Fic: Fix You (Tina Fey/Amy Poehler, Tina Fey/Lindsay Lohan; R)
Title: Fix You
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Fanfic, not journalism. I don't own these people and this is all fiction.
Summary: This is inspired by the cover story on Lindsay Lohan in a recent issue of Vanity Fair.
Feedback: Would be so nice!
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
The last time I saw her, her hair was thick and firey red, not brittle and bottle-blond as it is now. The last time I saw her, she was thin, no doubt about it, but she wasn't this frail and sickly looking. The last time I saw her, there were still signs of life in those eyes that now are sunken and empty.
The last time I saw her, it wasn't because of a hosting gig that was concocted solely as a way to get her here so that I might stage an intervention. She was in town for a radio station Christmas concert and called to ask if we could get together. I hadn't seen her since summer, which was far too long to go without seeing someone who I considered the closest thing I had to a little sister, but we had a show that weekend and my schedule was packed.
I ended up writing her a cameo in the show just so I could see her and so I could hopefully keep her busy and out of trouble while she was in the city. As it was, my plan almost didn't work thanks to Colin Farrell's inappropriate advances toward my young charge, but she chose me over him. She could've gone and spent the night fucking some hot (at least to her) foreign guy, and instead I was the one she invited back to her hotel room.
I was still inwardly boasting about this when we made it to her suite late that Saturday night. We were both buzzed, her much more so than me, but she still went straight to the mini-bar and poured us both shots of some strong brown liquid.
I shouldn't have felt so cocky, as though getting drunk with an 18 year old was something to be proud of. She always made me feel that way. I genuinely cared about her, honestly thought she was a good kid, but those were just secondary reasons for why I wanted to spend time with her. The truth of the matter was that I liked how I felt about myself when she was around. I didn't worry about how broken my marriage was becoming or why I couldn't stand up to Amy and tell her that I wasn't going to keep being the whore she relied on to distract herself from the boredom of her life. When Lindsay was around, there was finally someone in my life who was impressed by me. And I needed to feel impressive.
We kept on drinking and she kept on talking. About her father, her ex, her friends that were friends in name only, her string of one night stands. Sometimes I think you're the only person I can really trust, she said. You're the only one who understands.
I was her only, not her backup plan or her obligation, and that's why I kissed her. It was wrong. She was younger than me. She trusted me. She was drunk. But her lips were pressing insistantly against mine, and I wasn't thinking about right or wrong any more.
That night, I fucked her on the expensive hotel sheets. I took everything Amy had taught me about how to please her and used it to make Lindsay scream out my name. She had never done this with a woman before, she said, but she still managed to make me feel like a queen as she knelt down at the foot of the bed and made me come so hard it hurt.
Then again, the pain could've been coming from my woefully ignored conscience. The next morning, I woke up to find her clinging to me tightly as she slept, red wavy hair splayed across my chest in stark contrast to the white sheet I had pulled up around me in some needless show of modesty.
I was used to being on the receiving side of rejection. I knew by then how to let someone down carefully, gently, without letting their heart take a freefall. I knew, but I was embarrassed and disgusted with myself and just wanted to get this over with so I could go home and shower. When she woke up, I looked into those adoring eyes and told her that I had to leave. No, I can't come back tonight. We can't do this. It was a mistake.
But you were the one I trusted, she said, her forehead wrinkling as she tried to hold back tears.
I thought she would be used to this by now, would know that there's no one you can really trust in this life. I told her as much, and she yelled at me to go to hell as she threw the wrinkled sheets onto the floor in a barely controlled rage.
Even as I walked out the door to a chorus of profanity that put the proverbial drunken sailor to shame, I knew that she would forgive me. Despite the hardened party girl exterior, she is still very young and naive enough to believe that everyone is ultimately good. I have seen the way she lets people in, lets them destroy her, and then allows them back in to put the damage on all over again.
Confident that my sins will be absolved in time, at least in her eyes- I myself have already deemed my entire existance unforgiveable- I made the short trip to Amy's. She was a mess, sprawled out face-down on the couch and more than a little hung over from whatever the hell it is she ingested at last night's afterparty. I brought her water, but she refused it and asked for a Bloody Mary instead. I made her the drink, cleaned up the mess that I knew she'd never get around to straightening before Will got home the next day, and then prodded her into the shower.
Her body dripping wet and her blood alcohol content replenished, she pulled me down onto the cold tile of the bathroom floor. She was kissing me, pawing at me hungrily, and I didn't want this but I still let her have her way. The tomato juice smell on her breath made me nauseous and the cold water on my bare skin made me shiver, but I knew she got off on thinking that she's a phenomenal fuck so I put on a good show and she kept grinding against my thigh until she decided she'd had enough.
She didn't want me to leave afterward, and it was getting dark by the time I left her apartment and hailed a cab to take me back to the hotel I left that morning. A quick check of my cell phone revealed that my husband had called 17 times since last night. I didn't bother to return the call in the few moments I had to spare while in the cab- rather, I reapplied concealer to the dark shadows under my eyes and popped a few breath mints. It should be no mystery why my marriage is not working out.
I let myself into Lindsay's suite with the key that she foolishly gave me last night. She was curled up on the couch watching a movie, snuggling a ratty teddy bear and holding a shot glass like the utterly confused woman-child that she is.
Her eyes seemed to ignite when she saw me. "What the fuck are you doing here? I thought I told you to get the fuck away from me..."
I wasn't listening, because I knew what she would say. It's almost like an absurd little play in the sense that I had both our roles already mapped out. I apologized, saying that I didn't mean what I said, that I was just afraid of boundaries being crossed and I never wanted to hurt her. She has spent her whole life with various other people calling all the shots for her, so it is familiar territory when I announced that she needs to forgive me so that we can move past this. I kissed her when it seemed that she was wavering in her resolve to hate me, and that's all it took before she was clutching me and crying and I was estimating how many minutes would elapse before we were in bed again.
Seventeen minutes. I'd rather not do this, but she wanted it and I figured that it's the best way to ensure that she'll be willing if I should have another momentary lapse of judgement in the future and want her again. You've always gotta keep an eye toward the future, I told myself as I slid my tongue inside her.
I left her that time with a half-hearted promise that we would get together the next time she was in town. It was absolutely insincere, but I told myself that she didn't know the difference, that she would only hear what she wanted to hear.
Three weeks went by. She had called several times, sent a few emails, but I never returned them. I kept putting it off, telling myself I'd do it next week. Four weeks went by. I found out that I was pregnant, thanks to the magic of ineffective birth control, and getting back to her became the last thing on my mind.
It figured that the one time I have sex with my husband in literally months, I got knocked up. Jeff thought this was great, that it would save our marriage and bring us closer together, and all I could think about was how Amy would react.
Turns out I was right to worry, because Amy was furious when she heard the blessed news. Apparently, my having a baby didn't fit into the grand plans she had for the two of us. A kid might mean that she was no longer my number one priority, and she was unable to cope with the thought of not having me at her disposal whenever she needed someone to bail her out of trouble or loan her money for drugs or go down on her while her husband was in the next room. Out of desperation, she even offered to pay for me to have an abortion (as though money was the issue). I had no idea what the going rate for one was, but I knew it had to be more than the cost of a pack of gum, making it the most generous offer she'd ever given me.
I didn't want the baby, but I didn't want an abortion either. Even though I've always been staunchly pro-choice, I was at the point in my life where I didn't need to do even one more thing that might induce feelings of guilt. So I told her I was keeping the baby and she didn't speak to me for almost a month.
In between those strenuous bouts of ignoring my husband and being ignored by Amy, I had a lot of time to think about the one person who refused to give up on me. The day the news of my pregnancy hit the papers, she sent me an ungodly amount of gourmet soft peanut brittle- my favorite indulgence apart from redheaded teenage girls. The horomones were making me crazy and emotional and I wanted her more than all the peanutty goodness in the world, which I took as an indication that I still needed to keep my distance.
She probably thought I hated her. She probably didn't know that it was myself that I hated, didn't know how I laid awake at night craving her touch. And I'm sure she didn't know how this longing made me hate myself even more,continuing a vicious cycle of self-flagellation and guilty indulgence followed by more self-flagellation. All this, and Amy wasn't even around for me to sacrifice myself to in a misguided act of penance.
One night I was weak. I called Lindsay and breathlessly apologized once more for every facet of my existance. She forgave me, even though I'm pretty sure that it was just the cocaine talking, and then she purred at me in that case-a-day smoker voice until once again I was coming with her name on my lips.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
It was time for some serious soul-searching, which I would've loved to do if I wasn't so unsure whether I actually had a soul at all. I *was* sure, however, that I needed to cut Lindsay out. She's better without me; that much I was certain of.
I vowed to leave her alone, and this time I was successful. But this was not the only thing I needed to do if I was to have any hope of turning this damaged life around.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Amy is a harder habit to break. Six weeks after I made my big announcement, we had finally gotten to the stage where she could grudgingly tolerate being in the same room with me, even if speaking more than a few words was too much of an imposition on her.
She walked in on me while I was changing for a skit. I had forgotten to lock the door in a moment of pregnancy-induced dementia, and she had never been a big fan of knocking anyway. I was standing there in my underwear, painfully aware of nothing else besides that Amy was looking at me and that I had gained weight.
"You look good," she said, which I guess was her new way of apologizing for barging in uninvited. She walked over to me, running her hands up and down my sides. "Seriously. I was worried that you'd be all gross and fat, but this is nice. You were too bony last fall anyway."
I hated how she did this, hated the way she could bring all my insecurities to the forefront with a couple dozen words. She undresseed me, pushed me back onto the couch and I wished I didn't want this, but I still didn't know how to say no.
When she left, she said something about how she could never stay mad at me that long again because she was so goddamn horny that she couldn't stand it. Apology accepted, Amy.
I didn't know how to let her go. I remembered ten years ago when we were young and happy and I thought she really loved me, and I didn't know how to cut myself off from her without also leaving all those old wishes and dreams and memories behind. Part of me still held out hope that she would come around. The other part knew that I was just lying to myself.
I remember when we were shooting Mean Girls, how one day Amy was in the RV that served as my home away from home and we were fooling around. Somehow we started arguing- I can't even recall what about, but I do know that I was sitting on the bed half-undressed and out of nowhere she slapped me across the face. It wasn't hard enough to leave a mark, but it brought tears to my eyes and I started to laugh out of utter shock.
"Amy! You can't do that!" I exclaimed, still reeling.
She shrugged and gave me a confused look. "I just did."
"But why?"
Another look. "Because I can?" With that, she buttoned up her jeans and walked out, leaving me in stunned silence.
She was right, too. She could do *anything* to me, and I would just lie there and take it (both literally and metaphorically). In many ways, I was and still am the ultimate masochist. I may not be into BDSM, but I punish myself by overworking, by purposely doing things I know I'll regret, by letting myself become Amy's plaything. I have absolutely no insight into the origin of this condition, but I know I want to be better. Not for me- I'm already a lost cause- but for my daughter.
I knew I had some work to do before I can even dream of being classified as a good role model. I flip through the magazines that people leave around the office and Lindsay seems to be in every one of them. She's impossibly tiny, of course, but upon closer inspection I realized that the change isn't just physical. Her eyes gaze at me on the page, and they seem almost hollow, as though I could see right through them and into the ache that consumes her heart. I asked myself if I caused that, even in some small way, and I had to admit that the answer is yes.
Lorne liked the idea of having an intervention. He's as much as a tortured soul as I am, although his stems not from chronically poor relationship choices but from the guilt of feeling that he's let too many of those in his inner circle fall through the enormous cracks in the pavement of stardom.
Next I go to Amy, hoping to solicit her help with this undertaking. She agreed with me that Lindsay's in trouble, but this whole intervention idea really isn't her thing. I didn't assume it would be- after all, it might force her to face the reality of her life and we both know that she'd crumble under the weight of the inevitable shame that would follow. It's easier for her to keep on self-medicating, keep on believing that being able to control me means that she's not completely worthless.
She apologized insincerely for her refusal to help, and then her face brightened as she announced that she has a gift for me. It's a tiny green winter cap- well, it's about two-thirds of a cap.
"I started making it for the baby, but then I realized I didn't know how to do the stitching around the edges, so I figured that you could finish it off yourself," she said with a shrug.
Tears welled up in my eyes, and I cursed the horomone cocktail that my body had become. "Th-thanks..."
"Oh for fuck's sake, are you going to cry?" I just shook my head noncomittally, knowing that I couldn't explain to her how I felt. It didn't change all that had transpired between us and it didn't make being in love with her any easier, but I knew that this was her way of trying to show the affection that was buried somewhere inside her confused little heart. Her hand clutched, and I tried to remember the last time she had considered my feelings in anything she did.
"Are you going to break up with me when the baby's born?" Ha, an ulterior motive. I almost got up and stormed out before I got a good look at her. You could actually see her thought process as clearly as if it was spelled out in a cartoon bubble above her head. She was realizing, perhaps for the first time ever, that I had the power to hurt her. And she was scared. I could tell that just by the way she phrased it as a question, instead of threatening to "OD or some crazy shit like that" as she did the last time I had tried to end this.
"I don't know."
"I'd miss you."
"I'm sure you would."
"Would you miss me?"
"I can't talk about this right now," I said as I got up and left.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
I sat in my dressing room, nervously rubbing my stomach and waiting for Lindsay to show up. The doorknob turned and the baby and I jumped in unison.
It was Amy. "Hey, I just wanted to tell you that I talked to Lindsay."
"You did?"
"Yeah, I went up to her on her smoke break and said 'Jesus, kid, you're too skinny. Start eating and stick to the gateway drugs'."
She looked genuinely pleased with herself for delivering this sage advice, and I realized that she had probably done it solely to please me. God knows Amy didn't usually stick to the gateway drugs herself. "Thanks, Aim. I appreciate that."
"I thought you would." Taking my face in her hands, she leaned down and kissed me. "I love you."
"You know you can't just say things like that and expect me to believe it."
"You don't think I love you?"
"I don't know. I think you love the idea of me, knowing I'll always be around, but I don't know if you truly love *me*."
She looked sickened. "How can you even think I don't?"
"Because you treat me like I'm your plaything. Amy, I'm not your little dolly that you can use however you want and then toss back on the shelf. I think you love me, yes, but you love me like I'm your possession."
I think those were actual tears forming in her eyes. "Has it ever occured to you that maybe I have no fucking idea what love actually is?"
"It's not my job to teach you," I said, turning away so I didn't have to watch her cry.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Amy wasn't the only one who cried that day. No sooner had Lorne and I sat Lindsay down before she lost it, drawing her knees up to her chest as she sobbed hysterically. She knew she had a problem- had more than a few problems- but I don't think that anyone had actually bothered to confirm her suspicions. Her mother and her manager and the rest of her entourage seemed determined to convince her that she was fine, and a little piece of me hated Mrs. Lohan for forcing me to intervene when this should've been her job. It was her responsibility to look out for her daughter, but she had her own agenda of denial and so it was up to me.
Lorne was delivering a valiant attempt at a fatherly speech when she bolted out of the room, still wailing. He looked at me, bewildered, and I assured him that I'd go talk to her 'woman to woman.' He sighed with obvious relief, as though I had just volunteered to explain the facts of life to his kids. Which I would like to go on record as saying that I will not do, thank you very much Mr. Bossman.
I found her in a prop closet, the same one I myself have disappeared into to cry on more than one occasion. She was lying down, and her shirt was riding up enough for me to see the angry cuts across her abdomen. What has she done? What have I done? The exposed skin brings unbidden images to the forefront of my mind- mental snapshots of the two of us naked and entwined. I remember the way her hand reached down in between our bodies, her fingers cautiously fluttering inside me as though she was afraid I might break. Don't worry, you won't hurt me, I had whispered.
She didn't hurt me. I hurt her, and I can't be thinking about this now. I can't want her like this anymore. "Lindsay," I said cautiously, sitting down beside her. "Can we talk? There's some things I need to say to you. Things I should've said a long time ago."
She didn't say a word, just laid her head on my lap so it was nestled next to the baby and kept crying noisily. Okay then. My offspring, disturbed by this histrionic stranger who was getting all up in its personal space, started kicking to note its displeasure.
The crying stopped. "Is that the baby? Can I feel it?"
I was highly uncomfortable with her current position, and having her touch me wasn't going to make it any better. Seemingly oblivious to my plight, she reached up and rested her palm on my stomach.
"I owe you an apology," I finally blurted out, and she looked up at me curiously. "Linds, I've made a lot of mistakes. I admit it. I'm not exactly a good person."
"I know." Ah, the honesty of teenagers. She pulled her hand back from my abdomen. "I don't really care if you're sorry. I just wanna know how you feel about me and stuff."
"I think you're a great person, and-"
She rolled her eyes, sighing loudly. "Wow, I'm a great person. So let me guess, we're never going to fuck again."
"Lindsay, I'm having a baby. It's time for me to stop living the way I've been all this time."
"Does that mean you're not going to fuck Amy, either?" I must've looked surprised, because she rolled her eyes again. "I'm 18, not retarded. I know things. Like how you're her bitch."
"This isn't about me!" Wow, I'm not defensive at all! "Listen, just because I can't have that sort of relationship with you doesn't mean I don't care, and I'm seriously worried about you."
"I got that, okay? I know I have problems. I need to get my shit together, and I will." She paused. "So you're saying you don't want me at all?"
"I didn't say that."
"Because it would be a lie." Her hands were on my thighs. "I know you still want me."
"Linds-"
"Shut up." She was straddling my waist now. "I would be so much better to you than she is."
"This isn't about Amy," I said in a low voice.
"Then what's it about?" I sat, paralyzed, as her hands slipped under my shirt and started rubbing my breasts slowly. "I'd fuck you right now if you'd let me."
She was licking my earlobe, and I let out an involuntary moan as her teeth nipped at the soft skin. "We can't."
"Oh, we can. You want it, I want it...c'mon, you know I'm good." She kissed my neck. "You know I love you."
That four-letter jolt was enough to propel me onto my feet and toward the door. "We can't," I repeated as I walked out.
The only thing worse than being manipulated is not being sure whether you've been manipulated or not.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
I cried. Slammed the door to my office and bawled just the way Lindsay had. Amy heard the noise and came to investigate, gaping at what she saw.
"Don't," I warned. "Don't ask. I can't explain."
She continued to stare at me curiously, as though she had forgotten that I had the capacity for strong emotions. "You did a good thing," she finally said before she sat down and wrapped an arm comfortingly around my shoulders.
I couldn't bring myself to tell her that no, I hadn't done a good thing at all. I had made a long series of mistakes, came up with a half-assed plan to redeem myself, and ended up getting beaten at my own game. Nothing good about it. But it had been so long since someone had just held me with no sexual strings attached, and all I wanted to do was savor the moment. I leaned into her embrace and she rubbed my arms as I continued crying.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
This wasn't fun anymore. See, the thing is- I never realized that I was having fun in the first place, but now I know that I was and it's all gone now. I only liked playing this game with Lindsay as long as I was the persuer. With her, I was on the other end of the chase, the one that I never got to experience as long as Amy was making me dance like her dutiful puppet. I liked being in charge for once, liked being the cruel one, but then I realized that I wasn't completely in control and all the fun vanished.
I couldn't let her do this to me. I no longer cared about my goal of being a "good" person, whatever that meant. The path of righteousness would be there waiting for me after I finished settling the score with Lindsay. I had no clear plan of action in mind as I stormed down the hall. In fact, I was completely fucking out of control, but I'll be goddamned if I let her win this round.
I flung the door open, prepared to make my grand entrance of fury. And then everything stopped.
They were in the corner, a tangle of blonde and red pressed up against the wall. I could see them kissing, could hear someone laugh and then gasp as they realized they were being watched.
We were all frozen for a moment. Neither of them apparently had the presence of mind to take their hands out of the either's pants. Not knowing what else to do, I inhaled sharply and walked out, expecting someone to follow me next door with a ridiculous excuse and an even more ridiculous apology.
But no one did. I sat alone in my dark office, and I could hear Lindsay call out my name as she came.
It wasn't supposed to be this way.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Thank you kindly for reading! Don't forget to tip your server in comments :)
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Fanfic, not journalism. I don't own these people and this is all fiction.
Summary: This is inspired by the cover story on Lindsay Lohan in a recent issue of Vanity Fair.
Feedback: Would be so nice!
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
The last time I saw her, her hair was thick and firey red, not brittle and bottle-blond as it is now. The last time I saw her, she was thin, no doubt about it, but she wasn't this frail and sickly looking. The last time I saw her, there were still signs of life in those eyes that now are sunken and empty.
The last time I saw her, it wasn't because of a hosting gig that was concocted solely as a way to get her here so that I might stage an intervention. She was in town for a radio station Christmas concert and called to ask if we could get together. I hadn't seen her since summer, which was far too long to go without seeing someone who I considered the closest thing I had to a little sister, but we had a show that weekend and my schedule was packed.
I ended up writing her a cameo in the show just so I could see her and so I could hopefully keep her busy and out of trouble while she was in the city. As it was, my plan almost didn't work thanks to Colin Farrell's inappropriate advances toward my young charge, but she chose me over him. She could've gone and spent the night fucking some hot (at least to her) foreign guy, and instead I was the one she invited back to her hotel room.
I was still inwardly boasting about this when we made it to her suite late that Saturday night. We were both buzzed, her much more so than me, but she still went straight to the mini-bar and poured us both shots of some strong brown liquid.
I shouldn't have felt so cocky, as though getting drunk with an 18 year old was something to be proud of. She always made me feel that way. I genuinely cared about her, honestly thought she was a good kid, but those were just secondary reasons for why I wanted to spend time with her. The truth of the matter was that I liked how I felt about myself when she was around. I didn't worry about how broken my marriage was becoming or why I couldn't stand up to Amy and tell her that I wasn't going to keep being the whore she relied on to distract herself from the boredom of her life. When Lindsay was around, there was finally someone in my life who was impressed by me. And I needed to feel impressive.
We kept on drinking and she kept on talking. About her father, her ex, her friends that were friends in name only, her string of one night stands. Sometimes I think you're the only person I can really trust, she said. You're the only one who understands.
I was her only, not her backup plan or her obligation, and that's why I kissed her. It was wrong. She was younger than me. She trusted me. She was drunk. But her lips were pressing insistantly against mine, and I wasn't thinking about right or wrong any more.
That night, I fucked her on the expensive hotel sheets. I took everything Amy had taught me about how to please her and used it to make Lindsay scream out my name. She had never done this with a woman before, she said, but she still managed to make me feel like a queen as she knelt down at the foot of the bed and made me come so hard it hurt.
Then again, the pain could've been coming from my woefully ignored conscience. The next morning, I woke up to find her clinging to me tightly as she slept, red wavy hair splayed across my chest in stark contrast to the white sheet I had pulled up around me in some needless show of modesty.
I was used to being on the receiving side of rejection. I knew by then how to let someone down carefully, gently, without letting their heart take a freefall. I knew, but I was embarrassed and disgusted with myself and just wanted to get this over with so I could go home and shower. When she woke up, I looked into those adoring eyes and told her that I had to leave. No, I can't come back tonight. We can't do this. It was a mistake.
But you were the one I trusted, she said, her forehead wrinkling as she tried to hold back tears.
I thought she would be used to this by now, would know that there's no one you can really trust in this life. I told her as much, and she yelled at me to go to hell as she threw the wrinkled sheets onto the floor in a barely controlled rage.
Even as I walked out the door to a chorus of profanity that put the proverbial drunken sailor to shame, I knew that she would forgive me. Despite the hardened party girl exterior, she is still very young and naive enough to believe that everyone is ultimately good. I have seen the way she lets people in, lets them destroy her, and then allows them back in to put the damage on all over again.
Confident that my sins will be absolved in time, at least in her eyes- I myself have already deemed my entire existance unforgiveable- I made the short trip to Amy's. She was a mess, sprawled out face-down on the couch and more than a little hung over from whatever the hell it is she ingested at last night's afterparty. I brought her water, but she refused it and asked for a Bloody Mary instead. I made her the drink, cleaned up the mess that I knew she'd never get around to straightening before Will got home the next day, and then prodded her into the shower.
Her body dripping wet and her blood alcohol content replenished, she pulled me down onto the cold tile of the bathroom floor. She was kissing me, pawing at me hungrily, and I didn't want this but I still let her have her way. The tomato juice smell on her breath made me nauseous and the cold water on my bare skin made me shiver, but I knew she got off on thinking that she's a phenomenal fuck so I put on a good show and she kept grinding against my thigh until she decided she'd had enough.
She didn't want me to leave afterward, and it was getting dark by the time I left her apartment and hailed a cab to take me back to the hotel I left that morning. A quick check of my cell phone revealed that my husband had called 17 times since last night. I didn't bother to return the call in the few moments I had to spare while in the cab- rather, I reapplied concealer to the dark shadows under my eyes and popped a few breath mints. It should be no mystery why my marriage is not working out.
I let myself into Lindsay's suite with the key that she foolishly gave me last night. She was curled up on the couch watching a movie, snuggling a ratty teddy bear and holding a shot glass like the utterly confused woman-child that she is.
Her eyes seemed to ignite when she saw me. "What the fuck are you doing here? I thought I told you to get the fuck away from me..."
I wasn't listening, because I knew what she would say. It's almost like an absurd little play in the sense that I had both our roles already mapped out. I apologized, saying that I didn't mean what I said, that I was just afraid of boundaries being crossed and I never wanted to hurt her. She has spent her whole life with various other people calling all the shots for her, so it is familiar territory when I announced that she needs to forgive me so that we can move past this. I kissed her when it seemed that she was wavering in her resolve to hate me, and that's all it took before she was clutching me and crying and I was estimating how many minutes would elapse before we were in bed again.
Seventeen minutes. I'd rather not do this, but she wanted it and I figured that it's the best way to ensure that she'll be willing if I should have another momentary lapse of judgement in the future and want her again. You've always gotta keep an eye toward the future, I told myself as I slid my tongue inside her.
I left her that time with a half-hearted promise that we would get together the next time she was in town. It was absolutely insincere, but I told myself that she didn't know the difference, that she would only hear what she wanted to hear.
Three weeks went by. She had called several times, sent a few emails, but I never returned them. I kept putting it off, telling myself I'd do it next week. Four weeks went by. I found out that I was pregnant, thanks to the magic of ineffective birth control, and getting back to her became the last thing on my mind.
It figured that the one time I have sex with my husband in literally months, I got knocked up. Jeff thought this was great, that it would save our marriage and bring us closer together, and all I could think about was how Amy would react.
Turns out I was right to worry, because Amy was furious when she heard the blessed news. Apparently, my having a baby didn't fit into the grand plans she had for the two of us. A kid might mean that she was no longer my number one priority, and she was unable to cope with the thought of not having me at her disposal whenever she needed someone to bail her out of trouble or loan her money for drugs or go down on her while her husband was in the next room. Out of desperation, she even offered to pay for me to have an abortion (as though money was the issue). I had no idea what the going rate for one was, but I knew it had to be more than the cost of a pack of gum, making it the most generous offer she'd ever given me.
I didn't want the baby, but I didn't want an abortion either. Even though I've always been staunchly pro-choice, I was at the point in my life where I didn't need to do even one more thing that might induce feelings of guilt. So I told her I was keeping the baby and she didn't speak to me for almost a month.
In between those strenuous bouts of ignoring my husband and being ignored by Amy, I had a lot of time to think about the one person who refused to give up on me. The day the news of my pregnancy hit the papers, she sent me an ungodly amount of gourmet soft peanut brittle- my favorite indulgence apart from redheaded teenage girls. The horomones were making me crazy and emotional and I wanted her more than all the peanutty goodness in the world, which I took as an indication that I still needed to keep my distance.
She probably thought I hated her. She probably didn't know that it was myself that I hated, didn't know how I laid awake at night craving her touch. And I'm sure she didn't know how this longing made me hate myself even more,continuing a vicious cycle of self-flagellation and guilty indulgence followed by more self-flagellation. All this, and Amy wasn't even around for me to sacrifice myself to in a misguided act of penance.
One night I was weak. I called Lindsay and breathlessly apologized once more for every facet of my existance. She forgave me, even though I'm pretty sure that it was just the cocaine talking, and then she purred at me in that case-a-day smoker voice until once again I was coming with her name on my lips.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
It was time for some serious soul-searching, which I would've loved to do if I wasn't so unsure whether I actually had a soul at all. I *was* sure, however, that I needed to cut Lindsay out. She's better without me; that much I was certain of.
I vowed to leave her alone, and this time I was successful. But this was not the only thing I needed to do if I was to have any hope of turning this damaged life around.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Amy is a harder habit to break. Six weeks after I made my big announcement, we had finally gotten to the stage where she could grudgingly tolerate being in the same room with me, even if speaking more than a few words was too much of an imposition on her.
She walked in on me while I was changing for a skit. I had forgotten to lock the door in a moment of pregnancy-induced dementia, and she had never been a big fan of knocking anyway. I was standing there in my underwear, painfully aware of nothing else besides that Amy was looking at me and that I had gained weight.
"You look good," she said, which I guess was her new way of apologizing for barging in uninvited. She walked over to me, running her hands up and down my sides. "Seriously. I was worried that you'd be all gross and fat, but this is nice. You were too bony last fall anyway."
I hated how she did this, hated the way she could bring all my insecurities to the forefront with a couple dozen words. She undresseed me, pushed me back onto the couch and I wished I didn't want this, but I still didn't know how to say no.
When she left, she said something about how she could never stay mad at me that long again because she was so goddamn horny that she couldn't stand it. Apology accepted, Amy.
I didn't know how to let her go. I remembered ten years ago when we were young and happy and I thought she really loved me, and I didn't know how to cut myself off from her without also leaving all those old wishes and dreams and memories behind. Part of me still held out hope that she would come around. The other part knew that I was just lying to myself.
I remember when we were shooting Mean Girls, how one day Amy was in the RV that served as my home away from home and we were fooling around. Somehow we started arguing- I can't even recall what about, but I do know that I was sitting on the bed half-undressed and out of nowhere she slapped me across the face. It wasn't hard enough to leave a mark, but it brought tears to my eyes and I started to laugh out of utter shock.
"Amy! You can't do that!" I exclaimed, still reeling.
She shrugged and gave me a confused look. "I just did."
"But why?"
Another look. "Because I can?" With that, she buttoned up her jeans and walked out, leaving me in stunned silence.
She was right, too. She could do *anything* to me, and I would just lie there and take it (both literally and metaphorically). In many ways, I was and still am the ultimate masochist. I may not be into BDSM, but I punish myself by overworking, by purposely doing things I know I'll regret, by letting myself become Amy's plaything. I have absolutely no insight into the origin of this condition, but I know I want to be better. Not for me- I'm already a lost cause- but for my daughter.
I knew I had some work to do before I can even dream of being classified as a good role model. I flip through the magazines that people leave around the office and Lindsay seems to be in every one of them. She's impossibly tiny, of course, but upon closer inspection I realized that the change isn't just physical. Her eyes gaze at me on the page, and they seem almost hollow, as though I could see right through them and into the ache that consumes her heart. I asked myself if I caused that, even in some small way, and I had to admit that the answer is yes.
Lorne liked the idea of having an intervention. He's as much as a tortured soul as I am, although his stems not from chronically poor relationship choices but from the guilt of feeling that he's let too many of those in his inner circle fall through the enormous cracks in the pavement of stardom.
Next I go to Amy, hoping to solicit her help with this undertaking. She agreed with me that Lindsay's in trouble, but this whole intervention idea really isn't her thing. I didn't assume it would be- after all, it might force her to face the reality of her life and we both know that she'd crumble under the weight of the inevitable shame that would follow. It's easier for her to keep on self-medicating, keep on believing that being able to control me means that she's not completely worthless.
She apologized insincerely for her refusal to help, and then her face brightened as she announced that she has a gift for me. It's a tiny green winter cap- well, it's about two-thirds of a cap.
"I started making it for the baby, but then I realized I didn't know how to do the stitching around the edges, so I figured that you could finish it off yourself," she said with a shrug.
Tears welled up in my eyes, and I cursed the horomone cocktail that my body had become. "Th-thanks..."
"Oh for fuck's sake, are you going to cry?" I just shook my head noncomittally, knowing that I couldn't explain to her how I felt. It didn't change all that had transpired between us and it didn't make being in love with her any easier, but I knew that this was her way of trying to show the affection that was buried somewhere inside her confused little heart. Her hand clutched, and I tried to remember the last time she had considered my feelings in anything she did.
"Are you going to break up with me when the baby's born?" Ha, an ulterior motive. I almost got up and stormed out before I got a good look at her. You could actually see her thought process as clearly as if it was spelled out in a cartoon bubble above her head. She was realizing, perhaps for the first time ever, that I had the power to hurt her. And she was scared. I could tell that just by the way she phrased it as a question, instead of threatening to "OD or some crazy shit like that" as she did the last time I had tried to end this.
"I don't know."
"I'd miss you."
"I'm sure you would."
"Would you miss me?"
"I can't talk about this right now," I said as I got up and left.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
I sat in my dressing room, nervously rubbing my stomach and waiting for Lindsay to show up. The doorknob turned and the baby and I jumped in unison.
It was Amy. "Hey, I just wanted to tell you that I talked to Lindsay."
"You did?"
"Yeah, I went up to her on her smoke break and said 'Jesus, kid, you're too skinny. Start eating and stick to the gateway drugs'."
She looked genuinely pleased with herself for delivering this sage advice, and I realized that she had probably done it solely to please me. God knows Amy didn't usually stick to the gateway drugs herself. "Thanks, Aim. I appreciate that."
"I thought you would." Taking my face in her hands, she leaned down and kissed me. "I love you."
"You know you can't just say things like that and expect me to believe it."
"You don't think I love you?"
"I don't know. I think you love the idea of me, knowing I'll always be around, but I don't know if you truly love *me*."
She looked sickened. "How can you even think I don't?"
"Because you treat me like I'm your plaything. Amy, I'm not your little dolly that you can use however you want and then toss back on the shelf. I think you love me, yes, but you love me like I'm your possession."
I think those were actual tears forming in her eyes. "Has it ever occured to you that maybe I have no fucking idea what love actually is?"
"It's not my job to teach you," I said, turning away so I didn't have to watch her cry.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Amy wasn't the only one who cried that day. No sooner had Lorne and I sat Lindsay down before she lost it, drawing her knees up to her chest as she sobbed hysterically. She knew she had a problem- had more than a few problems- but I don't think that anyone had actually bothered to confirm her suspicions. Her mother and her manager and the rest of her entourage seemed determined to convince her that she was fine, and a little piece of me hated Mrs. Lohan for forcing me to intervene when this should've been her job. It was her responsibility to look out for her daughter, but she had her own agenda of denial and so it was up to me.
Lorne was delivering a valiant attempt at a fatherly speech when she bolted out of the room, still wailing. He looked at me, bewildered, and I assured him that I'd go talk to her 'woman to woman.' He sighed with obvious relief, as though I had just volunteered to explain the facts of life to his kids. Which I would like to go on record as saying that I will not do, thank you very much Mr. Bossman.
I found her in a prop closet, the same one I myself have disappeared into to cry on more than one occasion. She was lying down, and her shirt was riding up enough for me to see the angry cuts across her abdomen. What has she done? What have I done? The exposed skin brings unbidden images to the forefront of my mind- mental snapshots of the two of us naked and entwined. I remember the way her hand reached down in between our bodies, her fingers cautiously fluttering inside me as though she was afraid I might break. Don't worry, you won't hurt me, I had whispered.
She didn't hurt me. I hurt her, and I can't be thinking about this now. I can't want her like this anymore. "Lindsay," I said cautiously, sitting down beside her. "Can we talk? There's some things I need to say to you. Things I should've said a long time ago."
She didn't say a word, just laid her head on my lap so it was nestled next to the baby and kept crying noisily. Okay then. My offspring, disturbed by this histrionic stranger who was getting all up in its personal space, started kicking to note its displeasure.
The crying stopped. "Is that the baby? Can I feel it?"
I was highly uncomfortable with her current position, and having her touch me wasn't going to make it any better. Seemingly oblivious to my plight, she reached up and rested her palm on my stomach.
"I owe you an apology," I finally blurted out, and she looked up at me curiously. "Linds, I've made a lot of mistakes. I admit it. I'm not exactly a good person."
"I know." Ah, the honesty of teenagers. She pulled her hand back from my abdomen. "I don't really care if you're sorry. I just wanna know how you feel about me and stuff."
"I think you're a great person, and-"
She rolled her eyes, sighing loudly. "Wow, I'm a great person. So let me guess, we're never going to fuck again."
"Lindsay, I'm having a baby. It's time for me to stop living the way I've been all this time."
"Does that mean you're not going to fuck Amy, either?" I must've looked surprised, because she rolled her eyes again. "I'm 18, not retarded. I know things. Like how you're her bitch."
"This isn't about me!" Wow, I'm not defensive at all! "Listen, just because I can't have that sort of relationship with you doesn't mean I don't care, and I'm seriously worried about you."
"I got that, okay? I know I have problems. I need to get my shit together, and I will." She paused. "So you're saying you don't want me at all?"
"I didn't say that."
"Because it would be a lie." Her hands were on my thighs. "I know you still want me."
"Linds-"
"Shut up." She was straddling my waist now. "I would be so much better to you than she is."
"This isn't about Amy," I said in a low voice.
"Then what's it about?" I sat, paralyzed, as her hands slipped under my shirt and started rubbing my breasts slowly. "I'd fuck you right now if you'd let me."
She was licking my earlobe, and I let out an involuntary moan as her teeth nipped at the soft skin. "We can't."
"Oh, we can. You want it, I want it...c'mon, you know I'm good." She kissed my neck. "You know I love you."
That four-letter jolt was enough to propel me onto my feet and toward the door. "We can't," I repeated as I walked out.
The only thing worse than being manipulated is not being sure whether you've been manipulated or not.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
I cried. Slammed the door to my office and bawled just the way Lindsay had. Amy heard the noise and came to investigate, gaping at what she saw.
"Don't," I warned. "Don't ask. I can't explain."
She continued to stare at me curiously, as though she had forgotten that I had the capacity for strong emotions. "You did a good thing," she finally said before she sat down and wrapped an arm comfortingly around my shoulders.
I couldn't bring myself to tell her that no, I hadn't done a good thing at all. I had made a long series of mistakes, came up with a half-assed plan to redeem myself, and ended up getting beaten at my own game. Nothing good about it. But it had been so long since someone had just held me with no sexual strings attached, and all I wanted to do was savor the moment. I leaned into her embrace and she rubbed my arms as I continued crying.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
This wasn't fun anymore. See, the thing is- I never realized that I was having fun in the first place, but now I know that I was and it's all gone now. I only liked playing this game with Lindsay as long as I was the persuer. With her, I was on the other end of the chase, the one that I never got to experience as long as Amy was making me dance like her dutiful puppet. I liked being in charge for once, liked being the cruel one, but then I realized that I wasn't completely in control and all the fun vanished.
I couldn't let her do this to me. I no longer cared about my goal of being a "good" person, whatever that meant. The path of righteousness would be there waiting for me after I finished settling the score with Lindsay. I had no clear plan of action in mind as I stormed down the hall. In fact, I was completely fucking out of control, but I'll be goddamned if I let her win this round.
I flung the door open, prepared to make my grand entrance of fury. And then everything stopped.
They were in the corner, a tangle of blonde and red pressed up against the wall. I could see them kissing, could hear someone laugh and then gasp as they realized they were being watched.
We were all frozen for a moment. Neither of them apparently had the presence of mind to take their hands out of the either's pants. Not knowing what else to do, I inhaled sharply and walked out, expecting someone to follow me next door with a ridiculous excuse and an even more ridiculous apology.
But no one did. I sat alone in my dark office, and I could hear Lindsay call out my name as she came.
It wasn't supposed to be this way.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Thank you kindly for reading! Don't forget to tip your server in comments :)