Chapter 27: Genevieve
GENEVIEVE
Trina is a piece of work. We met in detention in the sixth grade and became fast friends. She enjoyed skipping class and smoking cigarettes in the baseball dugout as much as I did, so really, it was inevitable that we’d cross paths. And while I have more good memories of Trina than bad, I’m still nervous when I walk into the bar to meet her. Even when we were kids, she always had an infectious quality about her. Like she was having so much fun, you wanted in on whatever she was getting up to. Insatiable and alluring.
Evan’s right, though. If I can survive Trina’s temptations, I’ll most definitely be cured.
“Damn it, Gen.”
Winding through the crowded high-top tables, I turn at the familiar voice. Trina sits at a table against the wall, an empty highball and a bottle of beer in front of her. She hops to her feet and gives me a tight hug.
“I hoped you’d gotten hideous since the last time I saw you,” she says, brushing my hair off my shoulder. “Would it have killed you to sprout some heinous zits for the occasion?”
“My bad,” I laugh.
“Sit down, slag.” She looks over my shoulder and waves for a waitress. “Catch me up. What the hell have
you been up to?”
We didn’t really talk after I left Avalon Bay. As I did with most of this town, I quit cold turkey. Other than some texts here and there, I’d kept my distance, even muting her on social media so I couldn’t be tempted by her exploits.
“As it turns out, I start a new job soon. Cooper’s girlfriend is reopening The Beacon Hotel. I’m the new manager.”
“For real?” She’s incredulous at first. Then, apparently realizing there isn’t a punchline coming, she throws back a swig of her beer. “That means the next time I come to town, you’re hooking me up with a room. I think me and my dear mother have exceeded our quota of quality time.”
I grin. “Didn’t you get in last night?”
“Exactly.” Her eyes widen. “Shit, I’m sorry. I heard about your mom. You okay?”
It seems like ages ago now, though it’s only been a few months. The reminders of Mom are fewer and further between. “Yeah,” I say honestly. “I’m good. Thank you.”
“I’d have been at the funeral if I’d known. But I only heard recently.”
I don’t think she means them to, but the words come out like an accusation. She’d have been there if I’d bothered to tell her, is the subtext. If I hadn’t all but ghosted her a year ago. But that’s probably my own guilt talking.
“It’s fine, really. Was mostly a family thing. She didn’t want a big fuss.” Least of all from her kids.
Trina gets a menacing glint in her eye as she sips her drink. “You seeing much of Evan lately?”
I swallow a sigh. For just one night, can’t something be about anything but him? My head’s been on backwards since I came back to town. I’m my favorite self when I’m with him—and also my worst. Everything at both extremes wrapped up in this volatile
cocktail we become.
“Sometimes, I guess. I don’t know. It’s complicated.”
“You’ve been using that same line since we were fifteen.”
And I don’t feel much better equipped than I was then.
“So what’s up?” With another mouthful of beer, she plasters on her usual irreverence when she reads the heaviness closing in. “You back for good now?”
“Looks that way.” It’s strange. I don’t remember making the decision to stay. It just snuck up on me, the ties reattaching overnight while I slept. “Dad’s selling the house, so I need to find a new place soon.”
“I’ve given some thought to sticking around too.”
I snort a laugh. “Why?”
Trina always hated this town. Or rather, the people. She loved her friends fiercely, the few she kept. Beyond that, she’d have lit a match and never looked back. Or so I thought.
We’re briefly interrupted when the waitress finally makes it to our table. She looks young and flustered, a new hire struggling through the waning weeks of the summer crush. I order a club soda and ignore Trina’s judgmental eyebrow.
“I don’t know…. This place is a drag,” she says. “But it’s home, I guess.” There’s something in the way her gaze drifts to the soggy coaster, the way her fingernail picks at the corners, that suggests a deeper explanation.
“How are things?” I ask carefully. “LA not agreeing with you these days?”
“Eh, you know me. I’ve got a four-second attention span. I think maybe I’ve seen and done everything worth doing in that city.”
Only from Trina would I believe that. “You still working at the dispensary?” The least surprising part of her West Coast move was getting a job doing stuff that, around here, still gets you
thrown in jail.
“Sometimes. Also bartending a little. And this guy I know, he’s a photographer, I help him out now and then, too.”
“This guy …” I watch as she dodges eye contact. “Is that a thing?”
“Sometimes.”
The conundrum of Trina is a bitter one. Few others I know manage to suck as much out of every minute of their lives as she does—eyes open and arms wide, try anything once, twice as much—and yet, at the same time, be so utterly unfulfilled. There’s a hole in the bottom of her soul, where everything good leaks out and all the worst, thickest, blackest muck clings to the sides.
“He’s an artist,” she says by way of an explanation. “His work is important to him.”
Which is the kind of thing people say when they’re making excuses for why their needs aren’t being met.
“Anyway, I didn’t tell him I was coming here. Probably still hasn’t noticed my stuff is gone.”
A wave of sympathy swells in my chest. I felt like that for a long time. I kept grasping for anything at all to satisfy me, whether it was good for me or not. How could I know unless I found out for myself, though? It takes a lot of trial and error to realize all the good advice we ignored along the way.
When our drinks arrive, she drains the last of her previous beer and gets a start on the next. “Enough chat,” she announces, running a hand through her hair. She’s wearing it shorter these days, which gives her even more of a tough girl vibe. “I’m bored with myself.”
“Okay. How shall we entertain ourselves?”
“If I remember right, you owe me a rematch. Rack ’em up, West.”
I follow her to the pool table, where
we split two games and call it a draw. From there, we barhop down the boardwalk, with Trina ingesting a quantity of shots and beers that would kill a man twice her size.
It’s a relief, actually. A taste of the old life without the accompanying blackout. And it’s incredible the things you notice when you’re not wasted. Like the guy who hits on Trina at the second bar. She thinks he’s twenty-five, but really, he’s pushing forty with a spray tan, Botox, and a tan line from his missing wedding ring. Still, he’s good for a couple drinks before she instigates him up to the karaoke mic for shits and giggles, as if he’s her personal court jester. I’d feel bad for the dude if I wasn’t sure there’s a kid at home somewhere, whose college fund will be a little lighter after this midlife crisis.
“He was not forty,” she insists too loudly when I inform her, as we trudge down the boardwalk in search of our next venue. “It was the lighting!”
“Babe, he had white chest hairs.”
Trina shudders, a tremble of revulsion that vibrates through each limb. She makes a dry gagging noise while I howl with laughter.
“No,” she moans.
“Yes,” I confirm between giggles.
“Well, where were you? Tell a girl next time. Throw up some hand signals or something.”
“What’s sign language for pendulous, sagging testicles?”
Now we’re both doubling over in hysterics.
The boardwalk at night is a drag strip of lights and music. Shops with neon signs and bright window displays. People pouring out of bars with the competing soundtracks mingling in the humid salt air. Patio restaurants bursting with tourists and souvenir cups. Every dozen steps or so, a young guy is barking about two-for-one drinks
or free cover.
“Live music,” one of them says, shoving his arm out to give Trina a pale green flyer for the music venue around the corner. “No cover before midnight.”
“Are you in a band?” A flicker of interest brightens her eyes.
Trina has this way about her. Flirtatious in a vaguely threatening manner. It’s hysterical when she’s had a little to drink. When she’s had a lot, it’s not dissimilar to a lit firecracker that’s stalled. You stand there. Waiting. Watching. Certain the moment you try to intervene, it’ll explode and take your fingers and eyebrows with it.
“Uh, yeah,” he says, hiding his fear behind an alert smile. Some guys like the hot, scary ones, and some have a sense of self-preservation. “I play bass.”
He’s cute, in a Disney Channel punk rock sort of way. The kid who grew up with parents that encouraged his creative endeavors and put out a plate of fresh-baked cookies while he did homework. I’ll never understand the well-adjusted.
“Oh.” Trina’s carnivorous grin flattens to a grimace. “Well, no one’s perfect.”
We take the invitation, nonetheless, if only because it’s the closest restroom that doesn’t require a purchase in advance. Together, Trina and I stand in line down a dingy hallway covered in framed concert photographs and graffiti. It smells of cheap liquor, mildew, and perfume-scented sweat. “You realize you’ve probably jinxed that poor guy, right?” I tell her.
“Please.”
“Seriously. You just put ten years of bad mojo on him. What if he was supposed to become the next great American bassist? Now he’s going to end up vacuuming baseboards at the Spit Shine car wash.”
“The world needs bass players,” she says. “But I can’t be responsible for their misplaced
notions of fuckability.”
“Paul McCartney played bass.”
“That’s like saying Santa is fuckable. That’s nasty, Gen.”
Six women stumble out of the single-toilet restroom, sloppy and laughing. Trina and I take our turn. She splashes water on her face while I pee.
After we’ve both finished up and washed our hands, Trina pulls a small compact out of her purse. Under it is a little plastic baggie of white powder. She dips her finger in to gather some in her nail and snort it up her nose. Takes another up the other nostril, then spreads the excess on her teeth, sucking them dry.
“Want a bump?” She offers the compact to me.
“I’m good.”
Cocaine was never my vice. I smoked plenty and drank like a sailor. Dropped acid every now and then. But I was never tempted by the harder stuff.
“Oh, come on.” She tries shoving it at me. “I haven’t said anything all night, but your sobriety is starting to become a buzzkill.”
I shrug. “I think you’ve got enough buzz for both of us.”
Big saucer eyes plead with me. “Just one little hit. Then I’ll shut up.”
“But then who’s going to stop you from going home with some middle-aged car salesman?”
“You make a good point, West.” Backing off, she snaps the compact shut and drops it in her purse.
To each their own. Trina gets no judgment from me. We all have our coping mechanisms, and I’m in no position to fault anyone for theirs. Just not my bag.
“So this straight-edge thing,” she muses as we exit the restroom and scout a good table for the show. “You serious about that?”
We spot a two-seater high-top beside the stage and make a beeline to snag it.
I nod slowly. “
Yeah, I think so.”
I’m rather proud of myself, in fact. A whole night together, and I’ve yet to hop on a table or steal a pedicab. I’m still having a good time, not once missing a drink. That’s progress.
Lifting a flask from her purse, Trina nods. “Cheers to that, then. May your liver bring you many years of health and prosperity.”
Hell, if Trina can accept the new me, maybe there’s hope yet. Maybe I really can make this change stick, and I’m not simply fooling myself.
Our party swells during the concert. A group of friends we went to high school with wander by our table and pull up a few stools. Some, like Colby and Debra, I hadn’t seen in years. When the second act of the night turns out to be a ’90s one-hit-wonder cover band, the entire place goes bonkers, everyone singing slurred, slightly wrong lyrics at the tops of our lungs. We’re all breathless and hoarse by the time Trina and the rest of the group go outside to the smoking patio, while I babysit her purse at the bar and order a very big glass of ice water. I pull out my phone to find a missed text from Evan earlier in the night.
Evan:
You haven’t asked for bail yet. Good sign?
I have to admit, he was right. Meeting up with Trina turned out to be an affirming experience. Hardly the catastrophe I’d worked it up to be in my head. But I’m definitely not going to tell him that. Evan doesn’t need any ego stroking from me.
Me:
We’re on 95 with a one-eyed bounty hunter and his pet wolverine hot on our trail. Send snacks.
When I feel a hand tap me on the
shoulder, I’m impressed Evan managed to track us down. But then I turn around and am met with the dark, pleated polyester of a sheriff’s deputy uniform and the potbelly of Rusty Randall.
“Genevieve West.” He grabs my wrist and roughly jerks it behind my back. “You’re under arrest.”
My jaw drops. “Seriously? For what?”
I’m pulled off my stool, struggling to find my feet. People around us retreat, some taking out their phones to record. Camera flashes blind me while my brain stutters to understand what’s happening.
“Possession of a controlled substance.” He wrenches my other arm behind my back, where metal cuffs bite into my skin. Deputy Randall grabs Trina’s purse, picking through it, until he pulls out the compact and opens it to reveal the baggie of cocaine.
“That’s not even my purse!” I shout, my head spinning with the instinct to run or fight or … something. I look desperately at the door to the smoking patio.
Wrapping his hand around my biceps, he leans close to my ear and whispers, “Should’ve left town while you had the chance.”