by N. K. Smith
Who the fuck needs love? Love will never make me feel as good as this coke will. Never.
Chapter 22
I do nothing the next day. Elsie calls for the first time in weeks, but I ignore it, just like I’ve ignored all of her calls. Peter calls with nothing but concern in his voice, but I tell him I’m fine.
“Why’d you upload that video? Is this a thing now with you?” he asks after a long silence.
I’m still in bed, so I drape an arm over my eyes. “What video?”
“The video of you looking a little wild and talking nonstop about your broken relationship with Elsie.”
“I uploaded that?” I ask as I roll onto my side and pull the covers up over my head.
“Yeah, and it’s feeding the vultures this morning.”
“Hold on.” I pull the phone away from my ear and see a voicemail and text from my agent. I open and scan the message from Meg. Sure enough, she’s advising me to stop uploading videos to the Internet.
I groan at the thought of the morning gossip girls chatting it up, but I don’t think it’s that bad. “I don’t even remember what I said. Besides, who cares about the scavengers.” An idea pops into my head. “Hey, come over today. We haven’t skated in a while. It’ll be fun.”
I feel like shit, but skateboarding and rollerblading with Peter when we were younger will always be some of my best memories. Together with Liliana, we starred in series of kids’ movies centered around skating, so we all got the best training and became quite skilled. Lili never cared to do it unless the cameras were around, but Peter and I took to it.
Peter doesn’t even acknowledge that I’ve asked him to come over. “Listen, Adra, about that video, I know I’ll never understand what you went through with your parents, but you give Elsie too much credit. She didn’t nurture you, you know. She saw a business opportunity and took it.”
It looks like reality is going to seep under the covers and find me. I take a deep breath, kick off the comforter and sit up. “You’re right. You’ve never understood, but you and Lili always seemed to think it’s okay to make comments about it.”
“I’m your friend. Friends give advice and try to warn—”
“Look, Elsie’s not on my top ten list of favorite people right now either, but I don’ t need you to chime in again about how much you don’t like her. I get it. I’m sorry I released some video, and I’m sure it’s going to make everyone feel they have the right to weigh in, but I don’t want to hear it.”
I hear him sigh on the other side of the phone, and then I hear a female voice. Shyla.
“Can you come over today?” I ask again.
“Probably not. I’ve got this interview for a magazine this afternoon, and Shy—”
“Okay,” I say because I don’t want to hear about his plans with his girlfriend. “Thanks for calling. Sorry about the video. Everything’s fine. I’ll talk to you soon.”
I don’t wait for him to respond before I hit the END button. I reach over to my nightstand, grab my MP3 player, and pull the headphones over my ears. They are perfect for blocking out the white noise of my empty bedroom. As soon as I hit PLAY, I’m transported into Highland’s latest musical dream. She’s just uploaded it a few days ago, and I can’t get enough of the Celtic melodies over the dubstep beat.
It blocks out everything I don’t want to think about, and when I lie back down, I succumb to the usual overwhelming fatigue I experience after wrapping a film, but this time, the fatigue is a little heavier.
Chapter 23
I’ve run out of coke again. Eight balls don’t seem to last. I have no idea what time it is, but I’ve got to find some. Sometimes I think I should slow down with it. I mean, I used to do more before all this started, but I can’t ever seem to make that thought of slowing down stick.
***
Time and space have ceased to exist.
At least, that’s what I feel like when I roll out of bed.
My first instinct is to get high. My second instinct is to get indignant because I remember that I don’t have any cocaine left.
I know all of Elsie’s contacts, but even if I didn’t, this is Hollywood, and I’ve got more money than I can think about, so it’s not like scoring a gram would be difficult.
But I don’t pick up my cell to make it happen. It is great being high, but I need to start managing my shit. I fired my manager, so I have to do everything myself. Meg still sends me scripts, but I have to wade through all of them, and I have to attend auditions, reads, and negotiations alone. Okay, so my lawyer goes to the contract negotiations with me, but he’s not Elsie.
Right now, it’s too early for me to remember how long it’s been since I’ve seen her, or how long it’s been since I’ve seen anyone. It feels like I’ve been alone in this house for months, but it is probably more like days. Thinking about being alone makes me want to get high. I roll out of bed and shuffle around my house in nothing but a bra and panties. I need some kind of pet. I need friends.
A knock sounds, as if the universe is answering my wish. Anticipation tickles its way from my gut to my head. There are only a few people who know the gate’s new code, and the security guard wouldn’t let up anyone without calling me if they didn’t know the code.
The knocking is insistent, so I walk to the front door and throw it open. I smile a huge smile when I see Peter standing before me. His hair is tousled a bit, and I glance down at the drive to see that he has, in fact, ridden here on his motorcycle.
“Hey!”
He drops his gaze from my face down my body, and the heat that builds within me almost keeps me from realizing that I’m almost naked in front of him. Before I can acknowledge it or cover my torso with my arms, Peter steps in and places his hands on my shoulders. “Are you okay?”
I melt under his touch but blink in confusion to his question. “What? I’m fine.”
Peter takes a deep breath. “Okay, good, I thought you’d take the news—”
“What? News?”
He widens his eyes and relaxes the muscles in his face. In this moment, he looks much younger, and I feel a smile forming as I remember the softer features of his youth. “You haven’t heard? No one’s called you?”
This is bad. It has to be bad if he’s here with that somber look on his face. My body reacts quicker than my mind. All the sudden there’s a hot pit opening in my stomach and my legs are shaking, but my mind is still back on Peter’s deep voice.
I look down at the cell phone in my hand. I’m holding it upside down, so I flip it around. With precision, I enter the passcode and the screen lights up with missed calls and messages. Jesus, I must have really been out of it.
I hadn’t even heard it ring.
I look up at Peter. “What’s going on? What’s the news?”
He tightens his hands around my shoulders, but all that does is make me want him to let go. I take a step back and watch as his arms fall to the sides. I know something huge is happening because I can only register these movements in slow motion.
“Adra, Elsie’s dead.”
I take another step back. “What?” I think my voice should be more panicked, but it’s not. I must have misheard Peter. “What?”
“I don’t know.” He takes a step toward me and reaches out for my hand. I don’t let him take it. “Sue called. There’s something about a car crash and a heart attack and a suspicion of cocaine.”
Well of course there’s cocaine involved; it’s Elsie for Christ’s sake. I pivot on my heel and head to the kitchen. I can’t deal with this right now. This is probably just some stunt Elsie’s cooked up to get me to give a shit about her again. I need coffee. I need an assistant to make me coffee when I need it.
“Adra?”
I feel like I should answer him, but I can’t. Instead I think about heart attacks and what one might look like. Elsie has a pretty face. She’s aging, but she is still pretty. There’s no way Elsie had a heart attack. But why would Peter help Elsie pull off this little trick. He hates Elsie. Wh
y would he come here and tell me all this stuff? Peter wouldn’t.
As I fill the machine with coffee, I feel Peter’s warm hand on the curve of my lower back. I let out a long breath.
Peter wouldn’t participate in any scheme of Elsie’s. Peter would tell me the truth. Always the truth.
Once the breath out of my body, I feel limp. My hands fall, spilling the ground coffee from its bag. My knees buckle and hit the cabinets. My head rolls back.
Peter steadies me, but he can do nothing for the searing pain that rips through my body as his words finally hit me with the full force of a demolition ball. Elsie’s dead.
The one woman in all the world who gave a shit about me. She’s dead.
Elsie’s dead after I repaid her loyalty and love by firing her.
I close my eyes and try to draw in a breath, but it’s shallow. I can see her face behind my closed eyelids. I imagine her tangled body, fused with her car. A heart that exploded under the weight of too much coke and not enough love.
I betrayed her.
She’s dead because I didn’t return what she’d given me. I assumed I’d stay pissed at her for a few months, maybe even a year, but then we’d reconcile and continue to take Hollywood by the balls together. She left me all those messages, but I never returned them. God, she was so upset in some them, and I completely ignored it. I ignored her.
Everything gets dark, and when I look at Peter’s face, it’s like I’m watching him in an old black and white movie. Maybe that’s what this is. Maybe it’s just—
No. Peter is telling the truth. He always tells the truth.
Elsie is dead. I have one less person on this planet to care about me. This is not a movie, and I’m not some troubled heroine, a victim of pure chance and circumstance.
I stand up on my own and move away from Peter. I can be my own person. I don’t need Elsie to hold me up anymore. I’d already made the decision to step away from her influence. This changes nothing. And Peter was probably right when he said Elsie was only interested in me for business reasons.
Squatting down to pick up the spilled coffee makes the muscles in my legs ache, so I shift onto my knees and scoop the grounds up between my hands. As I try to get up, I start shaking again. My loose arms offer no resistance, and the coffee spills over my thighs. I sink to the floor, and I cannot breathe or make my body to submit to my will.
How can I? How can I control my body when I can’t even control my mind from spinning out of control? Maybe it’s a side effect of grief or maybe I’ve gone too long without a little powdery pick me up, or maybe I just really need something to calm me down, but whatever it is, I cannot figure out how to stop my mind from spiraling into a million little thoughts about—
“Adra, calm down, okay? You’re going to pass out.”
I blink at Peter, who has knelt down beside me. If I focus, maybe I can use him to block it all out. His large body obscures my view of anything else, so maybe if I curl into him, his very being will act like a veil between me and this world. I lean into him, my shoulders hunching, and I let out a long breath.
After a moment, Peter squeezes me, then lets go. “Breathe.”
I didn’t realize I’d been holding my breath, so I suck in air again. My heart thumps and sends heavy pulses throughout my body. “I need to get . . . ” It takes so much energy to just speak that I stop.
“Get what?”
“Pills. From the bathroom upstairs.”
“Pills?” He pulls away just enough to look at me with concern, but his arms are still around me.
“Yes. My doctor prescribed them for anxiety, and I can’t seem to . . .”
Peter slides one arm under my legs and the other one around my back and then stands up. “Jesus, you’re light,” he mumbles.
I just close my eyes as I feel him start to walk. When he sits me down, I open them again and see that we’re in the bathroom.
“Where are they?”
I manage to point to the cabinet. He opens it. “Damn, Adra, how many pills are you on? What are all these bottles for?”
There’s no denying I’ve gone to my doctor for mood enhancing drugs over the past few months, but I don’t take them all the time. I have no desire to get into it with Peter though, so I ask for what I want. “Lorazepam.” I watch as he runs a finger over the row of bottles. “No, not there. Over. Yeah, that one.”
“How many are you supposed to take?”
“One if it’s mild, but maybe I should take more since—”
“We’ll start with one,” he says as he twists open the top and shakes one into my opened hand.
I try to take it dry, but it gets stuck in my throat. The sensation of choking forces me to move, shoving Peter away from the sink in my haste to get some water. I turn on the tap, stick my head under, and slurp up the water.
And then I stand there looking in the mirror.
Peter is behind me, and I wish I could just focus on his solid body, but I can’t. I can only see mine, in a bra and panties. But my body is not real. I’m not real anymore. I am growing opaque. I wish I could say it’s because of the prescription drug I just took, but I know this is all my doing.
I’m in control, right? I know that I’m the one in control. It’s what I’ve wanted since I was young—to be in control of my life. I have control, right? Now, without Elsie in my life—Jesus, she’ll never be in my life again—there is no one left to control me. But what am I going to do? I don’t know what to do. Who is going to help me figure it all out?
Chapter 24
Elsie’s been gone for weeks. Dead, I mean. She’s been out of my life for longer, but dead for only a few weeks. I’m not sure what I’m doing. I’ve been trying different things. Staying off drugs. Doing different kinds of drugs. Talking to people about how I feel. Keeping it to myself. I’ve even tried to eat my dead feelings away like characters do in TV shows. Nothing worked.
I was watching something on the television the other day about how giving to other people helps you feel better. About being of service to others. Maybe I should do that. Elsie’s the one who had the heart attack and crashed her car, but I feel dead, too.
I just want to feel better . . .
***
My current state of hypocrisy knows no bounds. I thought volunteering at a homeless shelter would help me put my life into perspective, but as I fake-smile at people who have no idea who I am or why my clothes are so clean, I’m not feeling grateful, I’m wracked with guilt about having spent five hundred bucks on coke before coming here.
I’d stayed off the stuff until Elsie’s funeral.
My parents were there. I didn’t talk to them, but they were there. My mother’s iron eyes latched onto me, scanning the length of my body, and when she finally met my gaze, I could see the negative opinions dripping from her withered tear ducts.
My father smiled at me. It was the kind of smile I remembered from my childhood. It was his smile, and not my mother’s judgment that spun me. It made me almost feel safe, like I was a kid and the only thing expected of me was to finish my dinner and remember to say please and thank you. I almost got caught up in that smile, but then I remember how quickly he had just sided with my mother and abandoned me.
He took a step toward me, like he was going to come talk to me, but I turned before he could get any closer. I couldn’t wait to get out of the cemetery and call Ron, one of my coke contacts. I couldn’t wait to feel the burn of it flying up my nose, stretching its hot, spindly arms throughout my body until I was nothing more than its puppet. It was becoming easier and easier to just fall into that warm embrace and lose myself in it, although, losing the surrounding world was better.
After that, I stopped paying attention to how much I snorted. I have a limitless supply of money and an abundant need to be taken away from my thoughts.
In one of my quiet high moments—those are different from the frenetic high moments—I hated myself so much that I arranged to do this volunteer work. Now that I’m here,
I want to be anywhere else.
The fucking media followed me here, so now I’m trapped. If I leave early, they’ll report on how weak I am, but if I stay, I might make the Good Deeds column on Locker’s blog.
“A lot of people are a bit overwhelmed when they come here to volunteer.”
I jump and turn to see a woman standing next to me. “Oh.”
“I’m Hettie. I’m one of the coordinators here. Have you ever volunteered before?”
“When I was fifteen a studio had me and some other kids volunteer to paint houses and stuff.”
“But nothing hands on with the homeless population?”
When I shake my head, Hettie takes me over to a small table. It’s filthy. I mean, not like crawling with bugs, but I can see that no one’s wiped it down between the last few people sitting here and us. I don’t know what to do with my hands. I can’t rest them on the tabletop, but it feels awkward to do anything else with them.
“So why do you want to help out today?”
I lift up my sunglasses and squint into the line of people waiting to get something to eat. Apart from being dirty and less groomed, they could just be regular people. And then it dawns on me.
They are regular people. They’re just not as lucky as I am.
After thinking back on how this whole thing came about, I remember Liliana’s charity and how it seemed to make her happier. Stories like this were always on the news. All those smiling celebrities have something I don’t and the common thread is doing service like this. “I want to be a better person.”
Hettie nods at me, but her face remains passive and hard to read. “Volunteering can definitely lead to a sense of connectedness and internal happiness.”
I put my sunglasses back in place over my eyes. “I guess that’s what I want.”
“We have varying mentoring programs, but perhaps—”
“Can’t I just give out food or something? Mentoring seems like it might not be for me.” I don’t tell her why, but I think just looking at me she would be able to tell that I’m not in a position to mentor anyone. In fact, I think I need someone to mentor me. One glance into Hettie’s eyes tells me that she already realized I wasn’t a candidate for the mentoring program. A woman like Hettie probably doesn’t have any pity left for a washed up child star like me. Maybe I should ask her for help. Tell her I need someone to help me—to mentor me.