You First: A Joe Goldberg Prequel (You, #0)(112)

No birds chirping or eyeing me. No bird-watchers either. I am safe.

I forgot how much I like the water, and it feels good to park the Buick. To kill the lights and be alone with Mother Nature. I like her, Vail. She is fair. Indifferent to all people, unlike all the real mothers on this fucking planet. It’s this John Prine song in Mooney’s tape deck. You want me to find what I’ve already had. Some people get too much love too early, and it is possible to love someone too much, too hard. I’m lucky that’s not me, and I remember what Dick said about his mother. I wonder when she’ll see that she went wrong, if she’ll regret telling him that no girl is good enough. No one is above Mother Nature’s Law—what is lifted must come down—and I wonder if Mrs. Palmer made meat loaf for her son and I wonder if his dad took him to some pier like this to go fishing and talk about the birds and the bees.

What a waste, if so, and I pop the trunk. “?’Sup, D. You ready to go for a swim?”

I lift him up—he is heavy—and I put him down—he is dead. My muscles are tight. Throbbing. But I can do this. I leveled up at Crunch when I was a gym rat, but mostly I can do this because of you. You deserve your freedom, and he was never going to let you go. He is gone now, and I drag it—a body is a thing, not a he, not a she, it is an it—and I listen to the waves pound at the pylons. Dick was a reckless abuser. The kind of cocky faux artiste who came to places like this to get high and “think” about all the movies he was never going to make.

Mother Nature sends a few pellets of hail that bounce off what used to be his face. Yes, it’s starting to rain. Icy. Cold. There is lightning followed by thunder and am I gonna get shocked? Killed? Is it safe to be in the open on a pier with a single soaring lamppost? For once, I wish a computer did fit in my pocket so I could Ask Jeeves if I’m safe. The hairs on my arms tickle me. Are they trying to tell me something?

Is anyone watching? Does anyone see me?

No. I am alone. I’m good at knowing when it’s just me. I had a lot of practice as a kid, waking up on my mattress in the wee hours. I never needed to turn on the lights. I would just feel it, the absence of other hearts beating behind closed doors.

I toss Dick’s computer into the sea. I don’t hear it land, because of the wind. Next is the phone. And then I toss the paraphernalia. Some make it into the water and some do not. That word never made sense to me. Paraphernalia. It sounds like fun, not like this.

I would say a few words for our friend Dick, but I already wrote that obituary in my head. Honestly, I’m kinda mad, Vail. Frustrated that I’ll never get to put any of these firsts in my fucking Moleskine. I’m not a bad guy. I don’t kick him into the water. I’m not mad at him anymore. I take my time with it. I push the top half of his body and then the lower half, going back and forth and before you know it, he is home again.

He always did say there are plenty of fish in the sea. And now he belongs to them.

I sit on the dock by the last little crack pipe, and I do…I do kinda miss the guy. I guess that’s what happens when dicks die. You can’t help but think of the good stuff.



* * *



—

Mooney and his wife are asleep when I head back to their place. I leave the keys where I found them, like he asked. I stand there a minute looking at their place, wondering why they stay together, if there’s any love in that raised fucking ranch, in any of these houses. It’s getting light now, too light to see. I walk through the mist and I am not Woody in Hannah. I am not Elliot in Hannah. They never killed for love, and they didn’t have what I have, what we have.

They also didn’t have internet cafés. I pay up and rev up one of the loud, chunky computers in the back and I log in to Dick’s AOL account. There you are. Available. Online. Desperate.

Me as Dick: You up

You: I am always up for you Dick. Can’t help it. And honestly if you made up some girl so Joe would tell me and make me jealous well good job…It worked.

The muscle under my ribs needed that, Vail. The pain. This is not you. This is you on him. On the drug that is Dick. You were a lost cause, I know. Stuffed so full of the ghost of his assembly-line penis that you were incapable of letting me in there. But all that changes today.

Me as Dick: lolol r u fucking high? enough’s enough. Check it: u need to get a life. It is never, was never, will never be you. your tits are too small; your nose is too big. you’re a stage-nine clinger and hate to say it but I guess you need to hear it, kid. joe told me that you were the one who went looking for him on craigslist and like…Relax. I didn’t tell him I know whats up. But you need help. Get a shrink; get that janky toe fixed. Join a gym. Get it through your thick head (a little too big for your body by the way). you are not a lovable beautiful baby; it is not my job to take care of you lol I’m audi 5000 vail. C ya





39


I didn’t sleep. I’m guessing it’s not easy to sleep after you see a dead body for the first time. Especially a body that you made, compounded by the idea of you reading the dead dick’s last written words, tearing yourself to shreds and crying to Cynthia, too rattled to call me, too hurt. The pain of wanting to be there for you kept me up, pacing, knowing that I cannot be the one to bring you H?agen-Dazs and assure you that Dick is a dick.

My buzzer rings. Is it cops? Did I mess up?