You First: A Joe Goldberg Prequel (You, #0)(20)

“What’s this?”

“The door code,” he says. “Franzen’s publicist will deliver the books this afternoon. And you’ll deliver them this evening. You’re in luck. The Upper West Side eccentric is off in the Hamptons or some such. You’ll enter the premises and leave the books. In you go, and then out.”

Never got to do the in-and-out with you, and I nod. “Got it.”

“Chin up, Joseph. Life is a dead end. So a cunt does you wrong. The sourness in you, that is your fault, boy. Remember the danger of hope, Joseph. Remember to kill it before it…”

Kills you. I’m back on the floor, behind the register. Sinking chair, sinking spirit. And it doesn’t make any sense. It was a few cups of coffee, a few dates. I shouldn’t miss you, not like this. I open some Bukowski and think about the girls before you, the subway beauties, and the one who did or did not have dimples, but none of it helps. I love no one and no one loves me.

I snap the rubber band on my wrist. Again I try to read and again I can’t do it. I’m like you now. I go back to the computer and I open AOL Instant Messenger. You’re online, but you’re not talking to me. I should close my account, but I don’t know how.

I snap the rubber band. Nothing.

I carry new Kings to Fiction, to Horror and that’s the thing about some guys. Stephen King. Dick the Barista. You put them anywhere, in any section, and people gravitate to them.

The door opens. The bell chimes. I do not shout hello. I have no voice left in me, no cheer. No reason to be alive. You made me lonesome, and the loneliness is worse, the way I can’t even say you left me, because I’m the one who left you and Dick in India.

The customer moves slowly, and I wish we never met. Craig and his list…The man is a sick fuck who’s trying to drive us all crazy, and why did you have to do it, Vail? Why did you claim that you missed me, that you wanted to connect?

I snap the rubber band. Nothing.

The customer settles in. Kids section or the Finance section. Two things I’ll never have: kids and money. I bet you’ll have them both by the time you’re thirty.

I snap the rubber band. A red mark on my wrist. Something.

I make my way to the front of the shop because this is what I am, all I am. I am a bookseller. I roll up my sleeves and walk through the dusty stacks and I think of Dick and his parasailing and you and your exes and the sushi and I reach for the rubber band but then no.

As in yes. “Vail. Hi.”

“Hello, stranger.”

You’re smiling at me like we were never in India. You clutch a kids’ book with both arms. Your arms cover the title, your heart. “So! How’re you feeling, Cusack?”

Like death. I thought you were gone. Done with me. Buh-bye. “Fine. Good.”

“Yeah,” you say. “Well, I’m…I kind of don’t believe that, Joe.”

Dylan ends and begins again, and I don’t know what to do with you, how to be, what to say.

“Joe, come on. Look at me. You got diarrhea, okay? It’s not the worst thing in the world. It happens to everyone.”

“I didn’t get diarrhea.”

You bite your lip and smile, and then you do a ta-da kind of reveal. You thrust the book forward, in my face.

Everyone Poops.

I laugh. You laugh.

You lay the Poops on the counter with tentative, nervous hands. It’s a gift for your cousin, and you’re breathless the way you were at the Angelika, before we had history, if that’s what you call it. And I know. I know it wasn’t easy for you to come here, but you did.

“Vail, I…I wanna say something.”

“Me too, Joe, but you first.”

“I’m sorry. I guess…I just assumed you were done with me because…” No one ever loved me. No one ever came back. “I mean, I thought you wanted me to go.”

“Cusack, come on. I’m here. Would I be here if I didn’t want to see you?”

It’s tempting, Vail. I want to jump back into the ocean that is you, but you bailed on Serendipity. You brought a Dick on our date. I pick up Everyone Poops, and you grab my arm to stop me. “My turn now. Remember?”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t do that. Don’t apologize when I’m the one who messed up. For you…there’s no shame in being human. Ever. And that food…it was a lot. Especially if you’re not used to it.”

WE WERE SUPPOSED TO BE BATHING IN FROZEN HOT CHOCOLATE. “Yeah.”

“You don’t have to be embarrassed.”

YOU BROUGHT A DICK ON OUR DATE. “I know. I’m not.”

“Ah,” you say. “There it is.”

My eyes are black holes. How do you know what’s in me? “There’s what?”

“Well, you’re obviously mad at me, Joe. That’s why you left. The thing with Dick…”

Dick.

“Okay.”

“But don’t you get it? I’m a little…I was mad at you.”

“Me?”

“Joe, come on. I screwed up and overreacted and then you screwed up and overreacted, and that’s what I mean…. Everyone poops. Literally. You walked into the coffeehouse with that flannel, and I felt like you were sending me a sign, like you weren’t into me….”