and lines it up with this thing called time. I am the ticking, I am
the pulsing, I am underneath every part of this moment.
2) I'm the girl who knows he's capable of poetry, because like I said,
there are things I just know. I'm the one who could give him that old-
fashioned song title of a thing called Devotion and True Love (However
Complicated), if he ever gave a girl like me a second glance… maybe I
would have walked along Battery Park with him at sunrise, holding his
hand, knowing I would become the one who would believe in him.
3) My heart understands the direction we're going in, because it
starts pounding like it's got something really damn important to say,
and by the time I'm out of my head enough to really use my eyes,
there's someone in out way, and that someone is the girl who took the
key to my heart and swallowed it with a smile.
4) It's my turn to lead now, and I can barely do that. It's not that
I'm drunk or stoned or spiralling high. It's just that I'm defeated.
And that's impairing all of my senses.
5) There's only one hopeful chord in this cacophony, and it's this
girl I'm following.
6) but the truth is I don't feel like I can carry anyone but myself
right now. The streets are empty. I am empty. Or, no - I am full of
pain. It's my life that's empty.
7) "Tal," she says with an edge usually reserved for cutlery, "you
haven't missed me for one fucking minute. You have never for one
single second in your entire pathetic life missed me. You might have
missed fucking with my head, and you might have missed the
satisfaction you so clearly got from demolishing me, but those are
your emotions you're missing, not mine. I'm afraid I can't help you."
8) How did such a reputably smart girl get herself in this
predicament, on the brink of adulthood, with no future to grab on to?
9) Somehow my head presses Nick's T-shirt and in this moment I am
forgetting about time and Tal because maybe my life isn't over. Maybe
it's only beginning.
10) Happiness serves hardly any other purpose than to make unhappiness
possible. - Proust
11) God, he made great playlists for her. Tal's mixes for me were all
Dylan and Yma Sumac crap. Nick could mix Cesaria Evora to Wilco to Ani
followed by Rancid, capped off with Patsy Cline blending into a Fugazi
finale. Although at some point, if our whatever-it-is-happening-this-
night progresses, I'll have to reeducate Nick on the poor use of Patti
Smith and Velvet Underground tracks on lovesick playlists. Fucking
hate them. Patti Smith was a poser suck-up, and Lou Reed was just a
plain dick.
12) Time to go back out there and make this right. I am brand-new. I
can change. Only not for Tal. For me.
13) I am doing everything right. And it is getting the exact right
reaction. This is like a miracle to me.
14) This should divert me, but my mind keeps returning to a simple,
scary fact:
I am liking Norah.
15) "There's no such thing as ready," she says. "There's only willing."
16) I owe you a kind of explanation. I know you probably think I'm a
horrid bitch from the planet Schizophrenia, but I'm honestly not
trying to mess with your head. I'm just messing with my own head and I
seem to have dragged you along for the ride. I think you're nice to me
and that scares the fuck out of me. Because when a guy's a jerk or an
asshole, it's easier because you know exactly where you stand. Since
trust isn't an option, you don't have to get all freaked out about
maybe having to trust him. Right now I am thinking about ten things at
the same time, and at least four of those things have to do with you.
If you want to leave right now and drive home and forget my name and
forget what I look like, I wouldn't blame you in the least. But what
I'm trying to say is that if you did that I would be sorry. And not
just sorry in an I-apologize-I'm-so-sorry way, but sorry in a sad-that-
something-that-could've-happened-didn't way. That's it. You can go now.
17) I am here and I am now and there's nowhere I'd rather be
18) We're sparking, and part of me just wants to sit back and watch.
19) I am falling into it, the black of it, the pit of it. It screams
that time is an angry machine. Music is an angry machine. We are all
angry machines.
20) I flinch and Norah sees it and I have no way of saying it's not
her, it's not now, it's the ten thousand thens that she has nothing to
do with. I lean in and kiss her again, the same way you do when you
run to your room and blast the music when your parents start shouting.
I know it wormy work and it doesn't work because some things you don't
need to hear in order to hear. The mind has an ear of its own and
sometimes memory is the fiercest fucking DJ alive.
21) Somehow we stay together. We are graced, and we are together, and
the twoliness us trumping the loneliness and the doubt and the fear.
We are making it through. Thank you, music. Damn you, memories. Thank
you, present.
22) I hate the regret, pumping though every artery of my body, craving
a cheeseburger right now. I hate time and I hate this night and if I
truly believed in God outside of that momentary lapse of faith, I'd
hate Her too.
23) It's like that mythic God take human beings at creation and
divides us into subsets: Group A gets the hot looks, sex appeal, and
lots of action with natural ease (Caroline); Group B is the makeover
prospects who will figure it all out and eventually get their action
(Tris); and Group C is the rest of the poor schmucks (me) for whom God
has decided, You're on your own. Don't expect much.
24) I kind of hate Nick right now, too, but there's someone else
higher on my list, someone I hate more than Saddam Hussein and any
asshole named Bush combined, hate more than that fuckhead who canceled
My So-Called Life and left me with a too-small boxed DVD set that does
not answer the questions of whether Angelo and Jordan Catalano ever
did it or if Patty and Graham got a divorce, or if there really was
something to all that lesbian subtext between Rayanne and Sharon. I
need to fucking find that person I hate most, so I can hopefully at
least kill that other hate, the one called regret.
25) Nick is - was - this thing, this person, I discovered out of
nowhere and then discovered I wanted - and once I tasted it, I yearned
for it - but I know I must accept defeat because this whole night was
an accident, clearly. My heart literally aches, that shit is not made
up; it hurts for an unexpected, brief time warp of suddenly wanting
and longing and believing, but not having. Who am I kidding? The best
parts of Nick were ones he doesn't even know I know he has -the
lyrics, the playlists, the loyalty - and all of them, dedicated to Tris.
26) That's okay. He'll make some girl, the right girl, a great
boyfriend one day. He'll be the love of some lucky girl's life, and
maybe after I've had some sleep after this epic night, I'll be glad
for him and the future he's waiting to grab, once Tris truly sets him
free.
27) I head for the door, but not before imparting some last saintly
wisdom upon Tris. "Be more careful next time, bitch," I tell her.
28) Fuck her.
Fuck her for getting in that cab. Fuck her for fucking with my mind.
Fuck her for not knowing what she wants. Fuck her for dragging me into
it. Fuck her for being such a fantastic kisser. Fuck her for ruining
my favourite band.
Fuck her for barely saying a word to me before she left. Fuck her for
not waving. Fuck her for getting my hopes up. Fuck her for making my
hopes useless. Fuck her for taking off with my fucking jacket.
Fuck me.
Fuck me for always getting into situations like this. Fuck me for
caring. Fuck me for not knowing the words that would've made her stay.
Fuck me for NOT knowing what I want. Fuck me for wavering. Fuck me for
not kissing her back in the right way. Fuck me for getting my hopes
up. Fuck me for not having more realistic hopes. Fuck me for giving
her my fucking jacket.
Fuck.
29) My pride shut me up, my hurt shut me down, and together they
ganged up in my hope and let her get away.
30) Why do we even bother? Why do we make ourselves so open to such
easy damage? Is it all loneliness? Is it all fear? Or is it just to
experience those narcotic moments of belonging with someone else?
31) Fuck this.
Fuck this wondering. Fuck this trying and trying. Fuck this belief
that two people can become one ideal. Fuck this helplessness. Fuck
this waiting for something to happen that probably won't ever happen.
32) She never could take it... Never. Put her on the spit and she'll
refuse to admit that the spot is there.
33) When someone breaks up with you, their beauty - which you took
such satisfaction in - suddenly becomes unfair.
34) Let me give you some free advice. She's a runner for sure - she'll
run away every time without saying a word. But here's the thing - you
are NOT a runner. And deep down, I don't think Norah wants to run,
either. She just feels like she has to. Partly because she's a
tiresome spoiled-brat smartass with no fashion sense. And partly
because she's a fucking human being.
35) I'm through with you for tonight... Find that other fuck-up and
have fucked-up children together. Don't name them after fruits or
months. Be original and just name them like children.
36) Happy endings don't happen. Merle Haggard knows it, and now I know
it.
37) Life fails. Songs don't always.
I'm on the curb. Taking it all in, including the nothing. Where I am,
how I am, who I am, what I'm not.
It starts to come to me.
on Ludlow
the world goes so slow
all the things I don't know
closing in
on Ludlow
the sidewalk shadow
keeps pleading don't go
but you won't hear
Alright, Nick. Louder.
WHO WILL APOLOGIZE FOR HOWWE ARE?
WHO WILL NAVIGATE WHEN WE'VEGONE THIS FAR?
ANSWER ME
ANSWER THIS
ANSWER ALL THE QUESTIONS THAT
I'M TOO AFRAID TO ASK
ON LUDLOW
YOU LET ME KNOW
AND I LET YOU GO
AND WE WERE WRONG WRONGWRONG
ON LUDLOW
THERE'S A SHADOW
THAT LETS THE TRUTH SHOW
AND WE WERE WRONG WRONG
WRONG
NEVER AGAIN
IS WHAT I ALWAYS SAY
NEVER AGAIN
IS WHAT I ALWAYS SAY
NEVER AGAIN
IS WHAT I ALWAYS SAY
Take it back down.
on Ludlow
it's just a stone's throw
from where we could go
to where we are
on Ludlow
find me on Ludlow
on Ludlow
find me here…
38) "Other bands, it's about sex. Or pain. Or some fantasy. But the
Beatles, they knew what they were doing. You know the reason The
Beatles made it so big?"
"What?"
"'I Wanna Hold Your Hand.' First single. Fucking brilliant. Perhaps
the most fucking brilliant song ever written. Because they nailed it.
That's what everyone wants. Not 24-7 hot wet sex. Not a marriage that
lasts a hundred years. Not a Porsche or a blow job or a million-dollar
crib. No. They wanna hold your hand. They have such a feeling that
THEY CAN'T HIDE. Every single successful love song of the past fifty
years can be traced back to 'I Wanna Hold Your Hand.' And every single
successful love story has those unbearable and unbearably exciting
moments of hand-holding. Trust me. I've thought a lot about this."
39) "I mean, where do these words all come from? I sit here on this
sidewalk and they just APPEAR to me."
"Maybe they're always there and you just need to live enough life to
get them to make sense," Dev says.
40) And could you pass on the message that it's not enough to be
sitting alone on a sidewalk writing a song for a girl if you don't
have the guts to at least try talking to her again?
41) He's here. Holy shit. Memo to Merle Haggard: Miracles really do
happen.
42) World domination is exhausting and cliché. People ought to just
focus on being individual responsible citizens of the earth instead of
assholes.
43) I don't see why ogling same-sex kissing should be the exclusive
domain of frat boys whacking off to lesbian action, that's so sexist.
Feminism should be all inclusive - it should be about sexual
liberation, equal pay for equal work, and the fundamental girl right
of boy2boy appreciation.
44) "A true friend's work is never done,'" I singsong.
"'Bulimia is so '87, Heather,'" he answers.
HOLY SHIT squared. I think I just had my first orgasm.
45) Maybe this is my way of creating the illusion of control over
something I have no control over. Like, if it's just a story I'm
telling or a song I'm singing, then I'll be okay because I'm the guy
who's providing the words. Which is not the way life works at all. Or
at least not when it's unfair.
46) Then, to my amazement, she leans in and starts to sing the
refrain. Not in a full voice, so everyone in the restaurant can hear.
But like a stero turned low, or a car radio on a lonely night. She
sings me back to me:
The way you're singing in your sleep
The way you look before you leap
The strange illusions that you keep
You don't know
But I'm noticing
The way your touch turns into arcs
The way you slide into the dak
The beating of my open heart
You don't know
But I'm noticing
And I'm moved, it's so beautiful. Not what I wrote, but to have it
given back like this. To have her remember the words and the tune. To
hear it in her voice.
47) It was about the feeling, you know? She caused it in me, but it
wasn't about her. It was about my reaction, what I wanted to feel and
then convinced myself that I felt, because I wanted it that bad. That
illusion. It was love because I created it as love.
48) "Okay. There's this one part of Judaism I really like.
Conceptually, I mean. It's called tikkun olam."
"Tikkun olam," I repeat.
"Exactly. Basically, it says that the world has been broken into
pieces. All this chaos, all this discord. And our job - everyone's job
- is to try to put the pieces back together. To make things whole
again."
"And you believe that?" I ask. Not as a challenge. As a genuine
question.
She shrugs, then negates the shrug with the thought in her eyes. "I
guess I do. I mean, I don't know how the world broke. And I don't know
if there's a God who can help us fix it. But the fact that the world
is broken - I absolutely believe that. Just look around us. Every
minute - every single second - there are a million things you could be
thinking about. A million things you could be worrying about. Our
world - don't you just feel we're becoming more fragmented? I used to
think that when I got older, the world would make so much more sense.
But you know what? The older I get, the more confusing it is to me.
The more complicated it is. Harder. You'd think we'd be getting better
at it. But there's just more and more chaos. The pieces - they're
everywhere. And nobody knows what to do about it. I find myself
grasping, Nick. You know that feeling? That feeling when you just want
the right thing to fall into the right place, not only because it's
right, but because it would mean that such a thing is still possible?
I want to believe that."
"Do you really think it's getting worse?" I ask. "I mean, aren't we
better off than we were twenty years ago? Or a hundred?"
"We're better off. But I don't know if the world's better off. I don't
know if the two are the same thing."
…Then it hits me.
"Maybe we're the pieces," I say…
"Maybe that's it," I say gently. "With what you were talking about
before. The world being broken. Maybe it isn't that we're supposed to
find the pieces and put them back together. Maybe WE'RE the pieces."
She doesn't reply, but I can tell she's listening carefully. I feel
like I'm understanding something for the first time, even if I'm not
entirely sure what it is yet.
"Maybe," I say, "what we're supposed to do is come together. That's
how we stop the breaking."
Tikkun olam.
49) Wherever Nick's sexuality lies (lays? - whatever: same diff), the
bottom line is: This Nick guy is too good to be true. He writes
amazing songs. He is so fucking cute. He's damn smart. And damn
sensitive. He's given me more adventure and confusion in one night
than I've had in a lifetime. My heart is achin again, scared, because
I want to know EVERYTHING about him now. The more he gives me, the
more I want. I want to know about his plans for the future, about his
family, about his music, his dreams, his sorrows, all that sentimental
bullshit.
50) What's of more concern: If I don't shut down my brain soon, my
imagination will take off so far about what COULD be with this guy,
that nothing will ever be able to just BE.
51) I'm thinking I would like to dance in the rain with this person. I
would like to lie next to him in the dark and watch him breathe and
watch him sleep and wonder what he's dreaming about and not get an
inferiority complex if the dreams aren't about me.
I don't know if Nick and I are going to be friends or lovers or if
he's going to be Will and I'm going to be Grace, which will be
disappointing along with boring, but whatever Nick and I are going to
be to each other, it can't be - it won't be - just a one-night-stand
thing.
I know this.
52) Singing in the rain. I'm singing in the rain. And it's such a
fucking glorious feeling. An unexpected downpour and I am just giving
myself into it. Because what the fuck else can you do? Run for cover?
Shriek or curse? No - when the rain falls you just let it fall and you
grin like a madman and you dance with it, because if you can make
yourself happy in the rain then you're doing pretty alright in life.
53) I say, "Slow." Because this is not a rush. This is real. This is
happening. And this is ours.
54) I want to kiss her without counting the seconds. I want to hold
her so long that I get to know her skin. I want, I want, I want.
55) And we are giddy, because dawn is here, we're at the center of the
world and we're the center of our own universe, and spring is here,
and the air smells wet and clean.
56) When is a night over? Is it the start of sunrise or the end of it?
Is it when you finally go to sleep or simply when you realize that you
have to? When the club closes or when everyone leaves? Normally, I
keep these kinds of questions to myself. But this time, I ask Norah.
"It's over when you decide it's over," she says. "When you call it a
night. The rest is just a matter of where the sun is in the sky. That
has nothing to do with us."
57) Can so much really happen in a night? The song was never really
over, but now I have the ending - I don't know how I'll phrase it, but
it will involve our returning, it will take in the strange pink light
and the Sunday-morning quiet. Because the song is us, and the song is
her, and this time I'm going to use her name. Norah Norah Norah - no
rhymes, really. Just truth.
I shouldn't want the song to end. I always this of each night as a
song. Or each moment as a song. But now I'm seeing we don't live in a
single song. We move from song to song, from lyric to lyric, from
chord to chord. There is no ending here. It's an infinite playlist.
58) But I'll wait for next time. Because I know there will be a next
time. I was looking forward to next time the minute I met her.
Throughout the night, I've been looking forward to next time, and the
time after that, and the time after that. I know this is something.
59) My heartbeat accelerates. I am in the here, in the now. I am also
in the future. I am holding her and wanting and knowing and hoping all
at once. We are the ones who take this thing called music and line it
up with this thing called time. We are the ticking, we are the
pulsing, we are underneath every part of this moment. And by making
the moment our own, we are rendering it timeless. There is no
audience. There are no instruments. There are only bodies and thoughts
and murmurs and looks. It's the concert rush to end all concert
rushes, because this is what matters. When the heart races, this is
what it's racing toward.
60) Some spray-painted graffiti on the wall asks, Is it nothing to you?
all you who pass by? Lamentations 1:12 and I think, No, Lord, whoever
the hell You are, this is not nothing to me. This counts.
miki
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