Idiot - Laura Clery Page 0,25

soul-search about my choices, because Damon grabbed me by the arm and yanked me toward him.

“You only need me.”

Do you hear that? It’s a chorus of beautiful angels singing YIIIKKKEEESSSSSS! RUN AWAYYYY! At the time, I couldn’t hear them.

He’d grab me so tightly that purple bruises started to show on my biceps. When he saw them, I think he felt bad, because he bought me a cell phone.

Soon after that, he sent me to an agency where he had some connections. He was ready for the rest of the world to see my face, I guess! He thought I was beautiful!!! And also he thought I could make him some money. #romance!

But, you guys, I wasn’t doing too hot. I was getting high every day. I had never been so far from my actual dreams and I was working hard to numb my feelings of discouragement. I had completely lost sight of my goals. They were being eclipsed by the ones Damon had for me.

I showed up at the modeling agency. They took one look at me, snapped a Polaroid, and told me they’d be in touch. Okay, I did it. That wasn’t hard. You know, modeling auditions were way easier than acting auditions. I didn’t have to memorize anything or interpret anything. I didn’t have to search the casting director’s face for any hope that I did a good job! I could do this! Maybe I should do modeling.

As I walked home from the agency, I got a call from Damon. He probably wanted to hear about how it went!

“Laura, the agency called me.” He was mad.

“That was fast! Do they want me to come back in for a meeting?”

“Why the fuck did you show up with bruises on your arms and a stain on your shirt?”

I was stunned.

Apparently the agency had called him right after I left, appalled by my appearance, bruises up and down my arms and, yes, a stain on my shirt. (Was this karma for stealing Colleen’s shirt??) Wine is hard to get out! I thought that it was normal for meetings to be that short. But really they had just wanted this crazy chick to get the fuck out of their offices without causing a disturbance.

“You gave me the bruises, you fucking asshole!”

“Well you should have chosen a different shirt!”

He hung up. What the FUCK. I was so humiliated. I felt so gross. I walked down Park Avenue, my head hanging low. Then a cracked-out homeless lady sitting on the corner of the street pointed at me and yelled, “You think you’re pretty! YOU’RE AN UGLY BITCH!” I mean, her timing was arguably impressive.

I was completely defeated. I crawled back inside Damon’s world. I mean, it kind of makes sense, doesn’t it? I had nothing. I felt like nothing because he had taken everything away from me. ALSO I LOVED HIM. Completely unrelated, have you heard of Stockholm syndrome? But no matter how much our spirits are crushed, we keep fighting and longing for more even if it’s subconscious. It’s human nature. I kept meeting with Lavan, my only friend in the city, to have moments of normalcy, however fleeting.

There was one night that Damon was painting a shitty nude portrait of me as we guzzled wine. We did this a lot, actually. Our tiny studio apartment was covered in weird, off-putting paintings of me. It looked like the den of a serial killer who was plotting to kill me specifically. The green light did not help!

We heard a knock at the door of his dingy fourth-floor apartment. Followed by SOBBING.

“Damon?!” a crying woman yelled out. “Damon, I love you! Open the door! You told me you loved me!” She kept banging on the door while sobbing hysterically. “This is MY apartment too!”

I looked at him wide-eyed and he put his pointer finger over his mouth and mimed for me to be quiet. “SHHHH!!”

Wait a second. He was my boyfriend, and this random woman that I had never heard about just said that . . . this was her apartment? What the fuck was going on? Also, I WAS STILL NAKED.

So I did the most obvious thing to do in that situation. Laughed my ass off!

Not because I found this funny, but because I WAS UNCOMFORTABLE. Also, did I mention that I don’t like emotions? Somehow this discomfort was permeating my drunken numbness, which is impressive seeing how my teeth were VERY purple from wine at this point.

The woman outside heard me laugh. She