Vincent Square: Chapter 3: The Princess Royal

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It was an Indian summer day in late September.  Tegan and I were done with classes and we were putzing around SoHo people watching.  We often didn’t say much.  We just were.  It was an unspoken understanding between us.  Each of us had spent most of our pennies getting ourselves into school and paying rent – gathering enough money to escape but having no money to do anything once we got there.  We hadn’t many other luxuries.  I shared Ramen with him when my friends would send them from home.  Otherwise, we didn’t eat much except the one baguette we would buy ourselves a week and slowly pick at to fill the ache - and I lived off of the cartons of cigarettes sent.  Camel straight, no filters.  3 packs a day.  When you can’t eat, you fill yourself with something, so that it was. 

I was leaning against a brick wall beside a café, exhaling a cigarette when a scrawny redheaded kid came up and said, “Are you American?”  I looked around.  Was he really talking to me?  I hadn’t been speaking so it couldn’t have been my accent that gave anything away.  I was sort of a Goth loving hippy and from what I knew of I melded into most environments and I sure of shit wasn’t toting an American flag in my pocket so I was mildly taken aback and more so annoyed.  This was my home and I had believed I fit in like a camelion. 

“Yah.” I responded bluntly while staring aimlessly away from him.  “Cool…you live here?  I’m Dave.”  “Yah.” I turned to look him in the eye.  Sizing him up.  He looked decent enough.  Kind eyes, big smile.  A tad dirty.  He wasn’t lost like Tegan and I.  He was traveling.  There was a difference.  “I’m Willow.”  I extended moving my cigarette to my left hand and handing him my right. “Sorry to interrupt – I just got here and I’m trying to connect with people.  I’m camping outside of the city.  Traveling for a year or so.  London is my first stop.  Heard you asking your friend for a light so grabbed on to the assumption that you were American.”  Oh.  Ok.  I felt better now…there’s a chance I was blending. 

We talked for a bit about the fact that he had just arrived from California and was planning to camp his way around Europe and that we had a pretty large house with plenty of space so if he needed a place to crash, or to shower, he was more than welcome.  We had quickly learned the art of sharing space.  When you have a backpack, it’s like a community.  You share beds, floors, food, and stories.  You randomly knock on doors in the middle of the night of an address given to you in a drunken moment in a hostel and they actually take you in.  And so, I gave Dave our phone number, completely comfortable that at one point or another he might show up on our doorstep asking for a couch or a crumb.

Tegan and I parted ways with our new friend and headed home. 

The next day was tough.  The girls were going to Amsterdam and planning to smuggle some goodies back via tampons and the boys were heading up to Scotland.  Tegan and I didn’t have any money to go away for a long weekend of debauchery so we waved goodbye to our friends and settled into our usual night of bong hits, stories of his life working in the butter factory and my dreams of writing the great American novel, when the phone rang.

“Ughhh….” I grunted walking up the two floors to the dining room where our one house phone existed.  “Hello.”  “Hi, can I speak with Willow please?”  “Speaking.” “Hey – it’s Dave, we met yesterday in SoHo.  Dirty camper guy…” I could actually hear his ease and smile from the other end of the phone.  “Hey man, what’s up?”  “I was just calling to see what you and your roommates were doing tonight?  I met some cool dudes today that are playing in a pub tonight.  Was wondering if you wanted to come?”  Ugh, I thought to myself.  This guy totally wants to get in my pants and he’s so not my type.   But I was bored as shit and well, what could it hurt?  “Mmmmm….hmmm….ok.  Sounds cool.  Where should we meet you?”  “Victoria Station.  Upstairs, outside, I’ll find you.  8:00?”  Ughhhh….misery…god I pray he doesn’t try to touch me.  “Cool man, we’ll see you there.” Emphasizing the ‘we’ using Tegan as my imaginary boyfriend decoy just in case.

“Teeeeg.  Get off your ass and shower.  We’re going out.  I HAVE PLANS.  ME!  PLANS!  Up up, shower shower.”  Blank eyes stare back at me.  I know this look.  “T.  I’m not going anywhere.  I’m good here.  I can’t even afford a pint.”  “Dude, I’ll buy you a pint, a got some cash in the mail today.  You can’t leave me with the redhead to myself.  I can’t bear rejecting him.  But we need to get out.  C’mon!!”  “Nope.”  I’ll be here when you get home but I’m not going.”

“Shit.” I respond as I storm up the stairs to try to find some non-flannel, emo, hippy ensemble suitable for a night of doing something more.

“Do I look ok?” I grumble as Tegan lay on my bed watching me get ready.  “You look like that chic from Popeye.  What’s her name?” “Uhm…Olive Oil or something…”  “Yah.  Her.  You look like her.” “She’s ugly.  Thanks.”  “No man, I meant long and like thin and shit.  You look cool.”  “I hate you.  Have another hit – it makes you incredibly literate, asshole.”  I bend down to kiss him on the cheek.  “You sure you won’t come?”  He doesn’t respond.  “Fine, you better be awake for the recap when I get back.  Love you butter boy.  Later.”  And there I went out.  My first big night in the city all on my lonesome. 

Dave was there, at the top of the stairs, smiling his innocent, life is good smile.  We walked a few blocks chatting about life as a roaming 20-something year old.  We were all in some way trying to live out our own version of Dharma Bums and could all on some level relate.

Eventually we ended up in front of the Princess Royal Pub.  “Here we are.  I think…” Dave muttered.  “Sweet” was my retort.  We ordered pints – and sat down and suddenly I became overwhelmed with the need to set things straight.  And so I went on a rant.  “Hey man, it’s great to meat you and it’s cool to have new friends but I have to just put this out there that if you think this is a ‘date’ it’s not a ‘date’ and there isn’t a chance in Hell that we’d ever hook up.  OK?  I have no interest and I just didn’t want you to get the wrong idea.  Sorry.  Just needed to make sure we were clear.”

Silence.

Dave erupts in laughter.  I shift uncomfortably.  What the fuck is so funny?

“Dude, I appreciate your honesty but I have no interest in you either.  My girlfriend is meeting me here next week and we’re doing this trip together.  I was just trying to make some friends while I was hanging out here until we started the trip.” 

“Oh.”

His mocking smile was annoying as shit but I couldn’t help but laugh as well.  I mean seriously – I just assumed he wanted me.  But I had barely said two words to him – why would he?  Eventually when I got over the weird ego bruise of the guy I totally wasn’t interested in not being interested in me, we began to have a blast together.  Turned out we had loads in common and I felt as if I had met one of the good people.  Those that are who they represent themselves to be.  Say what they mean.  Mean what they say, all that jazz. 

Eventually we got more rowdy, got locals involved, started doing shots, laughing with folks, playing music on the jukebox and toasting to random encounters in SoHo. Out of nowhere and in the midst of laughing I turned my head.  The door to the pub opened.  It was as simple as that.  A door opening.

All feeling left my being.  Light and energy shifted and moved and jolted between me and the doorway of the pub.  In the silence of a second my hand fell loose and the pint in my hand crashed to bits on the floor.  My stare never waivered.  A part of myself was walking through the door and the other part of me was standing still while glass shattered all around me.  It was nothing about him.  Not his piercing blue eyes and raven black hair.  It had nothing to do with the fact that he looked as if he didn’t belong among us – in truth; I never saw any of that.  All that I saw was a blinding light of a link to a soul that had been a part of my story for lifetimes and here, in this life I had waited 20 years to find him and now I had.  In London.  He was standing across the room from me and for all that I didn’t know about whom he was or why I was finding him now, I had missed him so much. 

“Dude, you ok?  What the Hell man, you trashed?” Dave mumbled in a drunken stupor.  My head heavy and lost but snapping back to reality…“That’s my soul mate” the only words I could mumble as I stared straight ahead – at him.  “Who…?” Dave’s voice trailed off while following my stare.  “No shit.”  He let out a laugh.  “That’s Josiah.  That’s the dude that I met today busking in the street.  And the other guy – Noah.  The guy behind him.  That’s them.  That’s why we are here.  Ha.” 

Indeed.  That is why I was there.  Finally.  My reason found me. 

Vincent Square Chapter One: You Can't Go Home Again...

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My hand rubbed the cassette cover.  He had made me a mixed tape to bring on my journey.  I barely knew him.  I can’t even remember his name now but I believe to him, I was much more.  To me, he was a moment to occupy space and time before I left. 

Staring out the window as the highway silenced past me I was lost in thought.  Having no idea what I was doing, only knowing that I had to do it.  All that pulled me from my melancholy anticipation was her grabbing my hand.

“Hey.” I smiled looking over at her.  Her eyes welling with tears. My mother, in the front seat slightly turned her head to listen.  “Do you really have to go?” she whispered.  “I don’t know if I can handle things without you.  I’m sick to my stomach.”  She was so gentle, this dear friend of mine whom I had lived with at university and who I was leaving behind to ‘find myself’ somewhere in London.  We were two polar opposites.  She a preppy, virgin, wealthy Jew, me, a wild, non-virgin, Birkenstock wearing, dirt poor, Atheist.  Yet somehow, in each other we found acceptance, intrigue and comfort. “Delilah, you’ll be fine.  We’ll talk on the phone every day, I’ll write you letters constantly, and I’ll be back before you know it.  Promise.  I have to go.  I’m sort of dying here.  I need to see what else is out there.”  I try to sound confident but inside I had no idea what the fuck I was doing or why.  I’m just running.  20 years old and already running. “Promise.” I said again, squeezing her hand extra tight giving her the ‘I so mean this…not…smile’.  “Dad, how much longer til JFK?” “Less than an hour Weezy,” he said with a crack in his throat.  Above all else, I believe he was taking it the worst. I was his baby, and best friend and I was leaving him to muddle through without me. 

JFK was chaotic.  Hundreds of college students registering, waiting in line, lugging enormous suitcases, staring nervously around them, mimicking smiles to appear friendly as they embarked to study abroad and leave their families and friends for a year or more. 

I’ve never done well with goodbyes so my exit was quick.  I pointed around to the chaos and shooed my parents and Delilah away.  “I’ve got it from here – you have a long drive back…just go.”  As I placed my imaginary armor on, I was cracking…slowly.  Things became dizzy and I became overheated.  Hugs, my parents crying, Delilah holding on to me too tightly.  I was swallowing rocks to not break.  As they left the airport, and walked past the window I knew nothing else to do but stick up my middle finger and mouth the words “Fuck You” – mostly to make them laugh, but mainly because I was terrified and suddenly felt incredibly abandoned. 

Once out of site I crumbled uncontrollably.  Running to the bathroom I was hyperventilating with fear.  Caught between trying all that I could to pull myself together and to release the fear, I was a convulsing child.  Splashing my face in the sink and doing all that I could to find my center an arm touched mine.  “It’s ok.  I just did the same thing.  Here…” as I look up there is a pile of paper towels in front of me to which I dove into.  Mortified and grateful for a moment of kindness.  Deep breath.  Deep breath.  I stand up and stare at her in the mirror.  She stares back with an empathtic smile.  “Hey, I’m Maris – goodbye’s suck.  I know,” she says as she extends her hand to greet mine.  “Hi, I’m Willow.” I retort half looking her in the eyes, half staring at my Doc Martens.  “Yes, goodbyes, not my thing - sorry, I feel like an ass…” stopping my apology mid-air knowing it isn’t required.  She waves her hand in the air gesturing all is forgotten.  She’s vey pretty.  Milky skin with freckles, voluptuous figure and hazelnut hair.  Tall and statuesque, emitting a devilish and soulful, kind energy. “You smoke?” she asked.  “Jesus, yes…” I reply.  “Good, come with me.  I met a chic that has some weed.  We’ve got 4 hours to kill before the flight – we might as well make it worth our while.    

And so there Maris became a part of me, in the most vulnerable of my moments, she pulled me up and pushed me into all that I was afraid of but that would be the beginning of all that I was to become.