Page 64 of Full Tilt
I set my beer glass down, turned it round and round on the purple table. “She had to go,” I said quietly. “They’d ruin her if she broke her contract. She needs to decide what’s best for her, and I couldn’t ask her to stay anyway.”
“Why not?”
I gave them a look. “You know why not. You know why I don’t get involved. I have nothing to offer her but friendship and even that has an expiration date.” I scrubbed my hands through my hair. “It was stupid. The whole thing. Reckless and stupid.”
“What about what you want, Jonah?” Dena asked. “What doyouwant?”
I looked at my friends who’d been in love with each other for as long as I’d known them. Dena’s search for deeper meaningswas the perfect counterbalance to Oscar, who skimmed along life’s surface like a jet-ski. She grounded him; he made her laugh. My gaze strayed to their locked hands, his dark skin against her pale, fingers entwined. I remembered Kacey’s hand in mine at the diner.
It wasn’t enough. I want more…
But I couldn’t have more.
I mustered a smile. “I want to finish my installation, and I want another eight-dollar, non-alcoholic beer.”
Oscar burst out laughing and seemed content to let the matter drop. Dena’s smile fell soft on me the rest of the evening, and I knew she wouldn’t let me off so easily.
Being the perpetual designated driver, I dropped off Oscar and Dena at their house, Southwest of the strip.
“Don’t forget,” Oscar said, clasping my hand and pulling me in for a half-hug before he climbed out. “Great Basin camping trip in three weeks. Make sure you take the time off from work.”
“Already been scheduled,” I said.
The cheer in my voice was forced: I worried about the loss of work in the hot shop and the loss of tip money from my job, but Oscar and Dena had planned this trip for months. They wanted the time with me and I couldn’t say no. They were my oldest friends, the only friends I couldn’t push away when my last biopsy results were made known. They were ingrained in the fabric of my life, no matter how long a life it turned out to be.
Dena came around to the driver side, wearing the maternal look that meant I had a lecture coming, usually prefaced with a quote from her favorite poet, Rumi.
“That which is false troubles the heart, but truth brings joyous tranquility,” she said.
“And what does that mean, love?”
“It means you miss this girl. Don’t pretend you don’t. You’ll feel better for being true to your feelings.” She rested her hands on the open window. “I don’t like to talk about your schedule, you know that.”
I nodded. ‘My schedule’ had become a euphemism for the time I had left. The ‘gallery opening’ was the finish line I needed to cross.
“And I know you want to leave a beautiful piece of art in your wake. Your focus is solely on the destination, not the journey.” Dena placed her palm on my cheek. “Shouldn’t you also try to do the most important thing along the way?”
I covered her hand with mine. “What’s that?”
“Be happy.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY
Salt Lake City
Day Nine without Jonah. Day Five without booze.
I watched the bubbles dance in my champagne flute, but I didn’t drink it. Not a drop since that last drunken night in the Denver hotel room. Every nerve ending in my body screamed for a sip, but I only turned the delicate glass around and around. Did they give sobriety chips for making it five days? I doubted it, but they should. Every fuckinghourwhere I didn’t give into the need was a battle.
I sat in a huge, half-moon booth with ten other people in the VIP section of some club. The music was loud and relentless; I could feel the base thudding in my chest. Bodies writhed on the dance floor one level below. In our booth, talk and laughter zig-zagged around me. The girls from RC were flirting with the guys from our new opening act. Everyone was happy our latest set of shows had gone well, but all I could think was I was in the wrong place, doing the wrong thing with the wrong people.
I sat wedged between Jimmy Ray and Phil Miller, the owner of this club and, no coincidence, the Pony Club in Las Vegas. He turned to me now, shifting his bulk toward me with a gust of sweat and too much cologne.
“So, you’re my little trouble-maker, are you?” he said.
He smoked a cigar that smelled vaguely like licorice. I hated licorice. My shoulders flinched up and stayed there. I had four people on my right, five on my left. I was stuck tight at the middle of the booth.
