Right to Die

not easy for me to talk about my emotions. It never has been.”
    “Hasn’t affected—”
    “Don’t interrupt, okay?”
    “Okay.”
    She took another breath. “My dad died when I was little, John. Three years old. They didn’t have a tree-lighting ceremony in Southie, but even if they had, I didn’t have him to swing me up onto his shoulders to watch it. I really don’t remember him, not from real life. Just his face in photos, the pictures Mom kept. Holidays, especially Christmas, were hard on her because she did remember him from real life.”
    I thought back to my holidays with Beth, then to the period after I’d lost her to cancer.
    “Once Mom died, my last year of law school, I didn’t like the holidays anymore. All I’d had of the early ones was Mom, trying her best to be both parents at once. The later ones, I was always kind of propping her up, keeping her in the spirit of the season. When I rented the Lynches’ top floor, they tried to include me in their stuff, but it was awkward, you know? I wasn’t anybody’s niece or girlfriend or anything. I was just the poor tenant with no place else to go.”
    “And then?”
    “I met you. And for the first time, I thought I had somebody to share the holidays with. Really enjoy them, equal to equal, nobody making up for anything. I’ve been looking forward to the tree-lighting for weeks, then you behave like a freshman on his first trip to the big city.”
    I thought she was overreacting, but I said, “I’m sorry, Nance.”
    “No. No, you’re not. You don’t even understand what I mean, do you?”
    “I understand. I guess what happened in my life just turned me a different direction as far as the holidays go.” She sniffled.
    I said, “Maybe you just got under my skin a little over the marathon.”
    A sour face. “You big turd.”
    “Finally, a term of endearment.”
    She punched me on the arm. A little hard, but now playfully. “That rugby shirt doesn’t even fit anymore.” Standing, I pulled it over my head, whirling it by a sleeve and letting it fly across the room.
    Nancy looked at my pants. “Never cared much for those corduroys, either.”
    Leaning forward, I braced my hands on the back of the sofa to either side of her head. “Lady, are you trying to get me into bed?”
    “That depends.”
    “On what?”
    “On how much harder I have to try.”

    * * *

    Afterward, we lay in the dark under just a sheet. The window was open a crack, the wind whistling through. I was on my back, Nancy on her side, cuddled up against me.
    “John, you ever think it’s odd, the way we talk about it?”
    “Can’t be helped. Catholic upbringing.”
    “No. I don’t mean us us. I mean people in general. We call it ‘making love.’ ”
    “As opposed to...?”
    “I mean, it just sounds so mechanical, almost like a label for some manufacturing process.”
    “It’s worse than that, Nance.”
    “Why?”
    “We tend to say, ‘I want to make love to you.’ ”
    “Yes?”
    “Using ‘to you’ makes it sound like a one-way street. Provider to customer.”
    “How does ‘I want to make love with you’ sound?”
    “Pretty good, except we’ll have to wait a while.”
    She snuggled closer. “Why?”
    “Well, a man my age takes two, three weeks to recharge.”
    Another punch to the arm. “You’re still sore from the marathon remark.”
    “I’m still sore from where you punched me before.”
    “Man your age decides to run the marathon, he’d better get used to pain.”
    I shifted my face to Nancy even though I couldn’t see her in the dark. “What makes you think I’m going to run the marathon?”
    “The look you gave me after I almost kept from saying you were too old for it.”
    “What kind of look was it?”
    “A stupid look.”
    I shifted again, about to talk to the ceiling, when the telephone rang.
    That started the rest of it.

= 2 =

    “John! Gee, how long’s it been?”
    Tommy Kramer forgot to take the napkin off his lap as he rose to greet me. It fell straight and true to the floor. Only heavy cloth for Sunday brunch at Joe’s American Bar & Grill.
    “Tommy, good to see you.”
    He sat back, crushing a filterless cigarette in an ashtray but not noticing the napkin between his penny loafers. Moving upward, the flannel slacks were gray, the oxford shirt pale blue, the tie a Silk Regent with red background, and the blazer navy blue. Dressing down, for Tommy.
    I took in the room’s detailed ceilings and mahogany