“YO!” I yelled into the phone as I answered.
“Yo,” Henry said. “You home? I’m not far. I can make a quick stop by.”
“Yes!” I barked. “I’m not there right now, but I can be back in about fifteen minutes. Wait give me twenty,” I said, adding time for an ATM stop.
“OK. No more than that, though. I’ll need to roll. I’m the only one out right now.”
“No problem! I’ll see you soon.”
We were just about to the 63rd Street exit. “Excuse me, sir,” I leaned forward. “This traffic is too crazy. I’m not going to be able to make it to the hospital in time. Can you please turn around?”
“You pay fare either way,” he said.
“Yeah, that’s no problem. Just turn around. Here, can you make this exit?” I directed, desperate to not waste more time crawling all the way uptown before turning around.
“It’s OK. I can make it.” God bless his focus. God bless Russia.
“So, I really need to get to the corner of 23rd Street and First Avenue right away. Can you please make it as fast as possible?” “Yes, lady. Going fast as I can. I drop you, I get new fare. We want same thing.”
Sitting back I thought, I really just did this. I turned the car around. Now I had to tell my family that I wasn’t showing up. I was seriously not going to show up to meet my only brother’s first child. Well, screw them if they end up pissed off at me. I’m six months behind on my own problems. I’m a fucking drug addict and I need to meet my dealer. Can’t this fucking Russian drive any faster?
As we started back south on the FDR, I took a deep breath and dialed my brother’s cell number while I was still feeling self-righteous enough to call him. This was the flogging I had coming to me. The self-flagellation would come later. Stay focused, I thought. In twenty minutes, I’d be back in my safe house and Henry would sell me a handful of happiness. Just dial. The phone rang five times before my brother’s voicemail picked up. Did he see that it was me calling? Did my brother just ignore my call? He knew why I was calling, didn’t he? I’ll bet he tossed the phone on the bed in disgust.
Thank God he didn’t pick up. I left a pathetic message. “Oh my God, I’m in the car and I’ve never seen such dead-stopped traffic. It’s a total rainstorm and there are accidents everywhere. I’m so, so sorry, but it would take me like two hours to get out there and then visiting hours will be ending. I feel terrible about this, but I promise I’ll get out there this weekend.” At that point, it probably didn’t matter to either of us what kind of bullshit seeped from my mouth. It probably surprised neither of us that it would be two weeks before I’d find my way to New Jersey and first hold the baby.
11
In the fall of 2003, I started going to work under the influence. I could no longer wait until lunch to infuse my bloodstream with more alcohol, so I would drink even before leaving my apartment. One morning before a monthly meeting with a team of partners I downed an oversized screwdriver; when I was the one mixing, that was a tall glass of vodka with some orange juice for color. Then I did a few fat lines of coke.
Paranoia haunted me whenever I was in a public place that wasn’t a bar. I was sure that people could smell the alcohol. In the elevator of my office building I pictured people sniffing the air to figure out where the smell was coming from. Straight-faced behind my sunglasses, I would lower my head and exhale into my hand to check for booze breath. Sometimes I’d even imagine that I’d failed to notice a cop and his drug-sniffing dog at the back of the elevator. Those dogs scared the shit out of me, and it wasn’t rare for me to walk an extra seventeen blocks to avoid running into one in the subway. Even with not a wisp of coke on me, I was sure they’d know. Paranoia turned me into Pig-Pen, walking around the city followed by a little drug cloud.
Swiping my key card, I walked past the glass security doors onto the twenty-third floor. My office was large, with a wall of windows looking out on the tourist chaos of Times Square below—probably middle-aged men with cameras around their necks, Europeans wearing telltale sandals with socks, and t-shirt vendors hawking their wares from behind carts. I gazed down and wondered how many of them had already had a drink.
I flopped into my ergonomically correct chair and wheeled myself to my desk, dropping my head in my hands. Breathe, breathe. I was wearing one of my better black suits with a baby blue Ann Taylor button-down shirt and black Ferragamo heels. With my head still in my hands, I sat up straight and rubbed the heels of my hands against my temples. Get your shit together, girl. It’s showtime.
The phone on my desk rang and Jerry’s office number flashed. “Hey!” I answered on the second ring.
“DOG! You made it in on time!” He was probably cleaning his oval eyeglasses with the tail of his dress shirt and then squirting Visine into his bloodshot eyes.
What? I bristled in self-defense. “Of course I made it in on time. I have a meeting this morning.”
“Settle, settle. I’m just giving you a hard time. You sounded a little banged up last night. I’m double-checking.”
“I wasn’t bad last night!” I wanted to end the call and get back to focusing.
“If you say so,” he said.
“I have to go. Meet up for a pop after work?” I asked.
“Done! Just let me know where and when. Later.” He always hung up first.
He’d rattled me. I hadn’t been that bad the night before (had I?). The coke was put away by ten o’clock, and the combination of Tylenol PM and red wine put me down before midnight. When I’d gotten out of bed at six fifteen that morning, I felt as close as I ever did to refreshed. Just get that first drink down and all will be OK.
I stopped in the ladies room to check my lipstick and inspect my nose for blood. Should I do a couple of quick bumps out of the bullet in my bag, just for a little extra energy? No, just hold off, I thought. Don’t risk your nose running all over the meeting.
In the conference room, I flipped on the lights and placed the necessary documents around the heavy, oval mahogany table and tucked all the rolling leather chairs neatly in their places, and then I examined my handiwork. Perfect. Nothing wrong with that picture. I spat my gum into the trash can before anyone arrived. I assumed that anyone chewing gum before eleven in the morning had been drinking, so I believed others assumed the same.
“Lisa! Good morning. How are you?” Greg, a senior finance partner, breezed into the conference room. Like many old-school partners, he wore suspenders, wireframe glasses, and the furrowed brow of someone who spent his mornings poring over The Wall Street Journal on commuter trains. My head was buzzing, but it was just the right buzz. I’d gotten good at teeing up for these meetings, not too loopy, not too jacked. When the balance was just right, the energy in my head felt like the calm hum of a window air conditioner set on low. It created a pleasant purring that didn’t call attention to itself.
“All’s good!” I answered with a big smile. If the partners liked having you in the room, that was a big deal. It was almost as important for your career as producing creative, well-executed work.
“No sesame bagels this morning, huh?” he asked, bending over the platter.
“Hmm, that’s unusual. Should I ask catering?” I asked.
“No, no. That’s OK,” he answered, looking deflated. Shit. One demerit. Can he tell I’m drunk? Will he keep a closer eye on me now because of the bagels?
About a half dozen more partners filed in and exchanged greetings, the scents of their colognes and aftershaves circulating with the smell of coffee and bagel yeast. It was what morning smelled like in Normal World. I’d become more accustomed to the scent of cigarette smoke and the chemicals Henry’s supplier used to cut drugs.
Technically, office attire was “business casual,” but everyone wore suits. Alanis, the only woman, stood out despite being dressed as conservatively as the men. Women had become the hottest accessory in business development. Every client wanted a female on their team, so partners like Alanis—smart, accomplished
, and personable—were in high demand.
“Hey, Alanis,” I said, taking a seat across from her.
“Hi Lisa. How are you doing?” She glanced at my plate. “Hungry this morning, huh? You probably worked out already.”
Trying to look like anything other than a drug addict, I had grabbed a bagel with cream cheese, grapes, and two mini-muffins.
“Yeah, I guess I am,” I answered with my best smile.
Maybe it was just standard food commentary. She couldn’t smell booze, could she? She hadn’t noticed any of my sniffling, right? Women always checked out what other women were eating, didn’t they?
The group settled in around the table, and Rob, the lead partner, started the meeting. “OK. Good morning. Can you all put down your phones?” Instead of engaging in small talk, everyone around the table had been reading from their devices while waiting for the meeting to begin. All of the bowed heads made it look like a prayer circle. There was a pause and shuffling.
“Lisa, I think you have a number of items to report on,” Rob said, looking at me expectantly.
I snapped myself back into the meeting. “Yes, yes I do,” I said. “OK!” It was as if the director on a movie set had yelled, “Action!” My work brain fully kicked in, and for the next several minutes I focused on delivering my report with the authority of Walter Cronkite.
“On the project finance front, we had a nice uptick in our work last month and brought in three new matters, two in Latin America and one in Asia.” I rolled on through my full report, careful to keep my voice steady and make occasional eye contact.
“Perfect,” Rob said when I was done. “Nice work. Now let’s just go around the table.” Just like that, I was done. The weight of the meeting slid off my shoulders as easily as a negligee off a hooker.
It was time for my favorite part of the meeting, trying to decide who else in the room had been drinking and/or doing drugs this morning. According to statistics, up to 20 percent of lawyers had a substance abuse problem.
But “a problem,” what exactly did that mean? Getting a DUI? Throwing up at the office Christmas party? Sleeping through an important court date after an all-night bender? Or to have a “problem,” did you have to be like me, by 8:00 a.m. have a bloodstream dancing with cocaine and enough booze to blow over the legal limit?
It was hard to concentrate on the rest of the meeting, but I was good at faking it with an occasional nod or scrunching of my eyebrows to show acknowledgment.
Then a jolt of fear shot straight through me. Holy shit, did I leave my open pack of cigarettes next to my computer? Fuck! There’s a tiny baggy loaded with coke in that pack! What if someone walks into my office and picks it up? I might as well walk out to security and present my wrists to be handcuffed.
Fuck. I have to get out of this room right now. But I can’t leave. Sweat started to form on the back of my neck, and saliva filled my mouth as if vomit was going to rise. My perfect buzz was crushed, and I was back to being just a paranoid cokehead verging on hyperventilation. Everything in the room started to swirl.
Heather. Allison. Rick. Any of them might have cruised into my office to bum a cigarette. They knew that I always had smokes and that I always shared, so if any one of them saw the open pack on my desk, they would feel free to pick it up and reach in. Fuck! I was a wreck. I had to get back to my office. Heather and Rick might be cool but Allison, she was an associate on partner track. She couldn’t find coke in the office and not report it. She wouldn’t take that risk just for a smoking buddy. And would Heather and Rick really be cool about drugs in the office? Fuck, is one of them walking in there right now? Is my career being covered with lighter fluid as I sit here praying that nobody tosses a match?
I dug my fingernails into my hands. Relax, I told myself. Breathe. No one’s walking into your office. No one’s touching your cigarette pack. Remain calm.
But what if someone is? What if someone is??? My thundering heart rate started to scare me. I took more deep breaths. Shit, I must be calling attention to myself. Calm down, woman. You don’t need a room full of heavy-hitting partners thinking you’re practicing for childbirth.
When the meeting wrapped about forty minutes later, the partners gathered to chat over the buffet and their second cups of coffee. I hurried to the door as fast as I could without running, and once out the door I sprinted past the elevator and ran like an EMT down the stairs.
When I rounded the corner to my office, I saw it. The distinct gold shimmer off the corner of my Marlboro Lights pack. Thank God! It hadn’t been touched.
I slammed my door shut and lunged at the pack. Fuck me. I left a baggie of coke on my office desk! I fell into my chair and put my head between my knees. Taking deep, slow breaths, I tried to calm down by reminding myself that nothing bad had happened. After several minutes, my heartbeat stopped thumping like a bass drum. But there was no escaping the fact that I had just left cocaine out in the open, on a desk owned by my employer. My employer, the law firm.
12
I woke up one Sunday a couple of weeks later with a horn section blaring in my head. My mouth tasted like wallpaper paste. Water, I needed water. As I rustled the sheets to move, I kicked a leg. Fuck. What happened last night?
A mop of near-black curls twisted on the pillow next to me. A bare, male arm stretched up toward the headboard as if it were grasping for something. Rolling over to get a look at the face without waking the guy—whoever the hell he was—I saw thick dark eyebrows over deep-set eyes and a mole on the left cheek. Oh shit! It was the cute guy I’d been seeing around my building. Shit. Shit. Shit. What did I fucking do?
His face was definitely younger than mine. Jesus, how old is too old for one-night, blackout stands? He looked peaceful as he slept, but a tornado of memories began to whirl in my brain. Images from the night before appeared in snippets, like tiny pick-up trucks and cows swirling around the storm’s eye. The elevator. We ran into each other in the elevator. Name, name, what’s his name? Mark! Yes, Mark! How satisfying it was to recall the name that quickly. I used to take pride in things like learning to flip a canoe and re-enter it in record time or finishing the Sunday New York Times crossword puzzle in pen. These days all I had to do to earn a mental high-five was remember the name of the half-naked guy in my bed.
I had a flash of us sitting on my bed drinking wine, and I saw two empty glasses on my dresser. Okay, so I’d invited him in for a glass of wine. But how did we end up in here? Did we at least start in the living room? My panties were still on. Just my panties. Okay, we probably didn’t have sex. The rest of my clothes were in a pile on the floor. Not great, but it certainly could be worse. Peeking under the covers, I saw that Mark had underwear on, too. OK. Breathe, breathe. What the hell else happened here last night? I dragged my brain like a river that held the missing bodies.
Coke. My nose was numb so it couldn’t have been long since I’d used. Did he do it too or did I just sit on the bed like a hardcore drug addict blowing lines in front of a total stranger? My gut told me I’d been doing coke alone.
At least he wasn’t a cop. He was always in street clothes when I’d seen him around the building. But what if he’s an undercover cop! No, I’d be arrested by now. Unless he’s staking me out to get to my dealer. Is he going to arrest me and threaten a Class C felony drug charge unless I testify against Henry?
Something told me that these weren’t the morning thoughts of most women after a night with a new guy.
I needed a drink. Wearing my red and white Indian print robe, I walked into the kitchen. There were two empty wine bottles on the counter. Not terrible, but then again, I was already in a drunken blackout when I met Mark in the elevator.
I opened the refrigerator door and held onto it for support. What to drink, what to drink—white wine from that open bottle or a couple shots of vodka? I grabbed the wine and drank directly out of the bottle. Speed was important in case Mark wandered into the kitchen. The wine slithered a cold soothing trail down my throat. I
t also quieted the trumpets in my head, so I took a few more long swigs.
In the living room, I lit a cigarette. As I squinted away from the sun streaming through the window, I turned on the air conditioner to mask the smell of smoke. Had Mark smoked last night? He didn’t look like a smoker. He looked like someone I might have known in Hebrew school, one of the over-confident little brats who grew up in the suburbs and then moved to Manhattan to become a big swinging dick.
Despite having just slugged back more wine than most people would drink at a dinner party, I stood there shaking. Strands of hair hung around my face, and even they were shaking. Who has hair that shakes? I’m a disaster, I thought. At least it was Sunday.
Feeling like I might be able to fall back to sleep, I brushed my teeth, gargled with Listerine, and tiptoed back to the bedroom. I dropped my robe on top of the clothing pile, pulled on an old US Open t-shirt and a pair of men’s boxers, and climbed back into bed, careful not to touch or wake Mark.
A couple of hours later, I regained consciousness and realized that Mark was splayed across me as if he’d fallen from a building. His left arm stretched over my back, and his hand rested near my face like a claw. Ugh. I still didn’t want to wake him, but I had to pee. As I slid out from under him, he let out a sleepy moan and rolled over. Like a sewer rat, I scurried into the bathroom before he could fully awaken.
There it was, the mirror. I had two mascara black eyes—Courtney Love by daylight. Soap and water took care of that, but there wasn’t much to be done with the rest of me. I had a weird combination of bloat from alcohol, droop from lack of sleep, and gauntness from lack of food; for the latter, I thanked cocaine. There was no way through the knots and frizz in my hair, so I pulled the mess back into a ponytail. More Listerine made sense.
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