Free Here I Am by Jonathan Safran Foer Page A

people. Toasters don’t toast toast, toast toasts toast.”
    “Toasters toast bread.”
    “The margarine for error is too small!”
    What if she’d given him the love he needed, and she needed to give, if she’d said, “Your mind is making me want to touch you”?
    What if he’d been able to make the right joke at the right time, or better still, be still?
    Another glass of rosé.
    “You stole a clock from the desk! I just remembered that!”
    “I did not steal a clock.”
    “You did,” Julia said. “You totally did.”
    The only time in his life he impersonated Nixon: “I am not a crook!”
    “Well, you definitely
were
. It was a tiny, folding, cheap nothing. After we made love. You went to the desk, stopped the clock, and put it in your jacket pocket.”
    “Why would I have done that?”
    “I think it was supposed to be romantic? Or funny? Or you were trying to show me your spontaneity credentials? I have no idea. Go back and ask yourself.”
    “You’re sure you’re thinking of me? And not some other man? Some other romantic night at an inn?”
    “I’ve never had a romantic night at an inn with anyone else,” Julia said, which shouldn’t have required saying, and wasn’t true, but she wanted to care for Jacob, especially right then. Neither knew, only a few steps onto that invisible bridge, that it never ended, that the rest of their life together would require steps of trust, which only led to the next step of trust. She wanted to care for him then, but she wouldn’t always.
    They stayed at their table until the waiter, in splutters of profuse apology, explained that the restaurant was shutting down for the night.
    “What was the name of that movie we didn’t watch?”
    They would have to go to the room.
    Jacob put the duffel on the bed, just as he had. Julia moved it to the bench at the foot of the bed, just as she had. Jacob removed the toiletry bag.
    Julia said, “I know I shouldn’t, but I wonder what the kids are doing right now.”
    Jacob chuckled. Julia changed into her “fancy” pajamas. Jacob watched her, unaware of anything that had changed about her body in the decade since they’d last been there, because he’d seen her body nearly every day since. He still stole peeks, like a teenager, at her breasts and ass, still fantasized about what was both real and his. Julia felt herself being watched, and liked it, so took her time. Jacob changed into boxers and a T-shirt. Julia went to the sink and ritually craned her neck back, a worn habit, examining herself as she gently pulled on a lower eyelid—as if she were about to insert a contact lens. Jacob produced both toothbrushes and applied toothpaste to each, resting hers, bristles up, on the sink.
    “Thanks,” Julia said.
    “Do. Not. Mention. It,” Jacob replied in a funny robot voice whoseutterly random arrival could only have been an expression of anxiety about the emotions and actions now expected of them. Or so Julia thought.
    Jacob brushed his teeth and thought,
What if I don’t get hard?
Julia brushed her teeth, searching the mirror for something she didn’t want to see. Jacob applied five seconds of Old Spice to each armpit (despite being an inert and sweatless sleeper), washed his face with Cetaphil Daily Facial Cleanser for Normal to Oily Skin (despite having Normal to Dry Skin), then applied Eucerin Daily Protection Moisturizing Face Lotion, Broad Spectrum SPF 30 (despite the sun having disappeared hours ago, and despite sleeping under a ceiling). He gave an extra squirt of Eucerin to his trouble spots: around the alas (a word he knew only from neurotic Google searches—
Alas, poor Yorick, the alas of your missing nose
), and between the eyebrows and the tops of the upper eyelids. Julia’s regimen was more complex: a face wash with S.W. Basics Cleanser, application of Skin-Ceuticals Retinol 1.0 Maximum Strength Refining Night Cream, application of Laneige Water Bank Moisture Cream, gentle tapping application of