Alex glanced at the little piece of plastic around her wrist and frowned. This wasn’t the type of accessory a girl usually wants to wear for a night out, but she felt like a fake cutting off her hospital bracelet so soon. She shook thoughts of St. Francis from her mind and took a drag from her joint. She was stressed enough from having to play catch up at school after being released from the hospital. The last thing she needed was to have to try and impress some guy her friend had set her up with.
“It’ll help you get back into the swing of things…you know, normalcy” her friend Anna had told her.
The two girls were now wandering hurriedly around Alex’s room getting ready for their double date slash concert.
“He’s an old friend of Eric’s and he’s a great guy.” Anna said cheerily. I met him yesterday and he is really good-looking. He’s smart too. He’s been away at this fancy private school for the past couple of years, and he’s going to Vassar in the fall but as smart as he is, Eric says he’s still crazy fun. We’ll just all go to the concert together and have a great time. It will help you get your mind off of…stuff…”
As much as Alex appreciated the efforts of Anna and Eric, Anna’s long-term, perfect boyfriend, she doubted not only the sincerity of those efforts, but also that some demi-god of a guy would help her to forget “stuff”. In fact, she was pretty sure his perfection would only emphasize her instability, because the “stuff” Alex was trying to forget about didn’t consist of the normal, angst-ridden, teen issues. Less than a week ago Alex had still been unable to wear clothing with any type strings or metal attached to it, for fear that she would either try to kill herself or someone else with it. Even in the half-conscious, drunken, self-loathing state which Alex had been dragged to The St. Francis Psychiatric Facility, she had mustered the coherency with which to ask the nurse “how the fuck’mygonna kill myself with a zipper, bitch?” In response, the nurse proceeded to strip her down, dress her in an ensemble of a paper gown complete with slipper socks and that beautiful plastic bracelet and fed her a sedative (as if she needed any more drugs in her system) in order to shut her up. “After all,” said the nurse cheerily, “we don’t want to disturb the other patients who are on their way to a happy recovery.”
Despite the absurdities the hospital employed to ensure its patients’ well-being, it seemed that Alex always found an equal and opposing absurdity to ensure her ceaseless stay at St. Francis. And so, despite the hospital staff’s original estimate that Alex would only need to stay two months maximum, the entire year came and went and only four days ago, exactly one year and two weeks after she had been admitted, had she been officially released. No one but Alex and a few far-too-happy doctors at St. Francis knew exactly where she had been and why she had been admitted, and only Alex knew for sure why she had stayed so long. As Alex’s best friend since kindergarten, Anna had been satisfied with the explanation that “I knew I was on a bad path and I just had to go away for a while where people could help me…so basically my dad dragged me away kicking and screaming against my will” In any case, Anna got the gist and had dropped the subject. At least, this was the impression Anna had given Alex. However, in high school, bad news travels exceptionally fast, and so by this point, Alex was aware that, starved of information, Anna had proceeded to fill in the blanks like a bad game of Mad Libs with stories ranging from Alexis trying to kill her father and being hauled away by the authorities to Alex being pregnant, getting an abortion and going insane from the guilt of killing her first unborn child. “But what can you do?” thought the newly reformed Alexis, frowning, “that’s just your typical upper-middle class teenage girl sort of friendship.” “Besides, I am the only one who knows about that girl’s little eating issues.”
Alex turned away from the mirror where she had been applying enough black eyeliner to make even Alice Cooper cringe. She flashed a synthetic smile at Anna, but it quickly fell back into a frustrated pout.
“So you’re telling me that you set me up with some perfect guy who’s going to what is essentially an Ivy League level school in the fall a few days after I was released from a mental hospital? Anna, I don’t think he’s going to be smitten with someone whose interests are getting fucked up, resisting anything that isn’t masochistic, and listening to music that would make your grandmother cry. He’s probably into girls that wear kaki and headbands and play field hockey and go to sock hops.”
“Sock hops?”
“I don’t know, Anna, whatever it is that good, intelligent people who attend private schools do! Sock hops, clam bakes, croquet…practicing fiscal responsibility; I don’t know. But I do know that whatever it is that he does, I don’t know shit about, and he is going to think that I am a basket case at the very least. How did you even get him to go to a punk rock concert anyway?”
“Apparently his father has sold insurance to a couple of the members of the Misfits. He’s the one who got us these tickets in the first place. That whole family is tied in with a bunch of famous people.”
“Of course they are”, sighed Alex as she purposefully smudged her eyeliner because “a Misfits concert just isn’t a Misfits concert unless everyone there looks they’ve been on a ten week bender and a lot of drugs that can’t be smoked”.
“That’s lovely, Alexis” said Anna, not thrilled that her friend, fresh out of rehab, didn’t seem much different from before she had gone to rehab. “Listen, if you don’t wanna go, I can always have Eric tell Prince Charming that you weren’t feeling well. And then you and Amy Winehouse and Kieth Riachards can all hang out here and snort your parent’s ashes. Besides, you probably are still a little too…fragile” she said with a demeaning tone, “to be going out and meeting new people.”
“First of all, fuck you; my mother was buried. You should know that because if remember correctly we were ten and you wanted to skip her funeral because it just so happened to be on the same day that Lilo and Stitch came out in theatres.” Anna winced at the unfortunate recollection. “And second of all,” continued Alex, “after a year of residing in a place where a Britney Spears CD was considered contraband, there is no way in Hell I am missing that concert.” She looked back to the mirror for a minute and shook her head wildly in order to achieve that perfect “I’ve just had meaningless sex ten times in a row, now let’s go drinking” look. Content with her appearance she turned away from the mirror and reached for her combat boots. “So what’s Casanova’s name anyway?”
“Charles.”
“Jesus Christ, Anna… Charles? What’s his last name, Vanderbilt?”
“No” said Anna with a nervous laugh. “Its Walcott...” she said lowering her voice.
“Oh my God ...you set me up on a blind date with a ‘Charles Walcott’ four days after I was released from a, I mean, just when I’m starting to get my life back to normal?"
"Charles Preston Asher Walcott III actually..."
Alexis rolled her eyes. She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “I’m referring you to St. Francis,” she snapped. She laced up her boots and slipped a black hoodie over her wife-beater. “Now let’s go before his parents decide to lengthen his name and you have to introduce me to Charles Preston Asher Warner Skip III, Esquire.”
As they made their way to the back of The Pit, the local bar slash concert hall, Alex frowned, considered all the possible ways the night could get worse.
“Nope, can’t think of anything” she said just loud enough for Anna to hear, “not one damn thing.”
“What are you talking about?” asked Anna. “Listen, Alexis, don’t be weird in front of Charles and Eric okay? Like, I know I’m your best friend but…they’re not. So just try to act like a human being, kay? And stop looking so glum, you look like an Auschwitz victim.”
“Ugh,” Alex couldn’t decide if that was a shot at her religious background or not. “Whatever you say, Aryan Princess,” she spat at Anna, looking only more unhappy than before.
“Good. Now they’re at the bar getting us drinks because both of the boys have really good fakes. Let’s push our way through quick before the first band goes on, or the guards will give us a hard time when we try to go upstairs.”
“Woah, woah. Upstairs?”
“Yea. We got private balcony seats” said Anna happily. “Very VIP.”
“VIP? Anna, this is a Misfits concert! I want to be down there beating people up and drinking Guinness until I pass out, not sipping a Long Island ice tea and observing the mayhem from above.”
“Well, tough luck, Alexis. If you wanna go back stage and chill with the band afterwards, you have to be a good girl and sit still and watch nicely while the band plays. Come on, Allie, please” she said with a pout. Allie is what Anna had always called Alex ever since they were five when Anna wanted something that Alex wanted no part of. Alex was a sucker for nostalgia.
“Ugh, fine. Let’s go”
As they approached the bar, they saw Eric wave. From a distance, Alex could see the back of who she presumed to be Charles, buying drinks; and she already didn’t like the look of him. She could see that his hair was perfectly gelled and that he wore a crisp, white, collared shirt paired with a pair of designer, pre-ripped jeans. “Gross” thought Alex.
“Hey there, cutie” said Anna as she gave Eric a kiss.
“Hey Eric” Alex muttered.
“Hey, Alexis. This is Charles” he said pointing to the perfectly groomed back before her. The back disappeared as the boy turned around and handed her a Guinness. Alex froze.
“Well, hey there…Alexis, right?” he said with a sly smile.
“Well, that’s it,” Alex thought as she stared at a face she had seen many, many times before. “Time for me to back to St. Francis, because I must be losing my mind.” There, before her, stood someone she had laughed with, cried with, and lived day to day with for over a year. Perfect Charles Preston Asher Walcott III, was just as crazy as Alex was, “and we both have the same hospital bracelet to prove it,” she thought twisting hers around her wrist.
Charles stood still smiling that knowing smile, arm out-stretched, holding the Guinness.
“Allie, what’s the matter with you? Say hello and take the beer”
“Ch-Chuck?”, Alex finally managed to stutter.
“Uh…no, it’s Charles, actually” he said, all the while still smiling.
“Um, Allie, you okay?” asked Anna.
“Yea. No. I just, I think there’s something wrong with my contacts because I don’t think I should be seeing what I’m seeing, so I’m going to go fix them and then I won’t see it anymore. Bye.” And she dove into the crowd, careening towards the exit like a train off of its tracks.
“Wait!” came Charles’ familiar voice from behind her. “Alexis, hold on!” The sound of his voice grew closer. “Alex!” Charles grabbed Alex’s arm. “Jesus, you’d think I was here to bring you back to Francis”
Alex whipped around. “Away at a private school, huh?” she asked coyly.
“Well…that’s half true. I was away at private school last year. But after that…well, you know the story. Better than anyone else, in fact”, he said tugging on the bit of the hospital bracelet that stuck out from under Alex’s sweatshirt.
“Why are you still walking around with that scarlet letter around your wrist, Alex? We don’t need to be those people anymore. We’re out, it’s done.”
“It’s not a scarlet letter,” she said furrowing her eyebrow. “It’s more like a badge of honor. Like, I went through something most people will never have to and I made it out alive. I don’t really get why you don’t feel the same way.”
“Because, Alex, if I had a reminder everyday that I’m messed up, and that I’m different from everyone else I’d start to believe it, and I would never have a chance at being happy. I’d just end up right back at St. Francis…and so will you if you keep wearing that bracelet.”
Alex looked more displeased than ever. Then in a sort of a frenzy, she lifted her wrist to her mouth and began to chew away at the little piece of plastic. When at last, she had chewed all the way through, she spat the bracelet out of her mouth and watched it fall to the beer soaked floor.
She extended her hand. “Nice to meet you Charles”
He took her hand in his and shook it firmly. “Likewise… Alexis”
They let their hands drop, and Alex finally took the now-warm Guinness from Charles’s other hand and took a sip.
He smiled at her.
She smiled back.
