chapter 20

I still can’t believe what I did today. Hours later, and I’m a laughing, sweaty mess.

Coming home has a way of regressing a person many years: I become hyper, hungry, distracted, messy, and incapable.

So when my best friend Lucas called, saying he was coming home to NJ for the weekend, I couldn’t pass up the chance to join. After half a year of not seeing him, we packed into my living room like teenagers again, drinking beer and talking about rock music, concerts, and arm exercises. Except now he’s married with a one-year-old son living in Baltimore, and I’m living on my own across the Hudson with a dead Christmas tree.

Lucas: Living the dream, Doug. New York financier and bachelor.

He clinked my beer in a cheers and radiated that smile all the girls in high school loved, all the women we met at bars in our 20s loved – his tour de force and kryptonite.

Me: Thanks. It’s been pretty wild I’ve gotta say.

Lucas: Proud of you, man. It takes a lot to just pick up at 40 and move out and get a job. Good for you.

Oh, Lucas. He’s got this way of making even the sincerest of compliments sound condescending. It’s why people who don’t know him think he’s a jerk. But I know he’s awesome.

Me: Still can’t believe you’re a dad. And he’s still kickin’.

Lucas: Neither can I. I keep waiting for the day when someone realizes Sharon and I have no idea what we’re doing.

Me: Well, I know, but I’m not telling anyone.

Lucas: You’re a good friend.

We took another swig of our beers, surrounded by photos of my family trip to Bermuda in middle school, my kindergarten photo, and some memorabilia from college down south.

Me: Wanna go back to high school?

Lucas: Yeah, I mean, it would be fun. I’m pretty sure I peaked there.

Me: No, I mean right now. Visit.

He cocked his head like a dog who heard a doorbell.

Lucas: We can’t, it’s a Sunday. No one’s there.

Me: Who cares. Let’s just drive and walk around it. It’s been ages.

So we pack into my dad’s Honda Civic with a couple bags of Cheetos and fruit snacks, blasting Bon Jovi, and we race to the high school in the center of town.

It looked like a spaceship. It had grown, at least, four times the size since we scattered the place in our Nikes and sweatbands and pimples.

We got out of the car and wandered the grounds, peering into the cafeteria and 70s-style classrooms.

I put my nose up to the space between the two doors in the entranceway.

Me: It smells… it smells like teen spirit… and rejection.

He pushed me aside.

Lucas: Let me.

He took a big whiff.

Lucas: It smells like… like anatomy textbooks and… hairspray.

I ran to the long end of the building, looking into a computer and photography lab – and that’s when I saw it.

There, in all it’s hidden glory, was a door slightly ajar. An open door. Leading inside the high school.

Me: Lucas. No way. The door is open.

Lucas hurries over and looks.

Me: We’re going in.

So I swing the door open quietly, and we both tiptoe into the hallway, on the same carpeting and tile we once walked on to get to Spanish class. We look around, like we just landed on a new planet.

Lucas: Everything is so… shiny. And just big. When did the hallways get so big.

Lucas took out his phone and started snapping photos, making a video for Sharon of the bathroom where he used to play cards while skipping math class.

Walking through the long hallways brought back memories of truth-or-dare in the auditorium, breaking my nose during frisbee at lunch, asking a girl Emily out seven times junior year, and getting erections in history class. Really, a whole outpouring of insecurities. So much has changed and so much has stayed the same.

Lucas: Doug. Check this out.

I ran over to a section of lockers.

Lucas: This is where that kid hid the dissected pig. They didn’t find him for months.

Kids are sick.

I ran around the bend of the language arts hallway and spotted something I hadn’t seen before.

Me: Lucas, over here! There’s an entirely new wing.

The wing was practically glistening with fresh paint and new windows, connecting the language arts hallway to the history classes.

We looked at it the way many look at the Brooklyn Bridge when seeing it for the first time. With awe.

Me: Let’s go.

We dart down the hallway, when suddenly we hear a…

“click.”

I turn to Lucas. We both lock eyes.

We hear a voice. It’s automated.

“Intruders. Intruders. Intruders. Intruders.”

FUCK

We run, screaming like banshees through the new wing, through the language arts hallway, passed the spanish classroom, and through the open door to the outdoors. The alarm is whirling throughout the entire spaceship of a school.

Me: The new wing. It…it has new technology.

I yell back at Lucas as we race to my dad’s Honda Civic, hollering like we’re at a metal concert.

Lucas: Step on it. Step on it Doug.

I push my key into the ignition and slam on the gas.

We circle the parking lot and fire up the driveway, back onto the main road.

Lucas and I: WHAT THE FUCK WE’RE ON CAMERA

We’re yelling screaming laughing huffing puffing. Dying and alive, all at once.

Me: They’re gonna see our plastered faces on camera. Our looks of absolute fear. That’s what they’ll show on TV.

Lucas: The wanted posters, it’ll be all over.

Me: The cops, they’re gonna arrive.

We pull into my parent’s driveway, Cheetos and fruit snacks scattered about the dashboard.

We sit in the car, attempting to catch our breath. Bon Jovi still blasting. Sweat raining down our necks and temples.

I look at Lucas: my oldest friend, who’s seen me at my smallest, largest and now, my sweatiest.

Me: You’ve got to come home more often.

my 18th chapter: passing cars

Every morning when you wake up, you have those three golden seconds when you forget who you are, where you are and what you’re doing here. You’re just this free-floating unwritten page.

It feels like bliss.

When I woke up for work on Friday at 6:30am, these three seconds arrived. And naturally, I did my daily rundown.

– My name is Doug.

– I now live in New York.

– I work at a finance firm.

And then I continued:

– What did I do last night?

– The brownie.

– Alaska.

– She’s here.

I turned and saw Eleanor passed out next to me in bed, a little puddle of drool beside her cheek. I was partially stoned.

I knelt down next to her.

Me: Hey, I’ve gotta go to work, but you can stay as long as you’d like.

Eleanor: What time is it?

Me: 7am.

She looked at me for a moment, having her own three golden seconds of “blank page,” and then registering what happened. After a swift, sleepy hug and a “I’ll see you later,” she left, and that was that.

On the subway, I stood by the window, looking out as the car rolled through the tunnel.

One of the most fascinating things about a subway ride is the way two separate train cars pass one another on different tracks, moving parallel and and then continuing on their journey.

For 10 seconds, you get the voyeuristic thrill of literally staring into someone else’s life and daily routine – the way they lean up against the subway door, roll their eyes at the story in the paper, sneak a bite of a sandwich from their bag.

I like to wonder where they’re headed, if they want to go there, what they did last night.

People are so much more interesting than we ever imagine, you know? They’re like these walking Russian dolls where, if you take the time to open them, they keep unraveling into more and more pieces, filling up your shelves with stories and fears and quirks.

It’s moments like this – on these passing trains – when I think about my screenplays: all the pieces that are sitting in a box under my bed. And I want to capture these people, the same way a camera zooms in on an actor’s wrinkles and scars.

I feel something when I look into their lives for just a second. One day, I really hope that this feeling will be enough to stir me to write again and get back to my scripts.

Maybe even write something new.

When I got to work, there was an email in my inbox from my boss Greg.

Greg is a guy who takes what many perceive as stressful events, and turns them into breezy, charisma-filled moments, and I don’t know how he does it. Sometimes I sit there in my stiff suit, holding a miniature plastic cup filled with room-temperature water, and am in awe of him. He’s the personification of the “I think I can I think I can” Little Engine That Could.

Greg always emails me in the morning with updates, but this time the subject line said, “See me when you get in.”

What does he mean “see me when you get in?” What’s that about.

I froze and went to the bathroom and looked at myself. This was probably the worst morning to ever see him when I get in.

Not only were my eyes slightly red, but I realized my blue tie didn’t match my green shirt and my hair looked like that of a Tim Burton character. This is what happens when a 40-year-old eats a pot brownie and gets three hours of sleep.

But what are you going to do? The deed is done. Now is go time.

So I walked out and knocked on his door. He opened it.

Greg: Good morning.

Me: Good morning, I just got your email.

Greg: Of course, take a seat.

So I took a seat.

Greg: How’s it going, Doug? How are things going for you.

Me: Good, good, I’m enjoying it here. No complaints.

Greg: No? That’s great. I’m happy to hear.

We talked about our weekends, the workflow, etc.

And then there was a pause, and he looked at me for an unusually long time.

Greg: Well, I think you’re more than settling in. I think you’re doing a great job. Larry left, and I want you to fill his position.

My mind went blank. Wait, what? Who’s Larry?

Me: Really.

Greg: It means a bit of a raise and more responsibilities, so weekend business trips and stuff, but I think you’re ready for it. Bill agrees.

Wait, who’s Bill again? What the fuck is going on.

Greg: So what do you think of this? How do you feel.

How did I feel.

I sat there in my mismatched blue tie and green shirt and red eyes and dry mouth.

All I could imagine were the passing cars that rode through the tunnel, making stops and moving forward.

For three golden seconds,  I forgot who I was, where I was and what I was doing there.

And I felt nothing.

chapter 10: hit man

Ever since the holiday, it’s felt like a rippling, red-and-green-striped tidal wave has crashed through New York, and I’ve become swept up in it. My nights have been spent at work until 9pm, trying to stay focused and seemingly interested and capable in an industry I know nothing about, all while dusting remnants of nacho chips onto my keyboard every time I type.

Every time I think I’ve finally mastered something, the task suddenly gets harder and I’m proven wrong. It’s like thinking you’ve beat the boss at the final level of a video game, until he suddenly hurls a grenade you’ve got to learn how to dodge. Life stays interesting.

But does it really?

Sometimes I worry that I’m becoming this one-note person – someone who’s just his job, losing sight of his creative sensations and urges, who doesn’t look up – reach upwards – long enough to grasp what living is.

Why have I not seen Eleanor? I didn’t get her number. And I don’t have Facebook. In fact, I don’t even know if she’s back from the holidays. So now, we’re thrust into this 19th-century relationship where encounters are dictated by fate, not text. And since I’m working so much and hardly home to knock on her door, fate has yet to make its appearance. But why hasn’t she knocked on my door? Or maybe she has – and I’ll never know. “If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it…”

The good news: there’s been an addition to the family.

Meet: Sir Hunter Green.

He’s a modest three-feet-tall, stocked with colorful lights and a stuffed reindeer ornament I got at the Union Square holiday market. The lights were too long so I laid the rest of it on my heating vent. I’m not very crafty.

Sir Hunter and I have been listening to Christmas music all day while I’ve laid in bed watching Damages. Have you seen it? It stars Glen Close and Rose Byrne as ruthless lawyers in New York doing illegal things to bring ‘justice’ to the world. The moral of the entire five-season story: trust no one.

And now the lesson has started rubbing off on me. Have you ever noticed that about TV shows? When you become so committed and attached to them, these people become your friends and their outlooks become your own. You’ve got to choose wisely, you know.

Now I’ve started questioning everyone’s intentions: is that guy with the love-struck girlfriend secretly texting her best friend? Did my friend leave last night’s party early to feed his fledgling drug addiction? Did the waiter steal my credit card number to pay off a hit man to kill a roommate who knows his darkest secret?

You see, I don’t want to question people’s motives. Navigating life is hard enough without having to dissect every moment like a Salinger book. But yet – there’s an air of ‘mystery’ that the questioning brings, like there’s some underground scandal I’ve discovered, and should be sitting in an oak-paneled room with a cigar, plotting how to avenge ‘the bad guy.’

I’ve lost it. Have I lost it? Has my life become so humdrum that I’m assuming the thoughts of TV characters? I don’t want to be someone who spends his nights and weekends escaping to a show because his own life isn’t fun enough to watch.

Time to make things interesting.