Duality

"Don't you get it?" he asks, pointing at the painting. "It's duality. It's us. It's complexity."

I nod my head and let him pull me on toward the next exhibit. Some Chinese artist, and he begins to talk about liberty and the government, while I stare into the eyes of people I'll never know and wonder if he's really seeing it all.

"Don't you love it?" he asks. I don't even have to answer. He knows what I'll say.

"Come on, let's get some coffee."

I never drank coffee until him. Now my hands shake without it.

"It was an okay exhibit," he tells me, and I have to agree. "It has nothing on the Met, but you know."

I tell him I've never been there and he groans.

"New York is amazing. You'd love it."

And I suppose I would.

"What should we do next?" I ask him, hoping the answer is go home, where I can wrap myself in his blankets and let his fingers trace my body and forget about art for a little while.

"There's this really interesting documentary playing at State," he says. "We should see it."

So we do. And he holds my hand. And it's like a tether. Afterwards he asks me if I liked it, and I say I did, and he kisses me on the lips, and for a second I believe it.