Roller coaster from hell, my god, let me off, but let me off right here, right now, because this is perfect where this is right now. Right now I love life, life is beautiful, perfect, serene, godly.
Hit the 443 space last night for the !!!, Rah Brahs and Measles Mumps and Rubella show. Fuckin rocked the casbah like I knew it would. Richard ended up having to cancel due to having to stay late at work, and then he had to go home and work on packing up his apartment because he is moving this weekend. Snooze you lose. Energy! Pizzazz! Power!
Manic off my rocker, I left the show and decided I needed to get laid. I decided to track down MW\’s friend, Abe, who had more than expressed interest in me. I went looking for what I thought was one of his hang outs. In my disoriented mania, I ended up parking more than fifteen blocks away from where I wanted to be, and I walked there anyway, lost the entire time.
On my way there I saw these awesome 15 year old breakdancers in Dupont Circle who were absolutely horrible. I stopped to give them money and then, wonders of wonders, Don calls me. Mania is combined with delight and I spend the next twenty minutes standing on a street corner in Dupont, freezing my ass off and talking on the phone over the noise of the traffic. We lose the signal and I continue on my way.
Finally finding the bar I was looking for, it turns out that this is not Abe\’s hang out, and that it is in fact his former place of employment, and he was fired from said position. Well, damn, yo. No nookie here.
I take what I think is a short cut back to my car and end up even more lost. Frozen, and barely able to move my hands or knees and completely unable to feel my legs, I finally find my car. Debate — to go to Marx or not.
Fuck it, the night is young, so am I, I am manic off my gozongas and Abe might be there.
Abe was not there. But I got to chill with a bunch of other people, and then Don called again, so I bounced along in the cold to talk to him some more, then back inside by 2:30am. Then the fun starts.
MW comes up to me, \”do you want to go to a strip club after this with a drunk friend of mine? The one over there, who\’s staring at you.\” \”Are you going?\” \”No, I have to go to Kelly\’s wedding tomorrow.\” (My mood falters, because the plan had been for me to stay and talk that night with MW if his new girl didn\’t show up.) \”Hell no.\” MW laughs. \”Good girl.\” \”You mean you\’ll send me to a strip club with this friend of yours but you won\’t give me Abe\’s number?\” \”I\’ll give you Abe\’s number when he gets back from New York. I don\’t know why you want that monkey, anyway. Lemme go break the bad news to my friend.\”
He walks over to this sweet looking guy with black hair and a drunken smirk — not the guy I thought he had been referring to. There had been a guy in a yellow shirt staring at me from across the bar who was not worth my time; he was blonde. \”Hrrrrrrrm,\” I think. \”Talking with MW, a real honest to goodness talk, or going to the strip joint and then having my fun with this guy? He\’s a friend of MW\’s, so it\’s okay.\” (Manic thinking is not the best.) \”Play time!\”
Before I can make my way over to the talking pair, I am intercepted by a girl who wants to know what music is being played. Do I look like the DJ? Oh, wait… I am right at the DJ booth. \”It\’s Múm. From Iceland.\” \”Oh, Iceland, yeah, they have good music… yadaaahahahahfhfh drone I have an IQ of 82 and I work at the Reef and do you want to DJ there?\” \”Um, no, but thanks.\” And then I see MW and his friend approaching the booth and parting ways. Shit!
Manic, manic, so fucking manic, I reach across MW and put my hand on his friend\’s hand, his friend who is already turning and walking out the door. \”Hey, wait! I\’m sorry, look, hi –\” I stick out my hand. \”I\’m Cassandra.\” We shake hands and he introduces himself but guess what? I really do not care and do not pay the slightest bit of attention. Oh, blessed sweet mania, you do so wrong by me. I have this huge sickening sweet \”come fuck me\” smile on my face and MW bursts out laughing because he has never, ever seen me like this but has heard me tell tales of my charms. I have his friend eating out of my hand instantaneously.
He immediately grabs the closest bar stool and sits, then motions for me to do the same. I lean against a stool and he says, \”no, no, sit down properly, pull it out and sit that beautiful backside down\”. Oh, so this is how it is going to go! I sit and he immediately puts one hand on my back, causing me to burst out laughing. I can feel Sal\’s eyes on my back and I shrug it off. Guy and I are sitting next to the DJ booth, when MW says \”what was your name again?\” Eh? I thought this was a friend of his. Turns out that no, the guy is just a bar regular and while talking to MW approached him about getting me to leave with him. MW, thinking I would like the joke but having no idea what I get like when I am manic, relayed the message to me, never dreaming that I would then pounce on the guy. Oops.
MW stands there and stares at me, laughing while I look into this guy\’s eyes and start to make small talk. Yeah, small talk. It was not very small. In about two minutes out of nowhere I found myself looking into his eyes and saying \”and what makes you think I am going to go home with you tonight?\” MW laughs so hard I thought he was going to piss his pants. (The next morning he sings to me \”I know what boys like, I know what guys want\” and says that is my song.)
\”Go home with me? Who do you think you are that you think I want you to go home with me?\” this guy says. \”Who do I think I am? First, I am the girl you approached to leave with you, second, I am the last girl in the bar, and third, I know exactly what I have to offer and you can only guess at it and then go home and jack off over your imagined ideas.\”
His jaw drops, then he laughs and tries to kiss me. I put up my hand and turn his head away and laugh at him, saying \”no.\” \”I like it when you say no,\” he says. \”Oh, I know you do.\” \”So here is the game we are going to play. You pretend for a while that you are going to leave with me, and we will have some fun, okay? That is all. Just pretend and then tell me no.\”
(How many fucking times have I had to play this godforsaken game with these little boys?)
We play the little game for the next fifteen minutes, with the poor guy repeatedly asking for me to kiss him. Our faces are about two inches from each other, and every time he asks I laugh and say no. \”I like it when you laugh; it gets me excited.\” \”Oh yeah?\” Glance up to make sure MW is looking at the turntable and not at us. He is. Good. Reach down for the guy\’s crotch. He really is excited. \”Apparently so!\” I laugh some more.
\”I like you, you know, I really like you. I think you\’re hot. You look almost Brazilian, and I only like Brazilian girls. You feel so soft.\” He\’s stroking my back, and I laugh again and say that he has no idea — I am really quite prickly under the soft exterior. MW hears that one and laughs, knowing it to be true in so many ways. \”This is the last song, kids.\” He looks at me pointedly. \”Then we\’re going home.\”
Awww, well I will be god damned. MW was trying to look out for me. Was that not the sweetest thing you ever did see? Fuck. I almost left then and there, but this guy was just too easy. Where was the fun, where was the conquest? And my condoms were in my car, and I could not remember where I had left my car. At this point, I could not remember a lot of things. My entire focus was on this guy, and this game we were playing, and how wet my g-string had become.
\”Hey Nate!\” (Or some other variant of a male name.) \”Your wife called looking for you.\” Mark P, the bar owner is yelling at my boy toy. \”Oh yeah? Tell her I don\’t know where the milk is!\” Sal starts in as well. \”She\’s always calling here for you, and you\’re always here getting into trouble. You should go home.\” The guy removes his arms from me and looks at the guys good naturedly, saying \”I don\’t know what you\’re talking about, my wife\’s right here with me.\” He looks to me. \”Tell them, honey.\”
I bend my head over backwards and it is just the five of us left in the bar, the door is locked, the lights are on, the music is off — where did all the time go? Mark P and Sal have worried looks on their faces (god damn, can a girl not make her own decisions in this day and age?) and I smile and say \”it\’s just me, and I\’m going now. Night guys.\” Sal musses up my hair and I hop off my stool, somehow managing to walk over to where MW is standing and waiting for me at the door.
\”That\’s it then?\” the guy calls after me. \”Oh, for chrissakes.\” I was already halfway out the door, but I turned around and kissed him on the cheek. \”Thanks for the game. Get home safe.\”
Walking back to MW\’s apartment, he says to me \”You fucking lunged at him on his way out the door, stopped him dead in his tracks. Jesus, little girl.\” \”Well I thought he was a real friend of yours; I wanted to apologize for turning him down.\” (Heh.) \”Yeah, I\’m sorry about that. I should have made it clear that I didn\’t know the guy. But he got the apology full on. He got exactly what he wanted even if you didn\’t go to Archibald\’s with him.\” \”Archibald\’s? By the time we started talking, all that man wanted from me was a kiss — fuck Archibald\’s.\” \”He was putty. Unbelieveable.\” \”Not really. Men are easy. I almost gave in. I\’m really fucking sick right now.\” \”I could tell.\” \”What do you mean?\” \”Your body language; I could tell you wanted to kiss him.\” \”Oh yeah, I forgot.\” \”What, that I was there?\” \”Something like that.\”
Over the next six hours we talk and cuddle, MW curls up in my arms and sleeps, and I find myself coming down off my mania in the dark and sinking back to a level of normal human decency. My old self. Off drugs. Happy. Unmedicated. Alive. Life not on mute. And I shiver, and the one comforter is not enough, and MW\’s body heat is not enough, and I start to cry because the cold is so painful, and it will not stop.
I have not eaten since Thursday night, and I vomited all that back up. I have not slept since Thursday morning. I am cold to the core and my shaking wakes him up, my former lover, my dear friend, and he holds me and kisses me. In a tiny voice I ask if he has another blanket, and he jumps out of bed and quickly returns with a huge red comforter which he affectionately wraps around me, and then crawls back under the covers, pulling me close. \”Your body is so warm; are you cold inside?\” \”Deep inside, around my bones. It won\’t stop.\” He pulls me tight and I nuzzle deep under the cocoon of outer warmth. Eventually the cold subsides, and he falls back asleep.
By the time he awakens the morning light is pouring into the apartment and my head is full of sweet thoughts of bliss. Thursday night, I have decided, never happened. It never happened. This is the denial stage. Instead I think of how wonderful it felt to be manic again, how wonderful it felt to be that alive and exhilerated, empowered and in control, confident and energized and oblivious to physical pain and fatigue. Life not on mute. The old me again. Most of the friends I have right now have never seen me like this; they would not know what to think.
MW tells me he likes me like this. I talk more. I am less shy. I seem happier.
I like myself more like this.
We talk for hours; a real conversation, and a good one. We talk about politics, and about our relationship, and he apologizes and explains his side of what happened between us. It does not even hurt to hear him talk about it; from the start we both knew it was a mistake. I find myself not actually wanting to rehash that conversation. Suffice to say, all is forgiven on both sides and we are the better for it. I have my friend back, and I did not have him for a month and I missed him. I pointed that out to MW, that we had stopped being friends; he had not realized it was that bad, but he thought about it and admitted that yes, it had been. And he apologized, over and over again, but there was no need. I just wanted my friend back.
I left his apartment feeling all was right in the world. For the first time in weeks I was comfortable in my own skin. Fuck the fibromyalgia, fuck the CFIDS, fuck the bi polar, fuck the SSI, fuck the dependency, fuck the bankruptcy, fuck the lack of talent, fuck the lack of control, fuck everything. I felt good. I had a taste of ME again. Last night I was alive again, I was me again. Riding high on that wave of empowerment, that confidence that I lack in my every day life, I felt so good. My phone had been ringing off the hook last night, I returned home to even more messages, I feel it again in my veins — I am alive again. And Thursday never happened.
