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Andy and Rea are sick of the small town life, so they flee to the big city of Chicago. When young, mentally ill queer people run off on a whim, what could possibly go wrong?
Genre: Young Adult, Queer, Surreal
Word Count: 31,501
Date Completed: May 8th, 2024
Content Warnings: depression, substance abuse, underage drinking, explicit sex, suicidal ideation, domestic abuse, death, homophobia, transphobia, unreality, psychosisCheck out my other books here!
synopsis
I think this book is best experienced as blind as possible, so I won't be providing a synopsis beyond what you see above... just heed the content warnings, and enjoy the journey.
I hope you come away from it knowing more about the experiences of queer and trans people, and those with severe mental illness.
accessibility
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Depending on time and resources, I will be looking into more on-site accessibility features in the future. At the very least, I want to implement a light and dark mode.
navigation guide
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PREV/NEXT move you between the chapters on this page. These do not refresh your webpage.NOTE: Unlike my other books I have not included a chapter-by-chapter version of WYWU. Again, that is just how I feel this book is best experienced. If you have to leave and return, please note your progress and use the table of contents to return to your place.
Table of Contents
1
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Rea was bored out of her mind between customers. Sure, when the store was empty there were things to do–– she could pack out shelves, mop the floor, clean, dust, reorganize. But why would she do that when not even her boss would recognize the effort? She barely got paid enough to even bother standing behind the counter at all, never mind going above and beyond. Standing behind the counter. It's what she did.
Besides, she was really a people person at heart. Whoever might walk through the door, whether it be a teenager or a PTA mom, had a chance of making her smile. It was worth it, for that. Sometimes. In a small town in Kansas, it was only worth it sometimes. Working at Benny's Market, Rea knew everyone. She knew who to like. She knew who to love. Who to hate.
"Good morning Mrs. Patinkin," Rea said sweetly, offering her biggest customer service smile as an old woman entered the market. Margaret Patinkin only looked at her duly and gave a half-hearted nod. Fair enough, Rea supposed. I could care less about you either.
She waited. She drummed her chipped painted nails on the counter and waited. Patinkin hovered around the bread for quite some time before deciding on a loaf of locally made ezekiel. Then, she wandered towards the back where Rea could no longer see her. Technically, Rea was supposed to keep an eye on her to make sure she didn't steal, but Mrs. Patinkin had only ever stolen once– a pregnancy test, and it had been so funny and ballsy that Rea couldn't bear to stop her. Besides, it's not exactly like she had any personal stake in asset protection. If a true asshole tried to steal, that was a different story, but Rea didn’t mind Mrs. Patinkin. She didn’t like her, but she didn’t mind.
Eventually, the old woman came up to the checkout area, impressively spry for her age, and placed her bread, some milk, and a four-pack of butter on the counter. Rea punched in the prices from memory, as Benny had never been able to afford a modern POS system.
"That'll be fifteen dollars, Mrs. Patinkin."
"My, my… inflation, these days, am I right? This is what we get in Biden's America. When I was your age you could get all that for just a couple of bucks!"
"Well, I'll make sure to let ol’ Ben know you feel that way. Maybe he'll give you a coupon for a dollar off drain cleaner. You know he loves those."
Mrs. Patinkin chuckled a little and handed Rea a twenty. She made the change. Mrs. Patinkin took the five and looked at Rea for a moment, thoughtfully.
"You don't look so good, dearie. You been getting enough sleep?"
It stung a bit. "Not really. Not much time, working two jobs and all. Gotta support the family."
"It’s amazing what you do for that mother of yours, you know. Such a wonderful woman. Most kids these days would let their mothers starve if it meant they could skirt by on welfare."
"Sure, Mrs. Patinkin. We both try our best. We just don't want to lose the house, you know? She raised us there."
"Absolutely. Dig those roots in, darling, and never let go. See you around, alright? Next time I need eggs I'll bring a fifty."
Rea smiled as Mrs. Patinkin walked out the door. Alone again. If she had to rate it, that interaction was a 7/10. She liked ranking her interactions. It made her feel like they had more value than, in reality, they had. She didn’t really know Mrs. Patinkin. She only knew her as a customer of Benny’s Market. If Mrs. Patinkin invited her to dinner, Rea wouldn’t even think about going, but the kicker is that she never would be invited in the first place. Rea felt her head start to swirl a bit and a deep pit grew in her belly.
She looked out the window towards the small parking lot. It was October, but most of the leaves had been blown off the trees by a storm last weekend. She had already been having trouble keeping her mood out of the gutter, as always happened when the season grew colder, but the empty, lifeless branches seemed to have hammered the final nail in the coffin. It was winter, she decided. It’s official.
Rea always got depressed over the winter.
She wasn’t sure how long she’d been staring out the window when another customer walked in. This time, the smile she flashed was real.
“Hey there, Dorian. How’s things?”
Dorian grabbed a Red Bull faster than you could blink and approached the counter. He grinned back at her and Rea tried not to blush. He had always had the most dazzling smile, but she’d die if she ever let it show that she thought so. “Just peachy. You heard the news?”
“No, what news?” Rea loved gossip.
“I’m finally gonna make it, baby! I’m going to Nashville!”
Rea’s heart sank, though she wished it hadn’t. Dorian was the most talented country singer she had ever heard in her life, and an even more talented guitarist. His fingers worked magic, and his voice could silence the entire nation. With his tattooed dark skin, strong arms, and eyes that sparkled with determination, he could captivate hearts and minds–– she knew it. The country music world was ready to be rocked, and if anyone in this small town had a chance of making it big in Nashville, it was Dorian Baker.
She didn’t want him to leave.
“Really?” Her voice wavered. “Jeez, Dorian, that’s great! How’d that come about?”
“Well, you know how my solo act’s been drumming up a bit of attention? There was an agent at my last show in St. Louis. Can you believe it? He wants to sign me. Me! He wants me to record an album.”
“That’s amazing, man. I’d say I’m proud of you, but we both knew you’d do it.”
“Damn straight we knew!” Dorian held out a fist and Rea bumped it. “Can you picture it? Me selling out stadiums? My name in lights?”
Rea gestured across the space in front of her, indicating a marquee. “Dorian Baker! Come one, come all, to see the up-and-coming legend!”
“Nah, nah, you got it wrong.” He corrected, solemnly, mimicking his own marquee. “Dorian Sparks.”
Rea grinned. “Dorian Sparks. You’re gonna kill it. But, when do you leave? Are we gonna have a going away party?”
Dorian’s face fell. He cracked his knuckles. “Well, that’s kinda why I came by. He wants me to fly out tonight. Get started drafting the album tomorrow. I can’t risk letting this chance slip, so, I’m outta here. I wanted to at least stop by and say goodbye.”
“Oh.” Rea’s smile shattered. “Oh.”
“Hey, man, cheer up. You’ll see me again, yeah?” He patted her heartily on the shoulder. “I’ll cop you front row tickets.”
“Yeah,” Rea forced the smile back, if only for Dorian’s sake. “Front row tickets.”
“Hey… Bring it in.” Dorian flexed his arms then opened them warmly, still refusing to let that smile slip. “Last time you’ll get the gun show.”
Rea looked around, then shrugged, unable to avoid smiling a little at his joke. Dorian had always been a sensitive guy, and maybe that’s why this town suffocated him so much. It suffocated her too. She was jealous. His arms wrapped around her and squeezed her with gusto. She prayed that he couldn’t feel the staccato palpitation of her heart. It lasted only a moment, though, and he patted her on the back again. She would never admit how much it hurt when he did that.
“Gonna miss you. Stay sane this winter, alright?”
“No guarantees,” Rea said. “Mail me some sunshine?”
Dorian chuckled. “Will do. Hey, can I get a pack of Marlboros?”
Rea raised her eyebrows and fetched him the cigarettes. “You’re smoking reds, now, Menthol Boy?”
“Yeah, sure.” Dorian shrugged, tucking the pack into the pocket of his red flannel shirt. “All the real cowboys do, you know?”
“I know.”
Dorian paid for his items and, with a nervous energy you only ever see in people making the biggest decision of their life, he put his hand on the door. He turned to Rea.
“See you later.” He opened the door and a chilly October breeze rolled in. “Oh, and pass on my regards to that girl of yours. Tell her I’m sad I missed her.”
“Will do, Dor. Goodbye.”
And he was gone.
She wanted to cry. Really, she did, but not only was she still in public, she wasn’t even sure she knew how. Instead, she stared out the window again. Then, she checked the watch on her wrist. It was almost one-thirty in the afternoon. Soon, her shift would be over and she’d be headed on over to the next job. All she had to do was make it through the last half hour.
Not long after the tearless goodbye, an unfamiliar man wandered into the store. Rea paid him no mind until he approached the counter. He held a Slim Jim and two 20 ounce bottles of coke.
“Two Lucky Picks,” the man started without greeting, counting out his cash with dirt-caked hands. He smelled of sweat, booze, and sulfur. “A Mega Millions, and… ehhh, throw in a Golden Jackpot.”
Rea only blinked, as she always took an inordinate amount of offense to people who treated her like an object to serve them, and turned around to get his scratchers. The man whistled when he saw her hair, which hung down to her lower back and she always wore down.
“Damn, that’s some long hair you got there…”
I didn’t ask, man.
“Yep.” She placed the cards on her side of the counter and punched in the numbers. “That’ll be twenty-five dollars, sir.”
“Twenty-five?” The man scoffed and shot spittle in her direction. She wiped a droplet off her cheek, stone-faced, but boiling. “It was twenty when I was in here two months ago!”
“Inflation,” Rea said.
The man rolled his eyes. “I only got $20.”
“You could take off the Golden Jackpot,” Rea suggested.
“How about you let it slide, just this once? I won’t tell no one.”
“Sorry, sir, but my boss will kill me.”
“Not if I kill ya first…” the man muttered. Evidently, he was hoping she wouldn’t hear, but he was too drunk to control his volume.
“Excuse me?” Rea seethed, putting the scratch cards into the cash register and shutting it. “I refuse to sell you this merchandise if you’re threatening me. I’ll call the police.”
“Jesus Christ on a cracker, you’ve got an attitude!” the man hollered, crumpling his cash back into a ball and shoving it back into his pocket. “Fine then, be that way. I bet you’re gay as fuck anyway.”
“Oh, fuck off.”
“Burn in hell for all I care.”
The man shoved out the door of the market and the bell tingled sweetly as he did so.
“You’re not supposed to take the lord’s name in vain sir,” she called after him, almost bursting into laughter as she did so. “Guess I’ll see you in hell!” She often coped with stressful situations by laughing through them. Thankfully, his pickup truck peeled out of the lot. A breath she’d been holding released, and she felt a strong pain in her chest. The pit in her stomach had turned into a black hole, and she was starting to develop a pretty serious headache. She’d been sober a week now, but she still felt like shit all the time. Withdrawals, probably. Was it even worth it?
Another watch check. One forty-seven. She stared at the beer cooler in the back and thought about buying herself a forty for the way to her next job.
No, she decided. She wouldn’t. She was better than that. She was getting better. As they say in AA, one day at a time.
She picked away at her black nail polish until it was gone.
2
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Andy was already sick of being at work. He’d only been on the clock for a little over two hours, and he felt as if he was at his breaking point. Neon lights flashed, exacerbating a headache he couldn’t remember not having, and he wondered for the tenth time that day why he even still worked this job. He knew why. He needed the money. Why did anyone work any shit job?
Stairway to Heaven was playing as a group of conspicuously high teenagers laughed and roughhoused over a high-stakes bowling match. Seeing people have fun was one thing Andy didn’t hate about his job, as long as they weren’t assholes. So many people around here tended to be assholes.
A middle-aged couple approached his rental counter.
The woman leaned over it, numerous Alex and Ani bracelets dangling off her forearm. “Hi there sonny, could I get a pair of size nines?”
“Sure thing, ma’am.” Andy looked at the man. “And for you?”
“I’ll take a pair of 11s. They better not smell, you hear?”
“We deodorize all our shoes here, sir.”
“Well good. I hate smellin’ other fellows foot sweat. I don’t know how you do it all day.”
“Sheer force of will, sir,” Andy said, and went to get the proper shoes. Talk to people. Get the shoes. Talk to people. Get the shoes. God, it made him want to kill himself. What was even the point of it all?
“That’ll be thirty dollars. Pick any lane you like.”
The woman paid with American Express and the two went on their way. Andy sighed, rolling his eyes and sitting on the decrepit stool that had likely been here since the business opened. He was so tired tonight–– like he wasn’t every night. He took a hearty swig from his metal water bottle. He felt a bit better, but no less tired. At least he got to sit at work. He was grateful for that. Most people didn’t have that luxury.
The evening rush was beginning to pick up, so more groups of teenagers, business workers, or bored adults began to trickle in. For the most part, like any small town, it was people Andy knew or vaguely knew. He was too tired to want to converse with anyone, though, so he recited his scripts and moved on. Each time, he was happier than anything just to be able to fall back onto a stool and give his aching body a rest. Everything hurt. He took another sip from his water bottle. And another.
Near the end of the night, when the rush had died down and the only people remaining were a group of adults and a few of their teenage children, Andy reached his breaking point.
Marshall McQueen was an asshole. Everyone knew he was an asshole. He’d made a fortune in the oil industry and retired by 35, and he made certain that everybody knew about it. He was one of the adults still in the building when Andy was itching to close up shop, and he approached the counter.
“Hey kid, you know if ol’ Bartholomew’s thinking of selling this place?” Marshall asked out of the blue. He shoved his hands casually in the pockets of his blue jeans and gave a smile that was literally worth a million dollars, but Andy wouldn’t have bought it for a cent. “It’s real run-down, you know? I heard he was lookin’ to franchise.”
“Sure,” Andy said, because he had in fact heard that, “but not to you.”
Marshall’s jaw clenched. “I’m sorry?”
“Not to you,” Andy growled, flashing a super fake smile back at him. “He doesn’t want to sell it to you. No one fucking likes you, Marshall.”
Marshall leaned over the counter and grabbed Andy by the collar of his shirt. “What the fuck did you just say to me?”
“I said,” Andy spat, with zero regard for any consequences, “you’re a rich stuck-up prick and nobody likes you.”
Marshall threw Andy back down, and he stumbled, catching himself on the counter and laughing raucously. Marshall’s wife, Linda, came up to the counter with a concerned look on her face.
“Oh, what have you gotten yourself into this time, Marsh? Are you harassing the smallfolk again?”
Andy furrowed his brow. Smallfolk? What was this, the middle ages?
“This little bastard insulted me. He told me Bart’d never sell to me, and that no one likes me.”
Linda sighed. “Well, the little bastard’s half-right. Bart would never sell to you. But only half the town doesn’t like you, darling.”
“Why’re you taking his side in this?” Marshall asked, flabbergasted. “This twenty-something nobody still lives with his mom, and he’s drunk on the fucking job.”
“I am not,” Andy lied.
“Sure, kid. I could smell the vodka a mile down the road.”
Andy rolled his eyes, then looked at Linda. “Ma’am, please control your husband or I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you both to leave. Alright? Alright.”
Linda shook her head and ushered Marshall away, but it seemed as though there was still some fight left in him. Andy ignored him. God, he was sick to death of this place. Why did he even stick around here anyway? Men like Marshall were everywhere around here, and even the “smallfolk” tended to be jerks. He took another deep swig of what was most definitely vodka. He was nearing the end of the bottle, but it hardly mattered. His shift was almost over.
He needed the liquor, he’d decided long ago. There simply was no getting by without it. Anyone who told you otherwise was kidding themself, especially in a small town like this. Especially in the winter. Besides, it was the only thing that made the pain go away. Tylenol Supermax. Opioid Lite. However you wanted to view it, it was the only thing that made Andy feel okay.
It wasn’t impossible to leave. Just hard. He’d heard Dorian Baker had finally made it big and skipped town to Nashville. Andy didn’t have much musical talent. Still, he’d always thought Dorian was a cool guy. If he could get out of here, anyone could, right?
Andy had never been more sure in his life that leaving was what he wanted to do. Still, even as he swallowed the last few gulps of Smirnoff in his water bottle, liquid courage itself, he didn’t think he’d ever be brave enough.
3
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Rea was driving. To where? She had no idea. It was a brisk night, but she had all the windows of her 2002 Corolla down, letting the wind whip through her hair. She glanced at her speedometer, ignoring the check engine light that had been there for months now. She was going over a hundred on this immensely straight stretch of freeway. Every so often, she would pass another car meandering at no higher than eighty, and she'd let out a mad cackle. Sometimes they'd honk, so she'd slam hers even longer in response. So long suckers.
She had been trying to sleep, but couldn't. Lying in bed, staring at the glow-in-the-dark stars she had pasted to the ceiling over fifteen years ago, she felt that pit in her stomach deepening and deepening. Whenever she felt as though it would close up and allow her to sleep, she was struck with the remembrance that she had to be back at Benny's at seven the next morning, and her eyes would shoot open. She'd look at the clock. Midnight. One.
She couldn't do it anymore.
Past three, now, surely, and she was driving. Driving, driving, driving, with no end in sight. Seriously, where was she going? East, towards the sunrise. That was all she knew. Dorian was in Nashville. Maybe she'd swing south and surprise him. Or, her ex-girlfriend lived in Chicago now, finishing up grad school. Honestly, Rea had no doubt that she'd welcome her back with open arms.
An image of her current girlfriend flashed in her head: a simple girl, pretty, but not too pretty, with bobbed hazelnut hair and eyes as green as birch leaves in the springtime. She shook the image away. Why was she even thinking about Penelope, or about Dorian, when she had someone wonderful waiting back home for her? She hadn't told anyone she was leaving. She knew that if she did, they would have tried to stop her.
She hadn't even packed a bag.
The highway shot by for what seemed like hours. Eventually, she turned from the 50 onto the 335. Time had already begun to feel rather unreal, now that the idea of clocking in and out of shifts has ceased meaning anything to her. She hadn't called Benny either. Her first customer every morning, Marnie Jones looking for her four packs of Camels and a diet Pepsi, would be disdained to find that the store had never even opened. Within minutes, Benny would receive an earful from her, and would start blowing up her phone. It didn't matter. She'd turned it off.
Eventually, she could be certain that hours had passed because she saw a sign: Topeka, ten miles. She'd never actually been to her own state's capital, despite having lived there her whole life. In fact, she'd never been beyond the state's borders, and this trip was beginning to prove what she had always suspected: Kansas simply never ended. Every other state was a myth.
Then, like clockwork as she passed the sign welcoming her warmly to Topeka, her car made a horrific sound and slowed to a pathetic crawl. Rea cursed and slammed the wheel repeatedly. The poor car struggled along and she just barely managed to pull into a rest stop gas station before it stuttered out completely. She continued cursing as she got out of the car, opening the hood to a plume of foul-smelling smoke.
"Fuck!" She kicked the front grill and let out a soul-ripping scream. Of course this would happen, and now of all times. This little shitbox of hers had never failed to get her from point A to point B. Perhaps that had been her fatal flaw: not deciding on a point B.
Her watch read 5:37 AM. In late October, the dawn was just barely peeking over the horizon, so a spattering of stars could still be seen over the open horizon that seemed endless, even here. She had expected more light pollution, but it seemed as though there were just as many stars as in the countryside. They twinkled and swirled, but she blinked and looked back at her burning up car.
"Fuck," she said again, this time more resigned than angry. She ran her hand through her hair, which was caked with sweat from the sudden stress despite having been freezing only moments ago. Her heart pounded erratically in her chest. "Guess I'll die."
She’d always kind of meant to get good at cars. It was another one of those things her dad was always disappointed about.
"That don't look too good," a gas station attendant was peeking out the door at her, eyebrows raised. He walked over to Rea, flipped on a flashlight, and simply peered into her engine bay, saying nothing. He then crouched down and looked under the car–– again, saying nothing. Rea bristled. Did I ask, bro?
"Bad catalytic converter, looks like.” Said the attendant, groaning and stabilizing his knees as he rose to his feet. He was aging, but he looked like the kind of guy who had been under quite a few cars before. “Takes a lot of wear to get that bad. Tell me, how long was it driving bad before this happened?"
"This car is almost as old as me," Rea said. "It always drives bad."
"Keener eye might have noticed that issue before it got this bad. Take care of your vehicle next time, yeah? I’ll call you a tow. You're stinking up my entire parking lot."
She only stared at him, unable to tell in the twilight whether he was frowning, as unapproving as her father, or smiling like a Cheshire cat.
"How about you come inside and buy Gatorade?” He turned and entered the store, gesturing for her to do the same. “Least you can do."
"Sure, whatever," Rea said, but she hardly heard herself. She sulked into the store and grabbed a Monster energy drink and a large bag of sour cream and onion chips. She walked up to the counter.
"Pack of Parliaments, please," she said softly, unable to muster the energy to speak loudly. The cashier eyed her with concern as he grabbed them for her, ringing her up and taking her cash, which she counted out to the penny.
"You gonna be alright? I'll call the tow company–– on me, don't even worry about it."
"Tow it straight to the junkyard," she told him. "I can't afford the repairs anyway."
"Hey, now. Breakdowns are hard, but you do not need to lose your mind over it."
Rea took out a cigarette and started smoking it in the store.
"What the fuck are you doing?! Don't you know this is a gas station? You are out of your mind."
"Tow it straight to the junkyard," she repeated. Rea gave him the middle finger, took her merchandise, and walked out the door. The man called after her, but she ignored him and the smoking car, and just kept walking, down the merge ramp, down the freeway.
Maybe she should just keep walking until she keeled over. That wouldn't be the easy way out, but it would get the job done. She chugged the energy drink and opened the bag of chips, letting her lit cigarette hang out of her mouth as she did so. Between drags, she shoveled handfuls of chips into her mouth. She could barely taste the excessive sodium. She could barely feel anything at all.
She looked up at the sky. The star-strewn void still just barely hung on as the sky started to lighten. Then, Rea's eyes went wide. Star after star streaked across the sky. She stared up at them, with her jaw wide open, and a few cars honked at her. She realized she was walking down an interstate.
A meteor shower. Maybe this was a sign. Even when life seemed to hit rock bottom, there was still beauty in the world. In fact, it seemed like meteors were still falling around her when she directed her attention back to earth. She would not die today. One funeral, her car's, was enough for one day.
She wasn't sure how far she had walked before she had this revelation. Maybe a mile. Maybe more. Without a car, without a care, and with stardust in her hair, Rea pulled out her phone and called an Uber to anywhere.
4
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Andy woke up slowly. He tried to open his eyes, but the light was blinding, so he squeezed them shut again for a few moments before trying again. Squinting around at his environment, Andy only became more discombobulated. He was so hungover he could barely move, and he groaned, slowly reaching up to wipe the sleep from his eyes. How long had he been out? The last thing he remembered was walking home from work, drinking a few nips of apple whiskey he’d saved for after his shift. He must have overdone it. Again.
How did he get on this train?
This was why he needed to quit drinking. He told himself that every day.
He checked his body, finding that he was wearing the same green sweatshirt and flannel as he had been. His beanie was still on his head, against all odds, and he had cigarettes on him, but no booze. He sighed. Clearly, drunk Andy hadn’t thought ahead. Drunk Andy may not have thought about anything. How did he get on this train?
Despite having no memories of the night before, he felt like he knew. He was fed up after work. Marshall accosting him had been the last straw, and he never wanted to show up to work again in his life. He was too hungover to consider the financial implications of that, but he couldn’t help but wonder where he was headed to. He couldn’t really think of anywhere worth going.
Everything hurt. His body, which had seemed to be falling apart on shift the night before, seemed to barely be holding itself together. The hangover definitely didn’t help the matter. He kept resting his eyes, as he didn’t have any sunglasses, and fell in and out of restless sleep. The sound of the train rumbling over the rails was surprisingly soothing. He realized he’d never been on a train before.
Eventually, not long after a voice announced a stop in somewhere called Fort Madison that Andy had never heard of, an attendant came down the aisles, checking the tickets of the new passengers. Evidently, Andy had already paid his fare, because he had to flag down the attendant.
“H- Hey,” he rasped, holding up a shaky finger and coughing the frog out of his throat. “This may be a weird question, but where is this train going?”
“We’re bound for Chicago, sir. Is this a problem?”
“N- No, no… no problems here.”
The attendant continued down the aisle. “Ticket, please.”
Chicago, huh? Andy shrugged. Honestly, he’d always wanted to visit a big city. He’d asked around, and it seemed like over half of the people who lived in his town had never even been to the capital, never mind a major metropolis like Chicago. Maybe Drunk Andy wasn’t as stupid as he thought. Still, he wished the man had considered packing more alcohol for the road. After all, nothing was more effective at mitigating a hangover than more alcohol. Hair of the dog, as they say.
Hungover without it, and without much to do, Andy fell back into a restless sleep. As soon as he got to Chicago, he decided, he’d find a liquor store.
5
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Well, she was in Chicago. That was where she had wanted to go, in the end. Somehow, against all odds, she’d made it. Rea had found herself in a small café, with the afternoon sun beaming through the wide windows. Through them, more people that Rea has ever seen at one time bustled down the street. She watched them from a stool at the window-bar, ignoring a steaming cup of black coffee in front of her. She would drink it eventually, but for now she was far too enraptured.
There were office workers, walking with purpose on the phone or with a briefcase. Construction workers, in reflective vests and steel-toed boots. Buskers dotted the streets, and street sellers had flagged her down multiple times in an attempt to sell her this or that. These were commonplace fixtures of the big city, but to Rea they were immensely novel. Groups of students. Gaggles of tourists–– was she a tourist? Did hitch-hiking to Chicago on a deranged whim count as tourism?
Eventually, the people passing by grew somewhat repetitive, and she began to slowly sip her cooled coffee as she watched. The bitter taste coated her tongue and she smiled brightly, realizing with utmost certainty that she had absolutely nothing she was obligated to do here. She could have another cup, if she wanted. She could even get a bagel. Her watch read 2:32 P.M. Back home, she would be clocking into her bullshit second job. Here, she had absolutely nothing on her plate.
Still, there was an anxious undercurrent to her exuberance. Where was she going to stay? How was she going to afford anything? She had some cash in her pocket, having cashed her last paychecks from both jobs, but not much at all. It was supposed to go to her mother, to rent. Instead it was feeding her whims and delusions. So what? That place was eating her alive. She had to get out. She had to.
Against her better judgment, Rea fished her phone out of her pocket and turned it on for the first time in far too long. She realized in retrospect that it was probably unwise to have traveled so far alone with her phone off, but for some reason she wasn’t too concerned about it. As it loaded up, she felt that pit in her stomach again, opening like a half-healed wound. She felt sick. Still, she punched in her pin code and let everything load up. She put it down for a few moments, took a deep swig of coffee, which only made her heart pound faster, and inhaled sharply before looking at her messages.
- Benny Bossman -
October 29th, 7:22 AM
[Hey, where are you? I had to come in and my son had to take the bus to school. You’re never unreliable. What happened? Are you alright?]October 29th, 9:10 AM
[???]October 29th, 1:30 PM
[Will you be in tomorrow? I need to know if I have to rehaul the entire schedule. Mack says he can’t cover. Please respond.]October 29th, 2:29 PM
[Your mother tells me she hasn’t seen you since last night, and that you didn’t look so well. Everybody’s worried about you. I hope you’re okay, kid. Don’t do anything crazy.]
- Mother Dearest -
October 29th, 7:30 AM
[Benny says you’re not at work. Where are you?? Are you alright??]October 29th, 8:01 AM
[?????]October 29th, 10:10 AM
[Pumpkin, please answer me. Are you safe? Are you sober?]October 29th, 2:30 PM
[Sweetheart, please. I know this time of year has been hard for you. It’s hard for me too. I know it’s hard to miss him. Please come home. I’ll stop bugging you, if you’re not dead.]October 29th, 2:30 PM
[Please don’t be dead.]
- bbygirl -
October 29th, 8:01 AM
[morning baaaaabe, i hope work is as not horrible as possible <3 ily]October 29th, 1:06 PM
[Oh my god. Your mom told me you’re gone?? Wtf please respond ASAP I’m gonna have a panic attack for real]October 29th, 1:10 PM
[first dorian, now you… are you skipping town without me? what the fuck, babe?]
Rea’s head was spinning by the time she had processed all the correspondence. She finished off her coffee and stood up, simply pocketing her phone without responding to anything. She had no obligations, she reminded herself. All she wanted to do was explore the city. She shrugged on her sweatshirt, zipped it up, and a harsh gust of wind almost knocked her over as she exited the café.
6
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He had been drawn to it like a beacon.
Cloud Gate, it was called, but that’s not so much what it was known as. Gazing up at the massive structure, Andy could see why. It was huge, but above all, it was oblong and curved up in the middle. It was unmistakable. The crown jewel of Millennium Park.
It was the Bean.
When he walked closer and looked into the surface of the Bean, his form shimmered and distorted like a funhouse mirror. There were various groups of tourists around him laughing and marveling at the novelty of the phenomenon. Andy wavered side to side, observing the way the reflective surface altered his persona. He didn’t really like it. It unnerved him. He didn’t understand what all the hype was all about.
He backed up and gazed up at it again, through a pair of dollar store sunglasses he had picked up out of desperation. His head was still killing him, and he was used to it, but the glare of the sun always made it worse. Eventually, tilting his head up and looking towards the reflecting light was too much for him and he looked away, somewhat dizzy.
Nearby, there was an Arab man wearing a dark blue peacoat who was smoking a cigarette. Andy walked up to him and tapped him on the shoulder. The man jolted a bit, startled, but raised his eyebrows in calm inquiry as Andy spoke.
“Hey, dude, can I bum a cig?”
“Oh, yeah. Sure.” the man reached into the pocket of his coat and pulled out a pack, drawing one out and handing it to Andy. “Need a light?”
Andy nodded and the man took out a Clipper and lit it for him. For a moment, they stood there smoking in silence. Andy had his eyes glued to the Bean, still. It had a strangely mesmerizing quality to it. Eventually, the man broke the silence.
“Anish Kapoor designed that, you know. Cloud Gate, he called it, but you probably know what everyone else calls it.”
“The Bean,” Andy said, finally looking at the man for more than a moment. He had a broad face with handsome, defined features, glasses, and a full beard. He had an accent that Andy could place as British, but he wasn’t cultured enough to know exactly what kind. Andy puffed his cigarette and looked back at the Bean.
The man nodded, chuckling a little. “Kapoor hates that people call it that. Well, I guess he claims he’s embraced it now, but I’m not sure if I believe him. Artists can be a little possessive about their art. I don’t blame him, though.”
Andy looked at the man, not sure exactly what to say. He sort of assumed he would walk away, but the man seemed brimming with information about the Bean, and launched immediately into the next topic.
“You see,” he started, and Andy was wondering if he would be expected to pay for this lecture, “there’s this pigment, in the art world, right? It’s called Vantablack. It reflects less light than almost any other substance known to man. The ‘blackest black’ as they called it. Now, you might be thinking, ‘Who cares? It’s just black.’ and you might be right. But Kapoor cared. In fact, he cared so much that he bought an exclusive license to the pigment. Kapoor only. Property of Anish.”
Andy took a long drag. “Sounds like an asshole.”
His eyes glinted like he knew something Andy didn’t. “Oh, you’re far from alone in thinking that. Other artists went mad about it. This one guy, Stuart Semple, even went as far as to sell a ‘pinkest pink’ pigment in retaliation, with the explicit requirement that it not make it into the hands of Anish Kapoor.”
“No way.” Andy was surprised by how interesting this all was. This guy really knew his stuff.
“Yeah, and Kapoor? He got it anyway. Posted it to Twitter with his goddamn middle finger in it.” The man paused for a moment while Andy laughed, then doubled over and coughed for a few moments. “If you ask me, the man’s always been a visionary. So what if he wanted a cool pigment all to himself? White people have been stealing our shit for centuries. Personally? I think Semple was just jealous.”
Andy shook his head, crushing the filter of his spent cigarette in his fingers and tossing it on the ground. “Artists, am I right?”
“Takes one to know one.” The man seemed solemn as he said this, but it was clear to Andy that he knew how to poke fun at his own passions. He liked that. Andy smiled. The man’s cigarette had stopped burning while he was talking. He held out a hand to Andy. “I’m Anas. I go to school over at the Institute. You don’t look like you’re from around here.”
“No,” Andy admitted, hesitating for a moment before shaking the stranger’s hand. “I just blew in today. I’ve never been here before.”
Anas’s eyes widened. “What? Well, you’ll love Chicago. I know I do. Cloud Gate has to be my favorite place in the city to smoke, though. I love reflections. Kapoor did too. I think his work really forces you to take a look inside yourself. Especially right here. Sometimes I look into that mirror and I can’t bear to keep looking. Sometimes, when the light hits just right, and my world is calm… I see the truth.”
Andy was almost stunned speechless again by the sheer breadth of information Anas could convey in very little time. Did he even breathe? Eventually, he settled on, “What’s the truth?”
Anas shrugged. “Fuck if I know.”
Andy burst out laughing and Anas smiled. It wasn’t until Andy got ahold of himself and looked back up at him that he caught a glimpse of it, but Anas was right. In the sunset, with the light bouncing off of the Bean and landing on Anas, he could see a little hint of truth in this moment. Whatever that meant.
“Hey,” Andy beckoned Anas closer so he could speak quietly in his ear, “what the fuck’s a guy gotta do to get some weed around here?”
Anas raised an eyebrow. “It’s legal, dude. You can get it anywhere.”
Andy’s eyes went wider than saucers. “Wait, really? That’s insane.”
Anas couldn’t help but laugh. “Yeah, man… What, are you from Nebraska or something?”
“Worse,” Andy said, with dire pain in his eyes, “Kansas.”
Shaking his head and smiling, Anas pulled a 3x5 notepad out of his pocket like he probably had an entire sculpting kit in there. He skipped through dozens of pages before landing on a blank one, which he scrawled on. “Listen, uh…”
“Andy.”
“Andy.” Anas grabbed Andy’s hand and placed a folded paper into it, closing his fingers around it and holding his hand cupped in his own for a moment. He looked him in the eye. “I gotta go to class, but I’m always around here. Not sure what you’re here for, but if you need anyone to show you around the city, let me know, alright?”
Andy swallowed. “Alright.”
“Right, man. Cheers. See you around, yeah?” Anas swatted him on the back, causing Andy to nearly lose his balance, and dashed off into the crowd.
Andy stared off in the direction he’d run for a moment. What a strange guy. He looked at the paper in his hand and unfolded it. As expected, it was a phone number. He flushed a little, not exactly knowing how to feel about having been given a man’s number, but he stuffed it in his pocket. It couldn’t hurt to keep it.
He’d said he studied at the “Institute,” but Andy hadn’t the faintest clue what that meant. Probably the mental institute. He laughed out loud at his own joke, but no one even seemed to notice. Andy could get used to this. The bustle. The anonymity.
Looking back up at the Bean, Andy was starting to see what Anas meant about the light hitting it in the right way. As the sun was setting, it seemed to glow. The shifting forms of people against the warped streets and architecture seemed to decorate the sculpture like a moving painting, and Andy found himself mesmerized. How did he even make this thing, anyway? It seemed as though not a single seam had been welded in the entire thing. He knew it couldn’t be true, but he could have sworn the thing had to have been a giant drop of mercury. It was a miracle all of Chicago hadn’t been poisoned.
Maybe Anas was onto something. Maybe it wasn’t so lame after all.
7
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Rea was hovering around the outside of a liquor store. Every time a patron walked in and the bell tinkled, she swallowed a lump in her throat. She wanted to drink so badly. She paced back and forth in circles, twiddling her fingers and sighing. There were a handful of people, either standing around nearby or walking past, with a telltale brown paper bag in hand. It would be so easy. Everyone else was doing it.
She leaned against the side of the building and crossed her arms, watching the people as they passed by. She had been trying to avoid it, but here at the threshold between sobriety and relapse she couldn’t help but think of her father. She could hear his voice as clearly as she was still twelve years old.
“Have a sip, kid. You’re old enough for just a sip.”
The whiskey had been painfully bitter on her unacclimated tongue, but she hadn’t wanted to disappoint him by admitting it. Even the small amount of the hundred proof liquor sent her tiny, undeveloped brain swirling, and even though she wouldn’t start really drinking until high school, she would steal many more sips from her father throughout her prepubescence. She missed those sips, now. Her father always seemed to respect her a little bit when she drank. Maybe that was part of why it took her so long to quit.
She glanced at the advertisements in the broad window of the store. Eighteen packs of Budweiser cans were on sale. She could picture the cans, piled up in the corner of her kitchen. At one point, she’d tried to take them out to the recycling, to clear up some space in the ever-cluttered room, but her father had yelled at her.
“What in God’s name do you think you’re doing?” he had growled, and she’d frozen in her tracks.
“I- I was just gonna recycle these.”
He backhanded her in the temple with the hand holding the bottle.
“The hell you were. I’m bringing those to the return center tomorrow. I am not missing out on my rightful deposit because my stupid kid decided to ‘recycle.’ Jesus Christ, what am I even going to do with you?”
She wanted to tell him, you say you’re going to bring them to the return center every week but you never do. She wanted to fight him, to yell back, but her head throbbed and she was simply too tired to resist. Instead, she simply slinked away.
Rea wanted to get her mind off of things. She was on vacation, she’d decided, so she didn’t have to think about her problems. It didn’t matter. His face was on her mind all the time, but here in front of the liquor store, he seemed to stand before her.
“The hell are you lookin’ at, kid?” he said gruffly, his five-o’clock shadow spattered with blood. His face looked as she last remembered it, with his jaw caved in on one side. She couldn’t make out the rest of his body at that moment. It didn’t matter. He wasn’t real.
“You, dad. You look like shit.”
He laughed, giving her a crooked, half-faced smile. “Is that how you greet your dead father? Christ, kid, show some respect.”
“Sorry, dad, but you’re dead. You can’t hurt me anymore.”
“Oh, come on.” A bottle suddenly appeared in her father’s bloody hand, though his arm itself was torn to shreds and full of shards of windshield glass. He took a swig and exhaled contentedly. “Things weren’t always that bad. We had some good times, yeah? Remember the batting cages? Remember the sports bars?”
“I remember, dad. I also remember you drunk driving me home from one of those sports bars. I remember how you called me a pussy for putting on my seatbelt. Oh, and I remember you swerving through a right turn on red, and watching you fly out the window when the F-350 slammed into us.”
Her father cringed, and it was a sickening sight through his broken face. “Alright, I admit, that wasn’t my best moment. But who’s perfect, you know? You don’t hate me, right?”
He’d asked her this before, numerous times, in life. She wasted no time in responding. “Of course I don’t hate you. I’m a little pissed off though. You made me an alcoholic.”
Her father lunged towards her and a pang of anxiety shot through her. “I didn’t make you shit, kid. Every problem you have? You brought them upon yourself. You know why you blame me? You’re just fucking like me. Can’t help it. It’s in your blood.”
Rea covered her ears. “Shut up!”
“You are a pussy, you know. Too much of a coward to die with your dear old dad. But you know what, I’m sure your mother loves that. She always was a sweetheart, and you were her little darling. Go ahead, keep on letting her baby you. Run on home, now. Home to mommy.”
“Shut the fuck up!” She screamed out loud, and a few people turned their heads towards her. She blinked a few times and realized that her father had disappeared. She looked around nervously, then back at the liquor store door. A deep shudder ran up her spine and she bolted away from the establishment, holding her arms around her until the shivers passed.
What did she come here for anyway?
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Women on poles were dancing in the low-light. Andy watched them, and he enjoyed every moment of it, nursing his Jack and Coke. Some were skinny, some were a little more portly, but they were all beautiful. Curves in all the right places, large, shapely breasts, and asses that could drive any man to desperation. Country girls didn’t look like that. His girlfriend didn’t look like that.
He must have hit the marijuana dispensary at some point, because there were a few pre-rolls in his pocket, and with enough of a stash to cope in hand, he’d ended up here. He was drinking in silence when he overheard a man talking to a woman who had walked in the door around the same time as him.
“I’m sorry, lady. I got no problems with you, but people don’t pay for girls like you around here. They just don’t. You don’t uh… you don’t have the look.”
“Come on,” she was begging, with a crooked smile on her face, “I’m a hard worker, and I learn quick. I really need the money right now. I just got to the city and I have no idea how I’m going to pay my way.”
“Well, I don’t know what to tell ya. We don’t have any vacancies.”
“Please? Come on man, please. I’ll do anything…” she tugged on his shirtsleeve with a lusty look in her eyes and he shook it away, glaring at her.
“Hey, get your hands off me. Listen, we don’t have a job to offer you. Take it easy or I’m calling security, you hear?”
He turned away and briskly walked off into the employees only area. With a sigh, the girl turned towards the bar where Andy was sitting. She had a sad look to her, and she was pretty, but in that country way that the strippers on the poles surpassed by leagues. Aside from her casualwear of a sweatshirt and leggings, she wore large, novelty earrings, a black choker, and a large glass-blown pendant. It looked good on her. She looked good.
“Hey, don’t listen to him,” Andy told her. “You look just fine.”
She shrugged and hopped up on the barstool next to him, hanging her head in the palm of her hand. “Maybe. But ‘fine’ doesn’t pay for a night at a hotel.”
“Fair enough.” Andy finished his drink and hailed the bartender for another. The woman tending bar held up a finger as she shook another customer’s margarita. Andy turned to the girl and held his hand out. “I’m Andy.”
“Rea,” she said, shaking it. “You from around here?”
“Nah. Just blew in from Kansas.”
Rea’s eyes widened. “No shit, really? Me too.”
“No way!”
“Way.”
The two sat quietly for quite some time, making eye contact in the bar mirror.
“Can I buy you a drink, Rea?” Andy asked as the bartender made her way over to replenish his Jack and Coke.
The girl shook her head. “I’m sober, actually.”
Andy tilted his head side to side, and when his drink arrived, he stirred it for a few moments. “Good for you, I guess. I’ve thought about it. I keep waking up in places I don’t mean to be. Doing things I don’t mean to do.”
“I know the feeling,” Rea said with a sigh.
“So you’re a party girl,” Andy chuckled, taking a sip of his new drink. “Must be hard, not drinking. I don’t think I could ever do it.”
“It is hard,” she told him, with a fierce determination in her eyes, “but it’s not impossible. I was just like you, you know. I thought I could never do it. But, it’s not just one day at a time. It’s one moment at a time. Every moment you don’t drink matters. You can stop whenever you want to… it’s wanting to that is the hard part. It takes willpower.”
“I don’t have willpower,” Andy told her with a scoff, downing the rest of his drink in one concerning gulp. “It’s bullshit. Some people get clean. Others die in the gutter. You don’t always get what you want, you know. I want to get sober. You want to be a stripper.”
“Oh, come on. That’s not the same thing. They were discriminating against me.”
“No, really. Can you blame them for rejecting you, when you look like that? I mean, sure, you’re pretty, but these places have a different standard.”
Rea shook her head, and her long brown hair scattered messily around her shoulders. “You know what, I don’t need to take this from you. Fuck you.”
Andy shrugged. “Suit yourself. Talk to me when you’re back in reality. Later.”
See? Country girls. Always full of drama. Daddy issues, he was sure of it. As the liquor really started to take hold, he left the bar, unsure where he was going.
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Rea thought Andy was the one full of shit. She knew it was possible to get sober, because she’d done it, right? I mean, sure, she still spent a lot of time hovering around the liquor store. Sure, she still spent a lot of time at the bar. And sure, she still felt just as shitty as she did while she was drinking, but she was trying, right? She had willpower. He didn’t. He could go fuck himself for all she cared.
She grabbed the bartender’s attention. “Can I just get some water? From the tap is fine.”
The bartender gave her a funny look as she cleared away Andy’s empty glass, but nodded and filled a cup with ice water. Rea always felt weird being sober at bars, but she felt at home there. There was truly no better place to brood than at a bar counter alongside other miserables. With a deep sigh, she stirred the straw around in her water, watching the ice dance around in circles.
“Hey, mind if I buy you a drink?”
Rea blinked and looked up. There was an older man leaning on the bar counter, with a graying beard and a long brown ponytail. His face showed that he was a man who’d smiled much during his lifetime, and the one he showed her now was wide and hopeful. She liked the look in his eyes. It seemed the opposite of the look men typically tended to give her.
“I don’t drink, actually,” she told him, twisting a lock of her pin-straight hair, “but you can sit with me.”
The man chuckled and hopped up on the barstool. Literally, he hopped. She realized he was actually rather short. Probably about her height, if not a little shorter. Still, she was intrigued by the way he dressed and carried himself. He had the build and look of a mountain climber, with a dark green fleece vest over a simple white and gray plaid shirt, but he had a watch that, at a glance, cost more than her car. She realized with a twinge of embarrassment that he was watching her watch him.
Without taking his eyes off her, he held out a large, knuckly hand. “I’m Rob Howard. To whom do I owe the pleasure?”
Rea shook his hand, which was bigger than hers was, and felt like it could envelop her. “Rea. Call me Rea.”
“Rea,” Rob repeated, as though tasting the word on his tongue. The flavor seemed to be to his liking. “That’s a beautiful name. Now tell me, do you spell that with an ‘h” or without?”
“Thank you,” she said, blushing a little. She’d never heard that before. “Without.”
The two looked at each other for a moment and Rea found that she liked soaking in the clear attraction the man was expressing towards her. She’d always known she was bisexual, but until now, she’d really only had luck in love with women, and even that was debatable.
“I heard what the manager said.” Rob cut to the chase, solemnity in his eyes. “I think he’s a fool not to hire you. I personally think you’re incredibly beautiful. I’ve always had a thing for girls like you.”
Rea raised her eyebrows, trying not to let it show that his flattery was working on her. “Really, now? And how do I know you’re not just saying that?”
“Well for starters, because I don’t have to.” Rob shrugged, fidgeting a little with his watch. “I don’t feel the need to lie to people. Really, I find it exhausting. Don’t you hate that? The way people always expect you to lie all the time?”
She kind of got what he meant. There was an unspoken social code that took some people, especially those who preferred to wear their heart on their sleeve, longer to crack. Say this, but don’t say that. If you think this, keep it to yourself. Some people weren’t equipped to adapt to that, and he seemed like one of those people. “I suppose. I’m pretty good at it though.”
Rob chuckled, taken aback a little at that response. “Oh? So, what, so Rea might not even be your real name?”
“Maybe not,” she teased. “What are you gonna do about it?”
“Oh, trust me,” he murmured, giving her a look like she was Thanksgiving turkey, and he hadn’t eaten all day, “there’s plenty that I’d like to do.”
Rea bit her lip. She wasn’t sure she’d even been hit on so hard before, especially not by someone she actually thought was this handsome. As forward as he was being, and as suddenly as this had all happened, she realized she wanted him. “Is that so, Rob Howard? And what makes you think I’m on board with all that?”
“You’re blushing, for one,” he said, grinning. “That, and you’re playing with your hair. Women always play with their hair when they’re flustered.”
Caught red-handed, she dropped the lock she’d been fiddling with. “Wow, look at you. Truly a learned scholar of womankind.”
Rob shrugged, winking. “I try to read up on all the latest literature.”
Rea tapped her nails against the quartz face of Rob’s watch before settling her hand on his. “So, what’s a guy like you gotta do to get a watch like that?”
With a chuckle, he looked at it, then back at her. “If I lied to you, would you even really care? Maybe I should come up with something more flashy. Maybe I’m a politician. Or a writer.”
“Nice try. Those are just other Rob Howards.”
Rob shook his head, chuckling, but his eyes kept coming back to her. “Impressive. Most young ladies don’t even realize that’s what I’m doing.”
“I know a lot of useless information about a lot of useless things.”
“Well, you could say that’s what they pay me for.” He smirked. “My father and I are co-partners in Howard & Howard Insurance.”
“Fascinating,” Rea said drily. “You should have gone with writer.”
“Well, shit.” Rob snapped his fingers in mock defeat. “Guess I missed my shot.”
“Well, you know the rule.” She leaned coyly on her hand and smiled. “It takes three strikes before you’re out. There’s still a chance you could walk.”
“And she knows baseball? A woman out for my own heart.” Rob clenched his hand into a fist, inhaling deeply, and loosened it again. Rea loved driving this man crazy. “Alright, well pitch me another.”
“Okay, here’s a curveball,” she said. “Does your wife know you’re out flirting with young girls?”
Rob narrowed his eyes. “I’m not wearing a ring.”
“Well, does she?”
A sigh, another excessive head shake, and an exhale of sheer disbelief. She was blowing his mind. He made it obvious. “Okay, well, full disclosure–– probably. Like I said, I’m not good at lying. I’m a bit better at not telling the full truth. If it’s any consolation, she fucks around on me too.”
“Oh, that’s a given.” Rea sucked down the rest of her water. “You rich people’s marriages are always falling apart.”
“Yeah, and you gorgeous young women are half the reason why.” Rob drummed his fingers impatiently on the bar counter. “Listen, maybe I’m ruining my first-base lead here, but am I wrong in assuming you could use a cigarette?”
“Not wrong,” she admitted. “I’m kinda fiending right now. More than ever now that I’m sober.”
Rob nodded and got up, beckoning her outside. She followed him gladly outside, where he pulled out a pack of American Spirits and offered her one.
“Oooh, fancy,” she mocked as she took it and let him light it for her.
“The organic tobacco almost makes me forget about the cancer.”
“I feel the tar leaving my lungs already.”
Rob laughed again, and Rea realized she was growing rather fond of hearing it. “Listen, Rea. I really like you. I mean, hell, I knew you were gorgeous, but it turns out you’re a knockout. I couldn’t help but overhear that you need a place to stay the night.”
“Are you inviting me home with you?”
Rob nodded. “No pressure whatsoever. Honestly, I wouldn’t want to do anything unless you wanted to. I’m happy to just sit and talk all night. You’re a riot. It’s not so often I meet a woman as special as you are.”
“Aww, you’re so full of shit,” Rea cooed. “But, I love it. I’m in.”
“You’re in?” Rob almost didn’t believe it.
“I’m all in.” Rea said. Their cigarettes smoldered as hot as their expressions did. “So, are we doing this or what?”
There was an ashtray outside the club, and they dropped their butts in it and kissed each other, like a tornado touching down. She felt his muscled arms. He felt her soft skin. They could have jumped each other’s bones there on the street, but he pulled away breathlessly.
“I’ve got a penthouse a few blocks from here.”
“Well, what are we waiting for?”
Time flew by in a blur, and as if none at all had passed, she was lying on her side smoking another butt on a large, comfortable sofa in an opulent penthouse. The decor was minimalist, just like she’d seen in the movies, and the way he looked at her made her feel like the most valuable decoration in the room. In front of her, Rob Howard took his clothes off, slowly. In the end, it was him who gave her the strip show. Maybe he should have applied for the job.
Soon enough, her clothes shed too. Their bodies touched, their souls collided, and for just a while, they were the only thing that mattered to each other. Rea’s country girl back home mattered just as little as Rob’s rich wife. Nothing mattered but the love they were making right there in that room.
After, they smoked and talked again, for what felt like hours, but there was no stopping them from getting their hands on each other again. She almost wanted to tell him she loved him, just to see what he’d say if she did, but even a pretty little liar had a limit. If anything, she liked him too much to tell him she loved him. What was love anyway? It surely was what they were making, but what did it mean?
Late in the night, as she grew too sleepy to properly recall exactly how long they’d stayed up, she stared, naked, out the penthouse window at the city skyline, scattered with lights that seemed to shimmer and sparkle like the stars in Kansas did. Rob came up behind her, wrapping his arms around her and nuzzling his face into the crook of her neck. She tilted her head to the side, closed her eyes, and smiled as he planted kiss after kiss on her bare skin.
This, she decided. This is what the big city is all about.
10
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Andy woke up, for the second day in the row, with no idea how he got where he was. The cold morning air chilled him to the bone, and as he slowly processed his surroundings, he realized he was outside. His thin sweatshirt was not doing a great job of protecting him from the windchill, but he was sheltered from it for the most part by the side of the building he was huddled against. He was curled in the fetal position, clutching a half-empty fifth of vodka. Andy groaned.
This is why he needs to quit drinking.
For quite some time, Andy lay there, wondering how he got to this point. He swore there was a point in time where he never wanted to end up like this. There was a version of him that desperately wanted to avoid making these exact mistakes, but he didn’t know what happened to that guy. If he’d even existed, he was long dead. This was his grave. He had no choice but to lie in it.
No, literally, he had no choice. When Andy made any attempt to move any limb of his body more than an inch, his nerves failed him and pain radiated from every joint. His heart was pounding, as it often tended to when he woke up, and he let out a long, pained groan. Not this again. This tended to happen when he pushed his body too hard. He hated his pathetic, broken sack of a body. No wonder he drank. How else was he supposed to keep the pain at bay?
Still, there was no helping it. Andy was too weak to move, never mind stand. He wanted to cry. He thought about doing so, but he couldn’t figure out how. He thought about asking for help, but he didn’t want to be a burden. Instead, he lay there, clinging to his bottle and unable to even lift his arms high enough to twist off the cap. Unable to lift his head high enough to take a sip. Slowly but surely, he regained bits and pieces of his strength. His heart still pounded, but its effort paid off, for where there was hardly a neuron firing, blood steadily began to flow. Andy’s breath was short and ragged. He found himself unable to fill his lungs completely, and no breath he took seemed strong enough to get oxygen flowing to his brain.
This is why he needed to quit smoking.
He wished this was a rare occurrence. Really, he did. Andy hated calling out, and would push through his frequent pain wherever he could, but there had been a handful of occasions where not even his best was enough and he was stuck at home in bed. Each time, his mother would dote on him to the point of irritating him, asking if he would just please see a doctor. Each time, he would refuse and lay in bed miserably, wishing and hoping he would feel better the next day and be able to work. He always managed.
As long as he could make it to work the next day, there was no reason to see a doctor.
Eventually, Andy had managed to adjust himself out of his fetal slump to a position where he leaned, head lolling, against the side of the building. The ever-constant headache pierced through his skull, but at least he found it easier to breathe in this position. He had been shivering, but now he was sweating, and he still didn’t quite have the energy to shed his sweatshirt. Besides, the moment he did, he’d be freezing again. That cold wind blew again, this time bringing him slight relief.
He was a mess.
“Adam? Is that you?”
It took Andy a moment to realize it was him that was being addressed. His name wasn’t Adam, after all, and even if it was, there wasn’t really anyone he knew in this city. Besides, he could hardly think without expending more energy than he had. He squinted into the morning sun, unsure what happened to the sunglasses he’d had before, and could vaguely make out the shape of a man blocking it out.
“Hey, Adam. Are you alright? What the fuck happened to you?”
At this point, Andy realized who was talking to him based on his accent alone. “Anas?”
“Yeah, man. You look like shit.”
Andy took a shaky breath, as deep as he could manage, and exhaled as he spoke. “I feel like shit… How did you find me?”
“Well, I wasn’t exactly looking. I’m just on my way back to my flat, but here you are, looking absolutely knackered.”
“I feel like I died and came back to life,” Andy muttered, “but wrong, like when you revive your wife and she’s a zombie.”
“You look the part.” Anas chuckled, pausing for a moment, unsure if it would be rude to intrude more than he already had. “Do you need help?”
Andy didn’t want it, but he did feel like he needed it. “I can’t exactly stand up.”
Anas’s facial expression was still completely un-parsable to Andy. “Do you want me to take you to the emergency room?”
The response came faster than a bullet from its barrel. “No! S- Sorry, but no. I hate hospitals. Besides, I’m fine.” He realized how absolutely bullshit that sounded. “Well, I’ll be fine. I just could use… I could use a rest.”
“Christ, Adam… did you spend the whole night on the street?”
“I…” Andy paused for a moment. “I don’t know. Probably. It’s uh, it’s Andy, by the way.”
He was starting to be able to see the details of Anas’s face again, just in time to watch his mortified expression. “Oh, shit… Sorry about that. I thought I was doing so well, too.”
Andy laughed weakly. “Don’t even worry about it. I kinda like Adam. Maybe I’ll change it.”
Anas rolled his eyes, crouching down and offering Andy his arms. “Oh, hush. Let’s get you up, yeah? I live right around the corner. You can rest up as long as you need.
Andy didn’t respond, instead focusing all of his energy on using Anas’s arms as support. Once they supported enough of his weight, Anas helped pull him to his wobbly, barely functional feet.
“You’re rather warm,” Anas remarked nervously, and Andy was surprised at how well Anas was able to support his weight. “Can you walk?”
“Maybe.”
“Well, let’s give it a shot.”
Together, the two men straggled down the street, Anas needing to catch Andy multiple times when his legs simply gave out beneath him. Anas was growing more and more concerned by the moment, suggesting once again that perhaps he should go to the emergency room.
“No!” Andy insisted again. “No, please, god, no. I’ll literally die.”
Anas shook his head. “Suit yourself. We’re just about here anyway.”
On the front steps of Anas’s building, Andy collapsed for a moment, attempting to catch his breath. Anas just stared at him, hands in his coat pockets, not really knowing what to say.
“My flat is in the basement,” Anas told him, “so there’s stairs, but they go down. Do you think you can make it, or shall I carry you?”
Andy looked up at Anas, unsure if that was a joke. Anas seemed dead serious, but Andy was not about to let this strange man carry him bridal style down a staircase. Besides, he was scraping the bottom of the barrel, but his muscles had at least started to engage themselves, so there was more energy to be found. In an attempt to prove this, Andy reached up (an effort in itself), gripped the metal railing, and pulled himself to his shaky feet, wobbling and using the rail to stabilize himself. His entire body shook, but he was standing.
“I got it,” he said.
Anas nodded. “Right-o.”
They made their way inside slowly, and Anas let Andy collapse on his low, somewhat beaten-down sofa. Andy moaned with delight at the comfort of something that wasn’t a city sidewalk, and his entire body seemed to burn with exhaustion and strain. He lay like that for an inordinate amount of time, and Anas said nothing until Andy seemed like he was ready.
“So, rough night?”
Andy gave half a chuckle. “You could say that.”
“What happened?”
Andy shrugged.
“You really don’t know?”
“Nah.” Andy stared up at the ceiling. “Not a clue.”
Anas scoffed, and Andy didn’t have the energy to decide if he was being judged or if he should be offended. “Right… Does this sort of thing happen a lot?”
“The forgetting shit thing or the not being able to move thing?”
“Both.”
Perhaps it was just the sheer scope of his exhaustion, or perhaps it was the fact that he was so far away from anyone who knew him. Either way, he was compelled to admit it. “Yes.”
“My brother’s a neurologist,” Anas said, but Andy was waving the idea off before he even finished. “I could give him a ring. He might be able to squeeze you in.”
“Nah, nah. I’m fine. Thank you, though.” Andy hesitated before adding, “I appreciate it.”
Andy hadn’t realized Anas was even brewing it until a cup of tea was placed on the coffee table beside him. That was tempting enough that Andy carefully rose to a seated position and crossed his legs, picking up the cup and smelling it before tentatively having a taste. Anas was already drinking his own, and watched as Andy tried it.
“Earl grey.” Andy smiled. “My favorite.”
Anas did a tiny little fist pump. “Aw, thank fuck. I had an inkling you were a bergamot kinda guy.”
“Who isn’t?”
“You’d be surprised.”
The two men nursed their tea in silence for a while and Andy, finally finding some of his senses, took in the environment around him. The studio was dimly lit and decorated mostly with geometric art, tapestries and ornate rugs. The bed was unmade and a large, expensive-looking wooden table had numerous plans and schematics scattered across it, alongside many drafting instruments. Andy realized he didn’t even own a T.V. or a computer.
“Worried about the radio waves?” Andy hazarded.
Anas narrowed his eyes. “Pardon?”
“No electronics.”
“Oh.” Anas shook his head and chuckled. “Nah, I just used to be a bit wrapped up in the digital age. Always on social media. Binging too much Netflix. Got too angry at video games. One day I just up and binned everything. Perhaps that seems mad, but I’m a lot happier without it. If I need a computer, the library’s not far at all.”
“I don’t think that’s crazy,” Andy said, but then whatever he was going to say was completely derailed when he made direct eye contact with a small animal hopping about on the carpet. “Oh my god you have a bunny.”
Anas smiled and nodded, reaching down and rubbing his fingers together, beckoning the little white rabbit over to him. Surprising Andy, it obeyed him, and even hopped onto his lap. It still gave Andy a wary look, however. It snuffled its nose repeatedly as Anas stroked the top of its head.
“Oh yeah, this is Amira. She’s my little princess.”
Andy couldn’t help but grin like an idiot at the adorable scene unfolding in front of him. He hated to admit it, but he was really starting to like this guy. “I fucking love her. I would die for her.”
“Same,” Anas said, “but please don’t. I’d be rather offended if you did after I hauled your arse all the way here.”
Andy couldn’t think of a joke to make. For whatever reason, his heart sank as reality sank in. “You might have saved my life, Anas. I really don’t know.”
“Oh, please. You seem resilient like a cockroach.”
“I’m taking that as a compliment.”
“As you rightly should.”
Andy fished his phone out of his pocket, but it was dead. “Hey, Anas, do you by any chance have an Android phone charger? Or are you more of a flip phone kind of guy.”
“I am, in fact, ‘more of a flip phone kind of guy,’ but you’re in luck.” Anas got Amira to hop off his lap and walked across the room, fishing a charger out of a drawer. “I keep a few around, for mates.”
Andy handed Anas his phone and he plugged it in. Andy couldn’t help but notice that Amira had made quite the meal out of the charger cable, and he figured that anyone but Anas who tried to handle it would likely electrocute themself. Frankly, Anas’s technological aversion made even more sense now. Andy was willing to bet whatever cord he did use for his flip phone was absolutely eviscerated. This man liked to live life on the edge.
Despite having recovered some energy briefly, and having downed a cup of black tea, Andy was still absolutely exhausted. He had lain down again and his eyes kept fluttering shut. He was struggling to keep them open for more than a minute. Anas noticed this.
“Hey man, I’ve got to do some work for class, but you’re welcome to crash as long as you like. Methinks you need some serious rest. Whatever happened to you last night, you must have really overdone it. Not that I’m judging. We’ve all been there.”
“You an architect?” Andy murmured, eyes fully closed, but remembering the papers on the table.
“I’m trying to be, at least. I’m graduating soon, and I don’t exactly have a job lined up yet. I might be slacking, so I’m trying to beef up my portfolio.”
“You’re gonna be great, dude,” Andy said, losing track of what he was even talking about as his consciousness slipped away. “You’re gonna kill it.”
Andy passed out.
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Rea was starting to regret everything. She remembered her car, probably dead in a ditch somewhere. Why hadn't she even considered the engine light that had been glaring right at her for a whole year? She remembered her mother, probably crying her eyes out wondering when her only child would come home. She'd already lost her drunk of a husband last October. Now she was certainly convinced she'd lost her drunk of a daughter as well. Ever since her father had died, Rea's mother had been more paranoid than she already was. Constantly texting. Constantly on-edge. Where is my baby? Rea had been gone over thirty-six hours now. Surely, her mother had filed a missing person report by now.
Not that anyone would find her.
The confusion lay where the regrets and the good aspects of this whole excursion started to blend together. Sure, she was starting to have some mixed feelings about it all, but she didn't regret coming here. She didn't regret abandoning her jobs and letting down her bosses. If anything, she regretted sticking around that dead-end town as long as she did. Despite this, she was glaringly aware of the fact that as soon as the paychecks she was subsisting off of ran out, she'd have nothing, and they were disappearing astonishingly fast.
Another thing she didn't regret was Rob Howard. Admittedly, there was a twinge of guilt deep within her when she remembered her girlfriend back home, but it didn't bother her as much as she'd thought it would. If anything, it was only reminding her what she already knew: she wasn't happy in her relationship. She hadn't been for quite a while. She probably shouldn't have cheated, but she couldn't take it back now. It happened. It happened and she didn't regret it.
If she checked her phone, she’d probably have dozens of texts from her, but she wasn’t checking. In fact, she’d muted her, alongside anyone from her hometown who had tried to get in contact with her. Once he’d realized she wasn’t coming into work, Benny and her other boss had given up attempting to contact her. No one else had even bothered so far. Rea had figured that would happen.
Her head was pounding. She was shivering, even though it was warm in the library she was currently huddled in. With her knees tucked up, she hugged her sweatshirt around her and leaned her head on the side of the comfortable armchair she had found. She could fall asleep here. Why was she still always so sick? So tired? She got sober. She tried to rest. She couldn’t exactly remember leaving Rob’s penthouse. It must have been in the very early hours of the morning, and she figured she must have slept, but not too much if so.
Man, she was really lonely. She had half a mind to go back to Rob, but he wasn’t what she was looking for. Last night, absolutely. Now? Not so much.
Rea remembered, suddenly, one of the main reasons Chicago had crossed her mind as a place to go in the first place. With a start she jumped up and looked around. This was an extremely large library, she realized. She really didn’t want to have to talk to a librarian, but she figured she had very little choice. She approached the circulation desk.
“Excuse me,” she said awkwardly, “where would I go to use a computer?”
“Do you have a library card?”
“No.”
“Well, you need a library card. I can sign you up if you’d like.”
Rea sighed, pulling out her wallet. “Sure.”
She engaged in the somewhat tedious bureaucracy of signing up for a library card, then was directed to a separate room full of computers she could log onto. She sat down at the first one that was available and waited impatiently as the computer loaded up at the speed of a wounded snail. She was used to this, as wi-fi wasn’t exactly amazing where she grew up, but it still drove her crazy. She drummed her fingers on the desk. She chewed on the aglet of her sweatshirt lace.
It loaded. She clicked on a browser. That one took even longer to open, and each web page seemed to take its sweet time, which was less than ideal when she didn’t exactly know how to obtain the information she was looking for. Eventually, though, she had it.
At first, she wasn’t sure the number would even work. It rang and rang and rang, but when it went to voicemail, the voice was unmistakable.
“Hi, you’ve reached Penelope. Leave a message, or don’t I guess. But only if it’s funny.”
Rea’s breath caught in her throat and she cleared it before the tone sounded. “H- Hey, Penelope. It’s uh… it’s me. This may be out of the blue but, I’m in town. Chicago, I mean. And I miss you. I miss you a lot, actually. Fuck, this sounds ridiculous… call me back at this number if you wanna meet up.”
Rea sat and waited, not knowing exactly what else to do. Time passed slowly, or quickly, but it passed. Then, the phone rang, and Rea smiled.
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Andy never realized he liked window shopping. Back home, there weren’t too many stores to choose from downtown. There was the bank, a few failing small businesses, and a whole bunch of space for lease. People always talked like there would be a resurgence, like someone was going to revitalize downtown and the people would start swarming to visit, but it never happened. That was for the better, Andy thought. No one should ever go there if they could avoid it.
He figured that if he even so much as mentioned the name of his hometown to anyone here they’d have never even heard of it. He wanted to keep it that way.
The shops in this particular district were rather upscale, and Andy knew that he didn’t have enough cash in his pocket to even buy a pair of socks from any of them. Really, he wasn’t sure exactly where he was headed that brought him to this area. It seemed that was happening a lot lately. Ever since he’d followed his drunken whim to hop on a train to Chicago, he’d felt like any whim was worth following. Why not? That was his new life philosophy.
Perhaps a more inhibited version of Andy would answer “why not?” rather simply: because you are in terrible pain, you are still exhausted, and you haven’t stopped limping since this morning. But Andy didn’t care. He could manage, even if it took great effort. Sure, he had to rest often, but that was just a great excuse to check out some of the shop displays. He was just happy to be able to walk at all.
Two mannequins stood proudly in a boutique window. One of them held her left arm out daintily, with a handbag hanging off the elbow, and her right hand on her hip. She wore a fitted sleeveless dress in a bold cerulean with black stripes, and pitch black heels. Andy liked the look, but he had never seen anyone wearing anything like it until he came here. It was very city. The other, with both arms loosely flowing at her sides, wore a delicate patterned sundress of brown, yellow and white. With tan flats and a decoratively-tattered straw sunhat, Andy could actually picture his girlfriend wearing that one.
He kept walking, ignoring the piercing pain in his left leg every time he put weight on it. It was odd, looking at all the different stores and the numerous options. Andy had never felt like he had options. Same sweatshirt, sweatpants, and t-shirts every day. Same worn-down beanie. Same long, pulled-back hair. He caught a glimpse of himself in the reflection of a store window. He examined his face, where some stubble was beginning to come in, and grimaced. He hated the way his skin looked and felt when his beard was growing out. The sooner he could shave, the better. Other than that, though, he felt he didn’t look too bad. The last time he’d really gotten a good look at himself had been in the distorted reflection of The Bean, and that was a rather misleading representation of his actual look. In reality, Andy thought he looked quite nice.
Sometimes, in the darkness, when he looked in the mirror, he could see his face shift and twist into shapes that were not his own. It didn’t unnerve him as much anymore as it used to, but it was a little weirder when it started to happen in the day. The Bean had only exacerbated that effect, but Andy was even beginning to see it now. He saw his face begin to change into someone he thought he might have recognized, but couldn’t place, and he didn’t like it one bit, so he looked away.
This was why he needed to quit drinking.
Andy took a sip from a handle of whiskey he’d picked up at some point and hidden in a paper bag. He’d already smoked up a lot of the joints he’d bought, but he still had a few to hold him over. He’d worked up a nice buzz over the course of the afternoon, and he was in a pretty good mood despite the pain. After all, the liquor and weed made it a lot harder to care. He thought of all the sights he’d already seen in his short time in the city and smiled. Really, he’d been so lucky with the amount of hospitality he’d received.
Stopping in his tracks, Andy leaned against a nearby wall for a few moments. Fishing around in his pockets––first his sweatshirt, then his pants––Andy pulled out his phone and a slip of paper. He dialed the number and added it to his contacts, then slowly began formulating a text.
- Anas Beanguy -
October 30th, 6:22 PM
{hi Anas its Andy, just wanted to say hi. I know u have classes tonight but maybe tomorrow we could meat at the bean? I just want 2 thank u…}
Andy kept walking for a bit, then his phone buzzed in his pocket.
- Anas Beanguy -
October 30th, 6:30 PM
[Absolutely, dude! How’s 11?]October 30th, 6:32 PM
{sounds epic. I’ll see u then!}October 30th, 6:33 PM
[:D]
Andy smiled, holding the phone to his chest for a moment before putting it away. He squinted for a moment as he saw a woman rushing past. His head hurt a lot, but he was pretty sure it was her.
“Hey, aren’t you that girl from last night?”
“Can’t talk,” she said, waving him off. “Gotta go.”
“Where the hell are you off to in such a hurry?”
She scoffed and dashed off. “Like I’d tell you! Asshole!”
Andy rolled his eyes. He didn’t need to stick around this district anymore. He had better shit to do.
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Rea was surrounded by noise and commotion. She checked her watch, somewhat confused, and saw that she was actually about a half hour late for the game. How did that happen? She swerved through the crowd of fans and finally managed to track down the section where her seat was listed on the e-ticket she’d been sent. Rea shielded her eyes with her hand and peered across the crowd. A wave caught her attention and she smiled when she saw who she was looking for. Right in front of first base, in what seemed to be pretty decent seats. Rea approached the person who had waved at her and plopped down in the adjacent bleacher seat.
“Hi, Penelope.”
The girl she had approached was short, white, and had shoulder-length blonde curly hair that was pulled into pigtails. Her smile was awkward, almost forced, but there was a hint of genuine warmth there. They both had every reason to feel a little awkward. This was, after all, the first time they’d seen each other in years.
“Long time no see.”
“Yeah. You look good.” Rea said, honestly. Penelope had put on quite a bit of weight since they’d last seen each other, but she was just as beautiful. Penelope shook her head and sighed.
“Thanks, I guess. I don’t really think so, though. I got so fat.”
Rea shrugged. “You know I never really cared about that shit.”
“Everyone cares.”
“Yeah, well, that’s stupid.”
Penelope was snacking on Cracker Jacks, like a true classic baseball fan. “Well, you didn’t miss much. The first and second innings were up and down, now Doug Parsons is taking his sweet time walking half the lineup. 2 outs, bases loaded. No idea what the fuck he’s doing.”
Judging from the venom that dripped off the name, Doug Parsons was the enemy pitcher. Rea squinted at the field. “Who are we even fighting?”
Penelope rolled her eyes. “Did you even check the ticket? It’s the Brewers. And you claim to be a Cubs fan?”
“No one claims to be a Cubs fan.”
Penelope was not amused. “Wow, okay.”
“Whoa, damn, sorry.” Rea was already beginning to regret coming here, but she had to remember that obviously, given the circumstances of this reunion, things would be a bit awkward at first. “I’ve always wanted to go to a real major league game, you know? Watching it on T.V. just isn’t the same. Thank you so much for inviting me, I was not expecting that.”
Penelope shrugged. “Well, I have season tickets. And I wasn’t exactly expecting a call from you. I figured, why not? I would have just taken my brother again, otherwise.”
“Season tickets, huh?” Rea whistled, stretching her arms above her head. She got dizzy, suddenly, from the strain, and lowered them slowly. “That’s pretty impressive.”
“Yeah, well, I’m working now, on top of my Ph.D. So I’m making decent money.”
“Damn, you already got a job?”
“Yep.” Penelope didn’t elaborate. Rea realized she didn’t even know what Penelope was studying these days. That alone was an indicator that Penelope was still testing the waters of their relationship. In the olden days, she would have launched into an explanation immediately. Instead, she changed the topic. “Are you still working at old Benny’s?”
“Kinda. I have a night gig too, now, but I might have skipped town without telling anyone.”
“Wow,” Penelope raised her eyebrows, but her eyes were focused on the game. Rea wanted to pay attention, but her head was swirling, her heart was throbbing, and she was trying desperately to navigate the social sea she had marooned herself on. Why exactly had she called her ex, again? She was making all kinds of questionable decisions lately.
“Yeah, ‘wow’ is right…” Rea looked at Penelope. She had always been such a fun, interesting person, but she, like Rea, was damaged. Alcoholic father, worse than even hers had been, and a narcissistic overbearing mother. Frankly, Rea had always been afraid for her. Now, at least, on her own, she seemed to be faring better than she had been in Kansas. Rea figured she should push the college subject. “So, I probably should know this, but you know how I am… what are you studying?”
With a little scratch of her chin, Penelope smiled a little as she answered. “Social work. I’m doing my dissertation on the changes in individuals with borderline personality disorder as they age from teenagers into adults. I don’t think enough people talk about how much things can change. How people can get better.”
“That’s so cool,” Rea said, smiling. She loved it when Penelope talked about the things she was passionate about. “And what are you doing for work?”
“You wouldn’t even believe me if I told you.”
Rea scoffed, waving her hand dismissively. “Of course I would.”
“I’m a crisis line operator.”
Rea was dumbfounded. “Okay, I admit, that one kinda shocked me. Really?”
“Yep.”
“But you’re so… you’re so…” Rea trailed off, fearing she was about to step directly onto a pile of eggshells, but Penelope only laughed.
“Unstable?”
Rea relaxed a little and laughed along. “I mean, yeah. But to be honest, Penelope, you seem to be doing a lot better than me. I’ve hit a bit of a low point, I think.”
“Well, you disappeared to Chicago and called me. So, clearly something is wrong.”
“Oh, shut up.”
Penelope flagged down a man selling craft beer. She got out a small wad of cash and looked at Rea. “You want one?”
Every bone in Rea’s body screamed ‘yes’, but she was steadfast. “No, thanks. I don’t drink anymore, actually.”
Penelope gave Rea a look, but shrugged, purchasing her beer and giving the guy a tip. For a while, the two sat in relative silence. Some of the initial tension had been dissolved by the friendly conversation, and the two women both loved baseball, so they were able to immerse themselves in the game rather well, with Rea remarking on the various plays and Penelope filling Rea in on the current roster of the Cubs. What to expect, who to root for, who she was hoping they would trade.
It was an evening game, so the sun was well below the horizon by now, and it was a little chilly. After a while, it almost felt as though they hadn’t been estranged since high school. Penelope would look at Rea with a gaze that Rea never could really read, but one feeling always rang clear as day: affection. Rea felt the same way, obviously. Even despite their history, she had called, hadn’t she? Cool as a cucumber, Rea put her arm around Penelope’s shoulder. Penelope nuzzled her head into the crook of Rea’s neck and for a few moments, they stayed that way. Rea rubbed her back.
The game was tense. It was a pitcher’s duel.
“This is nice…” Penelope murmured. “I’ve missed this.”
“Me too.”
“We should probably talk about what happened.”
“Why should we do that?” Rea was trying to stay as far away as possible from any and all bad memories associated with the woman beside her. “That was then. This is now. I don’t wanna remember any of that shit.”
“Yeah, well… You hurt me.”
Rea rolled her eyes, but Penelope couldn’t see. “I know, babe. I hurt a lot of people. You hurt me too, though. Funny how you never did admit that.”
“I mean, if you say so. Whatever you say.”
Rea was starting to remember, to her dismay, why exactly the two of them had broken up in the first place. She regretted not taking up Penelope on that offer for a beer. With a sigh, she squeezed Penelope tighter and said what she knew she wanted to hear. “I’m sorry, darling. I’m so sorry. I just want to be able to––”
Whatever Rea had been getting at was interrupted by a hard line-drive to center. The crowd went wild as the center fielder bungled the catch and the runners on second and third made it home. Penelope jumped right out of her seat and started screaming, and Rea would have joined in, but she was far too exhausted. Instead, she smiled and clapped, but even that was starting to wear on her.
What was even happening to her these days, anyway? Were her withdrawals really still so bad? I mean, sure, her health had never been the best, but this just made her want to pick up the bottle again. Bad.
“Did you fucking see that?” Penelope turned towards Rea with a bright smile on her face. That smile made everything feel worth it.
“Yeah!" Rea nodded exuberantly. “What a play!”
“To break the tie with a two-run double in the seventh inning? Unheard of this season! If we hold this lead this could get us a shot at the series!”
“Didn’t they already win once?” Rea teased.
“Haha, very funny.” Penelope stuck her tongue out as she sat back down.
The crowd was erupting into a raucous chant. “Let’s go Cubs! Let’s go!” Rea’s heart swelled a little. There was something so wholesome about people cheering as a group at their favorite event.
"Listen Penelope…" Rea tried to finish her thought from earlier, but she had lost track of it, so she improvised. "I know things were a little fucked up between us."
"A little? You were really shitty to me, Rea. I tried to kill myself."
Rea, again, was not willing to delve into the specifics of the matter. She felt as though whatever nuance there may have been to the situation, whatever manipulation games Penelope may have been playing at the time, it would do nothing but cause problems if she brought it up. Rea knew this because she had tried, on occasion, to share the blame for how wrong things had gone, but Penelope only ever felt comfortable pinning the entirety of it on Rea. If that's what it took to be around her again, Rea was willing to deal with it.
"I know. But you didn't. We were both pretty fucked up back then, yeah? But we're in a much better place now."
Penelope rolled her eyes and scoffed. "I'm in a much better place now, but you? You showed up on a whim in a foreign city, texted your ex, and showed up drunk."
Rea blinked. Was this another one of Penelope's patented gaslighting techniques? "Wha… What are you talking about?"
Penelope shook her head. "It doesn't matter. All I'm saying is, you're kinda a hot mess right now. So don't go preaching to me about 'being better.' You're not better."
Rea sat in silence for quite a long time. The crowd roared around them, because to them, nothing was wrong. The Cubs were about to knock down the Brewers in the ninth, and that'd be the game. 3-1 Cubs. Woo-hoo. "So, why'd you even invite me here? Just to berate me? Just to talk shit?”
"Of course not," Penelope cooed, putting her hand on Rea's arm and smiling. Rea was weak for that smile. It melted her. "I just need you to understand, you know? If you don't get how you hurt me, you'll hurt me again… but I believe you can get there. You can be better."
"I can be better," Rea repeated, in somewhat of a trance. Then, she leaned towards Penelope. She thought about just going for the kiss, but thought better of it. "Can I kiss you?"
Penelope responded by simply doing so, and the two kissed softly at first, but quickly their passion intensified. Rea normally wasn't a big fan of PDA, but she was high on sleep deprivation, high on life, and making out with her ex at a Cubs game. What's better than this?
"Jesus, you two! Cut it out! Doncha know the kiss cam was three innings ago?"
The cheering lulled to a dull murmur. The game was over and fans were beginning to trickle out of the stadium. Penelope and Rea pulled away, looking deeply into each other's eyes. Rea had only one thought.
Why am I here?
"I want you," she said nonetheless. Maybe that was why. Maybe it didn’t have to be more than that.
“I want you too,” Penelope whispered, checking the time on her phone. “Listen, I have a studio not far from here.”
“Prime real estate.”
“Oh, definitely. But, yeah, um… do you want to come over?”
“Fuck yeah, girl.”
Penelope giggled, hopping up and dragging Rea to her feet. She was having a bit of trouble staying upright as they left the stadium, but Penelope didn’t mind offering support.
“Sorry if this is rude or anything,” Penelope remarked, “but your health issues seem worse than they were when I left town.”
“Yeah, uh… I guess they kinda are. But it’s not a big deal. I manage.”
“You said that back then, too.”
“Yeah, well… I do.”
Penelope shrugged and they kept walking, arm-in-arm. “Whatever you say.”
The apartment really was close to the park. Rea was impressed with the location, and even more impressed that Penelope seemed to be paying for this all on her own. Her parents had never been well off, after all. It seemed like her college education was really paying off for her. Rea wished she could say the same.
Penelope guided her up the stairs, which she didn’t struggle too much with, then into her apartment. Rea smiled. It reminded her a lot of Penelope’s high school bedroom, with dozens of cushions and plushies on a brightly colored bed, posters of the various TV shows and movies she liked on the walls, and tons of supplies for art and creativity. It was in disarray, but not a total mess. It wasn’t too small, for a studio, and Rea couldn’t help but wonder what the rent on the place actually was. What was the cost of living like in a city like this?
“Nice pad,” Rea said, plopping onto the couch and resting her body for a bit. She was exhausted, and the extremely comfortable couch threatened to swallow her whole if she wasn’t careful. She wanted to rest her eyes for just a moment, but she was worried she would fall asleep if she did.
“Thanks. I couldn’t pass it up, even though it was a bit outside my budget. I mean being right next to Wrigley Field, how could I not?”
“How could you not?”
Penelope sat down next to Rea on the couch and shuffled closer, leaning down and laying against Rea. The two women lay there, feeling each other’s closeness for a few moments. Rea inhaled contentedly and reached around Penelope’s shoulder again, giving it a firm, affectionate squeeze.
“This is nice,” she said.
“It is, actually. I wasn’t sure it would be, given everything.” Penelope turned her head to look at Rea for a few moments, taking in every inch of her appearance. “I like this look on you. It’s new. I wasn’t expecting it, per se, but I guess it makes sense, in retrospect.”
“I’m full of surprises,” Rea said, “but I’m still the same person you dated back then.”
“Don’t say that. I didn’t exactly thrive with that person.”
Rea shrugged. “Can’t change it. Don’t understand it. But it’s true. Can’t I be both?”
Penelope sat up, looked into Rea’s eyes for a moment, and then kissed her again. “You can be whoever you wanna be.”
“Then can I be Rea, right now?” Rea murmured, Penelope’s breath still warm against her face. “With you?”
“Of course you can,” Penelope said softly, caressing her cheek, “Rea.”
Suddenly, Penelope’s clothes were coming off. Rea hadn’t been expecting things to move quite this quickly, but she wasn’t complaining. Penelope let her play with her breasts, just like she always used to love, and for a few moments it felt like they were teenagers again. They kissed. They gave each other head. Rea never got tired of Penelope’s face when she orgasmed beneath her fingers. After fooling around for an amount of time that seemed never-ending until it suddenly did, they both collapsed back against the couch, exhilarated. Rea was only more exhausted than she already had been, but she was happy. She needed that. She needed all of this.
“God, that was amazing…” Penelope murmured, leaning over Rea’s exhausted form to plant another tender peck upon her lips. “Sorry I couldn’t get you there.”
“Oh, don’t worry about it,” Rea told her, then paused a moment before adding, “I think I’m depressed.”
Penelope frowned. “You definitely don’t seem well. Mentally or physically. Have you seen anyone?”
“No. I mean, I’ve been thinking about it. But I just don’t even see what a therapist could do for me. I feel too fucked up for therapy, ever since dad died.”
Penelope’s eyes went wide. “Oh my god, your dad died?!”
Rea smiled awkwardly. “Shit, it has been a while hasn’t it? Yeah. Last year, around this time actually.”
There was a silence for a few moments before Penelope responded. “He was an asshole.”
“Yeah, he was. I still miss him, though.”
“Well, what about a doctor? You seem, like, really tired.”
“Isn’t everybody?”
“Well, yeah, but… not this tired. It’s concerning, to be honest.”
Rea gulped. Why was her heart rate going crazy? Was it from all the exertion, or was she having an anxiety attack? She was starting to think that maybe it was both. God, she wanted a hit. Just one hit, of anything.
Rea sighed, running a hand through her hair. Penelope had always had a penchant for telling the hard truths, even when Rea wasn’t ready for them. Maybe Rea had to take a page from her book for once. “Penelope, I gotta tell you something.”
“Oh great, what is it this time?”
“I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing…” Rea dragged her hands across her face, shielding herself from the shame. “I have a girlfriend. Back home. Sadie Jenkins.”
There was silence. Eventually, Rea couldn’t take it any longer and lifted her hands from her face, forcing herself to look at Penelope’s puzzling expression. Her eyes were still trained directly on Rea, and her lips were pursed together, as if she was thinking long and hard about what she wanted to say.
“Well, leave her, then.”
Rea squinted. That was not at all what she had been expecting. “I’m sorry, what?”
“I said, leave her.” Penelope’s expression didn’t change, but Rea realized that it must have been more of a look of jealousy than of judgment. Somehow, that made Rea feel better. “You came all this way to be with me, didn’t you?”
“I mean…” Rea wasn’t exactly sure she’d put it that way. “I guess? I don’t exactly know why I came here, of all places. I was just trying to get away. You just happened to be here.”
In a way, what Penelope was saying was probably true. Whether subconsciously or not, she probably had come here in part just to see her. I mean, it’s not like she had any other connection to the place.
“Oh, and you ‘happened’ to call me up begging to get together, and fuck me in my living room on a weeknight? Come on– Come on, Rea. Get real.”
“Get real?” Rea’s head was throbbing now, and even the dim lighting that Penelope had turned on seemed to be searing into her retinas. “Get fucking real? You’re the one who needs to get real, dude. You think that just because we had drunken sex on your couch that I want you back, like for real? You’re out of your mind, just like always.”
“So you admit it.” Penelope crossed her arms. “You’re drunk.”
“I… what?” Rea rubbed her temples. “No, you were the drunk one. I literally don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.”
Penelope shook her head, lips quivering and eyes barely holding back tears. “You need help. Serious help. I miss you so much, you know, but you never cared about me. But even so, I’m so desperate for love that I’d still take you back. I would. If you leave her.”
Rea couldn’t bear to look her in the eyes. “I can’t, Penelope. I just can’t.”
“Even for me?”
With a heavy sigh, one that seemed to release years worth of pent up frustrations and anxieties with the relationship, Rea shakily rose to her feet and walked to the door. “Especially not for you.”
And she was gone.
14
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The Bean looked totally different in the late morning light. It seemed to be an entirely different color, even though it was never truly one color after all. It was the same reflection of the park and city around it, but everything seemed to be a different hue. Andy stared into the reflection of his body in the bean.
His face looked grotesque and ugly, with stubble he still hadn’t been able to shave burgeoning out of every pore. He picked at it, and the reflection of the movement looked like a kaleidoscope. He seemed to have four arms, like Vishnu, or some other god he couldn’t remember. That didn’t seem to be a part of what the natural distortion of the Bean tended to do, but he thought it was kind of cool in a way. For whatever reason, the strange things he saw in his reflection weren’t bothering him today the way they had the first time he’d come here. Maybe it’s because he was growing more and more used to seeing things that weren’t there.
Andy didn’t quite remember, but he was pretty sure he hadn’t slept all night. There had been nowhere to go, so he wandered the streets, trying and failing to escape the windchill and being unable to sleep even when he tried. Eventually, when the sun had begun to rise and he remembered he had an engagement, he had managed to pick himself up, wake and bake with one of his remaining joints, and haul himself up and to the liquor store for a morning refreshment. He was carrying on thru sheer force of momentum and the drugs flowing through his veins, and he felt like if he sat down he wouldn’t be able to get back up.
He wasn’t sure exactly how long he’d been staring at the strange approximation of himself in the reflection before he heard a familiar accented voice calling out to him. “Well hello there, stranger.”
Andy turned around and saw God. Wait. He shook his head. No, the figure behind him, backlit and shining in the sun, was just Anas.
“Oh, hi.”
Anas looked Andy over, furrowing his brow and making a judgmental clicking sound. “Not to be a prick, but you look bloody awful.”
“Not to be a prick, but I didn’t need you to tell me that. I’m well aware.” Andy held out a hand and snapped his fingers weakly a couple times, but it didn’t really make a sound. “Pay up. Mean comment tax.”
Rolling his eyes, Anas drew out his pack of cigarettes and gave Andy one. Again, Anas lit the cigarette for him and Andy realized he could quite get used to this. They stared at each other in silence as they smoked. Maybe it was just the delirium of sleep deprivation mixed with his already fragile emotional state, but he really couldn’t deny anymore just how attractive he thought Anas was. With his dark hair, eyes to match, and broad, defined brows and cheekbones, Andy was smitten. He’d never done anything like this before. Back home, he probably would have been shot.
“Gawking, are we?”
“Huh, what?” Andy blushed. “Sure. You could say that.”
Anas smirked. “Well, how about I treat you to brunch? You look like you could use a good meal.”
“Oh, yeah… that sounds amazing.” Andy closed his eyes and imagined the joys of pancakes and eggs. “You know a good place?”
“Yeah, right around the corner.” Anas put out his arm. “Shall we?”
Andy hesitated for a moment. Brunch? Walking arm-in-arm? This all sounded pretty fuckin’ gay.
“What is this, a date?”
Anas looked at him. “Well, do you want it to be?”
With a shrug, Andy locked his arm with Anas’s and they started walking down the street. “Fuck it, why not.”
Anas chuckled. “What, is this your first time?”
“With a guy? Uh, yeah.” Andy muttered. “Maybe you forgot, but I’m from bumfuck Kansas. Homophobia central.”
“Oh, I understand. I’m not exactly out of the closet in my home country either.”
“And where is this ‘home country?’ I thought you were just unfortunately British.”
Anas rolled his eyes as they turned a corner. Andy still had a really nice morning buzz going, and he was enjoying this. “Well, unfortunately, I am, but I’m from Qatar originally. We moved to England when I was nine.”
“Oh damn, I’ve heard of that place. Don’t know shit about it, though.”
“You and everybody else. It’s got its issues, like any place, but I like it. There’s a lot of beauty there–– and family. It’s home. It always will be.”
“Even if you don’t feel like you can be yourself there?”
“Yeah. I mean, I can be myself. Just a different version of myself than the one I can be here.”
Andy had never thought of it that way before. “Huh. You know, Anas, you’re a pretty smart fuckin’ guy.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that. I think I’m just full of useless factoids and vague philosophies.”
“Yeah, and that’s amazing.”
They made it to a little diner and a strange feeling overcame Andy. He noticed the familiar figure of that girl, Rea, loitering around the side of the building. What the hell was she doing here? Was she following him? Why did he keep running into her?
The next time he looked, she had disappeared around a corner.
“You alright, mate?”
Andy was staring into space, but he snapped out of it. “Yeah, sorry.”
They went inside. Anas asked for a table for two. They ended up sitting at a small booth by the window, where Andy could watch people as they passed by.
“Hi fellas,” greeted a mousey little waitress with dirty blonde hair in a bun, “I’m Gracie, I’ll be your server today. Can I start you guys off with anything to drink?”
“Yeah, I’ll take a hot vanilla latte,” Anas told her, then looked to Andy, who was poring over the menu.
“Ooh, can I try the apple bellini?”
“Coming right up!”
Anas looked to Andy. “Starting the morning off right, I see.”
“You know it.”
“So,” Anas templed his fingers and furrowed his brow, scrutinizing Andy like a lab experiment, “where exactly have you been flitting about to for the last day?”
Andy was staring out the window again. “Uh, oh, you know. Places. Doing stuff.”
“Wow, fascinating. I never could have guessed.”
“Well, what about you Mr. Architect?” Andy diverted the subject away from himself. “Did you finish your assignment?”
“Oh, I finished it, alright. Nearly killed myself doing it, but I did it.”
“See?” Andy winked and smiled, as the waitress came by with their drinks. “You are smart.”
Anas thanked the waitress and began stirring his latte, blowing the steam off as he did so. “Nah, just a normal uni dude. Just the way of the grind.”
“Fuck the grind,” Andy muttered, taking a rather large swig of his fruity little beverage. It was pretty damn good, actually. “That’s why I skipped town. I was working two jobs, you know. I dropped out of high school. Never went to college.”
“Oh, damn. I never realized.”
“Yeah, well. I’m here now. None of that shit matters.”
Anas contemplated that. “Well, it matters. I think it does still matter. If it didn’t you wouldn’t be looking so forlorn every time you talked about it.”
Andy sighed. “Is it really that obvious?”
“You’re not too hard to read.”
“Alright, yeah. I still care. I hate working, but I feel shitty leaving my bosses without good coverage. I miss my mom. But there’s so much I can’t even bear to go back to. I don’t know what to do.”
“And your, uh…” Anas wasn’t sure how to bring this up without offending Andy. “Your condition?”
“It wasn’t wrong, what you said the other day…” Andy admitted. “I probably could benefit from seeing a doctor. The thing is, I don’t have insurance, and I don’t have money. So what am I supposed to do, you know?”
Anas nodded solemnly. “We live in a society.”
“Man, we really fuckin’ do.”
“Alrighty, are we ready to order?” The cute little waitress had reappeared with a little notepad in hand.
“Yeah, I’ll get the eggs florentine,” Anas said, and smiled politely.
“And I’ll have the triple decker pancake meal with eggs over easy,” Andy said, mouth watering with anticipation. He held up his now-empty bellini glass. “Oh, and can I get another one of these things? Absolutely delicious.”
“You got it!” And she was off.
“Anyway,” Andy continued, “I guess I just feel a little stuck. It was hard enough to admit I had anything wrong with me, but it's even harder when I feel like there’s nothing I can even do about it.”
“Mm,” Anas nodded, sipping his latte delicately. Andy watched him, blushing from both intoxication and amour. Cute-ass, hipster-ass fuck. How dare he? “I guess I can understand that. I mean, I’m pretty healthy, as far as I’m aware, but our medical system is a bit shite.”
“Aye,” Andy mocked in a terrible accent, “rather shite.”
“Oh, fuck off.”
“Oh, fuck off,” Andy mocked again. Anas punched him lightly in the shoulder, but Andy visibly cringed. Anas’s joking expression softened.
“Oh, sorry. I imagine that must’ve hurt. I didn’t think.”
Andy waved it off with the arm that wasn’t radiating pain. “Oh, don’t worry about it. I hardly felt it.”
“You really are something else, you know that?”
“Yeah, I get that a lot.”
The two engaged in pleasant banter for some time. They laughed and joked as if they’d known each other forever, and Andy managed to forget altogether how weird it initially felt to be on a date with another man. He looked into Anas’s eyes and felt alive. He felt like he’d never truly clicked with anyone like this before. Not any of his friends back home. Not his girlfriend. No one. This was something entirely new. Maybe he was just drunk, but Andy wanted to venture that maybe it was love.
When Anas got up to use the bathroom, Andy flagged down the waitress for another drink. She didn’t even think about cutting him off and when Anas got back, Andy was already halfway done with it.
“Alright, I wasn’t gonna say it,” Anas started. “What’s with all the drinking? I mean, dude, it’s barely noon. Every time I’ve seen you you’ve been either drunk or hungover. You got a problem or something?”
Andy was taken aback. Again, maybe he was just drunk, but he couldn’t help but be extremely offended at the notion. “A problem? Man, this is the only way I can even cope with my fucking problems. Do you have a problem with it?”
Anas held up his hands, defensively. “Whoa, brother, I wasn’t trying to be an arse. Just, you’ve had three drinks in the course of an hour. That’s a bit abnormal, innit?”
“Abnormal? This whole thing is abnormal! Fuck, I’m on a date with a dude in Chicago for fuck’s sake. I’m a sad case, okay? I’m sad. I’m sick. I got issues. Who the fuck cares if I wanna drink a little to forget them?”
“I mean, I care,” Anas said. “I just don’t think it’s doing you a world of good. And now you’re getting rowdy in the bloody cafe, so, I rest my case.”
“You know what?” Andy scoffed and downed the rest of his drink, slamming the fancy glass on the table dramatically. “Fuck you. I thought you were cool, fuck.”
“Well, alright, then, if that’s how you want it to be!” Anas mumbled as Andy got his sweatshirt on and made to leave. “I was going to invite you over, let you shave and shower and shit. But I guess you’re too busy drinking and wanking off to care.”
Andy didn’t dignify that with a response, merely flipping him off and walking away. That move had become his signature, and he didn’t even realize.
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Rea was pacing in circles in some unfamiliar area of town. Well, every area was unfamiliar, really. She didn’t live here. She was so far away from home. Her heart was going crazy. Why was she still so anxious? Where had she been all night? Where was she now?
A handsome man walked out of a nearby diner, looking forlorn with his hands shoved in his pockets. She stared at him for a few moments and he noticed her, giving her a look she couldn’t quite interpret. She wasn’t usually one to start conversations with strangers, but the last few days had been changing her, and she wasn’t sure if it was for the better.
“Hey,” she said to the man.
“Hey,” he said back, though he wasn’t keen on making eye contact. Something had clearly upset him.
“Tough morning?” She asked earnestly, and the man laughed bitterly, looking at her with his thick eyebrows raised. He looked her up and down, taking in her appearance.
“Uh, yeah, you could say that,” he muttered, the side of his face twitching.
“That’s a shame. I’m sorry.” She sympathized with him, even if she wasn’t sure what had happened. She’d definitely been having a tough time lately as well.
“Right…” The man looked at her blankly. “Listen, perhaps I’m daft to even ask after all that’s just happened, but would you like to come home with me?”
Rea was taken aback. Was this really the second time this week a handsome stranger wanted to go home with her? This was more male attention than she’d ever gotten in her life. She thought it was a little weird that he would ask her so quickly, but he had a profound effect on her, and she couldn’t resist the temptation.
She giggled, adjusting her choker. “Sure, cutie. Why not?”
The two walked off together. The man didn’t seem to be in the mood for conversation, but Rea tried starting some anyway. For whatever reason, she didn’t think to ask him his name.
“So, how long have you lived in Chicago?”
The man looked at her sharply, and she couldn’t quite figure out what kind of game he thought she was running. For a moment, it seemed like he wasn’t going to dignify her with a reply, but he sighed and answered. “Three years. Almost four, I guess, since I’m already close to graduating. Feels like time flew right by me.”
“I bet.” Rea wanted to say that time seemed to be flying by her more and more lately, but she got a strange pit in her gut at the thought of it. Using his accent as a jumping off point, she changed course. “Do you like America more than England?”
He scoffed. “I don’t know. Kinda? I have freedom here that I don’t back home, but that’s mainly because my parents never get off my back. I like London, and I like Chicago… but I don’t know that I really like either country as a whole more than the other. They’re both pretty pish.”
Rea laughed softly and smiled, reaching out and taking his hand. He stiffened at first, but relaxed and allowed her.
“You’re real weird, you know that?” he said.
“I’m weird?” Rea scoffed. “You’re the one who invited me home off the street!”
The man raised his eyebrows and shook his head. “Oh, so we’re playing strangers already? Wow. Just like an old married couple trying to rekindle their spark.”
Rea wasn’t sure exactly what he meant, since she was being completely serious, but she figured she was just missing some kind of local joke. “Well, I have always wondered about the life of a streetwalker. I’ve gotten rave reviews in my day, so I could probably cripple the economy.”
The man smirked and shook his head in reluctant amusement. He was starting to lighten up a little by the time they made it to his apartment, and she was grateful for that. Maybe it wasn’t the wisest decision she was making, so she at least felt comfortable in the knowledge that he seemed to be a genuine guy. He pulled her by the hand into his building and by the time she got into the apartment, she was reeling with nerves and excitement. What a cute little place! He was such a real college boy.
As she collapsed casually onto his couch, the man’s flip phone rang. He took it out of his pocket and sighed, flipping it open and putting it to his ear. A long, somewhat irate conversation took place in a language Rea didn’t understand, but recognized as Arabic. Eventually, his tone softened and he said his goodbyes. He shut the phone and slipped it into his pocket.
“Sorry about that. It’s mum. I forgot to call her last night so she was convinced I’d been murdered and thrown into the lake. She just worries about me, is all.”
“Understandable,” Rea said, but really she was just focused on his face. God, he was just so handsome. He seemed to forget the phone call altogether as well, because he quickly sat down next to her and gazed with just as much desire. He offered her a sly smile.
“So, all this…” He reached out towards Rea’s chest and fingered the chain of her glass flower-shaped pendant. “The jewelry and all. It threw me at first, but you look cute. What, you just carry this shit around?”
Rea laughed awkwardly, feeling very out of her element and unsure. It was getting harder and harder for her to understand why he was so convinced he knew her. It threatened her very sense of reality. Absently, she twirled her earrings, which were dangles shaped like little eggplants. “I mean, I dress the way I like to, yeah. I like accessories and stuff. They’re fun. W- Why? Is it weird?”
“No, uh. I mean, yeah, you’re being super weird but that’s kinda what I expect from you. It just surprised me, is all. I mean, damn, you even put on makeup.”
Rea didn’t know how to process the confusing words she was hearing, so she just kissed him. Although taken aback at first, the man quickly leaned into it and they made out passionately. She straddled him, tugging open the buttons of his plaid flannel and groaning in mock-dismay when his bare chest was not so easily revealed.
“Ugh, why do guys always wear undershirts? Ruins all the fun!”
The man chuckled and pulled off both the flannel and his undershirt, revealing a chubby but muscular, hairy brown chest. Rea stared like a deer in the headlights, slowly reaching out and touching it. This felt like uncharted territory for her somehow, even though she’d just been with Rob. It’s not like it was her first time with a man anymore, but for some reason, this felt different. Why should it be? They were both just strangers.
She caressed his chest for quite some time as he ran his fingers through her shoulder-length hair.
“Your hair looks nice down.”
“Thanks,” she murmured dreamily, not hearing him well enough to wonder why he’d know how it looks when it isn’t down, “you look nice in general.”
“Ohoho, well the feeling’s certainly mutual.”
Rea felt the man’s hard-on start to rise below her, and suddenly she felt strong enough to take on the world. She felt pretty. She felt desired. She felt horny.
She wanted to feel him.
“Take me,” she said suddenly, digging her fingers into his chest and gazing at him with ferocious lust. “Oh my god, just fucking take me.”
“Now, now,” the man cooed, offering her an irresistible toothy grin. “You’ve been a bad–– uh, you’ve been bad, yeah? Only if you ask nicely.”
“Come on, please?” Rea begged gently, turning the bedroom eyes up to eleven.
The man exhaled through his teeth, still grinning as he slowly pushed her off him and put one hand on his belt buckle. “Please what?”
“Please fuck me,” Rea was not above getting into character to have a good time, and the words came naturally to her.
“Say my name.”
It came so naturally to her, it wasn’t even funny. “Please fuck me, Anas. Oh god, please fuck me.”
His belt buckle jingled and his jeans unzipped.
“See? Was that so hard?”
With a shit-eating grin, Anas pushed her onto her back with so little effort it rocked her world, and proceeded to continue rocking it for quite some time.
Once they had finished, Anas had so many questions to ask, but she wouldn’t have the chance to answer them. Mere minutes after their lovemaking ceased, Rea was out cold on the sofa once again.
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The pain woke Andy up at dawn again. Joints clicked and muscles moaned silently as he stretched his lanky limbs out in every direction. His head was as foggy and pounding as ever, but he heard a shuffling around him. That’s probably what woke him up. That, and the pain, but he was used to that.
“Oh good, you’re up. I was going to have to wake you anyway; I’ve got a night class.”
Andy squinted and rubbed the sleep from his eyes. “Anas?”
“The one and only.”
“How the hell did I get here?”
Anas cringed. “Oh god, don’t say that. You’re gonna make me feel like I’ve done something really sketchy. You didn’t seem too drunk by that point… You really don’t recall?”
Andy rubbed his tension-addled forehead. He had no idea what Anas was talking about. “I mean, I remember meeting up. I remember getting raging pissed at you, but I can’t say I really remember why. I definitely don’t remember coming here.” Andy feigned wanton innocence. “Why? Did you take advantage of me?”
Despite his attempt at making a joke, Anas did not seem any less troubled. He was looking at him with his eyebrows furrowed deeply. With a sigh, he kept rushing around trying to get his things ready for class. “Andy, I’m worried about you. I know we just met and all, but you’re blacking out and passing out all the time. Are you aware that it’s like five in the evening right now?”
Andy looked at his watch. “Well damn, it sure is. I’m sorry, Anas. I’m a mess. I think that’s why I left the diner, you know? I didn’t want to rub off my fucked-up-ness on you.”
“I’m offended,” Anas shook his head as he shoved textbooks in his backpack, “that you would dare assume I’m not fucked up.”
“Well, you sure seem pretty put together to me. Nice apartment, lucrative major, handsome as the devil himself.”
“Oh?” Anas leaned on the side of the couch and looked at Andy. “So you really think so, huh? That I’m handsome?”
“Yeah, I do.” Andy paused for a moment, simply looking at him. “I really like you, Anas. I’m sorry I was such a jerk yesterday.”
“Today.”
“Oh, fuck. Yeah. Today.”
“Don’t sweat it, man. I’m pretty easy going. It would take a lot to drag me away from you. Hell, there’s nothing that a hundred men or more could ever do.”
Andy deadpanned. Anas cracked up.
“Never mind, I actually fucking hate you.” Andy blushed a bit at the lame song reference, feeling really good about things. Wow, it actually felt like things were going well for once. How typical that it would so quickly end. Andy noticed a choker, a necklace, and a pair of earrings on the coffee table.
He recognized them immediately.
“Wait a second… why do you have those?” Andy’s fried brain started firing at ridiculous speeds in no discernable direction. Some connections were desperate to be made, and others struggled to find meaning in the perception. Either way, Andy’s headache was worsening by the moment.
Anas looked at where Andy was staring. “Oh, I took them off after you passed out. Didn’t want ‘em getting damaged.”
Andy’s neck and shoulders seemed to convulse and cramp suddenly and he gasped, but he wasn’t focused on his neurological symptoms. He was focused on the betrayal that was piercing through his heart.
“Did you have sex with her?”
“What?”
“I’m not an idiot, okay! I know her! We’ve met!” Andy grew suddenly loud and leapt from the sofa. “Did you have sex with Rea? That slut!”
“Rea?”
“Yeah, Rea, the fucking girl who wears this cutesy shit!” Andy gestured wildly at the pile of accessories. “I keep seeing her everywhere and now she’s coming for you too?? Did you fuck her? I’m gonna fucking kill her. Did you fuck her??”
Anas’s eyes had a glint of fear in them that Andy had yet to see. In his right mind, he would have hated to see it, but it was satisfying in the moment how effective his anger was.
“Listen Andy, I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about. Legitimately. I think you need help.”
“You did. Oh my god, you fucked her.” Andy scoffed incredulously, running his hand through his hair, which he haphazardly threw back into its usual ponytail without brushing it. He shoved the jewelry in his pocket so he could confront her with proof as soon as he could track her down. “I thought I could trust you, man. I thought we had something.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Anas screamed as Andy pulled his sweatshirt over his head. “Who the hell is Rea?”
“Like you don’t know,” Andy couldn’t stop shaking his head. He just couldn’t believe this had happened. He should know better by now. The joke was on him for getting attached so quickly. I mean, they were never official. He probably had no right to be this mad, but why did it have to be her?
“Andy, I don’t know.”
Was she just so much more desirable than him?
“Andy, who’s Rea?”
Was she just so much more charismatic than him?
“Andy, come with me, alright? I’ll cut class. We’ll get you checked out at the clinic, yeah?”
“No!” Andy erupted, clutching himself and digging his fingers into his arms. “No lies! No clinic. No fucking clinic. I’m outta here. Fuck you.”
Anas watched as Andy bolted out of the building, leaving the apartment door wide open behind him. He wanted to be sympathetic, because he knew Andy was sick, but his patience today was running out.
“Fine then!” he screamed, so he wouldn’t want to cry. “You know what, Andy? Fuck you too!”
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Rea was running. She was running, running, running and she didn’t know why. The wind was blowing freely through her long hair and she was cackling. Adrenaline was firing through her veins, and she couldn’t even feel how ragged she truly was. She was getting kind of used to this life, you know? Losing time. Waking up in strange places. Always going somewhere, never knowing where.
Really, it was so much better than the working week. She didn’t know why she hadn’t done this years ago.
She was running, running, running and the laughter flowed freely out of her like a broken fire hydrant. She was on top of the world. She couldn’t stop the flow of energy if she tried.
But he could.
Andy barrelled into Rea, and the two collapsed to the sidewalk. As soon as they were down there, it felt like there would be no getting up for either of them. Passersby hardly even stopped to glance down at the strange scene unfolding before them. Just another city psycho, they thought.
“You bitch!” Andy screamed, pulling at Rea’s hair. His skull cried with pain. “You fucking bitch you fucked him!”
“What? Who?” Rea screamed.
“Anas, you piece of shit!”
“The Arab guy? Yeah, and what of it?” Rea made him let go, smiling sweetly. “I’m a sexually liberated woman now.”
“Well I’m a very sexually repressed man, alright?” Andy sighed, slinking down against the side of a building, where he’d become rather accustomed to being. “So why did you have to go and ruin my chances?”
“Ruin your chances? He seems pretty into you to me.”
“No, he’s into you. Everyone’s into you. If I were a girl, I wouldn’t have any of these problems.”
“Oh, come on. That’s not true. They wouldn’t even hire me at a strip club.”
“...Fair enough, I guess.”
Rea just lay there, rubbing her hands together obsessively as she thought of a response. “I have issues too, you know.”
“Yeah? Like what.”
“My father was an abusive alcoholic. He died in an accident. I thought it would be better, but nothing’s been the same since. That’s one thing.”
Rea started chewing on the ties to her sweatshirt. Andy raised his eyebrows, surprised at the coincidence.
“Really? Well that makes two of us. I feel like a joke. Breaking news, everybody! Alcoholic faggot from Shitsville, Kansas went missing last week. Hopefully, if we’re lucky, he’ll never return!”
“That’s not true. People are looking for us. They miss us.”
“Yeah, but do we miss them?”
Rea thought about that for a second. She missed her mom, sure, but that was really it. There wasn’t much else for her back home, now that Dorian had skipped town. Then she remembered Sadie Jenkins.
“Oh my god…” Rea started to cry spontaneously. “I have a girlfriend. I have a girlfriend!!”
Andy wanted to comfort her, but he didn’t know how. “I have a girlfriend too. We all make mistakes.”
“I’m the mistake,” Rea sobbed. “I need to end it. She’s better off without me. I don’t… I don’t even miss her.”
The two sat in silence for quite some time. Rea hummed erratically all the while.
“I should give up on Anas,” Andy said, defeated. “It was stupid to fall for him in the first place.”
“Well, we both just met the guy. Why should you care so much?”
“I don’t know, I just…” Andy sighed. “I like him.”
“I like him too.”
Andy shot her dagger eyes, but then he realized they were both so confused, forlorn and defeated that it didn’t even feel good to fight anymore. His entire body ached and he didn’t want to get up. He probably wouldn’t. Not for hours.
“He deserves better than both of us, doesn’t he?” said Andy.
“Yeah,” Rea agreed. “He does.”
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Andy had officially lost track of time. It was daytime, somehow, even though the last thing he really remembered was fighting with Anas and Rea when it was dark out. He had been blaming all the blackouts on his alcohol consumption, but it was hard to do that when it felt like no matter how much he drank he ended up losing hours upon hours. He wanted to tell someone. He wanted to call out for help.
But who would listen to the man who claims he keeps waking up in the future?
This particular afternoon––or was it still morning?––Andy was definitely attributing some of the memory loss to the alcohol, as he had a half-empty fifth of vodka in his hand. Every time he did remember something, it made his heart ache more than it already tended to whenever he was up and about. All he could remember about his immediate past was all the fighting. All the anger, pain, and betrayal. He took another swig of liquor and it relaxed his head for yet another few precious moments.
Physically, it was hard to say how he was feeling. On one hand, every time he blacked in enough to feel his body, he was overcome with pain and paranoia that he should probably go to the emergency room. Then he would remember how much the emergency room would bankrupt him and drink the pain, and often his cognizance, away. It was all replaced with the void. The peace. The happiness.
There was one thorn in his side that did not seem to go away, no matter how much he tried to drink it away. He realized it was time for him to man up and rip the bandage off once and for all. As he stumbled down the street, nearly bumping into dozens of people, Andy pulled out his phone and opened the messaging app.
He wasn’t sure how long he’d been in Chicago, but it had been enough time that he had dozens of texts from numerous sources. Easily over fifty from his mom, begging him to come back. Pleading with what may have been a ghost, for all she knew. For all he knew, even. He didn’t feel alive. There were quite a few from his bosses, and even a few from some friends back home he barely cared about. Even Dorian Baker had got the news, all the way in Nashville, and texted to see if he was okay. He ignored all of them and selected one contact.
The chat with Sadie Jenkins was full of desperate yearning, a sad girl just hoping her boyfriend would come home. She hoped he was okay. She hoped he wasn’t binging again. Reading through all the messages made Andy’s hands shake even more than they already were, and he found that he had to lean against a streetlamp in order to balance enough to even type.
- bbygirl -
November 3rd, 2:25 PM
{it’s ovr, sadie. i’msprry.,. i just cant be wuth you any more. firget ab0ut me}
She was online, and responded faster than Andy could even process.
- bbygirl -
November 3rd, 2:27 PM
[what the hell???]November 3rd, 2:27 PM
[You disappear for a week and come back with this?!?!]November 3rd, 2:28 PM
[Motherfucker i thought you were DEAD i hope you fucking do die tbh FUCK YOUUUUU]
Andy smiled bitterly, happy that finally someone was just being honest with him, and knocked back half the remaining bottle.
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“Penelope!!”
She was screaming, alternating between pounding on the door, spamming the doorbell, and tearing out her hair. She tugged at her choker, scratching the skin of her neck, and yelled again.
“Peneeeeeeloooopeeeeeeee!!!”
“Jesus Christ!” Suddenly, a light snapped on. Thumps and rumbles were followed by loud footsteps down the stairs and the door screeched open. “What? Who is it?”
“It’s me,” Rea sobbed, gripping at her skull with fingernails chewed down to stubs, pacing in circles. “Pene– Penelope, I just had to see you I just had to!”
“...Andy? What the fuck are you doing here?”
“I left her!”
“What?”
“I broke up with her I broke up with Sadie I’m so sorry Penelope.” Rea’s lower lip trembled and she started scratching at her arms. She kept trying to make eye contact, but could never manage it. “I– I think I might have been drunk. At the– at the ballpark. I think you were right but Pen I can’t remember.”
Penelope was surprisingly calm, though it was clear that was more out of fatigue than a lack of irritation. She sighed deeply and crossed her arms. “And obviously you’re drunk right now.”
“I’m drunk I’m a fucking drunk like my father,” Rea started sobbing into her arms, wiping the snot off her face with her elbow. “He’s dead Penelope but he’s not dead because I’m not dead. I should be dead!”
“You shouldn’t be dead. You should be in fucking bed.”
“I– I have nowhere– nowhere to go.” Rea choked. “No more Sadie. Probably killed mom when I left without a word yeah? So no one left who loves me.”
Penelope rubbed her head in her hands, pulling her fluffy robe around her arms. It was rather chilly out. “Listen, And– I mean R- Rea, yeah? Rea.”
“Sure. I don’t care.”
“You need to get out of here. Go home. Go back to your mother. She still needs you. You know good ol’ Ben ain’t gonna fire you, and if the other guy does, who cares?”
“I can’t.” Andy said it with the finality of death and stared past Penelope. “I can’t.”
“Well, I don’t care where you go. It just can’t be here.”
“But you said!” Rea cried out, grabbing Penelope by the arm. Penelope froze. “You told me you told me if I leave her you’d be with me. I need you Penelope I need you I don’t have anyone I love you!”
“Let go of me.”
Rea realized she was gripping Penelope and let go, digging instead into her own arms. “I’m sorry I didn’t mean to hurt you, not back now not then please help me.
“We were drunk, Rea. And back then, we were idiots. It was stupid to have even returned your call, really. We both knew this was never going to work. It never worked to begin with. You’re not well. Get help.”
“Please Please Penelope I need you I love you. Please.”
“I’m going to need you to leave.”
“Please! Pleeeeeeeaaase!” Rea was screaming so loudly now that one of Penelope’s neighbors had noticed. He was screaming from his doorstep, “Can you shut the hell up?” and Penelope was apologizing profusely. Rea didn’t hear most of it. She was lost somewhere that didn’t exist and only came to for the latter half of the conversation.
“––delusions, and he was just leaving.”
“Nonono,” Andy reached out again, but jerked his hand back when he realized he was going to grab her again. He just wanted to touch her. Just for one second. He just wanted to get close to her, but she was denying him that. “Penelope, please. We can go back how to things were then if we have to. Rea I can die. I can kill her.”
“Yeah, uh, maybe don’t say shit like that when that guy's still staring you down. You should go. I think he's calling the cops."
"Finefinewhatever." Rea waved her hand dismissively and shook her head. She hated the idea of getting arrested even more than the idea of leaving Penelope, but she hated the idea of going home even more than all of it. She grew quieter and picked at the scabs that had popped up on her arms and neck. "Just know I love you. And I'm sorry. And I'll try not to be dead."
Penelope sighed, and as Rea walked away, she realized something sick and twisted. As Penelope closed the door, she turned around one last time and yelled, "Now it's my fucking turn to try and off myself! Wish me better luck than you, bitch!"
The lights inside Penelope's apartment went off.
"Aight bro,” said Penelope’s neighbor, “I'm calling the fuckin cops if you don't get outta–"
Andy ran as fast as he could.
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He was single. Now, he could gaze upon the scantily clad dancers with no remorse. That was the theory that had brought Andy back to the small strip club he had visited… he realized he could not remember when he had visited this establishment, nor the current day of the week. Really, how long had he been in Chicago? Andy was afraid to say he didn't know.
Andy thought about spending some of the little money he had on a lapdance from one of the girls, but he was sour over how things had gone down with Penelope. To a lesser extent, how he'd treated Sadie, but he didn't think he could have told her any other way. To look her in the eyes? Never. He was a coward.
And he couldn't look Penelope in the eyes either, when she turned him away.
"Sup with you, man?" A wiry white man with a Cubs baseball cap and a stained wife-beater struck up conversation with Andy. He was drumming his fingers erratically on the counter at which they both sat, within tipping distance of a dancer. Andy realized he hadn't been moving much at all. If he hadn't been sitting upright, one might have assumed he'd died right there. There were worse ways to die, Andy supposed. He could just end it here, blissed out watching pretty working-class city girls bump and grind. But that wasn't the truth, was it? There was nothing blissful about who he felt like he was tonight.
“Sup with me?” Andy deeply pondered the question for a moment. “Despair, I guess.”
“Damn.” The stranger swirled his glass of whiskey around so the melting ice clattered around in the glass. “That don’t sound good. What happened?”
Andy couldn’t say. He tried spinning a story together from fragments in his mind. “Well, I lost my highschool sweetheart. Showed up drunk at her doorstep while she was asleep. Guess that wasn’t my best move.”
The stranger gave a snorting chuckle and clapped Andy on the back, knocking the wind out of him for a second. “Oh, buddy, I get that. Bitches be crazy, right?”
“Oh yeah. Bitches be crazy,” Andy agreed, and wondered if he was sissy enough to be considered a part of ‘bitches’ when it came to measuring who was crazy. He wondered how this strange man would react if he knew about Rea. Then he wondered where Rea even came from. Who Rea even really was. This Rea chick he kept seeing around… if she was him, or a part of him, then how long has she been there? He could hear her laughing next to Penelope and the ambient sounds of stadium life. He could hear her giggling to the gruff, sonorous sound of Rob’s laughter, right in this very room.
He pushed it all back. The sound was too loud. Ringing ringing ringing in his head.
“Yo. Dude. You with it?”
Andy blinked. “Huh?”
“You’ve been spacing out for a minute there. You rolling?”
Andy pressed his fingers into his throbbing temples. “I wish. But I doubt even that could cheer me up.”
“I got ex, if you want it.” The man’s voice grew hushed and Andy raised his eyebrows. “Coke too. Weed. Whatever you need, man.”
Andy was done fucking around. “You got H?”
The man shuffled awkwardly and sighed. “Nah, sorry man… Got Percs, though. You into that?”
“A little rich for my blood, but I guess I can forgo the lapdance.”
“Hey man, kick in an extra twenty and I’ll blow ya in the bathroom. Normally I do it for fifty, but you’re handsome.”
Andy realized he was wrong. This was what big city life was all about. He chuckled. “While I appreciate the offer, I’ll stick with the drugs, thanks.”
“Suit yourself man.” They exchanged cash for a small baggie of pills and the man patted Andy on the shoulder before standing up. “Pleasure doing business, brother. Later.”
With his newfound friend gone, Andy was alone at the counter, swallowed by the music but still consumed by his inner sound. Within reach of the dancers, but still out of reach from anyone he knew or loved. The only thing guaranteed to be within reach were the Perc-30s in his pocket. So he reached out to god and embraced oblivion again as he took one.
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Rea blinked veeeery veeeery slowly.
“...crazy, really, that I’d run into you tonight. But I’m glad I did.”
Rea became aware of her surroundings. She was at a bar. What bar? She wasn’t sure she’d ever been in one that had booths like this, but the voice she was hearing was familiar enough. A heavy arm wrapped around her shoulder and she sank into it gladly. The scent of alpine cologne wafted over her and immediately she knew who was holding her. She still didn’t know why, or how she had gotten here with him in the first place, but he sounded so happy to see her, and she felt at ease.
“You doing alright, Rea dear?” Rob Howard pulled away slightly and looked at her. With some effort, she looked back at him too, but his deep blue eyes seemed like swirling whirlpools, pulling her into the void, so she looked away again, into the fabric of his thick, plaid flannel. Into the face of his expensive watch. Into the pores of the worn skin on the finger on which his wedding ring would normally reside. She saw so much in those places, but how could anyone possibly understand? Rea swallowed deeply and found her words.
“I’m just happy to be with you…” She murmured, burying her face in his arm. She loved the smell of his clothes. His skin. His cologne. She loved the way his big arms made her feel so small. She loved the way he called her Rea, the way he looked at her like a woman and she never had to doubt that he viewed her that way. She wanted to stay here in his arms forever, until they both decomposed and faded to dust, side by side. It didn’t matter that they only met… when exactly did they meet? It didn’t matter that he was married. He loved her. She had to believe he loved her.
“Well, I’m flattered, but I think I got the better deal,” Rob purred, and he slyly pawed at Rea’s chest with the hand that wasn’t around her. Rea prepared for the same kind of ecstasy she felt the first time he touched her, the kind that led to a night of lust and connection she would never forget as long as she lived. It never came. Instead, she felt limp like a doll as he groped at her flat chest. In fact, in striking contrast to the constant body pain she could never truly get used to, she felt next to nothing. She wondered how many of those pain pills she had actually taken.
She realized he was saying something again. “...so fucking sexy, and I know we’ve been drinking but god I want to take you home.”
Rea didn’t know if she could even get up, never mind get “home.” His hands strayed down to her legs and explored around her crotch and upper thighs.
“I want you so bad right now, Rea. Let’s get outta here.”
Rea was coming to a little, and it was only stressing her out. It was bringing thoughts and images to her mind that she didn’t think she could take any longer. So much she couldn’t even process. So much she didn’t understand.
She wanted another drink. Another oxy.
She put her hand on his, where it was softly moving down her thigh, and moved it to her cock. He glanced around, like someone might see them getting up to naughty business in public, but he clearly didn’t really care. Their table was secluded, and everyone was drunk and distracted.
“Oh yeah?” Rea cooed. “You want this dick?”
He nuzzled his face into her neck and inhaled deeply, feeling her up. He loved her scent as much as she loved his. “Fuck yeah I want it, and that tight little ass of yours.”
“Wow,” Andy said in a dull tone, turning to face Rob with an expression that couldn’t possibly be joking. “What are you, gay?”
“What?” Robert pulled away, giving Rea a befuddled look. “Where the fuck did that come from?”
“You like dick, right? You cheat on your wife with girls like me,” Rea said. “So it’s a simple question, I feel like. Are you gay?”
Robert blinked, taking a deep breath and turning to sip his whiskey. “I’ve thought a lot about it, honestly, and no. My marriage doesn’t work because we don’t work, not because I’m gay. I sleep around because we acknowledge this, and we stay married anyway. Why? I don’t know. Same way I don’t know why I only like cock if it’s attached to a lady. Something about the way a woman moves, I guess. Just gets to me.”
“What if I’m just a guy in a dress?”
“Oh, hush,” Robert said, stroking a strand of her stringy brown hair. “Don’t say that. You’re plenty womanly, don’t you worry.”
“Sure, sure…” Rea was having trouble staying upright. “Yeah, but what if the makeup comes off? What if I’m a girl now but when I wake up I’m a boy? Am I still beautiful to you?”
Robert furrowed his brow. “I’m afraid I don’t quite get it, dear. Of course you’d still be beautiful. Waking up before your makeup doesn’t make you a man if you live your life as a woman. I’m not so hip on the lingo these days, but the idea is that you are whoever you are on the inside, yeah?”
Who am I on the inside? Andy thought. Who am I on the inside?
“Rea? Are you okay?”
Robert reached out to touch her shoulder, but she jerked it away.
“I’m sorry,” Rea murmured, “I have to go.”
“Come on, Rea!” Robert cried as she shakily rose to her feet and stabilized her balance. “What did I say? I’m sorry. Please, stay.”
“I’m sorry.” She looked at him with eyes welling with tears, but sniffed and looked away. “I’m sorry.”
She rose from the booth, wiped the tears from her eyes, and weaved her way out of the busy establishment.
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Andy was staring into the bean. It was nighttime, but the lights of the city reflected in its shiny surface glimmered and swirled. The version of Andy that stared back at him was shrouded in shadow, and seemed to be more distorted than ever. He was more distorted than ever.
“So, I was right.” Andy turned around with a jolt. It was his father. For some reason, even despite the dried blood and gore, Andy wasn’t scared of him anymore. He was beyond caring about anything at this point, including himself. He didn’t say anything to the apparition, not at first.
“I always knew you would turn out to be a sissy.” Andy’s father scoffed and took a long swig of a Budweiser that appeared out of nowhere. He wiped a few drops off his stubbly chin. “But this? I’m ashamed of you, son. I thought I’d raised you better than that.”
“You kept me from it,” Andy whispered, rubbing his eyes. “You B R O K E every part of me that wanted to be like this, but then you DIED. YoufuckingDIED, dad, and youleftmetofallapart!”
Andy’s dad laughed in his face. “How the hell is it my fault that you can’t hold yourself together without me around? And you can’t even handle your liquor, like your goddamn mother. Woman’s soft. I should have always known she’d raise a tranny.”
“I’m not––” Andy wanted to refute it. He was used to being called slurs by his father, but this was different. It didn’t feel like the kind of slur he had any right to reclaim. He was losing track of who he was. He was confused. He wasn’t really a girl, so he was faking it. Right? He couldn’t possibly be… No, he couldn’t be.
There was no way in hell he was transgender.
“You can deny it all you like, kid, but I see you.” Andy’s father’s eyes were black voids, and Andy jumped when he caught them. Uncontrollably, he began to shake. “In fact, you’re the reason I killed myself. I took you out to the bar that night in order to kill us both.”
“No.” Andy covered his ears and started shaking his head. “Nononono.”
He could still hear him. “And now, you’re gonna finish the job, aren’t you?”
“Fuck you.”
“You are, aren’t you? I mean, you’re worthless. You know that, right?”
“I know I know shut up.”
“Why should I? You sure never knew how to keep your mouth shut.
“Admit it.”
“N- No.”
“God fucking dammit kid what are you even good for?”
Andy let out a breath he didn’t even realize he’d been holding and inhaled shakily in. He looked around him. There was barely anyone around this late at night and nobody had even heard him. A light snow had started and he hadn’t even noticed. His father’s words echoed in his head.
“Admit it.”
“Kill yourself.”
“Jesus Christ, what are you waiting for?”
“You lazy, good-for-nothing little–”
“Admit it.”
“Fine!” Andy screamed at no one, hyperventilating. He fell to his knees onto the fine layer of fresh snow. “Fine… I admit it. I’m KILLINGMYSELF slowly with DRUGS. Just like you did. hAppy?”
“Of course I’m not happy, son. Nothing you do could ever make up for how much you disappoint me. But you’ll die trying anyway, won’t you?”
Andy had tears in his eyes. They welled and they welled until they blurred his vision completely, then he sobbed as they cascaded onto the snow beneath him. When he finally stopped crying and opened his eyes, his father was gone.
His father was gone.
“Hey.”
The voice was familiar, but Andy covered his eyes again. He couldn’t handle it. “Go away!”
“I mean, I will if you want. It’s cold as hell out here.”
“I can’t take any more of this, get out of my head!” Andy groaned, rolling over onto his back on the snowy ground with his hands over his teary eyes. “Get out get out get out.”
“Hey,” the voice was softer this time, and it grew closer to Andy. He almost thought it might have been real. “I know you’re struggling, but I’m here. For real, and I’m listening.”
Andy tentatively removed his hands and slowly opened his eyes, blinking and attempting to focus through the snow. Above him was a familiar brown face and dark beard, and while it was hard between his mental state and the snow to discern his features, he knew exactly who it was. His heart sank like a brick.
“Anas?”
Anas was crouching next to Andy, knee in the snow. He smiled softly. “That’s me. I was on my way back from the pub when I heard you screaming. Not sure what you were going on about, but has anyone ever told you you have a very distinct voice?”
Saying nothing, Andy reached up with a shaking hand and whacked Anas in an attempt to dissipate the illusion. He made contact with flesh and still didn’t believe it. A pit was growing in his tummy, and it wasn’t because he didn’t want to see Anas. He didn’t want Anas to see him.
“Why did you come for me?” Andy whimpered, rising at least to a sitting position. “After everything I’ve done to you?”
“Remind me what that was, exactly?”
Andy paused for a moment, but his memory was television static. “I, I, I dontknow. You called me an alcoholic. I got mad. We… We had sex. I GOT MAD. You should hate me, hate me.”
“For getting mad?” Anas went to touch Andy on the shoulder, but he flinched away, so he left it alone and folded his arms across his knee. “Listen, Andy, whatever you’re going through is nothing to be ashamed of. I’m not mad at you for the way you acted… I’m just concerned.”
“You don’t gottabe- be concerned about me,” Andy mumbled, tracing circles in the fresh-fallen snow. He could barely feel the cold on his fingers. “Not your problem. Sick of being everyone’s problem.”
“Dude, I barely know you. I don’t even know your problems, but I could, if you wanted to tell me. The whole uh… the whole ‘Rea’ thing… That left me a little confused. Who, uh… who is she?”
Andy answered honestly. There was no reason to lie anymore. “I don’t know I don’t know I think ME, but I don’t who ‘me’ even is???”
Anas nodded solemnly. “I see… well, wanna come back to mine? We can discuss it. And again, I’m not mad. Just want to understand you.”
“Oh, you want to understand me? That’s rich.” Andy’s voice dragged on the grit of his lower register as apathy reminded him of his place. He scoffed. “Understanding people is a SCAM. It’s adrug we’re all addicted. We see tiny glimpses of ourselves in… in cracked mirrors, but the mirror’s CRACKED, hahaha Justlikeme!! I’ll never understand you, you’ll never understand me. GET. REAL.”
“Andy, wait.” Anas lept up as Andy did the same and started following him as he stumbled off in what seemed to be a random direction. “No fucking shit we’ll never understand each other, Andy! Do you think I understand Anish Kapoor when I stare into that fucking bean? Hell no, man! The point is that we can try. The point is that I want to know you better.”
“Wannaknowmebetter?” Andy stopped in his tracks and whirled around, screaming. “You want to fucking KNOW me better? Know THIS: I’mfucking h o p e l e s s. Oh, andyouknowwhat else? I think I fucking LOVE YOU.”
Anas let the words ring out through the silence for a moment, chewing on his lip. “You’re not crazy. You know exactly what you’re saying to me now. You know that “I love you” means no more and no less than “I understand you” and really, we’re saying the same thing.”
Andy stared at Anas, who seemed to be beyond himself. He couldn’t be human. He had to be God. Only God could make so much sense when nothing else did.
“You love me? Okay, cool. I love you too.”
“No. Stop. Don’t SAY that.”
“Why the hell not?”
“I AM CRAZY, ANAS. Not because I philosophical about love and understanding and bullshit. I’m crazy because before were you here, my DEAD FATHER told me to killmyself. You don’t Youdont KNOW what you’re getting yourself into.”
“Andy, wait!”
This motherfucking guy refuses to give up, huh?
What, you actually think that makes you worth something?
You know better.
Tell him.
“Anas,” Andy said, turning away from him as tears welled in his eyes. “If you don’t leave. me alone, I’m going to FUCKINGKILLyou, and then you’ll what crazy means.”
“You know, Andy. I just don’t believe you.”
Andy said nothing, only wiping his tears away before they could crystalize in the cold. It’s official. His heart had finished freezing over. Every part of him was numb.
“Yeah, well. Youright. Actually, Anas, I–”
Before Anas could realize he was being misdirected, Andy bolted into the night.
23
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Rea was grasping desperately at Andy’s cock.
“Give up,” Andy sighed, leaning his head against the rough bark of the bush he was squatting in. “It’s not gonna happen.”
“No, no, come on,” said Rea frantically, giving it a more rapid series of tugs. “I can do it, I swear.”
But every possible fantasy seemed tainted.
“Give up.”
Twigs and leaves were strewn through his and Rea’s hair, on their clothes, on the snow beneath their crossed legs. Moisture had long seeped through the fabric of Rea’s leggings, and she couldn’t feel her legs. The idea of standing up had long been abandoned, and hypothermia was not outside the realm of possibility. She reluctantly let go of Andy’s cock and the two stared vacantly through the criss-crossed angles of the branches at the city streets beyond. This was the only place she could find with any semblance of privacy, and of course, she was still at risk of a public indecency charge.
She didn’t care. Andy was sad, and she just wanted to make him happy.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t do it for you,” Rea said softly, tears welling in her eyes. “I want to be helpful. I want to do all those things girls are supposed to do, yeah? I just don’t know anymore. Why do I exist?”
“I don’t know,” said Andy, sighing and zipping up his fly. “You’ve been nothing but a fucking nuisance since the day you showed up. Fuck, how long have you even been squatting here? Did I ever fucking invite you?”
Rea scoffed. “No, but I don’t exactly exist out of my own free will. What the fuck am I supposed to do about it?”
“I don’t know,” Andy said drily, but he did have an idea. “Kill yourself?”
“I don’t wanna do that.”
“Maybe I’ll kill you, then.”
“No. Andy. Stop.”
“Why not, yeah? We have nothing left. Our family hates us. We have no girlfriend. No boyfriend. No job. Nowhere to go. Nothing.”
“That’s not true…”
“Isn’t it, though?”
“...”
Andy sighed deeply, rolling up his soaked sweatshirt and the dingy t-shirt underneath. “Here, lemme try.”
Andy groped at Rea’s chest. The tits that just weren’t there. Rea tried to relax under Andy’s touch as he groped her and rubbed her nipples, but it didn’t work. Every part of her felt numb, including her cock. It was no use. Andy gave up and Rea rolled down her sweatshirt. She wrapped her arms around herself and swallowed, trying not to focus too much on the Adam’s apple bobbing in her throat.
“Thanks for trying,” Rea whispered. “You do care.”
“Yeah, well. I wish I didn’t. I could just kill myself, like dad wants.”
Rea was quiet for a few moments, tracing lines with her numb finger in the dirty snow. “I was never sober, was I?”
“No. Well, you were,” said Andy. “I guess.”
“But you’re me,” Rea near-sobbed, holding her head in her numb, shaking hands, “and I’m you. So I’ve been drinking this whole time.”
Andy shrugged. “Guess so.”
“Fuck!” Rea exclaimed, leaning back into a mess of branches. She let her body fall slowly into the bush, branches scratching at her face and twigs snapping behind her. Eventually, it held strong and she just lay there. She wanted a drink. Might as well, after all this time. She looked around. There was some garbage scattered around, and she reached for a crumpled can of Natty Ice about 2 feet away, as though somehow it’d be full for her. It wasn’t. With a sigh she fumbled around in her soaking wet pockets. She pulled out a small plastic bag and stared at its contents. She had 5 oxycodone.
She grabbed a fistfull of snow, gulped it down, and swallowed them all.
“Thank god,” murmured Andy, letting the blissful nothingness wash over his body. “Thank fucking god.”
“Excuse me, sir. Sir? Hey!”
Rea didn’t realize at first that she was being addressed.
“Sir, can you hear me?”
“Wha?” Rea blinked and looked up. There was a blurry shadow in the light snow.
“Sir, I’m going to need you to get out of the bush.”
“What are you gonna do bout it?” Rea dared, barely managing to get the woman who towered above her into focus.
The police officer sighed deeply, putting her hand on her nightstick. “Sir, if you don’t get up right now I’m going to have to take you back to the station, and frankly, I can’t be assed. So get up.”
“I can’t stand,” mumbled Rea, but she was terrified. She knew all the small town cops back home, but city cops were a whole different beast. So, she feebly reached out a shaking arm. “Canyouhelpme?”
The cop sighed and grabbed her arm, yanking her harshly to her feet. Rea stumbled severely, and it was possible her shoulder got jostled out of its socket, but the cop seemed satisfied as soon as she proved she wasn’t going to collapse again. Rea felt fine, actually. Nothing hurt at all. She was even a little happy. She smiled at the officer.
“Thank you,” she said dizzily.
The cop looked her up and down, probably realizing she was high but not wanting to deal with it. She looked at her watch and sighed. “Just get outta here.”
“I got nowhere to go,” muttered Rea.
“Well, don’t be here.” The cop waved at her dismissively and kept walking down the street.
Rea considered just getting back in the bush, but with the drugs in her system she was barely aware of her heart throbbing in her chest, her frostbitten fingers, her shaking legs and twitching muscles. She decided to keep walking. She dug around in her pockets. No more drugs. No more weed. She didn’t even know where her wallet was. Fuck.
She wandered around for some time. Andy seemed quiet, wherever he was. She was aware of him now, as he was aware of her, but it didn’t seem to make a difference. She hated him.
“I hate you,” she said aloud as she kicked her grimy sneakers through the fresh snow, knowing he couldn’t read her thoughts.
“You hate me?” Andy replied, scowling. “You’re the one who started all of this! I hate you!”
“Me?” Rea held a hand up to her chest, indignant. “You’re the only reason I fucking exist, Andrew.”
“Stop it.”
“Yeah, yeah, you were too much of a fucking pussy to be who you are,” the words came like a waterfall and there was no stopping them, “You coulda just been yourself and maybe there wouldn’t have been a me but you didn’t so there’s me and now you hate me and i hate you and what the fuck are we doing andy? I don’t know I just don’t know I’m trying I tried so hard don’t you understand that? I can’t understand Andy I always wanted to be myself and you never let me so I had to do it myself oh, so that’s why you’re here I guess so I can’t takeitanymoreRea getthefuckouttamyhead no you should go youve already done more than enough NO i cant let you do that whynot?whynot? He likes you better as me. Everyone likes you better as me. You can be a girl if you want to you can be a girl i am a girl then why dont you like me IDONTKNOW
Andy suddenly came to, screaming into the night. A person sleeping in a bus shelter was staring at him, irritated. When he realized Andy had noticed him, he growled, “couldja at least keep it down?”
Sorrysorry. Andy waved his arms in circles and wandered away, realizing there was a metro stop right around the corner. He stood by the entrance and kept asking the same question.
Hi I lost my wallet can I have some change? Ohnothatsokay. Don’t worry about it.
JESUS, they all look at me like I’m some kind of street corner schizo. !!!!
You are a street-corner schizo………
oh.
Eventually, Rea gave up on trying to get money for drugs, or even a ticket to the L. She hopped the turnstile and ascended to the platform. She got on the next train that came, muttering all the while.
Whyarewestillhere? What, alive? Yeah kinda. Idk. lazy? I guess.
I like the rumbling of the train. Me too. Nice.
………
Where are we?
I dont know. Where does anyone wind up?
Dead.
stopwiththat
We could end it.
stop
We could get off at the next stop, jump onto the tracks
No
why not?
Idunnoshutupshutupshutup
Its what FATHER wuld have WANTRD
I KNOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWshutupshuthefuckup
She held her head in her hands and he
slammed it against the side of the train and
he moaned and she cried and he hit her
and she yelled at him and
eventually,
they both
fell
asleep.
24
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Andy had no idea how he ended up on a bench, but he knew he couldn’t get up. Not on his own. THis time, for real.
Everything hurts. Yeah. Gotnopills? Yeah. fUck!!
Andy began humming to himself, twirling his thumbs together and staring out across Lake Michigan. He’d never seen such a vast body of water. No way this is a lake. That’s gotta be the ocean. I mean, neverseentheocean. Gottabetheocean. Big and blue yeah
“Gotta be,” Andy muttered, smiling and nodding and rubbing his fingers together. “Gotta be!”
It was early morning. That much, Andy could tell. The sunrise was beautiful over the ocean.
“Wow,” he said aloud. “Just, wow. Do you guys see this?” He didn’t know who he was talking to. “Guys, look, this is amazing! Holy SHIT!”
A few people were out already, on their morning jogs or commutes to work or other such business. Andy was irritated that no one else seemed to be appreciating the absolute beauty of the sunrise over the ocean. DOYOUPEOPLESEETHIS? holyFUCK!!
“Hi there,” said one of the people. Finallysomeone who GETS IT! “Are you feeling alright?”
“Yo, do you fuckinseethis??” Andy rambled, gesturing wildly to the horizon. “Look!! Look while you have the chance!!”
The stranger chuckled and shoved his hands in his pockets. “I agree with you. It’s quite beautiful. I’m lucky enough to see views like this quite often, in my travels.”
“Whaddyado?”
“I’m an opera singer,” said the stranger with a smile. “Mind if I sit down?”
Andy slapped the bench aggressively, “Siddown dude,yeah, siddown! Nobody gets it but us man nobody gets it.”
“Sure, sure. What’s your name, friend?”
“Idunno. I lost my ID.”
The stranger clicked their tongue. “Well, names are overrated anyway, I suppose.”
“IthinkI, IthinkI fucked up. Bad.”
“Yeah? Why is that?”
“Friendsgone. Familygone. NOLOVE. I’m sad. I have nothing. No one. Not even me. She’s gone, I think. She’s gone.”
“Who?”
Andy thought for a minute, reaaaaally chewing on it. “Me.”
The stranger raised an eyebrow. Andy looked at him for the first time. He was older–– dark-skinned with stark white hair that fell in curls to his shoulders. He was dressed as one would assume an opera singer might dress, so Andy figured that story checked out.
“Oh? That’s interesting.”
“I’mma sissy,” moaned Andy, suddenly losing his sunny disposition. “I’mma fuckin faggot yeah like my dad said.”
“Whoa,” said the stranger. “That’s a big judgment to put on yourself.”
“Its true….” Andy stared at the stranger with wide, teary eyes framed by dark bags. “Im fag.”
The stranger burst out laughing, covering his mouth. “Oh god, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to laugh. I just, it’s funny. I remember being in your shoes when I was younger.”
“What. Really?”
“Well, yeah.”
“I think I might have multiple personalities,” Andy said, completely unprompted. He needed to say it out loud. He needed to. “Or. I did. I think she’s gone. I may have killed her. Or she killed herself.”
“Oh, honey,” the stranger went to put an arm around Andy’s shoulder, but his movements were a bit erratic so he decided against it. “So, there’s a woman inside you?”
Andy nodded frantically. “I don’t know what to do. If shesdead, imdead. She’s me. I need her to be me. I can’t be me alone.”
“Have you ever talked to anyone about this?”
“Fcukno,fuck no. THEy’d put me away. I can’t.”
“Have you ever thought that maybe you should talk to someone?”
“No. Nono.” Andy was shaking now, holding himself. “Goway. Nevermind.”
“Hey,” the stranger retreated a little, “I don’t want to scare you. I just want to help you.”
NOONE wants to help me! NOONE understands me!!
“I think I do, though. I have a woman inside me too. In fact, I am a woman.”
Andy looked at the stranger. What. Really.
“Yeah. I know, I don’t look it.”
No
“Well, it’s true. I didn’t realize until way later in life, myself. Well, maybe I always kind of knew, but it took forever for me to accept it.”
I can’t accept it. I cant. Everyonell hate me.
“I don’t hate you.”
Iguessthatstruebutyoudontknowme
“I’d like to.”
NOyoudont. I can’t even be a normal you know like shesnoteven the WHOLE. ME. icantbeashe why does SHE wannabeashe
“I think you’re getting way ahead of yourself, friend. Don’t worry too much about pronouns. I’m not ‘a she’, even though I’m a woman. I used male pronouns my whole life–– just seemed easiest to continue to. You don’t have to be anything you don’t want to be.”
he was crying idontwannabemeidontwannaidontwanna
“How about you walk with me?”
Cant. stuck.
“Are you hurt?”
Andy nodded weakly. Idkwhatswrong. Im sick. Have been Longtime. Sickinthehead but that makes the sick go everywheeeeere
“Hmmm…” The stranger put his hand to his face, pondering. “That’s not good.”
No noitsnot good its not. Im so tired…… Andy flopped over and leaned against the stranger’s shoulder.
“Listen here,” said the stranger, carefully propping Andy up and tilting his head so he looked him in the eye. “I want to help you. I can’t act like I understand you, but I can relate to you. And I care. So, do you want my help?”
ImscaredImsoscaredbutineedhelphelphelp he was crying
“Can I tell you a story?”
Helphelphelp he was crying
“When I was younger, I had an experience that really severed myself from the world around me. I felt lost, like you do now, and I needed help. I didn't want it, but I had no choice. It had gotten too bad. I'd lost myself.”
he was crying and crying and crying everything hurts nodrugsnodrugs
“How about this, alright? I know a hospital around here that's very good. One of the best in the world, and I know they'll treat you alright. It'll be hard. I won't lie. But they might also be able to get to the bottom of your physiological issues.”
icant. tooscared.
“Scarier than being out here alone?”
no.
“Come with me, then. I'll help you walk.”
ok.
The stranger dragged Andy up to his shaky, standing position. The places where his body ended and the strangers began felt like piercing electricity, but the pain didn't faze him. Anything to make it stop. Maybe the hospital would give him drugs. The stranger began guiding him away from the lakeside bench.
Holdonholdon
Andy made the stranger stop and he took one last look over the horizon. God, the sunrise over the ocean was so beautiful. Andy didn't know much about who he was, or where he was, or what he wanted, or much of anything, but what he did know, above all, was that he never wanted to live anywhere that he couldn't see something like this again.
…
……..
………………..
…………………………..
Epilogue
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Dear Andrea,
Forgive me if I'm wrong in assuming that might be what you want to be called. I'm still a bit confused about the whole thing, but I started to piece things together once you ditched me by the bean and dropped your wallet in the snow. I found your ID. “Andrew Wilson”, it said. Andy + Rea = Andrea. I'm clever, right? Well, if I'm right, that is… how awkward would it be if I weren’t?
I really hope this reaches you. I told my brother to check on you, and give you this when he thinks you’re doing well enough to read it. It took me forever to find you, you know. I phoned every hospital in the city, no one would tell me if you were there. Something about HIPAA I guess. I got lucky, though— I asked Irfan if there was anyone matching your description in the hospital he worked at. Sure thing, you were there. How wild is that? I hear you're in the psych ward, which honestly is not shocking... but I'm sorry. I hope you're doing alright. I hate that place. It was a really hard thing to deal with when my mum was in there.
Yeah, I never got a chance to tell you. My family has a history of this kind of thing. Maybe that’s why I didn’t run away when you told me to. Whenever you're feeling better enough to read this, I hope you don't feel afraid to talk to me about this stuff. I can understand better than you think, and even if I don't, well, I'm a pretty good learner. I’m in university, you know.
I miss you. Sounds mental, I know. We only knew each other for about a week, and it certainly was a whirlwind. But I can't help but worry about you. I know you don't have anywhere to stay, so if you need a place to go once you're out, you know where to find me. Actually, I really hope you call me, once they let you. I've attached all kinds of ways to contact me, and Irfan can help if you need anything from within the hospital. I did tell him that I suspect you've got some neurological issues, so if you’re open to it he said he was willing to run some diagnostics. Sorry if that wasn't my place… I just want you to feel better.
I want to help you. I hope you've realized by now that a lot of people do, and that not everyone is out to get you. I feel like I learned a lot about you through our experiences together, and I want to let you know that, whatever you think you did wrong… I forgive you. All of it. We can just start fresh, yeah? Don't worry about it. I got you.
You’re probably freaking out right now, if you’re even still reading this. I get that. It seems like you have a lot to work through and process, but I gathered at least one thing: you have a complicated identity. That’s cool. I’m not really a complicated guy myself, but I have a knack for complexity and an eye for detail. So if I’m right, and what I noticed is true, I’m willing to help you work out what kind of words you can use to describe yourself. Maybe you’re figuring some of that out right now. I hope you are. I’m just a bisexual guy, but I learn a lot about queer identity from my mates–– have you ever heard of being bigender? There’s also genderfluid, or nonbinary. Just food for thought, I guess.
If it isn’t clear enough from all of this, I wasn’t lying when I said I love you. I needed to say it, but I don’t need to act on it. If you need time, or you don’t really want this at the end of the day, that’s alright. I still want to be your friend. I really hope you reconnect with your mother in Kansas, but if you stay in Chicago, or if you decide you want to come back here, you know where to find me. Hell, if she’s willing, maybe you could bring her here. I reckon it’s hard, what with your father being gone and all, but it might actually be good to get a fresh start. Again, just food for thought.
You told me that I shouldn’t like you–– that it would be crazy to love you. I’m insane, then. If you never reach out to me again after this, I’ll be rather sad, but I respect whatever you decide to do. In the end, I’m not too worried one way or another. I trust in your ability to figure out where you’re trying to go, with or without me. But, you know something? The point isn’t really where you’re trying to go, is it?
It’s where you wind up.
Love and roses,
Anas al-Hajri
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© 2024 Avery Kolenski