Taipei (10 page)

In mid-June, one dark and rainy afternoon, Paul woke and rolled onto his side and opened his MacBook sideways. At some point, maybe twenty minutes after he’d begun refreshing Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook, Gmail in a continuous cycle—with an ongoing, affectless, humorless realization that his day “was over”—he noticed with confusion, having thought it was a.m., that it was 4:46 p.m. He slept until 8:30 p.m. and “worked on things” in the library until midnight and was two blocks from his room, carrying a mango and two cucumbers and a banana in a plastic bag, when Daniel texted “come hang out, Mitch bought a lot of coke.”

Daniel and Mitch were outside a bar, discussing where to use the cocaine. Paul said Daniel looked “really tired” and asked if he needed some eggplant, in reference to a joke they had that Daniel was heavily dependent on eggplant and almost always suffering its withdrawal symptoms, which could be horrific. Daniel said he stayed up last night with Fran, currently sleeping, to celebrate, by eating brunch and buying drugs, that she’d quit her job she got three days ago waitressing in a Polish restaurant.

They crossed the street to Mitch’s friend Harry’s apartment, where Harry, whom Mitch had earlier given some cocaine for his birthday, was repeatedly trying to hug more than one person at a time while shouting what one would normally speak. Paul walked aimlessly, into a kitchen, where he stood in darkness at the sink peeling and eating his mango. He washed his hands and walked through the apartment’s main room—two desktop computers and speakers on a corner table, four large windows overlooking Graham Avenue, ten to fifteen people hugging and shouting, two mediumsize
dogs—into an institutionally bright hallway, where he heard Daniel in a bathroom whose door wasn’t fully closed. “It’s me,” said Paul, and pushed the door, against resistance, which relented when he said “it’s Paul,” revealing a vaguely familiar girl, who appeared extremely tired, sitting on a bathtub’s outer edge, looking at Daniel and Mitch huddled on the floor around a toilet-seat lid with cocaine on it.

“You’re doing it without me,” said Paul in an exaggerated monotone.

“We thought you left,” said Daniel.

“I wouldn’t just leave,” said Paul.

“Out of anyone I know you’re probably most likely to just leave,” said Daniel crushing cocaine with his debit card.

Paul looked at the girl, who shrugged.

Mitch, who was allergic to Harry’s dogs, sneezed.

“Jesus, be careful,” said Daniel quietly.

“He’s sharing it with us,” said Paul. “And all you can do is berate him.”

“Bro,” said Daniel, and seemed to grin at Paul a little.

At Legion, twenty minutes later, Paul was sitting alone on a padded seat, staring at an area of torsos that were beginning to seem face-like. He texted Daniel that he was going to Khim’s to “stock up on eggplant” and walked six blocks to the large deli below Harry’s apartment, feeling energetic and calm, listening to Rilo Kiley through earphones at a medium volume. He paid for an organic beef patty, two kombuchas, five bananas, alfalfa sprouts, arugula, hempseed oil, a red onion, ginger, toilet paper and carried two paper bags reinforced with plastic bags toward Legion. Harry approached on the sidewalk with a panic-like expression of uncommitted confusion and, staring ahead, passed with a sweating forehead like the person in
Go
who is abandoned by a friend in
an alleyway outside a rave while—due to too much ecstasy—foaming at the mouth.

Mitch and Daniel, in the soundless distance, were outside Legion. As Paul approached, crossing a street, Daniel entered Legion. Mitch said they were openly snorting cocaine off a table in the back room, because the bathroom line was too long, when a security guard approached and Mitch threw the bag of cocaine (which Daniel was currently trying to find) under a table, or somewhere. They crossed the street, went in White Castle, sat in a booth. Paul realized a poster said “chicken rings” not “onion rings” and said it seemed “insane” and speculated on the process that must be required of making the meat into a paste to mold into rings.

“I’m worried about Daniel,” said Mitch.

“He has a warrant for his arrest in Colorado, I think,” said Paul.

“Jesus,” said Mitch.

“It’s probably better if he goes to jail instead of you. He’s unemployed and in debt to like five people. He has a seventy-dollar tab with me. I think he needs six hundred dollars in one week for overdue rent. You have a real job and a nice apartment. If he goes to jail I’ll relinquish his tab.”

Mitch was fidgeting a little.

“We can make a blog about him and mail him letters,” said Paul.

“A blog,” said Mitch. “Jesus.”

“I’m going to look for him,” said Paul.

In Legion’s bathroom Paul read a text from Daniel that said “come outside.” Daniel, on the sidewalk, seeing Paul, began crossing the street, toward White Castle, looking in different directions while saying he knew the bouncers at Legion and
that Mitch shouldn’t have panicked. Paul said Mitch had a high-paying job.

“Where is he?”

“White Castle,” said Paul.

“Should I get some of this coke? I could’ve gotten in trouble.”

“Yeah. If that’s what you want.”

“He’s lucky it landed on this little ledge,” said Daniel staring ahead as White Castle passed on their left. “I don’t think any was lost.”

“My groceries are in White Castle. Where are you going?”

“Let’s go to your room to do some of this coke,” said Daniel.

“It’s too far,” said Paul slowing his pace.

“We’ll go there and come back, it won’t take long.”

“It’s way too far,” said Paul. “Just snort it off your hand.”

They were on a dark street with no people, moving cars, or stores. Daniel’s head seemed more elevated than normal—and his neck, swiveling and ostrich-like, more mechanical and controlled—as he looked in different directions while removing cocaine from the bag with what seemed to be his fingers, then somehow maneuvering his hand into a fist, which he put into his jeans pocket. Paul felt unsettled, imagining amounts of cocaine trickling between fingers and slipping off the sides of fingers and the curve of the palm and sticking as powder against Daniel’s hand and pocket interior. Paul ripped a page from his Moleskine journal and said “here, use this.” Daniel continued looking in different directions a few seconds before taking the page and putting it directly in his pants pocket.

“You should snort it off the Lincoln,” said Paul.

“There isn’t a Lincoln here,” said Daniel.

“That looks like a Lincoln,” said Paul pointing.

“That’s a Pontiac,” said Daniel looking elsewhere.

“You should hide between two cars,” said Paul, and Daniel moved slowly toward the street. Paul used his phone to photograph Daniel kneeling between two cars and sent the photo to his own Gmail account and to Daniel’s phone. He imagined them both sprinting in different directions the instant a spotlight appeared, gliding across the street, toward them, from a low-flying helicopter.

“Good job,” said Paul walking toward White Castle.

“You know I don’t usually do this to friends,” said Daniel staring ahead.

“What do you mean?” said Paul grinning.

“I mean, do you think it’s okay I did that?”

“Yeah. You were put in a dangerous situation.”

“I was looking on the ground for it, but it was on this little shelf,” said Daniel in White Castle.

“Jesus,” said Mitch, who seemed distracted in a respiratory manner like, after Paul left, he’d become increasingly worried and hyperventilated a little and was still recovering. Daniel handed Mitch the bag and said “um, it was open, so I don’t know how much fell out,” with, it seemed, slightly averted eyes. Mitch put the bag in his pocket without responding and, with unfocused eyes, said he was going to the bathroom and went.

After snorting cocaine in Paul’s room Daniel and Mitch moved into the kitchen, then into Caroline’s room. Caroline’s door, except when she was sleeping, was always partly open. Paul, whose door was almost always closed, listened from his mattress and when he heard someone say “chicken rings” stood without thinking and went to Caroline’s room. Daniel and Mitch were aggressively looking at Caroline’s shelves and walls, bending at their waists and craning their necks.

“Hi, Paul,” said Caroline.

“Hi. I heard someone say ‘chicken rings.’ ”

“Chicken rings?” said Caroline.

“I think I misheard,” said Paul. “Never mind.”

“Caroline was telling us she went to a Fuck Buttons concert tonight,” said Mitch.

“Someone was talking about them before,” said Paul vaguely. “I feel like . . . Daniel . . . you were telling me about them. Fuck Buttons.”

“I don’t think so,” said Daniel.

“Last night, maybe,” said Paul.

“Where were we last night?”

“Um,” said Paul looking down with unfocused eyes, aware he looked like he was thinking but wasn’t, an increasingly common deception for him. “I don’t know,” he said after a few seconds, then said “Shawn Olive” as a non sequitur and grinned and said “Daniel knows Shawn Olive” to Caroline, who had gone to school with Shawn Olive.

“Who’s Shawn Olive?” said Mitch.

“I don’t know,” said Paul immediately while laughing a little. “I mean . . . seems hard to just answer that.”

“We’re good friends,” said Caroline. “He’s great.”

“We saw
Robin Hood
last night,” said Daniel.

Paul was alone, a few hours later, stomach-down on his bed, working on things on his MacBook—on 20mg Adderall—after eating most of his organic beef patty with an arugula salad containing flax seeds, alfalfa sprouts, cucumber, tamari, lemon juice, flax oil. He and Daniel, who’d left around 3:30 a.m. with Mitch, had been emailing steadily and were committed to meet at 9:30 a.m. to go to the Museum of Modern Art, where Marina Abramović was performing
The Artist Is Present,
for which she would be sitting in a chair for 736 hours over 77 days, staring at whoever was next in line to
sit and stare back at her from an opposite chair. When Paul emailed Daniel at 9:22 a.m. that he was naked and hadn’t showered Daniel responded that he was also naked and also hadn’t showered. At 9:54 a.m. Paul texted “where the fuck are you.” Daniel responded immediately that he was still naked and hadn’t moved from his bed.

They met, an hour later, at an intersection near the Graham L train stop. One of them said the museum would be crowded on a Sunday and, within seconds, both had strongly committed to not going. They went to the bookstore adjacent Verb. “Shawn Olive,” said Daniel holding the book with a black dot on its cover toward Paul and grinning. “Shawn Olive’s book has the same cover. Almost the same cover.”

“We already showed each other that,” said Paul.

“What do you mean?”

“We showed each other this book. Are you joking?”

“No,” said Daniel. “We talked about this book?”

“We talked about it where we’re standing right now.”

“Damn,” said Daniel looking away. “I don’t remember.”

At Verb they each ingested 10mg Adderall. Daniel removed from his tote bag a glass jar with a peanut butter label and, with a neutral expression, not looking at Paul, poured around 4oz of whiskey into his iced coffee. Paul asked what Daniel was going to do about his financial situation. Daniel said Mitch, a week ago, had mentioned hiring him to write promotional copy for his band but hadn’t mentioned it again. Paul suggested they shoplift things from Best Buy, or some other store, to sell on eBay.

Outside, walking steadily but aimlessly, they entered East River State Park and sat on grass, facing the river and Manhattan, which seemed to Paul like an enormous, unfinished cruise ship that had been disassembled and rearranged by
thousands of disconnected organizations. They decided to sell books on the sidewalk, on Bedford Avenue, but continued sitting. Daniel began talking, a few minutes later, in a quiet, earnest voice about his lack of accomplishments in life, staring into the distance with a haunted, slightly puzzled expression, seeming at times like he might begin crying. Paul, grinning anxiously at Daniel’s right profile, unsure what to say, or do, shrugged more than once, thinking that tears would have a restorative effect on the seared dryness of Daniel’s eyes, which looked like they’d been baked at a low heat.

“What were we doing now?” said Paul leaving the park, around twenty minutes later.

Daniel looked distractedly in both directions after walking a few steps onto a street, then turned right on the sidewalk, staring ahead with a worried expression.

“We had a specific goal, I remember,” said Paul. “What was it?”

“I don’t know,” said Daniel after a few seconds.

“We were just talking about it.”

“I remember something,” said Daniel absently.

“Oh yeah, selling books,” said Paul.

“Let’s do that,” said Daniel.

“We just actually forgot our purpose, then regained it,” said Paul grinning. “We still kept moving at the same speed, when we had no goal.”

“Jesus,” said Daniel quietly.

On the way to Paul’s room, to get books to sell, they went in a pizza restaurant, because Daniel was hungry. Paul, rereading old texts, saw one he didn’t recognize—“sorry, how was the party”—from Laura, more than a month ago, the morning after the Cinco de Mayo party. Between then and now,
maybe two weeks ago, Paul had asked her in an email if she remembered referring to him as “my boyfriend,” the night they attended two parties on Ambien. She’d said no, but was sorry if she did, but was sure she didn’t, then later emailed to say her friends who’d been there confirmed she didn’t. Paul was staring through glass at a pigeon eating specks off the sidewalk when he noticed the approach of what he briefly, with some sarcasm, began to perceive as another pigeon, inside the restaurant, but was Daniel. “Um, so, my debit card, either from cutting so much blow or being maxed out, isn’t working,” he said in a quiet, controlled voice with an earnest expression. “Could I borrow $2.75 for a slice of pizza?”

“Yeah,” said Paul thinking he wasn’t going to mention the pigeon illusion. “I’ll add it to your tab.”