I wasn’t sound asleep yet when I heard the doorbell ring. I glanced at the alarm clock and saw it was midnight. I muttered a curse word under my breath and closed my eyes. Again, the doorbell rang. Maybe it was restless teenagers, pulling one of their midnight pranks. But I knew better. When it rang a third time, I got up, put on my robe and went downstairs. I didn’t bother to comb my hair, or even run my fingers through it.

I took a deep breath and opened the door. “Hi, did I wake you?” She asked.

“What are you doing here at this hour Traci?” She was nicely made up, wearing black jeans and the pale lavender cable-knit sweater I had given her for Christmas last year. Not a good sign.

“The usual, I guess. Perry and I broke up.”

“And?” I was wide awake now. She was still standing on the landing, shivering in the cold November wind. I took her arm and gently pulled her into my foyer. The woman was like a malaria that kept coming back.

“I could use a place to stay. Just for tonight, George, really.”

We’d been through this before, twice in fact. The first time she left, I begged her to reconsider. I was so in love with her, but she insisted she needed some space, the catchall term for having a new love interest she wasn’t prepared to admit to yet. For two days, I cried, begged and made promises I knew I couldn’t keep, while she packed, unpacked and packed again before finally leaving. Six months later she was back, our first midnight reunion. That lasted 127 days (I counted) until she met Jason. That time I had to resist the urge to help her pack.

“Traci, don’t you have a couple of girlfriends or another ex you can stay with? Why do you come to me?”    

“Where else could I possibly go at this hour?”

“Did it occur to you that I might not be alone? That I might have found someone else?”

She walked into my living room and put her purse on the end table. “Do you? Do you have someone else?”

“You want something to eat,” I asked. I watched as she put on her Roberto Cavalli glasses and bent over to browse my magazine collection. Her face had that perfect combination of beauty and vulnerability that always enchanted me.

“Not really, just a glass of wine, please.” She sat on the couch and pressed one of the cushions down a few times. “Not as comfortable as your bed,” she said, winking and giving me what I now recognized as her practiced smile.

I gave her a glass of Pinot Grigio and made a show of sitting in my recliner. “I’m impressed,” she said. “Must be losing my touch.”

“Let me see if I understand this,” I said. “You figured we’d sleep together tonight, and tomorrow we’d move you in, right?”

“That thought crossed my mind,” she said. She took a sip of wine. “Maybe I shouldn’t have come here tonight.” She stood and reached for her purse.

“It’s too late to get a hotel now, Traci. I’ll get you a sheet, a blanket and a pillow. You can sleep on the couch. In the morning, we’ll have breakfast and give some thought to your next move.”

She hesitated then, not sure of what to do. During our times together, she had usually called the shots. This was unfamiliar turf to her. “There is someone else, isn’t there?”

“No, and at the moment, I’m not looking for a relationship.” I folded my arms.

“You’re bitter. I guess I can’t blame you,” she said. “I’ve been wrong so many times in my life, George, except with you. I was right about you. No one ever got me the way you do, George. It scared me and I ran.”

I laughed. “Let me guess. You’re not running anymore.”

She sighed. “Are the sheets still in the same place?” I nodded. When she finished making up her bed, she said, “I’ll make you breakfast tomorrow.”

I went upstairs to bed, knowing I wouldn’t sleep. I shut my bedroom door and locked it, making sure I wouldn’t get a visitor. I hated the fact that I wished I could lock myself in too.

Somewhere around 5:00 a.m. I finally managed to fall asleep. When I woke up, I shaved, showered and dressed before I went downstairs. Traci was in the guest bath, getting ready for her day. I noticed a little overnight bag sitting next to the couch. She must have retrieved it after I went to bed. I had no doubt that the trunk of her car and its back seat were filled with her clothing and the beauty products she sold.

I sat in the kitchen and drank coffee, not sure what to say. She walked in, dressed for work looking even more beautiful than she did the night before. She walked over to me and kissed me, full on the lips. After breakfast, we transferred her clothes from the car to the empty closet where she usually keeps her things. There’s no cure for this kind of malaria.