“Anyway, point is, as soon as I got out of high school, I joined the Marines. It was maybe the first time in my life I felt like my parents were proud of me, you know? But that was around the time I started realizing some things about myself. I dunno, maybe a part of me knew all along, but it wasn’t until I was out of the house and at basic training that I started piecing the truth together. When I told the base doctor I was trans and asked to get put on testosterone, I knew what would happen. This was back before Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell got repealed. I knew what was gonna happen, but I did it anyway. And I got kicked out.”
I scan the room, just as I always do after telling this part of the story. It’s easy to tell who is shocked by the confession, who is okay with it, and whose smile is just a forced attempt to be polite.
“That was pretty much it for my relationship with family. My dad…he was always tough on us. Well, I say tough, which is what he woulda called it, but I mean he got violent. After a bad fight, he told me I was no child of his. He kicked me out and wouldn’t even let me pack. I spent a couple weeks bumming around Morehead City, sleeping under the bridge at Atlantic Beach, trying to make a little cash selling seashells to tourists. But I ended up spiraling. Got hooked on dope, and then…y’all know how it goes. I was miserable, but at least I was numb.”
So much of those years exists only as a haze in my memories. All I’ve got is a collection of disjointed events strung together like beads on wire: the first time I saw someone OD, the sickening jolt back to consciousness after the paramedics shoot you up with naloxone, vomit in my mouth and in my hair, the time I spotted my family on the beach laughing and drinking beers and so fucking happy to have me out of their lives.
“I OD’d more times than I can count. It was only after the third arrest that I got my shit together and actually did the work. I was able to get a spot at a free rehab up here in New York. Even then it took four admissions before I actually stayed clean for good. That’s the main thing I wish someone would’ve told me when I was early in recovery: Sometimes you slip up. In fact, you probably will. But you don’t have to give up. You can choose to keep fighting and start over every single day.”
My gaze flits over to some of the newer faces, ones I don’t recognize. They’re watching me, fixated on me. I can only hope some of this is actually sinking in. Recovery isn’t magic. You can’t show up to a few meetings and get better. You have to want it. That took me way too long to internalize.
But maybe they’ll be smarter than I was.
“I’ve been doing good for a while,” I say after a moment, rubbing my doughnut crumbs between my fingers, watching the powdered sugar dust the napkin like a thin coating of snow. “Ten years, like I said. But I recently…I met this girl. She’s in recovery too. I like her a lot. We hooked up, and I kind of hoped it might turn into something, you know, if I was lucky. Well…turns out we have more in common than just being ex-junkies. She’s a student in one of the classes I’m teaching this semester. So basically I’m fucked. We had this crazy connection, but is it worth risking my career? My sobriety?” I shrug. “That’s all I wanted to say, I suppose. I’ll yield to the next person.”
There’s a moment of silence after I’m done speaking. I suck the powdered sugar off the end of my thumb and stare down at the table, already regretting bringing up the Ely thing. It’s not relevant to my recovery, not really. Or maybe it is. Maybe that’s what my subconscious is trying to tell me—to tread carefully.
“Don’t do it, man,” says one of the newer guys. I lift my head; it’s one of the court-ordered attendees. “You got ten years. Don’t throw that away. Stay away from her, or you’ll both end up right back where you started.”
“No cross talk,” says Ji, but of course, it’s too late. The words have already settled into my brain and put down roots there.
New guy might not know much about recovery yet, but that doesn’t make him wrong.
I do need to stay away from Ely Cohen.
For both our sakes.
9
ELY
I’m not a patient person. I have friends who are—Shannon is like some kind of superhuman when it comes to waiting. She had a kid last spring and went two weeks past her due date and basically didn’t bat an eye. Meanwhile, I struggle to put up with a slightly long Starbucks line. Waiting for my meeting with Wyatt is the worst kind of waiting, because I’m way more invested in this than I am in my iced Americano.
By Monday night, I’m exhausted and annoyed with myself for procrastinating on my very serious deadlines by spending gross amounts of time scrolling through Reddit. I could ask Ophelia if she wants to hang out, but it’s crunch time for her on some project, and Diego has flown out to Minnesota to visit family and doesn’t get back until next Monday.
I want to text Wyatt and ask if he wants to hang out. But that’s just asking for Wyatt to shoot me down, and I’m not sure my fragile ego could handle that.
As soon as my last class lets out on Tuesday, I head to the bathroom and spend two minutes trying to wrangle my hair into something resembling order. A useless effort because it hasn’t seen a brush in days.
Well, hey. At least this is nothing new. Wyatt saw me in my unfiltered morning state already, all drooly and covered in the previous night’s mascara. If anything, this is an improvement.
Plus, I’m not actively trying to get in his pants anymore. Obviously. Going after a guy who’s made it very clear he doesn’t want me going after him would be deeply uncool. This is just about the art.
I wrote the room number in my phone’s Notes app after Wyatt texted it to me last week, but apparently I have no problem remembering that detail on my own: 36C.
He’s already there when I arrive, leaning against a table and examining a set of photos scattered out across its surface. It takes a beat for me to recognize them as prints from my application portfolio.
Wyatt glances up when I close the door behind me. “Hey,” he says. “Leave that open, if you don’t mind.”
Right. I mumble an apology and open the door again, trying to fight the flush rising in my cheeks. Great—now he thinks I’m trying to come on to him again.
I clasp my sweaty hands behind my back and approach the table. He gestures for me to come around to stand at his side, and I comply, gazing down at the photos in front of me.
“What do you think of them?” Wyatt says.
I don’t know how to respond. I’ve spent hours—weeks, probably—staring at these images, between choosing them, cropping them, editing them, studying them for flaws long after I’d hit Send on my application to Parker. Looking at them now, trying to see them through Wyatt Cole’s eyes, is about as bad as you’d expect. All I can see are the mistakes.