I, the Divine Read Free Page B

someone behind me. David smiled as he came around and sat next to me.
    “Fancy meeting you here,” he said. “Where are you going?”
    Home, I told him, to San Francisco. That was where he lived as well. We were both surprised, each assuming the other was a Dallas resident. He suggested we sit together on the plane and said he would take care of it. He returned from the counter with a new boarding pass. It was next to him, in first class.
    We talked the whole flight. I did more of the talking than he did, a pattern that would prove typical. I told him about my first marriage, my second, the relationships in my life. I brought up my brother, I told him about my son. In that confined space, with an avid listener, I poured out my feelings, my fears, my hopes. I felt heard. He asked all the right questions, wanting details of the story. He told me about his marriage, his life in New England before he moved west. He spoke about his divorce. He was caught cheating. No, it was not the first time. He had no children. How did I feel about abandoning my son?
    I told him about Kamal, about the crushing choices I had to make, how much pain being without my son caused. I told him about my inadequacies as a mother, as a wife. He attempted to stem my tears with platitudes and admissions that he had not been the greatest husband either. By the time we left the plane we were holding hands. We kissed in the cab. We made love on the stairs in my flat, surrounded by luggage, with my cats watching.
    In bed, where we were to spend the next three years, we talked and explored each other. His caresses were gentle, intimate. He asked me the most interesting questions. He was all ears and hands. We talked as he caressed my breasts. I found out more about him, about his work, how he became the youngest vice-president, his style of management. I was captured by everything about him.
    He did not spend the night, saying he was unable to sleep well anywhere but in his own bed. He also left a little frustrated because he could not bring me to orgasm. He felt inadequate, even though I told him it was the best sex I had ever had.

    David was more mature than any of the other men I had loved. Whereas Fadi, my first lover, Omar, ex number one, and Joe, ex number two, were emotional, David was reserved. Physically, they all had Semitic features, while David was as waspish as you could get. But more important, while all my previous lovers could make me laugh, David could make me cry as well.

    For our second date, he showed up at my door carrying a smile and two bags of groceries. He was going to cook since I had told him I was not very good at it. His unkempt hair fell on his forehead. He wore khakis, a yellow merino sweater, his brown shirt had the top button undone, the left collar tucked beneath the sweater, light brown tufts of hair sprouting from the hollow beneath his Adam’s apple.
    He placed the groceries on the kitchen counter, took me in his arms and kissed me. “Won’t it go bad?” I asked. He led me to bed.
    He washed the vegetables in the kitchen, standing barefoot, in his khakis, shirtless, beltless, and underwearless. “You should stock your kitchen better,” he said. He went through my cabinets. “Oh, my God. You don’t even have a lettuce spinner.”
    I gave him my best helpless smile, shrugged my shoulders.
    “You don’t know what a spinner is, do you?” When he admonished, his voice rose a little higher. He shook his head in consternation. “It’s a good thing I came prepared.”
    I studied an arabesque of sun-induced freckles on his back, walked up behind him, kissed them, tried to connect the dots. He reached behind and spanked my butt. “Not while I’m cooking.”
    “What are you making?”
    “Can’t you tell?” He handed me a computer printout with recipes for tabbouleh, fried potato and coriander salad, and fatteh, a dish of minced lamb, baked pita, garlicked yogurt, and sautéed pine nuts. “A full-fledged Lebanese