Hi Hayley!
I miss you, so I'm writing you a letter. I'm not sure just where to send this, but I'm pretty sure it'll find a way to you somehow. So how have you been? I went to the beach last weekend. New Jersey is doing okay I guess. I forgot to take any pictures, but tomorrow I'm going to some little party by this river so I'll try to take pictures for you there. It'll be prettier there probably anyway. They don't have woods in Arizona, so I'll send pictures with lots of trees and rocks. Do you ever miss those things? I never even noticed those things until I really looked at them.
Well, I haven't been doing all that much lately. I've kind of been in one of those moods where I should just stay in my house, because I feel like being alone, and I could probably hurt someone's feelings without even knowing it, IF they were talking to me that is.
A few days ago, I went to Philly to go to that Lilith Fair thing, but it was all sold out. Some guy came up to our car and gave us all these stickers. So I have these Lilith Fair stickers and nothing to do with them because we never got in, so I don't know if it sucks or not, and I can't believe we couldn't even find any scalpers there (even though we were like two hours late).
Well, I quit smoking that stupid weed shit. You see, I realized that lately before I go out, I've been smoking way too much stupid ass pot, so then when I go out to find other drugs, by the time I get there, I'm either like FUCK IT or I'm already high and keep forgetting who told me what, or where to go, or who to ask. And pot is just not worth all that. Barely does much anyway. It's like cigarettes I guess. Like kindergarten shit.
I keep having these weird dreams. You were in one last night, with some old man. You weren't talking very much, but you were making me laugh. Are you doing okay? I mean, I know we can take care of ourselves more than anybody else can, but you seemed so sad in my dream. Like sad in a secret way. Like you didn't want anyone to notice. The old man was sad, but didn't care who noticed. You were almost going to follow him somewhere, but I asked you please not to. Do you have any idea what that could have meant? I'll have to think about it next time I'm tripping.
Hayley, what do you look like now? Please send me a picture. I'm going to send you some of me. I got my hair cut last winter, like short to my chin, but it's grown out some. Do you remember when you were showing me pictures of your old apartment and those people? You had a picture of this girl you said looked just like me! See, I know I'm just bringing up all these old things, but when I go into one of these just-stay-home-moods, I like to remember everything, and then think about it, kind of so I don't forget my life.
Man, I'm watching this stupid show on TV. I broke the VCR so there's no movies to watch. Oh yeah, I'm not drinking as much either, because I always end up breaking something. Not because I'm mad, just because I'm drunk. Like the other week I dropped the phone and it fell on the floor and the batteries fell out. Someone yelled, “Mary Rose broke the phone!” And then someone else yelled, “She didn't break the phone, I can fix it!” Then they got in some stupid fight over who was going to fix the phone, so I stomped on it a few times and said; “Now Mary Rose broke the phone!” I was laughing and just making a joke so everyone would shut up (it's hard to get drunk people to shut up) but it worked.
The next day I had to get a new phone, but it was my phone anyway. So that's why I'm not drinking like I used to (it's getting too expensive). Maybe I'll dye my hair again. Oh, I got this guy to buy me earrings. They're gold. These little gold kitties. I named them both Hayley. I never take them off.
I hope you'll call me soon. I lost your phone number. Sucks because I have a thirty minute phone card, too.
Well, I'm gonna go paint my nails. I love you! I love you! I love you!
I MISS YOU! I MISS YOU TONS!
XOXO Love,
Mary Rose
PHOENIXVILLE, PA
FALL, 1998
Dear Nobody,
I miss Geoff. His sweet smile, the cute things he’d say. I’ve never felt so close to anyone, or adored anyone as much as I do him. I miss his tangled curly dark tendrils that crowned his precious head, his beautiful dramatic dark brown eyes that shimmered like a river under moon light. I miss his brooding, but somehow proud posture, and deep way with words. Oh, I feel like a part of me has been taken far away, and now I’m incomplete. I’ve worn his blood and dried his tears.
I wonder if in heaven he will be my angel? Only in heaven will it be, when I could see him there, smiling again at me. To walk through the hell alone, to never have him there to hold my hand. How can I care for him so much when he has abandoned me in such hurtful ways? Is it really him I love, or the idea of loving him?
Dear Nobody,
I’m starting to feel again. Even though it’s in the wrong season for rebirth, I am starting to bloom again. I just want some fun. Some friends. REAL friends. I miss my old ones. I miss them so much. It still hurts. It’s almost ruined me. I’ve narrowly escaped the dangers of my misery, but I’m not out of the storm yet. Sometimes I feel like I don’t even want any more friends, then other times I feel like I’m desperate to hang out with ANYONE. My life is strange like that; I don’t know if I’m lazy, or if I just want to put myself in hard-to-be-in circumstances? Maybe it’s both. I don’t know.
If I assume GOD will work everything out, he usually does (THANK YOU). I feel like if I try to stay half occupied until something happens, I’ll be okay. I need to be content on my own for now—but I also need to remember my mom and Nicole, too. Mostly I need GOD. I just want to be satisfied.
Tomorrow I might try to call some theaters or something about acting lessons or work-shops or auditions. I tried before, but it was really cliquey. But I figure once they see my talent, they’ll either envy me, or respect me—I’ll either make friends or enemies. Worst comes to worst, I’ll at least get to be acting.
Dear Nobody,
I was just watching an interview with Gene Wilder, one of my favorite actors. When asked what to concentrate on while acting, he said to concentrate on nothing. Nada. Knowing he’s a genius, I was heeding his every word. The more I thought about it, the more sense it made to me. Every day, in real life, how much are we really concentrating? In simple actions like having a conversation with a familiar face or in arguing with an unpleasant associate, how often do we look back and think of how we forgot to mention something—or of the perfect rebuttal to an argument? If we had been fully concentrated on the situation, we’d know what we wanted to say; what the perfect thing to do at that moment would have been. It’s only later when we are really concentrating—by then our heads are clear—after we’ve gone over the situation in our mind a few more times. By then, we are not distracted by the heat of the moment, the shock of what the person is saying, or who that guy was that just walked by.
Dear Nobody,
I guess I really like to write. Maybe someday I’ll be a writer. I’ve been writing lately just to write. I can’t decide if it’s because I like releasing thoughts from my cluttered head, or because I just like the way the pen feels gliding along the paper? They go together so well. Oh, and one thing about a boring life—you’ve got to stretch your imagination farther to come up with fiction, than if your living a busy, entertaining life. Busy lives have more inspiration. I guess, overall, a bored writer becomes the best writer, because they develop a more brilliant imagination; while the busy writer may only develop the skill of moving reality into fiction.
Dear Nobody,
Today Geoff—that “ex-boyfriend” of mine—called me. We talked for a while. He broke up with that other girlfriend because she was saying really asshole-things. He says he wants to see me again. He said another PRETTY ASSHOLE THING, too. I’m not even going to get into all this shit though, because I’m kind of upset now.
Basically, guys just want pussy. Girls just want something or anything. It’s not fair. Sexism pisses me off. I fucking hate it. Whenever a guy does something like burp really loud, I want to
shove a tampon right in his fucking mouth. Like burping and shit is a guy thing. If a guy does it, he’s being a guy, if a girl does it, she’s being gross.
What really pisses me off is that a guy can fuck as many girls as he wants, and he’s just considered a guy that gets it a lot. A girl that has a lot of sex is called a slut. If a girl sucks dick, she’s usually called a “ho.” If a guy eats pussy; he’s just a guy that gets smooth pussy.
Double standards really suck.
Guys say that a girl gets loose if they have sex too much. I guess a girl CAN get loose just from doing it one or two times. Not even really loose, just not tight; but I don’t know—is that really true?
Dear Nobody,
I went over to Geoff’s house today. It was probably a terrible idea. After we talked, I walked home alone—smelling like him. The taste of him was still prominent in my mouth and throat. I almost liked it, in a self-derogatory way. It seems like anything having to do with Geoff is self-derogatory.
This isn’t like me. I had always considered myself the extreme example of dignity—but not lately. However, if anyone were to say otherwise, I would deny it profusely. My failings and the personal fraudulence to my pride are very private, secret thoughts of mine. Sometimes I feel like I need them to keep my realities in check—other times I think they are the opposite, and keep me away from reality.
Like after tonight, I know what the chances of him calling are, but I dove into this head first, fully acknowledging the devastation I could be causing to my ego. It helps me to think of it that way—to think of MYSELF as the person causing the damage. It makes me feel less like the victim—I can still be the cement wall of emotional endurance—just so long as I can control it all.
See, I really don’t CARE if he calls me.
I’m PLANNING on him not calling me.
Maybe.
Still, if he did—it’d be nice.
Hello?
Hello, reality, are you still there?
I think we’ve been disconnected.
Dear Nobody,
Don’t hate me—Geoff and I are back together again. I don’t know how long it will last this time and I’m pretending not to care.
Dear Nobody,
Geoff and I are back together FOR NOW. I am desperately in love with him and he says he feels the same. I really fucked up my life this past summer. I’m gonna try picking up the pieces now. I want things to be calm and to keep getting calmer. However, my health keeps getting worse. I’m not sure I’m ready to anticipate my death anymore. I can’t. I’m hoping they’ll find a cure in my lifetime—they’ve already perfected cloning. They say that can help them cure me. I hope so.
Dear Nobody,
I knew I would be going back into the hospital soon, so Geoff and I went down to the rope swing last night to try and get my jollies while I still could. It was freezing out. I had on a big winter coat and gloves. Some of the boys there had no coats on, but I could tell they were freezing even if they were trying not to show it. We were all in a big circle and I was sitting on a dirty old box spring mattress that was lying on the ground near the tree. There was a candle in the middle of our circle and two cases of cheap beer. I held my beer in the gloved hand, because it was so cold. I lent Geoff my other glove so he could hold his beer because he didn’t have any gloves on him.
When it got to be too cold to be outside we relocated to an old abandoned house that is pretty far downtown; on the East End almost. We kept drinking quickly because the drunker we got, the less cold we’d be. A guy across from me with no coat and a beanie hat pulled out a pack of generic cigarettes and offered one to the guy next to him. He was sitting on one of those old-people-plastic toilets. The girl next to him was on a broken lawn chair. I didn’t really know the other two people next to her. Someone threw a piece of ripped off cardboard from the beer case in the candle’s flame. It was starting to burn out. It was getting darker, and I could barely make out anyone’s face. No one was really talking—just the guzzle of beer cans being drank in one gulp broke the silence.
Someone else on the mattress lit her lighter to look for cigarette butts by her feet. I could see a cloud of cold from her mouth when she breathed out.
This guy John burped really loud, and a few of the guys laughed.
The girl with brown hair said, “That’s gross,” then burped even louder; it almost sounded like she’d thrown up.
People were talking now, and it didn’t seem so cold anymore. I was talking to the people on my left side, and they were looking at me, amused. The candle was just about burnt out when this cute Mexican kid stood up, looking a little happy, a little drunk; and said he was going to get another candle from the closet upstairs. Everyone just looked at him, no one really said anything. I stood up and said I’d go with him because he shouldn’t have to go alone. I walked up the steps behind him. He was using his lighter as a flashlight.
We went into the bedroom and looked around. He didn’t say anything, and neither did I. I walked over to the frosty window and looked out. It was snowing. He stood there looking around. I didn’t like the silence, so I had to say something. “Find the candles yet?” I said, with too much faked concern, because I knew he already had.
“Yeah,” he answered slowly.
“Okay, good,” I said, and we started walking down stairs.
When we got back everyone was laughing, and passing around some ugly broken bowl with a devil face on it. Some guy had my glove on, and the girl who had been wearing it went someplace to pee. I sat down next to Geoff and kissed him on his cheek. I held his hand. It was cold; not as cold as I thought it would be, but cold. Geoff was kind of staring off into the distance. It was getting quieter, but a few people were still talking. They were getting louder. I couldn’t tell who was trashed and who was just drunk, but I had that feeling in my stomach I get when I’m pretty drunk.
The girl who had been sitting next to me came back into the room and flopped down on the floor next to the mattress looking listless. I asked her if she was okay. She didn’t hear me, but I knew she was, so I turned my attention to the flame on the floor and listened to the other people talking. There were maybe six beers left from the second case, so I reached out and grabbed two and sat them behind me, while I finished the beer in my hand.
I heard one of the boys getting loud with another boy. I got into it, then the Spanish kid told us to shut up, that the neighbors would hear us if we kept arguing. We all forgot about it, and I kissed my boyfriend on the cheek one more time. He was really drunk—a lot of beer cans were at his feet.
“I love you,” he said, hugging me.
I laughed and squeezed his arm. The Mexican and his brown haired girlfriend were looking at us, smiling.
WINTER, 1998–1999
Dear Nobody,
I woke up this morning coughing up blood. I’m almost used to it by now. My lungs gushed bright red blood. It sputtered out of me. I choked on it. That horrible redness. It’s like in the movies—bright, shocking red—the color of hell.
It’s almost sick for me to say this, but I felt some RELIEF when I woke up with that distinct taste of blood in my mouth, because at least blood is thinner than that thick, chunky bile I usually cough up. At least with blood, I can swallow it before anyone sees. Unlike my death-stew that eats my lungs, the stuff that is too sticky and sickening to swallow. The mucus that gags and disgusts me.
I called for my mother and she called the doctor. When he arrived at my house, a half an hour later, I was still seeing blood on my napkin when I coughed. My mouth tasted like metal.
The doctor gave me two options; he said he could either put me in the hospital today, or try to make me better at home with strong antibiotic pills and steroids. I told him I wanted to try treating it at home—which we both know—NEVER works. The medicine he puts me on always temporarily turns me into an insulin-dependent diabetic, but it would be bett
er than the hospital.
Instead, they admitted me.
The doctor told me if I had waited one more day, I would have been dead.
Dear Nobody,
Tomorrow is Christmas Eve. I feel a lot better. My lungs are almost like a normal person’s now. I want to stay this way forever. I’ll still never be fully free from the illness, though. I have to take all of this medicine and do treatments. But at least I can breathe now. Although I’m happy to be feeling better, I could do without everyone lecturing me. The fucking doctors and social workers here need to mind their own fucking business about my personal happenings. I didn’t come here for counseling—I came here to get rid of my pneumonia. They keep hinting that the reason I’m here is because I don’t take care of myself.
That’s the most bullshit I’ve heard about myself since the last time I went to school—taking care of my disease has become my fucking life!!! Who are they to say something like that? They are not there every fucking morning when I wake up and choke down thirteen pills, then do a breathing treatment and physical chest therapy. They are not there when ten hours later I take thirteen more pills and repeat the process.
Fuck them.
I really wish they could have my disease for just one week.
FUCK THOSE FUCKERS!
Dear Nobody,
I’ve been in the hospital for three days. My lungs hurt from all the coughing. They are full of scar tissue and bleeding flesh—wounds from coughing and treatment.
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