with – aside from the dream-or-joke theory – for the fact that he's been recuperating from a car accident alone, for a full week, in a featureless hospital room. The phone on his bedside table mocks him the entire time, because damned if he can't make himself think of a number, any number, that he could call, and his cell phone is a writeoff after the crash. He asks the nurses to get in touch with Alison Grey, or at least her father, but the Yellow Pages yield nothing, and belatedly he remembers that none of the Greys ever list their phone numbers.
So he stews in his aggravation and seclusion while his forearm begins to mend and his stitches itch. He hightails it out of the hospital at the first opportunity, pocketing the prescription for painkillers and scribbling his signature as fast as the cast will let him. Dressed in his only clothes, which are torn and faintly bloodstained, he hails a cab and heads uptown, headed home.
Dream or joke…or amnesia. Because why else wouldn't his keys work in the lock – why else would Alison open the door of their apartment and stare at him like he's a panhandler from the street?
"What are you doing here, Benjamin?"
Disbelief and anger flare behind his eyes, precipitating what feels like an impending migraine. "Thanks to you, too, Alison, for caring where I've been for the past week." He flaunts his plaster-cased arm at her. "It would have been nice to have some company in the hospital, you know." Then he pauses – no, come to think of it, he'd tried to keep news of his hospitalization as quiet as possible. He'd been in no condition to be driving when he caused the accident, and he was afraid of the story somehow being spun against his new in-laws.
That's it. She must have figured, after the anxiety of the first day or so, that she would have been notified if anything had happened to him. Now she's just angry over his weeklong disappearing act. He rubs the bridge of his nose and sighs. "Look, baby, I can explain later, okay? Right now I am just exhausted." He moves to push past her into the apartment.
Unfortunately, he can't make his logic stretch to account for her holding the door firmly in place, or for her next words: "Benny, I don't know what you've been doing, but you cannot come in. Not to sleep, or for anything else, for that matter. You need to leave."
Slowly, he turns to her; the wheels are spinning in his head, but he can't make her statement make sense. "What?"
He thinks he sees her lip quiver for a moment, but it is masterfully suppressed, leaving only a hint of a tremor in her voice. "I thought we were done with this, Benny. You promised you would stop."
"Promised I would stop – what?"
"Coming back. Coming back to me."
Dream, joke, amnesia. Now a fourth alternative is taking hazy shape at the back of his brain, something along the lines of It's a Wonderful Life. Is this payback for that trip to the Cat Scratch two weeks ago? To teach him to appreciate his wife? He's got it, thanks. "Stop fucking around, Clarence," he mutters.
"What?"
"Nothing. Alison, what the hell are you talking about? I've had a hell of a week, and I just want to be in our own bed. Join me or not, it's up to you, but I warn you I won't be up for much." He doesn't like to swear at her, but he's at the end of his rope and then some.
Her mouth opens, then shuts, and she swallows. The door is pushed shut, an inch from his nose.
His whole body clenches: he is one giant fist of frustration. "Is there a reason," he says loudly, edgily, "why my wife will not let me into our apartment?"
There is a minute of silence, and then the door creeps back open. Now Alison looks like she is weighing her own dream-or-joke possibilities. Apparently opting for the second, she asks quietly, "Are you serious?"
"Yes, I am serious! What the hell is wrong with you, Alison? What are you trying to prove?"
"Benny – have you forgotten the fact that we divorced two years ago?"
She lets him into the apartment, after all – it may have been related to him going an ashy grey under his dark skin and sitting down hard against the opposite wall of the hallway. A hostess by instinct, she ushers him in, seats him in the living room, and goes to fetch a glass of water. From here, he can see the details that weren't obvious from the door – the framed photos of her and her family, conspicuously absent him; the subtly paisley décor, which he detests. A volley of barking brings his migraine back full-force, as a new Akita – another damned one – accompanies Alison from the kitchen.
She hands him the water and sits on the edge of another chair, facing him, clearly ill at ease. Didn't finishing schools teach how to deal with a spouse – ex-spouse – suffering from trauma-induced amnesia? Honestly, what did they charge an arm and a leg for?
He drains the glass and sets it on an end table. "Would you like more?" she asks. She looks at the carpet, at the divan, at the Akita, who is sitting next to her and eyeing Benny suspiciously – anywhere but at Benny himself.
"No. Thanks." Awkward. He folds his hands, then clamps them between his knees. He gazes at her. Her eyes lock with his, accidentally, and flick quickly away. There is a sharp pang in his chest.
"Could I—"
"Benny—"
He gestures for her to continue, and she takes a deep breath. "I think you should go see a doctor, Benny. God knows I can't – I can't help you."
The words are a knell of isolation. Benny looks at his twisted hands and nods. "I know. I will."
They sit silently for a minute. Then Alison says in a small voice, "Were you going to say something?"
He considers and discards a hundred ways of putting Why? into words. "Could I ask – who wanted the divorce? Was it you, or – or me?"
She pales a bit, but replies evenly, "It was mutual, more or less. In the end."
"In the end?" What the hell does that mean?
Her hands are neatly clasped in her lap, but the white knuckles betray her. "Well – all right, Benny, I did. I asked for it, in the first place. I had to convince you, a little. But you didn't put up much of a fight."
It feels like some sort of vindication – up until that last part. "But – why, Alison? You – God, why?"
"Why, Benny? You would have to answer that. I don't know which pulled you away from me first – those ex-roommates of yours who always hated me, or the stripper with AIDS that you couldn't keep your hands off of?"
Mark and Roger? As far as he can recall, he's glad and relieved to be out of that roach-infested, angst-ridden loft. What happened in the intervening years to make him prefer them to Alison? And Mimi – well, yeah, there's that, but surely he wouldn't have actually gone and cheated on his wife?
Alison is still talking, gesticulating with all the pain of old wounds: "—and then, when she went back to what's-his-name, it was just any girl you could get, Benny. Usually they were employees, but really, anything with a short skirt and fluttering eyelashes, because they could smell the money on you – my money, my father's money – and I was here, alone, always alone…"
She trails off, hiding her eyes with one lovely manicured hand, and Benny is in a quandary: his instinct is to comfort her, but he is the wrongdoer, the guiltless culprit.
"I didn't know what the hell was left to do," she says softly, at last, not looking at him. "You never saw how far the crack had opened. All I could do was love you hard – and let you go."
His throat constricts. "Alison – I don't know – I don't know—" He swallows hard. "I love you, Alison. I love the warm, sweet, shy, brave woman you are."
She makes a small choking sound. "It's been years since I've heard you say that, do you realize?"
"I'm so sorry for that, Alison. I don't know how I could forget – how I could not tell you every day, every time I saw you."
"Benny…"
"Alison—" He extends a hand across the gulf between them, willing her to close the distance. "Please – give me another chance, just one more."
"Benny—" She stares at his outstretched hand, and slowly, slowly reaches toward it. Then there is the tiny tremble to her lip again. Her fingers clench in midair, pull away. She looks down at her lap, then up to meet his eyes. "I can't, Benny." Her voice is almost a whisper. "I gave you another chance, and another, and another. You may not remember, now, but you never changed. It never made a difference."
He gazes at her, his beautiful girl, and then he slowly nods. It breaks his heart – but if he loves her, and if this is what she wants, then how can he say no?
"All right," he says quietly. "I'll go, then." Even though he can't help but feel that he's making a mistake.
He stands, and she rises with him. "Where will you go? You could stay the night, if you need – there's a guest room—"
He knows. It was their guest room, once. He shakes his head, trying to keep from crying. "I'll go to the loft, I guess. If I'm friends with them again, they'll let me get my feet under me, so I can figure everything out with a doctor."
She nods mutely. Together, they walk to the door, and she opens it for him. There seem to be several conflicting thoughts in her eyes as she looks at him, but she says simply, "Goodbye, Benny."
He hesitates, then dares a kiss on her cheek. "Goodbye, Alison," he replies softly.
He steps into the hallway, and the door closes on a chapter of his life that he can only remember beginning.
Bring back the lies,
hang them back on the wall.
Maybe I'd see
how you could be
so certain that we
had no chance at all.