Yet he prefers that to the dull heartache of her absence in the house. He knows he should be angry with her for ruining this night. But all he feels is the relief of resignation. His guilt from earlier about quitting his job is overrun by the conviction that were he to leave for Florida or Ohio by himself, for another sustained period of separation, Seema would certainly be lost to him. He sleeps fitfully in an alcohol-induced lifelessness—their king bed is a vast desolate feathertop—only vaguely aware that Seema hasn’t returned yet even as the hours stretch toward dawn.

He wakes to a pounding headache and the dream sound of rain. It’s seven in the morning; Seema is in the shower. Her side of the bed is not slept in. “Did you just get in?”

“I slept on the sofa downstairs. I needed some space. I’m sorry I ruined last night for you. But we can’t go on pretending like my life before you didn’t exist. Like I’ve nothing at stake in this election.”

He doesn’t ask her where she was or whom she’d been with. He’s too glad she’s willing to discuss the previous night to hold it against her too long. He admits that Obama’s stand on gay marriage is at the very least politically calculated. She accepts that her allegations against Obama are otherwise (mostly) baseless. She promises she will take some time before the election to volunteer elsewhere, since it would be unprofessional to un-accept her directorship now; he surmises there’ll be enough for them to do for the general election in adjacent Nevada. They both agree to forgive and forget.

But Bill cannot completely forget all that has been awakened: the anxieties and insecurities of their early days together; the memory of her at dinner, raging, a woman possessed.

21

A few Sundays later, end of June, Seema is at the San Francisco Pride parade with Fiaz. This year’s parade is to be a celebration of the recent court victory and the marriages that have resumed since then; for the second time, Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon were the first couple to be (re-)married, and Seema hopes to see them ride in the parade today—probably her last and only chance, for Del is in her late eighties now and wheelchair bound.

Seema is here at Fiaz’s pleading. Fiaz has been despondent lately, he and Pierre caught up in constant arguments. “I didn’t say anything about getting married,” he complains, as he and Seema wait under the rainbow flags of Market Street for the parade to start. “I only wanted us to march together in this year’s parade. But—”

He quotes Pierre morosely, mimicking his scholarly tone and French accent perfectly, as if he has internalized Pierre’s comments: “Parades and marriages are products of authoritarianism. I’d rather be at Mack Folsom Prison, hooded and handcuffed, partaking of homosexual delights, than marching with assimilationists and exhibitionists and look-but-don’t-touch queens.”