Valencia (3 page)

I dove onto a plastic seat and cried. I hated San Francisco. All the sex-radical girls and their slaves and their leather. I cried and wished for cigarettes. I thought I would run away. To Tucson, Arizona. I'd only just left the place. Flipped a penny when I found out my Tucson girlfriend had acquired a boyfriend. “Heads” was Javalinaland, the plot of lesbian separatist land out in the Arizona desert where I could build a shack out of scrap wood and dead cactus and spend a few months falling to the dirt with heat stroke, avoiding
rattlesnakes and bonding with wimmin. “Tails” was San Francisco, where I could start smoking again and walk around lonely in the drizzle writing vague love poems in my head. It had come up tails, but I was losing my faith in the penny. Tucson would be bright and warm and slow. San Francisco was filthy. The rainy season had started and I'd be damp for months. In Tucson I would be dry, I could sit in a cafe and be far away from Petra. I would be in exile. I would need a Walkman. For the Greyhound.

I sank some coins into the pay phone. I had to let my friends know I was leaving. It was about two in the morning. Ashley's machine picked up. Ashley, I'm Going To Tucson. If You Wake Up And Get This, Can I Borrow Your Walkman? I called Ernesto. Ernesto, I'm Leaving. Called Vinnie. Goodbye, Vinnie. A bus came and I got on it. I arrived back at my bright little bedroom in the Mission, a small, carpeted square. All my money was in a hiking boot in my closet, a tight little bulge in the toe. I took about half of it, grabbed some clothes and stuffed them into my black army bag. I took tapes, but nothing that would remind me of San Francisco. I was out of my head and probably a little drunk. The light in my room was so bright, it was manic. I called Greyhound, How Much For A Bus To Tucson?
One way or round trip?
Outside my window I heard some noise on the street, a woman yelling. Hold On, I said to the Greyhound lady and threw the phone on the rug, flung open my window. I saw a car, some men trying to pull a woman inside. I grabbed one of my candles, a pink candle in glass I had bought to magically seduce
Petra, and I hurled it out the window. Leave Her Alone! The glass cracked on the pavement and the people at the car all laughed. They were just kidding. The pink glob of wax rolled sadly into the gutter. I got back on the phone. Sorry, I said to the Greyhound lady, who now thought I was insane. Seventy-two bucks for a round-trip bus to Tucson. I'll Take It, I said. Who else did I have to call? My jobs, fuck them. The labor union was driving me nuts. I left a message on its machine, Sorry, I'm Going Nuts, I Have To Go Away. One of my roommates worked at my morning courier job. I left her a note to give to our boss: I Know These Are The Type Of Shenanigans That Get One's Ass Fired, But I'd Really Like To Work Full-Time When I Get Back. I called Gwynn to tell her I was running away, and she picked up the phone on the first ring. Gwynn, I'm Going To Tucson.
I'll come
. For Real? Oh, Gwynn was tragic.
Michelle, there's blood everywhere
. Gwynn sometimes cut herself. Not in a suicidal way, just when she was really sad, which was often. She'd been up all night digging into her arm with a razor. Over the girl in the apartment upstairs. Oh, I wanted Gwynn to come so badly. It changed everything. It would be an adventure. Gwynn was a warrior, she was deeply wounded and she was beautiful. And indecisive.
Oh, I don't know
, she said, picking crusty blood off her razor. She kept cursing as she nicked the tips of her fingers. Oh Gwynn, It Will Be So Good For You!
Where will we sleep?
I told her my friend Julisa would put us up, and if that fell through we could sleep outside, by the dried-up creek that ran through little tunnels beneath the city.
I'd heard the Manson gang had hung out in those tunnels. Hideaways for outcasts.
Oh, I don't know
. Gwynn didn't like the idea of sleeping outside. It'll Be An Adventure, I promised. You Can Write About It. Gwynn was a poet.

I took a cab to her house, on the toughest block of the lower Haight where boys grabbed her ass and threatened her with pit bulls when she walked alone. I found her on her mattress with the yellow sheets, her arms slowly scabbing. There were brown smears by the pillow. What Happened? I asked, hugging her.
Justine
, she said sadly. I had been in love with Gwynn once. I had wanted to save her. Then I realized Gwynn wasn't meant to be saved. At least not by me. I got her out of the house, which I couldn't believe. Gwynn is difficult to impossible to inspire. She was just so sad. Her whole face hung with it, like sadness was her personal gravity. We walked to the Castro to catch a train. The morning was taking shape around us, the sky slowly brightening into the deepest blue. It was the color of hope. We stopped at a gas station for cigarettes. If I was going to take a Greyhound, I was going to smoke. Romantic cigarettes on the side of the road. I was thinking that maybe I should leave for good. I'd never meant to stay in San Francisco. By the time we got to the Greyhound station Gwynn had decided to go to Oregon. Oregon? What The Fuck Is In Oregon?
Eugene
, she said. A town, not a person. Oh Gwynn, I sighed weakly. I knew how hopeless it was to persuade her. My energy was waning. I hadn't slept, I was in the same clothes I'd worn to the bar, my feet squishy
from sweat and last night's rain. Before we'd left the ticket counter Gwynn decided not to go anywhere at all. We bought Cokes from the machine and smoked cigarettes while waiting for my bus to board. I'm Going To Get A Tattoo, I said. A Heart. Right Here. I touched my chest.
Oh Michelle
, Gwynn said mournfully.
Don't get a tattoo that's going to remind you of a girl
. The heart I wanted came from a deck of fortunetelling cards. A real heart, not a valentine. I got on my bus. It wasn't so crowded, I got two seats for myself. I stretched out to sleep and woke up in total greenery. Outside, the earth rolled gently and there were lazy drooping trees and sunlight. This is where I belonged, this in-between place. I dozed back off. I could have stayed on that bus forever, someone else driving, always on my way, never arriving.

In a Burger King parking lot I smoked my romantic Camels. A guy from Florida told me he was on his way to Phoenix, to quit heroin. Greyhound is the coach of the desperate. He had his own cigarettes to smoke. We sat in our stories and stared out the windows. I realized I hadn't brought any socks. My boots, these plasticky things I had bought at Payless when I was vegan, were falling apart. My toes felt pruny. It took sixteen hours to get to Tucson, we pulled into town around four in the morning. Half-asleep, I stumbled with my stuff to the Hotel Congress, where the Dillinger gang once hid out and was nearly caught by the law. One of the outlaws was shot out front and died in a puddle of blood. It was a hotel for fugitives. I got a room in the hostel part of the building. An old room. I imagined a
band of bank robbers holed up behind the plaster walls. Army-style bunk beds and a porcelain sink with a hazy mirror. White toilet and a narrow shower, a radiator to hang my soaked socks on. I climbed up into the top bunk and stretched out, wondering if I was legally allowed inside the Hotel Congress, and if there was a warrant for my arrest in the state of Arizona. When I'd lived here I got in a brawl with a bouncer at the downstairs nightclub. It was my ex-girlfriend's fault. She had been out on the curb waiting for me and heard the bouncer call some boy a fag, so she started arguing with him. By the time I came out the scene was really heated. Liz was a compulsive liar and loved to start fights, but I really believed in Liz, so I hopped right in, harassing the bouncers, calling them macho men, mocking them with a swishy little tap dance and muscle-man moves. They were trying to kick us off the sidewalk, but we were waiting for our friends. Liz sarcastically applauded their toughness, clapping her hands about an inch from the big one's face, and finally he grabbed her and went to push her off the curb. Instantly I was on him, kicking with my patent leather pumps. I got him good in the crotch. I tore at his shirt and his hair, until his friends grabbed me in this police hold and I couldn't fight anymore. This was life with Liz. Violence could erupt at any minute like a big song and dance number, a musical of seething rage.
Y'all wish you had penises, huh?
chuckled the bouncer. He was real rednecky-looking. They called the cops on us, assault, so we called the cops back on them, assault. We went home. The police cars pulled up to the orange trees outside our quaint southwestern
adobe, and the trustfund deadhead roommates went crazy trying to hide the bongs and the pipes. Three mustached men leaned coolly in our doorway. I showed them the bruises on my arms from the redneck's fingers. I was wearing this flowered little dress.
Look at her!
Liz shrieked.
She's ninety-eight pounds, you think she assaulted them?
My little sister, who was visiting, cried in the corner. It was too much for her. This was her vacation. Me and Liz split town before our court date.

When I woke up in the morning my socks had dried into stiff boards on the radiator. I would have to go without. I put on some shorts and a flannel I regretted once I left the hotel. Tucson just never gets cold. It was February and had to be about ninety. I dragged my stuff over to Julisa's house. Her house was beautiful. A little adobe with a porch that cradled cats and futons and hammocks. Majestic cacti and tall stalks of okra grew in her garden. It was magical. Julisa was happy to see me. She was this voluptuous, earthy chick who threw potlucks for Earth First! and worked at a day-care center. I went to work with her and hung out with the kids. They thought I was a boy. I had no hair, I'd left my wig in San Francisco. With Petra. I couldn't stop talking about her, and Julisa wanted to know everything. She was curious and fascinated and judgmental and then insisted she wasn't being judgmental. We were eating cheap delicious food at a Guatemalan restaurant.
You had rough sex?
she
asked plainly. Yeah.
You liked it?
Yeah.
I do not like rough sex
, she said to her boyfriend, a hippie. He didn't either. That's Great, I said, and drank my beer. Around the corner from Julisa's house was a little tattoo shop called Denim & Doilies. I went there with my little fortunetelling card and some money. The tattoo guy's name was Picasso, this big biker guy, his hair held back with a studded piece of leather.
Now that's a
real
heart
, he said appreciatively. He took me around back to the private room with the reclining chair, and stuck the outline of the heart onto me with some Speed Stick. I had no reference point for tattoos, I didn't know how much they should cost or what they should feel like. Now I know that Picasso ripped me off and he was sadistic, digging the needle in deeply. I held on to a stuffed kittycat with a pierced septum and tore the fur from it. It really hurt. I felt the stinging in my nipple, which Picasso was trying to get me to pierce. One Thing At A Time, I said. He took frequent cigarette breaks, and I talked about Petra. He brought in some magazines to distract me. I picked up one of the modern primitive ones. That's Her, I said numbly, staring at the cover. That's Petra. She looked sharp and dangerous, her fanged chin jutting out like a dare.
No shit!
Picasso called out to his wife, a skinny, chain-smoking biker lady.
That's her girlfriend
, he bragged.
Petra!
the lady cooed. She's Not My Girlfriend, I pouted. Petra was never my girlfriend.
Did you, like, fuck her?
I nodded.
She fucked her
, he told his wife.
Petra!
she exclaimed again.
Do you know Zanya too?
She turned to a photo of another pierced and tattooed naked girl,
Petra's friend. Yeah, I Know Her, I said wearily.
Zanya!
she shrieked.
Zanya's her favorite
, said Picasso.

You could get stuff pierced at Denim & Doilies, by this really hip, good-looking fag. His ear was a slinky of stainless steel, his hair was long and dark, he was about seventeen and he was already much too jaded for Tucson. He invited me to a party the next night.
A dyke party
, he said with a little tinkle in his voice. When Julisa came to the shop to pick me up, she had the boy give her a tour of the piercing area. He showed us all the gleaming needles and I thought of Petra's knife.
So you stick these into people?
Julisa asked.
Oh, yeah
, said the boy.
Grrrrrreat
, she said. Julisa had this really sarcastic way of saying “great.” She looked at the pictures on the wall, cut out from magazines.
They chain themselves together by their bellybuttons?
she asked, pointing to one.
That's not codependent?
Before I went to bed that night I covered the new tattoo with Saran Wrap, so the goo wouldn't get all over Julisa's sheets. It nearly looked like a real heart, hanging rawly outside my ribs the way I wanted, a mess of wet red and pus and salve. Gory. But when I woke up in the morning it looked like I'd been shot in the chest. I'd sweated out bunches of the ink.
Why'd you do that?
Picasso cried when I called the shop. His masterpiece. He'd been so proud.
Now you can tell everyone you own a Picasso
, he'd said, taping a square of gauze to my chest. And now I had ruined it.