She buttoned her coat, after she sat and before she took the book out of her bag. Before reading, she lit a cigarette and took a sop of coffee through its white corporate lid. She smoked as she read with half her mind, the other half wondering first if anyone was looking at her from the windows of the apartment building across the street, second if there was anything she needed to do before 5:30. She decided she needed another cigarette.
Walking through dead leaves she stuffed her hands in her pockets, not at the place she was going yet, already evaluating the quickest route from there to the next place.
She asked the counter girl for Camel Filters, taking another sip of coffee before digging out and handing over $10. Even though someone she was avoiding might have seen her, she took the quickest route. Already there was little room for time alone. Even the few minutes with the book didn't c ount. It had been pressed upon her by someone else. That it was enjoyable didn't matter. She would have to account for it later. Her watch read 5 minutes to 5.
x He always thought she was a cold one, and wondered why no one else saw it. Granted, it took him a little bit at first too. Maybe they did see it, and never said anything. They weren't much of a group for talking of such things. When they talked, it was of poetry and philosophy and other sorts of high-brow things. Gossiping wasn't the thing. And because of that smile she had, and the way she listened, and the quality of the hugs she gave, he wondered if the coldness was just an illusion created in his own mind.
He watched her kick through the leaves walking from the corporate coffee shop and thought he was right. The smile went straight to her eyes and lit u her face, when she listened she was interested and showed so through questions and expressions. But there was a rigidity in her hugs and a vacancy in her eyes not quite concealed.
Offhand he mentioned it to Claudia and she was quite concerned at first, until he told her to forget it, and in her way she drew together her brows and bit her lip in an adorable frown. He told her not to worry but a couple days later Claudia told him "I thought about what you said about Bridget and you can't possibly be right. It just wouldn't be right. It would be the height of deceit."
Claudia was very anti-deception, against lies and unpure motives. Sometimes he privately laughed at the irony of that. So he let her rant for a while before asking her not to say anything.
"Oh, of course," assured Claudia. "Although I did tell Saul. but of course it's a given he would never breathe a word."
So maybe Claudia was slightly given to gossip.
She turned to walk away with a wave and a dimpled smile, and then turned back. "Nothing ... happened between you and..."
He told her no before she finished, "No, of course not," and walked away first.
He disagreed with Claudia It wasn't that it was deceit at all; not all masks are deceitful. He wasn't always himself, quite, either. What had intrigued him about her coldness was the welcome surprise it brought — that she was the same as himself.
She turned the corner in a swirl of scuffed leaves, and then he couldn't watch her anymore.
It wasn't even really a mask, nothing was hidden, nothing she did or said wasn't what she meant. She just meant differently by these things than most would expect. She was actually more genuine than Claudia, or Saul, or even himself. But oh, she was frigid. He wondered when the ice would break.
"Peter," Saul said from the doorway. His cheeks were red from the wind outside and when he pulled off his hat his fine black hair stood on end. "Are you going to that show tonight or not?"
Bridget said she'd call at a quarter to 8, but if there was no answer she would understand. She understood things like that. On the other hand, hanging out with Bridget was free while he would owe Saul $15 for the ticket.
"Cody wants to know if you want that ticket or not," Saul told him, dumping his books on the floor by the desk, moving towards the kitchenette.
That settled it. "No."
Times were he was always up for a show if he had to beg or borrow to get there. he needed then to keep up with the crowd and to know what was now and what it tasted or sounded or felt like.
"Did Jesse call?" Saul asked, fidgeting around in the fridge but he closed the door empty-handed. Saul must be back on the coke, Peter thought, but ignored the way his gut clenched.
"No. Isn't he going with you tonight?"
"Yeah, but it was a possibility we would get together before the show and go on a little walk."
Saul was also smoking more than he used to. He used to smoke even more than this, but shortly after they met Saul went clean on everything. In the spring, last spring, he seemed to slide back in a little, but after a relatively clean summer Peter detected a full-force backslide.
"Do you know where my pipe is?" Saul asked and followed quickly, "Never mind, I lent it to Claudia. Do you have any rolling papers?"
Without looking Peter took them from the top right desk drawer and handed them to Saul. He could see Bridget out his window crossing the street at the end of the block, banging a pack of cigarettes against her flattened left palm. As usual she appeared to be in a cloud, but he knew she noticed more than one might think she saw.
"I wouldn't have expected Claudia would want to borrow your pipe," Peter said, turning away from the window to Saul. Saul was rummaging through his top desk drawer, pulling out assorted pens and pills and placing them on the surface. Hand hovering over the array, he finally picked out three pills and one pen and pocketed the lot, sweeping what remained into the drawer and slamming it shut.
"Huh?" he looked up at Peter. "Oh. Well, it was more like I left it there but we were smoking together after we studied philosophy, you know, for Cassagranda's class."
Saul and Claudia were spending more time together this fall. It was odd, after the way they sort of avoided each other last spring and most of the summer. Actually, it was Saul who was avoidant. Caludia was more confrontational and had a need to talk things over. She was very female in that. It was something he appreciated about Bridget, that she wasn't.
"Right," he said.
"Um, yeah," Saul said to his cell phone, "I can meet you at Texaco in five or I can just see you at the show, it's up to you." He shook his coat upside down and the contents of the pocketsdd thumped on the rug — three little thumps for two quarters and a nickel, a more hollow sounding thump for a blue pack of American Spirits, the loudest thump for the plain silver zippo , and no sound at all for the $10 that fluttered down on the final shake. Saul put everything in his jeans and exchanged the denim jacket for a waterproof. "So I'll see you in a few." he pocketed the phone. "Later," he said to Peter and the door slammed.
Peter walked over to deadbolt it.
The distance between Saul and himself had closed as well after last spring but their closeness had a different feeling this time around. They didn't need as much to be always together, side by side, like they were steady enough now to step out each on his own. It may have been a feeling that what caused the break in the first place was that dangerous closeness.
Last winter was when he was Claudia's boyfriend, though the ones who didn't know them well often told him they couldn't tell if it was he and Claudia who were together, or Claudia and Saul, or if they all three had something going on.
He knew how Claudia thought of it, that Saul was their best friend, and that had a dangerous connotation. He and Claudia were not one entity by far, and to show her that he broke off the monogamy. Monogamy disagreed with him anyway, that solid stout label like a tie. No matter if no one could tell the difference between Peter and Claudia as a couple and Peter and Claudia as best friends but he knew it was there.
It fucked with her though. He realized now she thought the split was just another quirk of Peter's, and that they really were still one entity, and always would be, and other such everyday tripe. It muddled her poor pretty head terribly.
From that resulted a confusion in all of them between the states of what was between them all, and culminated in the events that created the temporary rift.
It was a Saturday night and they came back to Peter's room nearing on 11, three bottles of wine procured after the show and enough pot to get them fucked up enough. They opened the wine and drank straight from the bottle with Saul acting as DJ and Peter not answering the door, but they never got to packing the pipe and going for the ritual walk. Laying with Claudia on the bed, Saul on the other side of her pushed against the wall, Peter turned his head that way to say something to him and Claudia mistook it and took his mouth with hers. he decided not to be a fool and turn that down. They were all very drunk anyway. And poor Saul, against the wall, must not have been able to stand the exclusion anymore. They were together in everything but this anyway. So left with no judgment at all from the headiness of the wine he jumped into the fray. Neither Claudia nor peter objected. No one was in a state to think of afterward.
And afterward, so [cliche] and awkward. But that was when Bridget joined them, or the beginning of it, so he couldn't see it all as bad.
He couldn't say exactly though how they became four instead of three. She was the last to realize it, how close he and Saul eventually came to feel to her. She was Claudia's friend first and now he saw that was all she ever intended. But Bridget went with the flow.
He picked up Saul's copy of Camus' "The Stranger" and sat down on the couch to wait for her call.
x She left the bright fluorescent of another lecture into dark and cold and lit another cigarette. Same routine, as sure as inhaling and exhaling now. Two hours of class after work and a section of time for coffee then two hours of break running errands with perhaps a snatch of time for herself and another plastic coffee followed by two more hours of class and then —
She fished two quarters from her pockets. She found one in her coat and one in her pants, and stopped at the Texaco pay phone when she got there. The phone rang three times and she thought he might not be there this time but he answered as the answering machine picked up. They both waited for the beep.
"Peter?"
"Yeah hi," he said, and for a moment neither said anything. She heard his breathing in her ear.
"Did you still want to hang out?" She hated that he made her ask.
"Yeah yeah." There was another pause. "I'll watch for you from the window."
She hung up the phone, feeling like she always did after the phone call. She lit another cigarette and lingered by the ph one, just to be obstinate, but a few drags in she found herself walking the block to Peter's. Saul would be gone this time she knew. A lot of kids were going to a show tonight. Saul was where the shows were.
Peter was waiting for her on the steps of the apartment. He asked if she minded meeting Claudia at the library and going with them to get dinner, possibly pho. "She hasn't seen you in a log time, " he said. "She was excited when I told her you were going to be around tonight."
She clenched her hands inside her pockets, looking at his face. the streetlight glared off the lenses of his glasses and she couldn't see his eyes. So she pulled another cigarette from the pack in her pocket, placed it carefully between her lips and lit it from the lighter in her other pocket, plastic, bic, and green. Inhaling, then she said on the exhale cloaking her tone with smoke and short breath, "Yeah sure that'd be great. I haven't seen her in a while either." Obvious, but she wondered if he would pick up on the purposefulness. Sometimes she thought he was thicker than she gave him credit for.
he stood and took his head from his pocket to brush the back of it against her cheek as he kissed the air by it, then to place it at the small of her back as they walked. "hey baby."
It was cold enough to see his breath but she exhaled only smoke.
"Could I ah —"
"Yeah sure." She handed him her pack of cigarettes.
"Thanks darling." He took one and lit it after handing back the pack. Once he told her the way to tell a true smoker from a beginner or a dabbler was whether or not he had to stop walking to light it. She didn't break stride either as she lit another, but when Claudia joined them she stopped, and Bridget and Peter stopped to wait, while she turned first one way, then the other, unable to escape the wind. Bridget resented the pause.
x He wondered why Bridget never ordered wine with dinner. If he were 21 he would always order wine with dinner. When they went to Vancouver in August, he, Claudia and her, they had all ordered wine with dinner the first night — she shared a carafe of house white with Claudia and he drank one of red on his own.
He remembered that night when they all went back to the hotel room with its single queen size bed with a bottle of vodka they learned the first night in town must be bought before a late dinner. Claudia was throwing up in the bathroom with the door closed and most of the bottle gone. Bridget sat disheveled in the bed looking out through tumbled hair and heavy lidded eyes. She was looking at him.
Knowing her before that night he believed her when she said she wasn't at all sexual. but a quarter hour before that look he'd come from the bathroom to find Bridget being quite ardently kissed by Claudia. "Holy shit," he commented having expected no such thing. And after Claudia left abruptly to vomit in the toilet Bridget sat up and turned her gaze to him, not the least disturbed. He had been though, especially when she stood and walked with steady deliberance towards him. He kissed her and it hurt his stomach the way her fingers curled around his ear and the way her waist was very slender in his two hands. They moved to the bed and he threw her down on it because she smelled like sex and wine. He remembered hearing Claudia brushing her teeth and wondered if she would be upset when she came out but she actually joined them for a bit before passing out and Peter returned his attention to only Bridget, where it wanted to be, until they both fell asleep as well.
Now she sat slurping her noodles across from he and Claudia, who turned her foot around his ankle, and as usual he couldn't reconcile her poker spine and smooth white cheeks with the hot liquid she became under him.
And the air between her and Claudia was thick as cold chicken broth and as cloudy, though in her way Claudia refused to see that but instead tried to reach around it and under it and even through it while it seemed Bridget was content to sit and watch her try.
Claudia did not remember most of that night in Vancouver, the black parts including what passed between Bridget and himself, and between all three at once. But she confided to him once that after a cocktail party at her house in September Bridget spent the night and they had made love, but she did not know if Bridget remembered and she was in agony because she felt she could not bring it up with her.
And he knew Claudia was right, she would not get what she wanted from Bridget because the girl would retain her poker face.
If Claudia would only let herself know what went on between Bridget and himself she would probably vomit against her denial. Claudia disdained deceit but she so often deceived herself.
They paid their checks and left, and he marveled at how not a significant bit of conversation had occurred except between his eyes and Bridget's.
Claudia paid his check.
x She scowled at the bus as it pulled up to let her in. After she paid the fair she started to march to the back of the bus but as it lurched forward she stumbled into a front seat instead.
Besides her lowered brows though, Bridget's posture and expression were calm and quiet as usual.
At her apartment building she let herself in and climbed the stairs at an even pace. her roommate let her in, and Bridget grinned. Cassie's face was green with another cleansing mask.
"How was your day hun?"
Bridget lit another cigarette and leaned out the window Cassie had open for probably the same purpose. The smoke hit the cold air like breath and contrasted light against the dark outside. She thought it was a pity she was so distracted because Cassie looked ready for bed so it would be a good time to get work done.
She said it had been a usual day.
"Yeah? You look tired. You don't have to work tomorrow right? Now would be a good time to get some sleep," Cassie told her, then swayed to the bathroom, unwinding her towel turban as she walked. Cassie walked like Bridget thought the Chiquita Banana lady must walk.
"It would be," Bridget agreed, but made no move from the window ledge. She drew her knees to her chest and let the butt fall from her fingers to the grass seven stories below. The cherry glowed all the way down. She lit another cigarette.
After a while she noticed Cassie was done in the bathroom and doing something in the kitchen. Bridget was staring at nothing and had been for quite some time, the cigarette cold between her two first fingers. She shook her head and climbed from the sill, wincing at her stiff knees and numb ass. Her left side was cold from the outside air while her right was hot from Cassie's space heater. In the kitchen Cassie gave her a cup of tea.
"It's chamomile, it will help you sleep." Then, "You're not going to bed, are you? You're going to make yourself sick Bridge. You should at least get a little rest tonight, ok?"
"I'll try. Sweet dreams Cass." She had the kitchen to herself so Bridget took out Kierkegaard and sat down to read. The microwave clock said 1 a.m. But she was too tired to divide up the hours until the next thing accordingly.
x On Monday she was sitting outside class with Saul, waiting to go inside. They smoked in meditative silence — Bridget once called the time she and Saul shared "silent conversation" and Saul liked that. But Saul wore a surly expression, and the movement of hand to mouth with his cigarette was shaky. Bridget noticed that and kept her silence but Jesse walked over and began pestering Saul about something having to do with money and Peter. She turned her face away to be polite, until Saul's unresponsiveness caused Jesse to give up and go away.
"Yeah maybe you know what Peter's been up to lately," Saul said to her and Bridget asked him what he meant.
"Well you know Claudia's been suspicious for quite some time even if she would never say such to you."
Instead of biting back like she wanted to, or denying as she should have, Bridget suggested they go to class.
"i was supposed to wait for Claudia. But I'm beginning to think she's permanently running approximately five minutes late," Saul said.
"She says she's taken on too much this quarter," Bridget replied, opening the door for Saul.
"Yes, well. They're all beginning to make me sick," he said, then looked down at Bridget. "Well, not you, not yet. You have a sort of peaceful way about you. I still enjoy your company."
"Thank you," said Bridget opening her classroom door. She caught sight of Claudia rushing from the other end of the hallway, red lipstick and dark hair, before the door closed behind her.
In class she pulled her notebook from her bag before taking off her coat and drinking from her coffee cup.
Saul knew, and Claudia probably knew, and Peter wouldn't have given a shit, even if he wasn't the type to talk about it right out. he wouldn't even talk about it to her, not that she would ever bring it up. She wondered if it was
(That's as far as I'd written. It was last worked on around the first of December 2002 it looks like, and was probably done in less than a week's span.)
