Free On My Knees by Periel Aschenbrand

wants. There isn’t a goddamn thing wrong with me. If I’m not mistaken, I’m the one who is constantly pointing out that people are rarely what they seem. If you look at the facts, what do I really do? I sit around and write. It’s everyone else who’s out there doing fucked-up shit.
    I was like, “Mommy, you’re the one who’s always telling me that I should pick a doctor because they are good at what they do. What do I care if Leslie stole money? If she does a little coke here and there? She’s the best dental hygienist I’ve ever had. Jesus, it’s not like she killed someone!”
    My mother was silent.
    I go, “Okay, so maybe you’re right. Maybe she did kill someone. But no one ever proved that and even if she did kill someone, it doesn’t take away from the fact that she is a great hygienist. You can’t be so closed minded.”
    Again, Noam’s sage advice came to mind: People are complicated. They’re multifaceted. They can be more than one thing. Things aren’t black-and-white. Plus, Leslie was a Jew! Innocent until proven guilty!

5
    Casual Encounters
    M y mother was probably right to be worried about me. I had been living at my grandmother’s for going on several months and had no resolution in sight. My days were bleak, I didn’t really give a shit about anything, and I was subsisting on frozen pizza and espresso. I had spoken to Noam once and I cried the entire time. My main activity was moving from the giant fake king-size bed with the depression in the middle of it to the plastic-covered pink couch and back again. And with the exception of when I absolutely had to go out for work, I did nothing but watch television.
    Hanna, seeing what a sorry state I was in, convinced me that what I needed was a night out. She had friends in town and persuaded me to go with her to meet them at a bar. I should have known better than to take advice from Hanna, but it was just more evidence of how poor my decision-making skills had become. None of the guys were particularly good-looking but one of them, Steve, honed in on me from the second I arrived and began hitting on me. I wasn’t at all attracted to him but I was feeling particularly self-loathing so I went with it. Plus, he was Jewish, so I figured he was harmless. I’ve always been wary of strange men but I’m less wary of strange men who are Jewish since, statistically, Jewish men are rarely serial killers. Plus, Steve had just moved to New York from Canada and Canadians, by nature, are generally fairly innocuous.
    After a few drinks, I started to let my guard down. I was getting drunker and he was getting cuter, which is generally how these things work. I ordered another drink. We made out for a few minutes at the bar and I decided I may as well take him home with me. I think it’s fair to say that anyone who is making out with some guy she just met in a bar when she isn’t even really attracted to him is probably not in an especially good place in her life. I think it’s also fair to say that someone who then proceeds to take that guy back to her apartment, especially the home of a recently deceased relative is definitely , definitely not in a good place.
    The incredible thing was that I was such a disaster that this didn’t even occur to me. Like, oh, I don’t know, maybe it’s kind of weird to bring some random guy back to your dead grandmother’s house when it’s filled with all your dead grandmother’s shit and that maybe, just maybe it’s kind of creepy to fuck someone in your dead grandmother’s bed. The thought didn’t even cross my mind. I told Hanna I would call her in the morning and, with Steve in tow, hailed a taxi.
    During the ride, Steve started to tell me about how he had just gotten out of a very long relationship and how he had finally broken it off because his girlfriend wasn’t Jewish.
    I was like, “No offense, but you are seriously ruining the moment here. I just picked you up in a bar. Do you really think I want to