CHAPTER 23
Matt
_____
THE FINGER LAKES are wine country.
Fuck, they even have this thing called the Seneca Wine Trail. You go around the whole goddamn lake hitting up wineries until you pass out. It's like a hall crawl for cultured adults.
Granted, I wasn't about to hit the trail. I did hit up a few wineries, though. I'd borrowed my brother's bike, a silver Icon Sheene, and I tore all over Geneva like a maniac.
Not caring is really damn liberating.
I kept the cabin stocked with wine, bourbon, and Dunhills. Nate stopped pestering me around the middle of September—thank god. He'd had a damn good idea, me getting some time alone in nature or whatever, but I didn't need him to mother hen me the whole time.
So I was drinking again. So what? I forgot how much I loved it.
And fuck, I wrote Ten Thousand Nights drunk off my ass. It's still my most popular novel. I could write The Surrogate wasted, no problem.
I wrapped myself in an afghan and sat out on the porch. I made my weekly call to Pam.
"Matthew," she sighed.
God, that bitch. What did she always have to be such a bitch? I was starting to expect her oh-no-it's-Matt-again tone, like damn, too bad I have to talk to my most famous author.
"Yeah, sorry to rain on your goddamn parade," I slurred.
Silence.
"I mean fuck, Pam, it's not like I'm fucking nobody. Last time I checked—"
"It's the time, Matthew." Her voice was quiet and faraway. I looked at my phone. It was four in the morning.
"You're two fucking hours behind me! God Pam, also, fuck, work on my schedule. I'm the next fucking Balzac. What about Proust? He used to—"
"Matthew, what do you want."
There was no question at the end of Pam's sentence. That bitch. She knew she had me by the balls because she had Hannah.
I spit a mouthful of Riesling over the rail. I needed a bottle of beer. Better yet, I needed a bottle of Woodford Reserve.
"You know what I want. What does she think? I'm writing like you always ask but you're never fucking h—"
"She loves it." Pam stifled a yawn.
Okay, Pam had probably been asleep—like I fucking cared. She deserved this. She ratted me out to the reporters. Her and Bethany, maybe even Nate. I'd had time to think and I finally figured they were all in on it. They knew about me and Hannah. They tore us down on purpose.
Why, I didn't know, and it didn't matter. You can't trust anyone.
"I swear," I growled. "Tell me more."
"She... she really empathizes with the narrator, the surrogate."
"Why?"
"I don't know, Matthew. We work together, we don't do psychoanalysis."
"Oh, fuck you Pam."
I ended the call. Fuck her. I drained my bottle and dropped it, watching it roll across the porch. What a gorgeous fucking night. Cool and dark, windy and quiet. All I needed was a cigarette. Or that bottle of beer. My Ambien was kicking in, though. God, I loved that feeling... like a balloon rising and expanding in my head.
_____
I woke up drunk.
Jesus, why did I sleep on the porch? I was fucking freezing, wearing only a pair of boxers, and sore as fuck, slumped over in a wicker chair.
I flicked through my phone. Huh, I'd talked to Pam. God, she probably called me in the middle of the fucking night. She was always calling, always harassing me.
I shuffled into the cabin and took two shots of bourbon. I gulped down three glasses of water. Damn, that did me exactly right. Headache gone, stomach settled, hands steady.
I refreshed Laurence's water and topped off his food dish.
"Perfect morning," I told him. I hummed as I dressed. Mm, it felt good to drink. I'm an all-day all-night drinker when I drink. I do nothing by halves.
My mind whirred along as I brushed my teeth, popped a Xanax and a Lexapro, and collected my latest pages from the kitchen table. I was writing everything by hand. Only fucking way to write. Why did I ever use a computer? Pen in hand, hand to the page, it's godly.
The morning was chilly. I lit a smoke and headed out, leaving a few windows open and the front door unlocked. Uncle's cabin was in the middle of goddamn nowhere.
I strolled up the gravel road to my nearest neighbor, a little farm called The Patch where people came to pick fresh vegetables and buy eggs. My typist was the farmer's wife. Fuck, I couldn't be bothered typing out my own stuff, and this lady looked like she could use the change. I paid her ten dollars per typed page.
We had a rough start—she kept fucking up the formatting and couldn't make out my handwriting—but after about a month we got going smoothly. I wrote, I took the pages to Wendy, I bought some vegetables, I picked up the pages, I paid Wendy, I mailed the pages to Pam, rinse and repeat.
I never went online. I didn't even bring my laptop to the cabin. The internet was a mess of gossip about me, and it was part of how Bethany took me down. And it was how I met Hannah. Now, its unreal, anonymous spaces, the programs and sites where we connected, the laptop screen glowing like a window to another world... could only bring me pain.
"You got pages for me?" Wendy smiled, the corners of her eyes wrinkling sweetly.
She was crouched in a ring of wire mesh with a horde of fuzzy chicks teeming around her. When she saw me, she wiped her hands on her jeans and climbed out.
"Yeah, fifteen or so," I said.
I hovered near the pen. I didn't like to look Wendy in the eye. Hell, I didn't like to look anybody in the eye. Eye contact is too intimate.
Wendy understood that. She got me. She also didn't care about the perpetual booze on my breath—not that I could tell, at least.
She took the pages and rubbed my shoulder. She had dry knobby hands.
"Alright hun," she said. "Would you look at these little guys? Just look at 'em."
"Yeah, they're sweet. God, they're cute." I ran a hand through my hair. I needed a shower. I should have taken another two shots. "I'll look at the animals for a while. That okay?"
Wendy laughed.
"Matt, I told you to stop asking. You come see 'em any time. I'll be in the house."
"Mm, thanks. Thanks Wendy."
I watched as she moved toward the old farmhouse. Morning sunlight fell across the white clapboard. Here and there the paint was peeling. The grounds were unkempt, patches of garden braced by scruffy grass and dirt.
Perfect. This place was perfect. I stepped into the chick pen.
"Hey guys." I crouched and reached for the chicks. They swarmed away from me, making me laugh. "You little jerks. You're all fat. You're all going to be ugly in about a month, all scrawny and gray. Come here."
The tiny endless peeping of the chicks was breaking my fucking heart. I would probably cry when I got into the barn. That's what I usually did.
Finally, I captured one of the chicks. I cupped its body to my chest.
Little bird, I thought. Soft warm little bird.
I wandered around visiting the animals and talking to them. I fed the goats and looked into their weird rectangular pupils. I stroked my hand down a pig's leathery back.
In the barn, a tabby darted away from me.
I glanced around. There was no one in sight, just me and the old black Percheron in his stall. I drifted over and he came to the edge of the stall. He knew this routine. He lowered his lumbering head toward me and I hugged him around the neck.
"Hey pal," I said, my voice thick. I wasn't sad or anything. Mike said that crying is a cathartic release and sometimes it has nothing to do with sorrow.
The horse's huge body made the stall door creak. His neck was pure muscle. I ran my hand down his snout.
"You're big and strong," I whispered.
Even in the cool morning, the barn was warm. The smells of hay and feed permeated the air. I pressed my face into the horse's neck and tears began to slip from my eyes.
"Matt?"
I whirled.
Ah, fuck. Wendy's daughter stood in the doorway smiling at me. I could never remember her name. Hope? Grace? Something wholesome and forgettable.
"Mm. Fucking hay allergies," I muttered, rubbing my eyes.
"Oh, yeah, those'll get you." She lifted an empty bottle. "We've got a new baby cow. You ought to see him."
I shoved my hands into my pockets and looked away as the girl came closer. She looked twentyish and was very striking—black silky hair, freckles, blue eyes. She wore her hair in a long braid down her spine. I saw her pretty much every time I came to The Patch, but it never dawned on me that she might be seeking me out.
"Yeah, I will," I said. "I'm making my rounds."
"Mom's already working on your typing. You know, she really loves doing that. She won't let me read it, though."
The girl came to stand before me. She seemed too close, but then again, I was drunk—lost to that space-time shit.
"Well, yeah," I mumbled. "It's kind of private."
"No big deal." The girl chuckled. She rose onto her toes and wrapped her arms around my shoulders. Her breasts brushed my chest. "Matt?" she whispered.
I didn't move. I felt like a lump of clay. Her arms were cool and slender and I was aware of her pressing closer. Her breath tickled my neck. How strange. I felt nothing. I stood there listlessly and stared at the barn wall.
"Why are you so sad?" the girl said. "You're so sad. Let me try to make you happy."
A cold, familiar smirk distorted my lips.
"You think you can?" I said.
"I know I can. I'll take care of you." The girl's hands moved down my back. No fire sprang up in their wake. I only became aware of my pronounced ribs and the ridge of my spine. Huh. I'd have to pick up some eggs while I was here. More fat, more protein.
The girl began to undo my jeans. I let her, gazing down impassively as she worked. She gripped my soft cock and I saw her brows knit. My smirk twitched.
After massaging me ineffectually for a minute, the girl dropped to her knees. I had to hand it to her—she was determined. She licked along the soft organ and sucked at the tip. When she glanced up at me, confusion flashed through her eyes.
My cock had zero interest.
I shrugged, and then started to laugh helplessly. The girl turned red.
"Nice try, kid," I said.
I tucked my member away, did up my jeans, and strolled out of the barn. Turns out laughter works as well as tears.
I made two scrambled eggs when I got back to the cabin. I pushed them around on my plate, washing down small bites with bourbon. Somehow, the booze and pharmaceuticals kept my stomach full. I tried to eat throughout the day, but most nights I ended up puking.
No big deal; nausea comes with the territory.
I wrote for a few hours and then I got too drunk to see straight. I'd hit a roadblock in The Surrogate. My protagonist was about to make love to the woman he spent half the novel chasing. I wanted to write a steamy sex scene, but the words weren't flowing.
The images weren't flowing.
Usually I could sit back, imagine a scene, and transcribe it. Not this time. I kept thinking about Hannah reading it. I wanted to write it for her.
I tried to reconnect with the passion we used to feel. In my car, in the field, in her room, in my bed. The images were sterile. Hands on skin, mouths locked.
Fuck. What was happening to me? And why was I having Pam feed my novel to Hannah anyway? There was no point. Three months had passed. Hannah and I were definitely over.
I could barely remember the sound of her voice, the smell of her hair.
She had become an idea.
I sent my story to Hannah the way people pray—casting my plea into the ether. A plea to be understood. Looking for the signs.
_____
I woke on the couch. At some point, I had changed into a pair of loose pajama pants. The cold bit at me and I let it. So much of my life now was dumb penitence.
After taking two shots and a Xanax, I called Mike.
Mike was still a decent psychiatrist, even if I didn't trust him. He set me up with meds before I flew out to New York. I called him from time to time. A thirty-minute call to Mike cost me a hundred bucks, but the money didn't matter.
"Hi Matthew. How are you doing?"
"Fine. You know, good. Is it a good time?"
"Yes, sure."
I heard a door close.
"Look, who transcribes your notes?" I said.
"Matthew, we've been over this. I—"
"No, I know. But Hannah's mom, she does that, you know? The transcription stuff. And I was thinking, if she types your notes..."
Mike was one of very few people who didn't cut me off when I rambled. Granted, my rambling worked in his monetary favor. I still appreciated it.
"You know, that would be bad for me," I said. I began to prowl through the cabin. Shadows pooled on the floor. I had no idea what time it was or even what day. I lost whole weeks to the rhythms of drunkenness. "There are things I want to say. But no one can know. It gets onto the internet and everywhere."
The Mike-Hannah's mother connection evaded me. I thought about it a lot. There was Hannah's mother and the medical records. There was Mike, my psychiatrist. They might be conversing, but how could I ever find out?
"I take our physician-patient privilege very seriously, Matthew. Also, as I have mentioned, I dictate my own notes with a voice recognition program."
"Ah, right. That's right. Do you make notes about these calls?"
"Yes, I make short notes about these calls. Let me ask you a question Matthew."
"Shoot."
"Are you taking the Zyprexa I prescribed?"
"No, not really. It makes me sleepy. I take the Xanax."
"I would like you to hold on the Xanax and try the Zyprexa. These fearful suspicions you're exhibiting should be—"
"Fine, whatever. I'll try that."
I smirked and rolled my eyes at Laurence. Classic. Mike was trying to accuse me of paranoia. He did that every time I got close to the truth.
"Anyway, Mike, I have a problem. Basically..." I bounced the ball of my foot against the wall. "I can't get my prick up." I laughed and resumed pacing.
"Okay, help me with specifics," Mike said. I was grateful for his clinical tone. "Are you having trouble sustaining erection, or achieving erection?"
"Achieving, I guess."
"How long has this been going on?"
"About three months. I don't know, maybe two. Since I left Denver."
"Have you attempted intercourse and found yourself unresponsive?"
I thought about the girl in the barn.
"Um, not really." I winced. I needed another drink. "Look, all I know is, I used to wake up with wood almost every day." I ground my teeth. God damn, I wasn't about to tell Mike how Hannah could get me hard just looking at me, how her voice made my cock perk up, how I hardened instantly in her hand.
My throat started to burn. I rubbed my jaw.
"I just need some fucking Viagra," I snapped. "I need to get off, alright? I need the release. I'm going crazy."
"Medication is an option," Mike said, "but I can't prescribe treatment to a healthy young man without doing a workup first. Erectile dysfunction is often the result of organic—"
"Meeting over." I ended the call and tossed my phone onto the couch.
A healthy young man.
Maybe Mike had a point. Maybe my dick would be more interested in life if I stopped drinking myself into oblivion. Somehow, though, I doubted it.
I opened a bottle of beer and sat at the kitchen table. I ran my pen along the spiral ring of my notebook. I could skip the sex scene, come back to it later. But how would I handle the rest of the novel? The sex wasn't exactly incidental to the plot. Fuck.
I'd deleted the pictures of Hannah from my phone months ago. I didn't deserve to have them, and I knew she wouldn't want me looking at them. Still, I tried to remember them as I moved a hand between my legs.
I tried to remember that first time when we were strangers on the internet.
Hannah. You should let your robe hang open.
And the second time, when I saw her picture and grew hard looking at it.
The third time, in a motel in Montana.
God, you're perfect. Lie down. Put the phone near your ear. I want you to have both hands free.
I remembered her dark, heavy hair strewn across my thighs. Her fingertips brushing my cock for the first time. Her mouth, the bend of her knee. The sunlight on her eyelashes.
Beneath my hand, my cock didn't even twitch.
I hurled my bottle across the room. It crashed into the wall and beer and glass rained down. Laurence bolted to the corner of his cage with a loud thump.
"Sorry," I mumbled. "Fuck, sorry Laurence."
I shoved my notebook away. I stood and went down, my ankle twisting under me. The pain was a blessed relief. The floor rose to meet me and I tumbled right through it, down into the river of forgetfulness.