Adam Levin - The Instructions

I said, Good.

She said, “But still, let me finish what I was saying — I was talking to Starla Flangent during lunch, and she thinks you’re not dark enough for me and I think she’s right.”

I said, I’m half-Ethiopian.

She said, “Really? You don’t look Ethiopian.”

I said, Half.

She said, “That’s not what I mean, anyway.” She said, “You have all this joy. There’s nothing wrong with you.”

I said, I get sad all the time lately.

She said, “It’s nice to be sad. You have to have joy to be sad, and if you’re dark you don’t get to have joy, so you don’t get to be sad. You only get to be anguished if you’re dark.”

I said, I’m angry, though. I said, I get in fights all the time.

She said, “Anger’s not anguish and I’ve seen you fight. I saw you fight Kyle McElroy at the beginning of the year. I saw you dance on his back after you finished choking him — you did a kind of pirhouette. It was fun for you. And this morning, with Boystar—”

I said, I fell in love with you this morning.

She said, “That’s not dark at all.”

I said, But I’ve got all these disorders. I’ve got ADHD and Conduct D. and Intermittent Explosive D. and Antisocial P. D., and you can’t even have the last two ones unless you’re an adult, but I have them.

She said, “You don’t really have any of them, though, and you know it.”

I said, But people think I do have them, so that’s how I’m explained. I said, I’m very dark. I said, I’ve been kicked out of three schools. You should have seen how cruel I just was to Brodsky. I said, It was awful. It was a dark way to treat a person — I’m a tyrant.

She said, “If you were cruel, you wouldn’t think it was awful.”

I said, I’m not cruel — I acted cruel. I said, And that is what makes me dark.

I didn’t even know what we were talking about anymore, only that I had to prove to June that I was dark.

June said, “Listen. There’s this thing I just saw that’s carved into the lunch table. It says ‘We Damage,’ right? And I was thinking how that’s not dark, it’s just violent. But right next to it, there’s another carving that says ‘Damage We.’ That’s also violent, but it’s dark too.”

I said, Fine. I said, Why’s ‘Damage We’ dark?

She said, “Because dark people might do damage, but they’re only dark if damage comes first — if they’ve been damaged. You’re not damaged.”

That much was true — if dark meant damaged, then I wasn’t dark.

I said, Fine. So so what? So Josh Berman’s dark?

“Josh Berman?” June said. “Where did that—”

Did you kiss him?

“Bluck!” June said.

Bluck? I said.

“Bluh-luh, bluh-luh, bluh-luh-luck. Did he tell you I kissed him?”

I don’t even know him.

“Did someone else say I kissed him?”

Wasn’t he your boyfriend?

“Yeah,” June said. “Last year. So what? All of a sudden that means that I kissed him?”

Well—

“I guess that’s not crazy. But no. I didn’t kiss him. And no he wasn’t dark. That’s why I went out with him.”

Now I’m confused.

“I thought if I was his girlfriend, I’d get less dark.”

But so—

“I didn’t though. I stayed just as dark. I probably even got darker because of how I stayed just as dark and thought I should have gotten less dark — and I bet he told people I kissed him, that bancer.”

No, I said. I mean, at least that’s not what I heard, but look: Why’d you break up with him?

“Do you know that kid at all? He’s a total dentist.”

But you were his girlfriend!

“Now you’re being mean.”

I’m not, I said. I just don’t understand why you’d let someone be your boyfriend who you thought was a dentist.

“I thought maybe he wasn’t really a dentist,” June said. “I mean, I thought: Okay, he seems like a dentist, but sometimes people who seem like dentists are only acting dental because they think you’ll be mean to them, so maybe if I’m nice to him, he’ll stop acting dental.”

You went out with him just because he might not have been dental?

“Well not just that, Gurion. It’s complicated. Also, like I said, I thought I’d get less dark — it’s just… You’ve gotta understand: girls really hate me for some reason. I don’t know why. This therapist said it was because I’m pretty and I have red hair, but first of all that doesn’t make a lot of sense. Those aren’t good reasons to hate somebody. And secondly that’s exactly the kind of thing you say to someone who you’re trying to make feel good, who you’re paid to make feel better—”

You had a therapist? I said.

“The thing is—”

You don’t know that your gorgeousness is objectively factual? I said.

June bit her lip and squeezed her lids shut. = “I’m frustrated,” “I’m flattered,” or “I’m ready to cry.” I couldn’t tell which.

I didn’t mean to interrupt, I said. I’m sorry.

“It’s okay,” she said. “The thing is, though,” she said, unsqueezing her lids, “what I was trying to say was that most girls hate me, so most boys hate me so those girls will like them, so most boys don’t ask me out, and Josh asked me out, which meant he was different, at least in that one way, and since most boys are dentists, and Josh wasn’t like most boys, at least in that one way, I thought maybe he wasn’t really a dentist either, and maybe I should give him a shot.”

And then? I said.

“And then what? I broke up with him.”

But why’d you do that? What’d he do? What made you break up with him? Was it something I should hurt him for? I could hurt him, I said. I could break—

“No. Stop. He didn’t do anything.”

But so why’d you break up with him?

“Gurion, wow. You’re just drilling it in. Fine. You’re right. I was acting stupid. It was a stupid way to act, to be his girlfriend. Those reasons I told you were the reasons I was, and those reasons weren’t good reasons, okay? I barely believed he might stop acting dental. Even at the beginning when I first said yes. It seemed stupid even then. It was just what I told myself because I thought it would be nice if that’s how things were. It would be a nice story, a nice hopeful story. But I wasn’t in love with him. I didn’t even really like him. So there wasn’t any reason to be his girlfriend. There wasn’t any good reason to try to be hopeful. And so I broke up with him. You don’t have to laugh at me.”

I’m not, June, I said. You didn’t kiss Berman. This all makes me happy. Because I’m in love with you.

“And again,” she said. “That isn’t dark at all.”

I said, What does it matter if I’m dark or not, though? If that dentist wasn’t dark and you gave him a chance, then unless you think I’m dental, or secretly dental—

“Everyone gets damaged eventually,” she said, “so everyone eventually gets dark,” she said, “and that’s always a tragedy.”

I said, Well, I’ll be dark soon enough then, and so—

She said, “But I like you not dark, and if I love you, I love you not dark.”

I said, I really don’t understand the problem, June.

She said, “I’m dark and I might end up being what damages you, and then you’d be dark and the tragedy would be my fault.”

I said, How would you damage me?

She said, “Maybe I’ll break your heart.”

I said, You’d break my heart?

She said, “Well, not your heart-heart that beats, but your heart of hearts: the place in your brain where your love’s at. The frontal lobe? Yes. Maybe I’ll break your lobe.”

I said, You want to break my lobe?