There it was.
Just like that, he was dumping her.
Just like that, she couldn’t even touch him anymore.
“You met someone else?” Duh.
He nodded.
“Have you slept with her?”
“No.”
Next time you should hold out! Jiminy yelled. Easy for him say. He wasn’t the one deprived for three years.
Who needed this scolding little voice anyway?
“Fuck you,” she whispered to Jiminy.
“What?” asked Alex.
“Not you,” she told him, though it applied to him as well.
I’ll be going now, said Jiminy. Maybe this will teach you something.
I don’t think I can take any more lessons, Luna thought. “So I guess the ménage à trois plan’s a bust?” she asked Alex. Her voice cracked. She was going to cry, dammit. I’m trapped in my car with a man I can’t touch and I’m about to bawl.
“She’s not interested in something like that.”
Like I am. “How old is she?”
“Twenty-five.”
Ouch. “Do you prefer her because I’m so much older than you?” she asked.
“No.”
“Is she prettier?”
“No.”
Her stomach was doing flip-flops. Wouldn’t vomiting be attractive right now. “Then… What is it?”
He looked at her, finally. But now she didn’t want him to. It was the thing that finally made the tears come.
He said, “All I can tell you is I see gold in this girl.”
You said I was a gem. But Luna didn’t have the guts to say it.
She turned away from him, looking at the traffic passing by. Mostly yellow and black taxis. Blurred by tears, they looked like swarming yellowjackets. I was so stupid to think this could ever work out, she thought. “Get out, just get out of my car and leave me alone,” she told him, still facing away. The dumb tears wouldn’t stop… . Can I have some dignity, at least?
Her cold skin prickling with goose bumps. Each breath from her stuffed nose made a nasally, snorty sound as it struggled through snot. She was such a mess and wanted him gone. Why wouldn’t he go?
“I want to stay with you until you calm down,” he said.
She could barely catch her breath from all the heaving sobs. What the fuck good was this asshole who wouldn’t touch her?
She pressed up against her plastic van door, curled up as far from him as she could get. The pop-up door lock jabbed her arm fat. She’d been overweight for awhile after childbirth. Working out had slimmed her down, but that dangling skin never went away. He doesn’t want me because my arms jiggle like the thing that hangs from a turkey’s neck.
She moved off the lock and took hold of the steering wheel, running her fingers over the indentations. Somehow, she managed to verbalize the question: “What did this girl do to get you to be monogamous?”
He said, “She asked.”
Luna calmed herself finally, counting passing cars like sheep.
She really wanted to go to sleep. Crying was exhausting. She was sticky and hot and mucousy, and she could feel the blotchy patches on her face.
The van was silent, until Alex unclicked his seatbelt and stretched. He knocked into his briefcase, which rustled the paper bag. Oh yeah, the gifts, she remembered. He sure didn’t deserve them. But she’d brought them, and it’d be worse if she held onto them. “That bag’s for you,” she told him.
“For me?”
“Yeah.”
He reached down and crinkled paper, taking out Luke Skywalker and Yoda.
“I saw them on a Burger King commercial and picked them up for you,” Luna said.
“Gee, thanks.”
Then he pulled out the jar of half sours. “Wow… . I haven’t had these in so long… .”
“I know.” They’d discussed how there were no kosher pickles in Spanish Harlem.
He stared into the glass. What was so captivating about crammed kirbys? Maybe they’d triggered an epiphany! Does he realize how wonderful I am? That this twenty-five- year-old would never match up in thoughtfulness – never bring him brined cucumbers?
He said, “I want to tell you a secret.”
So much for awakenings. She wiped at the snot dripping down her nose and waited for whatever came next. What more could he possibly reveal?
He said, “I don’t just go to N.A. I’m also a sex addict.”
What did that mean? And why was he less willing to share that information than the fact that he had been addicted to crack? And most of all, why did the pickles prompt this admission? Was it their phallic, swollen thickness?
But who cared anyway? None of this would matter once he stepped out of her van and her life. “Okay. Whatever.”
“That’s another reason why I think it’s good to be with this other girl. Because she’ll keep me in line.”
Ridiculous reasoning. Twenty-seven-year-old ex-crackhead logic.
“And I’m a love addict, too,” he added.
Now that was just silly. “Like in that Robert Palmer song?”
“Who?”
“Never mind.”
“The meetings are for both sex and love addicts,” he said.
“That’s crazy,” she said. But then, so was this conversation.
“Why?”
“The sex addicts will eat the love addicts alive,” Luna said.
Alex laughed. Glad I provided you with amusement while you broke up with me, Luna thought.
Paper crinkled again as Alex put his gifts away. Was he finally hitting the pavement?
“Hope everything works out for you,” she said, trying to speed up the goodbyes. This needed to be done. Her prince was abandoning her, and she just wanted to get out of there before her van turned into a pumpkin.
“Don’t say that,” he said.
I can say whatever I want, she thought. You did. “What’s the problem with wishing you well?”
“Those words are so final. But this isn’t goodbye! We’ll still be friends,” he said. “They teach us that in SLAA—Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous. Men and women can be platonic.”
It was a little late for platonic.
And anyway, he’d just broken her heart.
What kind of a friend did that?
But Luna was too exhausted to talk any further, so she just waved her hand vaguely. He could relate to noncommittal. After all, that’s what he’d been.
Thank the Lord Jesus he finally opened the door and stepped out on the sidewalk with his briefcase, toys and pickles. And then, in a final contradiction, he said, “Goodbye, Luna.”
“Buh-bye.”
Her flippant, Bob Barkeresque farewell was lost on Alex. He closed the door and waved. Her tires squealed as she peeled away—not the easiest feat in a minivan.
Luna drove up and down streets for a long time, trying to find her path home through the garment district. Lost in an urban maze, even though she’d been through the area a million times.
Caught in January’s frigid snare, after all.
“Why? Why?” she called out. To God, and to Jiminy.
Neither answered.
After zigzagging aimlessly for a while, she pulled over next to a long row of garbage bags, stacked like sand sacks on the front lines. The sidewalks were deserted, the buildings were secured. This part of Manhattan shut down at five p.m.
Staring at the mounds of waste, Luna swallowed a last lump of mucus and called Sunny.
“Done with your boy-toy for the night already?” Sunny asked.
“He dumped me,” Luna said. The garbage smelled rancid. No, wait… the smell was too strong to be outside. There was half a cup of coffee in her holder. She poked her nose through the plastic lid and sniffed. Ewwww.
“Oh, shit. I’m sorry,” said Sunny. “What happened?”
“He met someone else.”
“Well, those crackheads are flighty,” said Sunny. “At least he got you off.”
“Ex
-crackheads,” said Luna. She was going to hurl the coffee out of her door when a rat poked its head around one of the garbage bags. Ick! She felt like she should park somewhere else¸ but lacked the energy to move. It wasn’t like he could get inside the van anyway, right? “I loved him.”
“Really?”
“I guess.” Keeping her eye on the rat, who’d gnawed into a bag and was chomping away at something, Luna thought about it. “I don’t even know what love is. When I’m with a guy, I see the best in him. I probably would’ve given Glen a chance if he wasn’t so scary. And Ari—if he’d slept with me, I would’ve stayed with him. I’m a wreck.”
“You just don’t know what you want yet. You should take a breather.”
“I know I don’t want to be alone.” The rat turned toward her. For a moment they locked eyes. His nose twitched. “I’ve spent so much time by myself already.”
She started the engine and jerked the van away, phone perched in her ear. She was on that rat’s radar now, and she didn’t like it.
Sunny couldn’t relate. “I love to be alone. I can’t stand people! But I do like what the male species has to offer, at times—like a certain organ… .”
“Could we not talk about that?” Luna missed Alex’s organ already. She’d never see it again.
She parked half a block up, past the piles. “It’s not fair. I’m doing the God thing. It’s just hard to read the signs.”
“N.A. was a pretty clear sign,” said Sunny. “And so was tongueless mullet man.”
Luna started crying again. Sunny said, “Alex was right about one thing.”
“Yeah? What?”
“You are a gem. I just wish you could see that.”
Luna stared out at the desolate charcoal buildings lining the street. “I wish I could, too.”
TWENTY-FIVE
Luna was staring at the blinking cursor on her blank Microsoft Word document when Sunny called. “What’s up?” Sunny asked.
“Nothing.”
“That’s what you’ve said every day for the past week. You have to snap out of this. Have you written anything?”
“Nope.” The last thing she’d typed was “sex addicts” and “love addicts” and “meetings” into Google’s search engine. “Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous” had popped up. Go figure. It sounded ludicrous, but there it was.
“What’s going through your mind?”
“I’m thinking of getting a dog.”
“Do my smelly girls attract you that much?”
“I just want unconditional love.”
“Yeah, well, you’ll also get poop to scoop, chewed shoes and probably fleas.”
“You should do an ad for the ASPCA.”
“I’m just saying… . You’re not a dog person.”
“How do you know?”
“Because if you were, you would’ve already had a dog sometime in your life.”
“I had a puppy when I was in second grade.”
“And?”
“My mom brought it back to the pound because I couldn’t house train it. I’d walk it, then it would pee on the rug.”
“See?”
“I was in second grade! I didn’t know how to teach a dog anything.”
“And you do now?”
“Well… no.”
“’Nuff said.”
“I’m going back to my cursor. Only a couple of more hours before the kids get home.” Luna had been pulling it together to help Ben and Dylan with their homework. Serving dinner was out of the question. The Chinese place was doing big business with her.
“Hold on, I called you for a reason. Why don’t you come out with me and Lois tomorrow night? She invited me to a bar.”
“Lois the butch lesbian who skydives?”
“Yes, but this won’t involve lesbianism or skydiving. Lois is a good time!”
“She barely speaks.”
“Well, she’s a quiet good time. We have fun.”
Luna looked down and scanned her clothing. It hadn’t changed in three days. “Can I wear my pajamas?”
“You probably could. But I thought maybe you’d want to look good in case there’s some cute guys there.”
“Cute guys?” That perked Luna a bit. “What kind of a thing is this?”
“It’s hard to describe. They call it Burning Man Happy Hour.”
“Sounds insane, dangerous and drunken.”
“It’s basically a weekly reunion for people who go to Burning Man every year.”
“And Burning Man is… ?”
“Insane, dangerous and drunken. Well, I guess there isn’t that much danger, except for sunburn or winding up on a government watch list for being a complete wacko. Basically, about 40,000 people go live in the desert for a week.”
“Oh my God. Why?”
“They build a community and create tribes based on the things they like. Lois skydives. Some people do sculpture, some paint, some have sex all day. Whatever. One tribe just gets drunk and stays that way—that would totally be my group. Not that I’d go to the desert, for fuck’s sake. Anyway, there’s practically no rules. It’s scorched anarchy.”
“Sounds awful!”
“Obviously these people are freaks. Which will make them very entertaining.” Sunny loved observing foolishness.
“And you think I should date one of these burning men?”
“No. I just thought that suggestion might get you out of the house and your pj’s.”
“Oh, fine.”
The next night, Luna met Sunny and Lois by the Long Island Rail Road information booth in Penn Station. Sunny and Lois worked together, so they’d come in on a different line.
“You look good, Chicky!” Sunny told Luna.
“Thanks.” It was a funny thing, but showering, getting dressed and putting on some nice jeans and a blouse did make Luna feel better—or at least, less of a blown-off loser.
“Hey,” she said to Lois, who looked extra butch in a wife-beater, exposed under her green half-buttoned men’s dress shirt, collar up. The bottom half of her outfit consisted of faded jeans and Nike black-and green-suede skateboarding sneakers. She dressed like Ben, except she’d topped off the outfit with a green plaid Balboa hat. Ben didn’t do hats.
Lois nodded.
Sunny was wearing her usual black-from-head-to-toe ensemble: black blouse, black dress pants, black platform shoes.
“Who’s ready to party?” Sunny asked.
Neither Luna nor Lois responded. “Woo-hoo! Good times!” said Sunny. “Take me to the vodka, please,” she told Lois.
Lois was tall, with a Herman Munster gait. She barreled through the rush-hour crowd, leading Luna and Sunny through the subway’s turnstiles against the spilling stream of commuters. It was lucky Luna had a Metrocard already, because Lois didn’t pause to ask. Luna paid for Sunny, too.
“Criminy, this girl would be a good foot soldier,” Sunny huffed from the rear. Lois was already at the top of the stairs, on the platform. The train roared in. Luna and Sunny hustled. Lois was holding the sliding doors open with her butt. They got in and circled around a pole to hang on.
The train roared downtown. To shift her mind away from herself, Luna tried to make conversation with Lois. “So what’s the story with Burning Man? Why do so many people go?”
“It’s fun.”
“And the groups have themes?”
“Yup.”
“Lois told me some of the tribes are really funny. Like, one of them huddles under a sheet and just wanders around stumbling into things,” said Sunny.
“You don’t say.” Luna wondered how Sunny had gotten that much information out of Lois.
Lois nodded.
“So what’s the basic premise of the whole thing?”
“Freedom,” said Lois.
“Aha,” Luna said, for lack of anything else. Trekking into the desert sounded way more cumbersome than liberating.
The train rumbled on. Sunny was no longer paying attention to the conversation. She’d become
too distracted with people-watching. Luna never looked at fellow subway passengers. You never knew who would take offense.
After a few moments Lois added, “And no judgments.”
“Huh.” Luna didn’t feel particularly judged anywhere, except for the criticism she heaped on herself.
The lights in the car flickered.
“And, no worries,” said Lois.
“Sounds like Never-Never Land,” Luna said.
Lois shrugged.
The train pulled into their station.
The bar was on Delancey Street, near the Williamsburg Bridge. Heading in, Luna felt a ping of panic. She didn’t do well in social situations under normal circumstances, not really getting the art of mingling. What do you say to people? Tonight she was feeling especially awkward.
“Don’t worry, Chicky,” Sunny said. “You don’t have to talk to anyone but us. Unless you want to.” It was like she was psychic! “But maybe you’ll feel braver after a drink or two.”
A possibility, albeit slim.
Luna and Sunny followed Lois up to the second floor. It was a dim faux paradise of leafy trees and winding vines with wooden benches lining the walls and a retractable roof overhead.
As it was winter, the roof remained closed. The scent of chicken and ribs floated through the room from an indoor grill by the rear window. Koi swam around a pond in the center of the room. People who must have been the Burners huddled in clusters, laughing easily as alcohol slid down their throats.
The place was packed. Good thing music wasn’t playing—the noise level was already high. They leaned against the wall’s shellacked wood paneling, sipping and chatting. Well, Luna and Sunny were talking. Lois mostly nodded. Sunny was scanning the eclectic crowd, looking for odd behavior. So far there was nothing outlandish, though one girl with cotton candy colored hair was hula-hooping with a tropical drink in her hand.
Then a guy in fatigues and combat boots walked by with a ferret in his hands.
Sunny gave Luna the thumbs up. She was having fun now.
Luna wasn’t exactly having fun, but she was in her first decent mood since Alex had left. It was good to be among other adults, even if they were odd. And the wine was helping.
Luna Rising Page 17