We Should Go

Our first and last trip as a couple

Feb 12, 2026

Updates: I’m hosting a show at TJ Byrnes on March 1 at 7 p.m. – original music by myself and others; you can still get a print copy of my pamphlet by mailing $15 (cash or check – $20 int’l) to August Lamm / P.O. Box 17 / New York, NY 10002; I’m also starting a physical newsletter – free & worldwide – just message me your address to join.

On the first night of our trip, my fragile optimism fading back into premonitions of doom, I lay next to Vera on the hotel mattress and watched a small bug cross the ceiling.

Our room was equipped with an extra blanket, as though even the online booking had carried a taint of emotional distance. I pulled my blanket up to my chin, The edge was pillowy and hard to grasp. Vera was somewhere to my right, out of view. It was our first trip as a couple.

I couldn’t stay like this all night: separate, silent. I shifted my body slowly toward her, limb by limb, as though transporting a complex piece of furniture. Her cold fingers crawled their way over my hip to my lower back.

Out of duty, I reached for the hem of her shirt and tugged it roughly upward. There was no desire in my touch. I touched her like she was a mannequin I’d been tasked with undressing. As if sensing this, Vera spoke. “I don’t know,” she said, holding her shirt down with one hand.

The night before our departure, I had tried to become sick. It should’ve been easy: my lungs were sensitive, especially in the winter. I opened all my windows and slept in the February air. I dreamt of the pulmonologist’s office, the glass booth, the plastic tube I would breathe feebly into, the slip of paper releasing me from all my responsibilities.

I woke up chilled but otherwise healthy, my breathing steady and robust, my body a finely-tuned trip-taking machine. I packed a duffel and left for the station.

Vera was waiting for me on the platform, carrying a bottle of wine in a brown paper sack. Her eyes widened, like she hadn’t expected me to appear. I held out a carton of pale, unflavored crackers.

We boarded the double-decker regional train. Our seats faced another couple, a man and a woman. Their affection was like a hot meal filling the car with scent.

I watched the woman lay her head on the man’s chest, then reach up to pinch his shirt collar. New love, I thought, full of fresh gestures. Nonsense just for the sake of it. I could see love very clearly now, in all its absurdities, feeling none of it myself.

After an hour in which I mechanically ate a sleeve of crackers to avoid holding Vera’s hand, we reached our transfer stop. The couple across from us remained seated, continuing on.

“Good luck,” said the man as Vera and I stood to leave. It was the first time he’d addressed us. I turned in surprise and noticed that he was tapping the woman’s thigh with one finger, as if testing a piano key.

The local train was just one car. It traveled at the approximate speed of a jogging human. “Why do people treat each other badly?” Vera asked as we rolled through dense woods. Her head was on my shoulder. It was a rhetorical question: she did not think we could shed light on the matter. Or it was a real question, urgent. Either way, I said nothing.

Through the train window, the trees looked slim and naive. I wanted to say, People hurt each other once they stop lying. I gave Vera the last cracker and she bit into it eagerly, snowing floury flakes down onto the upholstered train seats.

There were two ways of looking at the weekend: either it was a manageable interval of time, only one night longer than the shortest possible trip; or else it was unendurable, fully double the length of one overnight.

The inn Vera had chosen was in a reclaimed schoolhouse. The suites were appointed with modern amenities—boxy white toilets, rain showers, colored-glass lamps—but certain communal spaces had been preserved.

It was not clear whether guests were allowed to explore these spaces. When we entered the auditorium, we shut the door quietly behind us and approached the stage with soft, rolling treads.

The old curtain was crumbling, dropping little curls of velvet on the floor like garnish. Backstage it was dark and silent. There were dusty props scattered about from long ago productions. Plastic-sheathed costumes hung from a rusted rack.

I could sense Vera lingering backstage, waiting for me to make use of the darkness. “We should go,” I whispered, like there was a real show out there, something we could ruin.

At dinner, Vera poured the wine she’d brought. I swallowed a sip and it burned my throat like hard alcohol. I set down the glass. I was having trouble focusing on anything but bedtime, which shifted closer with every passing second. Would the mattress be big enough for me to lie there and pretend I was alone? Or would Vera’s warmth reach me beneath the covers?

The kitchen was silent except for the pasta pot trembling on the stove. I looked into my wineglass with its green hemisphere of liquid. Vera reached across the table and took my hand. “I could talk to you forever and never get bored,” she said. We hadn’t been talking. “This wine is great,” she added, taking another sip.

When she went to the bathroom, I opened my laptop and searched early train tickets back home. The toilet flushed. Vera returned before I could book a ticket, but not before I could see the price.