Her name is long gone, lost across crazy memories and a distance wrought by a sense of self-preservation, but God, she was beautiful. Dark cat eyes, the sides drawn out into exotica, that would pierce you with such intensity you’d look away. She was boundless, whether huddled to herself, her head buried in her arms shouting obscure quotes from obscure books, or strutting around a packed room of young men in a Holiday Inn wearing nothing more than a grimy t-shirt and a pair of panties.
She had one of those crazy smiles that hinted that she was always sharper than she needed to be, always a step ahead, and always a few steps off the beaten path. Her life during these times was bent on making new weirdness, constantly. Midnight rides to San Antonio just for a bottle of Pace picante sauce. Sneaking onto dormitory roofs and shouting at a world blanketed in sepia tones of sodium street lights.
Once on Riverside, she stood up through the sun roof, arms outstretched, shouting at the traffic, flying in East Austin. It was a scene stolen from a coming of age movie, and I remember wondering where I was. Did this mean those movies accurately reflected the lives of young adults? Had we seen too many of these, or were we just crazy enough that it was our story now.
It was her energy that was so beautiful. She was invincible. Perched on a rooftop corner four stories up exclaiming she could fly. Watching her bang out Rachmaninoff. Rachmaninoff was a good metaphor for her: dark, fiery, intense. Her head bent towards the keys, her black hair hiding her face, crazy gymnastic digits attacking the piano keys. And when she was done, you had that smile. Innocent. Mischevious. Beautiful.
But when she was ugly, she was ugly. Foul. Screamed epithets for a Taco Cabana boy twisted her face into something demonic. Cruel, cruel words for a best friend; a slap in the face; shouting, pushing, and dragging you all the way from her room to the dorm lobby where screamed some more in front of the desk and passersby before demanding the RAs throw you out.
She was scary intelligent, and when her darker moods came, she used it all to dissect you into the tiniest most worthless bits possible, telling you truths that not even you knew, literally digging out your heart and explaining, in detail, what defecation it was.
And then she was sad. Sobbing tears barely drowned out by the blanket she was smothering herself under and the Pearl Jam she was blaring. Black Black Black was all she ever played. And then the restrained sniffling, wiping tears away, the smile, thanks for being such a wonderful friend, yeah, she was ok, we’ll have lunch tomorrow, thanks. But you’d get that call at two in the morning. Slit her wrists in the shower, again. Her roommate had found her unconscious, foaming at the mouth, and vomiting from all the pills she’d swallowed.
Have you ever seen a psychiatric ward? They’re anti-septic like an orthodontists office. Soft, dark colors. Muted lighting. Generic furniture in the waiting room for friends and relatives. A nurse has to buzz you in, and someone else walks you down to the room. I wouldn’t be surprised if they keep the doors locked, but she wasn’t going anywhere. They had her tied down, anyway: thick white straps wrapped around her wrists. She was drugged, disheveled, groggy. But buried beneath all the sedatives, she was still there, brighter than she needed to be, a few steps ahead.
She said something funny about the nurse being a cock-sucker or something. We all laughed. It was funny. It was really funny coming from someone restrained and drugged and locked down. She was beautiful again.
She never dated any of us. I don’t see how. Too much crazy. Too much beauty. Too much everything, too fast. People like her live life in a way the rest of us can’t even imagine. At the top, they are life. They’re everything, on speed, conduits sucking it all down and spraying everyone around at full force.
I ran into her a year or so later in a video store in Austin after they’d gotten her medication right. She was doing pretty well. Living with a guy somewhere near Duval. Her last suicide attempt had been six months ago, but she’d been fine since. She was different. Her fire’d been reigned in with constant chemicals. She wasn’t as beautiful anymore. She was almost plain. Just another Austin girl looking through the cult movies.