I shook the can of air freshener and sprayed it generously in a circle all around my little apartment. I didn't stop until the fumes were choking me, and the room was momentarily covered in a cloud of blossomy freshness.
I stuffed the black bag of dirty laundry into a corner, tied it tightly. I laid new sheets. Not because I planned on sharing my mattress with her, beyond just sitting on it. Then I worried that the change of sheets would send the wrong message. Not having furniture was such a drag sometimes.
The intercom went off at fifteen minutes past the hour we'd agreed, but I was used to that by now: her not turning up on time, keeping me waiting just to make some kind of statement about how cool she was.
I buzzed her up then made a mad dash for the chips in the cupboard, and the dip in the refrigerator. I emptied the former hastily and messily into a bowl. We were going to order Indian or something, so these were just an easy snack.
"Hey," she said when I opened the door. She kissed me on the cheek, smelling of leather and pine. I kinda loved that leathery smell now. It had also become my new scent, thanks to the jacket she'd helped me pick out. "I brought beer." She held up the brown bag, that looked and sounded like she'd come here with half a liquor store. How much did she plan on drinking tonight? Didn't she think she would have to ride home afterward?
She shrugged off her jacket and dropped it to the floor beside her helmet.
"So, I borrowed an old TV/DVD player from my neighbor for tonight's entertainment." I pointed to the sad little machine that had seen better days, all of which were about a million years ago.
She snorted. "Do people still watch DVDs? I thought we were just going to browse Netflix for something."
"My laptop's been playing up. I think there's something wrong with the registry. So we'll have to go full caveman and use this primitive machinery," I said with a smile.
"Cool. Whatever. What DVDs do you have?"
I picked up the three that my neighbor had loaned me. "There's a choice of three. Dirty Harry. Million Dollar Baby...and Gran Torino."
"Do you maybe have anything that doesn't star Clint Eastwood?"
Yikes, I hadn't even noticed. The neighbor must have had a woman boner for Mr. Eastwood.
"This is all I've got, sorry."
We settled on Gran Torino as our first pick, and got comfortable on the mattress. Not once did my insecurity about my apartment come into play with her. Not just because, on first sight, she'd called it "a neat little cubbyhole", which I took as a compliment, but she seemed so unfazed by the area, or the people in it. I didn't know much about her family situation – well, besides the whole Kumbaya-we're-all-related-let's-sleep-together weirdness. But it seemed like she was grounded in the real world. Down to Earth. Not a doctor, nor a member of the English aristocracy who had money pouring out of her ears. In other words, she was nothing like Jean.
As we lay on our stomachs, staring at the small screen and listening to the foul language, my mind wandered to thoughts of Jean. As it often did when I was with Dallas. Just this innocent evening in front of the box would have been met with disapproval. And she probably never would have allowed me to explain myself, to tell her why these rendezvouses were so important to me. She would just see a werewolf, the werewolf, and lose her shit. That was why I could never tell her.
Dallas sat up suddenly. "You know what this party needs?" We were about halfway through the movie. She crawled over to her jacket, fumbled around in the pockets, then crawled back, looking like the cat that caught the cream.
"What's that?" I asked, eying the little plastic bag in her hand suspiciously.
She removed a fat joint, put it in her mouth, lit it with a colorful lighter, then took a long drag. Even if I'd been naive enough to think it was just a normal cigarette, there was no hiding that smell. It had always been foul to me. Tonight was no different.
"Why did you bring that here?" I asked, fanning smoke out of my face. "I don't smoke that stuff. I've tried it once, and I said I'd never do it again."
"You need to let loose a bit more, Liz. Let your hair down, you know."
My hair was already down...
I shook my head when she offered me some. "That stuff doesn't agree with me. I get super paranoid, thinking I'm being watched."
"Not with this strain. It's not like some of that street crap that's been diluted. This is home-grown, the purest kind. Here, try some." She pushed it in my face again, eyes wide and keen for me to break the law, and worst of all, to do so in my own home.
I don't know what compelled me to take it from her, nor what I was thinking when I stuck it in my mouth and inhaled some of the rancid fumes. But it made me feel adventurous, intrepid. Not the pot itself, just the act of smoking it. Then before I knew it, one drag became two, then three, then four. Until, laughing, she snatched it from me.
"Whoa, leave some for me, all right."
It didn't take long for the drug's effects to kick in, and I felt like I was floating. Levitating. My body felt as light as the air. And as we continued passing the joint between us, watching Clint Eastwood kick ass had never been funnier. Soon I was laughing at everything: the bloodshed; the accents of some of the characters; Dallas's own laughter. I even laughed when Dallas kissed me and tried to lay me down and pull my T-shirt off. An attempt which failed miserably, because even as high as a kite, I knew I didn't want her like that.
None of it would have been funny without the weed. I began to wonder if I would ever stop laughing. My stomach hurt, my mouth ached, my throat became sore. This was definitely a different strain to Petr's stuff, but in its own way it was worse.
"Water," I said after a while, stumbled to my feet, and staggered to the kitchen sink. "I need water." I twisted the faucet on and let it run, before dipping my head in the sink and opening my mouth around the nozzle. It was like I was watching myself do these crazy things, and couldn't stop myself.
"You'll finish all the water if you do that," Dallas snickered in the background.
Perhaps if I'd managed an eighth drag I would have been oblivious to the fact that she was talking nonsense. But I continued drinking from the tap, like a dog, until I couldn't take any more, then faltered back to the mattress and collapsed on it. It didn't take long for that feeling of weighing nothing to return.
I just lay there, ignoring the world around me, ignoring Dallas, who'd let the joint burn out and hadn't bothered to relight it. Then she lay beside me, and we stared up at the ceiling, saying and doing nothing, every now and then giggling about something unsaid.
We fell asleep like that.
Dallas shook me awake.
"Huh?" I blinked her into view. She'd already put on her jacket and boots. "W–what's going on?"
"I'm heading out."
"What time is it?"
She checked her phone. "A little after eleven."
"In the morning?"
She laughed. "No, silly. We weren't sleeping that long."
I still felt stoned. Not overcome with the urge to laugh, but still light-headed; still not myself.
"All right, let me walk you out."
"You don't have to."
I was already getting up, reaching for my sneakers. "I'm starving. Aren't you? We didn't even get to order dinner."
"I'll grab something on the way home." I heard her chuckle, and realized she was watching me attempt to tie my laces. My coordination was way off. "You should stay, Liz, seriously. I'm not going to get lost on the way down."
"It's probably for the best," I admitted. "But how are you so sober?"
"Because I'm not a beginner. We didn't even manage half of the joint. I'll save it for next time, huh?"
I shook my head, which felt as though it would fly off my neck! "No way. I'm out, for good. That stuff is lethal. Never, ever again." I didn't care what strain it was or wasn't, or where it was grown, my pot-smoking days were over.
"What a shame. You're so funny when you're high."
I opened the door for her. And then we both froze. That was the point when that breezy, trance-like feeling of floating on a cloud ended, and I came crashing back to Earth. Because seeing my girlfriend standing right in front of me while I said goodbye to the woman I'd been seeing behind her back, was enough to ground anyone.
"Fuck," I mumbled to myself.
It happened just as it had at the restaurant, only this time I was right up close to see the frightening transformation with terrifying clarity. She'd once looked so serene, so regal in her baby-blue cashmere sweater and black pants, ebony hair falling past her pert breasts. But now it was like looking into a pit of flames, as Jean's pupils blackened, and around them the whites filled with blood. Her fangs sprung out, sharp and pointy, and thirsting for blood. This time, I feared it would be for my own.
But something else was happening beside me, something I hadn't noticed the first time round, because I'd been too focused on Jean. There was a growling sound coming from Dallas. And when I turned to look at her, into her eyes, I saw that the color had changed completely. Once a striking blue-gray, now they'd took on the hue of wolf eyes – a yellowy-gold. Her lip had curled up slightly at one corner.
"If you value your worthless life at all, you'll leave this place and never come back," Jean boomed. I felt the darkness in her voice through my body. It was hard to believe it came from her, from the woman I loved.
"You're the only one who wants that, vampire bitch. Liz wants me to stick around."
"Lissa! Her name's Lissa," Jean snarled, baring her fangs. "And there's only one reason why you're still alive now. I don't want to rip you to shreds in front of her. But I will, if you make me."
"No one's ripping anyone to shreds," I said. It could have been the pot in my system making me courageous, or perhaps I was sick of these women fighting over me, making threats. However, just because I managed to find a voice, didn't mean I wasn't crapping my pants.
"You don't scare us, you know. You can only walk during the night. You can't sleep with one eye open. Who knows what could happen during the day?"
I didn't like the sound of that. With all the platting attacks going on in the city, Jean already had enough to worry about.
She stepped closer, so that only a few inches separated the two of them. "Is that a threat, dog?"
"No, just some friendly advice for you to watch your back."
"Stop it! Please, just stop. Both of you. Dallas, you should go."
"You sure you don't want me to stay? These bloodsuckers are dangerous, Liz." She put stress on my name, and never took her eyes off Jean.
"Yes, I'll be fine. Please, just...go."
Jean didn't immediately step out of the way, and Dallas didn't immediately move. Whatever natural instincts had been activated upon seeing each other had obviously made it difficult for them to stand down. But she did step aside, and Dallas did eventually walk out.
"I'll see you soon, Liz. And maybe you, too." She winked at Jean with a wicked smirk, then disappeared down the stairs, whistling as she went.
"Before you say anything," I started, when Jean had slammed the door shut behind us, "this isn't what it looks like." She hadn't turned around to face me, was still facing the door. I heard her heavy breathing, saw her shoulders rising and falling.
"How could you?" was all she said, in a low, pained voice.
"I didn't, if that's what you're implying–"
She cut me off. "I kept saying to myself, "No, Lissa wouldn't do this. Not my Lissa. Not the person I fell in love with. And not with a wolf."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a second, I haven't done anything–"
"But then I remembered how eager you were to sleep with me when you were still with Hilarie. Foolishly, I thought we were different."
"We are different," I said, desperately. "You, you're different. I never loved Hilarie. You know that. And I would never...not with Dallas, not with anyone. Okay, we kissed. More than once. But that's it. I swear."
Now she turned to look at me. She wasn't crying, she wasn't even angry. She just looked...tired. I would have given anything to see something other than that.
"You know, I don't care that you kissed her. I don't even care that you've been smoking pot with her in your home. It's the lying that I can't take. The secrets. And seeing as we're confessing now, I should tell you that I saw your painting. A couple of weeks ago. And I've known about this, whatever it is, for awhile. You think I couldn't smell the wolf on you?"
I furrowed my eyebrows, feeling even more light-headed than before. Quite dizzy, in fact, as the truth came to light. She'd known I was lying to her the whole time. Every time I stopped by her place, after seeing Dallas, and said I was with friends from work. Every lie I'd told about my painting. I hadn't even noticed that she didn't believe me.
"W–why didn't you say anything?"
"Because I wanted to give you the chance to come clean. And I really thought you would. I really thought I knew you, Lissa. Or should I call you Liz? That name seems to fit this new persona."
She sighed long and deep.
"Jean, I'm sorry I lied." The words sounded so hollow, so inadequate. If they did to me, surely they must have to her. "I'm sorry for all of this."
"You know, I wasn't all for it when you wanted to move out. But I came around. I understood your need for growth, your need to mature. But you didn't grow up, Lissa, you just changed. You're unrecognizable. The sneaking around, the lying, kissing other women...that isn't maturity, that's just behavior I, quite frankly, don't want around me."
"What are you saying?" I tried to swallow but found my mouth and throat were too dry. My heart thumped against my chest, the room began to spin. I didn't know if it was the effects of the pot that caused it, or my apprehension about what was coming next.
"I'm saying that I'm done. You wanted a life that was separate from mine, away from me. Well, now you've got it. I can't do this anymore. I love you, and that isn't going to change, but it's clear that we can't be together."
"That's–that's not what I meant when I said I wanted distance," I said in a shrill, pleading voice. "I meant I needed to live my own life, not that I didn't want you to be a part of it."
"I'll always be a part of your life, and you're still welcome to use your studio whenever you like. I won't stop you."
"Fuck the studio!" I shouted. Could she even hear what she was saying? What she was doing? Why did her words sound so final? "Jean, don't do this. I'm sorry, all right. I shouldn't have lied. I shouldn't have kissed her. It didn't mean anything. I love you, not her."
She was already walking out the door. "Goodbye, Lissa."
This couldn't be happening. Not to us. We were endgame, weren't we? She was always supposed to be there, no matter who came along. We were supposed to weather any storm, and all that other crap that the songs and movies taught us.
There was never supposed to be a goodbye.
She closed the door before I could run after her. And I didn't open it again because I didn't have anything new to say that she hadn't already heard. And also because, even as the tears started trickling down my face, and my nose started running, I wondered if she was right.
Maybe we couldn't be together. Maybe this had always been our destiny. That we never should have overcome the first hurdle all those months ago. We'd never really been "right", and our whole relationship, from the beginning, had been based on a lie, a painful secret. Now lies had plagued our second chance.
Maybe she was right.
It still hurt like hell, though. Where was that pot when I needed it?