A Long Ride Home

They waited on the corner of Sacramento and Polk for their Uber. It was only a little bit past 12, but it had been a long night and all they wanted to do was get back home. She was in a floral print blouse and heels and the young man in a tshirt and jeans.

“Why did you get so drunk? It was really embarrassing showing up in front of my coworkers like that.”

“I’m not that drunk.”

“You told me that you were going to try to change.”

“I’m just not feeling like myself lately.”

“It doesn’t mean you have to drink so much.”

They waited in silence on the curb. The car arrived shortly and they got into the long ride home.

“What are we going to do about Thanksgiving?”

“What do you mean?”

“Are we going to stay here or are we going to my parent’s?"

“Whatever you want, it doesn’t really matter much to me.”

“Well, since we are going to be traveling for Christmas we should probably go to my parents for Thanksgiving” she said decidedly.

“What are we doing with our relationship?”

“We’re doing fine T_____, why bring something like that up exactly at this moment?”

“Because we never talk about it and you always brush it off, exactly like you’re doing right now.”

“It’s just going to lead into another fight and that’s really the last thing I want to do right now. I don’t understand why you can’t just let things be."

“You don’t even want to get married, how am I supposed to be with someone who doesn’t want to marry me?”

“Then maybe we should just break up and go about our own ways.”

“Why do you always have to take it to that point?”

“Maybe we’re just different people and it’s just not working out.”

“Why can’t we just go to couple’s therapy and try to talk things out and work on these issues instead of just having you just throw everything away.”

“I’m not throwing anything away. I’m just sick of repeating the same arguments. We’re different people and it seems that we’re just going in opposite directions. What’s the point of trying to force things if we aren’t working? We should end things now before it gets even more complicated.”

She started to sniffle. “I should have listened to my parent’s and never moved in with you.”

“It was never my idea to begin with.”

“I should have stayed on the East Coast. I moved all the way out here for you and now you’re just throwing everything away. You don’t even care.”

“T______ you know that I care. We just can’t do this to each other anymore.”

“I should have never moved out here.”

“Well you can’t just go about getting everything you want in life.”

“You’re an asshole.”

He looked up at the Uber driver embarrassed but the driver was staring straight ahead into the dark road. They continued there long journey home in silence, with nothing resolved.