Animal Lover With Your Name (rough draft, work in process, haven't even read it over yet)
I’m awakened in the morning by a ringing telephone. The dream I was having ends sharply. I wipe the drool from my face and pick up the phone to stop the noise.
“Hello?” I say, unenthused, cranky. “Hey,” I hear. It’s you. Why? I say, “Why are you calling me at this obscenely early hour?” You say, “It’s five p.m.” I say, “Oh.”
I can’t be angry at you for calling me at a time when you didn’t think I’d be sleeping.
I am an egg, I said to myself as I lay on my back on the bed. My insides are protected by a shell. Nothin’s gonna harm me now, I said. Panic danced on my nerve endings when I felt something touching my skin. Where the hell was I? The something was a hand, caressing me. It moved slowly down my side. I looked over and saw him looking at me hopefully. He pulled toward him with both of his arms. I was worried that my shell was going to crack from the pressure.
“Are you okay?” he said. His voice was distant. I could barely hear it through the goop that filled my ears inside the shell. I wished that it would dry up more quickly. I knew that the silence was working against me.
“Can we listen to some music?” I said. He got up and read his cds to me. I chose one with a Bob Dylan song on it. As the music began, I snuggled into my back again, finding comfort in becoming hollow. But then the music got through my shell and filled me with longing. It exploded, I turned over and began to cry because I wanted you.
“Do you want me to take you home?” he said. I nodded and put my shirt back on.
“I’m concerned,” he said in the car. “This is the second time this has happened.” The second time what? The second time I didn’t put out.
I said thank you and goodbye. I needed a night in listening to my music and feeling sorry for myself. Listening to anything that brushed against my feelings was hard. Listening to anything shallow was hard. I listened to “Maryland Bridge” by the Weakerthans. I heard the line, “Sometimes you’re the razor on my private waterslide,” and for the hundredth time I thought of you. I got up and wrote you an e-mail. When I clicked “send”, I thought that the chains of egg goo would drop off of me onto the floor, that I would build a new and stronger shell and it would be perfect. I would be clean, free from emotion.
I needed to walk outside in the dark. My head was filled with buckets of snot from crying, my throat pained me with its dryness. This will pass, I told myself, but I didn’t really believe it.
I turned when I heard my name. The girl smiled at me. I saw nothing behind her smile but goodwill. She was an acquaintance, a friend of a friend. She said hello and asked what was up.
“I’m going for a walk,” I said. She said that she was supposed to go out but she didn’t know where her friends were. I said that I’d hang out with her. I was already sick of listening to music and feeling sorry for myself. I couldn’t find any songs that made me feel just right. I asked her what she wanted to do and she said that there was a place that she likes. I had never heard of it, so I agreed to go. I decided that this girl was going to be my new best friend since I no longer have you.
We chattered to each other cheerfully as we walked to her bar. It was with dismay that I followed her onto Crescent Street. No. Not Crescent Street! A street you had warned me about, the holy grail of worthless slime. Why was my new best friend leading me here?
We walked into the club and I immediately knew that it was horrible. The music sucked and I felt uncomfortable. Women were preening in shiny clothes and men were leering at me. We walked to the bar to get drinks and one man greeted me with a sneer. I gave him the finger.
I danced with her to shitty music. I shut my brain off so that I could have fun and ignore the fact that people were watching me. It was like closing my eyes. I smiled because I was happy that she was enjoying herself, even if the music really sucked. Then I felt someone’s hands on my hips. Someone behind me was trying to dance with me. How dare he! He moved closer to me and I elbowed him in the stomach.
“What the fuck?” he yelled as he fell to the ground. I laughed at him for falling so easily. Suddenly a bouncer was looming over me. Apparently sticking up for yourself is against the rules.
I stood outside the bar with a cigarillo and wondered if my new best friend would follow me out. I closed my eyes to enjoy the deliciousness of my old port colt as I imagined possible reactions to the e-mail I sent you. I imagined you angry at me for sending it at the worst possible time. What a shitty friend I turned out to be! I imagined you relieved that you wouldn’t have to talk to me anymore, shrugging it off and never thinking of me again. I imagined you agreeing with me that it was for the best and quietly staying out of my life. I took comfort in the last possible scenario.
I was a bit disappointed that I’d been kicked out of the bar before I had a chance to urinate. I walked into an alleyway and crouched in the shadows with my pants down. As I was relieving myself, a man saw me and began walking toward me. I finished and scrambled to get my pants back up. He stopped walking and gazed at me longingly as I glared at him. Can’t a girl have a quiet moment to herself to urinate in an alleyway? I gave him the finger and he turned and walked away.
I emerged from the alleyway to find my new best friend stumbling around outside the bar looking for me. She was holding my jacket. I gratefully took it from her and stuck my arms into the warmth as I wrapped it around me. As we walked away, a carload of leering men drove past us. One of them whistled at us.
“Fuck you!” I yelled at them, shaking my fist. My new best friend looked at me with surprise and disapproval before she vomited on the sidewalk. I watched it run into the sidewalk cracks. It was enchanting, like cloud watching.
“That’s pretty,” I said. “What are you gonna name it?”
“Name it?” she moaned. I thought of a creative writing teacher from my past. “It’s a common mistake of amateur writers to not give their main characters names,” she had said haughtily.
“It’s a common mistake of amateur drinkers to not name their vomit,” I told my new best friend. “So what are you gonna name it?”
“Steve,” she said.
I walked her to her door and hugged her goodnight. I wondered if she felt lonely once she made it into her apartment, like I’d abandoned her. I wondered if she felt like nobody loved her and that she was no fun, especially when she was drunk. I had felt that way before and I was sorry if she did now.
It was one a.m. Too early to call it a night. I decided to go sit in a random bar for the next hour, preferably one that wasn’t on Crescent Street. I found a small obscure looking pub. I saw a man checking me out as I walked into the bathroom, but he wasn’t quite leering. He looked like he was older than my parents.
I came out of the bathroom with the intention of sitting at the bar; the only open seat was next to the man who had been watching me earlier. I sat beside him and got a beer. I asked for an ashtray and lit a cigarillo. The bartender told me that cigars weren’t allowed. I looked around at all the people smoking cigarettes and put my cigarillo out. I asked the guy next to me for a cigarette. He told me to help myself and that he hadn’t realized that colts counted as cigars. I tried to contain my bitterness regarding the bar’s rule. He had a British accent. He asked me if I speak French and I said “No, do you?” He said no, and we talked about being able to get by with no French in Montreal.
We talked about what we were doing here. We’re both living here just for kicks, only I’m using school as an excuse. He asked me about that. He purchased my second beer for me, which was nice because I was running low on cash. When the bar was closing up he said, “Do you want to go home with me?” and mentioned an endless supply of alcohol and I said “Yes.” I tried not to think about how much you would disapprove because you’ll never know.
We walked out of the bar and he grabbed my hand. I always feel that a boundary has been crossed when someone I don’t know very well holds my hand in public. I said, “Can we get something to eat first?” I felt weak, I hadn’t eaten since I’d seen you in the afternoon when I tried to choke down a samosa and ended up giving you more than half of it. I didn’t feel hungry, though. My male companion and I went to a dirty pizza place. I got a slice of just cheese and picked away at it, wishing I could feel the urge to just shove it in my face. I told him I couldn’t eat anymore.
He got a cab. As we made out in the back seat, I felt a combination of curiosity and dread. What was this going to be like, and why the hell was I doing it? He was soft, he smelled like shampoo. The sex will be amazing, I said to myself. He’ll be more experienced than the others that I’ve slept with. The prospect of amazing sex stopped me from jumping out of the cab and running home when I realized how close we were to my apartment. We walked into his apartment and he sat at his kitchen table. I straddled him and kissed him, wishing that he were you. My shirt came off and he led me to the bedroom.
The sex was okay. It wasn’t spectacular. I had to ask him to touch my breasts because they were feeling neglected, and he was reluctant to use a condom. I insisted on the condom, I’m not a fool. I rested afterward, he tried to give me oral sex. I wasn’t in the mood for oral sex and I suspected that he was only doing it so that I would give him a blow job. I also wasn’t in the mood for giving anyone a blow job. I looked down and the way his head was bobbing disgusted me. I put my hand on top of his head and pushed him away. He resisted and pushed deeper into me. I threw my leg over his head and rolled over, pulling myself away.
“I’m not in the mood,” I said as I looked down with him a weary smile. We curled up together for a cuddle and I asked him how old he was. He wouldn’t tell me about first
“I’m forty-seven,” he finally said sorrowfully. Christ, I said to myself when I heard the note of woe in his voice. This guy just fucked me because he’s having a mid-life crisis.
I made an excuse about having to be somewhere and left to go have breakfast by myself in a loud restaurant. I dipped my toast in my eggs and tried to eat it, but I had no appetite. They were runny and gooey, those eggs. They were just soft blobs without their precarious shells. The couple at the table next to me got up and left, leaving their newspapers behind. I walked over and picked them up. The New York Times Magazine fell on the floor. I crouched down and brought it back to my table. I flipped through it and found an opinion piece about pampering pets. I began to read it in hopes that it would be amusing.
Almost near the end of the piece, a “famous British writer” was mentioned. This writer was an animal lover, apparently. I had never heard of him. His name was his first two initials with his last name. It jumped out at me. I had never heard of anyone with your last name before, and here it was, in print and staring me in the face, complete with your first initial. I tried not to panic. I needed to talk to someone, to have them tell me that it wasn’t a sign that I should call you and say I’m sorry. I told myself that I mustn’t give into weaknesses, but I’ve always had trouble being strong when it comes to the way I feel about you. That’s why I have to push you out of my life altogether. I stressed some more about how you would react to the e-mail. You’d never want to talk to me again and that was good, but so hard.
I eventually gave up on the eggs and toast.
I was supposed to meet a friend today, so when I was done breakfast I hopped on the metro. We were going to the Hindu temple, but I felt so dirty and unworthy after having sex with someone who was twenty-five years older than me. Why would people celebrating life want to share their joy with me, a weak person who had shown very little respect for herself some hours before? I hadn’t slept yet, eating had been out of the question for quite some time, I had a hickey on my neck and my hands smelled like penis despite all the washing I’d done in the bathroom at the restaurant. I didn’t feel happy and relaxed like I usually do after having sex. I wanted to cry.
I met my friend at the Beaubien metro station which is fairly close to you. I tried not to notice that. I knew that I couldn’t go to the Hindu temple feeling the way I did, so I asked her if we could go somewhere to talk. She could see that something was wrong and readily agreed. We found a place and got some tea, and I told her about going home with the older man and about how guilty I felt about it. She told me that I shouldn’t feel guilty, that I’ve done many other wonderful things to empower myself, that it was just a drop in the bucket. After I felt a little better about that I told her about disowning you and how hard it was. She thought it was a good idea and probably for the best.
We went to her house and ate lunch. I forced the food into my system and my stomach felt heavy afterward. We went into her room and she showed me her stuffed animals. The concept of age suddenly over-whelmed me again. I’m so young and so old. Different aspects of me contradict each other. I think you’ve seen this and you tried to tell me, but you only succeeded in scaring the crap out of me.
I finally went home and went to bed. I had trouble falling asleep but lay there anyway in hopes that sleep would come. I remembered a university professor from my past saying, “Give me unrequited love anytime!” What a fool. Give me anything but this. Take my emotions away from me, make me shallow and empty. What a mortifying e-mail I sent you.
I fell asleep and dreamed about you. Cutting you out of my life is hard. I dreamed that I sent you the e-mail on my birthday and the next day I was going skating at a public indoor rink. You were there, I saw in your stormy face that you had read my e-mail and thought I was being an idiot. You didn’t talk to me. I was angry that you were there because it wasn’t a coincidence; you knew I was going there the day after my birthday. Everyone was told to get off the ice for a bit so it could be cleaned. It was covered with litter. The zambonis came on and pushed the trash off of the ice.
And now I’m awake, and talking to you. You say, “I’m returning your call.” I say, “What call?” I’m still groggy and cranky. You say, “Someone called and hung up when I answered. I know it was you.” I say, “I was sleeping. You woke me up. Dial star sixty-nine.” I’m angry with this person who called and hung up on you, thus framing me. You say, “Whatevs.” I say, “You’re just making it up so you can yell at me for the e-mail I sent you.” You say, “What e-mail?”
“Hello?” I say, unenthused, cranky. “Hey,” I hear. It’s you. Why? I say, “Why are you calling me at this obscenely early hour?” You say, “It’s five p.m.” I say, “Oh.”
I can’t be angry at you for calling me at a time when you didn’t think I’d be sleeping.
I am an egg, I said to myself as I lay on my back on the bed. My insides are protected by a shell. Nothin’s gonna harm me now, I said. Panic danced on my nerve endings when I felt something touching my skin. Where the hell was I? The something was a hand, caressing me. It moved slowly down my side. I looked over and saw him looking at me hopefully. He pulled toward him with both of his arms. I was worried that my shell was going to crack from the pressure.
“Are you okay?” he said. His voice was distant. I could barely hear it through the goop that filled my ears inside the shell. I wished that it would dry up more quickly. I knew that the silence was working against me.
“Can we listen to some music?” I said. He got up and read his cds to me. I chose one with a Bob Dylan song on it. As the music began, I snuggled into my back again, finding comfort in becoming hollow. But then the music got through my shell and filled me with longing. It exploded, I turned over and began to cry because I wanted you.
“Do you want me to take you home?” he said. I nodded and put my shirt back on.
“I’m concerned,” he said in the car. “This is the second time this has happened.” The second time what? The second time I didn’t put out.
I said thank you and goodbye. I needed a night in listening to my music and feeling sorry for myself. Listening to anything that brushed against my feelings was hard. Listening to anything shallow was hard. I listened to “Maryland Bridge” by the Weakerthans. I heard the line, “Sometimes you’re the razor on my private waterslide,” and for the hundredth time I thought of you. I got up and wrote you an e-mail. When I clicked “send”, I thought that the chains of egg goo would drop off of me onto the floor, that I would build a new and stronger shell and it would be perfect. I would be clean, free from emotion.
I needed to walk outside in the dark. My head was filled with buckets of snot from crying, my throat pained me with its dryness. This will pass, I told myself, but I didn’t really believe it.
I turned when I heard my name. The girl smiled at me. I saw nothing behind her smile but goodwill. She was an acquaintance, a friend of a friend. She said hello and asked what was up.
“I’m going for a walk,” I said. She said that she was supposed to go out but she didn’t know where her friends were. I said that I’d hang out with her. I was already sick of listening to music and feeling sorry for myself. I couldn’t find any songs that made me feel just right. I asked her what she wanted to do and she said that there was a place that she likes. I had never heard of it, so I agreed to go. I decided that this girl was going to be my new best friend since I no longer have you.
We chattered to each other cheerfully as we walked to her bar. It was with dismay that I followed her onto Crescent Street. No. Not Crescent Street! A street you had warned me about, the holy grail of worthless slime. Why was my new best friend leading me here?
We walked into the club and I immediately knew that it was horrible. The music sucked and I felt uncomfortable. Women were preening in shiny clothes and men were leering at me. We walked to the bar to get drinks and one man greeted me with a sneer. I gave him the finger.
I danced with her to shitty music. I shut my brain off so that I could have fun and ignore the fact that people were watching me. It was like closing my eyes. I smiled because I was happy that she was enjoying herself, even if the music really sucked. Then I felt someone’s hands on my hips. Someone behind me was trying to dance with me. How dare he! He moved closer to me and I elbowed him in the stomach.
“What the fuck?” he yelled as he fell to the ground. I laughed at him for falling so easily. Suddenly a bouncer was looming over me. Apparently sticking up for yourself is against the rules.
I stood outside the bar with a cigarillo and wondered if my new best friend would follow me out. I closed my eyes to enjoy the deliciousness of my old port colt as I imagined possible reactions to the e-mail I sent you. I imagined you angry at me for sending it at the worst possible time. What a shitty friend I turned out to be! I imagined you relieved that you wouldn’t have to talk to me anymore, shrugging it off and never thinking of me again. I imagined you agreeing with me that it was for the best and quietly staying out of my life. I took comfort in the last possible scenario.
I was a bit disappointed that I’d been kicked out of the bar before I had a chance to urinate. I walked into an alleyway and crouched in the shadows with my pants down. As I was relieving myself, a man saw me and began walking toward me. I finished and scrambled to get my pants back up. He stopped walking and gazed at me longingly as I glared at him. Can’t a girl have a quiet moment to herself to urinate in an alleyway? I gave him the finger and he turned and walked away.
I emerged from the alleyway to find my new best friend stumbling around outside the bar looking for me. She was holding my jacket. I gratefully took it from her and stuck my arms into the warmth as I wrapped it around me. As we walked away, a carload of leering men drove past us. One of them whistled at us.
“Fuck you!” I yelled at them, shaking my fist. My new best friend looked at me with surprise and disapproval before she vomited on the sidewalk. I watched it run into the sidewalk cracks. It was enchanting, like cloud watching.
“That’s pretty,” I said. “What are you gonna name it?”
“Name it?” she moaned. I thought of a creative writing teacher from my past. “It’s a common mistake of amateur writers to not give their main characters names,” she had said haughtily.
“It’s a common mistake of amateur drinkers to not name their vomit,” I told my new best friend. “So what are you gonna name it?”
“Steve,” she said.
I walked her to her door and hugged her goodnight. I wondered if she felt lonely once she made it into her apartment, like I’d abandoned her. I wondered if she felt like nobody loved her and that she was no fun, especially when she was drunk. I had felt that way before and I was sorry if she did now.
It was one a.m. Too early to call it a night. I decided to go sit in a random bar for the next hour, preferably one that wasn’t on Crescent Street. I found a small obscure looking pub. I saw a man checking me out as I walked into the bathroom, but he wasn’t quite leering. He looked like he was older than my parents.
I came out of the bathroom with the intention of sitting at the bar; the only open seat was next to the man who had been watching me earlier. I sat beside him and got a beer. I asked for an ashtray and lit a cigarillo. The bartender told me that cigars weren’t allowed. I looked around at all the people smoking cigarettes and put my cigarillo out. I asked the guy next to me for a cigarette. He told me to help myself and that he hadn’t realized that colts counted as cigars. I tried to contain my bitterness regarding the bar’s rule. He had a British accent. He asked me if I speak French and I said “No, do you?” He said no, and we talked about being able to get by with no French in Montreal.
We talked about what we were doing here. We’re both living here just for kicks, only I’m using school as an excuse. He asked me about that. He purchased my second beer for me, which was nice because I was running low on cash. When the bar was closing up he said, “Do you want to go home with me?” and mentioned an endless supply of alcohol and I said “Yes.” I tried not to think about how much you would disapprove because you’ll never know.
We walked out of the bar and he grabbed my hand. I always feel that a boundary has been crossed when someone I don’t know very well holds my hand in public. I said, “Can we get something to eat first?” I felt weak, I hadn’t eaten since I’d seen you in the afternoon when I tried to choke down a samosa and ended up giving you more than half of it. I didn’t feel hungry, though. My male companion and I went to a dirty pizza place. I got a slice of just cheese and picked away at it, wishing I could feel the urge to just shove it in my face. I told him I couldn’t eat anymore.
He got a cab. As we made out in the back seat, I felt a combination of curiosity and dread. What was this going to be like, and why the hell was I doing it? He was soft, he smelled like shampoo. The sex will be amazing, I said to myself. He’ll be more experienced than the others that I’ve slept with. The prospect of amazing sex stopped me from jumping out of the cab and running home when I realized how close we were to my apartment. We walked into his apartment and he sat at his kitchen table. I straddled him and kissed him, wishing that he were you. My shirt came off and he led me to the bedroom.
The sex was okay. It wasn’t spectacular. I had to ask him to touch my breasts because they were feeling neglected, and he was reluctant to use a condom. I insisted on the condom, I’m not a fool. I rested afterward, he tried to give me oral sex. I wasn’t in the mood for oral sex and I suspected that he was only doing it so that I would give him a blow job. I also wasn’t in the mood for giving anyone a blow job. I looked down and the way his head was bobbing disgusted me. I put my hand on top of his head and pushed him away. He resisted and pushed deeper into me. I threw my leg over his head and rolled over, pulling myself away.
“I’m not in the mood,” I said as I looked down with him a weary smile. We curled up together for a cuddle and I asked him how old he was. He wouldn’t tell me about first
“I’m forty-seven,” he finally said sorrowfully. Christ, I said to myself when I heard the note of woe in his voice. This guy just fucked me because he’s having a mid-life crisis.
I made an excuse about having to be somewhere and left to go have breakfast by myself in a loud restaurant. I dipped my toast in my eggs and tried to eat it, but I had no appetite. They were runny and gooey, those eggs. They were just soft blobs without their precarious shells. The couple at the table next to me got up and left, leaving their newspapers behind. I walked over and picked them up. The New York Times Magazine fell on the floor. I crouched down and brought it back to my table. I flipped through it and found an opinion piece about pampering pets. I began to read it in hopes that it would be amusing.
Almost near the end of the piece, a “famous British writer” was mentioned. This writer was an animal lover, apparently. I had never heard of him. His name was his first two initials with his last name. It jumped out at me. I had never heard of anyone with your last name before, and here it was, in print and staring me in the face, complete with your first initial. I tried not to panic. I needed to talk to someone, to have them tell me that it wasn’t a sign that I should call you and say I’m sorry. I told myself that I mustn’t give into weaknesses, but I’ve always had trouble being strong when it comes to the way I feel about you. That’s why I have to push you out of my life altogether. I stressed some more about how you would react to the e-mail. You’d never want to talk to me again and that was good, but so hard.
I eventually gave up on the eggs and toast.
I was supposed to meet a friend today, so when I was done breakfast I hopped on the metro. We were going to the Hindu temple, but I felt so dirty and unworthy after having sex with someone who was twenty-five years older than me. Why would people celebrating life want to share their joy with me, a weak person who had shown very little respect for herself some hours before? I hadn’t slept yet, eating had been out of the question for quite some time, I had a hickey on my neck and my hands smelled like penis despite all the washing I’d done in the bathroom at the restaurant. I didn’t feel happy and relaxed like I usually do after having sex. I wanted to cry.
I met my friend at the Beaubien metro station which is fairly close to you. I tried not to notice that. I knew that I couldn’t go to the Hindu temple feeling the way I did, so I asked her if we could go somewhere to talk. She could see that something was wrong and readily agreed. We found a place and got some tea, and I told her about going home with the older man and about how guilty I felt about it. She told me that I shouldn’t feel guilty, that I’ve done many other wonderful things to empower myself, that it was just a drop in the bucket. After I felt a little better about that I told her about disowning you and how hard it was. She thought it was a good idea and probably for the best.
We went to her house and ate lunch. I forced the food into my system and my stomach felt heavy afterward. We went into her room and she showed me her stuffed animals. The concept of age suddenly over-whelmed me again. I’m so young and so old. Different aspects of me contradict each other. I think you’ve seen this and you tried to tell me, but you only succeeded in scaring the crap out of me.
I finally went home and went to bed. I had trouble falling asleep but lay there anyway in hopes that sleep would come. I remembered a university professor from my past saying, “Give me unrequited love anytime!” What a fool. Give me anything but this. Take my emotions away from me, make me shallow and empty. What a mortifying e-mail I sent you.
I fell asleep and dreamed about you. Cutting you out of my life is hard. I dreamed that I sent you the e-mail on my birthday and the next day I was going skating at a public indoor rink. You were there, I saw in your stormy face that you had read my e-mail and thought I was being an idiot. You didn’t talk to me. I was angry that you were there because it wasn’t a coincidence; you knew I was going there the day after my birthday. Everyone was told to get off the ice for a bit so it could be cleaned. It was covered with litter. The zambonis came on and pushed the trash off of the ice.
And now I’m awake, and talking to you. You say, “I’m returning your call.” I say, “What call?” I’m still groggy and cranky. You say, “Someone called and hung up when I answered. I know it was you.” I say, “I was sleeping. You woke me up. Dial star sixty-nine.” I’m angry with this person who called and hung up on you, thus framing me. You say, “Whatevs.” I say, “You’re just making it up so you can yell at me for the e-mail I sent you.” You say, “What e-mail?”