I had no desire to read about his relationship status via the Internet.

I decided that my questions about his business partner and her insinuations, as well as my new questions about the girl in the pictures, would just have to wait until Martin and I found the time to talk. I felt good about this decision. Less ragey—ragey because I couldn’t think of an equivalent real word to describe what I was feeling—and flustered. More in control of my mental state.

The show in Harlem with the entire band was also fine.

Although things between Janet and me were still frosty. Willis called us on it and wanted to know what happened. I think she expected me to air her dirty laundry—telling him about the drugs and her druggie friends—but I didn’t.

Instead I told Willis that she and I were having a disagreement about whether Jimi Hendrix or Jimmy Page was the most influential guitarist of the modern rock era.

He said he understood, as we both had good points, but that we needed to work through our differences like a knife cutting peanut butter…or mayonnaise…or something else that didn’t make any sense. He really had the nuttiest analogies.

Once he walked off, Janet turned her glower back to me, but it wasn’t quite as hostile. “Why didn’t you tell him?”

“Tell him what?”

“You know what.”

“Why would I? It’s none of my business. You want to ruin yourself, that’s your business. But I don’t have to watch you do it.”

Her glower softened into a suspicious glare. “Why are you so weird about this stuff? Did something happen to you?”

“No. But the fact you think I’m being weird because I have no tolerance for heroin is a bit distressing. The truth is, I have very little patience for people who choose to waste their potential and destroy themselves in the process.”

“Hmm…” The glare melted away, leaving only an uncomfortable frown. “See now, I completely disagree. Heroin helps me see the world differently, it opens up my mind. It makes me feel free. It doesn’t destroy me, it improves me.”

I shrugged noncommittally, because her words sounded crazy. I’d never done drugs, so I couldn’t comment with any authority on her personal experience. Plus we had fifteen minutes until show time; now was not the time to point out all the extensive research that proved heroin destroyed peoples’ lives. Plus, you know, it kills people.

Instead I pulled my bowtie from my bag, excusing myself to the ladies’ room. I could have affixed my bow tie in the backstage area, but Abram had just entered and I found his presence highly distracting. And agitating. I was avoiding him.

He liked me. I knew that. His suggestions I get a rebound guy notwithstanding, I wasn’t so clueless that I could miss the giant neon sign he’d dropped on my head last Saturday. According to Abram, he’d been waiting for me to see him, to notice him.

The more I thought about his words, the more they reminded me of similar sentiments expressed by Martin in the past.

It occurred to me that perhaps I’d been so busy hiding, trying to keep myself from being seen, that I hadn’t been paying adequate attention to the world around me. I was the one who wasn’t seeing others clearly. Maybe I needed to stop focusing inward and start paying attention to what was in front of my face, starting with Abram.

I was never going to be a jump-in-feet-first, flash-the-Mardi-Gras-crowd-for-beads kind of girl. I knew it would take me some time to actually do anything about Abram. But I was now willing to entertain the possibility.

***

Yes, I was spending the week with Martin on an island. But that was basically where the similarities to our spring break week ended.

After our pre-dawn chat Wednesday, I saw him zero times over the next few days. When I woke up in the morning, Martin had already left. By the time I came home, Martin was either already asleep or not yet home. I hadn’t talked to him other than a daily exchange of handwritten notes.

This started on Thursday morning, when I woke up and found a simple note on the kitchen counter,

Breakfast stuff in the fridge if you’re hungry. I’ll be home late. –Martin

Actually the fridge was stocked with every good thing. Because I had the time, I made myself eggs benedict and bacon, with a raspberry and banana fruit salad. I also baked chocolate pecan cookies, and was sure to clean up all my mess. Admittedly, I might have been stress baking. My drama-prone side wondered if Martin would be home late because of his redheaded friend. But my pragmatic sided quickly assaulted my drama-prone side and gagged her.

I left the cookies in a sealed plastic container on the same spot where I found his note with a message that read,

Eat me. –Cookies

When I arrived back to Martin’s apartment that night, I found his suit jacket on the arm of the couch and the door to his room closed. I surmised he was already asleep; but he’d left me a note on the counter that read,

I’ll eat anything you tell me to eat. –Martin

P.S. Did you read the interviews yet?

I noted that the plastic cookie container was empty. He’d eaten all the cookies.

Not allowing myself to get caught up in a marinade of uncertainty (where the ingredients were: my lingering feelings and resultant confusion, the unknown nature of his relationship with the pretty redhead, and his business partner’s mysterious insinuations) I jotted down a quick response,

Martin,

I have no time for reading interviews when cookies need to be made. Instead I’ve decided to wait until we have time to talk/discuss. I’d like to hear everything from you rather than the Internet.

-Kaitlyn

And so the next several days passed, and our note exchange proceeded as follows:

Friday morning

Parker,

Make me more cookies.

–Martin

Martin,

Here are more cookies.

–Kaitlyn

Friday evening

Kaitlyn,

What’s in these cookies? Magic?

–Martin

Martin,

No, not magic. But I do use unicorn blood to make them chewy.

–Kaitlyn

Saturday morning

Kaitlyn,

Unicorn blood? You can find that in Manhattan?

–Martin

P.S Make me more bloody cookies.

Martin,

You can find everything in Manhattan…except affordable rent.

–Kaitlyn

P.S. Here are your bloody cookies.

Saturday evening

Parker,

Move in with me. I’ll accept unicorn cookies as rent payment.

–Martin

Sandeke,

I haven’t seen you in so long I’m beginning to think you’re a figment of my imagination, except that you keep eating my cookies. Are you avoiding me because I smell like denture cream?

–Kaitlyn

Sunday morning

Kaitlyn,

Merry Christmas Eve. Do you have to work tonight? I thought I might take the afternoon/evening off if you’re off. Do you want to hang out? If you can’t today then how about tomorrow?

–Martin

P.S. I didn’t want to say anything about the denture cream, but yes. The smell is why I’m avoiding you.

Martin,

Merry Christmas Eve to you as well. I have shows today from 2 p.m. until 1 a.m. But, miracle of miracles, I have nothing on Christmas except for a short late afternoon gig that’s over at 4 p.m. We should hang out tomorrow morning. Also, know that I have burning questions you haven’t yet answered. We could make food, then eat it…since we have no tree maybe I could pick up a Yule log?

–Parker

P.S. I will stop using the denture cream, but then you will have to chew my food for me…

I was actually grateful Martin and I hadn’t seen each other for several days. The notes allowed us to settle into our friendship without all the looking at each other getting in the way and making things tense. He was still so completely and brain-meltingly lookable, as my pants liked to remind me whenever we shared the same space.

As well, it gave me time to contemplate and accept the very real possibility that the girl in the pictures had been his girlfriend. I decided I should feel happy for him, that he’d been able to move on so completely. I decided this, but I didn’t feel it. So I worked on feeling it, I worked on moving on as he’d obviously moved on.

Therefore, I stopped avoiding Abram.

And once I stopped avoiding Abram, he and I actually had a fantastic time together. We hung out backstage and discussed mostly music and our childhoods.

We ate meals together between shows and sets, and I learned about all his (visible) tattoos, what they meant and why he’d had them done.

After gigs I played a few of my compositions for him and he played a few of his for me. We were talking and enjoying each other’s company and it felt so very, very good to let myself like someone. Almost liberating.

As the week drew to a close I was feeling like things were moving in the right direction. Martin was my friend. Abram was my maybe future more-than-friend. Though I still had bucketfuls of residual feelings for Martin, all-in-all it had been a good week.

The plan was to head back to New Haven on Monday. I’d found a good price on the train ticket; tickets on December twenty-six were almost three times as expensive as they were on Christmas day.

Christmas Eve morning was actually my first and only chance to explore the city. I made a list of places I wanted to check out and crossed my fingers they’d be open. On the way I called my parents and wished them a Merry Christmas. It was a nice conversation, as they both sounded happy and relaxed.