Compromise

by Tamara Breuer

On the night we meet, he says I look like a dangerous kind of girl. I don’t know what he means by that and so I laugh. He takes my laughter as confirmation of truth. A determining moment. It appears so trivial at the time, like the catalyst of most wars. I would come to discover that the space between two people is a fragile state, one that can grow or shrink from insignificant acts: a stolen gaze, an unguarded word, a turned back. Careless laughter.

-

Sunday night, an art gallery opening. I am there with a friend, he knows the artist. His eyes follow me around the room, my eyes remain fixed on the artwork. A black and red painting of a naked woman tangled in spider webs.

Even with my back facing him, I can feel his gaze. I want to sleep with him, and I want him to go away. A push and a pull. At the end of the night, I tap him on the shoulder and ask for his number.

-

When my friends probe me, I don’t call it a date–we’re meeting up to hang out. The word “date” is so loaded, so charged with expectations.

-

Saturday night, an upscale bar with cocktail names like Boulevardier and Skidoo. I order a rum and coke, and the bartender with the imperial mustache smirks. I avoid glancing at my phone. My stomach feels like it has dropped a couple of inches too low in my body.

-

He strolls into the bar thirteen minutes after our agreed upon time.

I’m surprised you texted, he says. You seemed to have a lot going on for you that night.

My anxiety dissipates and I feel a slight thrill. He sees me as aloof and mysterious, he doesn’t know that I am just a woman bound up inside of herself.

-

Three weeks later, a parking garage filled with people. We fuck in his car while I silently dare passersby to make eye contact with me. He confesses that such exhibitionism is unusual for him.

I guess some people accuse me of being pretty traditional.

I laugh. If you were traditional you would have judged me for sleeping with you the night that we met. I can’t stand it when guys do that.

Silence as my words settle into the sex-steamed air. Sleeps with guys on the first date. Often.

-

I ask him to pick where we hang out one night.

Well, he says. There’s something I want to do with you. But. It’s a daytime thing.

Up until now, we have only seen each other at night.

Sure. We can hang out in the daytime.

Well…I’ve always wanted to take the boat from Georgetown to Alexandria. I thought it would be fun to go with you.

Oh, I answer, genuinely surprised. That’s so cute.

He laughs like a boy and a man at the same time.

You say that word like it’s poison.

No, no, I say. Let’s go on a boat.

Cool, he grins. It’s a date.

-

A Monday or Tuesday, 1 am. I roll over my phone and accidentally dial his number.

I wake up the next morning to a text from him: Got a voicemail from you last night. You should be more careful with your phone.

My bad, I must have butt-dialed you.

His response: Yep.

His curtness surprises me.

Do you want to come over later?

I don’t hear back until the next day, when he texts: I’m not as good at multitasking as you.

What do you mean?

In the voicemail you were talking to some other dude. Doesn’t take a genius to figure out what was going on there. The phone cut off before things went any further.

Oh! A misunderstanding. I explain that I was watching TV and a fragment of the episode must have been recorded onto the voicemail. We laugh it off, and he comes over that night.

-

It’s hard for me to admit that I search for things in other people. I want to believe that I am the Seychelles Island, completely self-sufficient.

He has none of these hang-ups. We never talk about being exclusive, but I can feel his yearning for more of me, for all of me. It makes me feel special. It makes me feel afraid.

-

Friday happy hour after a stressful workday. My coworkers and I down one drink after another and vent about our boss. I don’t check my phone until I leave the bar at eleven.

4:02pm. Hey gorgeous, what are you doing later?

6:33pm. I’m heading out of work soon if you want to meet up.

7:38pm. Hey, I’m in your area. What’s up?

8:42pm. Never mind, back at my place now. Hope your evening is going well.

10:19pm. Seems like you’re having fun with him. Stay safe.

-

The next night. I ask him to meet me at a bar near my house.

I’ve had a lot of fun with you, I say, but I think we want different things.

I give him a hug, thinking it’s the last time I’ll ever see him.

-

4am that night. He calls and I answer.

I’m so sorry, he says. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.

His voice sounds like a small boy. It activates a maternal instinct deep within my bones that I hadn’t known lived there. I feel myself soften.

Come over, I say.

I’m already outside, he answers.

-

Sometimes, I have these thoughts. You’re too weird to be loved. You’re too normal to be loved. You’re too fat to be loved.

He makes me believe that these thoughts aren’t true. He makes me feel like love is possible, if we work hard enough at it.

I understand that he has insecurities too, and so we become exclusive after that night. I figure if he knows that I am having sex only with him, we can go back to having fun.

-

He has certain expectations now that I am his girlfriend.

He asks questions like: Do you think texting another man is cheating? Would you be ashamed to pole dance for exercise? Do you think it’s okay to make new male friends when you have a boyfriend?

The questions aren’t really questions, but I answer them anyway.

Why do you tell me these things if you know they’ll upset me? he says.

I’m telling you the truth, I say. If you don’t like who I am, you can break up with me.

-

Game night at a sports bar. I pretend to care about football and he finds it adorable. We laugh and touch each other in inappropriate ways for a public space.

A split-second and everything changes. His face goes from mid-grin to stone-cold. He starts answering me in monosyllables, staring at the TV screen above the bartender instead of my face. The air presses in around us.

I try slipping my hands inside his jeans but he pushes me away. I keep chatting animatedly, trying to read his face. After ten minutes, I feel exhausted and uneasy. I ask if he’s ready to go home. He says no. We sit in silence for the next hour, watching TV as people in the bar laugh around us.

The next day, I ask him to explain the previous night’s behavior.

He shakes his head. You’ll just deny it.

Deny what? I ask.

I saw you. Staring at that guy.

What guy? I was talking to you all night!

You gave this guy a ‘fuck me’ look. I saw it with my own eyes.

I don’t what you’re talking about.

Like I said, you’ll just deny it.

He doesn't want to discuss it anymore. I replay every second of the night to figure out who he could be talking about. It seems impossible to prove the innocence of a glance. We go about our day and pretend like that night never happened.

-

His fits of jealousy happen more frequently. They are always accompanied with the accusation that I am looking at someone the wrong way: the waiter, someone on the street, his friend, my friend, my boss.

The first few times, a knot of fear grips my insides and I question my motives. Why did I feel the need to smile at the waiter when he handed me my utensils? Is it normal to hold a stranger’s gaze when he opens the door for you?

Once his accusations become a pattern, I start to feel something else.

I understand that it’s impossible to like everything about a person. The word compromise has been handed down to me like an heirloom from my mother, who received it from my grandmother before that.

The truth is, I am terrible with compromise.

During his fits of jealousy, I feel an intense hatred rising like vomit in my throat, and so I break up with him. The break ups are reminders that I am still in control.

We break up once a week–twice if the fights are especially nasty. My best friend listens to me recount one fight after another.

Why are you still with this guy? She asks. Relationships shouldn’t be this hard.

There are lots of good parts, I say defensively.

Like what?

-

The sex is the best I’ve ever had. We have sex two to three times a day, more if we are fighting. I become aroused during our fights, anticipating what will come after.

He says that we don’t fight that much. He says that the fighting doesn’t matter as long as we come back to each other in the end.

-

We are lying in bed one night when he tells me that he prefers his women hairless.

I am surprised. We’ve been together for six months now and he’s never mentioned this.

I had no idea, I say. It doesn’t matter to me because I’m not the one down there. I’ll start shaving.

He looks satisfied.

From that day forward, whenever he looks at me naked, I feel like he is scanning my body for hairs.

-

He says I love you constantly. In the middle of our fights, while we’re in bed, sandwiched between heart emojis by text. When I cry during our fights, he tells me he’s relieved. The tears are proof that I care enough to cry.

I can’t avoid the perpetual blinking question in his eyes: do you love me enough?

-

Love is compromise. I should dress a little nicer when we have plans together. I should take a long nap before we see each other so that I don’t yawn in his presence. I should drink more when he feels like drinking and drink less when he doesn’t. I should be more flexible with my diet so that we can eat at more restaurants. I should improve my sense of direction–the way you do anything is the way you do everything.

I edit all the edges of myself, until I am no longer sure where I end and where he begins.

-

3 a.m., the phone rings. He is the only one who would call this late. I broke up with him earlier that night for accusing me of fucking one of his guy friends.

I turn on the light and grab my phone.

He is trying to FaceTime me, and my phone camera is turned on. I am about to answer when I see my face. My eyelids are swollen from sobbing. Lines gather on my forehead, around my lips. My skin is dull from lack of sleep. I have never looked so ugly.

I reject the call and go back to sleep.

-

I saw you with that guy last night, he tells me the next day when I call him back.

What?

I saw your silhouettes when you turned on the light. You were standing by your desk and he was lying on your bed.

What? I am repeating myself, but I can’t wrap my head around his words. I was alone last night.

You expect me to believe that? His voice is a steel knife. I bet you had the next guy ready on speed dial.

I am still too confused to be angry. Something doesn’t add up.

Wait a second… You were outside my house? Were you watching me?

I came to apologize and make a grand romantic gesture, he said, but clearly I shouldn’t have bothered.

Up until this point, I have rationalized his accusations. I might have recorded part of my TV show onto a voicemail. I may have glanced at someone in a sports bar. But I can’t understand how he saw me with another man when I was standing alone in my room.

Why are you so determined not to trust me? My voice sounds like a small child’s now, and no part of him softens.

You won’t make a fool out of me, he says. I know what kind of girl you are. I know what I saw. There’s nothing you can say to convince me otherwise.

Not even if it’s true?

Nope, he says.

-

I ignore his calls. He shows up at my work and I tell him to go away. He shows up at my house before I get home from work, and my roommates let him in.

I jump when I walk into the living room to find him sitting on my couch. What are you doing here?

His entire body trembles. His eyes are red and I can tell that he’s been crying.

I need you, he says.

No one needs anyone.

I need you, he repeats. I’m so sorry.

He looks like a small boy again, and I wonder what happened to make him this way. He starts openly sobbing, the way actors do when they know the camera is watching them.

I sit next to him and wrap my arms around him, because it’s the human thing to do.

Baby, I can’t lose you, he says. Please don’t give up on me. I believe in us.

I can tell by the earnestness in his voice that he really does believe. There was a time when these words would worm their way into my heart. Now they seem delusional.

Let me be your trial boyfriend for a week. I’ll be on my best behavior, I promise.

Resisting him is exhausting. Sitting close to him like this, I can feel all the energy draining from my body.

We can give it another try, I say.

He lets out a sound that is half-sob and half-laughter. You won’t regret it.

I let him kiss me.

Should we go to your room? He asks.

Not tonight. I have work to do.

This is the first time that we get back together with no make-up sex. It’s the first time that I feel zero sense of relief.

He’ll be on his best behavior, he says, and he kind of is. It will be two whole days before he accuses me of cheating again.

-

A few weeks later. A friend texts me to hang out. He is the kind of friend my boyfriend is afraid of: we had a friends-with-benefits arrangement a couple of years ago that fizzled out naturally. We remained on good terms after that, and he is a reminder of how pleasant casual sex can be. We haven’t hung out in a year, as my boyfriend asked me to drop all contact with people I’ve had sex with. I grant his wishes, until today.

We meet at a bar to play darts. My friend has laser-sharp aim; I am so nauseous I can barely hit the dartboard. I tell him that hand-eye coordination has always mystified me. He stands behind me and places one hand on my wrist. Somehow this is supposed to help me but it makes throwing harder. I pretend like I understand now and he’s delighted.

I kiss him first. It feels strange to be kissing these lips. My body has been programmed to a different rhythm.

He wants to take me back to his place, but I want to have sex in his car.

That doesn’t sound very comfortable, he says hesitantly.

I won’t take no for an answer. As soon as I am on top of him, I want the sex to be over. My mind floats outside of my body, watching the two strangers below.

He gives me a ride home. I keep my face turned towards the window. The overpowering smell of sex makes small talk pointless. I open the door before the car has come to a full stop. He grabs my wrist, forcing me to look into his eyes. All I can see is my own face reflected back through them, fragmented like broken glass on a sidewalk.

I brace myself for an accusation of some kind, but instead he says: Text me tomorrow?

I laugh, not the cute sexy kind of laugh, but the full-on cackle of a mad woman, that of a witch about to be burnt at stake.

I can hear his car engine stalling as I walk inside my apartment building. It occurs to me then that I have confirmed my boyfriend’s suspicions: I am a dangerous kind of girl.

* * * * *

Tamara Breuer (she/her) is a Lebanese/Paraguayan writer based in Barcelona, Spain. Her work has previously been published in The Acentos Review and The Gateway Review.