by C. Desir
I expect Joe to say something about me refusing to believe I was the same as all the other alkies when I first started AA, but he doesn’t. He waits and lets me pull together my story. It’s so easy with him.
“I didn’t think it was that big a deal, is the thing. Because my friends were doing it with me. And yeah, I was drinking more. Drinking at home alone sometimes. Starting my weekends with V8 and vodkas. Not remembering parts of the nights when I’d go out and party.”
“And you didn’t get the DTs when you were in rehab?” Joe asks.
I shake my head. “No. Maybe because I’m young. Maybe because it hadn’t been going on for ten years like the other alkies. I don’t know. I wanted to drink. I still do. Like I would peel off my own skin to be having this conversation over shots right now. But it’s not all I want.”
“So it’s not just rehab that got you to quit?”
I shrug. “Well, the court situation didn’t help. And you know my dad installed a Breathalyzer on my car.”
“Natalie. I’ve been there. If you’re at the peel-your-skin-off-for-a-drink stage, that’s pretty far gone. Court cards and a car Breathalyzer aren’t much of a deterrent. You proved that last night. So what was it? What did it? What made you at least want to try to quit for good? Because this is hard, and you told me that you don’t hold on to things that are too hard. So why are you holding on to sobriety?”
I’m lighting my second cigarette as I say, “You trying to figure out my rock bottom? What pushed me to the point that I actually want to stay sober? I don’t know. I don’t think I have a real defining moment. No ‘Hey, Nat, get your shit together’ come to Jesus. Staying sober is hard, but so is being drunk. That’s why I’m not the same as you.”
“Not everyone hits rock bottom like that. Sometimes we just wake up and realize we’re pretty broken and the only way out of the hole is up.”
“Are we already to that part of the half hour? The platitudes about working the program and believing in my higher power? You don’t even want me to tell you about my crappy childhood or give you my poor-little-rich-girl sob story?”
He doesn’t even smile. “Why do you do that?”
“What?”
“Why do you make it seem like you’re not worth anything? Like your problems aren’t important?”
“Because they’re not. There are people starving in the world. People who have to live on the streets. People who grew up with single moms living on welfare.”
He reaches across the table and covers my hand with his. “Natalie. These things don’t change how we feel. They don’t change the holes inside us. They don’t change our addictions.”
“But it’s all stupid. My current problems exist because I drink. I made this crappy bed that I now have to lie in.”
“Maybe. Or maybe you started drinking to make your problems go away, and what really happened was they ended up just getting worse. Maybe your drinking was more about avoiding the hard stuff.”
I shrug and release a stream of smoke. The smokeless ashtray doesn’t work that well, I’m noticing, which makes me think maybe Joe doesn’t smoke inside that often.
“Should we go outside to smoke?”
“No,” he says. “It’s freezing outside and I’m not going to sit out there for hours while you spill your life story just to prevent a lingering smoke smell. It’ll be fine.”
“It won’t take me hours to tell my story.”
He looks at the clock on his wall. “Thirty minutes so far and all you’ve really said is that you’re good at boxing and you had a crappy childhood. But you haven’t explained what that part means.”
I sigh. “Oh, you know. The same as everyone else. It was fine. I’m an only child. My parents’ pride and joy. Except that’s maybe not so true anymore. And I’m not sure how true it’s ever been. Maybe with Mom. But I think that has more to do with the fact that she doesn’t have a job, so there’s nothing she can call her own beyond her role as wife and mother. But it’s always been wife first. My dad is sort of a big shot at the Board of Trade.”
Joe nods. “And your mom has never worked?”
“She did before she had me. She worked at the library. But then I was a difficult baby—they remind me of this often—and I guess Mom couldn’t really leave me with a babysitter for very long. She was sort of this crazy breast-feeder and I wouldn’t ever take the bottle. My dad was mortified about the whole thing, but she held her ground. I don’t know. It was a long time ago. And when I started eating real food, Dad got her back and turned her into this amazing trophy-wife hostess.”
Joe raises his eyebrow at this. “She doesn’t seem like a trophy wife.”
“Well, not in that boob-job, plastic-surgery kind of way, but believe me, she has mad skills when it comes to taking up no space so there’s plenty of room for the ego of Dad and all his trader buddies. You should see her when she’s hosting. It’s like she asks all the right questions, gets people to share their completely vapid life stories, without saying one thing about herself. From the outside, she has the emotional landscape of a rock garden.”
Joe laughs. “Well, rock gardens can be pretty elaborate if you’re serious about the design.”
I light a third cigarette. “Yes, but they seem like nothing on the outside. That’s Mom. She’s so good at faking—at lying, really—that you’d never really know how unhappy she is unless you were in her shoes.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I live with him too. Because he told me to give up boxing and she didn’t fight for me. And now . . . she says maybe I could have it back, but I just know he won’t let me. And asking for it, wanting it, that seems really hard.”
“Yes, probably it will be. Especially if your dad doesn’t want it for you.”
I nod. “Nothing else matters to him but what it looks like from the outside. That’s why my boxing, my DUI, my rehab, even going to AA meetings is a huge fucking inconvenience for him. And he orders Mom around like she has no brain, like she can’t pull off the simplest of tasks when she’s been holding our family together forever.”
“So. This is resentment. Which must have been on your list. And now we’re going to cross it off. And you’re going to let this go.”
“I am?”
“Yes,” he says. “Because this is something, someone, you have no control over. Your dad has made his choices. They aren’t the choices you would make. Same with your mom. But they don’t belong to you. There is nothing you can do to change them. It isn’t your responsibility. You want people to be better, but that can’t be on you. The only person you can make better is you.”
“Does that mean that I should just stand on the sidelines watching as he continues to treat my mom like shit? As he continues to get mad that I’m not everything he wants me to be?”
“No. You should tell him, tell them both, how you feel. Because that’s your truth. Because you’re allowed to make your own choices. But you shouldn’t expect them to change or suddenly support you. That choice is theirs to make alone. You’re not the hall monitor for better behavior in parents. It doesn’t work that way. Their system of dysfunction has been working for them for a long time, I’m guessing. You can choose not to be party to it, but you can’t pull the whole system out from under them if they want to hold on to it. Let go of this resentment. Be honest with them. Be honest with yourself. But this can’t belong to you anymore.”
The softness of his voice is my undoing. My body starts to itch and I stand up and walk to the end of the trailer, turn, come back, walk it again.
“Why are you being nice to me?” I ask after my third rotation.
“Because everyone needs help. Everyone needs someone to care about their stories.”
He’s turning my words inside out and it makes me start to shake. I don’t deserve this. I don’t deserve him spending his time listening to me. I want to leave. I want to bail. I glance at the door and then back at Joe’s face. It’s like he’s waiting for it. Waiting for t
he moment when I take off. I fumble for another cigarette, but his hand drops over mine, stopping me.
“Tell me about last night,” he whispers.
“I have an ex . . . Brent,” I start, my voice shaking along with my hands. “He’s the one who I drove home the night of the DUI. We weren’t ever that serious. We fooled around when we were partying. I guess he was that guy for me, you know? Kathy would call him an enabler, but I was right there with him. I enabled him just as much.”
A giant well of silence sits between us. I don’t know how to keep going, but Joe’s face is so open and understanding, looking up at me from his seat at the table.
“We weren’t safe.”
“Because you were driving drunk?”
I shake my head. “No. With sex. We weren’t always safe. I got pregnant. That night—the night of the DUI—I told him about it. I wasn’t sure he’d want to talk about it, but he’s been pushing me and he came over last night. And yeah, he wants to talk about it, only I can’t. Not with him. It’s too hard.”
“You’re pregnant?” Joe says, and I slam my eyes shut to avoid the judgment. When I crack them open again, his face is still open. God. How can he even be like this?
“No. I lost the baby. When I hit the stop sign. I was only a couple of months along. I’d been drinking a lot. I don’t know. Maybe it would’ve happened anyway. So yeah, I’m not pregnant.”
“And how do you feel about that?”
I take a deep breath. I need a cigarette so much right now. I fumble for my box and light up. Two full drags later, still standing next to the small table, I say, “Relief. Fucking relief. I’m a horrible person, but I didn’t want a baby. I was ready to go back to boxing. Jerry, the owner of the gym, he once said I had a shot at amateur boxing. And I was going to do it. I didn’t care that it went against my parents’ wishes. I didn’t care that it would be hard. Jerry saw potential in me and I thought, yes, maybe I can have this after all. If I could just get sober. But then I found out I was pregnant and it was like it all got snatched away from me again. And I hated the baby for taking that away from me, as much as I hated my parents for it. So yes, I was relieved when I miscarried. I didn’t want the mess of it. I didn’t want to have to tell my parents or figure out if I had the stomach to go into some shitty Planned Parenthood office and have them vacuum me out, though I’m pretty sure that’s what Brent thinks I did. I didn’t want to deal. And there’s a part of me that wonders if maybe I didn’t slam into that stop sign on purpose.”
He nods. “You’re not a horrible person.”
“Joe. I just told you I’m glad my baby died. I get that you’re tolerant, but for fuck’s sake, let’s not pretend this is okay. Let’s not pretend I’m not a huge asshole for this one.”
“I’m not here to judge you. You’re doing enough of that on your own.”
“Then what are you here for?”
He shrugs. “I’m here to listen. I’m here to tell you it’s going to be okay. You’re going to be okay. That you aren’t the only alcoholic who has done or thought horrible things.”
He stands up so he’s right in my space. He takes the cigarette from my hand and puts it out in the ashtray. Then he wraps his arms around me and again whispers, “It’s going to be okay.”
And that’s when I really lose it.
Chapter
Twenty-One
I’m not sure how long I stand there sniffling into Joe’s shirt. Long enough to get it pretty damp with tears, long enough to smell all the parts of him: cigarettes, soap, laundry detergent, Joe. When I finally pull away I notice his eyes are wet with tears too.
“Why are you crying?”
He gives me a half grin. “Don’t know. Guess I’m just hurting for you. For all of us. For what we all lost.”
“You mean like a baby?”
He shakes his head. “No. Like a life. Addiction changes everything. And getting over it, getting through it, it involves constantly being on guard. And you’re so young. I hate that this is your life now.”
I step back from him. “I did it to myself.”
“You did. And I’m glad you know it. That’s a big part of the Fifth Step. But also part of it is knowing you’re not alone. Knowing that you have this community of people who are right there with you. Who’ve all had moments where they’ve done something terrible. Your life isn’t over now. There’s still potential.”
“Will you tell me now?” I ask in a low voice.
“Tell you what?”
“Tell me what your rock bottom was. Did you even have one? A real one?”
“Yours is real, Natalie, whether you think it is or not.”
“Maybe.”
“Natalie . . .”
I shrug. “You really want to know what keeps me sober right now? That was your question, right? Why I don’t let sobriety go even though it’s really fucking hard?”
“Yes. That was my question.”
“You. You and Kathy and your relentless nagging.”
He laughs, but it’s a sad laugh. “Not the best idea to count on someone else for your sobriety.”
I lift a shoulder. “It’s what I’ve got. Now. What happened with you? You’ve got a rock bottom. Let’s hear it.”
He takes my hand and guides me back to the table. I consider lighting another cigarette, but I grab a pack of gum from my bag instead.
“You mean a rock bottom other than going to jail for driving into the White Hen and leaving the scene of the crime?”
“You told me you didn’t get completely sober after you got out of jail.”
He settles back in the chair across from me. “I didn’t.”
“So?”
“We’re not done with your Fifth Step,” he says.
“Yeah. But I’m exhausted after spilling the pregnancy news. And it’s not much worse than that. I need a break. I need you to tell me when you were a huge asshole so I don’t feel so bad.”
He lets out a long breath. “You’re not an asshole. It’s not terrible not to want a baby at seventeen. It’s not terrible to resent things in your life that keep you from your passion. It’s not even terrible to let go of things that are hard. You could’ve handled it differently. Gotten help. But it’s not—”
“Joe,” I interrupt. “Please. My skin has been scrubbed raw here. I don’t want to talk about it anymore. You need to give me something.”
“Okay. Okay. My rock bottom. Well, when I got out of jail, I was going to meetings. It was part of my probation for a year. And I’d go to all the meetings, but nothing really sunk in ever. I’d go, get my card signed, then head back home and get wasted. I didn’t drink with other people most of the time. I was too far gone for that. And I didn’t want to get another DUI. So I was mostly home by myself.”
I pull out another piece of gum and shove it in my mouth, my jaw aching at the extra work. My jaw aches a lot these days. I should probably give up the gum, but I have no idea what I’d replace it with.
“But this one time, I went out with friends. It was for a bachelor party for a buddy. It involved this drinking game called Golf. Basically, every bar along the way is another hole and each one has a par. So the first bar the par was two beers. The second bar the par was a shot and a beer. The third was an upside-down margarita. Each bar had a specialty drink so that was usually the par. As you can imagine, by the seventh bar we were all really hammered.”
I smile. “I can’t believe you made it to seven. I probably would’ve stayed at the first hole and gone for a triple bogey.”
He laughs. “I probably should’ve. Anyways, somewhere along the way, we picked up this hooker.”
“Of course you did,” I say with a smirk.
Joe raises his eyebrow. “You’re judging me?”
I shake my head. “Go on.”
“She started playing Golf with us, drinking just as much. In between rounds, she’d pull one of the guys into the bathroom for a quick blow. By the tenth round, I knew I should go home. Sleep it off. I
could barely stand. I’m surprised any of the bouncers were letting us in.”
“Yeah. Me too.”
“The tenth round was tequila body shots. We were in the back room of the bar. No one could really see us. The hooker ended up in nothing but her thong underwear with all of us doing the body shots off her. I’m not really sure what happened after that.”
I release a shaky breath. My whole body has gone tense. Joe’s telling has gotten cold and methodical. There’s no warmth in his voice. Like he’s told this story before to a less-friendly audience. On instinct I reach out and grab his hand. He squeezes mine for a second, but then pulls back. I spit out my gum and shove in a new piece.
“Someone must have sent me home in a cab. I was a blackout drunk so I lost a big chunk of the night. I’ve been told I made it to the fourteenth hole. I have no idea how any of the rest of the guys made it that far. Maybe they stopped drinking earlier. Anyway . . . I woke up the next afternoon with my head pounding and a dead hooker next to me.”
The last part he says so softly I’m not sure I heard him right. “The hooker was dead? Are you kidding?”
He shakes his head. “Alcohol poisoning. I don’t know if she came home with me and we drank more. I don’t know if it was the rounds of Golf. I . . .”
“Jesus. I can’t imagine. What did you do?”
“I called my brother,” he whispers. “I called him and asked him for help. He had no reason to help me. None. I’d been an asshole to him and my parents before they died. I was a selfish prick and had absolutely nothing to offer but a dead girl and a tangle of problems. But my brother came. He called the police. He sorted it all out. Took me back to our parents’ place, which we’d been trying to sell for a year. Shut me in there with him, stayed with me for a month, while I dried out, while all the pieces of me fell apart, while I searched through every cabinet and damn near killed myself drinking anything with alcohol in it, trying to forget that I was responsible for the death of a girl.”
