There was a long pause.
“Three thousand dollars,” Annie said.
“Oh, shit! Who paid it?”
“I put down twenty-five hundred dollars,” Annie said.
“Nadia and I raised the other five hundred through donations from our Nest Life group,” you said. “She sent out an emergency group text to all the OMers, and the donations came flooding in.”
It was so sweet and kind that it literally felt like someone was stabbing me in the middle of the chest with an icepick. No offense, but all that time I thought you were a giant cockblocking mooch, when really you are the truest friend anyone could ever imagine. And Annie—well, she had surely wiped out her entire savings.
“How can I repay you?”
“Go to your hearings and we’ll get the money back, you beautiful idiot,” Annie said.
It was almost painful to have such amazing friends.
I was a little annoyed on Nadia’s behalf, when you said to her, “It’s probably her blood sugar. Roxy always gets like this when she’s hungry.” I mean, perhaps she is trying to forget our history and how well you know me?
I asked if anyone knew where Artemis was. Annie said no one had seen her since the protest. I was a little sad when you and Nadia said you were tired and were going to head home. Nadia’s goodbye hug was so intense I could hardly breathe. It was nice of her to give me her cell phone number since you, Everett, do not have one. I feel silly I got so choked up when I told y’all to thank the OMers for their help. I am going to be sure and get their money back asap!
Annie drove us to Kerbey Lane for pancakes—I was starving!—and on the way I charged my phone, which had died in police custody while I was locked up. I had eight new messages and even more texts. But none were from Artemis. I texted her, asking if she was awake and if she wanted to come meet us. She didn’t respond. And when I tried to call her, she didn’t answer.
Over blueberry-gingerbread pancakes and giant glasses of hibiscus iced tea, Annie showed me news coverage of the protest on her phone. Someone had filmed Artemis and the burlesque girls’ dance, and clips of it had run on the local evening news with black bars concealing their boobs. A perky blond announcer who spoke from behind a tan mask of base makeup and concealer said: “One protester has been jailed. What exactly the protest was about isn’t clear. But even though we have no idea what they were trying to accomplish, those dancers definitely got our attention.”
“They sure did, Cindy,” said the lascivious, white dudebro announcer sitting next to her.
“Ugh,” I groaned. “Did any of the stations mention that we were protesting the existence of a corporate store with a shady ethos on the corner of Sixth and Lamar—an intersection known as being an epicenter of local business and culture?”
Annie shook her head. “That didn’t come through.”
“Didn’t they read my flier?”
“I’m guessing not.”
“Fuck!” I said. “So what do people think the protest was about?”
Annie shrugged. “It’s a little confusing. A crowd of protesters, signs with somewhat mixed messages.”
“Mixed messages?” I said.
“The signs were genius. But some said, ‘Honk if you love your body,’ while others said: ‘Her lips are the edge of a galaxy.’ ”
“Every woman’s lips are the edge of a galaxy,” I said a little hotly.
“There was also a stripping Lululemon employee backed by twenty members of a self-taught local burlesque troop dancing to Beyoncé. And spray-paint graffiti that says ‘Lulu Out’ and ‘Keep Austin Weird.’ It may have been somewhat perplexing for the uninformed layperson, is all I’m saying,” Annie said.
“I would not have written ‘Keep Austin Weird.’ That was Artemis.”
“ ‘Keep Austin Weird’ is an ad campaign encouraging people to support local businesses. So that one actually makes the most sense.”
“Aaaargh!” I said, putting my head down on my arms. What a catastrophe!
“Cheer up,” Annie said. “At least you put on a hell of a protest—whether people knew what it was about or not, no one will be forgetting it anytime soon.”
After our midnight breakfast, Annie dropped me back off at the Waterloo Records parking lot. When I thanked her, she said, “Of course. You can be a real pain in the ass, but I adore you and I’d do anything for you. You’re totally worth it.”
She didn’t drive away until I’d let myself into my car and started the engine. Then I pulled out of the Waterloo Records parking lot onto Sixth Street, driving slowly past the Lululemon. The sidewalk was empty; all the protesters long gone; the store closed; all traces of my protest signs vanished. They’d surely been chucked in a dumpster where they belonged. The protest was over. I had achieved nothing except depleting Annie’s bank account and getting myself arrested and charged with vandalism and resisting arrest. At least you, dear Everett, had made sure Roscoe got his insulin shot.
At my front door, I found a note lying on the doormat, pinned down by a rock. The note read:
Roxy,
Artemis Starla is a figment of our collective yearning and imagination.
Watch out for the army of bloody white mice and the plumbers who shepherd them. The plumber has cleaned out my bank account. He’s obsessed with me. I don’t want it to happen to you.
As I read it a chill ran through me. It was written in Artemis’s strange, loopy handwriting I recognized from the silly notes she would leave servers on the checks—which she always paid in cash. Was that so I wouldn’t see her real name on her credit card?
Artemis had a different handle for every location and situation. It had been foolish for me to believe she had revealed her true identity to me the first time we met. And why had I ever believed Artemis Starla was a real name? It was so obviously an alias. But even more worrisome was the creepy talk about the plumber. It did not make any sense.
I shoved the note in my pocket and when I opened my front door, Roscoe went berserk to see me and even Charlize Theron came running to rub herself against my legs. I felt this immense wave of gratitude for them, and an even bigger wave of gratitude that I have no human children to feel disappointed in me for fucking up.
I tried again to call Artemis. No answer. It was too late and I was too tired to go to her house. So I washed my face and crawled into bed.
For once I let Roscoe and Charlize get in bed with me, their warmth and fur a great comfort as I fell into an exhausted and worried sleep. I woke up this morning at almost noon to my landline ringing. A robo-call from the Travis County Public Defender’s Office telling me to come in for a 9 a.m. court appointment on Thursday the fourth.
I finally steeled myself to listen to all my voice mail messages. Most were from friends wondering if I was okay. But the final message was from Dirty Steve. “You are fired. For real—no taking it back ever, FIRED! You have lured half my staff into skipping out on their shifts. And now you AREN’T HERE FOR YOUR SHIFT. Don’t come into work ever again! Don’t call me! Don’t show up here! YOU. ARE. FUCKING. FOREVER. FIRED!”
It seems I’ve lost my only source of income.
This is now my life.
Dreams crashing down,
Roxy
October 2, 2012
Dear Everett,
So yesterday I really started worrying about Artemis. I called and texted her first thing when I woke up, then went over to her place. Though I’d been there before, the day we walked around the lake, her town house was even nicer than I remembered. Why hadn’t I angled harder to get an invite inside? She wasn’t there, and neither was her car. I checked in with Annie, who still hadn’t heard a peep out of her either. “Maybe she’s shacked up with some guy?” Annie asked.
“She always texts me back!” I wailed.
“Maybe she lost her charger.”
So I told Annie about the note, which even she admitted was alarming. “Maybe she was drunk?”
“When is she not drunk? But she
never disappears, not for twenty-four hours. We’ve got to find out her real name,” I said. “Then maybe we could find her.”
“Do you know anyone else who knows her?”
I pondered. “No,” I said. “I mean, she’s never introduced me to any other friends. And I met her in the—” That’s when it hit me. “The Lululemon! They are bound to know her real name in the Lululemon. To get a job there she must have shown an ID at some point.”
“You just got arrested vandalizing that place. They aren’t going to tell you anything.”
“If there’s one thing I’ve learned from hanging out with Artemis, it’s the power of a disguise. People see what you want them to see.”
Annie just shook her head. “They’ve probably got a restraining order against you by now.”
“It doesn’t count if I haven’t been served. Meet me at Amy’s Ice Creams at eleven,” I said.
“I’m at work!”
“Take an early lunch break and walk over. This is important!” I said, and hung up.
Then I went to my garage and dug out the prop microphone and news camera from the Halloween that I was a news anchor and you, Everett, were my trusty videographer. My brunette news anchor wig was a little dusty, but nothing a good hard shake couldn’t fix. And my navy blazer was in my closet, so I was good to go.
I arrived early at Amy’s and bought a scoop of dairy-free mango ice cream for confidence and self-soothing. Annie arrived, looking intrigued despite her earlier resistance to the project. She was also clearly impressed by the thickness of my anchorwoman makeup.
“Are you even under there?” she asked.
When I gave her some of my ice cream AND told her that her only job was to silently hold the cardboard camera on her shoulder, she agreed she was in.
As we approached the Lululemon, I saw a cleaning guy scrubbing the last vestiges of graffiti from the window with a scraper and a bucket of soapy water. I felt a stab of guilt. Annie and I walked into the Lululemon and all of the employees immediately turned to look at us. It was so quiet you could seriously have heard a scrunchie drop.
“May I speak to the store manager?” I said to no one in particular, hoping I held the cardboard microphone with confidence.
“I’m just an educator,” one of the women said before scurrying away as if afraid of being captured on film.
A moment later a smiling blonde in (you guessed it) flattering tights appeared from the back of the store. “I’m Louise, the store manager.”
“I’m here from Channel Five hoping to interview the Lululemon employee who masterminded the flash mob at the protest.”
“Zoe Panagopoulos doesn’t work here anymore,” the pert manager said with a smiling finality that could have only concealed a great anger. (I would never have taken Artemis for a Zoe—to me, Zoe’s will always be dark haired, blue eyed, and adorably twee. Thanks, Zooey Deschanel! But Panagopoulos! That made sense—the Greeks have always been bold!)
“Thank you!” I retorted. “By the way, you might want to look into potential long-term health impacts of the emotional labor of your job.” And then I hurried out, Annie on my heels. We rushed down the sidewalk, out of sight of the Lululemon and toward Whole Foods.
“I cannot believe that worked,” Annie said. “Now what?”
I told her my plan and Annie wished me luck, insisted I keep her posted, and hurried off to work while I drove home to further my investigation.
I went to the Whitepages online and searched for the last name Panagopoulos in Austin. Six listings came up. I started with the first one.
“Hello,” a gruff man voice said.
“Do you have a relative named Zoe Panagopoulos?” I asked.
“When I was a kid we asked if the person we were calling had Prince Albert in a can,” the man said and hung up.
The second number yielded a ruder response. But when I called the number for Demetria Panagopoulos, an elegant, older-sounding woman answered.
To my query she replied, “Who is this?”
“I’m Zoe’s friend.”
The woman sighed heavily, as if weighed down by some great grief. “Zoe,” she finally said.
“You know her?”
“She’s my daughter.”
“I’m her friend and I can’t get ahold of her. Do you know where she is?”
“I do.”
“Well, where is she?” I tried not to sound impatient.
“Are you the girl that got arrested last night?”
“I did! Did she tell you?” Part of me wanted to explain it had been Artemis who encouraged me to spray-paint the glass windows of the Lululemon, that I’d been carried away by her charisma. But I didn’t want to place blame on my friend. I was the one who had taken the spray paint can, after all. No one had made me do it. “But I’ve never been arrested before.” I paused. “I’m just worried about Artem—I mean, Zoe.”
“You sound like a nice girl,” she said. “She always picks a nice girl to be her friend. It might be best for you if you just let her go her own way.”
“I can’t do that,” I said. I didn’t know how to explain to this posh woman how much better my life had gotten since the day Artemis shoved me into the crumb cake display. “She’s done too much for me.”
She sighed again. “You sound determined.”
“I am,” I said.
She paused for a long time—so long I wondered if she’d hung up and I’d missed the click. “Zoe’s at the Shoal Creek mental hospital,” she finally said.
“What?” I almost yelled. “Did you have her committed?”
“I drove her there, but she checked herself in. She’s bipolar. She’s having a severe manic episode. She knows it now.”
For a moment I found myself reeling. But in an instant so many things made sense. The fact that Artemis had shoved me the first time we met. Her alter egos. Her insatiable sex drive. Her energy. Her wild talking spells. All her paranoid talk about the plumber. That creepy note. Now I really understood: Artemis (a.k.a. Zoe) wasn’t just talented and creative and energetic and incredibly original. She was also mentally ill.
“Can I go see her?”
Again, there was a long, thoughtful pause. “Visiting hours are from four to seven.”
“Is there anything I can take to her there?” I asked, unsure of the appropriate gift to bring. Certainly some things I might think to take—Bulleit Bourbon, man candy, fireworks—would be forbidden.
“I’m sure you’ll think of something,” she said. “She’ll ask you for a curling iron, of course. But they aren’t allowed.”
So in two days I have to go to court, and in the meantime, I’m going to visit one of my very best friends in the mental hospital. I’m feeling overwhelmed and very, very sad.
Just,
Roxy
October 3, 2012
Dear Everett,
I was nervous as hell to go see Artemis. I thought about asking Annie to go with me, but decided this was something I needed to do alone. First I went to CVS and bought a box of no-heat spiral ringlet hair curlers, which I was sure Artemis would be thrilled about.
I was oddly comforted that Artemis was in a hospital in Central Austin and not out in some hideous, soulless location north of town and right off the MoPac Expressway. At least Shoal Creek hospital actually sits right on Shoal Creek, which has a nice walking path and lovely drooping oak trees, and from her window she can probably see the Tres Amigos patio and imagine having a margarita. At the front desk of the hospital I told the receptionist I was there to see Zoe Panagopoulos. The receptionist checked my ID, had me sign in, and gave me a visitor’s badge, which I pinned on my go-to flowered sundress. I took the elevator to the fourth floor. When I told the nurse at the nurses’ station I was visiting Zoe Panagopoulos (Had I ever really believed her name was Artemis Starla? It seems ridiculous to me now), she said, “Room 472. Just down that hall and to the right.”
While I’d feared padded cells and a terrifying “One Flew Over the Cuckoo
’s Nest” vibe, the hallway seemed like a typical hospital—linoleum flooring and fluorescent lights. Paintings of sunsets and beaches hung from the walls in a failed attempt at cheer. At room 472, I knocked on the cracked door. “Come in,” Artemis said. I steeled myself for the worst, then entered.
Artemis was sitting in a chair wearing pajamas. Her face was freshly scrubbed. I realized I’d rarely seen her before without a full face of makeup. It was as if all artifice, all glamour had been stripped away and what was left was a pretty but sad-looking girl, her usual crackle dulled by psych meds.
“Artemis!” I said. I could not bring myself to call her Zoe.
“Roxy,” she said, her voice flat. She didn’t stand up to give me a hug or even offer that I sit, so I just stood awkwardly.
“How’s it going?” I finally asked.
“Well, since I’m in a fucking mental hospital, it’s clearly not going all that well.”
I didn’t know what to say. “I brought you something.”
“You did?”
I nodded.
I pulled out the box of curlers. “Your mom told me you can’t have a curling iron in here.”
She took the curlers and set them down on the table next to her chair without looking at them. “Cool,” she said. I suspect her disinterest was feigned, because she couldn’t help but pick the box up again. She opened it and pulled out a single ringlet curler, examining it and giving it a tug. “I’ve never used these before.”
“They’ll give you Shirley Temple hair. But sexier, you know, for a grown woman.” I wished I didn’t sound so stilted, but I was new to all this. “Want me to help you put them in?”
Artemis looked at me as if I’d offered to help her with a tampon. “Um, no thanks.” So much for my fantasy of us bonding as I put curlers in her hair.
“I brought you this, too.” I handed Artemis a little cardboard jewelry box, and when she opened it her face actually glowed— for a moment she looked like the Artemis I knew.
“For magic and protection,” we said at the exact same time.
“It’ll help you get your groove back,” I said.
The Roxy Letters Page 20
