We walked the five miles back, exhausted, I was too tired to be angry. The time on my phone kept changing as we walked up and down each hill. We took naps when we got back to the house and then biked around the town in the twilight of dusk like a couple of local kids. Ken’s uncle had a few spare old bikes in the garage that we used.
. . . . .
Day 25. Another day of rest, it’s good to have friends on the road.
I honestly just don’t know how to feel about Lila. I’m sorry, I hate complaining about this, I hate going on about this, but it’s just about all that’s been on my mind. I guess I’ll just wait and see what happens, I guess that’s all I can do.
What time is it? 3PM? She should be free, right? No. I’m not just gonna text her. I can be okay. She wanted her space, and I’ll give it to her it’s not fair of me to ask more of her, it’s not fair of me to worry about her, it’s-
I texted her at 8PM. Waiting, waiting.
“I’m here,” she texted back, 8:35.
“Hey.”
“Hi.”
“So, how are things going, what’ve you been up to? If you want to talk, of course,” I texted.
“Sure. Phone?”
I dialed. Ring… ring… ri- she picked up.
“Hey, so, how’ve you been, what’s new?” I asked.
“Lots, I’m having a great time. You?”
“That’s great Lila. Yeah, things are good, we’re at Ken’s uncle’s house in Upper Michigan; it’s nice, relaxing.”
“Fun.”
“So, what’ve you been up to? I’m glad to hear you’re having fun.”
“Yeah.”
“Anything new at work?”
“Not much… Work, reading, movies with my sister and her friends,” she said flatly.
“Oh, great, that sounds really fun,” I was really trying.
“I went to a student film festival yesterday, and then I went shopping with some friends from work. I run in Central Park a lot, it’s nice. You know, the usual.”
“Run in central park, when?”
“At night usually.”
“Jesus Lila, be careful.”
“I’m an adult,” she said. No, you’re not, I thought.
“Please be safe, okay? I don’t want to have to go to a charity run with your name on it, you know I hate running.”
“Okay, Alex.”
“What else, how’re the roommates?”
“Good. I’m going clubbing tomorrow, my sister knows a club promoter. He can get us in for free, and get us free drinks.”
“Oh wow, that should be a lot of fun, that’s great,” I said, wondering if it’s wrong that I felt jealous, even protective, when she said that.
“I bought a veeerry short dress for it, I’m almost embarrassed. It’s so sleazy, they get paid to find good looking girls.”
I didn’t really know what to say to that.
She continued, “He told us we had to wear heels and that we can only take drinks from the bottle, no middlemen.”
“Wait what? What is this? What’re you talking about?”
“So no one can put stuff in our drinks.”
I didn’t know what to say, why was she telling me this? Did she know how saying that was making me feel?
I interjected, “but Lila, you’re there being ornaments, literally objectified pretty much, I mean—”
“Yes.”
“He told you how to dress, he—”
“I know, it’s so bad,” she said, cavalierly, nonchalantly, almost amused with herself.
“Lila, that’s wrong.”
“What? Using sexuality to get ahead in the world?”
“Why are you going to do that?”
“You’ve heard Lana’s song? Fucked my way to the top?”
“You can get drunk other ways, other than by being used.”
“It’ll be fun.”
I didn’t say anything, I didn’t know what I could say.
“We’re using him in a sense, if you think about it. No need to get upset, Alex.”
“I’m not upset Lila, just—”
“Nah…” she paused “he’s using us.”
“Lila—”
“What?”
“I’m just worried, that’s all.”
“But I’m fine, I probably won’t go home with anyone, I’ll be fine.”
Probably? I thought. “Please, just be safe, Lila.”
“I hope I can get in, it shouldn’t be too hard with that dress though.”
“Lila, this isn’t like you’re at some party, it’s the real world, if you’re too drunk things could happen that’d be out of your control.”
“I know, I know my limits.”
“As a friend, I’m just asking you, please just be careful.”
“Yes, Alexander…I will be…” another pause and then she retorted, “What, are you worried?”
“If I tell you I am it’s a bad thing, but I am. Because I’ve seen how bad people can be, and I care about you, Lila.”
“Oh, what do you know?”
“Okay, sure, yes, have fun in any way you can. Just be safe, please.”
“K, I’ll let you know if I’m still alive Saturday morning.”
“You’re smart, and I shouldn’t worry, but… Okay, have fun, Lila.”
“I plan to.”
The conversation was silent for a few seconds, just dead air and the static between us. What could I say? Was she deliberately trying to break my heart? I could barely breathe.
“How’s everything else been?” I finally asked.
“What’s everything else?”
“Enjoying yourself, being happy?”
“Yes.”
“Well, that’s good.”
“You?” she asked.
“Yah…”
“Good.”
“Yah, I’m glad to hear you are—”
“You said that.”
“I’m sorry, Lila.”
“Okay.”
“And I’m sorry I haven’t been able to talk to you more, being on the road and all.”
“Okay.”
I took a breath, sighed silently, waiting if she’d just say something, anything. But there was nothing.
“Well, have a great time,” I said.
“Where are you right now? A house?”
“Yeah, his uncle’s house, in Upp—”
“Oh, okay. That’s nice.”
“I’m in a bed, which is nice.”
“So how have you been? You made me explain everything I’ve done, you should have to do the same. I’m jealous of the trip you’re getting to take.”
“As I am of you.”
“How so?”
“Miss Socialite.”
“Ah, but you don’t like people, Alex.”
“I enjoy people, Lila, and I like certain people.”
“That’s nice… Huh, this is first time I’ve been cold outside this summer.”
“Is it nice?”
“No. Coldness is usually uncomfortable, Alexander. But I’m always cold.”
Especially those shoulders of yours, I thought. But instead, I said, “well, it’ll change soon enough.”
“True... So, are you actually having fun? The time of your life?” she asked.
“Some
thing unpredictable, that in the end is right…”
“Ok, calm down.”
“Yes, I’m actually having fun. I hope you are too.”
“Right, we were talking about you, I think you’re uncomfortable talking about yourself.”
“Oh really?” I retorted, but then thought for a second, the last thing I wanted to be was hostile, “Well, you’d be right, I am. But, yes, I’m fine.”
“Is it meeting your expectations?” she asked.
“The trip?”
“Yes.”
“Yes, it is.”
“That’s good,” she said.
“Fuck it’s cold,” she again interjected, “I should go inside.”
“Where are you?”
“Fire escape, looking out at the park and the steps under the streetlight, it’s really pretty out here.”
Another pause.
“Well, goodnight I guess, get warm,” I said,
Another pause.
“Alex, I have to ask where you are, where your feelings are,” she said.
“Where are yours?”
“Nope, I asked you,” she insisted.
“Does it matter now?”
“You can’t do that, Alex.”
“I’m sorry. Okay. Since we talked?”
“Yes, how are you feeling now?”
“I just don’t want to have this conversation every time we talk, Lila.”
“Fine.”
“Do you not agree?” I asked.
“If you say so.”
“Well, what do you think, Lila?”
“I guess I’ve just been thinking a lot, that’s all; deconstructing. And I don’t love what I see.”
“And what would that be?” I asked nervously.
“In fact, it almost makes me angry, which I don’t like at all.”
“What does?” I asked again, nervously.
“Bluntly?”
“Yes, Lila.”
“Well, you broke up with me, and now you regret it.”
“And, bluntly?” I asked again.
“That’s it. You realized your mistake too late.”
“Too late?”
“Yup.”
“Okay, Lila, please. I-I’m not defending myself, because I know I was short-sighted and dumb, but I think that I just needed time to process that transition. And, and…”
“Yes?”
“But I still feel the same, to answer your question, Lila, I still feel the same.”
“Too bad it took this long,” she said very bluntly, flatly, emotionlessly.
“I’m just trying to wrap my mind around how you feel, Lila.”
“How I feel?”
“Yes. How you can be so detached after all we went through, how you can now feel how you do. I just want to know.”
“Honestly, Alex, it was upsetting to see something that I wanted so badly but told myself wasn’t possible suddenly become possible.”
“I’m sorry. I just don’t know how you could be acting this way, Lila. And bluntly, how you could be so cold. It hurts, Lila.”
“I’m sorry.”
“But why?” I asked.
“Cold how? Because I don’t want to be with you?”
“Do you not want to be together, or do you just want to make me feel how you felt?”
She said nothing.
“I’m sorry,” I apologized.
“Yeah, okay, goodnight.”
. . . . .
Day 26. I stayed in bed.
Ken was understanding.
“If there’s a chance, any chance that something could happen, I’d drive back to New York with you right now, day and night. We could do it right now,” Ken put forth. If Kenneth Chester believed in anything, he believed in love. And I seriously considered it.
. . . . .
Day 27. I stayed in bed again, as long as I could. My pair of Goldtoe socks were starting to become all holes. I washed all of my clothes again that morning, and after they were done we packed up the car, said our gracious goodbyes and left. We were on the road again.
I’m not ready for forever. I want her, I want to be with her, but I just don’t know when. I don’t know if being with her in college will make me resent her for ‘holding me down’ or if that’s nonsense because it’ll be love. But I guess it’s not even up to me at all anymore.
We drove to Chicago, all things go, all things go.
We drove around Chicago at night and ate at the world’s biggest McDonald’s, our Mecca of the road. We thought better than to sleep in Hyde Park, so we drove into the UChicago campus and slept there.
We slept in parking lots, I don’t mind, I don’t mind.
. . . . .
Day 28. We left the car parked and went to walk around the city, the “L” buzzing overhead. We had deep dish pizza at a hole-in-the-wall little Italian Ristorante joint that I’m convinced was just a front for the mafia, as it was quite nice but quite empty. We went by the Sears Tower and Millennium Park, and from there we went our separate ways around the city, each with very different ideas of what we wanted to do. I took the car and went to the Frank Lloyd Wright house and then to the Museum and Ken walked to the waterfront and swam or watched the birds or something. Being there just made me miss her even more though, I loved the city, and I know she would have loved it too, especially the museum. I wish I could stop thinking about her, or at least stop complaining and ruminating and torturing myself; I just feel like a whiney little Amory Blaine.
I went back to the car and parked somewhere on the waterfront and waited for Ken to make it there, I let him take his time. I texted Lila to ask how the club was. She called and told me she was going on a date the next night, ‘dinner and drinks, very classy,’ with a guy she met at the party when she was ‘embarrassingly drunk.’ He was older, of course, a grad student; I didn’t even stop to think how dinner and drinks would work for the only recently seventeen-year-old Lila, and wondered at the same time how much or how little regard this guy, Phil Raymond, had for the statutory laws of the great state of New York. I just agreed politely, and let her know that I was happy for her. She let me know that he was, once again, not only a grad student, but also an international one, and would therefore not see him again after her New York story had concluded; I didn’t know if it made me feel better or worse to know that the people she’d chosen to be making out with would be conscious flings and not acts of love or even liking. This guy was an international grad student from Dublin, I can’t fucking compete with that. I felt a horrible knot sink in my stomach, like all those butterflies had just died. My goddamned jealousy and I.
You only hate the road when you’re missing home.
I have to enjoy the rest of this trip and just let her exist apart from me. I just love her too much to give up on that hope just yet. But I can’t just dwell until then.
While I kept waiting for Ken, after the call, I kept thinking about her. I put in my earphones and tried to, once again, escape into music, but I only thought of her. So instead I just embraced it, I listened to all of those songs that made me think of her, I made a goddamned breakup playlist. I chose each song carefully and meticulously, I created a story out of them, taking me through my own breakup, form that last terrible month, through the long summer, all up to the point where I was right now at this moment, confused and still hopeful, trying to piece it all together.
Peace, O.A.R.
Landslide, Fleetwood Mac
Let Her Go
, Passenger
Harvest Moon, Neil Young
Simple Twist of Fate, Bob Dylan [our time in New York]
I Miss You, blink-182
Stubborn Love, The Lumineers
Jealousy and I, Torres
The One That Got Away (acoustic), Katy Perry
Dark Paradise, Lana Del Rey
Over and Over, Three Days Grace [Ken’s contribution]
Hero, Regina Spektor
All I Want, Kodaline
When It’s Time, Green Day
Say Yes, Elliot Smith
Romeo and Juliet, Dire Straights
These were songs that we had shared or songs that I had found or turned to in the months without her. I don’t think I could ever bring myself to listen to Lovers Spit again. She had given me Lorde, Lana, and Torres, incredible Torres; she had given me everything I thought. I grew up on punk rock, she was sort of hip-hop, and we listened to Sweater Weather in that first winter we were together when we drank peppermint mochas and stayed up all night making love, sleeping, waking up and making love again. Those were some of the best nights of my life, holding her naked skin against mine, feeling all of her lying beside me, watching the sky light up into morning through the gaps in the drawn blinds of her room. And she’d sit up, bathed in that golden-white light, and I’d lay with my head in her lap and I’d look up at her as she’d sing softly with her fingers running through my hair in that beautiful voice of hers “your big sad eyes, your crooked smile, your gap teeth, your widow’s peak, my November baby” as if those words were written just for the two of us and just for that moment. Just lying with her in her bed, I may miss that feeling most of all, it was then that I felt closest to her, when I felt the most complete.
Ken arrived, and we drove off. I drove on that open road, hooking up with what I’d guess was what was left of The 66, that old mother road, to St. Louis. We drove deep into that American night with the top down, blasting music and singing at the top our lungs. We belted “Bring Me Back to Life,” “Misery Business,” “Helena,” the whole Black Parade album, “Miss Murder,” “Sugar, We’re Going Down,” “I Write Sins Not Tragedies,” and all of the emo throwback crap we could think up. It was just great to get some of that angst out.
No More Dead Kids Page 18