The Line Begins to Blur - Late June 1999
Sneaking around wasn't something I was good at.
I'd gotten drunk once. It was some post-track meet party, and someone had handed me a Jack and Coke. I'd spent most of the night playing video games in a side room, trying not to throw up from the awful taste. To be honest, most of that night was a blur.
My clearest memory was trying, and failing, to act nonchalant. I'd puked as soon as I'd walked through my front the door, mostly from the fear that my parents would catch me stumbling in so late.
Playing it cool was not my strength.
"You're absolutely, positively sure she's at the gym all afternoon?" I was keeping my voice low while Naomi led me into her foyer.
"HEY, MOM!" Naomi screamed, cupping her hand to her mouth for effect. "RYAN AND I ARE GOING TO DO CRACK IF YOU WANT TO JOIN!"
I flinched a bit, but the silence proved her point. We were totally alone in the house.
"Point made," I said, slipping off my shoes.
"You turn red so easily." Naomi chuckled. "Seriously, your ears look like they're on fire."
"Hardy-har-har. I'm glad you're taking this seriously."
She led me down the hall to the computer room, more of a nook just off the kitchen. Unlike the attic, it was immaculately staged. Not a hint of dust or clutter.
It was also totally exposed. If someone were to walk through the front door, we'd have seconds before our cover was blown.
"So, if she comes home early...?" I dragged a kitchen chair next to the monitor.
"If she comes home early, I'll just yank out the power cable before she can see anything." Naomi sat at the keyboard and flicked on the screen.
"It's a laptop, though." I pointed at the closed black Gateway docked on the table. "You pull the plug, and nothing will happen."
"Then I'll turn off the screen. Keep it cool, Mr. Privacy." She was already connecting. The modem started its mechanical cry of life as she logged in.
Naomi was fixated on the screen, waiting for the browser to load. I found myself entranced by her in at that moment. Even now, years later, I can picture her clearly.
She was slightly hunched, with a familiar sharp determination in her eye. It was the look she had when she ran the final sprint of track or buckled down to solve an AP calc problem.
Naomi's outfit was one of her staples, something I'd seen her wear countless times senior year. A loose black tank with some white squiggly lines and Japanese characters. She'd once told me it was an album cover, but I couldn't remember the name for the life of me. Her black sports bra was visible from the side but not enough to be scandalous. Just comfortable.
I'd figured out she favored the most restrictive, compressing bras out of practicality. The couple of times I'd seen her without one, her profile was impractically top-heavy. I'm sure some kids would have accused her of implants, especially after seeing her mother.
Her jeans were ripped, partly by design and partly from wear. They were probably just old Levis from Macy's, but she filled them out preposterously well. She wore those jeans almost every day to school, but I'd only ever noticed her after my friend Aaron had asked if I thought she was cute enough to bring along to prom. To be fair, Naomi hadn't ever been seen as a "hottie" in our school; that honor went to the cheerleaders and Clueless-wannabe cliques of blonde rich girls.
Since we'd started dating, I'd seen Naomi use her mirror exactly once to apply some dark eyeliner before heading out to the battle of the bands the week after finals. Her idea of dressed up was smoky eyes and a thrift-shop jacket that looked like some punk had donated it after finding Jesus. It was covered with buttons and patches for bands I didn't know.
Naomi was effortlessly hot back then. It's my last memory of the 'old' her, one I still come back to often.
I didn't know what I'd expected when Naomi told me she'd found something about Perfect Wife Inc. online, but I certainly didn't anticipate the site she pulled up.
"Alt Mind Control Sluts?" I read from the page header.
"I've been searching around, and AMCS has a ton of information on hypnosis and brainwashing." Naomi seemed unfazed by the pornographic banner image of a woman with cartoon swirly-circles for eyes drooling over an impossibly large penis.
"But this is... this is porn." I'd looked around the web--nervously, furtively--on occasion, but I'd only gotten as far as Playboy and some edited nudes of Sarah Michelle Gellar. This was a whole different level.
"Well, yeah. Some if it's porn..." She scrolled through the forum, looking for one in particular. "But ya know... it's pretty tame."
From the titles of topics alone, I had to disagree.
"Ahh, here we go. It's linked somewhere in here." Naomi clicked through to the discussion page and began reading out the top message.
LOOKING FOR VID OF HYPNOTIZED GIRL
