Richard Yates (13 page)

“Why do you think he chose you instead of someone

else?”

“I don’t know,” said Dakota Fanning. “I was quiet and weird.”

At the carnival they made funnel cakes under a tent with Dakota Fanning’s mother and a church pastor. Sometimes one of them left the tent to get more milk from a full-size refrigerator. Haley Joel Osment tried to make a funnel cake in the formation of a pentagram. Dakota Fanning said they mhp-yates-01.indd 102

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should replace the sugar powder with bacon bits. Haley Joel Osment said they should fry the funnel cakes in bacon oil then wrap it in bacon and pour nacho cheese on it to create a family-size funnel cake for cheese beast families. They talked about having their own tent next year to sell organic vegan funnel cakes. They made funnel cakes for about three hours and then walked to different areas of the carnival, sometimes saying “cheese beast” or “party girl” quietly while facing forward with neutral facial expressions. They looked at a pony and said it was a cheese beast and a party girl. Five people were on a wood stage playing heavy metal cover songs to about eight people, some not wearing shirts.

Haley Joel Osment wanted to give leftover funnel cakes to a group of Hispanic people standing in the distance.

“My mom will be angry,” said Dakota Fanning.

“But it’s good, why would she be angry?”

“She’s a beast. We should do it. Let’s do it. Forget what I said about my mom, that was stupid, we should do it. My mom’s stupid.”

“Can you do it, I’m afraid,” said Haley Joel Osment.

“I’m afraid,” said Dakota Fanning.

“They might not like the funnel cakes because they’re cold,” said Haley Joel Osment.

“They might get offended or something,” said Dakota Fanning.

“We’ll just be making them obese,” said Haley Joel Osment.

“It’s better not to give them the funnel cakes maybe,”

said Dakota Fanning.

“Where are they?” said Haley Joel Osment. “They disappeared.”

“I don’t know,” said Dakota Fanning.

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“I don’t see them,” said Haley Joel Osment. “I think they disappeared.” He and Dakota Fanning walked away from the carnival. They ran holding hands toward a puddle on the street. They jumped over the puddle. Dakota Fanning’s mother drove past and stopped and they sat in the backseat. “Thanks for helping us out today,” said Dakota Fanning’s mother. “I really appreciate it.”

“You’re welcome,” said Haley Joel Osment. “It was

fun.”

“Well, I don’t know, but it was certainly nice of you to come out on your birthday.”

“Did I make you nervous yesterday when I broke things and cried?” said Dakota Fanning the next night on Gmail chat.

“I felt melodramatic and stupid and afraid. I cried in the shower. I don’t know why.”

“I don’t know,” said Haley Joel Osment in Bobst Library. “Why?”

“I don’t know,” said Dakota Fanning.

“Yeah you do,” said Haley Joel Osment.

“You want to know why I asked if you felt nervous or why I was crying?”

“Crying,” said Haley Joel Osment.

“I felt embarrassed of myself again. I felt nervous. Sometimes if I stare for too long I think about loneliness and I think about what is going to happen if I annoy you and you leave me and about how lonely and afraid of everything I used to be and I just get nervous and cry I guess. I don’t know. Before when I was lonely it was sort of a calm loneliness. Like I would just say ‘oh well.’ And lie in bed.

And just be alone. But now when I think about being lonely mhp-yates-01.indd 104

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it’s very depressing and I can’t relax.” Haley Joel Osment wasn’t responding. “I feel selfi sh,” said Dakota Fanning.

“I’m going to try to come tomorrow.”

“Okay,” said Haley Joel Osment.

Dakota Fanning went to talk to her mom. “She won’t let me go,” she said about forty minutes later. “We talked for a long time and I scared her I think. She thinks I’m crazy again.”

“How did you scare her,” said Haley Joel Osment.

“I don’t know. When I get nervous and upset I do re-petitive movements like pacing back and forth or hitting my head over and over again and I did that. I think she was afraid and told me I had issues and that I shouldn’t be so affected by one person that I break down or something. Then she said some stuff about my dad and then she was worried because she thinks you don’t eat anything because I couldn’t tell her that you steal things. And she doesn’t want me going to the city and not eating anything all day.”

“Just tell her I eat things,” said Haley Joel Osment. “I don’t understand.”

“I did. I told her you ate things but she doesn’t understand how you get money.”

“Just tell her I have money from writing. I still don’t understand.”

“Because fi rst she asked me how you can afford all the train tickets and food and I said I give you money sometimes and that you sell things sometimes to get money but she doesn’t believe me because you wear the same pants all the time, she thinks you’re poor. And she doesn’t believe you get much from writing because you said the writing you do will never make much money before on the phone.

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She kept telling me to ask you to come here but I said it’s shitty here and then she got angry and said ‘well that’s too bad’ and said that if you really care about me you wouldn’t mind coming here all the time but I said that isn’t fair, I should visit you, it isn’t fair for you to have to pay for train tickets all the time, then she thought you were poor again,”

said Dakota Fanning. “I hate myself,” she said after about fi fteen seconds.

“Why,” said Haley Joel Osment.

Dakota Fanning typed seven times that she hated

herself.

“Why,” said Haley Joel Osment.

“Because I’m being selfi sh.”

“With what,” said Haley Joel Osment.

“With you. I should try harder to fi nd new things that you would like. I wanted to give you a new towel but I forgot. I don’t say thank you enough. I should try harder to fi nd things for you. I haven’t written enough things for you. I want to write things for you. I’m going to write you another letter. I liked writing you a letter. I feel happy when I do things like that but then I hardly ever do them.

It’s retarded and I hate myself. All I can ever think to do is hold you and pet you. I’m so lucky to have you as a friend.

I want to hold you and pet you. I’m retarded. I hate myself.

I want to hold you.”

“I don’t know,” said Haley Joel Osment.

“Are you still editing your chapbook?”

“No,” said Haley Joel Osment.

“Did you cut those stories.”

“I don’t know yet,” said Haley Joel Osment.

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told me tonight that he said I was the only thing he cared about and I stared and felt depressed. I’m going to call him.”

After midnight Haley Joel Osment and Dakota Fanning text-messaged a few times. Haley Joel Osment was on his bed. Dakota Fanning asked if she could call. Haley Joel Osment said he didn’t feel like talking because he felt bad.

“Okay, I understand,” said Dakota Fanning. “I made you a mobile. I’m sorry it’s late. I had planned to give it to you for your birthday. Good night.”

“Email me if you have anything to say,” said Haley Joel Osment in an email the next afternoon. “I’m editing my novel.

I was going to email you but I feel tired now. And you didn’t email me. So I don’t know what you’re thinking.”

“I’m going to try harder,” said Dakota Fanning in an email. “Do you believe me? I’ve been trying. If I hadn’t you wouldn’t have visited me or let me visit you. I just need to try harder. I am now. I am going to try harder. I didn’t email you because I thought you wanted to be left alone, that you wanted time to think. I miss you. You are my best friend.”

“I think I feel indifferent to you right now,” said Haley Joel Osment in an email. “I don’t know. It is depressing because I want to like you because probably I won’t ever meet anyone like you, but I can easily meet someone who in other ways, like considerateness and thoughtfulness, I would like more than you. I wanted to go home after we went to your room and you went to shower without saying anything. You are the person who said in my apartment that the guest always showers fi rst. Then I thought about mhp-yates-01.indd 107

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what to do about the lemon drawing I drew for you. Since if I gave it to you it would only make it more obvious to me and maybe to you that I thought of you more and did more for you than you did for me, on my birthday, going to your house to make funnel cakes. I was going to go home but your mom was downstairs and we were already going to make funnel cakes. It was too hard to leave so I thought

‘I’ll just be nice to her for the rest of the day.’” In another email he said “At each moment you can either kill yourself, try harder to detach yourself from people and reality, or be thinking of and doing what you can for the people you like.

Those are the only 3 choices at any moment. I don’t know.

It seems like you do the second one but say you want to do the third one.” A few minutes later he sent another email that said “I think I’m being stupid right now. I shouldn’t lecture you. You are who you are, people don’t change. You probably need to be with someone who won’t want you to change. Even if you change now you’ll change back later. So I’m being stupid right now. To some people you would be very thoughtful and good. It’s relative, like everything, and stupid of me to complain.”

Dakota Fanning sent a giant email that said she had been thinking lately and realizing her mistakes. “I thought about how I stole blueberries and fl axseed meal to make you vegan cake but then I was nervous you wouldn’t want to eat cake because you don’t really eat anything unhealthy so I just gave you the blueberries and felt guilty for not just making you the cake anyway even if you didn’t want it. I thought about how I had planned to make you the mobile for your birthday but then forgot. I thought about when we were making funnel cakes and how I wasn’t letting you mhp-yates-01.indd 108

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make them enough and how I was afraid to bring the cake to those guys even though I knew you really wanted to. I thought about it when we were walking home and I thought about apologizing but I was afraid to because I didn’t know if you were really upset by it or not because you were smiling and I didn’t want to talk about something depressing on your birthday after you had chosen to spend it making funnel cakes at a white trash festival to be with me. I had the panic attack on the train ride home because I was so embarrassed that I had eaten so much and wasn’t paying attention to you and Ana. I felt so embarrassed to the point where I wanted to kill myself. I felt guilty the day we walked to sell books and you carried my bag to help me. The whole time I was thinking that I should be helping you, that I should have carried the books, but then I never did and I felt terrible. When you gave me the lemon drawing I felt terrible. I can’t stop thinking about you.

I mailed you things earlier today. All I have been doing today is thinking about you and everything I have done to make you unhappy and how I can fi x them. I can do it. I can. I owe you everything. You have done the greatest thing for me than anyone has my entire life. You have been honest with me.

You know I want to be healthy or else I wouldn’t make fun of cheese beasts. I don’t want to kill myself. I want to be in a happy and healthy relationship with you.”

After the giant email she sent three short emails.

Haley Joel Osment sent a short email.

Dakota Fanning sent many medium-sized emails.

They sent more emails.

Around 5:00 p.m. Dakota Fanning said she was going for a walk and that Haley Joel Osment could call or text message mhp-yates-01.indd 109

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whenever he wanted. Haley Joel Osment left Bobst Library and bought a salad and sat on a bench in front of New York University’s business school. He ate his salad listening to

“Jackass” by The Vandals on repeat and felt sunlight on his face. He bought iced coffee. He went in Bobst Library. Dakota Fanning had emailed two photos of the backs of people in her town. “Thank you for the pictures,” said Haley Joel Osment in an email. “If you have more things to email so I can know more about you, so I can think about them, email them please.”

The next afternoon Dakota Fanning sent a very giant email.

“Thank you for emailing me about those things,” said Haley Joel Osment in an email. “There have been many times where I really wanted to leave you but because of cir-cumstance I couldn’t. One time after we ate at Zen Palate you wanted to go home and read. I wanted to tell you to go home to New Jersey to read. When you were late to meet me at the train with the orange dress, I think the orange dress, we had agreed on Gmail chat to go to the ledge. But then you were late to the station and then you didn’t want to go to the ledge. When we got to the buses you didn’t want to go on the buses. I walked around trying to fi gure out if I should go back to New York. When we got off the train at Hoboken you didn’t take off your headphones even when you tried to ask me how to buy a ticket for the PATH