Blazed (15 page)

“How long ago was it?”

“I was one when we left in the middle of the night.”

“That was a long time ago, Jaime. People change.”

“Maybe,” I say. “But you can never change what you've done to another person. You can't take
that
back. And I judge people based on their actions, not their fucking empty words, ya know. And I've been alive for fourteen years and yesterday was the first time I spoke to that pie grinder. That fucking d-bag.”

Savannah walks around the piano and leans back down. “Hey,” she says. “Maybe you should give him a chance.”

“A chance at what?”

“Redemption.”

“Why would I do that?” I snort. “My mother's never been given that chance.”

“So be bigger than both of them,” she says.

“Whatever,” I say. “You're rad, but you don't know what you're fucking talking about right now.”

“That's true,” she goes. “But you're so amazing, Jaime, and it sucks to see you so angry.”

“I'm not angry.”

“You're the angriest boy I've ever met.”

I roll my eyes and go, “Just stop it, please.”

“Okay,” she whispers, then kisses my cheek. “You're so beautiful. Such a beautiful boy, Jaime Miles.”

She kisses my cheek once more, and then her phone rings again.

When she looks at it, her face explodes with joy.

“Yes!” she says. “My boy is here.”

“Your boy?”

“A good friend of mine,” she goes. “You might've heard of him before.”

“What's his name?”

“James Morgan,” she says. “He writes books.”

Now my face explodes with some goddamn joy. Like, James fucking Morgan. Like, my favorite fucking author ever. And he's here. And I get to meet him.

Savannah says, “From the look on your face, I take it you know about him.”

“Dude's one of my heroes. I've read all of his books and short stories. All of his poems. I've seen every fucking interview I can find with him on the Internet. So yeah, totally. I totally know about James Morgan.”

“Awesome. I met him a year ago in New York. He was at the opening of an exhibit of mine. We've stayed in touch ever since.”

“That's so sick.”

“I think he's coming to dinner tonight too. Your father told me to invite whoever I wanted.”

“You invited Morgan?”

“I did.”

“Jesus,” I go. “Yes! Fuck yeah!”

Savannah starts laughing and goes, “Come on. He's downstairs.”

I jump to my feet and grab my records and shades and follow Savannah out of the apartment.

“James,” Savannah shouts out when we hit the bottom of the stairs. “Oh yes. My fucking boy is here!”

James is standing near the door, looking at one of the photographs hanging in the gallery. He's wearing a pair of dark aviator shades, a black Sleepy Sun T-shirt, a pair of tight white jeans with a black bandanna dangling out the back right pocket of them, and a pair of red cowboy boots, and his hair is combed, parted from the right to left and shaved on the sides.

He turns and looks at us. “Sav,” he goes. “Fuck yeah, baby. You look great.”

Savannah, like, jumps at him and he catches her. She wraps her legs around him and squeezes him hard. I can see the muscles on her legs flexing.

She kisses the side of his mouth and he sets her down.
Then he turns and points at this other dude I didn't see standing there who looks super familiar.

And James says, “This is Michael from Lamborghini Dreams. I think you two have met before. But maybe not.”

Like,
holy shit!

Like,
Greatest fucking moment ever!

And Savannah goes, “We definitely have. I met you in Charleston when you guys played there last year.”

“Oh cool,” says Michael, clearly not remembering. “That's right. Totally. Definitely.”

Michael's brown hair is long on the top and short on the sides. A skinny blue bandanna is tied around his forehead. He's got a beard and he's wearing a pair of big sunglasses. He's also wearing a maroon Members Only jacket, a gray Terry Malts T-shirt under that, tight black jeans with both knees totally blown out, and a pair of black-and-white Chuck Taylor All Stars.

Savannah hugs James again before turning to me and going, “And this is Jaime Miles. His father owns this gallery and the gallery where I'm showing my new work next Friday. Jaime just got here too. Yesterday.”

“From where?” James asks.

“Joliet, Illinois.”

“No shit. I'm from Illinois.”

“I know you are, man. I'm a huge fan of your work. I've read everything you've put out.”

“Oh wow,” he goes. “Why?”

“James,” Savannah says.

And James goes, “You must have some kinda fucked-up head, man.”

“Maybe I do.”

“You have to if you've read all my stuff.”

“I haven't even read everything you've written,” Michael says. “I stopped after that short story you posted about those two kids, the teenage brother and sister in Kentucky who are fucking each other, then they murder their dad and bury him in a field and run away. Shit was so gross, dude. Especially how detailed the sex was.”

“You pussy,” says James. “That story was totally hot. Made me wanna fuck my sister.”

“Jesus Christ, James,” Savannah snorts.

I'm laughing right now.

“What is wrong with you?” she asks.

“Nothing at all, baby.” He smacks Savannah's ass. “Even he's laughing.”

James is pointing at me.

And I go, “That's pretty funny.”

“See,” he snaps.

“I'm a big Lamborghini Dreams fan too,” I say. “
Always Driving Drunk
is one of my favorite records ever.”

“Shit's overrated,” says James.

“So are your fucking books, you pilgrim dick.”

“Blubber cheek,” says James.

“Rim muncher,” Michael snorts.

“Jaime makes awesome music under the name Tiger Stitches,” says Savannah.

I totally wish she hadn't said this either. Like, these dudes don't fucking care. Such an amateur fucking move by her.

“Tiger Stitches, huh,” Michael goes. “That's a dope name, man.”

“Yeah, it is,” says James.

“Thanks,” I go.

“So it's good then,” Michael goes. “The music.”

I shrug. “I like it just fine. Probably some of the best stuff out right now.”

“Well,” snaps James, “we should go listen to it.”

“What?” I go. “Nah, you don't need to do that.”

“So it's not good then,” James says.

“No, it's dope. All my songs are dope.”

“I wanna hear it then,” Michael says. “Let's go to the Whip Pad and get high. Blast some Tiger Stitches.”

I've always maintained, always told myself that I'd never give a shit if one of my heroes took an interest in my work at some point. I've always said it wouldn't matter, wouldn't be a big deal. But this is pretty fucking rad. This is actually the coolest thing that's ever happened in my life.

“So you're holding?” Savannah asks James.

James makes a face. “Is that a serious question?” he says.

“It was.”

“I was born with a bag of coke in my hand, Sav. Without the blast, this life is bullshit.”

THE WHIP PAD. FIRST OFF,
it's right across the street on the other end of the block from my father's gallery. Before we jump in there, we stop at a liquor store across the street. James buys a twelve-pack of Budweiser and a pint of Jameson.

“Warm-up drinking,” he says, when he walks back outside.

Savannah seems in awe of him. I wonder if they've fucked before. I wonder if Savannah's fucked Michael. Or if she's fucked both of them at the same time and is going to today.

She's a slut. Like, she wants to fuck me because of some poems she saw me read online. It's nice, I guess. I was hard. But that seems crazy to me.

I wonder if she's gonna blow my father for flying her out here and showing her paintings to a sliver of the world.

We walk down a small set of stairs and inside. I've read about this place before. This kid Kaden, James's cousin, he wrote about James and the Whip Pad in a book called
Dickpig Sux
.

I hadn't even thought about that before now. It didn't even occur to me that the Whip Pad was so close.

We walk down this long, narrow hallway full of graffiti and bikes and posters and into the last room on the right.

“Make yourselves comfortable,” says James.

Me and Michael and Savannah sit down at this round table in the center of the room.

James, he grabs a record from a crate next to the door and puts it on.

“Who is this?” Savannah asks.

“Shannon and the Clams,” James answers. “From Oakland.”

“They're fucking great,” Michael goes. “They opened for the Dreams on a small East Coast tour we did last year.”

This is insane to me. How I'm sitting in James Morgan's room. Life is such a fuckhead like that. If my mother doesn't go insane, go fucking crazy on me a few nights ago, then I'm never here. I'm never in San Francisco. Never meeting Savannah or Dominique or Kristen. Never in James Morgan's fucking room in the famous Whip Pad listening to a sick garage/psych band.

James grabs a mirror and sits down at the table.

“When did you get back to San Francisco?” Savannah asks.

“This morning.”

“How was L.A.?”

“Fucking radical,” he says. “We got the funding for the movie. We start shooting next spring.”

“What movie?” I ask.

“This screenplay I wrote based on a short story of mine called
The Whore
,” says James. “Nobody wanted to touch that shit for a year, man. It's the most honest, perverse, and violent depiction of a two-faced slut you'll ever see. I'm directing it too. One of Michael's old homies, this dude Travis Wayne, stepped in to produce it, so it's going to happen for sure.”

“Sick,” I say.

James dumps an entire bag of coke onto the mirror and starts cutting it with his ID.

“So what's this dinner you want me to go to tonight?” he asks Savannah.

She looks at me and goes, “Jaime's father wants to get a bunch of people together at the Cigar Bar and have a nice meal. He's invited me and told me to invite whoever, and since I don't know anyone here really besides you, you're my fucking date.”

“Sounds boring,” says James.

“Hey,” Savannah goes.

And I say, “It will be, man. Unless you show up. My father's a dick.”

“Jaime,” says Savannah.

“You don't know,” I say. “He is. He's a fucking asshole.”

“You hate your dad?” Michael asks.

“Actually, I just met him yesterday. But from his track record, I'm thinking that he's pretty much an asshole.”

James laughs. He rolls up a hundred-dollar bill and snorts a line and then hands the mirror to Savannah.

“So why are you here then?” Michael says.

“My mother OD'd. We don't have any living relatives near Illinois. Now I'm here for the week while she's getting treatment.”

Savannah does a line and Michael goes, “And now you're kicking it with us. Worse things have happened, dude.”

“Tell that to my mother.”

“She's the one who OD'd,” says James. “The thing I've figured out with family bullshit, like, total dysfunction is that these people who you start figuring out are really just a bunch of selfish assholes, these people can turn your life upside down in a second and you don't even have a say in it. No choice. It's just done and you're left to navigate through the shitstorm you didn't start. It ain't fair.”

“Right,” I say.

“But if you're smart about it,” James continues, “if you're really fucking smart about it, man, you can turn that shitstorm into a goddamn paradise. Those people can go fuck themselves. They're evil and the quicker you realize that, the quicker you can take your life back. It's your life, man. It's yours. And you can take it back and carve out a path that has nothing to do with them. This is the window, man. This is the space in which you decide to be a legend or a pussy. Be a legend, dude. Use their dysfunction to make yourself better than they'll ever be.”

Savannah passes the mirror to me, but I decline and then Michael takes the mirror and does a line.

James is staring at me.

I go, “What?”

And he goes, “I can see the anger in you, man. I can see the hate in your eyes. How old are you?”

“Fourteen,” I say.

“Tiger Stitches, huh?”

“Yeah.”

“That's dope, man.”

“Thanks, dude.”

“You don't do coke?” he asks.

“No.”

“You should,” he says. “It's fun.”

“It's the tits,” Michael snaps. “Totally righteous and shit.”

“Really, guys,” Savannah goes. “He's fourteen.”

“That's just a silly number,” says James. “Anyway, dude, use that hatred, that anger.” He lights a cigarette and takes a pull from the Jameson. “Use that to carve yourself out of stone, man. Make yourself better than them. All of them. They've turned your life into chaos.”

“Yeah.”

“There's nothing better than chaos to prove you're worth a damn, man.”

James takes the mirror back and does another line. “The second you start listening to those ancient people, that's the moment you stop living your own life. The life you want for yourself.”

Savannah hits another line and passes the mirror to Michael.

“I love cocaine,” says James.

“I love good cocaine,” Michael says back, then does another line. “That's the shit I love the most.”