THIS IS YOUR NEW BEGINNING
PLEASE CHECK ALL NEGATIVITY AND SELF-DOUBT HERE, AS YOU WILL HAVE NO NEED FOR THEM INSIDE. FROM THIS POINT ON, YOU WILL LIVE YOUR LIFE.
“What a shame they didn’t remind me to breathe my air,” says Beck, opening the door with a half smile. But it’s not his signature half smile, all cute and coy. This one is different, lackluster. Supremely lacking in luster. “Mim,” he starts. And suddenly, my arms are around him, because I don’t want him to finish that sentence.
They aren’t coming inside, because this isn’t for them.
This is my wooden box.
It’s a deep, powerful hug, and Walt turns around, because even he understands there’s nothing romantic or funny about it. My mouth, just inches from Beck’s ear, whispers the familiar line on its own.
Beck kisses me on the cheek, and responds beautifully, simply, “Yes, Mim. You are.”
And I think of all the times I thought I wasn’t okay, and all the times maybe I could have been, if only I’d had a Beck Van Buren around to tell me otherwise.
He steps back now, throws an arm around Walt. “We’ll be starting a New Beginning when you get back. Right, Walt?”
“Hey, hey, I’m Walt.”
“Damn straight,” says Beck, winking at me.
An image: my two best friends with their arms around each other, so different and so alike, colorful and puzzling and alive, clicked into place like Walt’s cube. I tighten my backpack, wondering if I’ll ever again have friends like these.
“Damn straight.”
39
Sunrise Mountain
SUNRISE MOUNTAIN REHAB slaps me in the face with its unapologetic frontier motif. Standing between a butter churn and a rodeo saddle, I’m thinking it should apologize—to me, yes, but not exclusively. This place owes an apology to all those who have had the misfortune of setting foot inside its hellish doors.
On a throw rug a bald eagle soars atop snow-capped mountains; it is majestic, patriotic, and above all, obnoxious. Beyond the mountains, a purple sun sets on my electro-fuchsia shoes. A large bust of Daniel Boone stands tall in the corner, leading an army of oil paintings like a brigadier general: a wild lynx, an impossibly gorgeous horizon, a diagram of birds in their natural habitats—each painting in impeccable formation, awaits the trumpeting charge of their courageous General Boone (sic).
It is this: ridiculousness magnified.
Locating the nearest ladies’ room, I run inside and slam the door behind me. But there’s no escaping the resiliency of the eagles. They’ve soared their way in here as well, at least a hundred of them, flapping their wings for freedom, hovering, circling, diving, intent on breaking out of their embroidered wallpaper prison. An Aztec tapestry hangs on the wall above the toilet, adding a certain I-don’t-know-what . . . turquoiseness to the mix. A miniature cactus sits in a pot on the sink, crooked and lonely.
I drop to my knees, lean over the toilet, yank back the seat, and heave.
She’s here. In this awful, kitschy, eagle-soaring hellhole.
It pours out of me . . .
Lonely.
All the semi-digested contents of my stomach . . .
Lost.
God, it stinks in here.
She’s here.
Sometimes, when it gets bad like this, I imagine my heart, my stomach, my liver, kidneys, and spleen, all the innards of Mary Iris Malone, pouring out of me like a hose, leaving behind a sagging skin–shell, a deflated air mattress, a soft mannequin. I’d be Born-Again Mim. A fresh start. One hell of a New Beginning.
I collapse on the bath mat (an altogether hideous depiction of cowboys and Indians, complete with stampeding buffalo and six-shooters) and try to catch my breath. A minute later, there’s a knock on the door.
“Mim? You okay?”
I sit up, take a long pull of paper towels and wipe my mouth. “Be right out!”
Above the toilet, a sign reads:
USE TRASH CAN FOR PAPER TOWELS AND FEMININE PRODUCTS
DO NOT FLUSH
And like dominoes, the memories tumble; a yellow-tinted bathroom knocks over the most Carlish Carl, knocks over Arlene, knocks over old wisdom, knocks over youthful innocence, knocks over, knocks over, knocks over . . .
Looking at the handle on the toilet, I smile. Young Mim of Not So Long Ago, upon discovering the well of friendship to be completely tapped, found new friends, an ensemble cast of saviors.
Mom is here, in this stinking place. But this time, there are no Carls or Arlenes or Pale Whales or Karate Kids or Fabulous Walts or Consummate Beck Van Burens to save the day. There is only Our Heroine, and once again, she is on her own.
At the sink, I splash water on my face and rinse my mouth. There is no mirror, so I stare at the droopy cactus.
Lonely.
Crooked.
A trash can sits in the corner, boasting perfect trajectory. With precision, with skill, with lionhearted determination, I swipe the potted cactus across the room and into the trash can—hole in one. I wipe my hands on my jeans, exiting the Southwestern ladies’ room forever and ever, and good riddance.
Down the hall, Kathy is talking to a guy at the reception desk. He’s tall, attractive, a few years older than me. As I approach, my stepmom straightens up. “You okay?”
I nod, then smile at the receptionist, who, upon closer inspection, really isn’t good-looking at all. Like a connoisseur of fine wines lost in a hack’s vineyard, I have been spoiled rotten by the beauty of Beck Van Buren.
“You must be Mim,” he says through crooked teeth. “And how are you today?”