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Saul says, This is your last chance.
 The lights are out and the a/c is out. I'm opening windows
and lighting candles. I'm wearing my wedding dress, which I was in the
middle of showing Saul when the electric went out.
Earlier, before Saul got here, Eli said we should smoke
and I got excited because more than anything I need a cigarette, but
then I realized she wasn't talking about cigarettes. No one smokes
cigarettes anymore.
Anthony Kiedis's dad smoked with him when he was eight,
she said, and I said, yeah, I know, I read the book before you,
remember?
Now Saul is begging and I'm saying no but in the way that
usually ends up meaning yes. Last week I watched Ferris Bueller with
Eli and Eli and I were both like, oh my god, that's Saul. Saul is
someone neither of us can say no to. Which is how the three of us
ended up at McDonald's an hour ago, even though it was after midnight,
and how now we're sitting on my bedroom floor, passing around what I
think they still call a joint, though I could be wrong. I am probably
wrong.
I'm reading this book about a man who smokes pot with his
son and then they go for a drive and the son is killed, I say.
No one says pot anymore, Eli says.
Weed, I say.
But we're not going anywhere, Saul says.
We get in my bed and watch a movie on my laptop because the lights are
still out and the TV won't turn on. I'm still wearing my wedding dress
and it'll probably smell like marijuana in two days but right now I'm
studying Chloe Sevigny's face and it's unclear if she does or doesn't
have AIDS.
You're not going to blow this, Saul says, and a pool of
sweat has formed between our legs, and Eli's head is on his chest. And
suddenly I'm worried what will happen to our relationship – Eli's and
Saul's and mine. I'm actually thinking shit like: you have to let one
person out of your life to let another in. And it feels like maybe a
long time has passed and I can't remember if I answered Saul's
question. And then Chloe's back on the screen and I'm trying to figure
out what's really up with her character's HIV status so I can go to
sleep.
At four the electric comes back on and because I forgot to flip the
switch before we got in bed, suddenly we're all sitting upright,
confused, bathed in light.
I have to go, Saul says, and Eli stands to hug him. Saul
and I have never hugged. It would be weird to start now.
Eli goes upstairs and I walk around the house in my
wedding dress, blowing out candles and closing windows. There is ten
minutes left of the movie and I can't remember it being this
devastating but probably it's just the pot. Everything else seems hard
to pinpoint by comparison. This weird feeling that won't go away.
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