Little Panic

by Amanda Stern

  I spin in bed until the morning, where I wake into a hot cloud of shame. I’m starting to realize that once you start lying, you can’t actually ever stop unless you come clean, and I can absolutely never come clean—about the pot, about any of it. I like this fake person they’ve invented on my behalf, and besides, isn’t it my job as an actor to embody other people? Plus, no one has ever wanted to access my deepest self, and I like how it feels. Paul smokes pot. I can practice with him.

  Turns out, he’s totally game to deliver drugs and smoke them with me. When he comes downtown with the pot, which he doesn’t know is practice pot, I feel confident in my ability to overcome my first-time reaction. We go to the roof and I watch as he rolls the joint, determined to master that next. He lights up, takes a drag, and hands it to me before lying down to stare at the stars. We pass it back and forth until a creeping horror begins to spread inside me. It’s happening again; this time it’s worse. I’m in a dream I can’t escape, a dream not happening in my sleep, but in my waking life. I’m being squeezed from the outside by the atmosphere, and no matter where I stand the air won’t let me breathe all the way in. The roof is untrustworthy. I feel something tugging on me; an energy wants to drag me toward the edge and fling me over the side. I feel like I am watching it happen. That’s how I know to climb down from the roof and get back inside my house. In the bathroom I vomit and cry. I do not like smoking pot.

  How am I going to fake this? I live in fear of going back to Taylor and Gwen’s place, but I can stay away for only so long without having to provide some sort of believable excuse. I come up with one-liners for when he pulls out a bag of weed. None have traction. I can’t “already be high,” not when we’ve been together all afternoon. I can’t be “trying to quit,” because no normal teenager in the prime of their pot-smoking years makes a measured decision to scale back their drug use. Maybe I could start smoking cigarettes instead, and that will be my thing.

  When I do return to their apartment it’s for a party. I’m surprised to find out that Paul and I are the only kids invited. I’m overwhelmed by the adults, but Paul seems to know them. He even knows what Taylor wants when he asks to “borrow” him. When they return, Taylor brings me down the hall to the bathroom, and presses something small and hard into my palm. “Have fun,” he says and kicks open the bathroom door for me.

  In the bathroom, I look at the object in my hand, which I recognize as one of the discarded drug vials I step over on the street, but I have no idea what it is, or what I’m supposed to do with it. Is this crack? Or maybe it’s heroin. Even cocaine. How much is normal for a person to do of whatever drug I’m holding? I open the vial, shake a little out, turn on the faucet, and rinse it down the drain. To be safe, I empty a little more and when I clear the sink basin of the granulated remnants I return to Taylor and Paul and hand it back. Taylor investigates.

  “Wow. You’re a fiend,” he says. “Nicely done.”

  “Thanks.” I accept a beer.

  Gwen and Taylor introduce me around, looking proud. They always have their eye on me, watching to make sure I’m okay, like I’m their kid or something, and I love how attentive they are to me, love how protected and safe it makes me feel when they check in on me and ask if everything’s okay and how am I doing, and do I need to talk about anything? I feel weirdly safe, even if a part of me doesn’t entirely trust them as people.

  I still do things with Madison, Tatum, and Amelia, but they’re offset by how often I hang out with the acting school kids, and Taylor. They think it’s cool that I have a separate life outside of school, and they like hearing about it, just not so much about Taylor, who seems to scare them, despite the fact they think he’s hot.

  The next time I go over to their apartment, it’s with Taylor alone, who has a “surprise” for me. I am afraid. The last time a man had a “surprise” for me, he made me sit on his lap and put his hand down my pants. But each time I step into the persona side of myself, the more in control I feel. The more time I spend playing this angry teenager, the farther down I can press the real me. I much prefer this other me, the tough, punk, no-bullshit, nothing-can-hurt-me, my-family-is-more-fucked-up-than-your-family version, over the scared girl who is, quite frankly, a fucking baby.

  Taylor was so impressed with my aptitude for doing coke—I am relieved to hear it wasn’t crack—and he holds up a bag now, not of buds, but powder. He wants to do two things with me, he says; the first is “do blow,” something I’ve done a million times, obviously, as evidenced by last week’s party. There is no getting out of this. I watch everything he does. The way he cuts the block of hardened powder into loose mounds, and separates them into fire drill lines. He has a cut straw he places under his nostril and vacuums up each tidy spill. My turn.

  Coke, it turns out, does not make me feel scared. It knows me better than I know myself. It makes me more hyper, more vigilant, more masterfully in control of my body and self. There is no impending death, no fear, no conviction of my weakness and failings. But more importantly, it forces me to be somewhere I never am: in the present moment. Off the drug, I am always in the future, anticipating the horrible next thing that will trigger the dying. In fact, for the first time in my life I feel the way I’ve been pretending to be all along: invincible, in control and unafraid. Even my lies feel true.

  “Don’t you want to know the second thing?” he asks.

  “Oh. What?” I ask, suddenly feeling clammy and vaguely nauseated.

  “It’ll have to wait until you’re eighteen,” he says. I think he means he can’t tell me until I’m eighteen, until he continues, “Because then it’ll be legal to fuck you.”

  I have to respond quickly, to deflect from what’s happening inside me, to throw off the scent of my abrupt fear and sense of betrayal.

  “Ha-ha, good one,” I say, standing up.

  “Man, I can’t wait to get you into a bathing suit,” he says, eyeing my body.

  “Good thing I don’t own one,” I lie. I am officially in over my head, I don’t know what to do, and I am sickened by disappointment. I want the Taylor who didn’t say these things to me, who doesn’t talk about having sex with me, even if it’s not now. Doing drugs is tough and cool, but having sex is intimate, too intimate. I’ve never had it, and I don’t want to have it with Taylor, not now, not later. My body, my personal bits, that’s the real, true me. It’s feminine and girly, and right now I am not feminine and girly. How can he even see my body when I’m always in baggy clothes?

  “Well, you better buy one for the summer party Gwen and I are throwing,” he says.

  “What summer party?”

  “We do it every year. It’s an acting school thing, and it’s mandatory,” he says.

  I don’t know if Eddie’s ever scared or not, but he never, ever looks it. In fact, people are probably scared of him, too afraid to say things like “Man, I can’t wait to get you into a bathing suit.” And while I’m pretty sure he does drugs, no one would try to pressure him into doing them.

  “’Kay, I gotta bolt. See you tomorrow,” I say as cool as possible, trying not to look like I’m racing away, back home to the house I know will protect me.

  1984

  Dr. Parker Prentice

  Amanda likes people, which might be a little bit of a downfall. She might want to belong too much. She is sensitive to people and their needs, but has down periods. She’s not as sure of herself as she deserves to be. She needs a better understanding of herself. She’s beginning to tell herself she can’t do some of the things being asked of her and is starting to pull away.

  Everywhere I Look, Families

  Javier and I stop at a hotel and get a room. The storm is too rough and we can’t see. He wants to break up, and I am spinning through the universe, unable to stop. I am catatonic. I am sitting in an armchair staring. I have not removed my shoes, winter coat, scarf, or hat. Javier is sitting on the bed. He doesn’t know what to do and I don’t care that he’s in over his head, that I’m scaring him
and he’s terrified to speak in case I break.

  I am so old. I am forty-one and have nothing. I am forty-one and losing the only something I’ve ever wanted. Without Javier there is no Frankie. For four weeks I had a family, and now it’s being taken from me, although it has never been mine to keep. He’s not losing anything. He has a family; he’s had one all along. He’s safe and I am out.

  Why can’t I get a family? How is it that I keep getting closer and closer but never achieve the goal? There seems to be some trick that I don’t know, a code I can’t crack. Who can teach me?

  “I don’t know what I’m saying,” he says. “Can we not make any decisions right now?”

  I don’t know if I’ve even blinked. Javier thinks he’s broken me, but I broke a long time ago.

  * * *

  I once admitted to him that if we broke up I’d be devastated.

  “You won’t be devastated,” he said. “I don’t have that much power.”

  “You do, just not in the way that you think. I have more at stake than you do,” I said.

  “Let’s not dwell in the negative. Let’s look at the light,” he said.

  I was glad we were on the phone so I could roll my eyes.

  * * *

  Ever since I met Frankie, when I have imagined the future, all the places I once occupied alone are now filled with thoughts of her. She is my motivation, my real-life Frankie Bird. Every store I go into, I look for things she might like. Silly things I see or hear, I tuck into the Frankie part of my brain, eager to watch her buckle with laughter, tears licking her cheeks. Sure, I imagined Javier in my future, but it was all about Frankie.

  Frankie could have been my daughter. I felt that; I know she felt it, too. She might be the only child I’ll ever have. What if she needs me? What if I let him leave me, and Frankie has no one to turn to when she’s in pain? I can’t let this happen. We cannot break up. We have to make this work.

  I know that Javier embodies my last chance at having a biological baby, and I also realize that the anxiety I feel about losing that chance is, paradoxically, what is ruining it. But I can’t stop. Even though I know I would be fulfilled and satisfied with just Frankie, the fear of never having a biological child becomes a worry stone I cannot stop rubbing. I cannot stop pressuring him about having a baby, about getting married, about creating a family, even as I’m unconvinced he is the right partner for me. Even though I know, if I had to, I could just have a baby on my own.

  My therapist tells me to take the baby thing off the table and see if that changes things. When I tell Javier I’m going to do that, he is instantly relieved. I am surprised at how quickly my anxiety recedes the second I let go of something. Maybe it’s knowing that I’m not losing everything—I still have Javi and Frankie.

  A few days later, alone at the farmers’ market, I run into Max and Jane. Jane is pregnant. I’m happy for them, but still, sadness flakes off my body, and I hope they don’t see it.

  “We need your naming input,” Max says. “Come over for dinner and we’ll begin the proceedings.” I look forward to dinner, yet the whole exchange makes me feel outside of time, in a place the world can’t reach. Everyone advances, and I stand still watching them pass me by. Down at the bread stand, partners are discussing what to buy for dinner; mothers are strapped to their babies; fathers are pushing strollers. People hand their money over to the vendors with gleaming, wedding-banded hands. Everyone has someone; no one is mine. Later I run into Franklin and Iris, who is about to pop. I offer my help to them, too, but they’re all set.

  “Can you tell me?” I ask.

  They look at each other and smile. Iris leans in and whispers, “Frances Wren. Either Frankie or Bird for short.”

  At first I think it’s a joke, that I must have told them; but no, I never told them. My entire future slips out of me, like my own water broke, and I swallow my urge to yell, “No! That’s my name and you can’t have it!” Instead I force a smile and say, “That’s the name I was going to give to my daughter.” Then, head down, I hurry home.

  Upstairs, I leave my produce on the floor, climb into bed, and cry. I feel forgotten, somehow, like I don’t exist on the same linear plane as everyone else, as if I am nothing but a witness to their realities. I’ve named so many babies, given so much advice, saved so many relationships, set so many people up; the couples I introduced got married and created families, and now I feel like I barely exist anymore.

  To clear my mind, I go with some friends to a Saturday-afternoon African dance class at Mark Morris, my third time trying the class. For a while I am happy: the rhythm of the drums, the vibrations of our bare feet on the wood floor; this is what I need to get my mind off everything. But as we dance across the room in sections and I lag behind, still unsure of the steps, I suddenly feel quite singularly alone. The next group can’t begin until I’ve crossed to the other side, and no matter how fast I go, it’s not fast enough. It’s clear to everyone ahead of me that I’m not one of them, and I’m even ruining things for the people behind. There’s never been a place for me. Once I thought there was, but I was wrong.

  Javier and I have been together nearly a year, and as I hurry to catch up with my group of dancers, I’m struck by how little of that time we’ve spent together. He’s hardly ever in New York. If I want to see Frankie, I’ll have to go to Maine and face my jealousy about Meredith. I’ll have to wait a year till they leave the island. But can I really trust what will happen next? Can I drag myself through another year of this uncertainty? My body tells me no.

  Not even for Frankie? I ask it.

  No.

  My body always knows, even when my brain tries to override it. But what even my brain has to agree is this: To Javier, I am not a priority. I’m cut out of his decisions because I’m not part of his family. I’m sideswiped by an epiphany. To Javier, Meredith is still his wife. They’re still enmeshed, although she has a boyfriend and he has a girlfriend. Javier, I’m nauseated to realize, already has a family. To make one with me would be redundant.

  I stop dancing. I stand off to the side, struck and encased by this discovery. Profound dread forces me out of the classroom and outside. He has no incentive to move toward me. I’m in this relationship alone.

  I have to break up with Javier.

  I try to talk myself out of it on the way home. On a whim, I pull out my calendar and count up the days that we have spent together in the last ten months. Sixty-three. I have a choice. I can continue on, feeling like I’m chasing a family who doesn’t want me, or I can cut myself free. I can take that pain out of my life.

  I sit on the edge of my bed, trying to breathe. Breakups undo me, and I don’t want to come undone. For once, I just want to break up with someone without worrying I’m going to die. When I try to imagine the worst that can happen, I can’t seem to see or feel anything. My feelings go dark. The worst that can happen is that I will stop existing. I know I faced this same sense of extinction onstage, but it’s never felt like an option in my personal life. Maybe the only way to get through this is to pretend I’m onstage.

  I call Javier, trying to keep the image of my bombing but not dying onstage in my head, but when he picks up, I fight back the urge to throw up. I breathe, and I tell him, as calmly as I’m able, that I can’t do it anymore. He doesn’t seem upset. He may even be relieved; I can’t bear to think about that. I will write Frankie a letter and send her a package. I’ll call her. I just need a few days. As I put the phone down, I wait for the devastation to set in, wait to spiral off into an endless world without a bottom. But the anguish doesn’t come.

  I wait. I am sad and empty, but for the moment, that’s all. When the welling in my chest begins to take shape, and the world expands before me, vast and frightening, I move toward the panic—although I don’t want to. Wait! Wait! I say to the world, or maybe to myself—wait! I am being pulled toward my new stark reality of being without a family, of never getting what I want, when I remind myself how my body felt when I took the ba
by thing off the table. It was just a decision, a simple choice, but it shifted my feelings. I realize that I have a choice right now. I’m the one who makes the feelings; the emotions don’t already exist in the world, waiting to trap me. Usually, I let the emotion happen to me, following it until I lose control and need someone else to care for me; but what if I just decide I can care for myself, that I know how? That I am not going to die because I’m without Javi. I can believe my feelings are not facts, just as I told Frankie.

  The groove I’ve worn into my life is there, I suddenly see, because I’ve followed it. After every breakup, I have always followed the helpless groove it led me into. But if I made that groove myself, that means I can make another, different groove; and if I keep following that one, maybe I can get myself out of this cycle. The degree to which I fall apart is a choice.

  I breathe deeply, and I make the choice. I was fine before Javier, and I’ll be fine without him. I can want a family and feel sad I lost this one; but, I remind myself, I want a family who wants to be my family in return. I’m saddest about Frankie. She’s the person I really need to mourn, and that loss is different. I know I’ve lost the island, too, that I’ll never be able to return because the island is Javier’s, just like Frankie is his, and I am still looking for something to call mine. But at least I had it. For four incredible weeks, I had a family.

  1985

  Dr. Nancy Weinreb

  A highly verbal youngster, she is quite comfortable expressing her ideas. Her interests are varied: art, music, the theater, philosophy—almost everything except traditional academics. She is, however, interested in learning—the kind “that pushes your mind” and “forces you to think.” She clearly has some insight into her own functioning and is aware that she is a visual learner (“I memorize easier if I can see things. I have to write everything down; if I can see it, I can know it”). On the other hand, she does not feel she needs tutoring because she feels her major problem is lack of effort. In fact, she doesn’t think she has a learning disability at all.