>>From: Belacqua
>>To: Perdita
>>Subject: counting it down.
>>Date: Mon, 1 Jan 2001

There's about two minutes until the new year and I'm flying mighty nice right now. I paced myself marvelously so I'm not feeling sicker than shit right now and I'm not dead sober, either. I spread a quarter of a half-gallon bottle over almost five hours so I've had just enough right now to feel the effects of it. I keep tasting it and it tastes so marvelous after all the beer and scotch and vodka. We're under a minute now. New year: same old shit. Dick Clark and his goddamn ball. That weird ball is turning all different colors and people are going apeshit over nothing...under 20 seconds. Dick Clark is giving amazing play by play for a falling ball...5...4...3...2...1... new year. Whoopee. Confetti and champagne and all that shit, people kissing and doing people things, and it's just another second in another day in another fucking year that'll mean absolute shit to me in the end. I'm a cheery spirit on the holidays.

Our cable went out tonight while we were watching the Mississippi State game, so we put on the DVD my mother got from me for Christmas, The Talented Mr. Ripley, and I don't know if you've seen it or not, but at one point, Matt Damon's character (Tom Ripley) says to this guy Peter that for some reason he's all involved with taking all his memories of the past and storing them in this basement inside himself, and all he wants is to find someone he can give the key to so they can see all his dark secrets and personal demons, but he can't seem to give that key to anyone. So I start to think about you again and how that basement door has been flung wide open and you are commingling with my personal demons and I'm fraternizing with yours and neither one of our evil monsters are scaring each other away. At various points throughout the movie I was thinking about you and missing you and almost crying in the middle of my living room.

I've had a rough day. I had a rough yesterday, but for some reason, today was worse. I just kept jumping on my own back and tearing myself to pieces. I do that too often. I'm my own worst enemy. If I could ignore what I think about myself most of the time, I probably wouldn't feel so bad all the time, but I really just tear myself to shreds. I beat the shit out of myself for stupid shit I did years ago that I can't do anything about and that may not have seemed so bad to anyone else, but I beat myself up for not doing things differently than I did. Then I just lay in my bed and stare at the ceiling with the whiskey burning the back of my throat and my CD player turned up loud enough to drown out the rest of the house's noise with Bear in one arm and my blankie in the other. I wish I didn't have to escape my own head every day. I wish I didn't have to cower in fear at the destruction my own brain rains upon itself. I hate having to run from myself. I'm going to be bleeding alcohol if I live much longer. I'll have a flask before school starts back, and chances are I'll be drinking between, and perhaps during classes. But who really cares? Belacqua can do no wrong academically. If I can still pass when I write papers half or fully drunk and get A's and B's in classes, then an exponential increase in alcohol intake probably won't affect my grades all that much. I don't know what it is about bourbon whiskey, but I fucking love the shit. Canadian whiskey isn't all that great, but Kentucky whiskey is cool as hell. As far as I'm concerned, that's the only thing the south is good for. I don't remember what I was talking about anymore. That's awesome. I still have to take my evening medications. I don't remember if I increase the Paxil tonight or not. I'll have to look I guess. The Risperdal doesn't seem to be doing a whole lot. If I keep waking up like I've been doing, I'm going to have to take that shit in the morning because I like to stay asleep as long as I possibly can unless there's something happening, and since that's not the case right now, sleep is valuable stuff.

What am I talking about? I e-mailed my friend in California a few weeks ago, and I just heard back from her the other day and she's all concerned and shit because of how much I've been drinking and how rotten I feel in general, and she wants to know what she can do to help, and I just told her to not be upset if I write her and tell her I've offed myself. That, and not to abandon me like all my other "friends" have done when they saw the darker side of my personality. Everybody loves Belacqua when he's passive and cooperative and not too screwed up, but when we glimpse the horrors that happen inside his head, all of a sudden we have better things to do than worry about his problems. I hate people. Everybody is so concerned with their own shit. I listened to their crap for how many years, and when I go to lean on them, all of a sudden there's nobody there. Normal people are horrible, horrible creatures. They're fucking vultures who pick at your carcass until you start to stir, and then they fly off and leave you with your guts spilling through your fingers, miles from any sort of help...miserable fucking scavengers.

I'm tired. I think I'm going to go to sleep. I made it to midnight: mission accomplished, I guess. I'll be here until early Tuesday afternoon, just so you know where I am. And then, Wednesday, is of course the third, the only date I've been looking forward to throughout this entire holiday season. When I realize how close it is, I feel this swift stabbing sensation in my stomach. Goddamn anxiety never leaves me alone.

Okay, it's definitely bedtime. I hope your flight goes well tomorrow evening. Flying is always such a delight. Ha.

I love you, Perdita.
Belacqua

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>From: Perdita
>To: Belacqua
>Subject: Re: counting it down.
>Date: Mon, 1 Jan 2001

Belacqua,

The end is finally in sight. One day here, one day home, and then it's the third. Thank GOD. Christ, I can't wait to see you. I have seen The Talented Mr. Ripley, and in fact, I liked it so much that I went to see it in the theater three times. I LOVE that movie. It's so dark and disturbed, yet soothingly familiar. I love it. It's one of the worst things about the human species that they can't seem to deal with their own kind when there's something going on in their minds. It's like they look at you and take you seriously as one of their own until you open up that goddamn basement with a rusty, old key, and then they run like hell because they're so afraid. I just don't understand it.

I made it to midnight last night, too, which is rather surprising considering I almost passed out at about ten, after returning from drinking at TGIFriday's. Friday's was fun, and when we came back to my house, we played Taboo for awhile with a bunch of other people from the party, and that was kind of fun, too. I was trying to explain to my friends at Friday's that I just didn't understand what the big fuss was all about in celebrating a new year, and of course they just didn't know what the hell I was talking about. I told them I can understand how you might feel like celebrating for having gotten through a year, but I don't know why people want to ring in the new one with all that hoopla. Yay for another year with the same old shit. I'm the same person I'll always be, and the world is the same world it's always gonna be. So what's the big deal?

Well, my sister's walking out the door to drive home, so I guess I should go say goodbye. I can't wait to see you in just two more days.
I love you.
Perdita