Entry 19
By Steven Paul Lansky
"Lacey #5 "
What was I really looking for? Lacey was young and her experience connected with mine in only little ways. I did not expect her to want to be with me, but I desired her. I planned to read Lolita. Perhaps it would be the script for my connection with young Lacey. She had telephoned when I was in the facility in Trenton. It had been the first time we had ever talked on the phone. She wanted to drive up in her pick-up truck with Kerrie and rescue me from the state hospital. I tried to connect her to the social worker on my team, but it never developed. Counting on social workers to help with life was a long shot at best. From my experience, living life might just be too much for a social worker to understand. I want to live life.
I had met Lacey’s mother when Lacey was in Oregon. After buying Lacey a toe ring, I’d driven out River Road to New Richmond, where I’d found the Empress Chili and gone in for a meal. Lacey’s gray VW Fox was in the parking lot with a “For Sale” sign in the window. Lacey’s mom ran the place. She had red hair and cat-eye glasses, a ponytail and a fine welcoming attitude. I asked her for Lacey’s address. She gave me her phone number and told me to call her later on after work and she’d give me the address. When I got home there was a message from the clerk at the jewelry shop saying she had found only one Montgomery in the New Richmond phone directory, talked to Lacey’s father, and had gotten the address and sent the ring. I laughed out loud. I still called Lacey’s mom to follow through, and double-checked with the clerk the next day.
There had been the subdued conversation on the bus stop bench outside Sitwell’s late at night, my right arm draped over her thin shoulders. She had listened patiently while I told her of the Memorial Day barbecue in the locked hospital. She laughed low at the description of sausages and grilled chicken breasts, without seasonings or sauces, single servings of Kool-Aid in Styrofoam cups and potato salad with lots of Mayo but no onion. We had looked up together at the Esquire Theater marquee. Many of my friends had listened to me talk about the troubled times. Still, somehow I was making Geodon work. Lacey had been a calming presence before I left for Vermont. As the bus rolled I was second-guessing the whole trip. Why had I left Cincinnati? Things there had been going so well compared to how they had gone in New York and Burlington. She asked me about LSD when we talked on the bench. I don’t know if she was experimenting or not. She mentioned her young poet friend in the blue velvet jacket. She had wanted to sleep with him, but he was hardly interested. I wondered what was wrong with him without letting on to Lacey.
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Links
· The Citizen Archives
· About Steven Lansky--QCF Magazine March 2005
· QCF Magazine homepage
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