Allis agreed with me that our group in high school was like “Now and Then” meets “Girl Interrupted”. Out of the original five, we are the only two that have kept in contact. Spanky the liquid latex extrovert is now Katie the unheard from. Fox the fearless pomegranate grenade tossing rebel is now Jaqui the painkiller-imprisoned epileptic, sentenced to daily seizures from a condition doctors tell her is all in her head. Humpingwolf the Ziploc-contraceptive nymphomaniac is now Mell the mother. Ragedianne, the conductor of chaos and sticker-bush moshpits, is now Anomie Fatale, a crippled bitch entrepreneur, throwing punches with her mind as well as at it. Grapehead stopped dying her hair purple, and became Allis by freeing herself from the Lithium. We were all bipolar; we were young women.
I told her how I’d spent the night sorting through stuff in the storage underworld of my parents’ house. I am in the process of moving to New Jersey, and my folks made it clear that anything left behind goes right to the trash. I try not to leave them behind so much, I even started letting them call me “Keli” again. My sinuses were clogged with dust and nostalgia down there. I uncovered my collection of kooshball critters, an i-zone camera with sticky film, and a dead-bird carcass. My mother made the comment that you know you’re a hoarder when you find one of those in your stuff, but I told her that you’re only a hoarder if you find one and then can’t bring yourself to throw it out. I found my old college notes; page after page of wasted time. I read over worked-through chem problems like a diary. I looked over an old letter from a quixotic windmill affair. We were 12; of course our love would last forever. I found my bluebook from church confirmation class that had “Jude Law is sexy for your sins” written into my description of faith. I even found the get-well-soon cards from middle school that the faculty had forced the kids who bullied and beat me out my sanity to make. I then came upon an old newspaper from my high school. I went to an alternative school for those who didn’t survive the public system. The mentally criminal, the mentally challenged, the mentally brilliant, the mentally insane, and the mentally mixed; it was daycare for the disturbed. It was where I met the greatest people I have ever known. The newspaper was dated the month I graduated, there were shout-outs in it from the other students to their departing seniors. I had never read it...they handed them out at the end of the year like commercial pamphlets, advertising how much of a joke the school really was. I never knew someone had written one for me. He said I was a great bassist, and a great friend. And that I was beautiful, whether I would ever admit to it or not. I texted him saying that I knew I was five years too late but thank you anyway for saying that. He texted me back saying he still hated me for destroying him.
Allis’s car floor was carpeted with her surmounting collection of empty Pall Mall boxes and Wawa receipts. Wiping my muddy boots without guilt, I appreciated that she didn’t smoke in her own car when I was in the passenger seat. She was always the most considerate in our circle of the psychos. My medical condition makes me a light weight is all respects, I get ill from one cigarette, and smashed off a single shot of tequila. We were headed for the bar. After meeting up with my college bestie Amanda, my only sane lesbian vampire-fetish friend with Limb Girdle Muscular Dystrophy , we departed on our three-way adventure to the Barbary Bar in Fishtown; the center of hipster hell. We unfortunately got lost and unfortunately were aware of it. Amanda filled the time up with telling us how her and her girlfriend got lost driving around Camden New Jersey...but they were so stoned that they just laughed and watched the bums and hooker-fighting like animals in a six flags drive-thru safari behind the safety of thier locked car doors. We made it there two hours after we expected, and two hours before the bar actually opened. We spent the angry meantime in a diner ordering a multi-course meal of side salads and herbal teas. We went to the bathroom together, not to fullfiill girlish social standards, but because of our disabilities meant that neither myself nor Amanda coulf get up off a toilet seat without assistance. Allis had to man-handle the two of up and around a singe person lavatory the size of purists closet. We took myspace-style photos to commemorate the moment.
The Barbary was a barbarian den of electronically scribbled noise and vertigo lighting. The disco spins made my damaged hindbrain dance like non-fiction without the pulp. I held onto a pole in the center of the room as the bright colors of people danced around my sober form. I was solid and unstable. A loosely transvestite male grabbed onto the other side and started pole dancing with and around me. His hair shook like a bundle of squid tentacles. He wrapped his slender leg around my cane, and rhythmically dipped down. He smiled and said hello by shaking his ass. I gripped hard to the pole for balance, and seductively danced with my free hand. I then made my way over to the bar for a tongueful of tequila; just enough to warm me up without burning me down. Amanda sat down and got salvatiously wasted. Allis was the lucky one, being a smoker, she had an excuse to walk out of the bar and have a conversation. Amanda and I couldn’t step out as easily; there were steps to get out the door. She took pictures as I dare-angel-ed my way into the dance floor. I say “angel” instead of “devil” because there’s no evil in trying anyway. I don’t have the back of a skull anymore, or the ability to explain that to a large mobile mass of techno-thrusting able-bodied people, but I can use them for support. Everytime I almost fell I’d just grabbed onto the closest stranger to keep myself up; I did not get a single compliant or dirty look for doing it. I even asked a stranger to dance. I wished Jesse was there to dance with me, but he was out having guys night in an alternate chromosomal universe. Instead I went for the best replacement I could find; a socially awkward floor-flowered gay-guy who was planted in the corner of the room. We friendly tangoed together with my cane and his beer. He let me wrap my arm around him for balance. My headache pounded with every turn, but I still smiled and took it on beat. I had only put my sippie-cup of a shot glass down for a second, but someone had stolen it. The bartender was tenderhearted enough to replace it for me without charge. I crept into the corner with Allis and Amanda and we hand-danced, alluring my palinopsia. As horrifying as it is being visually stuck in a psychedelic trailing world, its beautiful to see this unique universe sometimes. People need LSD to see like this..surreality....this serenity. My friends look so pretty smiling at me behind the rainbows. I kissed them both on the cheek, it wasn’t even the tequila
Across the room I saw another stick figure with a cane. He had wildwool hair, and morbidly constrictive denim-wear. I wanted to dance with a matching partner, so I tri-step hobbled over to his area. He saw my third leg and asked if I would fight him. I said “Sure“, and we began to dance. Suddenly he leaned his falstaff against the wall and surrounded me with swift movement realization. He was not disabled. He was a trend slave with a confusing fashion conformity. The moment and movement ended when he realized that I was using mine for medical reasons. I smiled and contemplated flogging him. Instead I went back to gaggle on to Allis and Amanda. They had a separate adventure to complain of. Some coldshot cockhead wouldn’t leave Amanda alone at the bar asking her to get up and dance until she made it clear to him that A. she could not not physically get up on her own, and B, she was a lesbian. Allis almost beat him up for her. Instead she helped her up and the two of them went to the bathroom graffiti-ing onto the wall:
“HIPSTERS SUCK”
Thought unfortunately I explained that the pathetic apathy culture with its anti-way of thinking would actually appreciate that statement.
We held hearts the whole car ride home, flashbacking through digital cameras and Allis’s teenage pirate mixtape of limewire downloaded Allanis Morisette songs. My two friends, new and old, not silver and gold, but both titanium..were fusing together my lifelines and collective spirit My sinuses were running from the sentimentality and hipster perfume. We made it to my new home in Bellmawr NJ. Allis helped Amanda out of the car and hugged her goodnight in the same fell swoop. I made my way inside to find that my own mother had help set up and clean my room while we were out. My new landlord, new friend. maternal creater of my boyfriend, and new parent was sitting at the computer typing a letter to her internet lover. Since she’s Jesse’s mom- I call her “Ma-J”. MaJ had visited a psychic to inquire about her current circumstances. She told her not to trust the guy yet, and when she asked her about me, having no previous conceptions of my condition she told her that I was ill, and needed another surgery, but would get better from it. I sent the new neurosurgeons in Maryland an E-mail today asking them for an appointment. I spent the night with Jesse, holding onto each other for balance. I’m so glad that he’s not a hipster.
And of course Meredith Brooks is a bitch...everyone on Limewire thought she was Alanis Morisette.
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