Chapter 29
Fifty-one hours later, I am wasting away at the Beanery like a gigolo with no place to go and what is soon? Is soon tonight? Is soon never? I’ll tell you this much, Vail. It’s not sooner than I think! Are we done? Is this because I don’t want to drink beer with Dubs? Dick groans.
“You need to chill, Goldie.”
“I am chill.”
He smirks and who the fuck could chill? I tell him your parting words again—Sooner than you think, no doubt—and how do I do it, Vail?
How do I chill when you’re trying to kill me and INXS is too fucking loud.
Live, baby, live? More like Die, baby, die.
Dick taps away on his suddenly ever-present laptop.
What the fuck does he do on there all day?
Is it really that hard to make a movie you’re never going to make?
No. I won’t be that asshole, Vail. I won’t blame him for the things you do to me.
He smirks and says they’re all “nuts,” and he closes his laptop.
Good riddance. Computers should not be fucking portable. Coffee shops are for talking!
“All right,” he says. “Here’s the truth, Goldbitch. Seems to me like she still doesn’t want a boyfriend. She wants a dog. Do you want to be her dog? Obey every command?”
“Woof.”
He rubs his eyes. “Well, then you have to let her train you.”
“You mean like when Carrie told Aidan she wanted space and then freaked out when she couldn’t get a hold of him?” I have to stop doing that. I will stop doing that. “Sorry.”
“Go home,” he says. “Two days is nothing, and I’m warning you, Goldboy. No girl wants to be your whole fucking life. And yes, she put you in the doghouse because you wouldn’t hang out with that Doug guy.”
“Dubs.”
“Whatever. Don’t sweat the ‘soon’ stuff. Forget about her and go to a strip club or hit some fucking golf balls. Whatever passes the time so you have something to fucking say when she hits you up and that’s the other thing. No calls, Goldbitch…Let her come to you.”
I do it. I live, baby, live. I pull doubles in hell.
I eat at McDonald’s and think about how to check on my typewriters back at Mooney’s.
I don’t “make things right” with him. I don’t know how to do that.
I call Vagina to say hi. I don’t go to her “modeling agency” parties, but I do get invites.
After another long day in hell, I go down to Union Square and hit the bank and blow a hundred ones on random buskers, a Black guy with drums, a willowy young blond girl with a cat on a leash and a guitar, a voice that haunts me on the walk to Veselka, where I order six different kinds of pierogi, all of which I rate in my Moleskine.
See that, Vail? I have a life. And maybe I need to invest in it. Girls seem to like the way Dick carries his laptop and the computer at Mooney’s isn’t mine. Fuck it. Overtime in hell is pretty good, so after Petra liberates me, I go to Circuit City.
And now I have a laptop. I walk home to SoHo, and soon is a short word, a long time.
Where are you? Dick is probably right and I should’ve just had a beer with Dubs but it’s not like I did something terrible.
The silent treatment is a bit much and I’m not a dog, not completely.
I log onto IM for the hell of it and holy shit it’s…
Me: You’re up late.
You: Omigod JOE! HI! HII!!!!!!!!
You owe me more than a “hi,” and those exclamation points hit like acid-laced daggers. Gently, Joseph. You are trying. But I can’t ask you if you miss me, or how many hours it takes for “soon” to fucking end. I have to be a cool cat. Hard to get.
You again: So really how are you Joe? What’s new?
Me: Nothing. Barry let you back on IM?
You: No lol we have a night shoot so I’m holding down the fort. Yawn. But yay for good timing! Work is crazy and Cynthia got me a Giuliani poster lol you will die when you see it.
Oh, joy. Yet another older man on the walls in your bedroom. GREAT! But also actually great because you invited me back into your bedroom. Can I come now? Too soon?
You again: Are you there?
Me: Yeah. Kinda hungry. Might go to that diner on 23rd Street.
The minute I let those words go into your laptop I know I fucked up.
You: Cool! Who with?
YOU, GODDAMN IT, I WANT TO BE WITH YOU.
You again: Well don’t let me stop you. I mean if you’re hungry you gotta eat. Ha.
Ha and I nod like you can see me, but you can’t.
You again: I’m actually kinda starving and I do love their spinach omelet.
Me: Oh yeah? You gonna wrap soon? I can wait if you want.
I sooned you, and I get silence. Is that bad?
Do you want me? It’s 1:12 a.m., and my heart races like Aretha Franklin is inside of me howling, hoping.
You said you want me to see your Giuliani poster and I want to tear it off your wall and what the fuck am I doing?
Hunched over this laptop when you specifically told me that you want space.
You need to learn your lesson—I’m a fucking catch—and for once in our relationship, I have to be the teacher.
I close my new Dell laptop. Let you drown in the soon.
I don’t go to the Twenty-third Street diner, but I do eat six Fruit Roll-Ups. I think I sleep. Maybe?
In the morning, I don’t need to ask Dick for per-fucking-mission. I earned the right to call you, and you know it. You pick up on the first ring.
“Joe! I thought you got kidnapped or something.”
“Ha.” That is payback for your fucking ha. “What’s up?”
“Are you by chance hungry again? I have a little time.”
I am always hungry, but it’s too soon to reward you. “Not just yet.”
“Ah.”
“Ah?”
“Well, I mean, if you don’t want to see me, you don’t want to see me.”
“Vail…”
“Seriously, Joe, it’s fine.” WHY DO YOU SAY IT’S FINE WHEN IT ISN’T FUCKING FINE. You grunt. “I mean, I’m cool.”
“Vail, I’m sorry…. Fuck it. I miss you…” Who let the dogs out? Me. Me. “And I don’t mean that in the needy clingy way but…Where do you want to eat?”
“Shit,” you say. “Work is calling. I’ll let you know when I’m free, okay?”
After you hang up on me, I call in sick to hell. I can’t go to the Virgin Fucking Megastore. I am in my empty loft shaking our snow globe likes it’s a Magic 8 Ball when Dick orders me to report to Sweet and Vicious.
He takes one look at me and orders two J?ger bombs. “Fuck. That. Slut.”
“I didn’t even say anything about her. And she’s not a…Never mind.”
“You don’t have to say it. You look like hell…again. And fuck you too, Goldskin. I warned you. This is what happens when you give a girl a mixtape.”
I hate J?germeister even more than I hate Jim Henson and I hate Sweet and Vicious, but there is nothing that I hate more than me.
Two bombs in, he tells me to forget it, you.
“Girls like Vail…Do you get it now? She’s a head case, kid.
And honestly, I’m psyched for you. You put your foot down.
Any girl who puts you in the doghouse isn’t fucking worth it… You’re free.”
“But I don’t want to be free…. Do I call? Even if I just ask for Dubs’s number?”
He’s aloof. Things never change. He’s rating the six girls eyeing him and he knows things, how to make women want him just by sitting at a bar with his laptop in a bag like he’s a big shot. I didn’t bring my laptop. What’s the point of it when I can’t IM with you?
And then he deigns to speak to me. “You should go to the cops.”
I stare at him. The cops?
“Bro, come on…. Technically, it’s statutory rape. For all you know…You should get tested.”
He gets loud like that to make the girls around us think I’m the young dumb one, but he fusses with his brother’s dog tags and it’s hard to feel anything but pity. “She’s clean, Dick. Trust me.”
“When a chick blows you off, she’s probably blowing someone else, Jailbait.
Make her pay. Picture it. She’s at work…
. The cops show up, that hottie detective from SVU, and they ask questions and she’s banging a minor and…
Where is your self-respect, kid?” He elbows me, pulls me so he can whisper.
“She gets jammed up, you get over it and you and me hit up some high school dances or some shit.”
I don’t choke him out with his dog tags because he says he’s “just kidding,” but this isn’t fun for me, Vail. I miss you.
He groans. On to the next order of business, a manila folder stuffed with headshots and résumés. “So many actors…so little talent.”
“Are you finally making your movie?”
“Nah. I’m just being the fucking hero. Helping this kid cast his short, but the actors…
Someday I gotta learn to say no to people.
This kinda thing is below my pay grade….
” HE IS A BARISTA, VAIL, A BARISTA! But I’m lucky.
If you don’t have a big brother, you can’t lose a big brother and turn into a dick.
“This kid is casting off Craigslist because…Whatever. My brother, may he rest in peace…I get it from him. Some kid comes to me for help and ya know…I’m Mr. Yes Man. ”
None of that was true and none of it was for me. He says that kinda shit for the girls at the bar, some of whom probably believe that he’s a big shot. It’s kinda funny and kinda sad and kinda…
I throw a twenty on the bar. I can’t get outta there fast enough. Dick shouts, “Don’t call her, Goldberg! She belongs in jail!”
I pump my fist and fly out the door and how did I not think of this sooner, Vail?
You know how to get what you want. Once upon a time you went on Craigslist to look for NYC Bookstore Babe.
Craig delivers. Always. The man can help a person get anything from a devoted boyfriend to a rape fantasy three-way to… I don’t want to jinx it, Vail.
But I have a hunch that I’m about to make some friends. Literally.