Hope Idiotic | Part 23
Hope Idiotic is a serialized novel. Catch each new part every week on Monday and Thursday.
THE ONE THING LOU WAS CERTAIN OF WHEN HE ARRIVED IN CHICAGO WAS THAT HE AND MICHELLE WOULD GET MARRIED. That was all now in question. Unable to figure out the answer and afraid to figure it out with Michelle, Lou took to drinking alone in crowded bars.
During one mini-bender in an old tavern downtown about a week after the botched engagement, Lou was drunk enough to call his mother. She was drunk enough to share way too much information about marriage and divorce details with his father. It upset Lou and he took it out on his debit card and liver. When he fell through the bathroom stall door, they kicked him out. Then things got ugly.
Lou barely had enough money to tip the cab driver. He puked up all that gin as he entered the revolving door of the apartment building.
“Sorry about that, Arlo,” he said as he waved and stumbled past the friendly night doorman. “I’ll get it in the morning.”
He burst through the apartment door like a savage. It was just past one in the morning, and Michelle was in bed asleep. He started to kick his shoes off, but he noticed that she hadn’t closed the closet doors. He hated it when she left the closet doors open during the night. He pulled the folding doors to close but something was on the sliding track preventing him from closing the closet. Lou thrashed and thrashed them again. When he realized what was blocking the doors—some of Michelle’s shoes that had been pulled out—he kicked at them and a heel or two slammed against the wall of the closet as the door path became clear. “Fucking shoes!” he shouted. “To hell!”
“Lou! What are you doing?” Michelle asked. still half asleep.
“Fixing the closets. Doors were open. Bad to sleep that way.”
“Jesus, Lou, how drunk are you?”
“Tied a pretty good one on tonight. Oh yes! Me and my mama!”
“That’s great,” she said. “Why don’t you just go to bed.”
“Learned a lot about old Sarah Bergman tonight.”
“That’s great, Lou. Go to bed. It’s late.”
“She and my dad. They used to get busy.”
“Lou.”
“With half the fucking town—but not each other! Oh yes! I know all about the philandering and sucking and fucking and—you know, according to my mother and one of the guys she banged, she gives a great blowjob. Oh yes.”
“Lou, I’m begging you. Please. Just go to bed. I have a huge day tomorrow, and I’d like to get at least a little rest. We can talk about your mom tomorrow night.”
“Pretty much, this was one of the worst and strangest and funniest nights of my life.”
“What’s funny about your parents cheating on each other?”
“That she fucking told me!” As he said this, he swung his body around and kicked his leg out. His shin smacked the edge of the nightstand. “Fucking ouch!”
“Lou! Get out. Go to the couch. I’m going to sleep.”
“I’m going to sleep first. Might never wake up if we’re all a little lucky tonight.”
“Shut up.”
He bounced off a few walls as he made his way to the living room and collapsed onto the couch. Suit and shoes on, contact lenses in his eyes, he passed out moments later.
✶
“YOU THREW UP IN THE REVOLVING GODDAMN DOORS!?” Michelle said.
It was morning. Lou shot up on the couch. His brain nearly concussed as it slammed into the front of his skull. He was disoriented. His eyes felt crispy in their sockets. His mouth tasted like a cat shat in it while he was sleeping. He didn’t know why he was on the couch or what in God’s name Michelle was talking about. He was still drunk. She was fresh out of the shower, standing in her bathrobe with the phone in her hand.
“Huh?”
“I just got off the phone with the management office. It seems that when you came home last night, you found it necessary to throw up inside of the revolving doors. What in the fuck is wrong with you?”
“I didn’t do that.”
“Well, it was in Arlo’s report, and they said they watched last night’s security tapes and yes, you did.”
“Who watched the tapes?”
“Whatever their names are… the property managers! Lou, will you please explain to me what is wrong inside of your head that made you act like you did last night?”
“What’d I do last night?”
“After you puked in the lobby of our building, you stormed into the apartment yelling and kicking at the closet doors—“
“Oh, yeah. You left them open.”
“You woke me up and kicked the nightstand and started screaming about your mom and dad cheating on each other or something like that.”
Lou’s head dropped. “Fuck.”
“You need some serious help, Lou. You and your mother. Why in God’s name would she tell you whatever it is she told you? Is she fucking retarded? No, you know what? You’re beyond help.” She returned to the bathroom.
Lou stood up from the couch and winced from a sharp pain in his leg. He lifted his pant leg. There was dried blood from a small gash that was surrounded by a deep dark purple bruise. “Sonofabitch,” he said.
She came bolting out. “What did you say?”
“Look at my leg.”
“Good. I hope it hurts.” He followed her to the bathroom.
“Michelle, I’m sorry.”
“I don’t give a good goddamn if you’re sorry. Enough!”
“I just kinda had my whole world turned around on me last night.”
“Look, I get it. It’s fucked up. Your mother was completely out of line, and now you’re stuck with that information. But your world has been turned around since you moved here. Maybe it’s always been turned around, I don’t know. But I’m done with it.”
“Okay. Wait a minute. Let’s get out of here!”
“What?”
“You hate Chicago. You’ve been saying my family is bad for me. You’re clearly right. So why are we here? I don’t have anything going on here, so let’s go. We’ll move to Florida or California or back to Vegas. I don’t care. Somewhere warm, the way you want it. We’ll just go. You and me. L ’n’ M O.P. time all the time. Our world. Just us.”
She turned from the mirror where she was applying her makeup and looked at him. Her eyes didn’t look angry at that moment, but sad.
“That’s sweet, Lou. It really is. And if you had said that a year ago, maybe even six months ago, I might have been game for it. But not now. No. I’m done. Enough already.”
“Come on. This is the time. Now is the time to finally do this!”
“Not anymore it’s not. She went back to applying her makeup, then stopped and looked at him in the mirror’s reflection and said, “I don’t love you, Lou. I can’t anymore. You need to leave.”
“What did you say?”
“I need to finish getting ready. You can come back while I’m at work and get your stuff. But I can’t look at you right now.”
“Michelle.” He stepped toward her. He hugged her from behind and tried to turn her around. “I’m sorry.”
“I know. That’s all you’ve ever been.” She pushed him away.
“I love you.”
“It doesn’t matter. I can’t.”
That sobered him up some, but not completely. He somehow found his way to the building’s basement storage and pulled out his two large suitcases. He waited twenty minutes, long enough for Michelle to finish getting dressed and get out the door and then returned to the apartment. Everything that was his, sans a few kitchen items, fit perfectly into his suitcases. He really didn’t have much of anything.
He drove to his dad’s house, stopping along the way to buy a handle of scotch and a pack of cigarettes. He stumbled into the house with a lit cigarette hanging out of his mouth. He clumsily dragged both suitcases up the stairs with the scotch bottle under one arm and dumped it all in his old bedroom. The noise woke his brother Aaron who was sleeping in his own bedroom on the other side of the wall.
“What the hell? Are you smoking? Are you drunk?” Aaron said.
“Yes to all of it and more, my brother!”
“Dad’s going to kill you. Why are you even here?” He noticed the suitcases. “Did you and Michelle break up?”
“Sure did.”
“Well, shit, I’m sorry, but pull yourself together.”
“Look who’s talking. Pot? Meet Kettle. Kettle, Pot here just called you black.”
He took his shoes off. He used the left one as an ashtray.
Aaron flipped him off and went back to his room, closing the door behind him. Lou collapsed onto the floor with his back against his old twin bed. He took his shoes off. He used the left one as an ashtray. He looked around his room and realized that it hadn’t been touched since he left for college all those years ago. It still had that Oasis poster on the wall along with those photos from his senior prom. The twin bed he used to build forts in looked so small. His old desk chair was buried in punk band T-shirts he didn’t wear anymore.
His cigarette was about to burn out. He used the cherry to light another one. “Monkey fucking,” he said to himself laughing. He lifted himself off the floor as if he hadn’t stood in months. He was tired, sore and nearly sober enough to be hung over. He grabbed the scotch, walked to the window and cranked it open, then removed the screen. He unscrewed the cap from the bottle and took a long pull. He coughed and nearly puked. He set the bottle on his old desk, leaned out of the window and smoked.
He was facing Pop and Grams’ house. He had really done it this time. How was he going to recover from this one? And what the hell was he doing smoking in the house—smoking at all? He was drunk, bleeding, dumped, moderately homeless and broke. He did have that $8,064 engagement ring, which he probably wouldn’t be using at all now. But that thought just made his stomach turn. He took his cell phone out of his pocket and dialed Chuck. There was no answer.
“Motherfucking voicemail. We broke up. My parents are horrible, horrible people. I’m drunk and smoking in Dad’s house. This is surely what it feels like to rot in hell.”
He flipped the phone shut and threw it onto his bed. He took one last drag of his cigarette and dropped it from the window. Then he ran next door to his grandparents’ house and knocked loudly on the front door. Grams answered.
“Lou! This certainly is a surprise. What brings you down here?”
“Are you and Pop busy right now?”
“Not at all. We were just finishing breakfast. What can I make you?”
“Nothing. I’m not hungry. Thank you.”
Pop was sitting at the kitchen table reading the newspaper. A full bottle of the vitamin and protein drink was in front of him. “Hi, boy,” he said.
“Hi, Pop.” Lou leaned down and kissed his grandfather on the top of his head.
“What’s going on? And why don’t you smell so good? Are you drunk?” asked Pop.
“Abe,” Grams said, “Be nice.”
“He smells like car exhaust at the bottom of an empty bottle.”
“I need to talk to you guys. Can I talk to you?”
“Sure,” Grams said.
Lou walked into the family room. “Can we do it in here?” They followed. He watched his elders take their seats on the couch in preparation for the shit show that was underway.
This is what it used to look like. Pop and Grams on the couch, Lou and his brother performing some screwy skit Lou made up. But that was when they were younger, healthier and happier.
Grams was grinning—she was so sweet. Pop looked a little worn down and thin. For a moment, Lou thought about telling them to forget about it and to let Grams make him a bagel. But it was time for a confession.
“I’m a dick,” he started. Grams’ grin vanished. “I’m sorry. Can I swear?”
“No,” Pop said.
“Can I say ‘fuck?’”
“If you must,” he sighed.
“It’ll help me tell the story.”
“We’re listening,” Grams said.
“I fucking slept in my fucking shoes last night for fuck’s sake!”
Pop looked at Grams who was staring straight at Lou. Pop looked back at his eldest grandson and said, “What?”
“I’m a dick. I’m a failure, and I don’t think things through or consider other people’s feelings, and I’m beginning to think I have a serious drinking problem. Look at me. I’ve been wearing this suit for almost twenty-four hours now. I slept in this suit. I puked in this suit. I listened to my mother tell me all about The Butter Battle Book-like war of sex she and my father had between each other in this suit. I got dumped by my girlfriend in this suit then kicked my way out of our apartment in this suit. And now I’m in front of my heroes babbling like a retarded fucking monkey in this suit. Fuck this suit. This is a horrible fucking suit.”
Lou plopped himself down in a chair by the card table in the corner of the room.
“Maybe you tell us what’s going on,” Pop said. “Start from the beginning.”
“The beginning? Well, let’s see. I was born of two of the most disgusting human beings on Earth. Yeah, your son is awful. Did you know that? Did you know about all the cheating?”
“Your mother was wrong to burden you with that,” Pop said as if he’d been waiting for this moment.
They’re just humans. And humans have a way of doing the wrong things.
“No fucking shit!” said Lou. “I never looked to them as role models for relationships—that was what you two were for. But I never thought they were capable of that. Jesus Christ! I’m sorry. I never wanted you to see me this way. I am trying so hard to do the right thing. The best thing for me. For Michelle. For everyone. And I can’t. I just can’t get anything right.”
“We don’t think you’re a failure, Lou,” Pop said.
“We could do without the filthy language, though,” said Grams.
“You need to try and move past this business with your parents. There’s nothing that can be done about any of it now. The whole shenanigan is bad enough. You have a right to be angry, but try to forgive them. They’re just humans. And humans have a way of doing the wrong things. They never meant to hurt you or your brother.”
“You can’t say that. They had no thought of us whatsoever. Not of us or anyone but their own ego and pride. If they’d taken even a second to think about anyone else, they might not have made the mess they did. And you’re going to tell me that my mother didn’t mean to hurt me? What the fuck did she think telling me about it would do? And in such horrific detail.”
“Well, let’s talk about Michelle. What is this moving-out business? Shouldn’t you be engaged by now? What happened there?”
Lou weaved his wonderful Pop and Grams a romantic tragedy involving a girl and a boy from Las Vegas who found love after years of it being right under their noses only to have that love snuffed out by suffocating it with a tremendous amount of immaturity and misunderstanding. He spoke for an hour straight—a filibuster of misery. The whole time, Pop and Grams sat patiently listening to him, their years of suffering through bad theater productions proving useful. And although he had plenty to blame on Michelle, he felt as if he made it clear that all of it was his fault.
“Well, I’ll tell you what, Louis,” Pop said. “It’s not all your fault. This drinking, getting drunk during the day business; that has to stop. The smoking, too. You don’t want to get cancer like I have. It’s not a fun time.”
“You never even smoked a cigarette in your life.”
“Imagine how likely you are to get lung cancer now.”
“Alright.”
“I’ll tell you, Lou, I like Michelle. But maybe she’s not being so nice to you. Maybe she’s not helping you right now. Because you need help right now. You keep working hard on the job front and something will happen. The odds of being unemployed forever are pretty small. We’re in a recession. It’s bad out there. Keep at it. She can’t fault you for trying.”
“I am trying.”
“We know you are, boy. We know. And you can always go to work for your dad at the shop.” He stopped Lou from interrupting. “I know. That’s not what you want to do, but you can do that while looking for the right opportunity. And I know you’re angry with your father right now. But don’t let your parents’ issues become yours. Handle your issues with Michelle. That’s all you can do. Maybe she’s not the right person for you. Maybe this breakup is a good thing.”
They sat still on the couch for another ten minutes while Lou wept. They reassured him that they loved him and that they didn’t think any less of him and that he should get some sleep. They encouraged him to shower, too, because he smelled like an ape house.