The Real Catty World (Part 6: Three Half Naked Chinese Boys)

I would like to apologize to The American Public for the current blizzard situation. It's my fault. In September 2000, I moved to Burlington, Vermont, where I spent some time hanging out with my friends, Dagster and The Soggy Blind Lesbian (they have real names, but they're intimidated by my other friends' cool monikers). 2000/2001 was the snowiest winter in Vermont in 50 years. On December 26th, the three of us had a reunion, and sure enough it was a disgusting snow muck in Boston. Last Sunday, Dagster and I made pizza and went out to a poetry slam. It snowed. Today, I passed her on my way for a brief visit with my mother on The Cape. I'll be lucky to get out of here by Monday.

Thus far, it's been an eventful 2005. The new apartment...the new aprtment...Dear God, the new apartment.

The day after Christmas, my Dad dropped me off at the ferry (with an er, not an ai, wise-asses), and I headed into Boston to have dinner with the aforementioned Dagster and SBL. On my way, I decided to stop at my new apartment and put my luggage in my room, so as not to drag hundreds of pounds of suitcases around in the freezing snow. Now, I know Boston pretty well. I'm fairly new to Slummerville, but I know I live off Broadway, so when I get off the T and see a bus that says "via Broadway", I get on it. For whatever reason the "via Broadway" bus does not run via Broadway. So I had to ride it all the way back to the T station, and then walk the mile or so home. I was not inhappymode.

Now, those of you regular readers might think what happens next would be something of an enjoyment for me; a late Christmas present from the God of Twisted Whores: I opened the door to my new apartment, a room I'd set up with all my belongings, a bed I'd slept in twice, and what do I find? Three half-naked Chinese boys. The room is filled with suitcases that I don't remember owning, and there are three half naked Chinese strangers sleeping in my goddamned bed. Did I strip off my clothes and join them? Take off my shoe and beat them until they ran screaming out into the snow? Read them the advanced copy of the Are We There Yet? screenplay until they beat each other to death with my industrial sized stapler? No. I calmly closed the door to my room, and had a bit of a "what the fuck?" session with The Landlord. The crazy assed, what the hell was I thinking moving into this place Landlord. Oh, right, I was thinking "Food is included in the rent." Unfortunately, sanity, privacy, and a healthy sense of personal boundaries were not.

Having griped out some of my stress, I head into town to meet Dagster and SBL. About halfway there, I get a phone call from SBL, Dagster and she have been in a minor car accident (I told Dagster she should have let the blindie drive). They are fine, but are freaked out about the snowy driving conditions, so they go to Dagster's house, which is also in Slummerville. I go to The Lizard Lounge for poetry. I am one of five people including the real host, and the bartender that is stupid enough to go out for poetry during a snowstorm. We drink free drinks, and I catch a cab Chez Dagster.

By the time I get home, it is the 27th, and the Chinese Boys are barricaded in another room. Apparently, the pill popping gay roommate sat on one of their faces at three o'clock in the morning, so they decided to move into an empty room, and put a desk in front of the door so he couldn't get in. My room no longer shows evidence of anything Chinese, not even General Tso's Chicken.

The Chinese boys (who are mildly hot, but a tad on the rich and clueless side for me) head out to New York, leaving me, Landlord and Pill Popper. Pill Popper regales me with tales of his youth on Cape Cod. He repeatedly refers to me as Michael, Jonathan, and occasionally Frank; never by my proper name. He goes into vast details about all the clubs he used to go to on The Cape. Unfortunately for him, I actually did grow up on The Cape, and know that every story he tells me is complete and utter bullshit. Fairy fantasy tales. Meanwhile, The Landlord has adopted a Korean houseboy.

Korean houseboy won't let me do my own dishes, won't let me cook my own food, and gets in the habit of interrupting "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" to ask me questions about American culture. He has a fetish for "silver hairs." Hence, he is fucking my Landlord, though he is about five years younger than me, and Landlord is thirty years older. I try and stay out of the house as much as possible. New Year's Eve Eve, I am rescued from the madhouse by my friend, Celeste, and her ultra-cool roommate. We eat pizza and play arcade games at The Good Times Emporium. I even beat a straight boy at air hockey.

Actual New Year's Eve, I move my stuff into my new new room; a refinished attic with all sorts of cool angles, and closet space for all my friends who can't deal with their sexual orientation. I set up my bookcase and my laptop, and mourn the fact that my computer isn't equipped for wireless Internet yet.

original post: http://insafemode.livejournal.com/95840.html

The Real Catty World (Part 2: Purely Academic Reasons To Get Out Of The Rental Pool)

Not too far from Danny's apartment is the wonderful world of M.I.T. Hot nerd central. Granted, it's also ugly nerd central, but let's not dwell on that.

M.I.T. is a forest of equations that you can't see through the variables. I've always wanted to be tangentially associated with it. It implies math intelligence. I my have blinked my way through Calculus, but I am exceptionally quick with basic math, and simple geometry. For example: a fifty year old man claiming to be twenty-one has subtracted twenty-nine years off of his age, which equals me not even sticking around for the interview. Or, if Safey is looking for an apartment, and you advertise having a swimming pool, when you mean that there is a gym across the street with a swimming pool, how fast will Safey run away from your apartment when you invite him in for lunch? Very fast.

The Harvard landlords are more honest. This makes no sense to me, as Harvard is much likelier to spit out lawyers and fiction writers than chemical engineers. Then again, little in life makes sense to me these days.

The Harvard landlords tend to be "mature gentlemen" who are looking to help out younger men. While odds are against all of them having hidden cameras located in the bedrooms and bathrooms, I'm pretty sure that I met more than one "gentleman" who had a library full of homemade amateur porn starring unsuspecting young guys. "I'll cook you dinner, and do your grocery shopping, and if you need a few extra weeks to make rent" I'll rape you in your sleep was inferred at the end of the sentence. No thanks, Grandpa.

Harvard students had some fantastic apartments. Most of them well out of my price range. But looking didn't hurt. Much.

original post: http://insafemode.livejournal.com/85934.html

Hitting Too Close To Home (Part 4: Floored)

A majority of homes that I've lived in have hard wood floors. No wonder I grew up gay.

As a hard wood sort of fella, I've always had an aversion to carpets. They're high maintenance. When I moved to Big City, four years ago, the first major purchase I made was a bed, which was followed by sheets, a bedspread, and a matching carpet. I remember thinking how out of place the patch of carpet looked on the floor. I got the same feeling when James took off his clothes, and asked "So, do you like what you see?"

No, I didn't like what I saw. I saw a bunch of flea-sized Tibetans dying various patches of his hair, and weaving them into patterns. I saw a chia face with that ugly "not yet a beard, no longer just stubble" look going against the grain of his skin. I saw a man so petrified by the way he looked that he sent out fake pictures and then had the balls to take off his clothes and ask me if I liked what I saw.

I didn't reply. I pretended to be so absorbed by examining the room's decor that I hadn't heard him. I decided that if he was the type of person who loudly repeated questions when they weren't answered, I would leave. I prayed for him to ask again.

The next thing I knew Fuzzy Sluglips was more up close and personal than that horrible Robert Redford movie. I braced myself for impact. Scratch. Scratch, Scratch. I loathe stubble burn. I pushed him away. "I don't think this is a very good idea. The vibe is all wrong."

What the fuck did I say that for? I mean, I know that I needed to say something to stop the kissing and get out of naked guy's house, but of all phrases to come out of my mouth, that one kind of hurt to say.

I walked home quickly, taking a light detour when I noticed a skunk down the street from James's house. The night had been bad enough, I didn't need it to end traumatically.

I was staring off into space as I got home. Trying to spit the venomous taste of "the vibe is all wrong" out of my mouth without actually spitting. I was so wrapped up in my thoughts that I nearly tripped over Ethan as I walked up the stairs to my front door.

original post: http://insafemode.livejournal.com/45196.html

Hitting Too Close To Home (Part 3: Fuzzy Recollections)

At some point in the past month, I've begun to schiz. Insobermode flops between leather computer chair and leather sofa, watching TV screen or computer monitor. He lives on Ramen noodles and Cherry Coke. Insafemode leaves the house at odd hours, whether it's to meet strangers for sex, or just to mill around Boston.

It was Insafemode who left the house at 3:45 on a Friday morning, after Insobermode had been rejected. While Insobermode had fretted about what would happen on his way to meet Ethan, Insafemode was writing a LJ entry in his head as he swaggered over to James's house.

Neither personality had walked in this direction before. I'm not talking metaphorically, I'd never had any particular reason to investigate the area Southwest of Chez Insafemode. After a couple of blocks, the familiar multi-family houses gave way to apartment/condo/dorm complexes; the sort of buildings with broom closet sized rooms, where people who wanted to live closer to their sub-living wage jobs.

I envisioned entering James's terrarium. He would be standing on the not-so-far side of the room, that "come hither, even though you're only standing three feet away" look in his eyes. He would coyly offer me a drink from the water bottle hanging from his wall. After a few sips, he would start playing hard-to-get running laps on his metal wheel.

At roughly the point where I was mentally envisioning leaving his house in a plastic ball, the quality of the buildings started to improve. Parking lots were filled with Maseratis and other mid-life crisis mobiles instead of 1984 Ford Tauruses.

James would answer the door in a cashmere bathrobe. In the middle of his room would be a water fountain shaped like an erect penis. His chihuahua, Gates, would be shivering in his lush doggy bed. "Insafemode," he'd say, "so glad you could make it. Your picture doesn't do you justice. Let's say we cut through the bullshit." At which point he'd, literally, disrobe, revealing his perfectly chiseled ass. We'd fuck until the Cubs won the world series. When we were both too spent to do more than twitch and moan, we'd fall asleep in each others' arms. The next day, my own private Dellionairre would take me out to brunch where we'd discuss those poor slobs running around the streets in plastic hamster balls.

As quickly as they'd popped up, the posh condorms disappeared. I arrived at the properly numbered house. Hamster cage it was.

I buzzed the button with "james 's place" written in cursive letters on a post-it note, a big smiley face dotting the "j". Nothing about our encounter was what I imagined. His condorm was deceptively large. Two bedrooms, one kitchen, one bathroom, one den. His room was the swallowing image of Ethan's. Madonna poster? Check. Computer with pretty boys fucking screen saver? Check. Rainbow triangle adhered to window? Check.

"Hi."

James was...not the guy from his picture. Heavy-set, but not fat, he was majorly stubble-faced. I imagined he had a thick carpet of hair covering his body from Adam's apple to toe knuckle. A theory that was quickly proven accurate.

He pulled me toward him, and shut the door in one fluid motion. "So," he asked, "do you like what you see?"

A question, I realized, that I really shouldn't answer honestly.

original post: http://insafemode.livejournal.com/43308.html

Melissaphobia (Part 7: Inconclusion)

What Melissa didn't know was that I never had any intention of calling the police. I didn't have to.

When the college who cut me the check finally mailed me a copy of said check with my forged signature, I'd called a police officer friend of mine from Arizona. He'd advised me that the easiest way to ensure her suffering without having to get my own hands dirty, was to tell the bank that had cashed the check that the signature was forged. Then, the bank would reimburse the college, who would cut me a new check. Melissa would be at the bank's mercy, not mine.

But since she didn't know that (I hadn't called the bank yet), I figured I'd try to get a thousand dollars off her anyway because I was a poor bastard and she was a manipulative, lying bitch with a dog that had pissed all over my fucken clothes. I may have been a little bitter.

She didn't give me the thousand dollars. I never saw her again. Never had the satisfaction of knowing whether she was arrested or had huge penalties from the bank. I'm not even sure she got any financial comeuppance.

What I do know is that she got evicted. Whatever she did with the thousand dollars she essentially stole from me, she didn't use it to pay rent. Also, someone informed her landlord that she had been subleasing part of the apartment to me. She hadn't told him that. He was under the impression that only one person lived there, so he'd given her a great deal on rent. So during the year that I was there, I was paying 75% of the rent and had no idea. Since she was the one who was in contact with the landlord (I've been landlordphobic ever since I moved out of Hippieville), I just assumed we had been paying the same amount. One anonymous call to the landlord changed that.

I met the landlord one night while I was working at The Corporate Restaurant. He didn't know what happened to my bookshelf, my books, my comics, or my computer (and I didn't ask about the porn) but my bedframe and a few of my clothes had shown up in the basement, where (he informed me) all of my stuff had been stored while I was away. No wonder "the storage people" had easy access to the house, they lived in the basement.

I've only been back to the house once since the day Becca and I drove my stuff to storage. It's not too far from where I ended up moving to, but the house has some serious bad juju for me. Even though I know that Melissa hasn't lived there in about a year now, I always get really angry when I drive by, or when the subway passes within sight of it. I have the incredible urge to sneak into the driveway and let the air out of all her tires. But her tires aren't there.

If she didn't end up doing any jail time (and she probably didn't, I don't think she had any prior problems with the police or with banks), I'm imagining she moved back in with her parents. Why they should be punished for her crimes, I don't know. Then again, it was their terrible breeding and/or parenting techniques that contributed to the bipolar sociopath she became.

Melissaphobia (Part 6: InHulkMode)

My first thought was that I could shatter her dog's spine by merely snapping my fingers together. So would end the suffering of Gussy and everyone else who knew her. But I rarely kill ants, there was no way I could kill her dog, even if it meant putting it out of its blissful misery. I debated burning her house down. Gas wasn't as expensive then, but I decided I'd want to wait around and see the flames. That would probably make me a suspect.

In the end, I decided that rather than killing her or having her killed, it would be much more entertaining to see her try and explain herself. I called her and told her I had the money for her (which I did) and that I wanted to meet her the following morning (a Tuesday) to pick up my stuff. She agreed. But on Tuesday morning she was nowhere to be found. On Wednesday she called with some lame ass excuse about a work emergency. She did data entry for a friend of her family's very small business. She spent most of her days playing with her dog in the office. Whatever. I made an appointment to meet her Thursday morning. She said the storage people would be dropping my stuff off at nine. She's meet me at the house then.

I got there at seven. Just in case. At eight she came out to walk Gussy and was surprised to see me there. "Oh, sorry." I said, "I thought you said to meet you at eight." She was definitely shaken, not stirred.

By nine-thirty, there was no storage truck.

"Hold on a second." she said, breaking the tense silence.

I assumed that she was going in to call the storage people or some sort of bodyguard. I was unprepared when she walked out of the house with a box of my books. "It looks like the storage people must have come last night after I went to sleep. Your stuff is in the back hallway."

The storage people had come in the middle of the night? "The storage people came in the middle of the night?" How did they get in? "Do they have keys?"

"I must have left the door unlocked." What-The-Fuck.

If I gave her any more of "the eye" it would have been two eyes. I went into my former home, and sure enough there were piles and garbage bags of my stuff in the back hallway. I was too flummoxed to do a complete inventory, but I did notice one thing missing right away. "Where are my bookshelves?"

"What bookshelves?"

"The bookshelves that held all my books. Two big ones. They were against the wall."

"I don't remember them. Maybe the storage people took them."

"The storage people stole my bookshelves but returned my TV and CD collection?" She shrugged. "Maybe they misplaced them when they were rummaging around in the dark last night when they dropped off my stuff, huh?"

No reply.

I called a friend of mine to pick me up in her truck, so I could put my stuff in real storage.

"Did you remember the receipt from the storage place?"

"Receipt?"

"Yea. You said that storage was costing you a bundle, and I said I'd repay you if you gave me the receipt."

"No. I'm friends with the guy who owns the storage place. He let me have it for free."

"Then why did you tell me it was costing you a bundle?"

"You misunderstood."

Whatever. I then began counting off the thousand dollars. I made to hand them to her. "Oh. One more thing. Do you remember cashing a check for a thousand dollars the day after I left?"

Blank stare.

"Because the bank and the people who wrote the check seem to believe that you've already been paid the rent for the three months that I was away."

"Oh. The check. I forgot about that. It wasn't the amount I was expecting, so I forgot it."

"It was a check for a thousand dollars, right?"

"Yea."

"I did pay you enough money before I left so that the balance of rent while I was gone was only $900, correct?"

"Yea."

"So..."

Blank stare.

"I'm not giving you this money."

"But I need it." She threw her hand in the air, "Why do you make things so difficult?" And walked to her car, where Gussy was shivering in the back seat. "If I don't have the money by tomorrow, I'm calling the police."

"Here's my phone. Call them now. I'd love to hear you explain to them why you forged my signature on a check, and stole my fucken mail, you psycho."

She drove off.

Becca and I moved my stuff into storage uneventfully. The storage facility was right next to work, and i had to work in an hour, so I spent that hour doing inventory.

Things that were missing:

My bookshelves
All of my books from authors K-Z
My bedframe
My DVD/VHS collection
My pornography
My old comic book collection
My two overcoats (one of them my grandfather's cashmere)
My computer (which didn't work, anyway)
A good chunk of my clothes

What was left of my clothes was covered in dried old dog piss. I called and left Melissa a message to call me back. She did not respond. I called about seven times that week. No response. So on the eighth day I left a different kind of message.

"Melissa, it's Insafemode. I've been very patient. If I don't hear from you in forty-eight hours, I'm calling the cops. You stole a great deal from me, and forged my signature on a check. If I don't get a thousand dollars in my hands by the end of the week, I'm having you arrested."

I then went to take a shower. By the time I was finished she had called my phone seven times but left no message.

original posts: http://insafemode.livejournal.com/30121.html, http://insafemode.livejournal.com/30689.html

Melissaphobia (Part 5: Checks And Unbalances)

"I don't live here anymore?" In my head I'm doing the five fingers of death (though Kill Bill 2 has not come out yet, I am intrinsically aware of its future existence).

"You said there'd be a check arriving for me in January. I never received it."

"But I called you in January, and February, and March, and you never mentioned it." I'm pulling out her eyeballs with my fingers, and squishing them beneath my shoes.

"I assumed you knew."

I was just sleep deprived enough to think this whole thing was my fault. I asked her what had happened to all my belongings, and she informed they were in storage. When I could pay her the three months of overdue rent, and the storage fees, she'd return my stuff.

It sounded fair.

I went to Corporate Restaurant and explained my predicament. I needed to work as often as possible in order to get my stuff back. Several of my coworkers offered me couches and spare beds until I found a new place to stay. My current debt to Melissa would be roughly thirteen hundred dollars, I expected to have to have about $1800 to put down on a new place. I was fucked in a way that brought me no pleasure. I was also pissed off.

I called the institution that was supposed to cut me the check. They "thought" they had sent it out to me in January. It would take a couple of days to track down, but they'd be in touch. I posted angry anti-Melissa comments in my other LJ. A certain former landlord's girlfriend (I think, I have no proof of who the anonymous fuckwad was) said of my homelessness and misfortune, "That's awesome. You deserve what you get."

I tried not to turn into InHulkMode.

I called Melissa and asked how much storage was costing her. She said she didn't know, but she'd get back to me. I called her back the next day to ask again, and received no answer. The following day, she called my cell phone asking why I was ignoring her repeated messages. I called my voice mail. I had six messages. None of them from Melissa.

The next week was my birthday. I worked eight hours, and then crashed on a coworker's couch. My mom called to ask me if I'd received my birthday money.

The following morning, I trekked over to Melissa's in search of my mail. In addition to the birthday mail (one from my mom, one from my dad, two sets of grandparents, and one aunt), I was waiting for a package from a friend in Pieceofshitdeserttown.

"You haven't gotten any mail here in months." Ms. Smiley Melissa Face informed me as she was putting her work cooler in her trunk.

"No mail?"

"None."

"You're telling my five people's birthday cards got lost in the mail?"

"I don't know what to tell you." She started to slam down her trunk.

"What's that?" I stopped the trunk with my hand. Inside was a package with my name on it.

"Oh, that. That arrived yesterday. I forgot." It was my package from Pieceofshitdeserttown. "Here."

"No, mail for me, huh?"

While there is no doubt in my mind that she did steal my birthday mail (a federal offense, mind you). I had no proof. She had not been stupid enough to forge my signature on those checks. A few days after the run in by her trunk, though, I got a call from the people who'd written me the $1000 check. They'd written it. They'd mailed it. And on January seventh, the day after I'd left on tour it had been signed over to and cashed by one Melissa F*n Bitchface.

Enter InHulkMode.

Stuck In A Moment I Can't Get Out Of (Part 4: Contraction)

It doesn't take a degree in physics to know that you shouldn't poor scalding hot coffee into a glass you've just taken out of the freezer. And any server from a corporate restaurant will let you know that you don't take mugs fresh from the heated dishwasher and fill them with ice and cold soda. A quick change in temperature and the glass expands or contracts and creates a fissure and crack, time to get a broom and pick up the pieces.

When I came out of the bathroom and saw nearly naked Scott laying on the bed, I was hot and bothered. I took a while to cool down and fall asleep, and all was right in the world. When I woke up the next morning, and he was prancing around in his see-through kimono, singing and dancing to David Bowie's "Heroes" AND GOING THROUGH MY SUITCASE.

Fissure. Fissure. CARACK!

"Why are you singing that Wallflowers song?" I asked. Once he'd stopped twitching, he explained to me that they had merely covered the song for The Godzilla soundtrack. I knew this already. "Oh, I thought it was a Dylan song."

After a few minutes of awkward silence, he asked "What's on today's agenda?" I do not have agendas. I had intended on spending a romantic sex-filled weekend with someone, anyone really on this tiny little island. As that was no longer going to happen, I was willing to take the events of the day as they came, though I suspected no coming would be involved.

"How about breakfast?" I asked.

Breakfast was phenomenal. Not because of the food. The food was good, but nothing special. Eggs benedict, sausage, and apple juice. It was also not because of the company. The company was mediocre at best. All Scott could talk about was how he used to be fat. There were several times during our breakfast where my fist considered assisting his bulimia. What made breakfast phenomenal was when the bill came.

Scott looked over the bill, did some calculations in his head (a welcome change from the finger counters I'd dated previously), and said "Your total comes to eleven dollars."

"Ok." I said, and I reached into my pocket. My wallet was gone. Oh the shock. The horror. I rechecked each pocket three times. I lifted the cushions of the booth. I checked under the table. The only thing keeping me sane was the knowledge that my wallet was zippered into my secret inner-jacket pocket. "I can't find my wallet. I must have left it back in the room."

"No problem, you can pay me back when we get to the room."

Remarkably, we were unable to find it in my room, even after going through my suitcase, checking under the bed, and going through all the drawers. "Fuck. I can't believe I lost my fucken wallet. I'm going to go down to the front desk and try and retrace my steps. I mean, I had it last night when I paid for our dinner. It can't have gotten too far."

Instead of going to the front desk, I went to the Nantucket Bookworks and proceeded to be frustrated by their lack of anything worth reading. After about fifteen minutes, I gave up and went back to the room.

"Any luck?" Scott asked.

"Only the bad kind."

"What are you going to do?"

Guilt trip you into buying all my meals. "I don't know. I guess I could spend the rest of the trip eating at The Tap House, and charging all my meals to the room, and have my Mom pay for the charges on her credit card."

"Orrrrrr." He said. "We could charge everything to the room, and then not check out."

I'd been trumped.

"No, I couldn't do that. How about you just pay for the meals for the rest of the trip? After all, I've already covered airfare, and hotel. We're only here for another day, anyway."

"I didn't bring that much money."

So don't eat Mr. I Used To Be Fat But Now I'm Thinner And Holier Than Thou.

I pretended to be in deep thought. What I was actually thinking about was this really cool Italian Seafood place I'd walked by. They had Lobster Bisque, and Lobster Ravioli on their menu. Ohhhhhhh lobster. "How much money did you bring?"

"Not much."

What had he planned on doing? Clearly, not me. He knew I wasn't up for being anyone's Sugar Daddy. He didn't seem to like my company very much. I'd invited him because I'd hoped he would be putting out. Why had he accepted? He hadn't even expressed an interest in sight seeing. "Then I guess we might as well leave."

For the first time, something that looked like it might be a genuine emotion other than "You don't appear to know shit about David Bowie" passed over his face. It was just a drive by, but it was a start.

"You want to go home?"

"Well, I don't see much point in staying." I confessed. "We don't have enough money to enjoy the trip or enough chemistry to cause any mildly entertaining reaction."

"You...you don't think we have chemistry?" He appeared to be returning fire in the war of bullshit.

"You've seemed pretty irritated since you picked me up in Barnstable. And then there was that shit with my mother. I mean, if you're going to tell my mother that we're having a romantic weekend here, the least you can do is put out."

"So you want to fuck?" This is the point in the poorly written romantic comedy where the two mismatched characters begin making out passionately, and the camera zooms out, showing that the two are clearly going to be fucking during the passing of time music montage.

"No." Maybe just a little. "That's not the point. I guess I don't understand why you wanted to come here."

"You invited me."

"Yea, but..." Damn it. "Why did you say yes?"

"Because I didn't have any plans this weekend. And the world's ending, and..."

"You didn't know that when I invited you."

"I don't know. I don't know why I came."

"Me neither." I left the room, not slamming the door at all, and walked back to the Italian seafood place. Their bisque was amazing. Their lobster ravioli gave me an erection that didn't go down for weeks.

Scott was not there when I got back to the room. His belongings were.

I was in the midst of determining the proper way to act when he came into the room when he came into the room. "I brought you some Chinese. Do you like Orange Chicken?"

There was hope for him yet. "I love Orange Chicken." However, I've just eaten lobster ravioli and and lobster bisque, so the Orange Chicken will have to wait. "Thanks."

"No problem." He sat down at the little desk in the corner of the room and opened up a bag from the bookstore. Not much money, eh?

original post: http://insafemode.livejournal.com/90074.html

Elvis Rex (Part 9: An Age Old Question)

Night fell like a one-legged hooker in high heel shoes. Que Mal was crying. ElvisRex was downstairs whining to his mother. Gina and Mike had come in, tuned out, and got back in their car for more sightseeing. I was trying to make sense of how I'd gotten myself to this point. I blamed Demerol. I blamed kidney stones. I blamed RexElvisSeith. I blamed myself. I blamed my parents for fucking. I blamed Kool & the Gang. Everyone in the entire world was responsible for me sitting upstairs in my room, trying to read a copy of Tom Robbin's Skinny Legs and All while Whateverthefuckhisnamewas sat down stairs whining to his mother about how he wanted to go home. Not a word about a grandfather.

This is when I got the sinking feeling. It was the last weekend in August and Seith was doing everything he could to get home. School. He'd lied to me about his name, his family history, his sex life, he'd even lied about his father dying. What if he'd lied about his age? What if he was some sixteen year old who'd somehow convinced his mother he was going to spend time with...I don't know anyone who raised this kid would either swallow just about anything or else just didn't care about him. For all I knew the ID was his brother's (not the fictional Stepbrother, but maybe a real one). I'd just assumed that since the his mother asked for Byron, and the ID said Elvis B. Hayes that the B stood for Byron. Maybe Elvis Beauragard Hayes was his older brother, and he was Byron Wizwell Hayes.

I envisioned courtroom melodramas, made-for-tv movies, his mother crying on Montel about how her poor innocent boy had been led astray by a 21 year old pervert who'd used his vast financial resources to fly RexSeithByronElvisWhatever up to Cranberry Lake to be a sex slave.

Ridiculous thoughts.

His profile said he was 18. I had a chatlog where he told me he was 18. I'd seen the ID he brought with him which stated he was 18. Until that moment I had never doubted he was 18. I was a moron. But I was a moron who probably hadn't done anything wrong in the eyes of the law. What was I supposed to do? Fingerprint him and take him to the police office? Ok, in retrospect, that would have been a wonderful thing to do.

I decided to go out for a drive to get away from the sound of his voice and his chinchilla's voice. A drive. A drive would clear my head for the moment.

This is the point in the story where the poor narrator goes out to clear his mind and ends up hitting a deer or running over a small child. Wouldn't that make the story great? Or at least interesting?

No dice. A Mormon casino.

I returned home somewhat calmer than I had been when I left. I didn't even talk to Seithvisronex, I just headed straight to bed. The bad car karma would come the next night. It would not be pretty.

original post: http://insafemode.livejournal.com/4750.html

Elvis Rex (Part 8: The Grandfather Clause)

I don't believe in prophetic dreams. But even if I did, I knew Seith hadn't had one. He appeared somewhat shaken but something about him didn't sit right. It was as though he was trying to appear rattled. Like an actor who digs his nails into his flesh to make himself cry.

"Well, if you're so concerned that your grandfather is sick, maybe you should call your Dad and find out."

"It's my Mom's Dad. My Dad is dead, remember."

"Oh, yea, right. Sorry, I don't know what I was thinking."

Mike and Gina come in behind me and ask what's wrong. Byron/Seith goes into the story about his grandfather who helped raise him, and how he dreamed he was sick, and yadda yadda yadda. Basically, he's creating a whole new story that conflicts a bit with the story he gave me. If his Grandfather was so heavily involved with his life, where was he when Wicked and Stepbrother were raping him? Supposedly his grandfather lived next door. If that's true, why didn't Seith spend more time over there? Maybe he and Poor Boy could have hung out over there to get away from Poor Boy's Dad.

Mike started asking him loads of questions. The next morning when I got up, Mike was downstairs brewing coffee in my oft-neglected Mr. Coffee.

"I think your boyfriend is a liar."

"I know Seith is a liar. When you and Gina go home, I'm moving him into the guest room. I'll give him a month to find another place to live and then he's ass to curb. Out of curiousity, why do you think he's a liar?"

"Were you paying attention to the story he told last night?" I hadn't been. "I kept asking him questions and his answers would often contradict each other."

"I'm not surprised."

Talk turned to other things: old friends, the play, Big Gay Tom, work. After about a half hour, Gina woke up and the two of them went out to sightsee.

Byron/Seith woke up around noon. I reminded him to call his family regarding his grandfather. He took the cordless outside. I could see him crying out the window. I think the crying wasn't for my benefit, but for the benefit of his mother on the other end. I think Seith knew he was wearing on me, and he wanted to go home.

"He's in the hospital."

"Is it serious?"

"If it wasn't serious, do you think he'd be in the fucken hospital?"

I picked up the coffee mug Mike had been drinking from and began to dry it with a towel. "Do you know how long he'll be in there for?"

"They think he might die."

"Oh. Are you going to go down and visit him then?"

"Well, yea. He practically raised me. What kind of grandson would I be if I didn't go down and visit him?"

"When are you leaving?"

"Tomorrow."

"How are you getting back?"

"You're going to have to buy me a plane ticket. One way, though, since I don't know how long I'll be down there for."

At this point I'm not just drying the mug, but nearly sanding it. "Well, gosh, Seith, I can't afford to fly you down to Southern State on such short notice. I don't have any money in my checking account, and I don't get another paycheck for almost two weeks."

"So --- what am I supposed to do?"

"Call your Mom back. If they really think your grandfather is going to die, I don't think she'd have a problem flying you home to be with him."

"But you flew me up here. We had a deal."

"A deal? What sort of deal did we have?"

"I mean, if you flew me up here, shouldn't you have saved up some money to fly me home."

"Seith, call your Mom. I can't help you."

While he went to cry to mom, I went upstairs to avoid throwing the mug at his head. I uncalmly checked my e-mail and yelled at the Chinchillas who were either fucking or fighting, I couldn't decide.

original post: http://insafemode.livejournal.com/4552.html

Elvis Rex (Part 6: Wickeder Lies)

Inane lies that could only ever lead to the two of us breaking up:

1.) He overheard me having a discussion about how most pop divas aren't very good singers. I mentioned that artists like Whitney Houston have pretty good voices, but that their engineers up the volume on their high notes, and have the ability to correct notes that waiver a bit off key. Elvis (I don't call him Seith when he lies to me) says that he and Poor Boy were once part of a by-invitation only Whitney Houston show in The Southern State Which He Is From, and that her voice literally shattered glass.

2.) When visiting my Dad's we heard a top forty song called "Crush." Elvis informed me that he wrote that song. I suggest we go to a record store and buy it so that I can see his name in the liner notes. He says that he wrote it under an ssumed name, and can't remember what that assumed name was.

3.) During a conversation about one of my freind's bizzaire sexual fetishes I mention how I can respect people with golden shower and poo fetishes, but I just can't relate to them. Elvis tells me that during one of the two times he topped that he peed in me. As if I simply wouldn't notice someone peeing in my ass.

4.) When I finally confront him about his phone conversation

"Seriously I have the smallest cock here." Ummmm. "We all sleep in the same room. Four bunkbeds. No, no, it's really comfortable. Unfortunately, the cutest one is straight. I know, I know. Aren't they all? Anyway, I should probably go, we've got a shoot in the park in a few hours and I have to get ready."

he tells me that he was trying to make Poor Boy jealous. I ask how Poor Boy reacted when he told him the truth. He claims not to have told him the truth. In a later conversation with Poor Boy, I hear him mention my name, what we did that day, and how bored he is being trapped in the house all the time. I ask him, again, how Poor Boy reacted when he told him the truth. He tells me that he had told him the truth from the very beginning.

5.) His Dad leaves a message on my answering machine. His Dad. His Died when I was twelve years old Dad. I leave the message on the machine, and don't even mention it until the bitter end. And the end was very very bitter.

original post: http://insafemode.livejournal.com/3807.html

A Couple Of Nights I Wish I Could Forget

There really wasn't that much special about Eric. He was a heavyset business guy, roughly my age at the time (21) who was visiting The Peninsula for a week. His hotel was roughly a half an hour drive from where I lived in Cranberry Lake.

The first night that I encountered him in an AOL chatroom, I passed him over in favor of AlwaysOnEBoy. That proved to be a worthless evening, so the next night I decided not to be so choosy. I gave Eric directions to a local bar where we met up for drinks. Eric was husky. While husky isn't my favorite body type, I'm certainly not Johan Paulik enough to make fun of a person's appearance. So I'll just leave it at husky.

After a few Captain and Cokes, we headed over to my house, took a few Mike's Hard Lemonades out of the fridge and took off our clothes. A typical Wednesday night at Insafemode's house.

I'm not one to belittle another man's manhood. I'm no Long Dong Silver, but this guy ---

When I found his cock, I wasn't sure what I wanted to do with it. Return it to the Smurf Village Lost and Found? Impale it with a toothpick and offer it at cocktail parties? Keep it on ice in case I ever lost my pinky in a freak fingering accident? In the end I decided to try and suck it for a while, but his rolls kept bopping my nose. He wasn't a behemoth, but he refused to lay back, which would have made access to his microphallus much easier. As it was, his stomach was pressing against my nose, and since his cock was in my mouth, I was out of breathing holes. So I stopped.

"Maybe we better try something else."

His eyes were two lone bulbs on a a vast Light Bright. "Do you want to fuck me?"

Technically, the answer was no. I managed to skirt around the issue by announcing that I had no condoms (a shaved face lie). He offered to pick some up, but my nose had been close enough to his ass to know that I didn't want to go in there, even with a layer of latex around my cock. "That would be great. But the nearest 7-11 is a few miles away, and I'm awfully tired. Maybe we should try this another time."

After an awkward goodbye kiss, *shudder*, he drove out of the condo parking lot for what I assumed was the last time.

The next night I was IMing with AlwaysOnEBoy, negotiating a less frustrating rendez-vous when I got an IM from a screenname I didn't recognize. EBoy couldn't make it out that night, and after the frustration with Eric, I was desperate for some orifice. So, after exchanging pictures, I gave the guy directions to my house.

I'm always honest with I send out pictures. I don't consider myself hot but I've never made anyone run screaming from the site of my face. I've had my fair share of rejection when I've sent out my pic, but I've also had my fair share (and perhaps a few other people's) of acceptance.

The boy in the picture was fairly average looking. I love average looking guys. And not just because I may be one.

The guy was going to drop by at nine. I showered, and put some Gomez on, and sat down in my living room. At 9:15 the doorbell rang.

Imagine my surprise when I opened up the door and found Eric.

"Ummm..Hi, Eric. What are you doing here?"

"Sorry I'm late but I had a tough time finding this place."

I wondered if I'd somehow entered a Twilight Zone episode.

"Oh. Did you" Awkward pause "leave something here?"

"Huh?" Awkward pause "No. I thought -- Are you Insafemode?"

What the?? "Yes."

"Didn't we agree to meet up tonight?"

"No. We talked about getting together again at some point but I have plans tonight. I'm actually supposed to be meeting someone here very soon."

"Oh. I thought you said tonight at nine." He was staring at my rug.

"No." I felt really bad. I tried to figure exactly how I'd misled him into thinking we were going to meet again tonight. I hadn't. I'd suggested that there may be some time in the future when our paths would cross again, but I'd certainly never said "How about tomorrow at nine?".

Eric started to walk away. I was about to close the door when he turned around. "I know I look a bit different than I did in the pic I sent, but I'm not ugly. You're treating me like I'm ugly."

"You're the one who sent me the picture tonight? You're TheAliasThatIveSinceForgotten?"

"Yea. who did you think I was?"

"You're Eric. We met last night for drinks. You came over. We hung out a bit."

"Really? We've met before?"

I don't believe in amnesia. If I've ever had it, I've forgotten. I certainly don't believe that Eric "forgot" that he'd been over the previous night. I didn't know what game he was playing but I wanted no part in it.

"I'm sorry," he said, as I made to close my door, "I meet a lot of people on the road. Sometimes I forget who I have and haven't met."

"Well, good luck with that. Night."

You couldn't have picked his face off the pavement with a spatula. "Night."

I went back online to chat or hookup. Business was slow, so I decided to get some reading done when I heard an IM open up.

AliasIveForgotten: Hey there!

Insafemode: Hello, Eric.

AliasIveForgotten: I'm sorry. Have we met?

original post: http://community.livejournal.com/bad_sex/556568.html

Slow Flashes (Pat 11: Black Friday)

I buried my depression beneath a pile of CDs. Rock and roll, rap, folk; it didn't matter. Music. Pearl Jam. U2. The Fugees. REM. Radiohead. A Tribe Called Quest. Smashing Pumpkins. LL Cool J. Ani Difranco. Whosoever played a song that didn't mention Jennifer. All the money I didn't have to spend on books or school supplies went directly to my music addiction. Florida wasn't far enough away from Cranberry Lake to keep the sound of Jennifer's voice saying I'm sorry, I just never felt that way about you out of my head, so I had to keep newer, louder music pulsing in my ears. My studies weren't interesting enough to keep my eyes floating out of my books and catching a glimpse of the boy I'd helped Jennifer not have. It would have been a son.

The music wasn't loud enough. The sun wasn't bright enough to blind me. So I abandoned college and Sulfur City, and headed back home. I enrolled in UMass Cranberry Lake, and maxxed out three credit cards buying music from local record stores. My mother, whose condo I was living in, politely suggested that I might want to take a job. Maybe one in a music store with an employee discount. That, or find a new place to live. For once, I took her advice, and set up an interview at Raspberry Records. One of those corporate music stores that adopted a hip, alternative image in the early nineties. Their logo was a face not unlike the old poison sticker faces, with a rolling tongue sticking out of its mouth. Their way of saying Stick it to The Man by buying music from an alternative music store owned and operated by The Man. My interview went okay, but not having any previous retail experience, I was doomed not to get the job, despite the fact that the manager was Fitz, a former coworker of mine from Camp Davis. Still, I filled out the application, and at eight-thirty that night, I drove to the store to turn it in. The store was scheduled to close at nine, so imagine my surprise when I pulled on the door and found it locked. All the lights were on inside, and two women were walking around tossing CDs into shopping bags. I walked over to a payphone and called Fitz's cell. "Did you guys close early tonight to do inventory?"

"No. We do inventory on the last night of the month. Why?"

I explained why. Ten minutes later he pulled up, and walked into the store. It turned out, his assistant manager and some rogue employees had been stealing a few thousand dollars worth of CDs every couple of weeks, and selling them to one of the used music stores in Boston. Every employee involved was fired the next morning, leaving Fitz, and one employee. The employee was Kevin Harris, who'd been working there since he dropped out of Cranberry Lake High. Since the store was now completely devoid of staff, Fitz was authorized to do some emergency hiring, and, despite being only eighteen and having no experience, I was brought on as an assistant manager.

"What the fuck." Kevin said, rather than asked. "I mean, I'm glad it's you and not some asshole stranger, but...I've been here a year, why didn't I get the cushy fucken assistant manager job."

The cushy job which required me to work no more and no less than sixty hours a week. The cushy job where I was not allowed to leave the store for my required, punched out, thirty minute break every six hours. The cushy job where I usually found myself alone, my coworkers routinely coming down with the killer-concert-in-town-flu, or the 24 hour Hangover Virus. The cushy job where the asshole drop out closet case who I'd been buddy buddy with when I was a kid, routinely showed up one or two hours late, and clocked out precisely when his shift was scheduled to end, no matter how much work needed to be done. Kevin fucken Harris.

I was hired in February. By November, we'd gone through four other assistant managers, and roughly three dozen retail associates, most of them named Sarah. The various Sarahs (which included both of the Queen Popular Sarahs from my elementary school days), rarely lasted more than two weeks. Queen Sarah Popular The Second being the shortest term employee in the history of Raspberry Records, when she aced the interview, then showed up positively wrecked on muscle relaxants the next morning, and screaming "This fucken job is corporate fucken bullshit" at the top of her lungs, when I asked her to check and see if we had a copy of the Pocahontas soundtrack in stock. My patience was quickly fagged, and she was quickly fired.

Unfortunately, having gone through three Sarahs in two weeks, the staff currently consisted of one manager, Fitz; two assistant managers, myself and a thirtiesh veterinary student named Madison; and one non-manager, Kevin. We had three days before Black Friday. Fitz was taking a two week vacation in Fuji, and Madison had to take a week of sick time because she'd nearly had her arm ripped off by some sort of rabid beagle. A couple of local managers had sent us some of their precious employees for a shift or two, but I was scheduled to work double shifts on Black Friday, No Relief Saturday, and Dear Fucken Jesus What Am I Doing Working In Retail Sunday. One of the more saintly managers had volunteered to help me close the store on Black Friday, but the morning shift was just me and Kevin. Kevin who had never been less than two hours late when he wasn't working with Fitz.

"You know we're opening an hour early on Friday, right?" I asked him on the Wednesday before The Apocalypse.

"Yea." He said, as though I had asked him if he knew how to spell his name. "You want me here at seven, right?"

"Yea, we open at seven-thirty. And it's going to be sick with shoplifters and people who absolutely must have that album by that singer who sings the song with love in the title. So, early. Please."

"Of course."

At eight-fifteen on Black Friday, I had a line thirty-seven people long. The credit card machine was on the fritz. I was out of ones, fives, and quarters. The phone was ringing. "Thank you for calling Raspberry Records, this is Adam, how may I help you?"

"Adam, it's Kevin."

"Thank fuc...calling. Are you on your way?"

"No. My grandmother had a heart attack, yesterday. My mom wants me to stay at the hospital with her, so I'm not going to make it in."

The line was now forty-one people long. The fax was beeping. "That sucks. Hope she recovers. I can't stay on the phone, though. Bye." And I hung up.

At three-thirty, I couldn't speak, smile, or leave the space behind the register. The line wound around the entire store, out the doors, and on to the sidewalk. "Criminy jickets!" Madison shouted, as she walked into the store. "Are you by yourself?"

Once she made eye contact, she had my answer.

"For how long? All day? Oh my goodness." She ran into the back, and came out with the cashbox for the other register. "Go. Take a minute in the back."

I expected several of the customers to jump me as I made my way to the back, but they all made space between me and the back door when I stumbled from behind the register. I peed for seven weeks, then refilled my water bottle, and made my way back behind the register. "I thought you were out on sick leave." I said, as I scanned through a pile of Whitney Houston and Jackson Five CDs.

"I was. I just came in to pick up my check, but this store is just sick busy, I can't leave you alone like this. You should have called."

I explained that I had called every store in the region, pleading for someone to send any associate they could spare. But no associate can be spared on the busiest shopping day of the year.

At five o'clock, the saintly manager from one of the Boston stores, showed up, and instead of relieving Madison, ordered me to take an hour long break. "And don't even think about clocking out. You deserve at least triple overtime for working by yourself."

I drove five minutes home, opened the refrigerator, and began devouring one of the tupperware containers filled with Thanksgiving's turkey and cranberry sauce that my mother had left. I drank an entire two liter bottle of Cherry Coke in ten minutes, belched loud enough to rattle the kitchen window, and went upstairs to take a quick shower. Full, clean, and wearing an identical (but different) raspberry red turtleneck, I had twenty minutes to make my five minute drive back to work. I decided to stop at the video store to pick up a movie to put me to sleep after work. I grabbed The Basketball Diaries and Until the End of the World, and made my way to the checkout. And there...there....there, behind the counter, wearing the blue and gold uniform of every Blockbuster video in the known world, was Kevin Harris.

"How's your grandma, motherfucker?" I asked. My smile was so wide, it knocked over a box of Twizzlers on my left, and the hat of the gentleman standing on my right.

"Hey, Adam. Look, I'm sorry I―"

"Does your boss know that you called in sick to your other job, claiming that your grandmother was dying of a heart attack?"

The other blue and gold golems lurched to the scene of the impending homocide. "Is there some sort of prob― Adam?"

The leader of the blue and golders was familiar. "Saint?"

Michael Christopher shook his head and laughed. "Why are you causing a scene in my store?"

"Well, I'm the assistant manager over at Raspberry Records, and I had to work by myself for eight hours this morning because Kevin's very ill grandmother had a heart attack, and he had to stay at the hospital with her."

"Really?" Michael asked. "The same grandmother whose funeral he had to go to last Tuesday?"

"Couldn't be." I said, pleased that Michael and I fell so easily in stride with each other. "Kevin was working with me last Tuesday. His car ran out of gas on the way over, and he was about two hours late, but he wasn't wearing funeral clothes."

Kevin was the color of my turtleneck. "Guys."

"You are so fired." I said.

"From your place, too?" Michael asked. "Damn. Fired from two jobs in two seconds. That's rough."

The person in line behind me cleared her throat. "Well, I've got to go back to my sixteen hour shift. It was fun talking with you, Michael. I'll stop in the next time I have a day off, which I think is March, and we can catch up."

"Have a good one."

And I drove back to Raspberry Records, so happy, my smile could barely fit through the door.

original post: http://insafemode.livejournal.com/231406.html