OLD FLAMES
When we run into ex-partners, they hold up a mirror in which we see our old selves, warts and all, and remember the intense emotional ache of a love from the past.
When we run into ex-partners, we hold up a mirror into which we see our former selves and feel the ache of old emotion.
Stephanie tightens her mask. Only her mischievous, candy-blue eyes are visible. But beneath the face-cover I can tell she’s licking her lips. My nails dig into the cold arms of her leather chair as her slender fingers pry apart my jaw and expertly locate the exact spot they’re searching for. A second later, hot, wet waves of pain melt into my skull. There’s no hope of making a run for it; it is all I can do to breathe.
When it is over with, and she allows me to stand, I promise Stephanie that I’ll floss every day. She gives me a dentist’s laugh, full of perfect teeth and perfect sarcasm: Sure you will. I deserve it.
Bumping into an old flame is nothing like that. Nothing like it at all. It’s a hundred times worse. Chancing upon someone you once shared PIN numbers and pubic hairs with has none of the appeal of a difficult dental procedure, and all of the aching – for me anyway. There may be people who can run into former partners and not require weeks of therapy or hours bending friends’ ears, but I’m not one of them.
Funny thing is though, in general, my ex-partners have been, well, really nice. There’s always smiling, affectionate hand squeezing and enquiries after my parents, kids, wife. They tell me of their successes and about old friends. We exchange pleasantries as if it was the most natural thing in the world for two people who once exchanged Valentine’s cards, birthday gifts and bodily fluids.
But then a weird, unreal feeling creeps up on me, and just at the point when the surrealness peaks to Tarantino levels, my brain stops working and turns into that rainbowcoloured wheel the computer makes when it’s crashing. It fails me, and I stand there, drooling, like my mouth is full of cotton wool balls and exposed nerve roots.
How can I make small talk with the person who, beneath the Eiffel Tower, I once promised to love forever, and whose backpack I schlepped halfway across Europe because of the sultry look in her eyes?
I’m supposed to be a selfactualised male now. I’ve grown up and moved on. Really, I have. I am settled, in a longstanding, enriching marriage and content with my life. So why then do I get so utterly discombobulated?
I have a theory about this. A partner from my past is like a mirror. What she reflects however, is not an image, but a memory; a memory of me and her as a couple. What’s more, this type of looking glass does other strange things. We’ve all seen those distorting mirrors in amusement arcades – Look, I’m a giant! Ah, where’s my head gone! Likewise, a sudden, unexpected encounter with a past love reflects a distorted image of the old relationship: it blurs out the terrible times and magnifies the magnificent ones. And, oh, those magnificent times! The whoosh of a first kiss against her eager lips, the chestthumping grown-upness of signing a rental contract together, the two of us screaming at the top of our lungs to the Red Hot Chili Peppers … how determined we were about our careers, our politics and that our hair would always stay fabulous.
Staring into that human mirror, I inevitably fall into a then-and-now comparison. Have I won a Nobel Prize? (Have I won any prizes?) When was the last time I joined a protest march? Surely the hair in the shower drain is someone else’s? Trying to reconcile the past with the present is like trying to solve a quantum space-time equation in my head.
Is it any wonder holding a conversation is so difficult?
It’s not just distorted reflections that can make these encounters so excruciating. When the relationship was in full swing there was a transaction of emotional currency. Desire, jealousy, affection, lust, pride, anger – take your pick – they got deposited as a kind of emotional investment. The longer we stayed together as a couple, the bigger the deposit. When it came time to split, we each made a withdrawal. But not a complete withdrawal – these accounts can never be fully closed – some capital remained in each of us. Sure, it gets eroded by time and new loves, but a fraction of that emotional capital still lingers in me. More than that, part of it is me.
Part of the consternation, then, is the struggle to understand which pieces of me are original and which are due to the relationship. Did I always like French cinema or was it only since she dragged me along to see Three Colours: Blue? Was it she who impregnated me with the revelation that I might one day become a father? And what’s the deal with denim overalls – did I find them sexy before I saw them cinched around her waist?
On top of the distorted memories and the emotional reconciliations there’s the unfinished business. Like, how did we fall out of love? If it could happen then, what’s to stop it from happening now? Does she still have that, eh, embarrassing photo of me from New Year’s Eve? Uncomfortable questions all of them.
There are no easy answers. But at our regular lunch, where Dr Fabulous and I dissect the week, we figure that trying to be self-actualised males doesn’t immunise us from the peaks and troughs of relationships – it just makes us think more about them. The thing is, just talking and laughing with him, I feel better – an unburdening of sorts.
Over one lunch I half-recognise someone from behind, an ex-girlfriend, I’m sure. The auburn bob, the Laura Ashley blouse, the delicate fingers. I freeze. Of all places, she turns up at this place, my local café. What is she doing here? Dr Fabulous catches my look of dread and cranes his neck to investigate. A moment later he’s laughing loudly. “Steph!” he calls out. She turns, directs her candy-blues in our direction and gives us that impossible smile: our dentist friend, Stephanie – not an ex-partner. I let out the breath I’ve been holding. My dread was just a conditioned response from years of associating panic with her and her dental procedures.
She breezes over. “Hi boys,” she says. “I hope you’ve been flossing.”
I start to feel nervous all over again.
HOW DID WE FALL OUT OF LOVE?