Chapter 1: Worth

Part I Unstoppable Force Meets an Edible Object Once upon a time, there lived a girl of worth. Here is her story, give or take a lie or two. Chapter 1:WORTH Zoe Beaupre stood at a crossroads. She was lost, but standing at an intersection of two forgettable Toronto streets had nothing to do with this pressing issue: in one hand, she held an empty bottle of Percocet, complete with her name on the label, like an honest-to-god prescription she actually needed. The other clutched a very old, recently stolen pocket watch. The Percs had been a gift from a gentleman doctor of her acquaintance back in St. Louis. Knowing she couldn’t pass a customs search with her drug of choice, she’d asked for and received—for a favor that still hurt when she tied her shoes—a prescribed solution to carry her through the week long stay she’d planned with her sister. Should have, but didn’t. She dropped the bottle back into her purse, just in case. You never know when you’ll need an empty pill bottle, complete with your name on it. Zoe dangled the watch by its chain and it rotated lazily, trapping arcs of sunlight that shone like butter against the tarnished casing—and she suffered a momentary pang of guilt. The watch wasn’t exactly hers to sell. While searching for a pair of earrings in her sister’s jewelry box, she’d rescued it from an encroaching mass of cheap trinkets. “That’s right, bitch,” said a voice from within her head, “Do it. You’re already going to Hell. What’s a little theft gonna hurt?” She should’ve known she wasn’t going to make it through the morning without him speaking up. “What’s it to you, Monkey? Is it yours? No, it’s not, so shut the fuck up.” “One monkey, shutting up.” The purple monkey materialized on the sidewalk at her feet, holding one fuzzy hand over his yarn stitched mouth, and flipping the bird with the other. This didn’t compute. Monkey never gave up so easily. “That’s it?” Purple Monkey nodded his head earnestly. That’s weird, she thought. He’d usually not stop until she’d torn him to pieces or tossed him out a window. “What’s weird?” “I thought you were gonna shut up?” “I am. Let your conscience be your guide, yada yada.” The monkey shrugged and hitched a ride on the back of a passing dog. Zoe stared after him. About ten feet away he turned, winked, and disappeared. The word weird had taken on a whole new meaning after he’d invaded her head. A doctor had run several tests, but they came back negative for a tumor or any physical reason for his presence. A Psychiatrist, on the other hand, asked if there’d been any changes in her life lately; had she been taking any new prescriptions…any other drugs? He’d known about the heroin. How could he not? He did have the results of her blood analysis in his meaty little claw. Upon leaving his office that day, she’d decided to forgo another appointment or a second opinion in favor of self medication. A quack couldn’t help her, not even if they knew the whole truth about Monkey. Truth was, the monkey wasn’t exactly new to her. His previous existence had marked a very pivotal point in her young life, a time of growth and discovery. In appearance he was all she remembered him to be, but that was the sole similarity. This Purple Monkey—this invisible monster—wasn’t cuddly and soft, he was vulgar and rude. Bought as a pair when they were children, purple for Jeanne and pink for Zoe, the monkeys immediately became the main attraction of The Sisters Beaupre private circus. Though seen as nothing more than a broom under a bed sheet by their mother, the circus was their own secret fantasy land. A world in which the sun shone its smile all day and all night; a world where a girl could be a star, take charge—living on cotton candy and pretzels—and thrive without parents who would leave or yell about Jesus all the time: Two girls and their monkeys against the world. During a return bus trip from one of Jeanne’s chemotherapy sessions, Zoe had been so caught up with the fog art she’d been painting on the window that, when her mother dragged her away, she left Pink Monkey behind on the seat. Later, her mother had called the bus line, but the monkey hadn’t been turned in to their lost and found. Pink Monkey was gone forever and so was Circus World, at least for Zoe. Three days later while she sat cross-legged on her bed, staring miserably out the window at the rain as it pelted the road with tears the size of golf balls, Jeanne brought Purple Monkey to her room and tossed him on the bed. She told Zoe the monkey wanted to be with her now – that it was tired of Jeanne and liked her better. Zoe gladly accepted her sister’s offer and immediately pitched the Big Top. She felt sad for Jeanne, not having her own monkey anymore, but she could thereafter be the audience neither one of them ever had, someone to laugh and enjoy the show. At first, Jeanne watched all the time, but then the cancer came back and her visits to the Big Top grew shorter and further apart. Soon she stopped watching at all; not even Purple Monkey made her smile anymore. Circus World was never the same after that. Zoe tried to understand her sister’s lack of interest, but couldn’t help hating Jeanne and her cancer for giving up on Circus World. After a while the illusion died and Zoe also gave up on the Big Top. By the time she turned seven it was just like her mother had said: a bed sheet and a broom, nothing more. That didn’t mean she gave up on Purple Monkey. After all, he was still her best friend. Zoe remembered dragging the stuffed carcass of that violet simian to school, the dentist’s office, and the beach—literally everywhere, including the bathtub. Eventually there wasn’t much more than patches and a lingering aroma of unwashed socks left of him, but she didn’t care. He was more than material, stitches and button eyes. To Zoe, he was a connection; a conduit to that sunny place where fathers didn’t leave, mothers didn’t scream, and sisters didn’t get cancer. One day, while Zoe was down the street at a friend’s pool, her mother tossed Purple Monkey out with the trash. Upon finding the monkey missing, Zoe was inconsolable, nearly tearing the house apart in her search for him. Her mother couldn’t understand the tantrums, especially when they continued past the first week. And, subsequently, neither did the therapist Zoe was sent to see over the affair. It wasn’t until Zoe came across a wonder drug named heroin at a house party some thirteen years later that the same monkey—odd colored button eyes, clumsy patchwork and all—returned. He walked right up to her in the middle of someone’s trashed living room and said, “Hey, Bitch.” Just like that. She knew it wasn’t real. She was older and knew better then. Grownups, at least sane ones, didn’t have imaginary friends. But that little fact didn’t stop it from talking, or, for that matter, from acting like a complete dick. And why should Monkey care about a stupid watch? Why should I? Besides, if Jeanne had even cared a little bit about the damn thing, she should’ve taken better care of it. At times, Zoe found guilt as easy to sidestep as an oncoming turtle. She dropped the time piece into a pocket and waited for the light to change. She was left-handed, so she went right. Penniless after only two days, she’d sorely underestimated the price of a good time in Toronto…hence the watch, hence the pawning of said watch. If needed, one or more swinging egos could be milked for the rest of the cash, but only as a last resort. She was on vacation after all. For lack of a pill, she popped a breath mint. Two blocks up, she found a pawn broker. ~~oOo~~ “Fifty dollars, no more,” was the pawn broker’s first and final price. “What do you mean ‘fifty dollars’?” Her words lashed like a cool mint scented whip across the mixed odors of the cubicle sized entry. “The fucking thing is gold, you asshole.” For his part, it was clear the pawnbroker had played this game many times before. In response he grunted and found his bellybutton with an index finger. Zoe sensed she was going about this all wrong, and wished her last words were spaghetti so she could suck them back in one long strand. “I’m sorry, sir. I’ve been under a great deal of strain lately and recently lost my plane ticket home to St Louis. My finals start tomorrow and I need to get back. What do you say about eighty bucks for a poor student?” The pawn broker, a dark little East Indian man wearing a shirt too short for his paunch, eyed the grouped track marks below her rolled up sleeves and flexed the wrinkle between his brows. “I say fifty dollars.” He picked up the magazine he’d been reading when she entered and proceeded to flip through the pages, ignoring both watch and woman. After a few fanned pages, he smoothed a few wisps of hair across a forehead so high he’d need a telescopic handle to comb past the crown, and said, “Let me show you something, please.” The man laid the magazine face down and left the counter. He returned with a dusty shoe box, pulled off the lid, and set it atop the magazine for her to see. In the box a Timex rubbed faces with a Rolex, whose strap was slid through the buckle of a very feminine pearl backed number, which sat on the face of another, and so on. The gangbang of jewelry in the box was very impressive and all looked very expensive to Zoe, but she could see his point: This was a buyer’s market. Damn. As this new failure spread through her like a stain on a takeout bag, she wondered if Jeanne would give her another loan. “You see, my friend,” said the smelly man, “I have many, many watches—more, probably, than I could ever sell. Yours is a very fine watch, a pretty watch. But, young lady, if I cannot sell it, how much do you think it is worth?” Again, she saw his point, but the way he spoke was really beginning to irritate her. “Okay, whatever. Take it and give me the fifty bucks.” Zoe sighed and leaned back in the small entrance, tapping the wall with her head. The watch had belonged to her father. When he left the last time, he’d pulled Jeanne aside and given it to her. He must not have seen his younger daughter in the hall as he bent and kissed Jeanne before leaving. Zoe hadn’t received that same farewell. Actually, she’d received no farewell whatsoever, so she felt almost nothing by the loss of the watch. A hand emerged through the bars and set a slip of paper on the counter. “Please sign your claim ticket. There is a pen to the right.” From where she stood the hand reminded her of Thing from The Addams Family. She pushed away from the wall, plucked the pen from its cradle, scribbled Morticia Addams in the signature box, and slid the slip back through. She was going to be short, way short—especially if she planned to have any fun while she was there. Before giving up, she decided to play her only remaining card. Zoe tilted her head and tapped her fingers on the counter to get the man’s attention. “Hey,” she said, low and gentle, inwardly cringing at what she contemplated. The pawn broker looked up from writing her information into a ledger, and his massive forehead wrinkled into rounded steps as his eyebrows came up. “Miss?” She glanced out the door, then forced a smile to her lips. “Is there anything we could work out for, say, another eighty bucks?” A stab of revulsion flowered in the pit of her stomach at the thought of him sweating over her. No stranger to doing what needed doing for the cause, Zoe succeeded in diffusing the rebellion with a silent burp. “Maybe back there?” she said, pointing over his shoulder to the rear of the shop. The little man didn’t miss a stroke with his ballpoint. Once finished with her claim ticket, he ripped it off and approached the window. Sliding it through, along with enough body odor to fumigate a square block of roach infested houses, his face loomed within inches of the bars. “Whatever it is that has you, young lady, you must fight it. It is not my place, for certain, to speak to you so boldly, but you started it.” Every consonant hit her like a sledge hammer. He leaned across the counter and ran his fingers along the cluster of needle marks on Zoe’s arm. “My dear son, Senji, was taken by the drugs two years ago.” His fingers trembled as his arm receded back through the gap in the bars. Zoe’s skin tingled in the wake of his touch. Her eyes found the floor and stayed there as she took the fifty from the counter and stuffed it into the front pocket of her jeans. Before leaving, she mumbled, “Thank you,” then walked out. Once on the sidewalk, she took a deep breath as she unrolled the sleeves of her shirt—sleeves she didn’t recall rolling up!—and buttoned them at her wrists. Feeling more than a little dirty, she drifted into the flow of pedestrian traffic and allowed it carry her where it would. After a while she began to feel an old familiar itch. Damn monkey.