Small Victories

Melissa L. White

Walking into the bookstore, I caught a glimpse of my reflection in the storefront window and noticed that my new haircut looked pretty good today. “Maybe I will finally meet someone,” I told myself as I breezed past the bargain book racks at the entrance. Then a beautiful blue book caught my eye. The cover had a picture of a snow-capped mountain and a wolf howling at the full moon. I stopped, picked up the book, and glanced inside. It was a collection of Jack London stories, and it was on sale for $7.99.

“This isn’t what you came here for,” I reminded myself then returned the book to the shelf.

Upon entering the store, I was bombarded with the new Eat, Pray, Love display, complete with a TV showing clips from the film. I stood there watching as Julia Roberts circled the globe and found romance with a handsome stranger. Could this be an omen?

This was my mindset after viewing the Eat, Pray, Love clip—always be open to possibilities. So that’s what I thought of the moment I first saw him: possibilities. He was standing in the biography section, reading. As I walked past him on my way to the literature section, I saw the dark edge of a tattoo on his forearm, just barely showing beneath the rolled-up cuff of his long-sleeved black button-down shirt. As I passed him, something made me pause and do a double take.

Nice butt. I bet he’s an excellent kisser. As a rule, my first impressions were rarely wrong.

“You are old enough to be his mother,” was my second reaction, so I kept walking back to the literature shelves, to the M’s. I found what I came for right away, Haruki Murakami’s short fiction collection called The Elephant Vanishes. After thumbing through the book and skimming the table of contents, I decided to go ahead and purchase it even though I had already exceeded my monthly book budget for September. Although it was only Labor Day, I figured it was worth it not to be idle on a national holiday with the library closed and nothing to read.

Now I had something to keep myself occupied so I wouldn’t let my perpetual loneliness overwhelm me. Locating the book which I was looking for was a small victory. And you might say it’s the small victories like this that added up throughout the day which helped me fall asleep at night secure in the knowledge that things would turn out all right eventually. After suffering from bi-polar disorder for most of my adult life, I’d learned to take any victory that presented itself. Living with this disability had taught me, over the years, to be grateful whenever I experienced unexpected moments of pure bliss and joy.

I took my book to the checkout line and inhaled deeply— loving the aroma of all that latte and cappuccino. After giving up coffee last year, on my doctor’s recommendation due to my propensity for caffeine-induced manic episodes, sometimes when I felt decadent, I would come into this bookstore and browse the magazine racks just so I could smell the coffee.

There were several people in line in front of me, so I stood there patiently, inhaling deeply, mouth watering, until low and behold, Mr. Nice-Butt-But-Way-Too-Young-For-Me walked up and stood next to me in line.

“Talk to him,” screamed the sex-starved intuitive voice inside my head, while my logical better judgment tried to remind me that I was more than likely old enough to be his mother— okay, maybe if I was a teenage mother— but still, he was quite a bit younger than me. I cleared my throat and inhaled that lovely coffee aroma, then as nonchalantly as possible, I glanced out of the corner of my eye to see what books he was buying—The Collected Short Stories of Jack London and a biography of Abraham Lincoln. Interesting.

Immediately I remembered the Jack London book I’d seen on the bargain rack outside. “Tell him about it,” urged the voice inside my head.

The checkout clerk waved his hand and called out, “Next?” The line advanced.

I hesitated, only briefly, then blurted out, “There’s a hardcover collection of Jack London stories on sale out front for $7.99.”

He looked up at me and smiled.

“It’s outside,” I continued. “I saw it on the way in.”

“Really?” he asked softly. “What stories are in it?”

“I don’t know. I just glanced at it. But it’s only $7.99.”

He flipped his book over and read the price sticker on the back cover. “Much better than $16.99. Where is it?”

“I’ll show you.” I stepped out of line. He followed me through the front entrance to the bargain racks and I pointed to the book. “See, it has several of his best stories.” I picked up the book and opened the cover to the table of contents then I gave it to him.

“Thanks,” he said, his voice soft as silk. He glanced over the table of contents and then closed the book and looked at me. “Three times as many stories at half the price.”

“A real bargain,” I said.

“You know, with the money I’m saving, I could buy us a cup of coffee.”

I laughed out loud. I thought about my abstinence from coffee for the past year, and the last seven years of being single, and I held my breath. He looked at me and then pointed over his shoulder at the café. “Are you interested?”

“DO IT, YOU FOOL!” screamed the voice inside my head. An opportunity like this rarely arose for me, especially the older I got, and the more pronounced my disability became.

I looked into his eyes and noticed how very blue they were.

“Okay. Sure.”

“Great,” he said. “My name is Kyle. What’s yours?”

“Abigail.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you.” He touched my elbow. “Shall we?”

We went back inside the store and got in line to buy our books. He stood beside me, and I could smell the faint but unmistakable scent of Giorgio Armani cologne. I loved this scent on a man and I remembered my ex-husband wearing it. I took a deep breath and told myself that this little trip to the bookstore could soon escalate from a small victory into a major coup if I played my cards right.

“So, what are you buying?” he asked me.

I held up my book, so he could read the title.

“Murakami? Didn’t he write The Wind-Up Bird Book?”

“Chronicle,” I said. “It’s called The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. Have you read it?”

He shook his head. “No, but my sister read it and she said it changed her life.”

“Wow. That’s a powerful recommendation. I’ve not read it either. It’s over six hundred pages, and I prefer fiction in shorter doses.”

“Me too.” He thumped his Jack London book cover. “This guy is phenomenal. I still remember reading Call of The Wild in high school. It really affected me.”

I nodded, noticing the silver ring on his third finger, right hand.

“Who is your favorite writer?” he asked.

“Gosh, there’s so many.” I said this, being intentionally vague so as not to scare him away with my voracious appetites. What if he saw right through this flimsy disguise that I wore everyday of a forty-seven-year-old divorced woman who was happily single—and glimpsed the naked truth: that I’m bi-polar and read like a maniac to help me survive my loneliness. I desperately didn’t want to say the wrong thing and draw attention to the fact that I tended to hibernate at home while doing very little to alleviate my craving for companionship, because my disability made connecting with new people extremely difficult. Meeting someone new usually created a potential for sensory overload, which could in turn lead to a manic episode. Because of this, I had to be careful, and protect myself from spontaneous, unplanned connections. For me, meeting a man who showed any interest in me was so rare, it made living alone feel like my destiny—as if I was supposed to be perpetually single. I glanced at him and held my breath, not wanting to jinx this.

“So, what’s the last really great book you’ve read?” He watched me, curious.

Without thinking I said, “Ray Bradbury’s Dandelion Wine.”

He tilted his head then smiled at me thoughtfully. “Dandelion Wine. I remember reading that in junior high.”

“He’s such a great storyteller.” I smiled, wistfully. “In fact, two of my most favorite characters in all of literature come to life in Dandelion Wine.”

“Really? Which two?” he asked.

The checkout clerk waved his hand and called out, “Next?”

Kyle moved toward the cashier then motioned for me to come with him. We approached the cashier together and paid for our books then he turned to me. “Do you like espresso?”

I hesitated, thinking of how I would definitely not sleep tonight if I drank espresso. “I prefer latte.”

“Latte it is.” We stood in line at the coffee bar until the barista took our order and prepared our drinks. Kyle ordered a white chocolate mocha, of which I secretly wanted to partake. We took our coffees outside and sat beneath an umbrella.

“Finish telling me about those characters from Dandelion Wine.”

“Helen Loomis and William Forrester.” I stirred the milk foam around in my cup. “She was ninety-five and he was thirty-one when they met. He told her that he had seen her photo in the newspaper a couple years earlier and had fallen in love at first sight, until he realized the photo was seventy years old.”

“Then Helen told William that he reminded her of the only man she ever loved, who had died fifty years earlier. She wondered out loud, if William was her lover’s reincarnation.”

“She also told him that she was going to die soon but that she wanted him to meet a young girl, fall in love, get married, and be happy—but not to live too long so that they could find each other again and be together in their next life. Isn’t that romantic? Loving

someone so much that one lifetime isn’t enough and you’re able to find them again the next time around.”

He sipped his coffee and didn’t say anything.

Logic told me to change the subject before scaring him away with all this talk about love. I ignored it and blurted out, “Have you ever felt that?”

Kyle shook his head. He thought for a moment then said, “I imagine most of my exes would try to avoid me the next time around.”

“Stop it right now!” screamed my logical inner voice, but since I was sorely out of practice talking to interesting men, I was at a loss as to what to talk about. He wasn’t saying anything, so I began to panic.

“Do you live here in San Rafael?” I asked.

“Peacock Gap. Out by the marina.”

“Oh really? Do you sail?” His eyes suddenly lit up. “As a matter of fact, I do. I just bought a new Catalina 22. Do you sail?”

“I used to, back when I was married.”

“Oh,” he said. “How long were you married?”

“Seventeen years.”

“Really? How long have you been divorced?”

“Seven years.” I felt suddenly self-conscious. What if he did the math and realized I’m older than his mom?

“Damn,” he said. “You don’t look old enough to be married twenty-four years ago. Do you mind if I ask your age?”

“I’m forty-seven.”

“Wow. I guessed you were in your early thirties. You look great for your age.”

“For my age?” I asked, embarrassed. “Next thing I know, you’ll be calling me Helen Loomis.”

He laughed then reached across the table and took my hand. “What I meant was you not only look younger than your years, but you look great, period.”

“Thanks.” I took a sip of my latte.

“Hey,” he said, full of enthusiasm. “What are you doing this afternoon?”

I shrugged.

“Would you like to go sailing?”

I grinned.

“Why don’t you ride with me to the marina and then I can bring you back to your car after we finish sailing?”

“Sounds good to me.” I felt my cheeks flush; my hormones were raging. I felt hot all over, yet he looked as cool as lime sorbet. Most importantly, he wasn’t trying to run away after my racing soliloquy about timeless love. Another small victory.

He talked about his father as we drove to Loch Lomond Marina where he kept his boat docked. He mentioned how his dad used to take him sailing as a kid but had abandoned him and his mom when he was seven. He mentioned that buying a boat was a big step for him.

“A small victory?” I asked, softly.

He nodded, then grew silent as we stowed the sail covers and motored out of the marina and into the bay. A steady ten-knot breeze blew from the east, and there was not a cloud in the sky. It was a perfect day for sailing.

Out past the breakwater, he cut the engine and we hoisted the sails and headed out on a southern tack to San Francisco Bay. He turned on the stereo, playing reggae music nonstop until his mood lightened, and he started dancing. Out on the bay, I felt like my old self again, the “me” that intuitively knew how to pique a man’s interest with just enough flattery and sincere desire for equal parts companionship and intimacy. He talked about his job as an animator for Pixar Studios and I talked about my job as a paralegal for the Riesner Law Firm in San Rafael.

Talking about our respective pasts, he mentioned that his wife left him last year, after four years of marriage, because he didn’t want to have kids. I watched him at the helm and wondered what it would feel like to kiss him.

Suddenly the wind changed, and the boom jibed across the cockpit. I saw it coming but it happened so fast, that before I could duck, the boom knocked me in the head. I fell to the deck and felt the warm trickle of blood down my forehead and into my eye.

“Oh my God, Abbey!” he yelled, releasing the mainsheet and dumping the wind out of the sail. He rushed to my side and helped me up off the deck.

“You’re bleeding. Let me look at that cut.” He assessed the gash on my forehead. “You probably need stitches. I’ll take you to the ER.”

He lowered the sails, started the engine, and we motored back to the marina. He then rushed me to the emergency room at Marin General Hospital where I got six

stitches. We hardly spoke at all on the way back to my car. My head hurt and all I wanted to do was go home and lie down.

The next day at the office, a dozen red roses arrived for me, with a card from Kyle that read, “My apologies again. Let me make it up to you. Pretty please?”

I smiled and gently touched the bandage on my forehead. Even if it left a scar, it would be worth it. I smelled the roses, especially thankful for this victory because it was definitely not a small one. Years of loneliness and isolation receded behind me as I picked up the phone to call Kyle, feeling young, full of life, and open to possibilities—completely unlimited by my disability.

Melissa L. White is a screenwriter, novelist, and short story writer. Her LGBTQ+ film, “Catch the Light,” premiered in June 2019. Melissa's biopic script, “WHITENESS OF BONES,” about female artist, Georgia O’Keeffe, was a finalist in four different screenplay contests in 2021. Melissa is currently in pre-production for her latest film, “Sunrise Hollywood,” which she will write, produce, and direct.