They Let Us Play With Markers, but I Keep Trying to Draw Infinity

I couldn’t bring myself to open my eyes. It felt like an elephant had sat on my head and made it explode. That or a really, really fat lady. I could feel the dried goo of my brains fanned out around my head, stuck between my skull and the floor. Every time I moved the tiniest millimeter, the brain-tentacles pulled my head back to the floor and the elephant would get angry and jump. I reached up to try to pry my brain matter off the floor so I could lift up my head but was thoroughly surprised to find that my head hadn’t literally exploded and that it was only my hair trapped under someone’s arm that was keeping me on the ground.

“Get the fuck off me right now.” Every word brought bile up through my stomach. It sat anxiously at the base of my throat, waiting for me to talk again, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it because the vibrations of my larynx made the brain-elephant scream and flail. I felt like I was dying. Had I known that hangovers were unmistakably similar to migraines, I would have contained myself. I’m capable of attracting migraines all on my own. I don’t need the help of copious amounts of alcohol.

Sitting up was just as bad of an idea as I knew it would be but lying against the cool wood floor made the world spin. At the time, it seemed a lot worse. The grass is always greener, though, isn’t it?

I looked around Leif’s living room to see everyone sprawled in a similar fashion: Toby and Ivy were spooned on the couch; Leo was curled in a ball in the corner right next to the heater; Jacob and Chuck were sleeping in separate lounge chairs but each had an arm thrown over the side and were holding hands in their sleep; Randy was stretched across the window seat and Leif was stretched across the floor directly beneath her; Mikey was spread eagled in the middle of the floor; and Tristan turned out to be the one lying on my hair, reaching out for me in his deep sleeping state. I rolled my eyes, feeling completely pissed off at everyone and knowing the only reason was because of my excruciating headache.

I stumbled to my feet and plopped down at the kitchen table, bottles half full and less of liquor still sitting there. I was tempted to take a drink of one of the strongest left in hopes that it really was a hangover cure. I had reached out to grab a bottle when I heard movement in the other room then Chuck appeared in the doorway looking only slightly better than myself.

“Hey.” She smiled a little as she sat across from me, tilting her head from side to side and rubbing her neck. “Remind me to never fall asleep in a chair again.”

“You guys looked cute though.” My voice was nothing more than a croak and I had to take a few slow, deep breaths to keep from throwing up.

Chuck’s smile grew. “If I tell you something, will you promise not to overreact?”

I gave her a weary look. “It depends on what you tell me.”

“Come on, Josey, promise.”

I groaned and laid my head gently on my arms. “Fine. Just tell me.”

“Jacob and I made out before we got here.”

“I figured as much. Your face and his hair kind of gave it away, so I think it’s safe to say that everybody knows. ...What made you think I was going to overreact to that?”

Chuck shrugged. “I don’t know. I was just expecting a lecture about taking things slow or something.”

“Dude, you’re a grown ass woman. You know how fast is too fast for you. You can take care of yourself. However, if Jacob does anything to upset you, I’ll cut his fucking balls off. Just remember that.”

“I’ll be sure to tell him,” Chuck chuckled.

I squinted at the rum bottle, trying to read the small print of ingredients and sighed.

“What’s wrong?” Chuck asked.

“Are you worried about Randy?”

“No. Are you?”

I shrugged. “A little bit. I mean, I’m not worried she’s making bad choices or anything. I guess saying I’m worried about her is the wrong way to put it. I’m more... worried about the situation. I’m worried it’s not going to go as well as we think, that she’ll never come back, that we’ll get left to the wayside.”

“Josey, that’s not going to happen. I was a little worried that it wasn’t going to work out too, but Jacob and I talked about it, and he’s really confident. They all are. I think they’re gonna be fine.” Chuck reached out and gripped my hand, squeezing it comfortingly.

It didn’t take much longer for everyone to wake up, one by one. It was nearly two o’clock before the last of us was up, and by that time all of the signs of the night previous had been removed, most of everyone’s hangovers taken care of, and all of us stuffed with Chinese – extras in the fridge for Leif and Tristan when they woke up. We left at our own pace, Tristan and I parting on the street as I had to go help Randy pack, and Chuck heading off to dinner with Jacob. They had announced to everyone their intentions and we voiced our concerns about the bad timing, but we ended the discussion feeling confident that Jacob and Chuck would figure things out and could, for the most part, handle themselves.

“What a weekend,” I said as we climbed into my car, heading for Randy’s house. “Can you believe Chuck and Jacob? What the hell are they going to do?”

“Have lots and lots of phone sex.”

I wanted, with everything in me, to cover my ears, but I couldn’t risk taking my hands off the wheel on the icy road. “Oh, yuck! Can you just—can we not have that conversation?”

“You think you’ve got it bad,” Randy intoned. “At least you’re not going to be living with her.”

“Yeah, I meant I didn’t really want to think about either end of it. Oh, holy hell.” Another thought popped into my head. “You don’t think they’re going to be sexting, do you? I don’t know if I could handle that. I’d have no idea when it was happening because Chuck texts all the fucking time. She could be talking to me and sexting at the same time, and I’d never know,” I whispered dramatically.

Randy laughed. “I thought you didn’t want to have this conversation.”

“I didn’t. I don’t. But now I’m worried and freaked out. I always knew there was a reason she wouldn’t let me go through her phone. Oh, god! My imagination!” Randy began to laugh hysterically. “This isn’t funny. You’re a lot more capable of handling such situations. I am not.”

“I hope Chuck has the common decency to keep it private. I know Jacob does. Or he’s just that shy.”

“Well, let’s just say that when she and Hunter were dating, she never disclosed intimate details unless it directly related to a problem. So it was kind of half and half.”

“Then you and your poor virgin ears should be fine.” She grinned her usual broad grin that always appeared when I became embarrassed about something sex or naked people related.

“Must you put it like that? I’m not completely in the dark. I do watch R-rated movies. And HBO.”

“It’s a joke, Joseybean.”

“I hope it works out for them. I like Jacob. I like all of those guys. I think you found a good group of people. ...I am right, right?”

“Depends. Which definition of good are we talking about?”

I had to roll my eyes. Really? It took specification? “They’re not going to coerce you into animal sacrifices and breaking the law or kidnapping you and either ritualistically killing you or selling you for drugs. Things along those lines.”

“Oh. No, in terms of that, they’re a very nice group of gents.”

By this time we had reached Randy’s house and slowly talked our way up the stairs and into her room. I stood before her open closet as she sat on the bed she hardly ever used and mindlessly strummed the small ukulele she’d had sitting on a chair.

“So how long are you estimating you’ll be gone? Because that will determine how much you’re going to need to pack.” I turned to her, already exasperated, and we hadn’t even begun the long process. “Why would you leave this till now? You do realize you only have two days to make sure you don’t leave anything behind now?”

“I always leave packing until the last second, and I always leave something behind. But whatever it is, I’m sure I can buy one in LA.”

“Which reminds me,” I sat next to her, kicking off my shoes, “how are you guys going to handle the whole money thing? Did you save or are you going to get jobs? I can’t imagine just packing up and leaving for months at a time. It’s crazy.”

“It shouldn’t be months. Maybe one. Plus the label’s putting us up in a place.”

“Oh. I’m still so confused on how this whole process works. It’s so foreign to me: music as a job.” I caught myself and laughed. “I don’t even want to imagine how I sound because I totally just felt like my grandma there and feeling like it’s bad enough.”

Randy grinned. “Hey, look at it this way, you’re better than my parents.”

My heart nearly froze. “Oh my god. Dude, I totally forgot to ask. How did they take it? What did you say? Tell me everything.”

She winced. “Not...incredibly well.”

“What happened? I’m assuming they yelled, but they didn’t kick you out or anything, did they? If they did, you can so come live with me. You practically do anyway, and my mom loves you so it’s all good.”

“Well, the thing is... I'd kind of only told them the night of our big show that I was in a band, so they didn't really believe me. But when they did, Mom said I couldn't go because I 'had to get an education so I could succeed in life' and Dad said I should do what makes me happy and then they had this huge screaming row.” She shrugged. “Then I had to go to work.”

“Question: Who wears the pants in your family?”

“Used to be my mom, until Dad got the job out here and he became Mister Big Important Provider Guy.” She grinned. “But I am of the opinion that in the best relationships, nobody wears the pants.”

“So Dad rules and Dad gave his thumbs up. Good times. And no, your opinion is that nobody should wear pants.”

“Same thing.”

“Whatever. So you’re not homeless. This is good news! Or... wait. They know about the band, but do they know about you leaving? You know you can’t just leave them hanging.”

“I told them after the meeting. I called all excited. Neither of them really cared, so long as I'm still enrolled in classes online.”

“My god, that's going to suck. Are the guys doing that too? I don't even know if they're in school. Are they?”

“Toby and Leo used to be, but they all have jobs. Which I guess they've put on hold.”

I flopped back on the bed, bouncing a little at the sudden dispersing of weight, my mind whirling. “I still can't wrap my head around all this. I mean, I've never left the Midwest. The farthest I've traveled from home is to Iowa to visit family, and it's really not that far away. But you guys are going nearly two-thousand miles away, and then after that you're going everywhere! Shit. When you get famous enough, you'll go to other countries! You'll have to get a passport and shots. Wait.. do you need shots if you're not going to third world countries?”

“Josey,” Randy laughed, “you’re thinking way far ahead. We haven’t even recorded an album yet.”

“I'm sorry. I can't help it. My mind.. reaches for things to worry about. It can't be satisfied fretting over the situation at hand, it has to worry about all the possibilities in the future. You remember those stupid factor tree things we had to do in math to figure out how many possible outcomes? That's what my mind looks like only it's a Worry Tree.”

She looked at me and blinked. “I’m very sorry that your brain is a math problem.”

“Putting it like that makes it sound even worse!” I groaned. “I fucking hate math.”

“I know, dearie.” She patted my arm.

I paused for a second, trying not to think pessimistically, but it’s a very hard urge to control. “I guess you’ll be going home, though, in a way. Won’t you?”

“Los Angeles is a very different place from San Francisco. It’ll be nice to be near an ocean again, though.”

“Do you miss it? The ocean and the sun and the warmth?”

Randy chuckled. “It wasn’t really warm that often. ‘Temperate’ is a better word.”

I sat up and faced her, crossing my legs. “Warmer than here, anyway. God, I fucking hate it here sometimes. It gets so damn cold but never snows because we're too close to that shitty ass river so you're just freezing and everything looks miserable which makes you even more miserable. I think about moving all the time, but I don't know if I could leave my family behind.”

Randy looked surprised. “I didn’t know you hated it.” She paused. “Maybe you should convince your family to take a vacation somewhere.”

I scoffed. “With what money and what time?”

“Well, I don’t know. It was just an idea.”

“Don’t worry about it.” I waved her off. “Chuck and I are coming out to see you during Spring Break. What more of a vacation do I need?”

Randy’s usual smile was back. “Indeed.”