Home: two messages. Both from Filth. The first from work, seeing if I’m going to the bar. The second from home telling me he was on his way to the Spot. There is a note attached to the phone from Kurt and Chloe saying they are going to the bar.
Three e-mails. Two porn. One a silly joke forward from my mom that isn’t funny in the least. I don’t have the strength to send out any requests for guidelines or poetry/short story submissions.
I log off and sink into the couch, struggling with the question of whether I have the strength to go to the bar. I don’t think I do. Of course, I want to drink, but going to the bar would be such an unnecessary effort. I decide to sit on the couch and think about it a while longer.
I doze, but don’t achieve sleep. I’m jarred awake by the obnoxious ring of the telephone. It’s probably Filth, calling from someone’s cell phone at the bar, sitting with Kurt and Chloe, probably Tommy Guilt as well, calling to find out why I’m not there. Instead, to my surprise, it’s Alicia.
“What’s up?” I ask.
“Rubin, what are you doing? Are you busy?” She sounds urgent and upset.
“Not really,” I say, pulling myself to a sitting position and stretching. “I was just taking a nap. I’m supposed to meet some friends at the Spot. Want to go?”
“No... No, I... I need to talk to you tonight, if I can. Can I come over?’
I already don’t like where this is going. When a girl says this, especially a girl you have some kind of ‘relations’ with, it means trouble. Trouble in the line of “you’re not going to be seeing much of me in the near future.”
“Yeah, yeah, I suppose so. Come on over.” I get up and walk to the small window next to the phone, staring out into the inky blackness of the overheated ghetto night. “What’s wrong?”
“I... I, uh... just, just wait. I’ll be over in a few minutes,” she says, and hangs up the phone.
Wonder-fucking-ful.
I meet an amazing girl, and before I can work up the nerve to make a move, she wants to end it. I mean, of course it’s my fault. I manage to fuck up everything I do, so of course I’ll fuck this one up too. My chance at happiness, and I’ve done something to offend her. What is it though? My lack of college education? My cynicism? My loose connection to the darker world she used to live in? Is it because I write bad poetry? What could I possibly have done?
I get an Ice Beast from the fridge and fall back on the couch, morose. Come on now, I’m self-educated enough to use the word ‘morose’ and think of it as a very good word, much like extrapolate, confabulate, melancholy, and antidisestablishmentarianism (which means, essentially, ‘anti-Catholic’). Why would she want to break off relations with me? With the use of words like that, I’m a hefty catch, one to take home to mother and even brag about. I’m a writer, bound for a controversial and prolific career—why would someone throw that away? Isn’t it every girl’s dream to be with a successful writer? Just look at Kerouac in his books; he had to beat them off with a stick. Just like Burroughs, who had to shoot them to keep them away. Of course, they were shooting them and beating them off with sticks so they could have sex with each other, but that’s not the point! The point is: why would she want to throw me away?
I’m exciting! I’m adventurous! I go on wild, cross-country excursions just because I feel like it! I’m wild! I’m unpredictable! I’m crazy! I’m prone to use exclamation points far too often! I’m a keeper! Well, I’m a-West-Coast-struttin’, one bad mutha, got a rattlesnake suitcase under my arm! I’m a mean-machine, been drinkin’ gasoline and honey you, can make my motor hum! I’ve got one chance left in this night-life trap; I’ve got a dog-eat-dog sly smile! I’ve got a Molotov cocktail with a match to go; I smoke my cigarette with style!
By the end of beer one, Alicia is already there. I open the door and weakly say, “Hey,” and step aside to allow her entrance.
“Hey,” she responds, equally weak, walking past without looking at me and sits down on the couch.
“You want a beer?” I ask, my voice quaking.
She looks at the empty Ice Beast and shakes her head. “No, I’m fine,” she says, her eyes focusing on her hands, folded in her lap.
Did she sleep with someone else? No way. We certainly don’t have enough of a defined relationship for her to feel bad about that. If I can sleep with Zoe and not feel guilty (which, of course, I do), then Alicia shouldn’t feel guilty about any random hookups on her part.
I sit down on the couch with the middle cushion to separate us as a buffer zone. “So what’s going on?”
“I... I have something to tell you that I should have told you from the beginning,” she says, her voice almost a whisper.
“What is it?” She’s pregnant. She’s married. She has AIDS.
“I didn’t expect to like you as much as I did. I didn’t expect anything to come of this. I didn’t expect to need to tell you this.” She’s pregnant. She’s married. She has AIDS. She’s really a man.
“What’s wrong?” She’s pregnant. She’s married. She has AIDS. She’s really a man. She’s a pregnant married man with AIDS.
“I’m moving away.” Not as bad as any of the above. One hundred times as bad as any of the above.
It takes a couple seconds to respond. “Where?”
“Phoenix, Arizona.” Phoenix? Why Phoenix?
“Phoenix? Why Phoenix?” Has she ever been to Phoenix?
“It’s where my family is from.” When is she going?
“Have you ever been to Phoenix?” So where does this leave us?
“No, it seems like as good a place as any to make a fresh start, though.” Any further questions formulating are kind of held up at this point. I’d like to go back to ‘Why Phoenix,’ but that would seem redundant.
“When are you going?” Still no new questions.
“A month from Friday.”
Long pause. “So where does this leave us?”
Another long pause on her part. “Some place I don’t want us to be.” Third, longer, more unpleasant pause. “What if I asked you to come with me... to live with me?” Then, before I can respond in a definite affirmative, “No, I know you don’t know me well enough. You don’t have to answer that. Where does that leave us? Where does that leave you?”
“When did you decide this?”
“I’ve been working toward it since I moved back here from Syracuse. I didn’t plan on to get messed up with someone I really liked.”
Messed up. Interesting choice of words. “I like you a lot, Alicia. A lot.”
“And I really like you,” she says hesitantly. “I wish we had more time. I’m really sorry about this.”
“It doesn’t seem like there is much point in starting anything,” I whisper. “But I really don’t want to just let go.” Now, I need another beer. “I need another beer.” I get another Ice Beast and sit back down. “Long-distance relationships don’t really work for me,” I say. Those were the two years that Zoe was sleeping with other guys at a school up north.
“Neither do I,” she says, finally looking at me. “But we do still have a month to have some fun,” she says with hope in her voice.
The only thing I can do at this point is smile stupidly. “Then let’s have some fun.” I grab her hand and gently pull her to me.
Go to Chapter 46
Go to Chapter 46
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