The First Entry

The morning we met I was abuzz with adrenaline and guilt from accidentally crushing the hind leg of one of the show cats I was supposed to be watching. Well, they weren’t show cats yet. They were technically still kittens, cute, dust-bin gray, with blue-tipped boots and tails. They were Russian, and very expensive. I was turning out to be a bad cat sitter.

I had spent the night at my apartment instead of the house with the cats, as my roommate had just confessed her undying love for me that afternoon, and I felt that this needed my complete attention. We talked through most of the night, drinking cheap Chilean wine straight out of the bottle. Her argument was that she was not just a Catholic school girl testing out the bubbly waters of lesbianism, but that she was truly, deeply, and profoundly in love with me. So much so that she was willing to put up with my rising alcoholism, my blatant disregard for her feelings, and my tendency to bring home strange men.

“But see, I love you,” she said, wiping the tears from her rosy cheeks and clasping the bottle of wine to her chest. Her recently shorn locks were still thick, rich and buttery. The blond highlights caught the flickering candlelight and gleamed.

“Mary. Listen to me. It will not work. I am so emotionally unavailable that the number for my heart is unlisted. I won’t even give it to myself.” This was the wine talking. I had a flair for bathos when drinking heavily, like any other college dropout just old enough to buy booze at the store, proudly flipping out my newly minted driver’s license and smirking at the clerk as he did the math.

“But…I…” and she dissolved into tears again, body wracked with real pain, not believing, like most people the first time they get their heart broken, that it could ever happen to them.

It didn’t matter to Mary that my brief forays into same-sex relationships had never included her. We had always been just friends. She was 18, just out of high school, and settling into her sexuality with her eyes wide and dewy, like the innocent forest creature she was. I was 21, and convinced that my three years of seniority made me infinitely more mature and wise. That was also mostly the wine talking.

“Listen,” I said putting my hand on her shoulder in a way that I hoped was supportive but not suggestive. “There’s a woman out there for you who will love you and treat you like you deserve to be treated. But I am not that woman. You’re so young, just a girl really,” and here I struck a pose, furrowing my brow in an attempt to convey that I knew what I was talking about. “And you aren’t ready for me, or anyone like me. I’ve got problems. Emotional baggage. I’m toxic, actually, now that I’m giving it real thought.” I took a slug of wine and coughed unattractively, hoping to drive home my point. Something I said had the desired effect on her, because she narrowed her eyes at me and lowered her head, face wet and flushed with anger.

“You sound just like a man,” she growled, her voice dangerously soft. I started to think that maybe drinking during this exchange had been a bad idea.

Mary stood up, wobbled on her new high heels, an affectation meant to impress me, I think, to make her seem sexy and more grown-up, and pitched forward. They were cute, really, the shoes. Shiny black with just a small two inch heel. Sort of clunky but expensive. She reached out with her arms to break her fall, but refused to let go of the wine bottle, which struck a potted plant to the right of me, baseball bat style, and dead leaves jumped ship and scattered all over the floor.

“Here, let me help you.” I tried to take her arm and prop her upright, but she recoiled and yelped.

“NO! Don’t touch me.” She smoothed her skirt with one hand and regained her composure. “In fact, I’d like to be alone.” She teetered again on her shoes, but stayed upright. She took a few steps out of what she considered to be my grasp and continued. “I’m sure there’s some guy you could stay with tonight.” It was supposed to be a dig, but I felt glamorous and adult when she spat it at me. Yes, there were actually a few men I could call.

Then I decided to remain in the spotlight for just a little bit longer, as emotionally damaged people are apt to do when they feel the glow of drama fading. I grabbed Mary’s arm and pulled her towards me, her eyes getting big, mascara running garishly down her cheeks, mouth open in surprise and what was probably shock, although at the time I thought she was being coy and disguising it as protest. I gripped her rigid neck with my other hand and kissed her, hard. Nose smashed against her face, I thought, “This looks sexier on TV than it feels in real life.”

She pushed me away using the wine bottle for extra leverage, the mouth of the green glass a small, toothless guard dog.

“Ow! What the hell did you do that for? That really hurt!” Obviously, she should have punched me in the stomach and then maybe spit on me when I fell to the floor.

“Just stay away from me.” She sounded defeated now, broken in some essential way, and I suppose she had no other way to sound. I had just broken her Christmas ornament heart and then tried to toy with whatever was left of her dignity by fucking with her head. Maybe I should have just punched her in the stomach. A good catfight would have simplified and truncated this whole mess. But this twisted little scene could go on for hours.

I turned towards my bedroom and wrestled with the doorknob. I could feel the quarter-sized mark on my ribs where Mary had nailed me with the bottle. It was going to bruise like a hickie. I deserved it.

I collapsed onto my bed and spun, in the merry-go-round style of drunks, into sleep.