The Trouble With Eden - Lawrence Block [11]
“Gretchen, answer me if you can hear me. Because otherwise I’ll assume you’re unconscious and I’ll kick the door down, and then we’ll just have to get it fixed again.”
“Leave me alone.”
“Are you all right?”
“No.”
“What’s the matter?”
“Nothing. Go away.”
“Open the door, Gretchen.”
“You fucking little snot, can’t you leave me alone?”
“What’s the matter?”
“I’m all strung out and I’m shaking.”
“Open the door.”
He waited, and just as he was about to give up and turn from the door he heard the bolt. She held the door open a crack and peered out at him.
“Well?”
“I want to see you.”
She opened the door further and supported herself by leaning against the jamb. “Anybody who wants to see me,” she said, “has got to be crazy.” She tried on a smile but it wouldn’t play. “Oh, Jesus,” she said. “Oh, I’m so fucked up. How did I get so fucked up?”
He looked at her face and felt tears welling up behind his eyes. She was such a beautiful woman and none of the beauty showed now. Her face was ravaged, haunted. The circles under her eyes looked unreal, like make-up amateurishly applied. Her dirty blond hair was uncombed and lifeless. There were tiny sores in the corners of her mouth. The yellow cotton housedress she wore had been tight on her body when she bought it. Now it hung like a tent.
“Peter, I’m dying,” she said. “Oh, poor Peter, poor poor Peter.”
She lurched forward and he caught her, let her head drop to his shoulder. He stroked her hair and the back of her neck, making automatic calming sounds. He couldn’t get over how thin she had grown. She was eating herself up, melting the flesh from her bones.
She said, “I look like hell, don’t I?”
“You could straighten out. Get off all this shit, put yourself back together again.”
“I can’t do it.”
“You can try. I’ll help.”
“You can’t even help. Nothing can help. I hate those fucking pills and I’m worse without them.”
“What are you on?”
“What do you think? Speed.”
“Just pills?”
“I was going to shoot but I didn’t.”
“Thank God.”
“I don’t know which is worse. Shooting might have been better. Now I’m all strung out. I can’t get off and I can’t get back on either. You know what it is, I’m overamping. My brain is burning too fast for my brain to keep up with it. You can’t understand me, can you? I don’t know if I can, either. Some of the time I can—”
She ran out of words and he held onto her. “I have some grass,” he said, “but I don’t know if that would be better or worse for you.”
“Worse. I’m on a bad trip and it would just make the colors brighter. Where did you get it?”
“From Marc. Well, from Linda. Marc’s halfway to Chicago by now.” He told her briefly about the note Linda had found and that he was going to light the show. It was hard to tell whether she was interested or not. She seemed to be listening but not reacting.
She said, “Maybe that’s a good idea.”
“What?”
“Chicago.”
“You want to go to Chicago?”
“You could go. To Chicago or Kansas City or Acapulco or Tel Aviv or, oh, some place.” Her eyes fixed on him suddenly. “Why don’t you leave me, Petey?”
“I like it here.”
“Oh, shit. Nobody likes it here. I don’t know how you stand it. I can’t live with myself, how can anybody else stand to live with me?”
“Sometimes it’s good.”
“It is, isn’t it? But not very often. I haven’t been any good for you in a long time.”
“You will be.”
She lowered her eyes. “I don’t know.”
“Sure you will.”
“I just don’t know. It’s a hard corner to turn this time. It isn’t a matter of getting straight. The pills, all of that shit. You know it’s not just that.”
“I know.”
“It’s wanting to be straight. If I could work. But lately all I can think is who on earth gives a shit if a pot has a lip or it doesn’t, or what fucking glaze I put on it, or whether