Heather Lewis - Notice

Once in my apartment I started searching in coat pockets and drawers. I told myself I was only wanting equilibrium, wanting to even myself out. Not wanting to get off and go away from things. I did finally find a scrap of foil so small I had to put it on a pin to try and smoke it. I had to hold the pin with needlenose pliers. I lit the thing over and over. Sucked at it even when there wasn’t any hint of smoke coming off it.

I wanted sleep, long sleep. And I wanted some chocolate milk. I used to always have some in the fridge. It used to help lull me. But now I didn’t buy it anymore, not on a regular basis. I’d meant to quit this time. I’d also meant to call Beth. Reminded myself of this right before I finally dozed off.

It wound up that Beth called me. I was in that place of half-coked and dazed. That place where you memorize the ceiling but aren’t quite conscious.

She said, “Where are you?”

It seemed such a silly question that I said, “What?”

“You’re supposed to be here,” she said.

And even though I got it by now, I said, “Where?”

She didn’t say anything, and I didn’t want her to think I was jerking her, so I said, “Sorry. Look, I’ll come over now.”

I hung up the phone and pulled on some clothes. And while I knew I looked bad, I still figured I’d pass. I was glad I lived within walking distance of her office because I didn’t think I could drive.

On my way down the stairs, I considered taking my car anyway – it’d get me there that much quicker. But I realized I didn’t exactly know where I’d left it. Then I remembered the train station. I figured it’d have a ticket lounging on the windshield. That people at work might notice, if any of them had noticed me at all.

So I walked. And it settled me down some, though it pumped me up, too. Woke me up. I thought I was okay by the time I got to her office. Though, really, I suppose I must’ve been kind of a mess. If I go by the look on Beth’s face, anyway. A look you’d call wary or guarded, or maybe simply confused.

I did my normal walkabout. She just waited it out. Neither of us talked and the silence finally sat me down.

“What happened?” she said. “What’s going on?”

I started badly. I said, “I’m sick, is all. My stomach’s upset and so I took the day off and fell asleep.”

“Come on,” she said. “Why are you making up stories?”

It was true I’d kind of forgotten who I was talking to. But at the same time I knew I had a reason for evading her. I couldn’t place it, though. I couldn’t remember back to the last time I saw her or what had gone on between us.

I stalled by not answering. Used simple silence. She leaned forward in her chair, rested her arms on her knees and clasped her hands. And when she spoke, she made her voice very soft. She said, “Please tell me what’s going on.”

When she talked to me like that, with that little catch in her voice, I could never defend myself. Before I knew it I was telling her. I was saying, “I got mixed up in something over the weekend and it stretched out. I couldn’t get home and I couldn’t get to work. And I guess I couldn’t get here either.”

“What, what did you get mixed up with?”

By now I’d recovered myself enough to see where I was headed. There was probation to worry about. And how much could I tell her without stretching her thin. I said, “Is what I say really between us?”

“It’s that bad?”

“No. Maybe it’s not as bad as all that.”

“I think you better tell me.”

“Who do you tell then?”

“No one. I don’t tell anyone.”

I considered this a moment. I don’t know if I believed her. What made me go on was realizing nothing had happened. I hadn’t sold any sex and while I’d done drugs, that wasn’t prohibited; well, that’s not what was spelled out in my release agreement. It wasn’t a condition. Drugs hadn’t even come up. It had been all about hooking. And so what could they get me on now? Intent to commit prostitution? I didn’t think so.

So I made up my mind just to go ahead and talk, but I still had trouble starting. I’d left out too many things along the way. Things I wished I’d said because it’d make this easier to explain and just plain shorter. I wanted to start from the beginning but as I searched back for that, my brain grogged out while my body sharpened.

The way I was sitting hurt all of a sudden so I uncrossed my legs. Before I knew it I was rubbing my thighs, trying to get the pins out. I stayed in the chair, though. I considered this an accomplishment. And eventually I stopped my hands, stopped them moving, but I couldn’t let go of my legs. It seemed if I did I wouldn’t know where I was.

Beth didn’t say anything about any of this. When I looked at her, she’d sunk back in her chair and was watching my hands. We both seemed to have lost any sense of time. I’m not sure she knew where to go anymore than I did.

I only knew not to make a run for the door, though I couldn’t say why. And my hands on my legs, instead of stopping the tingling they absorbed more and more of it until it travelled up my arms. I rolled up my sleeves, made small tight folds that stopped just above my elbows, thought this could tourniquet me off, keep my chest clear anyway.

“Why don’t you tell me,” she said finally, and it was a suggestion, not a question, so it seemed a way in.

I told her the events without filling in what went on behind them. I didn’t say I was looking for money, didn’t say much at all about Burt or Jeremy. I kept it to drugs, and a party that dragged out, and not having a ride home.

Beth said, “You know, you need to hang on to that job.”

“Yeah, I know,” I said.

She said, “No, really. It matters.”

I knew she was talking legalities but I also knew the probation was pretty short. That I’d be free of it in a matter of months. I didn’t care about keeping the job, not beyond the absolute minimum to be practical. But I saw what had happened by having left so much out, and so how could I blame her for choosing the wrong tack in all this?

Unless I gave her more to go on I knew she couldn’t help much. I crossed my arms and hugged my chest because despite all my efforts the quivering had found its way there.

“Are you cold?” she asked.

“No, not exactly.”

She leaned forward again, clasped her hands again. What she said was, “I think we need to talk about Ingrid.”

This I didn’t expect. I found myself clutching my chest even tighter until I let go altogether and instead tried to breathe. Breathing worked better.

She still sat that same way. She looked at her own hands now, not mine, and I thought I saw something sad, but shifty, going on in her eyes.

“Why Ingrid?” I asked.

“Because she’s where we keep stopping.”

Beth still watched her hands. What she said was the truth, but not all of it. What she wasn’t saying – that’s what made me tell her, and so my reasons weren’t much better than hers. I wanted to get her going, wanted to upset her so I started hard. “So, you want to know how we fucked, or maybe how much, or how about where?”

She acted as if I hadn’t put it this way. She said, “I want to know what you need to tell me.”

I said, “Well, I want to know what you need me to say. Or how about why?”

I stopped myself here. I could see what I was doing. The corner I’d backed into felt almost homey.

I needed to decide why I was stalling so badly on this. I mean, sure, I could put it on her and why she wanted to know. And her reasons not being stellar made this all the more tempting. But it still fit much too neatly with my need not to talk about this.