Tiffany Scandal - Jigsaw Youth

So I did and left with a whopping $2.38 in tips after an eight-hour shift.

I was still getting messages from you a month later. An enthusiasm to connect that didn’t exist when we were still friends. It was unsettling. I just wanted you to go away.

Ira showed up to the diner with flowers, smiling huge. She handed them to me and said they were from you. I told her I didn’t want them. Ira asked me what was wrong. I told her I didn’t feel like talking about it, but I started crying the moment her hand touched my shoulder. My boss turned the corner, saw my eyes and told me to take the rest of the night off. He didn’t want my attitude scaring customers away. My friend and I looked around the restaurant. Its beige walls, the stained linoleum, fake plants, and turd-brown tables. Apart from us the roaches, the diner hadn’t seen any action all day. I grabbed my things and left.

“Wow, what an asshole,” Ira said.

She hooked her hand into the nook of my arm and led me away from the building.

She took me out for a coffee and told me to spill. By this point, she’d known me for years and didn’t like knowing that something was up.

I told her everything.

When I was done, she was staring with her mouth open. I suddenly felt ashamed.

“Did he wear a condom?”

I wasn’t sure. Everything happened quickly. .

The question dug its claws in, began immediately fucking with me.

“Let’s go to planned parenthood tomorrow. I’ll be with you.”

I was speechless.

Ira held my hand while we waited. I was growing anxious, and wanted to bolt when they called my name. But the doctor was patient. I filled out a form and she ran tests.

What else:

I wasn’t pregnant.

I never got a call with the results.

I never heard from you again.

My anxiety has subsided some, though I still get fits.

It wasn’t until after the stuff with the band materialized years later that I saw you again. I’d been on tour. Traced the highways across several states in a van with women who got me. Getting away felt right. I gained some perspective. There’s nothing better than being in a touring band no one’s heard of — you get to live it, but no one bothers you.

But home is home and I was ready to get back to Portland.

We passed you crossing Burnside as the sun was coming down. Ira was sleeping.

I’m not even sure it was you. But I think so.

You looked the same. Actually, more ridiculous. You’d gotten highlights to mask your thinning hair. I noticed the younger woman at your side, someone different, and she looked excited to be there. Now that the mask was off, it was hard for me to ever see how I’d been fooled by it. I wanted them to stop the van. But I was tired. I didn’t really feel like confronting you, like that fire was settling or had moved on.

Whatever the fuck that means.

This place is a total dive, and I love it. Two large windows hugging the front corner of the building, the view of the side street obscured by neon beer signs. Torn up black and white checkered linoleum bleeding into black, beer-soaked particle board subfloor. A place half-finished or half-destroyed, it’s hard to tell which. And they keep it dark inside.

It isn’t just a bar, it’s also one of the few places you can catch a live show that doesn’t involve a twenty-something manipulating samples through a laptop. It’s dirty, raw, one hell of a venue for punk bands.

Tampons On Fire, an all-female punk group from Eugene are slated to play tonight. Angry grrrl music that you can really mosh to.

The venue is far from packed. You’ve got regulars camped out at the bar, a couple that looks like they’re on some first-ish date, and a handful of people dressed in black, decked out in studs and boots. I’m in that last group.

The stage is in the corner of the bar opposite the large windows. And it’s not much of a stage, only a foot off the ground, and still its original ugly birch color. I’ve always wondered how sturdy that thing is, because there’s always some serious bounce from people just walking across it. I always imagine the stage caving in when someone jumps with their instrument.

During the sound check, my palms start to sweat. I’ve seen this band a handful of times. Because they’re one of my favorites, I still turn into a mega fan-girl when I get to see them play. Then the lights dim and the excitement starts all over.

When the band comes out, it’s to the opening chords of “Eat Shit and Die.” I fucking love this song.

Behind me, someone says, “Shit, there’s a show?” I feel them bump into me. An entire group walks past me, to stand at the front of the stage. The men are wearing polos, collars popped. Women barely anything at all.

One of the men, in pastel green, tells another, “This band sucks.”

His friend, in pastel blue shouts at the stage, “Hey! Hey, you suck!” and laughs.

They high five. One of the women laughs with them. I can’t really tell the women apart, they’ve got the same spray-tan, black dress combo going.

“Learn to play some real music!”

“Where’s Iggy Azalea?” one of the women chimes in.

More high-fives and laughter.

“I’d rather eat my own dick than keep listening to this shit.”

“Yeah!”

Despite what they’re saying, they’re not really making an effort to leave. And I’m getting pissed.

Oddly enough, I’m remembering this dream I had. In it, I’m here, but there’s no show going on. Everything looks the same, but it’s more packed, almost entirely people in pink polos and shiny black dresses. I’m trying to weave through the crowd. I don’t know where I’m going. I just feel the need to keep moving. For some reason, there’s a table in the middle of the crowd, where you’d normally see a pit forming. At the table, Henry Rollins is there. But it’s not old man spoken word celebrity Rollins, it’s early-eighties long-hair poet hardcore Rollins, looking grim as hell. He’s staring right at me. He motions for me to come over to the table. I have to fight through a sea of shoulders and chests. But before I get to the only other chair at the table, someone bumps past me and sits in it. Rollins shrugs and takes out a piece of paper and starts reading what I think is a poem, though I never quite hear the words. I pull on the collar of the guy’s pink shirt and drag him to the ground, chair and all. His drink, what’s safe to say is very probably a vodka-energy something, is still sitting on the table, so I grab it and chuck it at his face. Next thing I know, I’m outside, running from the place, and a hand grabs my arm. It’s him, it’s Henry Rollins. Only he’s got a shaved head, he’s wearing the smallest pair of shorts I’ve ever seen. Same stone-faced expression. I don’t remember how the rest of it goes, maybe we hooked up, maybe we rode off on a giant fucking unicorn. I don’t know. But I remember that he seemed to care.

Anyway, the night before’s prophecy aside, I look at the people around me. Everyone’s annoyed. I think of the table in the center of the crowd. The girl beside me says, “Let’s start a pit.” I shove her, gently. She shoves back. Someone else shoves me forward, into one of the men, and he bumps into one of the women. I don’t look up, I just keep pushing back, keep moving. It’s so fun we start laughing.

More people join us and we catch them in the center of the revolt. One of the women screams and trips on her heels. I have to hand it to the guy that tries to help her up and takes a stray elbow to the mouth, falling over on her. It takes them a few tries to escape. I watch them leave, and swear to fuck, I see pepper-haired, black-shirted Rollins at the entrance. Like he’s been there the whole time. I turn back to the stage and the band is killing it. Everyone is getting into their set. Back at the doorway, he’s gone. Empty space.