Something Fierce (26 page)

The drugs are keeping you in the fog. You have to wake-up, Seth. You have to get clear.

He took a deep breath. And another. “Okay,” he said, “okay.” He concentrated on eating the condiment sandwich. Chewing. Tasting. Swallowing.

His whole sense of reality was askew. He knew this, but he didn’t know how to set it right. Even his once dependable gut feelings now changed with the wind and proved to be completely unreliable. There was nothing to hold on to, no higher ground to run to where he might get a better perspective. “Am I losing my mind or is she fucking with it?”

The fact that you ask that question is all the answer you need.

Was it? The man who’d met Kerri Engel at Coffee and Books in Willoughby four months ago would have said so. He would have dismissed his current crisis with a grin and a shake of his head. “Too many beautiful women in the world to put up with that shit,” he’d have said, and meant it. In the past, dishonesty in a woman—even suspected dishonesty—had always been a huge turn-off, a guaranteed buzz-kill, enough of a reason to stop seeing her. But for the exhausted, drugged, drunken, delusional man he was now, this lack of trust, this uncertainly had the opposite effect. The
need to know
weighed on him night and day, when they were together and apart; the burden of trying to decipher the truth from what
might be
a half-truth, a half-truth from what
could be
a lie was on him, like an addiction, all the time. He needed the truth. He needed it.

Then find it.

“How?”

By any means necessary.

Maybe this
was
how killers and certified madmen heard voices.

A
rms raised over her
head
, hips rolling, feeling the eyes of everyone at The Abyss, male and female, stealing glances or outright gawking at her, Kerri Engel soaked in the hot lights and the beat of the music. She
was
music. She was sex. She was youth and beauty and life lived out loud. The dance floor was crowded, but she and Tiff owned it and never more than when they were bumping and grinding up against each other. “Who’s your daddy, bitch?” Kerri laughed into Tiff’s ear while slapping her friend’s highly-coveted ass. Donna and Carlene were on either side of them. Donna rolled her eyes and shook her head, but she was smiling and keeping the beat. Carlene, Donna’s latest charity case, shouldn’t be out here at all. Not only was she
fugly,
she couldn’t dance, couldn’t keep a beat to save her life.

“Here come the Latin lovers,” Kerri shouted to the girls, regarding the two guys—one tall, one short, both dark, cute—dancing toward them, with wide, white grins. This would be the third set of men attempting to dance with them in the past half hour. It was still early for that unless the guys were exceptional. As usual, the girls would decide whether or not to open the circle after the guys started dancing and the verdict would be communicated through eye contact with one another. Everyone had been denied so far. Mostly it was up to Kerri and Tiff. Donna was too nice. She would dance with anyone unless they were wasted or vulgar. Carlene, obviously, didn’t count.

“What up?” the tall one shouted over the music, but he was talking to Tiff. Typical. Aside from that ass, she was a beautiful face, blonde hair and big tits. She danced like a stripper. The kind of girl Kerri assumed a guy would instantly want to fuck. The short one zeroed in on Donna. Also typical. Donna was as sweet and wholesome as freshly squeezed orange juice. Conservatively dressed, at least beside Kerri and Tiff, she didn’t need to flaunt it. She had big doe eyes and a mouth that Kerri sometimes imagined kissing. The kind of girl Kerri assumed that a guy would instantly want to marry.

Kerri hated the two guys, especially the tall one. He had a phony smile, was saying some bullshit that she couldn’t hear over the music, and spitting when he talked. She wanted to keep the circle closed, but there was not going to be a vote this time. Tiff was intrigued by something the tall one said so they were in. For a while anyway. Kerri danced away from them. She didn’t want to be associated with guys like that, so uncouth, so rude. Too stupid to know that you don’t approach four girls and completely ignore the two you’re not interested in like they were garbage, like they didn’t exist. Carlene was the one she felt sorry for, big nosed and pitiable, leaning in, trying to be included, ready to agree or laugh along with whatever asinine thing these fools were saying.

Screw that. Kerri left the dance floor, but no one seemed to notice. She went back to their table to check her phone. Five missed calls from Kyle. He’d been impossible since she’d been forced to tell him—in order to get some breathing room—that she had no physical attraction to him and was in love with Seth. Kyle tried to be big about it and insisted that the most important thing in the world to him was her happiness, but he’d been moody and erratic ever since, ignoring her for a few days and then hounding her like this with the phone calls. There was a text message too:
Jinx is sick. Please come. Friends only.

She was about to put the phone back in her purse when she saw Seth’s wallet. The plan was to return it after the weekend but looking at it now made her feel sad. She felt worse when she opened it up and found a crinkled ten dollar bill and a note that she’d left for him a while back:
I love you!
He always saved her notes. He even saved ticket stubs if it had been a great night. She had an impulse to call him and tell him that she was sorry. Not about the wallet, of course, she’d have to return that as deftly as she’d taken it but about the fight. It had been mostly her fault; she couldn’t say that either but she could say she was sorry they’d fought and that she missed him. That would be enough.

He’d been clingy that day which always made her feel claustrophobic and smothered. Many times he’d written in his journal that it bothered him when she would drop the names of male friends that he’d never heard of and then “casually change the subject, volunteering nothing else.” If he wanted to know more, he wrote, he had to ask and when he’d asked, she’d be evasive. He also accused her of “leading men on” though he’d never met or seen her around any of these men, another thing that bothered him.

So, feeling annoyed with him that day, she’d pushed those buttons by peppering their conversations here and there with the names of some of her guy friends from school and work: Chris, Daniel, and David. It worked. Seth had started prying then, acting all jealous and paranoid and controlling, which made her feel more boxed in. The fight had gotten pretty intense. She’d purposely left her phone out and went to the bathroom. She’d made it faster than usual and came out to catch him checking her phone. Then things had really gotten ugly. He’d been the one that looked like the fool though. Not only had he been invading her privacy, he couldn’t have found their names in her call history anyway. She’d given them all female names: Chris was Christina, Daniel was Danielle, and David was Darla.

He’d apologized in the end, admitting that he had no right going through her phone, but he’d said a lot of mean things before that so she’d punished him by taking his wallet. But now, she was sorry she’d done any of it and she missed him so much all of a sudden. It felt like her heart was breaking open. She would have cried right then and there if Carlene hadn’t joined her at the table.

Carlene had a sheepish smile on her face and shouted unconvincingly, “This is fun. The DJ’s great.” She bobbed her head against the beat of the music. Then she leaned toward Kerri and shouted, “You want a drink?”

She didn’t really, but sending the girl on an errand was better than having to talk to her. “Get me a Wet Pussy.”

Carlene laughed like a second-rate clown. When Kerri didn’t join her, she stopped and said, “What?”

“It’s a drink.”

Carlene didn’t seem to believe her. She looked across the room, buying time, then said, “Really?”

“Ah…yeah.”

“Okay,” she said and went to the bar.

Kerri surveyed the crowd and felt a terrible emptiness overpowering her. She suddenly hated this scene, this nightmare of desperation: girls looking and acting like sluts for free drinks and ego boosts; guys strutting around like they owned the place and the girls were brought in for their entertainment.

And yet, watching Tiff, Donna, and the boys dance, she couldn’t help but feel jealous. At least she had the satisfaction of knowing how poorly the boys had chosen. Tiff was popping her ass, rubbing up against the tall one, but little did he know that was as good as it was going to get. This dude, Kerri could already tell by the way Tiff was looking around, wasn’t even going to get a kiss. He would never imagine that Tiff was a virgin, saving that cherry for her husband, whoever he turned out to be. She didn’t even give blowjobs unless she was practically engaged. If the next song was not one of her favorites, Tiff would return to the table where she would let this moron buy her—and her thirsty friends—a round of drinks, after which, they’d return to the dance floor and the circle would gradually close leaving him no choice but to awkwardly dance away.

The short guy dancing with Donna wasn’t doing any better in the scoring department. In fact, he wasn’t even getting the bump and grind on the dance floor. The difference was, however, he already knew he wasn’t going to get laid. Donna didn’t lead guys on. She told them right up front that she had a boyfriend and was just out to have fun with her friends. If he wanted to dance with her that was cool, if he was after something more, she wasn’t his girl. Most guys tried to seduce her anyway—men were such whores—saying that they wouldn’t tell if she didn’t. Some thanked her for her honestly, but then had to go talk to someone on the other side of the room and never returned. Others, like this guy tonight, danced with her anyway, maybe glad to be relieved of the pressure to score. He was probably telling her how lucky her boyfriend was and meaning it, probably dreaming of someday meeting a girl like her, as sincere as she was sexy and beautiful.

Carlene brought back the drinks, moving her head like she was just loving this night. “I got one too,” she said. “They’re not very big.”

Kerri took one of the drinks from her and said, “They’re shots. You’re supposed to shoot them.” Then she shot it back. Carlene nodded but didn’t follow suit. The thought of her getting ready for the evening was tragic. All the time she must have spent and for what? To be outshined by Tiff and Donna, to have those pricks look right through her. It was a horrible world. Really. A disgusting place. She hated it. She hated everyone in it.

Except for Seth, who she was missing terribly right now. She wanted to get out of this evening and be with him. She needed that but she’d told him she was in bed with the flu so tonight was out. Maybe she could call him later. He’d be awake. He was always awake. In the meantime, she sent him a text:
How are you, baby? I’m feeling a little better. Not a lot, but a little. I miss you so much. I can’t wait to see you. I love you!

“I have to pee!” Carlene shouted to her.

“Congratulations.”

The girl made a laughing sound. “You want to come with?”

“No.”

Carlene looked at her drink and the bathroom. “I need some air,” Kerri said before she was asked to play drink-sitter. She grabbed her purse and went out the door. It was a beautiful spring night. Slightly chilly, but nice. The outside patio bar was open for business and Kerri took a seat at it. Since she wouldn’t be seeing Seth tonight, she lit a cigarette and took a long satisfying drag. Watching the smoke dissipate in the air, she knew Seth would be ticked off if he found out that she smoked sometimes, not because she was smoking but because she’d never told him about it. He would accuse her of “lying by omission” again or add this to the evidence he was gathering in his journal—all circumstantial so far—that she led a double life.

He wrote about these things incessantly. Pages and pages worth. Reading it was a little scary. Sometimes he wrote in red or green ink and when he was writing in these colors, he was writing as someone else. The red ink was a mean character that berated him, said sarcastic and mean things to him. The green ink was a character just as harsh but one that encouraged him and was very against her. On a couple of occasions, he would switch back and forth between the black ink that he usually used and one of the other colors, having these weird conversations with himself where he tried to convince himself that he should or shouldn’t trust her, that he was or wasn’t crazy, that he should or shouldn’t leave her. But no matter the verdict, he was terribly lonely when she wasn’t there and he was obsessed with thinking about her. When he did come to a conclusion that he should leave her, she made sure he didn’t. She had a crisis of some sort and needed his help or she surprised him with a gift or she was in a great mood or she was insatiably horny. And he would come around little by little until things were good between them again and they were both happy.

But then, she’d want to be somebody else for a while without having to give up who she was, what she had, what she’d earned. Maybe she was a selfish person or as she’d once told Kyle, a hateful bitch, but this is how she was, it was how she’d always been. Not everyone could play fair. Not everyone was built for it. She knew she wasn’t. Maybe someday she’d be a better person, maybe after they were married and having babies together. But she was done thinking about this now. Things were the way they had to be and she refused to feel guilty about it.

Two guys at the other end of the bar were looking at her, discussing her. She smiled shyly and turned away. They were not bad looking but they were young. Her age seemed so much younger on other people. Especially guys.

She checked her phone. Seth hadn’t responded to her text.

The boys flagged down the bartender and then he was on his way over. The gentlemen would like to buy the lady a drink. They smiled and waved at her; she smiled and waved at them. “A Wet Pussy,” she said to the bartender.

“I’ll need to see some ID.”