The Temptation of Adam: A Novel by Dave Connis (8)

I’VE NEVER READ IT

I’m driving home, but I’m also on the log in the Pacific. The empty expanse of both places has me thinking about things I don’t think about.

This is a thing I never think about:

Me sitting alone on the curb at the corner of Acker Street and Marvin Lane crying by guts out.

This is a thing I never think about:

It was midnight. Addy just told me The Woman asked her to move with her to Portland and she’d said yes.

I hugged my knees on that curb and did what my dad always told me was fine for guys to do—rock ’em, sock ’em ugly cry. I was in the midst of such a cry when Addy sat down next to me.

“Ten out of ten,” she said, trying to cheer me up with a joke. “The scrunched eyes are a good touch.”

I wiped my cheeks on my sweatshirt sleeve and then tried to flatten the scrunches out from underneath my eyes.

We sat silent for a moment.

This is a thing I never think about:

How that moment felt like a good-bye, and the weight that comes when you want to say everything, but can’t seem to say anything.

“Adam, I’m not moving because of you. Our parents need us. You with Dad. Me with Mom. They’ve been there for us, now it’s our turn.”

This is a thing I do think about:

The problem with being smart and analytical is that people expect more from you. If I’d constantly been lying or drinking or getting in trouble at school, something, maybe Addy wouldn’t have left. But I was all straight A’s, clean shoes, and big words. I wanted to tell Addy that big words aren’t synonymous with a strong heart. That words were only as big as the mouth that said them, and a person seen as only their words is about as true as gold-plating and as revealing as the tip of an iceberg.

This is a thing I don’t think about:

I was just as lost as The Woman and Dad, and I was supposed to be in charge of my dad’s recovery.

“I can’t be Dad’s wise and guiding wingman,” I said. “I’m not like you, Addy. I can’t just—”

“Bull, Adam. You do just. You always do just.”

“Addy, please don’t move to Portland.”

“Mom needs me, Adam. I can’t leave her alone.”

“It’s not our responsibility to fix our parent’s hot cluster of a marriage fail.”

This is a thing I never think about:

She stood, sighed, and then pulled me off my butt into a hug. “But it is our responsibility to love them.”

What about me? I wanted to say. I need you. I want you to stay here. I need you.

The next morning, Addy was gone. So was The Woman. So was my dad.

This is the thing I never think about:

I was truly alone.

—

I’ve given up on not thinking about porn.

I’ve needed it to get through this horrible day. This day where somehow, in just a few short minutes, Mr. Cratcher made me think about things I don’t think about. Where I’ve been up since ass o’clock. This day where Addy still hasn’t responded, even when I called her three times. This day where I’m now sitting in Mr. Crotcher’s living room with a bunch of random guys, listening to him talk about how the Transparency Forum works.

The forum is pretty much like the Addiction Fighters meeting, just on a smaller scale. He says it will help us be more “intimate and honest about life.”

I’d almost rather be in the Hunger Games.

Almost.

“Of course,” he says, taking a sip of water, “the end goal is to get you young men to a place where you could meet without me.”

I’m pretty sure that none of us would ever do that.

“Anyway, I’ve taken up a good bit of our time, so let’s get to business. Because this is Adam’s first forum, let’s go around and discuss our stories. Elliot, why don’t you go first?”

Elliot sweeps the hair out of his eyes and flashes a brief smile. “So, my mom committed suicide when I was eight. After I told her I hated her.”

Whoa. Way to come out of the my-life-sucks gate swinging.

“My dad blamed me for her death and kicked me out of the house, so now I live with my grandmother. I started cutting because I wanted to feel something else besides numbness …”

I zone out. I don’t mean to, and I don’t even know what I’m thinking about, but I know it has to do with me and girls and sex. I just want to do it. I think about Dez on top of me. Moving slow. Moving sexy. Why haven’t I had sex yet? From the way the world depicts high school, you’d think I would’ve scored by now. I feel a shot of adrenaline rush through me and I feel my hand reaching toward my phone.

“… all that to say, this group has helped a lot. Trey, your positivity has been a huge help, so thanks for that. Adam, I’m stoked to have you here. I think if we can get past the awkwardness of the first few meetings, it will be great for all of us.”

“Do you have any advice for Adam, Elliot?”

I pull back when I hear my name. My eyes were open the whole time, but now they’re actually open and I see Elliot in thought. His head tipped the side to get the hair out of his eyes. “Yeah, stop being a fuck-up.”

Everyone laughs. The way he says it is so self-reflective even I laugh.

“I’m kidding,” he says. “I don’t know. I guess, uh, you can fight all this if you want, but if you really want to change, you have to realize you’re as fucked up as everyone else. Oh, and realizing that getting better doesn’t happen if you run away from things is pretty big, too. You’re addicted to porn, right? That’s why you’re here?”

I lock my jaw. The question sets off my Gollum brain. He’s yelling. Messing up words by adding random ses to things that don’t need them. I try to shut him up as Elliot gives an awkward glance to Mr. Crotcher as if to ask, “Was that not okay to say?”

“Adam?” Mr. Crotcher asks.

No. I’m not. I’m here because someone did something stupid at school and it wasn’t me. I’m here because Mr. Crotcher made me be here. I say nothing.

“Al—alright,” Elliot says, “well, I just said that to, you know, let you know we’re all struggling too.”

That’s not what he was originally going to say. I see it in his in his eyes as he glances around at the other guys for help. Trey comes to his rescue and starts to share.

Trey is the oldest Knight of Vice, clocking in at nineteen. He didn’t have any incredible trauma that inspired his addiction. He just was super popular in high school and liked women and, unlike me, was blessed with the ability to charm. At some point, he realized he was taking advantage of his popularity to have sex with as many girls as he could. After high school, girls weren’t as readily available and suddenly he started feeling depressed and empty. He ended up spending most of his time on Craigslist, trying to find strangers to meet up with at least once a day. His parents intervened and told him about Mr. Crotcher’s program, and he willingly joined. This fact alone solidifies my theory that Trey and I are too different to be good friends.

“I became a consumer,” he says. “I still am, but now I believe the fight to be a better person is worth fighting.”

Trey rambles on for forever, and at some point he tells me to let go of my judgments because they’ll keep me from entering into the fold. To finish his time, he puts a hand on my knee and tells me how glad he is that I’m here.

Then it’s Mark’s turn. Thank God for Mark. He talks for a minute, maybe a minute and ten seconds. When he ends, we have this moment where he looks at me with weighty eyes and I nod in understanding. Neither of us want to be here.

“I’m probably the happiest you’re here,” he says.

“You’re welcome,” I say, and he laughs.

By the time the Transparency Forum peace pipe gets to me, the group time’s gone over by fifteen minutes. Mark and I stand to leave. I expect Trey and Elliot to do the same, but they don’t. In fact, it looks like their night is just getting started.

“See you guys later,” I say.

Mr. Crotcher waves. “Bye, Adam. Bye, Mark. Feel free to stay if you’d like.”

I pretend I don’t hear him and open the front door. Mark bounds down the stairs.

“Hey, do you want a ride?” I ask. “That’s my car right there. I can bring you wherever, no problem.”

“Oh,” he says. “Um … nah, don’t worry about it. I’ve got to wheel my brother home from a friend’s house. See ya.”

“Alright, bye.”

—

Some girl named Britannia is riding a lucky guy I’d prefer to remain nameless. As long as he doesn’t have a name, I can replace him with myself. I’m filled with heat, on the edge of everything, and my cell phone rings. It scares the crap out of me, and my mojo turns into a distant memory. Though I’m pissed at the interruption, I’m glad I’m not turned on by fear. No one wants to date a guy who goes hard in a horror movie. I pause the video and check my phone. I don’t recognize the number, but I answer anyway, trying not to sound to out of breath.

“Hello?”

“Is this Adam?”

Sweet mercy, it’s Dez. Suddenly, I feel embarrassed or guilty. I’m not sure which, and I don’t know why I’d feel either.

“Oh, hey,” I say.

“What am I interrupting?”

Does she know? Do I play it off? I try a simple, “Huh?”

“It’s stupid for people to ask if they’re interrupting something because life’s a bunch of actions that make up a whole. So, at any point in time, when I call you, I’m going to interrupt something. The question is: is the thing I’m interrupting worth interrupting? So, what am I interrupting?”

“I, uh—nothing really. Just reading.”

“Aw, you’re literate? How unique of you.”

Her playfulness pulls me out of my stupor. “I really just wanted to be set apart from the rest of the pack, you know?”

She laughs. It’s a mighty sound.

“I got your number from my sponsor. He had the sign-in sheet from the other night,” she says.

I cock my head. “Your sponsor?”

“Yeah, you’re supposed to find a sponsor to call in Addiction Fighters. You know, someone who’s been through some of the process to help you talk through stuff?”

“Oh,” I say.

“Anyway, she told me it wouldn’t hurt to find some friends going through the addiction process to talk through stuff with. She also told me she thinks I’m more of a lost teenager than an addict, which is why I’m never calling her again. Anyone who thinks their shit is greater than mine is more lost than I am. So, I’m in the market for a new person to call, and I thought of the Knights of Vice. I figured you were as good a pick as any.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“So, you aren’t an asshole. You care. That’s a good start. I need someone who cares. Okay, so I’m just going to dive right in: I’ve been thinking about being utterly fucked up.”

“Okay?” I’m unsure what she wants me to do or if I’m supposed to do anything.

“It’s exhausting, you know? It feels like I’m hungry all the time, and everything I eat just pushes me closer to nowhere. I see the reason for the whole higher power thing in the twelve steps, but that confuses me, too. People always say God’s the answer, but they never tell me what he’s the answer to. What are the questions? How do I figure out the questions? It’s like solving for X when the only information you have is that the answer is Y. But even then, if the only two variables we have are X and Y, wouldn’t that mean X equals Y? That God is both the question and the answer? How the hell does that work?”

“You know, I’m a genius with formulas and even I don’t know how it works. Sorry.”

“I was just watching porn,” she says, and I wonder if this conversation is legal. Guys and girls aren’t supposed to talk about this topic unless it’s a random joke here and there.

“Yeah,” I say, feeling the words slide out of my mouth before I can identify them. “I was too, kind of.”

WHAT?

Why would I say that? You don’t say that to a girl as hot as Dez. Or a girl in general.

Or anyone.

“You were ‘kind of’ watching porn?” she asks dryly. “How do you do that?”

“I was wearing an eye patch?”

She laughs. “Well, I was watching some buff guy with a mustache named Rick do this nameless girl, and I got pissed. In fact, I got so pissed that I opened my window and threw my computer into my pool.”

“Seems like a healthy response?” I laugh a little. “Why would you do that?”

“I’ll answer by asking another question. A better one. What do you think about the cinematography of porn?”

“The cinematography of porn?” I repeat.

“Exactly, you don’t think about it. Here’s the thing: how often do you see the faces of the people actually having sex? Like, next to never, right? Mr. Cratcher told me at Addiction Fighters the average age a boy starts watching porn is twelve years old. I’m sure girls aren’t too far away from that. Do you know what that means?”

I don’t know what that means, and I’m not sure I want to know. This conversation is making me feel incredibly guilty, and there’s not even anything to feel guilty about. The only reason I haven’t hung up yet is because a girl outside of Addy is talking to me willingly, and even Addy isn’t talking to me right now. I can’t take this opportunity for granted.

“It means from the age of twelve, we’re taught to be consumers instead of people who care. Think about it. There are millions of videos. You go from one to the next, always running away from the last feeling bored. What’s worse is I realized I’m playing a part in the destruction of the line between sexuality and sexualization.”

“Is that why you threw your computer in the pool?”

“No. I threw my computer into the pool because I had those revelations, kept watching, and finished myself off regardless. That’s what pissed me off. I figured out what’s wrong with porn, and I didn’t even care.”

“Should we be talking about this?” I ask, feeling awkwardness rush through my body, making me shift uneasily on my bed.

“Why shouldn’t we?”

“Isn’t this kind of discussion between guys and girls illegal or something?”

She scoffs. “Typical guy—you’re okay with us using our mouths on your junk, but as soon as we use them for betterment of ourselves, or equalization of our genders, you tell us to shut up.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, not what I was saying.”

The phone is silent for a few seconds. I regret saying anything.

“Dez?”

“What were you saying?” she snaps.

“I was just saying guys and girls don’t typically talk to each other about this stuff, that’s all.”

“Well, that’s everyone else’s problem. Now we’re each other’s problem. I mean, we’re both eff’d to the max, right? So what does it matter?”

“I’m not eff—Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

Why’s Master agree with the stupid woman hobbitses?

Because I think I’m having a moment where literally everything in my life is changing.

Something about her wry honesty hits me perfectly. The way she talks about her flaws. The borderline irrationally snaps at perceived slights. Her strength. This girl is poetry I’ve never heard before. Is that why I’m so up for agreeing with her? Is it simply just because she’s a girl willing to talk to me? I might just be that shallow.

“Adam?” she says.

“Yeah, sorry.”

“Ooh, this applies here! ‘Happy families are all alike,’” she says. “‘Every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.’”

“What’s that?”

“The first line of Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy. It just makes a lot of sense to me. Everyone may be unhappy in their own way, but at least we can all be unhappy together. That way we aren’t as alone.”

I like her.

I really, really like Dez Coulter.

“Do you like that book?” I ask.

“Anna Karenina?”

“Yeah.”

“I don’t know. I’ve never read it.”