The Tribuo - 59. Part V, chapter 13

- XIII -

LEX

Thanksgiving came and went, nothing spectacular, the same turkey as always. Russell was ecstatic to get his car finally. Jess was acting stranger and stranger every day. Sometimes, it seemed like she could go without any sleep for a full week, and then she wouldn’t get out of bed for the entire weekend. Her eating habits were bizarre as well. I was having really bad suspicions about the whole thing, even though I really didn’t want to believe it. I knew that sooner or later, I would have to talk to her about it. I was never a fan of pep talks or interventions, and I never believed that those actually worked. Well, maybe sometimes they did, I don’t know. I promised to myself that if nothing changed in a couple of weeks, I’d definitely talk to her. She'll probably tell me to go to hell, but I’d do it nevertheless. Talk to her, I mean, not go to hell part. Although that could be entirely possible as well, you never know.

Russell and I hung out all the time now. I couldn’t help myself -- I fell for him more and more every time we spent time together. Jess would ask me if we made some bizarre no-sex pact or something like that, and I would avoid the conversation like a plague. Finally, she stopped asking me, and it seemed like she couldn't care less about the whole thing. The truth was that we never made such a pact. It was more like a silent agreement between us. Neither of us spoke about it, but neither of us tried to push anything further. So far it worked.

Today was the first Friday of December, and when I got home from school, there was Jess, sitting on the steps, waiting for me. She was chewing on her fingernails, dark circles underneath her eyes so huge that she looked like a panda bear.

“Hey,” I said when I got closer. “What’s up?”

“Hey,” she muttered back and stood up without pulling her finger out of her mouth. “Can I borrow a hundred bucks? I’ll pay you back, I swear!”

That was another thing with her lately. She was always one of those people who hated borrowing money. Every time she had to do that, it looked like she was about to get her teeth pulled. But in the last month she borrowed probably five hundred bucks from me. I knew that she’d pay me back sooner or later, so I didn’t care. I was lucky enough not to have money problems. As I mentioned before, I am fairly good when it comes to computers, and I can fix pretty much anything. So I would always have people asking for help, and thus, I never ran out of money. That and my mother kept sending me two hundred bucks or so every two weeks, even though I told her a hundred times to stop doing that. She just ignored me, and continued with her 'financial help' as she called it. I had to admit, it was nice, so I stopped bitching about it and just accepted the good thing.

I hated being a dick to Jess, but the truth was that right now money was sort of tight with Christmas coming up and all. I also ended up upgrading my cell phone, and that cost me a hefty amount.

“Jess,” I sighed. “I can spare maybe fifty bucks, I’m sorry…”

“I’ll pay you back!” her voice flew up a desperate octave. “I swear!”

“I know you will,” I nodded. “That’s not the reason, okay? The holidays are coming up; I have a couple of payments I have to make, so I really don’t have much money right now. I am sorry! But as I said, I can spare fifty bucks if you still need it.”

She chewed on her fingernail with great gusto.

“Fine,” she snapped finally. “Fifty is better than nothing…”

“Wanna come in?” I pulled out my keys. “It’s cold out here. I’ll make coffee.”

“Yeah,” she muttered. “Sure.”

Ten minutes later, I was debating with myself whether to do the whole intervention thing or not.

“You okay?” I asked finally, and she just moved her head jerkily.

“I’m fine,” she said. “Why?”

“Never mind,” I said, thinking that now was probably not the best time for the talk that was looming in the back of my mind.

She grabbed the check I wrote for her, shoved it into her pocket, and said that she really needed to go.

“Coffee’s almost ready,” I said.

“No time,” she muttered. “Thanks, Lex! I’ll see you later.”

She ran out the door, and then I heard her angry yelp.

“Dammit!!”

I went outside to see what that was about. Apparently, she ran full speed into Russell who was on his way up the steps, and almost fell down.

“You okay?” he asked, and she shook off his hand.

“Fine,” she snapped. “Watch where you going!”

I watched her get into her car and I bit my lip. Crap, I have to talk to her. The sooner the better, too. Russell walked in, his face thoughtful.

“Coffee?” I asked.

“Always,” he nodded. “I think she’s in some deep shit,” he said suddenly.

“I know,” I grimaced. “I’ve been thinking the same thing… What do you think she’s doing?”

He took the mug out of my hands and sat down.

“I don’t know,” he said finally. “But it looks hard-core.”

“Ecstasy?” I offered, and he immediately shook his head.

“I don’t think so. You don’t get a come down like that from ecstasy. I tried that shit when I was seventeen. It can mess you up pretty bad, but nothing like what she is going through…”

“Coke?”

“Mm-mm,” he shook his head again. “It’s way too expensive. I’d say crack or meth.”

“No way!” Now it was my turn to do some violent shaking. “Not Jess!”

“The symptoms fit,” he shrugged.

“You live with her,” I frowned. “Is she doing anything at home?”

“Breaks stuff mostly,” he shrugged again. “I tried talking to her, but every time I say something, she literally snarls at me. So I left her alone.”

“Son of a bitch,” I sighed. “I’ll talk to her. I've been thinking about it for a while now..."

“Well,” he set his mug on the table. “Let me know when you gonna talk to her.”

“Why? You wanna help or something?”

“God, no!” he said seriously. “I’ll get out of the apartment.”

“Great,” I sighed.

“I don’t think she likes me much,” he said. “I don’t know why, but every time she sees me, she gets this look on her face… You know, the one that says, 'If I knew I’d get away with murdering you, I would've done it by now'? That sort of look…”

“You are seeing things,” I snorted.

He shrugged.

“Maybe.”

He dropped his head on his elbow and looked at me very thoughtfully. I drank my coffee in silence, leaning on the counter.

“What?” I asked finally after several minutes, when he just kept staring at me.

“Thinking,” he said seriously.

“About?” I finished my coffee and set my mug aside. “You look like you planning something…”

He sighed and got up.

“Close enough,” he nodded and stepped closer to me. “I am trying to come up with a really good excuse, actually.”

“An excuse...?” I frowned. “For what?”

“This,” he said simply, and the next thing I knew, his mouth was on mine.

Unlike that night in early November, when he kissed me like it was the last thing he would do in this life, right now he was really slow and gentle. My head was spinning and my heart was trying to jump into my throat. I put my hands on his shoulders and kissed him back. I had no idea if that was the right thing to do or not, but I didn’t care. He pulled the hairband off my ponytail and buried his fingers in my hair. It felt like his fingers sent electrical currents down my entire body.

We kissed for what felt like an eternity, and I didn’t want it to end. Finally, he slightly pulled away and pressed his forehead against mine, his hands still tangled up in my hair.

“I couldn’t come up with any excuse,” he muttered, his breath warm on my face.

“That’s a good excuse right there,” I said, my breath nowhere near normal.

“You think so?” he straightened up and looked at me seriously.

“Yeah,” I breathed.

“Hmm,” he said thoughtfully. “I am better than I thought…”

I laughed, and then he kissed me again, and this time, we didn’t come up for air for a very long time.

_____________________________________

JESS

It’s a week 'till Christmas; there is holiday spirit everywhere; Santa Clauses keep “Ho-ho-ho”-ing everyone in sight; Christmas music has taken over every single radio station and store around. I used to love Christmas. Right now, I hate it. I don’t have a slightest idea how I managed not to flunk anything in school. Remember how I said that I would do the damn drug until the end of the semester, and how it would help me to stay on top in school? Yeah, right. By the end of November, I couldn't care less about school. Somehow, I managed to finish this semester with three C’s and several very shaky B’s. Still surprises the hell out of me. I thought I’d flunk everything.

It’s officially Christmas break now, and this is the time when I was supposed to start my detox. Right, like that ever gonna happen… Oh, and yesterday I found my new low. The sad part was that it didn’t even bother me. Oh, now you want to know what I did, huh… Well, now that my share is not seventy bucks anymore but a hundred instead, that puts me in constant need for money. The eightball lasts maybe two days for us now, which means I have to cough up two hundred bucks every week. That’s eight hundred a month. I have no idea how much I owe Lex by now. Used to make me feel guilty, but now I don’t even give a crap.

But anyway, I had to pay my hundred yesterday, and of course, I didn’t have it. I thought about asking Lex again, but then figured that it would be absolutely futile. Plus, he’s been trying to 'talk' to me for almost two weeks now. I knew exactly what he wanted to talk about. Lex is not a complete idiot, even though the thought had crossed my mind, because guess what? Russell and him are fucking each other’s brains out now. That’s idiotic in my book. I mean, how thick can someone get, really? Does he seriously believe that Russell doesn’t see that guy Brian every time he sees Lex’s face? Come on!

But anyway, it’s his problem. I don’t even care anymore. To be honest, he is really annoying lately. But enough about Lex. Back to yesterday when I needed money. So I needed cash, which I didn’t have, so what did I do? I went into my beloved roommate’s bedroom, and I went through every single drawer and pocket that I could find. Finally, I came across some cash -- almost two hundred bucks, to be exact -- and I could almost hear angels sing. That would solve my money problem for a whole week!

So yes, that was my new low; and nope, I didn’t feel anything but giddy joy after I stole that money. Sometimes I would wake up in the middle of the night, completely horrified of everything I was doing. I would cry until my head felt like it was on fire. I would make all kinds of promises to God, myself, and whoever else came to my mind, that I was going to stop this insanity. But then in the morning, I would just go back to Landley’s (who looked like hell lately, by the way), and the whole thing would just start all over again.

Maybe I’ll be finally able to stop… I mean, Christmas is almost here. There is such thing as a Christmas miracle, right? Yeah, whatever…