20
Big things are happening. We are finishing the record. We are mastering and mixing and multitracking, seated behind great boards, nodding our heads to the beat, using words such as tone and pitch and low end as if we were industry pros. The guys at the studio humor our requests. It’s sort of funny.
We are due to leave Los Angeles in a few weeks, scheduled to fly to New York to play the record for the folks at the label, to have meetings and do press and assuage stockholders. A tour is being planned. It is all very professional. The idea of boarding an airplane and traveling across the United States terrifies me. All those mountains and lakes and cities, all those places in which to crash. I’m not sure where I picked up this fear of flying, but it’s real and not going away. I’m not sure how I’ll manage, but I’m trying to take things one day at a time. The shrink told me that. I’m meeting with him regularly now, and while I won’t bore you with the details, he seems like a genuinely good guy. He tells me amazing stories about the guys in Mötley Crüe going on drug binges and buying automatic weapons and barricading themselves in hotel rooms. He has seen it all. He is trying to get me to meditate with him, and we take drives down to secluded beaches, sit on mats, and watch the pelicans swoop up and down the coastline. And, yes, he does, in fact, have a dangly earring.
I haven’t paged the Soap Opera Doctor in a few weeks. That doesn’t necessarily mean that I’m cutting out all the pills, but, rather, that I’m refusing to refill my prescriptions. I say good-bye to the tandospirones that you can only get in China, and the buspirones and the eptapirones that made my head whirl. I watch as the Zolofts and Ativans and Klonopins slowly dwindle away, and when they finally disappear, all I’m left with is some Tylenol PMs. Enough of them will do in a pinch. Everyone is a little less worried about me. The Death Watch is officially over. No one is afraid to wake me up in the mornings anymore.
This is all happening when she decides to leave me. We had a fight after I told Her that things were going well with the band, that I was excited again and that I hadn’t thought about quitting in a few weeks. I told Her that I was considering staying in Los Angeles and thought she should move out here to be with me. After all, I joked, it’s closer to Berkeley than the North Side of Chicago. She didn’t laugh. This was apparently the final straw. The next day, she is on the phone to me, saying she knew this day was coming, and that she couldn’t sit by and watch me kill myself. She said we had been stuck in place and she owed it to Herself to move on. I didn’t necessarily disagree with Her. I can tell she has found someone else, probably some boring dude in one of Her study groups or something. Someone who wants to wear sweaters and drink expensive coffee and live around the corner from the food co-op. Someone who is into Freud and the unconscious self. Someone who is not me.
She only cries a little bit as she’s telling me this, and only retches once, the phone clinking against Her teeth, Her tears echoing off the bathroom tile. It is a fairly low-key affair. She doesn’t even wait for me to object, probably because she knows I won’t. We are both too tired for grand gestures, both too weary to go on fighting. A year ago, I would’ve hopped on a plane and showed up at Her place with dynamite strapped to my chest and a list of demands in my hand. I would’ve begged for us to go back to the way we were—or else. F*ck hostage negotiating; I would’ve been romance’s last terrorist. Love’s last chance. Now, I can’t even be bothered to whip up some fake tears. No one needs to die for this. We’ve grown up and grown apart. We haven’t slept in the same bed in months now, not since I went back to Chicago, and she hasn’t made any attempts to come out to LA, even now that Her mother is stable again (as I knew she would be). Love has long since left the building. It’s not coming back. As we’re saying good-bye, I wish Her good luck with the new guy, and just as she asks, “What does that mean?”—I hang up on Her. She doesn’t call back. I don’t blame Her.
That night, I don’t stay up waiting for the phone to vibrate, as I’ve done after every single fight we’ve ever had. I don’t call any of my friends in Chicago and tell them to keep an eye on Her, just in case she does anything stupid. I don’t stare at myself in the mirror and think about cutting my wrists, about expressing my love for Her with some childish final act. I just accept what has happened as part of life; an inevitable step on the path to wherever; “rungs on a ladder,” as my dad always said. She’s gone. Good-bye. And all of that would be great if any of it were true. What I actually do is sit on the edge of my bed and stare at my alarm clock and realize that this is never going to work out, that she will never be with me as long as I am with the band, and that I can never have everything because life is unfair and God has it in for me. I will always be alone and unloved, no matter how many kids buy our albums or shout my name. I start to feel like I’m going to vomit, but I stop myself because it would’ve got all over the carpet and we probably wouldn’t get our deposit back. I pull my knees to my chin, rock back and forth in an attempt to settle my stomach, and as I’m curled up, I realize that I’m nothing more than a frightened child, a scared little boy with tough-guy tattoos and a hollow snarl, and that no matter how much I like to think of myself as a die-hard romantic, I’d never have the guts to actually die for love. Sure, I’d flirted with the notion, had got some illicit thrills out of the Soap Opera Doc and his prescription pad, but I’d never dreamed of going all the way. And that made me a phony, a liar. A coward. So right then and there, I decide to make a life change: I am going to die. I am practical about it. My shrink would be proud. I gather up every last pill in my possession—a fistful of blues and oranges and pale yellows—and swallow them all, lock myself in the bathroom, and break the mirror with my fist. I cut my knuckles up pretty good and blood trickles down my arm in bright red ribbons. It’s full of oxygen and oozing and steaming hot. I begin to worry that all the pills I’ve been taking aren’t letting the blood clot, so I freak out even more. My head is churning and there’s a whole lot of blood now, so I crawl into the shower and start crying. White flashbulbs are going off in my eyes, and when I rub them, I get blood on my face. I turn on the water and sit there, getting soaked, watching the blood wash away from my knuckles, staining my clothes. Martin knocks on the door, asking me what’s wrong. When I don’t answer him, his voice gets louder, and he says my name, telling me to let him in, but I just put my head in my hands and feel the water run down the back of my shirt. I don’t know how much time goes by—five minutes? An hour?—but then security comes and takes the door off its hinges, and a big, burly guy in a blue suit turns off the water and puts a towel around me while Martin and the rest of the guys stand in the living room. I sit on the corner of my bed, watching water pool around my sneakers while an EMT wraps my hand in gauze and shines one of those pocket flashlights in my eyes. He asks me what I’ve taken and I tell him I don’t know, and his partner knocks around the pill bottles by my computer. I laugh because while my body is shivering, my head is so, so hot, and I ask the EMT if steam is coming out of my ears. He doesn’t laugh and just goes “Uh-huhhhh” and calls me “sir” and asks me again what I’ve taken. The other guy is in the background holding up empty orange bottles, asking me if I took all of these, sir, did I take all of these, and I smile and lie and say, “Noooo.” Both EMTs go back out into the hallway and talk to the guys, then come back into my bedroom and tell me I’m borderline and they think I should go down to the ER and have my stomach pumped, but since I’m borderline, they’re leaving the decision up to me, and I tell them I’m fine and they respectfully disagree, tell me I should go with them, but I refuse again. They tell me that whatever I do, don’t fall asleep, and as they’re packing up their stuff, they tell the guys the same thing—whatever you do, don’t let him fall asleep. They leave and the guys take turns watching me sit in a chair. Occasionally I go into the bathroom and throw up, and pink puddles are on the floor, my blood mixed in with the water, and one of the guys stands in the doorway and watches as I stick my head in the toilet. By noon, I feel better, and everyone decides it’s probably okay for me to go to sleep, so I crawl into bed and sleep with my right arm elevated, since I’m still worried about the blood not clotting. When I wake up, I look at my damp clothes balled up in the corner and decide that I had probably overreacted. It was nice of the EMTs to come out though.
The Oakwood management, apparently concerned over the previous night’s events, have called the record label and demanded I move out. They also put an official-looking letter on my front door—typed and on letterhead and everything—that mentions such stuff like property damage and “inherited risk.” I think they’re overreacting, and I go tell the property manager that if he really wants to clean up this place, he should start with the hot tubs, but he won’t be swayed and I am shipped off to a hotel. The guys help me move, and our manager flies out to room with me. I can tell they are all annoyed with me, but they’re masking it with serious talk and “general concern.” Apparently, my little incident has morphed into “a cry for help,” so now there’s talk of my taking a little break from everything, since I’m clearly cracking up. I tell our manager that I’m fine, and I was just trying to get the blood off my hands, but he doesn’t say anything, just nods. I am suddenly seeing the shrink with the dangly earring daily. He’s gone serious on me now too. No more stories about Mötley Crèe and their AK-47s. He says I could’ve died from all the pills I took and that he can’t believe the EMTs didn’t take me to the psych ward for a seventy-two-hour hold. He tells me this is “very real” and that everyone just wants me to “get healthy.” I shoot back that if people are really worried about my health, they should get me a gym membership. He actually laughs a little bit when I say it. He’s okay in my book. People watch my every move, ask me how I’m feeling. I am under twenty-four-hour supervision. Jen-with-Two-N’s is hugging me every time she sees me. Things are getting ridiculous.
All of this happens just before we are to leave for New York. Timing has never been my strong suit. We have a meeting to determine whether I’m okay to fly, and I lie on the couch and tell the guys I’m ready to go. They say I don’t have to, that they can handle it, and that I should stay here and relax, but I won’t listen. My hand is healing—the cuts are just tiny pink crosses on my knuckles now—and my head is actually feeling pretty clear, and I figure it’s time to meet the shareholders. They’re the ones who paid for this ridiculous trip, after all. I probably owe them an apology.
• • •
I believe I am fine until the night before we leave, when I find myself staring at my bags and googling stuff like world’s safest airlines. We are not flying on any of them. I can feel panic starting to creep in, like ice water in my toes, so I take a couple of Tylenol PMs (the shrink said they were okay) and try to sleep. All night my bags sit by the door in an ominous black heap. At one point I swear I saw them move. Then it’s morning and we’re loaded into an SUV and sent on our way, and I pull my hood over my eyes and try to relax, try not to think about plummeting into the Rocky Mountains, but it’s not working. I’m trying my best not to let the guys know, but I start shaking as we’re going through security, and I can’t take my boots off on my own. Martin helps, unknots my laces and places my boots on the conveyor belt. He tells me it’s going to be all right. I don’t understand why this is happening to me. I am embarrassed to be seen like this by my friends. I never wanted to be the anchor, I never wanted to pull us down. It seems that’s all I’m doing these days.
As we sit on the runway, I can feel my pulse quickening. I’m having a hard time catching my breath, and tears are in my eyes. I wipe them away with my sleeve and try to focus hard on the in-flight magazine in my lap. I play with the tray table. I pray to God, even though I can’t remember the last time He helped me out. I try to get my life in order, just in case this plane doesn’t make it to New York. It’s funny how fears hide inside other fears. The fear of airplanes hiding inside the fear of heights hiding inside the fear of highways hiding inside the fear of cars hiding inside the fear of elevators hiding inside the fear of leaving my room hiding inside the fear of living. Fear tries to own me. In the past, I had paid it rent by downing twenty milligrams of Valium and a Xanax and sleeping through flights, but now all I’ve got on me are some of the PMs, and they’re not going to do the trick. A tranquilizer couldn’t slow my heart right now.
I try to calm myself by thinking logically. I have read about calculated fears and irrational fears. The fear of flying is irrational. The odds of a fatal plane crash are something like nine in twenty-one million. It’s like gambling, only you want the house to keep winning. Only nine in twenty-one million flights crash, but every single person who got on any one of those nine planes was thinking about a statistic just like that. Somewhere out there, someone pulls the lever on a slot machine and wins $30,000 on the first try. Somewhere out there, someone gets on a plane for the first time in his or her life and it crashes into the Atlantic Ocean.
Fear owns me because I let it. Because I obsess over it, name it, raise it, and nurture it to become perfect. It is one of the few things in my life that I can control. “It’s just on this side of crazy,” they say, but I’m not sure what side they’re yelling that from. “You’re losing it,” they say, but I know I am, so technically speaking, I’m pretty sure I’m “giving it away,” not “losing it.” I decide before we take off that I need to hear Her voice, not because I miss Her but because I feel the need to get my life in order just in case the plane goes down. I call Her up and the phone just rings and rings, so I hang up and call again. This time she answers, but she’s not in the mood to nurture my fears, to massage my neurosis, or to agree that God won’t let this plane go down because there are kids on it. I don’t really blame Her.
“You’re losing it,” she sighs.
“Whose side are you on?” I whine.
“There aren’t sides. This isn’t high school.”
“There is me, and then there’s everyone else,” I shout into the phone. “Now pick!”
Sometimes when I am leaving, arguing with someone takes the place of saying a formal good-bye. Everyone on the plane is staring at me now. Kids have turned all the way around in their seats to look at the crazy man screaming into his cell phone. Their parents grab them and spin them forward again, as if I might infect them or something. The flight attendants are giving me concerned glances. I don’t let any of that stop me. My life has veered off course. Has crashed into the mountain. I have become one of those people you see on daytime TV, the ones who shout obscenities at their exes and throw chairs around the studio. The ones who have Maury Povich do paternity tests for them. I am at the bottom. But still, I can go lower. I call Her a bitch and tell Her she has ruined me. I don’t mention my incident from the other night, or the EMTs, but she gets the drift. The silence on the other end of the phone tells me she is searching for something to say to me. Something punishing. Something unforgivable.
“I hope your plane crashes,” she spits.
Somewhere deep down, so do I, but I’m not lucky enough to be struck by lightning or to win the lottery. I’m not nine-in-twenty-one-million lucky. I hang up on Her just as the flight attendant tells me to turn off my phone, and after a perfunctory safety demonstration (as if any of it is going to help), we are roaring down the runway, picking up speed, rattling and straining and leaving the earth behind us. I am suddenly not afraid of dying anymore. I think it’d be a relief. And besides, no one would miss me if I were gone. I’ve burned all the bridges, collapsed all the walls.
Every time the plane bumps, I think of Her.
21
It’s later. New York City on a February morning, in a winter that just won’t quit. A hotel near Times Square, a wind that tears through the city streets, a cold that grips you and won’t let go. Businessmen in trench coats, collars turned up, hustling to work. Neon signs just waking up. Or just going to sleep. Steam billowing up from somewhere down below, rank and heavy, the way you see in old movies. Coffee from a cart, in a paper cup, sugar congealed on the bottom. Me in a dream, taking it all in, skin blue, smoke pouring from my lips, hands dug in my pockets. My coat is somewhere in Chicago. My apartment, long vacant, probably burned to the ground. My life just as empty, and quite possibly as charred, the smoldering remnants put out on the street. Alone. Low. Months since I’ve shared a bed with another warm body, since I’ve put my hand on soft skin. An ad on a bus for laundry detergent, a smiling woman in a white robe, an angel here to rescue me. She disappears around a corner in a cloud of exhaust. Typical.
• • •
The guys are meeting the shareholders without me. They are playing them the record they made in spite of me. It’s probably better that way. I am barely in the equation; I am a remainder at best. Maybe a decimal point. I have nothing to do, no place to be, and I can’t bear to sit in my hotel room any longer, so I’m just wandering around the city, up and down the streets, with no coat on. It’s almost as if I were on vacation, except I don’t want to be here. I walk down to the water, stare at the old aircraft carrier rusting by the pier. It’s called Intrepid. It is a floating metaphor. They’ve turned it into a museum, and tourists stop and take pictures. You can buy souvenirs up on the flight deck. New Jersey squats in the background, tiny rows of condominiums crowding the shoreline. The smokestacks of a factory. The darkness on the edge of town. Somewhere out there, Bruce Springsteen is waking up and having breakfast with his wife. Thinking of the Boss in his bathrobe makes me sad. The wind whips off the water, so I turn and walk off in the direction of nothing in particular. Eat breakfast at a diner even though I’m not hungry. Take a cab ride up and down the avenues, even though I’ve got nowhere to go. The driver looks at me in the rearview with his wild African eyes. I tell him anywhere is fine, and he dumps me on some corner on Eleventh Avenue, down by the Lincoln Tunnel. The air is thick with the smell of gasoline and the sound of mufflers. Huge buses hiss and downshift, full of passengers escaping the island. I can see the rear of the Intrepid off in the distance . . . I drove around for twenty minutes and only traveled ten blocks.
It’s only around 10:00 a.m.; the meeting probably hasn’t yet begun. I picture the guys sitting in some expansive lobby, being asked if they would like anything to drink. The Animal will say yes, because he always says yes. Martin will say no because he is polite. I laugh to myself and dig my hands even deeper in my pockets, start to walk back across the city, through the dingy parts of Ninth Avenue, with its old butcher shops and even older Italian restaurants, smoke-filled bars already open for business, bums hunched over in doorways, like another world, another time. Past the Port Authority Terminal, dank and smelling of urine, terrified kids from Indiana clutching their suitcases and looking up, always up, at the towering skyscrapers, some guy in a leather jacket trying to steal one of their wallets, everyone smoking. Beneath the shadow of the New York Times Building, white and regal and ramping up toward heaven. Back through Times Square, the tourists now posing for pictures with cops on horseback, the Ferris wheel in the Toys “R” Us lit up and slowly turning, laden with children. I’m nearly hit by a cab as I’m crossing Broadway, the driver throwing his hands in the air, me pounding the hood with my palms for added effect. Down to Bryant Park, old black men playing chess even in the cold, the grass slightly frosted even as the sun begins to poke through the February sky. Around to the front of the New York Public Library, those famous steps dotted with people, those famous stone lions sentinel and stoic, proud and vigilant. Even the pigeons won’t go near them. Then over to Grand Central Terminal, cavernous and bustling, people pulling suitcases in every direction, children crying, voices and heels echoing around the space, off the marble floor, up to the constellations on the ceiling. The four-sided clock in the center of the room. The massive display board above the ticket booths, listing destinations (Katonah, New Canaan, Mount Kisco). Train tracks at the end of mysterious, gilded corridors, a temple full of secret passageways, and I follow one of them down below, see the trains snort and kick and whinny on the tracks, yearning to break free and go, and for a minute I think of getting on one—any one, it doesn’t matter which—and heading north, but instead I just watch them fill with businessmen and women and babies, then shudder and depart, reminding me that there are other places in this world I could be, other places that are not here.
I look down at my watch and realize I’ve only killed about ninety minutes, and that the meeting is probably still going on, and that I cannot think of anywhere else to go, or anything else to do, and it sounds stupid, but in that instant it becomes clear to me that I am not in control of my own life, that none of us are, that the very notion of control is ridiculous. A man in a suit boards a train bound for White Plains, makes sure he catches the 7:05 so he will be sufficiently early for his appointment, and as the train departs from Grand Central, he is sitting in his seat reading his newspaper, feeling self-assured and calm, and everything is fine until that train hits a snag on the tracks—a broken joint in the rails, a loose bolt, who knows?—and derails, and he is thrown from his seat and killed instantly, dies with the same, smug look on his face. It was beyond his control. Something like this happens every day. Every minute. A train crashes. An airplane plummets to earth. John Miller’s baby son dies. A land mine, an earthquake, a calamity. Life is merely a numbers game, a series of odds, and eventually we all lose. To think otherwise is foolish. But if we didn’t, why would anyone ever bother getting out of bed in the morning?
Yet, I have spent the first twenty-five years of my life believing the exact opposite . . . that I was in control of my destiny, that fate is a myth, that there is no great book in the sky with my expiration date already written in it. I have fought and gouged and grabbed for control, have pushed everyone and everything aside to possess it. When I thought I had it, I vowed to never let it go, gritted my teeth and held on tightly, snapped at anyone who came close. That’s how I lost Her. How I became an afterthought. There is no such thing as control. It’s a red herring, a MacGuffin. It keeps us going, gives us false hope. Life is cruel and unfair and nothing more than a series of cosmic coincidences. We are powerless to stop it.
Right then and there, on the dirty subterranean platform, as the 11:37 off-peak departs for New Haven, I lose my mind. The water main bursts behind my eyes, and hot, salty tears come pouring down my cheeks, some of them flowing into my mouth, others landing on the filthy platform with a loud splat! Tears like I’ve never cried before. My pulse is pounding in my ears, it’s so loud that it drowns out everything else. My legs go out from underneath me, and I am suddenly aware that I am sitting on the concrete, my knees pulled tight to my chest. People are staring at me, a woman nearly trips over me, and then a police officer grabs my shoulder, shakes me, and asks if I’m all right. It sounds as if he were talking underwater. I nod and wipe the tears from my eyes, tell him that my girlfriend was on that train, that she left and is never coming back. I am probably shouting right now. The officer clearly can’t be bothered to arrest me—probably doesn’t want to do the paperwork or something—so he pulls me to my feet and tells me to go cry somewhere else. I wipe my nose on my bare arm, leaving a long, glistening trail of mucus on my tattoos.
Now I am sitting in the second-floor waiting room, which is also sort of a food court, not to mention a good place for homeless men to masturbate. My head is in my hands, my ears are ringing. I’m not crying anymore, but that’s mostly because I’m utterly, completely drained. There’s nothing left inside of me. I am so alone, and so scared—terrified, for the first time in my life—because I’ve glanced behind the curtain, I’ve seen that no one is at the wheel. Not God, not anybody. There is no one left to believe in, nowhere left to go. We are all adrift, we are all lost, with nothing to put us back on course . . . because there is no course, there is only emptiness and space, numbers and ratios. That is a terrible way to look at life, but maybe it’s also the most realistic. The most scientific. Albert Einstein did not believe in God. Neither did Carl Sagan. But they believed in numbers. Numbers are all that matter. God probably does not exist, and if he does, he’s nothing more than an angry, old white man who spends his days shooting dice with the archangels, rolling sevens and elevens and making airplanes fall out of the sky, taking babies up to heaven for no reason in particular. He would not be the beatific, cloud-inhabiting superbeing we learned about in CCD classes. You would not like God if you met him.
Then again, maybe I am wrong. Maybe God is not a superstition. So I sit there and pray for Him to reveal Himself . . . for Him to show me a sign that He is really up there, that all of this misery is worth it in the end. These are the moments when He is supposed to reveal Himself, after all, when His followers are at their lowest. I pray to Him, beg for an answer. I wish this were easier. I want God in the form of a teen magazine “Is He right for you?” test, where I can turn the magazine upside down and look at all the answers to get the outcome I want, so I can cheat my way to peace of mind. I want it glossy. I want it easy. I’ve always believed in God. I’m just not so sure He believes in me.
It’s like when Her and I used to fight late at night and then for the next six hours I’d watch my cell phone and wait for Her to call. That’s what my belief in God has always been like. It is the most desperate, obsessive relationship I’ve ever had in my life. I want to stalk Him, to sit out on the street in front of where He lives and just know that He exists. I have been more unfaithful in this relationship than I have been to any of my exes. And it hasn’t paid off at all; or maybe it has because I’m not dead. Yet. I open my eyes and look around the waiting room, searching for a ray of light or a dove or something. A woman is eating a chicken sandwich. A janitor is mopping the floor. A homeless man has his hand down the front of his pants. Then, to my left, there is a child . . . a cherub-faced boy, in overalls, blond hair hanging down over his forehead, his eyes bright blue. A holy infant, so tender and mild, like the ones we used to sing about in church. He is looking at me with curiosity. I stare back at him, not knowing what to do. It occurs to me that I am looking directly into the face of God. I am peering deep into His azure eyes. There is a splendid silence. I lift my hand to Him, as if He were a spring and I am a parched man who has crawled through the desert. I reach for Him, an oasis, an illusion, a glorious thing. Then He starts freaking the f*ck out, bawling, and His mother puts down the chicken sandwich and grabs Him by the waist. She lifts His tiny face to hers and coos, “What’s the matter? What’s wrong?” She wipes the tears from His tiny face. He wasn’t God. He was just a little kid. God doesn’t exist.
I wait for them to leave the waiting room, then I wobble to my feet and do the same, head back up into the massive windows and marbled arches of the main terminal. The light is shining down in the most theological way, and I understand that, once upon a time, someone built this entire building as an edifice to God’s glory. I wonder if he or she knew what I know. Probably not. If they did, you can bet they never would’ve stacked two marble blocks together. I walk out onto the street, take a cab back to my hotel, shaken and broken, yet, on some level, alive, or maybe reborn, eyes wide, confident in the knowledge that I will probably never have a more depressing day in my entire life. And if I do, well, then I hope God or whoever strikes me down. I hope the universe pulls my number. Either way, the result will be the same.
22
I think everyone should go crazy at least once in their life. I don’t think you’ve truly lived until you’ve thought about killing yourself. It’s oddly liberating. I’ve called Her and apologized for my actions. Told Her I had gone off the rails a bit, but now I’m doing fine. Really, truly fine. She told me it was okay, and that I can call Her anytime I need to talk. She talks about school and Her job. Her voice is warm and comforting, like a blanket or the gentle hiss of the radiator on a cold morning. She sounded just like my mom. I am making peace with my past. I am moving on. I don’t give a f*ck anymore.
The shareholders liked the album. They heard a potential first single. And a second one too. It’s coming out in May, I think. We’re back in Los Angeles now—at least some of us are, Martin went back to Chicago—putting the final touches on the thing, doing overdubs and the like. Glossing it up a bit. I flew back here with no problems, made it all the way across the Great Plains and the Rocky Mountains without a sliver of anxiety medication, without a single tear. That chapter of my life is over. I’m tired of being afraid, and of being in control. I am officially on autopilot. I am leaving it all up to someone else. I am unchained and ready to live again.
I call my landlord back in Chicago, tell him that I’m going to keep my place there, and I use some of the money from the record advance to pay my rent for the remainder of the year. He sounds surprised to hear my voice, says he’s glad to hear from me. I haven’t been back to the apartment in something like six months, and I may never go there again, but I like the idea of having a space in the city, a hermetically sealed chamber, untouched since I left it so long ago. Cardboard boxes are still in my bedroom. I will probably never unpack them. That’s okay.
I find another place in LA, up in the canyon, an old house with massive windows and a weathered veranda that overlooks the city, and the Disaster moves in with me. We are all alone up there, free to do stupid things, so we smoke tons of pot and get lost in the foothills, dry-mouthed and wandering among the scrub and the sago palms, leaping from rock to rock in the arid heat. At night, we explore with flashlights, twist our ankles in unseen crags, chase off coyotes with shouts and yips. We are like feral children, wild and free, unkempt. Except with drugs. And the handgun that the Disaster bought and now keeps tucked into the top of his jeans. He only shoots bottles at the present, setting them up on boulders and blasting them into oblivion, the sound of the gun echoing around the great walls of rock. He says he’s going to bag a coyote one of these days. One time a jogger yelled at us, but for the most part we are left to our own devices. It’s not too long before we stop wearing shirts, and the California sun begins to bake our skins. Imagine, a suntan in the middle of March.
We do a run of shows that takes us from west to east, headlining stuff now with a crew and catering and the like. Our very own bus. It’s good to see the kids’ faces again. To hear their voices sing along, not just to the old stuff but the new songs too. Our band is better than it’s ever been before, we are survivors, we have made it through the tunnel and emerged into the light. We are on the cover of a magazine. We shoot a music video, again with a crew and catering and the like. Folding chairs with our names printed on the backs. Friends are texting me from Chicago to tell me they heard our song on the radio. My dad’s clients are asking him if I could sign something for their daughters, since they’re big fans and all. It occurs to me for the first time that I may actually be famous. You can’t tell these kinds of things when you live in Los Angeles because everyone is famous out here. But in the Midwest, the Iowas and Ohios of the world, I can no longer go to the grocery store without having kids follow me, call out my name. I am signing autographs in the cereal aisle while the store manager apologizes. If we are out at a restaurant, we are asked to take photos with the waiters, to pose with the bartenders. Kids sit at tables near us, faking that they’re snapping pictures of their friends, but tilting their cameras just enough to catch us in the background. Our manager is saying we might have to hire security pretty soon. I just laugh.
But back in LA, I’m just another guy. I can eat my dinners in peace. Only, in the weeks before our album comes out, my face starts turning up at bus stops, in the window of Tower Records, on a billboard down on Sunset. Suddenly, I am not just another guy. I am invited to parties at clubs, then after-parties in penthouses. It’s just as it was all those months ago, when the Disaster and I ran roughshod over the city, only now we are supposed to be here. We are invited guests. Well, actually, I am, but the Disaster goes everywhere with me. I am beginning to be able to get us into any event, no matter how long the line outside, no matter how stone-faced the doorman. I have become Mr. +1. You should see my name there on the list . . . right there, yeah. And here’s my friend. He gets in too. Okay? Cool? Thanks, man.
Eventually, we don’t even have to bother with the list. The doormen know me by first name. They know I come with company. They unlatch the velvet rope and let us inside without a moment’s hesitation. I am putting twenties in their pockets. They nod and say stuff like “Good to see you again” or “Have fun tonight.” We usually do. One night we are in a club—a minimal, throbbing place with pure white light emanating from the floor, sort of like the Korova Milk Bar only without naked women for tables—sitting in the back, when the Disaster starts elbowing me. He nods across the room, and I look in the general direction and lock eyes with the most beautiful girl in the entire world—only for a split second, of course, then I avert my stare to the floor. I glance back up again, and she is smiling at me.
“Lookit that, man,” the Disaster whispers in my ear. “She’s lovin’ you.”
It would appear she is. She motions for us to come over and join her table, and the Disaster and I get up and make our way across the dance floor, nodding our heads to the beat, praying not to trip or spill our drinks. Everything is happening in slow motion. She is smiling at me and biting the corner of her lip. One of her friends whispers something to her and she nods and laughs. She covers her mouth with her hand. My heart is racing, I am understandably nervous.
“Hi,” she shouts over the music. “Have a seat.”
Her circle of friends parts and I am suddenly sitting right next to her, my hands nearly in her lap. She leans in close to talk to me, and I can see down her dress a bit, down into the promised land. I can smell her perfume. You can tell it’s expensive. She is poured into something backless or strapless; either way, it’s missing essential parts. And when I say poured, I mean more like half a glass—but definitely of something strong. I introduce myself and the Disaster, who is across the table, in between two girls who on any other night, in any other city, would’ve been the center of attention. They are gorgeous, otherworldly. Long necks laced with diamonds. They are slightly annoyed by the Disaster’s presence, sitting upright and rigid, their eyes forward. He looks as if his head were about to explode. He has made it to the top of the mountain.
“I know who you are,” she shouts in my ear. “I’ve seen your picture.”
This is a key moment in all young celebrities’ lives, the instant when they stop wondering and just know that they are different from the rest; that the world will stop for them. She figured this out a long time ago. Her skin shines as if it had been buffed with diamonds. Chances are pretty good it actually was. She is not mortal. She is something greater. How do you make small talk with someone like her?
“So . . .” is about all I can muster. “Hi . . .”
There is a pregnant hush around the table, everyone is craning their necks to hear me speak. I clear my throat and don’t know what to say next. The pressure is mounting, my palms are sweating. She has reduced me to a panting, stuttering teenager. I am drowning.
“Relax.” She smiles and touches my arm. “Have a drink.”
She knows exactly what she wants, and she doesn’t have time for games. She has seen and heard it all before. She is not impressed by any of it. Yet, as the night goes on, she seems positively fascinated by me, laughing at the stupid jokes I eventually make, leaning into my shoulder. She’s like a cat toying with a mouse, batting me around with her paws, savoring the moments before she sinks her teeth in. The drinks flow, the music blares, the people stare, and suddenly it’s two in the morning and she is asking me what I’m doing now, and if I’d like to come back to her place. She asks this merely as a formality: she knows I’m coming back with her, that we all are, and that we will stay for exactly as long as she wants us to, do anything she asks of us, because she is who she is, and that’s the way it is. We leave the club, and photographers outside take her picture. They shout her name and ask her questions, but she doesn’t even acknowledge their presence. It is as if they don’t even exist to her, and she would walk through them if she could. Her friends form a protective barrier around her, usher her to a waiting SUV. The Disaster and I go with them, eyes wide, dumbfounded. You can see us in the background of some of the pictures. We look ridiculous.
She climbs into the passenger seat of the SUV—the photographers bringing their cameras low just in case she’s not wearing underwear—and we pile in the back. Her friend is driving, driving right through the throngs of photographers, honking her horn almost as an afterthought. They pound on the windshield and snap away; the light from their cameras is blinding. Now I understand why celebrities are always wearing sunglasses. From the front seat, she is laughing, and she turns back and smiles at me.
“Sometimes they’ll stick their feet under the tires on purpose,” she says. “So they can sue you. That’s why Cookie is honking the horn. You have to prove there was no malicious intent. Look at them, they’re so . . . ridiculous.”
She says ridiculous the way normal people say rat or cancer, with pure disdain. We pull away from the madness and head up into the Hills. At a red light, a couple in the car next to us look up and do a double take. They start waving and she smiles, says, “Whateverrr,” under her breath. We pull away and the couple have a nice story to tell everyone at their next dinner party. We climb higher into the night, and she is skipping through tracks on the CD player now and rolling down the window, sticking her head out into the night and shouting to no one in particular, “F*ck!” Everyone in the car laughs and nods. They know exactly what she’s talking about. The Disaster and I exchange glances from the backseat. She lights a cigarette and talks to the car about the house of Balenciaga or something, laughs loudly at some joke Cookie makes, calls her a “cunt.” We bend around curves, the headlights illuminating the road ahead. We pull up to a gate that opens slowly, then we are inside. The lights in the house turn on automatically. No one is amazed by this except for the Disaster and me. Everyone piles out of the car and goes inside. More drinks.
She sits on the floor in the middle of the room, legs crossed, smoking a cigarette and talking about Damien Hirst’s diamond-encrusted skull. She makes wild gestures with her arms; her voice is low and scratchy around the edges. It sounds as if it hurts her to speak, but she only stops when the mirror gets passed her way, then she ducks her head down and makes a few lines disappear. Her hair is long and straight and covers her entire face when she’s snorting. When she’s done, she knocks her head back and brushes the hair out of her eyes, laughs, and screams, “Oh, my Goddd.” Her friends all laugh. Now she’s at the stereo—what the rich refer to as “the entertainment center”—fumbling through some CDs, knocking stacks of them onto the tiled floor. She’s shouting for Cookie to come help her find the Stooges album . . . “Cookie! Cooooookie, you cunt, where’s the Stooges?” she cackles. “Cookieeee! Stoooges!” She is out of her mind. “Coo-kie!” she cries, then, silence, some more rummaging, more shit falling onto the ground, followed by “Found it!” She walks away as Raw Power cranks from the speakers at unfathomable volume, pulls open the massive glass doors to her balcony, and dances out into the darkness as Iggy wails about being a streetwalking cheetah with a heart full of napalm. She is shouting and thrusting her middle fingers toward the heavens. Judging from the looks in the room, this occurs fairly regularly. Her neighbors must hate her.
I excuse myself from the room, and nobody so much as looks at me, not even the Disaster, who is sunk deep in an armchair, watching the show in disbelief. I wander down the hallways, upstairs to another massive sitting room, lined with leather-bound books, unopened, bought for decorative purposes, with a fireplace filled with candles, spatters of wax on the floor. “Gimme Danger” is blasting downstairs, nearly drowning out her voice but not quite, and I can hear her laughing about something and squealing with delight. I go into an adjoining room, this one filled with religious artifacts—a hanging cast-iron cross, a book covered in golden Sanskrit—as if her interior decorator were trying to cover all the bases. The flat-screen TV on the far wall has probably never been turned on; the remote and the manual sit on a glass coffee table, still wrapped in plastic. I go into the bathroom for no other reason than I can—I mean, how often do you get to see a bathroom like this?—only it’s clear this isn’t her bathroom, just one reserved for her many guests. You can tell no one’s been in here for a while; the medicine cabinet is empty, the sink is clean. This whole wing of the house is like a natural-history museum. I look at myself in the mirror and just smile. . . . What am I doing here? How is this happening?
When I head back downstairs, side two of Raw Power is already under way, only it’s blasting to an empty room. Everyone has gone off to their respective corner of the house, to do whatever it is you do when you live in the guest wing of a celebrity’s mansion (more cocaine?). The Disaster is gone too, which makes me chuckle a bit to myself. This kid from Florida, this wonderful son of the New South, is probably passed out in bed with a swan-necked model folded around him, a mirror on the bedside table, a mirror on the ceiling, smiling and snoring and dreaming big American dreams, the kind that aren’t possible anywhere else but Hollywood. Tomorrow he will be bloated and red-eyed and hoarse, but he will still tell me all about his adventures, will spare no detail, will begin most sentences with “An’ got-damn,” will end them with a weary chuckle. He is perhaps the most predictable person I’ve ever met, the most dependable. You can set your watch to him.
“What are you laughing at,” she purrs from the balcony, just as “I Need Somebody” is trailing off.
I smile and shrug. She beckons for me to come outside. I don’t have any choice in the matter. The air is crisp, slightly cool. The lights of Los Angeles twinkle in the distance. She is leaning against the railing of her balcony, her amber hair flowing out into the canyon. She is looking right into me, biting the corner of her lip again. She is getting ready to sink her teeth into me.
“I think it’s so cute how you little punk boys act like you hate girls,” she jokes, lighting another cigarette. “It’s like we’re your enemies or something.”
I tell her to replace girls with everyone and she’d be onto something. The whole night has been leading up to this moment, when we would be alone in the dark, her friends gone off into their own little worlds. It has been perfectly planned, a well-organized, businesslike seduction. You get the feeling she has done this before. She knows what she wants. She draws closer to me, her eyes looking up into mine, and she puts her hands on my chest, inching her lips closer, and then we kiss, and she bites my lip and pulls back, asks me, “Where are you sleeping tonight?”
It’s a mere formality. She already knows the answer.
23
The sun is coming up but we’re still awake. She lies next to me, in all her glory; the morning light is soft and blue and makes her skin glow. I want to trace the freckles on her shoulders into constellations. I want to map every square inch of her. She smokes a cigarette and looks up at the ceiling, casually stroking my leg, sighing. I kiss the top of her head to keep up the illusion. She keeps excusing herself to the bathroom and I know how it goes.
I fall asleep and have the most insane dreams. She shakes me awake a few hours later, her face hovering above mine. She tells me she’s been watching me, says it was adorable. The ashtray by the chair backs up her story. I don’t think she’s slept—I don’t know, she could have—and she’s still as wired and lean as she was last night. She tells me we’re going to a hotel, and I don’t understand why, but I agree. I have to. I take a shower and put on the same clothes I wore the previous night. We barrel back down the hill in her SUV, and at least three cars are trailing us, photographers who accelerate around blind curves and try to overtake us, try to box us in. They dutifully fall back into line with the approach of oncoming traffic, then attempt to zoom ahead again when the road is clear. She is laughing and calling them “f*ckers.” It is the most pointless car chase I have ever been a part of.
We walk to the coffee shop in the hotel lobby, making our way through a wall of even more photographers, all of who seemed to know we’d be lunching here. She is careful not to grab my hand as we navigate past the lenses. Inside, we take a seat that’s near enough to the window—a happy accident—and everyone in the place notices. They’re all either blatantly staring at us or trying hard to make it look as if they were not. Either way it makes my skin crawl. I hide my eyes in the shoulder of her jacket. We sit next to each other—not across from each other—at a booth. Outside, the photographers trample the shrubbery to take our picture. She pretends not to notice. I can’t do the same.
“Should we, you know, move?” I ask.
“It’s fine,” she says flatly, like I’ve let her down. Then she strokes my hair with her hand, laughs at nothing in particular. It is a great photo op.
I struggle to stay awake, but we’re both so f*cking out of it. She’s high on whatever comes out of that little bag and goes up her nose in the bathroom. I’m just along for the ride. I am aware of exactly what we are, and exactly what this is. Business, pure and simple. A way to make the tabloids. “Who Is Her New Man?” the headlines will scream. If only they knew I’m just her man for the day, someone preselected to give her the edge her career needs. Her “rocker boyfriend,” as the tabloids will put it. The waitress comes by and I order a ginger ale. I pull my hood over my head and kiss her neck to keep up the act. The hotel manager lowers the screens on the windows now, as a courtesy to her. It’s feeding time at the zoo.
After lunch, we go up to her suite at the hotel. She has it reserved for all of infinity. I look around at all the furniture and mirrors and artfully arranged flowers and realize this is probably as close as I’ll ever get to domesticity. She disappears to the bathroom again, and I follow her down the hallway, my feet padding on the cold wooden floor. Through a crack in the door I watch her shadow move. She runs the tap so I won’t hear her snorting up the little lines. I’m not sure why she bothers with all the mystery. I already know exactly who she is. I think about leaving while she’s in there, but I just can’t bring myself to do it. I am fascinated by all of this, by her, because deep down I suspect she’s just another sad, lonely girl. I think I can make her happy, can rescue her from her life and take her someplace far away. It is the hero in me. The ego. She turns off the tap and I slip back down the hall, sit in a chair and pretend to be interested in the latest issue of LA Magazine, which they always have in places like this. She walks into the room wearing only a bathrobe, traces her finger across my shoulders as she heads for the bedroom. She opens the robe a bit, and her golden shoulder peeks out of it. I dutifully follow her in.
She lies on the bed, the robe unfurled around her like a flag. Old Glory. I stand in the doorway and want to believe that this is going to be something more than it is. Only I know it’s not. She tells me she has condoms. It is like signing a contract. Initial here . . . and here. Notarized. Filed. One copy each for our attorneys. The hero in me dies a tragic death, as heroes tend to do. We complete a fruitful and successful business transaction while the photographers wait for us downstairs.
Later, as she sits on the floor by the bed, smoking a cigarette and talking to me about Transcendental Meditation (or, as she calls it, “TM”) and how it “saved my life” or something, I get up and start getting dressed. She stubs her cigarette out and asks me where I’m going, and I tell her I’ve got to split. As I’m buckling my belt, she crawls across the room to me, wraps herself around my legs, looks up at me with hungry eyes, and purrs, “Sta-ayyy.” I tell her I can’t, that I’ve got to get back home, and I step through her grasp. You can tell this doesn’t happen to her often. As I’m pulling on my shirt and walking out of the bedroom, she sits on the edge of the bed and pouts, legs crossed, then lights another cigarette.
“You don’t have to do this, you know.” She exhales. “You don’t have to prove a point to me.”
I tell her I’m not trying to prove any point, that I’ve just got to get back to my place. We both know that’s a lie, but I can’t stand being here any longer, trapped in this penthouse with her. I don’t want to be a part of this anymore. I don’t want to be pulled back down by her, don’t need another addiction to (mis)handle. I’m heading out the door when she shouts that she’ll call me, and then she cautions, “Leave out the back . . . it’ll be easier that way.”
I take the freight elevator down and exit the hotel through the kitchen. A couple of Mexican kids in aprons are smoking out by the loading dock. As I walk by, they smile at me slyly. I’m probably not the first guy to leave this way. I walk a few blocks up to Sunset, call the Disaster, but he doesn’t answer his phone. I hail a cab by a gas station and ride back to my place, making the driver take me back by the front of the hotel before we head into the canyon. Photographers are still out there, leaning on the hoods of cars, smoking cigarettes, drinking coffee out of paper cups. Their lives are one long stakeout. For the first time, I feel sort of sorry for her.
I try calling the Disaster again, but it goes straight to voice mail. He might still be at her house, asleep with a model wrapped around him and a smile on his face. But as the cab pulls up to our place, I see him on the front porch curled up in a wicker chair, asleep. I can hear him snoring as I walk up the dusty driveway. I kick a stone at the porch, but he doesn’t stir. I shout his name . . . nothing. He finally wakes up as the cab rattles back down the canyon; a dry, sickly grin crawls across his stubbled face. He looks sunburned and ragged, as if he’d spent the day crawling through the Sahara. He’s out on the porch because, last night, he lost both his keys and his phone.
“Ah think one of them girls musta taken ’em,” he drawls, scratching his stomach. “Or maybe I lefem at th’ house. You think we can go back there again tonight?”
I laugh and say that we probably won’t be going back there anytime soon. As we go inside, he pats me on the back and chuckles, “Boy, whata night. . . .” I can tell he’s aching to continue, but he knows that maybe right now isn’t the best time to relive past glories. He is a good friend. The sun is slowly setting in the canyon, and the rocks are glowing electric red. We open the windows and sit on metal folding chairs—the only real furniture we’ve got in the place—listen to the birds settling into the trees for the night, greeting each other with their familiar calls. Soon the coyotes will emerge from their dens and scurry through the brush; the owls will start up their mysterious, sonorous racket. The moon will come up, will shine yellow on the canyon floor. She will still be up in our penthouse, alone, or with some other guy, it doesn’t matter. I will still be sitting here, in this metal folding chair, with my best friend in the entire world. Maybe we will go out and explore, and maybe the Disaster will finally bag a coyote. Or maybe we won’t. We’ve got plenty of beer and some great stories to tell, when the time is right. I think we both deserve a night in.
24
Pretty much everyone saw the pictures. People I haven’t heard from since high school are texting me, my mom calls and tells me she doesn’t approve, says she’s read stories about that girl. I can hear my dad laughing in the background. Kids on message boards are talking about it, saying the usual stupid bullshit. I even get an e-mail from Her, a one-liner, “Star f*cker,” followed by a smiley face. The smiley face was key . . . otherwise I would’ve thought she was mad at me. Not that I cared or anything.
She is also calling me every other day, leaving me voice mails that are getting progressively more insane. At first, she was polite, rasping that she had a great time the other night, and if the Disaster and I (she calls him “your friend”) want to come by the house again, just let her know. Received at 2:27 a.m. When I don’t return her call, she leaves me another message, her voice a little more agitated, wondering where I’ve been hiding, what I’ve been up to. Received at 3:52 a.m. I can hear Raw Power playing in the background. When I still don’t call back, she blows a gasket, leaves me a rambling message that says her cousin shot himself in the head, but he didn’t die; rather, he’ll be a zombie for the rest of his life. She says she’d call me bad luck, but I’d probably take that as a compliment. Received at 4:14 a.m. Worried, I finally call her back, ask about her cousin, and she sounds like she has no idea what I’m talking about. She calls me an a*shole and tells me never to call her again before hanging up. Perhaps everything my mom read about her was true.
Our album is released and debuts. Heatseekers chart and all that. The first single is getting played on the radio, and our video is being shown on MTV (when they actually show music videos). The world is pulling me away from my hideout in the canyon, and I am obliged to obey. I pay the landlord six months’ rent, and the Disaster and I rent a car and drive down to San Diego, where our tour is scheduled to begin. Meet up with the guys for the first time in months. Everyone is happy to see that I’m not only living, but flourishing. I joke that it’s that good California air, and that they should all get the hell out of Chicago before it’s too late. They all laugh. That night, we go out and get absolutely shitfaced in the Gaslamp; the Disaster and the Animal get into a brawl with a bunch of dudes from the navy. The two get beaten up pretty bad, but it wasn’t a fair fight. The Disaster ices his face with a can of beer. The Animal swears a lot and says he’s officially an enemy of the state. The tour begins the following night, at the decrepit, old San Diego Sports Arena. Before the show, the manager of the place excitedly tells us that Elvis Presley played there once and gave a brand-new Cadillac to one of the security guys. We’re more interested in the Chick-fil-A across the parking lot. We haven’t seen one of those since our swings down South.
The show is great, the kids are loud, and the place is packed. I introduce a new song by shouting, “This one is for anyone who’s ever looked at their hometown and wanted to burn the motherf*cker to the ground,” and all the girls squeal. I’m not sure if it’s because I cursed, or because they hate San Diego. Probably a combination of the two. Afterward, we hug each other and spray champagne around Elvis’s old dressing room. Our manager looks on with a huge smile on his face. None of the other guys see it, but he winks at me. We are off and running. We are catching up to the present. We are in top form.
The tour snakes throughout the Southwest—Phoenix, Flagstaff, Albuquerque, Santa Fe—and down into Texas, skimming along the Mexican border (we campaigned hard to take a detour into Juárez), shooting east to San Antonio and Houston, a hard north to Dallas. The tour bus slinks along through the night, taking us up into Oklahoma and Kansas. Our bus driver is a chain-smoking, delightfully acrid road dog named Vincent, who used to drive for Ozzy Osbourne and doesn’t have time for your shit. He stares out at the open road—the same road he’s stared out at a thousand times before—and tells us stories about Ozzy snorting just about everything you can imagine, chasing women, and pissing on things, namely the Alamo. “Shit, you guys are pussies compared to him,” he sighs. He’s probably right. We are stopping at Indian casinos to play nickel slots, and places like Truckhenge, outside Topeka, where a guy named Ron shows us the rusted-out trucks and buses he’s stuck in the ground for no reason. Admission was free. Some nights we stay in hotels—each of us in our own room, finally—and terrorize the staff and our fellow guests. We toss furniture into the pool. Run the housekeeping carts down the hallway. Flush bizarre things down the toilet. Vincent drinks beer in the hotel bar and shakes his head. The following morning, the managers always give us dirty looks, but they don’t say anything. I don’t even have to use the business centers anymore . . . we’ve got wireless on the bus.
We head into Kansas City, two shows at a venue named after a cell phone company, then begin the long drive across Missouri (nothing in the middle except for Columbia). Hit St. Louis on a Tuesday and then head up into old Illinois, past Springfield and Decatur, heading home to Chicago. The show there is sold out, has been for weeks. My parents are coming, and so is my high school music teacher. Unlike at our last hometown show, she is going to be there too. I left Her two tickets and VIP passes at will call, just in case she wants to bring anyone. You know, Her roommate or whoever.
We get into Chicago a day early, and my parents take the Disaster and me out to dinner, ask us questions about California as if we’ve just returned home from a semester abroad or something. I will never grow up in their eyes. I am okay with that. After dinner, the waitress asks if she can take a picture with me. I laugh and pose for the shot, holding a goofy smile on my face while we wait for the flash to go off (the flash never goes off when it’s supposed to). I glance over and see my mom and dad smiling. What must this be like for them? I am thinking, getting slightly emotional, when all of a sudden my dad sticks his tongue out and I crack up and the waitress and I have to take the picture again. My mom wraps up all the leftovers and has me take them back to the apartment, just in case.
My apartment is hermetically sealed. Frozen in time. An inch of dust is on everything. My bedroom is still filled with cardboard boxes, just like I had left them. Reminders of my previous life. I decide to unpack and put T-shirts I will never wear again into drawers I will probably never open again. It feels good to do it: I’m burying my past in a Hemnes dresser. I can remember the night she and I put it together, me getting all frustrated and Her trying so hard not to laugh. Her stuff is still in the bathroom, and I find myself staring at Her toothbrush, contemplating putting it in my mouth. It’s almost as if she died or something. The Disaster is fumbling around with something in the living room, so I put the toothbrush down and turn off the light. I grab my coat—the one I had missed in New York—even though it’s summer, and tell the Disaster I’m going to sleep at my parents’ house. He doesn’t object, probably because he knew I was going to anyway. My mom is so happy when she hears my key turning in the lock. We stay up and talk in the kitchen, then she touches my arm and tells me not to stay up too late. I sit there with the lights on, looking out the window, at nothing. Up the creaking stairs to my old bedroom, still there, still the same, not a speck of dust because my mom cleans it just in case I pop in unannounced. They have repainted my brother’s room and put a treadmill in there. I think how pissed he’ll be when he finds out and laugh to myself as I fall asleep.
The next morning, the Arts & Entertainment section of the newspaper has an interview with me. A full-color photo of the band. A mention of my infamous fling with you-know-who. My dad has left the paper open to the page, so when I come downstairs, I am greeted by my face staring up at me from the kitchen table. He smiles and asks if he can have my autograph. Then he tells me to mow the lawn. For the first time in history, I actually don’t mind doing it. The big rock star, angling a Craftsman mower around the flower beds. The Disaster comes by, and he and my dad sit on the porch and laugh at me. My dad is pretty close to retiring from his job at the law firm, so he doesn’t give a f*ck about anything anymore. He is sitting back in his chair, wearing jogging shorts and shoes with no socks, drinking a beer with the Disaster. He has raised two sons and has navigated his way through life. He has earned the right to have someone else mow the lawn for him. Someday I hope that will be me. Only I’ll probably wear longer shorts.
That night, we play the Allstate Arena. Before the show, the manager presents us all with jerseys, our names stitched on the backs. I freak out way more than I probably should about this, and the manager looks at me like I’m crazy, but that’s mostly because I’m so nervous. It’s not that this is our hometown, or that my folks are going to be here, or even because she will. It’s more about who she’s bringing with Her. Doors are at 7:00 p.m. Kids start streaming in. Backstage, I am trying unbelievably hard to stay cool. I walk the corridors in my Columbia jersey. My parents come back to say hi, wish me luck. My dad is drinking some champagne from the craft-service table because, why not? My mom is taking pictures of everything because she can. They are having a ball. It’s sweet, I suppose. The opening band starts playing, and their guitars chase me back into the dressing room. I feel the slight trickle of panic dripping down my spine. First time in months. I breathe and count to ten. Let go of the moment. Try to remember this is all beyond my control. Then there is a knock on the door, and it’s Her. I pretty much forget about all that let-go-of-the-moment crap. The last time I saw Her was when Her mother was sick, when I left Her apartment and got on a plane headed back for Los Angeles. When I was lost and manic and out of my mind. I can remember Her kissing me with Her eyes bunched tight, still warm and half-asleep, beautiful in the way all girls look when they’ve just woken up. Now she looks different. Older. The way exes always look when you see them again. You notice the small things. She is wearing a jacket I have never seen before. Her eyes are ringed and dark. We hug and my face is in Her hair. She’s still using the same shampoo.
We make small talk: I ask about Her mom, she asks about California. A wall is between us. Both of us want to say something to the other, but neither of us have the guts to do it. So we just shadowbox, pantomime. Then she tells me she wants me to meet someone. The gloves come off. The bottom falls out. We go out into the hallway and she introduces me to Robert. “This is Robert,” she says, raising her voice on his name, just so I know he’s someone special. He is totally boring. Wire-rimmed glasses. Collared shirt. Dumb haircut. Small-dicked intellectual. He looks at me with a mixture of fear and jealousy, the way new boyfriends always look at the man they have replaced. He is picturing me f*cking Her. Girls never notice these things.
“Hey,” I say, and nod to him, and we shake hands, a gesture that never ceases to be awkward in situations like this. Then I just stare at him and wait for words to come out of his meager little mouth.
“Thanks for the tickets, man,” Robert says, his voice rising slightly. He is way too excited. I can tell she is embarrassed.
“Sure,” I say, hands on my hips. Then I am done with him, so I turn to Her. “Hey, can I talk to you for a minute?”
I pull Her into the dressing room before she can even answer. Robert stands in the hallway with his hands in his pockets. Frozen. The door latches behind us and I turn to Her, eyes wild. Part of me wants to throw Her down on the couch and remind Her what she’s missing. Another part of me wants to cry. I feel so betrayed. So angry. I have no idea what is about to come out of my mouth.
“Are you serious?” she spits before I even have the opportunity to speak (she knows me pretty well by this point), then, again, just in case I didn’t hear Her the first time, “Are you f*cking serious right now?”
“You f*cking bring a guy to my show?!” I yell, loud enough so Robert can hear me. “I can’t f*cking believe you’d do that. Why would you f*cking do that?”
“I’m not even going to f*cking talk to you about this. I don’t need to. We f*cking broke up. I f*cking broke up with you. I’m with Robert now, so what? Get over it. Grow the f*ck up.”
She goes to leave, but I grab Her arm. I pull Her close, just as I did the first night we met. I feel Her body against mine for the first time in months. It’s not the same, but I’ll take what I can get. I am out of my mind again. I want to ravage Her. I want to hit Her. Her eyes are wide. She is afraid.
“Look . . .” I trail off, not knowing what to say next. “Meet me later.”
She pulls Herself away, leaves the room. I imagine Robert greeting Her on the other side of the door, asking Her, “What’s wrong?” Being tender and supportive and weak. He probably wants to break down the door and break my neck, but he knows he can’t. Not because he’s too weak, but because my security guard is standing in his way. I wonder if they’ll even stay for the show. I decide I don’t care. Instead, I concentrate on getting incredibly, incongruously drunk. This is easier to do than you’d imagine, especially when you’re the headliner on an arena tour. By the time we take the stage, I’m out of my head. I shimmy around the stage like an idiot. I climb my stack of amplifiers and leap down, crashing hard on the stage. I probably break something, only I don’t feel it. The kids squeal and shout my name. My parents are watching from the side of the stage, backstage passes hanging around their necks, stupid smiles on their faces. I grab the microphone and dedicate the last song to Robert. The guys look at me like I’m insane. I am a terrible drunk, especially in Chicago.
That night, we have an after-party, at the same place we had our record-release party. The same place I got drunk and passed out in the bathroom and went home with that chick. She’s probably here tonight, probably looking for one more opportunity with me. She won’t get a chance this time because I am behaving myself tonight. Or at least trying. I keep calling Her phone because I want to hear Her voice, because I want to hear Her lips curl around the receiver. I want to tell Her about my plans of destruction. I want to be with Her. She doesn’t answer, so I call back again. She says she’s on the phone with Her aunt, and that she’ll call me back, but I know she’s actually talking to Robert. Nobody’s aunt is awake at this time of night. I call back to confront Her with this fact, but it goes straight to voice mail. I leave Her a rambling message that’s part accusation, part apology. Midway through, it occurs to me that I am still plenty drunk. I don’t expect Her to call back—not ever—but, to my surprise, she does. She agrees to see me. I take a cab back to my parents’ place, sneak my brother’s car out of the garage again, and head over, even though I shouldn’t be driving. I blast the radio and close one eye to keep the lines in the road from crossing. They do anyway, but I aim for the middle of the X.
I am too drunk to wonder why she’s agreed to meet me, and I don’t care. I just want to see Her. I pick Her up at Her apartment and we drive around the city for a bit, mostly because I don’t want to take Her back to my place. It seems a bit forward of me. But I probably could because we both know exactly what this is. In the meantime, I try my best to keep the car on the road. I don’t think I’m fooling Her. She is smoking cigarettes out the window. I ask Her what happened to Robert, the booze wafting out of my mouth in noxious purple fumes. She exhales and says, “It’s just . . . he’s . . . I don’t want to talk about it.” We don’t.
We go back to my apartment, make more small talk (“You unpacked”), have meaningless, hopeless sex. Fake panting. She is thinking about me f*cking you-know-who. So am I. We are both disappointed, both wanted more from this. But too much has happened now. We are too far gone. After, we lie in bed and I run my finger down the scar along Her spine. She is smoking and thinking about Robert. And what a terrible mistake she’s made tonight. She falls asleep, and I lie there, staring at the ceiling. Eventually it gets too hot in my room, so I pull on clothes and leave. I think I hear Her wake up, but I don’t stop. I walk around for what feels like hours, nowhere to go but only one place I don’t want to be: next to Her. This was a mistake. I should never have called. I should never have ruined Her life again. Eventually, I call Her and she tells me she went home. Says the door is unlocked. Asks me what the hell is wrong with me? I tell Her I don’t know, and she hangs up. When I get back, all traces of Her are gone. She even took Her toothbrush. But she’s left a pack of cigarettes on the kitchen counter, next to my old medication. I stare at both for a while, decide to leave them where they are, perfectly placed, in memoriam. A few hours later our road manager picks me up, and we head back out onto the road. I didn’t even get to say good-bye.