Jillian

inside,” said Amanda.
“Yeah,” said Megan. “I know. But I want to go outside.”
“Oh, um,” said Amanda. She looked around and then said, “Okay, sure.”
“Ppphhhbbbffff,” said Megan, leaning against the back porch railing. “What the fuck.”
“What?” said Amanda.
“Eh, nothing. I feel weird today.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Why?” asked Megan.
“Oh, I mean, it’s sympathy, not an apology.”
“I know,” said Megan, lighting a cigarette.
She offered one to Amanda, who waved her hand “No” at it.
“If I don’t quit smoking, I’m going to kill myself,” said Megan.
“Are they starting to take their toll?”
“No, I mean I’m going to deliberately commit suicide if I can’t do something as simple as not slowly poisoning myself.”
“Eh, you’re young. The right time to quit will present itself,” said Amanda.
“Do you really believe that? Do you really think there’ll be some day when I feel capable enough to resist the nicotine addiction? And be able to unburden myself of the glamorous and romantic associations I have with smoking? You really think that’s going to happen?”
“Well, yeah. All things we do but don’t completely like are phases. Sometimes they’re long-standing phases, but, I mean, they’re phases. I remember wetting the bed until first grade and just really wondering when it would stop, and feeling the same way you do when my parents told me I’d grow out of it. I really thought it would never stop.”
“What, are you a serial killer or something?”
“No. What kind of a thing is that to say?”
“Serial killers wet the bed, that’s all.”
“Lots of people wet the bed until they’re seven. Six and seven, that’s still a baby, I think. I’m just trying to relate our experiences.”
“Yeah, okay.”
They listened to the sound of other people’s chatter. The porch was half full with people.
“I wet the bed, too,” said Megan. “Until first grade. It’s no big deal.”
“I know it’s no big deal, that’s why I used it as an example.”
“But it’s different, because it’s not like I learned how to wet the bed and then got addicted to it even though it was starting to kill me. It’s not like bed-wetting was all the rage but the pee was, like, transdermally poisoning me.”
“I guess that’s one difference. Still, you should give it a few more years before committing suicide. Things might change.”
“Yeah, I guess I was just being kind of dramatic,” said Megan.
“Oh really?” said Amanda.
Megan sighed and opened another beer.
They hung out and drank, and at some point someone started smoking weed out there on the porch. Megan was drunk enough to think she wanted some. She eyed the people who were smoking. They all looked like they were pretty close friends and like they were having a real conversation. They were laughing and saying “Nuh-uh” and stuff like that.
“I want to smoke some of that weed,” said Megan.
“Then ask for some.”
Megan winced. “You do it?”
Amanda rolled her eyes. “Hey,” she said to the group in general. “Can we trade you guys beer or smokes for a few hits of that?”
“Whatever, just have some,” said one of the guys.
“Cool,” said Amanda.
“Thanks,” said Megan.
The pipe had a bug-eyed glass crocodile on it. Megan drunkenly identified with it for its mute and endless proximity to all this social fun. She felt like a warty little toad or a troll or a guy who was so visibly lonely that everyone thought he might start beating off or crying just for the feeling of connection he would get from all that wild, concentrated attention. She raised the pipe, tried to look the croc in the eyes, took a massive undergrad hit, and then re-inhaled it through her nose. A “French” inhale. She raised her eyebrows in gratitude in the general direction of the pot smokers.
Amanda took a small sip off the pipe and passed it back and, in a surprisingly genuine tone, said, “Thanks.”
“I feel like a fucking freak,” said Megan.
“Well, you’re not a freak,” said Amanda.
“Oh, god, yes I am.”
“No you’re not.”
As the weed worked its way through Megan’s system, she became more and more pantheistic. She became a living symbol for her emotions and, in response to the honor, her emotions began to swell. As they swelled, she felt simultaneously less stable and more happy, but happy in an awful way, since her happiness had something vaguely to do with death and complacency. No, not complacency. Acceptance, maybe? No, complacency.
She looked at all the people on the porch and only sort of heard Amanda say, “You’re just a normal person who hates her job, but you’ve got a lot of nice things going for you. You’re in a stable relationship, for one thing, which is something I wouldn’t mind having. You know, I have pains in my life, too, but I manage. You manage, too. You’re not a freak, and you don’t turn people off except when you pout all the time, which you’re doing now, but, geez, you’re fine, all right? Stop being so overly self-involved. You have support from family and friends and everything is generally okay. Okay?” Which was a funny backdrop to the exalted feeling she was having of being one with the moment, being one with the porch in its misery, reveling in and revering this capsule of synthesized misery.
“I’m not trying to kiss your ass or anything, I’m trying to get you to snap out of it, because it’s not a great way to relate to people. You’re not a freak. Are you even listening to anything I’m saying? You’re not even looking at me and I’m trying to help you.”
I guess she gets pissed when she’s high, thought Megan.
“The thing I have going for me,” said Megan, “is that I don’t even have to be here if I don’t want to be.” When she said “here” she pointed her finger down at the porch and held her hand in that position for a little too long, and she and Amanda made eye contact, which Amanda thought was aggravating, but which Megan thought was intense and transcendent.
“You’re not even listening at all,” said Amanda.
“Oh,