The Cake is a Lie (37 page)

Then it’s all gone. The spell is broken
and I’m a different being. I think of my mom telling me that sex
means a lot more to women than to men. That intimacy is the biggest
turn on for women. I think about Randy West, an old pornstar that’s
slept with 3,000 girls, saying casual sex is like borrowing
somebodies body to masturbate with. The look in his eye as he
laments over missing out on affection. I’m filled with shame and
regret. Where do players find the heart? Jonsen pulls 6’s at the
bars these days after he’s had his 8+ drinks. He looks them in the
eye and extravagantly promises them he wants to marry them. He
can’t even cum when he sleeps with them, he can barely perform,
that’s the part I don’t understand.

Emma plays it cool after, it’s no big
deal. I know that it’s an act and that she probably still thinks
about me all the time. I know that when goes home and I don’t call
her for a month it will hurt her as hard as she’s ever hurt. She
probably Facebook stalks me and worships my every word. I need to
let her go.

Chill, Marco, be kinder to
yourself. You’ve been completely honest with her. She makes her
decisions, it’s on her. Maybe she likes the challenge of trying to
make me fall in love with her. She might get over you really
quickly, you have no way to know. We’re hardly sluts anyways, more
like prudes. I have urges, like a vampire, I can’t help it. I do
the best I can. Life’s not this
or
that, it’s dialectical, it’s both. And f those
pornos, great sex happens when it’s a girl’s choice, not when you
make her. I toss and turn for an hour in the night before falling
asleep.

I breathe deeply into a crisp breeze,
holding it in for a tranquil second. It’s intoxicating. I can smell
the trees. I keep breathing as I walk through E-Rock’s flaking
gate, past the worn down porch love seat. I get to the pool and
find ten people lounging around. I’ve known half of them since
grade school. Rachel Goody’s wearing a pink tutu and neon leg
warmers. Johnny Little’s in a bright multicolored cheetah leotard.
He’s smoking a cigarette next to some guy with dreads to his maroon
bellbottom corduroys. I don’t say “hi” to anyone.

They call themselves heady people.
Eric’s dad rents out the neighboring house to Eric’s older brother
and some of his friends. They’ve dubbed the house, “The compound.”
It’s something like a druggie commune.

I don’t see Eric so I stroll over to
the edge of the pool. The water’s faintly green with bunches of
leaves floating around, algae stains cover the bottom. The ring of
checkered tile is cracked and rusty. Most of the once lush bushes
that frame the yard are brown and drying. Taking it in I get an
overwhelming nasty feeling like I should be somewhere else in the
world. A four season’s pool party in another life.

I breathe into the anxiety. That
thought does you no good, Marco. In this moment I’m okay and
thankful, and there’s only this moment. You came to see Eric, you
love Eric. I’m thankful for every moment alive, I remind myself,
every breath. I imagine all the billions of people living in
poverty around the world that would kill to have the things I have.
I imagine breathing out the negative feeling as I exhale, letting
the hot anxiety in my neck float away like a balloon. When I inhale
again, I imagine filling my body with fresh new energy. You’ve been
doing so amazing lately, how long has it been since you’ve had a
panic attack? Two months?

E-Rock finally appears, shirtless with
pajama bottoms and an American flag bandana tied around his head. I
can’t help but smile. Mia Illy’s standing next to him. Mia Illy,
the anomaly, the exception to the rule. She’d made it to college
and graduated. Handled all her shit while maintaining her
unbelievably fast lifestyle.

“
You made it just in time
Marco, we’re just about to start grilling.”

Illy just stares at me. She’s still got
that bite in her eyes, accentuated by the cat eyeliner she’s been
wearing since middle school. She hasn’t been broken yet, not like
the others. Every time I interact with her I can’t tell if she
hates me or likes me. That’s part of her awe. Does she still think
I’m creepily into her, like in highschool? I flashback to a few
awkward moments when I’d tried to innocently hit on her. “Hey Mia,
take a picture with me?” “Uh, no.”

E-Rock and Illy’s eyes stand out
amongst the smiles and stares, they’re wrecked. Their pupils are
drowning in a sea of red. I walk over and hug them both, bare skin
on bare skin. I hear the rumbling of a frail thought, you could be
drugged. But it brings with it a rush of joy, knowing I beat this
phobia years ago.

“
Matty. You still got twenty
on those burgers? We’re making a store run,” Eric yells to the
group.

“
Ya, but Johnny owes me
ten.”

“
For what?”

“
Those pills I fronted you
last weekend.”

“
I smoked you out Thursday
though.”

While the heady people sort out who
owes who I look Mia Illy over. She’s chubby. Not just her muffin
top, her face. The tribal tattoo around her arm that I once thought
was the tightest thing ever looks really stupid. Her skins badly
sun damaged, her chest, arms and face are red, wrinkly and dried up
like a prune. It’s funny, all the crazy drug binges, drunk driving
without a seat belt, sleeping with 36 guys, and who knows what
else, not washing her fruit, abortions. After all that, not wearing
sunscreen ended up doing the most irreversible damage to her. God
you’re so critical Marco, I lash out at myself. Something’s wrong
with you. You’re just like your dad. Our whole hyper perfectionist,
anxious bloodline is gonna be weeded out by natural selection. It
has to stop with me.

Quit it, I argue back to myself. Being
aware of criticizing people is a big step. Take pride in that. And
don’t criticize yourself for being critical, be kind to yourself.
Is there another way to look at this? Beauty’s subjective. Looks
aren’t everything, everyone gets wrinkles eventually. Plus your dad
isn’t even that critical anymore, he’s not even your old
dad.

Eric leaves to go shopping and Mia sits
by the pool, letting her legs slip into the water. I jog over to
her, landing a big jump-step. Movement’s the key, to show them
you’re loose and relaxed.

“
Oh, you’re tight.” Mia
stabs. I feel the sting of the burn. She’s still got it. Some
shadow of an understanding that Oakley would never make such a
social gaff flickers into my mind. I breathe into the malaise and
imagine a wave of relaxation washing over my body like
water.

“
Hey Mia, when you were
younger did you ever think you were destined to be cool because
your last name’s Illy?”

“
Bitch, I knew I was cool
because my last name was Illy.” She sticks her elbow out and jerks
her hand up and down like she’s rap battling to over emphasize her
half-cocky persona. One of her genius mannerisms that makes Mia who
she is. We both laugh.

“
So where you living at now
that you’re done with college?” I ask.

“
Downtown. I bussed down
here.” I give her a curious chin pull-up, unsure why she added the
last bit of information.

“
Oh, you didn’t hear? I got
a dewy a month ago.”

“
Oh, what? What
happened?”

“
I blacked out and crashed
my Civic into three parked cars.”

We share a heavy pause.

“
I’m lucky really, like when
I think about all the stuff I’ve done..” It all reels by behind her
eyes before she comes back with a perplexed expression. “Marco, I’m
crazy, I’m like seriously crazy,” she says it with a fire, as if
she needs me to validate her life, be a witness. I nod my head. I
know. She knows I know.

“
I’ve always been a fan of
the bus anyways. Always. I used to ride the bus all the
time.”

“
For sure. I like the bus.”
I agree. “Well, you’re in the system now.”

“
Ya. They’re making me start
treatment. I gotta stop smoking pot soon.”

“
Now that I’d like to see.”
I laugh.

“
Don’t doubt it. I’ll do it.
It won’t be hard.”

“
You’ve smoked heavy your
whole life.”

“
Ya, but I’m over it. I like
really am.”

I’ve heard so many of these empty
sentiments before. But with Mia it’s different. She’s accomplished
some extremely rare things. Her will power can’t be
ignored.

“
And drinking?”

“
I’m still gonna drink on
the weekends, but I’m never gonna drink again during the
week.”

“
Why not just stop for a
while. You’ve been drinking your whole life. What’s a year
off?”

“
I can’t breathe without
alcohol, bitch.” She yells laughing. “Seriously, I don’t know how
to have fun without it.” We both laugh at how seriously she says
it. “But I’m not going to be like my parents. I swear, never. I
don’t want my kids to see me be an alcoholic, drinking every night.
I’m never drinking during the week again.”

One of the heady kids enters through
the gate carrying an armful of junk with his head drooping. When he
sees Mia and me he makes an effort to brighten up his body and
comes towards us. Before he even says anything I can tell this must
be Corky—the one the heady kids are worried about. They say he
stays up for days straight in his room or “studio” burning money
and making art that he hangs on clothes lines all over.

His white shirt is covered in splashes
of paint and cut up with scissors all around the bottom. It’s not
good when kids who buy crazy drugs over the internet that put each
other in comas for days are worried about you.

“
Hey you guys wanna come to
my art show?”

“
When is it?” I
ask

“
Tomorrow at six. In my
room. I’ve been working on it nonstop for weeks. Well it will never
really be complete, cause there’s no such thing. Life’s one big art
show, one big continuous movie. Do either of you have a cigarette
by chance?” It all comes out in one manic burst.

I roll through the vague
memories I have of seeing Corky around growing up. Was he two years
older? I remember him being quieter, I certainly would’ve never
guessed he had
this
in him. His cowlick’s still familiar, just bigger and much
more oily and scraggly. The amateur psychologist in my perks up at
his clear mental duress.

“
Do you have any samples?” I
ask.

“
My shirt’s a sample.” He
pulls the shirt out wide by the bottom corners.

I imagine the same shirt hanging up in
some designer boutique for 300 dollars. It’s possible.

“
This shirts a piece of shit
though. I wouldn’t sell it for anything, not a dime, not a piece of
dirt, it’s worthless. I just got some more materials, here I’ll
make you a sample. Real art’s spontaneous.” He gets on his knees
and dumps out the items in his arms. Some tape cassettes and empty
cd cases, more second-hand shirts, an egg carton and some beaded
bracelets.

He grabs one of the cd cases, Kanye
West’s “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.” Tossing aside the
plastic case he pulls out the cover leaf-let and unfolds
it.

“
And they call this art.” He
says in disgust, waving the unfolded leaf-let.

The cover’s a George Condo. A cartoony
black man with a maniacal face having sex with a white demon. I
hate to admit it, but it might be the coolest CD artwork I’ve ever
seen. Although you could argue his style’s a more cartoony Francis
Bacon. But I’m not trying to disagree with Corky.

Pulling a marker out of his pocket he
puts the leaf-let on the ground and goes to work on his hands and
knees.

“
You think the rich have
discovered some way of prolonging their lives?” He asks. “What if
Mark Zuckerberg lives to be five hundred? They’ve probably already
discovered it, there’s probably some people that are hundreds of
years old. Did you know the Egyptians discovered electricity?
That’s what the Pyramids really are, they’re generators. They’d
pour chemicals down shafts from the top. That’s why the pitch-black
halls don’t have any torch holders. They used the electricity to
power tools, how else were the carvings cut so precise and
smooth?”

Corky’s complete inability to pick up
on the deterring scowl of discomfort and annoyance on my face is
fascinating.

All five of my minds begin racing.
We’re all as ambitious as Ozymandias. We all can’t paint on the
cave walls. I steer my thoughts back to the present. Focus, be
mindful. Right now isn’t the time to philosophize. Pay attention to
the present moment. The present is all there is. I begin feeling
the hairs on my legs with my hand, focusing my vision on Corky’s
moving lips.

“
And they just discovered
batteries in Baghdad that are as old as the pyramids.” Corky gets
up and hands me the leaf-lit. “Now this…This’ worth
hundreds.”

He’s drawn big bold letters over all
the pictures and lyrics: “THIS IS A WARNING.”

“
I gotta go get ready,
remember, tomorrow night.” He gathers his things and starts to
leave before turning back once again. “Seriously it’s gonna be
awesome, I’m gonna knock on the cute girls door down the street and
invite them. Everyone’s going.”