Variations in Red   CATHLEEN CALBERT   Inside their pockets, his hands curl like snails, like seashells. He's no longer smoking. He looks up, without apology, not adjusting his stance whenever a car sails through her neighborhood. Flipping up his collar, he shivers under the winter moon, moody in its milky ring. Finally, a light goes out. He thinks, Is this how it ends? WAIT He sees her light go out. She's with someone. She's happy. She is with someone because she is happy. She is happy because she is with someone. He stands at attention with due respect for the disastrous turn that his life has taken. Only the moon, circled by a smoky ring, watches his waiting. He stays until ten past three when the new lover spins out the front door as she stands at her window, robe loose, waving. WAIT He stays until the new lover rolls out her door at ten a.m. He taps the man's sleeve three times as if to say did you drop this, is this yours. Then he curls the cold fists back in his pockets. He wants to escalate their meeting into violence—that's why he's here and why his stomach is turning over—but it's not easy to act after waiting so long. He looks into the man's eyes, which are red, the man's face, which is chapped, and he smells something tropical—her ankles or the curls on the back of her neck. He rolls him onto a patch of dry grass until the new lover coughs her up. WAIT He leaves ten minutes before she will come home. He doesn't see anything, and he makes sure he never will by moving in three weeks to another city. In the future, he will think, I tempted fate by going to her place, but I was saved by a pain in my stomach and by running out of cigarettes. Ten minutes before she will fumble with her keys, he goes to a nearby diner, where he stirs circles in his coffee. The waitress wearing shell earrings smiles at him. Between orders, she spins a thick gold ring around one finger. He asks if she minds working late. No, she doesn't mind. He leaves her a five. WAIT He drops a bill on the table and brushes past the waitress whose red hair eludes the clasp of pink barrettes. In town for three days, he doesn't see the way she looks at him, promising a soft body, rose of a woman. After he's gone, she leans an elbow on the counter, rolling his five like a cigarette between her finger and thumb. WAIT He knows she's home: her lights are on. He hasn't seen her for three weeks. He is appalled by the number of the nights between now and then, but he's here and he's knocking. Incredibly, she is ready for him; her lips are painted pink. No, she doesn't mind it being late. They kiss to forgive; for what, they don't say. He curls his free hand into a pocket, pulling out a red velvet box, and, between the two of them, they slip a thin gold ring onto her finger before circling up the stairs. WAIT He knocks at her door and hears the sliding of silk as it parts. She appears in a red kimono, smoking. Even her neck is red. He hurries home to spend three weeks dreaming of drowning. WAIT He knocks at her door, giving himself three minutes, but, hearing nothing, leaves. WAIT He knocks at the door, giving her three minutes, and hears something. “Wait.” Cathleen Calbert is the author of two books of poetry: Lessons in Space and Bad Judgment. Her work has appeared in a number of publications, including The Best American Poetry 1995, Ms., The New Republic, and Poetry. She has been awarded The Discovery Award from The Nation, The Gordon Barber Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America, and a Pushcart Prize. New work is forthcoming in The Southern Review and The Women's Review of Books. Currently, she is a Professor of English at Rhode Island College. TLR Web home page