Keep Art Alive :: “Sleeping Beauty” :: Art by Sarah Joncas

“And the sex,
and the drugs,
and the complications.”

(an excerpt from a longer piece of writing of mine)

It has been two weeks now since Troy and the bleacher scene. I have yet to say a word to him. I just cannot confront him, or confront what he said. I have been ditching classes for two weeks, too, avoiding Troy and Robert both. Instead of school I take the 55 bus to South Coast Plaza every morning so Mom doesn’t ask any questions. I sit in the center court, watch the merry go-round go round in its dizzy predictability. I stole lipsticks from May Company yesterday and used my lunch money to buy magazines.

Today I decided to walk down by Sears, to that spot where all the runaways collect themselves. I met this boy with green streaks in his hair at that same spot last week, though I never caught his name. He had rough hands. I let him feel me up in the back of this van he led me to, “it’s not mine“, he’d said. He leaned his body up against me, pressing and rubbing, closer, his tongue pushing my mouth open. I didn’t feel a thing, not that he seemed to notice.

I want to feel something, I think, or maybe I don’t want to feel anymore, at all. I stole Valiums from Mom’s bathroom and a bottle of vodka from Town and Country liquor. I crept to the back of the store, by the toilet paper, diapers and mouth wash, and shoved the bottle into my coat, then walked out.

I have met up with that boy a few times. I let him touch me places. I close my eyes and feel myself go numb. I can hear him moaning into my ear, his face buried in my hair, his breath quickening and then suddenly he pulls away, his pants sticky and his eyes glazed over. He digs into the bottom of his backpack and pulls out a cigarette, shares it with me, passing it back and forth without looking at my face. Today some feeling bled through, but I hid a stifled gasp in an exhale before handing the cigarette back to him. He doesn’t look up. He doesn’t notice the single tear trickle down my cheek.

During the day it’s the last of Troy’s speed that keeps me going, and at night it is more of the pocketed pills from Mom. Some nights sleep eludes, toying with me like a clue waiting to be solved, or a word dangling off the tip of my tongue. Other times it hits hard and fast, collapsing my body into worn bed sheets and image-less dreams, the buzz of non-existent moths brought on by the chemicals ebb and flow in my bloodstream the lullaby lulling me under.

In that kind of sleep, well, I can forget about everything.

Meds :: Placebo, featuring Alison Mosshart