In Which We Watch "Lie to Me" Online After Emerz Loses the Remote

"Lie to me," sings Emerz softly. "I promise, I'll believe."

"The check's in the mail," I say.

"I love you," says Emerz.

"The dog ate my homework," I say.

"The dog ate my condom," says Emerz.

"I was talking about someone else named Emerz," I say.

"I was thinking of you the whole time," says Emerz.

"I got no problem with lies," says Emerz. "Where would we be without them? Virginal, in jail, minus the insurance money from the speedboat. I find them comforting. Flattering."

"Emerz' new clothes," I say.

"What?" he says. "I just got back from the outlet mall!"

We're knee-to-knee on the couch. My eyes burn from the PC screen. The episode ends. The rapist almost got away. The browser window closes and a Word document pops up. Personal essays. I mean, personal.

"Oh, about these," says Emerz. "I'm going back to college."

"Barber or clown?" I say, with kindlings of jealousy twisting into fire somewhere between my heart and my head. I'm not sure where the feeling comes from. I think about Uggs and iPhones and ivory towers, my own squandered third chances. Emerz sighs. I stretch. "I'll talk to you later, Van Wilder," I say, bitingly, wondering when I will grow up enough to allow others their fair share of happiness.

Wild Emerz Can't Be Broken

"Burn Notice?" says Emerz, brow cocked, scrolling through the guide. "I've gotten a few of those. Not really something I'd want to DVR. These days they mainly come via e-cards."

"Well, that's true," I say. "Unfortunate title. I think it's an industry term. But think of the white-washed art deco facades, the cocaine swing, the nightclub thang, the jittery thump of the pulse of Miami. Plus, that girl from Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken..."

"I love that movie," says Emerz, miming a horse diving off a pier. It's unnervingly believable. He drops an ice cube into his fizzing cola. "Splash," he says.

I remember For Love Or Money a little better. J. Fox powerwalking around a cheesy hotel, making deals fresh outta Cornell. Just missing elevator doors. Brushing his hair back in boyish, good-natured aggravation. Gabrielle Anwar, that was her name, the one that made it all worthwhile for Fox, for the whiplashed horse, for me, for Emerz. It's an interesting turn of events. Emerz, big city lug, latches onto the rural county fair crowd pleaser. I go for the big city power-play crowd pleader. "It's called escapism," says Emerz. Fish out of water stories, I say. Horses in water stories, he says.

Emerz Lights Out For The Territory, My Place

Anna Faris leaves the Playboy Mansion, and settles down in a loose, closer-to-life version of the reality she has just escaped. Isn't that what we want? To become our best selves? Somewhere between the glossy and the grimy? Between Saturday night and Sunday morning? Say, Saturday at 10:35? When the momentum is palpable but not yet the scraping undertow it will soon become? Emerz fixes me a vodka and wheat grass. Its called a lawnmower, says Emerz, pulling tight the belt of his robe. Emerz refuses to manage his dreams in this way. Emerz invests in Powerball tickets and Valtrex, in eHarmony and bomb shelters. The grip of home, that at once critical and forgiving place, the place we run towards and hide from, is squarely in Emerz' rear view mirror. Who knows how long the gas cards will work? So we're at my place. Emerz looks around. Sniffs. We watch The House Bunny, eat Papa Johns, fight over the last jalapeno. Rumer Willis wears a back brace, but still manages to show off her burgeoning chest. The lead singer of The All-American Rejects courts the black-eyed girl from Superbad. Katherine McPhee wears a prosthetic pregnant belly. Has anyone seen Sydney White? I mean, besides the writers of The House Bunny? Anna Faris/Amanda Bynes cage match, says Emerz. His breathing quickens slightly. We discuss our own Greek lives. Emerz' frat got thrown off campus, mostly because they let him in. I left mine after Mardi Gras was over and dues were due. I told Emerz about running into a few of my old brothers at a bar in a forgotten city I no longer call home. You're okay with us, McGrath, they said. Yeah, yeah. There was a chorus of yeahs. I noticed a recent Real World alum in the corner, chatting up someone who was drinking something I had just bought her. Yeah yeah, they said. We don't care what they say about you. They talk about me? I said. It was vaguely flattering even though I knew where it was headed. Oh yeah, they said. You're the warning, the alternative. The rest of the world. Like, if we're slacking on our push-ups. That's me, I say. The one who doesn't want it enough. Next to most naked people we see, the Playboy bunnies are relics, shiny statues with mindboggling birth dates and banal interests, unreasonable chests held up by sturdy forearms. Where's the gynecological details? Where's the degradation? Where's the cup? So now do we need The House Bunny? The feelgood story of an expelled Playmate who finds a slightly less judgmental place to live, with even less nudity? Playboy is 6:45 on a Tuesday, over at a friend's house across the street, working to look cool, working to cover your lap. The House Bunny is 2:45 on a Sunday, over at your grandparents, soup and sandwiches, oh now what is this says your grandmother, walking back in, mildly embarrassed, after fetching seconds.

Emerz on Jason Biggs

Emerz says Jason Biggs is underrated. He says he might just be his favorite actor. There's a vulnerability to Biggs that Emerz identifies with. A slender sorrow slackens his face. In My Best Friend's Girl, Biggs and Dane Cook are fighting tooth and nail over the heart of Kate Hudson. No matter who wins, we all lose.

"I mean, have you seen Saving Silverman?" asks Emerz, incredulous. "Saving Silverman? Hello? The sequel to Schindler's List?!"

Oh. Right, I say. That one.

Emerz Goes to Thailand, Struggles For Relevance

"It's like, the balder Nic Cage gets, the more hair he has?"

Emerz is confused, struggling over this paradox while watching Bangkok Dangerous. Nicholas Cage looks more and more like Alan Rickman every day, I tell Emerz.

Emerz always references celebrities in a casual shorthand, like how he saw Bobby de Niro at a sushi restaurant, or Angie Jolie at a toy store. It's something you get used to, or you don't spend much time with Emerz. The villain in Bangkok Dangerous is Thai. You know he's bad because he has blond hair, says Emerz.

I find it increasingly hard to take Cage seriously, but Emerz still holds him dear. "You have to respect a man that takes his fetishes that seriously," says Emerz. He lists them on his fingers. Lisa Marie Presley. A 19-year-old Japanese wife. "Someone say passion project?" says Emerz lowly, widening his eyes and biting his bottom lip. Like, wink wink. Nudge nudge.

Emerz coddles his fetishes with similar vigor. Coyote Ugly, for one thing. That's still going on. Ladies tennis. Something involving ladies tennis and belts, actually. Pregnant women. Pregnant women smoking. I won't say what Emerz wants them to smoke. Emerz is a veritable piggy bank of web site passwords. His doorstep is often home to plain brown packages. He sees a kindred spirit in Nicholas Cage. Even the craggy, marrow-deficient Cage of Bangkok Dangerous, the one who looks ridiculous in leather. The one who looks wobbly on a motorcycle. The one who breaks all his own rules and dates a deaf Thai woman who works at a pharmacy. The hit man with the heart of gold. We've seen it before. His life is a paradox. The balder he gets, the more hair he has.

Emerz' So-Called Life Continues Unabated

Emerz is watching My So-Called Life. Well, re-watching it. The high school dynamic is foreign to Emerz. He went to boarding school. Well, he went to school in Brooklyn, but he did spend one cold summer in Newport. Emerz went to school with Susan Sarandon's daughter, but he didn't put two and two together until he saw The Banger Sisters. Well, saw it again.

Flannel aside, Emerz is slightly disturbed that he identifies more with Ricky than with Jordan this time around. He swears he remembers high school from a distinctly Jordanesque perspective. We all do, I tell him. It's important to hold onto that. It is important to keep Emerz' delusions straight.

Emerz almost stopped watching after the mother got her severe haircut. Or when the Sheriff of Nottingham from Robin Hood: Men in Tights showed up as an inspiring substitute teacher. Or when that knowing bass line kicks in during the opening credits, the one that makes Emerz automatically cock his head and place a hand on his hip and smile like hey, it's crazy, but it just might be enough. Like, bless this mess.

Emerz Debra Messes Himself

Emerz has a stomach ache, stress-related, he says, Real World: Brooklyn-related, he says. He has barely touched his Applebee's Curbside.

"In the year 2009 people are getting open," says Emerz.

Recently Emerz has been surrounded by a chorus of criers, from the Bromance contestants to his parents. All he sees these days is shaking shoulders, he swears. He's buying stock in Maybelline, figuring people will be reapplying their make-up a lot more often. He personally is buying concealer by the gallon, hoping it might work to mask more than just his T-zone. He's thinking of coating his life in the forgiving goo.

"It's 2009," says Emerz, "no jokes are funny."

He's living life tightly. There's little room for error, but is there ever?

It's ladies night at Emerz' house, which means we watch Lifetime, which means we watch Frasier and Will and Grace. We all hate Grace. Something about Debra Messing makes Emerz crinkle his nose. He describes her as acrid. Whenever he sees her, he says, he smells urinal cakes. Her sculpted red mane pops onto the screen. "Ugh," says Emerz. "She might be one of those people, places and things they tell you about." I tell him to consider himself lucky. She's easy to avoid.

In a rare showing of artificial intelligence, the television tests Emerz' theory. The Wedding Date is playing on TNT. Messing offers Dermot Mulroney 6K to pretend to be her bf. "I'll give you six grand to change the channel," says Emerz. "Bon mot Mulroney," says Emerz, I assume self-referentially.

Emerz on Bush

"I've been thinking a lot about Bush," says Emerz. "Transitions," I say. "You're a clean, articulate guy, Emerz," I say. "This must be an exciting time for you." And Emerz is surprisingly political, or at least he was up until someone mistook him for Gov. Bill Richardson at a fundraiser. Fucking liberals, says Emerz ever since. "Sophia Bush," he says. "And Lauren Bush to a lesser extent. Sophia Bush, hello? House of Wax, The Hitcher? Doe-eyed brunette?" I look into Emerz' dough eyes. "Ex-fiance of Chad Michael Murray," I say. "That's the one," says Emerz.

Reflections on Emerz

We were watching the Golden Globes, critiquing. The Tina Fey backlash is a large presence in Emerz' house. Fuck, it may have been born in Emerz' house. There's an ad for Kiefer Sutherland's Mirrors DVD. We watch as that handsome face is stretched and distorted gruesomely.

"Oh big deal," says Emerz. "I never like what I see either."

I remind him of Teen Wolf, of a twinkish J. Fox staring at a mirror in his high school's bathroom and begging his reflection, "Please don't change, please don't change, please don't change..."

"That's right," says Emerz. "That's after he runs out of class, when he goes to the blackboard and notices his fingernails start to darken. That always reminded me of nervous math-class boners."

"I think that's intentional," I say. "It's a metaphor for hormones."

"Maybe," says Emerz. "I'm just happy I don't have to worry about those anymore."

"About what?" I say.

"The math class boners," says Emerz.

"Why? Because you dropped out of school or because you don't get boners anymore?"

"Both," says Emerz.

He goes upstairs and comes down with the Teen Wolf DVD. We are reminded again of the high school formula. Loser has a rapid social ascent, and then, Icarus-like, plummets, generally in front of a large, formerly adoring crowd. We are reminded of Can't Buy me Love. Emerz puts on his white leather jacket. We cheer during the choreographed prom dance. We cheer as Fox's friend Styles surfs the suburban streets of California aboard his van. We cheer as the Wolf spins the basketball on his index finger, wondering what everyone is staring at. When the resident hot chick seduces J.Fox in the drama department dressing room, we howl.

A Miscommunication Between Me and Emerz

"You know my favorite part of Boys Don't Cry?" asks Emerz.

"What's that," I say.

"When Hilary Swank finally gets what she deserves," says Emerz. I cringe hard, remembering the bleak prairie twilight, the savage violations, the twisted, forced gender reassignment.

"Ugh," I say.

"What?" says Emerz. "I mean the Oscar! The Oscar!"

Emerz and the Downsides of Immortality

We're talking about rehab jumping the shark. It's a cold, dim afternoon, perfect for judging others, that always reliable heart-warmer, schadenfreude, permeating through the glass walls of Emerz' sun porch. The ocean appears ghostly in the near distance. Emerz isn't wearing socks, despite the snowstorm that has left us stranded and without cable. We end up watching Interview With A Vampire on DVD. There is something to be said for old favorites, I tell Emerz. "I mean, what did Kirsten Dunst go to rehab for?" asks Emerz. "Not brushing her teeth?"

Spoilers From Emerz

"The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift has a surprise ending you'll never see coming," says Emerz.

Tossed Salad and Scrambled Eggs for Emerz

"Well, Emerz, " I said, "it looks like your new building isn't quite as exclusive as you thought. The doorman just waved me right in." "That's because he knows you," said Emerz. "Oh, really" I said. "A fan of myfriendsgotcable?" "No," said Emerz. "He lives in your building."

Double Vision

"Have you seen Eight Christmases?" asked Emerz. "You mean Four Christmases," I said. "I'll call you back in two hours," he said.

A Busy Holiday Season for Emerz

"Have you seen Doubt?" I asked Emerz. I'd been hearing a lot of buzz. "What's the deal with all these Holocaust movies coming out right now," he said.

Emerz' Test of Faith

"You've got a better chance of getting into heaven than getting into Devyn," said Devyn, of the brave, new, Real World.

"I'm an atheist, bitch!" said Emerz, with impressive vitrol.

Emerz as Cerberus, Lording Over the Triborough Bridge

"First they come for your friends, and you say nothing," says Emerz, "and then they come for your city..." He is blasting the squirrels that sixty-nine the bird-feeder with a pellet gun, eating glovefuls of snow. "What?" he asks, "You got a problem with this?"

"Not at all," I say, "as long as you don't start wetting the bed or starting fires." Emerz is, for better or worse, a born and bred New Yorker, who is currently posted up in a tri-state resort community in search of a little breathing room. Whitney Port is doing the opposite, keeping her head amid the skyline, and doing it suspiciously close to how Emerz remembers doing it, one hand busy held aloft, sunglasses the size of apartments, Dinner parties! Eating outside! Coffee! and chanting that untrue refrain, "What a small world, what a small world, what a small world..."

I say the problem with the show is that it takes the vibrancy of NYC and condenses it into banal conversations about manufactured juvenile drama. Instead of talking about art, they talk about art dealers. "Fuck art dealers," says Emerz. "And their kids."

What's cooler, I ask Emerz, the uptown crowd or the downtown crowd?

"How the fuck am I supposed to know," he says. "Downtown like what, 61st St.?"

Whitney seems similarly confused, attending an "uptown" party in Tribeca. "Well, it's a state of mind," says Emerz. "Everyone knows that."

Finally, says Emerz. A show about dating in the big city.

"Does that work?" I wonder aloud after Alex asks Whitney to meet him to discuss her boyfriend. Do girls do that? Listen as other men just blast out a rumour like a cannon ball warning shot? Do men do that? Just assume that eventually a guy with an accent is going to slip up and fall into his place in your elaborately constructed reality? I guess they do, I finally realize, while watching it all unfold across an elaborately constructed reality, taxis swimming uptown like salmon, full disclosure kept in safety deposit boxes. The City within the city, vaguely familiar people and places. It can all be a little much. "I don't want to think about anything," says Whitney. I tell Emerz I would think she'd be tired of that, but who can blame her? After all, who would want this, this exploded life?

"The unexploded life..." says Emerz, stroking the pellet gun across his lap.

So where does this leave us, I ask Emerz. "Eyeing the metropolis from afar? Thinking about people who are not thinking about us?"

"I'm redoubling my efforts to become a doorman," he says.

"A doorman to what?" I ask, "A building? A club? Uptown? Downtown?"

"The city," he says. "I'll be the doorman to the city."

Rooting For The Villain

"This cast is so L.A." says Emerz. We're watching S.W.A.T., just barely too young to remember the show. I ask for clarification. "Oh, come on," he says. "Rosario Dawson? LL Cool J? That guy, that guy, Mr. International, who dates Kylie Minogue? Who directed this? The maitre d at Koi?" "Michelle Rodriguez," I say. "What?" "It's Michelle Rodriguez, not Rosario Dawson." "Oh, that's right," says Emerz. "I wonder if she's out of Hawaiian prison yet." Emerz hates police. He hates the lights, the radio static, the mustaches, the flattened foreheads. He roots for the villain. Always. When we watched Rent he rooted for gentrification. When we watched An Inconvenient Truth he rooted for the truth. When we watched Hook he rooted for Robin Williams' continuing dedication to his work. "Oh, grow up," he said to Peter Panning. "It's a once in a lifetime deal!" The S.W.A.T. villain, Mr. International himself, Mr. One-hundred-million-dollars!, Mr. Kylie Minogue, is as good as anybody to root for. "But he's a wanted terrorist," I tell Emerz. "And he cockholded Richard Gere in Unfaithful," says Emerz. "But...but," Emerz takes a deep breath, massages the bridge of his nose, "I find him irresistible." Emerz is against regulation of any kind. Don't tell him who to root for. And don't regulate his heart. "Do you remember that?" he asks. "That scene on the staircase?" His nose is pinched white under the pressure of his remembrances. "Do you remember that scene on the staircase?" What goes around comes around, I tell Emerz. And, in the end, Hollywood always leaves the villains holding the bag, dead or in jail. Just look at Michelle Rodriguez, I say. Proof positive that life catches up to you. But Emerz isn't hearing it. He's flipping through the movie channels, looking for a team to cheer for. I check the TV Guide. United 93 comes on at 8.

FRIENDSHIP IS RARE, or INNUENDO OVERLOAD

(Image courtesy of Emerz) What should young people do with their lives today?Many things, obviously. But the most daring thing is to create stable communities in which the terrible disease of loneliness can be cured.-Kurt Vonnegut Emerz is familiar with loneliness. He knows the cold feeling of a television remote on a Friday night. He knows the clammy spiral of porn sites and the false hope of adultfriendfinder. Emerz knows the thunderous silence of a quiet phone, lying across his bed under the heavy drapes of the canopy, legs crossed behind him, face first into a suffocating pillow. Oh wait, he has it on silent. There. That's better. Brody Jenner should be immune to this affliction, Emerz thinks. The fact that he clearly is not does not have the reassuring effect Emerz was hoping for. It's more like a guffaw, like, Brody's got problems? Like, is there hope for anybody? Here's the thing about Emerz and Brody Jenner. Emerz would consider himself to be friends with Brody. Bromance is something of an insult to Emerz. He wasn't aware Brody felt so alone. A Brody Jenner dating show, Emerz could get behind that. Brody's got needs, Emerz understands this. And any woman would be lucky to land him. It speaks to Jenner's skills that he doesn't need MTV for women. So then, what does Bromance say about him? There was a bad split with Spencer, former BFF. "You're dead to me," Spencer said to Brody, "I'm talking to a dead man right now." How many times have I heard that, thinks Emerz. Variations on a long-running theme, thinks Emerz. Breaking up is hard to do. I don't believe that Spencer and Brody are actually enemies, but Emerz gets fussy if you challenge the reality established by The Hills. So Brody is floating listlessly through Los Angeles without anyone to tell him how good he looks, without anyone to laugh at his jokes or admire the shiny leather of his SUV's interior or stand next to and feel taller, faster, sharper. He has Frankie, but he is more of a succubus than a wingman. More of a hanger-on or package carrier than friend. Emerz is adamant on this point. Of all the teams Emerz is on (Team L.C., Team Aniston, Team Ronson, Team Fez (vs Moore), Team Moore (vs Roddick)) team Not Frankie is Emerz' banner headline, his number one cause, his Rushmore. Emerz doesn't feel too threatened by the competition, as he calls them. He was puzzled by the arrival of an openly gay contestant, until I explained to him that the gay man's purpose was to assure us that all the rest of the bros were not gay. No matter how much time they all spend in the hot tub together ("That's just how Brody rolls," Emerz tells me after I wonder aloud about the hot tub thing). The gay man may have spoken for all of us when he said, "I thought this would be more like an episode of the Hills." It is not, despite Lauren's cameo in later episodes. Say what you want about the denizens of The Hills, but they don't go to Fredrick's of Hollywood parties at Hush. They don't have Boston accents. They don't worship television personalities. They don't drink out of red solo cups. They don't help people, or reconsider, or apologize well. "What are friends for?" I once asked Emerz, rhetorically, while giving him an affectionate slap on the back. "I've got no idea," replied Emerz. With Brody, he thinks he is beginning to understand. Emerz owns the Princes of Malibu Collector's Edition DVD Box Set. He celebrates the entire Jenner catalogue. He bought birthday presents for Brody's half-sisters, the Kardashians. He refused to watch Kim's sex tape ("my most trying hour," says Emerz) out of familial love. Emerz doesn't like to share (see the great six-foot party-sub debacle of '06), but even he has to admit that there is more than enough Brody to go around. He's going to keep his eye on the black guy though. "I don't trust him," he says. "I don't want Brody to get hurt."