Crisp Air

The car resonated with Meat Loaf’s I’d Do Anything for Love. She shot him an annoyed look out of the corner of her eye and turned the volume down. Squinting like he had just glimpsed a solution to a long-standing problem somewhere above the steering wheel, he bit his lip and turned the volume back up.

“I can’t concentrate.” She turned it down again.

“Yeah, ok,” he smirked. “Because copying inspirational quotes off of your phone requires so much concentration.”

He cast a quick side glance at the small black notebook on her lap. It was full of doodles and snippets of what some people undoubtedly considered wisdom. Her handwriting was neat and childish. She even held her pen like a child. But there was something hypnotic in the way she wrote; in the steady, deliberate movements of her hand. Her eyes glistened with feverish focus, and with each pen stroke, she seemed to get closer to that thing she’d been searching for ever since realizing, while brushing her teeth one morning, that there really wasn’t much point to anything.

“It’s not an inspirational quote.”

“What is it?”

“A definition.”

“Go on.”

“ ‘Adiaphora: matters having no moral merit or demerit.’ ”

“Ok. Go on.”

“Well, it’s basically this concept in Stoicism. There are things that are considered good that people should pursue, like honesty or courage. And there are things that are considered bad, like cowardice or laziness.”

“Uh-huh.”

“And then there are things that are neither good nor bad. They don’t necessarily make you happy. They don’t necessarily make you sad. They’re just neutral. Things like status or money or health. Those things are called adiaphora.”

“How does health not make you happy? How is it just neutral?”

“Well, I’m not sure. I think maybe it’s the idea that a sick person can still be happy with the right mindset. It’s how you approach a situation. It’s all in your attitude.”

“That’s such bullshit.”

“Whatever.” There was now a hostility in her voice. It indicated that she knew how little he thought of her and she thought just as little of him.

“It’s just something I came across. I’m not saying I agree with it. You asked so I answered.”

“Something you came across. Where? Because it doesn’t sound like something you’d come across in one of your self-help books. Or the kind of thing your empowerment gurus talk about in their self-care videos.”

She leaned against the window wondering when he had become this mean. Big, wet snowflakes were turning into slush on the windshield.

“You’re such an asshole. I heard it on a podcast. Why do you act like I know nothing? Why are you always belittling me?”

“I don’t belittle you.”

“Seriously?”

“What?”

“You’re unbelievable.”

“How am I unbelievable?”

“You really don’t have any self-awareness. Just now you basically said that the only way I would know anything about philosophy is if I read it in a self-help book.”

“Because that’s pretty much all you do: read self-help books and watch makeup tutorials. While I work.”

She felt a sudden tightness in her throat.

“You act as if I don’t work.”

“You only work part-time. I’m practically the sole breadwinner at this point.”

“Is it my fault my hours were cut?”

“It’s not, of course it’s not, but you need to start looking for another job.”

“I am looking for another job. You know that! I’ve been looking for months now.”

“Have you? Have you really?

“Yes! I spend hours applying every day. I’m not sure you noticed, but the job market isn’t that great right now.”

“You don’t spend hours applying every day. You spend hours watching self-obsessed idiots draw on stupid eyebrows and talk about products that make their skin shiny like they’re fucking unicorns. And I can’t focus on work because you don’t even bother to put your headphones on. Speaking of self-awareness.”

She leaned back slightly and gave him an incredulous look.

“Wow. Ok. I’m glad you finally told me how you feel.” She slammed shut the notebook.

The muscle in his jaw started to twitch. He kept his lips pursed as if to prevent something truly irredeemable from escaping.

“I guess I do nothing,” she continued. “I guess dinner just magically makes itself, the dishes wash themselves, the laundry does itself, the floors mop themselves.”

“I never said that you —- -” He waved his hand as if to dismiss his own thoughts.

A silence fell between them. The road trip was supposed to be a good thing. It was supposed to be a chance to escape, if only for a few hours, the loud footsteps of their upstairs neighbour, the mould stains on the bathroom ceiling, the leaky faucet that the landlord promised to fix a month ago.

The space they shared inside four walls had been growing smaller every day and they had longed to breathe the cool, fresh air of the countryside.

But now they found themselves in an even smaller space.

The air in the car was stifling, and it was almost impossible for either of them to tell whether it was due to the heating or to the weight of the other’s presence.

Snow covered fields slid past them. Rundown gas stations, dilapidated barns. The sky hung over them like a slab of concrete. There were tiny cracks where the sun was trying to break through.

“Listen, I know that it’s been r — - -”

The sound of screeching tires cut him short. As he swerved to the left, a heavy blow to the rear end of the car propelled them forward. Trees, buildings, cars, everything melded into a phantasmagoria of blurry images. They swung back and forth as the car collided with the traffic barrier that ran down the middle of the freeway and spun across the road back to the other side.

A couple of seconds later, an SUV and a minivan pulled up to the side of the road. Two men ran up to the car as a woman stood by and dialled a number on her phone.

***

The air smelled like salt and wet grass. He felt a strange lightness despite the back pain, as if he’d spent weeks fighting a fever and it suddenly broke. The stroll he had taken around the neighbourhood had been restorative, and climbing the stairs to the apartment didn’t seem as daunting as usual.

From the hallway, he caught a glimpse of her as she sat on the sofa with her headphones on, staring into the void. It was impossible to tell from the slight curve of her lips whether she was smiling or concentrating intently on whatever she was listening to. She sat upright in her colourful, childish pajamas. She wore a brace around the neck and a sling on her right arm. There was something tragic and funny about the image.

She closed her eyes as he kissed her on the forehead.

“Did you take your meds?”

“Yeah.” She glanced at the coffee table in front of her. It was cluttered with prescription bottles, tissues, mugs. In the corner stood a pile of books at the bottom of which lay the little black notebook she wouldn’t be writing in for a while.

In the middle of the table, amid all the chaos, a white piece of paper lay next to a a beige envelope.

“What’s that?” he motioned to the letter.

“Compensation from the insurer. The mailman passed by while you were out. Read it.”

His eyes impatiently shifted from left to right. She watched his expression change.

He looked up at her, his mouth agape. She frowned quizzically, as if to compensate for her inability to shrug. They both burst into laughter.

“Twenty thousand!” he exclaimed. “Twenty thousand dollars!” he repeated, as if to ground himself in reality by clarifying that he wasn’t talking about some useless foreign currency or an antiquated form like shells.

He sat down on the sofa next to her.

“So, what should we do? Should we go on a cruise?”

“Oh, yes! But I think we should buy our own cruise ship first.”

They both smiled, then fell silent for a few seconds.

He gently patted her on the head, as if to reassure her that she looked more endearing than pathetic in her silly pajamas, with a brace around her neck.

“Wanna order in?” he asked.

“Yeah, sure.”

“Ok, let me get my phone.”

She looked out the open window. There were cracks again in the concrete slab that was hanging over the city. Bits of blue among the grey. She knew that they wouldn’t be taking any cruises any time soon. But she could almost smell the ocean. And the air was crisp.