Up Against the Wall

I am in desperate need of a new journal, but I haven't found the right one yet and I'm poor and so I will write something not quite as personal here.

This week, most notably the past two days, has been a complete and utter mess. So what's a girl to do?

She calls the boy of her affection 2348394827 times, texts him just as much and listens as his friends ask her where he is. Only, she doesn't know, well she has an idea, but not one that she likes, and so she sulks - attempting to go unnoticed, but that is impossible. So she calls some more and no one picks up. Then said boy's friend asks for a ride. She obliges. She drops him off. She can't go home because she's not supposed to be here, but because her plans fell through she's desperate for a couch to crash on. On her way to said couch some idiot hits her in Adam's Morgan, but she can't help thinking that if she had been with said boy she wouldn't have been there or even have dropped off his friend, because she would have been with him. And then when she didn't go knock on his door she ended up at 18 and T in an SUV's way. She's not blaming said boy at all, she's simply thinking of all the ways, reasons, why that night went wrong. And she comes up with this - his complete incapability for using a telephone properly, the fact that he was drunk...and she knows she's over analyzing everything, each detail to the umpteenth degree, but at this point she's leaning against her car in a frequented intersection flipping the bird to each prick that drives by yelling out their window - And so she calls Couch to come pick her because that motherfucking idiot of a Georgia Peach didn't have sense to learn how to drive properly in the District and so her car is not drivable. So the tow-truck comes, she writes down all sorts of information, and thankfully has all the contact information of the wonderful witness - who saw the whole thing, but wasn't being obnoxious about it like that other dude who kept bugging the cops to let him write down what he saw. The car is towed away and she is all shaky and quiet, and completely calm when most people's reaction would be to flip out. She didn't. She didn't even tell that Georgia Peach how stupid she is, because by God, that Peach is a fucking twat. So Girl texts Affection and is further upset, and gives up, but knows that if he weren't passed out in bed (two blocks away) he would hold her and let her get mascara all over his Thomas Cook shirt, that he most undoubtedly would be wearing. So Couch takes her home - their home anyway - and she attempts to fall asleep. unfortunately prior to the smooshsmash she had begun to get a knot in her stomach, the kind that develops as a result of combining hunger, stress, and the ever-present ability to appear forlorn. This doesn't come completely on purpose, but it's not an accident either. She's going out of her way to rethink, and hope, and pray, that this most surreal of evenings was just a nightmare that she'll wake up from in the morning, and he will make her toast, and hand her a glass of cranberry juice, and everything else he does that for some reason despite his idiocracy make sher smile. But that doesn't happen. She shits and crys, on and off for the next five hours. How is it that most people, when they get sick to their stomach, they expel their anxiety through their mouth and she through her ass? And eventually her eyes hurt to much to keep them open, but not enough to close, and she calls that insurance agent and tells the Nice Lady what a horrible evening she had. And that Nice Lady, notes the quivering of her voice and takes a pause and asks if she's okay. And of course they both know she isn't but she says yeah, I'm fine anyway. Couch is still asleep and Affection is not going to respond to her text because he has no idea where his phone is. Eventually Couch wakes up and they get breakfast, a slow, tasteless one served by newly immigrated Ethiopians. And then they drive around in search of the lot with her car in it hoping to have it towed to a garage, but that doesn't happen and won't until Monday. So they go back to Couch's house and she gets her stuff and is dropped off at the Metro, and her parents will come to pick her up in Springfield. But she doesn't go straight there, she gets off at Dupont and walks the four or five blocks uphill to Affection's building. The lady at the desk is unable to reach him to let her up, but lets her anyway because she recognizes her. And when she reaches his door, there's a long pause between the elevator doors closing and her knuckles beating the old door. He answers, uses the bathroom and then joins her on his couch. They don't touch. Or sit next to each other. The silence infiltrates the tired morning walls, until finally they speak. Very little is to be said. He knows exactly what he did, there is no need for her to explain what an arse he is, he knows, and he knows well. And she still wants to be the girl on his arm, if only one uninterrupted, one unshared night a week. They agree that she is not being unreasonable, but she can't stay, she has to get back to the train. And he offers to drive her instead. Do you want to? Yes. And so he does. And little is said, and they attempt to be cheery, it works, slightly. They are both still walking on wobbly legs, but with time will stand up and this will all be behind them. This is one of those "bigger" things that he had told her would come up. He knows it's much bigger than he had anticipated. And he's thinking of how stupid he is, and what if she hadn't been able to reach anyone? What if it had been more serious? They keep these thoughts to themselves. Do you love me? Yes. Really? Yes. And he drops her off. Now give me a kiss. (she turns her cheek) You know, I love you, you make me mad, but I love you. And with that she shuts the door and walks down the stairwell to where her parents are waiting. They don't know any of this, just that Couch doesn't live with girls and that people should be in bed early in the morning. And when she gets home, still shaken and not quite awake to reality, she changes out of the previous night's clothes and goes for a ride to clear her head, and she listens to this song on repeat. Somehow it suits perfectly, maybe a bit uncannily so.