Chapter 33 #3
I scramble up to my feet, but my legs barely work.
I know what comes next in your trash fucking book.
Dick was the ex who “dragged” you to bookstores, the reason you were on antibiotics when we first met—You should get tested—and you probably never even auditioned for The View.
I puke on old newspapers and rat shit. You lied to him.
You lied about us. About you. About me. I hawk a loogie, and it lands on the pile of vomit.
Perfect. I could stop now. Leave it there.
It was early. A lot of true love starts with a lie and I fucked up.
I reached under your sofa, into your past. Maybe I was never supposed to know this, any of it.
But I do know it and I can’t write it off as a fucking origin story. You just talked to the bastard…today. Your book is a work in progress, and I go back to my character’s point of entry.
Dick: Bring the stalker in so I know who he is in case he really does kidnap you or some shit
You: I dunno. He’s awfully young and handsome. Might even make you jealous…
Dick: Haha
And then you did it. You lured me into the Beanery to meet the Dick that got away. And then you went to him to talk about me. Innocent me.
You: So?
Dick: So you’re gonna break that poor kid’s fucking heart
You: lol just having fun
Dick: Cut him loose. That high school chick I got with? Fuckin slow play low key attempted suicide. Don’t fuck with the youths
You: Well maybe he just needs a strong older man to guide him…
Dick: I do kinda miss my brother
You: You’re adorable
Dick: You’re a pervert
You: I miss your dick
Dick: How’s his dick?
You: Pleading the fifth and keeping my legs crossed for now
Dick: Tease
You: Slut
Dick: Come over
You didn’t like me and you probably didn’t have your period and it wasn’t about your extra fucking toe. The night I took you to Angus’s, you didn’t meet up with Cynthia. You ran to him, to Dick and his dog tags. Gundylocks. Of course.
You: So that was crazy. I mean I never have three orgasms
Dick: Ha. You were just freaked out by the dude’s gun you were scared as fuckkkk
You: Or freaked out by how good you were…my hero
Dick: Ha how’s stalker boy taking it?
You: Might be time to cut it loose and find me an older man…
Dick: Shit gotta run
It’s a pattern. The book gets worse because I’m in it now, only not.
You paint me as a stalker, an incompetent pussy who puts you in danger so Dick can step up to the plate to save you.
It’s Super Mario Bros., but you are not the princess, and how do you not see it?
I have access to the truth, to the unabridged book of us that lives in my mind, in my Moleskine.
You are the same but you choose to lie, to play.
Dick is now becoming my “big brother,” telling you about training me and you are telling him he could be a trainer in mental gymnastics.
We’re about to get to our first semi-time together, to the bathroom at Passerby, to Pop Rocks. And then we do.
You: HOLY. FUCKING. SHIT. I can’t believe I did that lol
Dick: I can And I’m psyched for my boy. Kid needed a blowie haha
You: Okay but…um I shouldn’t but I have to omg Dick he’s…it has a little hat lolol
Dick: LOL MY BOY IS UNCUT
I would rather be marooned in a fucking comedy club in the Times Square Virgin Fucking Megastore while Vagina riffs on her love life than in this fucking warehouse. I didn’t know anything about hell on earth, and now I do. And I can’t even tell you about it. Which is easily the worst part.
You: I almost have to sleep with him to see what it’s like because who knows when I’ll have the chance again right?
Dick: Damn that explains a lot
You: How so?
Dick: There’s something off about him a little freaky no deaky
You: I know but I kinda like being mommy. I got him out of his shithole apartment and his weird job. Honestly social services should have something like this, women in their twenties help the boys become men…Maybe I could start a business…
Who are you, Vail? You are not this way with me.
You are sweet with me. You have morals with me.
It is him. He is the problem. The poison.
I saw you, Vail. I saw you light up when you found me my apartment and I saw you turn green when you met Vagina, when you were jealous, jealous because you want me, because you love me.
But you just can’t quit Dick.
And I don’t get it. He doesn’t love you. He doesn’t love anyone, not you or his hero brother or his wingdick Schlitz. He doesn’t even bother to bring closure to his sentences half the fucking time and he sure as hell doesn’t care about me.
Dick: Schlitz is kinda over it not so into the big brother shit lol but I bring the kid around cuz he has no bros and I don’t think you get it Vail. The kid wants you bad. Kinda weird
You: I don’t think it’s reeeeally so weird for a guy to want me lol
Dick: You know what I mean he’s a loner and you can’t trust that shit
You: Aw, are you trying to protect me?
Dick: Don’t invite him to your birthday
You: Ah, so you don’t want him messing with our anniversary
Dick: Ha right
You: It’ll be fine. He digs his own grave like he booked a VACATION for us in Bermuda for my birthday lol…
I killed that, I mean wtf right? But he’s still bringing up my bday every thirty seconds to the point where I had to say that he’s not on boyfriend duty.
Why don’t boys get hints? I know I’m good lol but dude… Back off. We’re not married.
LIES LIES LIES WHY WHY WHY
Dick: It gets worse. He made you a fucking mixtape
You: No he did not. Oh my heart.
Dick: Also I’m thinking Costa Rica in June if you could swing it minus the kid
You: Are you serious? Like that feels like a birthday slash anniversary present…And what do we do with our boy? Do we ask Schlitzy to babysit LOLOL
Dick: Ha. Don’t sweat it. I’ll make him bail on your b-day. Kid does whatever big bro says to do. Kinda fuckin cool honestly
You: Ha. Good luck with that. He’s obsessed with me and I warn you he’ll be there at 8:01 with Pop Rocks so you better get there first . Don’t want to get locked in his basement!
So there it is. You two put me in a no-win situation so he could go to your birthday.
He “let you” suck his dick in the bathroom.
You came running back to me the way you always do when he puts you in your place, which is to say no place.
When you pushed me away, it wasn’t your fucking job crisis.
It was because Dick reneged on Costa Fucking Rica.
How are you so smart and stupid all at once and what does he have (aside from his chopped-up penis) that I don’t have?
I want to bash the computer over his head, but I can’t do it.
I’m a reader, Vail. I have compassion. You’re not the two-faced girl you play on AOL IM and I’m not the stock character bully who flies off the handle and kills Dr. Evil.
Dick is not “evil.” The bad guys in books are always the way they are because of some unresolved childhood bullshit.
Dick is punishing anyone who tries to love him because he doesn’t think he deserves to be alive. Dead brother guilt is a thing.
Yes, even after what he did to me, what he did to us, all I want to do is help him. I feel…sorry for him, Vail, same way I feel sorry for you.
You were so intimidated by my sincerity and my decency that you went behind my back and pretended to stab me.
But that doesn’t change the way we were in real life, in private.
You prepared me for this moment, showing me Good Will Hunting and Ordinary People.
Stories where lost dicks get schooled by super-ass-smart good guys.
Robin Williams didn’t write off vicious Will Hunting and Judd Hirsch didn’t put whiny Conrad Jarrett out of his misery.
You see Dick’s pain and think it’s your duty as a female citizen to let him take his shit out on you.
But that’s not how it works, my dear. Only a man can fix a man.
And come on. This is New York Fucking City.
The towers hit the ground and we bounce up like round ball.
We chin up like Carrie Bradshaw, and we take care of our own.
We help the mom with her stroller and yes!
Yes, we help the bald, guilt-ridden leftover lesser fucking brother.
I peel the duct tape off his face. I feel like God.
Reading; it really does elevate the soul!
Dick spits the sock out, kinda like how you spit me out…
No. I won’t go there. Love is all or nothing and the novel that the two of you co-fucking-wrote is like those forgotten teenybopper books from the ’80s where the Hardy Boys teamed up with Nancy Drew.
It’s in the trash, obsolete. Gone. I’m the lucky one, Vail.
You and Dick need two faces to get through the day. I only need one. Yours.
“Goldfuck,” he says. “What the fucking fuck?”
I roll up my sleeves. Dr. Goldberg in the hizzy.