Excerpts from Record Fair

There's no beginning to this story.

All apartments in Allston must be this cold, I doubt this shithole is special. There's no insulation or heat and these pseudo-intellectual faux-political Mass. Art kids think it makes them punk to suffer. They come into Record Fair and try to steal buttons that say things like "Fame may be fleeting, but obscurity is forever," and "Sit on my face, Stevie Nicks!"
Olive disappeared almost a month ago. James and I had our fight the night she left. He had said he's sick of making my vegan food and picking Jenn up drunk in Somerville, I said that's the least he can do. I told him, "my body's not your personal dumping ground, and if my needs mean nothing to you -- if you have no respect for me at all -- the least you can do is pick up my drunk sister.”
“I don’t want to love someone who is trying to die,” he said, defeated.
“I’m not a killer,” I retorted.
James's argument was that if I don't take care of myself, why should he?
Mine was if he didn't take care of me, why should I.





On my way home from work I’d worry that Erica would be dead before I got there. That I’d open the door, see her lying on the yoga mat, eyes open. Biting the arm that held her phone. Spilled coffee. Wearing two pairs of socks and my Slayer t-shirt. Olive pawing at her shoulder. I tried to prepare myself for it, the taking the phone out of her clutched fist and dialing an ambulance, calling her mother, kneeling next to her, checking for a pulse just in case. A part of me is still surprised that that never happened.

Erica liked to do things alone, which is all fine and good, but she used to want to be together. I’d drive her to work just for the hell of it. Every once in a while we’d call in sick together and stay in bed all day.
“I told you that I don’t like it when you touch me there.”
“But I like touching you there, honey, I think it’s beautiful.”
“It’s not, I can’t stand it, it makes me anxious.”
“How could it make you anxious?”
“Stop it.” Erica pulled a sweatshirt off of the floor and over her head. There was nothing I could say. She turned her back and slunk beneath the covers. He went to the bathroom and locked the door.
I noticed a thin, speckled red stain down the outside of the toilet, towards the back. It looked like a drop of something – shampoo? Period blood?
“Erica,” I spoke through the door, “is it your time of the month?”
“That’s what you think? I must be on my period?”
“No, no, I just couldn’t remember the last time you had one.” I sighed heavily and went back to bed.
“I can’t sleep.” I touched her shoulder. “I’ve been having nightmares.”
“All that caffeine causes bad dreams, maybe you should cut back a bit.”