Lee and Nin

Chapter Five: Happiness is a Warm Bath

"Are you happy?"

I was seated on the floor with my back up against the wall outside the opened bathroom door.

I occupied myself with a matchbox that I rolled back and forth onto its corners and chain-smoked cigarettes as a distraction while I tried to carry on a conversation with Nin. It was difficult not to imagine what she was doing through the opened door and other side of the wall.
Every so often, I'd hear the splashing of water as she adjusted some part of her body.
I knew that she was obscured, she had to be, I had poured half a bottle of shampoo into the tub when I ran the bath but when my mind wandered I couldn't stop myself from thinking about what was being obscured--
I drank whisky from a tea mug and fidgeted something awful... trying to shake thoughts like sickness.
"I thought that we were here because I'm unhappy," She answered. There was more splashing and I pictured her drinking whisky from the mug I'd set out for her, or maybe smoking a cigarette of her own. I'd doubted that she would but set some out for her in good measure.
"In the bath?" She questioned.
"In the bath."
"Sylvia Plath once wrote something about there being few things a hot bath couldn't cure--"
"And absolutely nothing a gas oven wouldn't take care of, apparently." I mumbled.
"What was that?"
"Happiness!" I exclaimed. I gulped down whisky, "Hey, do you wanna see any of that stuff while you're here? I mean any of that touristy stuff like where Plath lived and all that rubbish."

Even I thought this sounded gruesome as I spoke the words but I was grasping at straws to keep her around and to keep myself from getting on a train north.

"Maybe not Plath," I surmised.
"Oh. You mean all of the stupid things that Americans do when they're here just to say that they were here? No thanks."

Something in her tone made me smirk even though there was no way of her seeing it. I spilled more from the whisky bottle into my mug.

"Fair enough."

"Besides we don't have time."

"Ah. There's plenty of time."

"Lee," she scolded.

"Nin," I mocked in return.

The alcohol coursed through my bloodstream with warmth and much needed relief. I tilted my head back against the plaster wall and closed my eyes. I squeezed the matchbox into my palm. The corners dug into my skin causing a kind of pain that satisfied me.

"I don't know happiness," she circled back to a long forgotten enquiry, "I haven't figured it out."
"Nonsense and you know it. Got to be something that makes you happy."
"But there isn't. I used to think that records made me happy but none of it seems to matter anymore-- nothing matters anymore."
"But what is your happiness? What is the one thing in the world that you can do that no one else can do for you?"
"Like a talent?"
"I wouldn't go so far," I teased. I felt myself make a light expression and hoped she could hear it in my voice.
"I haven't got one."
"Everyone's got one."
"I haven't."

I blindly brought the cup to my lips before I peeled my eyes opened and stared across the room. My gaze fell upon a crate of records. I jumped to my feet.
I rushed into the bath without aforethought.
"HEY!" Nin yelped. She attempted to cover certain parts of herself with her arms and hands.
"Jesus," I turned my back to her and raised my sight to the ceiling, "Get out of the bath."
"What?"
"Get out of the bath," I waved my hands about excitedly as I shifted my weight from one foot to the other.
"Why?"
"I want you to see something."
Nin sighed and the water sounded heavy as it was vacated.
"I guess you've already seen everything that I've got so why not?"