Chapter 30
Something unexpected greets me when I get home: The living room floor is shining and the couch cushions are fluffed. The dark spots on the coffee table that I assumed were part of the wood have been cleaned away.
Cat Cat is sitting outside Mom’s closed bedroom door.
I gently knock. When there’s no answer, I open it a crack.
Mom is on her bed, cross-legged with headphones on, typing on a new laptop.
All around her are things I’ve never seen.
There’s a large printer, stacks of envelopes and rolls of stamps, hardbound notebooks, and an expensive-looking camera in a haphazardly opened box.
Crumpled papers with printed text are scattered around.
“I don’t want to know,” I mutter, and step back into the hall before she notices me.
Maybe this should be my new set. My boyfriend rejected me for not admitting I’m gay. My mom is on a manic spree. It’s all material. Comedy is tragedy plus time. And hasn’t it been enough time?
I take off my shirt and jeans and drop them in the living room. I make it to my bedroom but can’t make it to the bed, so I lie down on the carpeted floor.
It’s a good night to watch porn but a bad night to find something that makes sense. I search for bisexual men but the results all involve more than two people. Where are the couples politely fingering each other in pleasant lighting?
I put on Joe’s third special, Average Joe . It’s his mainstream hit. He’s in a giant theater with great lighting. He tells the first joke and I’m so bored by it that I’m embarrassed I ever thought this person was good.
I try reading Audre Lorde’s Zami . I try A Boy’s Own Story and Transgender History .
I turn to the first page of the enormous James Baldwin biography.
It should be soothing to read these voices, the seriousness in them, but they make me feel unserious, almost idiotic in comparison.
These writers share their wisdom and I’m still dumb because I don’t know how to hear it.
I open a blank document to write down…I don’t know, these feelings? But I don’t care enough to type the words.
I do type one thing:
I no longer believe in the ability of art—neither putting it out nor taking it in—to help me. I am too stupid to be helped.
“That’s a good line,” I say, but there’s no one around to hear.