By Betty Underground © 2009
Around most men, I never really get nervous. And not because I'm uber-confident and get it all the time, no, it's really more that I'm oblivious to attention directed at me; pretty sure they are interested in someone else so I don't feel pressure and in turn, stay pretty cool headed. It's a mild case of social retardation I blame on never honing my dating skills at an early age. Being complacently tied to the same, and hot mind you, man for the span of my twenties, I never developed an ability to overtly flirt. Though I've been accused of it, I consider it a well-timed accident.
Not lacking in feminine wiles, I've successfully attracted a good lot of men; by accident. Lookers, most of them and despite a propensity for soaking themselves in cheap beer and preferring an evening of hootin 'n hollerin at some display of sports to a night with a hottie like me and some wildly intellectual conversation about reality TV, they were really good boyfriends. When you line those guys up tip-to-toe they don't amount to much more than a sitcom that is cancelled after the first season leaving my "action" full of enormous gaps of time; I'm pretty sure if you stood next to me and yelled at my last relationship, you'd get an echo. It's nothing I get terribly worked up over and certainly makes the chance encounter EVEN THAT MUCH BETTER.
It was a Wednesday and I had been busy cooking; preparing the quiche and scones, and frosting the cupcakes I made the night before. The kind of day when I wonder how I've ever found time for a job when there is so much involved in entertaining guests. Hollywood would be there later in the afternoon and since she'd been kind enough to hop a shuttle, the only effort required from me was picking her up in town; which didn't even involve putting on shoes. Before she arrived I had a little business to take care.
I had enlisted the help of a friend who specializes in all things aesthetic for a graphic design project I was stumped on. Certain people have a knack for being able to ignite creativity and since I'd long since been convinced we shared the same taste in nearly everything, I was confident that he was the right one to bounce ideas around with; or at least worth looking at across a table for a few hours. It's great to have the occasional loosy-goosy work week that affords an opportunity for an afternoon of conversational ping-pong, and we had both lucked out this week.
A gravel road is very unforgiving if you intend to creep your vehicle up it, so I knew when he had arrived. I'm a bouncy greeter; likening my enthusiasm to that of a child when she hears the ice cream truck coming, I'm frequently out the door and dancing around the drive-way before my guests roll to a stop like I have to pee; which I usually don't, or at least best I could recall this day I didn't.
Like some chariot of magic, as his car rolled down the driveway the morning clouds were given a stiff shove-off exposing blue skies and a summer sun. So we'd sit on the deck and sip iced tea and attempt a focused conversation. Impossible. Even with the span between visits requiring us to take mental notes of what things we want talk about next time, we never get to those things. One comment leads to another and like the winding road that brought him to that beach house, we are all over the mountain of topics that are just 'life'. The non-specific, yet charmed, lives of two souls who have a lot of blanks to fill in and it seemed this time I was doing a lot of the filling-in.
One of the first things I learned being a poker player was to become aware of my own "tells"; that might also be the only I learned as a poker player which is why I don't play so well. Or when I do, it's totally accidentally. Sitting at the felt, I have nerves of jello; I knock over stacks of chips, fold on the blind and hyper-ventilate waiting for an orbit. (btw: that is about all the poker lingo I know, and I'm sure it's not accurately used). But that's poker; I know I get nervous there, and like I said up there, with men, I don't really get nervous. This day we sat jabbering away like two Jewish sisters and on my part, there were some admissions and blanks that I was required to address in order to get to the brainstorming on the creative project. Ya know, I put stuff out on the internet and largely over-share my life with strangers and friends alike, but I remember looking down at my hand and having trouble steadying it as I told him. NERVES? Nah... I must be hungry. "Are you hungry? Quiche sound good? I made quiche. We'll have quiche," and I escaped to the kitchen to get us a nibble still rambling on.
Eating helped, but I still felt off center. Tapping my foot and fidgeting as I pushed the words out between a fissure of nerves. Nerves? I was nervous. Unnerved. Deliciously unnerved. I'd rationalize it away under the guise that it was the content of the discussion and not the presence of being. Shake myself loose from my awareness of the unsettled feeling and eventually find a pace to settle into that felt normal. And then time ran out. Snapping back to the responsibilities of life beyond the dirt drive-way and having to say our good-byes. Much like greeting guests, I'm always sending them off on their vehicles rather than the threshold of the door. I like that time you spend finishing the conversation: the last minutes of dialogue when neither wants the time to end, so you linger and fill the space between you with things of little importance.
And then you hug, or at least I always hug. I had friend once, Bonk. Bonk told a group she was introducing me to that I was not a hugger before I arrived. No idea where she got that idea; I might not have hugged her but mainly because I wasn't sure I ever trusted her and her hair smelled like patchouli - my least favorite smell. These people shook my hands, which is fine, and then said," we heard you were not a hugger." Bonk and I stopped being friends after that but I made-out with AND HUGGED at least one of the guys I met that night. So, I'm a hugger. Never got good at the European cheek-kiss thing because that is a risky move if someone doesn't know it's coming, but I've been known to get caught in the moment and plant a kiss on someone. I don't usually think about it and naturally land it with near perfect accuracy on the lips. It is a precursor to the hug though; the order is very important here. A kiss before a hug is just a "good-bye". A kiss after the hug is a "please don't leave, but if you must, here is something to remember and hopefully I'll see you again super soon."
I remember hating the moment standing by his car doing that thing I do where I stop being in the moment and I am lost in some endless rambling but in my head I am over-thinking. "Damn, really, this is it? You really have to leave? When will I see you again? Why can't we hang out like this everyday? Will you come back tomorrow?" all this while white-noise is pouring from my lips and I am so somewhere else I need an atmospheric reentry and a map to find my way back to the present. Or, he could kiss me. SNAP! back to reality and I finish off with a hug. Good-bye.
So what happened next is where dream and reality get completely muddled.
Giving what I'd describe as a perfect hug; aware of his palms pressed on my back and the linger that waits for an exhale before a dizzying recovery. Some hugs you just never want to end. Some you just want to lay down right there on the ground together a short period of forever and never let go. That's what a perfect hug leaves churning around in my head hours, even days after it's ended. I hadn't been more relaxed the entire afternoon than I was right there in that hug. It took a few seconds for me to realize we'd unwrapped but the air between us had disappeared once again and his lips were softly dusting across mine. I steadied myself, hands on his arms and eyes closed, imprinting the moment in my mind before opening and mirroring the smile across his face. I stepped back, fingers tucked into the back pockets of my frayed jean shorts and shooed him away with a flick of my head. "Go." I managed to utter through the grin. "Get out of here."
"I know what it's like to kiss you because we made-out in my dream last night."
Betty Underground is a writer from Northen California.
Showing posts with label Betty Underground. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Betty Underground. Show all posts
November 04, 2009
October 03, 2009
Just Lunch
By Betty Underground © 2009
That's how I sat waiting; as if he was watching. Not as if "people" were watching. Because that's a given; a girl sitting alone reading a book in a schwank restaurant on a random Tuesday afternoon. No, I sat as if he were standing across the street watching me. Aware of my every move and how it would look from across the street. Cool. I'd totally be doing it if I hadn't been so early. Had half a mind to pull up a stool at the cafe across the street to wait and watch once I got the text that he was running late. Figured as soon as I did he'd show and how'd I explain appearing as if to be ditching him.
And what's the difference in worrying about people looking at you and focusing on a specific someone watching you? If it were me running late, I'd pause on the corner in view of him, looking for those things I do when I'm nervous. Was he doing them? Looking around for me. Tapping his foot to a beat only in his head. Reading that same paragraph over and over desperately trying to focus on the words and not glance up every few seconds to see if I was coming. Would he be trying to look relaxed? Fumble his water glass? Adjust his shirt so he wasn't showing too much skin? Creating the illusion he was taking this all in stride.
Maybe he'd be so good at it I'd never catch his tell. Maybe it's just me who so obviously wears her nerves like this season's Louis Vuitton bag. Then fumbles deeper into the nerves as I talk endlessly through them. He might not ever get a word in edgewise if it weren't for the need to chew what little lunch I ate.
There used to be this boy who came into a Starbucks I worked in; Triple Grande Soy Latte Boy. So handsome. A singer in a local band, my weakness. And every time he came in, I was a pool of babbling nervous energy. My master swing was to spill a drink on a guy I was smitten with. It was my tell. One morning, I saw him crossing the street headed in, and I started this latte for him. Finished it by the time he stepped to the cash register and promptly spilled it all over the counter.
Pulled the same move with Vince Vaughn and a beer, but unfortunately the beer soaked the lap of my then boyfriend. Ooops. Now I looked uncool and my boyfriend had a soaked crotch. I'm pretty sure that's why he doesn't talk to me anymore. The boyfriend, not Vince Vaughn. Well, Vince Vaughn as well but only because I've been unable to find a super sleuth who can score his number. I'm sure he'd totally talk to me if I called. Vince, not that boyfriend.
My nerves were not as rattled as I anticipated. I know that I hadn't had time really to over-think it all. Days had been busy and nights more restless than they should be. In my professional life I am constantly switching gears. "We" collectively head in one direction one minute, then pause, flip around and run screaming down an entirely different path. It keeps things interesting to say the least. You plan for change the best you can and uncertainty is something that is commonplace. You get used to it. I make decisions requiring business acumen. I am excellent with quick, tactical decisions; a keen ability to see down the path of the unknown and decipher enough details to nail my next step. It's a skill they don't teach you in college and it isn't until you've done it for as many years as I have, that it is second nature. It's only when you stop to think about it, that you trip. Like marching in formation and playing an instrument.
With as consuming as work had been, it all but escaped my mind that I had a wildly exciting luncheon. While I made a joke out of him choosing his outfit the day before, I tossed on the same "uniform" that I've been throwing on since the insanity commenced a few weeks ago; pants and a t-shirt. I'm usually put together in a seemingly effortless manner, largely because I have no time for the effort, so again, you develop the skill. Like survival. Life acumen, if you will. So when it hit me about 10:30am, I quickly checked myself in the mirror and figured it'll have to do. Really, he's not going to care, or notice, that those few hairs keep flipping out and rebelling against the styling pomade.
It wasn't until I got to the restaurant that I even had time to exhale from the past week. No time to bundle the nerves up and bring them with me. Sure I was a mass of fidgety energy, but it was the excitement of it all. No doubt that this would be the first of many endless afternoons. The kind that would go on for days if one of us didn't have "adult like" responsibilities. I imagined it would be the first of many to come. Didn't matter what impression I made really, the certainty that this was only the first, was solid to the core.
Then, I fell into the book I was reading. The restaurant blurred out around me and it wasn't until he was right in front of me that I first noticed a shape. If he had stood on that street corner only seconds before, he would have caught me in those few moments where I was so obviously collected. And that was the moment I realized, I so wasn't. Fumbled the menu sending silverware crashing to the floor. Used both hands to sip fizzy water and feeling the top-heaviness of my glass of Sangria, I clutched it firmly, inched it off the table and hovered it away from my clothing, and him, in case of spillage. A perfectly executed move. Helped by announcing to him first that I was going to NOT SPILL THIS DRINK and to please be very very quiet. "Shhhhhhh." I think a bendy straw would have made an excellent addition to the presentation.
It was silly really, when he with a of a pile of broken toothpicks and me thankful I didn't have a paper napkin to nervously shred, finally admitted that those 3 1/2 hours had been the fantastic. Ping-ponging from one topic to another. Leaving loose ends but filling in some of the big blanks of the last 26 years. A shade of awesomeness filling the space between us.
We're not strangers, though perhaps we should be; the span between the time when knew each other before and now, is vast. Back then, we didn't even know ourselves, and what we knew about each other was drawn with immature minds. When we first reconnected I'm sure we imagined what we thought the other had become. Like reading a book and imagining the movie version. Thought now, in this moment, I don't even remember what I thought of him. What life I had assigned to him. Perceptions erased as the stories of our lives unwind. His life seems to suit him. He'd say the same about mine. Our paths not surprising, except maybe to ourselves, but I think what stirs the childlike curiosity in us is how similar we might be.
Comfort in familiarity and we'd only scratched the surface of our shared idiosyncrasies.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
That's how I sat waiting; as if he was watching. Not as if "people" were watching. Because that's a given; a girl sitting alone reading a book in a schwank restaurant on a random Tuesday afternoon. No, I sat as if he were standing across the street watching me. Aware of my every move and how it would look from across the street. Cool. I'd totally be doing it if I hadn't been so early. Had half a mind to pull up a stool at the cafe across the street to wait and watch once I got the text that he was running late. Figured as soon as I did he'd show and how'd I explain appearing as if to be ditching him.
And what's the difference in worrying about people looking at you and focusing on a specific someone watching you? If it were me running late, I'd pause on the corner in view of him, looking for those things I do when I'm nervous. Was he doing them? Looking around for me. Tapping his foot to a beat only in his head. Reading that same paragraph over and over desperately trying to focus on the words and not glance up every few seconds to see if I was coming. Would he be trying to look relaxed? Fumble his water glass? Adjust his shirt so he wasn't showing too much skin? Creating the illusion he was taking this all in stride.
Maybe he'd be so good at it I'd never catch his tell. Maybe it's just me who so obviously wears her nerves like this season's Louis Vuitton bag. Then fumbles deeper into the nerves as I talk endlessly through them. He might not ever get a word in edgewise if it weren't for the need to chew what little lunch I ate.
There used to be this boy who came into a Starbucks I worked in; Triple Grande Soy Latte Boy. So handsome. A singer in a local band, my weakness. And every time he came in, I was a pool of babbling nervous energy. My master swing was to spill a drink on a guy I was smitten with. It was my tell. One morning, I saw him crossing the street headed in, and I started this latte for him. Finished it by the time he stepped to the cash register and promptly spilled it all over the counter.
Pulled the same move with Vince Vaughn and a beer, but unfortunately the beer soaked the lap of my then boyfriend. Ooops. Now I looked uncool and my boyfriend had a soaked crotch. I'm pretty sure that's why he doesn't talk to me anymore. The boyfriend, not Vince Vaughn. Well, Vince Vaughn as well but only because I've been unable to find a super sleuth who can score his number. I'm sure he'd totally talk to me if I called. Vince, not that boyfriend.
My nerves were not as rattled as I anticipated. I know that I hadn't had time really to over-think it all. Days had been busy and nights more restless than they should be. In my professional life I am constantly switching gears. "We" collectively head in one direction one minute, then pause, flip around and run screaming down an entirely different path. It keeps things interesting to say the least. You plan for change the best you can and uncertainty is something that is commonplace. You get used to it. I make decisions requiring business acumen. I am excellent with quick, tactical decisions; a keen ability to see down the path of the unknown and decipher enough details to nail my next step. It's a skill they don't teach you in college and it isn't until you've done it for as many years as I have, that it is second nature. It's only when you stop to think about it, that you trip. Like marching in formation and playing an instrument.
With as consuming as work had been, it all but escaped my mind that I had a wildly exciting luncheon. While I made a joke out of him choosing his outfit the day before, I tossed on the same "uniform" that I've been throwing on since the insanity commenced a few weeks ago; pants and a t-shirt. I'm usually put together in a seemingly effortless manner, largely because I have no time for the effort, so again, you develop the skill. Like survival. Life acumen, if you will. So when it hit me about 10:30am, I quickly checked myself in the mirror and figured it'll have to do. Really, he's not going to care, or notice, that those few hairs keep flipping out and rebelling against the styling pomade.
It wasn't until I got to the restaurant that I even had time to exhale from the past week. No time to bundle the nerves up and bring them with me. Sure I was a mass of fidgety energy, but it was the excitement of it all. No doubt that this would be the first of many endless afternoons. The kind that would go on for days if one of us didn't have "adult like" responsibilities. I imagined it would be the first of many to come. Didn't matter what impression I made really, the certainty that this was only the first, was solid to the core.
Then, I fell into the book I was reading. The restaurant blurred out around me and it wasn't until he was right in front of me that I first noticed a shape. If he had stood on that street corner only seconds before, he would have caught me in those few moments where I was so obviously collected. And that was the moment I realized, I so wasn't. Fumbled the menu sending silverware crashing to the floor. Used both hands to sip fizzy water and feeling the top-heaviness of my glass of Sangria, I clutched it firmly, inched it off the table and hovered it away from my clothing, and him, in case of spillage. A perfectly executed move. Helped by announcing to him first that I was going to NOT SPILL THIS DRINK and to please be very very quiet. "Shhhhhhh." I think a bendy straw would have made an excellent addition to the presentation.
It was silly really, when he with a of a pile of broken toothpicks and me thankful I didn't have a paper napkin to nervously shred, finally admitted that those 3 1/2 hours had been the fantastic. Ping-ponging from one topic to another. Leaving loose ends but filling in some of the big blanks of the last 26 years. A shade of awesomeness filling the space between us.
We're not strangers, though perhaps we should be; the span between the time when knew each other before and now, is vast. Back then, we didn't even know ourselves, and what we knew about each other was drawn with immature minds. When we first reconnected I'm sure we imagined what we thought the other had become. Like reading a book and imagining the movie version. Thought now, in this moment, I don't even remember what I thought of him. What life I had assigned to him. Perceptions erased as the stories of our lives unwind. His life seems to suit him. He'd say the same about mine. Our paths not surprising, except maybe to ourselves, but I think what stirs the childlike curiosity in us is how similar we might be.
Comfort in familiarity and we'd only scratched the surface of our shared idiosyncrasies.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
July 18, 2009
Yellow No. 2
By Betty Underground © 2009
It was a guest house behind a Spanish adobe style mansion just off 7th St. near Montana Ave in Santa Monica. Painted an authentic pink, it stood out like a sore thumb in the block of white and beige.
The owner was an old eccentric lady, all but completely deaf so she never bothered us. She never heard us. We occasionally saw her barking orders at the gardener about the care and tending to of her prized Hydrangea. He was Russian and would yell back at her in his native tongue prompting her to throw her hands up in the air and storm back into the house. I watched them from the kitchen table and was struck by the obvious sexual tension between them. Wondered if she called him over late at night to tend to her other needs.
We shared, for the second time in our long relationship, this guest house tucked in the corner of the property. Our entrance private and parking was included. A small storage shed out the side door housed our washer and dryer. Bonus for as much laundry we seemed to go through. Him with is numerous sports and me, well, I was just a girl in need of frequent daily wardrobe changes.
It was a one room flat. But it was huge. A separate kitchen with one of those great old Wolfe stoves. Tiled countertops and open shelving instead of cabinets. It was a chef's dream kitchen with plenty of space to hang pots and pans and a massive pantry. The refrigerator was a 1950's replica icebox in sea-foam green. I hated sea-foam green but it worked on the fridge and I was half tempted to steal it when we moved out years later.
The bathroom was well appointed with a bear claw tub, separate water closet and a porcelain sink with a horrible blue Danish floral pattern and gold fixtures. Must have cost a fortune but it was ugly as sin.
The main room, as I said, was huge. At one end, our king size bed centered on the wall under the window. Foot of the bed away from the door, because it is bad luck if your feet point towards the door. That is how they carry the dead out.
The opposite wall was covered in built-in redwood bookcases. Ceiling-to-floor and we had them stuffed with books. No room for knick-knacks. Books laying on top of rows of books and books stacked on the floor next to rows of books.
The walls were fairly sparse. He had acquired two Henry Miller prints when his grandfather, an art collector, passed. Miller was one of his favorite writers and he felt no other art should share a wall with him.
The middle of the room was our living space. Sofa, chair and an oblong Eames coffee table he bought in Chelsea the last day he lived in NYC. It had a shelf underneath where a small box sat on a beveled edged mirror with a gold swirled pattern in it. I had found that mirror at one of the estate sales in the neighborhood and had intended to frame it but never got around to it.
On this evening we had returned early from Father's Office where we had met friends for drinks. I had drawn a bubble bath and was relaxing in the candlelit bathroom. The door open and we continued a conversation about Dante's Inferno. We had both re-read it recently and had varying opinions of the underlying meaning. That was what we did when we were coked up. We analyzed great pieces of literature as if we knew the author personally.
He had pulled the mirror and the little box from the coffee table shelf and was cutting and lining up the next round. It was the 90s in Los Angeles. We had fallen into the alteration that cocaine had provided for our creative minds. Neither of us addicted to the drug, but walking a fine line of destruction to our relationship. Being almost unable to communicate with each other without it.
I finished my bath and did a line through a rolled up $20 bill. He used a glass straw he had picked up in a head shop on Venice Beach. It was a clean batch. We had gotten some a few weeks before that was cut with aspirin. Just horrible. The drip was enough to make me ill and I chased back my gag reflex every time, I loved the affect cocaine had on me. My mind clear, unlike the haze that pot always created. Coke brought us closer. Like E, we wanted to be near each other. Touching and talking. Kissing and grabbing at one another. We were frisky but sex waited because we had things to talk about. All things. Every thing. Every topic leading to the next in an endless flow of thoughts. Connected thoughts. We were connected to each other in an almost ethereal manner.
Nothing could explain what had gone wrong this night though. He was passive. When I was unhappy, he shut down. When we did blow, he opened up, but this night he was in his own head. He started writing. I remember how loud his pencil scribbling in that book was. He always used pencil. I could smell it. Yellow No.2. It rang in my ears and penetrated my thoughts and I felt like I would scream if he didn't stop. Stop writing. Stop not talking to me.
I was enraged. Not even slowly. One minute I was perfectly content to be rinsing the glasses we used for our Scotch. The next minute I am yelling at him to stop that noise. Then I slammed one glass on the tile counter. Shattering part of it and knocking the other into the sink, smashing it to pieces. I was high on the noise of breaking glass. Drowning out his god awful scratching on the paper in the other room.
Still screaming, but only in my head, I pulled the china we had received for our engagement. Nasty, ugly fine china with horrible flowers and gold trim on the edges. His mother's taste and I loathed it being in my house. One by one the salad plates shattered on the floor. Then the tea saucers and cups. Leaving the dinner plates in case his mother came over and we had to serve her on them. It felt like it took hours for the 8 piece set to be obliterated onto the kitchen floor and my ears were ringing from the noise. When I was done, there was silence in the house. The noise from his pencil ceased.
A breeze came from the side door as he came back in from the laundry shed with the broom and dust pan. Standing across the kitchen from me, the pieces of our engagement present coating the floor between us. I walked towards him to get the broom and start cleaning up my mess. Giggling a little as the realization of what I had done set in. Taking two, maybe three steps towards him when he yelled, "Stop" and looked down. My feet, bare, were bleeding from the shards of fine china imbedded in them. "Don't move."
He quickly swept away the debris between us and scooped me up. Carried me to the bathroom and placed me gently on the sink cabinet. Blood pouring from my feet. He wet a towel and slowly wiped my feet. Wiping the glass that was stuck to my feet away first. Using his nails to flick and pull the glass out.
He filled the tub and carried me to it. Gently placed my feet into the hot water to allow the rest of the glass to fall out. His face white, brow furrowed with worry he left me there to soak while he swept the rest of the china from the floor of the kitchen.
When he returned, he had a bottle of hydrogen peroxide, a tube of ointment and a pair of his cashmere lined wool socks. He never let me wear those socks because he knew I would ruin them walking down the driveway to the mail box.
He dried my feet and dabbed them with a cotton ball soaked in the hydrogen peroxide. It stung. He blew lightly. His breath cold on my hot feet. After he spread the ointment ever so gently over the cuts he carefully placed the socks on my feet. Rolling the tops down as far as he could first so as not to wipe the ointment off when they slipped on.
He gathered my off the counter into his arms and I instinctively tucked my head in the curve of his neck. I remember thinking how much I loved him in that moment. I loved that he could so easily carry me in his arms. How the curls of his long waves played on my face when I was in the nook. How caring and attentive he always was and not understanding the rage that had come over me in that kitchen.
He placed me on the bed and curled up next to me.
"It was just a bad trip, babe. Don't worry. I hated that fucking china anyway. I'm glad it is gone."
We both roared with laughter and then calm rushed back through us and we dozed gently off to sleep.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
It was a guest house behind a Spanish adobe style mansion just off 7th St. near Montana Ave in Santa Monica. Painted an authentic pink, it stood out like a sore thumb in the block of white and beige.
The owner was an old eccentric lady, all but completely deaf so she never bothered us. She never heard us. We occasionally saw her barking orders at the gardener about the care and tending to of her prized Hydrangea. He was Russian and would yell back at her in his native tongue prompting her to throw her hands up in the air and storm back into the house. I watched them from the kitchen table and was struck by the obvious sexual tension between them. Wondered if she called him over late at night to tend to her other needs.
We shared, for the second time in our long relationship, this guest house tucked in the corner of the property. Our entrance private and parking was included. A small storage shed out the side door housed our washer and dryer. Bonus for as much laundry we seemed to go through. Him with is numerous sports and me, well, I was just a girl in need of frequent daily wardrobe changes.
It was a one room flat. But it was huge. A separate kitchen with one of those great old Wolfe stoves. Tiled countertops and open shelving instead of cabinets. It was a chef's dream kitchen with plenty of space to hang pots and pans and a massive pantry. The refrigerator was a 1950's replica icebox in sea-foam green. I hated sea-foam green but it worked on the fridge and I was half tempted to steal it when we moved out years later.
The bathroom was well appointed with a bear claw tub, separate water closet and a porcelain sink with a horrible blue Danish floral pattern and gold fixtures. Must have cost a fortune but it was ugly as sin.
The main room, as I said, was huge. At one end, our king size bed centered on the wall under the window. Foot of the bed away from the door, because it is bad luck if your feet point towards the door. That is how they carry the dead out.
The opposite wall was covered in built-in redwood bookcases. Ceiling-to-floor and we had them stuffed with books. No room for knick-knacks. Books laying on top of rows of books and books stacked on the floor next to rows of books.
The walls were fairly sparse. He had acquired two Henry Miller prints when his grandfather, an art collector, passed. Miller was one of his favorite writers and he felt no other art should share a wall with him.
The middle of the room was our living space. Sofa, chair and an oblong Eames coffee table he bought in Chelsea the last day he lived in NYC. It had a shelf underneath where a small box sat on a beveled edged mirror with a gold swirled pattern in it. I had found that mirror at one of the estate sales in the neighborhood and had intended to frame it but never got around to it.
On this evening we had returned early from Father's Office where we had met friends for drinks. I had drawn a bubble bath and was relaxing in the candlelit bathroom. The door open and we continued a conversation about Dante's Inferno. We had both re-read it recently and had varying opinions of the underlying meaning. That was what we did when we were coked up. We analyzed great pieces of literature as if we knew the author personally.
He had pulled the mirror and the little box from the coffee table shelf and was cutting and lining up the next round. It was the 90s in Los Angeles. We had fallen into the alteration that cocaine had provided for our creative minds. Neither of us addicted to the drug, but walking a fine line of destruction to our relationship. Being almost unable to communicate with each other without it.
I finished my bath and did a line through a rolled up $20 bill. He used a glass straw he had picked up in a head shop on Venice Beach. It was a clean batch. We had gotten some a few weeks before that was cut with aspirin. Just horrible. The drip was enough to make me ill and I chased back my gag reflex every time, I loved the affect cocaine had on me. My mind clear, unlike the haze that pot always created. Coke brought us closer. Like E, we wanted to be near each other. Touching and talking. Kissing and grabbing at one another. We were frisky but sex waited because we had things to talk about. All things. Every thing. Every topic leading to the next in an endless flow of thoughts. Connected thoughts. We were connected to each other in an almost ethereal manner.
Nothing could explain what had gone wrong this night though. He was passive. When I was unhappy, he shut down. When we did blow, he opened up, but this night he was in his own head. He started writing. I remember how loud his pencil scribbling in that book was. He always used pencil. I could smell it. Yellow No.2. It rang in my ears and penetrated my thoughts and I felt like I would scream if he didn't stop. Stop writing. Stop not talking to me.
I was enraged. Not even slowly. One minute I was perfectly content to be rinsing the glasses we used for our Scotch. The next minute I am yelling at him to stop that noise. Then I slammed one glass on the tile counter. Shattering part of it and knocking the other into the sink, smashing it to pieces. I was high on the noise of breaking glass. Drowning out his god awful scratching on the paper in the other room.
Still screaming, but only in my head, I pulled the china we had received for our engagement. Nasty, ugly fine china with horrible flowers and gold trim on the edges. His mother's taste and I loathed it being in my house. One by one the salad plates shattered on the floor. Then the tea saucers and cups. Leaving the dinner plates in case his mother came over and we had to serve her on them. It felt like it took hours for the 8 piece set to be obliterated onto the kitchen floor and my ears were ringing from the noise. When I was done, there was silence in the house. The noise from his pencil ceased.
A breeze came from the side door as he came back in from the laundry shed with the broom and dust pan. Standing across the kitchen from me, the pieces of our engagement present coating the floor between us. I walked towards him to get the broom and start cleaning up my mess. Giggling a little as the realization of what I had done set in. Taking two, maybe three steps towards him when he yelled, "Stop" and looked down. My feet, bare, were bleeding from the shards of fine china imbedded in them. "Don't move."
He quickly swept away the debris between us and scooped me up. Carried me to the bathroom and placed me gently on the sink cabinet. Blood pouring from my feet. He wet a towel and slowly wiped my feet. Wiping the glass that was stuck to my feet away first. Using his nails to flick and pull the glass out.
He filled the tub and carried me to it. Gently placed my feet into the hot water to allow the rest of the glass to fall out. His face white, brow furrowed with worry he left me there to soak while he swept the rest of the china from the floor of the kitchen.
When he returned, he had a bottle of hydrogen peroxide, a tube of ointment and a pair of his cashmere lined wool socks. He never let me wear those socks because he knew I would ruin them walking down the driveway to the mail box.
He dried my feet and dabbed them with a cotton ball soaked in the hydrogen peroxide. It stung. He blew lightly. His breath cold on my hot feet. After he spread the ointment ever so gently over the cuts he carefully placed the socks on my feet. Rolling the tops down as far as he could first so as not to wipe the ointment off when they slipped on.
He gathered my off the counter into his arms and I instinctively tucked my head in the curve of his neck. I remember thinking how much I loved him in that moment. I loved that he could so easily carry me in his arms. How the curls of his long waves played on my face when I was in the nook. How caring and attentive he always was and not understanding the rage that had come over me in that kitchen.
He placed me on the bed and curled up next to me.
"It was just a bad trip, babe. Don't worry. I hated that fucking china anyway. I'm glad it is gone."
We both roared with laughter and then calm rushed back through us and we dozed gently off to sleep.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
May 02, 2009
Blue No. 1
By Betty Underground © 2009
That night he flipped the switch. Threw the cruel reality of light onto the months we had been spiraling out of control. In those moments of clarity it was impossible to imagine my life without him. Without his strength and his fearlessness in the face of the adversity we had buried ourselves in.
Working through our human imperfections was something we made the decision to do in the relationship. A safe place for us to learn, grow, change. The relationship wasn't broken by who we were. It existed because of it. At times in spite of us.
She was slender. Austrian. Wore her pants tucked into her knee high boots. A fashion statement that had played out already, but she was dedicated to it. Every week. The boots made her ridiculously tall. Him barely over 6ft, still dwarfed by her when she greeted us in the empty waiting room. Therapists always had empty waiting rooms. To protect anonymity. Her receptionist was positioned on the other side. In the lobby where patients exited. A separate door. Never seen. The entrance on Olympic Blvd. The exit on Beverly Drive.
We were there to have our characters poked and prodded. To pour Blue No. 1 into our souls, staining the leaks. Barium. Emptying out our pockets and doing a cavity search of our thoughts. To understand how we got off course and find our way back to the place we were at our best.
We never feared honesty. We were probably the easiest patients she had. Even looked forward to us because we quickly identified the areas of opportunity and were willing to set a plan in place. People don't fix themselves overnight but we had been together for so long and good for so long that this hiccup was just that. A hiccup. We committed to work through it together. To get to the other side.
Why did I get so angry? Irish blood? The curse of the redheads? Why did he shut down? The reserved Scotsman? Introverted writer?
All the things that were the triggers for the dysfunction were the reason we were drawn to one another. The reason, for nearly a decade, we loved no one else. We were wired for each other. The battles that had taken place in the last few months were not because of the drugs or weakness of character. We were becoming a product of our environment. Allowing the outside influences into our souls. Living in a space too small to find our own selves in. Too close to the control of his mother. Forcing marriage on two people who never intended to go down that aisle.
We were rubbed raw by the expectations of others. Of living in Santa Monica. Of measuring up to our neighbors and shallow friends. Escaping into lines on a beveled edge mirror. Using it to bind us together against the elements outside. It did. We came together because of it. Because we needed to leave it behind. Together.
It only took a few months. We were back to who were were. The way we were. He stood firm with his mother. Wedding plans halted indefinitely. We decided to move up. More room to spread out. Space to be individuals. A home. Without fine china.
We packed boxes. Endless boxes of books. So full we couldn't even push them across the Spanish tile floor. We packed as we house hunted. We were ready to flee as soon as we found something we could afford. The options were plenty. One of us always finding something wrong with them but the agent kept trudging along.
It was a Saturday. We sat together at the small table in our kitchen. Built in breakfast nook that I was inspecting to see if I could dismantle it and take it with us. I loved that nook. Our nook. A piece of that place that broke us and us built back up stronger.
He poured coffee and sat across from me. A soft finished wood that had taken a beating over the years. Scared by the love of the people who sat at it over the years. Running his finger in the scratches on the table top, like he ran his finger tip across the lifelines of my palm. He would do that at night when we were quiet with each other. Speaking low about our future dreams. Him on his back. One knee pulled up and out the the side. Me, on the other side. His left side. Curled in the shape of his body. My palm opened on his chest, his fingers dripping from his hand, lightly tracing my lifelines. We often fell asleep. Frozen in that moment.
He looked up from the table and our eyes were locked. After so many years, sometimes there is no need for words. Smiles grew in our mutual satisfaction over what had just been decided. Together, without words. He called our agent. Her job, and commission would double. We needed two homes.
We had grown as far as we could together. Had dug deep into our souls for a decade and experienced the stuff of life and love many only hope for. It was time to take that and share it with others.
My first great love. Not my last.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
That night he flipped the switch. Threw the cruel reality of light onto the months we had been spiraling out of control. In those moments of clarity it was impossible to imagine my life without him. Without his strength and his fearlessness in the face of the adversity we had buried ourselves in.
Working through our human imperfections was something we made the decision to do in the relationship. A safe place for us to learn, grow, change. The relationship wasn't broken by who we were. It existed because of it. At times in spite of us.
She was slender. Austrian. Wore her pants tucked into her knee high boots. A fashion statement that had played out already, but she was dedicated to it. Every week. The boots made her ridiculously tall. Him barely over 6ft, still dwarfed by her when she greeted us in the empty waiting room. Therapists always had empty waiting rooms. To protect anonymity. Her receptionist was positioned on the other side. In the lobby where patients exited. A separate door. Never seen. The entrance on Olympic Blvd. The exit on Beverly Drive.
We were there to have our characters poked and prodded. To pour Blue No. 1 into our souls, staining the leaks. Barium. Emptying out our pockets and doing a cavity search of our thoughts. To understand how we got off course and find our way back to the place we were at our best.
We never feared honesty. We were probably the easiest patients she had. Even looked forward to us because we quickly identified the areas of opportunity and were willing to set a plan in place. People don't fix themselves overnight but we had been together for so long and good for so long that this hiccup was just that. A hiccup. We committed to work through it together. To get to the other side.
Why did I get so angry? Irish blood? The curse of the redheads? Why did he shut down? The reserved Scotsman? Introverted writer?
All the things that were the triggers for the dysfunction were the reason we were drawn to one another. The reason, for nearly a decade, we loved no one else. We were wired for each other. The battles that had taken place in the last few months were not because of the drugs or weakness of character. We were becoming a product of our environment. Allowing the outside influences into our souls. Living in a space too small to find our own selves in. Too close to the control of his mother. Forcing marriage on two people who never intended to go down that aisle.
We were rubbed raw by the expectations of others. Of living in Santa Monica. Of measuring up to our neighbors and shallow friends. Escaping into lines on a beveled edge mirror. Using it to bind us together against the elements outside. It did. We came together because of it. Because we needed to leave it behind. Together.
It only took a few months. We were back to who were were. The way we were. He stood firm with his mother. Wedding plans halted indefinitely. We decided to move up. More room to spread out. Space to be individuals. A home. Without fine china.
We packed boxes. Endless boxes of books. So full we couldn't even push them across the Spanish tile floor. We packed as we house hunted. We were ready to flee as soon as we found something we could afford. The options were plenty. One of us always finding something wrong with them but the agent kept trudging along.
It was a Saturday. We sat together at the small table in our kitchen. Built in breakfast nook that I was inspecting to see if I could dismantle it and take it with us. I loved that nook. Our nook. A piece of that place that broke us and us built back up stronger.
He poured coffee and sat across from me. A soft finished wood that had taken a beating over the years. Scared by the love of the people who sat at it over the years. Running his finger in the scratches on the table top, like he ran his finger tip across the lifelines of my palm. He would do that at night when we were quiet with each other. Speaking low about our future dreams. Him on his back. One knee pulled up and out the the side. Me, on the other side. His left side. Curled in the shape of his body. My palm opened on his chest, his fingers dripping from his hand, lightly tracing my lifelines. We often fell asleep. Frozen in that moment.
He looked up from the table and our eyes were locked. After so many years, sometimes there is no need for words. Smiles grew in our mutual satisfaction over what had just been decided. Together, without words. He called our agent. Her job, and commission would double. We needed two homes.
We had grown as far as we could together. Had dug deep into our souls for a decade and experienced the stuff of life and love many only hope for. It was time to take that and share it with others.
My first great love. Not my last.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
April 04, 2009
Red No. 5
By Betty Underground © 2008
We had been fighting for weeks. Finances, forgetting to put gas in the car, not hanging up a towel. You name it we were fighting about it. Years of togetherness and long extended separations had us uncertain about the future. I had a case of the "mean reds". Carcinogenic, like Red No.5. Tugging and pulling at our relationship.
It had been close to 6 years since he had pulled that custom made emerald ring of the pocket of his jeans, picked the lint off it and woke me from the dead of sleep to ask me if I would promise to spend a big piece of forever with him. A non conventional proposal but they were the exact words I wanted to hear. Forever was something neither of us believed in, but we both knew that we wanted to look at each other's faces over the newspaper for a ton of Sundays.
After so many years, his mother was getting squirrelly about us not finally marrying. Didn't make her look good at the country club to have her only son living in such sinful quarters. We had decided to make it official but dilly-dallied around getting plans in place. I bought a dress. He bought black socks. That was about it.
The coke trips no longer engaged us. They were driving me to fits of rage over him withdrawing during the trips. My left nasal passage so over used I couldn't snort air through it, let alone crystalized dust. My right passage was clear. The line slid up through my nose. The cold pain tightening around the bridge of my nose. My eyeball, then the front of my head. Like brain freeze, 7-11 slurpy style. By the time the drip started I was already high. A mix of clarity and creativity not matched by any other drug. The slide down stopped quickly in it's tracks with another snort. My head only slightly light. My thoughts grounded in conviction and conversation flowing uninhibited.
Words nailing his ego to the wall. Grinding his love for me down to a bloody stump. I was relentless. Trying to uncover a reason, any reason to end the relationship. It had run it's course. Nearly 10 years and I was ready to be free of it. His mother breathing down my neck. Pissing on my ideals and trying to morph me into the daughter-in-law she wanted. Not accepting me for who I am.
He hated it even more than me. Her judging him for being a writer rather than the lawyer she had asked for. For dating a woman in combat boots, rather than a priss in pearls. Tattoos on us both. Scratching our way out of her perfect vision of our life.
We could not fight her. We fought with one another. The anger infested our home. Cockroaches laying eggs and scattering around in the night. In the words on his pages. In the darkness in my mind. I was afraid. Afraid of being caught in this world that was not mine. We sucked the life out of each other towards the end. Our love wrung out. Dried stiff in the sun of the Southern California, like a Chamois Cloth.
The drugs covered up the inevitable. We needed help. We needed to find a way to talk to each other again. To resolve our fears, our pain, our anger. We were stuck. In quicksand. Slowly drowning in our own human shit.
One night I raised the catalyst for change high over my head. Gripped tightly in my fist as he sat silently at the kitchen table. Unresponsive to my ranting. I was literally out of my mind and body. My soul standing next to me on the Spanish tile floor watching my actions unfold. Not stopping me. Watching me. Allowing me to put an end to it.
He glanced up from the nothing on the paper in front of him. No thoughts. No words. Silence in the room and on that paper. I remember him raising to his feet in utter slow motion. His eyes fixed on mine, forcing me into stillness with his pure will. He pulled down on my left wrist and peeled my white fingers from the wooden handle. Laying the blade on the kitchen table. Then taking both my wrists and placing them at my sides. Wrapping his arms around me and flooding the room with his breath. Breathing warmth into my ear. Into my heart. Into my soul.
Breathing love back into us.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
We had been fighting for weeks. Finances, forgetting to put gas in the car, not hanging up a towel. You name it we were fighting about it. Years of togetherness and long extended separations had us uncertain about the future. I had a case of the "mean reds". Carcinogenic, like Red No.5. Tugging and pulling at our relationship.
It had been close to 6 years since he had pulled that custom made emerald ring of the pocket of his jeans, picked the lint off it and woke me from the dead of sleep to ask me if I would promise to spend a big piece of forever with him. A non conventional proposal but they were the exact words I wanted to hear. Forever was something neither of us believed in, but we both knew that we wanted to look at each other's faces over the newspaper for a ton of Sundays.
After so many years, his mother was getting squirrelly about us not finally marrying. Didn't make her look good at the country club to have her only son living in such sinful quarters. We had decided to make it official but dilly-dallied around getting plans in place. I bought a dress. He bought black socks. That was about it.
The coke trips no longer engaged us. They were driving me to fits of rage over him withdrawing during the trips. My left nasal passage so over used I couldn't snort air through it, let alone crystalized dust. My right passage was clear. The line slid up through my nose. The cold pain tightening around the bridge of my nose. My eyeball, then the front of my head. Like brain freeze, 7-11 slurpy style. By the time the drip started I was already high. A mix of clarity and creativity not matched by any other drug. The slide down stopped quickly in it's tracks with another snort. My head only slightly light. My thoughts grounded in conviction and conversation flowing uninhibited.
Words nailing his ego to the wall. Grinding his love for me down to a bloody stump. I was relentless. Trying to uncover a reason, any reason to end the relationship. It had run it's course. Nearly 10 years and I was ready to be free of it. His mother breathing down my neck. Pissing on my ideals and trying to morph me into the daughter-in-law she wanted. Not accepting me for who I am.
He hated it even more than me. Her judging him for being a writer rather than the lawyer she had asked for. For dating a woman in combat boots, rather than a priss in pearls. Tattoos on us both. Scratching our way out of her perfect vision of our life.
We could not fight her. We fought with one another. The anger infested our home. Cockroaches laying eggs and scattering around in the night. In the words on his pages. In the darkness in my mind. I was afraid. Afraid of being caught in this world that was not mine. We sucked the life out of each other towards the end. Our love wrung out. Dried stiff in the sun of the Southern California, like a Chamois Cloth.
The drugs covered up the inevitable. We needed help. We needed to find a way to talk to each other again. To resolve our fears, our pain, our anger. We were stuck. In quicksand. Slowly drowning in our own human shit.
One night I raised the catalyst for change high over my head. Gripped tightly in my fist as he sat silently at the kitchen table. Unresponsive to my ranting. I was literally out of my mind and body. My soul standing next to me on the Spanish tile floor watching my actions unfold. Not stopping me. Watching me. Allowing me to put an end to it.
He glanced up from the nothing on the paper in front of him. No thoughts. No words. Silence in the room and on that paper. I remember him raising to his feet in utter slow motion. His eyes fixed on mine, forcing me into stillness with his pure will. He pulled down on my left wrist and peeled my white fingers from the wooden handle. Laying the blade on the kitchen table. Then taking both my wrists and placing them at my sides. Wrapping his arms around me and flooding the room with his breath. Breathing warmth into my ear. Into my heart. Into my soul.
Breathing love back into us.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
March 03, 2009
Hunter Wellington
By Betty Underground © 2008
She stood before me; white cotton panties with little cherries, a t-shirt, yellow rain slicker and her Hunter Wellingtons. Thighs red and chaffed from the wet jeans she had discarded in the mud-room. The rest of her, soaked.
Dead pan, she states, "It's raining." Then grins. Even when she states the obvious, her wit overcomes me. I let out a chuckle as she drips on the floor.
Six inches of mud, up to the calf of her boots. "Driveway flooded?" I ask the obvious. I'm not as funny to her and so she only smiles with one side of her mouth.
It was the worst storm in 6 years to hit Southern California. The house was mostly finished, the driveway left unpaved due to the weather. Now, buried under mud, neither of us were going anywhere. And that would be awkward.
She'd confessed to a fling with an ex-lover. I might have been more angry if it was a stranger, but this was a friend. One who had given her things when I could not. I owed him. Still, I wasn't willing to give her over to him. Even she was still conflicted.
And there we were; stuck in that mud.
___
She stepped out of her Wellies. Toe on the heel of one, her foot slides up and out. Then the other. Perfectly balanced on one leg, like a Ballerina. I stepped to her and unzipped her slicker, pulling it off her and reaching over her to hang it on the coat hook, next to mine.
She is uncertain about still being here, in my house. Being with me. I can offer her the world, but he has something else. Something ethereal. He creates laughter in her. I have seen it; heard it. A noise from her I can't evoke. It comes from somewhere deeper. From this man that is her one great love.
Still, I love her. She burns slow in my soul. Having her hurts. Giving her to him hurts. I needed to be sure he could give her what she deserved. Could he be the man she needed him to be, or would be let her down again.
I wasn't ready to let her go. One last time. I needed to feel her one last time. Knowing her thoughts would be filled with him as her touch is etched in mine. I didn't have the strength to care what would be on the other side of this storm. What would be left behind when the water receded.
___
I pulled her wet shirt up over her head, and starred into her eyes. Hair wet on her forehead, I brushed it aside, allowing my finger to draw down the side of her face. Down her neck where it curves to her shoulder and then dropping down to brush her nipples. She held her breath, maintaining contact with my eyes. She doesn't hide.
I look down the length of her body. She is wiggling her toes and pushing up on the balls of her feet to draw my hand closer to her sweetness. I run my finger around the inside of the lace trim of her panties. The soft peach fuzz hair in the small of her back standing at attention for me.
Her ass is warm,. "Sorry my hands are so cold."
"Just touch me. I don't mind the cold, just touch me." She was pleading. I pushed her panties down around her ankles. Bending to my knees before her. Taking the sweet warmth between her legs into my mouth. My tongue swirls in her wetness as her legs begin to shake. I grab the back of her thighs hold her against my face. Burrowing into her soft curls.
She braces herself. Her hands clutching the door frame on both sides. Fingers digging into the unfinished wood trim. Her head thrown back as her chest heaves for breathes. Each one harder to control and the sounds begin to escape her.
She bucks into me uncontrollably. Thrusting her pelvis at me, I rise and push her against the windowsill behind us. The mud-room is narrow; she pulls one leg up and pushes it against the opposite wall. Balanced, like a Ballerina.
I plunge my fingers into her and she pounds her foot against the wall. The sound echos in the small room. Her naked body pressed against the undressed window, in plain sight of the neighbors.
___
She doesn't care. She never has. Her comfort in her own skin surpasses societies modesty boundaries. It is just how she is. Most people come home from work and take off their shoes. She doesn't stop there, she takes off her pants and pulls her bra off through the sleeves of her t-shirt. Discarding them on the floor of the entrance. She prefers the freedom, and cares less about what others might think.
___
I am beneath her. Squaring myself under her wetness. Pulling her lips apart to expose all of her and taking her in with my eyes, then with my whole mouth. I pull my fingers out and she gasps. My tongue is strong and fierce in her, my wet fingers playing the rim of her anus like fingers on crystal. The hum, a vibrations on her clit.
Her legs give and she sits on the windowsill trying to catch her breath. I pull back and she again is fixated on my eyes. Her hand on the back of my head, grabbing a clump of hair and pushing my lips onto hers. She tastes herself on my lips. Licking her sweetness from around my mouth, like a mother cat cleaning her young.
My hands free I quickly relieve myself of my pants. Commando, my dick is immediately exposed. As hard as my will to keep her, I grind into her. Back and forth, up and down as deep in her as it would go. When I pulled my dick from her, she looked down at it glistening in the afternoon sun that flooded the room. Then I would slam back into her. Over and over again.
"Fuck me harder. I want the neighbors to hear me scream."
She demanded and I submitted. I grabbed her hips and held her solid on the ledge so that could thrust into her without her trying to pull back. She was so wet that we were both soaked in her sweetness.
I licked my thumb and placed it on her swollen clit. Rolling it under my thumb as I throbbed and pumped in her. Her legs trembled intensely and her screams louder and louder. Each breath a squeal and a gasp.
She was nearing orgasm and I pulled her onto me. Pushing my dick into her. Pulling her onto my dick. I froze. Pushed. She twitched and screamed and I gave her one last thrust. We exploded together. Then collapsed.
"I think the neighbors heard."
___
Later that night, I laid spooned behind her. Both my arms wrapping her tightly to my chest. Her breath quick and shallow, I rolled her over.
Salty tears streaming down her face, I kissed them away, but knew the storm had passed. Her thundering screams earlier was the sound of her letting me loose from her heart. She was no longer conflicted. Her decision made.
With my thumb, I pushed her tears away. She replaced them. Breathing hard. Willing them to stop but with every thought they came harder.
"It is okay." I whispered into her breath. "Honey, it's okay. I know. It is okay. This is how it's meant to be. Be happy for what you feel. Happy to be alive and feeling it."
I let go, accepting that these moments were our last. She exhaled. Pulled her knees to her chest and curled herself in the nook my body created for her. She pushed up against me as close as she could. One last crash of thunder, and the sky lit up. I tightened my arms trying to pull her inside me. Sharing one body, for one last night.
___
In the end, she was my only fear. Her independence. That she didn't need me, and that wanting me would be fleeting. He'd sustained the storms for nearly a decade. Wrung each other out. Waded through the mud to higher ground. Earning a place that I tried to build, but could never finish.
He will be worthy. And with her heart, shall he never be reckless.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
She stood before me; white cotton panties with little cherries, a t-shirt, yellow rain slicker and her Hunter Wellingtons. Thighs red and chaffed from the wet jeans she had discarded in the mud-room. The rest of her, soaked.
Dead pan, she states, "It's raining." Then grins. Even when she states the obvious, her wit overcomes me. I let out a chuckle as she drips on the floor.
Six inches of mud, up to the calf of her boots. "Driveway flooded?" I ask the obvious. I'm not as funny to her and so she only smiles with one side of her mouth.
It was the worst storm in 6 years to hit Southern California. The house was mostly finished, the driveway left unpaved due to the weather. Now, buried under mud, neither of us were going anywhere. And that would be awkward.
She'd confessed to a fling with an ex-lover. I might have been more angry if it was a stranger, but this was a friend. One who had given her things when I could not. I owed him. Still, I wasn't willing to give her over to him. Even she was still conflicted.
And there we were; stuck in that mud.
___
She stepped out of her Wellies. Toe on the heel of one, her foot slides up and out. Then the other. Perfectly balanced on one leg, like a Ballerina. I stepped to her and unzipped her slicker, pulling it off her and reaching over her to hang it on the coat hook, next to mine.
She is uncertain about still being here, in my house. Being with me. I can offer her the world, but he has something else. Something ethereal. He creates laughter in her. I have seen it; heard it. A noise from her I can't evoke. It comes from somewhere deeper. From this man that is her one great love.
Still, I love her. She burns slow in my soul. Having her hurts. Giving her to him hurts. I needed to be sure he could give her what she deserved. Could he be the man she needed him to be, or would be let her down again.
I wasn't ready to let her go. One last time. I needed to feel her one last time. Knowing her thoughts would be filled with him as her touch is etched in mine. I didn't have the strength to care what would be on the other side of this storm. What would be left behind when the water receded.
___
I pulled her wet shirt up over her head, and starred into her eyes. Hair wet on her forehead, I brushed it aside, allowing my finger to draw down the side of her face. Down her neck where it curves to her shoulder and then dropping down to brush her nipples. She held her breath, maintaining contact with my eyes. She doesn't hide.
I look down the length of her body. She is wiggling her toes and pushing up on the balls of her feet to draw my hand closer to her sweetness. I run my finger around the inside of the lace trim of her panties. The soft peach fuzz hair in the small of her back standing at attention for me.
Her ass is warm,. "Sorry my hands are so cold."
"Just touch me. I don't mind the cold, just touch me." She was pleading. I pushed her panties down around her ankles. Bending to my knees before her. Taking the sweet warmth between her legs into my mouth. My tongue swirls in her wetness as her legs begin to shake. I grab the back of her thighs hold her against my face. Burrowing into her soft curls.
She braces herself. Her hands clutching the door frame on both sides. Fingers digging into the unfinished wood trim. Her head thrown back as her chest heaves for breathes. Each one harder to control and the sounds begin to escape her.
She bucks into me uncontrollably. Thrusting her pelvis at me, I rise and push her against the windowsill behind us. The mud-room is narrow; she pulls one leg up and pushes it against the opposite wall. Balanced, like a Ballerina.
I plunge my fingers into her and she pounds her foot against the wall. The sound echos in the small room. Her naked body pressed against the undressed window, in plain sight of the neighbors.
___
She doesn't care. She never has. Her comfort in her own skin surpasses societies modesty boundaries. It is just how she is. Most people come home from work and take off their shoes. She doesn't stop there, she takes off her pants and pulls her bra off through the sleeves of her t-shirt. Discarding them on the floor of the entrance. She prefers the freedom, and cares less about what others might think.
___
I am beneath her. Squaring myself under her wetness. Pulling her lips apart to expose all of her and taking her in with my eyes, then with my whole mouth. I pull my fingers out and she gasps. My tongue is strong and fierce in her, my wet fingers playing the rim of her anus like fingers on crystal. The hum, a vibrations on her clit.
Her legs give and she sits on the windowsill trying to catch her breath. I pull back and she again is fixated on my eyes. Her hand on the back of my head, grabbing a clump of hair and pushing my lips onto hers. She tastes herself on my lips. Licking her sweetness from around my mouth, like a mother cat cleaning her young.
My hands free I quickly relieve myself of my pants. Commando, my dick is immediately exposed. As hard as my will to keep her, I grind into her. Back and forth, up and down as deep in her as it would go. When I pulled my dick from her, she looked down at it glistening in the afternoon sun that flooded the room. Then I would slam back into her. Over and over again.
"Fuck me harder. I want the neighbors to hear me scream."
She demanded and I submitted. I grabbed her hips and held her solid on the ledge so that could thrust into her without her trying to pull back. She was so wet that we were both soaked in her sweetness.
I licked my thumb and placed it on her swollen clit. Rolling it under my thumb as I throbbed and pumped in her. Her legs trembled intensely and her screams louder and louder. Each breath a squeal and a gasp.
She was nearing orgasm and I pulled her onto me. Pushing my dick into her. Pulling her onto my dick. I froze. Pushed. She twitched and screamed and I gave her one last thrust. We exploded together. Then collapsed.
"I think the neighbors heard."
___
Later that night, I laid spooned behind her. Both my arms wrapping her tightly to my chest. Her breath quick and shallow, I rolled her over.
Salty tears streaming down her face, I kissed them away, but knew the storm had passed. Her thundering screams earlier was the sound of her letting me loose from her heart. She was no longer conflicted. Her decision made.
With my thumb, I pushed her tears away. She replaced them. Breathing hard. Willing them to stop but with every thought they came harder.
"It is okay." I whispered into her breath. "Honey, it's okay. I know. It is okay. This is how it's meant to be. Be happy for what you feel. Happy to be alive and feeling it."
I let go, accepting that these moments were our last. She exhaled. Pulled her knees to her chest and curled herself in the nook my body created for her. She pushed up against me as close as she could. One last crash of thunder, and the sky lit up. I tightened my arms trying to pull her inside me. Sharing one body, for one last night.
___
In the end, she was my only fear. Her independence. That she didn't need me, and that wanting me would be fleeting. He'd sustained the storms for nearly a decade. Wrung each other out. Waded through the mud to higher ground. Earning a place that I tried to build, but could never finish.
He will be worthy. And with her heart, shall he never be reckless.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
February 01, 2009
A Proper Bow-Tie
By Betty Underground © 2008
I woke up groggy. Mouth coated in the taste of scotch and cigars. Where am I? What time is it? The haze quickly clears and I am in a complete panic.
"Shit shit shit. What time is it?"
It's daylight still. We'd dozed off but we couldn't have been asleep too long. My heart races as I spring from the bed and frantically rummage through the clothes on the floor.
Pant pocket. Check every pant pocket. Why do men insist on wearing safari pants with so many god forsaking pockets.
In the last one, a cell phone.
Hearing voices I glance out the window. The crowd is assembling across the lawn. Our friends. Dressed in wedding frocks.
Flip open the cell phone. "4:30." I scream. "Get up! The wedding starts in thirty minutes."
"No it doesn't. It's at 6pm."
On the bedside table is the invitation. I reach over him for it, with a grasp on a clump of his hair on the other hand I pull his buried face from the pillow. Pointing at the text, "Wedding, 5pm."
"Shit."
"You. In the shower," I command, pointing to the bathroom. "I'll get your tux."
I wrap the bed sheet around me. 250 thread count. Scratchy. I hate the fucking country.
His growl booms from the bathroom. Eerie in it's calm. "SOAP?! There isn't any in here. Can you grab my shampoo from my dop kit and the soap off the sink?"
I toss the soap over the shower curtain and dig through the dop kit. How does one man require so much shit to look good?
I pull back the shower curtain, holding the dop kit, "I can't find any shampoo in here!"
He reaches in and pulls out an unmarked container of white stuff. He grins. That slight sideways grin so comfortably familiar already.
"You really should label that shampoo if you ever expect me to help you again. I suppose this other container of pinkish stuff is conditioner. You want that too?" I say, rather snarky.
He grins. Wraps his water soaked arms around me, lifts me over the tub wall and into the shower. The contents of the dop kit scatter across the floor. The sheet still around me is soaked and clinging to my shape. "Sexy," he says giving me a full glance from head to toe. I remain fixed on the upper part of his body, working against the force of gravity to not look down. I try to speak. To discourage his next thought, but before I can he is pinning me to the tile wall, warmed from the heat of the water. He presses his soapy body against me. Roaming hands and body slippery as he is devouring me. The steam filled air is heavy and my head grows lighter. My knees weaken below me and I push him back into the stream, "This is not going to help us get ready any faster."
I wad the wet sheet up, wonder, "What will the maid think," and wrap a towel around myself.
I lay out the pieces of his tuxedo. Pants, shirt, coat, bow-tie. The cuff links from his grand father and the expensive watch he treated himself to. He finishes the primping process. Gathering the necessary toiletries strewn across the bathroom floor one by one, as he needs them. The hair dryer goes off, my cue to do my most favorite thing; run my fingers through his dried, loose, locks and secure them in the back in a short ponytail. I love the way his soft hair feels between my fingers, the curls twirl around them, fighting against the taming. Then he tones, moisturizes and brushes. In that order.
He dresses as I dig through the pile of mutual clothing tossed on the floor for the pieces that I came in wearing.
"Shit." I spin around and see him holding one end of a piece of black fabric. "I don't know how to tie a fucking bow-tie. Why isn't it pre-tied?!"
I had gotten as far as finding my panties and a wife-beater. His. "Let me do that."
"You know how to tie a bow-tie?"
"Yes. Age = Wisdom = me knowing how to tie a proper bow-tie." I finish, close my eyes and breath him in one last time. He smells of cedar and nectarines. "There you go. Perfect. You look perfectly dashing."
"You'll never stop amazing me."
"Get your jacket and get out of here. I have to get back to my cabin without that crowd of people seeing me!" I say pointing out the window.
One final hesitation in his step before he leaves. The screen door slams and I put on the rest of my clothes and plot the best route to avoid being seen.
The screen door slams again and my heart leaps out of my chest. I freeze. Who just came in.
There he is, standing in the doorway to the room with a panicked look. "The ring. Where is the ring?"
"Crap. Where was the ring?"
"In my dop kit."
"The dop kit you tossed on the floor before dragging me into the shower?'
He sheepishly grins, "Yep."
It is 5:53. I scurry to the bathroom and kick a little black box across the floor. "Found it." I open the box. "Eternity band. Nice." I hand it to him, "Put it in your pocket. No, not that pocket, your breast pocket. You don't want to loose it again!" Pushing him out the door, "Now go. Get. They may not notice if I show up late, but trust me, if the groom shows up late, people will notice. Now, go. Get married."
(alarm sounds)
I shoot up in bed. No one laying next to me. It is 5:30am. My room. My bed. A dream.
For now.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
I woke up groggy. Mouth coated in the taste of scotch and cigars. Where am I? What time is it? The haze quickly clears and I am in a complete panic.
"Shit shit shit. What time is it?"
It's daylight still. We'd dozed off but we couldn't have been asleep too long. My heart races as I spring from the bed and frantically rummage through the clothes on the floor.
Pant pocket. Check every pant pocket. Why do men insist on wearing safari pants with so many god forsaking pockets.
In the last one, a cell phone.
Hearing voices I glance out the window. The crowd is assembling across the lawn. Our friends. Dressed in wedding frocks.
Flip open the cell phone. "4:30." I scream. "Get up! The wedding starts in thirty minutes."
"No it doesn't. It's at 6pm."
On the bedside table is the invitation. I reach over him for it, with a grasp on a clump of his hair on the other hand I pull his buried face from the pillow. Pointing at the text, "Wedding, 5pm."
"Shit."
"You. In the shower," I command, pointing to the bathroom. "I'll get your tux."
I wrap the bed sheet around me. 250 thread count. Scratchy. I hate the fucking country.
His growl booms from the bathroom. Eerie in it's calm. "SOAP?! There isn't any in here. Can you grab my shampoo from my dop kit and the soap off the sink?"
I toss the soap over the shower curtain and dig through the dop kit. How does one man require so much shit to look good?
I pull back the shower curtain, holding the dop kit, "I can't find any shampoo in here!"
He reaches in and pulls out an unmarked container of white stuff. He grins. That slight sideways grin so comfortably familiar already.
"You really should label that shampoo if you ever expect me to help you again. I suppose this other container of pinkish stuff is conditioner. You want that too?" I say, rather snarky.
He grins. Wraps his water soaked arms around me, lifts me over the tub wall and into the shower. The contents of the dop kit scatter across the floor. The sheet still around me is soaked and clinging to my shape. "Sexy," he says giving me a full glance from head to toe. I remain fixed on the upper part of his body, working against the force of gravity to not look down. I try to speak. To discourage his next thought, but before I can he is pinning me to the tile wall, warmed from the heat of the water. He presses his soapy body against me. Roaming hands and body slippery as he is devouring me. The steam filled air is heavy and my head grows lighter. My knees weaken below me and I push him back into the stream, "This is not going to help us get ready any faster."
I wad the wet sheet up, wonder, "What will the maid think," and wrap a towel around myself.
I lay out the pieces of his tuxedo. Pants, shirt, coat, bow-tie. The cuff links from his grand father and the expensive watch he treated himself to. He finishes the primping process. Gathering the necessary toiletries strewn across the bathroom floor one by one, as he needs them. The hair dryer goes off, my cue to do my most favorite thing; run my fingers through his dried, loose, locks and secure them in the back in a short ponytail. I love the way his soft hair feels between my fingers, the curls twirl around them, fighting against the taming. Then he tones, moisturizes and brushes. In that order.
He dresses as I dig through the pile of mutual clothing tossed on the floor for the pieces that I came in wearing.
"Shit." I spin around and see him holding one end of a piece of black fabric. "I don't know how to tie a fucking bow-tie. Why isn't it pre-tied?!"
I had gotten as far as finding my panties and a wife-beater. His. "Let me do that."
"You know how to tie a bow-tie?"
"Yes. Age = Wisdom = me knowing how to tie a proper bow-tie." I finish, close my eyes and breath him in one last time. He smells of cedar and nectarines. "There you go. Perfect. You look perfectly dashing."
"You'll never stop amazing me."
"Get your jacket and get out of here. I have to get back to my cabin without that crowd of people seeing me!" I say pointing out the window.
One final hesitation in his step before he leaves. The screen door slams and I put on the rest of my clothes and plot the best route to avoid being seen.
The screen door slams again and my heart leaps out of my chest. I freeze. Who just came in.
There he is, standing in the doorway to the room with a panicked look. "The ring. Where is the ring?"
"Crap. Where was the ring?"
"In my dop kit."
"The dop kit you tossed on the floor before dragging me into the shower?'
He sheepishly grins, "Yep."
It is 5:53. I scurry to the bathroom and kick a little black box across the floor. "Found it." I open the box. "Eternity band. Nice." I hand it to him, "Put it in your pocket. No, not that pocket, your breast pocket. You don't want to loose it again!" Pushing him out the door, "Now go. Get. They may not notice if I show up late, but trust me, if the groom shows up late, people will notice. Now, go. Get married."
(alarm sounds)
I shoot up in bed. No one laying next to me. It is 5:30am. My room. My bed. A dream.
For now.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
December 03, 2008
Of All The Bars In NYC
By Betty Underground © 2008
When in New York, pretending to be a New Yorker comes easy. I like that when I walk fast, no one asks, "Why you in such a hurry." That when I jaywalk, I am part of a crowd—I do not stand out like someone disrespecting the law. And when you go out at 11:30 p.m. on a Monday for a cocktail, no one judges you. In fact, you are an early bird.
We left the hotel and headed east to the Village. We didn't have any particular destination, but in New York, you don't need one.
We made it a few blocks before the wind chill factor had cut through our layers and we reverted back to whiny Californians. We were in search of a quiet place to drink and chill and the amber lights from the bar across the street looked warm and welcoming. That and the crowd was sparse enough so that we could actually sit. Close to empty was more like it.
Sparse was also how we described the service. We sat at the bar and waited. And waited. I saw movement in the small kitchen off the right side of the bar but couldn’t catch the guy's attention. There was a waitress out back having a smoke but other than that it was just the two of them.
The interior was decorated with what looked like a pile of garage sale cast offs. License plates. Bad art on the walls. Pictures that resembled the ones that come with the frame and some old photos you might see on a college dorm wall. A pair of antlers hung over the bar, slightly off center. I chuckled, I would have totally hung those antlers slightly off-center too. There was a jukebox and a rusty old gas station pump tucked in a corner. Eclectic. A wee bit cluttered too.
We gave it a little more time but got annoyed with waiting so we decided to duck into the place next door instead.
Reaching for the door handle, we heard a voice.
"Sorry to keep you waiting ladies, first round is on me."
My friend turned to me with an ear-to-ear grin and it was easy to see, we were willing to forgive and forget. We were easy to win back.
I turned around and approached the bar with my friend in tow.
You know when you see someone and maybe it is the job you do or the frequency you travel to the same places, but you sort of recognize them and for some reason you can't put them in the context of where you are right then? Like when I had trouble placing that totally hot guy in Chelsea yesterday so I stared until I realized it was noted fashion photographer, Nigel Barker from "America's Next Top Model." This was sort of like that, but this person wasn't famous. I was having a hard time getting a solid look at him as he restocked the liquor bottles behind and under the bar. Chatting us up, pulling our Blue Moons. Friendly enough bartender, but it was nagging at me. Who was he? My friend was talking to me and I was completely ignoring her, fixated on trying to get a head-on view of him.
Then he turned around, put the drinks in front of us and said "On me." He couldn't have been more spot-on. I proceeded to knock the entire beer in his direction. Yep, I do that sometimes when I am nervous, or a few seconds before I get nervous. I think at the same second he looked up at me, laughing at the beer streaming down his front, we both realized it. We knew each other.
He froze. I shook my head back and forth, half laughing, half wanting to shoot myself right there.
"Of all the bars in this city, did I seriously stumble into the one where you work?"
"Own."
"What?"
"I own this place. Mondays are usually slow so I give most my staff the night off. I work the bar and one of them takes the wait shift, but we close early so no one has to work too late. I used to just close up on Mondays but with football and all, I thought this was as good a place as any to watch the game and get a beer. Most my friends come in and hang out, but since the game is over, it has gotten quiet. I was just in the back putting away stock when you guys came in."
He was rambling. It is what he does when he gets nervous. Always the one with nerves of steel and here he was, drenched in beer, wearing his fingers down to the nubs trying to get a firm grip.
"I am going to run in the back and put on a fresh pair of jeans," and off he went.
I sat there, rather dumbfounded. I thought about leaving, but curiosity kept me there. That’s when I was struck by one of the pictures behind the bar. It was a guy in motorcycle leathers hugging a girl. He was facing the camera looking down as if he was listening to what she was whispering to him. All you could see was her back.
The waitress came around the bar. "Let me get you a fresh beer. He should be right back, he just lives upstairs."
She poured the beer and asked how I knew the bartender. My friend answered, "We don't, do we?" She was puzzled at my odd behavior.
"I know him."
"Really?" the waitress asked.
"I am the girl in that picture," I pointed.
"You guys must go way back. That was taken years ago."
"We do."
That cold December wind had blown me in to his bar. The Reason. The reason I came to New York so many years ago.
Now, he was upstairs changing and the only thought in my head was remembering how he used to go commando, sans underwear, and that he was just upstairs probably standing butt naked digging around in the clean laundry pile for a fresh pair of jeans. He never hung up the laundry--just left it in a pile and dug out the day’s clothes as he needed them.
My friend brought me back to the present when she asked how I knew him.
"I was engaged to him."
"That is him?"
"Seems like it is."
I heard his steps down the back stairs. Those heavy steel-toed boots. When he entered the room, he came around the bar to give me a hug. Like an old habit, my hands slid up under his t-shirt onto his bare back. "Your hands are freezing," he said, but didn't flinch. He just squeezed me tighter. My chin strained to rest on his shoulder. He was just a stitch too tall, so I tucked my gaze into the curve of his neck, and inhaled. Irish Spring®, just like I remembered. He joked that he showered with it to try and wash away being a Scotsman around my mildly disapproving Irish father.
I moved away from his neck, "Don't let go yet," he whispered. I pushed the tips of my fingers into his back. Arms wrapped tightly around him. The nerves rushed out of my body and I felt exhausted. His hair, blonde with those waves barely contained in a red rubber banded ponytail. I could have fell asleep, right there in the curve of his neck with the beat of his heart thumping against mine.
I felt a gust of wind and when I looked up, my friend was at the door, smiling. "I think I will head back to the hotel. I didn't realize how exhausted I was."
There was a couple at the end of the bar, him trying to convince her to come home with him and she caved. They left. It was a quarter past midnight. He followed them to the door and locked it behind them. The waitress went about her closing duties and he finished restocking the bar. I chugged my beer and asked for a refill and a side of whiskey. He poured two, neat. Our glasses raised, clinked together and the toast was a silent glare we shared. Squinting a bit at each other with an acknowledged nod. Like old friends with a history.
He was in and out of the back. Doing whatever you do when you close down a bar for the night. We exchanged no words, only looks each time he poured another shot, always two. His waitress turned the stools up on the bar to mop.
"No need to do that. I will take care of it. You can head out."
She said it was nice to meet me and although I never got her name, something told me she knew mine.
She went out the back and he pulled the bar stools around me back down. Pulled one up next to me, held his glass and waited for me. Our glasses met and hovered together for what seemed like forever.
"Here's to the wind," he finally said.
He told me a little about what he had been up to in the five years since we had seen each other. I shared a few of my own tales. He was holding my hands, playing with the ring on my right hand, snapping and unsnapping the leather band around my wrist. He was completely attentive. Actively listening and engaging and yet slightly distracted. Fidgety. I wiggled the tip of my finger in a hole on the knee of his jean and alternated that with spinning the silver ring around his thumb. He scratched my ring finger and felt the void that his engagement ring once filled. He took my hand in his, stood up and led me off the bar stool. I followed behind him, both his hands wrapped around mine, through the kitchen where he paused to turn off all the lights, and up the back stairs.
I hesitated. Anxiety. Panic. Resolve.
Betty Underground is a writer who currently resides in Montana.
When in New York, pretending to be a New Yorker comes easy. I like that when I walk fast, no one asks, "Why you in such a hurry." That when I jaywalk, I am part of a crowd—I do not stand out like someone disrespecting the law. And when you go out at 11:30 p.m. on a Monday for a cocktail, no one judges you. In fact, you are an early bird.
We left the hotel and headed east to the Village. We didn't have any particular destination, but in New York, you don't need one.
We made it a few blocks before the wind chill factor had cut through our layers and we reverted back to whiny Californians. We were in search of a quiet place to drink and chill and the amber lights from the bar across the street looked warm and welcoming. That and the crowd was sparse enough so that we could actually sit. Close to empty was more like it.
Sparse was also how we described the service. We sat at the bar and waited. And waited. I saw movement in the small kitchen off the right side of the bar but couldn’t catch the guy's attention. There was a waitress out back having a smoke but other than that it was just the two of them.
The interior was decorated with what looked like a pile of garage sale cast offs. License plates. Bad art on the walls. Pictures that resembled the ones that come with the frame and some old photos you might see on a college dorm wall. A pair of antlers hung over the bar, slightly off center. I chuckled, I would have totally hung those antlers slightly off-center too. There was a jukebox and a rusty old gas station pump tucked in a corner. Eclectic. A wee bit cluttered too.
We gave it a little more time but got annoyed with waiting so we decided to duck into the place next door instead.
Reaching for the door handle, we heard a voice.
"Sorry to keep you waiting ladies, first round is on me."
My friend turned to me with an ear-to-ear grin and it was easy to see, we were willing to forgive and forget. We were easy to win back.
I turned around and approached the bar with my friend in tow.
You know when you see someone and maybe it is the job you do or the frequency you travel to the same places, but you sort of recognize them and for some reason you can't put them in the context of where you are right then? Like when I had trouble placing that totally hot guy in Chelsea yesterday so I stared until I realized it was noted fashion photographer, Nigel Barker from "America's Next Top Model." This was sort of like that, but this person wasn't famous. I was having a hard time getting a solid look at him as he restocked the liquor bottles behind and under the bar. Chatting us up, pulling our Blue Moons. Friendly enough bartender, but it was nagging at me. Who was he? My friend was talking to me and I was completely ignoring her, fixated on trying to get a head-on view of him.
Then he turned around, put the drinks in front of us and said "On me." He couldn't have been more spot-on. I proceeded to knock the entire beer in his direction. Yep, I do that sometimes when I am nervous, or a few seconds before I get nervous. I think at the same second he looked up at me, laughing at the beer streaming down his front, we both realized it. We knew each other.
He froze. I shook my head back and forth, half laughing, half wanting to shoot myself right there.
"Of all the bars in this city, did I seriously stumble into the one where you work?"
"Own."
"What?"
"I own this place. Mondays are usually slow so I give most my staff the night off. I work the bar and one of them takes the wait shift, but we close early so no one has to work too late. I used to just close up on Mondays but with football and all, I thought this was as good a place as any to watch the game and get a beer. Most my friends come in and hang out, but since the game is over, it has gotten quiet. I was just in the back putting away stock when you guys came in."
He was rambling. It is what he does when he gets nervous. Always the one with nerves of steel and here he was, drenched in beer, wearing his fingers down to the nubs trying to get a firm grip.
"I am going to run in the back and put on a fresh pair of jeans," and off he went.
I sat there, rather dumbfounded. I thought about leaving, but curiosity kept me there. That’s when I was struck by one of the pictures behind the bar. It was a guy in motorcycle leathers hugging a girl. He was facing the camera looking down as if he was listening to what she was whispering to him. All you could see was her back.
The waitress came around the bar. "Let me get you a fresh beer. He should be right back, he just lives upstairs."
She poured the beer and asked how I knew the bartender. My friend answered, "We don't, do we?" She was puzzled at my odd behavior.
"I know him."
"Really?" the waitress asked.
"I am the girl in that picture," I pointed.
"You guys must go way back. That was taken years ago."
"We do."
That cold December wind had blown me in to his bar. The Reason. The reason I came to New York so many years ago.
Now, he was upstairs changing and the only thought in my head was remembering how he used to go commando, sans underwear, and that he was just upstairs probably standing butt naked digging around in the clean laundry pile for a fresh pair of jeans. He never hung up the laundry--just left it in a pile and dug out the day’s clothes as he needed them.
My friend brought me back to the present when she asked how I knew him.
"I was engaged to him."
"That is him?"
"Seems like it is."
I heard his steps down the back stairs. Those heavy steel-toed boots. When he entered the room, he came around the bar to give me a hug. Like an old habit, my hands slid up under his t-shirt onto his bare back. "Your hands are freezing," he said, but didn't flinch. He just squeezed me tighter. My chin strained to rest on his shoulder. He was just a stitch too tall, so I tucked my gaze into the curve of his neck, and inhaled. Irish Spring®, just like I remembered. He joked that he showered with it to try and wash away being a Scotsman around my mildly disapproving Irish father.
I moved away from his neck, "Don't let go yet," he whispered. I pushed the tips of my fingers into his back. Arms wrapped tightly around him. The nerves rushed out of my body and I felt exhausted. His hair, blonde with those waves barely contained in a red rubber banded ponytail. I could have fell asleep, right there in the curve of his neck with the beat of his heart thumping against mine.
I felt a gust of wind and when I looked up, my friend was at the door, smiling. "I think I will head back to the hotel. I didn't realize how exhausted I was."
There was a couple at the end of the bar, him trying to convince her to come home with him and she caved. They left. It was a quarter past midnight. He followed them to the door and locked it behind them. The waitress went about her closing duties and he finished restocking the bar. I chugged my beer and asked for a refill and a side of whiskey. He poured two, neat. Our glasses raised, clinked together and the toast was a silent glare we shared. Squinting a bit at each other with an acknowledged nod. Like old friends with a history.
He was in and out of the back. Doing whatever you do when you close down a bar for the night. We exchanged no words, only looks each time he poured another shot, always two. His waitress turned the stools up on the bar to mop.
"No need to do that. I will take care of it. You can head out."
She said it was nice to meet me and although I never got her name, something told me she knew mine.
She went out the back and he pulled the bar stools around me back down. Pulled one up next to me, held his glass and waited for me. Our glasses met and hovered together for what seemed like forever.
"Here's to the wind," he finally said.
He told me a little about what he had been up to in the five years since we had seen each other. I shared a few of my own tales. He was holding my hands, playing with the ring on my right hand, snapping and unsnapping the leather band around my wrist. He was completely attentive. Actively listening and engaging and yet slightly distracted. Fidgety. I wiggled the tip of my finger in a hole on the knee of his jean and alternated that with spinning the silver ring around his thumb. He scratched my ring finger and felt the void that his engagement ring once filled. He took my hand in his, stood up and led me off the bar stool. I followed behind him, both his hands wrapped around mine, through the kitchen where he paused to turn off all the lights, and up the back stairs.
I hesitated. Anxiety. Panic. Resolve.
Betty Underground is a writer who currently resides in Montana.
August 02, 2008
Black Hole Sun
By Betty Underground © 2008
I can't remember how we became friends. We worked for the same company. He had a crush on my best friend at the time. Still, our paths were not even parallel. I think the friendship came at a time when I had become a relationship guru. Avoiding my own shortcomings and turning my efforts to advising others.
Michael was an oddly skinny man. Probably the same age as me but not covering the grey as insistently as I was. He had a full case of it, and it was boofy. Making his head look awkwardly large on his narrow shoulders and slight frame. Not unattractive, but just not enough of him to have me frothing at the gash. I like men with a little meat on his bones and I certainly don't want to outweigh them.
He wore glasses. An intellectual nerdy type who had been trying to break into acting his whole life. He had some luck with voice overs, but he couldn't find a niche for his unique "character" look. So, he worked in technology to pay the bills.
And, he smoked. In his car. With the windows rolled up. In his house, with the windows closed. I imagined his curtains stained yellow. I had never been inside. Dropped him off a few times. His cat sitting in the window, desperate for a gasp of fresh air. He smoked so much, his skin smelled like an ashtray. Even when we would meet for morning coffee. Fresh out of the shower, his skin still smelled. A cloud followed him, so all our interactions took place outside. We would sit for hours and drink coffee and chat. Good conversation and he was kind enough to not smoke when I was trying to quit. But the smell. It was in his pores. The phlegmy cough triggered my gag reflex. He would spit into his empty ice coffee cup. The clear ones.
He had come off a rough break-up with a long time live-in girlfriend. He had over extended himself getting a two bedroom place and helping her finish law school. She worked part time. Selling subscriptions over the phone. So it would be safe to say he supplemented more than the rent. One day, out of the blue, she left him. High and dry. Ran off. Couldn't take it anymore and was out. Never knew why. Something got to the boiling point and she high-tailed it out. Leaving him with the lease.
He was bitter. I don't know if it was justified because I only heard his half. Of course, it was all her fault. But, he was also desperate to love. Wanted that companionship so bad. He was a great guy. Smart. Creative. Making good money at his tech job. Waiting to be discovered. He had potential. He even had social skills. He could easily "woo" a gal. Maybe easier if he quit smoking but I have a thing about smells. Not everyone does.
One day, we were doing our coffee talk thing, and he busted it out. He had met someone. Head. Over. Heels. Came out of left field. He had been waiting until he was sure. Until she confirmed she was there as well. On the same page.
So he started from the beginning. He had meet her at her work. Had gone in one night for a drink and a light nibble. He was drawn to her. Magnetic as he described it. When she got off work, she sat with him. They talked for hours. He felt inspired. They came from the same struggles. She had come from Arizona with a guitar and a dream. She was going to make it big in Hollywood. Still thought she might, but like him, her dreams were hard to bring to reality.
A producer took advantage of her. Took her cash with the promise of a demo tape and head shots. She had nothing. Except her looks and rent 15 days past due.
Down near LAX was a strip of joints full of girls just like her. She started just serving drinks but the draw of the money she could make on stage was too great. A few months and she could build a nest egg. Get ahead on her rent. New head shots and a real demo tape. It would only be for a few months. Then she would quit and put her all back into her music. Give Hollywood another chance.
That was seven years before he met her. The money was addicting even if the work turned her stomach inside out. She set her goals higher. Further from reach. Further from her dream. It turned into stuff. Getting stuff. A house. A BMW. Shopping on Rodeo Dr. without a care. Things. These things that would make her complete.
Her dreams of stardom, crushed beneath lucite stilettos.
He told me he wanted to pull her back into the sunlight. Her spirit was strong and he trusted her talent was too. He fell hard and fast that first night. His eyes enveloped her as he watched her dance. Her breath impressed on his heart when she sat, for hours, just talking. Together, they would put their dreams back on course. All this, in the first night. The night he met her at the strip club where she worked. A stripper. Talking to him after work. Wanting nothing from him.
Why did I have trouble wrapping my head around it? In typical fashion I was skeptical. He wasn't shelling out cash for her. Except when she was on stage. He visited her every night she worked. Her protector. Sitting in the dark corner.
She didn't need his money. She appeared to enjoy his time. They saw each other a few times outside of work. Dated. Nothing physical. She even told him her real name. Susie. That is something. Right? Still, there was something that smelled fowl.
I caught a strong whiff when he told me she lost her lease. Because she declined advances from the apartment manager. I know those Hollywood scum-bag types. It was likely completely true. She didn't feel right staying and needed a place to stay. ASAP. Michael offered his apartment. He had two bedrooms and could really use the help with the rent. A financially responsible decision. It would help them both out. Strictly platonic but he hoped if they played house, something more might come of it.
He made a key for her. She moved in while he was at work and when he got home, a full spread on the living room floor. A picnic of home cooked food to say thank you. She did this most every night for him. Made him a hot meal and if their paths didn't cross before she headed out to the club, she left it in the microwave for him. With heating instructions.
I was ready to stand corrected. Hell, I was even liking her.
Then, I met her.
Just for coffee on a Sunday. Our place was in the heart of the parade of beautiful people in Hollywood. I loved it there. The people watching unparalleled. He and I would guess what theirs lives were like when they passed by. Judged. It was a game. An equation. The number of gaudy designer labels divisible by their debt-to-income ratio and you could peg them with in a digit of their zip code. We summed up everyone. As we did, jealousy bubbled in her. Rage, suppressed. Quivering each time he turned his head to look. Gazelle like women with super model looks. If one glanced back and him, she latched to him. Tighter. It was uncomfortable to sit across from.
He headed off to an acting class and I avoided the awkwardness of remaining behind with her by offering up the excuse of needing to get to the market. She smiled. Hugged me. As I turned away from her I noticed her eyes. They had gone black. Cold and empty. Glazed over. Freaked me out.
Men, she controlled. Their wanton desire in her hands. Eating out of them. They gave her money to feel whole. With women, she competed for that money. Competed for the desire of men. In her job. But she could not separate it from life outside the dark, twinkle-lit stage, of the strip joint. Lining the street to LAX. The road to escape.
I couldn't get her face out of my head. Blank and full of jealousy. Not directed at me, but me as part of the female species. As a representative of the sex that threatened her the most.
That was the last time I spoke to Michael. I left town shortly after and wondered, for a little while, about what might have become of them both. Then something told me, I didn't want to know. Los Angeles can be unkind to the weak hearted. The devil lives in those streets. Grabbing at the ankles of the impressionable. Leading them to the rewards of temptation.
I knew a few strippers in the years I was there. The level headed kind. It was a job and pleasure was never mixed in. They were clean. No drugs. No booze and houses in the Hollywood Hills. Dare, I say, they were respected. Had great stories. Like Vegas Pit-Bosses. Stories of temptation and poor judgment. Stupidity and loss. You couldn't help but laugh at how gullible men were. And sad ones. Stories of girls that the devil swallowed and spit out. Black hearted and covered in distrust. Girls that might have had a chance if someone hadn't taken advantage of them. Stories about girls like Susie.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
I can't remember how we became friends. We worked for the same company. He had a crush on my best friend at the time. Still, our paths were not even parallel. I think the friendship came at a time when I had become a relationship guru. Avoiding my own shortcomings and turning my efforts to advising others.
Michael was an oddly skinny man. Probably the same age as me but not covering the grey as insistently as I was. He had a full case of it, and it was boofy. Making his head look awkwardly large on his narrow shoulders and slight frame. Not unattractive, but just not enough of him to have me frothing at the gash. I like men with a little meat on his bones and I certainly don't want to outweigh them.
He wore glasses. An intellectual nerdy type who had been trying to break into acting his whole life. He had some luck with voice overs, but he couldn't find a niche for his unique "character" look. So, he worked in technology to pay the bills.
And, he smoked. In his car. With the windows rolled up. In his house, with the windows closed. I imagined his curtains stained yellow. I had never been inside. Dropped him off a few times. His cat sitting in the window, desperate for a gasp of fresh air. He smoked so much, his skin smelled like an ashtray. Even when we would meet for morning coffee. Fresh out of the shower, his skin still smelled. A cloud followed him, so all our interactions took place outside. We would sit for hours and drink coffee and chat. Good conversation and he was kind enough to not smoke when I was trying to quit. But the smell. It was in his pores. The phlegmy cough triggered my gag reflex. He would spit into his empty ice coffee cup. The clear ones.
He had come off a rough break-up with a long time live-in girlfriend. He had over extended himself getting a two bedroom place and helping her finish law school. She worked part time. Selling subscriptions over the phone. So it would be safe to say he supplemented more than the rent. One day, out of the blue, she left him. High and dry. Ran off. Couldn't take it anymore and was out. Never knew why. Something got to the boiling point and she high-tailed it out. Leaving him with the lease.
He was bitter. I don't know if it was justified because I only heard his half. Of course, it was all her fault. But, he was also desperate to love. Wanted that companionship so bad. He was a great guy. Smart. Creative. Making good money at his tech job. Waiting to be discovered. He had potential. He even had social skills. He could easily "woo" a gal. Maybe easier if he quit smoking but I have a thing about smells. Not everyone does.
One day, we were doing our coffee talk thing, and he busted it out. He had met someone. Head. Over. Heels. Came out of left field. He had been waiting until he was sure. Until she confirmed she was there as well. On the same page.
So he started from the beginning. He had meet her at her work. Had gone in one night for a drink and a light nibble. He was drawn to her. Magnetic as he described it. When she got off work, she sat with him. They talked for hours. He felt inspired. They came from the same struggles. She had come from Arizona with a guitar and a dream. She was going to make it big in Hollywood. Still thought she might, but like him, her dreams were hard to bring to reality.
A producer took advantage of her. Took her cash with the promise of a demo tape and head shots. She had nothing. Except her looks and rent 15 days past due.
Down near LAX was a strip of joints full of girls just like her. She started just serving drinks but the draw of the money she could make on stage was too great. A few months and she could build a nest egg. Get ahead on her rent. New head shots and a real demo tape. It would only be for a few months. Then she would quit and put her all back into her music. Give Hollywood another chance.
That was seven years before he met her. The money was addicting even if the work turned her stomach inside out. She set her goals higher. Further from reach. Further from her dream. It turned into stuff. Getting stuff. A house. A BMW. Shopping on Rodeo Dr. without a care. Things. These things that would make her complete.
Her dreams of stardom, crushed beneath lucite stilettos.
He told me he wanted to pull her back into the sunlight. Her spirit was strong and he trusted her talent was too. He fell hard and fast that first night. His eyes enveloped her as he watched her dance. Her breath impressed on his heart when she sat, for hours, just talking. Together, they would put their dreams back on course. All this, in the first night. The night he met her at the strip club where she worked. A stripper. Talking to him after work. Wanting nothing from him.
Why did I have trouble wrapping my head around it? In typical fashion I was skeptical. He wasn't shelling out cash for her. Except when she was on stage. He visited her every night she worked. Her protector. Sitting in the dark corner.
She didn't need his money. She appeared to enjoy his time. They saw each other a few times outside of work. Dated. Nothing physical. She even told him her real name. Susie. That is something. Right? Still, there was something that smelled fowl.
I caught a strong whiff when he told me she lost her lease. Because she declined advances from the apartment manager. I know those Hollywood scum-bag types. It was likely completely true. She didn't feel right staying and needed a place to stay. ASAP. Michael offered his apartment. He had two bedrooms and could really use the help with the rent. A financially responsible decision. It would help them both out. Strictly platonic but he hoped if they played house, something more might come of it.
He made a key for her. She moved in while he was at work and when he got home, a full spread on the living room floor. A picnic of home cooked food to say thank you. She did this most every night for him. Made him a hot meal and if their paths didn't cross before she headed out to the club, she left it in the microwave for him. With heating instructions.
I was ready to stand corrected. Hell, I was even liking her.
Then, I met her.
Just for coffee on a Sunday. Our place was in the heart of the parade of beautiful people in Hollywood. I loved it there. The people watching unparalleled. He and I would guess what theirs lives were like when they passed by. Judged. It was a game. An equation. The number of gaudy designer labels divisible by their debt-to-income ratio and you could peg them with in a digit of their zip code. We summed up everyone. As we did, jealousy bubbled in her. Rage, suppressed. Quivering each time he turned his head to look. Gazelle like women with super model looks. If one glanced back and him, she latched to him. Tighter. It was uncomfortable to sit across from.
He headed off to an acting class and I avoided the awkwardness of remaining behind with her by offering up the excuse of needing to get to the market. She smiled. Hugged me. As I turned away from her I noticed her eyes. They had gone black. Cold and empty. Glazed over. Freaked me out.
Men, she controlled. Their wanton desire in her hands. Eating out of them. They gave her money to feel whole. With women, she competed for that money. Competed for the desire of men. In her job. But she could not separate it from life outside the dark, twinkle-lit stage, of the strip joint. Lining the street to LAX. The road to escape.
I couldn't get her face out of my head. Blank and full of jealousy. Not directed at me, but me as part of the female species. As a representative of the sex that threatened her the most.
That was the last time I spoke to Michael. I left town shortly after and wondered, for a little while, about what might have become of them both. Then something told me, I didn't want to know. Los Angeles can be unkind to the weak hearted. The devil lives in those streets. Grabbing at the ankles of the impressionable. Leading them to the rewards of temptation.
I knew a few strippers in the years I was there. The level headed kind. It was a job and pleasure was never mixed in. They were clean. No drugs. No booze and houses in the Hollywood Hills. Dare, I say, they were respected. Had great stories. Like Vegas Pit-Bosses. Stories of temptation and poor judgment. Stupidity and loss. You couldn't help but laugh at how gullible men were. And sad ones. Stories of girls that the devil swallowed and spit out. Black hearted and covered in distrust. Girls that might have had a chance if someone hadn't taken advantage of them. Stories about girls like Susie.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
June 05, 2008
The Crucification of Kaminsky
By Betty Underground © 2008
In 1996 I moved into the house in Santa Monica Canyon. Wedged between Pacific Palisades and the Santa Monica Pier. Channel Rd and PCH. State Beach. Volleyball nets stretched across white sand. Roller bladders fighting for the attention of the boys at the spike.
It was the only team sport I had ever played with any regularity. The only one I enjoyed and was somewhat good at. Volleyball. Mixed doubles. 2 man teams.
I met Kam my first weekend at the house. Kramer, the consummate welcome wagon introduced me around the beach crew. Most of them locals. Living in and around the canyon. Like most everyone, he was blonde and tan. Towered nearly 6'7". A full foot plus on me and he was a lefty, with a right handed wind-up. Catching opponents completely off-guard irrespective of how many times they met him at the net. I was a digger and moved quickly in the sand. We would be a deadly pair.
The second weekend I met Monique La Bouche (The Mouth). Moni as they all seemed to be referring to her as. I soon learned she was a regular. Well, more of a fixture. In her bikini, wafting smell of coconut oil and the sound of sizzling flesh. A natural beauty but she could have used a sandwich. Bit skinny in my opinion.
She was Kam's friend. Roommate as it turned out, but the terms gave off an awkward appearance. She came with him everyday. Carrying a large stripped bag. Colorful. Reminded me of a Pousse Cafe and the contents were as lethal. She was a pill popper. Many of the beauties on State Beach were. They drank very little. A beer here and there, but consumed diet pills and speed at an alarming rate. One way to stay skinny.
The way she wiggled her jaw back and forth and rubbed her nose were tells about that other way girls were avoiding eating. Coke. I had been there. Knew the signs and the side effects. Paranoia. It started from the get go. Her crawling up his ass whenever I was around. Riddled with jealousy. Easiest thing was to hate me and she did an outstanding job making that clear.
"Get to know me bitch and I promise to give you a reason to hate me," I remember uttering under my breath one night at the local bar.
After the sun went down, we tracked sand into Marix's. A Tex Mex joint at the mouth of the canyon behind Patrick's Roadhouse. Taco Tuesdays were a big hit. Dollar Tacos and Dollar Margaritas, or free as Kenny the bartender was my upstairs neighbor. Fantastic neighbor for more than the free drunk; he took his shoes off before entering his apartment so he did not disturb me with his clunky boots on the hardwood floor.
There was Moni. Two steps behind Kam no matter where he was. I didn't think much of it. She seemed comfortable with everyone and Kam was kind and generous to her. She didn't seem to want the attention on men. Other than Kam. She was perfectly content hanging on his every word. I get the friend things, but this was suspect. I stayed out of it. She tossed me the stink eye and I would keep my distance.
They came and went together most of the time. Thursdays and Fridays she worked late so we never saw her at the volley ball courts those days. She would roll into whatever watering hole we were holding up later in the evening in her slinky hostess dress. She had a gig at some swanky restaurant that apparently paid a nice grip of cash. Enough so she only had to work two nights and one day shift. Sweet gig if you can get it. Not sure it paid well enough to support her habits.
I was in my late 20s. Newly single. Pulling shots (Espresso shots) on Main St. for a big wig coffee joint, training to be a manager and a decent wage was the reward to get up at 4 am. Leaving plenty of sun in the afternoon for court trim. Kam and I had been playing mixed doubles for 2 months, or so. Hitting our stride as a two man team and looking forward to the string of tournaments a few weeks away. We spent most every evening on the courts and then all of us tying a few on at the bar.
One evening, I dropped Kam off at home. He knocked and waited for her to let her in. Odd. She flashed a fake smile and pageant wave and I just rolled on. Later that same night I was hanging out on our communal deck overlooking PCH. Kam and Kenny cut through the alley across the street leading from Marix's. Moni and Kam had a falling out and he had made his way to the bar to wait for Kenny to get off. He needed a place to crash and Kenny had a couch. He was starting his gig working on the set build for Dante's Peak and looked in desperate need of a good nights sleep.
The next afternoon I queried him about what had happened. He was terribly out of sorts and hesitant to dive right into it. Lots of dancing around about the landlord and her having problems with her job. Her boss was hitting on her which I could tell enraged Kam. It was his nature to protect. Still there was something underneath the surface. I didn't push it. We just sat, talked about a whole lot of nothing and then he blurted it out. He and Moni were more than roommates.
They had dated a while back. Moved in together as a couple. He was in love with her and looked forward to planning their future. He hadn't realized how deep into the Hollywood drug scene she was. He was an athlete. Living clean. No drugs. Her habits had began to claw away at their future. He didn't want to give her up. He wanted to help her. Get her healthy again. So he stayed. Struggled through her withdrawals with her. Every step away from the drugs opened the door to more demons.
She was abandoned. Spending most of her younger years in Foster Care before being adopted at the age of 11. Her adopted father molested her. Her mother locked her and a younger sibling in the closet. Disappearing for hours to do god knows what. Returning in time to serve up cold tater tots and uncooked hot dogs.
Moni unloaded stories of a horrific childhood. Slowly. Feeding them to him one by one each time he took a step away from her. They tore Kam apart. The pain she had endured. He had seen the good in her and desperately wanted to heal her. Help her. Make her whole again. He was committed to her. When he told me the story, on the balcony that afternoon he was ripped apart. Shredded inside. I could see right through the thin exterior and into an empty soul. One that had been given over to her. To help her. Forsaking himself. He had been battling her addictions and demons for more than a year. I saw in his eyes, it had beaten him. He was lost.
In the past few months he had been trying to get her into therapy. He recognized this was bigger than him. More than he had to knowledge to fix. He also needed to be released for the prison the relationship had put him in. He convinced her to get help. She went. She was doing the work the therapist was giving her. Facing her past. That was when Kam tried to leave. The first time. He felt she would be more successful in her path to healing if she focused on her, and only her. He didn't want to create any distractions.
She lost it. Snapped. Locked herself in the bathroom screaming and crying. Kam sat outside the door. On the floor. Begging her to let him in, to let him hold her. He promised not to leave and the screaming subsided. Silence fell. The weight of his body against the door. Whispering to her through, the palm of his hand pressed on the door trying to feel her.
Slowly the latched lifted on the door and he fell in. Catching himself only inches from where she lay on the round white bath mat. Bleeding. Vertical slices in both wrists. He ripped his shirt into pieces and wrapped them around her wrists. Not thinking to call 911, he carried her to the car and sped off to the hospital.
They kept her, under psychiatric observation for the next 72 hours. She was released into his care and required to attend therapy. Kam took her to every appointment. Sat and waited for her. Lost his job because if it, but it didn't matter. He felt obligated.
Things got better. Bliss came back into the relationship. She was able to speak openly to him about these horrors. When she was 17, she became a prostitute. Her parents were never home. When they were, they were drunk and abusive. She ran away, but would send money back for her little brother. She got beaten up a lot. Learned to survive on the streets of Los Angeles. She had no self esteem. The diet pills made her skinny. Made her feel excepted in the land of the beautiful. The speed getting her through the days. Coke came at night, when she needed to escape her own mind. Her past.
She was getting help. Mending herself again and the road to recovery was one she travelled willingly. This time was different, she let him go. She understood why he had to be away from it. To give her the space she needed to build a foundation for her own happiness. Outside of him.
Two weeks later, she called and told him she was pregnant. That was about a month before I first met him. He knew the only right thing to do was ask her to marry him. He had morals and beliefs that simply would not allow him to let her give the baby up. Marriage was the right thing. He bought a ring and got down on one knee. At the beach, in front of everyone. This was going to fix her. Fix them. He was excited about the future.
The very next week, she miscarried. He struggled to wiggle loose from the commitment. The tragedy shaking him loose from the dream. She was not getting better. Not healing herself. Lying to him. But with every attempt to break loose, she unloaded another horror to churn the guilt. Guilt for leaving her so soon after the loss. Shoveling his inadequacies on him.
Her demons became his. He carried the weight of her past on his shoulders like a cross. Crucified for the life she had been given. Suffering for the sins of others. Unable to free himself. Cemented in the relationship. Nailed him to the ground. Dead in his tracks. Buried in his own desire to help her until he suffocated. Was torn down. Loosing his own will.
This is how things had been for the last month. They had separate rooms. Living more as roommates. Moving out is not made easy by the soaring rental prices and he needed to be quiet about seeking out a new living situation. Guys at the beach had their eyes open and were helping him find a place to land.
We played our first tournament. Took second place. Alex threw a huge party at his apartment on Montana Ave. It was the first night Kam was without her. A Saturday night. She would be coming after a hostess shift she had picked up because she had missed so much work. She needed the money.
Kam was happy. Smiling. Enjoying the friendship. He was a huge goofball. Hurling all six and a half feet of himself around the living room, dancing. He had sworn off the booze. Intoxicated by the freedom of the night and the happiness that filled his heart in those moments. Alex's roommate was heading off for the Billabong tour and it was shaping up to look like Kam would be able to take his room for a few months.
Then Moni arrived. And she brought his cross. His burden. She tried to get him to leave. Threatened to hurt herself. Cut herself. He couldn't take it. Told her he would meet her back at the house. Needed to clear his head. He wasn't angry, just broken. That happy joker. The life of the party was turned inside out. His empty soul exposed to everyone. He was embarrassed and bolted to the street. She was hot on his heals, Alex right behind her to put himself between them. She screamed and struggled against Alex's chest. Standing tall and firmly planted with his arms straight out. She could not budge him. Kam pulled away in his smurf blue Toyota FJ40 and headed down Montana. Probably towards PCH. The beach, where he would sit and clear his mind for a while.
Kramer and I checked the beach for him about an hour later. We didn't see his car parked in the State Beach parking lot just after midnight. Figured he was still out driving. Maybe headed up the coast to Malibu. Maybe to his parents place in Topanga Canyon. PCH was eerily quiet at night. Silent. Dark. No traffic. The traffic signal at PCH and Chautauqua changed for no one. Red. Green. Yellow. Red. Lights bouncing off the fog that blanketed the coast.
Early the next morning the house was buzzing. It was barely dawn and emergency vehicles had shut down PCH in both directions. A Sunday. Traffic rerouted up our street towards San Vicente. I walked down to the beach with Kramer and Kenny to see what was going on. We turned the corner by the liquor store and we saw it. A mangled twisted pile of smurf blue steal wedged into the cliff.
As the wreck came into focus, so did the gurney. A body, covered in a yellow plastic sheet. A bystander said the police thought the driver had flown down the California incline to PCH so fast that he catapulted the car into the side of the hill. Killed instantly. No one had seen it happen. The fog was solid. Like sludge that night. It wasn't until the first ray of sun hit the hillside just south of Patrick's Roadhouse that the wreck was discovered.
Nailed to the cross by her demons. Kam was dead at 28.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
In 1996 I moved into the house in Santa Monica Canyon. Wedged between Pacific Palisades and the Santa Monica Pier. Channel Rd and PCH. State Beach. Volleyball nets stretched across white sand. Roller bladders fighting for the attention of the boys at the spike.
It was the only team sport I had ever played with any regularity. The only one I enjoyed and was somewhat good at. Volleyball. Mixed doubles. 2 man teams.
I met Kam my first weekend at the house. Kramer, the consummate welcome wagon introduced me around the beach crew. Most of them locals. Living in and around the canyon. Like most everyone, he was blonde and tan. Towered nearly 6'7". A full foot plus on me and he was a lefty, with a right handed wind-up. Catching opponents completely off-guard irrespective of how many times they met him at the net. I was a digger and moved quickly in the sand. We would be a deadly pair.
The second weekend I met Monique La Bouche (The Mouth). Moni as they all seemed to be referring to her as. I soon learned she was a regular. Well, more of a fixture. In her bikini, wafting smell of coconut oil and the sound of sizzling flesh. A natural beauty but she could have used a sandwich. Bit skinny in my opinion.
She was Kam's friend. Roommate as it turned out, but the terms gave off an awkward appearance. She came with him everyday. Carrying a large stripped bag. Colorful. Reminded me of a Pousse Cafe and the contents were as lethal. She was a pill popper. Many of the beauties on State Beach were. They drank very little. A beer here and there, but consumed diet pills and speed at an alarming rate. One way to stay skinny.
The way she wiggled her jaw back and forth and rubbed her nose were tells about that other way girls were avoiding eating. Coke. I had been there. Knew the signs and the side effects. Paranoia. It started from the get go. Her crawling up his ass whenever I was around. Riddled with jealousy. Easiest thing was to hate me and she did an outstanding job making that clear.
"Get to know me bitch and I promise to give you a reason to hate me," I remember uttering under my breath one night at the local bar.
After the sun went down, we tracked sand into Marix's. A Tex Mex joint at the mouth of the canyon behind Patrick's Roadhouse. Taco Tuesdays were a big hit. Dollar Tacos and Dollar Margaritas, or free as Kenny the bartender was my upstairs neighbor. Fantastic neighbor for more than the free drunk; he took his shoes off before entering his apartment so he did not disturb me with his clunky boots on the hardwood floor.
There was Moni. Two steps behind Kam no matter where he was. I didn't think much of it. She seemed comfortable with everyone and Kam was kind and generous to her. She didn't seem to want the attention on men. Other than Kam. She was perfectly content hanging on his every word. I get the friend things, but this was suspect. I stayed out of it. She tossed me the stink eye and I would keep my distance.
They came and went together most of the time. Thursdays and Fridays she worked late so we never saw her at the volley ball courts those days. She would roll into whatever watering hole we were holding up later in the evening in her slinky hostess dress. She had a gig at some swanky restaurant that apparently paid a nice grip of cash. Enough so she only had to work two nights and one day shift. Sweet gig if you can get it. Not sure it paid well enough to support her habits.
I was in my late 20s. Newly single. Pulling shots (Espresso shots) on Main St. for a big wig coffee joint, training to be a manager and a decent wage was the reward to get up at 4 am. Leaving plenty of sun in the afternoon for court trim. Kam and I had been playing mixed doubles for 2 months, or so. Hitting our stride as a two man team and looking forward to the string of tournaments a few weeks away. We spent most every evening on the courts and then all of us tying a few on at the bar.
One evening, I dropped Kam off at home. He knocked and waited for her to let her in. Odd. She flashed a fake smile and pageant wave and I just rolled on. Later that same night I was hanging out on our communal deck overlooking PCH. Kam and Kenny cut through the alley across the street leading from Marix's. Moni and Kam had a falling out and he had made his way to the bar to wait for Kenny to get off. He needed a place to crash and Kenny had a couch. He was starting his gig working on the set build for Dante's Peak and looked in desperate need of a good nights sleep.
The next afternoon I queried him about what had happened. He was terribly out of sorts and hesitant to dive right into it. Lots of dancing around about the landlord and her having problems with her job. Her boss was hitting on her which I could tell enraged Kam. It was his nature to protect. Still there was something underneath the surface. I didn't push it. We just sat, talked about a whole lot of nothing and then he blurted it out. He and Moni were more than roommates.
They had dated a while back. Moved in together as a couple. He was in love with her and looked forward to planning their future. He hadn't realized how deep into the Hollywood drug scene she was. He was an athlete. Living clean. No drugs. Her habits had began to claw away at their future. He didn't want to give her up. He wanted to help her. Get her healthy again. So he stayed. Struggled through her withdrawals with her. Every step away from the drugs opened the door to more demons.
She was abandoned. Spending most of her younger years in Foster Care before being adopted at the age of 11. Her adopted father molested her. Her mother locked her and a younger sibling in the closet. Disappearing for hours to do god knows what. Returning in time to serve up cold tater tots and uncooked hot dogs.
Moni unloaded stories of a horrific childhood. Slowly. Feeding them to him one by one each time he took a step away from her. They tore Kam apart. The pain she had endured. He had seen the good in her and desperately wanted to heal her. Help her. Make her whole again. He was committed to her. When he told me the story, on the balcony that afternoon he was ripped apart. Shredded inside. I could see right through the thin exterior and into an empty soul. One that had been given over to her. To help her. Forsaking himself. He had been battling her addictions and demons for more than a year. I saw in his eyes, it had beaten him. He was lost.
In the past few months he had been trying to get her into therapy. He recognized this was bigger than him. More than he had to knowledge to fix. He also needed to be released for the prison the relationship had put him in. He convinced her to get help. She went. She was doing the work the therapist was giving her. Facing her past. That was when Kam tried to leave. The first time. He felt she would be more successful in her path to healing if she focused on her, and only her. He didn't want to create any distractions.
She lost it. Snapped. Locked herself in the bathroom screaming and crying. Kam sat outside the door. On the floor. Begging her to let him in, to let him hold her. He promised not to leave and the screaming subsided. Silence fell. The weight of his body against the door. Whispering to her through, the palm of his hand pressed on the door trying to feel her.
Slowly the latched lifted on the door and he fell in. Catching himself only inches from where she lay on the round white bath mat. Bleeding. Vertical slices in both wrists. He ripped his shirt into pieces and wrapped them around her wrists. Not thinking to call 911, he carried her to the car and sped off to the hospital.
They kept her, under psychiatric observation for the next 72 hours. She was released into his care and required to attend therapy. Kam took her to every appointment. Sat and waited for her. Lost his job because if it, but it didn't matter. He felt obligated.
Things got better. Bliss came back into the relationship. She was able to speak openly to him about these horrors. When she was 17, she became a prostitute. Her parents were never home. When they were, they were drunk and abusive. She ran away, but would send money back for her little brother. She got beaten up a lot. Learned to survive on the streets of Los Angeles. She had no self esteem. The diet pills made her skinny. Made her feel excepted in the land of the beautiful. The speed getting her through the days. Coke came at night, when she needed to escape her own mind. Her past.
She was getting help. Mending herself again and the road to recovery was one she travelled willingly. This time was different, she let him go. She understood why he had to be away from it. To give her the space she needed to build a foundation for her own happiness. Outside of him.
Two weeks later, she called and told him she was pregnant. That was about a month before I first met him. He knew the only right thing to do was ask her to marry him. He had morals and beliefs that simply would not allow him to let her give the baby up. Marriage was the right thing. He bought a ring and got down on one knee. At the beach, in front of everyone. This was going to fix her. Fix them. He was excited about the future.
The very next week, she miscarried. He struggled to wiggle loose from the commitment. The tragedy shaking him loose from the dream. She was not getting better. Not healing herself. Lying to him. But with every attempt to break loose, she unloaded another horror to churn the guilt. Guilt for leaving her so soon after the loss. Shoveling his inadequacies on him.
Her demons became his. He carried the weight of her past on his shoulders like a cross. Crucified for the life she had been given. Suffering for the sins of others. Unable to free himself. Cemented in the relationship. Nailed him to the ground. Dead in his tracks. Buried in his own desire to help her until he suffocated. Was torn down. Loosing his own will.
This is how things had been for the last month. They had separate rooms. Living more as roommates. Moving out is not made easy by the soaring rental prices and he needed to be quiet about seeking out a new living situation. Guys at the beach had their eyes open and were helping him find a place to land.
We played our first tournament. Took second place. Alex threw a huge party at his apartment on Montana Ave. It was the first night Kam was without her. A Saturday night. She would be coming after a hostess shift she had picked up because she had missed so much work. She needed the money.
Kam was happy. Smiling. Enjoying the friendship. He was a huge goofball. Hurling all six and a half feet of himself around the living room, dancing. He had sworn off the booze. Intoxicated by the freedom of the night and the happiness that filled his heart in those moments. Alex's roommate was heading off for the Billabong tour and it was shaping up to look like Kam would be able to take his room for a few months.
Then Moni arrived. And she brought his cross. His burden. She tried to get him to leave. Threatened to hurt herself. Cut herself. He couldn't take it. Told her he would meet her back at the house. Needed to clear his head. He wasn't angry, just broken. That happy joker. The life of the party was turned inside out. His empty soul exposed to everyone. He was embarrassed and bolted to the street. She was hot on his heals, Alex right behind her to put himself between them. She screamed and struggled against Alex's chest. Standing tall and firmly planted with his arms straight out. She could not budge him. Kam pulled away in his smurf blue Toyota FJ40 and headed down Montana. Probably towards PCH. The beach, where he would sit and clear his mind for a while.
Kramer and I checked the beach for him about an hour later. We didn't see his car parked in the State Beach parking lot just after midnight. Figured he was still out driving. Maybe headed up the coast to Malibu. Maybe to his parents place in Topanga Canyon. PCH was eerily quiet at night. Silent. Dark. No traffic. The traffic signal at PCH and Chautauqua changed for no one. Red. Green. Yellow. Red. Lights bouncing off the fog that blanketed the coast.
Early the next morning the house was buzzing. It was barely dawn and emergency vehicles had shut down PCH in both directions. A Sunday. Traffic rerouted up our street towards San Vicente. I walked down to the beach with Kramer and Kenny to see what was going on. We turned the corner by the liquor store and we saw it. A mangled twisted pile of smurf blue steal wedged into the cliff.
As the wreck came into focus, so did the gurney. A body, covered in a yellow plastic sheet. A bystander said the police thought the driver had flown down the California incline to PCH so fast that he catapulted the car into the side of the hill. Killed instantly. No one had seen it happen. The fog was solid. Like sludge that night. It wasn't until the first ray of sun hit the hillside just south of Patrick's Roadhouse that the wreck was discovered.
Nailed to the cross by her demons. Kam was dead at 28.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
April 07, 2008
Skinny Dipping for Christ
By Betty Underground © 2008
The poolside bar at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel had closed. The guests of the surrounding cabana rooms were continuing the party from their patios. A long way from retiring.
At the other end of the pool a barefoot young woman, steps to the edge of the pool. Slender. Blonde with alabaster skin. Flawless. Angelic. She steps out of her skirt and pulls her t-shirt over her head. Standing naked, starring down into the pool, still lit from below. Into the water like a ballerina. Extended legs. Toes pointed. Each step erasing her body from the night.
Flashes from the balcony. From the patios. Camera phone paparazzi. Her breasts still exposed, she walks deeper and dips under. Blonde locks floating on the surface for an instance. The crowd waits. Silence fallen over them. Her body gently piercing the still water. They watch. Lap after lap. She holds her breath from one end of the pool to the other. A breath taken, but never heard, and she dips under. The lights bouncing off her young, perfect body.
She exits from the steps. Again, slowly. With purpose. They are mesmerized. Forgetting the photo opportunity and becoming lost in her motion. An audience under her spell. She bends down for her clothes. The flashes ignite the darkness again.
When she turns back, now dressed, she sees him. At the edge of the far patio, starring at her. Summoning her to him. She sits next to him. Her legs extended the length of the white terry cloth covered lounge. Pulling her hair to the side to twist the water from it. Soaking the front of her t-shirt. The water pressing it to her breasts.
"Hi, I'm Sunny."
"That you are." He chimes with a cocky confidence. Not offering his name in return.
They chat. He is there visiting his sister in from New York. The room is hers. Not much is learned before an older man. Early 40s approaches to fetch her. Not a lover. Not a relative. A handler of sorts. Before she leaves she offers an invitation for the next evening. A group of her friends have rented a house off Mulholland Drive. She scribbles the address on the palm of his hands and leans to kiss him on the cheek.
He chuckles as she glides out of sight, "Only in LA."
_______
The next day he contemplates bringing a friend with him. No. He will go alone. Not unusual. He is confident in all situations and prefers to not have anyone running interference. Or reducing the opportunities.
Dressed in black. A dark horse. He gives nothing of him away. The devil. No disguise.
The house is thumping. Music from every corner. All the windows and doors thrown wide open. In the kitchen he stands with Sunny. Trying to focus on her. A parade of beauties coming from all angles. Passing by him. Waving. "Hi Sunny." None of them stopping. Carrying his gaze along with them as they move past.
In the rooms beyond him, more women. A few men. Mostly young and fashionable. Your typical Hollywood types. Over extended credit cards cowering under the purchases of True Religion Jeans. The older man from the night before he recognizes and becomes momentarily uncomfortable as he makes eye contact with Sunny.
Jasmine, dripping from the pool grabs his eye. The first one to take his attention from Sunny. She approaches and asks for an introduction. "Hi, I'm Wag." The first time Sunny has heard his name. She is equally stunning. Only with dark hair. A more exotic look. His type. Perfectly profiled.
They find a quiet place to chat. The conversation strained. Her eyes unfocused. Not altered. Just distant. The man from the night before sits with them. Asks about his religious beliefs. This is the wrong discussion to have with the devil. He is challenging of their questions. Rapidly realizing why he is there. He watches one of the young strapping bucks persuade a beauty to go into the nearby room with him. She is coy. Playful. Denying his advances. The older gentleman gets up to separate them.
Wag takes the opportunity as an out. Begins to say his good-byes. First to Sunny. She asks him for grocery money. He chuckles. Kisses her on the cheek and walks to the door with Jasmine. It is all clear to him. The adventure is only beginning. The one he will guide.
He agrees to come back the next night. To take Jasmine on a date. To dinner. Show her Hollywood.
_______
The next night he is prompt. Good manners. Dressed again in black. Jasmine keeps him waiting and when she is finally ready has a request. "Can a friend join us?"
"Sure." His hopes of a second lovely are dashed when a scrawny man, barely 21, appears to join them. He rolls his eyes. Not hiding the obvious scam being pulled. A meal ticket. Anyone else might have darted then and there. He decided it was lesson time.
Down into Hollywood. To Santa Monica Blvd. To the Pink Taco. Hip. Trendy. Perfect.
They order a round of drinks. No one reaches for their wallets. He waits. An inordinate amount of time as the tab is ignored.
Jasmine asks, "Why do they call it Pink Taco?" This is what he had hoped for. He summons the less than straight waiter. "Can you tell her why they call it Pink Taco?' The waiter laughs. He is happy to explain the origin of the Pink Taco. At full volume to the naive Jasmine and her scrawny man-child. You could tell, gay waiter boy lived for these moments. It is possibly the most rewarding part of his job. "Well duh honey. It is referring to your pretty pink snatch! You know, your pussy."
Mortified. Perfect. He tips gay waiter boy.
Their table ready, he settles up.
He suggests the appetizer plate. Just enough for them to get their stomach juices churning. He eats more than his share. Asking, "Can I have the last one." Not finishing his question before it hits his lips. Then he leans back in his seat. Forces his stomach out and declares, "Man am I stuffed. Wow, I could not eat another bite. I am done." Tosses his napkin on the plate. The "throw down", signifying the end of the meal.
"You guys full? Because I am. In fact, I am not sure that last tamale is sitting well with me. Do you mind if we got out of here?" He is up out of his seat before they can answer. Tosses the few bills to cover the food on the table and heads to the door.
In the car, he fills it with the smell of his flatulence. A skill any devilish mastermind needs. Rolling the window down and apologizing profusely. "Do you mind if I just drop you [burp] off?"
Barely rolling to a stop. Jasmine asks again if he can pitch in for groceries. The party the night before having cleaned them out. Not having eaten at dinner. She thought she was owed. Shameless. Unaware of what she was doing. Acting as she was asked to. Taught to.
God will bring food to her, but she had to ask for grocery money.
He suggests she try the pool at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. "Just be sure to make sure your mark is not a local, honey."
_______
Skinny Dipping for Christ. Only in LA
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
The poolside bar at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel had closed. The guests of the surrounding cabana rooms were continuing the party from their patios. A long way from retiring.
At the other end of the pool a barefoot young woman, steps to the edge of the pool. Slender. Blonde with alabaster skin. Flawless. Angelic. She steps out of her skirt and pulls her t-shirt over her head. Standing naked, starring down into the pool, still lit from below. Into the water like a ballerina. Extended legs. Toes pointed. Each step erasing her body from the night.
Flashes from the balcony. From the patios. Camera phone paparazzi. Her breasts still exposed, she walks deeper and dips under. Blonde locks floating on the surface for an instance. The crowd waits. Silence fallen over them. Her body gently piercing the still water. They watch. Lap after lap. She holds her breath from one end of the pool to the other. A breath taken, but never heard, and she dips under. The lights bouncing off her young, perfect body.
She exits from the steps. Again, slowly. With purpose. They are mesmerized. Forgetting the photo opportunity and becoming lost in her motion. An audience under her spell. She bends down for her clothes. The flashes ignite the darkness again.
When she turns back, now dressed, she sees him. At the edge of the far patio, starring at her. Summoning her to him. She sits next to him. Her legs extended the length of the white terry cloth covered lounge. Pulling her hair to the side to twist the water from it. Soaking the front of her t-shirt. The water pressing it to her breasts.
"Hi, I'm Sunny."
"That you are." He chimes with a cocky confidence. Not offering his name in return.
They chat. He is there visiting his sister in from New York. The room is hers. Not much is learned before an older man. Early 40s approaches to fetch her. Not a lover. Not a relative. A handler of sorts. Before she leaves she offers an invitation for the next evening. A group of her friends have rented a house off Mulholland Drive. She scribbles the address on the palm of his hands and leans to kiss him on the cheek.
He chuckles as she glides out of sight, "Only in LA."
_______
The next day he contemplates bringing a friend with him. No. He will go alone. Not unusual. He is confident in all situations and prefers to not have anyone running interference. Or reducing the opportunities.
Dressed in black. A dark horse. He gives nothing of him away. The devil. No disguise.
The house is thumping. Music from every corner. All the windows and doors thrown wide open. In the kitchen he stands with Sunny. Trying to focus on her. A parade of beauties coming from all angles. Passing by him. Waving. "Hi Sunny." None of them stopping. Carrying his gaze along with them as they move past.
In the rooms beyond him, more women. A few men. Mostly young and fashionable. Your typical Hollywood types. Over extended credit cards cowering under the purchases of True Religion Jeans. The older man from the night before he recognizes and becomes momentarily uncomfortable as he makes eye contact with Sunny.
Jasmine, dripping from the pool grabs his eye. The first one to take his attention from Sunny. She approaches and asks for an introduction. "Hi, I'm Wag." The first time Sunny has heard his name. She is equally stunning. Only with dark hair. A more exotic look. His type. Perfectly profiled.
They find a quiet place to chat. The conversation strained. Her eyes unfocused. Not altered. Just distant. The man from the night before sits with them. Asks about his religious beliefs. This is the wrong discussion to have with the devil. He is challenging of their questions. Rapidly realizing why he is there. He watches one of the young strapping bucks persuade a beauty to go into the nearby room with him. She is coy. Playful. Denying his advances. The older gentleman gets up to separate them.
Wag takes the opportunity as an out. Begins to say his good-byes. First to Sunny. She asks him for grocery money. He chuckles. Kisses her on the cheek and walks to the door with Jasmine. It is all clear to him. The adventure is only beginning. The one he will guide.
He agrees to come back the next night. To take Jasmine on a date. To dinner. Show her Hollywood.
_______
The next night he is prompt. Good manners. Dressed again in black. Jasmine keeps him waiting and when she is finally ready has a request. "Can a friend join us?"
"Sure." His hopes of a second lovely are dashed when a scrawny man, barely 21, appears to join them. He rolls his eyes. Not hiding the obvious scam being pulled. A meal ticket. Anyone else might have darted then and there. He decided it was lesson time.
Down into Hollywood. To Santa Monica Blvd. To the Pink Taco. Hip. Trendy. Perfect.
They order a round of drinks. No one reaches for their wallets. He waits. An inordinate amount of time as the tab is ignored.
Jasmine asks, "Why do they call it Pink Taco?" This is what he had hoped for. He summons the less than straight waiter. "Can you tell her why they call it Pink Taco?' The waiter laughs. He is happy to explain the origin of the Pink Taco. At full volume to the naive Jasmine and her scrawny man-child. You could tell, gay waiter boy lived for these moments. It is possibly the most rewarding part of his job. "Well duh honey. It is referring to your pretty pink snatch! You know, your pussy."
Mortified. Perfect. He tips gay waiter boy.
Their table ready, he settles up.
He suggests the appetizer plate. Just enough for them to get their stomach juices churning. He eats more than his share. Asking, "Can I have the last one." Not finishing his question before it hits his lips. Then he leans back in his seat. Forces his stomach out and declares, "Man am I stuffed. Wow, I could not eat another bite. I am done." Tosses his napkin on the plate. The "throw down", signifying the end of the meal.
"You guys full? Because I am. In fact, I am not sure that last tamale is sitting well with me. Do you mind if we got out of here?" He is up out of his seat before they can answer. Tosses the few bills to cover the food on the table and heads to the door.
In the car, he fills it with the smell of his flatulence. A skill any devilish mastermind needs. Rolling the window down and apologizing profusely. "Do you mind if I just drop you [burp] off?"
Barely rolling to a stop. Jasmine asks again if he can pitch in for groceries. The party the night before having cleaned them out. Not having eaten at dinner. She thought she was owed. Shameless. Unaware of what she was doing. Acting as she was asked to. Taught to.
God will bring food to her, but she had to ask for grocery money.
He suggests she try the pool at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. "Just be sure to make sure your mark is not a local, honey."
_______
Skinny Dipping for Christ. Only in LA
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
March 02, 2008
My LA
By Betty Underground © 2008
You either love it, or you hate it. Makes no difference if you are living at the beach or the pit of the San Gabriel Valley.
Traffic
It is spread out. Public transportation is still a joke, even with the recent addition of light rails from some outlying areas. It is still the most embarrassing display of a subway system. Not to mention, the whole thing could sink with a good hard November rain.
So, get used to it. You live in LA county, you are going to have to drive. Even when you get home to your "close to everything" overpriced apartment in a planned community, you are still going to have to drive.
Mapquest says that a trip from Manhattan Beach to Long Beach will take 35 minutes with traffic. Not with LA traffic! Double that time and bring a book. Murphy's Law of LA traffic; "When you allow for plenty of time, you will get there with a ridiculous surplus of time and nothing to do." Fall into the trap and cut that time down and you will be late. Sitting on any one of the dozens of LA freeways that look more like parking lots.
And parking. Forget it in certain areas. I was the World's Worst Parallel Parker. The. Worst. I would park super far away just to have enough room to pull my Ford Escort alongside a curb. I am not any better at it now.
I also avoided left hand turns like the plague. Would drive around the block to be pointed in the direction I wanted to go.
My apartment in Santa Monica Canyon had this ridiculously steep driveway. Simple right hand turn into it but then I had to quickly cut it hard to the right again to avoid plowing into the lower apartment. Getting out required backing out, blind, onto a major thoroughfare connecting Santa Monica commuters with both PCH and Sunset Blvd.
Accidents happening all around you on the freeway. The world's biggest spectator sport! Traffic is not because of the carnage in the road, it is from the rubberneckers trying to catch a glimpse of the blood and guts, only to be disappointed when it was a minor fender bender.
You drive in LA, you gotta be aggressive. Quick like a bunny with lightening reflexes. It is the only way to survive. Yeah a manual transmission gets better gas mileage, but there is no way you would get me worrying about an extra pedal when my life hangs in the balance as a Mack Truck barrels down my ass in the fast lane!
It takes skills, people. I had a friend who was terrified of driving in LA. She missed out on a lot and was tied to a job in the Promenade that she hated just so she could walk to it. Held hostage by LA drivers. Not that being a pedestrian is any safer. Seriously, the Car vs. Pedestrian accidents were some of the best gawking opportunities.
My father taught me to count to ten before I made a move when my light turned green. Whether I was walking or driving, you have to build in a ten second cushion to avoid loosing a limb.
I have been hit in crosswalks and wrecked my car plenty of times to offer up these warnings. Look both ways. Wait ten seconds. Look again and RUN.
Expenses
While not the Number One most expensive place to live, it is in the Top Ten. Running around Number Seven last I checked.
One of my bestest friends left LA and moved to Alaska. Gave himself a 8.5% raise because Alaska has no sales tax! That is close to three times the annual salary increase nationwide. Granted, it is ALASKA.
While housing is plentiful, a neighborhood can go from good to bad just by crossing the street! I lived in the ritzy Hancock Park area of LA but because of my proximity to the largest crime street (Western) I was mugged and my boyfriend's car was stolen.
Ellen DeGeneres lived three blocks away and I was a victim TWICE in less than a year!
Crime pays, pays big! The threat is everywhere, everyday but if you live like a victim, move about like a small frightened woodland creature, they will get you. Devour your innocence and spit out the bones. Hold onto your kids!
If you do find parking, you will pay for it. Either pumping a meter or a monthly paid parking rate. Commuting? Awesome for you, that will be $50 on parking at the station in addition to your rail pass. Oh, and don't go thinking you can get drunk after work and crash at a buddies house. You don't move your car from that lot, they will tow it away. No overnight parking. $500, thank you. Don't forget to watch the street cleaning signs. A stack of those tickets because you forgot to move your car on Franklin before 5 AM on Tuesday, $45 dollars each, adds up to a months rent. Thanks!
The water is horrible in LA, so you will be paying to have it delivered in five-gallon jugs. Cha-Ching.
You name it, it will cost you more and take you longer to get to it!
Movies. Dinner out. Cocktails. Gasoline. Yes, they even charge you pick up your recycling.
LA is like a bad relationship. "But I love him (it)." I just can't stop myself from going back.
I learned how to drive in LA traffic.
Learned how to manage money based on the LA standards.
Know the best back alley route from Santa Monica to Venice.
The shortest route from the Valley to Hollywood.
I can make a left hand turn at Sunset and La Brea at 5:13 PM on a Friday without flinching.
Hold my own in stop-and-go traffic over the Sepulveda Pass.
Know all the back roads. The main drags and the location of every 24 hour 7-11, even a few 24 hour Home Depots.
And Pink Dot - need I say more?
For me, LA is comfortable. What I know. A nook that I can snuggle into. Inhale the smoggy air and exhale with a smile.
My first true love. Los Angeles. Wait for me, I will be home soon.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
You either love it, or you hate it. Makes no difference if you are living at the beach or the pit of the San Gabriel Valley.
Traffic
It is spread out. Public transportation is still a joke, even with the recent addition of light rails from some outlying areas. It is still the most embarrassing display of a subway system. Not to mention, the whole thing could sink with a good hard November rain.
So, get used to it. You live in LA county, you are going to have to drive. Even when you get home to your "close to everything" overpriced apartment in a planned community, you are still going to have to drive.
Mapquest says that a trip from Manhattan Beach to Long Beach will take 35 minutes with traffic. Not with LA traffic! Double that time and bring a book. Murphy's Law of LA traffic; "When you allow for plenty of time, you will get there with a ridiculous surplus of time and nothing to do." Fall into the trap and cut that time down and you will be late. Sitting on any one of the dozens of LA freeways that look more like parking lots.
And parking. Forget it in certain areas. I was the World's Worst Parallel Parker. The. Worst. I would park super far away just to have enough room to pull my Ford Escort alongside a curb. I am not any better at it now.
I also avoided left hand turns like the plague. Would drive around the block to be pointed in the direction I wanted to go.
My apartment in Santa Monica Canyon had this ridiculously steep driveway. Simple right hand turn into it but then I had to quickly cut it hard to the right again to avoid plowing into the lower apartment. Getting out required backing out, blind, onto a major thoroughfare connecting Santa Monica commuters with both PCH and Sunset Blvd.
Accidents happening all around you on the freeway. The world's biggest spectator sport! Traffic is not because of the carnage in the road, it is from the rubberneckers trying to catch a glimpse of the blood and guts, only to be disappointed when it was a minor fender bender.
You drive in LA, you gotta be aggressive. Quick like a bunny with lightening reflexes. It is the only way to survive. Yeah a manual transmission gets better gas mileage, but there is no way you would get me worrying about an extra pedal when my life hangs in the balance as a Mack Truck barrels down my ass in the fast lane!
It takes skills, people. I had a friend who was terrified of driving in LA. She missed out on a lot and was tied to a job in the Promenade that she hated just so she could walk to it. Held hostage by LA drivers. Not that being a pedestrian is any safer. Seriously, the Car vs. Pedestrian accidents were some of the best gawking opportunities.
My father taught me to count to ten before I made a move when my light turned green. Whether I was walking or driving, you have to build in a ten second cushion to avoid loosing a limb.
I have been hit in crosswalks and wrecked my car plenty of times to offer up these warnings. Look both ways. Wait ten seconds. Look again and RUN.
Expenses
While not the Number One most expensive place to live, it is in the Top Ten. Running around Number Seven last I checked.
One of my bestest friends left LA and moved to Alaska. Gave himself a 8.5% raise because Alaska has no sales tax! That is close to three times the annual salary increase nationwide. Granted, it is ALASKA.
While housing is plentiful, a neighborhood can go from good to bad just by crossing the street! I lived in the ritzy Hancock Park area of LA but because of my proximity to the largest crime street (Western) I was mugged and my boyfriend's car was stolen.
Ellen DeGeneres lived three blocks away and I was a victim TWICE in less than a year!
Crime pays, pays big! The threat is everywhere, everyday but if you live like a victim, move about like a small frightened woodland creature, they will get you. Devour your innocence and spit out the bones. Hold onto your kids!
If you do find parking, you will pay for it. Either pumping a meter or a monthly paid parking rate. Commuting? Awesome for you, that will be $50 on parking at the station in addition to your rail pass. Oh, and don't go thinking you can get drunk after work and crash at a buddies house. You don't move your car from that lot, they will tow it away. No overnight parking. $500, thank you. Don't forget to watch the street cleaning signs. A stack of those tickets because you forgot to move your car on Franklin before 5 AM on Tuesday, $45 dollars each, adds up to a months rent. Thanks!
The water is horrible in LA, so you will be paying to have it delivered in five-gallon jugs. Cha-Ching.
You name it, it will cost you more and take you longer to get to it!
Movies. Dinner out. Cocktails. Gasoline. Yes, they even charge you pick up your recycling.
LA is like a bad relationship. "But I love him (it)." I just can't stop myself from going back.
I learned how to drive in LA traffic.
Learned how to manage money based on the LA standards.
Know the best back alley route from Santa Monica to Venice.
The shortest route from the Valley to Hollywood.
I can make a left hand turn at Sunset and La Brea at 5:13 PM on a Friday without flinching.
Hold my own in stop-and-go traffic over the Sepulveda Pass.
Know all the back roads. The main drags and the location of every 24 hour 7-11, even a few 24 hour Home Depots.
And Pink Dot - need I say more?
For me, LA is comfortable. What I know. A nook that I can snuggle into. Inhale the smoggy air and exhale with a smile.
My first true love. Los Angeles. Wait for me, I will be home soon.
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
February 05, 2008
Declaration of Independence and Love
By Betty Underground © 2008
He followed me home from work that day. That early July afternoon. The 4th was mid week this year and we took advantage of a 4 day weekend. It was Wednesday. His car was parked discreetly in the unpaved alley behind my house. Green Way.
He had attended a party a few weeks back that I hosted, and remembered how to find the back entrance.
It was hot, as it is in California in July. The windows thrown wide open and the back screen door the only thing left closed. Unlocked.
I sat on the counter in the kitchen. Eating ice cream with a fork. Waiting.
The screen door slammed and I heard his weight on every step as he climbed the back stairs. His flip flops shuffling with a purpose until there was a pause. Silence. One last shuffle and he was standing in the door way to the kitchen.
"Hey", he said. The last thing he said. Or the last thing I remembered hearing as passion drowned out the world. All the sounds on the calm summer day swirled up from the center of the earth and rushed into us. It was as loud as it was silent. Like a ringing in the ear. Silent to everyone but us.
He stood square in front of me. Facing me. My legs wrapped around him. My breath calm, my heart racing. I wondered if he could see it wanting to jump out of my chest. I exhaled, he inhaled me in and leaned into me. It felt like I had stopped breathing for minutes as he brushed his lips across mine, without touching them. Dusting them like feathers. My head grew light as he teased me. I was frozen. Suffocated by desire.
He tucked the hair behind my ear, and warmed the nape of my neck with his breath. Not once has his lips touched me but I was shuttering as if they had been all over me for hours.
I waited, impatiently. He moved up my neck. Kissed my chin. My nose. My eyelid. My lips were parted, dry from my breath, or his. My legs clenched tighter around him and finally it came. The kiss. Our first kiss. His tongue was warm, mine still cold from the ice cream. I exhaled into him. Collapsed into his touch.
Still without words, I took his hands and led him into the other room. The bedroom, the living-room. He gazed around the room for a little while. I beamed as I watched his face. His eyes warming in the sun drenched room. This was my place. My first place since I declared my independence from another. It was small, but all mine and I was proud. He saw that in my smile and the corners of his mouth turned up to the sky.
His touch was as mesmerizing as his kiss. He was not mine to have, but I gave myself to him completely. Heart wide open and willing. Completely comfortable in my own skin, next to his skin. He took his time, like with the kiss. Covering me in his scent and tasting every inch of me. For hours, in the sun, on the fresh white cotton sheets. Our moans echoing off the trees outside my open window. Until there was no light left in the room.
The world remained silent. I lit candles and fetched the ice cream, and a fork. We ate and giggled and got lost in each other's eyes.
Until my phone rang. A female voice on the other end. Her voice. The reason he was not mine to have. I lied to her, as he lay naked next to me. Both of us without guilt.
He left, but on this way out, he wrote on a napkin: "I ♥ U"
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
He followed me home from work that day. That early July afternoon. The 4th was mid week this year and we took advantage of a 4 day weekend. It was Wednesday. His car was parked discreetly in the unpaved alley behind my house. Green Way.
He had attended a party a few weeks back that I hosted, and remembered how to find the back entrance.
It was hot, as it is in California in July. The windows thrown wide open and the back screen door the only thing left closed. Unlocked.
I sat on the counter in the kitchen. Eating ice cream with a fork. Waiting.
The screen door slammed and I heard his weight on every step as he climbed the back stairs. His flip flops shuffling with a purpose until there was a pause. Silence. One last shuffle and he was standing in the door way to the kitchen.
"Hey", he said. The last thing he said. Or the last thing I remembered hearing as passion drowned out the world. All the sounds on the calm summer day swirled up from the center of the earth and rushed into us. It was as loud as it was silent. Like a ringing in the ear. Silent to everyone but us.
He stood square in front of me. Facing me. My legs wrapped around him. My breath calm, my heart racing. I wondered if he could see it wanting to jump out of my chest. I exhaled, he inhaled me in and leaned into me. It felt like I had stopped breathing for minutes as he brushed his lips across mine, without touching them. Dusting them like feathers. My head grew light as he teased me. I was frozen. Suffocated by desire.
He tucked the hair behind my ear, and warmed the nape of my neck with his breath. Not once has his lips touched me but I was shuttering as if they had been all over me for hours.
I waited, impatiently. He moved up my neck. Kissed my chin. My nose. My eyelid. My lips were parted, dry from my breath, or his. My legs clenched tighter around him and finally it came. The kiss. Our first kiss. His tongue was warm, mine still cold from the ice cream. I exhaled into him. Collapsed into his touch.
Still without words, I took his hands and led him into the other room. The bedroom, the living-room. He gazed around the room for a little while. I beamed as I watched his face. His eyes warming in the sun drenched room. This was my place. My first place since I declared my independence from another. It was small, but all mine and I was proud. He saw that in my smile and the corners of his mouth turned up to the sky.
His touch was as mesmerizing as his kiss. He was not mine to have, but I gave myself to him completely. Heart wide open and willing. Completely comfortable in my own skin, next to his skin. He took his time, like with the kiss. Covering me in his scent and tasting every inch of me. For hours, in the sun, on the fresh white cotton sheets. Our moans echoing off the trees outside my open window. Until there was no light left in the room.
The world remained silent. I lit candles and fetched the ice cream, and a fork. We ate and giggled and got lost in each other's eyes.
Until my phone rang. A female voice on the other end. Her voice. The reason he was not mine to have. I lied to her, as he lay naked next to me. Both of us without guilt.
He left, but on this way out, he wrote on a napkin: "I ♥ U"
Betty Underground is a writer from Northern California.
October 05, 2007
Morrissey
By Betty Underground © 2007
I make no excuses, or try to hide the fact that I don't trust him - haven't in a long time. Still, the business of us was left somewhat unfinished, and I admit I was overcome with curiosity when he called to offer an extra ticket to the show. That, and I was one really bad idea away from a trifecta for the week, how could I pass up the chance!
I was bored. Itching to get out of town and into my head. A long, heady, drive would give me just the fix I needed.
After more than three hours of driving, I finally hit town. With great caution, I maneuvered my car towards the 2.7 million dollar house tucked back off a secluded road in Mission Canyon. No fancy gates or walls protecting what he has worked so hard for. Just a one way dirt road, a questionably safe bridge and a gravel drive-way keeping door-to-door salesmen out.
He was outside when I arrived. Busying himself with something obscure and unnecessary so that he could catch an early glimpse of me. Or was he hoping to head me off so I didn't see what was in the house? OR he heard NIN ripping the bass from my car speakers. Telling when your playlist to get you in the mood includes NIN's Head Like A Hole. I am just sayin.
He looked more handsome than I remembered. He stared. I hate it when he did that.
"I liked you better as a blonde."
"I like me better as a brunette."
Snarky.
I did my usual, obvious, snooping about, inviting myself in to use the powder room after the long drive. I knew my way around. I knew what it looked like the last time I was there. I was looking for signs. Girl things. Grown up girl things. A woman's touch in the decor. Pictures of the happy couple. Anything. Nothing.
"She moved out 2 months ago." He wasn't stupid, he knew what I was up to. "Do you think I would have invited you if she was still living with me?" I flashed him a look. That look. That sideways look of mild disgust, and relief. He is not exactly known for being completely faithful, but knows I, more than anyone, can sense these things and would have quickly caught her scent if she was still there.
I dropped my bag in the guest room upstairs, closed the door and changed. I had been sitting in the car for 3 + hours and needed a fresh outfit and a fist full of Vicodin to make it through the night.
In the kitchen, on the counter were two wine glasses and an already opened bottle of '89 Brander Bouchet. Our wine. Still my favorite bottle of red but for reasons that extend so far beyond him and the memory of us. I was thankful for some liquid courage. I needed to calm down. I was all over the place. Eyes darting around the house, still uneasy about being there. I moved from room to room. Sat in most every chair but avoided my most favorite chair. The leather one. The one that I had so often draped myself in, wearing only my panties and wife-beater during those talks that took us well into the morning. It faced his bed.
I love this feeling. It is a drug. The feeling of having no idea what comes next. Of being absorbed with trying to figure out his next move. I simply can't help it. I don't have an eating disorder, low self-esteem, a drug habit or an alcohol problem. What I am is a rush junkie. If I wasn't deathly afraid of heights, I would jump out of a plane. But I am, and so I leap into oblivion where the men are the sky, my instinct the parachute, and I will wait until the last possible moment to pull that rip cord. Free falling into them. That is my rush. What does the ground I hurl myself at represent? Life? Commitment? Reality? You decide.
With the exception of the glass he had, I might have consumed the rest of that bottle of wine by myself. With that, we were off. He still drives the BMW 740L he bought nearly 7 years ago. Cute. He could afford an upgrade but prefers the older styles. The 1974 BMW 2002 he bought in high school is still in the family - his little brother has it in storage to use when he is home visiting from Spain.
The venue is not far from his house, but the road to get there is precarious. Good thing he was driving, better thing I was drunk since I was still having trouble calming my nerves. He has always fancied me a bit of a lush, making it perfectly acceptable for me to request a beer before heading to our seats.
"They will bring us drinks. I have box seats."
See, now that is just cool. I had no idea! I see those box seats, largely empty, and never knew the benefits attached. Foolish people, why would you NOT use them. Pffff.
I couldn't tell you who opened. I couldn't tell you much about the set he played. I can tell you it generally sucked, but with an ego as big as his, not terribly surprised. The white noise of confusion that filled my head drown out most everything around me. The time flew by, in slow motion. When the show was over, it was only a tad past 11 o'clock and I was trying desperately to figure out where the nearest bar was as I followed him back to the car. I paid exactly zero attention to where we parked but was keenly aware of the location of the taxi stand if things had gone south.
"Where to now?" I asked.
"Home," delivered without the lift in his voice that would signal a question.
Back at the house I was still uneasy, but drunk. It helped. Still wearing my shoes, heels click clacking on the Spanish tile floor. Klunking around the wooden deck that wrapped around the entire house, suspended over the Sycamore trees. It made him uncomfortable. "You planning on making a run for it at some point?" He asked.
"In these heels? Not likely. You want me to take them off?"
"Please."
The tide was shifting just enough in my direction to catch the wave. He was now uncertain about what would come next. He was the one having trouble calming his nerves. Crawling out of his skin. Both of us afraid to stop talking or moving, fearing our clothes would suddenly fall off and we would drown in the emotion of each other.
The next few hours were a blur of laughter, pool, beer and silliness. A place we historically gelled in. The place where I couldn't stop looking at him. Swimming in the pools of his eyes. He couldn't walk by me without reaching out for me. Natural. Calm. Still in the back of my mind, the remnants of previous storms remained and I desperately wanted to know why I was there. Why I wasn't there a year ago. Why, after so many years, so much dancing around us was this the time.
Why didn't I ask him? Because I am addicted. Addicted to not knowing what will come next. The rush of uncertainty and even though I swore to never speak to him again, swore to never be in this place again, I can't help myself. It is my vice. It is the devil inside me, wanting the things I can't have. Wanting to break through the walls built around their egos. I spend every day making smart, logical, adult decisions. I like having my reason torn down.
I can say I was there for answers, but I was there because I needed a rush. If I wanted answers, I would have been asking the hard questions, but I didn't. I have learned that asking, "Why wasn't it me," gets you no answers. No real, honest answers. So I didn't ask, and just fell into it. Into him as the night grew darker and eyes became heavy. I had to be up early. Had to get home. The girls would be expecting me for Sunday Bloody Marys in the city by 3pm.
He went missing for an extended amount of time. When I went looking for him, I found him crashed out, buried under the down comforter, in the bed across from that leather chair. I crawled in, the warmth around me, and sunk into the feather bed. Sunk into the memories. Sunk into uncertainty. Sunk.
Then, I pulled the rip cord.
The phone rang, it was my mother. It was 7:43 am. My iPod had been set to play all tracks, including the Berlitz "Learn to Speak French," I suspect. But it was NIN that came screaming out if it as I scrambled to locate my phone. As I answered, the room came into focus. I was home. My home, not his. He had crawled into my head, disrupting my sleep and curdling my dreams.
The best rush? A dream that leaves you with no regrets come morning.
That's a lie.
Betty Underground is a writer, probably stuck in an airport, dreaming of being home.
I make no excuses, or try to hide the fact that I don't trust him - haven't in a long time. Still, the business of us was left somewhat unfinished, and I admit I was overcome with curiosity when he called to offer an extra ticket to the show. That, and I was one really bad idea away from a trifecta for the week, how could I pass up the chance!
I was bored. Itching to get out of town and into my head. A long, heady, drive would give me just the fix I needed.
After more than three hours of driving, I finally hit town. With great caution, I maneuvered my car towards the 2.7 million dollar house tucked back off a secluded road in Mission Canyon. No fancy gates or walls protecting what he has worked so hard for. Just a one way dirt road, a questionably safe bridge and a gravel drive-way keeping door-to-door salesmen out.
He was outside when I arrived. Busying himself with something obscure and unnecessary so that he could catch an early glimpse of me. Or was he hoping to head me off so I didn't see what was in the house? OR he heard NIN ripping the bass from my car speakers. Telling when your playlist to get you in the mood includes NIN's Head Like A Hole. I am just sayin.
He looked more handsome than I remembered. He stared. I hate it when he did that.
"I liked you better as a blonde."
"I like me better as a brunette."
Snarky.
I did my usual, obvious, snooping about, inviting myself in to use the powder room after the long drive. I knew my way around. I knew what it looked like the last time I was there. I was looking for signs. Girl things. Grown up girl things. A woman's touch in the decor. Pictures of the happy couple. Anything. Nothing.
"She moved out 2 months ago." He wasn't stupid, he knew what I was up to. "Do you think I would have invited you if she was still living with me?" I flashed him a look. That look. That sideways look of mild disgust, and relief. He is not exactly known for being completely faithful, but knows I, more than anyone, can sense these things and would have quickly caught her scent if she was still there.
I dropped my bag in the guest room upstairs, closed the door and changed. I had been sitting in the car for 3 + hours and needed a fresh outfit and a fist full of Vicodin to make it through the night.
In the kitchen, on the counter were two wine glasses and an already opened bottle of '89 Brander Bouchet. Our wine. Still my favorite bottle of red but for reasons that extend so far beyond him and the memory of us. I was thankful for some liquid courage. I needed to calm down. I was all over the place. Eyes darting around the house, still uneasy about being there. I moved from room to room. Sat in most every chair but avoided my most favorite chair. The leather one. The one that I had so often draped myself in, wearing only my panties and wife-beater during those talks that took us well into the morning. It faced his bed.
I love this feeling. It is a drug. The feeling of having no idea what comes next. Of being absorbed with trying to figure out his next move. I simply can't help it. I don't have an eating disorder, low self-esteem, a drug habit or an alcohol problem. What I am is a rush junkie. If I wasn't deathly afraid of heights, I would jump out of a plane. But I am, and so I leap into oblivion where the men are the sky, my instinct the parachute, and I will wait until the last possible moment to pull that rip cord. Free falling into them. That is my rush. What does the ground I hurl myself at represent? Life? Commitment? Reality? You decide.
With the exception of the glass he had, I might have consumed the rest of that bottle of wine by myself. With that, we were off. He still drives the BMW 740L he bought nearly 7 years ago. Cute. He could afford an upgrade but prefers the older styles. The 1974 BMW 2002 he bought in high school is still in the family - his little brother has it in storage to use when he is home visiting from Spain.
The venue is not far from his house, but the road to get there is precarious. Good thing he was driving, better thing I was drunk since I was still having trouble calming my nerves. He has always fancied me a bit of a lush, making it perfectly acceptable for me to request a beer before heading to our seats.
"They will bring us drinks. I have box seats."
See, now that is just cool. I had no idea! I see those box seats, largely empty, and never knew the benefits attached. Foolish people, why would you NOT use them. Pffff.
I couldn't tell you who opened. I couldn't tell you much about the set he played. I can tell you it generally sucked, but with an ego as big as his, not terribly surprised. The white noise of confusion that filled my head drown out most everything around me. The time flew by, in slow motion. When the show was over, it was only a tad past 11 o'clock and I was trying desperately to figure out where the nearest bar was as I followed him back to the car. I paid exactly zero attention to where we parked but was keenly aware of the location of the taxi stand if things had gone south.
"Where to now?" I asked.
"Home," delivered without the lift in his voice that would signal a question.
Back at the house I was still uneasy, but drunk. It helped. Still wearing my shoes, heels click clacking on the Spanish tile floor. Klunking around the wooden deck that wrapped around the entire house, suspended over the Sycamore trees. It made him uncomfortable. "You planning on making a run for it at some point?" He asked.
"In these heels? Not likely. You want me to take them off?"
"Please."
The tide was shifting just enough in my direction to catch the wave. He was now uncertain about what would come next. He was the one having trouble calming his nerves. Crawling out of his skin. Both of us afraid to stop talking or moving, fearing our clothes would suddenly fall off and we would drown in the emotion of each other.
The next few hours were a blur of laughter, pool, beer and silliness. A place we historically gelled in. The place where I couldn't stop looking at him. Swimming in the pools of his eyes. He couldn't walk by me without reaching out for me. Natural. Calm. Still in the back of my mind, the remnants of previous storms remained and I desperately wanted to know why I was there. Why I wasn't there a year ago. Why, after so many years, so much dancing around us was this the time.
Why didn't I ask him? Because I am addicted. Addicted to not knowing what will come next. The rush of uncertainty and even though I swore to never speak to him again, swore to never be in this place again, I can't help myself. It is my vice. It is the devil inside me, wanting the things I can't have. Wanting to break through the walls built around their egos. I spend every day making smart, logical, adult decisions. I like having my reason torn down.
I can say I was there for answers, but I was there because I needed a rush. If I wanted answers, I would have been asking the hard questions, but I didn't. I have learned that asking, "Why wasn't it me," gets you no answers. No real, honest answers. So I didn't ask, and just fell into it. Into him as the night grew darker and eyes became heavy. I had to be up early. Had to get home. The girls would be expecting me for Sunday Bloody Marys in the city by 3pm.
He went missing for an extended amount of time. When I went looking for him, I found him crashed out, buried under the down comforter, in the bed across from that leather chair. I crawled in, the warmth around me, and sunk into the feather bed. Sunk into the memories. Sunk into uncertainty. Sunk.
Then, I pulled the rip cord.
The phone rang, it was my mother. It was 7:43 am. My iPod had been set to play all tracks, including the Berlitz "Learn to Speak French," I suspect. But it was NIN that came screaming out if it as I scrambled to locate my phone. As I answered, the room came into focus. I was home. My home, not his. He had crawled into my head, disrupting my sleep and curdling my dreams.
The best rush? A dream that leaves you with no regrets come morning.
That's a lie.
Betty Underground is a writer, probably stuck in an airport, dreaming of being home.
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