Angst

by Victoria Sawyer

  “Oh shit, I am not wearing that ridiculous mustache!” says Samantha, finally realizing that if she’s asshole she’ll have to sport the ‘stache.

  “Me neither!” declares Hannah. The boys groan.

  “Oh no, everyone will wear the mustache. It’s a singular honor,” says Andy with an evil grin.

  “I will as long as everyone promises they won’t take any photos of it,” I say with a smile, shuffling the thick, clumsy deck of cards. As I divide the deck and carefully shuffle again, Andy peels off the ‘stache and places it firmly on Hannah’s face next to him. She screeches.

  “Get that nasty thing off me!” she says, about to reach up to her face. Andy grabs her hands, so she can’t rip it off and she just sits there staring at us, her eyes watering as she tries not to laugh. The mustache is crooked and it looks like a huge caterpillar has crawled onto her face. It’s absolutely hilarious and everyone is dying laughing, leaned over, gripping our stomachs, eyes watering in hilarity.

  Meanwhile I try to pass out the cards, my middle hurting from laughter for once and not from nerves. It’s so good to feel free, to feel altered, to simply enjoy hanging out with friends without being worried every second.

  Next, Andy passes out Jello shots as we are going to play a slightly different version of Asshole, where instead of sips of a drink we take bites of our Jello shots.

  “Social!” says Jared, holding up his Jello shot as everyone around the table takes a “drink” of their shot. Andy was right and Jared is Asshole next and he looks utterly preposterous with the mustache. I laugh hard, but silently, bent over in my seat, my eyes watering, hardly able to breathe. I can’t stop, I keep look over at him, giggling constantly behind my cards, trying to pay attention to my hand because I don’t want to be Asshole next. Jared looks over and glares at me when he notices that I’m trying to withhold giggles and I blow him a big kiss.

  “Sexy mustache, Jared,” I say boldly, covering my huge smile with my fanned out cards. He doesn’t say anything, just raises an eyebrow and gives me a slightly crooked sexy grin, looking like a naughty police officer or porn star.

  After a few rounds the card game wears thin and we just lazes around, doing whatever, everyone drunk and high. I look around the circle at everyone present, eyes are glazed, bodies are limp, smiles are playing at the corners of mouths. Suddenly I felt a bit more hyper. I want to dance again.

  “What kind of music do you have?” I asked Jared, getting up from the couch to look at his computer.

  “Just poke around,” he says, as Andy steals the mustache back from Ian and places it back on his own face. Samantha, who is quickly becoming a new friend, comes up behind me to help me pick out songs and soon dance music is pumping through the speakers and we dance in the small area in between the coffee table and TV. Hannah and I are fooling around, getting a bit rowdy, pushing each other over, doing the Macarena and other silly dances.

  “Oh you wanna fight, do you?” I ask with a smile, grabbing her wrists and pushing her away from me.

  “I’ll kick your ass, snatch!” she says with a smile, pushing me back. Andy is up off the couch now, dancing all by himself on the other side of the room, twirling around, the mustache pulling away from his upper lip, the hat tipped over one eye. His feet are unsteady, which only adds to the show. Hannah, Samantha, and I stop for a moment and just watch. He’s really drunk now, grinning, eyes shining, his movements sloppy, but he is ever the clown, making us laugh, jumping around, moving his arms like he’s pedaling a bicycle. While I’m busy watching, Hannah reaches over and gooses me on the chest and I jump.

  “You slut!” I say with a pretend modest look, pushing her back. As I look over, Andy stumbles and spills his Jello shot all over the wood floor, making a mess of green goo. He groans, a dumbfounded expression on his face, pointing a wavering finger at us, addressing Jared and Ian sitting on the couch.

  “I saw them touching titties and I didn’t know what to dooooooooo!” he says, his mouth open wide in amazement, as if this statement explains the spill. Hannah and I laugh at Andy’s continued confused expression, his mustache crooked, his eyes staring widely. He repeats his line, drawing out the dooooo and then proceeds to get down on all fours, his upper body poised over the spilled Jello shot.

  “No!! Don’t do it Andy!” I say, watching in hysterical horror as he slurps up the spilled Jello from the floor.

  “I couldn’t let that nectar of the gods go to waste,” he explains, getting back up on wobbly feet, his arms outstretched for balance, with a huge grin for Hannah and me.

  Eventually, after more ridiculous dancing and another hit off the bong, Andy does seem to tire himself out and soon he’s passed out on one of the easy chairs, leaned back with his eyes closed. Jared gets up off the couch and gets us all together to start plotting our “shaming.”

  “We’ve got to find some stuff that we can use to stack on his head,” he says, squinting as he looks around the room for useful objects. He goes into another room off the living room, and finally comes out with a camera and several books. “Here’s my camera to catch the shaming evidence. And here are some books we can use to stack on his head. Oh, and maybe I can find some cans or small boxes or something,” he says, going into his kitchen. Once there he pulls down several small food boxes, cans, and random objects of various sizes.

  Jared is the first to try stacking something on Andy’s head. He creeps up slowly to the sleeping drunkard and carefully places the first item on top of his head, balancing it just right so it perches there and doesn’t fall off.

  “There’s number one,” he says, creeping back to us with a huge smirk on his face and a twinkle in his eye. He is totally getting a kick out of messing with his little bro and I’m totally enjoying the fact that I’m getting to see another side of him. Literally, sigh, he’s hot. He picks up another object, slightly smaller than the last and asks if anyone wants to be the next to try.

  “Let me have a go at it,” Hannah says with a very serious expression, grabbing the box out of Jared’s hand. She goes in low, walking softly, trying not to wake Andy. Finally she’s close enough and places the box on top of his head, moving it back and forth a bit, trying to make sure it isn’t going to fall off. When she’s finally satisfied, she pulls back and turns to face us with a grin.

  “Success number two!” she says in a loud whisper, coming to stand by me. This continues on for a while, each person taking an object and trying to stack them on Andy’s head. It’s like a game, trying to sneak up and place the item so Andy won’t wake up and so the object won’t fall from its precarious perch. So far everything is staying and nothing has fallen off.

  “I feel like I’m playing fricken Jenga or something,” says Ian with a grin after depositing his pencil sharpener on top of several other objects on Andy’s head.

  “I think we should stack a few items on his shoulders or knees or something. The one on his head is getting too tall. It’s gonna have to give soon,” says Jared, ever the engineer.

  So we start stacking elsewhere, boldly making our approach, no longer afraid of waking Andy, since he hasn’t stirred since we started. Finally our creation is complete, a monumental ridiculous totem to our drunken enthusiastic creativity.

  “It’s magnificent, Jared and I’m so impressed,” I say as Jared grabs the camera. He grins at me with an ‘I’m the shit’ nod and starts to take shots of Andy. He goofs off, pretending to be taking photos of a model, getting in close, asking Andy to “work it big guy, work it!” We all laugh, standing back as Jared captures his final shots and joins us across the room.

  “The best part is that he is still wearing that dumb mustache!” I say to Hannah with a giggle.

  Finally our mustache wearing sleeping beauty is ready to be awakened by the kiss of the boombazala prince. Jared pulls out the horn with an evil grin on his face, walking toward Andy, careful not to knock any of the objects by stepping too close. I stifle a laugh, waiting in anticipation.

  Jared put
s the horn up near Andy’s ear and looking over at us for encouragement, finally puts his grinning mouth to the horn emitting a loud blast. Andy jumps and all the objects fly off his head and other body parts and across the room. We can’t stop laughing. Ian guffaws in the corner while I hold my stomach, bent over, my drunk feet shaky, my eyes watering. Andy looks stunned, his eyes wide, his mouth hanging open, his mustache crooked and Hannah grabs on to me, holding herself up because she’s laughing so hard. I can’t breathe and try to straighten up and pull much needed oxygen into my lungs, but Andy’s expression is too funny and I can’t stop.

  Andy glares, his eyes slowly beginning to close again. Jared grabs him, shaking him awake, showing him a photo on the camera. Andy’s eyes won’t focus at first, but finally they do and he glares at Jared.

  “You sir, are hilarious, the funniest man I have ever met. But you are disturbing my sleep with your ridiculous antics and I won’t have it,” he says, snuggling back down into the chair, closing his eyes, the mustache still pasted on his face. He cracks open one eye, glaring at the rest of us. “Beat it, all of you, coupla pairs of fucking clown shoes,” he says, closing his eyes again, his mouth cracking a tiny smile. “Oh, uh, everyone except Hannah,” he says, with a tiny grin, his eyes still closed.

  #######################

  Clouds, immense clouds of smoke

  shadows creeping through hallways

  dim with candle light

  smoky rooms with walls inhaling

  Faded words and sounds and sensations

  Taste of orange laughter

  Spinning in a smoky haze

  Reflections dim, destroying minds

  Time stands still tonight

  For that second of unbroken silence

  I live within myself

  I live to tell the truth

  My mind spins out of control

  Creeping pulsation and musical beat

  Pound in a mind empty and yet full

  Smoky and yet clear

  Spinning yet immensely still

  In thoughts, clouded by you

  Blurred by the image of your being

  As clouded as mine

  Respectfully yours

  Forever and ever

  Don’t speak

  Just spin

  January 10, 1992, Five Years Old

  I am ashamed

  I’m sleeping over at my cousin’s house. It’s probably around 5 o’clock in the morning, although I can’t really tell because it’s very dark outside when I wake up. My bladder is full and I have to go immediately. I get up. I’m not used to this house and the room is very dark, no nightlight in the hall or in the room. The house and the dark scare me and I can’t find a light switch anywhere, no matter how many times I run my hands over the cool drywall. I begin to panic and my heart rate thuds in my chest. I have to go, but I can’t find my way to the bathroom!

  I give up on finding lights and stumble through the darkness, trying to find the stairs to the first floor. Finally I find them and shuffle my way downstairs, gripping the wall, every toe hold desperately sought. When I reach the first floor, the door of the only bathroom is shut with a tiny sliver of light shining underneath. I can hear the shower. My uncle must be getting ready for work. So I wait, hiding around the corner, hoping to hear the door click open at any moment. I’ve really got to go. I dance, I squeeze my legs together. Half an hour goes by in uncomfortable crisis. I look outside again. It’s dark and unfamiliar, no moon. I’m too afraid to go outside in the cold and darkness, so that option is out.

  I pick my way back upstairs and try to lie down and go back to sleep and ignore my bladder. I feel panicked that if I do not go now I am going to die. I am afraid, terrified of what might happen, terrified of the monsters in the black hall, terrified of peeing my pants. I feel hot and sweaty and my pajamas are sticky with moisture. My heart is beating too fast for my little body. I get up and go back downstairs. Yellow slit. No luck. I am terrified of my uncle, so I don’t dare knock on the door, and I certainly don’t want him to catch me outside. I stumble back upstairs thinking about how afraid I am of my big, scary, gruff uncle, looking out the window longingly. I really have to go now, it’s unbearable, and once I am in the bedroom I can’t hold it any longer. My bladder explodes all over the floor and my clothes. The smell is pungent and horrible.

  I climb back into bed because I don’t know what else to do. I feel completely out of control. I feel embarrassed that this has happened to me. I feel too old to have wet my pants. I am ashamed.

  December 2, 2004

  A little 20 questions

  So I gave him my phone number. Right before Hannah and I left, the unthinkable happened, he asked if he could call me sometime. Ever since then, my previously un-interesting phone has taken on new significance. I’m waiting for it to blow up. I can’t stop thinking about it. I’ll forget for a little while, caught up in something else, when suddenly I’m reminded that he might call and my phone is the medium through which we might be connected. Please ring!!!!

  I’m suddenly lightheaded, dizzy, my stomach wrenching into a knot one day in astronomy class when it’s announced that there will be a mandatory field trip to the planetarium next week and that a bus is going to pick us up. Instantly heat sears me, my pulse throbbing as I sit in the uncomfortable stadium seating surrounded by my peers. I feel like I’m on fire, cheeks red hot and noticeable to everyone around me. Shit!! There is no way on God’s green earth that I will ever take a bus ride again in my entire life. My mind races through the possibilities of terror and trapped embarrassment at the hands of my college classmates. They will never be kind, of that much I’m certain. Then I think…maybe I can drive my own car and meet them there? Momentary relief floods me as I decide I’m going to ask the professor after class if he would mind.

  Then my sick little mind starts to race on to other fears, the idea of sitting in the planetarium where it’s dark and the doors are shut. What if you’re not supposed to leave your seat during the presentation? What will I do then? This sucks. It’s part of my grade and I have no choice but to go through with it.

  Now that I think about it, I’ve been to the planetarium once before as a young child. It was one of my torturous unbearable field trip experiences as a kid after the incident in Florida. I had gotten through it, somehow. I think we had been asked to stay in our seats, but in the face of grave embarrassment or perhaps sickness, leaving the room could be managed. It would be a one-time shot.

  It’s funny because whenever I panic and feel that I need to leave the space that’s causing me distress, I inevitably feel like I can’t return. To sit back down and then start to panic again and disrupt everyone again is unthinkable. I can’t do it. My fear and the sickness would only strengthen, becoming unbearable, simply because I was afraid of it, because I didn’t want to feel that way. I can see myself now, sitting there, tense, on edge, nervous, afraid the entire time, not allowing myself leave because it would be my one chance. I’d try to last as long as possible, attempting to shove down the demented thoughts and sick bodily sensations.

  I don’t pay much attention to the rest of the lecture that day in astronomy class. My professor’s droning voice continues on about the Milky Way and slides flash up on the screen but I’m too busy, caught up in my own thoughts and feelings, despairing of ever being normal, of ever enjoying life as simply as other people do. How I wish I could be an oblivious dumb-fuck! To never feel the clenching of my stomach or the rising panic in my throat as I realize a frightening situation is upon me. Most of the time, I’m able to fight through it. I can’t let it completely control my life, although at times I think it’s going to beat me, that I’m going to end up some broken person, alone and crazy with fear of everyday life.

  But when these thoughts start to blast me…I get pissed. Fuck this. I won’t let it beat me. Goddamn it. I might have to make concessions, I might have to make excuses, I might have to lie through my teeth to everyone I love but I won’t let i
t completely overcome me. I won’t let it destroy all the happiness I can find in this life. This is my burden, I hate it, I damn it to hell, and yet I’ll deal with it, even if it terrifies me to death because to give in would be complete failure. I can’t let myself fail.

  Finally class is over and I pick my way down the steps of the lecture hall to ask the professor about meeting them at the Planetarium. He seems surprised at first by the request, his bushy white eyebrows rising but after a quick moment his answer is a positive yes, that as a commuter student I can certainly meet them there. I let out a huge sigh of relief. Somehow I’m always able to manage, just barely. I push my way out of the throng of students into the weak November light. The day is overcast and I feel my spirits plummet. Will this ever go away? Do I have to deal with this shit for the rest of my life? Just then at my blackest point of the day, my phone begins to vibrate in my backpack. I scramble to pull it out and hit the accept button.

  “Hello?” I say with a huge smile because the number, one that I had already programmed into my phone just flashed across the screen. Jared. Holy shit!

  “Hi, Vicky,” he says and I can tell he’s smiling.

  “Hi,” I say, rather more enthusiastically than I would have liked. “How are you?” I hold my breath, overcome that he is finally calling me, that maybe he’s interested. Let him ask me out!

  “I’m good,” he replies, “I was wondering if you’d like to get lunch with me today?” I smile again, unable to hold back the huge overpowering grin that’s covering my face. I stop though and try to straighten it out so it won’t transfer through the phone.

  “Well, I dunno, let me just check my busy, busy schedule and see if I can pencil that in,” I tease, trying not to act too excited. “Hmmmm….yes, it seems that I could make that work with a minimum shuffling of other appointments. Where would this lunch take place?” I ask.