THIRTY-EIGHT
“Your friend,” Sean murmurs. “She’s something else.”
“I know.”
Sean and I have called an uneasy truce since the last time he was home from school. We’ve hung out a few times. We’ve even agreed to keep working on the song we were writing. But it hasn’t been the same. The things I said to him on the phone when I was upset seem to have destroyed the affection between us. I’m not even sure why he’s decided to forgive me – or if, in fact, he has.
He’s drunk. This is the third time in a row that I’ve seen him get sloppy. I don’t think I ever noticed how much Sean drank. But it seems like he’s drinking more these days. Is this new for him? Or was I just too far out of it to notice he was a serious boozer?
“No, I mean…” he licks his lips mischievously. “If I wasn’t back with Edie, I’d be doing bad things to your girl right now.”
“Yeah? Get in line.” I’m a bit snide. I still have something of a crush on Sean. Even though he’s behaving like a completely different person. Okay, fine, so he’s back with his ex. I can live with that. But hearing that he’s attracted to Sharon kind of sticks in my craw.
His eyes rest on me for a second. The reason for my tone of voice doesn’t seem to register, because he continues his leering. I light a cigarette and blow the smoke in his general direction, which he also doesn’t notice. I have no right to be jealous. He’s not my boyfriend, and when I met Edie, despite everything, I liked her.
Sharon sashays back into my living room from the bedroom, where she’s just been trying on new dresses.
“How about this one?” she asks us, turning dramatically like a runway model. She’s wearing a clingy white gown made of velour. It lifts her breasts to a place of improbability.
I watch Sean salivate. I wonder irritably whether he realizes they’re fake, and if so, whether that matters to him. She does look pretty, though. That’s the thing: she always looks pretty. She looks pretty when she’s strung out beyond the pale. It’s maddening.
“I liked the red one better,” I comment.
“You know what?” Sharon says. “I like the red one better on you. It goes with your skin. I’m giving it to you.”
“Really? Are you sure?”
She nods. “Definitely.”
The advent of owning a new dress cheers me up somewhat. The dress is killer. I love the way it’s cut. I’m certain it’ll make me money.
I turn to Sean. “Do you want to run through the tune again? Try to write some more?” Any enthusiasm I’m showing him is artificial.
He picks up his bass and turns his amp back on. “I don’t know if I can think of anywhere to go from here, but we can give it a shot,” he replies. He’s matching me point for point with the artifice. I’m one step away from calling us both out and showing him the door.
Sean plays his bass line for the song we’ve been trying to write for a couple of months now. I sing along doubtfully. I’m about to begin improvising another verse when the buzzer rings.
Sharon jumps up and down maniacally. “That’s Willy! How do I buzz him in?”
Sean stops playing. I suck my teeth. The mood we were trying to create has just popped like a soap bubble. This will be one more day we don’t get anything done. What’s the point?
“Left side of the wall, next to the door,” I answer, concealing my irritation as well as I can. “Do you see it?”
“Hey, where are we going tonight?” Sean asks.
I look at him with half-lidded eyes. “Any place that’s open.”
Any place that isn’t here.
Sharon opens the door for Willy and tackles him, planting kisses all over his face. Willy holds her the same way you contain an energetic puppy when it jumps on you. Then he breaks from her to give me a hug and shake hands with Sean.
He sits with his elbows on his knees, making Sean the center of his universe. They both don poker faces – two boys pretending they’re two men and sizing each other up. Competing for the alpha position. Because only one of them can be king of the jungle, right? Jesus.
Sharon hovers over Willy’s chair. Her energy is desperate. He’s later than I guess he’d promised to be. But I don’t think that’s what’s bothering her.
“Baby, I’m sorry,” Willy tells her, looking up.
“What do you mean, you’re sorry? Don’t even fuckin’ tell me that. You swore you’d bring it!” Sharon’s mood changes instantly.
Sean and I are motionless on the couch, watching them.
“I know, but they weren’t out. There’s nothing I can do.”
“Then why didn’t you try the other place? I’m gonna be sick in an hour. I need it now! You knew this! What the fuck, Willy?”
“What was I supposed to do? You told me to come over.”
“I didn’t mean come empty-handed!”
“I’m sorry. Okay? I’m sorry. How many times do you need me to say it? You know, you oughta learn to live a day or two without it sometimes.”
“I need to what? How ‘bout you first?”
“Do I really need to remind you how I got hooked on junk in the first place, princess?”
“Guys, come on.” I try to intercede. They ignore me.
“Maybe if you hadn’t been sick yesterday, you would’ve made that audition,” Willy continues. “You said yourself the part was yours. All you had to do was show up!”
“FUCK YOU!” Sharon rushes him suddenly and slaps his face. Willy immediately grabs her right arm and holds it midair. She lands a left hook to his other cheek. He closes his eyes in pain and embarrassment. But he doesn’t hit her back.
“Whoa, whoa, hey!” Sean gets up and moves towards them. I’m too stunned to do anything except stay on the couch, open-mouthed, and watch the scenario unfold. Sharon backs away and glowers at Willy, who stands up. Sean puts his hand on Sharon’s shoulder.
“You fucking cocksucker… you piece of shit!” Sharon spews, never taking her eyes off her boyfriend as she shakes Sean’s hand from her shoulder.
Where is all this coming from?
“Take it easy, Sharon,” Willy tells her. In my opinion, he’s showing remarkable patience.
Sharon pulls her head back for leverage, and spits in Willy’s face. That’s enough for both of the guys – they wrestle her to the ground to restrain her.
She struggles, gives up, and begins to sob. She does this until she’s red in the face and hiccupping, just like a small child. Then she slowly tapers off and falls onto the floor in the fetal position, exhausted. It’s like a thunderstorm. It subsides as suddenly as it arrived, leaving the three of us in shock.
After a long, uncomfortable silence, during which we all avoid each other’s eyes, Sharon sits up quietly and says, “Willy, we need to go cop.”
Willy nods. “Can you give us a ride uptown?” he asks me.
“Yeah, no problem,” I murmur. “We’ll all go.”
Sharon looks at me. “I’m sorry,” she says. “I didn’t mean to do that in your house.”
“It’s okay,” I say automatically, though it really isn’t. “Come on. Let’s put some warm clothes on you and get out of here.”
She shuffles back into my bedroom to change out of the white gown.
Once Sharon is out of earshot, I look at Willy. “What the hell just happened?”
His shoulders slump. “Sharon lost an important role. She was called back three times, and it looked like she was good to go. But she was too sick to get out of bed yesterday, and we couldn’t find her anything in time to get her to the final audition.”
“That’s a shame,” I say.
He continues, “It’s her own fault, though. She shot an extra bag the night before. Just because she felt like getting high. If she’d concentrated on just getting straight, she would’ve had enough for the next day.”
I stare at him. “Do either of you have any interest in getting your shit together?”
Did that sound preachy? Probably. But I’ve never seen anyone so addicted. I can’t help it. These two worry me.
“Are you kidding?” he asks. “I never do it to get high anymore. I do as little as possible so she can have the rest.”
“How nice of you,” I say.
Junkie logic at its best.
“That’s not fair,” Willy says. “You don’t know what I’ve been through with her.”
“I think I just caught a glimpse.”
“Right. A glimpse. And that’s all you’ve got. You know, before I met Sharon, I’d never even tried junk. And I had no desire to, either.”
“So why did you start?”
“I love that woman,” Willy says. “I wanted to know what she went through. What it felt like to be in her skin.” He sighs. “Now I know.”
Sharon and Willy disappear to cop near her building, and Sean saunters into a bodega, returning with three forty-ounce bottles of MGD. “I’ll finish these, you know,” he brags as he jumps back into the car.
I roll my eyes. He’s making me hate him. My mood has grown so foul that I probably shouldn’t be around anyone tonight. But it’s too late. How do I always wind up peddling along in the middle of these combustible situations?
My two junkie pals emerge from around the corner, clutching each other just like an old couple out for a stroll. It’s striking, that dependency that so many people sentimentalize and claim to want for themselves. And I find myself buying it, too. I’m no better than those fuckwads who blather platitudes from Hallmark, with my wishes and my needs and my staggering disappointments. Anything is preferable to being alone.
I’m trapped with my loneliness. Day and night. Everywhere I go and no matter who else is with me. Maybe Sharon’s found a solution to this kind of aching. In junk, or in Willy, or in some combination of the two. If so, I’m no one to judge her. Hell. Maybe she can teach me how to keep my own demons at bay.
With this theory in mind, I’ve given Sharon money to buy me two bindles of heroin. It’s my turn to party, and I hope two is enough. I’ve never done dope in front of Sean before. But now I think it’s the only way I can tolerate him. He’s so not the person I thought he was.
Sharon and Willy’s home is looking even worse than it did the last time I saw it. The room is acrid with the stench of mold and other nameless unpleasantries. Sharon’s works are out before her coat is even off.
Once she’s shot up, she walks across the room with the needle poking out of her arm as casually as you’d hold a drink at a cocktail party. She passes the needle to Willy. I notice that he doesn’t even clean it before he uses it to absorb the freshly cooked dose from the bottle cap he’s holding. His eyes close with relief when the shot hits his system.
Sean has made it through three-quarters of his first forty ounce. He’s still sipping away. Nobody has much to talk about. Sharon sits on the floor next to Willy. She lets her head fall on his chest. They nod there together with slackened expressions like two clockwork toys winding down on a shelf.
I unroll one of my little cellophane bags of dope. I dump its contents onto the first book I grab. It’s a biography of Courtney Love.
Sharon’s eyes flicker open. She says drowsily, “That’s a great book. I really identify with her, you know? She gets such a bad rap, because nobody understands her. You should read it. Do you want to borrow it? You have to promise to bring it back though.”
“Thanks,” I say, cutting up a line to snort. I’ll give the book a scan, though I suspect I’ve already gotten the most I could from it without ever having opened it.
As usual, the advent of junk in my system doesn’t bring ecclesiastic peace the way it seems to for my friends. I’m warmer, though, and calm now. I don’t feel like moving. I climb the loft bed ladder in slow motion and curl up with the book. Sean joins me and settles under a blanket. He’s already into forty ounce numero dos.
My head jerks suddenly off the pillow and I look around, disoriented. I must have fallen asleep at some point. I’m not sure for how long. Sean is flipping through the book I’d been reading. Sharon and Willy are still underneath us on the floor. Once again they are bickering about something. Their voices grow progressively louder.
“It’s a better club, that’s why,” Sharon is saying.
“No place in Jersey is better. It’s too far. How are you gonna get there? How are you getting back in time to cop at night?” I hear Willy protest.
“People give me rides all the time,” Sharon replies.
“Yeah,” Willy snorts. “I know.”
“What’s that tone of voice mean, Willy? Huh?”
“You know how much I love it when you get into a car with a customer. It’s really great when those assholes know where we live.”
“I was talking about other girls giving me rides, shithead.”
“Whatever, Sharon, I’m not stupid.”
“What the fuck are you trying to say? Spit it out. You make me sick, you know that? How can you trust me so little?”
“How can you have lied to me so many times?” Willy counters. “How can you even be on a horse this high after you gave me herpes?”
“I didn’t give you herpes! You gave me herpes!” Sharon’s voice rises.
Sean and I exchange a look. He raises his eyebrows. I purse my lips. Both of us are feeling pretty uncomfortable, but I don’t know how we can excuse ourselves in the middle of this, and I doubt he has a clue, either.
“Oh, you’re right. That’s exactly how it happened,” Willy scoffs.
“I hate you! You’re so nasty and for no reason!”
“This is the pot and the kettle, Sharon.”
“Shut up! You’re talking down to me again!”
The bed shakes as one of them pushes the other into a bedpost. A scuffle begins in earnest. From where we sit, it’s impossible to tell who is doing what to whom. But then the noises gradually shift into another direction, growing rhythmic and regular. I’m shocked to realize that Sharon and Willy have managed to segue effortlessly from fighting into fucking.
Sean leans down and sneaks a peak at them. “Whoa, right on,” he whispers. His cheeks are flushed with lust, or booze, or both.
I know for a fact that he’s drunk just from the way he tastes when he starts kissing me. I guess I’m still pretty stoned. I let him.
His touch is completely different from the last time we had sex. There’s no emotion involved. We’re doing this to each other by rote. The same way I do it with everyone else.
The more I think about this, the angrier I feel. We could have left our experience together alone and allowed it to be a pleasant memory. Instead, he’s fucking me and thinking about someone else. He’s also cheating on his girlfriend.
But he is fucking me, which is a shred of closeness at least, whether it’s real or imagined. So I try to give it back the way I’m getting it. We wind up going at it for a long time. Over an hour, maybe close to two. There’s little pleasure in it, but no pain either. I don’t feel much of anything.
Finally we look at each other. I’m on top, he’s inside me, and neither of us has managed to get anywhere near an orgasm.
“I don’t think I can come,” I tell him.
“Fuck it,” he shrugs. He pulls out of me and doesn’t even bother to take the condom off before covering his torso with the blankets. I lay beside him, biting my lip and staring at the ceiling. Sharon and Willy must have finished up a long time ago, because it’s quiet down there. Eventually Sean is snoring next to me.
I wrap my arms around my body and squeeze my eyes shut, feeling lonelier than ever. And I try to sleep again.
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May 26th, 2009 at 4:29 pm
Could sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll be less fun?
May 26th, 2009 at 6:16 pm
In Emily’s world? Certainly. *evil grin*
Regardless of whether Emily is having fun, I’m glad to see you’re still reading. Thanks!
L
October 20th, 2009 at 12:48 am
This book is ruining my life! I cant get anything done, cant sleep! Its definitely a cant-put-down-page-turner!
October 20th, 2009 at 5:09 am
Well look on the bright side… at the rate you’re reading it, you’ll be done in about 10 more minutes.
I’m always amazed by people who read that fast. (And since it’s my stuff you’re devouring here, I’m also quite flattered!)