the dead malls
chapter 22
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The rest of that year continued much the same as the last. The dermatologist began to wage war on my acne, but a decisive victory had yet to be won, and I took up the subsequent inner turmoil with a therapist, which helped me maintain a less depressed disposition. My grade point average remained solid, balanced with my social life, although I still hadn’t found anyone as interesting as Tommy to be a close friend.
When I came home, Tommy and I extended the length of our runs to eight miles, sometimes more, always followed by a smoking session in the woods. I continued to work at The Big T Grocery.
Late in the spring semester of that sophomore year, though, there was an inflection point that constituted another strike against Tommy’s psyche, one I realized had been a long time coming.
One weekend, toward the end of the year, just before finals, we got tickets to see a band called The Dead Malls—a four-piece folk-rock-pop band from Veddersburgh that had achieved a small level of national, and even international, fame over the past few years. They had a few million plays on Spotify and had toured the USA and Europe, opening for bands like The War on Drugs. The band members, four years older than us, were seniors when we were freshmen. We hadn’t been close, but now they were gods—proof that someone from Veddersburgh could escape and achieve something beyond its confines.
We had procured four tickets: one for me, one for Danveer, and for Emma and Tommy. (Cynthia had declined to come, either because she didn’t want to see me or had better things to do. I guessed both.) The show wasn’t part of any promotion for The Dead Malls. They had a lull between tours and were putting on a special homecoming show for family and friends.
The only place in Veddersburgh that could accommodate the few hundred tickets sold was the Veddersburgh High School amphitheater, which wasn’t the sort of amphitheater you’d expect at a place like Veddersburgh High School. It had been constructed with the original school in the 1920s, and while most of the building’s features had long since been gutted and remodeled into lifeless, sanitary modernity, the district had won a grant to restore the theater to its original condition and brand it as a historic landmark. Naturally, everyone flipped out, complaining about other areas in which Veddersburgh was financially suffering and wondering why, of all things, the place where the art kids put on their high school plays should get the tax dollars. Still, there were few places in Veddersburgh I liked more than that amphitheater, with its proscenium arches, ornate ceiling, velvet drapes, and deco sconces.
Before the show, we met for dinner at Cusatis, a small Italian spot by the train tracks, one of our favorite hangouts as teenagers. Danveer and I sat on one side of the red-cushioned booth, Emma and Tommy on the other.
It had been a couple of months since I’d seen Tommy, and I noticed a strange pallor to him. There was a paleness in his face that I hadn’t seen before, or hadn’t noticed. His eyes seemed glossy, not with the usual high-ness or drunkenness, but perhaps with sickness. His usually lustrous hair looked straw-like and frizzy.
“Drinks?” the waitress asked.
We gave our orders: Water for Emma, Coke for me, water for Danveer.
“Whatever you may have on draft, in the largest quantity,” Tommy said in an aching voice.
“ID?” she asked skeptically. We were amazed as Tommy brought out a Pennsylvanian ID with his likeness on it. She inspected it briefly and handed it back. “In town to see that show of those kids from Veddersburgh?”
He nodded. The waitress returned with a pint of cheap beer for him, along with the rest of our drinks. We all watched, astonished, as Tommy downed it in three enormous gulps.
“Let me see that,” I demanded. He took the ID out and handed it to me.
It had his name as Tommy Harris, and for a moment, it felt like I was his brother. He even had my street address on it, though it was ironically listed as Harrisburg, PA. It was a pretty good fake, but I suspected Tommy’s haggard look made him seem older. I handed it back.
“Where’d you get it?” I asked.
“Guy I know at school,” Tommy said.
“Wow, nice Big T. Planning on going hard for this concert?” Danveer asked, as Tommy belched and made us all laugh. He ordered three more beers before we left.
“My parents have been around all day,” he said, as though that explained everything.
Emma and I exchanged one of our glances, and I saw that she was afraid.
We arrived at the high school, which had taken on a strange air of venue-ship, and the parking lot was packed despite it not being a school day. The entrances were cordoned off, and bouncers and ticket-takers stood at the doors.
“Ah, stepping inside a school from our youth—is there ever a more Proustian sensation than the smell of one’s old school, eh guys?” Tommy remarked as we entered, taking a deep breath.
“What exactly is that smell?” I wondered. “What causes it?”
“Smells like lunch meat and ass,” Danveer said.
“I think it’s definitely cafeteria-related,” I said.
“It’s the desperate sweat of unrealized dreams, pubescent wanderings, and filthy thoughts,” Tommy stipulated.
Emma remained quiet. We found some seats, but since it was general admission, we quickly abandoned them in favor of standing in the pit in front of the stage.
For me, it was a magical time. The Dead Malls had a small catalog, so they played all their hits. Between songs, they bantered with the crowd, thanking their friends, teachers, and the school. The light show was modest, but the sound quality—aided by the theater’s remodeling—was incredible. Amongst the crowd were old friends from school, parents we knew, and even some old teachers. There was no need for the alcohol that other venues might offer. The concert felt like a victory for Veddersburgh, celebrating that, though the local mall was dead, The Dead Malls were alive and thriving
But Tommy seemed agitated. Every time I looked back at him, he was staring somewhere other than the stage. He kept shifting, saying things to Emma in her ear, seemingly bored with the performance.
Halfway through, he tapped me on the shoulder.
“Hey Jude-dude,” he yelled in my ear. “What do you say we get up to the roof and have a toke?”
“I’m good,” I told him.
“You sure?”
Emma elbowed him. “Tommy, stop,” she said.
“Are you sure, Jude-dude? Here, do you want a drink of this?” he asked when the song ended, offering me a flask he’d snuck in. I declined again. Emma wore her look of fury, eyebrows furrowed like a bird of prey.
“Well, I guess I’ll go by myself,” he finally said, and left. Emma went after him. Despite not wanting to miss the next song, I followed at a distance, stopping around the corner from the hallway where she caught up to him.
“We’re just here with Dan and Jude having a good time, and you have to go and make everything about drinking, smoking weed, and whatever the hell else you’re on,” Emma said. “Plus, this weird narrative thing where you want to smoke on the roof of the school for some reason.”
“Is it a crime to want to augment a good time?” Tommy replied in his snide voice that somehow managed to sound playful. I didn’t need to see him to know he had on his tilted smile.
“Augment? AUGMENT?! Look at Jude. He’s having the time of his life. Why does he need to go smoke weed with you? Why?!”
“I thought we talked about this?”
“Talked about how you wanted to sneak off to smoke on the roof, for some reason of fitting the metaphorical and symbolic narrative? Yeah, you mentioned it.”
“Communication, correct? Isn’t that what you always say? We need to communicate.”
“Except I said, ‘no, you shouldn’t do that, it’s a bad idea,’ and you ignored me.”
“Communication doesn’t imply mutual agreement,” he said, walking away.
“No, but it does mean you at least talk about it,” Emma said, her voice cracking. “You know what, Tommy? I’m done. I’M DONE. I should’ve been done a long time ago.”
I don’t know if Tommy heard her. Then I heard Emma’s sandals tapping toward me, and around the corner we came face to face. She looked at me, processing that I’d overheard their argument. “Have fun with your boyfriend,” she said, heading down the marble steps.
I didn’t smoke weed with Tommy on the roof. Instead I went back to the orchestra pit and stood by Emma and enjoyed the show. He came back a half hour later, drunker and higher than before, having missed half the show.
That night might have been a victory for Veddersburgh, but it was a loss for Tommy.
Emma broke up with Tommy at the start of the summer, timed neatly with her departure for a summer exchange program in Europe. When she returned, she transferred from Hartwick to George Mason in D.C., probably to get away from him.
I called her before she left, after Tommy told me what had happened. In retrospect, the reason for my call was selfish—I wasn’t really concerned for her (I knew she’d be better off), and I knew I couldn’t (and shouldn’t) try to change her mind. But I didn’t want to lose her friendship. I wanted to make sure we could still talk, even without Tommy being the common thread.
Like most people my age, I had developed an aversion to phone calls, but for some reason, calling Emma felt right. It felt comfortable.
“Tommy is great, Jude, and I know you love him. I love him too. But he has this undercurrent of darkness, and it comes out when he’s drinking. And he drinks to let it out. He’s an alcoholic—and an addict,” she told me.
Of course, we talked about Tommy. My experiment had failed.
“An alcoholic? Like, he drinks every day?”
“Uh-huh. Jude, I think he’s been drinking since high school. Remember how his track times got worse, even after his leg healed? Remember how none of us even realized he was drunk at senior prom? Being .07 drunk felt like nothing to him then. And after his leg injury, he had a thing with pills too. I bet you didn’t know that.”
“He’s sensory-seeking, not an addict,” I said. “And how could he even be an alcoholic in high school? Where would he get alcohol without a fake ID?”
“Sometimes, he tricked his mom into buying it for him. He still does. She’s so confused, she just believes him when he says he needs it for a party.”
I took that in, dark and heavy.
“Impossible. He runs with me all the time. He’s still faster than me! I can’t be that out of shape.”
“Jude, you’re in denial. He’s functional. It’s possible to be a high-functioning alcoholic. And it’s gotten worse since college.”
“But wouldn’t we have seen the signs?” I asked, even though, as I said it, all the signs flashed before my eyes—years of them.
I could feel her shaking her head on the other end.
“You’re the same as me, Jude. You love him, so you don’t see what he’s putting you through. Someday, something’s going to happen, and you’ll realize he’s gone too far. What if those frat bros had beaten you up when he stole that hat? What if you’d drowned in the pool after prom? And when that day comes, I hope he realizes he’s hurt you and stops. But I hope you realize it before then.”
“What am I supposed to do, stop being his friend? I can’t break up with him like you did.”
“I can’t do this,” she said suddenly, and hung up. I couldn’t blame her.
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previous (the legacy of parade day)