Party Girl_ A Novel - Anna David [107]
Different people come up to me as I make my way out of the room and I realize, with shock, that it’s twenty minutes after the meeting ended and I’m still here. As I’m hugging this girl with nine months of sobriety who tells me she “related to every word I said,” I see someone I hadn’t even realized until this moment was in the meeting, and my heart starts racing like an IV of cocaine has been injected straight into it.
“We need to talk,” Rachel says, and I nod.
“You need to start making friends at Pledges,” Rachel says, looking at me sternly. We’re sitting at one of the plastic tables outside a burger stand near her apartment in Culver City after leaving the meeting. There’s something about her that seems almost angry—a sort of schoolmarmish drone has replaced her typical singsongy lilt.
“I have friends at Pledges,” I say. I look up at her. “I have you.”
She looks me straight in the eye. “I’m not your friend,” she says. “I’m your sponsor.”
I feel a bit like I’ve been pummeled in the gut but don’t want to show it. “Okay, Miss Serious. I’ll make some new friends.”
She still doesn’t smile. “Amelia, this is serious. It’s about life and death. And sometimes I think you treat recovery like it’s an accessory—it helped you get your shit together and made you better and now you can go about pursuing your fabulous life again.” She picks up a fry and dips it in ketchup. “But it doesn’t work that way. You can’t show up at alumni meetings when you want, smoke cigarettes outside, and pretend that everything’s going to be wonderful and easy now that you’re getting famous.” She shoves the fry in her mouth, chews, and sighs. “It’s not about incorporating this into your life; it’s about incorporating your life into this.”
I want to object and defend myself but I see she has me so nailed that there’s no use in fighting her on it. Since getting out of Pledges, I’ve basically neglected everything I was taught in there—about how my day-to-day happiness and serenity depended on getting out of myself and being of service to other people, about going to meetings and connecting with the people there.
“Being sober has to be your primary purpose in life or you don’t stand a chance,” she says. “Do you get that?”
“Well…”
“My point is this: if you’re really committed to doing this right, I’d be honored to keep working with you. I think if you set your mind to doing this the way it’s suggested, there’s no limit to the kind of serene life you could live. But if you want to half-ass it, I don’t really want to be a part of it.”
There’s a tiny pause. “I want to do it.” When I say it, I realize I’ve never felt more certain of anything.
“That means sitting down to write about your resentments and fears and being willing to go apologize to the people you’ve hurt because of your disease.”
Every time she’s brought this up before, I’ve somehow diverted her attention away from it—usually by telling a funny story. I’d assumed that I’d been so sly that she hadn’t even realized I’d been purposely distracting her. Writing all this stuff down and having to face my entire past has always sounded wholly unappealing but somehow, right now, I look at it in a different way. I’ve been waiting a long time for people to ask me who I’m pissed at, I think. Possibly my whole life. “I’ll start today,” I say.
“And it means trying to live your whole life according to sober and honest principles.”
I nod.
“And that includes your job.”
I look at her as she polishes off her fries.
“Are you saying I have to quit doing my column?”
She balls up her empty wrappers and tosses them into the nearby trash can—a perfect shot.
“I’m saying that you have to try living your life according to sober and honest principles. In the same way that no one can diagnose another person as an alcoholic, no one can tell you what that should