Sorry for the lack of updates lately. I have been winding down my last days at school and have just had other things to do. As such, today I give you another post by Tyler Newhouse. Enjoy.
——–
The door was open when I tried it. Inside, my friend sat slouched in a high backed maroon leather chair. It was well worn, like him. Hillary sipped from a stout glass of clear brown liquid, probably Scotch, bringing the glass to his lips as I entered his small apartment. This was his means of greeting. I had learned to recognize the gesture, a motion to say, take a seat, or grab a glass and join me, you know where the bottle is.
It was noon, so I sat. Hillary’s red nose rested upon the lip of his glass, and I stared at the sunspots that speckled his crown. This was a habit of mine, and I think it unsettled him. He had taken, of late, to combing his thin, graphite wires of hair forward over these spots, and I had no heart to tell him that it did little to hide the recess. And this quiet, a reverence for silence and drink, was, at least from time to time, characteristic of our relationship.
Hillary broke the silence.
“You wouldn’t happen to have any dope on you, would you, Miles? I’m near out,” he said. “I just need a little.”
This too was a shared passion of ours, the love of chronic, an escape from running minds. Yet I tried my best to discourage his habits, no matter how hypocritical that seemed.
“This again? Isn’t this unethical? This has to be unethical. I’m not your dealer, Hill,” I joked. This was a continuing game between us, and one that we both understood as such.
“No, no. Unethical would be sleeping with you, and trust me, Miles, I don’t want to sleep with you. I’ve never slept with a client.”
“Don’t you mean patient?” I laughed, and thought for a moment of taking a drink.
“You pay for these sessions. You’re a client. A patient and a client.”
“I haven’t paid you for a while now. If I still had to pay you, I wouldn’t come. This isn’t therapy.”
“Whataya mean?” he slurred, “I’m a therapist.” He must have been awake for a while.
“So you’ve told me.”
“Want my business card?”
Hillary dug through his suit pants before finding his slender billfold tucked into the breast of his black cotton blazer. The pants and jacket didn’t match. The blazer was rumpled, his signature, and beneath it he wore a grey tee. His look had a certain fashion to it, a nonchalance that was coolly cocksure and made him seem approachable, which he wasn’t.
“Did you ever actually care about your practice?” I said.
I rarely probed Hillary with such blunt force, but as mornings moved toward dusk and the old man’s liver soaked up his appetite, he opened himself up to such brutish attacks of reality, which I also believed would help pull him back from the edge if he’s strayed a bit too far in the day’s early light.
“Of course.” Hillary nodded, slowly. “When I still had clients to care for. But now all I’ve got is you, my patient.”
“Your friend,” I said.
I didn’t speak for a moment. “And you need to start watching your consumption,” I added warily.
Hillary, though generally unaware of social reality during that time, did possess a virile mind, a lucidity that had once allowed for a highly prosperous psychiatric practice. Like me, he realized that for now this had put an end to the conversation. We sat for some time in silence.
“Have you heard of John Money? Infamous for his quest to remove paraphilia from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders?”
We had been acquainted for three, nearly four years, and good friends for half that time, and yet he still talked down to me in this fashion. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, not the DSM. And yet I knew nothing of John Money.
I raised an eyebrow, sheepishly.
“Of course there was the incident with David Reimer. In sixty something,” he said.
Hillary continued speaking. He talked of the 60’s, and psychiatry, and it seemed, as it often did, that he was stuck there. I thought of the 60’s too, which inevitably brought me to psychedelics. All the while I was audience to Hillary’s lecture. His words escaped me, but his eyes were softer then, peacefully reminiscent and grey. He would have made a good character in black and white. Glass empty, Hillary went quiet and stood.
Behind me, he refilled his glass.
“Do you have any pot on you Miles?” Hillary said.
“Yes,” I said. “I brought a J.”
I was still in my 60’s trance. Smoking seemed appropriate, noble even. I took the pencil case from my coat pocket and retrieved the joint.
Hillary stood expectantly over my shoulder. I passed him the joint, letting him start it. He took it from me without a word and moved to his chair across from me.
The joint was good, and smoked slowly, and we got very high.
Some unknown time passed, and eventually my legs stopped shimmering like oil in a hot skillet. When I was able to uproot myself from my chair, I poured myself a drink. Hillary took another too. It could not have been later than two o’clock. I suppose this is another shared passion of ours, the fine art of drinking.
***
“You need to get out more,” I said into the phone.
“I don’t want to get out ever,” he said.
“Stop being difficult.”
“Stop harassing me.”
“I’ll take you out. We’ll go see a show. Mamet has something new on Broadway and it’s very well received.”
“We’ve got no cash. You’ve got no job. You should go out, find a new job. Maybe the money people will take you back.”
“We’ll sneak in,” I said.
“Yes, we’ll sneak in,” Hillary mocked.
“Yes, at intermission. We’ll wait outside, and find people who leave, and ask for their stubs, and then walk back in with the smokers.”
“Who would leave, for good, at intermission?”
“People leave.”
“Do they?” Hillary said, again mockingly.
“Yes, Hill, they do. People leave. People in high places. People not even you would have known when you ran with the high circles.”
“Yes.” Hillary sounded defeated, quickly pulled back to a different time, one that I believe he yearned for.
I sat on my bed and listened to the silent phone.
“No.” He was back. “If we go out, I’ll do the taking. Friday, pick me up at seven. Dress nice”
Then he rang off.
***
I left my apartment early and hailed a cab going west. We waited outside Hillary’s apartment for 15 minutes, and I was very relieved when he finally came out. He looked dapper wearing his tuxedo with hand-tied bow, and I was happy to see he had combed his hair back. He seemed confident, exposing his pate like that, and the grey shock that remained added to his air. He was quite the bon ton.
Hill lowered himself into the car. I wondered what the driver thought of us. He hadn’t been upset by the wait, or even interested, which is unusual for a cabbie. By five minutes in I had expected an outburst, but he said nothing, didn’t even ask a question, or toss a look back through the rearview mirror. He didn’t even play the radio. I wish he had been bothered and bent out of shape. I wish he had turned round his shoulder and laid into me. I would have been calm, and soothed his concerns. It would have looked good, and I would have been an important young gentleman. Instead, we just sat, and once Hillary had joined us, he directed the cabbie to the Museum of Modern Art, and we were off.
When we pulled up to 53rd Street, Hillary said nothing, just pulled me along until we faced the museum’s ground floor restaurant, The Modern. In the windows hung large banners announcing the American Psychiatric Association’s Annual Meeting.
Hillary had frozen, waiting for something, perhaps a hand to descend and move him across the diagonal, into the dining room. His eyes were turned down, but when they darted up momentarily, they looked like a cat’s, if the creature had been provoked, paws tensed, fur electrified.
“What are we doing here?” I said. It was not an unkind question, more a product of my bewilderment than an outburst of incredulity.
“Now,” Hillary said. “Use your trick.”
“What trick?”
“To get in. We’re smokers and we need tickets.”
“Do they sell tickets? Maybe we can pay at the door.”
“No, there are never tickets to these things. It’s all by invite. Exclusive invite.”
His eyes were still fixed ahead, moving around the cocktail party on the other side of the plate glass.
“So why did you say tickets then?” I said.
“Just use your trick,” Hillary said.
With one hand holding my phone to my ear, and the other around Hillary’s broad shoulder, I led him inside. A squirrely man with pale skin and a misshapen rug of red hair sat behind a table. He was the holder of the list, which appeared to be many pages in length. It looked as if quite a few people had been invited. I laughed into the phone, and as we passed this man, I gave him a knowing wave, sauntering into the busied room ahead. Hillary loved it, and I was very suave. I could feel the energy flow down his back.
“I’m a first year member of the Association, Hill. Just out of med school,” I said.
Peering over my shoulder, Hillary spotted the bar, and without word made his way there. I followed.
“We only have wine,” the frail, rented tuxedo told us. “Liquor is across the room. See the line? Yes, right there.”
“No, that’s fine,” Hillary said. “Two reds.”
“Oh no,” another man whispered to me. His beady eyes looked over Hillary in disappointment. He had an aggressive, bulbous chin and wore a grand, well-groomed mustache, which made him look as if he had stepped out of a witty comic strip, something with only one frame and no caption. “You really should be specific or else they give you the Merlot,” he said.
“Oh,” I said.
“And you don’t want the Merlot,” he assured.
“I don’t want the Merlot?” I said.
“Nobody wants the Merlot,” he said
“Then why do they serve it?” I said.
“What you really want is the Pinot Noir. They have a great bottle from the Santa Lucia Highlands. Ask for the Sequana. It’s named in honor of the Franco-Roman goddess of the River Seine,” he said.
I looked over at Hillary, who was still waiting for the wine, his back turned to us. The barman must have gone around back for more of the standard Merlot, and Hillary seemed displeased, fidgeting.
“Yes, the River Seine,” the man continued, “flows through the ancestral birthplace of Pinot Noir.”
The man sipped from his glass. His face was purple with wine. I’m not sure how he held that much wine and that much wine information. It was far too much wine for me, and I thought briefly of snagging an unattended whiskey from a nearby table and going outside for a joint. But I couldn’t leave Hillary there alone.
“Is that the Sequana?” I nodded at his glass.
“Yes of course,” the man said.
“Is it more than the Merlot?”
“More what?”
“More expensive.”
“Oh, yes,” he nodded. This seemed to be an important quality.
The barman returned and handed Hillary two glasses of red. Hillary turned, walked up to me, and forced both glasses into my hands. He gave a smiling nod to the man, and I was surprised by how genuine it looked.
Hillary returned to the bar and paid for a glass of Sequana.
“I’ve been reading R.D. Laing recently,” Hillary said to the man with the purple lips. “Are you familiar with The Politics of Experience?”
“Ah, yes,” the man said, and then looking at me, “You should really get a glass of the Sequana.”
“Yes Miles, go get a glass of the Sequana,” Hillary said.
I had nothing to say, so, smiling meekly, I turned and slowly made my way towards the center of the party.
“He knows nothing of Laing,” I heard Hillary say behind me. “Terribly brilliant, but no Laing.”
***
As I moved then, weaving through the party, I came upon several deserted drinks, and I took each of them. My head swam a bit, though I certainly was not drunk, so I went outside for my smoke. Down 53rd Street towards 6th Avenue I found a long courtyard that cut the block in half. It was a small, sparse park that connected 52ndto 53rd. I found myself a nook and lit up. The tobacco in my spliff covered the smell of marijuana nicely, so I relaxed and looked across at the American Folk Art Museum. It’s a great thing to look at when high because it looks like a towering metal rock, dotted throughout with pockmarks. My case was well stocked, and I lit another. I sat for some time, I’m unsure of exactly how long, and then, thinking of Hillary wandering about alone inside, I returned. Again, I nodded at the list man.
I visited both bars and retrieved a few more unattended drinks. What were all of these people on that had them so cheery and cordial? Half downed Old Fashioneds? Maybe that mystical Pinot was more alcoholic as well.
Hillary was not at either drinking post. He was not at the buffet. He was neither sitting around the outskirts, nor milling through the center area. I was quite worried, and in a frenzy, I pilfered another drink. Worried that this drink, a smooth, oaky Scotch, might have had an active owner, I scurried off and made my way to the far end of the room, where a glass wall overlooked the museum’s sculpture garden. It too was a great thing to look at, and I drifted off.
“Miles?”
I hadn’t been sleeping, I don’t think, but my eyes were terribly sore and dry. I could feel their red veins that shot out like grapevines.
“Miles?” she said again.
“Constance?” I said, squinting.
“Miles, wow. What are you doing here?”
Constance Coquette and I first met in college. She knew French and I fell in love with her. When she spoke, her chin would move forward and bob, gracefully, and it was a great chin. The relationship lasted nearly five years, but she left me for a “more committed” man. This man did not exist, as it turned out, but was more of an ideal she held onto. It was all very confusing. It was also what drove me to Dr. Hillary Locke, whom I had now lost.
I squinted again at Constance. She was a very cold girl.
“Well, anyway,” she said. “It’s so great to see you.”
“Yes.” I tried blinking my eyes to free them up, but they seemed resolved not to cooperate. If there were shortfalls in her personality, there certainly weren’t in her person, and I wanted very badly to get a less blurred look at her beauty.
“Are you all right, Miles?” she said.
“Yes,” I said. “Yes.”
“I could get you some water, maybe.”
“Oh, no. I’m fine. Save your money.”
These sorts of situations are always very painful when talking to someone you are still in love with, and this pain must have been transferred to my eyes, which got worse with every move of my mouth.
“Well, how are you these days Miles?”
“Yes, it’s been a while.”
“Yes, eleven months. But, really, how are things?”
I looked out into the restaurant. Where was Hillary? I wanted Constance, but not for this chat. There is no sense in going through all of these niceties, not when they’re going nowhere. How was I going to find Hillary without my eyes?
Constance, it seemed, was still looking at me.
“You’re here with your father?” I said.
“Yes, he was one of the speakers this afternoon. He’s been making the rounds all night, and left me all alone.”
“Yes, everyone must want to speak with him.”
“Let’s sit and have a drink.”
“Oh, yes,” I said, “maybe another time.”
“I can go grab a bottle of wine and some glasses.”
“No,” I said, “I hear they’re only serving the bad stuff tonight.”
“What bad stuff?”
“I really should go,” I said. “My eyes.”
“They do look very red. Maybe you should rinse them out. Do you know where the bathroom is?”
“Yes,” I said. She was always dismissing me like this. I turned then, and headed for the door.
“Call me and we can do dinner, Miles,” she called out.
I tried to scan for Hillary on my way out, but instead I bumped into a table. I think a glass might have broken. I had claimed many glasses that night.
A hand took hold of my shoulder.
“Need some help?” The peculiar faced list man was back. He looked a bit like the wino as well. Maybe it was the wino.
“No more wine,” I said, shaking my head.
“What?”
“Wine.”
“Wine? No, I don’t think so. You’ve had enough wine.”
“Hill?”
“This way, sir. Let’s get you in a cab.”
“Cab.” I nodded.
***
It was nearly sunrise when I awoke, and my landline, which sits beside my bed, was shrieking in my ear.
“Yes,” I said. It was more of a pant. My eyes still burned, but now the pain wasn’t as much on the surface as it was buried behind them. I was very dehydrated, and I wondered if my brain was swelling.
“Miles. Good. There you are. Very good. How are you?”
“Bad, Hill, very bad.”
“Oh.” Hillary sounded very bad too.
“Hill?” I said into the silence. “What do you want?”
“What?” Hillary said.
“Why did you call me?” I said.
“I called you? I thought you called me,” Hillary said.
“No.”
“Oh.”
I was beginning to feel as if I was sinking into the bed. It was all very hallucinatory, so I did my best to focus instead on the silence on the other end of the line, which lasted for quite some time.
Finally Hillary spoke up. “I’m in a bit of a pickle here Miles,” Hillary said.
***
The hotel was located between the last lit avenue and the highway, and the wind coming off the Hudson River was glacial. As I neared both the entrance and the water, I felt as if I were pressing into a wall of nails. It reminded me of playing with one of those little square toys, which have the moving rods so you can place your hand in it and leave your imprint. I was happy to be leaving my imprint, despite the weather.
Inside, the hotel looked like a set for a Terry Richardson shoot, somewhere the true madman could snap all of life’s banal insanity. It was sleazy and perfectly unkempt. I found Hillary’s room, just above the lobby, and the door was ajar.
Hillary, fully clothed, sat on the floor with his back resting against the foot of the bed. He held a tall glass, which was empty but for a few final drops, and he stared down into the bottom of the glass.
The hooker lay above him, and was glaring at me. She looked as if, for some short period, she had experimented with many sorts of drugs, and had survived with all her good looks in tact. I have always been attracted to these kinds of girls because that history adds a whole extra layer of intrigue and risk, though I’ve never had the pleasure of actually uncovering that layer.
When I caught her eye she nodded quickly, head rising instead of falling.
“Yea,” she said. This was a greeting. I hoped she thought I was here to collect my poor drunk father.
I knelt and gave Hillary a gentle shake. When he looked up and recognized me, his eyes were cuffed with sagging yellow skin and he was sweating gently.
“Miles.” He smiled.
“Are you o.k.?” I said.
“Miles,” he continued, “I’m so happy to see you.”
I smiled too. I was just as happy to see him.
“What the fuck are you two smiling about,” the hooker said.
“Oh, Miles, have you paid this nice lady?”
“Who do I pay? Do I pay you?” I asked the hooker.
“Yeah. I’m independent. It’s a hundred,” she said.
“Shit,” I said. “I only brought 60.”
“Cock-suckers,” she said. “Wastin’ my fuckin’ time.” She seemed more aggravated than angry, and lit a cigarette. I don’t think smoking was permitted inside, but maybe flophouses operate differently.
“I’ve got a joint too,” I offered.
“Gimme,” she said and sucked her teeth.
I did, and picked Hillary up. We weren’t too far from his place, and the walk through the cold streets might help to heal us.
I stopped in the door.
“Sorry,” I said, looking back at her.
“Yeah,” she said. “To hell with the both of you.”
“In good time,” I said, “but not yet,” and closed the door.
End
- Drawing by Tyler Newhouse
