Free An Available Man by Hilma Wolitzer Page A

clinking glasses with a friend. Jesus. It was an even dirtier trick to allow those long past the age of procreation to want to go on fucking, maybe forever, even without the gentling grace of love.
    “I’ll have the striped bass,” Karen Leslie said.
    They got through dinner discovering that they didn’t care for any of the same movies or music or books. If they were a couple, Edward thought, they would always cancel out each other’s vote. And if one of those matchmaking services had set them up, they’d have just cause for a refund, if not a lawsuit.
    But his own cynicism disturbed him. Bee used to say that he had a gift for bringing out the best in people, a natural empathy. Had he lost that when he’d lost her? “What happened between you and your son?” he asked Karen.
    “He’s decided to be gay,” she said.
    “That’s not really a decision,” Edward said.
    She clicked her fingernails against the side of her espresso cup for a moment, and then she said, “You don’t do this very often, do you?”
    “Have dinner?” he said. “Nearly every night.”
    “Funny,” she said mirthlessly.
    So he’d blown it. A least they’d come to the restaurant in separate cars and could part ways in the parking lot without too much discomfort.
    When he’d walked Rachel Granby home from their date, he’d ventured to take her hand and she let him, after moving a balled-up Kleenex to her other one. The play had been
Our Town
, that perennial favorite of the school’s Drama Department,and Rachel had snuffled and wiped her eyes throughout the performance. Edward had to swallow several times, but managed to hold back his own tears. Love and death, that incomparable duo; a good-night kiss seemed built into the scenario. He remembered to moisten his lips, while Rachel dried hers with the back of her hand. Then he moved closer and she met him halfway.
    In the parking lot of the Paper Moon, Edward walked Karen Leslie to her BMW. “This was nice,” he found himself saying as she pressed the remote to unlock the doors. The headlights blinked and the horn beeped, and he leaned over to kiss her cheek. He almost lost his balance when she grabbed the lapels of his jacket and pulled him toward her, crushing her mouth against his—tongue, teeth, pelvis, the works.
    Then she released him just as quickly, slid into the driver’s seat, and asked if he wanted to get in beside her or follow her home. Edward stood there, regaining his breath, his equilibrium. First Lizzie’s furtive smooch in the garage, and now this—Bee’s reluctant prophecy for him coming true. So why didn’t he feel elated, at least below the belt? He patted the roof of the car and said, “Karen, thank you, but you’re right, I am still new at this. And I’m not quite ready yet.” When she slammed the door and sped away, he inhaled a lungful of exhaust as if it were pure oxygen.

What I Did on My Summer Vacation
    E ven as a child, Edward, who enjoyed school, had looked forward to the freedom of summer. By May, he was already distracted by the balmy air and the occasional housefly or gnat that drifted in through the open classroom windows, by the promise of all the unstructured days that lay ahead. His father had worked for the post office and always took his two-week vacation time in July. The family would go on a short trip somewhere—to camp out up at Lake George; to visit a historic site, like Colonial Williamsburg; or to stay at a small hotel in upstate New York. Edward had shown an early propensity for science in school, but his love affair with nature began during those summers, with the discovery of nearly invisible life among the blades of grass, and the mysterious humming and chirring from the trees and ponds at night.
    As a young teacher, he’d gone off to Europe in the summertime,like most of his colleagues. He and Laurel had planned a monthlong honeymoon in Venice and Trieste; she’d littered their apartment with travel guides and brochures.