What's Important Is Feeling: Stories (8 page)

What Spine wants is for Jess to lead the way, searching the city streets for one last hit.

“I don’t know, man,” Jess says. “This ain’t the hour.”

“Buddy,” Spine says. He’s got a hand on Jess’s shoulder, and he speaks in a calm, low voice like he’s a boxing coach, coaxing his fighter in for one last round. “Now or never, dawg,” Spine says.

We walk outside. The sun lingers on the horizon, threatening to burst the graying black. The streets and lawns smell like dew. Jess leads us. We follow, trancelike, weaving over Longfellow Bridge as the skyline approaches. We’ve been walking for an hour. I’m sweating, half asleep, or maybe I’m sleepwalking and the morning is a surreal dream: this sleeping city, our holey leader, Spine, humming the blues.

Jess leads us through the Chinatown gates into the old Combat Zone. I remember hearing stories about this place: the night-beat hookers asleep on benches, fishnet legs fetally curled; cops hitting the homeless with nightsticks; human corpses laid out with the morning trash.

Things are different these days. The city is quiet. The streets are empty. It smells of fish. Jess tells us to give him all our money.

For a second we hesitate, look up at the building, back at Jess. His hands are in his pockets.

Spine takes out his wallet, peels off a fresh fifty. The rest of us give Jess tens and twenties. Jess crumples the money in his palm. Whatever we’re getting, we’re overpaying. Jess says to wait outside.

We light cigarettes almost in unison, blow smoke at the remaining stars as they shine weakly against the gray and coming blue. We check our watches.

Jess reappears ten minutes later, grinning. We follow him to the harbor, watch the ocean lap its waves. Jess pulls a bag from his pocket. It looks like pebbles.

Walking back to Cambridge, as the sun warms my body, I feel like part of the people’s cavalry, its vestigial remains.

The next day Donny calls us in for another round of theft. Jess doesn’t come along. Says he’s too tired, needs some shuteye. He says
shuteye
like it’s a word he’s only just learned.

When we get back to the house everything is gone: instruments, plasma TV, stereo equipment, all our laptops.

“Shit on a brick,” Spine says. “Shit on a goddamn, motherfucking brick.”

Jess must have had help, known a guy with a van. Our furniture’s gone too—Spine’s king bed, even the corduroy couch with all the rips and burns.

At first, it’s hard to believe. I stare at the empty living room as if the stuff is still there but I’m just not seeing it, not looking hard enough.

A smile slowly opens on Spine’s face. His lips snake toward his ears. Spine starts to laugh.

“He deserved it,” Spine says. “He deserved it all.”

When Isabelle knocks on my door that night I don’t say a word. I’m under covers with the lights off, listening to our next-door neighbor play piano. I’ve been having trouble sleeping. The neighbor repeats the opening bars of some famous overture, a piece I recognize from movies but could never name.

Isabelle enters anyway, climbs into bed, lays her head against my chest. I lie perfectly still and try to slow my breathing. Isabelle adjusts herself, gets comfortable. She lays a leg over my legs.

“Spine passed out on the carpet,” she says. “Took too much Klonopin.”

“It’s been a stressful day,” I say.

“He thinks the whole thing is hilaaaaarious,” she says, elongating her vowels in imitation of Spine. “Now he gets to go on a shopping spree. What an ass.”

The hair on my arm stands from the static friction. The neighbor keeps screwing up on the exact same note and starting over.

“Why?” I say.

“Why what?”

“Why Spine?” I say. I run my fingers gently over her arm, just the tips. There is a long pause. Isabelle inhales like she’s about to say something, then stops herself. She fidgets a little and I stop stroking her arm.

“Don’t you see?” I say.

“See what?” Isabelle says.

I take a strand of her hair between my fingers. Isabelle says nothing. I only have to turn a tiny bit. I give the softest kiss I can, hardly a kiss at all, just closed lips brushing her ear.

“Don’t,” Isabelle says.

I roll on top of her, pin her arms to the mattress.

“Stop,” she says.

I’m not the kind of guy who acts like no means yes even when it does. I try to wear this weakness as a badge of honor. I roll off Isabelle, sit up.

“I can’t do this anymore,” I say.

“Do what?” Isabelle says.

“I’m done,” I say.

“Just come back and cuddle me,” she says, and yawns. It’s the yawn that gets me.

“No,” I say. Isabelle pulls my arm.

“You’re being dramatic,” she says. “Come on.”

“I’m done,” I say.

“Fine,” Isabelle says. She pulls herself up. I listen for her footsteps, let myself sink into the mattress. It feels like I could just keep sinking, falling through the floorboards, burrowing until I’m beneath the house itself, a mole to the earth’s soft middle.

We Close Our Eyes

I
n the year following her hysterectomy, my mother befriended a priest. Before that, religion hadn’t figured much into our family. We were secular Jews who didn’t believe in God, went to temple once a year on Yom Kippur, and dabbled occasionally in Eastern thought. We’d all read
The Tao of Pooh
, but none of us got more than five pages into
The Te of Piglet
.

My own relationship with God existed solely through the prism of LSD, which I took whenever possible, ideally in star-soaked fields amid fresh-cut grass, but more likely in a basement with wall-to-wall carpeting and, possibly, a strobe light. I was sixteen and having a very difficult time getting laid.

I blamed this on numerous factors: that I went to a school where no one “got me”; that puberty hit me late, leaving me with a wispy attempt at sideburns and a voice like a tone-deaf parakeet; that my doctor wouldn’t prescribe anything stronger than mouthwash for my halitosis. The main difficulty was probably the fact that I was stoned all the time, but I saw it as more of a coping mechanism than cause. When I was stoned I was still horny, I just didn’t feel so angry about it. And when I was tripping, my penis shriveled to half its size, and I might have forgot it was there if I didn’t so enjoy watching the trails of light dance around my stream of urine as I pissed in the dirt or in a pile of snow.

I also spent plenty of time masturbating. I left my seed everywhere: on towels, shower curtains, pillow cases, pieces of notebook paper, the pages of my mother’s photography books (Man Ray was an early favorite), women’s fashion magazines, the mouse pad of our computer. I liked to return days later, find the dried crusty jizz, crumble it in my fingers. I imagined each wad as an unborn child. Sometimes I would name them: William, Kathleen, Rufus, Ezekiel. I didn’t like having a priest around the house.

Not that I had a say in the matter. We were careful around my mother since she’d had surgery. No one said, “Since she’d had cancer,” but that’s what we meant. You weren’t supposed to say cancer or cervix, just surgery. She picked up smoking for the first time since my sister was born, and everyone kept quiet about it. “Your mother’s under a lot of stress,” my father said.

Me too. I was failing three out of five classes, and my sister was on the verge of becoming school slut. She thought our father was having an affair.

“How do you know?” I asked her. We were on the way to school in my car, which was actually my mother’s old Toyota, given to me when she was sick because she wasn’t doing much driving.

“Mom was crying the other night.”

“Mom’s always crying.”

“This was different. She just kept crying and crying.”

“She’s under a lot of stress.”

“Dad left her there. He didn’t come back until like one in the morning.”

“I’m sure it’s nothing. And you better not be putting out for Matt Poncett either.”

“It’s none of your business.”

“Everyone will say you have genital warts.”

“Matt’s sweet.”

“He’s not sweet.”

In sixth grade Matt had bitten the tail off the class hamster.

“Believe me,” I said, “He’s not sweet.”

“And he doesn’t have genital warts. That’s just a rumor. I’ve seen his dick, and it’s, like, totally normal.”

“I don’t want to hear about it.”

We were almost at school.

“It’s the most normal dick I’ve ever seen.”

“How many dicks have you seen to compare it to?”

“Seven.”

“You’ve seen seven dicks?”

“Well, only five not counting you and Dad.”

“When have you seen my dick?”

“When we were little and we used to take baths together.”

“That’s not an accurate representation. It’s grown a lot since then.”

“I’m sure it has.”

“I don’t want you to think . . .”

“So six, then,” she said. “Six regular size and one child size.”

“It was only child size because I was a child at the time!”

“Whatever,” she said.

I pulled into the junior lot. Almost hit Sally Danzig, I was so distracted. The sun was aimed at me like a dentist’s lamp. I could barely make out Sally giving me the finger and mouthing the word
loser
.

Later that day, or maybe it was a different day—that whole spring blends together, bathed in Dijon yellow light like a three-hour Spanish film where the plot is hard to follow, but you get the gist of it, understand in the actress’s vacant gaze that she’ll never be the same again—I met Father Larry for the first time. I’d been at Mike’s doing whippits in the shed, or in Weinberg’s basement ripping the four-footer. When I pulled into the driveway, my mom was sitting on the front step with a man I’d never seen.

He wore the priest outfit. I’d always wondered if it was a black shirt over a white shirt, or a white patch on the neck of a black shirt.

Straight off, I pegged him as a lush and an Irishman—the kind of Boston McDrunk priest you see in movies molesting little boys. They passed a cigarette and sipped from Styrofoam Dunkin’ cups.

The tulips in the front garden had come up, yellow and white. Every morning my father had been out there planting, watering. Sometimes I’d watch through my bedroom window. From my vantage it looked as if he were digging through the earth like a blind dog.

“This is Father Lawrence,” my mother said.

“Call me Larry.”

“Zach,” I said.

“Zachariah,” he said.

“Just Zach,” I said.

“Where have you been?” my mother said.

“At Molly’s.”

Molly was my imaginary girlfriend. I used her to quell suspicion about my drug use. If I’d said I was at Weinberg’s, mom would know I’d been taking b-rips. She would call them b-rips too, because she’d overheard me say it.

“When are we going to meet this Molly?” my mother said.

“A good Irish name,” Father Larry said.

It was two shirts, I was pretty sure.

“Hello?” my mother said, waving her hand in front of my face.

“You’ll meet her.”

“You could at least show us a picture.”

“What does she look like?” Father Larry said. “A pretty one, I bet.”

“She has tits like cantaloupes,” I said.

It was the first thing that came to mind. And it wasn’t even true!—I’d always imagined my imaginary girlfriend to be waifish.

“Zachary!” my mother said.

“Excuse me, Father,” I said. “I meant eyes like cantaloupes, not tits. Her eyes are orange like cantaloupes.”

“That doesn’t even make sense,” my mother said. “What is she, a cat?”

The priest laughed. “Young love,” he said.

“Have you been sucking down jayskis?” my mother said.

“What?”

“Are you smoking ill nugs of kindbud?”

“You sound ridiculous,” I said. “I have to go in and do homework.”

“It’s been a pleasure, Zach,” Father Larry said.

I didn’t do homework. Instead, I lay on my waterbed—another parental hand-me-down because it had been making my mother nauseous during chemo—and pretended I was floating. I wondered how many times my parents had had sex in this very bed, how many positions they’d used.

That night at dinner I said, “What’s the deal with you and that priest?”

Mom blushed and said, “He’s a poet, you know. He writes these wonderful poems about the earth and seasons. Very Zen. Sort of Zen-Catholic. You guys would like him.”

“How did you meet him?” Ramona said.

“He works in the hospital. He goes around and talks to sick people.”

“Shouldn’t they have given you a rabbi for that?” I said.

“I don’t know. He just showed up in my room. Said we didn’t have to talk about God if I didn’t want. He mostly just sat with me. I’d tell him about you guys. He would tell me stories about traveling through Europe on trains. Sometimes he would read to me.”

“Sounds romantic,” I said.

“He’s a very nice man. He told me he prays for me every night.”

My father wasn’t there, and no one mentioned it.

After dinner Ramona and I watched TV in my bedroom, which was also the attic.

“Where do you think Dad is?” she said.

“Working late.”

“Probably.”

From my bed, I could hear my mother at the piano. She played Chopin, one of the nocturnes. I imagined the music mixing with all the dust and soot in the pipes as it came up through the grates. By the time it reached me it sounded condensed, congested.

In the middle of the night I woke with the feeling I’d been dreaming the same music that I’d fallen asleep listening to. I looked out the window. My father’s car was in the driveway. Beneath the streetlamp, a raccoon was fucking up our garbage.

This was around the time my parents made me start seeing a shrink. His name was Goldstein or Rothstein, something-stein, and I just knew he was an adult version of the type of arrogant shits I went to school with. I lied and told him I didn’t do drugs. Dr. -stein didn’t believe me. My parents had already told him I did. I could tell he thought I was this typical angsty bourgeois stoner. He wasn’t smart enough to understand the depths of my existential suffering.

“You don’t get me,” I said.

“You have to let me try,” he said.

“Whatever,” I said. “I think my sister’s lezzing it out with your daughter.”

He paused. “And how does that make
you
feel?”

“I don’t know. She’s
your
daughter.”

“We’re not here to discuss my daughter,” he said, though it seemed like he was thinking about it, wondering if it was true. It wasn’t. He probably never sees her, I thought. They have their own bathrooms, keep different hours. Sometimes they pass in the kitchen.

“So what do you want to discuss?” I said.

“You,” he said, “We’re here to discuss you.”

“This is bullshit,” I said.

My sister was at the movies with Matt Poncett. So she claimed. She was probably blowing him in the front seat of his car, parked sketchily on the top level of the Papa Gino’s/Filene’s Basement parking garage.

“Eat some peas,” my mother said. “You don’t eat enough vegetables.”

She put some on my plate, and I smushed them with my fork.

“Zach,” my father said. He placed his hand on my shoulder. “Are you okay?”

This was code for “Did you just rip a fat blunt of orange-haired beasters?” Or “We know you jizzed all over the Frida Kahlo poster in the upstairs bathroom, but actually it doesn’t look half bad now, like your dried come is her tears.”

“I’m chill,” I said.

“We know you’re chill,” my mother said. “That’s what we’re worried about. Sometimes you seem a bit too chill.”

“You’re going to graduate in a year,” my father said. “What do you plan to do after that? With your grades, I’m not sure college will be—”

“Don’t say that, Mark . . .” my mother said.

“I’m just saying—” my father said.

“If he gets his grades up—” my mother said.

“I’m just saying it might be time to start thinking—”

“Zach,” my mother said, “I know we’ve been distracted lately. I know we haven’t had a lot of time for you. It’s been tough with my surgery and everything.”

“Whatever,” I said.

“Not whatever,” my father said.

When my sister got home it was late. I could smell the essence of jizz on her.

“Dad’s out again,” she said.

“You let him come all over you.”

“You’re insane.”

“Don’t you have any dignity?”

“Don’t you?”

“No,” I said, and ripped a scab off my arm that I’d been picking.

By this point we were deep into April. Spring break was over. I’d spent it in my room playing
GoldenEye
and eating Little Debbie’s Zebra Cakes. Through the window I’d watch Ramona run out to Matt Poncett’s pickup, holding her jacket over her head so she wouldn’t get wet. The door would pop open, and she’d climb in. Her skirt rode up her ass when she made the step up.

An hour or so later my father would walk out to his own car. He didn’t appear to notice the rain. I knew my mother was alone downstairs, abandoned by all, listening to the rain like it was a requiem. I couldn’t bring myself to walk down and say hello.

But now school was back, and Father Larry was showing up even more often. They’d be in the kitchen every day when I got home.

“You think Mom’s fucking the priest?” I asked Ramona. She was standing in the upstairs bathroom with the door open, applying mascara. I lingered, half in the bathroom, half in the hall.

“He’s a priest,” she said. “He’s married to Jesus.”

“That’s nuns.”

“Then who are priests married to?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think they’re married to anyone.”

“Maybe the Virgin Mary?”

“What do you know about virgins?” I said.

“I don’t,” Ramona said. “There’s only one virgin in this house. Everyone’s getting some but you.”

She said it casually, blinking to perfect her lashes.

“I have a girlfriend,” I said.

“Sure,” Ramona said.

One night at Weinberg’s, me, him, and Mike took ecstasy. We sat in his basement and listened to the techno remix of that Rusted Root song with the African drumming. I took off my shirt, rubbed my naked back against the leather recliner. We played
Mario Kart
and chewed gum. We each took a second pill; they were called Mercedes and had the logo imprinted on them. No girls came over. At sunrise we drove down to the lake. Lying in the grass I felt like I was lying in a hammock. I thought about my family and imagined them as pieces of clay that only needed to be fused together and fired in a kiln in order to take a shape and hold it.

We fell asleep outside for a couple hours. We were late for school. Weinberg swung me by my house so I could grab my backpack. My father was at work already. Before I got in I could hear my mother’s piano. It was Bach, a piece she used to play for me when I was a kid. Father Larry was sitting in my father’s chair, listening. Both their eyes were closed, but sunlight came in the window, and I knew they were seeing bright colors beneath their eyelids.

I stood in the doorway. Father Larry had his legs crossed like he was meditating. A carton of OJ and an empty champagne bottle were on the table. The floor was wet from where the champagne had spilled.