Dear Eve, It's Friday.
Letters to my dead hero. Eve, you were a real one.
Dear Eve,
It’s sunny today. I’m thinking of you. Yesterday, I read an essay by a New York girl about her brother ten years after his suicide. When she writes, “He didn’t have any push. I have so much,” I thought of my mother. How I used to think I was the one with all the push, all the forward momentum; I used to believe I had so much force, all that brutal potential.
Leaving was the greatest push of all, and I was the one who made the call. Who stared at the ceiling in the office guest room because I didn’t feel safe in my room because it was so isolated, and feverishly asked my mother to pack up—now. Bring the dogs and enough clothes for two weeks. In fifteen minutes, we were out the door and driving away before Dad got home (we were always a little afraid of what he might do when confronted, so we took the dogs). “No mess,” my mother said the day after a great Austin storm, the kind that sweeps away cars and leaks into our front door which sat at the bottom of a great big hill. And even then, as her world crumbled, she calmly drove down the wet pavement, dry-eyed, calling hotels to find a room that allowed pets.
It was the Monday after Thanksgiving, which felt ironic somehow. Looking back, I see she must have possessed a great deal of push to leave her home and husband in the span of thirty minutes. I never saw her cry except when we watched an 80s film I can’t remember, and a character’s father died in a hospital bed. She loved hers, and I think she hoped I would feel the same about mine. We left the house clean and silent. But that is my mother—so quietly pushing forward.
I wonder if my push still exists. Or if I, like my father, spin out in circles, never moving forward, locked in our own centrifugal force.
Our little jokes, private smiles, and excursions felt to be some wonderful conspiracy, evidence of his preference for me. How he said he’d lay down his life for me. How without me he’d shoot himself, leap off a bridge, drive off a cliff for love of me. How I still think that might be love. How I see his face everywhere, how I’m not frightened in the way my therapist assumes I am. I am afraid, but only at how deeply I wish to reunite. How I wish to be covered in his arms, protected, and feel his stubble cut my cheek. I’m afraid of what it means. Do I want to be ruined? All that devotion and secret language did nothing to protect my mother and me.
Dear Eve,
It’s nearly five here. I’m thinking of you because I want to quit vaping and thinking about my father. I’m addicted to both. I wonder if you would stay in Los Angeles if a civil war was coming. I wonder if you would have chained yourself to the Hollywood sign before you let another city become your home. I wonder if I would do the same (somehow I doubt it, I’m a horrible coward). To what end does my devotion to our city reach?
I wonder what you would have thought about the essay, the one about the brother; if you would have liked it. What you might have thought of his suicide letter, of how his parents posted it on the Internet? What you would have said on the subject of morbid gifts?
Perhaps you'd think it was well-written or contemplated the contents of your own hypothetical suicide note. If you thought about dying in your final days or those months after the burn in the hospital, or if you wished you hadn’t drunk so much. I wish I could have met you, asked you questions, lunched on your back patio, surveying you over a glass of ice-cold red wine while you smoked. I wonder if you would have liked me. If you thought I’d had talent. Probably not. But it’s nice to imagine.
Dear Eve,
I want to be famous. I want to be fuck-you rich. I want to be amoral. Cruel. If I go to hell, so be it.
I want to be unattached. I want to be a wife. I want to be obedient. I want to be famous for being famous. I want to be so beautiful it hurts to watch me cross the street. I want to haunt people.
I want to say nothing, smoke all day. Go under the knife for a tummy-tuck and jet off to Newport. I want to be a point of fascination. I want to be the kryptonite for some powerful man. I want him to hate me for how much he needs me.
Dear Eve,
I spent the fourth of July on a friend’s Hollywood high-rise rooftop. We watched the fireworks from on high, pointing out the puffs of light around Mid-City and Inglewood. When the Rams won the Super Bowl, Martha and I lived in East Hollywood. We climbed up to her service roof and watched the fireworks from all sides like an expensive surround sound system. We were close to the action back then.
We saw less from down below, which is to say we saw more. And this year we lounged in cabanas, and I tamely drank micheladas. As guests in that private, richer LA, we have to maintain composure; nobody minds an interloper as long we’re hot and tame. The moment we’re neither, our passes get revoked.
“Only women can do this,” said Martha as we craned our necks for a better view against the Plexiglass. “Only women can get a free ride to places like this without being a part of it. We can exist in the outskirts and not have to afford a place like this.”
I said the views in East Hollywood were better. And she said, “We won’t belong in those places for long. Enjoy it while you can.” And I thought how maybe being successful has its drawbacks, and I wondered if I would miss this—miss the thrill of ascension.
Dear Eve,
I’m drinking too much. I’m not able to go a day without some period of altered being. Buzzed from nicotine, dizzy from beer, sleepy from weed, but I never do too much. Still, I’m always on something. Is this a problem? You would say no, you’re twenty-three, it’s impossible to have a problem at twenty-three. But most people with problems started at twenty-three. I think it’s what you’re willing to give up to enter the adult world. As of now, I’m not giving anything up.
Dear Eve,
I love country music. It’s a shame Miranda Lambert is almost certainly a Republican, Pistol Annies have been putting out the most progressive country music since Willie Nelson. Speaking of which, if Willie Nelson dies before I can shake his hand I think I’ll die from heartbreak. Even just thinking about it makes me want to burst into tears. I’m one Michelada down. Could you tell Willie it’s not his time yet?
Dear Eve,
At a new place by Mama Shelter, I hated everybody. They seemed, to me, to misunderstand Los Angeles. To misunderstand Hollywood. And then I wonder if I’m the one who’s misunderstood it. If the only people who can wrap their arms around our massive, sprawling mother live in Tarzana now. Sally Field used to live in Tarzana I think.
Dear Eve,
I want to raise children who call Los Angeles home. Not Brentwood, not Venice, not Santa Monica, not Sherman Oaks. Los Angeles. I’d like to raise them far away from Calabasas.
Dear Eve,
I like drinking. Is this a problem? With respect, I don’t want to be like you (in some respects, certainly not all). Which are the good parts?
Dear Eve,
Were you ever called Evelyn by accident? I named my favorite character after you.
Dear Eve,
I just wish I were a boy genius.
Dear Eve,
That’s a rip-off (and so is this whole series) from an author I think you’d like. Kate Zambreno (of Green Girl) wrote a series in Screen Tests to Kathy Acker called “Dear Kathy.” So what I’m saying is you’re my Kathy. But I’d prefer to be your Chris Kraus (that’s an After Kathy Acker reference). I don’t know how much reading you did in your later years. Did you ever read romance?
Dear Eve,
Did you ever read Twilight? It’s better than you remember. Or, actually, it’s worse, but the film is better than you remember. Catherine Hardwicke is a G.
Dear Eve,
I want to be a teen heartthrob.
Dear Eve,
I want to be famous.
Dear Eve,
I want to own a home on the Reservoir.
Dear Eve,
I think about you lots. I miss you tons. What did your playlist look like? Did you ever have Spotify?
Dear Eve,
I’m doing my best. It’s never enough.
Dear Eve,
I’m almost twenty-four. I’m contemplating lying about my age so I’ll seem more impressive. Would you recommend this endeavor? It worked for Alexa Demie. Even if I get caught, it might make me more interesting.
Dear Eve,
I’ve been drinking. I guess at least I’m not on pills.
Dear Eve,
I’m a wannabe. A total and utter poser. Maybe this is a perfect recipe for becoming an internet phenomenon. Okay, I never want to be Caroline Calloway or that girl from Not Okay. I just want to be different. Better, I guess.
Dear Eve,
Were you a good person?
Dear Eve,
Does it matter?
Dear Eve,
You have no idea what you have given me. I wish you knew.