Side Effects May Vary

A sharp memory of my body pressed against Harvey’s on this very mattress last night. His kisses on my eyelids and my cheeks and—I froze, completely paralyzed. The whole situation came into focus. This stranger. In my bed. Debora on the bottom bunk. Harvey in the living room.

I grasped for the strings of my bikini, trying to hold my swimsuit top in place as I scrambled off his lap and into the corner of the twin bed farthest from him.

“Get out. Go.” I felt disgusting. This was wrong. Maybe I had lost Harvey, but I couldn’t lose myself; especially not when I had a choice.

“But you said—”

“I said get out. Now.”

He practically fell from the top bunk, then gathered his shoes and combed the carpet for his car keys, tripping his way to the door. I closed my eyes tight with my knees pulled to my chest. The bedroom door clicked shut behind him. I felt like I was drowning again, like last night. And again, it was all my fault.

When I heard the front door shut, I climbed down the ladder to lock the dead bolt. On my way back, I heard the buzz of the kitchen light and tried to tiptoe past Harvey, who was standing there with half a piece of cold pizza in his hand.

Too late. He had already spotted me, pinning me in place with his eyes. He dumped the rest of the pizza in the trash. I watched him as he stood there, his chest bare, wearing only blue plaid boxer shorts. His hair was disheveled and his face lined with pillow creases.

Humiliation crept up my chest to my cheeks, I crossed my arms. Not in defiance but in defense.

Then he spoke to me, which I never expected to happen again. His voice was detached and cold. “He didn’t know how much to leave for you. I told him first one’s on the house. Isn’t that right, Al?”

The worst part was that he called me Al. It felt familiar, but really it was a knife in my ribs. My chest tightened, and my eyes burned, holding back tears. I didn’t say anything.

He didn’t mean it, I told myself. He only said it to get back at me because I had hurt him.

In my bedroom I found Debora sitting upright on the bottom bunk, with the blankets neatly folded back on her lap. She reached for her glasses on the nightstand and unfolded them carefully before pushing them up the bridge of her nose, her eyes relaxing, as her world fell into place. The little lamp on the bedside table let out a small pool of light.

I wanted her to disappear. I wanted her to dissolve.

“Get out, Debora.” Maybe if I told enough people to get out they finally would.

“No.” She folded her hands in her lap. She wore pink-and-white-striped pajamas, the type of PJs that button up the front and look like they should be ironed. Each of her even blond hairs sat uniformly in place.

“Leave.”

“You are hollow on the inside, Alice, did you know that?” she asked. “Rotten too. And no one cares. No one cares because you make it so difficult to. I should tell you to go on being rotten on the inside, but I can’t because Harvey is so invested in you. Here’s the sad truth: Harvey cares for you. He more than cares for you, and he still would even if you were as ugly on the outside as you are on the inside. Harvey, the one you string along mercilessly. Not some slob who wants you as arm candy, but Harvey. He loves you, and for whatever reason this transcendental devotion he has for you defies the laws of science and love.”

Tucking her hair behind her ear, she said all of this in a calm, even tone, like she was reading from a history book. Regardless of her tone, her words hit me and drilled into my chest, burrowing deep and deeper. I was rotten on the inside, and I didn’t know if that had happened over time or if it had always been so. For a moment, I felt bad for Debora. Here she was telling me how much her boyfriend loved me. The worst part of it was that she was more deserving of Harvey than I was and she knew it.

I sat down next to her on the bottom bunk, and the tears that I had swallowed back in the kitchen with Harvey poured down my face. My shoulders shook as sob after sob broke through my chest.

I loved him too, but it wasn’t that happy ending bullshit. It was disfigured and crushing. “What do I do?”

“About Harvey?”

“No, well, yes, but no. What do I do—” I stopped, letting my tears eat up my words. “About what’s wrong with me.”

“I don’t really know, Alice. I think it’s different for everybody. But maybe you should figure that out on your own, before dragging Harvey through it.”

Wiping my nose with the back of my hand, I nodded.

“I know what happened last Friday with the memorial stuff must have been hard. I still can’t believe someone would even do that. I don’t know what to say except that I’m sorry that had to happen to you.”

“Thanks.”

“Listen,” she said, “I can’t tell you what to do. I mean, you of all people, obviously. You don’t listen to anyone. But don’t destroy Harvey. Because you can. You have that power. Love’s different for him. For Harvey—”

“Do you like him?”

She didn’t answer.

“You should tell him,” I said.