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The first message arrives on Mike’s answering machine on a Monday afternoon. He’d just come in from surfing, his wetsuit discarded on the small front porch, and he hit PLAY on the machine as he made his way to the kitchen to make himself a hot toddy. Why he’d imagined a few waves would be good for his budding cold, he wasn’t sure, but he was a firm believer in whiskey’s myriad of curing abilities.
He shakes his head at a message from his editor about optioning his newest novel, Sleepless in San Diego, in France, thinking he was hardly in the mood for another international tour. A critic had written that he possessed a remarkable “eye for color,” and though he knew it was a compliment—the highest of compliments really—Mike couldn’t help feeling like a fraud. For all his romance, for all the love he just knew he’d had, the world was still an endless montage of black and white. He could have written a million words about the bursts of reds and blues that came with true love’s first encounter—he had and had been paid handsomely for it—but until he experienced it for himself, he considered himself a liar and everyone who bought his books unwitting contributors to his duplicity.
A woman’s voice follows the announcement of his second unheard message. “Hey, it’s Gin. I’m flying in on Wednesday. Trev’s not coming. Long story. See you soon. Love you, Mom.”
The rest of his messages play as he goes down the hall to the bathroom to shower off the day’s surf and sand. He wonders who Gin is and what could have happened with her Trev that she’d be spending Valentine’s Day with her mother. When he realizes she hadn’t left a number for him to call back to inform her that she’d gotten the wrong number, he frowns under the shower’s warm spray, but figures she’ll realize her mistake when her mother doesn’t return her call.
X
Mike is dozing off in front of the television, reruns of Friends he’d told himself would inspire him get writing, when the phone’s ringing rouses him. He awakes fully when he realizes it’s Gin again.
“Hey. Me again. You must be at Pilates class. Give it up, Mom. I got moved to an earlier flight so I’ll be getting in tomorrow morning instead of afternoon. Should be around 11 but I’ll call when I land. Love you even though you can’t answer or call me back as if I’m not your child. It’s fine. Totally not crushed or anything.”
He chuckles at the message as he sits up on the couch, runs a hand through his sleep-rumpled hair as he heads for the kitchen and opens the refrigerator.
“Who’s Ginny?” Mike nearly jumps out of his skin at his best friend Blip’s voice, whirling around to find him seated at the small kitchen table.
“Why are you in my house? How did you get in my house?”
Blip shrugs. “It’s moms’ night out and I’m hungry.”
“So you broke into my house?”
Blip laughs, shakes his head. “You should actually hide your hide-a-key.”
Mike shrugs, starts on his own sandwich. “Not if it was bought for when I’m stumbling drunk.”
“Fair,” Blip replies then asks, “Who’s coming to visit?”
“She’s not coming to see me. She got her mom’s number wrong and hasn’t realized.”
“Who spends Valentine’s Day with their mother?”
“Her boyfriend isn’t coming. It’s a long story evidently,” Mike answers. “So what are you gonna do?”
Mike blinks. “Nothing?”
“But you’re the only person who knows she’s coming to town after presumably being dumped right before Valentine’s Day.”
“I doubt her mom’s gonna blow her off.”
“Her mom doesn’t know she’s coming.”
Mike shrugs. “I’m still pretty sure she knows where her mom’s house.”
“So you’re gonna let this lonely girl show up in a strange city after getting dumped only to have no one meet her at the airport? And you call yourself a romantic.” Blip shakes his head and Mike snorts.
“So I should go to the airport to meet this strange woman and say what? You left your messages on my machine and I figured I’d shoot my shot?”
“Not r— Well, yeah I guess. Don’t tell her you’re shooting your shot though. Just shoot.”
“And what if she—I don’t know—freaks the fuck out in the middle of a crowded airport and I get arrested for any number of crimes?”
“Okay I just said to go tell her about the mix-up so she doesn’t think her mom blew her off, not to kidnap her at knife point or whatever you’re thinking of doing.”
Mike shakes his head. “I’m just saying what you’re suggesting is crazy.”
“Not really. This is some Hallmark-level shit right here. You could be standing in front of your next best seller and not even know it.” Blip looks at him pointedly. “What if it’s…”
He doesn’t finish his thought but Mike knows what he’s getting at, what Blip has been getting at since Rachel. (There had been no blinding burst of color, no hammering of hearts frenzied with the realization, no blushing embarrassment when one realized their clothes didn’t match, but Mike had suggested that maybe soul mates were made. “Maybe all love isn’t crazy fireworks,” he’d told her on their first date when holding hands yielded nothing more than sweaty palms. She’d agreed however hesitantly and they’d married after a pleasant albeit colorless year together. It was nearly two years later when she brought him a shirt that she said she thought would go nicely with his eyes. The remark passed without notice until he wore it the first time and she told him he was a little paler than he’d been when she bought it, that it was too deep a purple for his winter coloring. He was about to point out that there were plenty of people to whom it wouldn’t make a difference when he realized it shouldn’t have made a difference to her either. She confessed that it had been the store’s salesman, that it had been the most fortuitous of accidents. Mike signed the divorce papers without complaint.) He shakes his head. “It’s not.”
“It might be.”
Mike sighs. “It never is.”
“So you’re just gonna spend forever writing about experiences you’re actively denying yourself?”
“It’s working out pretty well for me so far.”
Blip only shakes his head, goes back to his sandwich.
X
The next morning, Mike stands before his mirror, his dreaded reading glasses perched on his nose as he trims his beard. Blip’s told him he’s graying, and Mike’s immediately reminded him that it makes little difference. He supposes he can see that his temples and the borders where his beard meet his face are lighter than his hair (Rachel was kind enough to tell his hair was brown, a color she’d told him was common, and his eyes were hazel, a color that wasn’t.) He writes so much about color that he imagines he doesn’t miss it so much, but there are times when he longs (Rachel’s hair was red and her eyes were green, facts that meant nothing to him but fascinated her new love endlessly) and at the moment he longs, perhaps not for the ability to see color but to give someone else the excitement. The phone rings and he leaves it, sure it’s Blip asking if he’s going to the airport. Instead, Ginny’s voice comes over the machine’s speaker. “Hey. I just landed. I’m at Gate 52B. See you when you get here.”
Mike sets his scissors aside, runs his soft brush over his beard until all the hair lays orderly. It is only then that he notices the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, Rachel’s dreaded “crow’s feet”. He remembers replaying her messages the previous night as he seriously considered Blip’s suggestion, as he allowed his mind to wander over the possibilities which the encounter might provide, fodder for his next story if nothing else. Blip’s suggestion that he had nothing to lose replays on a loop as he brushes his damp rumpled hair.
He continues telling himself he has every opportunity to leave as he got dressed, picking the purple shirt Rachel had bought for him, the only thing he’s sure looks nice on him. The drive to the airport preoccupies him with wondering just what color everything was, and if it really mattered. He’d chosen his car because it was nice, not because it was any particular color (Blip told him it was black, confirming that color meant even less), and he’s sure that even if he’d known it wouldn’t have made him any difference.
The airport is bustling with sound and as he looks around, he wonders how many people can see color. Looking at people embracing or shaking hands, he wonders how many are gaining the ability at just that moment. A girl with a buzz cut bumps fists with a girl in baggy jeans and their eyes widen as they look first at their hands then at each other. Mike smiles as he passes them, headed for gate 52B.
He only realizes when he arrives at the gate and looks at the gaggle of disembarking passengers that he doesn’t know what Ginny looks like, and the flimsy explanation that he has to give her seems even more flimsier still as he says it in his head.
He watches women passengers who exit the gate alone until he spots a tall woman holding what he guesses is a keyboard case, a backpack hanging off her thin shoulders. Mike relaxes his usual frown as he approaches. “Ginny?”
“Yes?” Her eyes widen then squint as she looks over his face, probably trying to place his face. She frowns, says, “Please tell me you’re not my mom’s latest fling and she sent you to pick me up because she can’t be bothered?”
Mike shakes his head. “No. Your mom’s not coming. You left your messages on my machine and I didn’t know how to get in touch with you so I came down here hoping you wouldn’t think she’d blown you off, which I guess didn’t work.”
She frowns a little then, replies, “Okay so I have no idea what her phone number is and if I tell her that, I’ll never hear the end of it.”
“Well I won’t tell.” He shrugs, smiles. “Couldn’t if I wanted to.”
“But if I show up unannounced, she’ll ask why I didn’t call and then I’ll have to tell her.”
“How long are you here for?”
“Just for tonight. I was supposed to be bringing my boyfriend to meet her but Monday he told me my clothes didn’t match,” her eyes fall to her clothes and Mike looks at them too as her voice falls slightly, “and I didn’t know.”
He shrugs. “Been there. Did he at least tell you what color your eyes are?”
“Brown, like coffee.”
“I like coffee,” he replies with a smile.
“Me too. Nice to know I’ve got something in common with it.” She smiles and extends her hand. “I’m just realizing you know my name but I don’t know yours.”
“Mike.” The touch her palm to his makes his heart hammer so violently against his rib cage that he makes a note to blame it for deafening him as he grits his teeth and shuts his eyes, undoubtedly holding onto her hand too tightly. When his head stops pounding, he sheepishly releases her hand as he opens his eyes, his eyes on her shoes. He croaks, “Your socks don’t match.”
He doesn’t expect her laugh. “That’s all you’ve got to tell me? I’m your soulmate and you’re criticizing my socks?”
Mike finally laughs too, a sound he hasn’t genuinely made in so long that it almost doesn’t sound him. “I just thought you should know.”
“Socks don’t even need to match!”
“Then why do they come in pairs?”
“Because you’ve got two feet.” She smirks, her nose scrunched, and Mike’s smile is unmovable as he looks at her face.
“Your eyes…” He stares a moment longer, tells her, “I think brown might be my favorite color.”
She reaches up, caresses the apple of his cheek. “What do you call your eye color? Do you know?”
“Hazel,” he answers.
She nods, turns the word over on her tongue a few times before she tells him, “Hazel sounds like a nice favorite color.”