Holding Still for as Long as Possible (23 page)

“He's a medic, actually.”

“A medic? Really. Like, he drives an ambulance?”

“Like, he saves lives, asshole.”

“I know, I have to deal with paramedics all the time at work. Brave job.”

Josh poked his head into the bathroom. “Are you okay, Billy?”

I cupped the phone. “Yeah
.”

He mouthed,
Oops
,
sorry
,
didn't know you were on the phone
,
and shut the door.

“Well, I want to make sure you're okay. I know how rough it's been for you lately. I wouldn't want you to get into anything you couldn't handle.”

I was perversely annoyed at Maria's maternal-sounding concern, despite the fact that I longed for it. I located a single roll behind the spray-bottles of cleansers, and lifted my head too fast, banging it on the top of the cupboard.

“So, you're not serious about this Josh guy?”

“What does ‘serious' mean?” I rubbed the rising bump on my head and slumped against the side of the claw-footed tub. “And what the fuck are you doing calling me at 4:30 a.m.? Are you drunk?”

“Yeah,” Maria admitted.

“Do you miss me?”

“Yeah.”

“Good.”

“Billy, you don't understand, it's hard to be around someone constantly who's afraid of everything. It starts to grate, you know? I felt so helpless and unable to help you.”

Oh, fuck you
, I thought.

“Besides, Hilary, I asked you to get back together two months ago and you didn't even call me to talk about it. You just let it drop.”

“I didn't think you were serious. It was just a text message.”

I could feel the dramatic drunk talk escaping me, those words that in the moment feel so honest but are invariably just heightened lies. I decided to change the subject. “How's work, Maria? What's it like finally to become what you've been working so hard to become all these years?”

“I dunno, Billy. Sometimes when I'm listening to clients talk, especially the ones I know are never going to get it together, I contemplate telling them to just give up. You know, just do all the crack you want to do until you die. It doesn't mean anything anyway!”

I laughed. “That doesn't sound like you. But it's kind of hilarious.”

“I wonder why I ever decided to do this. Sometimes I look at the clients and think, it must feel really good. It must be the best feeling in the world if you truly want to walk around with piss-soaked pants yelling out indecipherable things and losing everything. Like, what could make me want to lose everything?”

“That's a pretty big question,” I said. I heard Maria take a long sip and light a cigarette. “You're probably just overwhelmed with the reality of how sad people are when you meet them at their lowest point,” I continued. “I'm sure, eventually, you'll get used to it. And you really will see how you've helped them.”

Maria snorted. “Aw shit, Billy. I've got to go to sleep. Sorry about being jealous and stuff.”

“No problem,” I said.

And with that, we hung up. A conversation that might have ended in a fight three months ago was now ending harmoniously. I felt oddly reassured; a friendship with Maria might be possible after all.

I stumbled down the hall towards my bedroom, where Josh was leaning out the window. I stood silently in the doorway, watching him smoke. His phone, sitting in an upturned ball cap that also held keys and pocket change, started buzzing. He ignored it. Drunk and curious, I moved towards it and tested the waters. Josh still didn't turn around. I leaned closer. A photo of Amy's face blinked, signalling a text from her.

I handed Josh the phone. He flipped it open quickly, read it and clicked it shut.

“Things okay with you guys?”

“They're starting to shift, you know. She's going to try to date some people. Get out more. She knows what's going on with us. We're all being honest, right?”

“Right,” I said.

“I think it would be fine if I stayed over,” Josh offered.

It seemed crazy, but I still wasn't ready. I liked the booty calls, the drunken fun, the honeymoon chemistry. I didn't want normalcy to creep into the equation just yet. Plus, I wasn't ready to be up front with Josh about how mentally ill I felt almost constantly. What if I had a panic attack in the middle of the night and he woke up? I would be ashamed.

“It just makes me so happy to be with you, I lose track of time,” Josh continued.

I, on the other hand, felt hyper-aware of every moment. “I've got so much homework to do,” I said, pointing at the pile of books on my desk, all texts for my Medieval Literary Theory course. I'd read none of them, had attended two of six classes and left both early.

I sat on the edge of the bed and nodded at Josh. He straddled me, kissed my neck. “You're dangerous,” I mumbled.

Josh smirked, as if I had meant he was dangerously sexy. But that's not what I meant at all.

[ 24 ]

Amy

Tina had become my social panic button, a buffer between me and potential discomfort. We were sitting out on the Drake patio with mugs of green tea, picking at a shared pumpkin muffin. We had the weeklies spread out between us, scanning the live show listings. I was trying to cheer up. Not even work could occupy me the way it used to, and shopping provided no sparkle. I was definitely in a slump. When I was alone, I wanted Josh back so much I felt like my teeth were hurting from the force of my longing. But when I saw him and we slipped back into our routine of bickering and the mundane motions of life, the longing faded.

“So, I can't come to Roxy's birthday party with you,” Tina said. “Sorry, babe, but I'm going to Alex's cottage.”

“Oh, great,” I said. Negotiating the world as a single girl was less and less appealing.

An ambulance pulled into the art-store parking lot across the street. It drew my eye. You didn't really notice ambulances until you met a medic. Then, all of a sudden from six blocks away you'd see a blur of blue and white, and crane your neck. I don't know why that is. Maybe it's like when you think you might be pregnant, and all of a sudden you see pregnant women everywhere.

Tina's hair was newly white-blonde with bits of purple that caught the light. She pushed her sunglasses up to rest on top of her head. I could see some wrinkles forming around her eyes. We were supposed to be having a meeting about our queer youth film outreach project, but so far we'd only gossiped. Last night, Tina had slept with the curly-haired bartender from the little pub down the street. “The girl smoked during sex,” Tina had said, loud enough for all the other tables to turn and look. “I mean, seriously. I was doing some of my best work. Still, I kept looking up and she'd light another one.”

She turned around now to see what I was looking at and noted the ambulance. “Is Josh working today?”

“Nope. Sleeping off a night shift.”

“Huh. When's he moving out?”

“Dunno.”

“
Amy
.”

“I know, I know.”

“So is he, like, serious about Billy now? Will Roxy's party be weird?”

“I'm not sure what's happening, to be honest.”

“Huh. Well, I think you should just go for it with Roxy. She's a nice one, you know, really one-of-a-kind. Minimal bullshit.”

“Roxy and I are such good friends, it would be too weird. I'm going to just take things as they come.”

“Any other crushes?”

“Well, I got an e-mail from an old lover, actually. A guy I used to date at summer camp. We have this kind of longstanding true-love thing happening.”

“Another straight dude?”

Tina wanted me to be a lesbian. She found my lack of gender preference as confounding as the Olsen twins.

“Yup. We might reconnect again. He just got divorced, actually.”

“Divorced? How old is he?”

“Twenty-six.”

“Kids?”

“Nope.”

“Interesting.”

“Very,” I lied. The truth was, it felt less right than ever.

“You have a backup plan, right?” Tina continued. “A distraction, at the very least. Josh was a good thing, you know, but seriously, that horse was long, long dead and you kept at it.”

“That's such a weird expression, ‘beating a dead horse.' I wonder where it comes from.”

“Tonight I'm taking you out,” Tina said. “And you cannot say no. I won't accept it.”

I took a sip of my tea. Tina was already on her phone texting someone about a party. She always knew about the parties.

Minutes later, she said, “Okay, we're going to the Beaver tonight. Ten o'clock. It's some sort of Wednesday-night dyke hip-hop or whatever. Wear something totally slutty.”

“I don't know.” I didn't tell her that my plan for the evening was to continue making a sad experimental film using close-ups of ant farms — the official way I was mourning my relationship — before smoking pot and watching season two of
Weeds
in six-episode marathons. No, that would sound pathetic.

“We need to get drunk and make bad decisions,” Tina said, lighting a cigarette. “It's for your own good.”

“Okay, sure. Whatever.”

Tina blew smoke in my face. “That's my girl.”

At ten, I was sitting on a bar stool watching the three cutest art fags in the world make drinks, wash dishes, and clean up from the dinner rush. Tina was late, as usual. Everyone seemed to know one another in this bar. They walked in and greeted the bartenders, the bus boy, and the waitress, as well as the people sitting at tables. I felt a bit out of it, the way you do when you've been married for years and are suddenly thrust into the scene again.

The bar was pretty small, so I drank my vodka-soda too quickly and popped out to the street to have a cigarette and send Tina irate text messages.

I leaned against the window and watched a cute, blonde, scruffy tomboy lock her bike to the gas line. When she turned, I recognized her as the girl I saw everywhere lately — at the farmers' market, at Starbucks near my work ordering green tea in the mornings, at the art supply store across town, once at the doctor's office. We'd progressed to nodding at each other and smiling, because clearly we were meant to meet somehow. I called her the Everywhere Girl.

She wore a loose white T-shirt, jeans, and a backwards baseball cap, and she was chatting with a skinny guy in purple jeans and a wife-beater holding a crate of records. The guy went inside. I smiled at Everywhere Girl. She nodded, still trying to lock up her bike. It was obvious that her lock was jammed.

“Fuck this piece of shit.
Man, if this doesn't work I'm going to have to go all the way back home again.”

“Where do you live?”

“Carlton and Yonge.”

“Oy.”

I picked up her lock and shook it, hearing the telltale click. “The lock is broken inside. It's toast. But if you're going to the Beaver, you can lock it to mine, for a while anyway. I'm planning on hanging out here until at least midnight.” Tina had made me swear to stick it out a full two hours.

“Wow, that would be wicked. I'm only having one drink, tops. I have to work early. Are you sure you don't mind?”

“Nope. I mean, I'm bound to run into you in a day or two anyhow.” I snapped open my U-lock and attached it to hers.

I introduced myself to her.

“I started calling you the Redheaded Run-In,” she told me. “Like, ‘I keep running into this redhead,' and that's what my friend started calling you.”

She said her name, but I immediately blanked on it. “That's hilarious,” I said. “I started calling you Everywhere Girl.”

We smiled at each other in that way that acknowledges chemistry.

Everywhere Girl disappeared into the bar and I waited for Tina outside. Eventually she arrived flanked by two girls with similar blunt brunette bangs. They were already drunk, and walking like they were on stage. They carried oversized white purses, just like me. I wanted to go home.

When I ordered us drinks inside, the bartender, a surly-looking indie-rock guy in a cowboy shirt, informed me that all my drinks were going on Everywhere Girl's tab. She lifted her drink from across the room in a toast.

“Are you sure?” I walked over to her table, which was packed with girls in tiny shirts and oversized hoop earrings. “I mean, you don't know me, but I'm a lush. I might order ten shots just for kicks.”

“You seem far too nice for that, what with the whole sharing-the-lock thing. Plus, I know you get up early since I always run into you at Starbucks before 8 a.m.”

Apparently, Everywhere Girl's version of one drink meant five and my two hours meant six, and even Tina went home before me, leaving the two of us on the patio at 1 a.m., leaning into each other.