By Andrea Lambert.

baby pigeon

2008

My name is Lena Cosentino, I’m 31, and I like being an alcoholic. Beats all the coke I used to do.

Today is Valentines Day. My boyfriend has shining eyes with long eyelashes, and likes to play poker with toy giraffes. We share an apartment in North Hollywood. I slice the plastic off the steaks and he turns them lightly into a pan of butter and garlic. I pour wine on top.

This is the same recipe I used to make with $1.50 wafer-thin sirloins, fried in that apartment in the Haight district where I spent the last months with Brady. But tonight, Nick and I watched Valley of the Dolls and I take my antidepressants. I cry during a scene where Neely O’Hara, the Broadway diva broken by pills, sings to her amnesiac friend in the psych ward.

A bottle of wine later, I put on my corset, and we discover that Depakote retards orgasm.

2004

On a...