Down the Drain

Rohan is Julia’s “sugar daddy.” She met him when she was 19 and working at the Dungeon. He is a billionaire with an undisclosed vocation and readily devotes himself to Julia. Rohan immediately enamors Julia because he sees her like no one else has before. He listens to her, asks her opinion, takes her advice, and values her ideas. He also validates Julia’s beauty and talent and begins to finance her life. He buys her a car, sends her to school, rents her a $ 10,000-per-month apartment in Manhattan, and invests in her and Liana’s budding fashion design company.

At first, Julia believes Rohan is the ideal sponsor for her decadent lifestyle. They develop a romantic and sexual relationship, but Julia largely values Rohan because he lets her do what she wants and fuels her passions and impulses. Over time, however, Rohan “starts becoming more needy and possessive” and Julia must “live in constant fear that he will take everything” away from her and Liana (201). She starts to change her behavior to Rohan’s moods and suspicions. She needs him to continue financing her but also longs for her freedom. This latter desire is redoubled when Julia falls in love with Shane and feels incapable of ending the affair to maintain the terms of her relationship with Rohan. Julia ultimately says goodbye to Rohan when she discovers he’s seeing someone else. She convinces him to keep paying for her life but realizes that she hurt Rohan and wasn’t always considerate of his needs or feelings. The relationship is formative in Julia’s coming-of-age and self-discovery journey and influences how she thinks about money, artwork, independence, and intimacy.

Gianna is one of Julia’s best friends. Julia and Gianna meet at an AA meeting in New York. Gianna approaches Julia after the meeting because she is impressed by Julia’s bold decision to confront Shane and his girlfriend in front of the group. The women become fast friends. They start spending their time together and sharing their past sorrows and artistic aspirations. At the time of its inception, the friendship is therefore motivating, supportive, and stabilizing. However, the friends soon relapse at the same time and begin to enable one another’s alcohol addiction and drug use. After Katharine dies, Julia tries to convince Gianna to get clean with her, but Gianna refuses. Ultimately, Gianna overdoses and dies while Julia is doing a photo shoot in LA. Julia blames herself because she feels responsible for having left Gianna alone in her time of need.

Gianna and Julia have a deep, loving connection. Sometimes, the women feel like they are soulmates destined to share their lives. When they’re spending time together, Julia sometimes wonders if “she [is] the one,” because their “bond transcends anything either of [them has] ever felt before” (269). Because of their close bond, Julia experiences emotional upheaval when Gianna dies. Losing Gianna is like losing a part of herself. At the same time, Gianna’s death inspires Julia to change her life and pursue sobriety to honor Gianna. Gianna’s death also compels Julia to keep her pregnancy with Valentino because she learns that his due date is Gianna’s birthday. She sees Valentino as a reincarnation of her late friend.

Harmony is another of Julia’s close friends. Harmony emerges in Chapter 9 when Julia decides that she needs a friend to venture across the country with her when she agrees to do the nude spread for Playboy. She sees Harmony as “the only person” she knows “who will drop anything in an instant for a fun adventure” (230). She collects Julia from her house in upstate New York, and the two hit the road together. They rekindle their friendship from the past and create a new, nomadic life together. Harmony is by Julia’s side throughout her time in Louisiana. She also supports Julia’s artistic pursuits and tries to get sober with her after Julia overdoses. The more time they spend together, the more apparent their bond becomes. Julia starts to regard Harmony as her muse and enjoys “capturing her in all her glory” (267), tugging her into adventures and photographing her throughout. She’s devastated when she and Harmony have to part ways and say goodbye to each other. Harmony moves to California to attend film school, and Julia returns to New York. Julia worries about leaving Harmony, as their connection feels as deep as her connection with Gianna. The friends understand and support each other through both failures and successes. When Harmony dies from a drug overdose, Julia is so distraught about losing Harmony that Julia attempts to track down the dealer who sold Harmony the drugs that killed her. These efforts prove the significance Harmony had in Julia’s life.

Shane is one of Julia’s boyfriends. They meet at a party one night when Julia is still seeing Rohan. Shane initially insists that he respects Julia and Rohan’s relationship, telling her that he “thinks it’s fuckin’ badass” and promising that he “won’t fuck it up for [her]” (203). However, Shane’s perspective changes once he and Julia start sleeping together and after they fall in love. He becomes increasingly controlling and jealous and gets angry at Julia for refusing to cut ties with Rohan. Shane is also a person with addiction and has erratic, selfish patterns of behavior that mirror many of Julia's other romantic dynamics. Julia repeatedly tries to end the affair but repeatedly returns to it. She often likens Shane to a drug that she can’t deny herself or get enough of. The relationship finally ends when Shane attacks Julia on multiple occasions. Julia does everything she can to stand up to him and bring him to justice. Her efforts often go awry, but her refusal to cower in the face of Shane’s violence marks a turning point in her self-discovery and empowerment journey.