You know what I mean. I am beginning to worry about Her. She is hardly sleeping, she is never going to class, she is fixating on me and slowly coming unraveled. I am beginning to think this was a terrible idea.
I don’t know what caused all this. Actually, that’s a lie; I do, I just don’t want to admit it. Like everything else in my life, this was all my fault. See, one night last week, in a moment of weakness after the after-party, when the moon hung low and bright over a stretch of I-95 somewhere in southeast Georgia, when I was awake on the bus and sad and really, really drunk, I may have written that I was falling in love with Her again. It was probably a mistake. I didn’t even mean it—I don’t even remember writing it—but she didn’t know that, and by the time I woke up the following afternoon, she had replied with three separate e-mails, each sent a few hours apart, and each crazier than the last. I rolled over in my bunk and went back to sleep. I am an addict. I am an idiot. My sickness is severe.
The worst thing about Her e-mails isn’t even the i love you s. Don’t get me wrong, those are pretty bad, but what’s even worse is that when I read them, it’s almost as if I’m looking at myself. She’s started writing like me now, all lowercase and parenthetical, full of tangents and angles, half-realized thoughts thrown into go-nowhereparagraphs. She has become narcissistic and maniacal, obsessive and pathological, only she hides it all beneath a thin layer of self-effacement. I’ve been getting by on this same trick for years, and I’m beginning to realize that I can be insufferable because of it. With each e-mail I read, I wondered more and more why no one has ever bothered to tell me this. Or hauled off and belted me in the face. Anyone besides the philosopher, that is, but he had just cause. I wouldn’t want to spend a minute with me, that’s for certain.
We’re somewhere in South Carolina now, in some awful strip club off the interstate. The kind of place where they serve breakfast and the parking lot is loaded with truckers looking for a quickie. We came here as a joke, and I’m the only one who isn’t listening. Instead, I’m on my Drone, reading another of Her endless e-mails. In front of me, a too skinny girl with bad makeup and dead eyes asks me if I want a dance. I say yes, then instantly regret it. Under the black light in a strip club, everything takes the shape of regret sooner or later.
She puts out her cigarette (she has a pack of Camels stuffed into her thigh-highs) and goes to work. I’m trying to write Her back, but there are breasts in my light. “I’m only doing this to pay my way through school,” the dancer says to me, and I think to myself, somewhere, there is a university full of strippers paying their way through. Somewhere out there, a college takes tuition payments in dollar bills. I look in her dead eyes and lie, “You’re too pretty for this. You should model.” She smiles and I can see the stains on her teeth, all blotchy and off-white beneaththe black light. I wish she’d stop. She asks me what I’m writing, and I lie again, tell her I’m writing a letter to my wife. I ask her to press SEND and she obliges.
“You’re too young to be married,” she whispers through her hideous teeth.
“She’s my second wife,” I say. “My first wife died in a fire. My whole house burned down, and she was in there with my kids. They’re all dead.”
She pauses on my lap, midgrind. You have to say something pretty fucked-up to get a stripper to do something like that. I am on a roll now, and I don’t want to stop. I tell her that I was just e-mailing my second wife to tell her it’s over, that I want a divorce. I’ve told my wife she doesn’t understand my needs, that we grew apart long ago. I’ve told her I’m in love with another woman. As long as a guy has a sob story, he doesn’t have to throw out dollar bills. If I string together every single
I don’t know what caused all this. Actually, that’s a lie; I do, I just don’t want to admit it. Like everything else in my life, this was all my fault. See, one night last week, in a moment of weakness after the after-party, when the moon hung low and bright over a stretch of I-95 somewhere in southeast Georgia, when I was awake on the bus and sad and really, really drunk, I may have written that I was falling in love with Her again. It was probably a mistake. I didn’t even mean it—I don’t even remember writing it—but she didn’t know that, and by the time I woke up the following afternoon, she had replied with three separate e-mails, each sent a few hours apart, and each crazier than the last. I rolled over in my bunk and went back to sleep. I am an addict. I am an idiot. My sickness is severe.
The worst thing about Her e-mails isn’t even the i love you s. Don’t get me wrong, those are pretty bad, but what’s even worse is that when I read them, it’s almost as if I’m looking at myself. She’s started writing like me now, all lowercase and parenthetical, full of tangents and angles, half-realized thoughts thrown into go-nowhereparagraphs. She has become narcissistic and maniacal, obsessive and pathological, only she hides it all beneath a thin layer of self-effacement. I’ve been getting by on this same trick for years, and I’m beginning to realize that I can be insufferable because of it. With each e-mail I read, I wondered more and more why no one has ever bothered to tell me this. Or hauled off and belted me in the face. Anyone besides the philosopher, that is, but he had just cause. I wouldn’t want to spend a minute with me, that’s for certain.
We’re somewhere in South Carolina now, in some awful strip club off the interstate. The kind of place where they serve breakfast and the parking lot is loaded with truckers looking for a quickie. We came here as a joke, and I’m the only one who isn’t listening. Instead, I’m on my Drone, reading another of Her endless e-mails. In front of me, a too skinny girl with bad makeup and dead eyes asks me if I want a dance. I say yes, then instantly regret it. Under the black light in a strip club, everything takes the shape of regret sooner or later.
She puts out her cigarette (she has a pack of Camels stuffed into her thigh-highs) and goes to work. I’m trying to write Her back, but there are breasts in my light. “I’m only doing this to pay my way through school,” the dancer says to me, and I think to myself, somewhere, there is a university full of strippers paying their way through. Somewhere out there, a college takes tuition payments in dollar bills. I look in her dead eyes and lie, “You’re too pretty for this. You should model.” She smiles and I can see the stains on her teeth, all blotchy and off-white beneaththe black light. I wish she’d stop. She asks me what I’m writing, and I lie again, tell her I’m writing a letter to my wife. I ask her to press SEND and she obliges.
“You’re too young to be married,” she whispers through her hideous teeth.
“She’s my second wife,” I say. “My first wife died in a fire. My whole house burned down, and she was in there with my kids. They’re all dead.”
She pauses on my lap, midgrind. You have to say something pretty fucked-up to get a stripper to do something like that. I am on a roll now, and I don’t want to stop. I tell her that I was just e-mailing my second wife to tell her it’s over, that I want a divorce. I’ve told my wife she doesn’t understand my needs, that we grew apart long ago. I’ve told her I’m in love with another woman. As long as a guy has a sob story, he doesn’t have to throw out dollar bills. If I string together every single
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