JC looks at AJ and cracks up laughing as he walks into a room.
“You breathe a word of this and you die,” AJ says pointing a finger at him.
“Ok ok,” JC smiles before cracking up again.
AJ was sitting on the couch next to him by now and around his neck held by a piece of string was a sign that read: “Confront me if I ask for a cigarette.”
“They said I was putting all my problems into smoking instead of alcohol now. What the hell since when is it a crime to smoke?”
“How much are you smoking?” JC smiles slightly.
“Two packs a day,” AJ says.
JC’s face falls and he stares at AJ, “That really isn’t healthy man.”
“I know. I know. It’s killing my voice too.”
JC shakes his head and runs a hand through his hair.
“So I heard you proposed.”
“Huh?”
“To Polly.”
“Oh that. I was just joking around with her. She knows that right?”
“Yeah. She’s worried about you Jace.”
“Huh?”
“You’re destroying yourself. What are you going to do when you get out of here? When there is no safe haven?”
“I don’t know. What are you going to do? You’re gonna be just as bad off as me when you get out.”
“I know, trust me I know.”
“I just got off the phone with Justin.”
“And?”
“I think he is gonna become Buddhist or something.”
“Vanessa?”
“Yup.”
“She’s catholic…well some form of catholic where she practices some forms of Buddhism like meditation. She can do that shit on her head. It’s pretty damn amazing.”
“I don’t think he knows what he is getting himself into.”
“Did you?”
“Not a damned clue.”
JC looks out the window as AJ walks by outside with one arm around his girlfriend Rachel Leigh. Chase looks from the window to JC and then back out the window again.
“She’s his girlfriend right?”
“Yeah.”
“She nice?”
“One of the nicest people in the world.”
Chase nods before picking up a pool stick and getting back to the game he was playing JC in.
“You have a girlfriend?” JC asks Chase taking a shot at the stripped seven ball.
“No. All I cared about out there was where I was gonna get my next hit and occasionally where I was gonna sleep and what I was gonna eat.”
JC looks at Chase and frowns.
“You gonna be ok here once AJ and I leave?”
“Yeah, I always am.”
“You sure?”
“Trust me I’ve been through this enough times to know that I’ll be fine.”
“If you were fine you wouldn’t go through it so many times.”
“It’s time for group therapy,” Chase says staring at him before putting down his pool queue and walking out of the room.
JC sighs and follows him out, down the hall and into their group therapy room. AJ was already sitting in his chair with a brood smile across his face and JC takes a seat next to him.
“How’s Rachel?” JC asks him.
“Good.”
“What she think so the sign?”
“She laughed at me, but I was prepared for failure already.”
JC smirks and shakes his head, “Did she say how Vanessa is?”
“Didn’t Justin tell you?”
“Yeah, but I dunno.”
“She’s fine.”
“Ok.”
“JC,” Marilyn says, “It’s your turn to start us off today.”
“Here we go,” AJ says as JC takes a breath before he begins.
AJ stares at JC from the chair he is sitting in in his room and shakes his head then stares at JC, “I told you you talked about Polly to much.”
“Shut up,” JC says and folds his arms across his chest.
JC was wearing a sign that read: “Confront me if I talk about my ex-girlfriend.” He had gotten it half way through group therapy before Marilyn asked him why he dwelled upon the past so much. To tell you the truth JC didn’t even think he dwelled upon the pass at all. She told him that his problems seemed to be coming from him dwelling on his past mistakes and he needed to stop before he hurt himself
JC wanted to take off the sign and burn it.
“This isn’t fair she’s not my problem,” JC says.
“I thought we already went through this at least ten times.”
“But it’s not her fault.”
“I know that.”
“Then why the hell am I wearing this?”
“Because whenever you talk about her you get depressed and say how much you messed up and how much you don’t deserve to be here right now. And you’re doing it again right now.”
“Shut…up.”
JC lets out a long sigh before leaning back on the bed he was sitting on. AJ sighs slightly and starts humming to himself as JC flips through the TV stations.
“And I like cream in my coffee. And I like to sleep late on Sunday. And nobody knows me like my baby. And I like eggs over easy with a flour tortias. And nobody knows me like my baby. Nobody holds me. Nobody knows me. Nobody knows me like my baby. But it was dream made south of the border. And nobody knows me like my baby. And she cries to me how could you do it. And I saw that there weren’t nothing to it. But nobody knows me like my baby. And nobody holds me. Nobody knows me. Nobody knows me like my baby. And I like cream in my coffee. And I hate to be alone on Sundays. And nobody knows me like my baby.”
JC looks over at him, “What would you say if I…”
“No.”
“I didn’t even say it though.”
“No.”
“But…”
“No.”
“AJ.”
“No.”
“Do you think?”
“No, don’t even try it.”
“Ok, ok.”
“I mean it.”
“Ok.”
“Ok,” AJ says and looks back at the TV.
JC shakes his head and looks back at the TV.
“I hate my life,” he mutters to himself.
JC walks down the hall and looks over his shoulder as AJ chases after Marilyn saying something about, “please just one. It won’t hurt if it’s just one cigarette.” He shakes his head.
“What’s that about?”
JC turns his head around and looks at Polly in front of him and follows her gaze down to the sign he is wearing around his neck.
“Uh it’s um for group therapy.”
“So you can’t talk to me?”
“No.”
“Then what’s it mean?”
“I can’t talk about you and my past anymore.”
“Oh, I saw Justin today.”
“Really?”
“We met up at Starbucks and had a drink and talked about things.”
“How is he?”
“In love. You have to trust him JC. He’s old enough to make his own decisions.”
“I know.”
“He’s not twelve anymore.”
“I know he’s not the little kid who used to walk in on me with you.”
She shakes her head, “Yeah.”
“C’mon lets go outside.”
JC stares down at the grass blades and plucks one out.
“So tell me what happened to high society JC?” Polly asks sitting next to him.
“Huh?”
“The JC that drank wine and ate stuff I can’t even pronounce. The one who hung out at museums?”
“Oh. I don’t know. He was there because of Bobbie.”
“Bobbie worked for a teeny magazine.”
“I know. I know,” he smiles picking out another piece of grass.
“What step are you on?”
“Ten.”
“What step is AJ on?”
“Eleven, he’s always ahead of me for some reason.”
“He ok?”
“Yeah better off then me aside from the smoking issue.”
Polly shakes her head and sighs, “I heard.”
“What’s step ten?”
“We continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.”
“You doing it?”
“I’m keeping a journal and writing stuff down in it now for inventories.”
“And are you admitting when you are wrong?”
“Yeah.”
“Let me see,” she says taking the piece of grass and holding it up to her mouth with both hands and blowing on it making a screeching sound.
JC smiles at her and takes the grass blade back.
“I made a mistake.”
“Huh?” she asks.
“I made a mistake.”
“How?”
“I let you get away.”
“Don’t pull the sappy romantic shit on me now.”
JC stares at her and then looks back at the grass.
“That was a mistake though.”
She nods silently and looks out over the property, “You have to move on JC.”
JC looks up at her.
“You have to move on it’s not healthy to dwell on these things in the past. Your sign says so.”
“Fuck this then,” he says and stands up.
“JC.”
“I don’t want to hear it,” he says and starts walking away.
“JC. JC. Josh!”
JC stops and stares at her, “What?”
“Don’t hurt yourself please.”
“Why would you care?” he asks and then keeps walking.
AJ turns to look at him as he comes storming through the center, up the stairs and into his room. AJ shakes his head as Polly runs by after him and into his room.
“Josh, don’t be stupid,” she says and looks at him sitting on his bed.
“It doesn’t matter anymore,” he says lying back on his bed.
“Just because I won’t date you doesn’t mean I won’t be there to help you,” she says walking up to him and sitting on the bed by him.
“Right.”
“Go to sleep,” she says rubbing his face softly and smoothing his hair out, “Go to sleep.”
JC stares at her and then pulls his head up onto her lap and starts to close his eyes slowly as she starts smoothing out his hair again.
And nobody knows me like my baby. Nobody holds me. Nobody knows me. Nobody knows me like my baby.
