“She probably didn’t see you bro” Tad offers pathetically, further worsening the situation at hand.
“She walked right fucking past me, not even a hello.” I can’t even believe I’m saying this.
“I’m telling you she didn’t see you bro. Besides, I’m sure she wasn’t leaving. I know the girl she was with. She’s the type never to pass up a party.” Tad continues to offer his wisdom while we wait for a free beer at the bar.
“How can you say she didn’t see me? I was yelling her name!”
“I don’t know guy? Maybe she didn’t recognize you?”
“Didn’t recognize me! She invited me to this fucking thing in the first place!” I yell over the house music playing in the main room. Tad hears me, but is more focused on getting the bartender’s attention.
I can’t believe this is happening. For starters, I took a huge risk to my personal sanity in coming here in the first place. Just as I had feared from the beginning, Lauren found a way to extract the truth out of the situation. Despite my telling her I would be working late, somehow (and I really have Tad to thank for this) she was informed of the fashion show and my invite here. Of course she calls me after hearing the news and plays dumb – waiting for me to hang myself in a web of my own lies. I take the bait like a true dumb fuck, and she kicks the chair from under me. The following is transcribed from our phone conversation earlier:
Lauren: What the fuck Andrew? If it’s nothing for me to worry about, why did you lie?
Me: I didn’t want to hear any shit from you.
Lauren: But that’s exactly my point Andrew, love of my life (sarcastic), if you’re not doing anything wrong, then there wouldn’t be any reason to eat any shit would there? (Traffic and homeless are sounding in her background over the phone).
Me: What’s all that shit in the background? Where are you?
Lauren: I’m on a payphone. Broke my cell. Don’t ask. Back to my point, you understand my concern right?
Me: Yeah, I mean no, I mean, I don’t know anymore. Look, it wasn’t my intention to lie, it’s just, I knew I’d have to eat shit from you if you thought I was out partying all night. That’s all. I just didn’t want you to think I’m out having a grand ol’ time why you’re rotting away in the apartment.
Lauren: Well isn’t that the case here?
Me: What? (Genuinely confused and perhaps elsewhere with my thoughts)
Lauren: Never mind, Andrew. Whatever I say isn’t going to change shit… you go to your fucking fashion show, what can I do? I just think… I don’t know, I think we should have a serious discussion when you get back from your little show.
Me: See! That’s exactly why I lied in the first place. What’s there to talk about? I’m not out fucking around or anything. This is a networking opportunity. That’s all.
Lauren: Really. Then who’s Rachael. (fuck me)
Me: What? (Pathetically)
Lauren: Rachael… who the fuck is Rachael? Another networking opportunity I suppose? Maybe she’s the one that likes to wear Emporio Armani and get it all over your fucking jacket…
This went on and on until she ran out of change for the payphone and was disconnected. We haven’t spoken since. And now here I am, thinking the only thing that would have made all this drama worth it is a night out with Rachael and she completely blows me off.
Tad surfaces with two beers in hand. I take one. Can’t drink it fast enough.
“I’m sure she’ll be right back dude.” Tad says, not really paying attention to the scene around us. His mind obviously somewhere else.
My frustration both with Lauren and Rachael’s leaving me out in the cold propels my dialogue into an unintelligible stream of thoughts that not even the beer I’ve polished off in three swigs can sway away, “It doesn’t even make any sense dude. I mean, she invited me, us, right? It’s not like we’re crashing or anything. Even when the dude at the door wouldn’t let us in at first, did I call her? Fuck no! I should have, maybe this wouldn’t have happened. But I didn’t. And now here we are, I mean, we’re walking in, she’s walking out… I must have yelled her name twenty-fucking-times, and what do I get? Cold fucking shoulder! And now to boot, I’ve got to deal with Lauren’s shit? Sure she hasn’t called but her phone’s broken – probably my fault and another thing I’ll have to hear about – and with all this shit on the table, what do I have to show for it? Not a fucking thing!”
Without having to ask, the bartender replenishes my once empty bottle of beer with a full counterpart. With the same mechanical reflexes the barkeep presented in filling my drink, I implement in empting it. Tad, keeping up with the trend of the entire night, is somewhere else completely – leaving my rant without an audience.
“Tad!” at this point I can’t help but to scream – tempted to shake him awake. To my elevated rhetoric he’s unresponsive.
After finishing my second beer in less than four swigs, I take the seemingly untouched beer from Tad’s hand and go to work. This of course gets his attention. “What the fuck?” Tad manages to say.
“I’ve got an issue here!” I say, realizing I’m whining, “I don’t think she’s coming back!”
“So what do you want to do then?” Tad asks casually as if my issues are far too trivial to concern himself with, “I thought you wanted to network? Who cares if she’s not here? Correct me if I’m wrong, but don’t you have a pretty banging girlfriend back at your apartment desperately awaiting your return?”
“That’s not an issue, how banging she is I mean, because if she is anxiously awaiting my arrival it’s not to fuck or anything. She’s pissed dude!”
“So what are you saying?”
“I’m saying I want to make tonight worth all the shit I’m going to eat when I get home. If Rachael were here—“
“Which she isn’t” Tad interrupts, and then poses in an irritated manner, “So what now?”
“I don’t know” I say, feeling my brain begin to sponge the alcohol I’ve instinctually pounded in the past 8 minutes. I try to recall just how many I’ve drank, but a solid count fails to present itself. Being as the beer’s free, I have no gauge as to how many have been acquired. I am certain of one thing; I’m on my way to getting quite drunk.
Tad checks the time on his cell phone then says, “Well you better figure something out. I have no problem hanging out with you tonight, Andrew. But if you’re not feeling this place or if nothing’s keeping you here, I know a couple other places we can make a night out of. This is LA after all.”
Something in Tad’s tone suggests he may be baiting me to follow him to whatever it is that has occupied his thoughts since our arrival. He’s been distant all night, and it’s obvious he has other prospects out there. With Rachael MIA, I’d imagine this fashion show is one of the last places he wants to be… especially with me whining on about what must be trivial nonsense to him. Detecting a buzz creeping its way up my neck, agitated at Lauren for failing to allow me to grow, and feeling like a round peg in a square hole at this Fashion Show without Rachael, I’m up for almost anything. I finish off my last beer and say, “What do you have in mind?”
We’ve only been away from the Fashion Show at Boulevard 3 for about ten minutes and already I can tell Tad’s calmed down some – but not completely. There’s still an edge about him – similar to the way he was acting the night at the house party. Shaken. Erratic. Pre-occupied. Slipping away from any semblance of self-control. Again, I suspect cocaine use.
Unlike Tad, I’ve managed to become more anxious since our departure from the Show. Not only is my mind racing with fears of my inevitable fight with Lauren, I find myself turning over in my mind the many of possible scenarios that would explain the could-shoulder Rachael turned to me earlier. Could she have really not heard me? I was yelling at the top of my lungs. I even distinctly remember her turning my way in acknowledgment to hearing her name in a crowd of strangers. Maybe she couldn’t find me? Who knows? I contemplate calling her but refrain. In the event she did blow me off… it would seem weird for me to be calling. After all, we hardly know one another.
Which makes my racing thoughts and free-flowing anxiety even more absurd. I need to relax.
Tad turns up the radio, a jumpy song called Change in the Weather by some chick-band The Concretes jams on and I’m reminded of nights back east with Lauren where she’d get stoned and listen to me drone on and on about my dreams and aspirations of becoming the great actor. I miss those nights. The simplicity. Back then she was all I needed. The dream of making it big was merely something I wanted. Now I can’t help but to notice part of what Lauren fears has become a reality, that that part of me is slipping – the ability to appreciate the simple. It seems as soon as my desires bled their way into my needs I’ve become a different person – putting whatever it is I already have aside in the pursuit of what I don’t have, what isn’t real… and may never be.
The buzz I caught at the fashion show is rapidly fading away – replaced by a self-loathing and depression I don’t want to feel. Not tonight. I’m confused. For someone who once thought he had it all figured out, I sure am lost. I thought this is all I needed. This city. This dream. It was supposed to be easy once I got here. Now I come to find everything more complicated.
I want to forget it all tonight. I want it all to fade away. Tonight I want to forget about Andrew Larson past and present and perhaps with the help of some drinking and possible debauchery, get a hold on the Andrew of tomorrow.
“I should probably clue you in on a few things before we get to where we’re going.” Tad says, thankfully pulling me from my depressing self-reflection-session. “This party has a different feel than the last one on Saturday or the fashion show today. It’s a little more” Tad pauses to find the right words, “Low key.”
“I’m sure I can handle it.” I say with confidence, wanting to point out to Tad I’m not some farm kid who hasn’t been around the block, but I refrain.
“This is a different group of guys. They’re a little older, I guess you could say more mature. None of them are in the industry, so networking is out of the question. Most of these guys are in real-estate, advertising, shit like that. I know it’s not the preferred spot, but for now it serves our needs.”
“What exactly are our needs?” I ask, genuinely interested.
“To get a buzz on” Tad says with a forced smile. “The night’s still young. I figure we show up, stay for a few drinks, maybe do some blow, and then see where the night takes us.”
At the very mention of the word blow my stomach turns on end. Just a moment ago I finally see some of the turns for the worse I’ve taken since coming into town and Tad has to bring up blow. No way am I touching that. Over a year sober (except for the booze which doesn’t really count) I’ll be goddamned if I’m going to put anything up my nose.
“I’m not sure how down I am with doing blow but you can help yourself” I say.
“I thought you were having a shit night?” Tad says.
“I was… am. But trust me, blow will only make it worse. I don’t know if I told you this or not, but I’m actually a recovering drug addict. I went to rehab and everything. Been clean over a year.”
“Clean? Didn’t you just pound close to five beers at that fashion show?” Tad asks behind a chuckle.
“Yeah that’s different. I just started with the drinking again. It’s not the same. I had a drug problem – emphasis on drug.”
“If you have a problem with coke you’re in the wrong city dude.”
“I never had a coke problem. I’m from the east coast. Skag was my demon. It doesn’t matter though. I know I’m not going to do any. I just wanted to put it out there for you… so don’t like, I don’t know, try to force any on me.”
“Don’t worry bro, I’m glad you told me” Tad says. A silence fills the car. Off the Rails by The Notwist is playing. Tad searches for anything to cut the silence and says, “Christ man you’re too young to have already been to rehab.”
“That’s what I hear” I smile.
“Well whatever” Tad says, “Just have a few drinks, enjoy yourself, and try and forget this shit going on with the chicks. Being older than you I can see what you’re going through is no big deal. You’re in lust with Rachael dude. You hardly know her. The real thing is waiting for you back home. Maybe after a night out and a few beers you’ll realize that.”
“I already know that” I say, realizing I actually half-mean it.
“Obviously not, because you’re still bumming” Tad says.
“You would bum too if you had a fight like I do waiting for me at home”.
“That’s just it kid! The fight is waiting for you – it hasn’t happened yet. Say tonight you sauce it up, come to a revelation and suddenly realize how stupid you’ve been in regards to your steady chick versus the crush. You go home having realized your mistake, you open the door, your chicks ready to go nuts on you, and BAM it happens!”
“What happens?” I ask.
“Before she can even get a word in you pummel her with love. You tell her how much you’ve fucked up, shit even be honest about Rachael, then you tell her how much you learned from your mistakes and all this drama you two have been going through was worth it on account of how much you’ve grown and how much you realize now that you love her” Tad says without taking his eyes off the road. All focus.
“That’s a pretty good line dude. Speaking from experience, are you?”
“Of course I’m speaking from experience; I’m ten years older than you. But it isn’t a line… at least it shouldn’t be. It’s only a line if you don’t really come to a realization and see the black and white right in front of your face.”
“You’re right” I say as I shake inside – because he is. Not a thing he just said didn’t ring true. The very term he used hit the nail on the head – I’m in lust with Rachael… When it comes to Lauren I’m in love…
Tad turns the car onto Sunset Plaza Drive and we make the trek up the hill toward the party. Sarah Slean’s California hums through the speakers and I allow myself to zone out to the melodic and very appropriate lyrics of the song.
The black and white is right in front of my face and it has been all the time. For every way I thought Lauren was holding me back I realized tonight that she was actually helping me. Alone, in a city like this, I’d be lost. It would only be a matter of time before I’d fall to all the seductive evils the city has to offer. I’d lose sight on everything and eventually myself…
With Lauren at my side however, I’m protected. She helps me remember the boy I once was and through my dreams and her companionship, guides me into becoming the man I’m destined to be.
More than a muse Lauren is my angel…
She’s my past…
My present…
And my future…
And after a couple with beers with Tad I’m going to forget about tonight, go home, and tell Lauren just how much she’s loved.
Today is the first day of the rest of my life.
