CHAPTER TWELVE
“Perry? Kiddo, you awake?”
Dex’s voice entered my dreams and a light knock at the door brought my eyes open. I was on my back, in bed, in the small, dark den, trying to recall the fragments of the dream I just had. Jacob was in it, again. Jacob and Dr. Freedman.
“Perry?”
The door knob turned and Dex entered the room, covering his eyes with one hand, harsh daylight splaying inside. “Hey, sleepyhead, are you decent?”
I groaned and rolled over. I was decent but all I wanted to do was keep on sleeping.
With a click the lights came on and I heard the door close behind him. He came over and sat in his chair at the desk. I turned my head away from the pillow and blinked blindly up at him. He was wearing camouflage cargo pants and a white T-shirt that was on the tight side. This wasn’t a bad thing. I could see every curve and sinew of his upper body. The fleur-de-lis peeked out noticeably from under his sleeve.
His face looked good. Curious and amused at the fact I was still in bed. He was clean-shaven, highlighting his high, sharp cheekbones and that olive coloring the doctor mentioned last night, and his moustache was almost faded out of existence. His eyes looked bright and not as broody as usual. Not crazed either. Interesting.
I had a reason for inspecting him like this. A terrible reason, but a reason nonetheless. After we had gotten in last night, I put my plan into action. Once he took Fat Rabbit out for his last walk, I quickly dumped out the contents of two of his prescription pills and refilled them with the Valium and placebo pills. I hid his actual medication in the very bottom of my duffel bag and placed the pill bottles back in the hollowed-out book like nothing had happened.
When Dex came back from the walk, he came in the room, we chatted a bit about the mental hospital footage and watched some of the interview we did with Doctor Hasselback. Then he took his pills with a glass of water. I watched him do this, trying not to be intrusive or overly interested, but it was hard. I didn’t know if he’d notice the pills were different. What if they didn’t feel the same way going down? What if they tasted strange?
But Dex didn’t seem to think anything was off. We said our goodnights and that was it. He left the room and I went to sleep.
Now, though, he was sitting in front of me and looking more or less fine, even though the night had passed and the medicine was coursing around in his system.
I know it’s totally wrong to play around with someone’s medication. I know that. Don’t judge me. At least, don’t judge me much. But I needed to know what would happen if Dex wasn’t on his meds. Sure he was still on some – I had only switched half – and Valium was no picnic either, but I needed to see why he was on them. When we were in Red Fox, he had forgotten his medication and had gone the entire weekend without any. There were some side effects, but he had professed to me how much different, almost better, he felt without them. Yet, for some reason he was back on medication again, and this time a whole lot more. It made no sense to me and I knew I’d never get any straight answers out of Dex. I was just planning to do this for a few days, then put his real pills back in before I left. My own little experiment. >
I guess I was staring at him a tad suspiciously because he furrowed his brows and asked, “What? Something on my face?”
I smiled quickly, trying to bury the guilt deep down and said, “Just your nose.”
He rubbed it vigorously. “This old thing? Anyway, time to get up, lazybones.”
I sat up slowly and looked around. It was hard to tell the time in this room with no window. “What time is it?”
“Eleven,” he said.
“Eleven!” I exclaimed and sat up straighter. “I have a lunch date, don’t I?”
It was Wednesday. Time was flying and I was supposed to go out with Wine Babe Rebecca for lunch.
“Yes you do. And I need to start working through the rest of the footage we shot last night. And you’re kind of in my office.”
I grunted and got out of bed, but not before making sure I was wearing pajama pants underneath. “Why did you let me sleep in so long?”
“Because you needed it after last night. I needed it too. I only got up an hour ago and that’s because the Rabbit was licking my face, threatening to piss all over me.”
I gathered up my clothes for the day and my toiletries bag and hurried to the bathroom to take a shower and get ready. The apartment was empty and cold and Fat Rabbit was spread out on the couch like a floppy doll and snoring loudly. The skies outside the windows were grey, wet and wild as the Monorail rumbled past the balcony.
I had barely gotten ready when Dex pounded on the bathroom door to tell me Rebecca was already waiting outside. I had wanted to look nice today – there was something about Rebecca that had me nervous and wanting to look just as put together as she did – and it took a lot of extra time to blow dry my thick hair straight (even though I used Jenn’s super-powered dryer that nearly flattened me against the wall) and put on more makeup than usual.
I opened the door and Dex was right outside, waiting. He gave me a surprised once over.
“Whoa, who are you trying to impress?” he asked with a smirk. “This isn’t a date, you know.”
I rolled my eyes and hurried into the den, throwing my pajamas on the floor and shoving my boots over my leggings. “I just like to keep you on your toes.”
“Well, you do that, all right. One minute the ‘who gives a shit’ rock and roll tomboy, the next you’re all pretty and girly and stuff.”
I quickly laced up the boots and straightened up, flipping my hair back over my shoulders. I put my hands on my hips. “And which one do you like better?”
“I like all of you,” he said. He smiled, closed-mouthed and strangely sad. I blushed and quickly pushed past him through the doorway.
“I’ll text you when I’m coming back,” I called over my shoulder as I made my way to the door. Fat Rabbit noticed I was on the way out, flipped right up, and scampered over to me. I shooed him away with my foot.
“Oh wait!” Dex exclaimed and scooted over, digging into his back pocket. He pulled out his wallet and handed me a fifty-dollar bill.
“Are you paying for my lunch?” I took it from him, confused.
He nodded at it as he stuck his wallet back in his pocket. “Just give that to Rebecca. She’ll know what it’s for. K, kiddo?”
I frowned at him as a way of saying goodbye and left the apartment.
Once I reached the lobby and saw how wet it was outside, I thought about going back upstairs to get an umbrella but I could already see Rebecca’s hazy form through the fogged up doors, sitting in a running hatchback parked at the curb.
I stepped outside, not giving myself enough time to get nervous about my lunch date with one of Dex’s friends (and a Wine Babe, let’s not forget) and quickly opened the door to the car as the rain poured down on my newly straightened hair.
“Hi!” I said, waving at her.
I stepped in the car and shut the door, which shut in the inevitable awkwardness with us.
I turned in my seat to look at her and was met with a giant puff of pot smoke.
I coughed, my lungs seizing from something they hadn’t been exposed to in a very long time.
“I’m sorry,” she said in her proper English accent and blew the rest of the smoke out to the left of her and out the window, which was open a crack, the rain coming inside and saturating the rim of the door.
“That’s OK,” I said, getting a hold of the spasms.
“Do you want any?” she asked, offering me the joint in her pale, delicate fingers.
I shook my head, not wanting to explain that I wasn’t eager to go down that path again. I didn’t have a problem with anyone smoking pot, it’s just that there was a reason they called it a gateway drug. And even though 90% of the population can smoke it and call it a day, it was just the starting point for me. It was better if I avoided it entirely. On that note, it was probably better that I never drank again, either, but we can’t do everything that’s right for us. I was allowed at least one vice.
“More for me then,” she said with a smile. I noticed how much softer her face looked when she smiled, almost girlish. She was dressed impeccably, wearing a modest grey linen shift dress that was structured and tailored to her body. The sleeves went out into little pointy corners that combined a 40s look and a futuristic style, like something out of Blade Runner. She had a thin black patent belt at her waist, her hair was perfectly in place and a maroon felt hat sat on her head at a nice angle and perfectly matched her lips and nails. Even though I put in the extra effort that morning, I felt like a giant slob next to her.
“So where do you want to eat?” she asked and brought the car out onto the street. It felt like the beginning of awkward small talk.
“Oh, I’m easy,” I said. “I don’t know Seattle that well so I couldn’t really suggest any place.”
We paused at the corner and she craned her head around, looking out at the street. “Which one’s your car?”
“They let me park in the apartment parkade. I have a motorbike so you can just rest it in the corner and no one says anything.”
Rebecca laughed, rich and amused. “A motorbike?”
She gave me a quick look before she brought the car onto the main road and roared along beneath the Monorail tracks, one hand on the shift, the other holding the joint and the wheel. “No offense Perry, but you do not look cool enough to ride a motorbike.”
I’d actually heard the opposite. That I looked cool enough, but didn’t act cool enough. Same difference, I guess.
“None taken,” I said as nonchalantly as possible and looked out the window. Dex had been right about Rebecca being rough around the edges. I wondered if agreeing to lunch was a mistake. If she was going to end up being someone just like Jenn, I was in for a hellish time.
“I know just the place, anyway, and it’s close by,” she said.
Whatever, I thought. Then I remembered Dex slipping me the fifty note.
“Oh,” I said and pulled it out of my pocket. I waved it in the air. “Dex said for me to give this to you; he said you’d know what it was for.”
She eyed it without turning her head. She had unnaturally thick and long lashes. She laughed. “Oh, he’s run out all ready? I suppose he’s not taking quitting too lightly.”
I squinted at her, not understanding.
“Just hold onto it for now,” she said and flipped on the radio with her hand. “Come Together” was on. I rolled my eyes. This album was freaking following me everywhere.
I stuck the bill back in my pocket and soon we were pulling up into a metered parking space in the middle of downtown.
“Look at this luck,” she said. When she had finished parking, she pulled out the ashtray and put the joint out in it. I was relieved we didn’t have to go far. It always made me nervous when people smoked pot and drove at the same time. Probably because when I was a teenager that’s why my parents took my old car away. Had a little mishap with the cherry tree in our front lawn.
We got out of the car and she pointed up at what looked like a downtown mall. We were on the corner of Pike and 5th, amongst office workers out on their lunch break, shielding themselves from the rain with a multitude of overused umbrellas. There were retail stores everywhere, from Anthropologie to All Saints. My sister would have gone nuts here.
“Hey,” I said to Rebecca as she locked the car and we quickly walked down to the lights to cross the street. “I’ve got a gift certificate for this Designer Shoe House or something, is there one around here?”
She nodded and pointed down the block. “Just down there. Want to do some shoe shopping after lunch?”
I nodded. “I don’t have any nice shoes for the Christmas party. I mean, I thought I did but my sister said they looked Amish.”
I looked down at Rebecca’s shoes as they stood poised in the falling rain. Of course they were as high as hell, as shiny as her belt and as maroon as her hat, lips and nails.
“Not a problem,” she smiled and she looked soft again. I could also see she was being sincere, which started to put me at ease. That was the one thing missing from all of Jenn’s perfect smiles: Sincerity.
We went up a few floors in an office building cum mall and ended up at a spread-out restaurant and bar that was named after me. Or my last name at least.
I chuckled as the perky waitress led us to our table. “Have you been here before?” I asked Rebecca, thinking it was just for me.
“Actually, yes,” she said as we took our seats and took the menus from the waitress. “Work isn’t too far from here so we sometimes come here after meetings. Best happy hours ever and we all need one or five after dealing with Jimmy.”
I leaned forward on my elbows and looked at her. I couldn’t help but smile like a goof. It finally occurred to me that I actually had a job with co-workers who were interesting and seemed somewhat interested in me. I didn’t know much about Shownet, obviously, due to geographic restrictions, but I couldn’t get over the fact how nice it was to be able to talk to someone about it, someone who wasn’t Dex. Sometimes I got the impression that Dex was trying to keep me separate from that world, even though it was the world that gave me a meager paycheck every two weeks and broadcasted my fat, scared face to the entire planet.
Sensing this, maybe, Rebecca put her hand out on mine and held it there. “This is my treat. Don’t worry about what to eat and what not to eat. I’m really glad you decided to come out today.”
I straightened up in my seat and blushed again. “Well, thank you. I was nervous…I thought maybe you didn’t like me.”
“Oh, I know,” she said, patting my hand and then returning her attention to the menu. “Dex told me you felt that way.”
I sighed. It figured. She lowered the menu and peered at me. “I knew if Dex liked you, I mean seriously liked you as he does, then I would like you too. We don’t disagree on too many things.”
There was way too much in that sentence. What did “seriously liked you” mean and what else could she tell me? Having Rebecca here reminded me of having Maximus at my disposal in Red Fox, except Rebecca didn’t seem to have a hidden agenda and would just tell me whatever I needed to know.
I took in a deep breath and brought my attention to the drink menu. Part of me wanted to just enjoy the company and the free food and learn something about my partner if it came up. The other part wanted to spend the next hour asking Rebecca question upon question about the man I was in love with, even though I was desperately trying not to.
“They do a really good dirty martini here,” she said. “It’s strong.”
“It’s lunchtime,” I said, noting how early it was for martinis.
She raised her threaded brow. “You need it.”
Did I? She was the one who was high. Maybe she needed me to catch up. But I nodded anyway, and soon we had two of them coming, along with hearty salads.
When our martinis came, we clinked over the table. I avoided her eyes even though I could feel hers boring into mine, trying to figure me out or work through my secrets in a telepathic way. Her cold, dark eyes were so unnerving at times that I wouldn’t have put it past her. In some other lifetime, she could have been a vampire or a witch. But one of the sexy ones.
“So how do you like working on the Dex Files?” she asked after taking a small sip of her martini, her lips leaving a red mark on the glass.
I laughed at the ‘Dex Files’. “That’s a good one. I like it just fine.”
“Just fine? Oh darling, this isn’t a job interview here. Look, Dex is a dear. I love him very much, as much as anyone can, perhaps, but you can be honest with me. I’m not here because of Dex. I’m here because I just wanted to know you better. You seem familiar to me in some strange way.”
I felt the same way about her but I didn’t voice it. It wasn’t that I knew her, I knew I didn’t, but there was something strangely comforting underneath the slightly awkward situation. It was hard to explain and if I did try to explain it to myself, the best I would come up with was again how much like Dex she was. Only she was honest.
I took a gulp of my drink for courage, enjoying the salty brine as it slipped down my throat while fiddling with the stack of olives in the glass.
“I like working on the show,” I admitted. “I mean, I love it. Sometimes. I love feeling like I’m doing something that I’m good at…even though it’s not really a skill anyone would acknowledge. I don’t know. It’s hard to explain. But I’m grateful that I have this. It’s so much better than working reception, what I was doing before. I’m happier now.”
She was watching me, chin resting on her hands. “And you and Dex?” >
“What about us?” I asked, trying not to sound suspicious. I started stabbing the olives with the stick, spearing them and re-spearing them.
“What’s the deal with you?”
“There is no deal. We’re just partners.”
“Are you sure? Because we all have bets on whether you guys are banging each other or not.”
My jaw dropped and my stick missed the last olive, causing it to ricochet out of the glass and onto the table.
She quickly reached over and plopped the renegade olive into her mouth. She smiled at me between chews, breezy and innocent.
“We aren’t…banging,” I protested.
“I know darling, I’m just teasing,” she said and raised her glass at me.
My eyes shot to the heavens again. “You are just like him.”
“Oh we’ve heard that before. You know he asked me out before he asked Jenn out.”
“Oh?” I said. I didn’t want to sound too interested but it was really hard.
“Well, I shouldn’t say ‘ask out’, that sounds terribly stodgy. He did ask me out but he and Jenn were just a sweaty, shagging mess before anything serious came-”
“That’s OK, I got it,” I said, raising my hand briefly.
A smile twitched on her lips and she cocked her head to the side. She was silent for a few moments, watching me, nothing but sympathy on her face. It wasn’t pity, which I appreciated.
She put one of her olives in her mouth and used the end of the stick to twirl the thick liquid in the glass. “Three…maybe four years ago, when we first started the show…Dex asked me out. He was strangely arrogant and shy at the same time. He’d been flirting with me and I suppose I had given him the impression I was flirting with him. I wasn’t. I mean, I was, yes, but not to mean anything. We all do that. Dex does. All the time.”
My heart creaked a bit at the thought that perhaps that’s all it was with me. It must have shown on my face, I knew my brow was tight, because Rebecca leaned in closer to get my attention.
“I know you know this, but just listen,” she said in a confiding tone. “He asked me out. I turned him down. He wasn’t my type.”
“Really?” I said, surprised. She seemed like a female version of him, to a tee.
“I’m not into men, Perry,” she said matter-of-factly.
“Oh,” I replied stupidly. A louder one followed when I realized what she was saying. She was a lesbian. My God, I hadn’t picked up on that at all.
“It’s because I don’t fit the stereotype,” she continued. “And I’m fine with it but so many people expect you to be a Butch. That’s so not the way it is. But then again, I get flack for being the way I am, even within the gay community, so whatever, f*ck them.”
I nodded, intrigued, and more at ease. Sounds dumb, but it helped to know she wasn’t interested in Dex. Jenn I could handle in a way, but Rebecca and Dex would be too much.
“Then he went after Jenn. I think because I was his first choice, Jenn had it in for me ever since.”
“Had it in for you?” I repeated.
“Jenn’s a cunt,” she said.
I choked on the martini and half of it threatened to come up my nose. The waitress chose that time to come by with our salads and stared at me curiously. I waved at her to let her know I was OK, while Rebecca ordered us more drinks.
When I recovered, I wiped my mouth and turned to her. “I’m sorry. Jenn’s a…you don’t like Jenn?”
She looked at me as if I was crazy. “I f*cking hate her. Everyone hates her. She’s not as innocent and docile as you might think.”
Actually I never thought Jenn was any of those things. I t was just so surprising to hear. The Wine Babes didn’t get along.
“I’m just…wow,” I said, putting the napkin back down.
“Oh, I know. Anyway. This is why we all have bets on you guys.”
“Bets? On Dex and me? What happened to wanting to set me up with this Bradley fellow?”
“Oh, I lied. Bradley is an a*shole. I had a theory.”
We all seemed to have theories these days. Theories based on lies. “What theory?”
She stuck the final olive in her mouth and held it between her teeth for a few moments before biting it in half. “Just a theory. Anyway, Dean and Seb and I have a bet as to whether you guys have shagged yet. But I can tell now that you haven’t.”
“Is that why you invited me out for lunch?”
“Oh, Perry. Why are you so paranoid? Of course not.”
I shrugged and downed the rest of my drink, more than ready for another one.
“Look, we are all on your side here.”
“What makes you think I want Dex…in that way,” I said, looking her straight in the eyes.
Her forehead rose, the top of her hat lifting a bit from the movement. “Oh…well, it’s obvious, dear.”
I sighed again, long and hard and wished the waitress would hurry back. “How obvious?”
“It’s obvious to me. And that’s because I’m intuitive and can…see a lot. It’s obvious if you know what you are looking for. It’s in the glances you give each other, and the glances you don’t give each other. It’s in how you speak to each other and what you don’t say.”
“Oh, great, so I’m screwed no matter what I do.”
“You’re not screwed, Perry. You’re just in love with him.”
“There’s a difference?”
I sat back in my chair and nodded politely to the waitress when she brought my next drink. I ignored the salad and went straight to drinking it. Noon or not, these were going down fast and I didn’t care anymore.
Rebecca watched me carefully. She opened her mouth to say something but then thought against it and started to eat her salad. I felt tears rushing forward. Another reason why I shouldn’t drink so early in the day, and on an empty stomach.
But I controlled them and sucked in my pride. I started to pick at my salad and owned up to the fact that there was no real shame in being in love with someone who wasn’t in love with you.
“Do you think I should tell him?” I asked.
She paused, fork halfway to her mouth, and then lowered it. “Tell him you’re in love with him?”
“Do you think he knows?”
She thought about it and then said, “No. I don’t think he does.”
“Do you think he might love me?”
The words hung above our table like a heavy net waiting to drop. I couldn’t believe I just said them. It was just all coming out now. I wondered if I got a contact high from being in the car earlier.
“Perry. I honestly don’t know. I’ve known Dex for a long time now and I still can’t claim to know him. If anyone would know that question, it would probably be you. You know him better than Jenn, I can tell you that much.”
I shoved lettuce in my mouth and chewed, not tasting the dressing or the ahi tuna.
She continued, “He wants to shag you, I can tell you that much.”
I raised my head and looked at her sharply.
She smiled. “Well, that part is obvious. If you could see the way his face lights up when he talks about you, when he looks at you, and compare that to Jenn. Oh, darling, no comparison. But Dex’s heart? I don’t know about that. And I would never lead you on.”
“But…he has a heart...”
“Yes,” she said. She reached over and brushed a piece of hair behind my ear, much like he would have. It felt nice. “Dex has a heart. I just don’t think he knows how to use it.”
She looked sad at that and it was a sadness I understood. A feeling of wastefulness and hopelessness. He had it in him, but whether it would ever be used was another thing.
“You know, he never talks about his past,” she said, eyeing me watchfully.
I nodded, knowing this all too well.
“I know he went to high school in Washington. Went to college in New York. I don’t know anything else. Nothing about his family. About what he used to do. We don’t know anything about him and we’re used to it. But…you know things, don’t you?”
“I know some things. Just the tip of the iceberg. I might be an old woman before I get to the bottom,”
“Jenn’s in the same boat. And for some reason, I think you have the upper hand. And that makes me very, very happy.”
I shook my head at her, still disbelieving it all. “So you really don’t get along with Jenn…”
“Or Bradley. They are a perfect pair of superficial f*cks. If you ask me. The pitiful thing is, I don’t even know if Jenn can tell I can’t stand her bony arse. She’s not very smart.”
“Why the hell is Dex with her?” I blurted out.
“Have you been in a long-term relationship?”
I had, I just wasn’t sure if it counted. “Sort of. For a year. Then he cheated on me.”
“Uh-huh. Well that happens. We all know. I was with a guy for two years back in England.”
“A guy?”
“Yes. That’s how in denial I was. But not just about my sexuality. I was in denial about…life. Changes. It was so much easier to ignore the truth and pretend. I cared about my boyfriend, even respected him, but I wasn’t in love with him. I was in love with my best friend, Alyson. But I never got to be with her, or tell her how I felt, because it was easier to go on and pretend everything was fine. Change is scary and it can be scarier to some people more than others. Dex needs stability, that much I can see. You wonder why overweight people say they want to lose weight but they keep going on getting fat on lollies and burgers. It’s the same thing.”
“Do you think he loves Jenn?” I asked.
“I think…I think he loves her as much as he can. As much as he lets himself and as much as he wants to. But I think if you compared that to, say, the way I feel about my partner Emily, it would amount to nothing. Not that we have some Romeo and Juliet love. But it’s close. The free, can’t live without each other, passion consumes you kind of love. Sure, Dex and Jenn have been together for three years or something now and Emily and I are still more or less new, but I never saw what we have in them. And really, how could that ever be? Look at Dex. And look at Jenn. They might look good but there isn’t an ounce of respect between them. And if you don’t have respect, what do you have?”
My shoulders deflated and I stared down at my plate. I felt dumb and hopeless. What Rebecca said made perfect sense and it’s that reality that hurt. I could see Dex staying with Jenn forever out of fear. They survived a pregnancy scare, they got Fat Rabbit, they moved to another apartment together. All these things could have been a catalyst for Dex to break it off. Or for Jenn, when you think about it. But they hadn’t. They were still together and would probably be for as long as I was in the picture.
That hot, wet feeling of tears appeared again at the corners of my eyes and I immediately looked up to the high ceiling and the lights.
“I’m sorry,” she said quietly. She scooted her chair closer to me and put a slender arm around my shoulder. “It sucks. It’s stupid. I wish more than anything that you were with him, not her. He may be like an overgrown child at times, but there’s just something about you both that just…you belong together. That’s just what I think.”
“I think so too,” I mumbled, and finished the rest of the martini in one go. She did the same and then grinned broadly, her face becoming aglow.
“Hey, now that we’re all sappy and drunk, how about we do some shoe shopping? Let’s see if we can get something the Amish would spit on.”
A tiny smile tugged at my mouth. Despite the feeling of sorrow, the touch of truth I was trying to bury away, I still felt a layer of warmth around my heart, knowing there was someone who was on both our sides.