A lake that's been poisoned

Speaking of progress, maybe you guessed that Abby isn't working at Glad Day anymore, with all the glamour on the girl block, saving for our new apartment with $20 tricks although she does get some good regulars who aren't so cheap. I say our new apartment, but it's not like anyone has called us. Oops, watch out for this K-hole on the stairwell, I'm just going to stay here a while, okay? Yes, it's the after-after-hours at our house again and now the X is literally yellow so you rush to the bathroom to vomit, too much heroin I mean everyone else rushes to the bathroom to vomit but luckily for me it’s just uncontrollable diarrhea although some people actually like the vomiting, heroin for sure, so I only take a half and it just makes me feel like I'm caving in until I do a bunch of coke so then I'm annoyed and edgy until finally too much K so here I am on the stairs oh I love these stairs who knew these stairs would be so comfortable. Maybe I'll just stay here for the rest of my life as everyone walks by, why are they all going so fast and there's Elana del Monte.

Elana, I say, and this guy with Elana’s plucked eyebrows looks at me with some blank distant sneer that I recognize from somewhere, where am I again, oh, this carpet, I love the feel of this carpet that yes, I know I usually hate because it's disgusting, but feel it, okay? Oh, let me touch my chest, arms, the back of my head, okay maybe there is some ecstasy in that ecstasy, I'll just close my eyes and drift away, there’s music in my head, a swirling tunnel and then all the colors pull away from one another until it's a cat's cradle. Then diamond shapes like some kind of videogame version of backgammon and this is when I realize I can make it do whatever I want, bouncing balls, rainbow spiral splatter paint, a big field filled with fluorescent orange trees and pink cats with diamond spider eyes and I'm dancing with some kind of swirly pattern projecting onto the walls I'm pulsating into tiny spaces and then expanding in light on stage until a black background clears everything and then I'm on top of someone's shiny car in a rainstorm no it's a cave filled with shimmering stalactites no it's the beach in  all that sun and all through this my arms are flailing around like I'm fitting myself into myself and there’s Abby biting her nails and saying Mattilda. Mattilda. Mattilda, are you there, we've got something special.

Oh, Abby’s touching me and when I open my eyes there's Elana again — no, not Elana, that awful guy with the plucked eyebrows but where’s Abby? Oh, right next to him except that her eyes look so far away, staring at me like I'm in a laboratory and where are her eyes with those tiny tiny pupils, what's going on? And Abby says it again: Let's go in the bathroom, for something special.

Oh, something special, okay, I guess I can get up, as long as the carpet doesn't swallow me, I'll just hold the railing, wait this is fun, no, slower, okay, you go ahead, and then when I finally get to the bathroom I'm making faces in the mirror to make sure that’s me, Abby’s sitting at the vanity with Elana who’s not Elana, cutting lines but I don't want any more coke and Abby says Mattilda, it's not coke — it's crystal. And when I look at her eyes again I notice that the blue is sparkling but it's like a lake that's been poisoned and I’m scared so I leave the room without even saying anything, go downstairs and now I realize that’s the look in everyone's eyes and Abby rushes downstairs as I'm going into my room and she says are you okay?

I say: I left San Francisco because of crystal— don't wake me up until it's over, okay? And then I go in my room and lock the door, cut up some Xanax and snort it, take two Doxepin, put on Moby’s Ambient and get in bed for I don't know how long, it feels like a roller coaster not a futon and when I get up the clock says 6:12 but I can't tell if it's morning or evening and I go to the kitchen for some water. Abby’s still awake but the house is quiet and I say don't ever let anyone bring crystal into our house again, and she nods her head but I'm not sure if she understands, so I say: Someone else will have to post the after-after-hours from now on, okay?

And then I just feel sad, or maybe I already felt sad, and I can tell that Abby feels sad too, I mean of course she's sad because she’s been up all night on crystal so now we're sad together which is better than being sad apart.

I don't know if I'll ever sleep again, Abby says.

I don't know if I'll ever feel anything, I say. I fucking hate this town.

And Abby says: I fucking hate this town.

And I say: I fucking hate this town.

And Abby says: I fucking hate this town.

So then we go down the list about everything in Boston that we hate, or not everything because then we would never be able to finish speaking, but enough that eventually we’re so annoyed that it's actually funny, and then somehow once I figure out that it's morning we decide we should go to the Burlington Mall to go shopping for outfits, since I'm sure there's a Contempo Casuals or something like that there, right, and then we can get matching dresses, but first we need to get ready to go out. Abby says she doesn't need a shower, and when I look at her kind of strangely she says oh, okay, so I make some oats with cinnamon and stevia, oh these are good, maybe I just needed to eat, and when Abby come down she tries to eat a bite but then she put down her spoon and goes over to the sink to spit it out. Sorry, Mattilda, she says, but everything tastes like sand, and then she lights a cigarette and I guess it's my turn for a shower.