Ilie down on the bed next to him, thinking that there is nothing wrong with having a conversation while prone. There's no other furniture in the apartment, after all. No chairs to sit on civilly. And he is tired. As I get near him, he stinks of whiskey, definitely hard stuff. He told me he's been up for three nights straight partying. His publicist told me that he'd given up on drinking, that all he does now is work out. His arms and chest are muscled and rippled like a person who lifts weights but his face is lined and puffy like a person who doesn't do anything good to his body.
I am facing him. I try to make conversation. I hear you got thrown out of prep school.
Yeah. Lawrenceville. I got pretty well educated before I got expelled.
I ask what he did wrong but he doesn't answer. Did you ever finish school? I ask.
Yeah. In Florida.
Is that where your family lives?
Yeah.
Still?
Yeah.
He rolls me to my side so that I'm not facing him, and pulls me close so that we are layered in fetal position, curled up like two plastic spoons that got bent out of shape by the heat. Maybe he wants to cuddle up when we talk. I'm sorry, he says, pulling me tighter, but this is all I can do right now, I'm so tired.
I am surprised by how nice it feels to be in his arms. I examine his bicep, and look at the tattoo from Hawaii. A girl in a bikini and hula skirt says, Wish you were here. There is another one, the Hell's Angels logo: Ride Hard, Die Free. He has tattoos across his knuckles, up his arms, on his chest and back. All I have is a tiny tattoo on my shoulder blade. It says FTW, which stands for Fuck the World.
The first time I met Alex was at the recording studio. He was being interviewed by a reporter from some metal magazine in the lounge while the producer was mixing tracks and adding some twelve-string guitar lines in the other room. She was asking Alex about his tattoos when I first walked in.
Some people think of it as an art form, but I just like them all over my body, he tells her.
I interrupt them, ask him if it hurt. I bled a little, he says.
I tell him about my tattoo, which a boy I had an affair with at college gave me, using a sewing needle and thread and some indelible black ink that has faded to a greenish-bIuish gray by now. It said FTW on the boy's hip, which was pretty much the only thing I liked about him, the only reason I was so eager to pull his pants off night after night so I could look at that mark and feel like he was a skate punk instead of a Harvard student like me. The night he did it I drank a whole bottle of white zinfandel and half a bottle of Wild Turkey so that I wouldn't have to feel the needle prick at my skin.
I say, It didn't hurt at all.
He asks to see it. He is sitting on a couch next to the woman who is interviewing him. I know she really isn't interested in seeing my tattoo. His publicist stands across the room, offering us some fruit: oranges and bananas in a basket. I can tell she is curious about the tattoo. I open a few buttons of the green cropped sweater and pull it over my shoulder. I am glad that I have a nice black bra on. I pull the strap over my arm too.
Alex looks at it.
I tell him I want it fixed since the guy did sort of a sloppy job.
He says, If you give me your phone number, I can call you and tell you the name of a good tattoo artist.
sorry, he says, pulling me tighter, but this is all I can do right now, I'm so tired.
