One Time All I Wanted Read online

  ONE TIME ALL I WANTED

  Nicolle Elizabeth

  _

  Smashwords Edition

  Copyright 2012 Nicolle Elizabeth

  Published by Dark Sky Books, Asheville, NC

  http://www.darkskybooks.com

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author and/or publisher.

  _

  One time, I stopped what I was doing and read Nicolle Elizabeth s One Time All I Wanted as soon as I received it. I wish that I were you so I could do it again. -- Michael Kimball, author of Us

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  There is something so perfect and aching in Nicolle Elizabeth s One Time All I Wanted. In a work that reads like a song, she offers a litany of truths that shatter and comfort by turns. Beautiful and arresting and completely original. -- Kathy Fish, author of Together We Can Bury It

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  The narrator of Nicolle Elizabeth s One Time All I Wanted tosses confessions like colored rings that slip over our heads and down onto our shoulders as we stomp and applaud, our eyes marking the simple, curved paths from the snap of the wrist to the wash of blues & browns & reds that fill our nodding, eager vision fields. -- Mel Bosworth, author of Freight

  Table of Contents

  one time all i wanted

  About the author

  Also Available from DARK SKY BOOKS

  one time all i wanted

  i once moonlighted for two nights as a magician s assistant. it was nothing like Desperately Seeking Susan.

  one time all i wanted was this dress. i saved forever to get this dress and when i finally got to the store to get the dress they had already sold it to somebody else.

  while working the overnight shift as a bookbinder in South Boston, i would count the ceiling squares to see which number was greater: the squares or the thousands of dollars in debt i was accruing to fund my master s degree. debt won.

  one time i thought i d impress a guy by doing a brake stand on my bike when riding up to the party house because he was out on the front porch but i ended up falling over and his girlfriend came running out to help me. she looked really beautiful in the streetlight. her hair smelled like coconuts.

  one time i really wanted to go to college and a guy gave me a chance to make something of myself.

  _

  once i wrote about you in a book.

  one time a friend and i were extras in a movie. we got to go to a costume fitting together. our roles were “hipsters at the fashion show.” so we get there, and based on my original measurements, the costume director has this really beautiful bolero laid out for me. he said, “it will be your first onscreen Vivienne Westwood moment.” i cried when the bolero turned out to be two sizes too tight.

  one time on a bet i wore the same Bill and Ted s Excellent Adventure tshirt for 22 days consecutively.

  i once ran off with my roommates bassist. we were about 200 miles north of Baltimore when we passed THE ERGS, who were on tour. we knew it was them because they had a license plate which actually said ERGS. i knew them because my ex, not the bassist driving, had put out one of their songs on a comp. there i was sitting backwards on an adventure at 90 mph yet waving out the window at a past life.

  once i fell in love. realized i d rather be standing.

  _

  i spent an entire year skateboarding to work across the Williamsburg bridge while listening to Interpol’s “Turn On the Bright Lights” on my headphones because even though bro dude preppy sports types seem to love that album, it was a really good album.

  i once went to Further Tour a lot. this was the 90 s and sometimes me and my friends would walk around the parking lot with our finger in the air yelling, “who’s got my miracle, i need a ticket in.”

  one time i tried to count how many times i have screwed it up and lost count.

  one time i roadtripped with a guy i met on a plane. somewhere around Jersey he put his hand on my thigh and i realized well, that was a bad idea, and we had like three more hours to drive.

  one time i was put on display. it was like i was one of those turning ballerinas in somebody else s music box.

  _

  i once tried to slide down a laundry chute and had to be rescued by the fire department.

  once, i got a high heel stuck in a cobblestone crack. lipsticks went flying.

  one time Nikki Brewster won prom queen but when they called Nikki i also stood up.

  i once fell off a chairlift.

  one year between the ages of 16-17 i would say that i was sleeping at a friend s house, book it through a heavily wooded area in the dark, take a train into Boston and go to poetry readings in the basement of the Cantab Lounge. over a decade later Big Mike the door guy still calls me tough kid Nicky every time I go back.

  _

  one time a friend and i were paid to dress up and hand out fliers for a grocery store. she was dressed as a giant bear, i was dressed as a giant Cheez-It. then a gang of hooligans knocked me over and i could not get up.

  one time i was living on my friend’s hammock in her back yard in Los Angeles and she gave me a copy of Miss Piggy s Guide to Throwing a Dinner Party.

  one time i asked Philip Levine about the bar fight he got in with some famous actor in LA as to me, “What Work Is” is one of the most important poems of all time, and I saw the fight as a metaphor for life in the states during that time period. so i asked him is it really true you got into this fight and he, confirming my suspicions said, “well, he hit me first.”

  one time i had a date with a famous DJ and we were standing outside by this gate and i went to lean on the gate to look cool and right where i put my hand, someone had recently hocked a giant loogie and there i was, standing, covered in someone s hacked up mucus, trying not to cry.

  i once was chased through a townsquare by a mob of angry people carrying fiery torches.

  _

  i once loved you the whole way through.

  one time i realized, if they don t like you, they don t like you.

  one time i agreed with you the whole time but you weren t hearing me.

  i once woke up in the middle of a meadow. still no idea what happened.

  i once survived a pretty horrific car crash. It was Valentine’s Day and we four girls were headed to a diner. we hit black ice by a reservoir, and spun right out. the car accordioned directly into a boulder, which was randomly placed in the middle of the water s edge. six feet to the left or the right and we would have driven right into the water. who put that boulder there, i would later wonder.

  _

  one time i learned i have an incurable illness.

  one time i danced in the kitchen while singing along to Prince.

  once spent an entire summer working in a bakery in the lower east side. some editor came in and said, “why do you have a picture of Madeline Albright on the wall?” she said it like we didn’t know who the woman was. “because we like hanging out with her,” i answered.

  one time i told you to grow out your beard like the old days and we were going to get together on Christmas and then i brought a friend platonically to your party and you thought he was a date and then the rest of our lives were changed forever.

  one time i figured the odds are shifting.

  _

  one day i decided to get really into running. i realized i m always running so i walked over to a hotdog stand and said, “i’ll take two.”

  one time i lied pretty bad. we re talking real bad.

  one time i waited up for you all night. many nights. in reality and in my head, on separate occasions.

&nb
sp; one time i learned how to say, “build a bridge and get over yourself,” in ten languages. i then spent time thinking about the architectural integrity of different bridges. there were things to take into account, such as materials used, such as climate, such as landscape, such as tradition. some bridges have water running under them and some don t.

  one time i read the same book all the time.

  _

  i once had the same song stuck in my head for three years. my friend took me to a drunken Karaoke night, where i mistakenly began to sing the song that had been in my head for three years, rather than the one actually playing. i don t think much about either of those songs now.

  one month i dreamt about a glowing orb.

  i once went and learned how to build an entire bicycle from scratch.

  one time, okay, no, many times i went to too many raves.

  i once convinced my best friend that buying up all the purple properties in Monopoly was a solid investment so i could take her for everything she had.

  _

  i was once electrocuted by a farm fence. i can tell you when rain s coming 48 hours in advance because my elbow starts to ache now.

  one time i applied to be one of those people who spend 365 days living in a Sequoia tree. the law says the tree can t be cut down if someone is inhabiting it, so all these organizations built these huts for people to live in up there. people work in 365 day shifts, rations are sent up via bucket. i figured i’d live up there and write an entire year. then i learned the waiting list for a tree is five years long.

  one time i was in such a good mood that i drove past two exits to continue

  listening to pop radio. i was in such a good mood that i ate a carb. i was in such a good mood i almost called you from thousands of miles away to say i was wrong.

  i once got a job working on the Iditarod but couldn t go because i didn t have enough money for gear.

  i once was waving goodbye to my friend and running alongside his bus when i slammed face-first into a giant pole.

  _

  i once quit smoking for four months.

  i once told myself i d gotten over you.

  i once told you i d gotten over you.

  one time i won a dance competition. what is up, Paula Abdul?

  i once made a promise and a promise is a promise.

  _

  one time i went to visit my friend s grave and these wind chimes started singing even though there wasn t any wind.

  one time i let you break my heart. one time i didn t ask you to.

  i once found an overhead projector on the curb in front of our stoop. i brought it inside to see if it was still working. it was, so i took a drawing from a book, and tore it out, and put it on the overhead projector. i then traced the image onto our living room wall. i was in the middle of painting inside the lines when you came home from work, got down on one knee in front of the projector light while I was up on a ladder, and asked me to marry you - not yet but someday.

  one time i learned that my old apartment was one building over from Patti Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe s apartment in Bed-Stuy, long after i d moved out. here i d been complaining the entire time about being hungry and how to make the rent, and i d been sleeping right next to where they d said the exact same.

  one time I had another apartment right down the street from the apartment Henry James used to live in. it was technically a room meant to be a closet in my friend s painting studio. i got headaches a lot.

  _

  one time you called me to say i was a hard woman to get a hold of. your voice sounded exactly the same as i d been hearing it all these ten years without you.

  one time i jumped into the ocean with all my clothes on, because sometimes you just have to swim.

  one time i sat alone at a bar. sometimes it s all that can be done.

  one time my friend asked me to have a three way with him and his girlfriend because he was afraid she was going to leave him for a woman.

  one time i said something i d wished i hadn t, and then a shooting star flew overhead. how does that work?

  _

  one time you called while i was flipping through the television channels and there was this scene of indigenous people fighting with each other. sticks, spears, sweat. figured i’d leave it on in the background on mute while listening to what you had to say.

  one time i really liked this guy as a friend but then i saw him read his poetry and thought, “that’s it? that is what the big deal is about?” then i tried to be friends with him anyway but just couldn t.

  one time i had an entire year of choking at my own readings. i believe it earned me the term “charming,” it was so bad. “oh yeah, she s charming.” (makes farting noise with her mouth.)

  one time this super nice girl who is super nice to everybody else was really mean to me.

  i once thought that introducing two of the biggest dipshits i ever met would be such a hilarious thing to observe from a distance. then they plotted against me.

  _

  i once showed up to a scrimmage game drunk and scored a goal for the other team.

  i once met a famous writer for dinner. i was so nervous and excited we were going to talk about literature. he ogled me the entire night and i felt like a piece of garbage the whole walk home.

  one time i wondered why it s taboo to speak up.

  one time a friend had to drive a band van named the Pequod (which was the name of the ship in Moby Dick, you ll remember) halfway across the country to rescue me.

  once, a friend and i were walking on Union and i was saying that i wanted to write MIA s song lyrics and a dude stuck his head out his apartment window and shouted down at me and i quote directly here, “you should probably kill yourself.”

  _

  i once tried to be a florist. i brought my resume to all the flower shops in town. i said to the managers i really wanted to spend my days working in a flower shop and spend my nights writing. the response i got was, “miss thinks her shit smells like roses.”

  one time i was standing in line at the overpriced Sunac grocery store in Brooklyn and miserable i was paying so much for bread, and then a great song came on the radio and everyone in the line started dancing together, and i remembered why i was there.

  one time i was miserable in a subway station and some dude s cellphone started ringing and the song was “Juicy” by Notorious BIG and i wasn’t as miserable anymore.

  one time i said i can t and you said i can. one time i started to make it right.

  _

  i once rode my bike through a snowstorm because you were cheating on me. i said “fuck him. I am never talking to him again.” in the morning, you showed up and i let you in.

  i once let a guy misspell my name into his cellphone library, and would regret it for the rest of the days i knew him.

  one time i saw your name on a bookshelf, and i smiled. i smiled.

  i once spent a winter working in the only female-owned hardware store in Baltimore. a man came in to ask about 90 degree copper plumbing pipes, and even though i had the answer he still chuckled and said, “what’s a woman know about hardware?”

  i once walked across two bridges to tell you to leave me alone.

  _

  one time we were standing on Charles Street in Boston and a fruit delivery truck drove past us and you said, “i’ve dreamt this,” and now every time i see that logo it s all i can remember.

  one time i was walking in a bad neighborhood and a man asked me what the blue ink on one of my tattoos meant. i said, “oh, my boyfriend picked it out,” and then he left me alone.

  one time i woke up in the middle of the night and turned on the light because there was a spider six feet above me on the wall. i d known it was there, that was why i had woken up. i could sense it. i m certain of this.

  one time i danced with you at a punk show in an un-permitted warehouse. i once did one hundred sit-ups but nothing changed.

  one time i really asked what have i done. i
once knew we were supposed to meet.