How can you not know your own daughter? Why can’t they just let me be who I really am? I can’t be who they want. They have one daughter like that already–Jessie is so perfect it makes me want to puke all over myself. I should probably just leave and let them get on with raising their real little angel. All I do is take things that are perfect and make them ugly. And everything that I find beautiful makes them sick. ::sobs:: I used to hate myself but now I know better. Now I just hate them.
I just threw a thing of lip balm across the room but it didn’t shatter. I think I just dented the perfect white wall instead.
I don’t fit in here. I tried. I’m going to be EIGHTEEN FREAKING YEARS OLD and it’s still not good enough. No matter how much I try to bend and hide something always ends up sticking out and breaking something. Ruining everything.
I have to change: me, my life, my world. Anything, really. I have to see what it’s like on the other side of this screen.
I think I have to go away.
“MzMisery signed on at 7:13 p.m.”
davidgould101: HEY.
MzMisery: Hello?
davidgould101: It’s David Gould.
davidgould101: The real one.
MzMisery: Oh hey
davidgould101: Yeah hey.
MzMisery: How was lunch?
davidgould101: What do you think?
MzMisery: I dunno. That’s why I asked.
davidgould101: IT’S A FUCKING DISASTER THAT’S WHAT IT WAS.
MzMisery: whoa
MzMisery: no need to shout
davidgould101: really? there’s no need to shout?
davidgould101: I’m living some lost episode of the fucking twilight zone
davidgould101: and you think I should LOWER MY VOICE?
MzMisery:…
davidgould101: fine ok sorry
davidgould101: thanks for telling me that you’re still seeing him
MzMisery: who?
davidgould101: the OTHER ME
MzMisery: oh
MzMisery: him
MzMisery: yeah…sorry. it’s just that he can be pretty persuasive.
davidgould101: I’ll bet
MzMisery: he’s a fun guy. look, I don’t know what’s going on! this is a weird city!
davidgould101: he’s a total asshole!
MzMisery: he’s not that bad
davidgould101: HE STOLE MY WALLET
MzMisery: LOL
MzMisery: really?
davidgould101: yes really!
MzMisery: whoa
MzMisery: what do you think he’s doing with it?
davidgould101: from what little I know of him I imagine he’s making both the salesmen at Barneys and the entire nation of Colombia extremely happy.
davidgould101: with my money
davidgould101: jesus
MzMisery: LOL
davidgould101: it’s not funny cath
MzMisery: sorry.
MzMisery: look what do you want me to do about it?
davidgould101: I want you to stay away from him
MzMisery: why???
davidgould101: because he’s some sort of supernatural asshole! because you can’t trust him!
MzMisery: and I can trust you?
davidgould101: of course
MzMisery: you’re the same person creepo!
davidgould101: please. we’re not the same person.
MzMisery: you are totally the same person. neither of you will leave me alone!
davidgould101:…
MzMisery: I didn’t sign up for this, dude
davidgould101: I know
davidgould101: neither did I
MzMisery: well maybe if you weren’t so repressed all the time, none of this would be happening
davidgould101: oh, I’m repressed
MzMisery: um, hello? yes!?
davidgould101: this is great
davidgould101: you’re just a kid!
MzMisery: yeah well yr just a grumpy old man
MzMisery: and besides, if I’m just a kid why were you so obsessed with me anyway?
davidgould101: I was not “obsessed” with you
MzMisery: that’s not what you #2 says!
davidgould101: what he’s TALKING about me now? fuck!
MzMisery: it’s cool. it’d actually be kind of sweet if it wasn’t so creepy!
davidgould101: cath please stop seeing him. he has to be stopped.
MzMisery: I dunno
MzMisery: what are you going to do for me in return?
davidgould101: I don’t know. anything. I just want my life back.
MzMisery: I’ll think about it. honest I will.
MzMisery: but I have to run
davidgould101: wait
davidgould101: are you seeing him tonight?
MzMisery:…
davidgould101: christ are you going to meet him NOW?
MzMisery: look I said I’ll think about it but I’m not going to change my plans just like that
MzMisery: not for the version of you that suddenly is too scared to talk to me face to face
davidgould101: no no!
davidgould101: wait—I’ll meet you. I’ll do whatever. honest.
MzMisery: maybe…
davidgould101: please, just tell me where to go.
MzMisery: whoops! gotta run!
davidgould101: no! wait! is he there? don’t go.
MzMisery: TTYL!
davidgould101: jesus! stop! don’t go with him! and DON’T LET HIM SPEND ANY MONEY!
“MzMisery signed off at 7:21 p.m.”
davidgould101: dammit.
I was sitting in my apartment with all of the lights out, staring at my computer screen, at the window where Miss Misery had just been. I was in my underwear, as my clothes were still completely drenched from my miserable post-lunch journey home. The thunderstorm had been ferocious, with rain that hammered the pavement like hailstones, leaving scores of people huddling under bus stops and awnings, flinching with each deafening clatter and roar that came booming from the sky. I had tried to stick to the sides of buildings, but the wind was blowing the rain at impossible angles; I was soaked through before I had even crossed the avenue. To get on the subway, I had had to borrow sixty-five cents from a red-haired girl with freckles and a Hello Kitty umbrella. Look on the bright side, I kept saying to myself as the water in my hair dripped down my face: At least you always keep your house keys in your pants pocket.
The storm had ended now and the sky was clearing, but I could still hear sirens in the distance, ferrying able men to trouble spots where they would soon be hard at work picking up the pieces of trees that had been forcefully removed from their rightful perches—no doubt restoring electricity and cable service; restoring order.
I wished that one of the sirens could have rushed to my aid, but there was no knock at the door, no helpful call from the street below. In that numb moment, I would have settled for that infuriatingly chipper painter from earlier in the summer, or that damn bird in the herb garden. Heck, I would have even answered the phone.
But for once it didn’t ring. I was alone, outdated, replaced. David Gould 2.0 was out running the streets now, taking over the city in a way I would never have dreamed. He had my money, my ID, my momentum. Heck, he even had the fantasy girl I wasn’t even sure if I wanted. It was, in the words of Ben Grimm, a rather revolting development.
In the ghostly half-light of my dim office, I wondered if this was the end of the me that I had known. I felt my anger fading, along with my resolve and maybe the rest of me as well. I felt shimmery, indistinct. What if my boring, insignificant life was in the end no different from Highlander, that stupid movie with Sean Connery in a ponytail? What if there really could be only one?
Just then my laptop chimed like a bell, saving me from further self-pity or marginal film comparisons.
TheWrongGirl87: you there?
davidgould101: hey ashleigh.
TheWrongGirl87: hey
TheWrongGir
l87: don’t you want to know what happened today?
davidgould101: absolutely I do!
TheWrongGirl87: well you didn’t ask!
davidgould101: oh. you mean with you. yeah, I want to know.
TheWrongGirl87: :-/
TheWrongGirl87: well I’m grounded again.
TheWrongGirl87: actually grounded for something I wrote. the only time I’m allowed out of the house for the foreseeable future is this weekend when I’m supposed to go on some stupid “potential applicant” visit to BYU.
davidgould101: god, that’s horrible.
TheWrongGirl87: I dunno, BYU is supposed to be pretty nice.
davidgould101: no, I meant the grounding part
TheWrongGirl87: oh.
TheWrongGirl87: yeah. it sucks.
davidgould101: you should never get punished for something you wrote—or something you created. that’s not fair at all.
TheWrongGirl87: yeah, well, tell that to my parents. they’re freaking out. my mom doesn’t even want me to hang out with my sister anymore. she’s afraid I’ll, like, ‘ruin’ her too.
TheWrongGirl87: I would do anything to get out of here. you know I said my parents were calling the principal
davidgould101: yeah
TheWrongGirl87: well he told them about the other thing that happened—with the pictures?
davidgould101: what pictures?
TheWrongGirl87: I told you all about this!
davidgould101: I’m sorry…I’ve been a little bit all over the place
TheWrongGirl87: :-P
TheWrongGirl87: I took these pictures of Krystal—my best friend? when she just found out she was pregnant. and so she was crying and had mascara streaked on her face and some on her wrist. and I entered them into the photo exhibit at school. and when her bitchmom found out about them she showed up in the middle of the day and ripped them all down then tried to get me suspended. said I made her daughter look suicidal.
davidgould101: wow
TheWrongGirl87: it’s like: newsflash lady! she WAS suicidal!
TheWrongGirl87: but whatever, I got out of it because I get good grades and they didn’t tell my parents
TheWrongGirl87: but now it’s out of the bag
TheWrongGirl87: they just hate the idea of me having my own thoughts you know? I’m a dark person and everything here is really really light. they refuse to admit who I actually AM.
davidgould101: uh huh
TheWrongGirl87: it’s like there are two of me. the perfect girl that used to have pigtails and is going to be a rich doctor and the me that I am now.
davidgould101: this sounds familiar
TheWrongGirl87: oh did you read my LJ from this afternoon? :-(
davidgould101: no I just mean it sounds familiar to me too
TheWrongGirl87: why? you’re awesome
davidgould101: no I’m not
TheWrongGirl87: yeah you are you’re like the coolest guy I know. you’ve got the perfect life
davidgould101: I wish
TheWrongGirl87: well at least yr not grounded
TheWrongGirl87: if there’s something wrong you can go and fix it
davidgould101: yeah you’re right
TheWrongGirl87: see? :) I got all the answers.
davidgould101: so what do you do if people have the wrong impression of you? if you want them to know who you really are?
TheWrongGirl87: yr asking me?
davidgould101: yeah I am
TheWrongGirl87: I’m just a kid!
davidgould101: so’s everybody
TheWrongGirl87: well
TheWrongGirl87: I think you gotta go out and shake people up. if they think yr somebody else, prove ’em wrong. grab that person that they have fixed in their heads and kill him dead!
TheWrongGirl87: LOL
davidgould101: huh
davidgould101: you might be onto something
TheWrongGirl87: yeah? cooool
TheWrongGirl87: well I’m glad I helped you. what about me?
davidgould101: what about you?
TheWrongGirl87: hello? I’m the miserable emo kid here not you.
davidgould101: ha. right
TheWrongGirl87: I can’t put up with them anymore or living in this house
davidgould101: well don’t do anything rash
TheWrongGirl87: my eyes are sore from crying. they’re all puffy. bleh.
davidgould101: I’m sure you look fine.
TheWrongGirl87: yeah?
davidgould101: seriously, ashleigh, the biggest difference between living at home and going out into the world is TIME. because when you’re stuck at home you can’t imagine there ever being a point when life isn’t just like it is now. but it gets different, honest it does.
davidgould101: it gets better.
TheWrongGirl87: I dunno
TheWrongGirl87: they just have everything planned out for me, you know? nothing is ever gonna change.
TheWrongGirl87: I kind of thought I could try something else. I was going to tell you about it.
davidgould101: yeah? I’d like to hear it. but look. I’m sort of in the middle of something and I think you just gave me some good advice on how to finish it.
TheWrongGirl87: oh.
davidgould101: why don’t you find me later? or tmw?
TheWrongGirl87: yeah…tomorrow.
davidgould101: ok, tomorrow. seriously thanks—hang in there. I’m sure it’s not that bad!
“davidgould101 signed off at 7:49 p.m.”
The seventeen-year-old on the other side of the country was right. I wasn’t grounded. I wasn’t in trouble unless I let myself be. If there was another me running around, it was time for him to find out who the boss was. It was time to go out.
I stood up and nearly tripped over a pile of CDs. I still wasn’t wearing any clothes. OK, change of plan: It was time to get dressed. Then it was time to go out.
A few minutes later, racing down the stairs, clothed and anxious, I almost bowled over Mrs. Armando, who was standing in the dark hallway with her arms crossed.
“David,” she said sternly, “you forget about somethin’?”
My brow furrowed as I racked my brain for some sort of plausible answer.
“Probably a lot of things, Mrs. Armando,” I said, trying to mask the panic in my voice.
She tut-tutted under her breath.
“It’s July, David, whole new month.” She said “month” like “munt.”
“Oh!” I slapped my head. “Rent. I’m sorry, Mrs. Armando. I guess I did forget. I’ll get it to you first thing tomorrow.”
“I don’t know,” she said as she slowly made her way through the dark toward her apartment. “Ever since Amy leaves, I don’t know where you’re at!”
You’re not the only one, I thought as I raced out of the door and into the steamy night.
In my pocket I had all of the dollar bills and change I had found on my dresser and under my couch. I had my passport for identification and my iPod for a soundtrack. I also had the “emergencies only” credit card that my parents had given me when I had moved to New York. I had never used it, because this was the first time I had ever felt like I was experiencing an emergency.
In my head, in addition to a nonlocalized state of panic, I had the voices of the bank operators from a few moments before telling me that I did not have the authority to cancel my cards, as I had just recently called them and told them that they were to ignore me if I called back and told them to cancel everything. It seemed that in addition to my wallet, my pride, and my PIN, the doppelgänger had the most important tool of all in the world of telephone finance: my mother’s maiden name. Bastard.
I was wearing my “fancy” jeans—that’s what Amy called them, as they were the expensive and pre-scuffed pair I had bought in a fit of confidence one weekend the previous winter when she had been away. My standard-issue jeans were hanging in the shower, still drying from the complete soak they’d received on the way home from the diner this afte
rnoon. I was also wearing a plain dark-green T-shirt—one of the few in my collection that didn’t pimp for a criminally underappreciated indie-rock band on its front. These would be my work clothes for the night: I was on assignment again at last. Except that this wasn’t an interview; this was a manhunt. I was going undercover. I was going to the Lower East Side. To prove my commitment to the mission, I had even pushed a dollop of Amy’s product through my hair in an attempt to recreate the flickering hipness that Cath Kennedy had given me the night before.
Other than that, though, I had no plan, no confidence, and only a sputtering hold on my identity. I was—like thousands of post-college young people every year—going into the heart of Manhattan to find myself. The thought alone would have made me laugh if I hadn’t felt like crying.
The sky was burning a dark shade of orange over Fifth Avenue as I walked briskly down the street toward the subway. The clouds were almost gone, and now the sun was dying. The sidewalks had dried from the afternoon’s thunderstorm, but I could hear the rainwater continuing to pour down the drains by the curb. Tomorrow was trash day in the neighborhood, and the overflowing cans that marked my walk were ripe with a sickeningly sweet aroma. I raised my hand to my face and smelled that instead—warm and salty and, thankfully, familiar.
Down the hill, at the intersection of Fourth Avenue and Ninth Street, Latino vendors were selling homemade popsicles and Ziploc bags full of sliced fruit out of the backs of navy-blue vans. The check-cashing spot hummed with activity, and the traffic, inching forward in both directions, was continuous. The F stop there was above ground, and after swiping my Metrocard I took the stairs two at a time and then hurried toward an empty spot near the end of the platform. It felt strange to stand still; my heart felt like it was about to cannonball out of my chest. I kicked at the ground and tried to slow my breathing.
It was possible to see the Statue of Liberty from where I stood, its familiar outline sheathed in the embers of the setting sun. Up here the air—an awkward marriage of exhaust and barbecue—somehow smelled cleaner, less heavy. For the first time that day I let my shoulders relax. God knows how many evenings I had stood in the same spot, seeing the same sights, hearing the tracks click and switch below me, smelling the air. And yet it still made me smile. New York was a beautiful city—you just had to have a different definition of beauty to appreciate it.
Miss Misery Page 10
