Long Past Stopping

by Oran Canfield

  “So, what do you think?” I asked, as he was looking it over.

  “Sure, it sounds great, but I have two concerns. One, what happens if you invest this much time and money into it, and for some reason you lose your warehouse space? And two, I hate to say this, but you just don’t have a good track record with money.”

  “Listen, I’ll pay you back no matter what. The worst-case scenario is that I have to sell the equipment and get a job. Either way, you still get your two fifty a month.”

  “Okay, I’ll do it,” he said hesitantly, pulling out his checkbook. “But if you don’t pay me back, I will never lend you money again. If you do, maybe this could lead to something bigger.” He then handed me a check for ten thousand bucks.

  “Don’t you want me to sign that agreement?” I asked. My voice was shaky from holding that much money.

  “No. The ten thousand dollars is nothing to me. I don’t care whether you pay it back or not. This is about you being responsible and keeping your word. If you don’t, that’s fine, but no more money from Jack.”

  NOT WANTING TO fuck up my one chance at owning my own business, I got to work the next day. It took a week just to get all the materials from the hardware store to the storefront on Mission Street. I would leave them my driver’s license in exchange for the use of their pushcart and spend the day hauling lumber and drywall back to my place. Next, I covered the floor and the walls of the basement with sheets of plastic, and then I started framing out the two new rooms. My dope habit was slowly getting bigger, but I needed it to get through the ten-hour days I was spending on the studio. On top of that, I kept ending up in more bands, including a garage band with Eli and Jibz called the Roofies and a Slayer cover band called Sleigher. We wore Santa Claus hats and wrote Christmas lyrics to all the songs. We played “Reindeer in Blood,” “Mandatory Yuletide,” “South Pole of Heaven,” “Seasons Greetings in the Abyss,” and “Angel of Mirth,” to name a few. It was the hardest music I had ever played, but it was worth it just to see people excited and singing along at our very first show. I was playing in four other bands as well, and I was still the token Jew in the Goys, which I hadn’t managed to quit.

  I was getting increasingly nervous about being the best man at Sean’s wedding. Not that I had to do anything other than get him to the ceremony on time and make a toast, but I didn’t have much faith that I was capable of either of those things. Waking up before twelve was almost impossible, but I ended being so anxious about the toast, getting Sean there on time, and not dropping the ring that I ended up not getting any sleep anyway. It didn’t help knowing that this girl Heather was going to be there. It’s true I would get crushes on almost every girl I saw, but these were mostly phantoms I would pass on the street and never see again, or girls I would sneak glances at on the BART. Before we’d even make it through the tunnel we would have been married, had kids, and gone through an ugly divorce, and I’d walk to my mom’s house with a resentment against them. I would also get crushes on girls I saw regularly in the neighborhood, in bars or at shows, but I would avoid talking to them at all costs. If an exchange of words was unavoidable, I would either get paralyzed and fuck everything up or they would say something idiotic, and I would lose my crush. If they didn’t say something stupid, I would usually find some way to judge them, even if it was as minor as their platform shoes, which, for some godforsaken reason, had come back in style. And finally, if they had passed all these tests, it was pretty clear that they shouldn’t be going after me. Something must be wrong with them, even if I couldn’t figure out exactly what.

  Heather was an exception to the myriad intentional and unintentional defense mechanisms I had developed over the years to keep myself lonely and miserable. She was smart, cute, cynical, funny, talented, didn’t wear those fucking shoes, and most important, in the three years I had known her, had never once exhibited any interest in me whatsoever. She was perfect.

  “Hey, Oran. You know Heather’s going to be at the wedding. Alex, her ex, just moved to Spain. You can finally get your chance,” Sean had told me after rehearsal a few nights earlier.

  “You mean my chance to fuck it all up?” I asked.

  “Dude, you’ve been asking about her forever, and she’s finally single. That’s all I’m saying.” Sean loved talking to just about anyone, so he couldn’t understand the paralysis I would experience in the presence of girls.

  “Thanks for the thought, but you know how I get.”

  “Goddamn, man. Just say hi to her, okay? She’s awesome.”

  “All right. We’ll see what happens. I don’t want to think about it anymore.” But all I could do was think about it.

  I kept thinking about it till we got to the Japanese tea garden up at Golden Gate Park. I thought about it through the ceremony, and I thought about it some more through dinner. Actually, I was fucking obsessed, but I couldn’t for the life of me bring myself to say hi to her.

  The only reprieve I got from the anxiety of being around Heather was the anxiety of having to do the toast. I had come up with the first half of the first sentence and had drawn a blank. When it seemed as though it was getting close to that time, I ran to my room, smoked some dope, and managed to calm down enough to make my voice shake less. When I got back, I resisted every instinct I had to turn around and run away. Instead, I grabbed a glass of wine, tapped my spoon against it, and waited for the room to quiet down.

  “When Eli first told me that the best man’s job was to get the groom to the wedding on time, I almost asked Sean to find someone else. As we all know, getting Sean anywhere on time can be an impossible task.” I knew that line would be a success, considering at this point in the evening it was still an intimate gathering of bandmates and relatives, all of whom dealt with Sean’s habitual lateness regularly. I wasn’t so sure Sean would laugh, but he did. I went into some awkward ad-lib about how we met, and when it seemed like I had been up there long enough I ended with, “…but as you all know, Sean is such a talented musician, and good friend, that he has always been worth waiting for.” Totally lame, I thought to myself as I sat down and tried to forget about it. And I didn’t say anything about Christine. What an asshole.

  After dinner the party livened up pretty quickly. The band started playing, and everyone started getting smashed. The ceremony and dinner had been a small gathering, but not because Sean and Christine lacked friends. Sean had been playing music in the city for years now and knew just about everyone, and slowly but surely, the place filled up. I found Jake and just kind of stuck with him. I was pretty intimidated by this crowd of Mission hipsters who had taken over our house, even though I had a pretty good idea that I was one of them.

  “So what’s going on? You talk to Heather yet?” Jake asked.

  “No, man. I can’t do it. She freaks me out,” I answered.

  “Jesus, do it for me then. You’ve been talking about her for how long now? It’s driving me crazy. ‘I saw Heather walking down the street today…I ran into Heather at the store…Heather this…Heather that.’ Just go talk to her. She’s right there.”

  I couldn’t help glancing over to where he was looking, and I made eye contact with her by accident. I quickly looked down at the floor and turned back toward Jake.

  “Damn,” I said under my breath.

  While Jake was imploring me to just go over and talk to her, I heard a voice from behind me say, “Hi, Oran.”

  I turned around and it was Heather.

  “Hey, Heather, how’s it going?” My heart was racing and sweat was starting to bead up on my forehead and upper lip, which made me more self-conscious and made my heart beat faster, and made me sweat even more. All I could do was stand there and try to look calm. I moved over a step, hoping to let Jake into the conversation, but he had vanished.

  “I just wanted to come over and say hi, since I didn’t get a chance all day.” She looked like a grown-up version of a Margaret Keane painting: big eyes, small face, little-boy haircut. So fucking cute.
r />   “Your toast was hilarious. Someone needed to say that.”

  “Yeah, well, I was just trying to be funny, but I was a little worried about bumming Sean out. That guy can be a little sensitive, you know?” I was surprised that my mouth was moving and words were coming out. I was calming down a little bit.

  “Jeez, you’re telling me? I’m in a band with him, too, you know,” she said.

  “By the way, I wanted to tell you, that last show I saw at the Chameleon was great. You’re an amazing drummer.”

  “Yeah, right. What a disaster. Jeff Ray and his fucking guitars. It’s like the Three Stooges up there.”

  “But there are five of you,” I pointed out.

  “Yeah, but the only way I can deal with it is to pretend that Tracy and I just happen to be onstage watching The Three Stooges. That way it’s actually pretty funny seeing those three guys run around changing instruments and tripping all over their cords. Otherwise, I’d lose my mind. How’s Optimist International doing?”

  “Sean didn’t tell you about San Pedro?” I asked her, kind of surprised.

  “No. I knew you guys went down to L.A., but he didn’t say anything about it.”

  I told her a few stories from our recent tour of Southern California and noticed that my anxiety had all but disappeared. I was more or less able to be myself around her. We continued talking for a while, and I kept waiting for her to say something stupid, or me to say something stupid, or anything that might give me the slightest reason to judge her, but it never happened.

  “Well, I think I’ve had too much to drink, but I need to say bye to a few people before I leave. It was good talking to you.”

  “Yeah…okay.” There seemed to be a moment of awkwardness where we couldn’t tell if we should hug, shake hands, or…then she walked away, and my paralysis came back full force. Shit. Did it go okay? Did I say anything dumb? Should I have asked her if she wanted to get a drink sometime? Fuck. I think I just screwed the whole thing up. I needed to talk to someone.

  I looked around the crowd to find Jake, but he had already reappeared in his old spot right next to me.

  “Finally. So what happened? You guys were talking forever.”

  “I don’t know,” I muttered.

  “What do you mean you don’t know? Did you get her number, or ask her to go out?”

  “No. I don’t know how to do that.”

  “What the hell were you guys talking about for so long?”

  “Stuff,” I said. While Jake was trying to get information out of me, someone grabbed me around the waist from behind. When I turned around to figure out what happened, all I saw was a blur of people dancing.

  “What was that?” I asked Jake.

  “I don’t know, it happened so fast, but I think that was Heather.”

  “Heather? What was she wearing? Was it like a white lacy thing?”

  “Yeah. That was her. Oran, she just gave you a hug from behind.” He said it as if a “hug from behind” were a thing I should somehow know about.

  “What should I do?” A flood of longing, excitement, anxiety, loneliness, and, finally, depression hit me.

  “Cranberry! She just came up to you and gave you a hug from behind! Are you crazy? Go outside and find her! Now, man!” He said the whole thing loudly and slowly to make sure I could understand him.

  “Uh…I’m sure she’s gone by now,” I said, contrary to everything I was feeling. I did want to run after Heather and tell her that she was the cutest girl ever, and that I had a crush on her from the moment I saw her, and I couldn’t stop thinking about her, and if she just gave me a chance…but I couldn’t fucking move.

  “Did you hear what I said?” His voice was getting louder. “Go! Go now, Cranberry! I don’t see you going!” I had never seen him so frustrated before. “Ahh! Jesus Christ, you’re killing me, man.”

  “Maybe I’ll call her tomorrow,” I said, depressed and confused. I wanted her to hug me again. It felt nice. Damn.

  Jake lowered his head in total defeat and said, “Un-fucking-believable, man. Un-fucking-believable.”

  I DECIDED I WAS going to call Heather, I just wasn’t sure when. First of all, I had to get my shit together and stop smoking dope. It was a good incentive. I hardly ever ran into her, so I knew it was just a matter of time before some other guy wouldn’t stand there like an idiot the next time she felt like hugging someone and running away. What the hell was wrong with me? Before I got the chance, though, I ran into her and Sean at the Casanova.

  “Hey, Heather, it’s good to see you. Twice in one week even.”

  “Yeah. Well, I don’t usually come here, but we just got out of rehearsal and…hey, you want to get something to eat? I’m starving.”

  I wasn’t hungry, but I wasn’t going to let her run away again.

  “Yeah, where do you want to go?”

  I didn’t even say hi to Sean. We just started heading back out the way I came in.

  “I don’t know. I just want to get out of here. I don’t really like this place.” She seemed agitated about something. We started walking up Valencia, and I asked her if she had made it home okay after the wedding. She looked at me kind of suspicious. “Uh, what do mean?” she asked. It would have been a perfect opportunity to ask her about running out of the wedding the way she did, but I dropped the ball.

  “Oh, just ’cause you said you were pretty drunk. That’s all.” She seemed relieved that I didn’t bring it up.

  We were coming across Seventeenth Street, and Heather said, “Hey, do want to go in that alley and make out?”

  Holy shit. I was stunned. Even I couldn’t fuck this one up.

  “I can’t think of a single thing in the whole world I would rather do,” I said.

  We didn’t talk for a while after that. We just hid in the dark, making out, oblivious to the legendary reek of Clarion Alley. There were also some incredible murals in there, but at night it just smelled like rotting trash and urine. I lost my sense of time, but at some point I said, “Wow, you have no idea how long I have been wanting that to happen.”

  “Really? Even at the wedding I couldn’t tell at all. Me, too, though.”

  “Ever since the first time I saw you. It was your first show with Sean, like three years ago,” I said, remembering how mesmerized I was by that train wreck of a first show.

  “I got you beat. You were one of the first people I noticed when I moved to San Francisco. You used to serve me coffee at the Art Institute Café.”

  “No way. I would have noticed you.”

  “Nah, I was just this shy little punk-rock girl. I had a shaved head and I just lurked around. I didn’t talk to anyone.”

  “Shit. I feel bad that I don’t remember,” I said, trying to visualize her with a shaved head.

  “Hey, I’ve got another confession to make. At the wedding, that was me who hugged you and ran out of there all crazy. I was just so frustrated. I didn’t know what else to do, so…”

  “I kind of figured that out, but I wasn’t sure,” I lied.

  “Wait. That’s not the confession. I was so frustrated from talking to you that on my way home I walked into the Casanova and grabbed some random guy, and…” I waited for her to finish. “I can’t believe I’m telling you this, but I took him home. I just didn’t know what else to do. That’s why I needed to get out of the Casanova and looked at you strange when you asked me if I got home okay. I thought maybe you knew.”

  “I didn’t have any idea. Well, I’ll take it as a compliment, I guess, but I wish you would have taken me home instead.”

  “Me too. Believe me. But tonight I have to go home alone,” she said.

  “What? You mean I basically got some random guy laid the other night and now you have to go home alone?” I said, pretending to joke. I mean, who else could this happen to but me?

  “Yup, but don’t worry. I’m not going anywhere.”

  “You just said you were going home.” I was joking this time, and she laughed. I didn’t tr
y too hard to get her to change her mind for two reasons. One, I never tried too hard, and two, I hadn’t brought any dope with me. I would have gladly traded spending the night with Heather for a morning of being dope sick if that’s how it was going, but she was determined to leave by herself.

  “Okay, but promise me you won’t go in any bars on your way home,” I said, giving her a final kiss goodnight.

  “I promise.”

  I watched her walk down the street till she disappeared. Then I started home down Seventeenth Street. I needed to avoid the Casanova because I couldn’t stop smiling. I didn’t want to freak anyone out.

  I was still smiling the next day, and for the next week, and the next month. For the first time I could remember, I was pretty psyched. I had an amazing girlfriend, and I started my first recording job the day after I finished soldering the last of the three hundred cables. The first band was two black guys of questionable sexual orientation, and even more questionable musical skill, called Rocket Science and the Nigger-Loving Faggots. With a name like that, you didn’t need to be good. Their lack of skill ended up working to my advantage anyway. Since the drummer seemed to think the microphones were actually tiny little drums, I got an extra two days of work just trying to mute all the mic hits out of the mix. I ended up making twice my rent in the first four days of business. With my new smile, and a rate of fifteen dollars an hour, getting clients wasn’t a problem at all.

  What I couldn’t understand was how the better things kept getting, the more I seemed to hate myself. It didn’t make sense, because I’d always believed that if I just got this, that, or the other thing, I would be fine. I had the girlfriend, the recording studio, my music, my friends, and…I was a junkie, and a lying piece of shit.

  As long as I was working, or playing music, or hanging out with Heather, I was fine. I had somehow managed to believe my own lies enough to convince myself I was doing great, until I started getting goose bumps, my nose started running, and I had to excuse myself to go get high. I dreaded it. Every six hours I would face the most hateful, venomous, self-critical motherfucker on the planet, as I hid in the bathroom, smoking enough dope to get well. Coming out, I would completely forget all about it and jump right back into whatever I was doing, oblivious that I had just been doing heroin. It was the only way I could keep the act going. I was actually the worst actor in the world, but I had figured out that if I believed my own lies, I could fool anyone.