Like it never was a thri.., p.3
Like It Never Was: A thriller, page 3
One that wants to eat me alive.
ELEVEN
It’s ten o’clock at night. I’m sitting on my kitchen counter, eating coffee ice cream out of the carton and catching up with Alice on a video call.
“Madness,” I say to my phone. “Sheer madness.”
“You had to carry a medieval tapestry on a fifteen-minute walk,” Alice says, as if she doesn’t believe me.
“In the rain,” I add. “Don’t forget that minor detail.”
If opposites do attract, that explains our friendship since high school, when we met at a music and arts conservatory held every summer. I was accepted as a budding actor, Alice as a gifted classical pianist. As soon as we were paired to paint each other’s portrait in an art class, we knew it was kismet. There was just a chemistry there, a friendly spark that made conversation pop like popcorn. To me, Alice is a human touchstone, a steady drumbeat in a world where I can barely hold a tune. To Alice, I’m a wild child, the zany, unpredictable character in her life that feeds her entertaining stories. She’s a general practitioner married to an accountant. Two roads don’t fork much more in the world than ours. Alice, a gift from the universe.
She squints at me. “Doesn’t this freaky woman you work for have a car?”
“Like me, this woman has no car.”
Alice yawns. “Not that you drive anyway.”
The way she says it is delivered with a little sting, like not that you have your life together anyway, but maybe it’s just me. She’s right. I don’t drive anymore. After high school I stopped, developed a fear of it.
I put the ice cream down and clear my throat. There’s something I want to say, a reason I called besides giving her the grand tour of my six hundred square feet, blank walls with nothing but my old Picasso reprint. I know she’s busy and tired and has a million things to do tomorrow. So I say it, even though the words burn on the way out.
“Speaking of cars, I saw something today,” I say. “The car. The car that … that …”
Alice waits, pokerfaced, not helping me out at all. She still looks just how she did in high school with her round face and big, expressive eyes. She even wears her hair the same—a sensible ponytail, every day.
“Remember?” I say. “That thing that happened I told you about, that I asked you not to tell anyone …?”
“The boots you shoplifted?”
“Not that. No.” Heat in my cheeks. “The other thing. From way back when.”
“Starting that trash fire?”
Yikes, she makes me sound awful. Am I that awful? Maybe I am. But anyone could sit down and write a CV of their wrongdoings and look like a horrid human being, right?
“No, the … the car crash thing.”
Alice’s eyes widen and her face gets graver. “Oh. That.”
She says it heavily, like it weighs on her too. Maybe it does. It’s a pretty vile secret to have to carry for years for your best friend. She’s the only human being in the world I’ve actually told about this. I confessed it to her a long time ago, maybe five or six years, and she was kind to me about it. Hugged me hard and told me it was an accident, I couldn’t have known it would go so wrong. But she did urge me to come clean about it and go to therapy. Unfortunately, I’m bad at following good advice.
“It’s not healthy to hold things like that inside, babes,” she said at the time, as she wiped my tears. “Cortisol wreaks havoc on the system.”
Since then, I haven’t wanted to talk about it again. Until now.
“Wait,” she asks. “The car? The actual car? Wasn’t it totaled?”
“I mean, it wasn’t the actual car. But it was one just like it.”
“And you still haven’t talked to someone about it?” she asks softly.
Talked to someone. She means a shrink. I would rather wrestle an alligator. “No, no.”
“Oh,” she says, with marked disappointment. In the background, her dog Sadie begins yipping. A chiweenie. Exactly as silly looking as it sounds. “Liam’s home.”
I interpret that as, hurry up and wrap up your trauma dump. Should I even say that? Is it my trauma if I caused someone else’s trauma? Shut up, brain.
“I just saw a car that reminded me of the whole thing. It’s stupid. Not a big deal.” I hop off the counter and go to my freezer, put the ice cream back inside.
“Maybe it was a sign to … you know … finally deal with the issue.”
“From the universe?” I ask, stopping in the middle of the kitchen.
“No,” she laughs. “Like, from yourself. The fact it upset you—” Her voice changes, gets higher and sweeter, and she turns her head. “Hi baby. Yeah, there’s still some of that sushi from last night, want to eat that? Oh come on, it’s fine.” Her voice drops back to normal as she turns to me. “Liam says hi.”
“Hi Liam. I’ll let you guys go. I know it’s late.”
She smiles. “It was great talking to you though, I like your place. When you get some furniture it’ll be even better.”
“Yeah, that would help, wouldn’t it?”
“And oh! I was thinking of coming out one of these weekends. Maybe I could visit, we could grab lunch?”
“I’d love that.”
“We’re not that far away now, it’s like two hours with traffic. I’m excited I might get to actually see you in person and confirm you exist in real life again.”
“Miss you.”
“You too. Hang in there.”
I wave and smile, but when the call drops, I drop my smile along with it. And I’m left alone in this apartment. Alice and Liam, having a lovely late-night dinner of leftovers and talking about their day. And here I am doing what? What am I doing?
“What do you want from me?” I ask the universe, with an edge of desperation. “What am I supposed to do with my life?”
But I get no response.
TWELVE
Telegraph Avenue is the heart of counterculture in Berkeley. The street strikes dead center into campus and is lined with funky shops and merchants selling tie-dye and handmade jewelry on the sidewalks. The musky smell of nag champa hangs in the air outside colorful record stores. Among the power-walking, backpacked college students there are mentally ill, homeless people sparing change and wandering up and down the sidewalks. Seeing people who have, by societal standards, “lost their minds” twists me up inside. It fascinates me and stokes fear in me at once because I understand them.
Poke my head into the shops. Browse a bookstore, debate if I could pull off a sarong (verdict: no girl, please don’t). People-watch, mesmerized by how young everybody seems. How confidently they carry themselves. When I was their age, I thought I knew everything. But growing up meant accepting I’m a fool. I don’t dwell too long, though. All nostalgia seems to bring for me is cringing and regret.
People’s Park—once a symbol of radical 1960s activism—is surrounded by police protecting the construction of student housing. The coffee shop where Allen Ginsburg wrote “Howl” is now a Japanese chain restaurant. I don’t know what I was expecting to find here, but this isn’t it.
There’s this restless undercurrent, as if there’s something I’m supposed to be doing, something more than working thirty hours a week and wandering around Berkeley to pass the time. Like the universe has a deeper mission for me here and I haven’t picked up the clues yet.
THIRTEEN
“You didn’t miss much. Ginsburg was an overrated, pedophilic gremlin,” Suzanne tells me as she watches me change the duvet cover on her bed.
Yes, apparently the job has morphed into part housework. The definition of “assistant” seems to be whatever Suzanne decides it is, day to day.
She sits on a chair in the corner of her bedroom, arms crossed and her many thin gold bracelets catching the sunlight. I’m not exactly sure why this task requires an audience, but I’ve quickly learned that Suzanne wants to watch my every move. I can’t tell if it’s because she’s lonely or she thinks I’m incompetent, but it helps the time pass and she’s interesting as hell so I can’t complain.
“Yeah, I read that on Wikipedia,” I tell her.
“Make sure you tie the wispy little strings in the corners.”
“I am.”
“And give it a proper fluff when you’re done.”
I fight the urge to say yes ma’am while I do as I’m told. I’m still wrestling that sinking feeling I got today, the letdown from visiting Telegraph Avenue. It reminds me of that summer in Seoul, that sticky regret that turned my stomach almost the moment I hopped off the plane. Something isn’t right.
“Daveed used to be the one who actualized the bed,” she says. “One of the only things that insufferable numbskull came in handy for.”
“Oh?”
I’ve been waiting for the backstory of her “expired” husband. She has a section of her living room that contains boxes of his things—she hisses the words when she says them. Strangely, she doesn’t seem ready to get rid of them. She says she may or may not need them for the memoir she may or may not write.
“Do you want children?” she asks.
She’s made a violent turn in the conversation, dodging the subject of Daveed yet again. I make a note to ask my dad about Suzanne’s deal later. He just told me vaguely she was “an interesting woman” with a “lotta spunk” and then reminded me of attorney-client privilege, which apparently supersedes father-daughter privilege.
“God no,” I say.
I mean, I’m a grown-up child, not an adult. I’d make a garbage mother.
“I’m also childless and proud,” she says, cocking her chin.
Won’t lie, it’s a little alarming how much I have in common with this woman.
“Do you have a significant other, love?” Suzanne asks, nodding approvingly at my duvet cover job and reaching a hand to me. I come to help her to her feet.
“No.”
Her eyes widen in blue surprise and she examines my face as if it’s changed in this new light. I note we’re exactly the same height. “None?”
“I mean, I date. I’ve just never found anyone that I care to share my life with to that degree.”
In my dating life, like the rest of my life, I’m also a dabbler as Suzanne would say. I’m on dating apps. I try people. Just last week I had coffee with a guy who wouldn’t stop talking about Pokemon, ogling my boobs the whole time; next. Then there was a woman I met up with at a bar. When I ordered a cosmo, she burst into tears and said her ex used to order the same thing; poor thing, goodbye. It’s for the best anyway as when I do find someone I vibe with, I either lose interest in a flash or I get kind of obsessed with them.
But know what? Over the years I’ve found I enjoy being alone. In fact, it’s not an unfortunate circumstance that’s happened to me, it’s a choice. This idea that people need to have another to complete them has always bewildered me. I have an excellent collection of vibrators. I’m good.
I don’t tell Suzanne this, of course.
“A wise woman beyond your years/ deserts of loneliness, oceans of tears,” Suzanne recites in a theatrical tone. “From one of my poems—December 2013 issue of Celestial Stanzas Online Literary Review.”
I nod, not knowing how to respond. I finally land on, “Nice.”
“Being alone is the bare-naked truth,” she says, brushing a piece of my hair out of my eyes. The motherly gesture of it is comforting somehow, even if her words are not. “We’re born alone and we die alone. Company is temporary.”
Well, damn. That’s some chilling nihilism right there. It’s official: I kind of love Suzanne. She’s unpredictable, yes. Sometimes she stares at me like she has x-ray vision and it gives me the willies. She recites her mediocre poetry aloud all too often. But there’s a depth and strangeness to her I find compelling.
You’re going to fuck this up, aren’t you, you little disaster? the horrible voice whispers in my ear. I can almost feel the tickling breath of it. You’re going to do something terrible and ruin it all.
I pretend I don’t hear it.
FOURTEEN
My improv class takes place at night in downtown Berkeley a few blocks from the subway station, wedged between a closed bagel shop and a packed Thai restaurant. Walking into the black box theater, beholding the rows of shadowy seats and the spotlights shining sunshine onto the stage—a smile spreads on my cheeks. I’ve never been to this theater before, but I’ve been to so many that look just like this. My high school theater, college theater, community theater. Home again.
It’s been at least three years since I did any real acting. This is my first improv class, an intro workshop. I survey the other dozen or so people who are here, offer friendly smiles to strangers. An elderly dude wearing a sweatshirt that says FUCK CAPITALISM. A middle-aged woman with poodle hair ready with a fresh notebook and pen—come on, lady. You don’t need to take notes in improv. A few hipsters in a row murmuring like they know each other. A handsome man with dark, messy hair and headphones on … too handsome. I don’t trust myself near him. Steer clear of that one. No college students here. Along with the hipster clique, I’m on the younger end of the spectrum.
The teacher comes in clapping, a bald man my dad’s age with too-much-espresso energy. He’s wearing a shirt with muppets on it and has a single dangling earring.
“Hello hello hello! All right all right all right!” he yells in a thick east coast accent—Brooklyn? Jersey? I can’t tell. He takes center stage and opens his arms. “Are we ready or are we ready? Ya ready? Ya pumped?”
The room murmurs a tepid response.
“What are you doing up there?” he asks, pointing to us. “You know what this is, don’t you? It’s an improv class, not a one-man play. Get your butt down here on the stage where it belongs!”
I don’t know about this guy. He reminds me of a sports coach and I’ve tried my hand at many things in life, but I’ve steered clear of sports. I leave my bag on the seat and join the rest of the class on stage. We sit in a circle, like a bunch of adults about to play duck duck goose. The teacher stands in the center, lording over us from the mush pot.
He introduces himself as Jerry Pinkerton and goes over his accolades: his degree in theater arts from NYU. His many classes he’s taught over the years. The off-Broadway plays he’s starred in and directed, some of them so far off Broadway they were actually in Newark. He proudly talks about the many times he was an extra on Law & Order. Listening to him, I’m reminded of how glad I am that I didn’t pursue acting as a career. Because this guy’s proud and that’s great for him, but me? I’d be dying inside if I had slaved away at acting as long as this man and all I got out of it was some extra work to brag about.
“Improv,” he says, pacing the stage. He delivers this with the passion of a monologue. “Imp-ah-rah-visation. Know what? I wish everyone in the world had to take this class. And not just because I’d be a billionaire.” A few giggles. “Because improv doesn’t just make you a better actor. It makes you a better person. It helps you learn to listen. To be here now. To focus on the positive. To be constructive. Supportive.”
He’s right. The whole concept of improv is beautiful. Someone does something in a scene and you accept it and build on it. You work with them. There’s no saying “no” in improv. I love that it’s a place that’s all about living in the moment, accepting one another, and pretending.
We do a quick round robin of names and stand up for our first game, which will be “yes, and.” Everyone’s going to play together in a circle here. I love this. I shake the delightful jitters out of my arms and we all build a story together, each adding a line on.
“The sky is blue.”
“Yes, and there’s an airplane flying in it.”
“Yes, and the airplane is crashing toward the earth.”
“Yes, and I see some parachuters jumping from it.”
“Yes, and one of the parachuters appears to be a horse.”
That was me. I get some chuckles, which makes me sparkle with joy. I’m bubbling. I’m happier than I’ve been in a long time. This is where I belong, this is what I’m supposed to be doing. Should I be an improv teacher? Is this my life’s purpose? Maybe that’s what the universe wants. I’m wondering what kind of experience I would need to be the next Jerry when the thud of a door slamming makes everyone stop their yes, and-ing and a woman walks in on clicky boots, hurrying from the shadows to the stage.
Assuming she’s arriving late, I don’t look too hard at her at first. But then she joins Jerry in the middle of the circle. She’s a bit breathless and wearing a white faux fur coat, dark blond hair parted in the middle. And then she turns her face, tucks her hair behind her ears, and I see the scars on her left cheek. Raised discolored wrinkles and tightened skin, an ear that seems to have been gnawed off. As if she can sense my staring, she whips her neck and looks straight at me. One of her eyes is bluer than the other.
My heart stops. My stomach does a horrid cartwheel.
It’s Elizabeth fucking Smith.
FIFTEEN
“Everyone, hey, listen up!” Jerry says, raising his hands. “This is my assistant, my protégé, the lovely and talented Liz Smith.” He turns to her with a smile and says, “We’ve done intros and ‘yes, and.’”
“Hi everyone!” Elizabeth waves. “Glad to be here. Let me tell y’all a little about myself …”
My ears ring and my gaze glazes over. I can’t hear her.
All I’m seeing is flames and all I’m smelling is smoke.
I haven’t seen Elizabeth since high school, since before the accident. The last time I saw her, her mouth was in an O in horror and then she was careening off the side of the road in her car. The scars on her face, the half-eaten ear—they’re all my fault. One of her legs isn’t real. One of her eyes isn’t real. I know this because I’ve looked her up on social media and followed closely the year after the accident when she posted about her recovery. And then guess what happened? I had a nervous breakdown and had to drop out of school. The guilt smothered me and I had to work hard, so hard, so very hard to get it out of my mind and move on. Stop looking her up, because it only made me writhe with guilt for what I did and irritation at her exclamation-pointy updates and then guilt that I dared to be irritated with her for exclamation-pointy updates after what I did.
