I stood there, shivering, and it seemed as though all the hours of love and comfort and pleasure that I’d discovered in that room with Glenna were compressed into a single moment, and in the next moment, quick as lightning, I lost them all, and the feeling of loss that raged through me was so excruciating it doubled me over.

It was a minute before the pain receded and I could stand up straight, and then, careful not to slip on the ice, I went down the steep set of stairs, opened the rusty iron gate, and got into my car.

I RANG in 1970 and mapped out my future speeding past the Bridgeport exit on I-95. I made it to my sister’s apartment, on the decaying cusp of Roxbury, at 3:00 a.m. I explained what had happened and said that I couldn’t deal with Mom and Dad.

Elaine treated me to a charitable dose of sisterly compassion. I hung out with her for three weeks, taking in the sights around Boston and talking nonstop about Glenna.

What I decided not to do during those twenty-one days was submit Selective Service Form 109 to the Brooklyn College registrar or enroll for the spring semester.

By the time I said good-bye to Elaine, I’d been drafted.

Part V

Present: New York

Chapter 27

“BLISS,” GLENNA SAID.

“It was only a club sandwich,” I replied.

“Not the sandwich. You and me.”

“What’d you mean?”

Looking down at the Rémy Martin in her snifter as if she expected the cognac to start boiling, Glenna said, “After you left New Year’s Eve, I began to ache. Every bone in my body hurt. Even my elbows. I was scared about developing an infection. I took my temperature every fifteen minutes. I thought something had gone wrong with—”

Glenna put the snifter on the plate with the remains of our sandwich.

“My temp didn’t spike,” she said. “But the aching went on. It lasted for weeks, and I went to see a doc at the student health service. An older woman. She’s peering at me over her bifocals and asking me about myself. I tell her I’m a fourth-year, I recently broke up with my boyfriend, blah-blah-blah. She examines me, and I’m starring in the usual med-student horror show, convinced that I’m about to be diagnosed with Hodgkin’s, leukemia, or cancer—either osteosarcoma or multiple myeloma—I know I’ve got one of them. Then the doc says I’m fine, and I burst into tears. She pats my hand, and I ask her when the aching will stop. She says, ‘Why, dear girl, you’ll have to wait till you fall in love again.’”

The pair of twentysomethings who had been drinking at the bar went out the front door, letting in a wintry gust of air. In their stocking caps and overcoats, I couldn’t tell which one had reminded me of Alex.

Glenna said, “I fell in love again and the aching disappeared. But there was no bliss. Not like with us. And I don’t know why.”