He didn’t want to protect her, or her to restore his youth. Nothing like that. He didn’t exactly know what he wanted. Yes he did — he wanted to be close to her, closer than anyone else. She was awkward and impatient. Too sensitive. She wore the wrong, unflattering clothes, had yet to inhabit herself convincingly. She seemed to have no ambivalence, and endless energy — anything he mentioned she would read practically overnight. She was combative, judgmental, angry. She utterly dazzled him. What a complicated mess of a woman she was, and how desperate he found himself feeling about her.
So here, on his fiftieth birthday, he was giddy with his crush on her, lying in bed with a lazy erection and longing for her. This was a pleasure in itself, just to lie in bed and long for someone. He felt ridiculous, happy, foolish.
But she liked him, didn’t she? That also amazed him. Last night she appeared at his door. She brought over a bottle of wine and even cooked him dinner, didn’t she? She wanted to celebrate his birthday. Sweet, her total incompetence in the kitchen. She fought against her spoiled suburban self, even washed the dishes.
“Don’t condescend to me,” she said, but he wasn’t, she just read his expression wrong. Later, flushed with wine, she began to flirt with him. He could feel her wanting him, and he let her lean toward him across the table, touch his hand. It was heaven when she closed her eyes and leaned in to kiss him. He wanted it so much. She pulled slowly back, opened her eyes and smiled. She leaned in again, and he pulled back. She opened her eyes.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“Don’t, don’t be sorry.”
“I think I have a little crush on you,” she said, all of a sudden willing to give all her trust in the truth. She smiled broadly.
He looked around the room and sighed. “I think you are terrific,” Nash finally said.
“You think this is all very adorable, don’t you?”
“Yes,” he said.
“Yeah, I know you think that, truly. It’s what I like about you.” She watched him from across the table. “I should go before I make a total fool out of myself.”
Nash handed her her sweater. She started to laugh when she stood up, apparently a little drunker than she had expected.
“Watch it,” he said, taking her arm.
“I’m only a little drunk, you know. That’s not why I kissed you.”
“No?”
“No, I did not kiss you because I’m drunk. I got drunk so I could kiss you. That’s different.” She started to move toward the door. Nash grasped both of her hands and squeezed them.
“Be careful, Miranda,” he said softly. He let go, and she left, and he imagined she thought he meant, Be careful, he would kiss her back if she stayed any longer. But what he meant was, Be careful with me. Please. Please.
The first time Miranda talked to Josh was under the auspices of Prairie Fire. Under the auspices of Nash, really, which she found ironic. After his birthday dinner, she had avoided Nash and the bookstore for a few days. She expected him to call her or seek her out. But he hadn’t.
Seven days passed, and she couldn’t bear it any longer.
She walked straight to the back of the store, right past Nash, and ordered a chai tea from Roland.
“Hi, Miranda,” Nash said from the table where he sat.
“Hey,” she said, cupping her tea and studying it. She walked to a secluded corner and sat. She picked out a book and began to read, furrowing her brow and concentrating. She read the sentences, and then read them again, but all she could think was, Why did I have to come in here, looking for him? After all, I kissed him. She parsed through that evening again, as she had been doing all week.
Not only did she kiss him but he didn’t really kiss back, did he? He just handed her her sweater when she said she was leaving. How foolish she was. By the time Nash came over to where she sat holding her book, Miranda felt close to tears.
“Why haven’t you been in?” he said.
“I’ve been busy.”
“We are having a big plenary tonight — remember?”
“Of all of your groups? That should be interesting since they all have the same members.” Nash laughed, and she glared at him, refusing to laugh.
“It isn’t any of my groups, I promise. It’s the Green and Black Action group. The GABA Group. I merely facilitate it. You should come.”
“Maybe.” She shrugged and turned a page in her book.
“Miranda.”
She looked at her watch and got up. “I’ll try.”
The GABA Group plenary was not promoted, and people heard about it only through word of mouth. Despite that (or because of that) everyone in the Black House, including Sissy and Miranda, went.
Nash was interjecting during a discussion on direct action, not leading, of course, but moderating, guiding. Facilitating. Miranda thought, Ha, right. He had been talking for at least fifteen minutes.
“It is not so much that we do direct action to get a certain result, you know, like pass anti-global-warming legislation,” he said. “We do an action for the action itself. Our act is the end, the point.”
“But we do also want to direct the action at something, don’t we?” Miranda says.
“Sure, we do. But I’m saying in our quest for whatever goals we have, we should make sure the tactics themselves are reflective of those goals. We dance in the street and stop traffic not because we want to be on TV to get our message out but because we like to dance in the street. It’s the world we want to live in.” Nash took a deep breath and smiled in spite of himself. “It is in itself organic and original and full of a delicious solidarity that is usually difficult to come by.”
“Or we could just talk about actions and never do them. Not dance but think about dancing. That would be really subversive,” she said flatly and looked at the ground beneath her sneakers.
Miranda hated when Nash used words like organic and solidarity. He sounded like an old hippie then, worse, like a caricature of a hippie. He of all people should know subversion started with the language you used. But Miranda couldn’t help but feel bad for Nash, despite her hurt feelings. And she knew the other kids weren’t really listening. The guy with the black-and-green flag on his jean jacket? He just couldn’t wait to break the window of a Starbucks for whatever reason.
“I have some plans for an action we should do downtown. The new shopping-oriented downtown. We dress in business suits and are stationed in all different locations around Fourth Avenue. And just at 12:30 p.m., the most trafficked time of day, we all head toward the traffic island at the center of the street. We approach at precisely the same time, briefcases in hand. Incidentally, this is where all the surveillance cameras converge.”
Nash crossed his legs. Miranda thought he should sound less calm and more angry. He should sound like there was something at stake. But that wasn’t even it. He couldn’t resist himself, could he?
“So we approach the traffic island at precisely the same time, maybe thirty or forty of us. The clothes have to be perfect. It is fine if we have dreadlocks sticking out or whatever, but it must be suits and ties and briefcases. Women can wear the skirt and jacket, the power bow. The point is to look uniform and of an easily identifiable type. We originally wanted car-mounted sound systems to play Swan Lake or something. But I think we would be arrested in no time for public loudspeakers without a permit.”