Pink Slip Party (26 page)

“Hey, dude, calm down,” Ron says.

“HEY!” comes a loud voice from above our heads. It’s Landlord Bob.

“WHAT ZOO DOING DOWN THERE?” he shouts.

“Celebrating, dude,” Ron yells back. “Want a cold one?” Ron attempts to offer Landlord Bob a beer across two stories.

Landlord Bob considers this a moment.

“BE RIGHT DOWNZ,” he says, tightening the belt of his pink terrycloth robe.

Great. Perfect. Just what I need.

“See, Jane? All you have to do is be NICE to people and they really respond,” Ron says. “No need for all the hostility all the time.”

“I AM NOT HOSTILE,” I shout.

“Dude, you SO need to get wasted,” Joe tells me.

“I’m going to call the cops,” I threaten, but even I don’t believe me.

“Jane, maybe you should go lie down,” Ron says, putting his arm around my shoulder. I bat it away.

“Ron’s the one with the broken heart, here,” Russ says. “Maybe you should show him a little sympathy.”

“Yeah, this is a record launch slash who-needs-that-bitch-anyway party,” Joe clarifies.

“Hey, don’t talk about Missy like that,” Ron says.

“I don’t care what kind of party it is, you can’t have it,” I say, resolute.

“Didn’t I tell you she still had the hots for me?” Ron asks Russ and Joe. They nod knowingly.

“I do NOT,” I say.

“Jane, it’s so obvious how jealous you were of Missy, and now that she’s gone you think you’re going to make the moves on me. But, look, it’s OVER, OK? I just am not attracted to you,” Ron says, patting my shoulder sympathetically. “It’s time you move on.”

“I have moved on,” I say, helplessly. “You’re the one who keeps coming around here. You’re the one who moved in.”

“I moved in for Missy,” he says.

“I am not still attracted to you,” I protest.

“Whatever you say, babe.
Whatever
you say.”

Disgusted, I go back inside.

Landlord Bob, who knows better than to come down his own rickety fire escape, has entered through my front door, which is wide open. He’s got a beer in one hand already.

“Count that toward back rent,” I tell him.

“OH, ZIS REMINDS ME,” he says, digging around in the front pocket of his bathrobe. He pulls out a crumpled piece of paper and hands it to me.

“What’s this?” I ask, taking it by the thumb and forefinger. Anything that has touched Landlord Bob’s bathrobe is contaminated.

“EVICTION NOTICE, YES?” he says. “ZOO OUT OF ZHERE.”

“What did you lose on this time? The Bulls?” I ask.

Landlord Bob shrugs. “DOG RACING,” he says.

“Great. Just great,” I say.

“HEY, MY DOGGIE, HE ALMOST WON.”

“This is not fair,” I say.

“JANEZ, MY COUSIN, HE PAY TWO MONTHS’ RENT IN ADVANCE FOR YOUR NICE APARTMENT. IN A WEEK, I CHANGE LOCKS, YES? UNLESS YOU CAN OFFER ME MORE, EH?”

“Bob, I’m not going to get in a bidding war with your cousin,” I spit. I can tell it’s going to be pointless arguing with him. He holds up his beer as if toasting my eviction and takes a deep gulp.

Somehow, above the din of the music, I hear the phone ringing. I manage to unearth the receiver under piles of used cocktail napkins and answer it.

It’s Mom.

“I just wanted to see if you were OK,” Mom says.

“Mom, of course I’m all right, but where are you?” I squeeze myself into a hall closet to get some quiet to hear.

“Never mind that now. I’m fine.”

“Mom, Dad’s really worried about you and he really feels badly about what happened,” I say, even though he never actually voiced either of these sentiments.

“Jane, your father and I haven’t been right for awhile,” Mom tells me.

“Mom…” I start.

“And I just need some time to think about things,” she says.

“Mom, I think maybe you should talk to Dad.”

“I will, soon, I promise,” Mom says.

Someone crashes into the closet door, and I can’t quite hear what Mom says next.

“What’s that?” I shout into the receiver, but all I hear is the dial tone.

A bit dazed, I open the closet door.

Can more go wrong?

I look up and see that Ganesha is wearing one of my scarves around her head. A quick glance around the throng of dancers and I see more articles of my clothing dotted throughout the crowd. I go into my room, where there’s a half-clad couple exchanging bodily fluids on my unmade bed.

“You!” I shout. “You both, out!”

They don’t even stop their tongue-kissing to look at me.

My room is a disaster area. My closet’s been pilfered, and my clothes are on the floor, tossed haphazardly over the closet door, spread out under the couple humping on my bed.

I am trying to get my favorite pair of jeans out from under them when I hear a pounding on the door that’s loud enough to be heard above the din of techno bass. I push through the crowd to my front door and there’s a uniformed officer on my porch.

I nearly faint.

I expect him to whip out a warrant for my arrest on felony burglary charges.

Instead he says, “We’ve had a noise complaint, ma’am,” resting his hands on his utility belt, inches from a very large gun. I am sure it is Mrs. Slatter who complained. Now that she’s back from Vegas, I’m sure she’s been calling the police every hour on the hour, given the number of people in my apartment.

A quick look behind me and I take in the scene as he sees it: loud, thumping music that is shaking the walls. An apartment jammed full of drunk, disorderly groupies smoking pot. Bob in his pink bathrobe. Vishnu, who looks like she’s in the process of removing her shirt.

“Can I speak to a Jane McGregor? The person who lives here?” he asks me.

“Er,” I pause. Now would be a good time to lie. “I don’t know her.”

“Jane!” shouts Ron from the back of the room. “Jane McGregor! I’ve got something that will cheer you up.”

I ignore him.

The officer looks at me.

“Jane!” he cries again. “JAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANE.”

He’s staring right at me. So is the officer.

“You don’t know her?” the officer asks me skeptically.

“Er,” I say.

Ron, who is coming closer, is doing a few wild, gyrating spin-moves to the dance music.

“Right, well, I’ll turn it down, officer,” I say.

“Turn it down now,” he says.

“I will,” I say, watching Ron making progress toward me.

“Now,” he says.

“OK.”

“ ‘Now’ means I’m not leaving until the music is turned down,” he says.

Ron is almost to me. He does one last spin-move, during which his curled up flip-flops get trapped in the giant cuffs of his oversized pants. Flailing, he wildly flaps his arms, looking like some scrawny, plucked bird trying to take flight. I see him coming in slow motion, his long, wirelike body a tangle of limbs headed for me. He collides into me, sending me into the officer, and the impact of the collisions shoots a small baggie of white pills into the air, which I see explode over our heads as we tumble into the hallway.

We land in a heap on the floor, and a small shower of white E pills rains down upon our heads.

The officer sighs loudly, before struggling to his feet.

“I really wish you hadn’t done that,” he says, dusting off small white pills from the front of his uniform. He grabs me by the arm and lifts me to my feet. Ron, who is notorious for getting out of tight spots, points to me.

“Those aren’t mine, officer. They’re hers,” he says, beating me to the punch by about half a second. I would be quicker, except the fall knocks the wind out of me.

“Would you believe they’re aspirin?” I cough, lamely.

The officer is examining one of the pills.

“Aspirin, right,” he says, taking me by the arm. “Let’s go.”

“Go? Where?”

“I’m going to have to take you both in,” the officer tells me. “Don’t try anything funny, all right?”

I can’t think of a single, solitary joke, anyway.

IN THE CIRCUIT COURT OF COOK COUNTY, ILLINOIS
MUNICIPAL DEPARTMENT

SUMMONS FOR TRIAL

The plaintiff(s) named above has filed a complaint in this court to have you evicted. A true and complete copy of this complaint is attached.

THEREFORE, you, the defendant(s) is/are hereby summoned to appear in person before this Court on
May 30, 2002 at 9:30
A.M.
,
at which time and place a trial will occur.

Signed:

DOROTHY BROWN
CLERK OF THE CIRCUIT COURT, COOK COUNTY, ILLINOIS

IMPORTANT INFORMATION FOR DEFENDANTS:

ON THE DATE AND AT THE TIME SHOWN ABOVE, THE COURT WILL DECIDE WHETHER YOU WILL HAVE TO MOVE OR WHETHER YOU CAN CONTINUE TO STAY. YOU MUST BE ON TIME FOR COURT. HAVING TO GO TO WORK, BEING ILL, OR DOING SOMETHING ELSE DOES NOT MEAN YOU CAN MISS YOUR COURT DATE. IF YOU DO NOT COME TO COURT, THE COURT MAY ORDER YOU TO MOVE WITHIN A PERIOD OF NO MORE THAN TEN BUSINESS DAYS.

19

R
on and I don’t speak as we sit side by side in the back of the squad car.

Ron attempts a conversation with a “Dude, this sucks,” but I ignore him. I am so angry at him, I could spit.

At the county jail, which looks less like a jail and more like a really old college dorm, I am booked, fingerprinted, and photographed. Of all the people at Ron’s party, I can’t believe that we’re the only ones who get dragged away in handcuffs. Ron and I are separated after the booking, when Ron shouts to me, “Don’t tell them anything until you get an attorney,” which causes all the cops in the place to give me a suspicious look.

“I don’t have anything to tell, you moron,” I shout back at Ron.

I am put in an open cell-like room with a few metal cots cemented to the walls. It looks more like a really poorly funded camp than a jail, and I almost expect to find the guards wearing red T-shirts with Camp Woebegone on them. In the corner, there’s a pay phone, with a line of three by it. I take my place in line and try not to make eye contact.

One woman, who smells strongly of gin, is passed out in the corner, and next to her are two very pregnant women sitting and talking.

I have never had much upper body strength. I suspect if any one of the women wanted to take me — even one of the pregnant ones — she could. But they seem less interested in fighting and more interested in talking about whether or not J. Lo has had a butt implant.

“You know that’s just not natural,” one of them is saying.

“It is,” another answers.

“It doesn’t
move
like a natural butt.”

“What does that even mean?” the other one says.

And on and on.

I feel like I’m in a salon, not a jail.

“What are you in for?” says a woman to my right. She’s wearing a bandanna across her forehead like the Karate Kid.

“My ex-boyfriend threw Ecstasy pills into an officer’s face,” I say, and then immediately wish I’d said murder.

Bandanna woman laughs. “I boosted my ex-boyfriend’s car,” she informs me.

The woman on the phone starts to yell.

“You just tell Marla she better stay away from my man,” the woman says. “I mean it. I don’t want to find
one
of that skank’s Lee Press Ons in my bedroom, or I swear, I’ll kill that bitch.”

It figures that women let men drive them to jail. What sort of power do they have over us anyway? It just doesn’t seem fair.

I finally get the phone after waiting an hour, and I call my dad collect. For health reasons, I hold out the phone about a foot from my ear, which makes hearing and speaking difficult.

Dad answers, sounding bleary, like he’s been sleeping.

“Charges? What charges?” Dad is shouting at the operator who is trying to get him to accept the collect call.

“Dad, it’s Jane. I’m in jail,” I say. “Accept the charges!”

The operator asks Dad again.

“Who?”

“Jane. Your daughter, Jane,” I say, but the operator is blocking me out.

“We don’t need any vinyl siding,” Dad shouts, and hangs up the phone.

I sigh.

I call Todd next. Surprisingly, he does accept the collect call charges. It seems he’s been expecting me to call from jail.

“Why didn’t you tell me about Mom?” Todd cries, first thing. He doesn’t even seem interested in the fact that I’m in jail.

“Todd, I was going to call, but everything happened so fast.”

“Well, you
should
have called me. Mom called me herself and told me about everything.”

“Did she tell you where she was?”

“No, but she said she’s talked to a lawyer.”

“Really?” My heart sinks. As much as I think my dad has been a terrible pill the last few months (and really, almost their entire marriage), the thought of my parents separating makes me feel sad and more than a little guilty. It’s clearly partly my fault for bad-mouthing Dad constantly and for living in an apartment I can’t afford.

“Who’s going to take care of Dad?” Todd asks, as if Dad is an invalid. “What will he eat?”

“It’s about time he learned to cook for himself, I think,” I say.

“Excuse me, but I
really
need to use that phone,” says the woman standing behind me. I can only imagine she is a prostitute, since she’s wearing silver platform boots and a flamingo-pink micro-miniskirt.