The Shards

by Bret Easton Ellis

We were teenagers, superficially sophisticated children, who really knew nothing about how the world actually worked—we had the experience, I suppose, but we didn’t have the meaning.

Suddenly there were the spider infestations that bloomed everywhere across the city.

For about two years they were in love, until that fall of 1981, when one of them wasn’t, which set into motion a series of dreadful events.

always mildly stoned on marijuana or Valium or half a Quaalude (but functioning—she was an effortless A student)

Sex and novels and music and movies were the things that made life bearable—not friends, not family, not school, not social scenes, not interactions—and that was the summer when I watched Raiders of the Lost Ark every other week but barely had dinner with my separated parents even twice. I had no stakes in the real world—why would I? It wasn’t

Imagine being 17 now

built for me or my needs or desires.

Goes w above

I remained the proud underachiever.

finished reading Cujo (the kid died—I was impressed and shocked; Stephen King had balls)

the number of murders committed by just one or a duo could hit twenty or thirty, fifty or sixty, during that particular decade. (Mass shooters have replaced them.)

everyone’s mild drug use was fairly under control in 1981 and there was no such thing as rehab—at

also no DUIs, there were no overdoses, there were no suicide attempts, and of course, there were no school shootings anywhere—all

all of this would come later.

though we were aware of the club’s purported racism we just hadn’t attached a deep or real meaning to it, because 1981 wasn’t asking us to.