The Rules Of Attraction Part 2

'Don't smoke pot,' someone else says.

'Yabba Dabba Do,' Getch says.

////The feeling is neither icy nor hot. Yet there is still no inbetween. Just this bland pulse that fixates in my body at any given time of the day. I have decided to put notes in his box every day. I imagine him pinning these notes somewhere, perhaps pinned to a white wall in his room, a room I wish to live in. Are these devices sufficient? I ask myself, sickened, left punctured and cowering after I deliver these notes into his box, his pocketbed. My will is an ambulance on emergency call. But I often try to forget him (I have not met him, will not meet him until later, have not dared open my mouth to confront him, sometimes I want to scream, sometimes I think I am dying) and I try to forget this beating from my heart, but cannot and get sick. The s.p.a.ce I follow is black and arid. My obsession (I do not know if it can even be considered that, that word does not seem quite right) though futile or ridiculous to you takes the mystery from nothing. It is simple. I watch him. He reveals himself in dark contours. Everything I believe in floats away when I witness him, say, eating, or crossing the boundaries of a crowded room. I feel a scourge. I have his name written on a sheet of pale blue paper that is tissue thin, fallen poplars I've drawn surround the letters. Everything reminds me of his being: there is a dog that lives across the hall from me. Its owner registered it as a cat (canines are forbidden at this place) and took a fuzzy photo of it and it is small and white-violet and has gremlin ears. I fed it Bon Bons once. I take that person's actions as a hint and because of that I speak to no one. He is beautiful, though you might not think so. There is something circular about him, like moths fluttering in the clear Arizona night. And I know we will meet. It will come easy and soon. And my resentment - my terrified, futile resentment - will float away. I write another note after dinner. He must know it is me. I know his brand of cigarette. I saw him buy a Richard and Linda Thompson tape in town once. I was standing, looking through a bin I didn't care about, and he didn't notice me. I listened to them in high school. When Linda and Richard were still together. They broke up, like John and Exene, like Tina and Ike, Sid and Nancy, Chrissie and Ray. That will not happen to me. His name is a word on top of a page and it signifies a poem started, stated, started but unfinished since the typewriter will not type anymore. I kiss my hand and smell it and smell him, oh I pretend it is his scent. His. His. I don't dare go to his house or pa.s.s his room. I will walk by him and not even look. 1 will pa.s.s him in the dining hall with a nonchalance that shocks even me.//// PAUL. I tried to talk to Mitch.e.l.l at the party at End of the World tonight. He was standing by the keg filling a plastic cup. I already had a beer and was standing alone, where The Graveyard started. 1 poured the beer out and walked over to the keg. 'Hi, Mitch,' I said. It was cold and my breath steamed. 'What's going on?'

'Hi, Paul. Nothing much.' He was filling two cups. Couldn't the helpless b.i.t.c.h get her own f.u.c.king beer? 'What's going on with you?'

'Nothing. Can we talk?' I took the tap from him.

He stood there holding the two beers.

'What do you want to talk about?' he asked with that famous blank stare.

'Just about what's going on,' I said, concentrating on the beer and foam coming out of the tap. A girl came by and waited. 1 gave her a look but she wasn't looking at me, only at my hands, impatiently.

48.'I warned you, Paul. Remember that,' Mitch.e.l.l said. Yeah, I know,' I said and laughed quickly. My cup wasn't even half-full but I handed the girl the tap anyway. 'Wait, you warned me about what?' I asked. I could see Candice standing by the edge of End of the World, behind her and down, the Valley of Camden, lights in the town. I didn't understand how he could prefer that because Mitch.e.l.l was, admittedly, too good-looking for her. It was beyond my comprehension. I took a gulp of beer. 'I warned you.' He started walking. 'Wait.' I followed him. He stopped by one of the speakers. The Pretenders were coming loudly from them. A small group of people were dancing. He said something I couldn't hear. I knew what he was going to say, but I didn't think he had the nerve to say it. Had I been warned? Probably, but not in any verbal way. In the way he would recoil if I touched him in public or after he came. Or if I bought him a beer at The Pub and the way he would throw a fit and tell me that he'd pay for it and push a dollar across the table. How all he would talk about was wanting to go to Europe, take a term off, and then how he would always add, stress, alone. I had been warned and I hated to admit it to myself. But I followed him over to where Candice stood anyway. He gave her the beer. She looked so trashy or maybe she looked pretty and I was having a hard time accepting this. Mitch.e.l.l was wearing a T-shirt (was it one of mine? probably) and an Eddie Bauer sweater and he scratched at his neck nervously.

'You two know each other?' he asked.

Yeah, hi,' she smiled and he held her beer while she lit a cigarette.

'Hi,' I smiled, genial as ever. Then threw her a severe look when she wasn't looking, hoping that Mitch.e.l.l would catch it, but he didn't.

The three of us stood there at End of the World, past that came the slope that headed down toward the valley, and then the middle of Camden. It wasn't steep but if I was to push her, accidentally say, inconspicuously, over the knee-high stone protector, it would cause more than slight damage. The Pretenders turned into Simple Minds and I was grateful because I could not have stood there if there had been no music. Parties are, in their own right, perfect grounds for confrontation, but not this one. I had lost this one. I had probably lost it a long time ago, maybe even that last night in New York. Someone had strung dim yellow lights up and they illuminated Mitch.e.l.l's face, making it seem pasty, and washed-out. He was gone. The scene of us standing there was too real and too pointless. I wandered away.

SEAN The girl's name is Candice. I'm standing by the keg with Tony who's giving Getch a long speech on the 51.effects of drinking too much beer and I watch her and block Mitch Allen out of my line of vision. She's dressed too nicely for a Friday night party and out here on Commons lawn she looks cla.s.sy, really nice, maybe too conservative and uptight in that j.a.ppy sort of way, but also in a good, s.e.xy way, like you look at her and you know she'd be wild in bed or something. At any rate she looks too good for Mitch, who isn't really all that handsome as far as I can tell. He always reminded me of a high school dork who was trying too hard. I wonder if she really likes f.u.c.king him. Then I think maybe they're not even f.u.c.king. Maybe I can just go over there and start talking to her and maybe she'll accept my offer and tell Mitch that she'll see him later. And thinking about all this is killing me, almost. Down another beer and another j.a.p, Roxanne, comes over to the keg, and stands next to me. Then this girl is walking away from End of the World, following him. They can't be leaving, I'm thinking, it's too early. But they aren't leaving, they're just walking away from someone. Too early for what? I wonder to myself. They'll just go back to his room . eventually (she probably has a roommate) and she'll let him f.u.c.k her. I'm so h.o.r.n.y I'm not even excited, just weak. I look at Roxanne, who I owe lots of money to. She's wearing too much jewelry and looking okay. I wonder if she'll f.u.c.k me tonight. If there's even a slight possibility. She's smoking a joint and hands it to me. 'What's going on?' she asks.

'Drinking beer,' I explain.

'Is it good? Are you drinking a good beer?' she asks. 'Listen,' I tell her, getting to the point, 'Do you want to go back to my room?'

52.She laughs, drinks her beer, bats her thickly mascaraed eyelashes and asks me why.

'Old times?' I shrug. I hand her back the joint. 'Old times?' She laughs even harder. 'What's so funny? Jesus.'

'No, I don't, Sean,' she says. 'I have to pick up Rupert anyway.' She's still smiling.

The b.i.t.c.h. There's a bug, a moth in her beer. She doesn't see it. I don't say anything. 'Lend me a couple bucks,' I ask her. 'I don't have my purse with me,' she says. 'Right,' I say.

'Oh, Sean. You're still the same,' she says, not being mean, but it makes me want to hit her (no, f.u.c.k her, then hit her). 'I don't know if that's good or bad.'

I want her to drink that bug. Where did Candice go, d.a.m.nit? I look back at Roxanne, who's still got that G.o.dd.a.m.ned smile, thinking to herself, happy that I asked her, happier that she has the power to say no. I look at her and am genuinely repulsed.

'Do you have any morphine?' I ask her.

'Why?' she asks, spotting the bug, pouring the beer out onto the lawn.

'Take some. You look like you could use it,' I tell her, walking away.

'I have something for you to pick up, sweetheart,' is the last clear thing I hear.

My line was neither quick or effective and I cannot believe I actually saw that girl for a while. It was when she started dealing c.o.ke so she could lose weight. It had worked, sort of. I think she still has a fat a.s.s, and can look dumpy, and has dried-out black hair and writes awful poetry and I'm p.i.s.sed off that I let her get into that position of denying me. I go back to my room and slam the door a couple of times. Roommate's gone, snap on the radio. I pace. 'Wild Horses' comes on the local station. I flick the tuner. 'Let It Be' is on the next station. On the next is 'Ashes to Ashes/ then some Springsteen dirge, then Sting crooning 'Every Breath You Take/ and then when I turn it back to the local station, a.s.shole D. J. announces he's going to play all four sides of Pink Floyd's 'The Wall.' I don't know what comes over me but I pick the receiver up and hurl it against the closet door, but it doesn't break and I'm grateful even if it is a cheap stereo. I kick it, then grab a box of tapes, unwind one I don't like and smash it with my boot heel. Then I take a crate of singles I own and make sure I have them on tape before I snap them all into two, then, if possible, into four. I kick at the walls on roommate's side and then break a doork.n.o.b on the closet door. Then I go back to the party.

LAUREN Me and Judy. Stretching canvas. My studio. Judy just did her nails so she is not really, as one says, into it So we stop. Another Friday night. She brought two Beck's over and some pot. I like Judy. I do not like Mother. Mother called earlier. After dinner. It depressed me so completely that I could only walk around in a stupor and smoke cigarettes until I came down to the studio. My mother had nothing to say to me. My mother had no pressing information to pa.s.s on to me. My mother was watching movies on the VCR. My mother is crazy. I asked her about the magazine (she runs it), about my sister at R.I.S.D., about finally (big mistake) my father. She said she didn't hear me. I did not ask her again. Then she mentioned that Joana (father's new girlfriend) is only twenty-five. And since I didn't groan or throw up or try to kill myself, she said that if I approve of what he's doing why don't I just stay with him over Christmas. By that time the call had already degenerated so completely I told her that I had a cla.s.s to go to at midnight and hung up and went to the studio and looked at all the s.h.i.t, the completely s.h.i.tty s.h.i.t I'd been doing all term. I was supposed to be doing the posters for the Shepard play but the d.y.k.e who was directing it really bothers me, so maybe I'll give her one of these unfinished pieces of s.h.i.t. I cry out, 'It's all s.h.i.t! Judy look at this. It's s.h.i.t!'

'No, it's not.' But she's not looking. Tou're not looking. Oh G.o.d.' I open my second pack of the day and it's not even eleven. Last thing I have to worry about is lung or breast cancer. Thank G.o.d I'm not on the Pill.

'I'm changing majors/ I say. Look at what I've done. Jackson Pollock freed the line, remember that, someone told me in Advanced Painting yesterday. How can I free 55.this s.h.i.t? I wonder. I stand back from the unfinished canvas. I realize that I would rather spend my money on drugs than on art supplies. 'I'm changing my major. Are you listening?'

'Again?' Judy says, all concentration on rolling another joint. She laughs.

'Again? Did you have to say that?'

'Don't make me laugh or else I can't do this.'

'This is ridiculous,' I say.

'Let's go to the party.' Whining. Judy whining.

'Why? We have everything we need here. Warm beer. Music. And even better, no boys.'

I change the tape. We have been listening to Compilation Tape #2 we made Freshman year. Bad/Good memories come from it. Michael Jackson ('How many songs off "Thriller" can you name?' Victor asked me once. I lied and said only two. After that he said he loved me ... where was that? Wellfleet Drive-in, or were we walking down Commercial Street in Provincetown?), Prince (having s.e.x in the campus van parked outside a Friday night party with good-looking boy from Brown), Grandmaster Flash (we danced to 'The Message' so many times and we never tired). Tape depresses me. Pull it out. Put something else, Reggae Tape #6, in.

'When is Victor coming back?' Judy asks.

I can hear music coming from Commons and End of the World and it sounds tempting. Maybe we should go. Go to party. There was always the book of s.e.xual diseases with gruesome explicit photographs in them (some of the close-ups, pink, blue, purple, red blisters were beautiful in an abstract minimalist sort of way), which always works as a deterrent to a Friday night party. Victor would be a deterrent too. If he was here. We'd probably go to the party and have a good time. Flip through the book. Close-up of girl who was allergic to the plastic in her diaphragm. Yuck. Maybe we would have a good time. I picture poor handsome Victor in Rome or Paris, alone, hungry, somewhere, desperately trying to get in touch with me, maybe even screaming at some mean operator in broken Italian or Yiddish, near tears, trying to reach me. Gasp and lean up against the posts in the studio and then throw head back. Too dramatic.

'Who knows?' I hear, myself saying. 'What does this stuff remind you of?' I ask her, standing back. 'Degas? Seurat? Renoir?'

She looks at the canvas and says, 's...o...b.. Doo.' Okay, it's time for The Pub. Get a pitcher of Genny and if we haven't forgotten to cash a check, maybe some wine coolers to get drunk/sick on, then a pizza or bagel? Judy knows it. I know it. When the going gets tough, the tough go drinking.

So we go to The Pub. Someone has written in black letters Sensory Deprivation Tank on the door and I don't find it funny. Not many people are here because of the party. We get a pitcher and sit in the back. Listen to the jukebox. I think about Victor. A joint left unsmoked is in Judy's bag. And we have the same conversation that we always have on partyless Friday nights in The Pub. Conversations that only recently, now that I'm a Senior, am I tiring of.

57.J: What's the movie tonight?

Me: Apocalypse Now? or Dawn of the Dead, maybe. I. think.

J: No. Not again, G.o.d.

Me: So, who are you in love with?

J: Franklin.

Me: I thought you said he was a geek, a bore. Why?

J: There's no one else to like.

Me: You said he was a geek, though.

J: I really like his roommate.

Me: Who's that?

J: Michael.

Me: Why don't you go for Michael?

J: He's maybe gay.

Me: How do you know?

J: I slept with him. He told me he likes boys. I don't think it would work out. He wants to be a ballerina.

Me: If you can't be with the one you love, honey .. .

J: f.u.c.k their roommate instead.

Me: Are we going anywhere or not?

J: No, I don't think so. Not tonight.

Me: What's the movie tonight?

58.PAUL. I first met Sean when I was standing by the keg, watching Mitch.e.l.l and Candice leave. They walked past me and Mitch.e.l.l smiled good-night and waved half-heartedly. As did Candice, which I could take as either a kind, pity gesture or as a victorious, gleeful salute. (Victorious? Why? Mitch.e.l.l would never tell her about me.) I watched them walk away and started to refill my cup. I looked over and remember seeing Dennis Jenkins, this scrawny, ugly drama-f.a.g staring at me. (Dennis Jenkins was one of many reasons why I despised being a Drama major). I sighed and told myself that if I went to bed with him tonight I would kill myself in the morning. I finished filling the cup, which was mostly foam since the keg was running out, and when I looked up Sean Bateman was standing there, waiting. I had known Sean like everyone knows everyone else at this place, meaning we had probably never spoken to each other but knew of each other's cliques, and we had mutual acquaintances. He was handsome in a vague, straight way, always spilling beer and playing video games or pinball in The Pub, and 1 wasn't much interested, at first.

'Hi Sean,' I said. If I hadn't been more than slightly drunk I probably would have said nothing; nodded and walked away. I was fairly sure he was majoring in Mechanics.

'Hi, Paul,' he smiled, staring off.

He seemed nervous and I followed his gaze to the darkness of the college, back to the houses on campus. I don't remember, or know, why he was staring off like that. Maybe he was just nervous and too shy to talk to me. Behind him people were leaving End of the World and heading either back home or to The Graveyard.

'Do you know that girl with Mitch.e.l.l?' he asked, which I took as a lame conversation starter.

You mean Candice,' I said, gritting my teeth. 'Her name is Candice.'

Yeah. That's right,' he said.

'I was in a cla.s.s with her but I failed it,' I said, getting wistful.

'I was in that cla.s.s too. So did I,' he said, surprised.

In that instant, looking back, mutual rapport was established.

'I didn't ever see you in there,' I said, suspiciously.

'That's why I failed it,' he admitted; a sheepish smile.

'Oh,' I said, nodding.

'I can't believe you failed it,' he said.

I hadn't failed it. I had actually gotten an incomplete, which I finished over the summer. In fact it was an incredibly easy, undemanding cla.s.s (Ethnic Chamber Drama) and I was shocked anyone could fail it. whether you showed up or not. But Sean seemed impressed by this and I kept it up.

'Yeah, I failed two others,' I said, trying to gauge his reaction.

"You did?' His mouth, the lips were full and red, s.e.xy, maybe sensitive but not really, fell open.

Yeah.' I nodded.

'Boy, I'd never think that you'd fail anything,' he said, making it sound like a compliment.

You'd be surprised,' I said. The first outright flirting of the conversation. It comes easily at Friday night parties.

'My type of guy,' he laughed, self-deprecatingly. Then 60.he remembered that he came for the beer, or had he? He reached for the tap, but it was all gone.

I stood there, looking him over. He was wearing jeans and boots and a white T-shirt and a fairly tacky leather jacket with fur trim: the casual American boy look. And I was thinking it would be quite a coup to get this person into bed. Then I sighed and realized I was being so stoopid. The party was ending and I was getting depressed and the keg was sputtering, so I cleared my throat and said, 'Well, see you around.'

And then he said the strangest thing. The thing that started it all off. I wasn't that drunk to misunderstand and I was taken aback at such a bold proposition. I didn't ask him to repeat his invitation. I simply rephrased what he had asked me: You wanna get a quesadilla?

You want to go and get a quesadilla?' I asked. You want to go out to dinner tomorrow night? Mexican? Casa Miguel?'

And he was so shy, he looked down and said, Yeah, I guess.' He looked bewildered almost. He was hurt. I was touched. The Supremes were singing, 'When the Love Light Starts Shining Through His Eyes.' And even though it seemed like he wanted to go now, we arranged to meet tomorrow night at Casa Miguel in North Camden at seven.

SEAN The party is starting to end and I've had my eye on Candice the whole G.o.dd.a.m.n time. But the moment comes and she leaves with Mitch and I'm not as upset or surprised as I expected. I am also considerably loaded and that helps. The last people are hanging out, and the last people hanging out at these parties waiting to find someone to go home with always depress me. It reminds me of kids being picked last for teams in high school. It's weak. Really improves one's sense of self-worth. But I don't give a f.u.c.k in the end. I walk over to the keg and Paul Denton's standing by it and somehow the keg has run out and Tony's selling bottled beer for two bucks apiece over in his room and I don't want to spend the money and I'm not in any mood to snake it from the guy and I suspect that Denton's got some bucks so I ask him if he wants to go with me and get a case of beer and the guy is so drunk he asks me if I want to have dinner with him tomorrow and I guess I'm drunk too and I say sure even though I don't know why the f.u.c.k I'm saying that, confused as h.e.l.l. I walk away and end up going to bed with Deidre again which is sort of ... I don't know what it sort of is.

LAUREN Wake up. Sat.u.r.day morning. Tutorial on the postmodern condition. Believe it or not. At ten. In d.i.c.kinson. It's October already and we've only had one session. I doubt there's anyone else in the cla.s.s. I was the only one at the first meeting a month ago and Conroy was so drunk that he lost the rollsheet. Go up to brunch. Pa.s.s Commons lawn. People who've probably been up all night are clearing the debris away. Maybe they are still partying, still having a good time. Eternal End of the World Keg Party? The kegs are being rolled away. Sound equipment packed up. Lights being taken down. Should have gone. Maybe. Maybe not. Stop by Commons. Coffee. No mail from Victor. Walk up to d.i.c.kinson. And . . . guess what. Conroy's asleep on the couch in his office. Office reeks of marijuana. Marijuana pipe on desk next to bottle of Scotch. Sit at the desk, not surprised, unfazed and smoke a cigarette, watch Conroy sleep. Getting up? No, he's not. Put the cigarette out. Leave. Victor recommended this course to me.

62.SEAN I get up early, for a Sat.u.r.day, sometime after breakfast. I take a shower and kind of remember about this 63.tutorial I happen to be up in time for. I smoke a couple of cigarettes, watch the Frog sleep, pace. I can't believe I have a roommate whose name is Bertrand. I go up to Tishman because there's nothing else to do. Sat.u.r.days suck anyway and I've never been to this cla.s.s so it can't be all that boring. I get to Tishman but it's the wrong building. Then I remember that it might be in d.i.c.kinson but I go to the wrong room but then I find the right room even if it looks like the wrong room. It's the teacher's office and there is no one here. I'm not that late either, and I wonder if maybe they've changed rooms. If they have, then I'm dropping this cla.s.s, I'm not going to put up with that kind of bulls.h.i.t. The office smells like pot though, so I stick around in case someone comes back with more. I sit at the desk, look for signs of what this cla.s.s is all about. But I can't find any. So I go back to my room. The Frog is gone. Maybe I'll check out the AA meeting in Bingham, but it's not there and after hanging out in the living room, waiting, smoking, pacing, I go back to my room. Maybe I'll take a ride, go to Manchester. Sat.u.r.days suck.

I was in a cla.s.s yesterday (terminable, because of you) and I noticed Fergus's back (though if it had been your back I would have noticed it sooner) and 1 wrote to the person next to me (a person I had never seen or witnessed, a person who does not know and does not care about me, a person who would spread her legs for you - perhaps already has, everyone has, everyone has, to me-) that Fergus has a s.e.xy back and she wrote something down and it said "Yeah . .. But look at his face.' The simple dumb cruelty of it all! That stupid response made me want to cry out and I thought of you. I left another note in your box, yet another tepid warning of desires in my heart. You probably think that I am a babbling insane creature but I am not. I repeat, I am not. I only want You. There must be something you want from me. If only You knew. These notes I leave are hard to compose. I have refrained desperately from spraying them with my perfume -trying to grab at any of your senses: aural, oral, nasal, etc. After I deliver these notes into your box I clench my teeth and squeeze my eyes shut, my hands feel like terrible claws, a patient in an eternal dentist's chair. It takes courage though. An irritating and tugging courage. The touch of you, or my imagined touching, seems both repellent and oddly succulent. It stings. These feelings sting. My eyes are always ready for you. They want to grapple and lay you down in fluffy white sheets of linen, safe, in your arms, strong arms. I would take you to Arizona and have you meet my mother even. The seeds of love have taken hold and if we won't b.u.m together, I'll burn alone.

65.PAUL I didn't make it to Casa Miguel on that Sat.u.r.day night for that first date in early October. I was in my room getting dressed, so unsatisfied with what I was wearing that I had changed four times in the s.p.a.ce of thirty minutes. It was getting ridiculous and near seven and since I didn't have a car I was going to call a cab. I changed once more, turned off the Smiths tape and was on the verge of leaving when Raymond burst into my room. His face was white and he was panting and he told me, 'Harry tried to kill himself.'

I knew something like this was going to happen. I just had a feeling that there would be some obstacle, major or minor, that was going to prevent this evening from happening. I had a feeling all day that there would be something that would screw this night up. So I asked, 'What do you mean Harry tried to kill himself?' I stayed calm.

'You've got to come to Pels. He's there. Oh s.h.i.t. Jesus, Paul. We've got to do something.' I had never seen Raymond so keyed-up. He looked like he was going to cry and he gave this event (a Freshman suicide? oh, please) a dimension of unwarranted emotion.'Call Security,' I suggested.

'Security?' he yelled. 'Security? What in the h.e.l.l is Security going to do?' He reached for my arm and grabbed it.

Tell them a Freshman tried to kill himself,' I told him. 'Believe me, they'll be there within the hour.'

'What the h.e.l.l are you talking about?' he shrieked, still grabbing at me.

'Stop it,' I said. 'He'll be fine. I have an appointment at seven.'

66.'Will you please come on!' he screamed and pulled me out of the room.

I grabbed my scarf off the coatrack and managed to close my door before I followed him down the stairs and over to Fels. We walked down Harry's hallway and I started getting scared. I was nervous enough about the date with Sean (Sean Bateman - I had whispered the name to myself all day, chanting it almost, in the shower, in my bed, the pillow above my face, between my legs) and even more nervous that I was going to be late and ruin it. That put me in more of a panic than this alleged suicide: dumb Freshman Harry trying to off himself. How did he do it, I wondered, heading toward his door, Raymond making weird breathing noises next to me. Try to O.D. on Sudafed and wine coolers? What provoked him? C.D. player conk out on him? Did they cancel 'Miami Vice'?