Blurb:Gina Troisi’s father moved out when she was five years old, but before he left, he insisted on telling her about his various affairs—with prostitutes, with her mother’s friends, and finally, with his secretary, Brenda, whom he had decided to marry.By the time she reached adolescence, on a search for respite from her father's verbal abuse and Brenda's psychological torment, Gina spent hours doing Jane Fonda’s workouts, smoked cigarettes instead of eating food, became obsessed with her thinness, and with the notion of fading away. She began to find solace in restlessness—drinking hallucinogenic mushroom tea and inhaling crushed pills and powders—perching herself on the periphery of danger again and again.As an adult, when she finally glimpsed a better life for herself, her grandfather, who had been a surrogate father to her, became terminally ill, and she fell in love with John, a stranger who was utterly familiar, but who was addicted to heroin. She moved from New Hampshire to California, crossing the country in an attempt to alleviate her selfdestructive tendencies, but found herself pulled back to New Hampshire, to John, a man with whom, despite his struggle, she could not deny the sense of home she felt. But what would it cost for a girl to run wildly and recklessly into womanhood, making instant, temporary homes? And would she ever find home within herself?
Indulgence
I’d been back in New Hampshire for over a month
when John
decided to quit heroin again. He’d been
trying to
quit all summer while I was in California,
but he’d been
unsuccessful. He told me he had not
been able to
find a fix, so he interpreted this as yet
another sign.
It was an exceptionally hot day for
early October.
While I was
away, John had finally moved out of
his
ex-girlfriend’s place. Since his belongings were at
Jacob’s
grandparents’ house, and mine were in the
cab of my
truck, we bounced from one apartment to
the next,
crashing on friends’ living room floors. That
week, our
friend, Marie, offered us her vacant apartment.
She had moved
across town, but her name was
still on the
lease for a few more days. While you find
a place, she said.
The entire
house was divided into four apartments.
Marie’s was
on the far left, and the driveway
was behind
the house. Inside, we brought a hiking
backpack
filled with necessities: clothes, toiletries, a
boombox,
cigarettes, and a trash bag. The apartment
had two
floors, but we congregated on the first, using
only the
bathroom, one bedroom, the living room,
and the
kitchen that separated them. We claimed
the bedroom
in the back corner of the apartment, the
room with the only shaded window.
The walls were
white. The tile floors had been
scrubbed
clean with bleach. No furniture remained.
In order to
be filled with spirit, feng shui theory
says one
needs to be empty of worldly things. The
color white,
I remembered, is associated with purity.
White is letting go. Surrendering.
I had hope.
We stocked
the refrigerator shelves with tomato
sauce and
cheap champagne. We spread my insulated
sleeping bag
on the floor of the bedroom. While
Jacob was at
school, we made love on top of the
sleeping bag.
The boombox played Pearl Jam’s song,
“Indifference,”
the music soft and slow. I was on top
of John, my
knees pressed against the carpet. The
twine chafed
my skin. A small portable fan hummed
as my flesh
peeled, but I didn’t mind the burning. My
body fit his,
like when I lay on the beach, and warm
sand filled
the folds of my skin. He swam inside of me
while I
climaxed. Orgasm was the single consistency
of our
relationship. Sex was the way we finished one
another’s sentences.
Afterward,
John filled the ashtray with cigarettes
while I
filled my journal with words. Still naked, I
sat up
against the wall and began to shape a poem.
He tucked his
feet in between my crossed legs. Damp
with sweat, I
was content in this empty space. We
had a place
to sleep tonight, and perhaps John would
have enough
determination to beat his demon. Our
conversation
would percolate throughout the rooms.
He would tell
me about his fear, about feeling worthless
when he
wasn’t high, and I would tell him about
mine.
“Are you hungry?” he asked.
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