Part 2 (1/2)
”In the wind,” I said. ”Long gone.”
Jim Burger
LAURA LIPPMAN is a Baltimore writer best known for her series about Baltimore-based P.I. Tess Monaghan. She also has written two stand-alone novels, is a Baltimore writer best known for her series about Baltimore-based P.I. Tess Monaghan. She also has written two stand-alone novels, Every Secret Thing Every Secret Thingand Tothe Power of Three. Tothe Power of Three.A Baltimore Sun Baltimore Sunreporter for twelve years, she also has written for the New York Times New York Times, the Was.h.i.+ngton Post, Was.h.i.+ngton Post,and Slate.com. Her work has won virtually all the major prizes given to U.S. crime writers, including the Edgar, Anthony, Agatha, Shamus, and Nero Wolfe.
the crack cocaine diet
(or: how to lose a lot of weight andchange your life in just one weekend)by laura lippman
Ihad just broken up with Brandon and Molly had just broken up with Keith, so we needed new dresses to go to this party where we knew they were going to be. But before we could buy the dresses, we needed to lose weight because we had to look fabulous, kiss-my-a.s.s-f.u.c.k-you fabulous. Kiss-my-a.s.s-f.u.c.k-you-and-your-d.i.c.k-is-really-tiny fabulous. Because, after all, Brandon and Keith were going to be at this party, and if we couldn't get new boyfriends in less than eight days, we could at least go down a dress size and look so good that Brandon and Keith and everybody else in the immediate vicinity would wonder how they ever let us go. I mean, yes, technically, they theybroke up with us us, but we had been thinking about it, weighing the pros and cons. (Pro: They spent money on us. Con: They were childish. Pro: We had them. Con: Tiny d.i.c.ks, see above.) See, we were being methodical and they were just all impulsive, the way guys are. That would be another con-poor impulse control. Me, I never do anything without thinking it through very carefully. Anyway, I'm not sure what went down with Molly and Keith, but Brandon said if he wanted to be nagged all the time, he'd move back in with his mother, and I said, ”Well, given that she still does your laundry and makes you food, it's not as if you really moved out,” and that was that. No big loss.
Still, we had to look so great that other guys would be punching our exes in the arms and saying, ”What, are you crazy?” Everything is about spin, even dating. It's always better to be the dumper instead of the dumpee, and if you have to be the loser, then you need to find a way to be superior. And that was going to take about seven pounds for me, as many as ten for Molly, who doesn't have my discipline and had been doing some serious break-up eating for the past three weeks. She went face down in the Ding Dongs, danced with the Devil Dogs, became a Ho Ho ho. As for myself, I'm a salty girl, and I admit I had the Pringles Light can upended in my mouth for a couple of days.
So anyway, Molly said Atkins and I said not fast enough, and then I said a fast-fast and Molly said she saw little lights in front of her eyes the last time she tried to go no food, and she said cabbage soup and I said it gives me gas, and then she said pills and I said all the doctors we knew were too tight with their 'scrips, even her dentist boss since she stopped blowing him. Finally, Molly had a good idea and said: ”Cocaine!”
This merited consideration. Molly and I had never done more than a little recreational c.o.ke, always provided by boyfriends who were trying to impress us, but even my short-term experience indicated it would probably do the trick. The tiniest bit revved you up for hours and you raced around and around, and it wasn't that you weren't hungry, more like you had never even heard of food; it was just some quaint custom from the olden days, like square dancing.
”Okay,” I said. ”Only, where do we get it?” After all, we're girls, girly girlygirls. I had been drinking and smoking pot since I was sixteen, but I certainly didn't buy it. That's what boyfriends were for. Pro: Brandon bought my drinks, and if you don't have to lay out cash for alcohol, you can buy a lot more shoes.
Molly thought hard, and Molly thinking was like a fat guy running-there was a lot of visible effort.
”Well, like, the city.”
”On, like, a corner.”
”Right, Molly. I watch HBO, too. But I mean, what corner? It's not like they list them in that c.r.a.p Weekender Guide in the paper-movies, music, clubs, where to buy drugs.”
So Molly asked a guy who asked a guy who talked to a guy, and it turned out there was a place just inside the city line, not too far from the interstate. Easy on, easy off, then easy off again. Get it? After a quick consultation on what to wear-jeans and T-s.h.i.+rts and sandals, although I changed into running shoes after I saw the condition of my pedicure-we were off. Very hush-hush because, as I explained to Molly, that was part of the adventure. I phoned my mom and said I was going for a run. Molly told her mom she was going into the city to shop for a dress.
The friend of Molly's friend's friend had given us directions to what turned out to be an apartment complex, which was kind of disappointing. I mean, we were expecting row houses, slumping picturesquely next to each other, but this was just a dirtier, more run-down version of where we lived-little cl.u.s.ters of two-story town houses built around an interior courtyard. We drove around and around and around, trying to seem very savvy and willing, and it looked like any apartment complex on a hot July afternoon. Finally, on our third turn around the complex, a guy ambled over to the car.
”What you want?”
”What you got?” I asked, which I thought was pretty good. I mean, I sounded casual but kind of hip, and if he turned out to be a cop, I hadn't implicated myself. See, I Iwas always thinking, unlike some people I could name.
”Got American Idol and Survivor. The first one will make you sing so pretty that Simon will be speechless. The second one will make you feel as if you've got immunity for life.”
”O-kay.” Molly reached over me with a fistful of bills, but the guy backed away from the car.
”Pay the guy up there. Then someone will bring you your package.”
”Shouldn't you give us the, um, stuff first and then get paid?”
The guy gave Molly the kind of look that a schoolteacher gives you when you say something exceptionally stupid. We drove up to the next guy, gave him forty dollars, then drove to a spot he pointed out to wait.
”It's like McDonald's!” Molly said. ”Drive-through!”
”s.h.i.+t, don't say McDonald's. I haven't eaten all day. I would kill for a Big Mac.”
”Have you ever had the Big N' Tasty? It totally rocks.”
”What is it?”
”It's a cheeseburger, but with, like, a special sauce.”
”Like a Big Mac.”
”Only the sauce is different.”
”I liked the fries better when they made them in beef fat.”
A third boy-it's okay to say boy, because he was, like, thirteen, so I'm not being racist or anything-handed us a package, and we drove away. But Molly immediately pulled into a convenience store parking lot. It wasn't a real convenience store, though, not a 7-Eleven or a Royal Farm.
”What are you doing?”
”Pre-diet binge,” Molly said. ”If I'm not going to eat for the next week, I want to enjoy myself now.”
I had planned to be pure starting that morning, but it sounded like a good idea. I did a little math. An ounce of Pringles has, like, 120 calories, so I could eat an entire can and not gain even half a pound, and a half pound doesn't even register on a scale, so it wouldn't count. Molly bought a pound of Peanut M&Ms, and let me tell you, the girl was not overachieving. I'd seen her eat that much on many an occasion. Molly has big appet.i.tes. We had a picnic right there in the parking lot, was.h.i.+ng down our food with diet cream soda. Then Molly began to open our ”package.”
”Not here!” I warned her, looking around.
”What if it's no good? What if they cut it with, like, something, so it's weak?”
Molly was beginning to p.i.s.s me off a little, but maybe it was just all the salt, which was making my fingers swell and my head pound a little. ”How are you going to know if it's any good?”
”You put it on your gums.” She opened the package. It didn't look quite right. It was more off-white than I remembered, not as finely cut. But Molly dove right in, licking her finger, sticking it in, and then spreading it around her gum line.
”s.h.i.+t,” she said. ”I don't feel a thing.”
”Well, you don't feel it right away.”
”No, they, like, totally robbed us. It's bulls.h.i.+t. I'm going back.”
”Molly, I don't think they do exchanges. It's not like Nordstrom, where you can con them into taking the shoes back even after you wore them once. You stuck your wet finger in it.”
”We were ripped off. They think just because we're white suburban girls they can sell us this weak-a.s.s s.h.i.+t.” She was beginning to sound more and more like someone on HBO, although I'd have to say the effect was closer to Ali G Ali Gthan Sopranos Sopranos. ”I'm going to demand a refund.”
This was my first inkling that things might go a little wrong.
So Molly went storming back to the parking lot and found our guy, and she began b.i.t.c.hing and moaning, but he didn't seem that upset. He seemed kind of, I don't know, amused by her. He let her rant and rave, just nodding his head, and when she finally ran out of steam, he said, ”Honey, darling, you bought heroin. Not cocaine. That's why you didn't get a jolt. It's not supposed to jolt you. It's supposed to slow you down, not that it seems to be doing that, either.”
Molly had worked up so much outrage that she still saw herself as the wronged party. ”Well, how was I supposed to know that?”
”Because we sell cocaine by vial color. Red tops, blue tops, yellow tops. I just had you girls figured for heroin girls. You looked like you knew your way around, got tired of OxyContin, wanted the real thing.”