Jennifer

Jennifer

“What are you thinking about right now?” She would ask this question often. It would be during one of those silences some refer to as awkward. I’d just be idly staring off into space while she looked at me, waiting for me to say something. I didn’t like the question. I had no profound answer. My apparently stoic look hid no deep thoughts. In fact, I probably never had anything particularly deep to say. But she would look into my eyes and ask that question. I never had a decent answer.

Jennifer Suzanne Vierra was my girlfriend in 1990. She was beautiful, brash and in a big hurry to live. Though she was just nineteen, she walked, talked and carried herself as if she was already thirty. She was simultaneously attractive, intimidating and captivating. I had never met anyone like her and never have since.

We met in San Francisco in July of 90’. It was at a punk rock show in a club called The Stone. It was on Broadway at the edge of the Red Light District at the top of a hill. I can even remember who was playing that night. It was Social Distortion.

Myself and two friends had parked my 67’ Mustang in Walnut Creek and rode the BART train into the city. From the train station we took a cab to the show. In the club I got separated from my two friends and didn’t care. Being in the city and in the club was intoxicating. I was 21 years old and everything was exhilarating. I can’t remember if it was during the warm-up act or the the feature but the mosh pit was becoming intense. There were some very large men in there and they were in the mood to dance hard. For anyone who hasn’t experienced a mosh pit from that era, it is a harrowing experience. To enter you must commit to the pit. You must accept that you’ll probably get shoved, elbowed and perhaps even knocked down. But the guys that knock you down will also be the ones to help you up. I’ve been asked, “Why is that even fun?” All I can say is it’s a place where I’ve felt as free as I’ve ever felt. You can submit to the music and the other dancers around you. As long as you don’t intentionally try to hurt someone, there’s a good chance nobody will hit you too hard.

I was taking a break at the edge of the pit when I noticed a girl. She was in the center of the pit. In the eye of the storm. She was very small. 5’2”. No more than 100 pounds. Short dark hair. Dressed in all black with her beat up leather boots. She was occasionally taking a hard blow but she seemed determined to stay on the floor. My impression from seeing her out there was she must be a tough little girl for venturing out into the chaos. I decided to go stand behind her to take the pressure off her. I could absorb punishment so she wouldn’t have to. I thought there was a good chance she’d tell me to buzz off, but she didn’t. Instead she leaned back against me instinctively. God did she smell good! She smelled of leather, shampoo, perfume and a hint of tobacco. We remained there, in the center on the pit for a long time. After a while nobody was bumping into us anymore. At one point she made it known she had to visit the restroom. I figured she probably wouldn’t come back. It offered the perfect opportunity for her to leave or to otherwise abandon me. I was prepared for that highly likely possibility. But she did return. When she returned she grabbed my hand and held it firmly. She got right back in front of me and leaned into me. It’s worth mentioning, at this point we still haven’t spoken. She doesn’t know my name and I don’t know hers. It was just some kind of unspoken punk show/mosh pit kinship. It was pure. So far, untainted by words.

After the show, out on the sidewalk we finally spoke. She gave me her name and phone number. I told her I was in the Navy. I thought that would change her opinion of me, but it didn’t. Punk rockers as a rule mistrusted authority and here I was, an employee of the government. I gathered my buddies and we made our way back to the train station. I couldn’t stop thinking about her. The next day I called her and we met the following Friday at her home in Stockton. So it began.

The several months I had with her remains the most memorable time of my life. She taught me how to live life hard and fast. She liked to have fun and she liked it every day in abundance. She taught me how to turn pain into pleasure. She taught me how to let go of my fear and just let the party and more importantly, life lead you wherever it wants. She was a whirlwind. The sex, the drugs, the food, the shows. She wanted it all and she wanted lots of it. She consumed life and all the pleasure it could offer her, and she did this ALL THE TIME.

She lived with her mother in an apartment. I always wondered why her mom said absolutely nothing to her about me being there all the time. In fact, her mother never questioned anything Jennifer did that I ever saw. I would show up every Friday afternoon and stay all weekend until late Sunday night and then drive out of Stockton to Concord or Vallejo, or wherever my ship happened to be docked.

We were inseparable for four months. One fall day we were sitting in a park on a picnic table in the late afternoon sun. Quiet time. Suddenly, without looking at me and without warning, she said, “Wes, I don’t want to die.” I was stunned! I had no reply to such a statement. Remember, she was only nineteen at the time. What nineteen year old says that? I just looked at her. I had no idea why she would say such a thing. She took my hand and still, without looking at me, said, “I have cancer. It’s on my cervix. I’m going to die.” At that point I was in emotional overload. I still couldn’t speak. My mind was racing, searching for something meaningful to say and coming up empty. All I could manage was to sit behind her on that table and wrap my arms around her. It was a similar position to the one we assumed on the night we met. I remained silent.

That day could have been the moment where I stopped being a boy and became a man. But it wasn’t. I wish I could say I stepped up. I wish I could say I was able to absorb the enormity of what she said to me. I was not able to. She was in love with me. I think I had fallen in love with her too. But her honesty about her condition was too much for me. I didn’t have the maturity required to handle it. To this day I hate myself for not supporting her. It might have been the worst decision I’ve ever made.

Within sixty days our relationship had become severely diminished. I went to see her less and less. She called my ship often trying to coax me to her house. Sometimes I went, sometimes I made up an excuse. I don’t know why I was so negatively affected by her admission. It should have brought us closer together, but it didn’t.

In January 1991 I transferred to a new duty station in San Diego. I found out from a mutual friend that she died in 1993. She loved me and I let her go, alone. It remains the single thing that I regret the hardest, and if we really do get judged by some higher power, I believe it’ll be the one thing I judged the harshest for.