Now seven years in Beverly later, was I happy? Content? Without fear of trapdoors and further transfiguration? Did I dwell on the unforeseen consequences of what happened with Mercy in Providence? No, no, no, and fuck yes. But, here in 2014, for the first time in my life, I was willing and able to be me, whoever that was, instead of striding toward some idealized version. Why? My not having to worry daily about making rent was certainly a factor that couldn’t be underestimated. My consistently doing physical therapy to strengthen my core and back hasn’t cured the pain but has kept it to a manageable low simmer on most days, which allowed me to become less reliant on painkillers.

Less reliant doesn’t mean “not reliant.”

(Aside: I haven’t been as faithfully attuned to my heart—the physical one—thanks-no-thanks shitty and/or no health insurance. The last time I had my biannual echocardiogram to check the size and function of my potentially rascally aorta was 2009.)

So yeah, barring the unforeseen, I am not going to be kicked out of my apartment, and I feel better physically. However, I attribute the seven years of on-and-off-again writing of this memoir novel, as frustrating and pride-swallowing and uncomfortable and impossible and improbable as it has been at times, to my current fatalistic (Mercy will be back at some point, but until then …) jouissance.

What’s with all the French? One might observe that I never left, because you kept me around by writing about me for seven years.

* * *

If you read the preceding passages and think, “Living with Mom isn’t very punk, Art,” or “I don’t sympathize with Art because he’s so passive,” you can go fuck yourself.

Monsieur, that’s not very jouissance-like.

* * *

When I eventually limped back to playing live music, I started with local open mics. Besides fearing I would see Mercy in the audience, the hardest part was overcoming my teenagery dread of running into ex-classmates. That happened less frequently than I had anticipated, mainly because the ones who remained local were married, had children, and were not frequenting the bars at which I performed. On the occasions when there were Beverly High alumni in the audience, most of whom (if I’m allowed to be gloriously mean and petty) had peaked as teenagers, socially if not physically (hello, polar-ice-cap receding hairlines), they remarked on my physical transformation. Like I said before, I do love my six-four height, Faustian-back-pain bargain be damned. I also had a scruffy, youth-culture-approved beard and carefree curling hair. When they said “Wow, look at you” or “You look great,” it was meant in comparison to the willowy, zit-infested, stick-bug high school me, in comparison to their diminished and/or exaggerated memory of the high school Art. (How many versions of that poor kid are there? If only I could collect them all.)