Nine years ago today, I was walking up the hill to my high school, when I saw this boy I thought I recognized. As soon as I heard the loud, horrible singing, I knew it was Peter. He was flinging his arms around like he was somebody special, and screeching "...this is the DAWNING of the AGE of AQUARIUS..."
Yeah, seriously.
So, I skipped whatever it was I was supposed to be doing, and Peter and I went to the mall just down the hill. I was fifteen and ugly and I didn't have many friends, and this boy was so cute and he paid attention to me... It didn't matter that he was gay; I would have died for him.
So, we walked hand-in-hand through the mall for a little while. I think maybe we got some french fries at Burger King. We stopped in at the brand new CD store. It was kind of like having a real boyfriend, hanging out with Peter, except he never kissed me and he refered to me as "the girl I'd marry if I wasn't a faggot."
He told me, nine years ago today, that he'd been diagnosed with HIV. He said it in front of the Bath & Body store, or whatever it was called. They have one of those stores in the Olympia mall too; the kind with the red-and-white checkered awning. You can smell it about a half-mile away. To me, it smells like death. Even now.
Of course, Peter didn't have HIV, and it's highly probable that he never thought he did. It was a cute little story as old as the hills, according to everybody else, designed to get Peter a lot of attention. He told everybody that the world was discriminating against him. He even pointed out the person whom he'd gotten it from. And five months later, Peter decided to let me know that he'd been "re-tested," and that he was just fine. The first test had been a fuck-up. This was 1995, but even then, the false-positive rate of an HIV antibody test was well over 1 in 1,000. For a long time, I thought it was a miracle and all that good happy crap. Later, by accident, I found out that Peter had lied about everything else he'd ever said to me. I never really gathered any hard evidence that Peter lied about testing positive, but I don't really consider the whole incident a miracle anymore.
He had a rash one time that summer. He said it was from his "meds." It was really from his fabric softener. Peter had sensitive skin when it came to that kind of crap.
The thing was, I prayed all summer. I cried all summer. I reverted to wishing on stars. All summer. I would have done anything for Peter to somehow magically be well. And then, he WAS magically well. I thought the lesson was: never give up hope. The lesson was: if you don't give up hope, you'll get what you ask for, but make sure you stipulate that you don't want the unpleasant side effect of your alleged best friend being a liar. I don't pray like that anymore.
That has nothing to do with anything that's going on right now. I just wrote about it because it was nine years ago today. May 16th. I'll never forget. Probably that's the most depressing part of the whole thing. Not so much the months I wasted, crying over nothing, but the fact that I still haven't forgotten the pain.
I have another story now. It's about a girl I "met" online in... oh, 1996? 1997? Forever ago.
So, we chatted a lot, this girl and I. She talked about her make-up, and her friends, and her boyfriends, and her girlfriends, and what music she liked. If I remember correctly, she was really into some schmuck named Ryan Adams for awhile, but I don't really remember very well. I talked about her make-up and her boyfriends and girlfriends too. With her, there wasn't much else to talk about. It was all about her. If I said, "yes, well, I'm having this terrible problem where I'm... let's see, homeless, and broken-hearted, and I haven't eaten anything in over three weeks," she would have said, "Well, honey, that's too bad... You should do something about all that! Meanwhile, back to me..."
Maybe not QUITE that bad... My point is, she was shallow and selfish. And frankly, her boy troubles weren't all that interesting. If you don't sleep with everybody you see, you don't have to have so many regrets about being a slut, you know? Well, she didn't know.
I had this girl's journal linked to my website for a couple of years. It wasn't really very interesting, and the background was this fucking ugly orange color for the longest time. But she said she'd started her journal because of me, and I thought that was sweet. But finally, I unlinked her. I don't remember when. She kept writing all this crap in her journal about her make-up, and how she wasn't sure if brown was better than red, and how "ruby delight" was so much sexier than "twinkle red." I mean, shit like that. And she would make all of this into a CRISIS. Her fucking make-up was SO important to her. She emailed me about it sometimes. She told me she could get me a discount if I ever wanted to buy any Avon -- or was it Mary Kay? -- from her. I told her I didn't wear make-up. And really, I don't. I never really have. It just makes me look worse.
So, I unlinked this girl. And I didn't reply back to her latest ruby-versus-twinkle email. This was a few years ago. At the time, I had better things to do. I was trying to dump a boy I didn't like, find an apartment before I ended up on the street, and finish up my classes. Oh, and find a job. I didn't have time for this chick's persistant whininess over things that were essentially boring, and generally her own damned fault. I didn't say anything rude, but I never heard from her again.
Until a couple of weeks ago. Then, she shows up in my email box wanting a place to stay when she comes up to Washington to go to the "Twin Peaks" festival this summer.
Oh yeah, and she wants me to go with her, because she doesn't know anybody else who's going, and her other friends don't have enough money to buy a ticket.
Great, like I've EVER had any money?
I was polite, I thought. I told her that the festival is like $300, and all you get out of it is like, a bus ride and a free dinner. And they take you around to all sorts of interesting filming locations. But I found all of the filming sites by myself. I told her that if she came up here, I'd be glad to save her the money and show her around the sites myself. Or, at least, I could email her the maps and stuff... But, I said, I didn't have the money to waste on a bus ride.
Well, noooooooo, that wasn't quite good enough either. No, she needed somebody to go WITH her. She had the money, so why not spend it on a bus ride and a free dinner? And she needed me to buy a ticket too, so that she wouldn't be so all alone...
You wouldn't think that there are "Twin Peaks" fans out there who care so little about other people... All she fucking wants is somebody to hold her hand and babysit her. This girl hasn't talked to me in over TWO YEARS, and she suddenly resurfaces to demand that I spend $300 to make HER happy? Oh yes, and could she sleep at my place? Fuck this shit. I despise people like this girl.
I think I need to cleanse myself of her, once and for all. In other words, I think I'm going to have to email her back with something nasty. I'll probably get a bratty reply, but really it's not any real loss. So this chick doesn't want to talk to me anymore? Where's the harm in that? Oh, except I might lose that promise of a 10% discount on Mary Fucking Kay.
Kill me now.
I feel horrible all over. I'm going to go lie on the couch and be miserable.
~Helena*