He began to be nostalgic for something. He read a lot of Roland Barthes. He wrote me long letters telling me about the death of the author, the death of us. Barthes argues the author, as a construct, is made up. It begins in the text, in the linguistic construction, in the reader. You can have multiple authors, multiple identities swirling in the great existential swamp. This seemed to frighten him. He once wrote, “I do not like to believe I’m a modernist, but I can’t get behind Barthes as liberating. He’s a death sentence.”
Hidden in the bathroom of a hotel, he passed me a well-worn leather flask. I took a swig of scotch, both of us pretending that we liked it because we were playing a bit. We were hiding from the debutante ball a half floor below, both of us escorting a friend to come out.
A drunken boy came in, an acquaintance of an acquaintance from Deerfield or something. He staggered, his shoes clacking on the green marble, and he thrashed to keep his balance. His arm landed on the wooden stall door, and with his wrist straight and firm, he fixed himself upright.
The boy introduced himself, and Apian introduced himself as me. I stood silently, wondering his game, wondering if I should tell the boy I was Apian or let the game continue. They exchanged pleasantries, as one does. They filled the room with hot air, talked of bowties, of girls, of society, of winter coats, of containers.
He told us that he had tripped acid in the Hamptons, and it had changed his life. He said he saw, “I am that I am,” written in the sand. He felt more complete, he said, more cohesive, more ready for his internship in insurance. “Most of my family’s in insurance,” Apian said, “It’s a bit of a nightmare. Tremendously risk averse. Hate any negative externalities. Like myself.”
The boy stumbled to the sink. He washed his hands. He gargled some mouthwash. He combed his hair. The modern luxuries of the bathroom at his disposal, he cleaned himself up, he washed away questions.
After the boy left, a deep silence ensued. Apian opened a window and began smoking a cigarette. The smoke hung in the air, made visible by the cold night. The space between us filled with grey matter.
“You know you should quit.”
More silence.
I curtly asked Apian about his decision to be me. He did not take this lightly. He said he was joking, that it was all game. He said I’d changed. He said I’d lost touch. He said I know longer knew who I was, who he was, how to play the game.
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I told him I didn’t think that was true. He started pacing around the bathroom in a drunken fury, muttering at me of Barthes and Butler. I wasn’t moved.
His tone changed; he became manic. He said he was in on the joke, didn’t I understand? He was playing, writing himself new lines. He knew this wasn’t real. He hated the boy, hated all of that.
“He is who he is, eh? I proclaim him douchebag. His name is his name.”
I stood silently, looking distantly into the mirror, seeing straight through myself in all the smoke and mirrors. This killed me.
“Come on,” he looked pleadingly, “Yahweh, no way.”
He made a poor pun, and he knew it.
He took his notebook from his jacket pocket. Taking the cigarette from his mouth, he opened to the first page and pressed the end of the cigarette deeply into the center, stabbing the words and burning their edges. The paper smoldered as the cigarette went deeper and deeper into the notebook.