Blazed (40 page)

“I feel so bad for you,” she goes. “We're kids, ya know, we shouldn't even be put in these situations. We shouldn't have to make these kind of choices just because two people couldn't hold on to the special feelings they had once, which brought you into the world in the first place.”

“But I had to make the choice. So it is what it is now.”

“And you made the best choice ever. You made me the happiest person. Seriously. Nobody right now is as happy as I am. Here,” she goes.

“What's up?”

She leans into me after taking a bite of the cupcake, and we start making out.

A couple of dogs bark and I even think I hear an owl in a tree, maybe not. But maybe so.

Anything is possible on a night like this.

And then Dominique, she takes out her phone and goes, “Have you ever heard that song ‘Lottie Mae' by the Riverboat Gamblers?”

“I haven't,” I say.

“The band is from Denton, Texas. They're pretty good. Like, some devastatingly tough Texas punk rock. And they
made this one absolutely perfect record,
Something to Crow About
. Anyway,” she goes, “the last song on that record is the song I'm talking about. Listen to it,” she says. “It's so sexy.”

She plays it, and she's right. The song starts out real slow and real dark, like some old, real, country tough song from the fifties or something. It's so good. It's mesmerizing. The entire aesthetic of it is haunting. Devastating.

She squeezes my hand.

She leans into me and she goes, “I can't wait to dance with you in Paris one day.”

Turning to her, I go, “We'll have a mailbox in Berlin, too.”

“Good.”

“Great.”

We kiss with this passion that's unlike anything we've done before.

It's really intense, and my body even shakes as I gently push her on her back and slide her shirt up and pull her tights down. I stick my fingers into her pussy and she sucks on them when I pull them out.

With my dick hard as a rock now, she goes, “I'm ready for you.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes,” she says. “I've never been more ready for anything.”

Getting on my knees, I unbutton my pants and push them down. Man, I don't know how long I'll even last. Like, I could blow my load now.

Seriously, it takes everything inside of me to not come this second.

My skin sucks back into my ribs. My back tightens. My shoulders tense. A line of sweat runs down my forehead.

And I don't.

Phew.

Like that, the entire sensation levels off and I sigh.

Sliding her white lace underwear down to her ankles, I lean over her and place my hands just above her shoulders on the cool gravel of the roof, and she goes, “Fuck me.”

Scooting right in between her legs, right up against her bare pussy, not a trace of hair that I can feel, I grab my dick with my right hand and guide it inside of her.

She moans and grabs the back of my neck, pulling me down to her, and she spits in my mouth.

I swallow it right down and then she does it again as I pound her really hard a couple of times.

I really start fucking this beautiful girl now. It's so crazy. It feels so amazing. The two of us. Together. The two of us, fucking each other for the first time ever, me losing my virginity to this queen on the roof of some graffiti-covered, abandoned warehouse in San Francisco.

It's the boss.

Dominique moans.

She bites my neck and she bites my chest and, like, three seconds later, I can't hold it any longer.

“You can come,” she goes.

“Okay.”

“Pull out, though.”

“Right,” I say.

I pull it out and shoot onto the roof.

Pulling up my undies and jeans now, we kiss and then I lie down next to her and we stare out into the sky, her head resting on my chest, the two of us passing the bottle of Coca-Cola back and forth again while the Saint James Society song “My Dearest Friend” hisses out of the speaker of her phone.

“SO WHAT'D YOU WANT TO
give me?” I ask her.

We're back, sitting on the ledge of the roof again, and she goes, “This.” Then she takes her septum piercing out and hands it to me.

“You don't have to give me anything now,” I tell her. “I'm coming back.”

“Just in case,” she says. “I know how much you love it.”

“But I'm coming back.”

“Not for four days. Please,” she says. “Keep it. Just this reminder of me and everything you love about me.”

“Okay,” I say, then slide it into the tiny pocket I used to keep my Oxy in.

Dominique grabs her guitar now and starts tuning it.

“I just took your virginity,” she says.

“I know you did. I'm still in shock.”

She grins. “You took mine, too,” she says.

“What?”

“Not literally,” she says. “Figuratively.”

“I see.”

“I love you,” she says. “Do you understand how much music we're going to make?”

“A ton.”

“Yes, we are.” She begins tuning her guitar.

“This is the first song I learned on guitar,” she goes.

“What song?”

“ ‘Maps,' ” she says. “Those Yeah Yeah Yeahs dolls.” Then she begins playing it.

“Oh, man. You are the fucking best,” I say.

“You ain't so bad yourself,” she says back, and we start to sing.

Once again, the two of us, singing together with a view to die for, except this time there's no end in sight. It's me and her. It's me and this city. It's me and the rest of my life.

Leaning over, she kisses my neck.

After that, it's time for us to belt that chorus out . . .

“Wait, they don't love you like I love you, wait, they don't love you like I love you . . .”

IT'S TWO P.M. WHEN ME
and my father pull into the driveway of my house with the U-Haul.

Both of us are nervous.

My father, he pulls out this one-hitter from his pocket and smokes it.

“Really?” I say.

“What? For the nerves.”

“Come on, man,” I say. “Keep it together.”

“It's weed.”

“It's the perception, man. The idea that I'm going to a more stable place than this.”

“Right,” he goes. “You're too smart for your own good.”

“I'm not smart. I've just seen way too much.”

As we're hopping out of the truck, the front door opens and my mother steps outside.

She wasn't lying, either. She does look much younger now, and much healthier.

“There he is,” she says. “My boy.”

I run up to her and give her a hug. But I can smell booze on her breath, although I don't think she's wasted.

“You look great,” I tell her.

“I told you,” she says.

She looks away from me now and down at my father.

“Justin.”

“Morgan.”

Pause.

“It's good to see you,” my father says.

“I bet it is,” snaps my mother. “Why aren't you gloating? Huh? Now you've got everything.”

“Oh, come on,” he goes.

“My career, my life, and my boy.”

“That's not fair at all,” he rips.

“Stop it,” I go. “None of this shit. This isn't about you anymore. It's about me. You two had your time. Now it's my time.”

“He's right,” my father says.

“You'll say anything to win him over.”

This clearly irks my father, but he doesn't rip back at her.

He goes, “Jaime, I'll see you tomorrow at eight.” Then he turns around and starts walking back to the truck.

“Justin,” my mother goes.

He stops but doesn't turn back around. “What?”

“Will you join us for dinner tonight, please?”

“Really?” both of us say to her.

“Yeah,” she goes. “It'll be nice. I promise. No fighting.”

My father finally spins back around and looks at me. I shake my head, trying to tell him to say no, but he goes, “Sure. That sounds nice. Are we eating here?”

“No,” she says. “I'm thinking pizza at Michael's. It's Jaime's favorite.”

“Perfect,” he says. “What time?”

“I'll make reservations for seven.”

“All right,” he says. “I'll see you both at seven.”

• • •

I follow my mother into the house. It feels surreal. This whole thing right now, it just feels off. It's like, I know her, I know my mother. There's no way she's this calm right now and this stable. Not with what's happening. It seems so odd to me. Like an act. But I'm not gonna say anything. I just wanna go with it and make this as easy as possible.

The house is spotless too. Even though I ain't staying, she cleaned the hell out of it.

She asks me if I want something to drink and I tell her no, and then she walks into the kitchen and says she's gonna get more water even though her glass is nearly full.

While she's in there, I hear a drawer open and I hear what sounds like pills shaking in a bottle. I walk in there to see what she's really doing and I watch her quickly shove a prescription bottle filled with something baby blue and white back into a drawer.

She gulps down what I'm sure is either Oxy or Percocet with the glass that she has not filled back up.

“What are you doing?” I ask her.

“Taking some Aleve. I've got a headache, dear. It's about the only downside to being clean again. Even though I love
feeling things again, I feel pain too sometimes. I used to never feel pain. That part was so great. Never feeling the hurt.”

“You also didn't feel a lot of happiness, either,” I go.

“Yes, I did.”

“It didn't seem like you did.”

“Fuck!” she snaps at me. “Eight days with your father is gonna make you an asshole to me too?”

“Hey,” I say. “I'm not being mean. I'm just finishing your thought.”

She rubs her face and goes, “I'm sorry, Jaime. That was horrible of me to say. I just . . . this isn't what I was expecting to happen, ya know. I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do now.”

“Be happy for me. Be okay with that.”

“I can't,” she goes. “I'm not gonna just be okay with any of this. I'm losing my whole life, my boy. I don't know if I can do this without you.”

“What was really in that prescription bottle?”

She glares at me and hisses, “Aleve. It's none of your business anyway. You're leaving. Stop asking questions, damn it!”

Just like that, I'm absolutely terrified now about what's gonna happen to her.

It's just like her too.

I shouldn't have expected anything less.

How she just turns the attention back on her and
her struggles. It's all my fault. I'm the last thing standing between this and her life falling apart, even though that's the furthest thing from the truth.

This beautiful woman has been crumbling apart for years. I've never been able to stop her from doing anything she's wanted to do. She's only ever needed me to patch her up again and again and again.

Still, as much as it pisses me off, I would die if something happened to her. I would never forgive myself.

“Fine,” I say. “Aleve.”

“Thank you.”

“But never tell me it's none of my business again. I saved your life. I've saved it so many damn times. Never say that to me.”

“You should feel relieved then,” she says.

“This is the furthest from relief I could possibly ever feel, Mom. The absolute furthest. This is the hardest thing I've ever done. You just don't appreciate anyone else's struggles.”

“That's not true.”

“Bullshit.”

“Stop attacking me, Jaime.”

“Stop taking drugs.”

She shakes her head and whispers, “You'll never understand.”

“That's such a cop-out, Mom. But hey, I'm gonna stop this before it goes any further.”

“Thank you,” she goes.

“I need to pack up.”

“Yup,” she sighs. Then, “You look so great, my boy. I mean, you look like you're really happy. Happier than I've ever seen you. It's cos you're leaving me.”

I ignore her comment and head up the stairs, listening to the drawer open again and pills shake in a plastic bottle.

IT'S 6:40 AND I'M READY
to roll. I go downstairs and find my mother sitting on the couch in the living room, looking at photos of her and my father in New York before I was born.

Photos I've never seen before.

Photos she must have been hiding from me all these years so she could keep up the lies about my father and make it seem like there were less amazing moments than she's ever let on.

My mother, she actually asks me if I want to look at the photos with her and I tell her I don't. That if she's had them all these years, she should've showed them to me before today, anytime really, and my mother, she doesn't say anything.

“I'm done packing too,” I tell her. “We should get going.”

She looks so nervous and horrified now. “Well,” she goes. “So now what?”

“I don't know.”

“Our last dinner together.”

“No, it won't be.”

She gives me the coldest look ever and says, “Our last dinner together, my boy.”

It's devastating. I can't deal with this. My mind is already made up.

Leaning down, I give her a hug and say, “I love you.”

“I love you, too, Jaime. I love you so much. And I'm gonna miss you.”

It's all feels really, really off. I nod and go, “Yeah. I know you will.”

“When will I get to see you again?” she asks, totally discounting what she just fucking said about this being our last dinner.