by Liz Phair
The first year I lived in Blue House, I was the lone female resident, a visual artist in a group of male athletes. I’d gotten the room because I knew one of the guys from my sophomore dorm, and I was desperate to live off campus. After one of their gang dropped out, he called to ask if I wanted to fill the vacancy, and I said yes. That strange arrangement lasted a year. They would have these raging keg parties where they blasted Talking Heads and Led Zeppelin. It reminded me of the movie Animal House.
I hadn’t been a great housemate. Over the winter term, I’d let the dishes pile up in the sink until they were stacked higher than the faucet. I think the jocks had hoped I’d be a mother figure, cooking and fussing over my boys, but I turned out to be the angry punk-rock sister—good for music recommendations and not much else. I was in a rebellious phase, having returned to Oberlin after dropping out to attend classes at Northwestern University and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. I’d found four years of college in Ohio to be unworkable without breaks.
Now, coming back after spending a semester in New York interning for the visual artists Nancy Spero and Leon Golub, I’m surrounded by these sensitive, haughty private-school kids who throw high-concept dinner parties and serve mixed drinks and wine. Being gone so long, I lost dibs on the best rooms and ended up living like the servant class, in cramped quarters off the kitchen at the rear of the house.
Just to give you an idea, one of our housemates wears bespoke clothes and, when at home in Taipei, is driven around by a gun-toting chauffeur in a Rolls-Royce with a locked briefcase full of cash in the trunk. Then there’s Helena, our Renaissance patroness, who is testing recipes for her eighteenth-century cookbook in our homely kitchen. But none of them typifies old money quite like blond, blue-eyed Whitney, whose milky skin, slender build, high-pitched voice, and mid-Atlantic accent make him stick out like a sore thumb among the grungy, opinionated hippie kids of Oberlin.
He’s the cause of this whole wretched debacle, it turns out. I’m incensed that I’m going to have to pay for Whitney’s idiotic behavior, especially since I’m the one who was the most traumatized. I can’t ask my parents for another subsidy. I’ve already spent enough of their money taking an academic tour of North America, accumulating credits which may or may not apply to my degree. In some ways, when I find out what really took place that night, I feel like I have more in common with the home invaders than with my housemates.
The guys who broke into Blue House live in Afrikan Heritage House, one of the identity-based off-campus housing units. Before I confront my roommates about the bill, I need answers. I corner Whitney in his room and demand an explanation. He sheepishly admits that he was sleeping with the forward-center’s girlfriend on the night of the break-in. He confesses that he and this girl were upstairs in his bed, listening the whole time, while the three men went on their rampage. He knew he’d get his ass kicked, so he never called the police.
“What is wrong with you?” I ask him, staring into his unblinking jasper eyes.
“I thought they were going to kill me,” he whines.
I’m disgusted. “Uh, yeah. Me too.” My first thought is that I’m wasting my time talking to him. What’s done is done. But my second thought is how odd it is that the basketball players were willing to risk expulsion and arrest for breaking and entering and destruction of property when they could have just marched upstairs and dragged Whitney out of bed by his boxer shorts. They made all this noise and broke all this shit, but it seems they were afraid to touch him physically. They wouldn’t cross that invisible line. Not that Whitney is in any way intimidating. I could probably take him in a fair fight. But they, too, know that race is such an incendiary issue that a single transgression could have disastrous consequences.
They’re right to be worried about Whitney’s lawyers. But I also suspect they were thinking of the minefield of covert bigots of all stripes, in all walks of life—in the police precinct and the courts, on the committees, waiting to pounce on just such an incident. That’s a fight nobody wins.
“Why would you do it?” I ask Whitney, shaking him gently by the shoulders. I’m trying to get him to understand the predicament he’s placed everyone in. He never offers to cover our portions of the bill, even though I know he can afford it.
He shrugs, sheepish. “I’ve never slept with a black girl before.”
Like the basketball players, I lack the guts to file a complaint against him. I’m amazed that I’m going to be left with the short end of the stick. But deep down, I know that this is how it works. I don’t have the kind of power he does.
Nobody from Blue House will come with me, but I’m going to confront the basketball player whose girlfriend Whitney slept with and ask him to chip in. I don’t know if I’m doing it to prove to myself that I’m not afraid of him—if, by putting a face to the voice, I can heal some of my lingering trauma—or if I truly need justice in this bullshit situation. Maybe I’m still trying to convince myself that I’m not racist by treating him the same way I would a white guy. The truth is, I don’t know why I’m going. I am drawn instinctively to the confrontation. Whatever my motives are, I’m still pretty scared.
It’s Saturday night. Afrikan Heritage House is throwing a party outside. I’m one of the few white people milling around on the lawn. I ask a nerdy-looking dude which guy is the one I’m looking for, and he points out a tall, broad-shouldered young man. My heart is pounding as I approach him. I tug on his sleeve. He turns around, frowning when he sees me. He’s at least two feet taller than I am.
Everybody in our immediate vicinity stops to watch what’s going on. His friends close in a circle around him. My friends are standing a little way off by the parked cars. I’m sure he sees the fear in my eyes and hears the quaver in my voice, but I plainly and calmly explain the situation as I see it. I ask him to help me pay for the damage he did to our house.
At first, he scoffs and says we’re all rich. “I’m not paying,” he says, laughing. But I’m focused, and I can tell that he’s putting on a front for the bystanders. I insist that my housemates are rich but I am not. I tell him what it was like for me that night while they were breaking everything. I describe what I thought was happening, and how frightened I was. It’s at this point that our body language shifts. It’s fleeting, and probably only perceptible to the two of us, but we each take a small step closer together.
“I’m sorry that you had to go through that,” he says. His expression softens slightly as he rubs his chin. “I’m sorry I lost my temper. But I’m not paying for the damage.” He looks at me, but it isn’t a cold stare. He’s showing me where his line is.
I hold his gaze, trying to convey that I, too, am aware of the line. I know I deserve better. But for some reason his apology and acknowledgment are enough. Maybe that’s what I came for. My heart feels lighter. I’m not sure what currency he just paid me in, but I think he offered me respect. And I can live with that.
The plane’s engines change pitch as we begin our descent into Heathrow Airport. I look out my window, disappointed not to see any of London’s historic landmarks beneath the dense cloud cover. I can feel myself getting anxious about leaving the security and privacy of first class. No one’s pushing or shoving, there are no surprises, things run smoothly. I’ve become a virtual recluse in my off hours, Howard Hughesian in my phobic avoidance of germs and people.
At heart I’m an introvert, an avid observer of the quirks and contradictions in people’s behavior. I like to be alone, to dream, to muse on the human condition and then turn it into art. But as soon as I got famous, my life turned upside down. I’m never alone anymore. In the mornings, I visit radio stations and play songs live on air. In the afternoons, we sound-check for a group of two dozen contest winners. Then there are the concerts, where I confess my private thoughts and feelings in front of thousands of people. I sign CDs after the show and shake even more hands. Throughout it all I’m
being photographed. When work is over, I climb onto a tour bus with eleven dudes, or head right back to the airport.
I need more personal space. Lately, everywhere I go, I get ambushed. There were fans waiting for me at the airport this morning, and I can’t figure out how they knew what flight I was taking. Paparazzi and professional autograph collectors waited outside of my hotel in Paris, so I had to use the back entrance and check in under an alias. I can’t move around freely by myself anymore.
A little over a year ago, when I had graduated from college but hadn’t found a job yet, I was unable to pay for the bare necessities—like rent, or a haircut. I took the bus and the train everywhere or, whenever possible, walked. I bought thrift-store clothes and rationed beans and rice throughout the day, hoping someone would invite me over to their house for dinner. I was the definitive starving artist. I lived in an apartment that was in the process of being torn down. One time, when I was using the toilet, I looked to my right and saw a workman staring up at me through a hole in the floor.
Now I have no more financial worries. My circumstances have changed dramatically in a short space of time. Hotels regularly upgrade my room to the penthouse, and limousines pick me up and drop me off wherever I need to go. I have more offers to attend social gatherings and VIP events than I know what to do with. I put all the beautiful invitations in a pile on my desk and hope that someday I’ll have time to answer them. If I don’t, I can always paste them in a scrapbook.
I still feel like the same person inside, but I’m frightened by the things that I’m supposed to embrace. The trappings of celebrity amount to a defensive wall behind which I can hide. Sometimes, during photo shoots, I get downright hostile because I think the photographer is trying to expose me. They say they want to capture the real person, but I don’t know who that is, so how can they? My persona is so fragile it tears like tissue paper in the rain.
“Pardon, Miss Phair?”
I turn to see the Air France flight attendant standing in the aisle, smiling down at me. Her colleague has come forward from the aft cabin, whispering something before disappearing back into economy.
“There is a passenger on board who would like to say hello to you after we land.” She bends down, speaking softly, “A Mr. Jake Papua? He says he knows you, that you grew up together. Would that be all right?”
I’m stunned. I nod automatically. I haven’t seen Jake since we were kids. We might have been in a few of the same classes in high school, but I don’t remember us talking much. Certainly not since his accident. Now I think about him whenever I drive by his house on Hawthorne Lane. His story has become part of the lore of my hometown. I suppose the same could be said about mine.
I was walking past our old elementary school, in fact, when my friend Mallory told me what had happened to him. I remember thinking how low and oppressive the clouds looked at that moment. I could hear the shouts and laughter of children running around at recess, and my heart clenched in nostalgic pain. Were we ever that innocent? I seem to recall us being fairly tribal and savage from the start.
In that respect, not much has changed. Just a few months ago, I read a passage from 1 Corinthians 13 at my best friend’s wedding. I was fresh off tour, hoarse from having flown in on a red-eye after playing a gig the night before. One of the bridesmaids pulled me aside and gave me some unsolicited advice before I went up to the pulpit: “Speak up, because people in the back of the church are having trouble hearing.” It didn’t occur to either of us until it was too late that she and I had very different expectations of what it meant to project into a microphone.
“ ‘If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels’ ”—I got my mouth right down on that thing—“ ‘but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
“ ‘Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.’ ”
My brother said my reading sounded like the voice of God coming down from on high to warn the pious and the wicked. He couldn’t stop laughing about my overblown delivery. He thought some of the older guests might have suffered heart attacks.
The reception was held at Indian Hill Club, one of the most traditional and buttoned-down institutions on the North Shore. At the end of the meal, the bride and groom fed each other slices of chocolate cake with a raspberry swirl. My friend’s new husband got a little cheeky in front of photographers and slipped her some tongue when they kissed. I’ll never forget Mary, enveloped in a giant white explosion of tulle, plopping down on the toilet in the powder room stall—too furious to bother closing the door. “Oh my God, Liz,” she moaned, “I married a dick!” They’re one of the happiest couples I know.
But back out in the drawing room, beneath the oil paintings of hunting scenes that lined the walls, I was confronted by a pack of matriarchs who’d gotten a little too cozy with the open bar, all wanting to know what manner of infidel I was.
“Why didn’t you play at your best friend’s wedding?” one steely-eyed golf widow growled. “Are you too good to sing for your friend now?” She swirled ice around her hatch rocks glass, determined to force a confession out of me.
“She didn’t ask me.” My face flushed crimson. I saw my mother talking to some friends across the room and prayed for her to come save me.
Another coiffed matron in a Chanel bouclé suit loomed over me, brandishing her wealth and power. “What’s wrong with you? Do you have a split personality? You’re dressed so prim and proper, but I’ve read about you.”
I don’t know, goddamn it, I wanted to scream. I don’t know what’s wrong with me! But something is definitely wrong with me, because I can’t stand to keep my thoughts and feelings bottled up like you ruthless doyennes of propriety. Maybe I overshot the mark. And, yes, I expect to be run out of town, tarred and feathered, a crimson letter stitched across my chest, for saying “fuck” and “cunt” and talking about my sex life in public. But, lady? I’m only twenty-six years old and I’ve known three friends who killed themselves, a dozen girls with eating disorders, seven guys who went to rehab, and more people than I can count who’ve been sexually assaulted and never talk about it. I want to hear the truth. I want to feel solid ground beneath my feet.
The wheels touch down on the runway with a bump, and my head dips forward as the copilot applies the brakes too suddenly. Dignity is worth fighting for in this land of fences and locks. It feels awful to be singled out, to be rejected or pitied. I have a vision of Jake in fourth grade standing by the schoolyard steps, his nose perpetually running, waiting to join one of the popular all-boy kickball games. This will be good, I think. I can be generous and try to help a vulnerable person feel better about himself. It’s got to be hard for him. I have nothing like his challenges, and I’m riddled with anxiety. Poor guy. I hope he’s not massively depressed.
We pull up to the gate and wait for the flight attendants to unlock the doors. There’s a delay with the Jetway operator, and everyone gets stuck standing up by their seats, their heads bent at odd angles under the low ceiling. No one is talking. Their eyes dart around the interior of the aircraft, or they simply stare at their feet. I start planning what I can do to make this a quick and positive experience for Jake. We’ll get somebody to take our picture, and then he can dine out on the story for the next couple of weeks. I’m pretty well known at this point, so bumping into me ought to net him an eager audience. He probably doesn’t get out that much and it’ll be a boost
to his self-esteem.
There’s a commotion in the back of the plane. Everybody’s heads come up, straining to see around their neighbors as we hear someone storming up the aisle. “Excuse me, pardon me, coming through.” A young man on crutches hurtles into the first-class cabin, and there he is: Jake from the playground. He has the same freckles, the same long nose and unruly hair that I remember, except now he’s well over six feet tall, with a rangy athleticism that seems comically out of place in the plane’s narrow corridor.
“Hey, Liz! How’s it going?” He greets me loudly, like a true Chicagoan. I feel myself shrink with embarrassment. “This is pretty crazy, right? I couldn’t believe it when I saw you were on this flight.” He accidentally knocks the person next to him off-balance. “What are you doing in Europe? Playing some shows?” Everyone around us is listening. They have nowhere else to go. Jake’s enjoying himself, voluble and smiling. He shifts his weight on his crutches, perfectly at ease as the center of attention. It’s kind of endearing, or inspiring, especially considering he was such an annoying kid.
“I read about your record in Rolling Stone! Congratulations—that’s awesome. I’ve been meaning to catch one of your gigs, but I’ve been competing on the wheelchair-tennis circuit. The training schedule’s nuts, and I have to do a lot of interviews. Listen.” He leans in. “Can you do me a favor? I need to make a tight connecting flight, and as you can see”—he looks down at his crutches—“I have my hands full. Can you carry my leg for me to the gate?” He braces against his armpit support and lifts up an enormous pink prosthetic limb, handing it over to me before I’ve even had a chance to answer.