Leah Mueller
Eulogy for an Almost-Ex
I’m not sure how we found out about ex-lovers’ deaths before Facebook was invented. The last time I saw you was in 1993. An awkward yet pleasant visit, filled with cannabis and sexual tension. I had a hunch it would be our last. You dropped me off on a street corner and drove away in your Camaro. I moved every few years, trying out different cities like they were shoes. You remained sedentary, staying in the same shabby apartment for almost two decades. We didn’t have any friends in common. If it weren’t for social media, I might’ve spent the rest of my life wondering about you.
When we first met, you already had a girlfriend. Supposedly, she gave birth to several kids and became a dental hygienist. But that was later. Our furtive affair lasted a year, overlapping your real relationship. You told your girlfriend about our trysts. Of course, she blamed me and not you. Why do people do that? I owed her nothing, but you owed her everything. You can’t betray someone if you don’t even know them.
It didn’t help that she resided in the suburbs, and I lived right next door. Your apartment was only a few inches from mine, on the fourth floor of a cockroach infested apartment building. Chicago’s north side had thousands of dwellings like that during the early 80s. Hive-like boxes, overstuffed with tenants. Bodies in every available crevice. I was too young to care.
I could smell your cologne when you left for work. My senses went into overdrive as I lay on my futon, listening to your morning preparations. They were always the same. Loud hissing of shower water, followed by blasts of wakeup music. You rustled through your closet, banged your cupboard doors a few times, and wandered into the hallway. The elevator whooshed you away.
You tempted me with your jazz collection. Miles Davis. Stanley Clarke. John Coltrane. One night, I crept across the stained hallway carpet and knocked on your door. After ushering me inside, you gestured towards your Formica table. “I was just getting ready to smoke a bowl. Care to partake?”
You pinched a bit of Mexican marijuana from a dusty Ziploc bag and pressed it into your pipe. Ignited the contents with your lighter. Handed the pipe to me, smiling. “I don’t have much left.” Your tone was apologetic. “But there’s enough for tonight.”
I spent the next three evenings at your apartment. It was one of those humid, insufferable Chicago summers. Nighttime temperatures hovered in the mid-eighties. No one in the building could afford air conditioning. A rattling fan in your window moved the hot air in lazy circles.
We drank cheap wine and talked about death. This was an unconscious ploy, designed to keep us from thinking about sex. “I’ve always had a hunch that I wouldn’t live long,” you said. “Even as a kid, I couldn’t imagine going past fifty. Whenever I try to picture myself as an old person, I draw a blank.”
“I know what you mean.” I took a huge gulp of wine from my glass. “But the women in my family live a long time. I’m hardwired for longevity.”
On the fourth night, we discussed Kurt Vonnegut’s book, “Cat’s Cradle.” Though we were unclear about the plot, we recalled a heady scene in which the two main characters made love with the soles of their feet. It was the best sex they’d ever had. Vonnegut called the technique “boko-maru.”
The premise seemed implausible, but we decided to give boko-maru a whirl. You pushed your battered furniture into one corner. We removed our shoes and placed them side by side, in two neat rows. They looked comfortable together, like old friends.
Finally, the two of us reclined on the floor with our heads against opposite walls. We pressed our feet together and waited for something to happen. You wiggled your toes against mine. Our insteps quivered together. My heels pulsated with an odd warmth that seemed to come from nowhere. Four nights of pent-up erotic tension radiated through our soles.
“I’m starting to feel something,” you confessed. “It’s exciting.”
“We must be doing it right.” Such a clever comment, made under duress. I’d gone beyond nervousness and headed into the realm of pure terror. Like I was falling into the Grand Canyon in slow-motion and would never be able to climb back to safety.
A few minutes later, we decided to switch our focus to more conventional sexual methods. The two of us had finally found a language we could understand. We were young, so our copulation ended quickly. Afterwards, we lay on our backs and gazed at the ceiling. “I feel so close to you,” you said.
Our affair went downhill afterwards, but I didn’t hold it against you. I knew the rules and had decided to break them. You were just another guy caught in a romantic triangle. I fantasized about you leaving your girlfriend and spending your time with me. On weekends, I heard her voice through the wall. When she saw me in the hallway, she sneered and turned her head away.
I moved out of the building, but that didn’t fix our problem. A year later, I relocated to Seattle. We sent each other a couple of postcards. I had a long series of recurring dreams about our apartment building. They featured three different scenarios:
I walk down Granville Avenue towards our building, excitement growing as I draw closer. The blocks keep getting longer, but I trudge forward, hoping to arrive before everybody leaves.
I stroll through the hallway corridor towards your door. You aren’t expecting me. I’m not sure if you’ll be home. I wake up before I have the chance to find out.
I’m standing in the downstairs lobby beside a row of mailboxes. I’ve decided to rent an apartment in the building. A temporary lease, until I return to my real home in Washington. Everything looks just like it did in 1982.
I visited Chicago on several occasions. You’d already split up with your girlfriend. It felt weird to walk into our old apartment building and surprise you with a visit, just as I had in my dreams. But you were always glad to see me. You threw open your door and invited me inside. Rolled a joint. Apologized for not having more marijuana. Cleared a space so I could sit at the table.
Your apartment never changed. A jogging suit hung in the bathroom, unused. An acoustic bass perched in the corner like a watchful owl. Your cheap stereo stood near the window, surrounded by a mound of albums. “Listen to this,” you said, flipping a record onto the turntable.
During those years, we had sex exactly once. You reminisced about our boko-maru experience and said that you wanted to try it again. I hesitated because I had a boyfriend. The two of us weren’t getting along, however. I reluctantly agreed, hoping for a blissful experience that I already knew was beyond my grasp.
We sprawled on your stained carpet and pressed our feet together, but nothing happened. It wasn’t your fault, or even mine. Perhaps our passion required hotter temperatures, or we needed to be five years younger and almost in love. Your toes felt chilly and hard against mine, as if they were made from stone.
We stumbled over to your couch. The act didn’t take long. Afterwards, we wandered to a small park near Lake Michigan and stared at the waves. You looked satisfied, like you had proven something to yourself.
“That was so intense,” you said. “As always.”
Do two people ever have the same experience together? “I’m glad.” My voice sounded soothing, like I was trying to comfort you. But I was the one who needed consolation. I scooped a couple of fallen maple leaves from the grass. The brilliant red and orange hues made me think of flames. “I miss autumn colors. The Pacific Northwest mostly has evergreens.” I stuffed the leaves in my purse. “I’m going to dry these when I get home.”
I kept the leaves for a while, but they eventually crumbled into dust. We never had sex again. Our infrequent visits settled into a strange mixture of comfortable familiarity and submerged desire. During our last meeting, you lamented your lack of a girlfriend. “I keep having these relationships that last a couple of months, then fizzle. Maybe someday my luck will change.”
A thunderstorm raged outside your window, rattling the flimsy panes. I had tickets to a Neil Young concert. The outdoor amphitheater was forty miles from Chicago, so I’d arranged a ride with a friend. I hoped the rain would stop in time, but it didn’t look likely.
“I wish I could come along,” you said. “I’m busy tonight, but I’ll give you a ride to your meetup spot.”
When we reached our destination, you turned towards me. “I’m still attracted to you. Perhaps we can throw a blanket in the bushes or something.” Your tone was only half-serious.
I laughed. “Well, I’m flattered. I feel the same, really. But I need to meet Maggie in half an hour. Thanks for the ride.” I gave you a hug and jumped from the car. “Maybe we’ll see each other around.”
Those words weren’t the last we spoke to each other, but they were close. You found a steady girlfriend and moved out of your apartment. I married a kind, intelligent man who eventually died from cancer. His death was long and painful. I’ve never seen someone fight so hard to stay alive. Is life worth that sort of battle? I would have given up much sooner.
In July 2021, I drove from LA to Chicago on Route 66. It was a strange, unsettled time. My husband had been gone less than three months. The protracted coronavirus madness had subsided, at least temporarily. People were re-learning socialization. I found your cellphone number on Facebook. Perhaps we could get together for a beer. Chat about the past. Compare battle scars. The kind of shit old people do when they haven’t seen each other in three decades.
Your voice sounded just as I remembered. “Sorry, I’m at a softball game. I’d like to talk later, though. It’s been a rough year.” I could hear cheering in the background. “Can you call me in a day or two?”
“Sure,” I said, but I never did.
You didn’t spend much time on social media, but last year you were online more often. You took up landscape painting and shared your creations with the world. Sometimes you commented on my Facebook posts. Your tone sounded cheerful, even flirtatious. I never suspected that you were posting from a hospital bed.
One morning I turned on the computer, clicked the Facebook icon, and instantly saw your face. The second anniversary of my husband’s death had come and gone. Your 66th birthday was three weeks away. You were never going to celebrate it, because you were dead.
Your distraught brother chronicled your demise in painstaking detail. He harbored a lot of rage towards the medical system. Shortly after our last phone conversation, doctors found cancer in your esophagus. They opted against outpatient treatment, confining you to the hospital for a year and a half. You spent your last months on a feeding tube.
There must have been a monetary motive for their decision. Your brother’s anger seemed to corroborate my hunch. He wrote eloquently about your final days. How he wiped the bile from your mouth when your digestion failed you. How you chose silence over music, because you were in survival mode and could focus on nothing else. How you longed for an ice-cold, fruity beverage and he finally brought you one. You sipped your Gatorade with perfect, monk-like concentration. Lime-cucumber. Who knew there was such a flavor?
Your brother’s pent-up words tumbled onto the page. He had kept your illness secret. Only your closest family members knew that you were in the hospital. Like many sick people, you didn’t talk about your cancer. The disease holds an unwarranted stigma. Its sufferers are often consumed by shame, as if they carried a curse that could spread to others.
The usual condolences appeared beneath your brother’s post. “I’m sorry for your loss.” “He’s in God’s hands now.” Well-meaning proclamations that struck me as woefully off-base. Fear of death creates many euphemisms. Our loved ones don’t pass, like they were wandering through a hallway into the Great Beyond. We don’t lose them, they die. After sixty-four years, I still don’t know where we go after we leave our bodies. I hope we get some well-earned rest.
On the other hand, perhaps cancer patients want their loved ones to think of them as healthy and strong. Which is something I can understand. I like to remember the two of us strolling down Broadway to shoot pool at the Double Bubble. Or climbing the fire escape ladder to our rooftop and lighting sparklers. Or just sitting at your kitchen table, listening to Miles Davis with perfect concentration.
Leah Mueller's work appears in Rattle, NonBinary Review, Brilliant Flash Fiction, Citron Review, The Spectacle, New Flash Fiction Review, Atticus Review, Your Impossible Voice, etc. She is a 2022 nominee for both Pushcart and Best of the Net. Leah's flash piece, "Land of Eternal Thirst" appears in the 2022 edition of Best Small Fictions. Her two newest books are The Failure of Photography (Garden Party Press, 2023) and Widow's Fire (Alien Buddha Press, 2023). Website: www.leahmueller.org.
