My Boyfriend Can't Be This Cute
Emma Ha
She’s turned away from him, her back taut like bow strings about to be pulled back. The bone of her scapula feels pointed and accusing towards him. The skin over her knuckles is red—red from her fingers rubbing over them in endless circles. Every shadow across her bony knuckles, thinning arms, and hollowed cheeks is sharp and digs into her body without remorse. Grease drags across her forehead from her overgrown and matted bangs. She can feel the air shifting on her nape as Gabriel moves around.
Gabriel drops the groceries on the hardwood floor with an angry thump, and a hard lump forms in her throat. She walks sluggishly into the living room and sinks down on the couch. She can hear him huff, the breath muffled from the distance.
“I mean it, Sara,” Gabriel grits out.“Get it together. Really.”
She grunts in response, hoping the conversation will end here. The rise and fall of her own chest fascinates her—she’s shocked she’s alive. In her periphery, she can see Gabriel swooping downward to grab the carton of eggs, plastic packages of strawberries, and lettuce before shoving them in the few crevices left in their fridge that haven’t been overgrown with mold.
He closes the fridge door with a quiet shut, a furious glint in his eye when he leans his hip against the door and looks at her.
…
Her old boyfriend had been the most beautiful man she’s seen in her life. Sometimes in the middle of July or August when they would grab a few beers from the fridge—open the tabs with a clean click. Excess fizz would lick at their finger pads. After they wiped condensation from their hands on the sides of their jeans, sitting on the lawn to admire the abusive sun on their backs slink downward into the horizon—she would really look at him. The warmth in his thin, pearly smiles. The small mole under his right eye that made his imperfect face even more perfect. Her reflection in his crinkled eyes—the loveliness of their faces together.
…
“Sara, are you listening to me?” Gabriel says exasperated. She doesn’t turn toward him, but she feels her rabid heartbeat jump from her tense jawline to the pit of her stomach. Behind her, Gabriel picks up two cartons of milk and lets the fridge door swing open. He pushes the old milk to the front. It’s untouched and near expiration. He frowns deeply at this and sighs as he takes them out.
“This is your problem,” Gabriel says. “You always ignore people and do things your way like an idiot.”
He glances at her back. It’s still straight, like a line pointed toward the sky. He hunches his shoulders and pulls the cap off the near expired milk carton open.
“Michelle called the home phone the other day. She left a voicemail. She said you haven’t gone to work for a month now.”
He pours the old milk down the drain.
…
Her old boyfriend was a good doodler. He packed her lunches, and when she opened her lunchbox it wasn’t uncommon to find a small post-it tucked away in the corner. He was always a little embarrassed of the notes he left, but he did them anyway.
When she would come home from work, drop her bags near the front of the door, and give him a kiss filled with all the fondness in her, his close lipped smile would make her melt in the center of her chest.
…
“When are you going back to work?” Gabriel asks. Sink water fills the emptied milk carton, and he twists the cap back onto it.
She says nothing. He shakes the carton vigorously, the sloshing water colliding with itself. It sounds furious.
“What are you even doing everyday when you leave the house?” Gabriel asks, voice growing louder. He uncaps the carton.
“Everyday, you go out that door at dawn and come back hours after sunset. And then I learn you never even went into work? How are you supposed to live like this, Sara?” He shakes the water out of the carton and then throttles it to remove the remains. She looks at the walls of the living room. They’re painted red. The couch has a layer of dust staining it grey.
“SARA!” Gabriel screams. “Listen to me! Look at me, for the love of God, would you turn around and look at me?!”
…
Her old boyfriend had been a passionate writer. She can distinctly remember nights when she would wake up and find the kitchen light on through the sliver left by the slightly ajar bedroom door. The low whistle of a kettle beginning to boil rang through the air and she pulled the blankets off her body. She tiptoed across the hardwood floors and reached the kitchen to find her boyfriend hunched over a mug filled to the brim with water and a tea packet floating at the surface.
His reading glasses had been pushed to the top of his head, and his fingers massaged his eyes. She padded over to him and rubbed circles on his back.
“Another late night?” she asked quietly.
He shook his head.
“Woke up and got an idea,” he said. “It couldn’t wait.”
He pulled his hands away from his face and she saw the mole underneath his right eye. The corners of his eyes crinkled from the warmth of his smile seeing her. He leaned in.
…
Gabriel throws the emptied carton down onto the marble counter with a loud slap. A dent forms on its side and it clatters to the floor. Stray drops of water skitter around as he makes his way over to her, the strength of each footstep like thunder that shakes the walls. His face twists into something monstrous—his disgust.
Gabriel’s face has no warmth now. But even now when she faces him head on, she feels the dig of a knife in her chest when she sees the mole under his right eye. She feels embarrassment in letting him see her like this: rumpled shirt, sallow skin, unwashed hair.
His brow bones and cheeks form gaunt shadows across his face. Sara can’t believe it’s the same man now.
When Gabriel walks over to her, she keeps her back rigid. But she cowers in his absent shadow. He drops to his knees and grasps her limp hands. She stares at him, hoping her gaze feels like sandpaper to his skin.
He leans in:
“Sara,” he says gently, “why can’t you just move on?”
Her skin feels clammy, his grip seems too too tight—in fact, it seems to be forming crescent moons on her knuckles. She blinks, and her vision doubles: on the right is Gabriel’s warm face expression. On the left, the red walls of the living room stare back at her, but she never painted them red; on her left, she can see life seeped from their home. His old piles of manuscripts, poems, and prose she had kept are untouched, unfinished.
She rips her hands from him and turns to the right, and without enough time to pull back her hair, she retches and throws up onto the floor. She lies on her side basking in the raw, scraped quality of her throat, eyes shut so tight it gives her a migraine, heart hammering, and exhales harshly.
Gabriel’s touch feels faint now, but it soothes her as he pats her shoulder gently, following the rhythm of her heartbeat. Her breathing slows and she manages to keep her right eye open, staring unfocused at what is in front of her.
“Please,” Gabriel says, “don’t go looking for my body anymore.”