Cleopatra and Frankenstein(29)

“Go on, girls,” said Kyle. “I am …”

“I am thinking this is a load of horseshit,” muttered Portia as Kyle retreated, rolling her dark eyes around the studio.

“I am not disagreeing with you,” replied Zoe.

“I am only here because my psychiatrist suggested it.”

“I am not here because I want to be,” said Zoe. “My crazy roommate convinced me.”

“I am ready to start drinking heavily.” Portia grinned.

Zoe laughed. “I am not opposed.”

Accelerated intimacy, that’s what Zoe was good at. She’d learned early that it was quicker to bond with another person over what you didn’t like than what you did, and that the easiest way to feel close to someone was to do something transgressive together. That’s why smokers always made friends. Her counselor after the seizure incident had suggested that this was part of what got Zoe into trouble, but Zoe still didn’t see it as problematic behavior. So far it had always worked for her. Tali, who had looked over when they started laughing, frowned at Zoe from across the room.

“Why’d your psychiatrist think you need this?” Zoe whispered, leaning closer.

“Because I like my job. And he’s a prudish piece of shit. It was either this or SLAA.” Zoe cocked her head. “Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous,” Portia explained.

“Oh right. My mom’s in the other one.”

“AA? Mine too.” Portia rolled her eyes. “Or she was.”

“So, what’s your job?”

“I’m a Sugar Baby,” she said proudly. “I’m on this website called Daddy Dearest that pairs ‘gentlemen of a certain means’”—she pulled her palms from Zoe’s and curled her long lilac nails into air quotes—“with girls like me. You have to be in college or have graduated to be a Baby. They just have to be rich. It’s men who want attractive but, like, educated girls to take to work functions and business meetings and such.”

“Do you …”

“Sleep with them?” Portia said brightly. “That’s between you and your Daddies. But if you want to arrange something with them … Well, I paid off my college loans and bought a Honda Accord off that shit.”

Zoe didn’t know what a Honda Accord looked like, but the loans part was impressive.

“And you just have to be in college?”

“And hot,” Portia said, her cheek diamond winking. “Which, girl, you are. Anyway, if you’re really broke like you said, you should try it. They go mad for ethnic girls on there too.”

Zoe decided to let this comment go.

“I think I’ll ask my brother to help me out,” she said. “But that’s really cool about your car and everything.”

She knew Frank was already being generous by covering her rent and tuition. It was her mother’s fault, really, that she was in this mess. Her mother had always been careless with money, in the way that people raised with a lot of it often are. She should never have started that luxury ski rental business, taking Zoe’s poor father along for the ride. It seemed to Zoe that she was the only person in her friend group at NYU who didn’t have parents providing her with endless funds for dinners and nights out—everything that made living in New York actually fun.

“Look, I’ll give you this.” Portia turned to rummage through her Louis Vuitton bag and produced a business card. “I’m stopping soon, so I’m not saying it to promote their shit or anything. One of my Daddies wants me all to himself, so he’s hooked me up with this swank office management job. I’m making money, honey!” She snapped her fingers and wiggled cross-legged on the floor.

Zoe laughed and took the card. It was thick, matte black, with Portia’s name and the words “Sugar Baby” scrawled in hot pink above the website address. On the flip side was a silhouette of a woman. She could have been anyone.

To close the session, the group joined hands and chanted a series of long “oms” with their eyes shut. After a few minutes Zoe could no longer hear where her voice ended and the others’ began; she could feel all the human noise in the room humming in her own throat. Maybe, she thought, this was what an orgasm with another person felt like, not knowing where they end and you begin.

The truth was she had never had one—not with anyone, not even with herself. Maybe she was a late bloomer, but she had never tried when she was young. She lost her virginity before she had really gotten to know her own body. She had tried to touch herself a few times after the seizure incident, but she had mostly felt uncomfortable and numb down there, so she had quickly given up. Sex since had been about validation and power for her, rarely physical pleasure. She felt no closer to having an orgasm with a man inside her than she did riding the subway. Her body, she had decided, was defective. She couldn’t even drink alcohol like a normal person, let alone come like one. All her body knew how to do well was betray her.

The chanting grew quieter until they were silent. Kyle struck a single gong, and the people either side of her released her hands. When she opened her eyes again, she was surprised to find herself blinking back tears. She tried to make her way quickly toward the bathroom, but Kyle intercepted her.

“I’m so glad you came tonight, Zoe,” he said. “I get the sense you might still be a little confused about what we do here, so I was wondering if I could tell you a quick story?” Zoe nodded unwillingly. “Great! One day, out of the blue, a guy falls into a deep hole. ‘Help, help!’ he yells, but no one comes. Eventually a rabbi walks by. He lowers a Torah down and tells him to pray to find a way out.”