Dry_ A Memoir - Augusten Burroughs [32]
David gave the group a writing assignment the other day that we had to go over in Group today.
“I want you to write a letter to somebody very close to you. And I want you to tell this person exactly what you honestly feel about them and your relationship with them.”
Dr. Valium wrote a general letter to his patients, apologizing for taking their Valiums and giving them aspirins. The WASP wrote to his mother, apologizing for being drunk, driving her to the party and going off the side of the road in the car, paralyzing her. He apologized for being born.
I wrote to Pighead.
Dear Pighead,
The reason I am so distant is because, well, there are two reasons actually. The first reason is my drinking. I require alcohol, nightly. And nothing can get in the way.
The second reason is your disease. I can’t stand the idea of getting close to you, or closer, only to have you up and die on me, pulling the carpet out from under my life. You’re my best friend. The best friend I ever had. I have to protect that.
I don’t call you or see you much because I’m killing you off now, while it’s easier. Because I can still talk to you. It makes sense to me to separate now, while you’re still healthy, as opposed to having it just happen to me one night out of the blue.
I’m trying to evenly distribute the pain of loss. As opposed to taking it in one lump sum.
I read my letter out loud in David’s group and something completely unexpected occurs. I mortify myself and get choked up. Tears fill my eyes. Marion reaches for the box of tissues.
“No, Marion, don’t,” says David.
“Oh yeah, I forgot . . . how stupid of me,” she says in a hard, punishing voice.
I mouth the words thank you to her and she gives me a small, private smile. I make her know that she handed me a tissue even though she didn’t and that it was just what I needed. Then I clear my throat. “I don’t know what that’s all about,” I say. It scares me that I can have emotions so close to the surface and yet not even be aware of them. And really, I thought I had all my Pighead stuff worked out.
“I, uh,” I begin. I’m surprised when my voice comes out thin and shaky, like I’m sitting on top of a washing machine during the spin cycle. And then I’m crying. And it’s humiliating to sob in front of these people, but I can’t help it. Something in me has snapped. After what feels like ten minutes, I’m able to pull it together.
“You okay?” David asks.
I nod, wiping my eyes on my sleeve.
He leans forward, elbows on knees. “What’s going on inside you?”
I bite the inside of my mouth. “It’s Pighead stuff, I guess. Reading that letter, you know. It makes me think back, I don’t know, to when it started.”
Pighead and I met on a phone sex line. I’d just moved to Manhattan and didn’t have any furniture except for a yellow inflatable raft to sleep on that I bought at Wal-Mart. But I had a phone, and a Village Voice. A number advertised in the back of the Voice promised, “Hook up with other guys.” So I called the number and drank beer while I chatted with guys. I adopted a British accent.
The way it worked was, you called the number and were connected to another caller. If you didn’t like him, you pushed the pound sign on your phone and you got somebody else.
Usually I would wait for the other guy to talk first. “How big is your cock?” was the standard question.
I adopted a British accent and started asking the question, “So what brand of toothpaste do you use?”
Mostly, I got pound-signed. Except one guy answered, “Crest.”
And I said, “Really? And why not Colgate or Gleem?”
And he said, “Because I like the taste of Crest better. And doesn’t Colgate have MFP? I don’t know what MFP is, you see. So I’m really mistrustful of that. It’s like Retsin in Certs.”
This caused me to laugh.
“You know,” he said, “You have an excellent British accent. Except it falls away when you laugh. You need to work on that.”
I said in my normal voice, “Shit.