Desert Chemistry

I had lunch with Maggie again that Friday. She got a worried look on her face as soon as she saw me.

"I just haven't been sleeping well," I said. "I'll be okay."

She looked back at me but didn't say anything more. We bought lunch and went outside to eat. It was beastly hot, but it was quiet outside, and the heat was bearable in the shade. Maggie once again did all the talking, with more tales of her kids. I was happy to listen, and she was happy to have an audience who wouldn't completely tune her out. Eventually, she ran out of stories and went quiet. We finished our lunches in silence, watching the little sparrows hopping around, looking for crumbs.

"It's the bed," she said after a while.

"What?" I had no idea what she was talking about.

"That may be why you can't sleep," she said. "After the accident, I couldn't sleep. What little rest I got was on the couch or in one of the kids' rooms. Being alone in the bed that we had shared was just too much. I went out and bought a new bed a week later, and after that I could make it through the night more often than not. I didn't change anything else in the house - I still want to remember him - but the new bed made a huge difference. So at least go buy yourself some new sheets."

"Okay," I said. "I'll try that."

This time she hugged me as we left.

I followed her advice and went shopping on Saturday. I splurged a little and got a whole new set of bed linens, with pillows and a light summer comforter. The sheets were a soft, dark gray jersey cotton. I slept peacefully until noon on Sunday. Maggie was right.

~~~

Things got exciting in the lab over the next few weeks. We were looking at a new group of enzymes, and David got a crazy gleam in his eye when the first results came in. He wouldn't say anything, but I could tell he was really excited. This was the part of our research where David excelled. I looked up the fungus that had produced the enzymes that had so piqued his interest, and I found they all came from the dryad's saddle mushroom. I love that name. The enzymes were all pretty average in the wild, similar to those produced by most other mushrooms, but David had a feeling they would be easy to work with.

Our research project was about finding a way to break down lignin. It's the stuff that, along with cellulose, gives woody plants their structure. Cellulose is fairly difficult to digest, but there are a lot of animals that manage the trick, from ruminants like cows (actually their gut bacteria) to tiny little crustaceans called gribbles. There are already test projects out there that make the process work economically at industrial scale, or close to it.

Lignin is much tougher. Out in nature, almost nothing can digest it. Animals can't and bacteria can't. The only thing that can is fungus. So we were studying every kind of fungus that grows on wood, looking for the enzymes they use. Once we found one we could work with, the plan was to study its activity and see if we could make something synthetic that does the same job. It's an unusual approach. Most scientists would just try to transfer the genes into a bacterium like E. Coli, which would make the enzyme in larger quantities, but that comes with its own set of problems.

The result, if we could make it work, would clear one of the biggest obstacles to producing useable biofuels from generic plant matter. That's a big deal. The world's transport system is going to need liquid hydrocarbons for a long time, especially in airplanes, but we've already dumped too much carbon into the atmosphere. Biofuels done right (NOT ethanol from corn) are the best bet for providing the fuel without adding to the carbon load.

So David and I settled in for a few months of great science, and that part of my life was really good. Other parts, though, were not so good.

~~~

I was used to being alone. After graduation, when Anne and I moved away from each other, I lived alone more often than not. I dated a little, even had a semi-serious relationship with a brilliant, manic Chinese girl going for her MS in civil engineering at MIT. Xiaomei, her name was. We lasted four intense months. When it was over, and I was alone again, that was fine. Alone was okay. In the depths of my dissertation research, when I was literally watching paint dry in the name of science, I could go a week without really talking to anyone. Human contact was always welcome, but it was never essential.

But after Cate, something changed. Alone was not okay anymore. I needed to see the spark of attraction in another pair of eyes. I needed to talk and to touch and to hold. I needed to feel a woman's soft breasts pressing into my back and her hot breath on my neck. I needed.

Most weeks, I go to the student recreation complex after work two or three nights to work out and then head home. One Wednesday toward the end of May, after all the madness of graduation was over, I decided to go out after exercising instead of going home. I worked myself to exhaustion, using pretty much the same routine I'd been doing since college, and then hit the showers.

After cleaning up, I put on my going-out clothes, a navy miniskirt and a tailored white cotton shirt. I looked in the mirror, and I actually liked what I saw. I had never much liked my body growing up, but I had come to understand that women's bodies come in all shapes and sizes. I was tall, skinny, and strong, and that was good. That was the way I was supposed to be.

My hair had faded from golden to silvery blonde under the desert sun and in chlorinated swimming pools, and the loose curls had relaxed into waves without the east coast humidity to sustain them. I decided to let my hair grow out when I moved to Arizona, and it was already well past the collar of my shirt. I pulled back and pinned the hair on top into a barrette to keep it out of my face, but I let the rest hang loose.

I walked to the campus light rail stop, trying to stay in the shade as much as I could, and caught a train into central Phoenix. Forty minutes later, I got off and started walking the mile or so to my destination. The sun had gone down, and the furnace blast of Phoenix heat had mellowed enough to be tolerable. There aren't a lot of gay bars in Phoenix, and none at all that are just women, at least that I know about. I'd been to Stacy's a couple of times with friends and been happy enough, and the online reviews say it's the nicest of the lot, so that's where I went.

The place was quite nice inside, all dark wood and low, warm light. It reminded me of a series of the little chapels attached to old European churches. There was a pretty good crowd for a Wednesday. I didn't see a lot of women who were obviously available - most of the patrons were either gay guys, straight couples or mixed groups - but I spotted a few here and there. I got some sort of silly, girly drink I don't remember and claimed a tiny table for myself. Halfway through my drink, the music changed, and a bunch of women gathered on one corner of the dance floor. I waded into the crowd to join them.

I found myself surrounded by a mass of writhing, slithering femininity, and then I became part of it. The music was obviously for the guys, with a heavy dance beat and a staccato male singer I didn't recognize, but the women somehow made it their own. I was swimming in in a blur of hair and arms and hips, and then one figure came into focus.

Her short, shockingly orange hair was moussed up into spikes, tipped with purple. Her makeup matched her hair, heavy and unsubtle, and there were at least three piercings on her face. Then she was right in front of me, her belly sliding against my hips, arms above her head, swaying with the beat. We danced like that, the two of us alone in the crowd, until the DJ slowed the tempo and dimmed the lights. Her arms wrapped around my waist, and mine went around her shoulders.

"I'm Julie," she said.

"Allison," I replied.

When the song ended, she fetched her drink from its place on the bar and followed me back to my little table. She sat down across from me. There were a few minutes of awkward small talk, and then she asked me if I wanted to go home with her.

"God yes!" I replied.

We were out the door and in her apartment, kissing insistently as clothes flew in every direction. I felt her lips on my neck, her hands on the small of my back, her teeth on my collarbone. And then we were in the bedroom and she was laying me down on the bed, her breath warm and moist on my skin . . .

"Allison? Hello," I heard her say. "Are you okay?"

I shook myself back to reality. We were still sitting at that little table in the bar, and she was looking at me very strangely.

"Yeah," I said. "I'm fine. Just a little distracted."

"Okay," she said, looking like she didn't quite believe me.

She handed my phone back to me. "Here you go," she said. "You have my number. Text me, okay?"

"I will," I said. "It was really good to meet you."

She smiled at me and then disappeared into a group of her friends, who walked out the front door together.

What the hell was that? I thought to myself after she was gone. I'd had erotic dreams, some of them really good, but I'd never lost myself like that before.

~~~

I did text Julie the next day, and we made a date to go hiking in Piestawa Peak Park on Sunday. I got up ridiculously early, grumbling to myself about the idiocy of doing anything at eight in the morning. Unfortunately, getting out early is the only practical way of doing anything outdoors in Phoenix in the summer, which lasts roughly from April to October. We met in the parking lot, already almost full, and exchanged hellos and a quick hug. Without the heavy makeup, hair gel and face metal, Julie looked like a whole different person. A more interesting one.

Piestawa Peak tears a hole in the city's orderly street grid, just north and east of downtown. It's a huge oasis of nature in the middle of the city, like Central Park in Manhattan, but it's all raw, untamed desert. The terrain is mostly rock, from big black boulders to little flakes of sandstone, with coarse, gray-beige soil filling in the gaps. The vegetation is sparse, each bush claiming as much land as it can, burrowing down deep to harvest the scant moisture. A wide variety of cacti sprout in any available spot, even tiny cracks in the rock. There are furry white pincushions, no bigger than a hand, fuzzy teddy bear cholla, and even a few tall, majestic saguaro. There's animal life too, lizards, snakes, chipmunks, and all manner of strange insects. It may look dry and barren, but the place is alive, as much as any New England forest.

The peak, the surrounding park, and the nearby freeway are all named after a Native American who died in Iraq. A lot of the old-timers in the valley still call the place Squaw Peak, but I don't. I wouldn't be at all happy if people travelled over Dyke Pass or fished in Lesbo Lake. I feel like I should extend the same courtesy to Lori Piestawa and the rest of her people.

The summit trail was a long line of people, one behind another. That kind of crowding didn't look like fun, so we chose the circumference trail instead. The hike was lovely, and Julie took me to breakfast afterward. She had an afternoon shift at the hospital - she's a physical therapist - so I went home to clean up and spent the rest of the day inside reading.

We went out a few more times - a Tuesday night movie; Saturday at the Phoenix Art Museum; Chicago deep dish pizza at Oregano's. There was something there, but it took a while to figure out what it was. We spent an intimate evening at my place, kissing and exploring. Julie gave me an amazing massage, and we snuggled together afterwards. In the end, though, we decided not to go to bed. We felt better together as friends. It wasn't everything I needed, but it helped.

~~~

I had a weird feeling walking into the lab one Tuesday morning in June. I was nervous, jittery, and I didn't know why. When I got there, David was in his chair, staring at his computer screen, not really seeing it.

"Hey," I said as I sat down.

He spun around in his chair. "Hey," he said. He looked stunned, like he'd been hit in the head.

"Are you okay?" I asked.

"Melanie's pregnant," he replied. His voice was flat, emotionless.

"Congratulations!" I said. I started to stand up to give him a hug, but he seemed to collapse into himself, his face shifting from blank incomprehension to bleak despair. I sat back down.

"It's not mine," he said softly. "It's Eddie's."

I sat still for a moment, letting that sink in.

"As in your best friend since third grade Eddie?" I asked.

"Yeah, that Eddie," he said, his voice still flat. "Melanie told me this morning."

"Oh, God, David," I said. "I'm so sorry."

I got up and knelt down by his chair to give him a hug. He leaned in and buried his face in my shoulder. There were no tears, but he held on to me like a life raft. "Thanks, Allison," he said after a while.

I sat back in my chair and waited. He never had an easy time talking about personal stuff, even when it wasn't painful.

"She's moving out today," he finally said. "That's why she picked this morning to tell me. It was when she could get the moving truck." His voice got a little bitter as he said it.

I wanted to scream - she decided to destroy his life on a weekday morning because of the goddamn moving truck! - but I kept quiet. This was his crisis, not mine.

"What about Lucie?" I asked.

That jolted him upright. He reached for his phone, started typing, and jabbed the send button with his middle finger. "I don't care about most of the stuff," he said, "but she is NOT taking my dog!"

A minute later, there was a binging noise from his phone. He picked it up to read the text and his face filled with rage. I thought for a second he might fling the phone across the room. "Give it to me," I said firmly, trying to calm him down. Smashing the thing wouldn't do anybody any good.

He relinquished it, and I read the incoming text: keep teh damn dog. i nvr liked it anywy.

I could see why he was so angry, but at least she wasn't going to fight. "Is Lucie in the house now?" I asked. "You should probably call that neighbor girl and see if she can take her for the day."

David took the phone back, flipped through his contacts and dialed, calmer and happy to have something constructive to do. I heard his half of the conversation.

"Hey, Tina.

Yeah, the moving truck is for my house. Melanie's leaving...

No, it's okay. I'm not going anywhere. It's just . . . It's complicated.

Listen, can you do me a favor? I need you to go next door to get Lucie and take her to your house for the day, if that's alright with your parents.

Great, great. Is that her barking? Guess I should've called earlier.

Thanks for doing this, Tina. I'll pay extra - we can figure out what's fair later.

No, no, you deserve it. Lucie will be much happier with you taking care of her.

Okay, Tina. Thanks again.

Bye."

David hung up and heaved a big sigh. "Thanks, Allison," he said. "I hadn't even thought about Lucie. The last thing I need right now is a traumatized dog."

"So what are you going to do now?" I asked.

"Now," he said, "I'm going to get ready for class. Really not looking forward to it, but at least it will be something to do."

"Are you sure you're up to it?" I asked. "You've just had a bomb dropped on your head. Lecturing a bunch of grouchy summer students might not be the best thing for you right now."

"Doesn't matter," he replied. "Summer session is compressed enough that canceling even one class really screws up the syllabus. We have a lot of material, and it's pretty stretched as it is. I'll just have to muddle through."

"I could sub for you today," I suggested, "even the rest of the week if you want. You could stay here analyzing enzymes. Much better distraction for you, and none of the students get traumatized by Angry Zombie Professor David."

"Would you really?" he asked. "That would be such a relief."

He ruffled through the papers on his desk and picked one up. "I've got a pretty good lesson plan for today."

"Great," I said, looking at the sheet he handed me. "I think I can handle this."

"Remember, Allison," he said, "these are not MIT students, and they're not chemistry majors, so go slow. They're engineers, and most of them will get the stuff in this lesson, but you need to explain things thoroughly."

"Got it," I said, and turned to go.

"Just don't burn down the lab, okay?" I added as I left.

Teaching was harder than I remembered. By the end of the two hour class period, I was tired and cranky. I don't know how David managed to do it every day, all summer. I found David in the lab when I got back. I gave him a smile and a thumbs up, and he went back to work.

David was immersed in work all afternoon, with that eight year old boy look of concentration in his eyes. I had to remind him that it was time to finish up for the day.

"So what are you doing tonight?" I asked. I was sure he hadn't thought about it yet.

When the reality of the day washed over him again, the rage returned. "Well," he said, "I'm not fucking going out drinking with my fucking best friend, because he's fucking my fucking fiancée. Ex-best friend now, I guess. Asshole."

He calmed down and his shoulders slumped, like a balloon deflating. "I guess I don't know what I'm doing tonight," he said. "Or tomorrow or the day after that. I had a life with Mel... with her, and now I don't anymore. I have to figure out how to have a life by myself."

"Okay, then," I said. "Here's what we're doing tonight. I'm taking you out, wherever you want. We'll get some food into you first, and then we'll get you very drunk. I assume this qualifies as a bad breakup..."

"Yeah, definitely," he said with a mirthless laugh.

"After that," I said, "you're going to spend the night in my spare bedroom, and you're going to sleep until you feel human again. I already called Tina, and she's thrilled to have Lucie with her overnight."

"Thank you, Allison," he said. "Thank you for always being here."

~~~

David didn't want to think about where to go for dinner, or anything else, so I chose for him: the Cornish Pasty Company, a short drive west on Apache. The place is dark and tiny, just a long bar and a single row of booths behind it, with old pictures of tin miners on the walls. We ordered food, one traditional Cornish pasty apiece, and drinks, soda for me and a strong, locally brewed Scotch ale for him. David had never heard of Cornish pasties, which are basically large, hand-held meat pies, but he was always adventurous with food. He was also famished because he had completely forgotten to eat lunch.

David was quiet, so I babbled at him about all sorts of random things - Julie, my trip to the zoo with Maggie and her kids, a new book I'd been reading about plant genetics. After his second beer, something unclenched inside him and he started to talk. It was slow at first, like each word was struggling to come out. I don't think he had ever talked much about his personal life.

"We met at my friend Doug's wedding," he said. "I was there alone, and she was alone too. She was a friend of one of the bridesmaids, I think. We were seated next to each other at a table full of old people, so we just kind of hung out together. We danced when the music was good, and I asked her out as we left."

"Sounds nice," I replied.

"It was," he said. "She was funny and outgoing, and she was so pretty in that pink dress. Just being around her made me feel like one of the cool kids, something I didn't get much growing up as a nerd."

I could picture her in my head wearing pink chiffon, and I had to admit to myself that she must have been stunning. Even twelve years later, she still looked like a prom queen. David smiled a dreamy smile and drank some more beer. I sympathized with him about not fitting in growing up. I didn't fit in either.