I didn’t know that it was a secret; still, I never actually told anyone except Felicia, and of course Roxanne and Jamie knew. But not even my mom.
“Don’t you get it, Crash? I know everything. I know that your father is getting married,” he said.
Actually, I didn’t know that, and he must have seen it in my expression. “Didn’t anyone tell you? I know that your mom is having a problem with the guy she’s dating, and that she’s afraid he’s not willing to commit to her and she really likes him. I know that Lindsey is still a bitch, but she’ll be getting hers soon enough because someone in school is out to out-bitch her. What else do you want to know, Crash?”
I stood there, absorbing, listening, not wanting to hear more, but needing to know. Thinking first, why didn’t she, as in Felicia, tell me?
My first thought: Good for my dad. Better for me, since my relationship with him was all about Felicia anyways and without her he would be intolerable again. Not good for my mom. I felt sad for her. Not interested in Lindsey. Really not. He probably got all the facts from his mother, who talked to my mom.
Or not.
“Are you IMing with Jamie?” I asked suspiciously.
“Sometimes. You have a problem with that?”
“Yeah. Stay away from my sister, you freak.”
Most guys would have considered those words to be fighting words, but Burn being Burn took it for what it was worth and laughed. Which also got me thinking that I had to tell my mom to make sure that Jamie did not have anything to do with this psycho.
“Which reminds me,” he said, “my sister did tell me to say hello to you. That’s what she said, tell Crashinsky I said hello. Plus she gave me a present and said I could share it with you.” He reached into the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out a plastic bag filled with weed. “Obviously she can’t have access to this type of stuff anymore. Did you ever get high, Crash?”
So apparently, he didn’t know as much as he claimed. I wasn’t sure what to tell him. So I didn’t say anything, while he reached into the bag and extracted a joint.
“I’ve been smoking her stuff since she told me about her stash when she was in the hospital. I was supposed to get rid of it, which in a way, I’m doing now.”
He lit up.
And coughed. And handed it to me.
I took a hit, then another, and coughed hard, feeling it burn all the way in the back of my throat, as if I had swallowed fire, and it continued to burn all the way back to Evan’s house, where even spiked Gatorade did not do much to ease the feeling that my lungs were searing.
I sat down at the poker table, thinking that it still hurt, but feeling nothing at all.
. . . Until it hit me, almost knocking me over.
This was, of course, before I became a weed connoisseur, with the tolerance of a Jamaican farmer.
It hit me so strong, in fact, that I apparently just sat there until Newman (not knowing I was blazed, since we had not smoked together) informed me that I had lost another hand, and I looked down to see my remaining poker chips spread out, most of my winnings gone, and my cards, none of which matched together in any way, displayed for all to see.
And there was Burn on the other side of the poker table, holding three tens and smiling at me. He could handle. I could not. He was finally playing. And apparently winning. His chips, which apparently included a good portion of mine, were stacked higher than anyone else’s at the table.
Where the fuck was I all that time?
“Your luck seems to have run its course,” Burn said to me, hauling in the kitty.
Pete was looking at him suspiciously, as if somehow, during my walk with Burn, he had put me under some kind of spell or something. Remember, no one except Burn knew I was baked.
I wasn’t feeling all that good. Not good at all. I was ready to quit.
Except I had a feeling that I could win, which, when I get it, I always do. So rather than give my seat up, I anted up for the next round, thinking that I could win everything back, as long as I didn’t look at Burn, as long as I treated him like any other player.
Which is exactly what I did, as in not thinking at all, even though Roxanne’s weed was making me overthink, which is something that I almost never did, as it makes my brain hurt.
And soon enough, I was back to where I was at just before I went for a walk with Burn.
And then it was just the two of us left, everyone else out.
And I was still high, feeling no letdown from the strength of this weed, and knowing this is the last hand of the night.
And Burn suggests we switch from Texas hold’em to five-card, which is fine with me.
And Burn deals, passing me cards, and us betting and me having nothing, well not nothing, actually, three random hearts is all, and we bet and we raise and we raise again. And I ask for two cards and he asks for one.
And then I look at him for the first time since we started playing, and he looks at me, and I know, I totally know that he is holding three aces and two other cards, and I am sure, totally and completely confident, bet on it positive, that those other two cards, whatever they are, are also a pair.
Which would give him a full house.
There are only three hands that beat a full house with three aces: four of a kind, straight flush, royal flush. But only one of those hands was even remotely possible for me, because I knew I didn’t have four of a kind or a royal flush.
I had a seven of hearts, a nine of hearts, and a jack of hearts. So all this time, I had been going for a regular flush, which meant any five hearts, except that if I was right about what Burn was holding, then just another two hearts, which I had a decent possibility of getting, would not be good enough.
So I pick up the two cards that he slid across the poker table.
I stare at Burn and he stares at me, and I can see from his eyes that he knows he won, but because I’m so baked, and because he is looking deeply into me, trying to figure out what’s in my head, I can, for some odd reason, see directly into his . . .
Mind.
And what I see in his mind is the fox and what they did to the fox. He’s still totally freshly pissed off about it even though it was months ago, and he’s planning some kind of revenge but doesn’t know who to go after. He just wants revenge. And then Connelly is in there. And so is the World Trade Center, smoke billowing from the towers. And then I see Roxanne, and how what happened to Roxanne was, in a way, at least to him, at least partially his fault. Like he knew that she was broken and couldn’t fix her, because he was broken too, maybe even worse than she was, and he was jealous because she was able to lead a normal life if she wanted to and he couldn’t, and then there was something that I couldn’t see in there, something that I didn’t want to see.
Because the deeper I looked, the more stoned I felt, and the more totally and completely anxious I became, until I could feel my own heart beating rapidly in my chest and I wondered whether somehow it was syncing with his . . .
Heart.
I had hearts.
Which was totally freaking me out.
Except that suddenly, in with all of the mashed-up images in Burn’s mind, at that very next moment, was the feeling of winning. Not just winning, but beating me. Which should have been easy, beyond easy with the cards that I knew he was holding. And he knew it too, but he also was anxious, very anxious, because even with his near-perfect hand, and even with his perfect sense of logic, he could not know for sure, and not being able to rely on the odds was driving him crazy with anticipation.
And in his mind, from what I could tell, it really, really mattered.
Winning.
Because the universe doesn’t give you an ace-high full house if it doesn’t want you to win.
Except that the two cards that I turned over happened to be, just like Burn said about me earlier, the exact cards I needed.
Eight of hearts.
Ten of hearts.
Straight flush.
I stared down at the
pool of money, almost every cent that everyone brought that night. Over three hundred dollars, well over three hundred dollars. And it was Burn’s turn to bet.
“All in, plus twenty,” he said, still staring at me with those intense eyes.
I looked away, breaking the connection, and it immediately hit me that something inside him would snap if he lost, something that would ripple through his psyche and infect others around him. And his sister, being so fragile, didn’t stand a chance. I know it sounds crazy, but I knew this every bit as much as I knew what cards he had in his hand. And in that second, I understood that I had a choice. Saving Roxanne wasn’t about going to the hospital to reach her. The universe was testing me, and somehow she was the bait. Saving Roxanne was all about doing the right thing now.
“I fold,” I said.
“C’mon, Crash, don’t be a baby now. Last hand of the night. What the fuck.”
“Sorry. I’m out. No more cash.”
“I’ll lend you the twenty,” Burn said to me.
“Fuck it,” Pete said from the sidelines. “I’ll give you the twenty. Destroy that motherfucker.”
“No,” I told him. “I’m out.”
“Fine,” he said, reaching for the entire kitty, confidently smiling. And when I looked into his eyes again, everything was completely gone. No fox, no Connelly, no World Trade Center, no Roxanne being infected or anything. Disappeared, as if I had imagined it, which maybe I had, but I didn’t think so. Just the win, just the money was there, as he flipped one card over, then the next and the next, revealing, oddly, three aces and two fives.
Fuckme. I did see it.
“Would’ve beat you anyway,” he said, ear-to-ear grin.
I nodded.
“What did you have?” he asked.
“Nothing,” I said. “I was bluffing.”
“C’mon, Crash, you never bluff. You always have luck on your side.”
“Not this hand.”
He reached across the table and I knew, I totally knew that if he saw my cards, the damage would be irreparable. I couldn’t let him do that.
So, stoned as I was, I stood up and pushed the table toward him, scattering the money and pushing my cards quickly into the remaining deck.
Shocking everyone with my actions.
“What the fuck, Crash?”
“Nice play” is all I said, walking away.
“What a sore loser,” someone said.
Chapter Fourteen
Getting High in Woodstock
Call me lucky.
After the brutal interview outside Pinky’s, I pretty much figured that life as I knew it was over, especially since my father had his publicist essentially break up with me by voice mail. All before eight A.M. the next morning.
By noon, there was a huge buzz on the internet about the Westchester Teen Hero who outed his father as a marijuana smoker on national television, all with links to a YouTube page showing the entire interview, along with additional links to earlier interviews that I had done after 4/21.
By one P.M., there was a traffic jam of reporters in trucks lined up along my street. The heat was most definitely on, and it was immediately back to Newman’s house, where Mrs. Newman was not so friendly to me this go-round. This time, there was talk between Mrs. Newman and my mom about my entire family relocating for the short period. But no way was Caroline Prescott going to bow to pressure; she made it clear that I wasn’t to go home until she said it was OK, but she also insisted that my mistakes were not going to disrupt her schedule.
When my mom stopped by Newman’s to drop off my things, she seemed disappointed in me, not necessarily angry, and I had somehow convinced myself that she was secretly happy about the turn of events, because, let’s face it, given their less-than-amicable divorce and the continuing negative feelings over the years, she wasn’t about to suddenly develop any deep sympathy for Jacob Crashinsky. And she most definitely did not develop a relationship with or even, to my knowledge, ever talk to Felicia. I guess you don’t come to a person’s house and eat their turkey if you’re fucking their husband. (Sorry, Felicia, my mom has a point, even though it did end up saving my life.)
Christina and some of her friends came over to spend some time with me and Newman and to share a bottle of wine by his pool, and while she called me a total douchebag (which she kept pronouncing “dewich” for some reason), she also said that I looked good on TV, and even though I should have known better—after all, she was there with me when my father gave me very explicit instructions on not talking to the press—she also understood how hard it must be to ignore reporters when they ambush you, which was the way I described the interview to all of my friends who weren’t there. Like my mom, Christina was disappointed, but not necessarily angry, and by the end of the night was even affectionate, thanks to a few too many glasses of chardonnay.
Long story short, it looked like we were still on, although I was pretty sure that she was also checking to see whether I was making good on my promise to stay away from weed. Joint after joint came and went in my direction without so much as a single public hit, and I was, to be honest with you, getting tired of the straightness and all.
Back to luck. Having just finished writing the poker chapter, I had to think that maybe Burn was totally right about me being beyond lucky.
To prove my point, consider this: not two days after my interview, the most amazing thing happened, which totally diverted attention from me and Jacob, as in people were all still talking about weed, but instead of talking about me and weed and Jacob and weed, they were talking about the movie that had just opened and was number two at the box office that weekend, and the only reason it was not number one at the box office was that The Dark Knight was still kicking ass over virtually every other movie.
The film that was number two, the film that I am referring to was, of course, Pineapple Express, which opened big and was about nothing except weed. My new hero, Seth Rogen, was all over the late-night shows and stuff, talking about how great weed is, and there was also this TV commentary guy saying that it wasn’t right, the public “vilifying Mr. Crashinsky” while at the same time letting Mr. Rogen “extol” the virtues of marijuana.
So thank you, Seth Rogen, wherever you are, even though, tell you the truth, I didn’t think Pineapple Express was all that. Of course, I was blazed when I saw it, which should have made me the perfect audience.
I had even heard that Seth mentioned my name in one of his interviews and suggested that maybe I should be in the sequel, so thank you again, Seth Rogen. Give my agent a call; I might be available around Christmastime, unless the Sandler people call first.
And even if you don’t consider that lucky, consider this: The talk shows decided to take my weed claims seriously, and a couple of them followed up with stories about doctors who were actually recommending weed as a possible alternative to stimulants like Adderall for treatment of ADHD, and suddenly there’s this whole big debate where my name is being mentioned, but this time as a spokesperson for kids with ADHD, advocating for alternatives to the traditional medicines, like I was some kind of medical pioneer or something.
And, get this, apparently all that coverage only made the book all the more valuable to my publisher, because Sally kept emailing me, requesting additional chapters.
If not for luck, what were the odds of that happening? For all I know (and again, I suck at math), greater than the odds of pulling a straight flush against a full house, don’t you think?
By the time that I picked Christina up for our “excursion,” as she called it, I was on day five of no weed (except for the Pineapple Express night out, which shouldn’t count; well, that and the nature center) and also of avoiding Claudia’s “sexts,” which meant my impatience was gnawing at me like a splinter that I couldn’t remove but could constantly feel, all based on the fact that Christina was going to make good on her promise. As I may have mentioned, I have never been very good at waiting for anything. Part of the ADHD thing, but knowi
ng that didn’t make it any easier.
Anyways, seeing as how it was looking like a better and better idea to get out of town for a while, and being as I had the book to work on, she suggested we go to her uncle’s cabin in upstate New York, somewhere in the deep woods, about twenty minutes away from Woodstock and about the same distance from Hunter and Belleayre mountains. Christina’s uncle and his family rarely used it during the summer months, as they were skiers, which she explained as I turned onto the New York Thruway. We both had cover stories: She was going with friends; I was going away for the weekend with my boys, which my mom actually thought was a good idea under the circumstances.
For insurance, I brought a cooler filled with water bottles containing Kenny’s distilled vodka. In my laptop case there was a sizable nugg of “Jacob’s Gold.” (Yes, I had named it. After all, it seemed like more than a coincidence that a movie in honor of very special pot came out only days after I discovered that very thing in my father’s apartment.) Another, smaller nugg was in my glove compartment, and several prerolled joints in a canister in my jeans pocket. I was totally covered.
I should have been in vacation mode. Sitting beside me, with her hair blowing back as she opened the car window, was a very hot girl who looked like an actress and moved like a dancer, who was wearing a slinky shirt that exposed her left shoulder and skinny bra strap and who smelled like flowers. I was driving into the middle of nowhere with this girl to have a total night of passion. So I should have been in vacation mode.
Except I was extremely anxious, not just irritable, but . . . jumpy.
She noticed and asked if I was all right.
So I told her about this unnerving feeling I was getting now that I was all over the news. It had to do with the fact that I was pretty sure that Burn had somehow seen the report; after all, they must have television in the institution where they placed him. I admitted that I had Newman do a check on the internet to find out Burn’s exact location, and we found out that he was currently in a psychiatric facility for criminal patients in upstate New York, a few hours from the location that Christina and I were traveling to.
Crash and Burn Page 24
