by Jay Fox
I was given a week to clear the premises.
It only took me two days to find Jeff's ad for a roommate. The rent for the room was seven hundred bucks a month. Luckily, I had a job at the time, so I was able to cover the extra fifty bucks, plus the additional costs of cable, gas, and electricity without much of a problem. We didn't exactly hit it off, but, as he has told me several times, most of the people who came to see the place were either “hipster assholes” or deadbeats. Chances are, he would have waited for a better fit that me, but the female and male components of the situation needed to come together with haste. In that sense, we clicked.
By the time finals came along, I had quit my job and my parents had calmed down some. They told me that they would pay my way until I found another job, which they expected would pay a good deal more than the small sum afforded to me by the good people at Java Express, my employer as of a few weeks ago. Thinking that they would only be supporting me a few months, we struck a deal: they would deposit fifteen hundred dollars into my checking account at the beginning of every month until either I found a job or September came along, though this latter condition was neither taken nor given entirely in earnest. This left me in a pretty good spot, as (at the time of graduation) I had a little over a grand in my checking account thanks to my previous job and several marijuana-related incidents prior to The Marijuana-Related Event. This was information that I did not feel the need to impart.
“Can I bum a cigarette,” I don't really ask because the pack is open; my thumb is already stroking one of the receded filters. “Thanks,” I add before he has time to object or accede. St. Germain can be heard coming from Jeff's room. I don't know the name of the song, but the central instrument is the flute. It's unlike Jeff to listen to such things; it is also unlike him to stare to me with such an admonishing expression unless I have forgotten to take out the garbage.
“You look like utter shit, man,” he says incidentally.
“Thanks,” I respond between plumes of smoke. “I didn't realize you and your parents were going to come back today. I would have slept in my room had I known.”
“It is a shame that we interrupted your convalescence.”
“Look, I know I made a bad impression. I'm sorry.”
“Well, it's a good thing that we woke you when we did,” he replies coolly. “Have you been greeting every day at the ripe old hour of noon?”
“I had a long night.”
“I see. And wherein lay the difficulty?”
“I'm not looking for pity, Jeff. I'm just explaining myself. It's not like I've been regularly getting up at this time every day,” I embellish (lie). I proceed to recount the entire night to him: Midas, Pepper, Aberdeen, Tomas, the triplets, Jane. The twenty-two was a mistake, I concede. Still, there's barely any left in the can. The air is hot now, as are all of the surfaces in the apartment—especially the Pleather couch on which I slept. My hair is pasted to my head and my body extols a viscous substance that smells like gin-breath and slightly putrefied beef. “I don't know how we're going to sleep in this fucking place without air conditioning,” I add.
Jeff ignores the final remark; he has decided to scrutinize the more inferential aspects of my behavior for the past two weeks with his cunning intellect.
I had told him that I wanted to spend some time searching for Coprolalia right after I had the talk with Sean back in May. He didn't take it seriously. To him it was just a statement that was made in order to perpetuate a conversation about things we wanted to accomplish over the summer. His current list includes finding a girlfriend, reading Infinite Jest, and seeing more jazz shows in the Village. If actions do speak louder than words, then the unopened vitamins on his desk that have been there since he made his New Year's resolution are calling him out. I'm obviously more ambitious. I'll spare the details of my life, and simply say that Coprolalia is not the first chimera I've courted.
“So why are you doing this?” he asks.
“Cowards taste of death many times before their deaths; the valiant only tastes of death but once.”
“Shakespeare?” I nod. “Richard the Third?” I shake my head. “It's Caesar, then.” I nod. “Tell me Brutus, can you see your face?”
“No, Cassius; for the eye sees not itself.”
He laughs slightly. “Seriously, though; why are you doing this?” in earnest.
“It's fun,” I respond too quickly. He sighs. “Look, man, it's an adventure. I mean, most of the people who looked for the Holy Grail were probably just in it for the adventure.”
“That's a bit of a stretch,” he grins. “How is it going so far?”
“I won't lie: it’s not going well. But I'd rather be doing this as opposed to doing what most of my friends are doing—besides the ones on vacation, of course.”
“And what's that?”
“Either moving back in with their parents or going to interviews for jobs they don't want. Dave is thinking about joining the navy. Connie—”
“—I still can't believe you even speak to her.”
“She was my girlfriend for over two years, Jeff; I'm not about to just throw away a friendship like that. And now that I've separated myself from the situation some, I can see that it wasn't that bad of a breakup. We just both realized that the long distance thing wasn't tenable any longer.”
“And yet she was the only one who concluded this before you two called it quits.”
I bite my lip. “I knew it, too; I just didn't want to admit it.”
“Well, Boston is not all that far away, but I suppose you would know about these things better than I would,” he says in a tone that could be described and interpreted in a number of ways. The two have never met, but Jeff believes that our separation has led me to create an altar for her. Perhaps there is some truth to this, but it's not something I'd ever admit to him.
“Yes, well, she's going to be moving back to the City soon. She's going to be staying in her dad's place in Gramercy because he doesn't want her to move to Brooklyn.”
“Why does her father own an apartment in Manhattan? Doesn't he live in Cleveland?”
“Detroit. He has the place because he comes out here on business pretty frequently.”
“And why doesn't he want her living in Brooklyn?”
“I guess he thinks Brooklyn is a lot like Detroit—and, as I'm sure you know, Detroit isn't exactly the nicest place to live.”
“I see.”
“Anyway, she's been down here on all of these interviews, and they ask her the most ridiculous questions.” He squints. “You know, these questions that require horribly facetious answers. 'Why did you apply here?' 'Because I need a job and you're hiring.' 'What is one of your worst qualities?' 'Being candid enough to let you know that I'm not going to actually tell you any of my worst qualities.' It's a fucking joke.
“Denise, on the other hand, is doing well.”
“She was the Cynic girl, right?”
“Yeah. I talked to her on I.M. a few nights ago.”
“Did she have her laptop in the tub with her?”
“No, she only does that shit when people are around. Anyway, she's preparing for grad school at Fordham. She's also starting an internship with a radical publishing house in a few weeks—once she's back from Cleveland.”
“So she's the one from Cleveland.”
I nod. “Not Cleveland, but a suburb. Something Falls—I forget the exact name. Anyway, the publishing house is paying her, too.” I pause to drag from the cigarette, but it's been cold for some time. I notice that the first track of the new Wilco album is now playing. “What do you think of this record?”
“With the exception of Yankee Foxtrot, I'd say it's their best. And that's only after four listens.”
“Yeah, I've been listening to it pretty regularly.” Caesura. “Anyway, I guess Denise is the exception. Things are really looking up for her.”
“And you're searching for a man who desecrates bathroom walls.”
“Yes,” I respond
with a smile. “And I've gotten to be pretty close with Tomas; not so much with James.”
“Aberdeen.”
“Yeah,” I respond. “He can be kind of condescending sometimes. Then again, there's certain nights he's a really fun guy to be around.” I relight the cigarette. “I don't know what his deal is sometimes. It's not like he's a celebrity or anything. Still, he's got this arrogance about him.” I shrug. “I'm surprised you know of him.”
“And what is that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing,” I respond quickly. “I just didn't think that many people knew about him. That's why I don't understand his arrogance.” Jeff is appeased. “But, to be honest, I didn't think you followed contemporary art all that closely. You don't go to museums or anything.”
“Well, I know plenty,” indignantly. “I even have Letters in Tandem on my bookshelf,” smugly. “I think it's utter bullshit myself, but some people seem to think it to be an iconoclastic work. I don't understand why. It's nothing more than gibberish; letters in tandem—that's it.”
“I've never even asked Tomas about it. We rarely talk about his work.”
“What do you talk about, then?”
“Normal things. He's a very down-to-earth guy once he stops trying to be a revolutionary.” Jeff squints. “Sometimes he talks like a cross between, like, a hipster idiot and Lenny Bruce. It comes in spurts.” Jeff is pensive. He says nothing; he just stares to me from behind the thick frames of his glasses. He's that guy you see on the train: the academic-looking white kid who moved into Brooklyn from Anywhere But Here, USA. I guess I'm no different, but it seems odd that he's here; he should be wandering around the campus of some elite, liberal arts school with several brilliant and monomaniacal professors, who eventually elope with a student after fifteen years of marriage to—go figure—a former student.
“What are you thinking about?” I ask after a small lapse in conversation. He's staring to the table blankly.
“I think you're afraid of the real world. Not to be too philosophical here, but the desire to extend the present is really just a form of nihilism.”
“There's some truth to that, but I wouldn't put it so definitively.”
“Think about it.”
“Sure. Do you want to go put on your analrapist stocking now, or—”
“I'm being serious here. I think you're afraid of the real world. While there are an infinite variety of possibilities in regards to your future, it seems as though your maturation has reached something of a plateau. Though this may sound presumptuous, I feel as though you are envious of your own past.” I squint. “This is not say that you are exhibiting reactionary tendencies; you just wish to continue living the same life that you live now: a student without the school. Yet this is truancy, is it not? However, at the same time, you exhibit the American predilection as James—Henry James—would have described it: the rapacious appetite for experience, which would seemingly be denied by a life preoccupied by the mundane career of the quote, unquote, normal person. It's not exceptionalism exactly, just a refusal to come to terms with the fact that you will inevitably have to support yourself with a pedestrian job before you are capable of producing anything of true value.” He pauses. “Not that you are incapable. These limitations are temporal more than meritorious. After all, Jack London washed dishes prior to being published.” He pauses again. “Or do I peg you incorrectly? Is this quixotic attempt at independence and some picayune truth simply a cover for your real motivation: to indulge in the freedom of childhood before you are borne with the responsibilities of adulthood?”
“Neither,” I respond coldly. “And don't talk like a character from fucking House, please.”
“Don't change the subject.” He pauses. “I don't know if I can fully believe what you're saying. There doesn't seem to be a third option here.” He shakes his head. “It just bothers me. You're an intelligent person, but you don't seem to have any occupational interests that fall short of international renown. Isn't there something more realistic that you can see yourself doing?” I roll my eyes. “Do you even have any idea what you want to do for a living?”
“What the hell does that have to do with anything?” I ask with an exaggerated hand motion. “You know I have no idea, Jeff. We've been over this; why are you even asking me?”
I rarely saw him over the initial months that we lived together. Consequently, our interactions have always been cordial and concise. He stayed with his girlfriend virtually every night of the week while they were together. She lived by Columbia—in one of the undergraduate dorms. Sometime in early May, however, some incident led to an acrimonious breakup. Just about all of their friends sided with her, but Jeff quietly maintains that he did nothing wrong. I never really asked him to explain himself; he never really offered.
Being that the break happened at the end of the semester, exams and papers managed to keep the two of us out of one another's hair. I'll be the first to admit that the amount of work demanded of a doctoral student at Columbia is far more than that of an NYU undergrad; still, we both spent many nights either in the library or cloistered in our respective rooms.
The coffee machine begins to hiss, which means it's been done brewing for some time. Neither of us pays much attention to it; instead, we stare to one another or the languid smoke of my cigarette, which hangs in the dead air of the apartment with torpid indifference for the window or the three fans blowing at full capacity. He shakes his head, which incenses me to no small degree. “Look, Jeff, I know what I'm doing. I mean, yes, I can see how this looks bad, obsessive and silly even, but, honestly, I can handle myself. Who cares if I haven't been to an interview in a few weeks? I'll get a job.”
“But I worry about you,” he says without compassion. He's trying though. “What, exactly, do you want to do?” emphasis, peculiarly, on want. “What are your strengths? What are your weaknesses? Where do you see yourself in ten years?” He pauses to light a cigarette of his own. “You need to be asking yourself these questions.”
“I can't see what ten years of life will bring. For all I know, I will have knocked up some girl with a trust fund and parents too conservative to permit either an abortion or a birth out of wedlock. We'll live in a condo somewhere in Manhattan, I'll get hooked up with a cake job, and the rest will just kind of work itself out.” I smile. He doesn't. “Look, I'll probably just go back to school after working some entry-level job for a year or two. Like I've told you, I want a little time to figure all of this out.”
“All of what?”
“My life. I don't want to jump into anything prematurely.”
“Well, you're at the age that you need to start making decisions that will—”
“Dictate the rest of my life? Yes, I'm barely responsible enough to get into a bar, yet I'm supposed to be mature enough to make the most important choices of my life.” I laugh. “You've got to be fucking kidding me, Jeff.”
“This is what college is for,” he says didactically. “You don't spend four years just dicking around getting drunk and laid; you spend four years learning a skill that will prepare you for the real world.”
“That is such a fucking load, and you know it. I went to college to learn about all of the things that the real world has dubbed irrelevant. I went to college to learn about history, philosophy, literature, art—things that people used to believe held inherent value.”
“I'm just saying—”
“What? If it doesn't make dollars, it doesn't make sense?”
“That's not what I mean at all.”
“Then what do you mean?”
“Don't turn this around on me. I'm trying to help you recognize where you are in life.”
“Look, Jeff, you were drawn to a major that provided you with a career path—I wasn't. Do I think I fucked up? No, absolutely not.”
“Just tell me what you enjoy doing. What can you see yourself doing?”
“Writing, playing bass, reading, researching, painting….”
“It sounds
as though you wish to live in a state of perpetual adolescence.” He stares back to me and my cigarette, which has once again gone out. “You fear the responsibilities of adulthood. Now, forgive me for being blunt, but your actions portend a feeling of indignity towards work. You need to find your calling; otherwise you're going to find yourself stuck working some menial job even with your fancy degree,” he condescends, as his degree is far fancier than mine (University of Chicago, class of '03). “If you want to be a career academic, go to grad school; but if you think you can eke through this life by living like some asshole bohemian, you'd better go get yourself a trust fund—otherwise you're going to learn a lot of very difficult lessons. And these lessons aren't going to be the types of things one picks up from a book, either.”
“I plan on going to grad school. I just told you that. Hell man, I've told you that a thousand times. I just want to take a year or two off from school. I mean, I really have no idea what I want to do. For the time being, I plan on taking up a bullshit job so that I have enough to eat. I'll figure out 'my calling' while I'm doing that.”
“Have you started looking for this bullshit job that you already seem to detest?”
“Jesus, Jeff; I just graduated from college. I want to have a little time to myself.”
“It's been more than three weeks. You didn't just graduate.” Emphasis, correctly, on just.
“Well, it feels that way.”
“What do your parents think about this? I'm sure they're not going to continue to support you as you destroy your liver on their dime.”
“If I don't find Coprolalia in the next two weeks, I'll give all of this up. I'll sit on the computer all day looking for postings. I'll scour the papers. I'll walk the streets of Midtown handing out fucking resumes.”
“That's great and all, but, in the meantime, it wouldn't hurt to apply to a few places here and there. It requires very little effort and even less time; and, who knows, you may even find something you actually want to do.”