What Else is There?

Four years before, a blogger had discovered an old 45 from a band called Death. The first punk band, or something along those lines. There were two songs on the 45 and after a lot of digging and prodding and hunting and begging, five more songs were discovered and an album was released by a smart and opportunistic label somewhere in Tennessee I think. I had heard about the discovery when it happened and heard the songs, but as it goes these days, I moved on almost immediately. A documentary was made of them, filling in the back story and laying down their credibility for the whole world to see and two months before, I had watched it and after watching it I downloaded the record again. I was listening to it in the car that night.

There was a show at Grant's house. A punk band and some band that everyone else was excited about and a band I had seen a few weeks earlier that I was really excited about. I was getting out of the house. I was making an effort. To be sociable. To be more active. To get my heart out of the gutter and my soul out of a coma and to feel healthy and alive again. It was an effort just to make the effort and Grant usually had a shitload of free beer and gin and that sold me. I said to myself in the car; "Don't be an asshole."

The neighborhood was dense and I parked in a line of cars on a side street and for as many shows have happened at Grant's house, I could never understand how they weren't busted up by cops or asshole neighbors, or regular neighbors who maybe didn't want to listen to screaming fucking punk bands on a Tuesday night. It was Friday though. I got out of the car and walked toward Grant's house. From outside the music was muted if at all audible. A light and warm hum in the air. As I came near the door Isaiah came out. Isaiah was younger than me, new to life and the world and yet to be devastated and addicted. Yet to die and yet to live and I loved him. I loved his purity and his innocence. His thirst for new and knowledge and his hunger for all things beautiful. He reminded me of me ten years before.

"James!" he said and opened his arms.

I hugged him. "Hey man," I said. "How are you?"

"Oh, great man. Great. I'm glad you made it out. How are you?"

"Is there beer in the tub?"

"Of course."

"I'm great."

He laughed. "Hey, I'll be right in, I have to get something. I'll be right back."

"Cool man."

He smiled and I wondered how he could feel like smiling all of the time. I thought maybe I made him smile and I liked the idea that I could make anyone smile and then I thought maybe he was just polite enough to smile for people and then I thought maybe he smiled to hide something and I thought I was projecting and I just went inside, shoving my cynicism away for the moment. Grant, Michael, and Paul all stood in the alcove on the other side of the door. It was an ambush.

"Oh shit!" Grant said.

"Oh, my dude," Michael said.

Paul laughed and nodded. 

My friends never had a problem making you feel wanted or loved, even if they didn't mean it or if you didn't deserve it. I hugged Grant and then Michael (whom had been odd and distant lately, adding another reason for me to come out that night), and gave Paul a high five.

"Two shows in a row? You never come out this regularly!" Grant said. "Are you having a breakdown?"

"Yes. Is there beer in the tub?"

Grant laughed. "Of course man. Of course. Help yourself."

I planned on it. "Ill be right back."

The way to the tub in the downstairs bathroom may as well have been a decathlon. A sea of people packed chest to chest and air thick and hot and suffocating. I knew that person. I knew that person. I knew those people. I knew that girl over there, and that one there and I avoided eye contact with that one, and waved to that one and I wanted to go home. To go lay in the dark and to drink a bottle of Nyquil and to slap a nicotine patch on and drink a couple of bottles of wine and scream my way through nightmares into morning. I shoved through the crowd and into the bathroom. The bathtub was filled with ice and water and cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon. I filled my coat pockets with four or five cans so I didn't have to fight my way through for a while and took one to drink and stared at the back of the door, sitting in the relative silence of the bathroom for a moment before I opened it and forced my way back through the crushing tide of bodies and sweat and inanity. 

Isaiah was in the kitchen now and speaking to a few people. I forced my way through to him. He put his arm around my shoulder and I put my arm around his. I showed I was having a good time and I showed I was comfortable there and I showed I wanted to be normal and I showed I wanted to be alive like the rest of them. He was talking to two girls who were younger than me, but if I wasn't thirty then I don't think I would have thought that. One had thick glasses on and I wasn't sure if she was being ironic, but I assumed she was. She had blue hair. The other was maybe Egyptian and had short, almost buzzed hair and a small braid on one side, reminding me of young Jedi. Pretty, in my fascination with oddities sort of way. I couldn't hear what they were saying. I nodded and laughed. The Egyptian touched my hair and I pulled back. Isaiah touched my hair and the Egyptian touched his hair and everyone laughed then I laughed. 

A band was playing in the living room. It wasn't the band I wanted to see. I didn't care. Paul was near the door, in the alcove, still and I smiled at Isaiah and the faker and the Egyptian and walked to Paul.

"Fucking asshole," Paul said staring into the living room.

"Who?"

"Fuckin' Grant."

I looked and Grant was in the living room, dancing with a cute red haired girl half his height, but probably mostly his age. 

"What about him?"

Paul took a large drink of his beer. "Nothing. Fucking Amy." He laughed. I didn't believe his laugh.

"Who's Amy?"

He pointed at the red head.

"Oh. What about her."

He shook his head. "I've been crushing on that girl for like two months, but fucking Grant dude. Dude has a girlfriend and just swoop. Right in there."

"Oh. Does he know you're into her?"

"No."

"Oh, well, then, that's your own damned fault."

"True."

"Fuck her anyway."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, she's already the other woman. Be the other guy. Then fuck someone else. Let's see how awful we can get this mess."

He laughed. "Nah, I don't know. It's fine."

"Okay. You want me to give them the cold shoulder?"

"Yes."

"Okay."

He laughed again. "I don't know, it's fine. I just, this shit always happens."

"Speak up then."

"Easier said than done, my man."

"Don't be a pussy."

He looked at me. "I love you."

"I love you too. Now get in there. You could probably still fuck her."

He watched Grant and Amy. "No, it's fine."

"Okay."

A girl with dyed hair, shaved in places, kept looking at me. She looked familiar but I couldn't place her. I smiled and nodded. I can be all right looking. It wasn't abnormal.

Soon I had one beer left on me and I was going to have to venture to the bathroom again. I had to refill and after a six pack I had to piss pretty fucking honestly. I did and when I came out Zeph was next in line to piss. Whenever I see Zeph he tells me he likes my writing and he talks to me about details about my stories and it makes me uncomfortable to talk about shit I've written, but it makes me feel like maybe I'm not just writing for myself and I like it, in some uncomfortable, shameful corner of my heart. 

"Don't piss yet," I said to him. "Come have a smoke with me."

"I have to piss pretty bad, dude."

"Give me a cigarette then."

"Meet me out there. I have one left. It's a rollie, but I'll split it with you."

"Okay."

I went out to the back porch and it was just as crowded as the kitchen or the living room or anywhere in between. Zeph must have pissed quick because he came out almost right after me, rollie in his mouth and lighter in his hand. He lit it, pulled it and passed it to me.

I don't normally smoke, but after a few beers I do and I do like it's my fucking job. I imagined I'd be out there most of the rest of the night.

"So, what's the smut name?" he asked.

"What?"

"The smut name? Clark told me you were writing smut on the side under a fake name. What's the name? I pretty much need to read it."

I laughed. I had been. I suddenly remembered telling Clark, another writer and a mutual friend of ours, after a few drinks about the best way to make money writing. "I can't tell you."

"Oh fuck, come on man."

"Well, no." I pulled from the cigarette. "I can't. I mean, I don't want to."

"Is it like, super filthy?"

"Have you read anything else I've written? Of course it is."

He laughed. "I mean, like, weird filthy?"

"I look at what's popular that day online and I write that. I write what sells. A lot of BDSM shit with college girls and businessmen lately."

"Oh, like that book...?"

"Yeah."

"That's great. How much are you making from it?"

"I make my paycheck back."

"What do you mean?"

"I make my paycheck from my normal job. I write porn, I make about five hundred a week if I keep writing every week."

"Jesus Christ."

"I know."

"That seems ridiculous."

"It is. I made more in my first week than I have with any other creative endeavor I have ever attempted. It's bullshit. Total fucking bullshit."

"But I can't read it?"

"Sure you can. You just have to read a shitload of erotica online and eventually you'll probably read one of mine."

"But you won't tell me what you wrote?"

"Nope."

"Not even a hint?"

"My pen name is a hundred proof."

"What?"

"That's it. That's your only clue."

"You mean like booze?"

"Fucking obviously. But that's it."

He squinted at me and butted his cigarette. "I'm going to find your porn."

"Good luck."

We went back inside and Zeph disappeared and I stood alone for a moment and went back inside.

A girl was singing in the living room. It was the band I had been waiting for. I went toward the living room and could barely poke my head into it. A smoke machine was billowing out and smelt strange and lights and patterns shone rotating and glowing through the smoke and people swayed and I could almost see the band. Her guitar was out of tune but she sang beautifully and passionately and she meant every word she sang and she seemed unashamed of any of it. Her band rumbled along behind her keeping strong and smiling and having a great time and I thought they embodied the experience of being in a good band, at least at first. I thought they were a perfect band for now and I thought they'd probably break up soon and the band would split into other bands and the singer would play coffeehouses and record into four tracks forever and though I may never know of any of them again after that night, I knew of them now and they spoke to my soul and in that moment, on that night, in that house, they were my band. They belonged to me. I imagined at least a few other people swaying and smiling felt exactly the same way. I sipped at the last of my beer and had to piss. I let the band finish their set. I clapped against the can and meant it. It was time for the gauntlet again.

The scene would repeat throughout the night. Swaying mass of noise and bodies. Shuffling, excuse me man, excuse me, sorry, excuse me. Bathroom. Beer. Stare at the back of the door. Take a deep breath and tell myself "you need this."

I opened the door and with pockets full of cans saw Paul at the counter. I swam toward him.

"Hey man," he said. "You going to talk to Michael tonight?"

"Yeah. I want to. I don't know if he wants to."

"You guys are strange lately."

"I don't know what happened."

"Story of my life," Paul said.

"Story of the world."

A hand crept over my shoulder and a head leaned on it. I turned and saw Shannon. Shannon was shorter  than me and very small. He had been in a bad accident over the summer and for a while we were all very scared for him. He came out of a coma and it seemed to me that he, even months later, was still getting back his bearings. "I miss your cats," he said.

I laughed. "Yeah? Come see them then."

He smiled. "Yeah. Soon man. They loved me I think. They wouldn't leave me alone."

"No man, they wouldn't. They love new people and especially friendly new people."

"They were like little furry sharks."

Paul laughed next to me.

"Circling, hungry for love?" I asked.

"Yep." Shannon laughed loud. "Roar!"

I hugged him. I was glad he was okay.

"You been all right lately man?" I asked him.

"Oh, yeah, you know. This is my first beer since the accident." He held up a bottle. "I don't think I like it anymore."

"Can't blame you."

"I just don't have a reason to like it anymore, I guess. It doesn't taste very good."

"Don't drink it then, Shannon."

"I'm not going to." He set it on the counter. "You know what though?"

"What?"

"Furry sharks."

I smiled and he smiled back and pat me on the shoulder and disappeared into the crowd.

"I'm glad he's okay," I said to Paul.

"Yeah. Different, though."

"I think I want to go home."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. I've had enough of this, I think."

"Haven't we all?" he asked.

"Why keep doing it?"

"What else is there?"

I sipped at my beer. I didn't know.