The Speed Chronicles (12 page)

“Never call my house again,” I said. The detective didn't answer. His eyes darted about.

I walked toward the mansion, the cat's claws digging into my shoulder, my ribs. I felt my leg cover in warm wetness. I met Harv coming through the doorway, his face twisted in shock. He saw the gun and moved out of the way. The unmistakable waft of feline ammonia rose from my hip and raided my nostrils.

“What the fuck is going on out here?”

“This is my cat now,” I said.

Harv hesitated. He could see it in my eyes: I had gone off to a place where diplomacy was incontrovertible. “Take good care of him,” he finally replied.

“His name is Raskolnikov.”

“Fine.”

“Raskolnikov, you got it? Not Judas, never Judas.” I motioned to go, but paused and faced the feared, respected, worshipped pusher. “No more Church of Zoom, Harv. I swear to fucking God, no more. Understand?”

Harv grudgingly nodded his head in false affirmation, with stark ballooning eyeballs full of guaranteed revenge.

“Will,” Jim Grace bayed, catching up. “Give me the keys. I'll drive.”

I bent sideways, nodding to my front right pocket, not letting go of the cat or the gun. Grace shoved his hand in and fished through my crotch. The episode on the bus flashed in my head. “We're queer,” I said. I started laughing, then tears took over, followed by a screaming slideshow in my mind of everything that had just happened—and in the same beat I became quiet, feeling in that moment the terror of cavernous sadness. My eyes dried hard and plateaued on a crux so severe that I was now beyond weeping. We walked down the path.

“How did you get those panties?” I asked.

“I …” Grace stammered, struggling not to rush ahead.

“How long have you kept those underwear in your freezer?”

Grace opened the car doors, and the cat, who I'd just named Raskolnikov perhaps for the redemption of us all, trembled on, wheezing against the saturated folds of my sticky shirt. I waited patiently for an answer from Grace, as if our lives weren't in danger; as if there was no reason for concern of the weaponized mob making their way down the path; as if everything up the hill had disappeared; as if we were simply high on a gorgeous meth run; as if the earth itself had frozen and two tight bros had all the time in the world.

JOSEPH MATTSON
is the author of
Eat Hell
(Narrow Books) and
Empty the Sun
(A Barnacle Book), a novel with soundtrack by Drag City recording artist Six Organs of Admittance. His work has appeared in
Slake, Rattling Wall, Pearl, Ambit
, and more. Mattson was also the literary editor of
Two Letters Collection of Art and Writing Vol. 2
(Narrow Books). His novel,
Courting the Jaguar
, is forthcoming in 2012, and he was awarded a 2011 City of Los Angeles Artist Fellowship for his novel-in-progress,
Hexico
. Mattson lives in Los Angeles.

Addiction

by James Franco

JAMES FRANCO: I was asked to write this thing for this magazine about crystal meth and the dangers of it. I didn't know what to write. Then I had this idea: I would write this thing that was like
Twilight
but then wasn't. I mean, I would appropriate the story of
Twilight
but call it
Crystal Meth
and not change anything, and maybe with the new title it would feel different when people read it.

I realized that I couldn't go to the book as a source because the books have been eclipsed by the films; at least the characters have.

You can never think of Bella Swan without thinking of Kristen Stewart, and you'll always think of Rob Pattinson as Edward Cullen, so I turned to the script, which was easy enough to find online, replete with notes from the writer to change things, such as the buck in the opening dream to a deer. I thought if I just changed the format to prose, took out the scene headings, and put it into past tense, I would get something new. It wouldn't be the book, and it wouldn't be the script: it would be a spare and equally bad middle ground that told the same story. I kept thinking about the scene in the biology classroom where Edward gets upset because Bella smells so good he wants to kill her. This, this, I thought, surely this will work, this is addiction, but not just addiction, it is flirting with death, this is the love that kills.

It was difficult to see how I would parse out the desires of the characters and parallel because I was starting with Bella as the focalizing character and switching to Edward when the addiction element came into play. Then the editor suggested I add some actual parallels between vampires and tweakers: never sleep, paleness, sensitive to sunlight, selective diet, one sole hunger, the burdens of living forever.

But I suppose she gets just as addicted to him, in her own way. I mean, he is all she thinks about. And then other things happen. He drives cars really fast, people get killed, and she almost gets raped, and they can't have sex because he is afraid that he will kill her, and blood is always on his mind, and teenagers get killed and kidnapped, and they hide out in hotel rooms from other murderous teenagers, and she is with a hundred-year-old man and she is underage, and then they go to the prom.

It seemed like ALL teenage emotions were there, all wrapped up in a fantastical premise, and they—Stephanie Meyers, the filmmakers, and the actors—were getting away with it because it wasn't real, it was just vampires and shit.

Well, I was going to change all that. I was going to show how close meth addiction is to
Twilight
. But then something happened. My manager's partner, Dalton, was hit over the head on New Year's Eve. He was in his front yard, it was nine at night, a nice neighborhood in the Valley out in the Tarzana area, he was walking to his car to go get some more champagne for his guests, when he dropped his keys. When he bent over he felt something smash into the back of his head. He fell forward and then stood. No one was around. He quickly called 911 (nine-one-one).

“I think I've been hit by a meteor.”

It took the ambulance only three minutes to arrive, despite the meteor comment. They found him sitting on the lawn. His wife and his son, Peter, ran out when they heard the siren. Peter was the good son, not the older son in jail for possession of marijuana with the intent to sell and possession of an unregistered firearm. That was Sam, the bad son, the son who got some Mexican gang shit tattooed on his boyish Jewish face.

“Please,” Dalton had said in the visiting room. “Please just don't get the tattoo on your face, you'll get out and you'll get past this, you can get a job, but don't get the tattoo.”

The kid was out and he was crazy and this is what it had come to: His life was fucked and he blamed his father. He tried to kill his father.

If the ambulance had come two minutes later Dalton would have died. They put part of his skull in his abdomen to preserve it. They cut open his forehead to relieve the pressure because the brain had been pushed forward. There was a hole in the back of his head. The police were investigating.

Then I learned that Sam wasn't out. He'd be in jail for eighteen more months.

Crystal Meth

In my dream I am in Olympic National Park, it is dawn. Moss-draped, shadow-drenched, tortured tree trunks twist upward, reaching for rare sunlight.

I'd never given much thought to how I would die.

Suddenly, in this dream, every creature in the forest is deadly silent. Neither bird, beast, nor insect makes a noise. A predator is near.

Then, in the distance, a tiny snick. I run, fast.

Trees whip past, I dodge branches. I'm chasing something. It's exhilarating. Terrifying. Finally, up ahead, through the whir, the first glimpse of my prey: a deer.

It's running for its life. It darts through the forest maze. It sprints, but I gain. Beyond the deer, I can see the forest's edge, white sunlight glowing against the trees. The deer races for the light. I'm just behind it, about to emerge from the shadowy darkness. The deer leaps into the light in a high arc, it hovers against the white glare of the sun. Then, bam!

It's white and only white all around.

Dying in the place of someone I love seems like a good way to go.

In Arizona, the sunlight. I have alabaster skin, I'm vulnerable. I'm an introverted, imperfect beauty.

I can't bring myself to regret the decision to leave.

Before I left Arizona, I dug up a tiny barrel cactus and put it in a clay pot.

Oh, poor little cactus.

Poor little me.

“Bye, Bella!”

The three tanned, athletic, blond girls from my old school waved as they left their McMansion and hopped into a convertible Mercedes. Their flawless, bought-and-paid-for beauty contrasted with my natural paleness.

“Good luck at your new school!”

“Don't forget to write.”

“We'll miss you.”

I waved back, sweetly, but halfheartedly.

“Have a good …”

As I stepped off the curb, I tripped. When I stood, they were gone.

“Life.”

Clearly they were not close friends. I have a grown-up demeanor and innate intelligence and their kind is not for me.

Rene, my mom, came out of our house. She's in her mid-thirties. Our house was low-rent for the ritzy neighborhood. Rene is eclectic, scattered, anxious, more like my best friend than my parent. She thrust her cell phone at me.

“It won't work again, baby.”

“You put it on hold.”

“I did?”

“Look. You also called Mexico.”

Rene pushed me playfully.

We laughed.

“I'll figure it out. You gotta be able to reach me and Phil on the road. I love saying it out loud, me and Phil on the road—woah,
on the road.”

“Very romantic.”

Phil came out. He's good looking with an athlete's body. He held my three suitcases.

“If you call crappy motels, backwater towns, and ballpark hot dogs romantic.”

He put his Phoenix Desert Dogs baseball hat on Rene's head and kissed her. Phil's love for Rene is reassuring. Phil headed to the old station wagon to load the luggage, while Rene slipped her arm through mine, clinging to me as we walked to the car.

“Now, you know if you change your mind, I'll race back here from wherever the game is.” But her face was strained and I knew what a great sacrifice coming back would be. I forced a smile.

“I won't change my mind, Mom.”

“You might. You've always hated Forks.”

“It's not about Forks, it's about Dad. I mean, two weeks a year, we barely know each other.”

Rene looked worried. “Mom, I want to go. I'll be fine.” As she hugged me, I realized I was full of dread, doubt, and regret. I tried to keep the façade up as I climbed into the backseat of the car.

I listened to my iPod, earbuds in my ears, as I got a last glimpse of the sparkling malls, chic shoppers, and manicured cactus gardens.

I said goodbye to the McMansions and goodbye to the scorched landscape baking under the hot sun.

Washington State: nothing but deep, dark, green forests for miles. Lake Crescent. Over it all hangs the mist from the ever-present cloudy gray sky. Everything is wet and green and drenched in shade.

The thing about Charlie is that he's a cop. He's taciturn and introverted like me. He drove me in his cruiser down a wet two-lane highway. Trees, drenched and heavy-leaved on both sides. Silence.

“Your hair's longer.”

“I cut it since last time I saw you.”

“How's—”

“Good … it grew out again.”

Silence.

“Your mom?”

More silence.

THE CITY OF FORKS WELCOMES YOU. Pop. 3532
. Logging town. Woodcarvings in the storefronts. Timber Museum's sign: two loggers sawing a stump. Police station: a small wooden building across from city hall, also wooden.

The old house. Two-story, a woodshed full of firewood. A small boat in the garage. Fishing gear, an old buoy. Getting out of the car, I thought: home.

Carried in the bags. The house, not stylish. Only new thing: flat-screen TV. Comfortable, lived-in. Fishing memorabilia; photos of Charlie fishing with Indians. Handmade cards to “Daddy” and photos of me. Me, age seven, in a tutu, sitting stubbornly on the ground.

“I put Grandpa's old desk in your room. And I cleared some shelves in the bathroom.” “That's right. One bathroom.”

A photo: a much younger Charlie and Rene, on vacation, beaming with love.

“I'll just put these up in your room—”

“I can do it—” We both reached for the bags, bumped one another. I let Charlie carry them upstairs.

An antique rolltop desk was sitting in the corner. The room was filled with my childhood remnants, which had seen better days. I unpacked my CD case and loneliness finally overwhelmed me. I sat heavily on the edge of the bed, tears threatening …

Then we hear a HONK outside. Bella runs across the hall and looks out the window to see—11. OUTSIDE—A FADED RED TRUCK, CIRCA 1960, pulls up … 11.