And obviously, I had no excuse. All I had was free time, but I just wasn't feeling the muse. As if I needed a muse-I just needed to sit my a.s.s down and write it. It wasn't like I didn't want to do a good job, or even just get this thing off my back and done already, but for some reason I just couldn't get it up to get it finished. I had sat down and opened up my notebook a number of times-well, definitely twice-but before I could accomplish anything, I'd always find something to distract me. A stray M&M. A shiny piece of metal. Nothing ever got done.

Even though she could have no idea that her ceremony remained unwritten, Stacey was treating me differently. It had been simmering for a while, but now it seemed the soup was ready. The length of time I had been unemployed, and her notion that I was doing absolutely nothing to change that status, were unfathomable to her. Exhibit A: Langford. Plus, I hadn't been shaving a whole lot, only when I had the rare interview, and I looked a bit of a mess. Frankly, that's how I felt, so why hide it? The night of our most recent dinner together, she fed me snide remarks about my level of dishevel and I just kept claiming, "Hey, I'm growing peyes for you two." She kept eyeing me with a genuine expression of worry, like a shopkeeper eyes a group of rowdy teens, and it was p.i.s.sing me off. I just knew that, when I excused myself to the bathroom, Stacey and Eric were discussing me, like, "I know, you're right. He'll ruin our wedding. But if we take this away from him, what will he have left?" She sent me text messages all the time with fortune-cookie-like aphorisms in them, such as "You make your own luck."

That night I was supposed to see Stacey again-Thai on Second Avenue-under the auspices of going over the wedding stuff again. It was only a few weeks away now. There was nothing really left to go over. I needed to stop being a p.u.s.s.y and write the d.a.m.n thing, was all. She was using the get-together to practice being a Jewish mom, with me playing the role of guilt-absorbing child. I hoped we'd have fun. I didn't like being unhappy with my friends. I was trying to stay positive, but I was feeling such negative vibes. It was as if no one had anything else to gossip about.

Like sands through the hourgla.s.s, so were the days of my life. I was doing a lot of sitting around the house alone, thinking. I had started writing again in the computerized journal, my current entry ent.i.tled "Unemployed, Broke, and h.o.r.n.y." It was cathartic to b.i.t.c.h in long, unedited bursts. My apartment should have been spotless given that I wasn't doing anything, but since there were no girls in sight, and with visits with Patty always happening at Patty's, the ennui and inertia were winning. I was perfectly content to let the plastic cups and paper plates pile up near the dirty laundry and a.s.sorted detritus.

I finally motivated out of bed and moved over to the couch, where I disregarded the wedding notebook on the coffee table, open to a page that screamed DO THIS, a.s.sHOLE DO THIS, a.s.sHOLE! in large black ballpoint scrawl, and leafed through a copy of The Stranger The Stranger I'd had since college. I always loved the opening paragraph. "Maman died today. Or maybe it was yesterday." That f.u.c.king Mersault had learned to float through the pleasure and the pain with none of it touching him. I could see that in a positive light from my current position. I got distracted, reached over to the coffee table, and checked my cell out of habit. I had a new text from Stacey, trying to confirm tonight. I responded in the affirmative. Just after I sent the text, the phone rang. Weirdly, I saw on the caller ID that it was the main number from JB's. I'd had since college. I always loved the opening paragraph. "Maman died today. Or maybe it was yesterday." That f.u.c.king Mersault had learned to float through the pleasure and the pain with none of it touching him. I could see that in a positive light from my current position. I got distracted, reached over to the coffee table, and checked my cell out of habit. I had a new text from Stacey, trying to confirm tonight. I responded in the affirmative. Just after I sent the text, the phone rang. Weirdly, I saw on the caller ID that it was the main number from JB's.

"h.e.l.lo," I answered.

"h.e.l.lo, is Jason in?"

"This is Jason," I said.

"Jason. Hi, it's John." Pause. "From JB Casting."

It took me a second to realize that John was JB. "Oh, hi," I said, sitting up.

"Jason, how have you been? Are you working?" JB, Mr. Tact.

"I've been doing a few things, mostly trying to finish my novella."

"Oh, that's nice. Well, if you are free today, we had a last-minute casting call that needs dozens of roles filled. You'd be perfect, and it pays five hundred for the day. I thought maybe you might be interested."

Was I! "Sure. Five hundred for the day, huh? What is the, uh, role?" I imagined he must need people to fill an audience for a scene with a band or something; I wasn't sure what else I was good for. Background person at the library?

JB explained that Discover Card was doing a ma.s.sive NYC promotion, and they needed lots of "young, friendly NYC folks" to help them pull it off. He gave the address of a place on Park and Thirty-third that I had to be at by eleven, and hung up. Five hundred bucks! I could kiss JB on the p.e.n.i.s.

Three hours later I stood on the back of a crowded bus, dressed as a giant, three-dimensional slice of chocolate layer cake with vanilla icing. I was a diabetic's nightmare. All the other "young, friendly NYC folks" wore similar huge, puffy foam outfits. We were all standing; you couldn't sit in bus seats in these ridiculous costumes. Every type of food was represented: a lobster, a big hot dog, a ham sandwich, a cookie, and in the largest costume of all, a thin black guy dressed as an entire roast chicken. Had it been fried, I think he could've sued for racism.

The Discover Card Company was sponsoring a special restaurant week in NYC. The bus was dropping us off on different corners in Midtown to hand out information on the special discounts available if you paid with the glorious Discover Card. They must have been grouping people as full meals, because the main-course chicken, a piece of broccoli played by a slightly plump Goth girl, and I, the dessert, were dropped off together on the northwest corner of Bryant Park and told to spread out a bit. I looked at Broccoli. You had to be seriously committed to be Goth in summer. Today it was supposed to hit the high eighties. Her thick black eye-makeup would soon be running down her stalk, that was for sure.

The sun was really intense. I found a spot in a bit of shade and held out my stupid flyers. My cake costume went from neck to knee, with white stockings for my legs. Thigh-highs. And, this was the worst, on my head I wore a chocolate beanie with a foot-tall pink-and-white plastic candle sticking out of it. The whole getup was not made of any sort of natural fiber or anything that remotely breathed, and even in the shade, I was cooking on the inside. If I were a wrestling coach, I would recommend this cake suit to my team so they could make weight.

There I stood. A moron. I was trying to be Zen, trying to picture the five hundred beans in my mind, but it wasn't working. Not with every business-casual a.s.shole in Midtown walking past and mocking me. They were all just so funny in this part of town. Maybe after they finished making spreadsheets they hit the comedy clubs, because I was hearing all sorts of brilliant cracks like "Hey, got milk?!" and a tsk-tsking "I told you to get your MBA." And then there were the secretaries in shiny white Reeboks, giggling at me and saying in grating Queens accents, "Oooh, now that makes me want to diet!" Oh, ha-ha. I had angry little daydreams of the many different ways I might torture them; the most vile involved wrapping a sweet potato in barbed wire and shoving it right up their a.s.ses. I was one surly slice of cake. I wiped the sweat from my brow on my hand, and I wiped my hand on my gauzy vanilla frosting. My face was so slick with oily perspiration that my gla.s.ses kept sliding down the bridge of my nose. I waited for more abuse and adjusted my candle cap; the elastic on it was tight and really kept in the heat.

I was getting delirious. I needed to talk to someone simpatico, so I crossed the street to see the roast chicken, who was standing on the far corner. As I waddled through the intersection, a car honked at me, and a sanitation worker hanging off the back of a garbage truck gave a wolf whistle as if I were a s.e.xy girl. Maybe the stockings flattered my calves.

Roast Chicken was grinning, trying to engage pa.s.sersby. He looked like he was having fun. That did not seem scientifically possible. "Hey, man," I said, touching his wing, "how's it going? You sweating to death?"

He smiled. "Nah, I'm cool. Couple more hours and it's payday."

I noticed he was also wearing stockings, golden-brown ones. "Can I ask you a question? How is it that you aren't miserable right now? I'm dying." I wiped some more perspiration on my frosting.

"I'm just rolling with it, is all," he said. He looked around, then down at me. "And also, I'm really stoned," he said, grinning again. "Smoked chicken, heh. Beth got me high."

"Beth?"

He flapped toward Broccoli. "Yeah, Beth. We got high before we changed into these costumes. She has a little one-hitter."

Broccoli Beth, you crafty little vegetable. h.e.l.l, I didn't even know Goths liked pot. I thought they were only into...s.h.i.t, I had no idea what kind of drugs they did. But they were the polar opposite of life-affirming hippies who had sort of claimed pot, so I would never have guessed she would've been packing. But I was glad I wasn't high. I needed something to dull the sense of reality, not enhance it. Now, a Vicodin, or an old-fashioned Valium, that might have helped. I cakewalked back to my spot, thinking I was really glad I had a diploma from an Ivy League inst.i.tution. What a laugh.

The next two hours pa.s.sed like a kidney stone. A mustached Hispanic man in a tank top walked right up to me and whispered that he would very much like to eat me. A little kid poked my frosting, made a farting sound, and laughed. A fat man's dog barked and nipped at me. A very cute girl in a wife-beater stopped, lowered her sungla.s.ses, and looked me over. She was stunning, a tight little body and blond funky hair, kind of rock-'n'-roll but not so much that it seemed like you could only meet her if you were in a band. She looked familiar.

Then I realized who it was. "Annie?" I said. I took a step toward her. She looked f.u.c.king fantastic. "Hey, it's Jason."

"Jason?" she said, as if trying to place me. She pointed at my costume. "What's going on?"

"Oh, you know, same old."

She squinted, then smiled awkwardly. We stood there in the heat like any young couple flirting on a summer day, she the stylish girl, me the slice of cake.

"So, uh, how've you been?" I asked.

"Why are you wearing that costume?" she said, her smile fading. She touched it with her finger.

"What costume? This is Gaultier." I shrugged as if to say, "Hey, it's funny." She gave me back a look that was...it was pity. Pure pity. Like she was looking at a homeless child in a gutter in Peru.

"Is this your job?" she asked, furrowing her brow.

"No, it's, well...it's obviously a long story," I said, exasperated. "Hey, let's make a plan and I'll tell you all about it. We should have exchanged numbers the last time we saw each other, that was dumb of us. Do you have, uh, a card?"

"Do you have a pocket?"

I looked down at my cake suit. "Good point."

She slid the sungla.s.ses back up her nose. "You look ridiculous."

"Yeah, I know it. It's just a temp job."

"Normally, you're a hamburger, right?" She grinned. "Just kidding, just kidding." She patted my cake shoulder. "Listen, I actually have to run to this meeting. I'll see you around, Jason. Try not to melt out here."

Then she was gone. I was the s.h.i.t she had wisely stepped over. I bet she'd be on IM in ten minutes with someone from school: "You are not going to believe who I just saw[image] ." I turned to watch her go and adjusted my itchy candle cap. A stream of perspiration escaped the elastic and drooled down my forehead, stinging my eyes. ." I turned to watch her go and adjusted my itchy candle cap. A stream of perspiration escaped the elastic and drooled down my forehead, stinging my eyes.

By the love of all that is holy, the bus returned on time. I pulled off the nasty hat and leaned on one of the seats as we went to pick up other a.s.sorted dinner items scattered about Midtown. This piece of cake needed an Indian Oceansized drink of anything but milk.

After changing back into my civvies at the loft, I was now in some dark bar called Fiddlesticks, buying a round of drinks for Goth Beth, Derek (formerly known as Roast Chicken), and a nameless girl who had been a pickle. The Midtown Irish pub was conveniently located near a check-cashing place that turned my day of shame into $303.36, after taxes and check-cashing fees. Following the capitalist food chain, the bartender was turning that money into the universal problem-solver, my friend and yours, alcohol.

I was already drunk. I was rehydrating by dehydrating. We had been there since about six, and it was nine-thirty. Derek had been trying to kiss Pickle for well over an hour, and slowly but surely his persistence was wearing away at her resolve. As I predicted to Beth that Pickle would be smooched before midnight, my pocket vibrated. I pulled out the cell; I had a few new messages. It was too loud in the bar to hear, so I checked my missed calls. Five from Stacey. Oh, f.u.c.k.

f.u.c.k f.u.c.k f.u.c.k! Dinner with Stacey. That was supposed to be at eight. d.a.m.n it. She was going to be perturbed, to put it mildly. I contemplated how to handle it. I did have a job today, okay, that was a positive. And now you could say I was networking. But I decided that calling her drunk and saying any of that would not be the best way for me to acquire forgiveness. I'd deal with it tomorrow, sober, with a protective shield of lies. Yes, that was the smart play. I congratulated myself on the choice by taking a giant slurp of Beth's cranberry and vodka by mistake. "Eww," I spat. "Healthy juice mixed in with my alcohol!" Beth smiled. Hmmm, without all the Goth makeup and with booze coursing through my arteries, she looked downright acceptable.

As I picked up my own drink, a vodka soda, my phone buzzed again. It was Stacey, again. I took two quick long swallows, walked out to the street, sighed, and answered. She let me have it right from the get-go.

"Where the f.u.c.k are you, Jason?"

"Hi, Stacey," I said. "I'm so sorry. I had a job today, it came up at the last minute and it was just horrible, and I completely forgot about dinner. You won't believe what I had to do."

"That's bulls.h.i.t. How could you forget? We confirmed it this morning. You couldn't call me?! Eric swapped rounds with one of his friends so he could have the night off and join us. We're sitting at a table for three."

The street was empty. I sat down on the curb and put my fingers to the bridge of my nose. "I'm really, really sorry, Stacey. I didn't mean to forget. I really did have a job today, and it...I'll tell you about it later but it was s.h.i.tty and I forgot. I'm sorry."

"I don't care, Jason. What's with you lately? I mean, how can I trust you to do the wedding when you can't even remember dinner?"

I stood up. "Because dinner is just dinner, it's not a wedding, people eat it every night. C'mon, I mean, sheesh, I'm sorry. I mean maybe I'm a little drunk right now and I f.u.c.ked up, but I'll remember your wedding."

"Whoa-whoa-whoa. You're drunk? Are you at a bar right now? Jesus, Jason..."

"Slow down. I got drunk after the s.h.i.tty-"

"It's just the way you've been lately, Jason. You do everything half-a.s.sed, and the wedding-I'm sure you mock it with Tina and all-but it is obviously very important to Eric and me. You can't marry us in front of our families half-a.s.sed. And you know, the last time we saw you...I don't mean to be rude, but you need to hear this. You looked like c.r.a.p, like you don't give a c.r.a.p, you're just soooo bohemian or something. And that's not exactly how we thought you were going to take this responsibility. Maybe it was a bad idea."

Now I was pacing back and forth in front of the bar. "I am taking it seriously, okay? I just got laid off..."

"Six weeks ago."

"Hey, I'm unemployed, I'm allowed to look like s.h.i.t and be in a s.h.i.tty mood. I went to those cla.s.ses, I'm not blowing off anything-how many times have we talked about it, how many dinners, how many phone calls? You don't trust me? That is so insulting, Stacey, I don't even know what to say. What am I going to do, show up wearing a swastika?!" I was yelling, and I was shaking.

"That's just how I feel right now, Jason," she said quietly, doing the calm thing now that I was mad. Oh, how I hated that! "I don't know what to say. You just seem a little out of it, or in a bad place or something, I don't know. You don't seem to want to talk about it, and maybe it's not the best time to do something like this, something for people other than yourself. I'm going to talk to Eric and we'll figure out what we're going to do."

"Oh, give me a break. What am I, some drugged-out high school kid on an after-school special? Don't sound so sorry for me, ugh!" I was squeezing the phone with all my might. Completely flummoxed, I blurted out, "You know, my f.u.c.king GPA was higher than yours."

Her voice was quaking a little. "I'm sorry you had a s.h.i.tty day," she said. "Bye." She hung up.

"f.u.c.k!" I yelled to the empty street. I snapped my phone shut and then reopened it. Then I shut it again and thought better of it and opened it again. Then I dialed Eric's cell-phone number as fast as I could.

"Oh, hi there, Jason," he said.

"Are you standing right there with Stacey?" I asked, heart pounding.

"No, no. She just ran into the bathroom crying." He put on a mock-happy tone. "Soooo, how are you?"

"I'm sorry. I'm really sorry, Eric, she just was nagging me and I had a really s.h.i.tty day-a really s.h.i.tty couple months too, and I'm drunk." I took a breath, and kept pacing. "Tell her I'm sorry. I'll call her tomorrow and apologize."

"I will. And you will."

"Are you p.i.s.sed at me too?" I asked.

"Yeah, I mean, my fiancee's crying and you blew me off for dinner," he said. I thought I could hear him take a sip of something, I was imagining wine. Wine they bought to calm themselves because they were mad at me. "I'm not exactly thrilled with you right now, you could say."

I stopped pacing and stared down the street. A homeless guy was directing someone in an Audi wagon as they parallel-parked. "C'mon, Er. It was only dinner. Give me a chance. I will not screw up your wedding. I'm not a loser." The wagon hit the minivan behind it, setting off the car alarm. The homeless guy cackled. I put my finger in my ear.

"Well, you're acting a little bit like a loser right now, dude." He paused. "But you are doing the wedding. It's way too late to find a real rabbi now, those guys get booked like six months to a year in advance." He took another sip of whatever it was. "Just, do me a favor. Call Stacey tomorrow and apologize."

"Done. I will."

"And, just slow down a bit. Okay? Stacey's worried about you, and, well, so am I."

I told him I would. I didn't think I had been speeding off anywhere, though; frankly, it felt like I was going in reverse. But I played nice and said good-bye. Then I walked right back into the bar.

16.

Yes, leaving would've been the right thing to do. The mature thing. The thought burped up after I did the shot Derek handed me. But I didn't feel like it, how about that? My hair was crunchy from sweating all day. I was chafing at the crotch. I didn't want to go home and think. I didn't want to lie on my couch again and be sad, brush my teeth and feel sad, and get in bed and jerk off sad. Christ, it was all so dull and pathetic and tiresome. So I got another drink after the shot and I bullshat with Beth. I gladly accepted a hit of Ecstasy from that pickle chick. She had a s.h.i.tload in an Altoids tin. I swallowed it knowing full well it was an eight-hour ticket to G.o.d knows where.

I looked around at the laughing faces. Everyone was having fun, I must've been having fun. For like a half-hour I felt good, like I could lift five hundred pounds right up over my head. It was all gonna work out. It always did.

Then just like that, I felt the nausea. I hurried to the bathroom and locked the door. My tongue felt swollen. I was leaning over the toilet, retching, puking up pure liquid. I wondered how much money in alcohol I was spitting into the s.h.i.tter. I coughed a final time, then balled up some toilet paper and wiped my mouth. I felt a little better. I washed my face with cold water and looked in the mirror. Jesus, my pupils! They took up my whole eyeb.a.l.l.s-I couldn't even remember what color my irises were as I looked at the black saucers that had replaced them. I was like a f.u.c.king j.a.panese anime anime character. Oh boy, I thought. Oh boy, oh boy. character. Oh boy, I thought. Oh boy, oh boy.

I went back out to the bar. The E was really starting to kick in. Who were these people? Everyone's sneakers were sparkling like they had special Christmas lights in them. Some s.h.i.tty Chieftains song was playing and the fiddle in it was like a paper cut on my eye. I squeezed past a guy so close I could smell his breath, I could see his nostril hairs growing, they were getting longer and longer and they looked sharp like bayonets and I felt relieved when I finally got past him and found my way back to the table and sat my a.s.s down. I gripped the sides of the chair with both hands.

Beth turned to me. "Where did you go?" she asked. Her face was like a puddle someone had thrown a pebble in, rippling gently.

"So tell me," I said, back to her, "what is it about death you Goths love so much?"

"What?" she said. "We don't love death."

"Yeah you do! You loooooove death. You want to marry it. Rock-'n'-roll is supposed to be about s.e.x and drugs, but you Goths can't wait to die and be buried and rot. It's all misery and spiderwebs and blackness. Explain it to me." I crossed my legs. "I want to learn the ways of your kind."

"What? You're wasted!"

I took a sip of a drink, it might have been my drink, it was wet like I recalled my drink being. "And yet, I am speaking the true word. Verily, I might add."

"Give me a break, we like drugs and s.e.x just as much as cla.s.sic-rock people like you," she said, poking me in the chest.

I grabbed her finger, hard. "How dare you?! How dare you call me cla.s.sic rock! Do I look like Sammy Hagar?"

She laughed, "No. Tom Petty."

I held her finger still. It was warm, I could feel the blood in it, circulating, doing its thing. I pulled her in and tried to kiss her.

"No, I don't think so," she said, pushing me back.

"C'mon, I have like every Cure alb.u.m," I said, sliding away from her, giving up, taking another sip of whatever it was in front of me. I hummed into the gla.s.s, "The Lovecats...da da da da da da da da da da da..."

"Hey, Cakeboy, you want this shot of SoCo? I bought it for you," said Derek, clapping me on the back.

"I f.u.c.king hate SoCo," I said, and downed it. It tasted like cough syrup and dirt.