by JD Hawkins
This is it; rock bottom. Knuckles raw from entire nights hitting the punching bag, trying to push the frustrating anger of my mistakes out of my flesh. Nights out that end with me blind-drunk in the back of a cab rather than bare-naked in some random woman’s apartment. My apartment trashed from the random rages that overwhelm me in the middle of the night, as if physical strength is the last thing I’ve got to depend on. If only it was that easy.
I could have taken Jessie seriously when she told me how she was feeling, instead of still regarding her as the immature kid that always followed us around. I could have at least tried to stop it when it was just fun, could have gone out and found another girl to fuck and see how I truly felt. I could have told Kyle the second we came back from the retreat. Shit, I should have stopped to talk properly with Jessie about what we were doing while we were there. Though if there’s one thing I can still forgive myself for, it’s not thinking straight when me and Jessie were burning for each other. Even now, even with the dull ache that thinking of her causes in my chest, I realize how amazing she is, how much I still want her.
I get up off the couch, but only to mope around the apartment like a caged animal. I used to like my place, until it started feeling a little small, but now it feels like a prison of my own making. A monument to what an asshole I am. The condoms I put in discreet but easy-to-reach places in all the rooms. The soundproofing in the door frames I had to put in when neighbors kept complaining about the sound of women orgasming too loudly. The ‘tasteful’ black and white nude portraits I have on the walls so I can brag about being a photographer. The spare room I keep as sparse and as non-descript as possible so I can film Bad Boy videos in it.
I walk through the rooms now and feel like a stranger, interpreting the apartment like a first-time guest. Who lives in a place like this? I don’t know, but he doesn’t live here anymore.
My mind goes back to Jessie, back to the party at my dad’s place. The way she glowed at the sight of her old home. The way she was still so connected to it. I looked at it and thought it was just the place she used to live, a run-down bungalow that wasn’t worth the trouble of knocking down. What did she see, though? Warmth, probably. Family, love, trust. All the things I took for granted. Things I never realized I had until I destroyed it all. Things I thought I was too good for, before realizing I was not good enough.
My cell rings and I sprint through the hallway to get at it, diving onto the couch like it’s second base and almost fumbling the phone as I bring it close enough to see who it is.
Dad. Reluctantly, I bring it to my ear.
“Hey,” I say, realizing how croaky I sound.
“Hello, Nate. When’s your lunch break? I’m in your neighborhood.”
“I’m not at work, Dad. I’m at home.”
“Even better! Come and meet me at Toaster’s, then. I’ll treat you to lunch.”
“Dad…” I say, realizing I sound exactly like I did when I was a teenager. “I don’t know if I—”
“You’re coming, and that’s that,” he says, most definitely the way he used to when I was a teenager. “Don’t think I didn’t notice that you didn’t stick around at my birthday for the cake. We’re long overdue for a little chat.”
Instinctively, a mental stream of excuses begins popping up in my mind. The art form of selecting the best one has been well-honed and perfected through years of experience. But this time I stop myself. I don’t want to be that guy anymore. I don’t want to be the guy who’s too good at lying to face himself, too good at deception to ever be called truly honest.
Besides, isn’t the whole idea of family and trust about putting up with the rough as well as the smooth? Well, they don’t come much rougher than my dad.
“Sure,” I say, “I’ll see you there.”
Toaster’s isn’t the kind of place guys in their sixties typically like to eat. It’s a pretty hip place, with a menu full of exotic, overpriced sandwiches (either ‘vegan’ or ‘free-range’), coffees drinks with candy store flavors, and the kind of faux-artisanal dressing that’s far too local-organic-gluten-free to come across as anything other than self-conscious. Most guys my dad’s age would take one look at the place and walk down the street to the old pizza place that sells slices so tasty and cheap you’d almost get suspicious. The kind of clientele Toaster’s attract is a whole lot younger, trendier, and indulgent. That means lots of cute, well-dressed, and fit young women – and thus, my father.
I push through the glass doors and step into the hum and clatter of coffee machines, women’s laughter, and Macbooks being typed on. Heavy reclaimed wood tables sit next to industrial steel chairs. A giant chalkboard listing the daily specials hangs above the counter, and the walls are decorated with old movie posters and hand-written notes.
I notice my dad before he sees me, mainly because he’s exchanging sly winks with a couple of half-terrified giggling women standing near his table in the coffee line. He still dresses pretty well for a guy his age, in a checked shirt with a good cut and flattering jeans - though I know it’s only a by-product of taking so many young women shopping. I step over to his table quickly, before he interprets the waiting women’s laughter as an invitation.
“Hey.”
“Nate!” he says, opening his arms wide, then bringing them together to point at the chair opposite him. “Good to see you.”
I sit down, adjusting the aviators I’m wearing to cover the bruise.
“I hate this place,” I groan. “It’s like Captain Kirk and Captain Ahab decided to go into business together.”
“Uh-huh,” my dad says, assessing my mood. “What’s with the sunglasses? Late night?”
“Um…something like that,” I say, fumbling.
He eyes me a little, but before he can say anything else his attention is completely taken by the tall model-slash-waitress who steps up to our table.
“Hi there, welcome to Toaster’s. Can I take your order?”
I see the look of delight that comes over my dad’s face as he takes full advantage of the girl’s tight shirt and skinny jeans.
“Well hello young lady,” he says, smiling back at her. “That’s an incredible tattoo you’ve got there.” He takes her arm softly and angles it to get a better look at the graphic tribal design, and I try not to puke as I bury my head in the menu.
“Thanks,” the girl laughs. “It’s kinda new, I’ve only had it a few months.”
“Oh, nice. I hear they’re pretty addictive, tattoos. You getting any more?”
I glare at him for a second, but I may as well not be there. He’s got ignoring me down to an art, with twenty-nine solid years of practice under his belt.
“I’ll have the, uh, grass-fed organic cheese steak with hot peppers and a water,” I interject. “Dad? You want the same?”
He breaks away from the girl, a brief flash of frustration crossing his face until he processes what I just asked him.
“Sure,” he says, turning back to smile one more time and send her off with a wink. “But make my drink a beer. Anything from the Golden Road brewery. I’m in the mood for a little buzz.”
The girl grins and turns to scribble the order in her pad as she walks away, my dad’s eyes laser-focused on the sway of her narrow hips.
“What’s the problem?” he asks, his voice heavy, all the light-hearted humor he had for the waitress gone completely.
I pretend to take a lot of care sliding the menu back into the condiment holder so I don’t have to meet his gaze.
“Nothing.”
“Bullshit,” he answers, quickly. “What’s wrong? Is it me?”
“No. It’s not you.”
“I know it’s not me talking to the waitress, ’cause you’ve had a face like a melted waxwork since you got in here.”
I sigh deeply and run a hand roughly through my hair, realize how unusually messy it is, and that I probably look like shit right now.
“Forget about it.”
“It’s a girl, right?” he
says, pointing a finger at me before jabbing it and putting it away. “Of course it is. It’s always a girl.”
“Can we talk about something else?” I ask, trying to keep it together.
“No. Because it’ll be like talking to a zombie. Come on. Tell me what’s going on.”
I sigh and stare at him, letting him see how frustrated he’s getting me.
“You gonna make me guess?” he says, digging his heels in. “I can sit here and guess all day, though I doubt it would take me too many tries.”
I stare at the table, then look around the restaurant. It’s funny. Before Jessie, all I saw were single women everywhere, but now, after everything that’s happened, it’s like all I see are couples.
“Okay. Fine. Yes. It’s a girl.”
He nods, leaning back in his chair with a thoughtful expression on his face like he’s my therapist. “So what? She doesn’t like you back?”
“No. Not that. Let’s just say I had her, and fucked it all up.”
“Uh-huh,” he says, sounding unimpressed. “So forget her. Find a new one. What’s the big deal?”
I snort a little, then shake my head at him.
“You think I want to feel like this? Forgetting someone isn’t that easy.”
He laughs a little, deep, throaty, but still light and easy. The kind of laugh you develop from years of partying.
“Nate, you were always too intense. Let me tell you something: the only thing holding you back right now from feeling as good as you can be is the past. Your baggage. The world is full of girls, too many for you to get hung up on just one. When everything you know is causing you to struggle, you’ve got to start trusting in the unknown instead.”
I allow myself a small smile at the sheer ridiculousness of what I’m hearing. The comprehensive absurdity of sitting here, with my father, hearing him say those words.
“Where did you hear that?”
He nods and digs around in his pocket to pull out his phone.
“I’m gonna send you a link. You need to watch this guy. ‘Bad Boy’ his name is. The guy’s got this shit figured out. I haven’t seen a guy talk as much sense since the seventies.”
“Dad, wait…” I say, feeling a wave of discomfort as he starts jabbing at his phone.
“And you can bet this guy is getting way too much pussy to be dragging himself around looking like a mess in the way you’re doing.”
“Dad,” I say again, pushing his phone away, “I know about the ‘Bad Boy.’ He doesn’t know what the fuck he’s talking about.”
This time he regards me differently, as if the veneer of nonchalant humor and buddy-buddy superficiality he always gives me is broken a little. He scratches his head, looks around, then nods softly at me as he finally tucks the phone away.
“I see. It’s that serious, huh?”
I shuffle in my seat, the weight of the question’s answer bearing down on me.
“Yeah. It’s the most serious I think it’s ever gonna get for me.”
After a few seconds of us looking at each other, open and frank, oblivious to the noise and commotion around us, he leans forward.
“Do you love her?”
“Yes.”
He scowls. “When I say ‘love,’ Nate, I’m not talking about just enjoying her company, or wanting to make her yours. I’m talking about the real thing. The feeling that you’re half a man when she’s not around, the knowledge that nobody else you’ll ever meet will change you, connect you, move you as much as she will. I’m talking about someone you’d give everything for. Everything. So let me ask you again. Do you love her?”
It takes a few seconds to respond this time – not because I’m not sure, but because I’ve never heard my father speak this way before, and also because I’m so sure the word wants to explode out of me in a shout of conviction that I have to take a moment to tamp it back down. Despite my effort, the answer comes out in a roar that rumbles from the depths of my being.
“Yes!”
I look at my father, desperate for him to tell me what to do now, where to go, how to be, so that I can fix this. In the long conversations with myself late at night, I always reach this point, the point of zealous belief, of impossible confidence that I love Jessie, that I have to find a way to make this right, but it’s been a dead end every single time. I look at my father, and pray that he’ll know what to do. He nods softly again before speaking.
“I don’t think I ever really told you, Nate, but your mother was the only woman I ever really loved.” He looks down, licking his lips nervously, before meeting my gaze again. “And I fucked it up. Biggest mistake of my life. I spent the next twenty years trying to feel that again. The marriages, the parties. The girls, the drugs. But that’s all it ever was. Chasing that feeling of true, genuine love.”
I go to speak but he holds up his hand to stop me.
“Look, I’m not asking for pity, or saying I didn’t like it. I know what I’m doing. And I have no regrets. No more than the one, in any case. I should have never let your mother go. I should have done everything I could to get her back. But it took me too long to understand that. I don’t know about your situation, Nate, about this girl, or what’s happened between you. But I’ll tell you this. You’re young, and I can see how much she means to you. So don’t stop trying, whatever you do. Don’t give up on her. Not unless you want to live the same life I did.”
At the words of hope, coming to me in my father’s voice, something shifts. I’ve never heard him speak like this, and that alone would be enough to shake me, but the fact that he’s giving me a way out, a way forward, is enough to make me want to run out of this place and straight to wherever Jessie is right now. I let the words echo in my mind, resonate, as if the power of hearing them alone will make them come true, and see my father with new eyes.
“Thanks, Da—”
“Here are your cheese steaks!” the tattooed girl interrupts in her best ‘have a nice day’ voice. “One beer, and one water.”
“Looks good enough to eat!” my dad says, leaning back and clapping his hands, before turning to the waitress. “And the food doesn’t look too bad either.”
“Enjoy your meal,” the girl says, going just a little red. “Let me know if you need anything else.”
My dad’s eyes glint, and he winks at me before turning back to her.
“What if I just ‘want’ it?”
The girl laughs awkwardly before turning away, my dad’s eyes once again studying her ass like he’s planning to sketch it later. I look at him and marvel at how the guy who just brought me back from the brink of suicide can suddenly turn into someone else entirely – and then I realize how similar we actually are. Or used to be.
24
Jessie
It’s only when I hear the sound of Lorelei opening and shutting the front door that I realize I’ve been staring at the same picture of a gingham dress on my laptop for about ten minutes now. As if jolted into the present, I move the mouse and continue flicking through the pictures of stock costumes.
“Jessie?” Lorelei calls from the hallway.
“Hey,” I say, turning to watch her come in. “I picked up some Chinese on the way home. I know I said I was going to cook something healthy but I didn’t have time.”
“Jessie.”
“I got an email from Caroline Tiernan asking if I could send her my ideas for a project she’s working on. Can you believe it? She might need me to assist her on set! The only problem is that I can barely think straight. I just worked a sixteen hour shift and I’m struggling to stay awake, let alone be creative. This is my fourth coffee.”
“Jessie—”
“I know, I know. She’s probably just indulging me. I shouldn’t get my hopes up. But what more have I been asking for but a chance to finally—”
I stop abruptly as she thrusts her cell phone in between my eyes and the computer screen. I pull back a little to see what’s on it.
A Bad Boy video.
I spin my
seat around to glare at Lorelei.
“Why would you show me that, Lorelei? The last thing I want to think about right now is Nate.”
“I think you should see this,” she says, slow and solemn.
“I really shouldn’t. Not now.”
“Please,” Lorelei pleads again, the expression on her face unreadable. She leans forward over the keyboard and I reluctantly let her bring up the Bad Boy video on the desktop screen. I cast one more reproving glance at her before looking at the screen.
The image on the website is different. There’s no soft candle lighting, no self-conscious posing. Nate’s sitting on a short chair, in front of a well-lit white wall, with his face just out of shot. The only thing visible is his white t-shirt, and his sinewy arms perched on his knees, fingertips together.
Lorelei presses play, and steps back.
#251: The Final Confession
This is gonna be tough. But at the same time, it’s not something I need to think about. I guess that’s how you know when you’re doing the right thing.
I want to tell every single one of you, every person who ever clicked on one of my videos, that I’ve changed. That I fucked up. That I’m not the Bad Boy anymore. And that I’m sorry.
But you guys don’t come here for apologies, you come here for confessions. So here it is. The final one. The deepest, hardest, and most important confession I’ll ever make.
I fell in love.
Not ‘we went on three dates and I think I really like her’ love. Not ‘I feel just like the cheesy songs I used to hate’ love. But full-on, bone-shaking, life-changing, can’t-turn-back love. I’m in deep, guys. Real fucking deep.
I know what a lot of you will think, hearing this. That I’m full of shit. That I’ve spent years on this channel talking about how commitments, marriage, all that ‘love’ crap is for people too scared to live the way I did. Who didn’t have what it takes to live a life of perpetual pleasure. Quick sex and fast getaways. But I didn’t lie. Nobody believed in that as much as I did. I thought it would be enough forever. Thought it couldn’t ever be better than that. But that was before I met her.