Chapter 15 what we talk about when we talk about love

My friend Mel McGuinness couldn't stop talking.Mel McGuinness was a cardiologist, and sometimes that status gave him the authority to speak like this. The four of us sat around the dining table at Mel's house drinking gin.Sunlight floods the kitchen from the large windows behind the sink.It was me, Mel, Mel's second wife Theresa (we call her Terri) and my wife Laura.We were living in Albuquerque at the time.But we are all from out of town. There is an ice bucket on the dining table.The gin and tonic was passed around incessantly, and somehow we got on the topic of love.Mel believes that true love is by no means inferior to spiritual love.He said he had been in seminary for five years when he left to attend medical school, and he said he still looks back on those days in seminary as the most important time of his life.

Terri said the man she lived with before Mel loved her so much he wanted to kill her.特芮说，“有一天晚上他揍我，拽着我的脚踝在卧室里拖来拖去，嘴里不停地说，'我爱你，我爱你，你这个婊子。'他不停dragged me around in the bedroom, my head kept knocking on something." Terri looked at everyone, "What do you do when you encounter such a love?" She was skinny, with a pretty face, dark eyes, and brown hair that fell down her back.She liked emerald necklaces and long, pendulous earrings. "My god, don't be stupid. That's not love, you know that," Mel said. "I don't know what you should call it, but you definitely can't call it love."

"Say what you like, and I think that's love," Terri said. "Maybe it's crazy to you, but it's equally true. People are different, Mel. Yes, sometimes he's Some crazy stuff, I admit. But he loves me, maybe in his own way, and he does, and there's love in it, Mel, don't say it isn't." Mel sighed, raised his glass and turned to Laura and me. "The man threatened to kill me," Mel said.He drank from his glass and reached for the bottle. "Terry's romantic, Terri's the kick-me-I-know-you-love-me type. Terri, honey, don't do that." Mel stretched his hand across the table, He touched Terri's cheek with his fingers.He grinned at her.

"He wants to make up now," Terri said. "Reconcile with what?" Mel said. "What is there to reconcile? I know what I know, that's all." "How did we get on this subject?" Terri said, taking a sip from her glass. "Mel's all about love," she said. "Isn't it? Honey." She smiled.I think this topic should be closed. "I just don't want to call what Ed did love. I don't mean it, honey," Mel said. "What do you think?" Mel turned to me and Laura. "Do you think that's love? " "You're asking the wrong person," I said. "I don't even know the person, I've only heard the name mentioned. How would I know. You need to know the specifics. But I think you mean that love is An absolute."

"The kind of love I'm talking about is, the kind of love I'm talking about, you don't think about killing people," Mel said. Laura said: "I don't know anything about Ed or the circumstances, but who can judge anyone else?" I touched the back of Laura's hand and she gave me a quick smile.I took her hand, it was warm, the nails were clean and manicured.I grabbed her wrist with my fingers and pulled her into my arms. "He drank rat poison when I left him," Terri said, and she folded her arms tightly. "They took him to the hospital in Santa Fe. We lived there about ten miles away. They saved Killed him. But his gums were out of shape. I mean they came off the teeth and they stood up like dog teeth. Oh my god," Terri said.She was silent for a while, then opened her arms and picked up her glass.

"People can do anything," said Laura. "He's gone now," Mel said. "He's dead." Mel handed me a small dish of limes, and I took one, squeezed the juice into the wine, and swirled the ice with my fingers. "It got worse then," said Terri, "he shot himself in the mouth and screwed up even that. Poor Ed." Terri shook her head. "Poor Ed," Mel said, "he's very dangerous." Mel was a lanky forty-five-year-old with loose curly hair and a tennis-tanned face and arms.When he was not drunk, his every movement and gesture was precise and cautious.

"But he does love me, Mel, and you have to agree to that," Terri said. "That's the only thing I ask of you. He loves me differently than you do. That's not what I'm going to say. But he loves me, you can agree with that, can't you?" "What do you mean he screwed up?" I said. Laura leaned forward with the glass, her elbows resting on the table, and she held the glass in both hands.She glanced at Mel, then at Terri, waiting for an answer with a puzzled look on her innocent face, as if wondering how something like this could happen to your friend.

"How did he screw up when he killed himself?" I said. "I'll tell you what's going on," Mel said. "He threatened me and Terri with a . Bought a gun. Can you believe it, a guy like me? But I did, for self-defense, in a box next to the dashboard of my car. Sometimes I have to leave my apartment in the middle of the night to go to the hospital, you know huh? Terri and I were not married then. The house, the kids, the dog and everything belonged to my ex-wife, and Terri and I lived in this apartment. Sometimes, like I said, I would be in I received an outpatient call in the middle of the night and had to rush to the hospital at two or three o'clock in the morning. The parking lot was pitch black, and I broke out in a cold sweat before I even got close to the car. I don't know when he would come out of the bushes or Shoot me from the back of a car. I mean, this guy is crazy, he's capable of planting a bomb or something. He's calling my helpline day and night, saying he needs to talk to a doctor, and I As soon as he called back he was like, 'You son of a bitch, you don't have a few days to live.' Things like that. I tell you, it's horrific."

"I still feel sorry for him," Terri said. "Sounds like a nightmare," Laura said, "but what happened to him after he shot himself?" Laura is a legal secretary.We met because of work relationship.Before we knew it, we were on the mend.She is thirty-five years old, three years younger than me.Besides loving each other, we appreciate each other and would love to be together.She is an easy person to get along with. "And then?" said Laura. "He shot himself in the mouth in the house and someone heard the gunshot and reported it to the manager," Mel said. "They opened the door with the master key, saw what happened and called an ambulance. He was I happened to be in the hospital when it arrived. He was still alive, but he was terminally ill. He lived for three days and his head was swollen to twice the size of a normal human head. I've never seen anything like this before, I hope I never see him again in my life. Terri wanted to be with him when she found out. We had a big fight about it. I don't think she deserves to see him like that. I don't think she deserves to see him at all He, I still think so."

"Who won the quarrel?" Laura asked. "I was with him in his room when he died," Terri said. "He never woke up, but I stayed with him. He had no other relatives." "He's dangerous," Mel said. "If you call that love. So be it." "It was love," Terri said. "Of course, it might not look normal to most people. But he was willing to die for it, and he did die for it." "I wouldn't fucking call it love at all," Mel said. "I mean, nobody knows what they're dying for. I've seen a lot of people kill themselves, and I can say no one knows what they're dying for." die."

Mel puts her hands behind her neck, and the chair reclines back. "I'm not interested in that kind of love," he said. "If that's love, it's yours." Terri said, "We were scared. Mel even made a will and wrote to his brother who was a special soldier in California and told him who to go to if something happened." Terri drank from her glass. "Mel's right—we're living like fugitives, in constant fear. Especially Mel, aren't you, dear? I even called the police, but they couldn't do anything. They said we had to wait until Ed was real. What did you do to take action. Isn't that a joke?" Terri said. She poured the last drop into the glass and swirled the bottle.Mel got up and went to the cupboard and took out another bottle. "Well, Nick and I know what love is," Laura said, "for both of us, I mean." She touched mine with her knee. "You should say something," Laura said, turning her smiling face to me. In answer, I took Laura's hand to my mouth and kissed it dramatically.Everyone was amused. "We're lucky," I said. "You guys," Terri said, "don't do that, it's making me sick. You're still on your honeymoon, for God's sake. You're still crazy, really. Wait and see. You two How long have you been together? How long? A year? More than a year?" "A year and a half," Laura replied, laughing.A flush appeared on his face. "Oh, then," said Terri, "wait and see." She looked at Laura motionlessly over her glass. "I was just kidding," Terri said. Mel opened the gin and poured it around the table. "Hey guys," he said. "Let's have a drink. I suggest a drink. A drink to love," Mel said. We clinked glasses. "For love," we said. In the backyard, a dog barked.The leaves of the poplar tree in front of the window tapped the windowpane softly.The afternoon sun seemed to come into the house, and the light was abundant and comfortable.We have the feeling of being in a fairyland.We raised our glasses again, grinning at each other like a group of kids who've agreed to do something they're not allowed to do. "I'm going to tell you what true love is," Mel said. "I mean, I'll give you a good example. Then you can draw your own conclusions." He poured more gin into the glass, added a cube of ice and a slice of lime.We sipped wine while waiting for him.Laura and I touched our knees again, and I put a hand on her warm lap and didn't let it go. "Do any of us really know what love is?" said Mel. "We're just newbies in love, it seems to me. We say we love each other, and it's true, and I don't doubt it. I love Terri." , Terri loves me, and you both love each other. You know what I'm talking about now. Physical love, that urge that drives you to someone special, and to another Essence love, loving him or her spiritually. Carnal love and... well, let's call it emotional love, caring about the other person every day. But sometimes, I have a hard time accepting that I Loved the fact of my first wife, but I loved it. I know I loved it. So I guess I'm a lot like Terri in that regard. Like Terri and Ed." He thought for a moment and went on , "There was a time when I thought I loved my ex-wife more than my life. But now I hate her from the bottom of my heart. I really do. How do you explain that? What happened to that love? What the hell is it What's wrong, that's what I want to know. I wish someone could tell me. Then there's Ed. Well, we're talking about Ed again. He loves Terri so much that he wants to kill her, and finally He killed himself." Mel stopped talking and took a big gulp of his drink. "You two have been together for eighteen months and you love each other. You can tell it in your every move. You shine with love. But, you loved someone else before you met. You both married Married, like us. Even before this, you probably loved someone else. Terri and I have been together for five years and married for four years. Terrible thing, terrible thing is, but also a good thing , the luckiest of misfortunes, you can say, is that if something happens to one of us—forgive me for saying this—but if something happens to either of us tomorrow, I think the other, the other will Sad for a while, you know, but pretty soon the one who's alive will run out and fall in love again, and it won't be long before someone else. All this, all this love we're talking about, it's just a memory. Maybe even Not even memory. Am I wrong? Am I saying something too far? If you think I'm wrong, I want you to point it out to me right away. I want to know. I mean, I don't know anything, I Be the first to admit it." "Mel, for God's sake," Terri said.She reached out and took his wrist. "Are you getting drunk? Honey? Are you drunk?" "Honey, I was just talking," Mel said. "Okay? I don't have to be drunk to speak my mind. I mean, we're all just chatting, right?" Mel said.He fixed his eyes on her. "Honey, I'm not judging you," Terri said.She picked up her glass. "I'm not on duty today," Mel said. "Let me remind you, I'm not on duty," he said. "Mel, we all love you," Laura said. Mel looked at Laura as if she didn't recognize her anymore, as if she wasn't what she used to be. "Love you too, Laura," Mel said. "And you, Nick, love you too. You know that?" Mel said. "You two are good friends of ours," Mel said. He picked up his glass. Mel said, "I was going to tell you something, I mean, I wanted to prove a point. Mind you, this happened a few months ago, it's not over yet, it's going to shame us, we're in the When you talk about love, talk like you know what you're talking about." "Okay," Terri said. "Don't talk drunk if you're not drunk." "Shut your mouth, just this once," Mel said quietly. "Could you please just shut up for a minute? The story I'm going to tell is this old couple got into a car accident on the highway. A young man hit them and they got smashed up and no one thought they were Can survive." Terri looked at us, then back at Mel.She looked a bit concerned, perhaps a little too strong a word to describe.Mel passed the bottle around the table. "I was on duty that night," Mel said, "and it was a day in May or June. Terri and I were just sitting down for dinner when the hospital called and there was this accident on the freeway. Drunk kid, teenage boy, drove his dad's pickup truck into the old couple's camper. The couple were in their seventies. The kid (about eighteen, nineteen) years old) died before reaching the hospital with the steering wheel piercing his sternum. The elderly couple is alive, you know, I mean, with only one breath left. They are covered in bruises, multiple fractures, internal injuries, hemorrhages, contusions , lacerations, all, plus, they each had a concussion. They're in terrible shape, believe me when I say it. Of course, their age is a double whammy for them. To say that the woman Worse than the man, and in addition to the above, she had a shattered spleen and fractured patellas in both knees. Luckily they were wearing seatbelts, and God knows, that saved their lives for the time being." "Guys, this is an ad for the National Security Council," Terri said. "This is the speaker, Dr. Melvin McGuinness." Terri laughed. "Mel," she said, "sometimes you're such a dick, but I love you, baby," she said. "Honey, I love you," Mel said. He leaned forward across the table and Terri met him.They kissed. "Terri's right," Mel said when she sat down, "put on your seatbelts. Anyway, they're kind of human, old ones. When I got there, the kid was dead, like I said. He was lying on a stretcher in the corner. I took one look at the elderly couple and told the nurses in the emergency room to get me a neurologist, an orthopedic surgeon and two surgeons right away." He picked up his glass and took a sip. "I'll try to keep it short," he said, "we carried these two into the operating room and worked like hell all night. These two, their vitality is incredible. You Occasionally someone like that comes across. We did everything we could, and by dawn we gave them a fifty per cent chance, maybe a little less for her. Just like that, they were alive the next morning .So, we moved them to the intensive care unit. During the two weeks they stayed there, they held on and got better in every way. We just transferred them back to their own ward." Mel stopped. "Now," he said, "let's finish off this bottle of cheap gin and go eat, shall we? Terri and I know a new place to go, so we'll go there, to that new place. But first Let's finish the bottle of cheap rotten wine." Terri said, "We haven't actually eaten there yet. It looks good, though, from the outside." "I love food," Mel said, "You know what? If I could do it all over again I want to be a cook, you know? Right, Terri?" He laughed.Put a piece of ice in the glass. "Terri knows," he said, "she can tell you, but let me tell you this. If I could be reincarnated in a different time, you know? I want to be a knight. Because wearing that armor You feel safe. Before guns and gunpowder, it was nice to be a knight." "Mel wants to be on a horse with a spear," Terri said. "Wear a woman's headscarf everywhere," Laura said. "Or a woman," Mel said. "I'm not ashamed," said Laura. Terri said, "Suppose you reincarnated as a serf. It was a hard time being a serf in those days." "Life was never easy for serfs," Meyer said. "But I guess even knights are somebody else's punch. Isn't that? On the other hand everybody's somebody else's punch. Isn't that, Terri? I like samurai, as well as ladies, because of that look." Armor, you know, they don't get hurt easily. There were no cars back then, you know? No drunk youngsters coming to bump your ass." "Servant," Terri said. "What?" Mel said. "Servant," Terri said. "They call servants, not bashing people." "Servant, jump," Mel said, "what the hell is the difference? You know what I mean anyway. Come on," Mel said. "I'm uneducated, I know my bit. I'm a heart surgeon, yes, but I'm just a mechanic. I mess around in there and fix things. Fuck," Mel said. "I've never seen you so humble," Terri said. "He's just a modest charlatan," I said. "But Mel, they sometimes suffocate in their armor. If it's too hot in there and they're tired and weary, they even get a heart attack. I've read they sometimes fall off their horses and can't get up because the armor made them too tired to stand up. They were sometimes trampled by their own horses." "That was horrible," Mel said. "That's a horrible thing, Nicky. I guess they'll just lay there and wait till somebody comes and kebabs them." "Other jumpers," Terri said. "Exactly," Mel said. "Some servants would come and stab the bastard to death, in the name of love, or whatever the fuck they were fighting for back then." "The same stuff we're fighting for now," Terri said. Laura said, "Nothing has changed." Laura was still flushed.Her eyes light up.She brought the glass to her lips.Mel poured herself another glass of wine.He looked at the label carefully, as if trying to figure out a long list of numbers.He then slowly put the bottle on the table and went slowly for the tonic. "What about the old couple?" said Laura. "Your story isn't over yet." Laura couldn't light a cigarette, her matches kept going out. The light in the room was different from before, it was getting dimmer and dimmer.But the leaves of the trees outside the window are still shining.I gazed at the patterns they had left on the window panes and Formica-veneered tables.Of course, they are not the same as what was left before. "What about the old couple?" I said. "Older but wiser," Terri said.Mel glared at her. Terri said, "Go on with your story, baby, I was just kidding. What happened?" "Sometimes, Terri," Mel said "Come on, Mel," Terri said. "Don't be so serious, sweetheart. Can't stand a joke?" "What's so funny?" Mel said. He held his glass and looked intently at his wife. "And then?" said Laura. Mel fixed his eyes on Laura.He said, "Laura, if I didn't have Terri, if I didn't love her so much, if Nick wasn't my best friend, I would love you. I'd take you away, honey," he said. "Tell your story," Terri said. "And then we'll go to that new place, shall we?" "Okay," Mel said. "Where did I go?" he said.He stared at the table for a moment, then started again. "I drop by them every day, sometimes twice a day, if I happen to be there for something else. Cast and bandages, head to toe, both. You know, like in the movies That. That's how they looked, exactly like in the movies. Just a few holes for eyes, nose, mouth. She also had to hang up her legs. Her husband was depressed for a while. Even in Destiny He's still depressed knowing his wife's going to survive. But not because of the accident, I mean, it's one thing, but not everything. I'm close to the little hole in his mouth and he says no it's not The accident made him sad, but because he couldn't see her through the eye hole, he said that was why he was sad. Can you imagine? I tell you, this man's heart is broken because he can't Turn his goddamn head to see his goddamn wife." Mel looked at everyone, wanted to say something, and shook his head again. "I mean, it's killing that old asshole not seeing that shitty woman." We all looked at Mel. "Do you understand what I'm saying?" he said. Maybe we were all a little drunk by this time.I have a hard time concentrating.The sunlight receded from the room, receding through the window through which it had entered.Even so, no one stood up to turn on the overhead lights. "Listen," Mel said. "We drank the shitty gin. There was just enough left over for a glass each. Then we went to eat. We went to that new place." "He's kind of depressed," Terri said. "Mel, why don't you take the pill?" Mel shook her head. "I've eaten everything." "Everybody needs a pill sometime," I said. "Some people are born with a need for them," Terri said. She was scratching something on the table with her fingers, and after a while, she stopped. "I feel like I want to call my kid," Mel said. "You don't mind, do you? I'll call my kid," he said.Terri said, "What if Marjorie answers the phone? You two heard what we said about Marjorie? Honey, you know you don't want to talk to Marjorie, it just makes it harder for you." "I don't want to talk to Marjorie," Mel said. "But I want to talk to my kids." "Not a day goes by without Mel nagging about this, that he wants her to remarry or die," Terri said, "and nothing else," she said, "she's bankrupting us. Mel said she Not getting married was to make things difficult for him. She has a boyfriend who lives with her and the kids. So, Mel is raising her boyfriend as well." "She was allergic to bees," Mel said. "If I'm not praying for her to remarry, I'm praying for her to be stung by a swarm of bees." "It's a shame," said Laura. "Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh—" Mel stroked Terri's throat with her fingers like a bee.Then the hands hang down, down to the sides of the body. "She was evil," Mel said. "Sometimes I really want to dress up as a beekeeper and go to her. You know? Wearing one of those helmet-like hats with a flap that goes down over your face, big gloves and a hazmat suit. I'll knock on the door , put the whole swarm of bees in her house. Of course, I have to make sure that the children are not at home first." He crossed one leg over the other, and it looked like he was having a lot of trouble.Then he puts both feet on the floor and leans forward, Rest your elbows on the table and rest your chin with your hands. "Or I'd better not call the kids, I'm afraid it's not such a good idea. Maybe we go straight to dinner, how about?" "Sounds good," I said. "Eat or don't eat, or keep drinking. I can go out now and walk into the sunset." "What does that mean, dear?" said Laura. "That's what I said," I said. "It means I can go on like this, that's what it means." "I need something to eat," said Laura. "I don't think I've ever been so hungry in my life. What can I do?" "I'll get some cheese and crackers," Terri said. But Terri just sat there and didn't get up to get anything. Mel turned his glass upside down, spilling the wine on the table. "The wine's gone," Mel said. Terri said, "What now?" I can hear my heart beating.I can hear everyone's heartbeat.I could hear the noise we were sitting there making until the room was dark and no one moved. ①Here Mel wants to say that "a knight is also someone else's servant". "Servant" corresponds to "Vassals" in English, and Mel said it as "vessels".It can be seen that this is a spelling error (a becomes e), which is a bit like "white character" in Chinese. The Chinese translation of Vessels is "container, boat".So you can translate "vessels" into "flutter".In the following conversations, Terri would use this "white word" to mock Mel. ②Nick and Nicky are both nicknames for "Nicolas". Nicky is more intimate. My friend Mel McGuinness is talking non-stop. Mel McGuinness is a Cardiologist, sometimes, that status gave him the authority to speak like that. The four of us sat around the dining table at Mel's house drinking gin. The kitchen was filled with sunlight from the large windows behind the sink. The four of us It was me, Mel, Mel's second wife Theresa (we called her Terri) and my wife Laura. We were living in Albuquerque at the time. But we were all from out of town.