Sketchtasy

by Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore

  I tap a little bit of the last capsule into the juice and take a sip: magic. Pass it around, I say, and then we smoke pot and get in the car and I love this day. We get to the Back Bay early so we float over the Mass. Ave. Bridge with the water zooming into the sky and then we’re going back over again, I’m cheering and Billy’s yelling fierce and Polly’s eyes are closed and when we drop her off she looks sad: Come visit, okay?

  Joey parks the car and yes, there’s Jeannine again so I’m blowing kisses and Billy says who’s Jeannine?

  Jeannine, I say, and I look up, but Billy’s still confused so I say the Tower of Jeannine Hancockatiel, she was just waiting for a better name. Look, she’s blending right into the sky and there’s a little cloud up top, just a soft little cloud you can almost touch it.

  You’re crazy.

  And I love it.

  Back up those escalators, I’m so glad to be back, gliding past WATCH OUT and MASS HYSTERIA except now it really is mass hysteria with all these people rushing around, who are all these people?

  But look, a garden: I’m touching all the flowers to see which are the softest—roses or daisies or carnations or lilies. And look at that tiny house, would I like to live in a house like that on a bonsai tree, maybe for a little while if there was a nice view. What are those flowers, the ones my grandmother used to have in her window boxes? Geraniums—they don’t look special, but oh, their leaves are almost as soft as the lilies, velvet pants, I’m glad I’m wearing velvet pants.

  I never realized the yellow part at the center of a white daisy would be so hard, you could hurt someone with these daisies—stop, stop hitting me with those daisies, but what are these puffy pink flowers like mums but more delicate except when you touch them they bounce right back like sponges with a little water that spurts out and do you think those orchids are real, they feel kind of like plastic and what about that prickly purple flower oh I love this game it’s so much fun, but why does Billy keep poking me and pulling my arm and laughing until he says Alexa, we have to go. It’s not a garden. It’s a flower shop.

  Oh, a flower shop.

  I pick out the biggest pink gerbera daisy, the one with the longest stem, and the woman working there says I like your earrings. Thank you.

  See, she likes us. I like her smile. But Billy drags me away, she wants to get something in the food court.

  Oh, the food court—I don’t know if I’m hungry, am I hungry? Maybe a juice, do they have juice? Where’s Joey? Oh, the bathroom—I’ll be right back.

  I love this bathroom. It’s so—white. There’s Joey in the mirror, fixing her hair. Well, hello. My eyes yes my eyes look at my eyes.

  Wait, who’s that? Oh, do you need to use the sink? We love it here.

  Joey, I love this mirror. I can’t believe I did three hits of ecstasy. Do you think I’ll be okay?

  Thank you for the juice, Alexa.

  Do they have juice?

  The orange juice.

  Oh, let’s get orange juice. Do you want to go outside together? I don’t know if I can handle it alone.

  Back into the food court and what on earth is Billy eating, something disgusting—where did you go, she asks with big eyes, but she’s just worried we did more drugs without her. My head is racing now, there’s too much going on in here—can we go across the street to visit Polly?

  Back down the escalators and outside it’s so bright if my eyes jump out who will catch them? Across the street through the wind and upstairs into the store oh I love this store, why don’t we come here more often? I guess because everything by the counter is Priscilla Priscilla Priscilla, but I do like her colors, she might not be as bad as I thought.

  Lube and travel guides and postcards. A book about Ab Fab, are you kidding? Oh—I do want to read this book by Esther Newton about Cherry Grove, but not now, the words won’t stay still. Neil Jordan, who’s Neil Jordan? Oh, The Crying Game, Neil Jordan wrote The Crying Game, and this is his new one.

  Joey and Billy go in the back to look at porn, but where’s Polly—there are customers around, but there’s no one behind the counter. Oh, a familiar snorting sound and then Polly jumps up so I hand her the flower and she starts waving it like a magic wand—Alexa, it matches my outfit. It matches my outfit.

  Oh, no—is this really Foucault at the front counter, with all that Jiffy Lube and Gay Europe and Herb Ritts’s coffee table. What’s this music? I love this music.

  Alexa, it’s the Pet Shop Boys. You hate the Pet Shop Boys.

  Maybe I was wrong. Can I borrow your makeup?

  I head to the bathroom and do some of Polly’s K and then everything slows down, even my hair. I sit on the toilet to relax—my eyes are closed, but there’s a lot going on anyway, who needs to open their eyes when there’s so much going on and then when I start to stand up I can see the floor on the wall, that’s kind of nice, but wait, I never realized there were two people dancing on the toilet paper, yes on every square people are dancing, but sometimes it’s just legs or torsos or arms, wait let me take some of this down the hall, don’t fall, feet into ground, turn around, lost and found.

  Polly’s ringing up someone’s postcards and Eros Guide and Elbow Grease. Thank you for shopping at Glad Day, she says. I hand her the vial and Billy whines so Polly taps some on the counter, good move. Not here, Billy says, and Polly ducks down behind the counter. Yours or mine, I say, and Billy looks both ways and then leans over. When she looks at me she’s smiling and I notice she just plucked her eyebrows. But why is she wearing that backward baseball cap like some frat boy, a frat boy with bleached eyebrows and eyes so blue not blue like eyes but blue like the blue on the Elmer’s glue label. I brought you something, she says, and hands me a magazine.

  Thrust. I open it and there’s a cowboys and Indians spread. I’m not looking at that.

  Billy hands me another: Stroke. Sex with a cop—gross, but his dick is kind of hot—wait, not a cop. What about Safer Sexy? This looks good. I open it up and it says, “SLIP on a condom SLAP on some lube SLAM in his arse-hole.”

  Arsehole, Billy says, and starts laughing. Slam his arsehole.

  I hand the book to Polly and she puts it in a bag for me—thank you for shopping at Glad Day, ma’am.

  Joey’s starting to get impatient because she wants to go to Moka so I hand her a square of toilet paper. Look, I say, two people dancing. Look. Polly ducks back down for another bump, and then she jumps up like a monkey in a box—or, wait, not a monkey, what is it that jumps up like that, a rat? A cat? A cat with its tongue hanging out, eyes open wide, and Polly says wait, do you need to use the restroom, be sure to use the restroom before you leave, and she hands me the vial.

  I do a half capful because I can feel myself getting edgy again, I really shouldn’t have done three hits of X but then we’re on Boylston and I can’t figure out which way the cars are going. Are you sure this is the right way? Oh, there’s Jeannine so we start walking in her direction. Suddenly there’s a gust of wind and everything is so bright it’s a good thing we’re holding hands because otherwise I would fall over. But why am I sweating so much even though Joey says it’s freezing and I hate sweating, maybe if I close my eyes, okay, good thing I’m in the middle but who’s that yelling, why is that guy yelling, oh, that car horn, why is everyone so loud, can someone turn it down? Then there’s the wind again, this street is a wind tunnel and now I’m freezing too but still sweating, do you think we’re close, how much farther, is there somewhere else we can go, can’t we just sit down here, are you sure this is the right way, oh, Neiman Marcus, that’s right, we’re close. Wait, are you sure this is it? Joey opens the door and inside everything is buzzing the lights all shaky I walk down the steps so many steps I don’t remember these steps could there really be this many steps and then I fall right into a black hole.

  When I wake up I’m collapsed on a sofa and Joey is waving his hands in front of my face and saying Alexa, are you there, Alexa, this is Dawn Davenport, Back Bay station, Dawn Davenport. I’m tryin
g to say something but I can’t. When I look at Joey’s eyes I see my eyes but upside down and then everything in the room is dark again, but I can hear people. We’re leaving, but how do we get out?

  Somehow we’re in the car and I’m trying not to look outside, too sharp I might break, where are we going, oh, maybe I said something. I close my eyes—all the keys on a piano are flipping up into my head, hitting the place behind my eyes—can someone else drive? I open my eyes: Joey’s driving. I close my eyes and drift off somewhere I’m not sure where I just watch the colors until I hear Joey saying something about stopping at the bar on the corner for some Irish hospitality, and everyone’s laughing, and when we get home I’m not sure how I’m going to get up the stairs, but eventually I’m in my room and I look at the clock: three p.m.

  I don’t know how I’m going to sleep so I snort some doxepin, take a Xanax and throw off my clothes and get in bed and for a while everything zooms past and then I’m talking to Polly about whether we’ll ever be able to dream again if we weren’t dreaming in the first place until I remember she’s not here she’s at work so I’m talking to Polly’s flower a field of flowers and eventually the clouds start slowing down and then someone’s knocking.

  Alexa, Alexa—we’re going to miss Avalon. It’s almost midnight.

  I look at the clock, somehow can’t figure out how 11:30 relates to midnight but it’s definitely dark outside and oh, I’m so hungry. I put on my robe, and everything hurts, especially my back—why does ecstasy always make my back hurt so much, I mean I know what they say about depleting your spinal fluid but no one else ever seems to notice. At least I got my eight hours of sleep, maybe I’ll be okay.

  Polly’s sitting in the kitchen smoking a cigarette—she’s wearing the same outfit, including the sunglasses.

  Did you sleep?

  A little bit.

  Are you sure you want to go to Avalon?

  We have to go to Avalon.

  Why?

  The photo booth.

  Oh, okay. I need to eat something first, and then take a shower.

  Just thinking about walking upstairs I start to feel sad in that way that feels like it will never end—at least I had that Xanax last night, but what am I going to do when I run out of the samples from my father’s medicine cabinet—don’t worry about that now, I probably still have fifty. I open the refrigerator—oh, I’m so glad I got this hummus and tabouli—Polly, do you want some hummus and tabouli?

  I put the pita bread on the table, and we dip it in—oh, this is delicious. Polly’s smoking in between tiny bites and I eat pretty much the whole container of hummus, which makes sense because I hardly ate anything yesterday—oh, wait, is that really the same glass of orange juice on the table, I mean I don’t usually believe in doing drugs in the morning but this isn’t really the morning, is it? An apple a day keeps the doctor away, but a quarter glass of ecstasy-laced orange juice—yes, just the right amount to bring that softness back to my head, okay now I’m ready for my shower yes this shower is amazing I can’t believe I didn’t try this yesterday it’s like a massage with water and then I’m downstairs and I throw together the perfect outfit, quilted polyester paisley housecoats one over the other, pink on top, purple on the bottom almost like petticoats, with my combat boots and pink, purple and green plaid tights—Newbury Street is good for something—but what should I do with my hair? Oh, I know, green rollers, perfect, and now Joey and Billy are downstairs too—Joey is trying to get the last bit of coke out of the vial and Billy’s eating my pita bread without asking but at the moment I don’t care, I’m just so glad I don’t feel disastrous, you girls going out tonight and then just like that we’re in the car.

  Sure, we don’t get there until just before closing and by then I already feel like I’m crashing again and what am I doing going out when I feel like I never want to go out again, but Jason waves us in and right when we get inside they’re playing that song that goes “Your hair is beautiful …” And yes, I’m giving slow runway as we make our way through the endless glitz of carpet and the bar that never ends and the fancy lights and the dance floor full of Boston’s finest messes and I lean over to the tired bitches looking at me like they’ve never seen anything like it and I say yes, my hair.

  Turn, stop for the camera, turn again—yes, bitch, my, hair. Yes, bitch, my, hair—speeding up with the beats and Joey starts to sing it, pointing at me: Your hair.

  Whose hair?

  Your hair, bitch.

  Polly’s got her Long Island iced tea and she’s doing that thing where she hums and sways with her eyes closed and the straw in her mouth and Billy’s whining and just like that the music stops.

  LIKE I’VE NEVER CRIED BEFORE

  I’m on the phone with my father, telling him I know I said I was moving to Boston because I needed to live in a bigger city, I know I said it would only be an hour drive to get to class, I know I said I needed that distance in order to stay in school. But I was wrong, because I can’t be there right now. I hate it. I’m not learning anything. It’s ruining my life.

  I can’t believe my father’s not screaming at me. All he says is that he and my mother won’t be able to support me anymore. He doesn’t even remind me that I only have a semester left to get off academic probation, and then I can go anywhere I want. He just says what are you going to do now, and I tell him I found a job phone canvassing. He doesn’t ask any more questions. He doesn’t even ask for the car back—I thought I might have to drive down to DC. And I don’t even want to think about DC. But instead he just tells me I should be in therapy, and I don’t tell him I was thinking therapy might be useful while I’m getting ready to confront him. I just say I’ll think about it.

  So now I’m doing time at the exclusive Copley Place. Not in the mall, exactly, but in those upstairs offices facing the magnificent broken-sun sculpture that pours water onto the hallowed granite Neiman Marcus shoppers tread. But don’t get all excited thinking I have that gorgeous view because this is classic office realness so of course my lovely cubicle faces another lovely cubicle, and behind that lovely cubicle I can glimpse another lovely cubicle, facing me, my cubicle, and I.

  My highly sought-after position consists of making crank calls for the Uncommon Clout Visa card—you know, the card that gives back to the gay and lesbian community. With every purchase. And when I say Uncommon Clout gives back, honey, I do mean gives back.

  That’s right—every time you use your Uncommon Clout Visa card, we make a donation of ten cents to the nonprofit of your choice. You heard me right—ten cents. Before you know it, you’ll be using that card, honey, using that card and saving our gay children ten cents at a time.

  Don’t worry, you don’t even have to call 1-800-GAY-CLOUT, because you’ve got this bitch on the phone to set you up with the debt bondage you’ve been waiting for. But there’s absolutely no pressure. I’ll just sign you up, and then you can cancel when you get your balance up to $24,999. I’m not working for the collectors, honey, all I need is your name, address and social security number. Or if you prefer, you can just give me your abusive father’s name, address and social security number, and we’ll go with that. We here at Uncommon Clout are nothing if not flexible, and I would like my two-dollar commission.

  Speaking of uncommon irony, Ms Marshall called a house meeting tonight—to discuss Polly’s drinking. Are you fucking kidding? Yes, it’s true that Polly starts every day with vodka over ice, but can you imagine how you’d feel if your tacky ex-boyfriend slept with your roommate so she didn’t have to move back to Webster, Mass.? And now Bobby Champagne Sham-poodle steals from everyone—drugs, money, clothing—I caught her the other day working one of my black T-shirts—oh no, Miss One, she said, this is Calvin Klein.

  Bitch, a Calvin Klein T-shirt costs twelve dollars.

  Now everyone’s getting locks on their doors—let’s have a house meeting about that. But not tonight—Polly and I already have plans to go to Bertucci’s for vegan pizza and cocktails—yes
, it’s a special occasion, because I’m actually getting paid. And at Bertucci’s, Heavy-Handed Wendy pours a pint full of Absolut and charges you for one drink—talk about saving money. But what should we get on the pizza? Broccoli, spinach, mushrooms, onions—artichokes? I don’t know about artichokes. Okay, artichokes.

  And yes, here come those magical cocktails—I don’t even like Absolut, but I do like Heavy-Handed Wendy. Oh, these artichokes—Polly, you’re right, artichokes are the answer. Do you need another cocktail?

  The T is so much more fun after help from Heavy-Handed Wendy—Polly and I are queening it up on the platform and no one’s even bothering us, or if they are then we don’t notice. The other day I was waiting for the train and some guy came up to me and said: Your ass stinks, you know what I want to do with your ass? And then he picked up a discarded beer can from the ground and stomped on it.

  Luckily he got on a different train. But then I was painting my nails on the platform and this group of kids walked by—I guess they were getting out of school or something and I don’t know what I was doing out of the house so early but these kids couldn’t have been more than twelve or thirteen and the kid in the back with crooked glasses and a bowl cut kept staring at me. I couldn’t help but remember that when I was twelve I had crooked glasses and a bowl cut so I was smiling at him, trying to be friendly, and he came over and looked at me and asked me the usual: Are you gay?

  Honey, I said, I’m a faggot. And he scrunched up his face and said ew, that’s GROSS. And then can you believe some old woman sitting there looked at me like I was the one creating a scene—it’s a good thing she didn’t say anything because I would have read her and that would not have been cute.

  Then I got on the train and someone sitting in front of me turned around and said: Stop following me, faggot. At least he didn’t ask if I was gay. After a few minutes he got up and changed seats so he was right behind me, I guess so he could punch the seat, over and over again, saying faggot faggot faggot FAGGOT faggot faggot faggot FAGGOT—you know how the Green Line shakes anyway and it was kind of a good rhythm for late-night runway but this was the middle of the day and the point was that I didn’t want him to think I was scared so I didn’t get up. He kept hitting harder and harder and of course no one on the train said anything and I started to worry he was going to stab me or something so finally I turned around and said bitch I know I’m a faggot, but maybe you need to look in the mirror once in a while. And his face got all red like he was going to punch me, but instead he slammed his fist into the metal part of the seat so hard that his hand started bleeding and I got off the train at the next stop just as I heard him yelling about how that faggot’s gonna give him AIDS.