by Eliza Gordon
Your boyfriend is probably going to sue you for talking about his dick like that. I wouldn’t blame the guy. And it’s normal for penises to have a curvature. I’m sure your anatomy is PERFECT, right? #bitch
THE ROCK IS SO HOT OMGGGGGGGG
Girl don’t be sad about your BF showing his peen to that other girl just be glad he didn’t give you any diseases and your free now to find a better man. Lotsa love from DC.
If the govt puts you in jail, WE WILL RIOT! This is the funniest shit I’ve read in months!
Obviously your mother’s affection for romance novels and extraterrestrials and illicit drugs, combined with your father’s disappearing act, have created in you a narcissism that can only be undone with months of intensive therapy under the care and guidance of a trained professional. You indeed have self-esteem and so-called “daddy issues,” and you will find no relief until you address that you have been damaged by parents serving their own selfish ends. Your entries read like a desperate call for help, and even more so if you published them for the whole world to see. I fear what Mr. Dwayne Johnson would extract from your missives—this goes beyond fandom into you creating a vision of “The Rock” as your stand-in father or stand-in life partner, neither of which is healthy. I am concerned for your well-being.
I’m guessing this blog is either a funny fictional account of some made-up character’s life, or you were seriously screwed over by someone and they posted all your secrets online—which if that’s the case, I sorta feel bad for finishing a bottle of wine while I read through every last entry! Also, LONG LIVE THE ROCK! Can you smelllllll what The Roooooooock is COOOOOOOOOKIN’!
THIRTY-SEVEN
April 26, 2016
Dear Dwayne Johnson,
Wow. It’s been a while since I’ve written to you like this, with an actual pen in my hand. (Forgive my penmanship.) All those years of correspondence, after the Jerky Jackie “hacking” incident back in high school—I thought my letters to you were safe online, locked up tight under the world’s most ridiculous, seemingly unbreakable password. For what, fifteen years, they’ve been safe?
But that was before I messed with the wrong super-secret nameless, faceless she-devil hacker.
Geez, DJ, it’s been a horrible and insane few weeks. I’ve spent so much time apologizing—emailing, calling, texting, faxing, eating into my savings to pay for bloody flowers and fruit baskets—trying to do damage control wherever I can. I’ll pretty much never be able to show my face at Stage III again, considering some of the PRIVATE entries I had about other actors that weren’t always 100 percent complimentary. While my sisters are at least talking to me, they’re still pissed, even though I’ve offered over and over to babysit so Georgie and Samuel can have a night out (and I swore I’d never give her kids Dimetapp again). Jackie had to have her lawyer draft a disclaimer to hand out to patients explaining the “tragic circumstances” surrounding the hack because you know the girl she gave the Ex-Lax cake to? Yeah . . . she was pissed. Fired Jackie and is taking her Botox needs elsewhere.
And Mommy said the only way I could make this up to her was to prune the three million overgrown rhododendrons in her yard (!!!) and mow and weed and get the back flowerbeds ready for her new garden. Of course, we’ve had a remarkably wet spring, so thanks to long hours spent in my mother’s yard in the pouring rain and then continued damage-management efforts and gym days and visiting Howie at the hospital and the resultant lack of sleep, I managed to pick up a lingering cold. Last night was the first night in a week I haven’t had to sleep with VapoRub smeared under my nostrils just to breathe.
The day after everything went down, I wrote a blanket-apology email and sent it to every single person in my address book, explaining what had happened and begging people to stop reading. But humans are natural voyeurs—judging by the number of comments on every single post, this whole situation has gone totally viral. It’s like a global wildfire, and fifteen years’ worth of my deepest secrets are the dry undergrowth feeding it. My most intimate thoughts splayed out there, dating back to middle school! Thoughts about boys I liked and girls I didn’t and pranks I pulled and virginity lost and hangovers that almost killed me and mean things I did to my sisters and the meaner things they did in return and my anger at Gerald Robert Steele and my total annoyance with my batshit-crazy mother and my raging insecurities and my epic failures and my ongoing, never-ending love for you . . .
Because that’s what people write about in their diaries. Everyone is seeing it, DJ. Like with a therapist—there’s the assumption that if you go to great lengths to keep something safe and private, safe and private it shall remain.
Wrong.
And EVERYONE who’s been reading has a fucking opinion. I’ve been called a narcissist more in the last fifteen days than I think there are stars in the heavens. Which is ironic in itself: I never wanted anyone to READ these posts. That’s why it’s called a diary. I’d been assured repeatedly that this UNpublished blog would be safe from hackers because of the password and two-step verification I had in place. Even Elliott the IT guy told me once that HE writes his dragon fantasy stories online but in a blog that he would never publish because it could hurt him professionally. Dude, if Elliott’s dragon stories are safe . . .
Maybe that’s my problem. No dragons.
God, Dwayne, I feel so cheated and naked and ridiculous.
Even worse than that—the email that the hacker sent to my entire address book, it, like, infiltrated the address books of all THOSE people too, so the link was sent to everyone in their address books, and so on. It’s like an infection, only the pathogen happens to carry a link to my blog under the custom URL the hacker created.
THIS SHIT ONLY HAPPENS IN MOVIES THAT STAR CHRIS HEMSWORTH OR JOSEPH GORDON-LEVITT.
Only it doesn’t. It’s happening in real time, and every day this email bot sends more links out to more people. Agent Superman and his cronies still cannot figure out how to get the blog back under my control, nor can they stop this email-humping bot. He said, “It’s like nothing we’ve ever seen before.”
Great. Awesome. FANTASTIC.
Jesus, I swear to all the gods, if the Russians really DO hack the United States government—if Agent Supes and his numbskulls are in charge of disentangling that clusterfuck—we’re all ghosts.
Anyway, with all this carnage, I haven’t been able to bring myself to sit down and write to you . . .
There have been a few positive comments—people who’ve had parents bail who can relate to those entries written during the bad-poetry stage of adolescence; other adult children who are glad they’re not alone in their own quiet parental issues; people who’ve laughed and complimented me on making light of difficult situations; people who don’t believe this is real because no one’s family is this much of a freak show; people who are embarking on their own fitness journeys.
I like those messages.
This has all become so surreal. I’ve tried to distance myself from the whole thing—sort of treating it like the Danielle Steele on that website is someone different. Someone who is not me. Well, I’ve tried to think of it that way, until I went back to work yesterday.
DJ, if you think the Arctic is frigid . . . Pretty much no one from work is talking to me, except Charlene, which is great because I had a trunk load of cat supplies for her from Minotaur, minus what I need for Aldous—Howie the Pop-Can Man’s crazy tabby that I’ve inherited while he’s in the hospital. I had to cover the top of Hobbs’s fishbowl, but I think he’s less depressed now that he has a buddy. Aldous sits for hours on the table and watches Hobbs swim, and Hobbs is either showing off or terrified she’s going to eat him.
Poor Aldous. I can tell she misses her dad, but I’ve sorta fallen for her. And I think Charlene is secretly hoping I’ll become a cat lady too so she’s not the only weirdo. Howie isn’t doing well . . . in a medically induced coma, but the doctor who finally agreed to talk to me doesn’t think his prognosis is good. I’m sad—Howie’s a brillia
nt, decent man who’s had a rough go—but he has no family. If he comes out of this coma, his doctor expects there to be significant damage from the stroke. Howie will end up in a state-run nursing home . . . that’ll kill him faster than anything.
Viv is still pregnant, which is good. But she’s not offering much more than the occasional hello, which is not good. I miss her.
And Shithead Trevor is still threatening legal action. He got so obnoxious at the gym, Miraculously Beautiful Marco and Trish with Muscles booted him out. I’m SUPER appreciative of that. I cannot focus on training when Trevor is making pointed comments about the size of my ass, and how I’d better get used to living in Flex Kavana because he’s going to sue me for all I’m worth, and just basically being a stalker-ish creep. I thought Minotaur was going to remove Trevor’s lungs last week. Epic. It’s so great to have friends there—especially friends who apparently know NOTHING about this hijacked-blog bullshit. And if they do, they’re not sharing that info with me.
Speaking of the gym . . . and Marco . . . NO, nothing has happened. Except for the huge crush that’s only gotten bigger since he promised he wouldn’t read a single diary entry. (And he brought me pho. And cookies. And the gorgeous leather journal I’m now writing to you in. And he told me an adorable story about his childhood love.) When I walk into the gym and see him there, I’m a giddy teenager again. Seriously. And then I try to show off and lift more weight, which in turn means extra ibuprofen once I get home. Minotaur says ibuprofen is bad—“It ruins your gains, bro!”—but it’s either that or I get stuck in my chair with no MedicAlert button in sight.
Yup. I’m an idiot.
Otherwise . . . Marco and I have started running through Forest Park with backpacks full of sandbags, and I haven’t been hospitalized nor have I passed out lately—and that’s saying something because the trails in Forest Park are nuts. I’m down almost fifteen pounds from the start of this grand experiment, and although it doesn’t seem like much, my clothes fit differently, and Marco says I’m replacing fat with muscle. This is good, right?
Can’t wait to show Jerky Jackie my fancy new LDL cholesterol. *fist bump*
Marco is confident that if I continue to work as hard as I have been, that walk-on role is within reach. GET READY, DJ.
Hang on—phone call . . .
Lady Macbeth. She knows about the hack, but given her own self-described “salacious” background of seducing her married director, she said, “Blow it off, Dani. People love drama, and thank the deities for that—it’s how I make a living!” Audition tomorrow, but I can’t go. Not on my third day back at work. I wonder how long I’m going to be on Joan the Crone’s shit list.
Probably until Agent Superman gets that damn blog taken down. Or until they decide what to do with me now that I’ve involuntarily violated the terms of their nondisclosure agreement.
Is this guy in charge of national security? Good thing I ordered that parka for Port-aux-Français. I’m going to look adorable in all that faux fur. I’ll send you a photo of me next to a penguin. I hear Antarctica is beautiful this time of year.
Gotta go. Aldous just made an epic poo, but she doesn’t understand that she has to bury it, so now the entire apartment stinks.
Devotedly yours,
Danielle Public Enemy #1 Steele
P.S. GYM UPDATE: The other night, I hit a few new personal records—Miraculously Beautiful Marco says we call those PRs—I moved up to 8 lb. dumbbells AND I added 5 lb. plates on the bench press AND I squatted more than just the bar—I think he put 10 lb. plates on? I felt like The Hulk when we were done. BOOYAH. Ain’t no candy-asses ’round here, DJ.
THIRTY-EIGHT
“Hello, this is Alison Klein from Emanuel—I’m the nurse who’s been taking care of your friend Howard Nash? I know this is against hospital protocol, but I think . . . it might be a good time for you to come in and see your friend. As soon as possible. Thanks, Danielle. Sorry to interrupt you at work.”
THIRTY-NINE
I don’t know if there is anything more depressing in this whole world than watching someone die.
My mother’s mother wasn’t much of a part of our childhoods—she never did approve of Mommy’s eccentricities or her terrible taste in husbands, and she wasn’t in love with the idea of being called “Grandma Wilma,” so naturally we called her the Wicked Wilma of the West. (Not always to her face.)
Wilma went from being a vibrant, well-positioned real estate agent with gel nails and a poufy bleached bob to a sickly, emaciated shell in a matter of weeks. Pancreatic cancer that metastasized, quickly, right alongside her denial that she was really sick. We visited her at the end, but the bag of bones lying in the bed wasn’t the Wicked Wilma I remember flitting in and out of our house once a year for enforced holiday bonding, her overwhelming perfume stealing the taste of the Thanksgiving turkey right off your tongue.
Howie looks like Wicked Wilma did. Paper-thin skin, sunken eyes, thin white hair greasy against the sides of his head. He’s aged a hundred years since we scooped him off the pavement behind the high school that night. At least someone gave him a nice shave.
I’ve visited every other day since it happened, hoping that he’d just wake up and wink at me and give me more unsolicited life advice or tell me another story about his teaching days. I hoped that somehow my voice would trigger something in his head that would pull him back from the brink—I finished reading Brave New World out loud to him; I’ve updated him on Aldous’s continued plots to entertain (read: maim) Hobbs, complete with photographic evidence on my phone, even though Howie’s eyes are very much closed.
But today . . . today I know that no amount of fine literature or interesting discourse about ongoing feline-fish interpersonal relations will lure him back from wherever he is.
Midafternoon, Alison the nurse brings me coffee. When she goes on her dinner break, she returns with a chicken salad sandwich and a banana for me. “I would’ve given you one of the extra patient meals, but not even I’m that mean,” she said.
And she sits with me when she gets off shift at midnight. Just after 2:00 a.m., we watch Howie breathe his last.
Alison leaves me alone for a little while, and I cry for a thousand different reasons, mostly selfish ones, but also because this man died here in this room, pretty much all by himself except for me and Alison. No kids, no wife, no friends, or colleagues. Not even his beloved cat.
Hospital staff give me an hour with Howie, but then things need to happen. Things that don’t involve well-meaning nonrelatives.
I walk out of his room, sadness cloaking my shoulders. Alison is still at the nurses’ station. “Thanks for waiting with me,” I say, sniffing.
“I don’t think it’s right for people to die alone,” she says. “It was nice that you were here for him, Danielle. I’m so sorry for your loss.”
“Thanks.”
“Before you go . . .” She turns and disappears into a locked room at the heart of this main hub. She comes back cradling a plastic bag labeled PATIENT PERSONAL EFFECTS. “We went through it when he first got here, looking for next of kin.” Inside is the metal box Marco and I pulled from Howie’s Whole Foods cart just before the ambulance took him away. “The only thing we found, other than his pictures, was a letter with detailed information for his lawyer. I made a copy for his chart—they’ll call the lawyer when the sun comes up and make Mr. Nash’s final arrangements. The original letter is still in the box, in case you need to talk to the lawyer for any reason. Maybe he knows of family we weren’t able to find.”
Howie had a lawyer? And documents? How could he afford that? Maybe from his professor days—it would have to be that.
I accept the bag from Alison, and she comes around the counter to give me a hug. “It was really nice meeting you, Danielle. Thank you for being Howard’s friend.”
I can’t speak anymore. I’m exhausted and heartbroken and I just want to curl up with that crazy now-orphaned kitten and sleep for a year.
When
I slide into the driver’s seat of my car, I dig my phone out of my bag and power on. In Howie’s room, I had turned it off out of respect—not even the nearly dead want to hear the constant digital chime of someone else’s life imploding. Trevor won’t stop harassing me. Jacqueline texts regularly to find out the status of Agent Superman’s handiwork, even though technically I’m not supposed to be talking to her about any of it.
Waiting, though, are two missed texts from Marco.
Got your message about Howie. Let me know how he is.
And the second: Guessing the evening hasn’t gone so well. Missed you at the gym. See you tomorrow if you’re up for it. Be well, Dani.
Of course, that makes me sob even harder. By the time I get back to my apartment, I’m a snotty, stuffed-up, swollen mess. I’m still in my work clothes, as I left the office just after eleven this morning, as soon as I got Alison’s call. Joan the Crone wasn’t happy about me leaving given the thin ice I’m still skating on, but when I told her it was for Howie, a softness came over her face that rarely shows itself.
I slide Howie’s photo box onto the kitchen table, change into jammies, and shuffle into the kitchen to put the kettle on for tea.
“Merrrrrrowwwww.” I turn around, empty teacup in hand, to find Aldous sitting on the table, atop Howie’s box, digging at the plastic.
“Yeah, sweetie, looks like you’re stuck with me.” I pluck her off the plastic bag and pull out the box. Lid open, I pull out the stack of photos, the letter Alison referred to, the other small keepsakes Howie thought enough of to store in here. As per the Rule of Cats, Aldous takes the opportunity to plant herself in the emptied container, curling her tail around her tabby body and purring like an idling freight train.
It’s three thirty in the morning, and I need to be up for work in four hours, but I can’t not look through these cracked, aging photos that have probably had too much exposure to the elements. A young, vibrant version of Howie wearing the gown and sashes they give people when they graduate from important university programs; Howie at the beach with a beautiful young woman with brownish hair in a blown-out seventies sculpt; a few pictures of a chubby black-and-white cat in the arms of that same woman, her radiant smile involuntarily teasing a smile from my own face, the back of the photo etched with the names “Clarence and Deanna”; that woman—must be Deanna—holding a newborn baby, her face exultant but exhausted; a few more photos of Deanna and a towheaded toddler, then little boy.
