Chapter 6
Dream nights are supposed to come the hard way, after a few nightmares. So of course, I get all the way uptown only to get a frantic phone call from you. Barry needs you downtown just in case, so you are stuck there waiting for the green light.
“And believe me, Joe, I know how ridiculous I sound. ‘On call’ like I’m a doctor or something. Anyway, I got antsy after I got ready at work so I’m doing time at the Beanery. I was thinking you could wait with me if you don’t mind coming…Do you want to come?”
Fuck yes, I do! The train can’t move fast enough but a thousand minutes later I’m downtown, flying up the stairs in my stupid smellier-by-the-second shirt.
I feel good. We’re on track. I love the way you take your work seriously but walk it back a second later.
Like I’m a doctor or something. I love that I’m not scared to show up for sex night in this oversize ugly flannel that reeks of stale cigars.
And when I walk into the Beanery, I almost collapse. You didn’t just get ready for me, you went all out for me. Hot pink bra straps under a see-through shirt. A skintight skirt. Eyelashes that will come off when I fuck you, when I move your mountain.
Down, Portnoy. Not just yet. I roll up to the counter. “Hello, Sitcom. I like your skirt.”
You startle. “Wow, um, thank you. I guess I got a little carried away.”
The barista laughs. The guy who gave me the free muffin. “I guess grunge is back.”
You ignore his dumb jab, and you pat my chest. “Now, this is not a Ralph Lauren.”
I kiss you on the top of the head. A little bold, but fuck it. You’re mine. The barista goes back to wiping the counters, and I tell you about Mooney, about the shirt.
You put your hand on my leg. “Joe, seriously. It’s fine. I get it.”
You really are the coolest girl in the world and the barista grabs his messenger bag. Same as yours, I think, and maybe I should have brought mine. “I’ll walk out with you guys,” he says. “And it’s Dick, by the way.”
I shake his stupid hand. “Joe.”
You ask Dick what he’s up to tonight. He looks around like he’s waiting for someone. The poor guy does that a lot. I feel lucky. He’s alone, and I am not. I have you.
“Well,” he says. “I was supposed to pitch this financier about my movie.”
You light up like he doesn’t make our coffee. “So cool, D!”
He shrugs. You are kind, the type of girl who lets the generic insecure barista talk like he’s the man, like he’s Harvey Fucking Weinstein.
You’re as caring as Miss Frascatore and I know you see what I see.
Overdone muscles and insecurity. The too-tight T-shirt.
Imagine being Richard and choosing to be Dick.
You are too nice for your own good, and he’s never gonna shut up, so I sling an arm around your shoulder.
“Well, dude, good luck with everything, but we gotta hit the road.”
“All good,” he says. “I’m jonesing for some mattar peetar, so I’m gonna hit up this rad Indian place a few blocks away. You kids have fun.”
You grab my hand. You squeeze. “Actually,” you say, “I too am kinda dying for some good matar paneer. What do you say, Joe?”
—
No no no. We are sitting on the floor of Malai Galli.
Our asses are on old green pillows. The floor is as hard as the food is spicy.
I don’t get it, Vail. Dick is on our date and he’s at it again, going off on his solo trip to Costa Rica.
He despises New York beaches because he prefers soft sand, and you say you are the same.
I don’t know shit about sand and the only reason I don’t haul off and punch him is that he keeps looking at me like he feels bad, like he knows he’s not supposed to fucking be here, like he knows we’re not supposed to be talking about some movie he’ll never make.
“Sorry,” he says. “I get started on my feature and I can’t stop. Gonna dedicate it to my brother. Use the earnings to make a doc about him.”
He kisses his dog tags and you tell him he doesn’t have to apologize and you’re right.
None of this is his fault. Dick is not the bad guy.
His brother died in Kuwait—that’s how he got the dog tags—and you don’t read so you don’t know The Body by Stephen King, but you might’ve seen the movie Stand by Me.
If we’re ever alone again, I will tell you that Dick is like a beefy gym rat version of Gordie Lachance minus the brains.
“Ooh,” you say. “I am living for this pakora.”
You don’t sound like you. You’re different tonight.
Preening and polite. What happened, Vail?
What did I do? You showered for me. You got dressed up for me.
Your blouse is a gauzy plastic bag, and your bra straps are hot pink.
I have a feeling that your friend in the makeup department did your eyes.
The black lines are blurrier, smokier, and you look hot, ready to lure my Portnoy into your Beckinsale, but what the fucking fuck?
WHY ARE WE HERE?! We had plans and the table is too low and too little and Dick’s T-shirt is too much.
We get it, kid. You have muscles. Tattoos.
You surf. He does things, and they show up on his body.
Me, I read things. I’ve never been more aware of it in my life. There’s a difference, there is.
I don’t want to make the other kind of list in my Moleskine. It’s too soon. But it’s flashing in my mind. Neon-black fucking Sharpie.
#1 WHY ARE WE IN INDIA WITH DICK?
Dick, who went north in Costa Rica because you have to go north, and he’s like Zoolander via Rick Fucking Moody.
“Of course,” you say, as if you’ve been to Costa Rica. And maybe you have been to Costa Rica. Maybe you don’t like me anymore. Maybe it’s the flannel. Maybe you like Dick.
“What about you, Joe? Do you surf?”
Before I can answer, you do. “Ah, Joe’s a bookworm. The idea of you on a surfboard, Cusack…” And then you rub my chest—good—but then you coo like I’m a baby—bad. “Joe’s a softy, an indoor cat, you know?”
I meow—what else do I do—and play it off like it’s a joke, but men are dogs, not cats. Dick rips a piece of naan in half.
“You guys want?”
You take the naan. I take the naan. I chew slowly while you dunk it in a bowl of I CANNOT PRONOUNCE IT AND I AM TIRED OF BEING CORRECTED. The two of you are doing it again. If you’re not discussing tropical paradises, then it’s back to the fucking food.
I am my father’s son. Food is meant to keep you alive, not give you a life.
I feel ignorant and soft—The idea of you on a surfboard, Cusack—and my mouth is burning and I know I am failing you, the way you nudge me and widen your eyes. “Are you okay?”
“Fine, just a long day.”
You rub my arm, and is that soft too? “I’m sorry, Joe. If you’re tired…”
I look at you and so does Dick. What do you want? What the fuck do you want? I pick up my Diet Coke, extra ice, because no, I didn’t copy Dick and order a beer and a shot of Jim Henson or whatever the fuck you call it. Things are bad enough without the possibility of the waiter calling me a fake.
“So, what about you, Joe?”
It’s Dick, and it would be so much easier if he was a fucking dick. But he keeps including me.
“Sorry,” I say, because that’s all I say at this table, all I am, the sorry, sourpuss fuck. “I missed it.”
“It’s cool, buddy. I was just asking if you have a favorite sushi place.”
“Oh, I don’t really eat sushi.”
You gasp. “Not even salmon? I mean, never.”
“I don’t like it.”
“But did you ever try it, Joe?”
No. Ick. “Of course I tried it.”
Dick knocks back another Jim Henson and laughs. “Chicks and sushi. Such a thing.”
You press and push and why, Vail, why? “I mean, Joe, have you had a California roll? Because even if you think you don’t like sushi, I just…You are so missing out.”
And you are so hurting my feelings with this uncalled-for assault on my taste buds.
I look at you, but my eyes aren’t Polaroids. They’re glossy and burned out because of the fire raging in my intestines. “Have you ever had On-Cor Veal Parmigiana?”
Dick wants a high five, so I meet his hand. “Now that’s what I’m talking about,” he says. “That shit is the shit.”
It could be so nice. We could talk about our favorite frozen foods so that I can participate, but it’s weird.
It’s like you don’t want me to participate.
You cut off Dick—oh God, you do—and you start talking about your show again.
You never do this when we’re alone, but it’s too soon to say never; I only did just meet you.
You’re rambling about an episode where the one named Carrie goes out with a guy who hates sushi and cracks bad jokes and she concludes that he’s only good for one thing.
“Sex,” you say, and if that was a jump, you did not stick the landing. You’re not good at it, Vail. You’re not good at summarizing that fucking sitcom. You sip your water. “I know,” you say. “Enough about Carrie Bradshaw. I get it, boys.”
Dick laughs. I laugh. The waiter brings more I CANNOT PRONOUNCE IT AND I AM TIRED OF BEING CORRECTED.
You and Dick have tasted everything. You’ve lived.
Am I dead? Was I ever even alive? Love is the thing that makes you alive.
The stories you tell that make me feel special now make me feel like a nonperson, a half person.
Your parents took you to sushi when you were twelve, and Dick worked at a seafood joint with his family at their place by the lake.
My heart races, and not because of you. It’s me, Vail.
I don’t have stories, not like that. The spices don’t agree with me, but other people are fine.
Everyone in here is noshing on their naan, their Malai Galli, so it’s not the food. It’s me. I’m not NYC Bookstore Babe.
I’m NYC loner teen runaway who lives in a cardboard box.
“Joe,” you say. Not Cusack. Not babe. Not honey. “Are you okay?”
Dick looks around at nothing, just a nice guy trying to give us a second. I don’t want pity, Vail. I want love. I force a smile onto my puffy, sweaty face. “I’m great.”
I lied to you, and you know it, and the bad list in the Moleskine of my mind is growing longer, longer than the good list. It’s too early for a night like this.
Glitches where the CD skips and the page that explains the big twist is missing.
You bite your lip and nod at the Malai Galli.
And then Dick gets a call on his cell phone.
Motorola flip phone just like yours. And it was some girl he knows, some waitress, so of course you’re talking about food again, Zagat bullshit, spice.
I lived on cold pizza for three days in the cage. A cage in a basement that I still sleep in when the cardboard walls are too thin and I’m a loser, baby, so why don’t you kill me?
My body turns on me. You make a face. “Whoa.”
I farted at the table. I’m a loser, baby, so why don’t I kill me? “Sorry.”
My bowels are like me. Inexperienced and failing.
I can’t blame money. This is New York Fucking City and there is good cheap food everywhere.
But who wants to try new things alone? It’s me.
Always just me. I lay my napkin on the table.
The two of you are comparing your parents and their tech skills.
I don’t belong here with you and I never will.
I can’t keep up with you, Vail. I can’t catch up with you.
My intestines are too stringy, too weak.
I tasted the matar paneer. I tried the masala dosa, and when you insisted, I took a nice big heap of that Hyderabadi biryani.
And now I’m not just the young dud in the oversize old-man flannel. My insides turn over—I’m gonna shit my fucking pants, I really am—and Dick raises another tiny glass of Jim Henson and why isn’t he about to puke? “The shitter’s downstairs, killer.”
You grab at your bag. “I might have a TUMS.”
I can’t risk responding to either fucking one of you.
I walk fast, bumping into the waiter and the curtains.
I am that guy no one wants to be, that guy no woman wants to be with.
I am not NYC Bookstore Babe. I’m a soft scrawny soft sad sack who gets the runs in public.
Ugly and unworldly. Weak with no pitches or future prospects or exciting fucking stories, a letdown of a fuck-up who’s never been to the airport, let alone been on a plane.
I hear your voice when I hit the stairs. “Feel better, Cusack!”
And I know: It’s the last thing you’ll ever say to me.