home sweet home.

Eight years ago, I arrived in Portland. If I close my eyes and listen to Either/Or, I can see it all clearly: I stumbled down the jetway with a tiny Dylan slung on my left hip, my messenger bag strapped across my chest, and a car seat in my right hand. I wore what I called my “Angsty Single Mother Costume”: beat up Levi’s, a flannel shirt, and one of the few pairs of sneakers I kept after dumping most of my Chicago belongings at the Salvation Army near my mom’s house in Central PA. Dylan was gnawing on one of my pigtails as strangers cooed about her cuteness. My mouth tasted like Cheez-its. The day had consisted of three thousand miles, two airplanes, and half a dozen diaper changes. I had a headache and a baby and a couple thousand dollars in my checking account. All I could think was “should I reset my watch now, or wait until we’re all settled in M’s car?”

I told my family and friends east of the Mississippi that I was moving to the Pacific Northwest to forget everything that had transpired in the last year. This was met with gooey eyes and sympathetic shoulder patting. But really, I was hoping that the change of venue would help me remember what it was like to feel anything. Months and months of sleepless nights and soggy pillows had left me with a deep numbness. The arrival of Dylan had marked the end of the most intense period of mourning, if only because I was too busy sterilizing bottles and battling diaper rash. I approached most days with the stoic resignation of a soldier at war. “Buck up, soldier!” There was no time for crying. Every once in a while I would feel a tinge of something (occasionally lovely, more often, ugly) somewhere in the darkest core of myself, but these flickers were fleeting. I felt so dry; I was becoming a desiccated body. An aspiring mummy. A future bit of petrified wood. I saw myself becoming a sweatpant-wearing bookkeeper within a few years. I would never date another person again. I would collect cats and commemorative plates. Maybe eventually I would join a church, just to meet other lonely people.

Drastic measures were required. Maybe I could have signed myself up for grief counseling. Or maybe applied for nursing school (my all-time, uber-practical back up plan). Instead just I moved to the other side of the country, to a city where I knew almost no one.I’ve waxed poetic about the magical healing powers of Portland over and over again. I always assumed it was the fresh start. Or the evergreen trees and snowcapped mountains. Kind strangers and cute boys and a great public library. Coffee and easy bicycling and a low cost of living. The years I spent here returned me to the land of the living. I began to smile and laugh for real, not just out of obligation. I met the amazing individuals that I still count among my best friends. I shed my outer skin of grubby denim and plaid in favor of dresses and cute shoes. I could hear my long lost boyfriend telling me, “You would be blindingly beautiful if you started dressing more like a lady.” I fell in and out of love, kissed boys in foreign lawns, and took secret swims in private pools. I climbed trees and jumped off roofs. Summary: Portland life was totally fucking rad, even when I was worrying about money or riding my bike to work in the rainy pre-dawn darkness.

And then I moved to Philadelphia. I don’t regret this decision at all, for three major reasons (and a handful of tiny ones): I got to spend lots of quality time with my family (difficult when I’m living in the Pacific time zone), I made some great new friends, and I once-and-for-all realized that Portland was my real home. Maybe that’s the true secret to my magical Pacific Northwest recovery; being in the place one truly belongs is the best cure for anything. Maybe your Portland is Cleveland, Ohio. Taipei. Buenos Aires. Exactly where you grew up. It’s all about waking up every day (even if it’s five a.m. and you’re sleepy/grouchy) and saying to yourself, “I’m so happy to be here.” That’s some real magic.

So here I am, back in Portland. So much planning was involved. I switched careers. I raised a ton of money to move my bizarre assortment of possessions. I had to find homes for two of my cats. I slept on a couch for a month. Three thousand miles and lots of packing tape later, I live in the cutest apartment. I have the greatest friends. Sometimes I work too much or I have a headache or I miss my family. Most days my feet hurt and I’m anxious about dealing with a lot of residual Philadelphia intrigue. On the other hand, I get to sleep in the yard and drink beer at the river and listen to cassette tapes at the park. I ride my bike across the Burnside Bridge every weekday morning at 5:30. As I watch the rising sun light up the river and the West Hills, I say to myself, “I can’t believe I get to live here.” And I’m proud of myself for making this all happen.

The upcoming week marks the nine year anniversary of The Day Everything in Amanda’s Life Changed. I’ve been reflecting on this for the past few days and my final conclusion is “So much happens in nine years.” Earth-shattering, I know.

Hi, everyone!  This week my story “Bedfellows” was published on Storychord.com, “thoughtfully curated” by Sarah Lynn Knowles (sarahspy).  “Every other Monday, Storychord.com features one story, one image, and a one-song ‘soundtrack’– each by an underexposed, talented up-and-comer.”  I’m really excited by the artists I was paired with for this week’s issue.  Check it out here.

Well, SO MUCH is happening right now!

For one, I’M MOVING BACK TO PORTLAND, OREGON IN five weeks.  FUCK YEAH!  If you know me IRL and/or you’ve been following FBB for a while, you know that I’ve been intensely homesick for the nearly four years I have lived in Philadelphia.  A lot of serendipity has landed me a job in PDX, in a new career path (visual merchandising).  Now I’ve got to spend the next few weeks minimizing my belongings, packing stuff up for my moving pods, and spending as much time as possible with my Philly friends and family.  Also, finding homes for two of my cats (Simon and Grace).  Let me know if you’re interested…

So that’s one piece of news.

The other  excitement is this:   Mark Schoneveld (you might know him as Yvynyl) and I have been preparing for the launch of our new record label, Trigonometry Club. More details to come…and we’re hoping to start our Kickstarter campaign this week. You’ll be the first to hear about it!

8.

Carrot’s nose is bleeding all over the pillow. I fall out of bed trying to retrieve a box of tissues from the bedside table, hitting my head on a nearby bookshelf. When I climb back onto the bed, he is pressing a t-shirt (hopefully his) against his face.

“I think you should put your head between your knees,” I suggest as I rub the bump forming on the side of my head. I silently add, “Or maybe you could consider snorting a little bit less blow this weekend.”

As if he can read my thoughts, he exclaims, “I’ve fallen in with a bad crowd!”

I laugh. There is a lot of this sort of talk at NA meetings: gateway drugs, peer pressure, and bad crowds. I couldn’t disagree more.

Some people are just born to look for trouble. We are the Trouble Seekers. When we gather, we form a bad crowd, but we are just as dangerous on our own. No one is to blame for our undoing but ourselves. It doesn’t matter if one’s parents were neglectful or high school was traumatic. Popular, well-adjusted individuals can also be Trouble Seekers. Bad sexual experiences, child abuse, and bountiful disappointment might unlock one’s desire for danger. And of course, this tendency toward ruin can be genetic. I come from a long line of poor decision makers and self-destroyers. I was this way from the moment I was aware of the world outside my pink little girl bedroom walls. I’ve always wanted to drink too much, sleep around, and kill myself with drugs. I had to be the first to lose my virginity, smoke pot, and drop acid. I wanted to bed every cute boy and girl I saw.

At first I saw this as a positive virtue. I was an artist, after all. Years of Art History classes, coupled with my obsession with biographical books and films had taught me one overarching fact: the “artistic temperament” was required for success. Trouble Seeking, indeed.

I was once a painter, creating and selling pictures with the greatest of ease. I wasn’t rich, but life was good. I made enough money to pay my rent. Occasionally I worked part-time at a coffee shop, but that as more for social networking purposes than anything else. I was invited to all of the coolest parties. I received an endless supply of free clothing, meals, and cocktails. Although I have never been beautiful, my charm and facade of hipness ensured that I rarely slept alone, unless it was by choice.

I wanted more. Alcoholism and promiscuity were boring me. That changed the day I made a latte for L. I could see that he was handsome, the sort of fellow I would want to charm back to my apartment. His skin radiated coolness. I was somewhat intimidated. As I handed him his cup, I dared a furtive glance at his face. His green eyes were those of a fellow Trouble Seeker.

I smiled and winked. I received the same in return.

We were instantly inseparable. First, we drank too much and made out in public. Then we had brutal arguments at in bars, restaurants, and galleries. Sex in bathroom stalls and taxicabs. Next we got into drugs. That happened so fast, that I didn’t notice when I was no longer eating or painting. I didn’t care that my hair was suddenly greasy, never mind my newly blemished face. I spent most afternoons in bed with him, either sublimely high, or trying to figure out a new way to get high.

“I would die without you,” he said to me. I knew it was true.

“I knew when I met you that I would know you my whole life.” I did not question this.

I cared about very little. We spending his trust fund at hyperspeed. My savings were almost gone, but there was no way I could make coffee for strangers, much less pick up a paintbrush. The party invitations were dissipating. I hadn’t received a free dress in months. And my phone barely rang.

Penny pinching was required. We started buying low quality heroin because it was a veritable bargain. Never mind that I was frequently vomiting up rat poison and god knows what else. I was convinced that my teeth were going to fall out. L. was feeling paranoid and headachey. The bed smelled like sweat and sickness. We held hands as we sprawled on the dirty sheets, feeling delirious and sore.

Days and weeks passed.

“We have to get it together!” I was surprised to hear my own voice screaming at L. We had been speaking in hushed whispers for months. But the sheets were filled with my blood, because I had somehow forgotten about the magic of menstruation. And for the first time ever, I noticed his grey-green pallor. How long had he been like this? I caught a glimpse of my own sickly face in the mirror above the dresser. Who was I?

L. had no interest in histrionics. “Maybe you should go back to your apartment for a while,” he mumbled.

I stormed back to my place, vowing that we were going to stop being drug addicts. I was going to start painting again. L. would work on his resume. We would resume daily showers and weekly dinners at yuppie restaurants on Milwaukee. We would take vacations and maybe even buy a car.

And then L. left me for good. He slipped into oblivion while I was trying to shave my legs for the first time in months.

The coroner’s report blamed “opiate intoxication.” I blamed myself, him, and our endless hunger for Trouble.

“Beware of the bad crowd,” I say to Carrot as I finally locate the box of tissues. “There is power in numbers, after all.”

9.

Long before I met Carrot on that street corner downtown, I was a Wife.

My husband found me at my lover’s funeral.

“You are a star and you deserve another chance. Let me take you to the west coast,” he said this as if he were merely offering me a piece of gum.

I nodded my head in agreement. I had nothing left in that city.

We were married by a judge at city hall. I wore a green silk dress. As my husband trapped my trembling finger in a cheap gold ring, I reminded myself, “This is my second chance.”

He set up a studio for me in our house, with plenty of natural light and fresh air. He expected that I would start painting again. I could see snowcapped mountains from the window. I convinced myself that I could feel the evergreen forests giving me new energy.

I had survived.
Or I was born again.

My hands were stained with phthalo blue, as I covered canvas after canvas with thin layers of black paint. Hundreds of brush strokes piled up, until silvery ghosts crept into the compositions.

My husband surveyed my work. “This isn’t like your old paintings. What’s going on here? Aren’t you happy? Isn’t this the best thing that has every happened to you in your otherwise sad life?”

Of course, of course. I was lucky someone would have me, after so much squandered potential and time. I really was. I wanted to be the best Wife ever.

“You can be a star again. I am giving you this chance.”

Yes, yes. I was so grateful. But I was starting to feel like a bird trapped in a cage. Sure, my cage was filled with fine art supplies and organic produce, but it was still confining me.

I found a job at a clothing store. It was the first real employment I had held in years. There was something gratifying about my work, even if it was just hours of mindless folding and hanging. All of my co-workers were young–probably the same age as me–but they seemed so hopeful and excited about each day’s offering. Rock shows, dance parties, endless cocktails. I wanted to participate, but I could not. I was a Wife.

Each morning before I left for work, my husband said, “I love you.” I returned the favor, telling myself that I believed what I was saying.

I raced home each afternoon to prepare a nutritious dinner for my spouse. I dutifully slept with him several times each week. I ironed his shirts with the most enthusiasm I could muster. I cleaned the house and did the grocery shopping. “I am good at this,” I told myself.

One night he lounged on the couch, smiling as he watched me dust his endless shelves of books.

“I know I only have you because you are damaged goods, the proverbial scratch-and-dent model. But like the owner of any status symbol, I can’t help but think I have really ‘arrived’ when I watch you cleaning my house like a good wife.”

His words singed the fine blonde hairs on my arms. I mustered a blank smile.

“I know it’s wrong somehow to be glad that your junkie boyfriend finally did himself in, but I am. And look at you…obviously you’re glad, too.”

I returned my cleaning implements to the hall closet before grabbing my house keys and wallet.

“I’m running out for linseed oil,” I called cheerily as I opened the front door.

Instead I walked to the closest bar, a seedy bouquet of stale liquor and hipster body odor. I drank four whiskeys in rapid succession, before enlisting the young bartender to help me track down some real drugs. I stumbled to a bank, using the ATM card for my marital checking account to withdrawal the fifty dollars in cash requested by the dealer.

The bright morning sun roused me in a bus shelter the next morning, reminding me to vomit in a nearby trash can. I ran home to change for work, ignoring my husband’s questioning stare.

“I’m going to be good,” I promised myself. “This isn’t the beginning of a problem.”

There was my job, after all. It was important to me. It made me feel like a real adult. And I had just received a promotion.

But I didn’t want to be a Wife anymore. I didn’t want to spend my night snorting heroin off dive bar bathroom sinks, either. Somehow the second option was easier, perhaps simply because it was familiar.

And so night after night, I stumbled into my marital bed well past midnight. A few times, I simply nodded off on the front porch, my head resting on our prickly WELCOME mat. My husband was eating take out dinners. His work clothes were wrinkly. Of course his books gathered dust.

One morning he was not home. I was relieved. I couldn’t bear another accusatory stare. I took a shower and wrapped myself in a bathrobe. I had thirty minutes to put on makeup and make myself presentable for work.

I was heading for the kitchen for some orange juice when the first blow struck me.

My head the wall. Before I could regain my balance, a hand grabbed my hair and whirled me around.

THWACK. That’s the sound his hand made as it hit my face. The metallic taste of blood filled my mouth.

I couldn’t cry out. Didn’t we love one another?

I was silent as he hit me again; this time he aimed for my eye.

My dutiful husband, the sensitive philosopher, the devoted son. I had driven him to this.

A few more blows, and I was on the ground. I deserved this. That was certain.

“I really ought to mop the hallway,” I thought as I saw a dust bunny roll by my hand. “I have been a bad Wife.”

He was yelling, but I heard nothing.

He kicked me in the stomach. I knew that if I wanted to survive, I would have to stand up and run away. I wasn’t sure what I wanted, so instead I crawled. To the bathroom. I was thankful for the high-quality, old-time lock on the door. The solid craftsmanship assured me that he would not be able to break down the door.

I sat on the floor, watching blood drip from my nose to the floor. I could not cry. I was not frightened.

I pulled myself to my feet. The medicine cabinet mirror revealed that my face was already a swollen patchwork of purple, yellow, and red. There was a bald spot on the side of my head, from where he had gripped my hair.

I tightened my bathrobe before hoisting myself through the window above the bathtub. I fell into the shrubbery below.

I wandered out to the sidewalk. What was I going to do? I would have to call out of work. I couldn’t show up with a bloody chin and a sweaty bathrobe.

A horn was honking. A woman in a passing station wagon. I assumed that she saw my face. She was rolling down her window. Maybe she would take me to a hospital.

“You left your soda on top of your car,” she said gesturing toward the black sports car next to me.
I looked over at the can of diet soda. “Thanks,” I chirped. What a samaritan!

“No problem. It happens to me all the time! And I’m always mad at myself for being such a waster!” And then she drove away.

I sat on the curb.  And so ended the second chance.

You have hankering for a different flavor, something a bit zesty?  With a sweet aftertaste of foolishness and the tang of teen angst?

We here at FRIGHTENED BY BEES WORLD HEADQUARTERS (my bedroom in Philadelphia) have something new and exciting for you:  Swap Meet.  ”A journey through space, time, bad haircuts, confusing sexual orientation, big cities, small towns, and many, many record stores.”

Check it out!

xo

Amanda (aka The Heiress)

6.

“The most important thing is to use the correct heat setting. Always check the label for the fabric content.” I gesture towards the dial, pointing out the cotton, silk, and polyester icons.

I am teaching Carrot how to iron. He had a dream about being mocked for wearing a wrinkly shirt. He was forced to wash away the aftertaste of imaginary ignominy with half of a plastic bottle of vodka. My concern for his liver–coupled with my own irritation from dealing with a drunk boyfriend at five pm–has motivated me to give this lesson. He’s so serious, he’s actually taking notes in an illegible scrawl on the back of a used envelope.

“If the garment doesn’t have a tag and you don’t trust yourself to guess, just use the lowest setting. It’s easy to assume that the hottest iron will guarantee the best results, but really you’re just going to burn your clothes.”

Carrot nods his head. “How do you know this stuff?”

I shrug my shoulders. “I guess my mom showed me somewhere along the line.” And then I remember. “Actually, I was obsessed with ironing for a while; I would beg my mom and my grandma to let me iron the curtains, the tablecloth, my grandpa’s pants…whatever. I found it very relaxing.”

Of course he laughs at this. “You know, that is the first time you’ve ever mentioned your family.”

Oh, he’s drunk. It’s a recurring theme, always fueled by bottom shelf liquor: “Ella you’re so mysterious and I don’t know anything about you.”

The next line will be “Why won’t you let me know you?”

When we first met, he would keep me awake in the wee hours asking questions. But nothing useful (and therefore, nothing that made me nervous). No, no…only the hard-hitting issues were covered, like, “Would you rather have a beard made of bees or a bee made of beards?” Hours of this every night. I would laugh and laugh, my answers growing sillier as I began to slip into sleep. An endless, foolish game of “Would you rather?” created a facade of intimacy. He liked this.

The best way to handle any uncomfortable prying is always by asking another question. A counter attack.

“Well, what do you think my family is like?”

Carrot likes this move. “I imagine that your dad is an English professor at a stuffy east coast university. And your mom is a debutante-cum-faculty-wife with a penchant for pottery. They have quiet, sarcastic fights. You were raised by college students posing as nannies. You wore frilly dresses and practical Swedish children’s shoes. You went to some sort of boarding school, maybe Choate? And then you blew everyone’s mind by choosing Smith over Brown.”

Of course.

Wouldn’t it be just as likely that my childhood was a melange of powdered milk and reduced cost school lunches? Plastic, no-name shoes coupled with jeans fished out of the “irregular” bin at the factory outlet? Scholarship applications and crossed fingers?

I could have been a smartass runaway, hiding from my wealthy-yet-morally-bankrupt parents. They would never understand me and my self-ordained revolution.

Or maybe I was a latchkey child eating microwaved frozen mashed potatoes for dinner. A single mother with 1.5 jobs. A revolving door of stepfathers and “uncles.”

I could be an orphan.

I once dated a terrible writer. He strung words into senseless sentences that formed meaningless, dense paragraphs. The paragraphs filled pages with nonsense, evolving into stories that said absolutely nothing. No plot, no characters, no anything. Of course I would always smile and say, “Good work, dear.” I was mostly drunk, and therefore, frequently jovial. It goes without saying that he also had a little cadre of female fans thats virtually wept at his imaginary genius, so he needed little cheerleading from me and my whiskey mouth.

One day he decided to write a little character portrait of me. It was a simmering stew of four-syllable adjectives and antiquated verbiage. I understood nothing, except for one surprisingly lucid turn-of-phrase hidden in the center of the otherwise undulating mess:

“Her father had left her, and so, she would leave everyone else…her husbands, her children, her lovers, her friends.”

I asked him, “Why do you assume that my father has abandoned me?”

And he said (without hesitation), “Because you didn’t know when Father’s Day was and you knew how to fix your own kitchen sink.”

I considered suggesting he focus more on detective work in the future, as authoring was unlikely to pan out.

But poor Carrot. Despite his excessive viewing of television crime dramas “ripped from the headlines,” he is no Sherlock Holmes. And so, he assumes I grew up on the set of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

He looks at me, waiting for a confirmation. “Oh, Mr. C. Flowers, you are so perceptive! Or did you just google me while I was at work?”

But instead I ask, “Would you rather have an iron for a hand or a hammer for a foot?”

7.

Carrot is the best liar I have ever met.

To avoid a shift at the clothing store, he tells his coworker a long sad story about his grandmother’s health. Chemotherapy and hospice care are included. “There isn’t much time left…” A single tear springs from the coworker’s eye. Meanwhile, his grandmother is playing tennis and drinking margaritas in Cabo.

When he decides that we need a video game system to entertain us during the long winter, he tells his mother that he needs money for an abortion. For me, obviously. “Oh, Ella’s just a wreck about this. I can’t very well ask her to pay for it herself.” And so the check arrives the next day, via FedEx, with a tiny scribbled note saying “If Ella needs to talk to a woman about this, I’m here for her.”

His skill is so impressive, it’s hard to be angry even when he lies to me. Generally I just want to buy him a sandwich or a trophy in honor of his unmatchable talent. I consider asking him to teach me his technique.

The thing is, his dishonesty is always obvious to me. His mouth is just a bit drier. His left eye twitches a little bit more than usual. And every sentence sounds vaguely like it ends with a question mark.

I tell myself that sleeping with someone every night can only lead to a certain level of transparency. My immunity to his deception was earned after hours, days, and months of folding his laundry and cutting his hair. Buying him a new new toothbrush every month. Serving his dinner almost every day. Comfort is found in always being able to discern truth from fiction.

Of course I pretend that I believe him. Always. There’s no need to rob him of his faith in his talents.

He’s nowhere to be found when I get home from work. It’s unlikely that he is out earning a paycheck right now. He’s probably at a bar with one or many of his attractive female coworkers. Or maybe he’s doing lots of coke and trying to get into fights. That was the agenda when he went out without me last Friday night.

I’m wondering how he will explain his absence.

“I was at the library, studying for the GREs.” That one always forces me to stifle laughter, generally leading to a dash for the bathroom so I can giggle into a towel.

“Oh, I was running. I’m trying to get fit.” Nevermind the tight jeans and beetle boots he might be wearing.

“I was just walking around, thinking.” Um. Okay.

I will just nod my head, smile, and offer a B-vitamin or a late night sandwich. The model girlfriend.

I grab cigarettes and book, before heading up to the roof. I sit cross-legged, petting a neighbor’s little black cat. Early is her name, according to the medallion dangling from her collar. I’m not even sure if she’s a SHE, because I’m far too delicate to peek at her privates.

Early visits me every time I’m smoking. She leaps from roof to roof, until she settles on my lap. I’m convinced that all felines are fans of tobacco. Their lack of opposable thumbs are the only thing saving them from emphysema and long bouts of lung cancer.

Cats filled my old life. If I nodded off on a bus stop bench, I could be assured that a little tabby would be snuggled under my elbow when I awoke. Strays gathered around me as I smoked unnecessary cigarettes on the corner outside any bar. Friendly house cats followed me home as I slurred and swayed after too many cocktails at happy hour. They climbed in my apartment window to lick my cheek when I was blacked out on the kitchen floor. In exchange, I gave them compliments, pats, and cans of chunk light tuna.

But Early is the only feline in my new life. I scratch behind her ears, cooing platitudes. She rewards my effort with a loud purr.

“Cats aren’t aloof at all,” I think. “They need people around to grant them the illusion of coolness and independence.”

I wish I could invite Early into my bedroom, to sleep on Carrot’s half of the bed in his absence. I’m sure he won’t be home tonight.

I should probably get a cat.

A writing professor (her hands covered with turquoise and silver rings) once told me “show, don’t tell.” And so, I’ve been struggling with that idea while working on this story.  There’s going to be a part 3…as this “little” story is evolving into a short, short novella.  Or a looooong story.  You pick.

4.

Carrot doesn’t get the twelve step program. “I mean, I’ve never even seen you take anything stronger than an Advil.”

I can’t explain it to him. But the idea is very simple: I go to these meetings so that I won’t do drugs. I am trying to protect my present and my future. The past has been unpleasant. Shameful. Destructive.

And at these meetings, I have a rapt audience for my sad stories.
Hits like “that night I got so high that I fell and hit my head on the very same sink I had just been snorting heroin from, chipping a tooth and being dragged to the emergency room by my best friend.” The crowd loves any saga that involves a bloody face (check) and an exasperated lecture from a loved one (check).
And “that time I collapsed on the Max tracks, just before the train came and a wholesome young man with a degree in Chemistry saved me and my supposed gratitude forced me to go on three awkward dates with him.” Oh, yes, tales of obligation and guilt are welcomed with only the most open of arms. And it goes without saying that I was super high for the aforementioned dinner-and-a-movie appointments.

But wait! There’s more! Like that summer of slow suffocation from the fluid slowly filling my lungs (a common complaint for devoted heroin snorters). Or the number of times I woke up in places I did not recognize. The night I almost drowned in my own bathtub.

They are all glad to hear this. I am a beloved member of this family of fuck-ups and ne’er-do-wells.

Repeat, revise, revisit. “This is helping,” I tell myself.

I call Carrot from work to tell him that I am having dinner with my sponsor, Evan. “I am struggling with step two and he wants to discuss it again.”

Carrot’s scalding glare travels through the telephone wires, burning my cheek. “Well, whatever. I thought we were going to see a movie tonight. Are you sure you aren’t sleeping with this dude? Because YOU DON’T HAVE A DRUG PROBLEM.”

I laugh nervously and promise to take him to the movie tomorrow. “My treat, of course!”

For the past six months I have been stuck on Step Two: “Believe that a Power greater than myself could restore me to sanity.”

“I’m sorry, Evan…but I can’t just turn into a Jesus freak,” I say over an iceberg lettuce salad at a diner in Center City.

He shakes his head. “It doesn’t have to be Christian. Have you tried other beliefs and religions? What about Buddhism? That was trendy with your people back in the 90s.”

It’s not that I don’t want to believe in something. I swear I’m an existentialist. I believe in myself and my power to overcome my problems. But that doesn’t fly in the 12-step world.

“I’m just not the sort of person who says Power with a capital P. Isn’t it enough that I have faced my problem? I’m coming to meetings. I haven’t done drugs in years. I’m not even drinking.”

A vague shrug from him. “I’m just telling you how it goes. This is what the program expects from you to indicate ‘success.’ Don’t forget that you go to these meetings for a reason.”

I do, I do. Here on the East Coast, I am a good, put-together person. I am no longer the sort of woman that drinks too much and sleeps with virtual strangers. I will never again pass out in public or eschew food and electricity for a tiny parcel of China White.

My co-workers think of me as a bastion of health and good reason. I complete my work in a timely manner, with occasional breaks to repair the printer. I make the appropriate small talk at the coffee machine.

My landlord appreciates my regular rent checks and my tidy apartment. The neighbors appreciate the quiet and lack of drama radiating from my walls.

The utility companies enjoy the on-time payments.

My student loan officer is thrilled by my ever-shrinking balance.

My liver enjoys a steady diet of vitamins and water.

I am new here.

5.

Carrot and I are smoking on the roof of our building.

He’s telling me about an incident at work. The manager called a female employee a “stupid cunt.” The workers are going to put together a petition. They are going to call the president of the company. They are going to write a letter to the city newspaper. Things will happen. They will not stand for this!

I nod my head as if I’m paying attention. But really I’m telling myself–for the 100th time that day–that my grip on everything is not tenuous. It is real. I’m not about to overdraft my checking account. The bills are paid and the bathroom is clean. I’m not going to forget to go to work tomorrow. I won’t accidentally burn of my bangs. Nor will I lose my wallet in a public bathroom. No, no. It is all fine.

“I think I’m going to quit smoking,” I announce, laughing as I light up yet another cigarette.

Carrot rolls his eyes. “Sure, give up the one thing we have left in common.”

I laugh some more. “Oh, c’mon…we have tons of stuff in common. We like the same movies and music and books. And I always giggle at the funny things that you say…”

He wants be melodramatic. His face transforms to that of Stage Carrot, man of the impromptu theatre: wrinkled forehead, grand gestures, and a voice one octave lower than usual.

“You’re not the same. You sleep eight hours every night. You never go out. I never even hear you speak to anyone but me. You go to alleged meetings for your alleged drug problem. Where’s the fun?”

More laughter from me, but this time it’s staged. “Well, I guess it’s time to start dinner, right?” And with that, I barrel down the stairs to the kitchen. Escape!

Last night Evan asked me, “How about your boyfriend? Is he helping you through your steps?”

An acidic chuckle escaped from my lips. “No, he doesn’t understand why I go to these meetings.”

Evan’s forehead was filled with question marks.

“He doesn’t know anything about me. He just thinks I was once fun, and now I’m not. I mean, I’m sure he’s just teasing me. After all, he has to realize that I am doing so much better now.” Even I didn’t believe this as I said it.

“But how can that be a healthy relationship? How can that help you get better?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “Having him around helps me. I mean, I love him.” Of course, I didn’t add that I’m not sure I am actually IN love with him. But what does that mean anyway?

Evan just shook his head.

Okay, okay. I felt compelled to defend Carrot. “I like having him around, I think. No, no…of course I LOVE having him in my life. We’re a team right? We moved here together. This is our new life, not just mine. And well, we complement one another.”

I wasn’t not sure what to say. My boyfriend is an occasionally good sidekick. Someone to keep my warm at night. A way to prove to myself that I am keeping my act together. I clean up after him and he gives me someone to clean up after. It’s perfect.

I allowed him to travel across the country because I knew that loving him was safe. My feelings for him were so calm, rational…ADULT, I liked to think. The simplicity of our relationship gave me the opportunity to become the person I always wanted to be.

But if I fell madly in love with him, he might break my heart. I would have to get wasted to cope with the pain. He would occupy all of my thoughts, forcing out important things like remembering to pay the electric bill and wash my hair. My work would suffer and surely I would lose my job. Back to the Northwest, where I would continue to get high and lose.

Jealousy, heartache, longing…these were not feelings experienced by successful people. They were the domain of flaky artsy types. The main ingredients in a self destruction cake.

No.

Carrot doesn’t want to know that I was once a junkie. He could never imagine that I might trade my records and books for a taste of heroin. Certainly he wouldn’t want see the bones poking through the back of my dirty t-shirt as I stooped over to vomit on the street after buying something cut with poison. He is not strong enough.

If I were truly in love with him…if I fancied him “the one,” I would have to tell him all of these things and more. The sad stories would stream out of my mouth. And then he would leave me. And then more sad stories would be written.

I know this.

During a Skype date with my friend Lem, I whined “Every time I write a story, everyone thinks it is about me.”  He gave me a knowing look, “Well, it is somewhat, right?”  Isn’t video chat grand?  I dismissed him with a “meh” hand wave.

This story is fiction, I promise…with certain elements of myself, of course…peppered with bits of people I have known, things I have heard, and dreams I have had.  Isn’t that how it’s supposed to work?

Here we go…”A Tragic Character….“

1.

Carrot isn’t thrilled to hear that I have sold the car.

“But why? How will we get around?”

He is from LA, where cars are mandatory and even going out for breakfast requires a thirty minute drive.

“We’ll ride our bikes or take the subway or walk. Cabs occasionally, I guess.”

His pursed lips indicate that he is not convinced. I’m certain he is subtly shaking his head.

Never mind that it was MY car. I feel as if I must defend my decision. “Neither of us knows how to park the car properly and we’re racking up tickets. I don’t even want to tell you how much money I gave the Parking Authority last week. We don’t live in a fantasy forest city any more. Our lives are completely different. We have to make changes.”

He shakes his head. “But we drove all the way across the country in that car. It’s one of the few things we have left from the west coast. It has memories.”

I know that he is serious about this, but I can only laugh. The car has smelled like feet since the six-day coast-to-coast drive. After much quibbling about various records and clothing that would be allowed to accompany us, we loaded all of our most valued possessions into my station wagon. I was going to be starting a job. A real job. With a desk and meetings and a stapler of my own. Carrot was coming along, because…well, because I couldn’t leave him behind.

Our new home was allegedly only a few thousand miles away. Initially it seemed so easy. The road atlas made it appear so close. But the long days of driving made me feel as if I were transporting us to another planet. I felt a twinge of sadness as I saw familiar streets and signs fading into the distance. By the time we passed the “You are leaving Oregon. Come again!” sign, I felt only relief. I was escaping myself and all of my bad decisions.

Despite a moderate case of food poisoning at a northern California Olive Garden early in the trip, I did most of the driving. Carrot’s vision is poor, at best. He had crashed three cars in as many years. No, our survival depended on me. Time was important. I had to start my job on the first of the month. Bathroom stops and sleeping breaks were minimal. I tossed back canned espresso drinks and b-vitamins as I blearily sped us across the Southwest.

I drove through rain and snow. Dark moonless nights. Rush hour traffic. Carrot laughed at my unconscious habit of crossing myself when we passed an accident. “I learned it from my Grandma, okay?!” I began to develop an affection for the truck drivers of the world. I tried (unsuccessfully) to engage them in conversation at various truck stops. They were not interested in my cheery comments about the weather and fuel efficiency.

We passed through the misty mountains and into the desolate desert. I had always dreamed of oversized cacti and football fields of sand. Plateaus and mesas! It was so exotic in comparison to my childhood in the rolling hills of the mid-Atlantic states. And the absolute opposite of my rainy longtime home in the Great Northwest.

I pulled the car over to the side of road as the sun was setting over New Mexico. I slipped off my shoes and stepped into the sand. It was colder than I thought it would be. I crossed myself–a trinity of ”no scorpions, no rattlesnakes, and no broken glass”–before I took off running into the horizon. Carrot took photos of me, a black and blue blur colliding with the cadmium sky.

“This is it,” I told myself. “The new life starts as soon as you enter the Eastern Time Zone.”

2.

“Remember when we met?”

Carrot asks this as I am carefully applying makeup before work. I am unaccustomed to seeing him this early in the morning, as he usually sleeps well past noon. He occasionally works at a clothing store, folding t-shirts and discussing obscure indie rock albums. Otherwise, he stays up all night, drinking and watching movies. Occasionally he dials up a west coast friend in the middle of the night. His calls are rarely answered. At some point, he ventures out to shoplift candy bars at the convenience store around the corner. He eats these until he falls asleep, tossing the wrappers under the bed. Of course, I am blissfully unconscious during all of this, thanks to over the counter sleeping pills (Simple Slumber) and silicone ear plugs. But I discovered his stash of candy wrappers while vacuuming the bedroom last week. I have seen the late night calls on our shared phone bill.

But here he is, sitting on the side of the bathtub, drinking a beer at 7:00 am. His eyes have the wild, glassy look of someone who hasn’t slept in days. He has probably run out of his anxiety medication again. I’m going to have to remind him to call his mother–handily enough, a psychiatrist–to request a new refill.

“Of course, I remember…how could I forget?” I close my eyes, envisioning the scene in crystal clarity and surround sound.

I had drunk a little too much at a gallery opening. Or maybe at the bar earlier. Regardless, I was tipsy. I was laughing so hard, tears were slipping from my eyes. I could barely stand. My friend Mike slung me over his shoulder and carried me out onto the sidewalk. We were meeting another friend outside. One of her high school buddies was visiting from L.A.

My dress was no longer covering my ass as Mike continued to lug me down to the corner. Our friend awaited. Her visitor was pale and blonde. His clothing was entirely black and far too tight. He giggled at my lace-covered rear.

I reached out my hand to him in greeting. “Hi, I’m Ella. And I’m a tragic character.”

He laughed. “Of course you are.”

“I’ve heard you’re thinking about moving here. I have to tell you, the black clothes and deep v-neck shirts are not going to fly here. You’re going to have to invest in some plaid shirts and cuffed jeans, like my faithful manservant here.”

At this, Mike dropped me onto the sidewalk. I stood up, brushing imaginary dust off of my skirt, and then giving the blonde visitor an exaggerated wink. I was going to win.

Later, in the most notoriously “hipster” bar in the city, we drifted into a silly conversation about toast.

“Oh, yeah, I could eat toast three times a day if given the opportunity,” I said as I took a drag from the tenth cigarette of the evening.

He giggled out everything I said. GIGGLED! Of course, I was charmed. I was enamored with anyone that laughed at my foolishness.

Eventually I invited him back to my house for toast. He enthusiastically accepted.
I leaned across the table, hoping I didn’t smell too much like gin and smoke.
“I think you should know that every time I say ‘toast,’ I mean ‘you should fuck me.’”

He blushed.

And now we are thousands of miles away, in a pale blue bathroom.

He’s shaking his head. “You know, when you said that, I decided I would follow you to the ends of the earth. Girls just don’t act like that!”

I ignore him as I try to draw a straight line with a dull kohl pencil.

“You were different then. A socialite! Here you just go to work and stupid 12 step meetings. Who are your friends? I miss the old Ella!”

I pause my work to scowl at him.

I was a mess then. A socialite? Maybe. But I was drunk and sick and slutty and sad. I could barely bother to wash my laundry. I sometimes passed out on the living room floor because my bed was too far away. I slept with boys I secretly hated and I made mistakes I could never undo. I lost things! Not just possessions. But relationships, power, and sleep.

And of course he misses this.

I want to shout. “You should be glad to know me now! I make our lives work every single day, by going to my job and cooking nutritious meals. I iron our clothes and scrub the shower. I write the checks and pretend there is a budget.”

If the socialite returns, we will lose everything we have. Can’t he see this?

Instead I rummage for my “understanding and concerned” voice. It’s not difficult to find, because I use it more often than not. “Why are you drinking in the morning?”

He winks at me. “Your sobriety makes me dry. I’ve got to quench my thirst somehow.”

3.

His name is not really Carrot.

But some time in his late teen years, in a quest to prove his hipness to his peers, he had the cover art from the quirkiest album he knew tattooed on his arm. Of course he won admiration from every misunderstood, bookish girl in the greater Los Angeles metro area. His name was scribbled in no less than 1000 speckled notebooks. Marginal poems about him were published in high school literary magazines. He was officially the coolest, most sensitive boy in Southern California.

Now it has assumed a vintage charm. Older artsy women blush with delight when they see it. Even tipsy fellows have approached our end of the bar to compliment his choice. “Nice ink, dude.” Naturally, I find it charming, too.

And so now I call him Carrot Flowers.

At first I referred him by his real name. A wholesome moniker, popular among parents producing sons in the late seventies and early eighties. There was nothing wrong with it. But lying in bed together, after delivering the promised toast, I said, “I can’t call you A____. I was in love with another boy with that name and he broke my heart.”

“That seems silly,” he replied. “It’s not my fault that some fool hurt you.”

“It’s not the name; it’s the connection in my mind. I have also dated four boys named M___. I didn’t love the first three, so it didn’t matter when I met the fourth. But he broke my heart within minutes, just reducing me to a mess. And so, I can never love another male named M___ either.”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“I’m just saying that I want to give you a fair chance, despite what your parents decided to call you decades ago.”

And so he became Carrot. The next day, he arranged to have his belongings moved from L.A. to my house hundreds of miles away.

On the other side of the continent, he remains Carrot.

Before I left for work this morning, I wrote the following note for him:

“Attn. Mr. C. Flowers:
Tonight is trash night. I will be at my meeting until very late, so please please please take it out for me.
Much love and thanks in advance,
Ella”

But here I am, close to midnight, dragging blue bins overflowing with empty beer cans and gin bottles out to the curb. Bag after bag of takeout food containers and dirty dental floss. An errant bit of pizza crust escapes it’s plastic prison and smears my shoe with tomato sauce. I exhale the longest, loudest martyr’s sigh I can muster. No doubt he is off at a bar with his t-shirt clad co-workers. Or at the deli trying to purloin an egg salad sandwich. Yesterday he declared “From now on, I’m only eating food I have stolen.”

Meanwhile, I was at an NA meeting. Narcotics Anonymous. I’ve been going to meetings twice a week since I moved here. Occasionally, if I’m feeling particularly overwrought, I go every night. That has been happening a lot lately.

I’m serious about it. I have a sponsor, Evan. I met him at the first meeting. He spoke at length about his struggles with cocaine and finance. Lost accounts and fractured relationships. An ugly divorce, followed by a rock bottom in the first class cabin of a flight from the Dominican Republic. Standard issue at these types of gatherings.

He came up to me afterwards, while I drank muddy coffee from a styrofoam cup, wondering if I should try to make small talk with the other addicts.

“Oh, fuck,” I thought. “He’s going to hit on me. A dude is about to try to pick me up at a fucking NA meeting. And he’s wearing a fucking suit.”

But no. He was trying to help me. Did I need a sponsor? He was willing to assume that responsibility.

I squinted at him. Of course I was skeptical. “Well, first I have to ask you something. Are you aware of the complete and utter cliche of being a cokehead stockbroker?”

He smirked. “As long as you’re aware that being an overeducated hipster with a heroin problem isn’t the most creative concept, either. Did you read a lot of Burroughs and just get turned on?”

I laughed. “Okay, you’re hired.”

We shook hands.

“And by the way, it was the rock and roll music that turned me into a junkie.”

1. Try not to lose things.  I tend to misplace keys, wallets, important documents, and telephones.

2. Be more forthcoming with my feelings.  Those of you who have read enough of “Peeling an Onion” know that this is not a new affliction for me.

Thinking about the second, infinitely-more-challenging resolution lead me to re-read/revise the following story, “The Foreign Tongue.”  I originally wrote this last year, after thinking about this.

For years (no joke, YEARS) in Portland, I was hung up on a particular guy.  Each time I consumed more than three alcoholic beverages in rapid succession, I gave my friends the same monologue, tentatively entitled “I am secretly in LOVE with _____, and I swear I’m going to tell him tonight.”  My friends graciously encouraged me, even though I’m sure they all knew I was just going to go over to his house and coerce him into drunken sex OR just fall off my bike on my way to his house.

This story is not about him.  But then again, maybe it is….along with the small handful of other fellows that have co-starred with me in this same, stupid situation comedy called “we’re friends with benefits and I’ll never tell you how I truly feel about you because I  fancy myself a tough modern woman.”  Perhaps I’m typecast at this point, but I play my part to an impressive degree of dramatic excellence.

I just counted…that would be a total of four fellows, spanning from Chicago to Portland to Philadelphia.  Ack!  Okay, read my story…

Some illnesses creep on slowly, with symptoms so minor and simply inconvenient, that one suspects nothing. A runny nose. A stiff neck. A twitchy eye. Time passes, until a raging fever or grand mal seizure forces one to accept that something is terribly wrong.

Other maladies strike without warning. Hindsight reveals no clues.

I can remember the first time I realized something was terribly wrong with me. I was at the bagel shop down the street from work, ordering lunch. The not-so-unattractive boy behind the counter asked me, “How do you feel about banana peppers?”

Ugh. I despised them. I would have preferred to eat a glue stick for lunch. I could feel a scowl creeping across my face. This guy had made no less than 150 sandwiches for me in the past year, and he couldn’t remember this? Was he somehow too attractive to note the preferences of his valued regular customers? I put my hand on my hip, leaned to the left, and opened my mouth, preparing to issue a sassy-yet-flirty answer.

And then I was interrupted by someone else. “Oh, wow…I think they are great. The more the merrier, you know?”

Startled, I turned around to confront the rude stranger with a knack for imitating my voice. The rest of the shop was empty. I wondered if there was a particularly skilled ventriloquist hiding behind the counter, stifling his or her laughter.

I spent the rest of my lunch break picking a seemingly endless supply of rancid pickled peppers out of my sandwich. What had just happened? It seemed like some sort of psychedelic experience. I told myself that I need to get some more sleep. No more late nights drinking whiskey with my co-workers before tipsily pedaling across the Burnside Bridge.

The next day my boss asked me to give one of the sales associates a stern talking-to. I pulled him into the office toward the end of my shift.

“Hey, what’s going on,” he asked nervously.

“Well, listen…you’ve been coming in late a lot lately.”

He solemnly nodded his head.

So far so good. I had issued so many of these verbal warnings in the last few years, that I practically had this speech memorized. I would give him a stern-yet-understanding look, inspired by my tenth grade geometry teacher. Next I would touch on the ways in which tardiness negatively impacted the rest of the team.

The taste of stale coffee was distracting me. I jammed a piece of cinnamon gum in my mouth. Now where was I? Oh, yes, the ways in which tardiness could negatively–

Someone else–with a very familiar voice–joined the conversation. “But you know what? That’s okay. I understand you have a life outside of work, so how can I expect you to arrive exactly at the moment your shift begins? In fact, are you making enough money here to finance your outside endeavors? Because maybe I can get you a small raise.”

Who was saying something so ridiculous? I looked around, expecting to see someone hiding behind the safe. Maybe one of the other managers. They were all a bunch of drunken pranksters. But we were the only two people in the room. And apparently those words had come from my mouth.

The sales associate looked at me skeptically. “Um, I’m confused. Are you being sarcastic?”

“Well, yes, of course that was sarcasm,” I sputtered. “Now stop being late.”

I stormed out of the office, making a beeline for the bathroom. What the fuck was wrong with me? I splashed cold water on my face. I felt fine…well, except for the embarrassment burning up my cheeks. Maybe I needed a vacation or maybe I should just get laid. I had been working pretty hard recently. I deserved a break. Yes, that was it. Exhaustion was affecting my ability to speak and think clearly. I would request some time off at the next manager meeting. I felt better already.

Biking home that night, it hit me: this might be the manifestation of a serious ailment! If I were a character on a prime time medical drama, my inability to control the words coming from my mouth would surely indicate a rare variety of brain cancer. Oh sure, initially it would be dismissed as the product of exhaustion and alcohol abuse. But then, in the last fifteen minutes of the episode, one rogue doctor with a true commitment to his patients would realize that every other doctor had missed a tiny-yet-virulent tumor hidden deep within the darkest folds of my brain. Experimental treatment would be required, perhaps involving lasers.

I was fairly certain that the insurance I received as one of the meager benefits of my job as a professional t-shirt folder would cover neither lasers nor rogue doctors.

Feeling upset, I decided to look for some distraction. So I stopped by the house of a male friend. Well, I guess we were more than friends, since we had been sleeping together for months. And honestly, I considered him the most amazing person in the world. I secretly wished that he would be my boyfriend. I wanted to spend the rest of my time at his house, listening to his records and making out in surprisingly cozy bed.

Unfortunately, I was really more of “you’ve got to hide your love away” kind of person.
I was tough.
He was cool.
So instead, we had been “friends” the whole time. Every once in a while, spells of giddiness made us declare that we were “best friends.” Or my favorite (and this was for truly special occasions, like that time we had sex on the roof of his house): “I love you, you know, as a friend. But really, I do love you.”

But that night, I was considering revealing my true feelings. I would probably need him by my side during my struggle with this almost–but not absolutely–deadly neurological illness. No doubt great-yet-inexpensive advances in medical technology would save me. I would emerge on the other side of it all as a better person. An inspiration to everyone. And we would be closer than ever. At our wedding, he would tearfully exclaim, “I’m so glad you decided to declare your feelings to me on that particular night.”

Yes, I should definitely do it. This had been going on for too long.

He was drinking a beer on his porch when I rolled up. “Hey, what’s going on? You just get off work?”

I nodded my head as dragged my bike up the steps. He handed me a can of PBR as I sat down next to him.

There was some small talk of the “work was stupid” and “my friends got drunk” variety. I tried to make a boring story about a difficult customer seem funny. He laughed out of obligation. And then silence.

I bravely put my hand on his thigh. A deep breath. “Listen, I have been wanting to tell you something for a while. I mean, I have been thinking about it every day.”

This was it. Now was the time I would say all of the words that swirled around the inside of my head as I drifted off to sleep each night.

He sat down his beer, giving me his full attention.

My heart was pounding. I could hear the woosh-woosh of blood through my body.

“Well, I just wanted to tell you that you are not my boyfriend. And I hope you aren’t thinking that you are.”

I watched him pick up his beer and take a long sip. What had just happened? I covered my mouth with my hand, lest any other untrue syllables and sentences wanted to slip out.

We sat in silence for a few minutes, while I replayed my words no less than fifty times. My head was deluged with exclamation points.

I jumped up and grabbed my bike, tripping as I ran down the steps.

I ran back to my house. I didn’t pause to cross streets. I didn’t even take the time to hop on my bike. All I could think about was getting back to my place and hiding my head under a pillow.

Instead, I grabbed a half-full bottle of gin from my freezer. I spent the rest of the night lying in the empty bathtub, alternating gulps of liquor with drags of cigarettes. Something was very wrong with me. And now it was ruining my life. Most likely I would die alone and unloved. I would probably pass into oblivion in this very bathtub. Eventually someone would come to look for me, probably because I hadn’t shown up for work or I owed them money. My poor mom would have to bury me in a cardboard box.

But I wasn’t ready to die! I was still young. Well, young-ish. I mean, I wasn’t a completely dried up old crone. Of course, my eggs were expiring at that very moment. And my closest relationship was with my cat. But still…I had reasons to live! I had a BFA!

With some determination and telephone melodrama, I was able to get a doctor’s appointment the next morning. As I sat on the examining table, crumpling the paper liner with my sweaty hands, I realized that this day could change everything else in the future. I might be too sick to work. Would I lose my health insurance? Would I have to move in with my parents? Oh, god, just telling my mom was going to be really–

“What brings you here today?”

The doctor was examining my chart.

“Oh, actually, I’m fine. I don’t know what I’m doing here.”

He laughed. “Are you sure about that?”

I clutched my forehead. “Oh, god no. There is something very, very wrong with me. I can’t stop saying the opposite of what I’m thinking. That’s what happened just now. Well, not the stuff I said in the last few seconds, but what I said before. You know, when you asked me why I was here? It’s like something else is controlling my tongue. I don’t even realize that the words are coming from my mouth until it’s too late. ”

“A lot of people have that problem. Do you have any other symptoms? Headaches, dizziness, that kind of thing?”

I shook my head. “No, just this. Something is definitely wrong with me. Do you think it might be a brain tumor?”

He laughed. “I’m going to check you for some neurological issues, but I have a feeling this might be more mental than physical.”

This was not what I wanted to hear. Was he implying that I was crazy?

I was putting my faith in modern medicine. I obediently followed the penlight with my eyes. I was silent and still while he checked my blood pressure. I didn’t flinch when he looked in my ears.

“Well,” he said as he returned the stethoscope to his pocket, “I think you’re fine physically. You do seem to have an ear infection, but that is unrelated to your problem. I’m going to give you a referral to a good therapist. I’m pretty sure your insurance will cover it. And I think she can help you work this out.”

I scowled. “Listen, I don’t think you know how serious this is. It’s going to ruin my life. In fact, it already is. My youth is passing me by!”

“Then I suggest that you call that therapist as soon as possible.”

I stomped past the receptionist’s desk with a prescription for an antibiotic (for my ears) and a card for some stupid psychiatrist. I was definitely not going to fork over the co-pay for this visit. Some help! What a waste of time. Maybe I should have seen one of those wacky herbal doctors or whatever! I was definitely suing him for malpractice when I was diagnosed (by another doctor) with that terrible brain tumor!

I was going to have to solve this problem myself. I bought a pink notebook at the drugstore while I waited for my prescription. I would need this to collect data.

For the next week, whenever someone asked me something, I wrote down both the exact wording of the question, along with my response.

I began to notice trends.

If I was asked something that could only be answered with a yes/no response, I always responded correctly.

Do you work on Tuesday? Did you bring your lunch today? Is that a new dress?

If it was not a yes/no question, but it was something I had been asked many times in the past, I could also answer truthfully.

What time does this store open on Sundays? What did you do last night? What do you think of this band?

It was the open-ended, surprise questions that triggered my foreign tongue. And even when I was asked nothing, untrue sentences just slipped out of my mouth unprovoked.

Out of the blue, I told my best friend that I thought her boyfriend was great and she should just learn to live with constant cheating.

“What the fuck? You’ve always told me the opposite. So you’re saying that I can’t do any better and I should just accept it?”

I apologized. “Lately I have had no control over half the stuff I say.”

She hugged me. “Have you been drinking too much? Do you need to talk about something? Have you been taking diet pills? Because you do seem a little thinner…”

No, no. Everything was going to be just fine. But did I really look like I had lost weight?

I began to write down the appropriate responses for various common situations. When I pulled an employee into the office to lecture him about his tendency toward secretly eating fried chicken while working the fitting rooms, I consulted page 49 of my notebook.

“Various policies exist for a reason: so we can serve the customer effectively. For that reason, certain actions are not permitted on the sales floor…”

I mastered the art of “reading aloud while not appearing to be reading aloud.” Everything was coming together. I was learning to cope with my disability.

One glaring problem remained: the boy. No, not “a boy.” Or “just any boy.” THE BOY. I had been forced to change my regular bike route, lest we encountered one another while coasting down Ankeny. I pedaled no less than ten blocks out of the way. I told myself that the extra exercise could only improve my health.

I had not spoken to him for weeks. I was thankful that he did not own a phone. In the past, this had been inconvenient. I had been forced to leave notes at his house or throw rocks at his bedroom window. I had complained about this, calling him a “hippie” and a “petulant teenager.” I had once drunkenly offered to BUY him a phone. Now I was glad that his own hipster pride had prevented him from taking me up on that suggestion. At least I would not be tempted to drunkenly call him. But I was thinking about him all night, every night. He was in the background of every dream, leaning against the wall or sitting across from me on the bus.

Of course I had a plan. I spent nights in my empty bathtub, writing down everything I had been wanting to say to him. Every fleeting thought, every dreamscape declaration. Furthermore, I practiced writing as small–but legibly–as possible. This was an important element of my scheme.

When I finally had put together all of the right words, I printed them as tiny as possible on the back of my left hand. I had so much to say, that the sentences snaked up my wrist, almost reaching my elbow. I used permanent ink.

I practiced in front of the mirror. Reading from my hand was a new method. I didn’t want to seem as if I was staring at my feet. Eye contact would be essential.

I wore a dress and stockings. This would impress him. I brushed my hair 100 times and I sprayed myself with expensive French perfume reserved for special occasions. I even filed my fingernails. “The wrapping is almost important as the gift,” I told myself.

I strolled over to his house on a Tuesday at dusk.

Fortunately he was sitting on the porch. I hadn’t prepared myself for the possibility that I would have to knock on the door and then work my way into his house. This could have derailed my entire plan.

I smiled broadly as I approached him. “Hey, what are you doing?”

“I’m just watching all of the crows in that tree. It’s like every crow in the city is hanging out here. They’ve been coming every day around this time.”

It was true. An army of black birds were blocking out the setting sun, while screaming at one another in glee.

“Do you mind if I sit down?”

He moved to the right, making some room on the step. “Go ahead. I haven’t seen you for a while. What’s that all over your hand?”

I looked down at the microscopic paragraphs. “Oh, that’s just one of those stupid hippie henna tattoos. Someone talked me into it.”

He nodded his head as if he believed me. “Well, you look nice. Big night out?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “My only plan is seeing you.”

Further head nodding.

I cleared my throat. “So listen, I said some stupid stuff to you the last time I was here. And I just want to set it straight.”

He smirked. “Yeah, it was definitely a little weird. But I figured, ‘Hey, she’s always saying something wacky.’”

I blushed. This was probably true.

My left eye consulted my hand–covertly, I hoped–while I looked at his face. Big swallow. And then,

“Remember that weird old-person diner place near work that closed last year? We used to go to lunch there all the time when I first met you. And there was this buffet in the middle of the restaurant that held only condiments and plastic cups of water? You came up with the idea that every time we had to get some ketchup or a napkin, we had to stand up and do a full lap around that buffet thing. I thought it was the funniest thing. I would laugh so hard, that tears would slip out of the corners of my eyes. I couldn’t do the lap with a straight face. But you would just stand up and do it, as cool as a cucumber. And that just made it funnier to me. All of the elderly customers thought we were crazy or on drugs or something.”

My left eye moved to my wrist bone.

“That’s when I started to realize that you are the most amazing person I have ever met. Ever since that first night together in your bed, I have forgotten that other boys exist in this world. And when one of them is brave enough to talk to me, I am just reminded that no one can compare to you in my heart.”

And then the words running along my ulna.

“I don’t know why I said that I didn’t want you to be my boyfriend. Because that’s the exact opposite of my feelings. I want to spend more time with you than anyone else. I want to hear all of your stories and know all of your opinions and listen to all of your dreams. In other words, I love you.”

He was silent. I figured he probably needed a moment to digest what I had just said. This was obviously a really pivotal moment. I took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, waiting. I began counting the seconds.

Onetwothreefourfivesixseven…
Thirtyninefortyfortyone…
Seventyeightseventynineeighty…

At 148, he spoke.
“I know this is going to sound strange, but sometimes I just can’t hear. And just now, I didn’t here anything you said. I could see your lips moving, but there was no sound. I think I have hearing damage or something. Old age, maybe. It happens at the most random times.”

I sighed with relief. Everything was going to be okay. “Oh yeah, I was just asking if you wanted some gum.”

“Sure,” he said with a shrug. I rummaged a pack out of my bag and he took a piece.

I reached for his hand. We sat in silence, watching the crows caw and carry on, our mouths filling with the taste of cinnamon.

I am nothing without my readers.  Yes, it sounds cheesy, but it’s also very true.  All of you have given me the reason to write, even on days when I would have preferred to lie in bed with a pillow over my head (and there were definitely a lot of those 2009).  I’ve appreciated ALL of the correspondence I have received from everyone…and I apologize for some of my delayed responses.  I promise that I save every email/Facebook/MySpace message that I have received about my blog.

So! One of the things I want to do in “honor” of this auspicious occasion is repost/revise/update some of my most popular posts.   That’s where you come in…please tell me what you have liked most.  It’s fine if you just say “oh, that thing about sleeping in the grass” or “that time that guy said he was an artist and therefore, he couldn’t just have a job.”  But it would also be great if you could tell me WHY you liked it!

How can you do this?  Well, posting a comment here is probably the easiest way.  But if you’re shy and/or you prefer to spell check your correspondence, you can email me:  vonlonewolf@gmail.com. If email makes you feel like you’re getting too serious with me, you can also send me a message via Facebook.  Wait….is that more serious-er?  And if you’ve never written to me before, this is a really good time to start something new.

Thank you (in advance)!

xo

Amanda (a.k.a. The Heiress)