Chapter 31.2: 1967, Georgina
Sitting at Paulie's table, I tapped my nails in a rhythm on top of the red Formica as I waited for him to wake up. Earlier, Carl had come by for Cha Cha, who was still very shaken. He wouldn't tell Carl why he was so upset, but I decided I'd tell him later.
Paulie was asleep on the couch he had perched on last night. He hadn't even looked at me sitting at the table before he laid down from his sitting position and fallen asleep.
I had gotten no sleep, the only person in this apartment who hadn't. As a result, I was dead tired, my head wanting to rest on top of the Formica, but I resisted. This was too important to sleep through. I had to catch Paulie right when he woke up, or else I feared the impact would not have as much effect. But I was so tired, the table beckoning me to lay my head down.
Paulie groaned and I turned my head as he rolled off the couch with a satisfying thud. Moaning, his hand went over his head and began to massage a spot on his crown. I decided not to speak, just let him see me when he saw me, whenever that could be.
He rolled over on the carpet and began crawling, entering the hallway on all fours. It was interesting to me, because I'd never seen him after a night of heavy drug use before. I wondered as the bathroom door closed if this is what he looked like in the mornings with Avi. Little thoughts started to invade my angry mind as to whether or not this was how things really went down for him whenever Avi came over. What exactly did they do together?
Something inside of me found itself wanting to call out to him, but I stopped myself almost as if a hand were pressing against my weakening train of thought. What was it inside that wanted to comfort him all of a sudden? But I couldn't falter, not now. I had to think about what had happened last night, with Cha Cha. Maybe it was my drowsiness, causing me to weaken my resolve. That had to be it.
The water turned on inside the bathroom, and I laid my head on the table, filling with frustration at myself. He seemed to be in there a long time, which was worse for me because I could not turn off these thoughts, and therefore I kept thinking about him and Avi together, about what they did. What could Paulie possibly be thinking during those...what were they? Sessions?
He began moaning to himself in the bathroom as he moved heavily, the booming sounds betraying his modest frame. To me, he sounded really messed up. Slowly, my face fell from angry to ashamed as I realized how some days I didn't care what I did or said, just surviving for some unknown reason. His loud movements reminded me how I'd make those same sounds after a long night of binging, the sick and pain from the lingering night pounding my brain and belly like fire and rolling rocks together.
Was he feeling that right now? Who was I, of all people, to judge him this way?
Would I have done the same if I was still...?
Cha Cha's face flashed to my mind. Rage filled my eyes. His little terrified voice snuck into my brain, his fear absolute. How he must have felt, alone with a stranger as police did god knows what to me, knowing awful things were happening just beyond the beaded doorway. What had he seen? Had Sasha explained to him what was going on as it happened? How did it affect him, really? What was he thinking now, with Carl?
Any sympathy was flushed from my body with these thoughts. Every movement I heard from the bathroom refilled me with rage, the shower now going and water rushing to the floor of the bathtub as Paulie moved around in there. I wanted to go in there, rip the shower curtain away and beat him, naked, for what he had done.
But something tiny inside of me, scared and small, shrank and caused me not to move. It was frightened of myself, my rage, what I wanted to do to my best friend.
He's sick, it told me in a fearful squeak, he's sick. He doesn't know what he's doing. You didn't...know what you were doing to Frankie when you were drunk, remember? Remember how Frankie had to tell you, how you weren't even aware how you were hurting him? What if...Paulie doesn't know how he's hurting people? What if he's so deep-
The shower turned off. My fingers curled into fists, from which emotion I had no idea. I stared into the living room as the bathroom door opened in the hall. Slowly, labored steps stumbled onto the floorboards and my fingers uncurled, beginning to rake against the tabletop nervously. Paulie was gingerly rubbing a soft pink towel against his short, wavy brown hair like his head hurt. Deep in my heart I hoped it did hurt, but another part hoped he'd be okay.
The same part spoke to him, finding pity instead of sympathy.
"Paulie," I said softly, trying to sit up as straight as possible in my sleep deprived state.
"Uh?" he winced with a groan, turning to me with confusion. His eyes widened, recognizing me instantly. "Oh, Georgina. You're still in your drag."
I cleared my throat, the night time phlegm gathered in a chalky cotton-like mess. "Yeah," I said simply, my voice gravely.
"You still sleepy?" he asked casually, rubbing the towel on his head more vigorously, suddenly so full of energy. What an act. But what did I expect from someone who's job was part professional actor?
My foot kicked the red chair in front of me out from the table. "Sit," I ordered, trying to make my voice authoritative, but I knew I failed.
"Hm? What's up?" he asked too casually again.
How could he act so casual?
"I want to talk to you about what happened last night," I said in the same tone, pointing to the chair like he was a child. A look came over his face telling me he'd really rather not. So he was aware of what had happened. I had half hoped he wasn't. "SIT," I shouted, half scaring myself at my own boldness and tenacity.
Fear overcame his face at this, and slowly he made his way over to the chair, pulling it out with an unwelcome metal shriek against the tile. The sound seemed to frighten him further. Sitting now across from me, he seemed to want to say something, but he didn't. The air was expectant, waiting.
The same boldness caused me to speak again, breaking this awkward silence he was creating. "How dare you," I whispered, finding I couldn't raise my voice louder in my shaking anger.
His hands swept backwards into his hair, his fingers separating the wet locks in a pose I recognized as his nervous one.
"How dare you abandon us. How dare you sell heroin right in front of Cha Cha. What- What were you thinking?! What were you doing?! Why?!" I was screaming now, unable to control myself. Paulie's hands covered his head, like I had done in elementary school. He looked like he was protecting himself from a nuclear bomb. Maybe one he had known was coming, from the looks of his movements. Knowing him so well made this harder, yet easier at the same time somehow.
"I'm waiting," I barked like an officer, a satisfying feeling burrowing into my heart, giving him a little taste of what I had gone through last night, what he had escaped by being in the lounge, by being high.
He made no sound. In fact, as I watched, he seemed to have no response at all. My rage increased at this. How dare he not respond. How dare he!
After a long time of waiting, my angry face stabbing into him, slowly he began to speak, if wanderingly.
"...Do you think...I'll go over the rainbow some day? Do I deserve to?" His head went down to the table, his hands spreading over the cold Formica. This caught me off guard, making my mouth open a little bit in my confusion, but he continued. "...Or maybe I don't, especially for what I did last night." He paused for a moment, straightening up and looking down at his hands. I followed his gaze. I don't know why I never noticed it before, seeing now in my hyper awareness of him, but one of his pinky nails was much longer than any of his other nails.
My eyebrows creased in concern despite myself. He put this nail in his mouth and started to bite it with his molars delicately. Looking away from me, he spat the nail on the yellow floor and stared down at the spot.
He continued in a small child-like voice. "I don't deserve to be friends with you, Georgina. I know that. Look what I did to the kid. I don't deserve either of you. I don't deserve Carl. But I do deserve Avi. Right? I deserve him. I don't deserve...anything else..." Large tears began to fall from his now obviously sad brown eyes onto the red tabletop, the bright plastic reflecting his sorrow. I found I couldn't move due to his words.
"Georgina, you can go now. You don't have to come back. I know I did you wrong." His pathetic eyes closed and he breathed shakily in despair, finally showing me this. My mouth parted, and I couldn't find any words. The room became silent except for his small sniffles, filling the room with his private aching. The room felt like a mask had lifted, now exposed and full of his long known hopelessness.
"I guess I'll just go into my room later. I'll go to sleep, and maybe I'll die so- Hey, what are you doing?"
The cupboard's old wood was grainy on my hands, swinging with a familiar weight. The metal of the tomato soup can was cold due to the vanilla colored wood having been closed to the heat of the room. I could feel Paulie's desperate eyes following me about the kitchen as I got out a small sauce pot, a wooden spoon, and a little bowl. As I snapped on the gas range, Paulie asked the question again.
"What're you doing, Georgina?"
I cleared my throat, putting elbow grease into the can opener against the stubborn metal lid.
"Making you soup, what does it look like?"
The pause that followed hung heavy in the room. Paulie's trembling breath raked across the kitchen under the sounds of my cooking.
"O-oh," he said softly, resigned and embarrassed.
I turned to him, my eyes neither sympathetic nor upset. "Paulie, you know," I sighed, leaning against the counter with my hands gripping, "I think...you're just sick...right now. I'm no saint either. Look at me, right? Look where I was a couple of months ago. Without Frankie supporting me, I'd be lost. You need somebody to help you, too. I want to help you get better, Paulie... Do you want to get better? Don't you think last night was your rock bottom?" The words left my mouth without thoughts leading to them, but they felt right.
"Y-yeah," he said deeply ashamed, his voice barely coming out of his mouth.
"'Yeah', what?" I asked insistently.
"Yeah, Georgina. I want to get better. I think I h-hit bottom. Its because of Avi and all every- but that's no excuse. Its not, Georgina..." he scattered in his words, losing himself in his thoughts. His eyes went distant, staring at the wall.
I put him back on track. "I know, Paulie. But you've got family to help you through this. We'll help you through this. You gotta believe me, Paulie. Right now, I'm making you soup. That's the first step, okay? I'm not gonna run away. I promise you that. Okay?" I began to stir the tomato soup slowly with the wooden spoon, strange warm feelings welling up in me. My motherly feeling, mixed with something uncomfortable persisting, uncertainty still in the back of my mind despite what I had just told him.
Suddenly, strong arms were around me, hugging me from behind tightly, shocking me.
"Thank you, Georgina. Thank you so much. I'm so sorry. I'm so, so sorry," Paulie whispered into my ear.
"Save it for the kid. He needs it more," I told him firmly, not stopping in my stirring though his arms impeded me, the same unsure feeling filling me instead of love.
"You're so right. Christ, Georgina. What do I say to the kid?" he asked with a heavy heart, backing from me like his shameful emotions were making him stumble away.
"That's for you to figure out. Your responsibility. That's the mess your drugs made, you figure it out." My heart rolled over in my chest, in found sympathy, though. I sighed deeply. "But," I went on, somewhat reluctantly in help, "comfort would be good. Comfort him."
"Thank you, Georgina," he whispered, the sounds of him sitting down again, that scraping metal chair on yellow kitchen tile, meeting my ears.
I sighed silently to myself, the tomato soup getting hot and releasing its familiar home-y smell to both of us in these unfamiliar waters. My hand slowly continued to stir, evenly heating the soup as reluctant forgiveness floated over my heart, still loving him. Loving him, because I knew he'd love me if I were in the same circumstance if given half the chance...if he were clean.