"You two are like braindead zombies," I said angrily.
They didn't care. They were busy making plans. Nothing else mattered.
When we arrived at the Knights Inn, Nicole got out of the car without saying good bye or thank you. She knew I was going to Germany the day after tomorrow, and she wouldn't see me again for a while, but none of that mattered right now. She had drugs on her mind. She disappeared in some dope boy's room. For a fee, he was letting girls like Lucy and Nicole use the room to have sex with guys, and he gave them drugs and took all their money. It was heartbreaking to watch Nicole walk off into that room.
Then Lucy said, "I just gotta grab something out of the room."
"What?" I asked.
"Hold on, I'll be right back," she said and jumped out of the car to follow Nicole.
"You're not coming back, are you?" I asked.
"Of course I am! It'll only take a minute. I'll be right back! Don't leave without me," Lucy said.
I waited 10 minutes. Then I texted Lucy: "Ur not gonna come out, r u?"
"No," was all she texted back.
I fucking knew it. I was so sick of this shit. I had enough. At first Lucy had seemed so different from Veronica, but then she turned out to be just like her. And Nicole seemed so different from girls like Veronica and Lucy, but then she became just like them, as her addiction got worse.
I decided that my upcoming trip to Germany, to spend Christmas with my parents, was going to be the end of my adventures in Fort Myers' underworld. Getting on the plane would be like me riding into the sunset, while the words THE END slowly scroll across the screen.
And it was perfect timing. It was the end of 2013, so my New Year's resolution for 2014 would be: NO MO HO! No more whores.
As I slowly drove out of the parking lot at the Knights Inn, I texted Nicole: "I'm sorry, but I can't be with a girl who tricks on Backpage. I can't handle when a girl I care about has sex with other people."
A week later, on Christmas morning, while I was in Germany, I thought of Lucy and Nicole. I checked Backpage. And there they were, posing semi-nude in a whole bunch of their escort ads, day after day, offering to have sex with any random stranger.
I messaged Nicole on Facebook: "Remember our conversation in the car a few weeks ago, when I told you, you wouldn't just fuck guys for a day or two to pay bills, but soon you would be doing it all day every day, and it would become your new life? See, I was right. It always starts like that. And are you happy with your life now? Are you happy living like this? Are you proud of yourself? I know you're not, sweetie. This isn't really you. Please stop. You're slowly killing yourself with this shit. And you're killing me, because I care about you, and I can't stand the thought of you doing this. You told me you are not the kind of girl who sleeps around. But now you spent Christmas Eve and Christmas morning letting pervs fuck you and sucking their dick. Did you ever think it would come to this?"
A week earlier, when I had dropped them off at the Knights Inn that day right before I flew to Germany, I had also texted Lucy, after she followed Nicole into the motel room and disappeared: "I can't believe u did this to me again. I hope ur proud of urself. It breaks my heart to see u like this. Good luck with everything. Have a nice life."
The next morning, while I was packing my bags for the trip, George called: "So what happened last night? Did you have a threesome with Lucy and Nicole?"
"No, actually I didn't have sex with either one of them," I replied.
He thought that was hilarious: "You had two beautiful girls spend the night at your house, you love both of them, and they both love you, and you didn't have sex with either one? You FAILED! I'm gonna have to revoke your man card."
"We were up all night, because they were doing drugs. And the next day they ditched me at the Knights Inn. It hurt so bad to see them walk into that motel room," I said.
In the afternoon, I got a text from Lucy: "I'm so sorry. I can't believe I did that to u. I don't even know what to say. Just... I'M SO SORRY."
I knew that whenever she had a lucid moment, she really did feel terrible about all the things she had done to me and other people. That's why she couldn't bear to be sober for even a minute. Her head was filled with painful thoughts and traumatic memories. The only way she could get through a day was by completely numbing her emotions with drugs, so she didn't have to think about anything.
Have you ever seen The Notebook? It's a movie about these two old people in a nursing home. A man reads an old lady a story from a handwritten notebook. It's a love story about a young couple. The old lady seems to remember the story, but isn't sure. It turns out she has Alzheimer's, and she was the one who wrote the story of how she and the old man had met. Her disease had progressed to the point where she didn't remember their life together, or even who he was. He was a complete stranger to her now. But every night, when he finished the story, she remembered him for a few minutes. For a few minutes each night, she came back to him, and she remembered how much she loved him. And then the fog took her away again.
That's how I feel about Lucy and Nicole. I love them. They're sweet, beautiful, lovable girls, who deserve all the love, kindness and affection in the world. And sometimes, for just a few minutes, they remember who they used to be. But then the drugs cloud their minds, and the fog takes them away again. I really hope they'll go to rehab.
NO MO HO
"Being a nice guy doesn't mean you are a push over. It also doesn't mean you are easy to manipulate or take advantage of. No, being a nice guy simply means you care, have no time to get mad at the small stuff, and you think of the world in larger terms than self. And despite living in the shadow of the bad guys and paying for mistakes you didn't make, you hold on sometimes more than you should, but when you can no longer, you move on because it's the right thing to do."
Eugene Nathaniel Butler
"Letting go doesn't mean that you don't care about someone anymore. It's just realizing that the only person you really have control over is yourself."
Deborah Reber
"Some people believe holding on and hanging in there are signs of great strength. However, there are times when it takes much more strength to know when to let go and then do it."
Ann Landers
"The truth is, unless you let go, unless you forgive yourself, unless you forgive the situation, unless you realize that the situation is over, you cannot move forward."
Steve Maraboli
"Pain will leave you, when you let go."
Jeremy Aldana
"The beautiful journey of today can only begin when we learn to let go of yesterday."
Steve Maraboli
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Oliver
Sex and Crime: Oliver's Strange Journey Page 54
