where-ls-my-mlnd

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

Much to my relief, my fumbling attempt to salvage this deal seems to be on its way to working; it piques his curiosity, but also triggers his paranoia. I realize this way too late as his eyes grow even larger, feeling a heavy sense of dread as he stares at me with that completely untethered look and starts rattling off accusations in a voice that’s just a little too loud. God, I was like that once. As unwelcome and unsettling as the thought is… it ain’t entirely useless. It gives me a rough idea of how to deescalate the situation, which I need to do quickly before anybody hears him: “Are you fucking laughing at me? Huh? Do we have a problem?” Stick to the bit. Don’t let him see any cracks in the facade. “No, no...” I say with a shrug, swallowing hard then cringing as if tasting the drip. “I just think it’s funny how you and I had the same idea.” It’s a fucking risky move; openly acknowledging his usage while he’s already in an agitated state. Some would even say stupid. There’s the chance that he might vehemently deny it, take great offense at the notion even though it’s undeniably true, get more pissed off. And then losing the deal would be the least of our concerns. Hell hath no fury like an addict scorned and all that. I know that. But I wouldn’t be this brazen if I saw another way out, or in, rather. If J didn’t need this so much. There may be a fucking sea of people out there who would beg him to sell to them, but it’d be idiotic to blow an opportunity like this, especially because of me. And god, I think I actually managed not to. There’s still that twitchy, edgy look in his eye, but it’s softened somewhat, and he’s gone silent. “No shit...” And I can see the wheels turning in his head. C’mon, motherfucker, just ask it. You know you’re going to... “Listen, you think you can hook me up?” I nod in J’s direction, biting back a smile. “Ask him.”

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

“They aren’t the sugar kind, y’know.” No, but compared to what I usually smoke, they may as well be. Ah, I shouldn’t say that. I’m just a whore for nicotine, and especially at this point in the night, I don’t have the capacity to be particular about brands. But damn these are so subtle. It’s not so much that I’m completely unaffected — that absurdly comforting burn at the back of my throat is still there, along with that calming, heady buzz — but there’s something missing. I’m used to a punishingly strong smoke. This is... such a forgiving, pleasant cigarette. It’s what you smoke when you still kinda have a will to live. And Winstons are just what you smoke when you haven’t had a will to live in years. There’s a metaphor in there somewhere, some sort of dark commentary on the differences between me and him, but I can’t think of it right now. As if he can hear my thoughts, he makes a crack about how they must feel pretty sweet, and god, it’s the kind of joke I would make. That, and the fact that it’s coming from him, makes me bust out laughing, right as I had a mouthful of smoke. The realization hits me too late, leading me to start coughing, and I swear, if I weren’t so preoccupied with trying not to choke and die, I’d cringe at how fucking hoarse the sound is. I really should quit someday... “Yeah... no shit,” I remark, smiling a little. Hesitantly, I bring the Parliament back up to my lips, god forbid he should nearly kill me again with another joke; but a moment passes and he’s silent, so I take a drag, closing my eyes. But a strange sound immediately cuts through my haze; the low, steady vibration of music coming from outside. Lazily, I crack an eye open, wondering if any other sounds will accompany the music. Footsteps, starting off quiet and then gradually getting louder. For a second, I thought someone was leaving the bathroom, but no, someone’s come in, and my stomach churns at the thought that they may have ran in here for the reason I did. Jesus fucking christ, please no, I just got my stomach to calm down, and even then, I can feel it tensing in anticipation of what’s to come. Holding my breath, I close my eyes again, wincing in fear, but after a few seconds, all I hear is a sniff. Oh, you motherfucker... I open my eyes, and I have suppress a laugh at the familiar, grating chopping that fills my ears. Damn, I didn’t think it’d be this easy, but nonetheless... “There’s your first customer, J,” and I can’t hide my shit-eating grin. This is all just... fucking hilarious. What the fuck has even been the trajectory of this night? First I manage to drag him to the club, somehow get him in the club, then we’re doing shots together, joking and laughing in the middle of the dancefloor, then I discover how severely my alcohol tolerance has dropped and fucking throw up, and now some poor fucker is doing coke a few stalls down. He doesn’t even have to move a muscle to make his first sale of the night, it’s just right there in front of him. Lord, I tell you, living in the Bay pays off. Literally. Slowly getting off of him, I give him a shove towards the door, watching him frantically scramble in that direction with a wry smile. Jesus, slow down, they don’t move that fast... But even if I said that, he wouldn’t listen; the kid’s on a fucking mission. The door swings open with a flourish, banging against the wall, and god, it‘s hysterical, but it’s also kind of sad. How fucking badly does he need this? How much would he lose if he lost this sale? I don’t have time to sink into that spiral, because then I hear the guy say what we were all thinking; “Damn, dude, you almost ripped that fucking thing right off!” J apologizes, tries to pacify his edgy ass, punctuating the end of his sentence with a sniffle that’s not subtle at all, and fuck, there’s something so surreal about watching this demure, painfully innocent kid pretend to be high that I can’t contain my obnoxious cackle. It stops being funny the second it breaks loose from my chest, and I don’t even need to look up to know everyone is looking at me like I just escaped the psych ward; I can feel their eyes on me. A cold shock of panic hits, and my eyes dart between the two of them as my heartbeat stutters and stops. Oh my god. Oh my god I need to do something. I need to do something like now. I can’t blow this whole thing, jesus christ, not when I’m the one that suggested it. Maybe I’ll just blame it on the alcohol? No, what the fuck, there’s barely any left in my bloodstream, how could there be? That’s an awful idea anyway. The last fucking thing you want during a drug deal is some drunken fool in the corner who physically can’t control what comes out of their mouth. I need to build some level of trust, with both of them, but primarily with the guy. And the thing with cokeheads is after a certain point, they don’t trust anyone, but they’re less likely to actively fear you if they think you’re just like them. “The fuck are you laughing at?” He asks, and that’s when I get an idea. Fuck it, if I’m already acting high, I’ll be high. I let out a little laugh, opting to slowly ease into the character (otherwise known as myself back in the day), clenching and unclenching my jaw as I fix him with a wild, feral stare then quickly dart my eyes away. “Nothing...”

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

No, you are. You are a really sweet kid, one of the sweetest I’ve ever met. You don’t need to be cautious and say you try to be, just in case you don’t actually succeed, because you do. You do, kid, and you have no idea just how easy you make it look. People spend their whole lives trying to reach that level of decency and kindness. You’ve already beaten them to it and you’ve barely lived a quarter of your life. Please give yourself credit for that… you should be proud that you can… “You’re successful in your attempts, JJ, trust me,” I say, locking our eyes. And god, how I wish he would. How I wish he would believe me, take my words as they are instead of obsessively parsing them and driving himself insane. But he just looks down and says, quietly, “I’m glad you think so.” It stings — so severely that it seems to stop my heart for a second — and I have to stop myself from immediately saying I know so. Because I also know that even if I did, he wouldn’t be any more receptive. He wouldn’t accept the compliment. He wouldn’t get out of his head and see himself how I see him, because he’s just not fucking capable, and I know this because neither am I. I honestly don’t know what hurts most: the quiet, insecure delivery, the meaning of the words, or the thought that he truly doesn’t know how good he is, and maybe never will. I can’t think of anything more unfortunate than that. In some ways, the pain is unbelievably fucking fresh and in others, it’s not; it’s old and diluted. I’ve gone through this before, but I had forgotten how completely soul-destroying it is to care for someone that doesn’t care about themselves. It almost makes me grateful that I’m such a fucking shut-in, because you can’t start caring for anybody if you don’t know anybody, and that way you avoid running into my predicament. That way you avoid any pain. Ideally, anyway... He releases a sigh loud enough to pull me out of my thoughts, and I look over curiously. He’s staring down at his lap, then he starts to move, and it only takes me about two seconds to realize what he’s trying to get. Yeah, I’d need one to put up with me, too. I lift my arm out of his way so he can reach into his pocket and retrieve a cigarette from the pack, smiling at the sight of him fumbling with the lighter. “Been there,” I mutter, and to my surprise I actually hear a quiet chuckle in response. It makes me smile, hope blooming in my chest as smoke slowly rises in the air and fills my nose. I watch him inhale, closing his eyes as if what he’s experiencing is so precious he needs to savor it. I know better than anyone that it actually is, so I wouldn’t dare tease him for it. There has always been something rather religious about smoking. But I can only watch him for so long before I start to get that same itch, that persistent buzzing under my skin, that awful, unignorable craving. So I tap his chest to get his attention, then once he’s looking down, hold out my hand. I trust him to understand what I mean, and he does; pulling out his pack of Parliaments from his shirt pocket and placing one in my palm, along with the lighter. It brings an amused grin to my face as I stick it in my mouth, lighting it more aggressively than maybe I need to, but I don’t care anymore. Because as soon as I take a drag for the first time in hours, nothing else matters. It doesn’t matter that I made a fool out of myself or that we’re still on the bathroom floor or that these cigarettes are so much milder than what I’m used to. I don’t have to think anymore, I can just close my eyes and focus on drawing in the smoke and feeling it collect in my chest. Smoking is religious simply for the distraction that it brings. And god, I need a distraction…

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

Surprisingly, he responds with a joke, and any other time, it would hurt to receive such a lighthearted response, but now it just makes me happy. It makes me crack a small smile, makes my spirit sigh with relief at the familiar, comforting back-and-forth we’ve established. There we go, we’ve still got it. We’re not finished yet. But what he says next reminds me that we easily could’ve been if I didn’t apologize; he admits that I did fuck up, but assures me that the most important thing is that I recognize how I did, that I have plenty of time to correct it now that I’m okay, which feels like he’s implying that I should correct it by slogging through the rest of this night sober, or maybe that’s just my conscience speaking. That I should’ve listened to him, especially since he was just parroting my own advice, and as he lifts his wrist to glance at his watch, causing me to shift a little, I start thinking about something else he said. Older people aren’t magically exempt from getting it wrong, man, they do it easily and often. How eerie to hear a teenager nonchalantly reference the failures of adults. Like it’s so familiar to him that it doesn’t even warrant a reaction; other than acceptance and diluted resentment. Nothing about it is shocking, nothing about it is even particularly disappointing, and that’s when I realize the reason why he’s handled my behavior so well, why he’s been able to stuff his emotions down to focus on what I need. Someone has done this to him before. Someone has fucked him over like this before. Someone older. Someone has fractured his trust like this before, someone has let him down like this before, someone has burdened him like this before. It’s a dynamic I’m intimately familiar with, though I was usually on the other side. In a way, I’m glad to be briefly distracted from this realization and what it implies about his home life, but mostly I wish I wasn’t going there, not now. I wish I wasn’t thinking about how I understand, and how rueful I am that I do, and how furious I still am at Remy, after all these years, for shaming me for having an addiction when he was hiding one of his own. Hell, what am I saying? Still is. Sometimes I truly think he’ll be drinking forever, and on nights like these, I almost understand why. As if J can sense my guilt and panic over the insinuation that he’s used to being failed — he attempts to console me. Apparently going apeshit with tequila shots and throwing up afterwards isn’t enough to rile his resentment, and I didn’t put him through anything he didn’t stay for… and while that may be true, I still can’t help but want to disappear every time he mentions why we’re huddled in this bathroom, every time I remember that taking care of his shitfaced, sick friend was the last thing he expected to do tonight. Even the reminder that he would’ve ended up here too if I hadn’t intervened and helped him barely provides any comfort. Because the fact still remains that if he had, he would’ve had such an innocuous reason… he was nauseous from the one shot that he had, whereas I was nauseous from six. You can brush off a teenager getting sick from drinking, but when an adult does it, it’s different. It just is. “In case you haven’t noticed, you’re the only person I know in this place and I suspect I’m the only one you know too, so if we want to survive this night and keep it as prosperous as it promised to be, we’re going to have to try and take care of ourselves first and foremost, but also keep taking care of each other… like friends do.” And fuck, it’s the most moving, beautiful thing I’ve heard in ages. Hearing him say that, with more sincerity in his voice than I can handle, is what softens me ultimately, what provides me with the clarity I was so desperately in need of: the realization that it really is that simple for him. There’s a pattern here I’ve noticed. The more he explains, the less that I understand, because for him, there’s nothing to explain. It’s as simple as somebody needed help and he was there to provide it. Viewing what he did as rather impersonal helps me detach and see the situation for what it is. Understanding that he would do it for anyone soothes me, but it also saddens me, because there aren’t many people like that. There aren’t many people who approach selflessness with such immediacy and certainty. Typically selflessness is something they have to consider, to really think about for a long time before they do it, to weigh whether or not it’s worth it. And I can’t say I’d blame someone for that. I just don’t understand it, and neither does he, because as intelligent as he is, he seemed to be guided by his heart rather than his brain tonight. And I’m glad that he was, I’m glad that he’s just like me, because if he wasn’t, I’d be alone right now. And god, I really don’t wanna be… The thought makes my eyes sting with tears, and while I would try my best to hide them any other time, I just don’t have it in me right now. Instead, I swallow hard, take a shallow, shaky breath, and lift my head up to face him. And there's so much to say. But I find myself thinking, a little bitterly, that nothing I say could be as good as what he said anyway, and I find myself remembering, unwillingly, that I barely have the capacity to communicate at all unless it’s nonsensical blubbering. And it’s not as good as what he said, it’s not as reverent as my true feelings towards him are, but it’s fitting, it’s honest, and I mean it when I say it. “You’re a really sweet kid, you know that?”

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

“Don’t. Please,” He says abruptly, sounding so desperate for me to shut up that it causes a wave of guilt, “Don’t worry about it. Shit happens when you’re sick, it’s fine. Everything’s fine now.” And while a part of me shatters at his oversimplification, a part of me wants to shake my head and say I’m sick in a way you wouldn’t be able to treat, another part of me is strangely comforted by hearing him echo my own words. He sounds more confident saying it than I did, but then again, that’s not saying much. Then he’s asking if I want another towel, and I actually shake my head that time because I’m scared if I don’t, I might cry over the level of concern he’s showing me. I don’t know what I want anymore. Maybe a drink. Maybe sleep. Maybe to get in my car and drive it off a bridge. None of these things are particularly attainable at the moment. Well, except one. But I don’t really feel like setting any new records for myself. I’ve lost almost every friend I’ve ever made but never within the span of an hour. “Alright… uh, are you finished with this one?” It takes me a second to even respond, but when I nod, he promptly takes it away and quips that his arm wasn’t even numb yet, looking rather amused with himself until he sees that it failed to have the same effect on me. Panic threatens to take over my body again when I see him stand, but it melts away after he simply flushes the towel and looks at me with a tense, but endearing smile. “Just… stretching.” Watching him sit down next to me makes my fucking heart hurt. I shouldn’t make eye contact with him, I must look terrible — heavy, bloodshot eyes, red, blotchy cheeks, and who knows what my fucking shirt looks like after all the sweating I’ve been doing — but I can’t pull myself away. Only when he lays a hand on my shoulder does the eye contact break, and with it a little piece of my soul. I can’t shake the feeling that I’m doing something wrong as I allow myself to slowly recline and lay my head on his shoulder, it’s the last thing I deserve and tenderness is the last emotion he should be offering me… yet it remains that he is. Maybe that’s why I feel comfortable enough to slump against him, and at this point, I shouldn’t be surprised that the tension leaves my body almost instantly, but I am. A beat of silence goes by, and he hasn’t pushed me off yet, so I sit up a little straighter, shift around, and once I’ve gotten my arms around his waist, squeeze as tight as I possibly can without hurting him in a sudden burst of affection. Like a non-verbal sort of thank you. After a second, I loosen my grip, my hands resting limply at his sides as my head begins a slow, lazy descent, stopping somewhere in the middle of his chest. It feels harder than it should, bony in a way that unsettles me, but he’s warm and his shirt is nice and soft and I can hear his heartbeat beneath it, which feels intimate in a way maybe we haven’t earned yet, but I don’t care. It grounds me, it calms me… it’s the reason why my eyes slip closed, or maybe it’s that being in his arms feels like safety, feels like the promise that I’ll always be cared for, feels eerily familiar, too familiar when we’ve known each other for such a short time. It feels like salvation, it feels like forgiveness, it feels like true acceptance, it just… feels so fucking comfortable. Cozy — the kind of coziness I haven’t felt since I was young and my mom was still alive to hold me. That thought would bring tears to my eyes any other day, but now, I feel fine. I am fine. Everything’s fine now. “I’m sorry,” I say, finally, burying my face in his chest. “Know you’ve gotta be tired of me saying that, but… I really am. I should’ve listened to you. I should’ve stopped… should’ve ordered water, should’ve… something. I thought I knew better than you ‘cause I’m older but…” I trail off, lazily gesturing around the stall. “Look where we are now. It’s just, I was really happy earlier and I never thought that I would be again… I got carried away, I guess. Not like that’s an excuse. I just, I never want you to feel like I’m your responsibility. I was supposed to take care of you. And you know, I’ve, I’ve been around a lot of people in my life who overdo it when they drink and then ‘cause they can’t take care of themselves, they somehow become your responsibility and it’s… you get really resentful about it. And yet you don’t, ‘cause then you feel guilty and you talk yourself out of being mad and… whatever. I’d never want to put you through that. I’m just sorry, kid. And I know you don’t want to hear that, I know you just want me to be okay and I… I am now, and I appreciate you being there, I really fucking do, it just… sucks to acknowledge why you have to be. But I don’t reckon we’ll end up here again… if only because convincing you to go to a nightclub isn’t something I can pull off more than once.”

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

He interrupts me then, which is probably for the better since I can’t form coherent sentences anymore, demanding that I stop and my heart jumps inside my chest. God, I know, I’m sorry… I’m so sorry, this is stupid, I’m stupid, I don’t know why I thought you would believe me. I don’t know why I thought I could make everything okay again. It makes no sense. And neither does the lack of follow-up from his initial interruption, or that the brutal honesty my body is frozen in anticipation of never comes. Why? Why… why not? He’s not snapping at me or urging me to cut the bullshit - he’s assuring that I don’t need to explain. “It’ll be fine,” he says, and it makes me suck in a harsh breath, leading me to nearly choke as my terror grows larger, looming over me like an unspoken threat. No it won’t. No the fuck it won’t! Especially now that you said it! Why’d you have to say it, oh god… There’s something so insidious about the open acknowledgement that something is wrong. Once you say it out loud, you’re fucking done for. That means it’s not stopping, that means it’s getting worse with every passing second, that means you’re going to need someone to talk you down and maybe more people after that if they can’t handle it by themselves and you start to cause a scene in the middle of class— God, not that. Not fucking that. No no no… oh god what if this turns into that? What if it’s even worse than that? Oh jesus fucking christ no, no no no, I’ll never make it… god I feel so faint, what if I pass out? Oh god what if I pass out on the bathroom floor like I’m a teenager again what if I pass out on this poor innocent kid and he can’t move because I’m too heavy and then we’re just stuck here forever and ever and ever— “Remember: inhale. Inhale as deep as you can…” He’s saying, and my knee jerk reaction is to hold my breath. It hurts to breathe, I actively don’t want to just to avoid the excruciating pain, but then I remember I’ll die if I don’t breathe, and that does more than enough to compel me to listen. The first tight breath I draw in feels terrible; I’m convinced if I try for another one I’ll pass out, but I do it for him, my fingers running down my chest and applying more pressure than necessary, like I’m trying to suppress my heartbeat. It’s grueling to inhale and though I can’t gather much air, he tells me to hold it anyway and I do, waiting patiently for his say-so before letting it all out in a stuttering exhale. It doesn’t feel any better yet, but it doesn’t feel any worse either, so I keep repeating the action until suddenly… I don’t need to anymore. The panic that had been ravaging my entire body disappears like smoke into the air. And to say it’s unusual for me to just stop panicking would be the understatement of the century, but then again I did bother to breathe through it for once. Or rather he made me breathe through it. “Are you okay?” He asks with a painful amount of concern, and for once, I don’t feel like bursting into laughter at the question. I actually think I might be. “Yeah, sorry,” I blurt, even though what I really want to say is thank you. “Sorry, I uh…”

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

“I’m sure you do, Kurt,” he says with a lightness I feared had already drained from him. “Perhaps you did assume his spirit…” It’s a bad idea to laugh, but apparently I’m full of them tonight, and luckily, it doesn’t spiral out of control like it did back on the floor, just one steady, consistent laugh bubbling out of me because fucking christ, that’s vintage… man, that must’ve been, uh… must’ve been February. Yeah. I remember ‘cause it was the same night he freaked the fuck out on me. Although, looking back, I can’t be sure if he actually did it or if it was a hallucination. Who can say? Just kidding. I can say. I know for sure he did it but jesus that night was ridiculous. Fucking smoked myself into a different dimension there. I mean, ghosts are real, that’s not up for debate, but you have no idea how paranoid and unhinged you have to be to believe there’s one residing in your car. The ghost of Kurt fucking Cobain no less. Like he would ever choose to haunt me of all people. He’s probably haunting Dave and Krist for the fuck of it all. But not even in the typical way — making strange noises in the middle of the night, or making objects hover in the air. No, he has all eternity to think of the most disturbing, inconceivable, absurd way to haunt them. I swear, when he was alive, he was like, the weirdest dude ever. We would’ve been compatible. Never thought I’d remember that night fondly, but god…. I feel some sort of heady nostalgia for it now. Just the idea of being so fucking blasted you separate from reality and end up somewhere else… I miss it. If I think about it hard enough, it’s like I get a little phantom high. More than anything else, that’s what mellows me out enough to joke back at him, “I hope not. I’d like to think I have more than three years left to live.” And I don’t know why that breaks him, but suddenly he’s cracking up, bordering on hysterical as he hides his face in his knee like I won’t see him losing his fucking mind. Bad idea to laugh, bad idea indeed, but laughter is contagious and it’s especially hard to resist when the one laughing is a smartass teenager who rarely smiles let alone bursts out cackling. It doesn’t last forever — soon he’s pulled himself together and so have I, sighing as I close my eyes for a moment. “Yeah, it feels nice,” I say, and it really does. “Thanks, kid.” There’s a pause, and then: “You’re welcome, man.” And that, for some reason, is what pierces through my fuzzy, dream-like haze and reminds me how fucked this situation is. It’s not that I had forgotten, I was just ignoring it, the way I tend to ignore everything unpleasant, but hearing him say that like, like taking care of me is the easiest thing ever for him… it sickens me, and then in a flash, grows into something else entirely. It starts with my heart rate picking up again - then it’s more than picked up, I can hear it pounding in my ears, then it’s that rush of dizziness to my head, making it feel light though it’s full of irrational thoughts, then it’s that first, sharp sudden gasp for air - which evolves into a series of heavy, uneven breaths, each coming faster than the last, and no matter how many I take, it is never enough. It feels like I’m slowly suffocating, it feels everything is closing in on me and my body seems to be convinced that it actually is, that the dark gray walls are slowly getting closer and closer, blocking off the outside world and trapping me in this horrible, tiny, sorrow-filled stall with the one person who was never supposed to see me like this. “I just want you to know, I uh, this, this isn’t me,” I don’t know what’s compelling me to speak, but I’m barely managing it. The words rush out too quickly and I keep compulsively laughing in the middle of sentences, none of which are coherent: “I’m not like this, I- I don’t, I don’t like, do this regularly. I don’t drink to the point of throwing up… that’s never happened, I just, I-I got a little overzealous. You know? It’s not like, um. It’s not like I have a problem or anything, it’s fine, it’s fine… I’m fine, everything’s fine…”

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

He lowers himself without hesitation, joining me down on the floor. Gently takes the paper towels from me, lays them on his knee for the briefest second, bunches up a single one, and then I can feel it pressed against my skin, smooth and softened by the water. His touch is gentle and firm at once — a juxtaposition not totally dissimilar to his personality. It’s precise, that’s what it is. Every movement is so precise, I can see it as I watch him work, eyes clear and focused. There’s something so… different about him now. I don’t know what it is. He doesn’t look at peace, per se. There are a bunch of other things he would rather be doing, and even more things he would be willing to do just to get out of doing this. He looks patient, though. And there’s something so forgiving in that, something so forgiving in the way he’s treating me. It brings a hint of a smile to my face, seeing him completely engrossed, like a child with their nose in a book, trying to soak in every single word they’re reading. Even when he pauses to reach over and toss the paper towel in the bowl, I’m still watching him, with a feeling I wouldn’t even know how to describe if I made a sober attempt. Until the piercing screech of the toilet flushing fills the room again, anyway, and I suck in a sharp breath and shut my eyes, feeling that dull ache in my head flare up. It’s like he can sense it, because right then a fresh towel is laid upon my forehead, and I blink at the startling cold sensation. I can feel it everywhere suddenly, like a light mist, washing away the tension in my body. Gradually, it gets even colder, and at the refreshing, invigorating sensation, I actually feel relief, seeping into my bones, flowing through my body. It’s relaxing, so relaxing that the repetitive, cleansing brush of the paper towel could easily lull me to sleep. I let my eyes slip closed, take a deep, ragged breath, and suddenly I have a vision of Remy kneeling at my side while I threw up liquor in his toilet at three in the morning. Smooth, cold tile beneath my knees, the overwhelming heat rising within making the palms of my hands sweat, my entire body shuddering as he laid his hands on my back, rubbed circles against my razor-sharp shoulderblades. You’re okay, kid. You’re okay. It echoes in my head over and over again, so clear and vivid, like a bittersweet lullaby. It’s all I can do not to pass out right here on the bathroom floor, with J cooling my hot, pulsing skin, and Remy’s voice floating in and out of my ears. You’re okay, kid… you’re okay… feel any cooler? Wait, feel any cooler—? I blink myself out of it to find J looking at me, and only then do I realize it was his voice I was hearing and not Remy’s. It’s fucking sick, it is, but something about it makes me crack a little smile. Oh, the things we invent when we are scared and want to be rescued. “Yeah,” I rasp, then add, deadpan: “I feel like a fucking rockstar.”

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

My chest tightens with guilt as he stares back at me, his deeply emotive eyes making my face flush with shame and briefly wonder if he’s doing this on purpose. I abandon the thought almost instantly — it was born out of self-pity, anyway, and there’s no way he would ever think of wielding a weapon as powerful as manipulation. He’s soft, that kid. Too gentle to inflict such emotional violence. It clashes with his very nature; he would never use his emotions to hurt somebody like that because he’s too busy hiding them. His eyes may be a bottomless well of sadness, but the rest of his face is… unflinching. It’s been… I don’t even know how long, that I’ve been holding onto his gaze the way I wish I would’ve held onto my sobriety, scanning his face for signs that he understands, but there are none. None that are discernible to me. He never wavers, save for the small, nearly imperceptible tilt of his head, and the change I’m desperately hoping for never comes. Figures. That about falls in line with what I deserve, huh? But maybe… maybe he does understand, and he just doesn’t want to admit it. Because this is probably the worst he’s ever seen me, and this is doubtless the most loaded look we’ve ever shared, and he hasn’t looked away yet. I was so tangled in my own pain that I didn’t realize that, but when I do, regret comes rushing in again, and I’m struck by the strange, almost paternal urge I have to walk over there and cover his eyes. As if he’s a little kid, as if this is the absolute worst of what he’s seen. I can’t shake the sick feeling I have that it’s not, and I can’t kill my instinct to scoop him up and take him away from all the bad things in the world, either. You couldn’t possibly blame me for wanting to protect him like a little kid. He still fucking looks like one. As though he can sense what I want to do, he turns away and disappears from my sight. Oh fuck. You’re never coming back, are you? Fuck. It’s okay. It’s okay, it’s okay… I’m not bothered. No, I… I always knew this was gonna happen. If it wasn’t gonna be when I made him meet me in a moonlit park just to sob at his side, it was gonna be now, where sure enough, I’ve managed to colossally fuck up again after less than a week. And if tonight had actually gone well, then it was gonna be something else, because there’s always something, isn’t there? There’s always something with me. And I try to stop it from happening, but my pulse quickens and my heart starts to pound with panic as the reality of what’s happening — what was inevitably meant to happen since day one — hits me all at once. My eyes are stinging they’re so wide open, as I stare straight ahead like maybe I’ll see him there, maybe he’ll change his mind, maybe he’ll turn around and come back. Fucking right. Like that would ever happen. But it does. With a sweet little half-smile, he stands before me, holding out a bundle of paper towels. “Here,” he says. “You need these.” And I almost want to shake my head. No, I need to drink. I need to pull myself together and out of this stall and go max out my credit card at the bar and I need to quiet the chatter in my mind and think of nothing and feel nothing but the exquisite pleasure that drinking brings me. I need to drink until that I feel that subtle abandon that comes after a few shots, until I feel that heavenly headiness and slackening of my muscles, until I lose the ability to think about what I say before I say it, until I feel that insistent warmth glowing beneath my skin as if it’s a sweltering July night instead of a cool April one, until my vision starts blurring at the edges so I never have to see that look on your face again. That���s what I need. But it’s not what you need. What you need is for me to never drink again, and god, I wish I could give you that. I wish, J, you have no fucking idea how much… For now, all I can do is take the paper towels and stare at them in confusion that melts down into sadness when I realize… they’re dampened. God, he doesn’t even want to say that I have an ungodly amount of sweat and probably something much worse on my face. He just wants me to quietly wipe it all away. After the silence has stretched on for long enough, he breaks it: “Well, if you’re not going to do it, at least can I?” And the thing is, if this were any other time, I would say no. I would show gratitude for the gesture, but ultimately say no, because if I don’t truly need someone to do something for me, why would I let them? I can do it my damn self. But I can’t, not anymore…. can I? No, I can’t, and even if I could, he looks so distressed and it’s chipping away at my guilty conscience enough for me to just give a slight nod. Couldn’t hurt any worse than it already does.

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

With a gag so forceful that it feels like it absolutely ravages my throat, I expel the last of the vile mixture of stomach acid and tequila. The disgusting, acidic aftertaste of it in my mouth is enough to make me want to vomit again, but a rough swallow and a deep, trembling breath seems to ward it off. For now. I’ve long since learned not to hope, but it does seem like it will last. There’s this welcome stability slowly setting in, but then again, it could be pierced at any moment - hell, maybe it already has been. Because the room is still spinning, it never even stopped, and my heartbeat is pounding with a fury, my breath has been stolen away and can only come out in short, painful bursts, and there’s a flush of heat on my neck that keeps growing in intensity with every passing second. Right at that moment, it reaches its peak, spreading over my whole body; it feels like I’m burning alive from the inside out, and it draws an agonized groan from me as I wipe the bile from my lips with a shaking hand. God, I wish I was sober. I never thought I’d say that. But jesus christ… I wish I was. I wish I had just stayed home. I wish I had never fucking come here. I wish I had never taken all those shots. I wish I didn’t want to go back out there and do it all again. I wish I could make the regret last for longer than ten seconds, I wish I wasn’t so used to this feeling that it barely fucking fazes me. I wish I was better than this. I wish I was surprised that I’m not. Fuck, I really wish I hadn’t dragged an innocent kid into this. God, I can’t even think about J right now… or at least I shouldn’t. I should be trying to relax so the nausea doesn’t sneak up on me again, not thinking of the overburdened teenager I left back on the dancefloor — yet visions of him float behind my eyelids anyway. The images don’t follow a linear narrative, I’m still so dizzy that if I tried to put together a coherent thought, it would bring me to throw up again. It’s more like a whirling, disorganized mess of memories; his wide, nervous eyes looking at me like I was the only one who could keep him safe in this new, scary place, his beaming smile when I proved to him that I was, how he had asked me for advice, under the assumption that I was someone you should take advice from. How he had trusted me with such abandon, because it was probably the first time he had ever trusted anyone. How uneasy he sounded when he reminded me of how much I was drinking, and how I ignored it and kept going until that note of fear in his voice was finally erased from my memory. God, I paid more attention to the shots in front of me than I ever did to that kid. How did that make him feel? That I invited him all the way here, and he was still an afterthought? Hell, he probably didn’t notice. And even if he did, he’d still apologize for it like it was his fault anyway. He was doing better tonight, too… and now I’m just opening up that wound all over again. “What is the matter with you?” I can’t help but ask myself. It’s so quiet, barely audible, but I can still hear the sadness in my own voice. It hangs in the air, heavy as the realization that I don’t have an answer for that question; I never have. Glancing to my left just serves as another reminder that I should’ve listened to him when he urged me not to forget my own advice. It’s easy to forget now that the contents of my stomach have stopped rushing out of my throat. I don’t know what’s more nauseating — the sight of it in the toilet bowl, or the fact that I’m twenty four years old and I still haven’t stopped drinking to the point where I throw up in club bathrooms. Taking a deep breath, I slowly pull myself up, just far enough that I can reach the lever. I have to try more than once to push it down, but eventually I do, and the harsh flushing noise that echoes through the room makes me cringe. It’s all too fucking loud, and I get briefly terrified that the horrendous, screaming noise is going to cause me to throw up, but thankfully, I only have to cough. Yet it’s not relief that envelops me as I pull my knees up to my chest and rest my head down, it’s anxiety. Because no matter how much I try to be calm, it doesn’t slow my heartbeat, and no matter how tightly I close my eyes, it doesn’t alleviate the pounding in my head. That’s when I hear it; through a headache so painful that it’s deafening, a quiet, devastatingly fearful “Oh no…” And my stomach drops. Don’t fucking tell me… My thoughts echo those words as my breathing accelerates and my eyes squeeze shut even tighter, and a wave of searing regret crashes into me as cruelly and brutally as that first burst of nausea. There’s actually a persistent gnawing in my stomach, but I don’t know if it’s brought on by the alcohol or the unbearable fucking guilt I’m choking on knowing that this kid has a heart so pure it served as a compass leading him into the bathroom with me. It’s not that I want to look at him — I feel bad enough — but rather that I’m curiously compelled to. Out of a sense of obligation, out of guilt, or maybe, out of a stronger sense of loyalty. I can’t not answer when he calls. What I see when I lift my head makes me want to fucking cry; he’s literally looking down on me, and I have the fleeting, terrifying thought that he always will be. The range of emotions flashing across his unnervingly young face is… too much for me to take in, almost makes me feel like I’m spinning all over again. There’s a muted concern, because he would never feel comfortable expressing the fear I know resides somewhere deep down inside of him. Maybe pity, or maybe he knows better than to pity someone who did this to themself. Definitely disgust, which doesn’t even gut me as much as I thought it would. I just coolly accept it and think yeah, you’ve earned that spot on your high horse. More than earned it. And then sadness. Sadness makes a home in his eyes, settling in so comfortably that the average person wouldn’t even notice. It’s the horrible, intuitive feeling I have that that’s the primary emotion he’s grappling with that has me staring into his eyes, almost like an apology. It’s beyond haunting to watch the pain glistening in them knowing that I put it there, but I can’t pull myself away, I just keep staring, desperately trying to reach into his soul and let him know everything that I lack the capacity, or maybe just the bravery, to say. I’m sorry that I’ve made my self-destructive tendencies your burden to bear. I wasn’t supposed to. It was supposed to be different with you. I’m sorry that it’s not. I’m sorry that I scared you, I’m sorry that I failed to protect you. I thought I could give you the support you deserve but I think I might have overestimated myself. I’m sorry that I ruined tonight. I’m sorry that I tore your happiness to pieces. I’m sorry that I destroy everything I come into contact with. I’m sorry that I keep confusing our roles, I’m sorry that you have to be the mature one even though you barely know how. I’m sorry that I made you think I know what I’m doing when I really don’t. I’m sorry that I’m even apologizing at all, I’m sorry that we’ve been friends for less than a fucking hour and I already have transgressions to take accountability for. And most of all, I’m sorry that I can’t say any of this to your face. I’m sorry that I can only stare into your eyes, and hope that the words transmit through sheer telepathy. I think they will… you’re smart enough to pick up on it. Or at least I hope you are.

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

“Okay, okay. I’ll do it.” These words sound like music to my ears more than the fast, lively, pulsating beat blasting from the speakers does, and an excited squeal jumps out of me as he slips out of my grasp and steps to the side. Fuck yeah man, this is your moment... you better make this dancefloor your bitch! The spotlight is on you, what are you gonna do? What kind of wild shit are you gonna pull? What kind of moves are you gonna bust— Oh… Oh my GOD, I’M GONNA LOSE MY SHIT… Jesus, fuck, god, what is that?! He’s not busting any moves, not even close; in fact, I fear I’m gonna bust my ass ‘cause I’m having trouble standing watching this unfold. I want to look away, but my attention has already been captured with such force that I can’t look away. It’s so bad! I don’t even know why, either, it’s just, like, his movements, man… his movements are so deeply unnatural and his posture is so stiff, and yet there’s something endearing about his awkward little jig, something familiar that triggers extremely unpleasant memories, and they play in my head as I realize I’m witnessing once again the awkward and unsure physicality of a teenage boy. It all fucking clicks now. The way his skinny little shoulders shimmy, the way he bops his head, the way his eyes dart across the room. He looks so goddamn self-conscious because he could never be anything but at this age. It’s a curse that will only break with time. Yet this newfound revelation does nothing to stop me erupting into laughter, the sound ringing out bright and full and with an edge of tipsiness to it as I clutch my stomach, fumbling desperately for purchase so my knees won’t give out the way I’m scared they will. “Whatcha laughing at, man?” He asks, like a little shit, “What’s so funny?” Everything. Everything’s fucking funny. His taunting has the exact effect he wanted it to; my laughter is fucking uncontrollable now, and I try to take these huge gasps for air, but each time I get enough of it back in my lungs, I just start laughing again. Every brief pause is immediately followed by a loud burst of laughter —I physically can’t stop laughing, but because I’m fucking unhinged and crazy like that, I still try to talk to him through the fit I’m having. “J… J, fuck, oh my god, oh my fucking god, J…” I force out, “You fucking - you look like the inflatable tube man! Holy shit! You look like the fucking inflatable tube man! Oh my god!” His only response is to raise both middle fingers in the air. “What are you gonna do when I appear?” He demands to know as he performs his weird little dance for me, and that, combined with the fact that he just quoted Azealia Banks, sends me catapulting off the fucking edge. It’s like dominoes falling into place; I lean forward a little too far and then next thing I know I’m abruptly toppling over. Curiously, the hard, unforgiving collision with the floor never comes, and I’m overpowered by confusion and a little bit of shock that I’m still upright before realizing that the only reason I don’t crash down to the fucking floor is because I fall into J, because he’s using all of his strength to hold me up since I can’t stand on my own. “Oh, J, you kill me… you’re such a fucking bitch… ” I slur out in between intervals of laughter, leaning heavily on him for balance because my legs - god, my fucking legs feel like… like jello or something worthless and gelatinous of the sort. Like they’re well and truly boneless. My body is permanently slanted at this point, and my head lolls back on his shoulder as I say, hysterical, “Please, my stomach hurts…” And I really shouldn’t have said that, because what happens inside of my body after I do is downright ungodly. It’s like I just laid a curse on myself, or maybe I already did that when I downed four — no, what, huh? Was it five? Six? Holy fuck it was six — shots. Because there it is, that suffocating hot flash, like the hands of the devil gripping the back of my neck, and a feeling of cosmic dread washes over me. Oh no. Through the overwhelming heat spreading over my body and my heart beginning to flutter hard against my chest, I try my best to stay calm, to hold out hope that that’s all it is, a hot flash, but that hope is quickly followed by disappointment — the unsettling beginning stage has slammed to a halt and now I’m fully queasy, floaty in the worst way, like I’m barely grounded in the physical realm. My knees are weak and the rest of my body is pulsating with a strong, constant nausea. Fuck, I’m so nauseous it actually hurts. Everything fucking hurts so fucking bad and I just want to lay down and die. But, as horrendous as the feeling I’ve got is, it’s still not so urgent that I genuinely fear something might happen. It’s not until I feel those awful pangs in my side, and the involuntary way my stomach clenches that I have the terrifying initial thought that I may vomit. I may vomit, oh my god… I really don’t want to, but jesus I don’t know how long I can try to ignore this swirling, sickening nausea. It’s so bad, but I need to hold it together, so I stay frozen in place, terrified that any sudden movements will trigger a fit of vomiting. And I can’t have that… I don’t want to, I don’t want to vomit on this sweet child, so I do the best that I can to suppress the feeling, but once a sudden dizzy spell comes over me, I know this is beyond management, and I know I am beyond saving. Because my heart is racing and I feel deathly and everything in this room seems to be rotating at a horrifying pace and that always happens before I vomit, I get so dizzy… and I think god no, not here, not on poor little JJ, not in front of everyone, holy fuck god jesus please… “Oh, oh god, it really does,” the words tumble out in a rush of panic, and then I’m shoving him away from me and breaking into a mad dash across the dancefloor. It’s truly a wonder how I can even do that in this state; I lost the feeling in my legs a long time ago and I’m so shaky all over like I might— no, definitely will collapse at any moment, it makes no sense, I must be running on pure adrenaline. There’s not a single thought in my head, except for the lone, vain prayer that all the long, grueling hours I put in at the gym weren’t for nothing and that I can speed the fuck out of here as fast as humanly possible because the bright, unforgiving lights shining from up above are giving me a splitting headache and it’s so fucking stressful to try to run around these stupid fucking idiots without crashing right into them. God, I hate them all, why the fuck do they have to do this, I am dying! MOVE! I don’t even give a shit when I accidentally bump into some stereotypical Chad and cause him to stumble about five steps backwards, and when his irritating ass voice shouts, “Hey! Watch where you’re going, dick!” I just flip him off, and I don’t even have time to think about how J would laugh at that, I’m just laser-focused on getting to the bathroom. So laser-focused that I don’t even have the capacity to feel grateful when I do; I just launch myself into the first empty stall I see and let my knees give out so I can collapse onto the ground and violently spew into the toilet bowl. God, please be by my side right now...

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

“YAY!” I exclaim, so excited by his acquiescence that I have nothing to offer in return but a drunken shriek, “Oh my god, it’s gonna be so fucking fun! And I ain’t even pulling that hard, I don’t know why you’re acting like I’m playing tug of war with your arm, but whatevs...” I say and relinquish my hold on his arm, standing up, too quickly, blinking a few times at the dizziness. There’s a subtle wobbling that occurs, like my body is just kind of... slanting to the side, and suddenly I have the sick feeling that I’m gonna fucking fall over so I quickly grip the edge of the counter, marble digging into my palm as I close my eyes and try to ward off the dizziness. “Holy fuck,” I say to no one, and then burst out into laughter, for no reason really, just because it feels good to laugh. “Forget about me,” a familiarly sarcastic voice says. “Are you sure you can dance?” Once I feel stable enough to open my eyes, I look over and find that J is not only extending concern, but a hand for me to hold onto. I chuckle a little at the gesture, shaking my head and then regretting it immensely when another sudden wave of vertigo comes on. “Uh... yeah! Yeah, don’t... don’t worry about me, I’m just, just really feeling those shots... it’ll go away...” “Are you sure you’re alright?” “No, I’m all left,” I quip and make finger guns at him. “Get it? ‘Cause of politics? ‘Cause... ‘cause I’m a leftist...“ He gives a small snort in acknowledgement. I stand there laughing at myself for longer than is probably appropriate, and then it gradually fades out and I release a blissful, dazed sigh. “Alright, fucker,” I say as I grab another shot and quickly throw it back. It warms over my body and rushes to my head, and when I go to slam the empty glass down, I end up slamming my hand on the counter, too — though I don’t feel any pain. “Let’s fucking tear this bitch UP!” And thus we embark on our journey to the dancefloor. The expedition is a fairly long one — and probably daunting to those who haven’t made it before — but it doesn’t wear on my spirit, or cause me to be discouraged. I push forward through the crowd with steady determination, bopping my head to the music and rapping along to myself: “Imma eat your food up boo, I could bust your 8, Imma do one too... fuck ya gon do?” Despite already being so energetic that if I added coke into the mix, I’d launch myself into fucking space. And I swear to god...the rapture that overcomes me upon arriving at the center of the floor is beyond words. Maybe it’s the tequila, maybe it’s that it’s been so long since I’ve been inside a club, or maybe it’s that having to force your way past everyone else is such a difficult power struggle that it feels somewhat like I’ve earned this, but watching the sea of people part for me is like watching the gates of heaven opening up. The dancefloor feels just how I remember it feeling; stuffy, a little bit gross, and like an otherworldly realm, not for any glamorous or beautiful reasons, but because there is no other place on earth that could possibly contain as much sin as a nightclub dancefloor. It’s almost like a liminal space. Reality becomes so gorgeously blurred and your connection to the outside world grows weaker and weaker every second that you spend on the floor, surrounded by strobe lights and people of similar ungodly desires. The air is heavy with smoke and the smell of sweat from the many bodies dancing and gyrating across the room. Fog machines work in the corners, blowing purple and blue fog into the air. 212 is still blasting so loud that the vibrations shake the floor and the beat rivals the one inside my chest. The atmosphere is un-fucking-real and it makes dancing ridiculously easy. Moving my body is easy, the side to side sway of my hips is easy, the rhythmic stomping of my feet on the ground is easy, raising my arms to watch the neon light flow through my fingers is easy... it’s all so fucking easy and I can’t help but smile big and wide, body buzzing with energy, high off of the intoxicating air of freedom. Then, when I spin around, my gaze lands on J, a solid fixture in the flurry of people rushing all around him. He’s completely unmoving, his hands hanging limply at his sides, watching the commotion before him with a look on his face that I can only describe as horror. I call out to him, “J! What the fuck are you doing?! Dance with me, man!” I come a little closer to take hold of his hands and try to force him to dance, laughing the whole time like it’s hysterical, ‘cause it kind of is. “I said fucking dance... c’mon, people are gonna think I’m draggin’ a corpse ‘round the floor. Move your ass! Go crazy, go wild, go fucking ape shit! No one cares what you look like, I don’t care, I just wanna dance with you!”

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

And it turns out that he is. He’s more than receptive to my idea, which was spoken in jest, but truly does come from someplace sincere, laughing in unison with me and telling me that he likes that idea — because that’s what friends are for, aren’t they? And that brings a fond smile to my face, because yeah, he’s right, that is what friends are for. I always viewed my friends as my life partners, in the purest, most platonic way. Friendship is a partnership — just as romantic relationships are. It shouldn’t be taken any less seriously just because there are certain physical barriers between friends that will never be crossed. What a horrible thing to do, to try and claim that there is no depth to be found in friendships! The older I become, the more I start to feel that friendships are the most important relationships of all. You’re navigating the world, in all of its unmanageable chaos, side by side with somebody, for no reason other than you just like them, and you want to spend your time with them until the day that it finally runs out. There is no obligation, no pressures, no voice in the back of your head urging you to stay because you’ve already poured however many years into this relationship and you don’t want it all to have been for nothing and honestly you don’t know if you have it in you to search for love all over again. It’s wonderfully simple at its core. You’re choosing a person to experience life with, because they make it a little easier to live, because they make you happy and they understand you and make you feel accepted. Your friends are your most trusted confidants — they need to be, if you want to figure out these kinds of problems with them. “I hope so, because I really want to learn,” he continues. “Need to, actually, because I’m beyond sick of my anxiety fucking up my night. It’s ruined enough for me this week and I just wanna relax, man.” You and me both, kid. I’m doing a hell of a lot better than usual, thanks to the tequila and J’s presence, but goddamn, I feel those words in my very soul. I can’t even count how many times I’ve had that exact thought. My anxiety will ruin everything it can get its shitty little hands on, from my night, to my week, to my month. In fact, I have to stop myself from getting too high off this newfound understanding, because even though I’ve shared so much, J still doesn’t know the half of it, he really doesn’t know how much I relate to that. I have a massive reservoir I could tap into, if he wanted to hear those sorts of stories, if he found comfort and reassurance in seeing people endure the same struggles that he does. I could tell him so much. I could tell him about how I have to catch a buzz before I make a phone call, about how I hate walking alone at night even though I’m a man and I have the privilege of being able to do that without getting killed, about having panic attacks in the middle of class, about bursting into tears over someone’s tone changing slightly over text and assuming they hate me now, about seeing my entire college career going up in flames because I got a B instead of an A like I wanted and this obviously means I’m going to have to drop out because I’m doing so fucking poorly anyway and I’m never going to get my bachelor’s so I’m never going to be a photographer like I’ve wanted my whole life so I’ll have to switch careers even though I know nothing will fulfill me the way photography does and I’m going to be completely fucking miserable until the day I die. But I won’t, because so much of his night has been ruled by worry already, and because he’s still talking — admitting that though this isn’t the kind of place he would go to for serenity, his usual ideas haven’t exactly worked any miracles for him either, and asking, as he looks at me with big, trusting eyes, “What else can we do here?” And all I can think is, holy shit. Holy shit, he’s coming to me for advice. He trusts me. He fucking trusts me, jesus christ... As I’m about to begin racking my brain for things we could do that don’t involve binge-drinking, my concentration is shattered by a sudden, loud, fast thumping; an infectious and familiar beat that blasts throughout the club and beckons me to get up and dance, and only when I hear the voice behind the song, punchy and full of confidence, do I recognize it. Hey, I can be the answer, I’m ready to dance when the vamp up, and when I hit that dip get your camera, you can see I been that bitch since the pamper... “FUCK, this song is my SHIT!” I exclaim loudly and with no warning. “Oh dude, you know what we can do? Let’s dance, J! Yeah, let’s fucking dance! Come on, I love this song!” “Uhh, no thanks man...” he says stiffly, looking uncomfortable at the mere suggestion. “I think I’ve embarrassed myself enough for one night.” “Embarrassed yourself — huh?! Man, who are you trying to impress? The cokeheads you’re gonna sell to later?!” “Yes.” That makes me snort a laugh. “You don’t need to be worrying about impressing nobody. Fuck that, J, fuck that so hard. The first step to becoming relaxed is not giving a damn what people think. You gotta separate from your ego! Push all that shit aside! You need to humiliate yourself a little, because that’s the purest state of peace — looking like an absolute fool and not caring that you do. Who were you before you realized what a cruel and judgmental world we live in? Before society made you feel shame for who you are? Let him out. Just fucking let him out and come dance with me, JJ...” I beg, desperately tugging on his arm in an attempt to drag him off his seat. You said you wanted to loosen up...

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

“I know you do...” He says, pairing the affirmation with a small, soft smile, and it makes me reflexively smile back, but it also fills me with incredible guilt. I’m not the one that needs to be comforted. I’m not the one that needs reassurance. I’m not the one that needs to be treated gently, as if I’m fragile, as if I might get knocked to the ground if the wind blew too hard. I’m doing fine. It’s J that needs to be nurtured — and all he can think about is nurturing others. Precious. The kid is purely fucking precious. And stubborn as ever. He refuses to concede to the fact that he desperately and blatantly needs support, choosing instead to make me the focus once again. He’s nervously stuttering out an apology that feels entirely unwarranted, and eerily familiar. “Um, I’m sorry if I made it seem like I was doubting that. I wasn’t, I just…uh, needed to clarify it all y’know? You weren’t being intense there, my festering compulsion was.” Yeah, it is a fucking compulsion. I know because I’ve got the same one. It controls my fucking life, that incessant and uncontrollable need to apologize. I never have a reason to, but that doesn’t matter, because I feel like the world will end if I don’t, and so I always, always do. Because of this similarity, decoding his desperate plea takes no time at all. It roughly translates to: “I’m sorry if I made it seem like you were a bad person. I don’t think you are, I’m just chronically anxious and never have any idea what to believe because my brain tells me lies that I accept as truth. It’s not you, it’s me. It’s always me. No one else could ever be wrong, because no one else could ever be as awful as I am.” He can believe that all he wants — but he needs to know that I sure as hell don’t. He thinks he’s intense? He asked one fucking question. And he’s still reprimanding himself for it, agonizing that he comes off as an “ungrateful asshole” which...really? He’s been wildly appreciative all night. He’s thanked me repetitively for several different things, from the coke to the tequila to the answer I gave. He’s been needlessly polite, almost like we’re at a dinner party and not a nightclub. During which part of this night did he act even remotely ungrateful? Goddamnit, J, it’s okay. I don’t need you to write it in fucking blood that you are grateful. I see that you are. It practically radiates from you. I know you just want me to know how much you appreciate it — but I already do. You’ve ingrained that knowledge so deep in my head I could never forget it. There’s nothing left to do but move forward. And he actually begins to; “Thank you for that…and for everything else as well, in case I haven’t said that already because I don’t think I have and I should’ve since it’s long overdue. Yeah, uh…loosening up doesn’t exactly come easy to me, especially on Friday nights, but maybe I can start to now…” I can’t help but smile at the optimism, feeling a profound sense of relief wash over me. I sure fucking hope so. “Aw, J...anytime! Really. You did say that already, but I still appreciate it. And you don’t need to apologize for shit, okay? I get needing clarification. Anxiety has a funny way of muddling things. It eclipses all logic. You can never tell if it’s intuition or paranoia, you can never tell what is real and what is merely a product of your perceptions. Discernment is not something I have in abundance anymore, so...you know...” I trail off, “Shit fucking sucks. Anyway, chill out with the apologies, Kurt Cobain. It’s alright. Hell, I’m kinda sorry for telling you to loosen up. It doesn’t come easy to me, either. Why do you think I had five fucking shots just now? Why do you think I’m stoned half the time I see you? It’s so hard. Everyone else seems to be able to do it on command, but me? If I want to relax, I need to employ some sort of substance to do it. And it’s not fucking good. Don’t be like me, okay? Don’t ever do that. I’m just saying... I understand. Maybe you and I can learn to loosen up together.” I say and let out a laugh. It would take about fifty fucking years, but I’m down if you are.

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

But it’s not. It’s not okay. Nothing is okay anymore, I’m certainly not okay. It’s as if time briefly ceases to exist, and everything slows to a harsh and unsettling stop. Like the most sudden 180 that has ever been performed. The relaxation that was slowly taking over my body has left, making me completely stiff, my body tightening up instinctively in response to the change in atmosphere. My warm, tingly, tequila glow is growing weaker and weaker, threatening to disappear entirely. Everything stills in a terrible way, everything around me has been put on pause, I can’t hear the music anymore, can’t feel the humidity of the room anymore, can’t feel the lights hitting my face anymore, can’t even feel my own heartbeat — there is just nothing. There is just a sudden, severe gloom, and my own shallow breathing, and the pangs in my chest when I look at J and register his achingly sad question. “Why are you being so nice to me?” And I swear to God, it’s the worst damn thing I’ve ever heard. It’s the most heartbreaking thing I’ve ever heard, it’s the most awful thing I’ve ever heard, it’s the most unnecessary, painful fucking thing I’ve ever heard. I never wanted to hear anything like that from him, I never expected to hear anything like that from him. The very fact that I’m hearing it right now makes tears begin to collect in my eyes and misery bury itself deep in my heart. The pain penetrates my soul and weighs heavy on my chest, and the worst part is that I know the agony that I’m in ain’t shit compared to the agony he must be in, or been through, to ask that question. That fucking question. God, what the hell happened to you in your life, J? You’re only seventeen...what could you have gone through to make you so violently uncomfortable in your own skin? Well, hell, don’t even answer that. At seventeen, I had already gone through the foster care system, juvenile hall, and drug addiction. Age truly don’t mean shit. Age will not shield you from trauma. Age will not make you immune. Age will not save you. In fact, age will often betray you — leaving you hurt and vulnerable when you need protection the most. It happened to me, and it happened to most everybody that I knew. We all just needed somebody to look after us and we didn’t get it, so we had to be that for each other. But maybe J doesn’t have that. Maybe he completely redefines being isolated. How else does one get to that point, of being so confused by basic kindness that you have to inquire about it, almost as if trying to study it, to learn what it means. This was triggered by a glass of water, mind you. A glass of fucking water. I just wanted to make him feel better. It’s so...bizarre, and also not bizarre at all, because I know it’s not really about that. It’s not about the water. It’s not about some miniscule gesture. It’s about all of it, isn’t it? It’s about something so much deeper; everything suddenly has a deeper meaning when you’re a chronic overthinker. It’s about me giving him a free ounce of coke, it’s about me taking him to this club, it’s about me paying for his drinks, it’s about me showing him how to do a shot, it’s about me asking for his friendship. It’s about me being overly friendly the entire Spring, it’s about me asking him to go to breakfast at eight in the morning just to tell him about something that made me happy, it’s about me gravitating towards him in my time of need, it’s about me being ruthlessly talkative even when he isn’t, always rattling off conspiracy theories, telling him my opinions on music, or sharing something one of my wild-eyed, strung out customers said to me. These things may seem like nothing to a “normal” person, whatever the fuck that means, but when you’re like J...you notice. Make note of every interaction, cling on to each little detail. He’s wise beyond his years, but also pensive to a fault, looking into things a little deeper than maybe he needs to. He’s got strong perception, though, and something tells me it’s been sharpened to such a point because he uses it to survive. What exactly he’s trying to survive, I don’t know. Maybe he got into this game so he could contribute to rent; it would explain why he takes every opportunity to make money, even if it’s random as fuck, and the cost of living in the Bay Area is certainly high enough to push a young kid into dealing drugs to help his family. Maybe he has no family, maybe he’s all alone out here. Maybe he’s depressed like I am. Maybe he has a shitty home life. Maybe something happened to him when he was young that still haunts him every single day. I don’t know exactly what happened to J in his life. Maybe I never will. What I do know is that he thinks absolutely nothing of himself, and expects me to think nothing of him, too. He can’t even look me in the eye when he asks me the question, he just stares down at his glass of soda, stirring it almost like he’s a little bit mad at it, or just mad at himself. I recognize that look well, because I see it every time I pass a mirror. That shameful look of self-deprecation brewing deep inside, buried far enough so that no one walking past can see it, but not hidden well enough from those that have seen it before on their own face. I’ve worn that look my whole damn life, I still wear it now, but seeing it on his face makes me reminisce on when I was younger. When I was sixteen, burnt-out and perpetually numb. Before drugs, before love, before self-destruction— I was addicted to solitude. Isolating myself for twenty four hours a day was the only thing that really consoled me. I remember being like that. I remember being so jaded and tired and wanting to just fucking give up. I remember being bitter and angry and paranoid that everyone just wanted to hurt me, just wanted to gain my trust only to break it and wreak utter havoc on my life. I remember going so long without love that when I received it, I was repulsed. I remember it. That cruel paradox. It was the one thing that I wanted the most, but when I got it, I rejected it. Turned my nose up at it and said, “What’s this? I don’t need this. I’m doing just fine on my own. Don’t degrade yourself by adulating over me like this.” I longed not for obsequious displays of affection — but for sweet and mild love. True love, the kind that doesn’t need to be put into words. I thought, if you have to tell me over and over that you care, you must be faking. But what is love if not a series of small, seemingly unconnected phrasings? “I miss you.” “This reminded me of you.” “I can’t wait to see you again.” “Text me when you get there so I know you’re safe.” “I’m always here whenever you need me.” It does not necessarily have to be the words, “I love you.” Love is a wonderful, all-encompassing thing and it is expressed in so many different, unique, tender ways. To limit the expression of love, to believe that if it’s real, it needs no words, is the greatest burden one can put upon oneself. I also know that J has no sense of self-worth. He expects to be given nothing because he thinks he deserves nothing. I recognize that about him, and god, I really recognize what he asked because I let that same question slip all the fucking time. It’s actually scary to hear it come out of his mouth. I hope this is the first time that it ever has, but that’s probably unlikely. Look at him. He’s visibly uncomfortable with even the smallest of gestures, and seems to feel quite a lot of guilt, which is why he asked the question in the first place, I’m guessing. I’ve never been very good at receiving affection, either. Giving it is no issue. I’ve always been a giver, it’s hard for me not to be. But there’s a real darkness to that. I assume everyone will leave me if I don’t give them my all and so I end up wearing myself out for no good reason. But hell, I would still rather do that than deal with that guilt, that feeling feel like I’m not enough. It’s funny...all I want is for someone to reciprocate the effort I put in but whenever someone does, I feel bad about it and wish that they hadn’t. The irony of the thought brings a sad smile to my face, and I can’t help but look at J, watching him look back at me with something in his expression that I can’t place. Why do we do this, J? Why must we reject the one thing we need the most? I swallow hard, blinking back my tears as I prepare to answer him in a way that he deserves. “Cause I like you, JJ,” is what I start off with, gently nudging him in the shoulder, cheesy smile and all. “And I think you deserve to be treated nicely. Contrary to what you may believe deep in your heart. I’m not judging you for that, either. I understand, you know? I’m like that, too. Every time someone does something nice for you, it feels like a debt that you have to pay off, right? Like you have to prove that you are worthy of their kindness. But that’s not what it’s about, J. The nature of kindness is not transactional. When you do something nice, you expect nothing. You only hope to make the other person happy. You know what that’s like; you put in so much effort last week just to make me feel better. You didn’t have to go, but you did. Just like I don’t have to do things for you, but I do, because I want to. So keep in mind, that when you ask “why are you being so nice to me”, I could ask you the same thing. We do these things for each other because we want to. Neither of us see it coming, but we ought to, because this— you, me — ain’t just business anymore. You can afford to loosen up a bit, J. If I’m too much, you can tell me anytime and I’ll cut it out. I mean, I know I’m really intense. And if you want a serious answer to your question, it’s pretty simple. I take care of my friends.”

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

After confirming what I knew to be true, but feared to be false, he raises his empty glass, declaring, “I’m done with the shots for the night, but I’ll cheers to that.” And I feel my heart clench a little bit; hit hard by the touching gesture. Oh, man, I think I’m making him even softer... Or maybe he was always this soft — but never felt safe enough to be until now. I don’t get tangled up in the particularities, the intricate details; there’s no urgent reason to uncover them, and besides, maybe he’ll confide them in me someday, that’s what friends do, after all. Instead I beam at him and pick up a shot, raising it alongside his. “Fuck yeah, let’s cheers. But before we do, I...I’d like to make a quick toast.” I pause for a moment before clearing my throat. “To finding friendship in the most peculiar places. To me finally being able to breathe again, to you conquering your first shot and coming out tonight with my crazy ass and actually seeming to enjoy it quite a bit — it’s fucking great to see you smiling this much, J. To you, to me, to us. May the spirit of this night live on forevermore, may the rest of our days be filled with exuberance, laughter, good times and good people, and may the hangover that I’m certain to get tomorrow be forgiving. Cheers!” Our glasses clink and the sound resonates somewhere deep within me, clearing the awful heaviness that used to live in my bones and easing my spirit, mind and body. “Cheers,” he echoes, and there’s just something so dearly sacred about this moment that I find myself called to extend it for a little while longer, hesitating to take my shot, instead leaving the glass suspended in the air as I stare at J with the most peaceful, happy expression I’ve worn in months. We really did find each other in the most peculiar place, but god, I’m grateful that we did. With a slight tilt of my head, I take the shot, swallowing the liquor down and adding the empty glass amongst all the others. The sharp taste snaps me out of my sentimental fog, and I laugh a little, shaken by the intensity of my own feelings. “God, I’m getting so emotional...” I muse with only a little bit of shame in my voice. “I can’t even blame it on the alcohol, that’s just how I am. I’m a little cry baby sometimes. I’m like, super sensitive to a lot of things...you better pray you have experience in dealing with highly emotional people, ‘cause that’s what you’re in for, bein’ friends with me.” “I think I’m qualified,” he quips without missing a beat, and my anxious heart feels affirmed. No, I know you’re qualified... Fucking more than qualified. That was expert, the way he handled my emotional breakdown on Sunday. I try to block out that tremendously painful night, but I still remember what he did for me. I’ll always remember that moment, where I was sitting on the bench, and I saw him, and I could finally get a full breath again. That’s what it is. His presence feels like the first breath of fresh air after it rains. Like the fog had been lifted. Like my pain just sort of...shook loose. It hurt a little less. It didn't go away, but it lessened, and god, that's a feat that I can't even achieve on my own, much less with the aid of another person. And J did it. He made me feel okay again. And that's something that I simply cannot stop obsessing over. No one else does that for me. How could they? I don’t open up to a single soul. Sometimes I feel like the loneliest person in the universe and it’s all my fault. It’s just, I always have to worry with everyone else. I always have to filter myself and wrap myself up in this neat little non-offensive package so that they don't get scared and run away and I never get to just say what I'm fucking feeling because it's disturbing, what I feel and think disturbs people. It disturbs myself. And I'm well aware that...that normal people aren't like me. Normal people don't get scared by their own thoughts or crushed by their own feelings. Not like I do. My feelings, it's just...it's too big. My feelings are just too big. There isn't any space for logic or reason or anyone else or even myself. But somehow everything is...different with J. I have a dangerous feeling that I might grow to regret it, like I do every time I let someone in, but I feel like I can be myself around him. Like he...accepts me. Like maybe he knows what I feel better than anyone. Maybe he has the same poisonous thoughts and maybe he has the same unbearably painful feelings. It's a disgusting thing to take comfort in, I know, and I feel filthy for even daring to, but when I said I'm gonna be alone for the rest of my life, and he said he was, too...jesus, that's never happened to me, ever. No one has ever just agreed with my negativity before. I'd be lying through my teeth if I said it didn’t bring me relief. I didn't have to feel like such a fucking outsider, for once. I hate that he said it and I hate that he meant it and I hate, so, so fucking badly, that he feels that way deep in his soul, that he thinks of his future, his long, bright future, and only sees isolation and despair. If I think about it too long, I'll start bawling and wanting to fix whatever is wrong with him and take him into my apartment and not let him leave until I've convinced him of his worth. So I can’t. I can’t think about what it means for him. A part of me likes what it means for me, though. I like that he felt comfortable enough to just fucking say something like that to me. I like that I got lucky enough to get a glimpse into his mind, even if it was the first and only one I'll ever get. I like that he told me, without even realizing it, that I'm not alone. I like that he didn't run. It makes me think that he and I aren't as different as I thought. It has to be true. It has to. Because instead of feeling that devastating, loud, screaming disconnect with the person I'm opening myself up to, I felt this...this wonderful, welcoming connection. It wasn't a magical breakthrough or anything but it felt like something close to it. Like maybe we're cut from the same fucked up cloth and because of that we can accept each other in the way that nobody else would ever be able to. Maybe all the mystery was really just misunderstanding. Maybe I don’t have to keep lying anymore. Maybe he’s just as sad as I am. That thought makes my heart hurt, so I shove it down and pretend like I never came up with it in the first place. Like a half-reformed addict, my first instinct is to take another shot to wash down all this pain, but I realize, horrified, that there are none left. I’m not sure what horrifies me more; how quickly they disappeared or how overwhelmingly desperate I’ve become for more. I thought I had distanced myself from that fiendish lust, the kind that I can feel all over my body. Guess old habits die hard, huh? “Alright, where’s the fucking bartender at, I need more shots, like instantly...wait, did you say you were nauseous? Oh, dude, I’m sorry, that sucks! I’m gonna order you a water. It’ll stabilize you a bit.” And then, immediately after saying that, the bartender comes back into view with J’s glass of coke, frantically apologetic as she sets it down in front of him: “Shit...I’m so sorry...I got caught up on the other end and almost forgot. Here...” He smiles at her, “No, it’s fine, really. Thank you.” Oh, there he goes...Mr. Manners strikes again... His gesture seems to mollify her anxiety, the last of it oozing out in her self-deprecating joke, “These Friday nights are getting to me. I’m Tamara—just call for me if you see me over there and need anything else.” “Wait, before you go, could I just get another round of shots and a glass of water?” I ask, and she nods, “Totally, yeah, I’ll be right back.” And she must be really remorseful for taking a while with J’s coke, because she returns to us expeditiously. In front of J she places a glass of ice water, and in front of me, a brand-new tray of shots, lined up in a perfect row of six, and I have to fight to keep from salivating. “Anything else?” “No, I’m good,” I say, not lifting my gaze from the shots. Really, I’m great... “Okay, well, enjoy!” She says then walks away. I don’t wait another second before taking a shot, but after I swallow and turn my head to face J, I almost pass out from the thick, whirling vertigo. It feels like everything is rotating even though I’m sitting still, and if that wasn’t enough, if that chronic unsteadiness wasn’t enough— I can feel that fuzzy feeling in my chest, a bone-deep warmth setting in. I can feel all of the stress leave my body, I can feel my limbs becoming lax, warm waves of relaxation vibrating through every single part of me. Yeah, I think dazedly and with a scary amount of delight, there it is. The five shots of tequila are hitting now, that’s for certain, and the sudden effects elicit an easy grin from me. “I’m feelin’ good, J...” I say in a sing-song voice, then proceed to crack up at myself. “Feelin’ really nice right now...um, anyway, so drink your fucking water, man. It helps. Any time you feel like you’re gonna throw up, take a sip of ice cold water. You won’t feel sick anymore. It’s like impossible to throw up after drinking ice cold water. It ain’t just for nausea though. You should always drink water in between drinking alcohol...I should probably order a water too, but fuck it, I can get it later, it’s okay.”

[where-ls-my-mlnd]

“Alright, but don’t forget your own advice. That’s your third one in as equally many minutes. It’s only 10, remember?” Ah, you jest? Alright...alright, touchè, J. Touchè. I remember the time, I just don’t care. I’d still be drinking if it was ten in the fucking morning right now. I couldn’t care less about the time for me, I only care about the time for him, which...yeah, that makes very little sense. Fucking teens, man. I forgot how sensitive they are to hypocrisy. Fair enough, though. Fair enough. I appreciate the concern, even if it was clothed in dry humor. It’s sweet. He looks out for me, J. He does. Even though it’s supposed to be the other way around. When the sound of his voice fills my head again, I lift my head up, eyes growing wide again in some terrible mix of anticipation and worry. He’s holding a shot, away from his face, like I taught him, telling me how he wants to set the record straight and try again— for good luck, even if the only luck it brings him is a calm and settled stomach. At the sight of him closing his eyes and bringing the glass closer to his lips, I draw a deep breath in along with him, only I never breathe out again, I keep holding it, because god, this is making me fucking nervous, and I just - I don’t want him to hurt himself, I want him to really remember what I taught him, I want him to do it right... And he does. He tilts his head back, not all the way, just a little, and swallows the tequila down smoothly. A burst of air rushes out of him as he sets the empty shot glass down, wipes his mouth, and mutters, “Shit.” Yeah. Yeah, it is shit, isn’t it? I can’t help but chuckle a little at that, my small, amused grin growing into a full-blown, oddly proud smile. He fucking did it. He did it right. He did it safely. He fucking did it, and I fucking taught him how, and now he’ll never run the risk of launching himself off his stool or choking on sickening fumes ever again because he has that knowledge now. God, I don’t know what the fuck...I don’t know why this is making me feel this way. I’m just proud, that’s all. A small achievement is still an achievement. There’s nothing that ain’t worth celebrating, especially on a fucking fantastic night like this. Why shouldn’t we be celebratory? We should be. J should be...he better be. I’m gonna make him celebrate himself, today and every day. Everyone should have a person encouraging them to do that. “Okay, that was…better. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t like it by any stretch, but uh…that’s ultimately more of my own alcohol bias than anything against tequila specifically.” He begins to share with me his review of the tequila— formal as hell, naturally, and full of tiny, but illuminating details I had not previously known, slipped in there so covertly and so casually. Like how he pretty much hates the taste of alcohol, which makes me think, good, keep it that way. And how he’s never drank before — which I knew, it was alarmingly obvious — but never anticipated him to explicitly tell me. He seems to feel no shame about it, owning his small mistake and explaining that he hadn’t known there was a specific way to take a shot. It’s honest and open in a way that I’m not used to from him. He’s relaxed as he speaks about his abstinence from alcohol, almost as if it’s a conscious decision, something he truly has no interest in. And that fills me with an inexplicable happiness, but also an inexplicable sorrow. A deep sorrow — dark, torturously gradual, like my heart is slowly falling down the cavity of my chest and into the pit of my stomach. The sensation is fucking scary, and I feel briefly helpless, because he’s not close to me like that, I can’t protect him the way I want to. I can’t stop him from going back on that decision and turning reckless like me. And god— god, I want to. I want to grab his shoulders and look him dead in the eyes and say, hold onto that abstinence for as long as you can, okay? Don’t start trying random substances just for the “experience”, and don’t ever get into the habit of using drugs to regulate your emotions, because you very quickly won’t be able to without them. Don’t be like me. Don’t be fucking stupid. Never let anyone make you feel less than because you don’t drink or do drugs. Never let anyone force their definition of “fun” upon you, never let anyone shame you, and never let anyone tell you what you should and should not be doing. If you want to stay out of that scene, stay out of that scene. If you want to dabble in it— I don’t recommend it, but I’ll be there to help you do so carefully if you need. Whatever you do, please, do not be like me. But I can’t say that to him, because it’s not my place, and knowing teenagers, it would likely only drive him to rebel, despite never feeling such an urge before. Oh, how I long to, though. It’s so devastatingly relevant, even today. It seems that the more time goes by, the more drugs become normalized. Fuck if I know why. I don’t mean to sound like a clichèd PSA but drugs aren’t fucking cool. They have never been cool, and they never will be cool. If I could only undo one event in my entire life, I would undo the night of my sixteenth birthday. My life could have been so different. If I had known how not fucking worth it drugs would turn out to be — I never would have tried them in the first place. I’ve spent so much of my life bitter and resentful because of terrible choices I made. I don’t want J to subject himself to the same poison. It’s not a lie when people say that drug-induced happiness is temporary. Purely fucking ephemeral is what that shit is. A few hours of bliss repeated over and over at rapidly decreasing intensity throughout the day traded for a lifetime of enslavement. Is a few bursts of euphoria worth the never-ending negative side effects, the unbearable stress it puts your body under, the torment it puts your mind through? I understand craving peace of mind more than anything else in the world. But drugs can never truly give you that. It’s only an illusion meant to lure you in, the honeymoon phase before the abuse starts back up again. To look to drugs for contentment is to worship a false God. But hey, this is coming from a guy who’s on the road to becoming shit-faced and is almost four shots of tequila in. I wouldn’t take me too seriously either. That’s why I ain’t gonna say none of this to J. “I wasn’t aware that there was a proper method of execution that eliminates the godawful smells and it really helped me there. I wish I’d known it before I knocked myself on my ass with that first shot ‘cause fuck…I’m still nauseated from it, but hey, you taught me and now I know how so…thanks for that, man. I appreciate it.” Oh. Oh, kid, that’s so... I really do lay my hand over my heart then, smiling in the syrupy way I had tried not to before, and as I look at this kid, this sweet, sharp, insightful, caring, great kid...I realize something. Something that I should have realized from the start. He’s not James Dean at all. He’s not some aloof, caustic, leather jacket wearing guy who speeds off on his motorcycle in the night after snorting a couple lines with some gorgeous women. That ain’t even who the real James Dean was, it’s just the weird fantasy of him I’ve been toting around all these years ‘cause bad boys make me harder than a fucking math equation. No, if anything, J is the character that James Dean played in Rebel Without A Cause. J is Jim Stark. That’s exactly who he is. Because before you watch Rebel Without A Cause, you likely believe that Jim really is that timeless vision of a badass, that smart-mouthed asshole who doesn’t care about anyone and is curiously regarded as cool for it. But when you actually watch the film, you realize that belief could not be more false. Jim is an angsty teen, sure, but he doesn’t take it out on anyone. In fact, he directs his grief and anger and hatred inward, lets it all build up inside of himself because he doesn’t know how to put his feelings into words and he’s too scared to try. Jim is a fucking sweetheart, openly pacifistic, adamantly refuses to let himself be overcome by the mean-spirited energy of the kids at his school. He does nothing to hurt anyone because he doesn’t even have anyone in the first place. He’s alone, isolated, he fits in nowhere and aches to belong everywhere. He’s conflicted all the time, he doesn’t know how to do the right thing or what the right thing even is. Still, he has that desire to be good, he is good, he’s the purest character in the film besides Plato. Jim Stark is not the cool guy. He’s the loner that the cool guys pick on. And while I hope and pray to God that nobody picks on J, I know that he embodies Jim Stark’s essence. Deceptively cool — in all actuality, a total softie. I’d feel more guilty for misreading him if I weren’t currently overtaken by sentimentality. “Aw, J. It ain’t no thing. I just want you to be safe and what not,” I say. “And hey, you fucking did it! You got it that time! That was good, J! Aw...baby’s first drink!” He laughs at that, genuinely fucking laughs, a big smile blossoming on his face, as bright as the strobe lights that flash in my vision. It’s such a sudden, unusual display of happiness that I almost want to fucking tear up, but I don’t; instead I return his grin, if not surpass it in terms of size.   “Aww, look at you smiling, J...you think I’m pretty alright, don’t you? Yeah, you do! You do, I can see it...aw, do you like me, J? Do you wanna be friends?” And then, the most shocking thing that could ever possibly happen does. He says, “Sure.” Like it was never something he had to give a second thought. Like it’s easy for him, easy to say yes. He gives me a little laugh,  along with his friendship, and oh my god, I’ve been longing for this for so long that it feels like a dream, a mirage, a result of drunk distortion. But it’s not. Reality is not warped, this is not a haze, I’m not even fucking drunk. This is as real as it fucking gets. J is not the type of guy who would ever bullshit you. He wants to be my friend. He said so. He said sure. Holy fuck. Holy fucking fuck. Excitement rises in my chest then. I feel giddy, bubbly, like a teenager. It’s uncontrollable, the sheer elation that seizes me. I’d try to contain it but it’s too powerful; I can only blink dazedly and stare at him, smiling out the eyes, aglow with joy. “Okay,” I say dumbly, still utterly stupefied as I laugh a little. “W-we’re friends.”