Guyaholic (9 page)

I glance at Brockport in my rearview mirror. I can’t help but think about the day I arrived here. It was late afternoon, the middle of January, and the landscape was so barren. As my plane descended into Rochester, I stared at the graying snowdrifts and gnawed my nails and pictured Aimee frolicking on a tropical beach with some twenty-two-year-old surfer, downing piña coladas decorated with colorful paper umbrellas.

I could already tell it was going to be cold down there. Of course, I was only wearing jeans and a tank top because Aimee and I got into an argument on the cab ride to the San Diego Airport, where I was flying east and she was flying south. As I was checking in, I was so angry, I forgot to pull a sweatshirt out of my duffel bag. The flight attendants were bitches and wouldn’t give me a blanket and I was hungry because they didn’t have meal service and I forgot to bring anything to eat and the movie sucked and the guy next to me wouldn’t stop humming and I scrounged up a pen, but I didn’t have any paper, so I scrawled
fuck
onto all my fingers and
everyone
down my thumb.

I can still remember that fight with Aimee practically word for word. It started by me saying how she’d dragged me everywhere for sixteen years, so why dump me with my grandparents now? She kept insisting that the schools weren’t great where she was going, as if she’d given a damn about my education before. She even ventured to say that this was best for all of us.

“Best?” I asked. “So you can have all the sex you want without worrying about anyone else?”

The cabdriver whistled under his breath.

“Watch yourself,” Aimee hissed.

From there it lapsed into how I couldn’t believe she’d cheated on Michael and I hadn’t even gotten a chance to say good-bye to him and why couldn’t we wait until he got back from that movie set in Vancouver? Also, whenever I asked Aimee how Michael had reacted when she told him, she just said, “I don’t want to talk about it,” which only made me madder because after all she’d put me through, at least I deserved more information.

I’m slowing at the train tracks in Bergen when it suddenly hits me.
I cheated on Sam just like Aimee cheated on Michael!
It’s not like Sam and I were living together, and it’s not like I ran off to Costa Rica with Amos — thank God — but it’s not altogether different, either.

I’ve always imagined I’m the opposite of my mom, the way she moves in with her boyfriends and I prefer to keep my distance, but maybe I’m more like her than I thought. Or maybe Aimee had her reasons for leaving Michael and didn’t want to burden me with them, and I basically told her she was a horrible person when I never stopped to think about it from her perspective, and maybe if I hadn’t been so harsh, she would have taken me to Costa Rica with her.

I’m on the verge of feeling like complete crap when I tell myself,
Stop.
The Aimee-Michael thing was a year and a half ago. Now it’s warm and breezy, and the early-evening sky is a perfect blue. There are wildflowers all over the roadside. My hair is in a loose ponytail. I’m blasting music, and the best part is that I spent an hour last night selecting 732 songs that won’t remind me of Sam. I have a full tank of gas, a stash of snacks, and in less than a week, I’ll be with Aimee in Texas and everything, or at least most things, will be better.

I was supposed to get on the thruway a few miles after Bergen, but as I approach the entrance, there’s a blockade and a police officer is using her megaphone to wave cars along.

I slow down and lean out my window. “What’s going on?”

“Accident on the thruway!” she calls through her megaphone. “Take Twenty instead!”

“Twenty?” I ask. I know I’m stalling traffic, but I can’t reach my atlas in the back and I haven’t exactly memorized the highway systems of western New York.

“Where’re you headed?” the police officer asks.

“Texas,” I say. When she gives me a funny look, I quickly add, “I’m going west.”

“Stay south until you hit Twenty. Of course, that’d bring you near Darien Lake and it’s gridlocked today, some big concert. So you could take Twenty A, or if you wanted to make better time, stay on Nineteen until you hit Eighty-six in the Southern Tier. Then again, Nineteen is slow, so you should probably do Three-ninety South for a while until —”

The silver pickup truck behind me starts honking, so the police officer lifts her megaphone again.

“Keep moving!” she shouts. Then she waves her arms in the direction of the entire southwestern United States. “Good luck!”

As I continue past the thruway ramp, I’m totally confused. Nineteen to 20? Nineteen to 20 A? Nineteen to the Southern Tier? I should pull over and glance at my map, except the silver pickup is on my butt and, judging by the driver’s splotchy face in my rearview, I’m guessing he’s skipped his anger-management class today. I gesture for him to pass, but he honks twice and sticks his middle finger out the window.

Oh, my God,
I think, glancing at his thick plastic serial-killer glasses.
He’s an escaped convict.
I know there’s a federal prison around here, Attica or something. Just my luck. He tunneled out of his cell, hoisted a truck, and after twenty years in solitary confinement, I’m the first person to piss him off.

I press hard on the gas. I drive through Le Roy, past 20, past 20 A. I think the police officer said 86 is the fastest route, so I figure I’ll look for that, maybe swing onto 390 on the way down. As I’m driving, I’m listening to music and watching the road and trying not to think about the pickup truck behind me. Finally, the escaped convict switches on his signal, flips me one more bird, and turns onto a smaller road.

I’m relieved to have dodged a violent bludgeoning, but then, up on the left, I spot a sign that says
SWAIN MOUNTAIN
with a little picture of a downhill skier.

Oh, no.
Total Sam flashback.

In early April, about a month after Sam and I started hanging out, he invited me to come to Swain with him and Luca. It was the last weekend the lifts were running, and even though the snow was slushy, he convinced me it was going to be great. Sam and Luca brought their snowboards. I’d never been on a slope before, so Sam suggested I rent skis instead because they’re easier for stopping. I remember thinking how my father was supposedly this champion downhill skier, so maybe I inherited some skills from him.

I totally didn’t. As Luca hopped on the lift to the black diamonds, Sam led me to a bunny hill and showed me how to snap my boots into my bindings and explained about snowplowing and told me how, if I felt out of control, I should sit down. He held onto my hips as I inched sideways up the incline, but then as soon as he let go, I toppled over, twisted my knee, and smacked my head on the ice.

“I suck,” I moaned.

“It’s okay,” Sam said, wiping the snow off my cheek with his gloved hand. “It happens to everyone.”

After my fifteenth nosedive, Sam conceded that it seemed to be happening more to me than most people.

“Why don’t we take a break?” he asked. “We can try again later.”

I urged Sam to find Luca and do some snowboarding, but he insisted on coming into the lodge and buying us hot chocolates and nachos. We found a table off to one side, and we were being all cuddly, kissing and feeding each other cheese-drenched chips. As I stood up and clomped toward the bathroom, Sam took my picture with his phone. “To commemorate your illustrious stint as a skier,” he said, laughing.

“Ha,” I said.

I went to the bathroom and then bought some water. As I was clomping back to the table, I noticed that Luca had joined Sam. Their backs were to me, but I could see they were looking at the picture on Sam’s phone.

“. . . but it still sucks about today,” I heard Luca say.

“I don’t mind,” Sam said. “I mean, she’s worth it.”

“Flaws and all?” Luca asked.

“I like the flaws best,” Sam said. “They make her real.”

I remember standing there in my damp jeans and those heavy ski boots, thinking how that was the nicest thing anyone had ever said about me.

Okay, I’ll admit it, I don’t know where the hell I am. It’s getting dark and I’m surrounded by hulking hills and I know I had everyone convinced I’m this experienced driver, but the truth is that when I went to Syracuse for a show last December, I smoked too much weed in the parking lot and this other kid had to drive my car home.

Plus, I just saw this warning sign about black bears, so every time I spot a tree, I think it’s an animal and I swerve into oncoming traffic. Luckily, there’s no oncoming traffic. That’s the upside of wandering this web of unmarked roads with barely any shoulder to pull onto and look at my map. Even if I did, I’m so lost, I’d have no idea where to begin. Also, there’s the black-bear factor. It’s not like
they
have signs saying,
PLEASE DON’T ATTACK THE PEOPLE
.

I think I got lost somewhere near Swain. I was distracted thinking about Sam and took a left instead of going straight and then —

Shit!

I see what appears to be a bear on the side of the road and jerk the wheel, but this time there’s a pair of headlights coming toward me. The other car honks, swerves hard onto the gravel, and then continues by. I keep driving, too, but my heart is racing and I’m biting so hard on my lower lip, I think I can taste blood.

I pull out my phone to call Aimee or Mara or even the twins, just to hear a familiar voice. Of course, there’s no cell-phone reception, which means if I get mutilated by a bear, I can’t even dial for help.

I see a motel coming up, so I slow down a little. There aren’t any cars out front, but I notice a faint light at the far end, near a sign labeled office. I steer into the parking lot, scan for bears, and then hurry through the door.

I step inside a small room that reeks of stale cigars. It’s covered floor to ceiling in dusty bundles of newspapers, and there’s an ancient guy hunched over a scratched desk, so motionless that for a second I wonder if he’s dead. But then he pushes his glasses down his fleshy nose and growls, “Whaddya want?”

I chew on my thumbnail. “Uhhh . . . a room?”

He scrounges around in a drawer, tosses me a rusty key, and barks, “Room seven.”

Then he shoves his glasses up on his nose and goes back to his newspaper.

“Don’t you want me to pay?” I ask.

“You planning to run off?”

“No.”

“Well, then.”

“Can I ask you . . .” I pause. “Could you tell me where we are? I got a little lost on my way to Buffalo.”

“From where?”

“Brockport.”

He stares up at me, his eyes milky with cataracts, and then launches into this phlegmy laugh. “Honey, you’re in Steuben County.”

“Where?”

“Southern Tier, near the Pennsylvania border,” he says. “You sure did get lost.”

I rush down the dark walkway until I reach a door labeled
7.
I fit the key into the lock, turn the knob, and reach for a switch.

Nothing.

I hesitate for a second before fumbling along the wall until I get to the bathroom, where I find a functioning light.

I turn and look around. There’s a lopsided bed, a wobbly nightstand, and a small table sagging under the weight of the television. I attempt to turn on the lamp next to the bed, but it doesn’t work. I hurry over and close the front door. As I’m rotating the lock, I can’t help but notice that it’s just a dinky sliver of metal, easily kick-through-able, if someone were so inclined.

I sit on the edge of the bed. It’s so quiet my ears are ringing. As I run my palms over my knees, I suddenly remember that, oh yeah, I hate being alone. No, I don’t just hate it. It freaks me out. My brain starts racing fast while the rest of my body is moving in slow motion. It’s scary, almost like I can’t control my thoughts.

I cross the dark room and press the power button on the television. Of course, it doesn’t work, so I dig in my bag for my headphones, but then I remember that I left my iPod in the car. I check my phone one more time. Still no reception. My breath is coming in short, panicky gasps. I collapse on the bedspread, press my hands over my eyes, and wish for all of this to be over.

I have to pee all night, but I’m refusing to walk to the bathroom because I keep hearing little mice toenails scurrying around the floor. And that’s not the worst part. Neither is this sorrowful moaning coming from outside my door. It started around midnight and has been going constantly for hours. And that’s not even the worst part. Neither is the fact that I’m die-of-frostbite cold. Of course, I’m only wearing a tank top and a skirt, but there’s no way in hell I’m going to my car to get warm clothes and there’s less of a way in hell I’m pulling back this bedspread and crawling into the mouse droppings that are most likely lurking underneath.

The worst part is that I’m completely alone.

All night I feel like I’m hovering outside my body. I’m looking down and watching myself lying there, my hair splayed on the pillow, my hands over my eyes, and I keep thinking,
This is why I chase guys. This is why I do the plays. This is why I go to parties.
Because then I never have to be in a situation like this, crumpled on a motel bed with nothing but my pathetic self to keep me company.