Love is Dead.

“Tell me something you’re afraid of,” Brian whispers.

We’re sitting on his couch, an overly cushy blue corduroy loveseat that likely belonged to someone’s parents before it ended up sandwiched between a honey-colored pine entertainment center and a basket of old Men’s Health magazines in his moderately-priced Ghent apartment.

We’re at the close of our third date and the living room is dark. A thumbnail of moonlight shines through the window near the sofa, illuminating half of his face. I’m sitting with my legs crossed, which is starting to make my knees feel raw and achy, but I’m too content with our placement to move. His legs are thrown over the couch; his head is resting near my shoulder. I can feel his breath hit my upper arm, and when he shifts slightly, I drawn in his cologne. He smells like lime and cedar.

“I’m afraid of lots of things,” I say, soft enough so as not to startle him away from my shoulder.

“Like what?” he asks, and his eyes, two startling bits of blue topaz, looked up at me in their upside-down sort of way and rested on my face. He smiled. My mouth cracked open dumbly; I had to remind myself to shut it.

“Well,” I start, “disappointing my parents. Being dissatisfied. Losing people I love suddenly.” I return his gaze and whisper, “Lots of things.”

He nods solemnly, and averts his gaze down to the brown throw rug stuffed under the shaky legs of the coffee table. He doesn’t offer anything, so, boldly as a woman who sits crossed legged on a couch in a dark room after a third date knows how, I lean into him closely and ask, “What are you afraid of?”

Brian takes a breath, and shakes his head. I am gripped by a strange fear that I’ve awakened something he’s been trying to hide, that he’s going to continue to bury himself rather than be revealed, but he looks up at me with surprising earnestness and answers, “Zombies, hands down.”

“Are – are you serious?” I ask, sitting up a little. He rises abruptly from my side and whirls around, putting two tightly gripped hands on my knees.

“I’m not even jokin’, Laura,” he says. His blue eyes are round as saucers. “People say anything about zombies, I have to leave the room. I hate zombies. I don’t like seeing them, don’t like talking about them – ”

 “When do you see zombies?” I shriek, and his dog, who was indulging in an albeit-too-brief nap in the corner, is jostled awake, gets up and trots into the other room. He is presumably no stranger to women howling their protests to his master’s declarations of fearing the apocalypse of the undead.  

“Laura, like, movies and stuff,” he says. “And I don’t know what’s out there, you know? Could be anything.” His whole body tenses and he shakes theatrically.

“Brian, they don’t exist,” I say, slower than normal.

“That we know of,” he returns, “but if they do, I – I don’t even want to think about it.”

I take a breath to further the debate, then think better of it. “Thank you so much for dinner,” I tell him.

“Yeah, of course,” he says, flipping on the tableside lamp. “Repeat for Thursday?”

He walks me to my car, plants a kiss on my tightened forehead  and turns on his heels back up the stairs to his apartment. He waves from the steps, mechanically, and makes his way slowly up the stairs, bobbing back and forth as walks up, his arms reaching towards the banister with a heavy, colossal grip, taking each step in a hulking slow pace, unhurried and measured. He stops suddenly and runs back to my car. I roll down the window.

“I just wanted to tell you your hair looked real pretty tonight,” he says, and kisses me suddenly and runs back upstairs into the dark of his quiet apartment and, quickly as they had died, my affections rose up again and walked the earth.

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