We were old friends. We never talked about the time he tried to run me over with his car. He was twenty-two and rich and he took me places: bars, restaurants, even shows on Broadway. We were lovers. Still in high school, I had an older lover, older than me anyway, and he got me away from it all. 

 

Margaret, he used to say, Maggie, love, just get in the car. Get in the car!

 

One night we ran out of gas in the woods. He was driving but too afraid to get out. It was late. Misty. I was seventeen and you know, a hot little mama. He wouldn't step out of the car, he just refused. You couldn't budge him.

 

So I had to walk all the way to the station and come back with a man in a truck. This was before cell phones. Cell phones would have made Max a little easier.

 

I was terrified, walking that road at night. Could have been hit by a car. Or some man, you know, could have tried to nab me. At that moment I wanted to be home with my little brothers, with my dad flinging the butter dish. He had a temper. And my mother had a temper and when the two of them got going, I wanted to disappear, just Narnia myself through the walls and slip away.

 

But Max loved me. Maximilian, Max-a-million, my brothers would sing-song because, you know, he was rich.

 

So stinking rich. I came back with the man in the truck. I should have gone home, but I couldn't just leave Max cowering in his black Mercedes, afraid of the dark. I couldn't do that to a twenty-something-year-old man, my lover. It was a thing to me still, I had a lover. An older lover.

 

We got there and the truck driver had a gas can and Max stepped out of the car and flexed open his wallet. The truck driver, who towered over Max, ducked his head. I had begun noticing things like that. Max wanted me to notice, but not think too hard about it. I was not as dumb as he might have liked. 

 

Max waited for the truck driver to leave, as if he didn't want to leave me alone with another man. And I had walked! Over a mile down the dark road! 

 

The truck's lights snapped on as I sank into the cold leather seat of the Mercedes. I rubbed my legs. The truck pulled away and the driver waved. We could see him in our head beams. 

 

He asked for my number, I told Max. I was still mad at him for making me walk, and it was true, the driver tried to get my number the entire ride back. I told Max, I gave him a fake one.

 

I expected Max to laugh with me but maybe some part of him was still frightened because he yelled at me to get out of the car. 

You get out of the car! I said.

 

This part I remember so clearly. The light was still on in the car, a little glowing thing. And Max pushed me. He pushed me against the door, one arm wriggling around to force the latch, and I fought back but he was strong when he was angry and I fell onto the road and he started the Mercedes and it was coming at me but I rolled toward the woods.

 

I rode horses back in those days. When you fall off, you roll to the side, fast as you can or the horse will trample you. So I rolled to the side and that was the woods and the car couldn't come there except Max drove the car into the woods and crashed into a tree.

 

No, he wasn't drunk. He sounds drunk, very drunk, but that was the thing about him in those days. He drove me home. You thought I wouldn't get back in the car? I didn't want to walk. It was late. I'd spent my luck, rolling through bramble, and Max was sorry. I knew his moods. And I needed time to think. 

 

He drove me straight home and I went into the house and shut the door. 

 

How was your date? my mother asked. Is that a twig in your hair? Can't Max get you a nice hotel room? At least, he can afford it.

 

They liked Max. They liked my prospects. So they weren't mad for once and were happy to see me even with twigs in my hair and Lord knows what kind of wrecked mascara. My mother touched my hair which was, at the time, my greatest asset. Long and dark and thick. I used to iron it and the scent of burning lasted for days.

 

Look at you, she said. She pulled a dead leaf from my hair with a pleased smile. That smile, it's stayed with me.  

 

As I climbed the stairs, I made my decision. She wouldn't like it and neither would Max. I never changed my mind, though he called me, begging. You know, on my birthday last year he sent me roses? Fancy, expensive. White, like for a funeral. 

 

That night, I brushed out my hair, working fast, shaking it free of grass and leaves. When it was finally clean, or clean enough, I lay down the brush and found a record. I stood there before the mirror. Stared at myself, while the Beatles sang in their sad voices, and waited to feel something again.