Miss Misery (5 page)

[x]
Eaten sushi:
no

[x]
Been dumped:
…

[x]
Dyed your hair:
yes

[x]
Stolen anything:
gum

---HAVE YOU EVER---

[x]
Flown on a plane:
not for a long time

[x]
Told a guy/girl that you liked them:
yes

[x]
Cried during a movie:
every movie

[x]
Had an imaginary friend:
yes, wish I still did

[x]
Been in a fight:
yes

[x]
Shoplifted:
just that gum

---THE FUTURE---

[x]
Age you hope to be married:
23?

[x]
Number of children:
ONE

[x]
How do you want to die:
painlessly

[x]
What do you want to be when you grow up:
a writer

---FAVORITES---

[x]
Fave color(s):
black

[x]
Day/night:
night

[x]
Summer/winter:
both

[x]
Fave food:
sesame chicken, taco salad, pb+j

[x]
Fave movies:
saved!, donnie darko, the matrix, can't hardly wait

[x]
Fave sport:
sports are stupid

---RIGHT NOW---

[x]
Right now wearing:
drive-thru records PJs

[x]
Drinking:
vitamin water

[x]
Thinking about:
litmag

[x]
Listening to:
“Deja Entendu”—Brand New

---DO YOU BELIEVE IN---

[x]
Destiny/fate:
yes

[x]
Angels:
yes

[x]
Ghosts:
I try not to

[x]
UFOs:
no

[x]
God:
not like everyone else does

---FRIENDS AND LIFE---

[x]
Do you ever wish you had another name:
just another life

[x]
Do you have a girlfriend/boyfriend:
no. boys don't like me.

[x]
What's the best feeling in the world:
going to a concert

[x]
Worst feeling:
getting yelled at

[x]
What time is it now?:
10:30 p.m.

---HAVE YOU/DO YOU---

[x]
Do drugs:
no drugs are gross

[x]
Pray:
not really, not anymore

[x]
Gotten drunk:
no way. sXe!

[x]
Run away from home:
it didn't work

[x]
Made out with a stranger:
no!

[x]
Three words that sum you up:
bruised. bitter. poetic.

---SOCIAL LIFE---

[x]
Boyfriend/girlfriend:
I wish you'd stop asking

[x]
Attend church:
when I am forced to

[x]
Like being around people:
no one I've met yet…

THE NIGHT AFTER AMY LEFT, I met Jack and Pedro for drinks at the Sparrow, the dank indie-rock bar a few blocks away from my house. Jack and Pedro were my “friends” in quotation marks—we saw one another socially, usually in the neighborhood, and talked shop: word rates, records, box scores. Jack was tall, aggressive, and quasi-bearded, with a shaggy mane of black hair that trailed to his shoulders; Pedro was painfully skinny, rocked a crew cut, and was fabulously gay. One was a journalist and one was a publicist, but sometimes it was hard to remember which was which.

“So, baby,” Pedro said as he rattled the ice in his empty glass, “how's single life?”

“Not great,” I said. And finished my third beer. In my own insulated and self-denying way, I was beginning to register the enormity of life without my girlfriend. It was, I imagined, the same sort of realization that dawns on someone who has been thrown out of a window: not so much that death is imminent, but that suddenly there is no longer a floor to hold the ground at bay.

“You should come out with us, man,” Jack said, leaning dangerously far back in his chair. “We can show you a good time.”

“Yeah?” I said.

“Yeah.” Jack played with an unlit cigarette as he talked. “Diplo is playing a Brazilian dance hall set at APT tonight, and there's a record-release party for Oral B at the Gansevoort.”

“I thought that was last night?”

“No, dummy,” Pedro said. “That was his
prison
release party. This one's for the record.”

“Oh,” I said. And felt the ground getting closer.

“You should come with us.” Jack sat up. “Pedro, when was the last time young David hung out with us?”

“Do you mean had two beers and went home to wifey? Or
hung out
hung out?”

“The latter.”

Pedro chewed ice thoughtfully. “That would be never.”

Jack stood up. “Exactly. I'm going to the john. Get me another?”

I watched him make a beeline for the back and wondered how he managed to have so much energy all the time. Just the thought of getting on the train to Manhattan at eleven p.m. paralyzed me with terror. Or apathy. I turned to Pedro.

“The Hague,” I said drunkenly. “What
is
that? What kind of a city begins with ‘the'? Seriously, I'm asking. Are there any others in the world?”

“Los Angeles,” said Pedro with a smirk. “Las Vegas. Las Cruces.”

“OK, OK,” I said. “Fine. But that doesn't count. That's Spanish.”

“So am I,” said Pedro as he handed me his empty glass. “Do I count, David?”

“Touché,” I said. And wandered up to the bar.

When I returned, drinks in hand, the two of them were looking at me strangely.

“We think you should come with us, David.” Jack's eyes were bright.

“We will get you laid,” added Pedro, enunciating each vowel.

I sat down. “Um,” I said.

“Come to the bathroom with me,” Jack said.

I gave him a funny look. “I thought
he
was the gay one,” I said, pointing to Pedro.

Jack rolled his eyes. “Come to the bathroom with me and do a bump.”

Suddenly I understood their relentless energy.

“You guys,” I said. “It's Monday night.”

Pedro tut-tutted me. “Technically it's almost Tuesday morning.”

“No, you guys…I've never…no. Thanks, but no. I have work to do tomorrow.”

“You had work to do today and you didn't do it. You've been complaining about it for almost two hours.”

I felt suddenly small and predictable. “That's just not me, guys. Sorry.”

Pedro rolled his eyes. “Why not? Because you're Mr. Responsible? With a job and a girlfriend waiting for you? Because correct me if I'm wrong, but it doesn't sound like you've got either of those things just now.”

I watched their jittery, pirouetting eyes and could feel the anxious energy coming out of them, and for a second I wanted it—desperately. But instead I sipped my beer, resigned myself to routine.

“Maybe another time. Thanks.”

“Your loss,” said Pedro, and scooted off to the bathroom himself.

An hour later, once I had locked the door of my apartment behind me, thrown my bag to the floor, and managed to make the walls stop swimming, I pulled out my cell phone and texted Bryce:

I hit
SEND
and regretted it, but not enough to send a follow-up. Because the thing was, it was true. The only thing I was full of was Brooklyn Lager, and that hardly counted.

I sat down at my desk without turning any lights on and flipped open my computer. I signed onto IM and watched my buddy list fill up with the usual assortment of half-strangers, insomniacs, people who accidentally left their computers on at work, and…no one. She wasn't there. I wasn't sure if I was disappointed or relieved.

Just then, a window popped open.

TheWrongGirl87 was seventeen-year-old Ashleigh Bortch from just outside Salt Lake City, Utah. I had interviewed her—or IMterviewed her, because we'd never spoken except on a computer screen—for the magazine story, and she had checked in with me almost daily ever since. Ashleigh was an emo kid, through and through, from the overly dramatic bands she obsessed about to the bleeding-heart poetry she scribbled in her livejournal, but she was something else too, behind all the clichés. She was smart, she was eager, and she was
trying
—something, anything. There was an ambition in her that I admired and recognized. Her parents certainly didn't; according to them, Ashleigh was headed straight toward premed at BYU. According to her, she planned to one day be a writer and live somewhere “different” like Boston or maybe even Berkeley.

I stood up then, stretched, and walked through my dark living room to the kitchen for another beer. I cracked it, drank deeply, and stared out the window for a moment. The light in my fridge—like many of the other bulbs around the house—had burned out, and I hadn't gotten around to replacing it. I think Amy and I were playing psychological chicken over who would actually act responsible first. As if there was ever any doubt about that.

Through the gated window to my left I could see into the backyards and bedrooms of all my neighbors. Unfortunately for the voyeur in me, everyone seemed to be asleep. One of the rare disadvantages of living in a neighborhood where strollers outnumber hipsters three to one.

I closed the refrigerator and padded barefoot back through my apartment. When I was settled in front of the glow of my laptop again, I noticed something: Miss Misery was online. I was worried about her then, to be honest. She was getting less sleep than I was. I put my headphones on and hit
PLAY
on iTunes. “On to You” by the Constantines started up. As good a song for an insomniac as I could hope for.

My IM window with Ashleigh was blinking angrily.