Obsession (xii)

Part XII
The Cruel Sea: Honeymoon is Over (1.2MB)

You think that you know what sort of person you are. What you would and wouldn’t do. What your standards are. And then you do something so incredibly stupid, you can only wonder what on earth would possess you. Blame the alcohol, blame the situation, blame whatever you want, but ultimately you have to wonder what makes you so self-destructive.

As it happens, not much happened. Whether it was the alcohol or the acid or the diabetes or me… whatever it was, Herb’s flesh wasn’t able to keep up with his desires. With a smile and a shrug, I suggested we walk up to Evan’s place and get some sleep.

It only took 5 minutes before Evan stormed inot the room.
"Tell me he’s fucking lying. Tell me you didn’t suck his fucking dick. Tell me!!"
I stood up and backed away from him as quickly as I could. I was still feeling the effects of all that alcohol.
"Did he tell you that?" I asked him. The world’s most stupid question. "I can’t believe he told you that."
And I couldn’t believe how devastated Evan looked. He had tears in his eyes and his face was black with fury. Thunderous.
"Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit." I sat back down again, with my head in my hands.
"With him? Why with him, Hooch? Why did it have to be him…" He might have cried then. I’m not sure. All I could hear was the blood pounding in my head, the sound of my shame.


There was a brief conversation with Sam the next day. I tried to explain that it didn’t mean anything, that I was drunk, that he’d gone off with those women.
"If it had been anyone else Hooch. Anyone. But Herb’s my best fucking friend."


It was easy to extricate myself from their lives. My friend Trudy was happy to have me back as her drinking buddy, and I no longer argued about going to the bars that she liked. Surfers and football players and the doof doof doof of the commercial top 20 while the peroxide blondes giggled and danced around their handbags. It wasn’t my kind of place, but with a tab of acid, it was bearable.

I was moving out of my apartment, into a share house just around the corner, even closer to the beach. I thought it was sensible while I still didn’t have a permanent day job. I was moving in with two men, in their early 40s, both divorced. Steady jobs. A joint business. Decent people, it seemed.

And I was spending a lot of time with Tony, preparing for his move to the States. Tony and I had met at the pizza place, working together. He was studying film production at the time, but was unsettled in Australia. He was brilliant, and had decided that America was where he would be able to spread his wings. We shopped for clothes, we saw movies, we went out to dinner, we watched B grade schlock videos late into the night, until our laughter drove his mother out to reprimand us like we were 10 year olds. He was my best friend and I was going to miss him terribly. I tried not to think what it would be like without him.

Neither Tony nor Trudy had asked much about what had happened with Sam. They hadn’t liked him and were glad that I was away from him at last. I still thought about him all the time, and would frequently have to drive past his house on my pizza deliveries. Sometimes I’d see him standing at the kitchen window, and I’d zoom past in the dark, wishing I didn’t still have this need to see him.