choose your own adventure (redux)

we are driving down the 101, its almost dawn and james is furious. we've been at beth's house, listening to clouds taste metallic and eating jello shots, just the five of us. it was supposed to be a big party, we think, but when we showed up at midnight it was just beth and danielle, spray painting the background of beth's next art project and slurping down vodka and jello powder, not quite gelatinous. things were already tense between the three of us, james, frank and me, when we showed up, but we did what we always do, which is get drunk and talk to anyone but each other. it hadnt been this way for the whole time we were living together, and of course the reason we wanted to live together was because none of us could ever forsee this being our collective future. before we lived toegther, last year, the thought of talking to anyone else besides each other was almost a nuisance. but there we were, leaving her apartment at four thirty in the morning, after having gotten into one of our now familiar "epic" debates and successfully either scared beth and alice into a coma, or bored them to sleep. this one was about whether or not quentin tarantino was a chauvenist, and though i didnt really have an opinion one way or the other, i was screaming until veins popped out of my forehead in order to convince james that he was the most heinous offender of recent memory.
frank and i werent talking when we arrived at beths. this is because a couple of weeks ago, at a party at our then unfurnished house, he was doing what he always does at parties, films. he would document the parties and we would sit around james's giant television the next afternoon, shredded from the night before, and watch in silent horror at our own truths seeping out through the holey screen of intoxication. but at this particular party he decided to ask me a question, on camera, that he knew, even in the drunkest of states i would never be able to answer. and when i ran into my bedroom with the door that never shut, literally or figuratively, he followed me in. we hadnt spoken since but as the night at beths progresses and our cheeks warm up, we begin making eye contact and sometimes laughing at each others jokes, our thinly veiled attempts at reconciliation.
we decide to leave and frank insists on driving, beacuse james is not only gummy kneed, hes so angry that his hands are clutching his hair and hes saying "i just cant believe it...i cant believe it." frank and i are now complicit in our mockery of him, and james's understanding of this is like the last scratch on an insatiable mosquito bite- this is when the blood comes out and you wish you had just put up with the itch.
frank says, im driving, and you know that.
fuck you, james says and opens the door viciously. get the fuck in the car, we're going home.
frank and i look at each other for a long minute. without taking his eyes off mine, he opens the back door and gets in. i get in the front door, and see james's head in his hands, his fingers white from gripping it.
i cant live like this, my two fucking best friends, my fucking roommates, not talking to each other.
i look back at frank and have to make a concerted effort not to laugh.
i think we're good, actually, james. i think we're back to normal. why dont you let him drive?
he looks at me and his watery blue eyes are blood shot, stale. he turns the key in the ignition and i grip the side of the door. i keep thinking surely he'll surrender and let frank drive, surely he will. but before ive realized it we're on the freeway, in the far right lane, going almost a hundred miles an hour.
hes screaming about our passive aggressiveness, about our drama, and he's right, but the tone of his voice and the speed of his volvo and the knowledge that there isnt much either one of us could do to stop him from ramming the car into the concrete wall and shutting us all up is making me want to laugh. its that feeling that you had in math class, when your teacher just yelled at you- the only thing more inappropriate than breaking into tears would be to laugh, so your body goes there, because crying would just make it all too real.
he can sense this, he can see frank and i glancing at each other, sharing this uneasy combination of terror and hilarity. he beats his hand against the rim of the steering wheel so hard that it honks, and i cant help but let a tiny laugh out.
i cant fucking believe youre doing this! im moving out, its over, this is all over you have to find a new fucking roommate, his voice is screechy and ragged.
oh come on, james! just calm down, youre being drunk and ridiculous and thats why we're laughing.
he exits onto echo park boulevard and as soon as the car is off the ramp he throws it into park and the car stops absurdly, as if it too has had enough. hes leapt out of the car and frank and i jerk a glance at each other before we're both in the street. james is running along the park, towards sunset, and im running after him. there are ducks on the water and a couple sitting in front of the paddleboat rental office, bodies involved in each other. frank runs back and gets into the car and begins to follow us.
i speak in a low voice. i am trying to calm him down, to bring him back to the essence of it- we're friends, this is insane, its almost daybreak.
just please wait james, just for one second, lets talk.
he swivels around and looks at me and his face is twisted in the most honest expression of anger ive ever seen.
i will move out, he says this as a threat, and for some reason it reassures me, all of this does, because it means he wont really. if he had said this to me on monday afternoon i would have been worried, i would have taken him seriously. but this, this is too raw to be what he says it is. he keeps walking, and im trailing behind him, two of my steps for every one of his. frank is driving beside us, wishing he had the camera.

choice a
no you wont, i say, and before the last word is out of my mouth james has reared back his right hand and plunged it through the drivers side window of a black jetta. he pulls it back, its dripping with blood. frank is out of the car the second it happened and im standing there, silent and numb.
nothing i say means anything to you, he says, and walks home.

choice b
no you wont, i say, and before the last word is out of my mouth james has reared back his right hand and thrown it into the left side of my face. the pain is both piercing and vague, and im not sure if my skull is broken or if he has reached inside of my face and ripped it out- my eyes, my nose, my cheekbones. im kneeling on the ground, and im not crying yet, and frank is beside me, saying holy shit tell us youre alright. i look up at james, his heaving chest and his jigsaw puzzle face.
nothing i say means anything to you, he says.