The Red Cup
“Nothing’s gonna change my world…”
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There she is. Not a bit of make up is on her face but it doesn’t matter. No, she’s still beautiful-- as beautiful as you could ever imagine. The sad thing is that she’s not even trying. The lack of effort kills me. Her hair is pulled back in a ponytail, her eyes low and exhausted. She wears a faded green t-shirt that looks like it has seen better days and tiny, black shorts that she’d probably wear while on a late afternoon jog around the neighborhood after school. No, she’s not even trying. Despite all this, in a tan colored room full of people that are dressed in their best attire, she glows.
As I move through the drunken crowd of my now former classmates, “Across the Universe” by The Beatles plays in the background. It hums low and in an almost somber fashion. The sound of a hundred voices attempts to drown it out. “Nothing’s gonna change my world,” the song says optimistically. As I get closer and closer to her, I almost feel as if John Lennon and Paul McCartney themselves are trying to convince me of this notion first-hand. I try to believe them-- at first, I do. However, as I climb further and further into the living and breathing mass, I begin to become more and more uncertain of their confidence.
It all comes down to a plastic, red cup.
Her tiny fingers hold on to it. I’m not even half way across the room when I first spot it. Who knew such a small, red cup could be so Earth shattering? The moment my eyes make contact with it, I feel my stomach drop. It churns and spurts. I feel dull pain form in my legs and under my brain. Somehow, in that seven-hour car ride over where I watched the world move through my window in a daze, I saw this happening. Somehow, I knew. It just had to happen.
He sits on the worn, faded red couch to her left. Every now and then, she casts a glance to him. He looks only to her. Then, I should have known. I should have seen the whole she-bang. But I don’t-- I want to believe in miracles. I want to believe that she still exists.
She’s clumsy in her stance-- nervous and anxious. She’s like a butterfly in its cocoon just before breaking out. At the moment, she’s broken the seal but she’s afraid to fly out. She’s afraid of what others will think. She’s afraid of my glance and me.
Her face changes even more as I approach. You could say that it drops just as my stomach had only a few minutes ago. I had only seen her an hour ago at a local tourist trap beach store. She was still in the same fashion of dress. However, she was just as she was back in Jackson. She was still just Haley.
Back at the store, she had said that maybe she’d see my friends and I around again. Just maybe. Minutes pass. The boys and I run across the highway while dodging speeding cars after grabbing some Wendy’s. It’s late and I’m starving. I’ve almost forgotten that I require food to continue to live. As I sit inside the modestly sized condo and stuff the calorie-filled fries in my mouth, I look out the window and at the black lake that separates us from the rest of the condos. Looking over the water, I wonder if she’s over there with everyone else. I wonder what she’s doing.
I hear rumors. I hear it’s an orgy of sex and alcohol. Kids standing on the tops of cars. Beer cans lining the streets. Swimming pools filled with young, naked bodies lit only by the moonlight from the dark night sky. The class of 2006 has only been in Destin, Florida for three hours and already it’s made it into its own little cesspool of decadence and hedonism.
Through it all, I wonder how she’s doing in the middle of the mayhem. After a while, I manage to convince my friends to go over to the other side.
People are everywhere. It’s a sea of human beings. I swim through.
My friends and I make our way into the nearest house, looking for one of our housemates that had wondered over an hour earlier. Of course, he’s not who I’m looking for. No, I’m only looking for her. By the time my eyes make contact with her and the red cup, I wish that I had never left our secluded condo on the other side of the lake.
When we talk, her words are edgy and uneasy. The entire time, I’m trying to make my eyes go over the rim of her plastic cup, trying to see what’s inside. Of course, I know what’s there. But, for one reason or another, I never actually see it. As we talk, she never dares to lift the cup to her lips. She holds it as low as humanly possible.
The talk is just random, nervous chitchat. It’s just to pass the time and act like nothing out of the ordinary is occurring. By now, we’re both acting. Neither one of us knows what to do. In a way, we both feel guilty.
Time passes awkwardly and slowly. He’s still looking at her.
Eventually, the rest of my friends come in to rescue me-- pulling me away to continue our search for our missing housemate. As we walk away, I turn my head to take one last look. She’s still standing there, only now her stance is as rough and off-balance as it could possibly be. Her face is slightly red and her eyes look as tired as ever.
She knows that I know. She knows that I’m upset.
As we move further and further away, the sea of my former classmates closes around her, swallowing her up.
Soon, she’s drowning in the middle of them. She makes no effort to swim for the surface.
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“Images of broken light, which dance before me like a million eyes…”
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Her blue, energetic eyes are as bright as you could have ever imagined. Her light, brown hair floats down in the air. Her smile widens, showing her pearly white teeth. She looks right at me, the look of pure joy on her face. It just doesn’t make sense.
How can she exist?
Tickets spurt out of the cheap pinball game in front of her, forming a huge pile on the ground. Deep down, I think about all the dirt from the floor that’s accumulating on the tickets. But I can only think about that for a split second-- after all, she’s looking right at me. Inside, I feel butterflies form in my stomach. For a second, I feel like I’m floating.
She offers me a bucket of tokens that she has accrued but I say no thank you. She then flashes me another smile and turns back to the game.
How can she exist?
Her innocence is almost that of a child and yet she’s a cheerleader at one of the biggest private high schools in the state. She is completely untouched and untarnished. Her eyes are bright and lively. Her smile almost never fades. She enjoys studying math and science. After stating this, she is always the first to call herself a nerd. Despite this, she has a very natural beauty about her. It doesn’t make sense-- she shouldn’t exist.
It is 2:45 in the morning on graduation night. In just one day, she will be just like everyone else. In just one day, they will take away everything that made her unique and special. They will take away everything that I loved about her.
And she will love every single second of it.
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“Words are flying out like endless rain into a paper cup…”
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She stands in front of me just as awkwardly as she did the first night I saw her drinking. That was two nights ago. Since then, everything has changed. Now, nothing is the same. She’s not Haley anymore. She looks exactly the same but the image has been perverted and blackened. The smile is gone. The eyes no longer glow. No, it’s not even Haley anymore.
We’re standing on the sand in front of the ocean. Waves crash near by, spraying salt water into the air. To my right, all of my former classmates sit, looking into the water. Most of them are already drinking. It is only ten in the morning.
“Hey, I need to talk to you,” I said just a few moments ago.
Now, she stands before me in a pink two-piece swimsuit. She still looks absolutely beautiful but that’s the last thing on my mind. No, all of that is gone. She wears thick, black sunglasses, completely shielding her eyes. Her hair is tied back in a ponytail. I’m still wearing my white T-shirt, covering my purple, horribly sunburned skin. It’s my armor just like the sunglasses are hers. The entire time we talk, I keep trying to peer through her glasses, trying to see her eyes. I feel like we never make eye contact the entire time despite the fact that I’m glaring right into her sunglasses.
“Umm… this is going to be kind of awkward…” I find myself sighing right to her face. Deep down, I hope it will lighten the mood.
“You want to talk about the past few days?” she asks.
She already knows. It’s so obvious.
I had tried to confront her yesterday. It didn’t work out-- I got sick to my stomach before I could reach her and threw up bits of a recently inhaled Coca-Cola on the beach, tears in my eyes. Only Patrick saw me. I broke down in front of him. I had goose bumps and my hairs were standing on end. I was shaking. She got me shaking.
“It’s Haley, isn’t it?” he had asked.
Yes, it was. He knew. It was all so obvious.
“I’m just really worried about you is all… I just don’t understand what’s going on… just… are you okay?” I stumble to her.
I think about how many times I’ve gone over this conversation in my head, all the different versions of it. I think of how I imagined her with her hair down and without sunglasses, her eyes looking directly into mine. I think of all the things I’ve fantasized about telling her and all the things I wish I could tell her. I wish I could tell her about how much she has hurt me. I wish I could tell her that I’m pissed off. I wish I could tell her to think about what she’s done and all the consequences of it. For a split second, I have the urge to tell her to think about God and how he feels about the things she has done. Then, immediately I hate myself for this brash and illogical thought. In my head, I’m calling myself an asshole and, at the same time, almost wanting to be one to her.
However, when it comes down to it and she’s standing there in front of me in her two-piece swimsuit in front of the entire class, all I can say is that I’m just worried. That’s all.
“I’m fine… really, I know what I’m doing. Really. I’m okay. It means a lot that you care enough to say something but… I’m okay,” she states.
“It’s just… are you sure about that? I’ve heard some really bad things. Things that you wouldn’t do. I’m not sure you…” I stagger.
“None of that’s true. People are just saying things…” she says with some hurt in her voice.
“Are you sure? Are you sure you are okay?” I ask again, struggling to find the right thing to say and trying to remember all the things I originally wanted to say to her.
“Yes, I’m fine. And I’m really flattered that you felt the need to check up on me. But, you have to understand, this is my life and I can live it anyway that I want to,” she spits.
I feel pain in my chest. For a brief second, I almost feel like hitting her across the face. I feel like ripping her apart. I just want her to know how I feel.
I make a low blow.
“I just wanted to help you. You know, all the other guys, they feel the same way. They’re pretty mad. They’ve all wanted to talk to you too but I just wanted to do it myself.”
I cannot see her eyes but I’m sure they look hurt at this moment. Her stance gets off balance. She’s like a leaf shaking in the wind.
“Well, I’m fine. But I’m glad you all care,” she manages.
“Okay. Just know that, if you need help, you can come to me. I can help you,” I say, trying to reach her.
“Thanks.”
“No problem,” I say, awkwardly starting to move away, “Just be careful,” I throw out in passing one more time.
I don’t hear her reply if she does. I start moving towards the ocean, pulling my t-shirt off, exposing my weak, purple body to the world. It must look like I feel inside. I never stop moving once I start walking for fear of breaking down in front of everyone. The rest of my friends are way out in the ocean, battling waves. They probably have no idea what I just did. I don’t dare turn back to look at her.
The water hits my legs, sending a shiver through my body. The water’s cold but I need it. I need it to keep me up. I start to swim into the vast ocean, moving towards my friends. For a brief moment, I wish that the current would just pull me under.
I don’t see her for the rest of the day. I’m told that she spent most of it locked in her room, crying.
Still, for the rest of the trip, she doesn’t drink again. As far as I know, she doesn’t even talk to him again.
She crawls into her bed at night, the echoes of merriment and good times reverberating all about her from the rest of the house. But she’s all alone in the bed, grasping tightly onto her second pillow. Inside, she feels nothing but the feeling of something missing. Her eyes hurt and she feels tired, overworked and confused. She feels pulled in a thousand different directions. She feels alone.
I’m the hero. The hero.
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“Thoughts meander like a restless wind inside a letter box, they tumble blindly as they make their way…”
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My hands work their way through my hair as I move my eyes around, searching the faded brick wall to my right. I take a breath of the icy air and then draw it out of my body. It is past midnight. My friend Amy sits across from me on the other side of the table. My hair is standing on end and I have goose bumps. A cold wind is making its way through the night air. I’m shaking again, trying to tell her what happened. I’m trying to get her to understand.
It’s been years since it all happened but it is still in the back of my mind. It won’t go away. The entire week it has been there, gnawing away at me. An hour earlier, I started to crack and she saw it. We ventured out into the bitter night, away from the rest of civilization. She wanted to know what was bothering me and now I’m trying to get her to see why I feel the way I do. I’m trying to get her to see.
But she doesn’t see. She doesn’t understand.
They never understand.
A few months after it all happened, I’m walking around campus with Anna, trying to tell her the same thing. She had been there, going through her own personal problems with separate people. I try to tell her what my experience was like and the pain I had felt. I try to tell her how it weighed on me throughout the summer, making me sick, insecure and untrusting.
She tries to tell me that she understands but, from the tone of her voice, I can tell she doesn’t.
They never do.
To be honest, there are times when I myself don’t even understand.
I ask Anna what really happened that night. She was in the same room as Haley when it all went down. She tells me.
Now, I know the truth but it still doesn’t change things. No, it’s always hanging over me, everywhere I go. It seeps into everything.
Months earlier, I’m standing in my kitchen, directing Haley herself in my latest film. I cast her in the film to try and make up for what had happened between us. Already, I’m trying to make up for the confrontation. Little does she know that most of the plot of the film is dealing directly with what I’m going through inside. It’s dealing directly with what happened to her.
As we move to set up a shot, I notice that she has her hair pulled back in a ponytail just as she had that day when I confronted her. I always imagined her hair down for the character she was playing just as I had imagined it down for our confrontation. I don’t have the heart to tell her to change it. In a way, it’s fitting as it is. As I begin to direct her, we make eye contact. They still look just as tired and faded as they did when it all began to happen.
Throughout the shoot and for the rest of our friendship, we never discuss what happened. Late at night, there are times when I find myself looking at her number in my cell phone. I always come close to calling her, wanting to talk about it all. But I never do.
My next few films follow the same pattern. Every time I start on them, I feel like I’m getting away from the subject matter but, somehow, I always find myself coming back to it. I never cast her again in one of the films but, in a way, I never feel like I have to. No matter what I do, her story is always there in some form or fashion. She is always there. What happened is always there.
But it’s not just present in the filmmaking.
No, it’s everywhere.
I see it in the eyes of every girl I know. I find myself being overprotective with all of them, paranoid of their next action. I’m afraid of seeing them go and losing them just as I lost her. I’m afraid of seeing that same hunger in them that I saw in her. I’m afraid of them going down the same path. I’m afraid of seeing their tiny fingers latched around the plastic, red cup.
But, most of all, I’m afraid of them enjoying it just as much as she had.
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“It calls me on and on…”
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I think of Ben Parker.
I think of how he moves away from everyone that second night, in the heat of the party. He moves into the kitchen all by himself. With drones and echoes of everyone laughing and having the time of their lives next door, he goes and lights the stove. The eye slowly turns red, the heat beginning to rise off of it. He simply stands and watches.
In the room next door, Haley is beginning to do the act that will haunt me for years to come. Already, it is beginning to make its way through her body and system. But that doesn’t mean a thing to Ben. No, he has other things on his mind.
Slowly, he takes his shirt off. With it swung over his shoulder, he walks over to the counter and opens it up, picking up a large kitchen knife. He then walks back over to the stove, placing the knife down upon it. After tightly winding the t-shirt up, he takes it and bites down on it as hard as he can.
The knife is starting to turn crimson with heat. For a second, he can smell the alcohol from his breath bouncing off of the t-shirt that lines his jaws, making its way to his nostrils. Just days ago, the stuff had never touched his lips. Now, they are the best of friends.
With a hint of grace, he lowers his hand down, picking up the knife up from the stove.
I think about how, in that moment, he must have thought about his mother. He must have thought about how she had struggled with breast cancer for a year, actually coming close to death at one point. I think about how he must have thought about all those sleepless nights when he lay in bed, crying and cursing God for the horrible thing that was happening to her. How could he dare try and take her away? She had never done anything wrong in her life. Now, here she was, dying. She was dying slowly. I think about how, finally, he had lost his faith. I think about how he had said goodbye to our Lord… how he decided that it just wasn’t worth it anymore.
Strengthening his grip on the t-shirt with his teeth, Ben puts the blistering knife into his shoulder and then calmly places it back down on a nearby table. He doesn’t cry. No, that time has passed. With all the stuff in his system, he barely feels it. Besides, he’s already felt it all before.
Slowly, he sits down on the kitchen floor alone, the t-shirt still clenched between his jaws. He sits there, staring forward, nothing to express in his face. He sits there until they find him minutes later, looks of horror breaking through their once joyous, drunken expressions.
We see him on the beach the next day, a horrible, jagged scar on his shoulder from where he placed the burning blade. When we ask him about it, he attempts to laugh it off, saying he had one too many.
But I see it. I see it in his eyes.
I see the knife, the stove and the alcohol flowing inside of him. I see his mother. I see his fingers around the cup.
He gives another forced laugh and walks off across the beach, the sun beating down on him and his scar. When he comes to the water he stops, looking over to his right where the rest of his former classmates sit sunning, talking and getting drunk. He then turns to his left, seeing a side of the beach that is empty of anyone that he is acquainted with. Despite being filled with other people, this side of the beach feels virtually abandoned.
Slowly, he puts his feet in the water, moving a hand over his fresh scar, and begins to move down the left side of the beach.
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“Sounds of laughter, shades of life are ringing through my opened ears, inciting and inviting me…”
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Years have passed.
I sit in the house of a college graduate surrounded by friends. My friend Caleb and I are the only ones without a drink in our hands. Despite this, I’m not uncomfortable in the setting. In fact, I’m quite relaxed. The week has been stressful and this is just what I have needed.
Jack gets up and grabs a karaoke microphone. He’s had way too many and, honestly, I doubt he’ll even remember meeting me for the first time tonight. Every time I see him in the future, I am sure to introduce myself just to make sure. He stumbles with the microphone in hand, almost falling over. Shortly after this, he begins to berate Caleb for inadvertently introducing him to his ex-girlfriend. He talks about how she was a complete psychopath, going into a story on how she broke into an ex-boyfriend’s house and vandalized it.
Everyone in the room is dying with laughter. I am too. It’s funny. There’s no sense of stress in the room.
As the night wanes on, people begin to become sluggish with their words and in the way that they walk. Everyone is plastered. But, it’s okay. They’re just having fun. I’m having fun. Every now and then, they playfully rebuke me for not drinking. They’re always offering me drinks. But, it’s okay. I’m not offended. It doesn’t upset me. I don’t feel like they’re trying to do anything wrong to me. And I have no problem with what they’re doing.
All around me they laugh and tell jokes. The television is too loud but no one seems to notice but me. Despite this, the room feels light and calm. Everything just feels relaxed. There’s not a care in the world here. There’s nothing to worry about. It’s just a place of solitude and peace.
I move my head to the right and see a red, plastic cup on the counter.
Part of me wants to drink it. After all, my twenty-first birthday has come and passed. Still, I can’t. I just can’t touch it and it’s all because of her.
In a setting like this, I wonder if I was even just in confronting her. What right did I have? What was she even doing wrong? Was she doing anything wrong? Most of what I believed was occurring was all just hearsay or my own imagination assuming the worst.
For years, I felt like confronting her was the only important thing I had done in my life. Now, in this setting, I have to wonder if it meant anything at all. What was the point? Did it even need to happen? Was I just being overly judgmental? Was it a terrible thing to do? Should I be proud or ashamed of my actions and my feelings?
I don’t know. I don’t have an answer. But, looking at the red cup, I know one thing. I know that I can’t drink what’s inside of it. I can’t do that because I still remember the cold, bathroom floor.
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“Pools of sorrow, waves of joy are drifting thorough my open mind, possessing me and caressing me…”
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I sit on the cold, bathroom floor. In the room next door, my classmates sleep peacefully. I don’t know how they do it.
I’m in pure hell. My stomach is eating itself to bits. I imagine the acid swishing around inside of it, eating through my intestines, trying to rip through my skin. I feel a dull pain in my chest, forehead, and legs. My arms and legs won’t stop shaking. I feel like vomiting but I know that my body is going to refuse me that luxury. My body rocks back and forth, my hands clasped together. Just minutes ago in bed, I cursed God for letting this all happen. Now, I’m valiantly trying to gain back his favor.
“Did you hear about Haley?” Jake had said to David as they entered the bedroom to go to sleep.
I had been in bed for the past hour and was now acting like I was asleep. Once I hear her name, I feel sweat forming between my toes.
God, no. Don’t let it be her. Not again.
“She was drinking again. She got plastered and was trying to get everyone drunk. Then she went into a room with Joe. When she came out, she was putting her shirt back on and was laughing.”
I feel my whole body drop. For a split second, it feels like I’ve died. Nothing feels real anymore. Then, all I feel is pain everywhere that you could imagine. My head throbs, a sick hollowness forming in my stomach and moving up into my throat.
I turn my face into my pillow and bury it there. I don’t want to breath. I don’t want to see. I feel like ripping my own eyes out. Minutes earlier, I had been praying. Now, I’m cursing God. How could he let this happen? How could he let her go like that? How?
Minutes pass as David and Jake settle in the room. After waiting for what seems like hours, I slowly climb out of bed and shamble over to the bedroom’s bathroom. I open the door and close it behind me. As soon as the white light flows through the room, my legs give out and I hit the floor.
My mouth opens up but nothing comes out. I try to scream but there is nothing. Sweltering tears come out, streaming down my face and hitting the bathroom floor. Slowly, with my face in a constant state of strain, I feel the blood vessels around my eyeballs begin to burst. For the next day or so, the skin around my eyes will be swollen and have little pink scratches about it. I heave back and forth with my body, trying to find the right rhythm to make the pain stop.
But it doesn’t.
Suddenly, I’m there with her in the condo across the lake. I see them all around her, cheering her on as she downs shot after shot of Vodka. He’s there, watching her go, a smile on his face. She smiling too, perhaps glowing to all of them as she had always glowed for me. But now she’s something-- now, she’s one of them.
They flirt. They’ve had their eyes on each other for days now. I saw it the first night. Already, it was happening. Already, she was his.
He gives her one last shot before they stumble off to the bedroom. The door creaks open and, under her drunken haze, she feels the butterflies start to form in her stomach. She feels him touch her bare skin and, before she knows it, her shirt’s on the ground. He gives her a playful push and, without a hint of resistance, she falls to the bed behind her. She lets go, surrendering herself to him. He climbs next to her, gently pulling her head up next to his. Then, in a haze, their lips come together.
I think about all the loneliness in her life that I had no idea existed up until that moment. I think about how it all disappears, the taste of him and the alcohol following through her mouth. I think about all the empty, lonesome nights she’s spent after late cheerleader practices, crawling into bed and grasping unto her pillow, imagining it to be someone… anyone. Now, here she is with the star quarterback of the high school football team. He is caressing her. He whispers nothingness. He tells her he loves her.
She melts. She becomes weak. They make her weak. Then… she’s gone.
I’m on the floor, my hands loosing feeling from the way that I’m squeezing them together. I’m whispering to God in horror as these thoughts play out before me. I’m whispering pleas to him to just make it stop. I’m begging him to take her away. I’m begging for him to make it all not true. I’m begging for her innocence to still be in tact.
New thoughts come to my brain, worse than the ones before. In these, she’s in charge. She gives him the shots, getting him drunk. She’s drunk too, but not enough to be not completely in charge. With the door flung open, she uses all of her strength to hurl him onto the bed, jumping on top of him just as he strikes the mattress. There’s no time to even breath before she forces her lips onto his. She’s in charge. She wants everything. She wants it all to happen.
I curse God again, my stomach churning to the point where I start to taste blood in my mouth. I run my hands through my greasy hair and try to get off the ground. As I rise, I see myself in the mirror and think about slamming my hands into it. But I don’t. I don’t have the strength. I don’t have the balls. It’s only a moment or two before I’m back on the ground again.
As I lie on the ground, I start asking God for help again. I ask him to just help me get through the experience. I ask him for the strength to just confront her and reason with her. I ask him to give me the right words to say. I ask him to give me the strength to say just one word to her.
I never sleep the entire night.
During that time, I think about the cold tile making my hairs stand on end.
I think about her tiny fingers wrapped around the red, plastic cup.
I think about her faded, tired eyes.
I think about the lyrics of the Beatles’ song.
“Nothing’s gonna change my world…” I tell myself.
“Nothing’s gonna change my world…”
