Megan kept talking. The way she thought she sounded was not the way she really sounded. Amanda stopped listening, because she could feel herself becoming offended in an impassioned way. The way Amanda saw it—kind of her one strong philosophy in life—was that it was impossible to “explore the complications of human feeling,” as Megan was calling it, while you felt miserable. Those explorations were best left for times of reflection, when your judgment was not confused by the horrible lens of self-hatred. She knew this was not an original idea, but it didn’t need to be. The way she understood Megan was that Megan’s preoccupation was with these “baser” things—having stability, having a decent job, having health, having a group of people to support her. Amanda based this understanding on Megan’s monomaniacal preoccupation with “that asshole and her stupid fucking job,” “that asshole and his successful project,” “those assholes and their stupid clique,” “those fuckers and their homemade Tupperwares of kale.” If you see something you’re envious of—really genuinely envious of, not just that you admire—the only escape hatch from that feeling is to insult the object, to tart it up like an idiot, and then parade it around as something ridiculous, but that was a hatch that just led to a deeper and more confusing layer of self-doubt and self-dislike. It was obvious and sad to Amanda, but not sad enough. Megan wasn’t paying her to listen to this. Amanda’s week had been hard, too, and she was just trying to relax with some friends, but since she was the only one who seemed to have any tolerance for Megan, Megan clung to her. And she knew that Megan thought insulting things about her, too, and that was the thing that fired her up.
“People think happiness is some kind of sign of complexity, but it’s not,” said Megan.
“Oh, do they?” said Amanda. “I always thought people mistook brooding as a sign of complexity.”
Megan gave her an I Dare You look.
“You must think I’m an idiot,” said Amanda.
Megan continued the look.
“Let me call your bluff and say this,” said Amanda. “There’s no one on this planet, not even my mother, who I like enough to stand around and soak up this selfish, whiny-baby bullshit from. A week? Okay, everyone has their weeks, but honestly I don’t even remember why we’re friends. This is miserable. I don’t know what I’m doing out here with you. There are people here who I don’t even know who I’d rather talk to than you right now. You seem to think you’re doing me a favor by hanging out with me. I find that laughable. I’d rather hang out with that guy,” she pointed to a white-faced, slump-eyed guy in a beanie, “who looks like he might barf in my face, than hang out with you for another second. I don’t know how much more clear I can be. I was just trying to give you a pep talk and you started shitting all over me. You are unbelievably draining, you self-serving, shallow, talentless waste of time.”
Megan’s I Dare You face had become stuck, but not without absorbing some of the psychotic torture that was going on behind it. It was a damn silly position to be in, trying to hold the bluff when it had already been called.
“I’m going to go inside now,” said Amanda.
The potheads weren’t eavesdropping as covertly as they might have liked. Amanda left.
“I think I’m going to go into the yard,” said Megan, to no one. “Good evening,” she said to the pale-faced guy in the beanie.
Her legs felt crazy and her hands were clammy.
“This is awful,” she said. She said it in a kind of hollow, matter-of-fact way.
It was difficult to walk down the stairs. Her purse of beer was tipping her to the side.
“This is terrible.”
She crawled under the porch and sat by the air conditioner and looked out into the yard. She could hear the people on the porch talking, not about her, just talking about whatever they wanted to. They weren’t really that interested.
Spring nights were so fucking nice.
That elevated feeling she’d had earlier while she was shit talking all of human behavior came back, and as it came back she started laughing a horrified laugh, because that swelling feeling was exactly the same feeling she always had before she started sobbing. She hadn’t recognized it ten minutes ago, but that was why the feeling had been so familiar. Not because her consciousness was tapping into the ineffable, but because she was about to cry and had cried before. She sat there with her eyes wide and her mouth open, laughing noiselessly. Then she started crying, which only made her laugh more.
Her body felt like nothing, not dense like it usually did.
I could stay here like this forever, she thought. This is infinity’s moment.
“Ha ha ha, uugh.”
Infinity’s moment sounded like the jargon of a pedophile, and the phrase repulsed Megan, but she couldn’t stop thinking it. “Would you like to go to the Movie Star Room, Tracy?” Like “infinity’s moment” would be what the pedophile called his orgasm.
Several feet above and behind Megan, Amanda walked up to Randy.
“Can I talk to you?” she said.
“Sure, what’s up?”
“I’m really sorry, I feel like kind of an asshole.”
“What’s up?” said Randy.
“Megan and I got into a fight, and I think I might have really hurt her feelings. I feel like an asshole.”
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine, but I don’t really
