How Many Letters Are In Goodbye? (20 page)

She gets into the car and as she puts on her seat belt, Michael glances over at me. She puts on the indicator, pulls away from the kerb, and they drive away.

I go to the diner, the diner where me and Sergei had breakfast that morning—not even three weeks ago. The hostess looks as if she mightn't seat me, then she does, at a table in the corner near the back. I'm looking for the waitress, the one who served us the day we had the row, but she's not there and that nearly makes the tears come again. I nearly order the pancakes, like Sergei had, but they're too expensive so I look through six pages of the menu before deciding on eggs and sausage because they come with hash browns and toast and coffee, and you get free refills on the coffee and at $4.75 before tax it's the best deal, plus it's soft so it won't hurt my mouth.

And now the food is all gone, like all food goes, and the thing about eating is as soon as I eat anything I always want more, like instead of making me full it just makes me more hungry. I want the curly fries, and the spaghetti and meatballs, and the waffles with cream and chocolate sauce. I want the loaded potato skins.

And I can't stop thinking about the look on Michael's face when he talked about Sergei calling his wife. Sergei must have been really mad to do that, or really hurt, but Michael was hurt too, I saw that, he let me see it. And in the movies there's always someone who hurts and someone who gets hurt, but maybe it's not always like that, maybe two people can hurt each other at the very same time?

Nicole Gleeson hurt me, Mum, but she didn't know she was doing it and maybe I hurt her a little bit too, by ignoring her after. With Laurie, it was different. She knew all along that I liked her and she hurt me anyway. You know what the funny thing was? In a way, I wasn't even surprised, like part of me knew she was going to do it, some part of me knew what was going to happen all along.

Rhea

West 46th Street, New York
11th May 1999
1:31 a.m.

Dear Mum,

Tonight, I did something different. I'm on 46th Street, just off Times Square. Usually I hate Times Square, but it's raining and I found a good spot, on a step under an awning, and I don't want to give it up. Nobody bothers me for ages, so I'm able to sleep on and off until, coming up to half ten, all these people start to arrive, one by one, to go in through the door behind me. It's a pain to have to keep getting up but I keep sitting back down on my step because it's the best spot. And one of those times, just as I'm about to sit back down, I see an old woman coming up the steps and something makes me stand back up and hold the door open for her.

“Thank you,” she goes. When she pulls down her hood, I see she has really long, grey hair. “Are you here for the meeting?”

“The meeting?”

“It's a good one. I wouldn't come out on a night like tonight for any meeting.”

She walks through the door and into a hallway, then she turns back to me. “Don't worry, you won't be the only new face. We get a lot of newcomers.”

I'm still holding the door open and I don't know what makes me walk through it, what makes me follow her to the end of the hallway and up the stairs, except that maybe it seems like such a long time since anyone's invited me anywhere and it's nice to be somewhere dry and warm.

Halfway up the stairs, though, I start to get nervous in case it's a trap, some kind of cult, but there's a young guy behind me on the stairs and he looks okay and if I need to get out I know I could push past him easily. When we go into the room at the top, there's folding chairs all laid out in a semicircle and two people behind a heavy table in the middle. The old lady hugs someone and they go and sit at the other side of the room. I take the seat closest to the door. And that's when I see the poster on the wall—the twelve steps of Alcoholics Anonymous.

I nearly laugh when I see that, because Alcoholics Anonymous is where Michael took Sergei one night, and Sergei said it was the lamest thing ever and the only good thing was that they had free coffee. This meeting doesn't have any coffee, I don't see any, but I'm glad Sergei told me about it, because he also said that you didn't have to say anything if you didn't want to, you could just listen. The man behind the table starts reading stuff from a folder, going on and on. It's warm and I know I'm never going to be able to stay awake. I'm taking off my Champion sweatshirt when he stops talking and introduces the girl next to him and everyone starts to clap.

She says her name is Tierney and that she's an alcoholic. I don't know why I'm calling her a girl because she's got to be in her thirties, but she seems like a kid in a way, especially when she laughs this really giggly laugh. She laughs a lot, right the way through, especially when she's telling us how she started to drink white wine because she thought if she drank it all there wouldn't be enough left for her Mom to get drunk. Everyone laughs at that part, only I don't, because I'm thinking it kind of makes sense and it reminds me of the time I poured Dad's Guinness down the drain. According to this girl, it didn't make sense though, because it didn't stop her mother drinking, the only thing it did was make her an alcoholic too.

I'm trying to get my head around all that and I almost miss the part where she says something about being a lesbian and I want her to back up and say that again, but she's moved on to talking about her work. I wonder if I'm imagining what she said, because she has long dark hair and she's wearing a skirt and red shoes with a little heel and she doesn't look like a lesbian any more than she looks like an alcoholic. And just when I think I must have heard her wrong, she starts talking about a date she was on earlier in the night with a girl called Susan and that she was glad to have had an excuse to finish up, she was glad she was coming to the meeting.

She looks at the clock and says she'll leave it there and everyone claps again. I hope there's going to be questions but there aren't, instead it starts at the other side of the circle with each person taking turns to talk about themselves and none of them are as interesting as Tierney. Some people go on and on and others don't say much. Hardly anyone talks about drink. The young guy from the stairs tells us all about his dental work and how much it costs and the man next to him is from Denver and he's in New York for a wedding and I feel sorry for him that he has to spend part of his trip in a meeting like this. When it comes to the old lady, she says her name is Winnie. She tells Tierney that she reminds her of herself when she was younger, but I don't think she means the gay part, because then she goes on about her pregnant daughter and how she really wants to help her, but she has to respect her daughter's wishes when she says she doesn't want her help.

It goes around the circle and then I'm going to be next. I'm not going to say anything, I don't have to, Sergei said you don't have to—but then the person next to me finishes and they all look at me.

I shrug. “I don't know what to say.”

“What's your name?” the guy with the folder says.

I picture Aunt Ruth's posters, hiding, lying in wait all over the city.

“Lisa.”

My voice sounds funny, not like my voice. I think maybe that's why I want to talk to them, that maybe I want to say something more than “I was wondering if you are hiring at the moment?” Maybe I want to use my voice so I know I still have it.

The room has a rug in it, an attempt to make it homey, only it doesn't work. The rug is purple and there's a red cross but it's kind of off centre and that bothers me and that's what I start talking about, the off-centre cross. And next thing I know, I'm talking and talking and talking, words spilling out of my mouth like I couldn't stop them even if I wanted to.

I tell them about all the places I looked for a job today, how I went into every single shop, restaurant, deli, fast food joint along Broadway from 23rd all the way up to 50th and not one place said yes, or even maybe. I tell them about the two girls talking at the counter in the shoe shop who ignore me even though I'm standing right in front of them and they crack up laughing when I walk away and say something I can't hear but I know it's about me. I tell them about the guy in the diner who says that they don't let homeless people in, even before I get a chance to ask about a job. I keep looking down at the rug as I tell them everything, I don't look at any of their faces. And then I get to the part about the nice woman in the bakery, who isn't hiring either but she tells me that in a nice way, and gives me a bag of cookies that she says are broken and when I open them later, they're still warm and all in one piece and not broken at all.

It makes zero sense that I start to blubber about the nice bakery lady when I didn't cry about the two bitches in the shoe shop but that's what happens. And before I can stop myself, I blubber that I miss Laurie, that I wish she was here, that I wish I had her to share the cookies with.

It's awful then, only silence and the sound of my crying. I want to get up, to run down the stairs, to pick up one of the chairs and hit the girl who walks over to give me a tissue, but instead I take it and blow my nose. Someone says, “Keep coming back,” and then it moves on to the lady next to me. And it's only then that I realise I forgot to pretend to be an alcoholic, and I hope they won't kick me out.

At half eleven, it ends and everyone holds hands in a circle, which is weird and like a cult and kind of awkward too, but the man to my right puts his hand on my shoulder and kind of squeezes it, which feels nice in a way. I'm getting ready to leave and when I look up the old lady is in front of me, the one called Winnie who was talking about her daughter being pregnant.

“It was nice to hear you, Lisa,” she says.

For a second I forget my name is Lisa, then I remember.

“Okay,” I go. “You too.”

“A few of us go for fellowship,” she says. “Would you like to come?”

“For what?”

She smiles, slides her glasses further up her nose.

“We go to the diner, for something to eat, coffee.”

I swing my backpack over my shoulder. “No, thanks, I can't.”

“They do the best burgers in Midtown.” She raises an eyebrow. “My treat?”

“No, thank you. I have to be somewhere.”

She looks at me, her eyes steady behind her glasses. We both know it's a lie. Right then, Tierney comes up behind her, puts her hands on both our shoulders.

“You coming to the diner, Winnie?”

“Sure am. I was just seeing if Lisa would come too.”

Tierney turns to me. “Oh, hi. Nice to meet you. You'll come, right?”

I start to shake my head. “I was just saying I can't, I—”

“Oh come on, we don't bite. Get to know us, it'll be fun.”

She giggles, like she did when she was speaking. She looks like someone who is fun. I look at Winnie and back to her. “Okay.”

On the way to the diner, Tierney tells me that she's Irish too, that Tierney was her mum's maiden name and she wanted to keep it, even though it was a last name.

We're stopped at a light, waiting to cross.

“Did you get teased at school?” I ask.

She looks at me, makes a face. “Did I? You wouldn't believe it. Kids can be cruel.”

“I believe it,” I go. “I used to get hassled about my name too.”

“Really?” I hear the surprise in her voice and realise my mistake before she says it. “Lisa's not a common name in Ireland?”

“I meant, for my last name,” I go. “I got teased for my last name.”

If she asks what my last name is, I'm going to pretend that it's Ass or Penis or something, but she doesn't ask. By then, we're at the diner and Winnie is in front, holding the door open for us. I'm scared they might say they don't want me in there, but walking in between Winnie and Tierney, no one says a thing and we all go to a big table at the back.

There's eight people altogether, two other women apart from the three of us and three men. I'm on the end, next to Tierney and opposite Winnie. Winnie's talking to the dental work guy next to her and Tierney's talking to the girl on her other side. I read the menu and pretend it doesn't matter.

I'm on the third page when Winnie leans across the table. “Don't forget to check out the burger section.”

Michael's $40 is only $23.78 now.

“I'm not too hungry, I'm just going to get a bagel,” I say, closing the menu.

“Suit yourself,” Winnie goes. “But it's my treat, remember?”

Tierney's head is down, looking at the menu, and when she hears that, she turns to me. “Get a burger, I'm getting a burger. And curly fries.”

Before I can decide properly the waitress is there and I order a burger because Winnie said twice she'll pay for it, and Tierney heard her too, so she can't back out.

When the waitress leaves, Tierney turns to me. “You sounded pretty cut up in there, about that girl. What's her name?”

“Laurie,” I go. It feels like the first time I've said her name in years, so I say it again. “Her name is Laurie.”

“Yeah, Laurie. Were you guys just friends or were you together?”

She says it real casual, just like that—“together”—and right then the waitress arrives with Cokes for me and Tierney and a cup of tea for Winnie. She spills some Coke and Tierney wipes it up and needs more napkins. With all the commotion, I don't want her to forget what we were talking about so as soon as the waitress is gone I answer her.

“I don't know if you'd say we were together, but—”

She nods, stirs her Coke with her straw.

“Let me guess—she blows hot and cold? One minute she's sure she's gay. But then it turns out she's just experimenting, having fun?”

She puts on this funny high voice then that makes her giggle, and I start to laugh too. “How did you know?”