speck of dust, the stove and refrigerator in the kitchenette gleaming.
Marley tells Cliff to take the bed, she has to do some stuff, and sits
cross-legged in the wicker chair, pecking at her laptop. He closes his eyes,
surrendering to fatigue, fading toward sleep; but his thoughts start to race
and sleep won’t come. He tries to put a logical spin on everything that
happened, works out various theories that would accommodate what he saw. The
only one that suits is that he’s losing it, and he’s not ready to go there.
Finally, he opens his eyes. Marley’s still pecking away, her face concentrated
by a serious expression. In her appearance and mien, she reminds him of girls
he knew in LA in the eighties, many of them weekend punkers, holding down a
steady job during the week, production assistants and set dressers and such,
and then, on Friday night, they’d dress down, wear black lipstick and too much
mascara, and go batshit crazy. But those girls were all fashion punks with a
life plan and insurance and solid prospects, whereas Marley’s a true
edge-dweller with a punk ethos, living paycheck to paycheck, secure in herself,
a bit of dreamer, though her practical side shows itself from time to
time—for a week or two she’ll binge on schemes to resurrect her fiscal
security; then, Pffft!, it all goes away and she’s carefree and careless again.
These thoughts endanger
Cliff’s resolve to remain friends with her, and more dangerous yet is his
contemplation of her physical presence. Frizzy blond hair framing a gamin’s
face; bra-less breasts, her nipples on full display through the thin fabric of
her t-shirt; she’s his type, all right. He understands that part of what’s at
play here is base, that whenever he’s at a loss or anxious about something or
just plain bored, he relies on women to sublimate the feeling.
Marley glances up, catching
him staring. “Hey! You all right?”
“Yeah,” he says. “Why?”
“You were looking weird is
all.” She closes the laptop. “You want anything?”
“No,” he says, a reflex
answer, but thinks about the things he wants. They’re all momentary
gratifications. Sex; surcease; to stop thinking about it. He suspects that the
real curse of getting older is a certain wisdom, the tendency to reflect on
your life and observe the haphazard path you’ve made, and then he decides that
what he wants above all is to want something so badly that he stops
second-guessing himself for a while. Just go after it and damn the
consequences…though in reality, that’s only another form of surcease.
“What do you want?”
he asks.
She tips her head to one
side, as if to see him more clearly. “I don’t think I’m getting the whole
picture here. Did something happen last night? You know, something more than
what you told me? Because you’re not acting like yourself.”
“I’ll tell you later.” He
shifts onto his side. “So what do you want? What would make you happy?”
She sets the laptop on the
floor and comes over to the bed and makes a shooing gesture. “Scoot over. If
this is going to be a deep conversation, I want to lie down.”
He’s slow to move, but she
pushes onto the bed beside him and he’s forced to accommodate her. She plumps
the pillow, squirms about, and, once she’s settled facing him, arms shielding
her breasts, hands together by her cheek, she says, “I used to want to be a
singer. I was in love with Tori Amos, and I was going to be like her.
Different, but one of those chicks who plays piano and writes her own songs.
But I didn’t want it badly enough, so I just bummed around with music, gigged
with a few bands and like that. One of my boyfriends was a bartender. He taught
me the trade, and I started working bar jobs. It was easy work, I met some nice
guys, some not so nice. I was coasting, you know. Trying to figure it out. Now
I think, I’m pretty sure, I want to be a vet. Not the kind who prescribes pills
for sick cats and treats old
Marley tells Cliff to take the bed, she has to do some stuff, and sits
cross-legged in the wicker chair, pecking at her laptop. He closes his eyes,
surrendering to fatigue, fading toward sleep; but his thoughts start to race
and sleep won’t come. He tries to put a logical spin on everything that
happened, works out various theories that would accommodate what he saw. The
only one that suits is that he’s losing it, and he’s not ready to go there.
Finally, he opens his eyes. Marley’s still pecking away, her face concentrated
by a serious expression. In her appearance and mien, she reminds him of girls
he knew in LA in the eighties, many of them weekend punkers, holding down a
steady job during the week, production assistants and set dressers and such,
and then, on Friday night, they’d dress down, wear black lipstick and too much
mascara, and go batshit crazy. But those girls were all fashion punks with a
life plan and insurance and solid prospects, whereas Marley’s a true
edge-dweller with a punk ethos, living paycheck to paycheck, secure in herself,
a bit of dreamer, though her practical side shows itself from time to
time—for a week or two she’ll binge on schemes to resurrect her fiscal
security; then, Pffft!, it all goes away and she’s carefree and careless again.
These thoughts endanger
Cliff’s resolve to remain friends with her, and more dangerous yet is his
contemplation of her physical presence. Frizzy blond hair framing a gamin’s
face; bra-less breasts, her nipples on full display through the thin fabric of
her t-shirt; she’s his type, all right. He understands that part of what’s at
play here is base, that whenever he’s at a loss or anxious about something or
just plain bored, he relies on women to sublimate the feeling.
Marley glances up, catching
him staring. “Hey! You all right?”
“Yeah,” he says. “Why?”
“You were looking weird is
all.” She closes the laptop. “You want anything?”
“No,” he says, a reflex
answer, but thinks about the things he wants. They’re all momentary
gratifications. Sex; surcease; to stop thinking about it. He suspects that the
real curse of getting older is a certain wisdom, the tendency to reflect on
your life and observe the haphazard path you’ve made, and then he decides that
what he wants above all is to want something so badly that he stops
second-guessing himself for a while. Just go after it and damn the
consequences…though in reality, that’s only another form of surcease.
“What do you want?”
he asks.
She tips her head to one
side, as if to see him more clearly. “I don’t think I’m getting the whole
picture here. Did something happen last night? You know, something more than
what you told me? Because you’re not acting like yourself.”
“I’ll tell you later.” He
shifts onto his side. “So what do you want? What would make you happy?”
She sets the laptop on the
floor and comes over to the bed and makes a shooing gesture. “Scoot over. If
this is going to be a deep conversation, I want to lie down.”
He’s slow to move, but she
pushes onto the bed beside him and he’s forced to accommodate her. She plumps
the pillow, squirms about, and, once she’s settled facing him, arms shielding
her breasts, hands together by her cheek, she says, “I used to want to be a
singer. I was in love with Tori Amos, and I was going to be like her.
Different, but one of those chicks who plays piano and writes her own songs.
But I didn’t want it badly enough, so I just bummed around with music, gigged
with a few bands and like that. One of my boyfriends was a bartender. He taught
me the trade, and I started working bar jobs. It was easy work, I met some nice
guys, some not so nice. I was coasting, you know. Trying to figure it out. Now
I think, I’m pretty sure, I want to be a vet. Not the kind who prescribes pills
for sick cats and treats old
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