Decidedly Unawesome Revisited

The thing about sleeping around when you live on a small island, is the inevitable awkwardness of running into your exes every time you leave the house. This is one of the reasons I never slept around during the summer I lived on Martha's Vineyard. The other reason I was chaste when I lived here is because of the sheer volume of people on this island who I've seen scratching at their genitalia. Apparently, the only thing that spreads faster than a rumor here, is crabs.

Back when I used to surf Craigslist for...inspiration, I'd occasionally find an entry on the Boston site from some poor schlepp on The Vineyard. If I still had my car, and the old Grub Tub I used to have moored on the Cape, I'd have made the journey just to pity fuck the poor guys. No. No, I wouldn't. But I'd have thought about it.

When I still lived on the Cape, I'd occasionally fling with someone from the Vineyard. They'd have to make the trip over to a very descript bar near the Ferry (please leave your bad fairy puns out of my comments section), where we'd have drinks and see if we clicked. We, usually, did not. But one time a couple of times every once thrice in a while, I'd meet someone I clicked with in several different positions.

One of these occasions was Jordan.

After our Solarcain & Vicodin filled fuckfest, Jordan faded to little more than a sunburnt memory. I forgot his name, the sound of his voice, how cute his hair looked when it was disheveled, pretty much everything about him. Until this afternoon.

My father's wife was dragging us to our third Christmas party in two days. I love his wife. She's sweet, smiley, effervescent...shit, if they made Efferdent in grenadine flavor, they'd have to call it Corrine.

Last night's party was...not so good. I tried to socialize, but apart form one guy who kept telling me about his son, the writer, I didn't have anything in common with any of the super WASPS in the nest.

This morning, we went to my step-grandfather-in-law's house for some of the best scallop chowed in the world, and a few polite conversations.

This evening was another social gathering at the house of someone I'd never met. Or so I'd thought. Turns out it was the guy who's son was a writer, and his son, the writer, was home for Christmas.

"Hi." His son, the writer, said. "My name is Jordan. You look really familiar. Did we go to highschool together?"

"No." I said, not yet able to place him, but knowing I-- *danger* *danger* this is someone you've shared an awkward sexual encounter with, take evasive action. God, bless, my little synapse-alert switcher.

"Huh. I'd swear--" And I saw it in his eyes. "Right, you didn't use to have that beard. I met you" don't say over The Internet. Don't say over The Internet. "a couple of years ago at a poetry slam."

"Oh. Yea." I said. "I do those a lot."

"I bet you did." Asshole. "I used to do them all the time. Not anymore, though. Maybe once a year."

Was he talking about Internet hookups, or was he actually talking about poetry slams? "Still writing?"

"Yea." He said. We sort of stood there for a minute until his father, or my father, or my father's wife, or his father's wife, or someone said something. Unfortunately, what that person said was, "Why don't you show Safey that article you've been working on."

"Awesome." He said. Yeup, it was him. "I've got a copy in my room."

Did the bitch just wink at me? In front of my dad? Oh, hell no. "Ok, why don't you bring it down? I'm going to go get a Coke." And pour some of the Captain Morgan I have stashed in my flask into it.

His article sucked. It was about "Why I write". He used the word awesome four times.

"Cool." I said. Then made a mental note not to say it again. "Where are you publishing it?"

"Oh, I don't get my articles published. I have a little folder I keep them in. When I'm famous, I'm going to put them into a book of essays."

"Great." I was running out of non-committal adjectives. "I'm kinda tired. It was nice seeing you again, and talking to you, but I think I should go home."

"Want me to walk you there?"

No. "Uh, ok."

Most of the walk was idle chitchat about living on the island, and the year he'd spent in Japan, and then "I've never kissed someone with a beard." Christ, dude, shit like that was cute when I was 21, and you were 23, but you're 30 now, and I'm not that gullible.

"So...no Tom Cruise, then?"

"Tom Cruise doesn't have a beard." He said.

"You mean, besides Katie Holmes?"

"You're so witty." He said. I was thinking that was about as stale a pop culture reference as I've ever made. Still, it was in the service of keeping him from kissing me.

"How often do you come visit your Dad?"

"Oh, every year or so."

"You should really come more often." He said.

"I know." I replied. "I feel bad about not seeing my Dad, especially now that he's retired and his wife is--" And then he kissed me.

Fuck.

original post: http://insafemode.livejournal.com/163581.html

Slow Flashes (Part 2: Welcome To The Club)

Pilgrim's Academy was my chance to start over. None of the kids in my new school knew that I had been third-grade famous for my Woody Woodpecker impersonation, or that Queen Popular Sarah The First had caught me picking my nose in fifth grade science class. Nobody had heard about the time Kevin Harris pushed me off my porch and broke my arm. Nobody even knew who Kevin Harris was. I was safe.

I've never asked my parents precisely why they decided I should go away to a private middle school. I think they believed that I was too smart for the public school system, and that's why my grades had been dropping. It couldn't have been because I was bored with the facts the teachers mumbled, and terrified of the small humans who were supposed to be my peers.

Whatever the reason, I'm mostly grateful. I've heard stories about what happened during my two year absence from the public education system: group showers, rat tails, stabbings, a pregnant girl, marijuana. The most exciting thing I can remember from my two years at Pilgrim's was when the Latin teacher had a nervous breakdown between third and fourth periods, and stormed out of her classroom yelling that my friend Scott and I were "trying to destroy" her and her "teaching curricula". That night, she called our parents, and the parents of a few of our classmates, and told them how "ill-behaved" and "dangerous" we were. After a brief investigation into our third and fourth period activities (the highlight of third period being that my teacher failed to collect the homework I didn't do, and the highlight of fourth period being that nobody blamed me for the fart someone dropped in the darkroom), the Headmaster issued a written and verbal apology to all the children and parents involved, and the Latin teacher was demoted to assistant librarian.

It was during the Pilgrim's years that I fell in love with the idea of Jennifer. Long brown hair, green eyes, nose that wrinkled pleasantly when she laughed at my stupid, stupid jokes. After voluntarily going to a couple of her cello recitals, and convincing her tutor me in Science, I finally got the courage to ask her out, and was stunned when she said "Yes." I was less stunned when she dumped me four days later, confessing that she'd only really gone out with me because she wanted to make out with my supposed best friend, Scott. And he hadn't noticed her at all, until she started tongue kissing me during lunch.

I'd like to say I spent the rest of the year shunning both my treacherous friend, and that filthy hobag, Jennifer. But I didn't. I continued to worship my ex-best friend's new girlfriend. And pretended to not hate Scott for his betrayal. After all, they were my best friends.

Unlike public school friendships, private school friendships are hindered by distance. No one in my school lived in the same neighborhood that I did. Only two of them lived in the same town, and neither of them were my friends. So, during most school vacations, I stayed home alone and began my affair with computers. Typing elaborate fantasy stories, and some of the worst rhyming couplets recorded by twentieth century man. I became really good at top of the line games like Where In The World Is Carmen Sandiego?, and King's Quest IV. During my Spring Break (which did not correspond with the public school's February and April vacations), I spent some time at the doctor's office where my mother worked, and riding in my father's work truck, eating sandwiches while he fixed electrical wires and telephone poles.

On the third day with my father, I ate a runny Grilled Cheese sandwich that had decided that, since it had defeated my throat with its power of burnination, it was more than up for the challenge of destroying my colon. Despite my life-long dislike of public restrooms, I had no choice but to run into the restroom that my father's many coworkers shared, and purge my body of this greasy affront to cheesdom.

I knew this was going to be a multiple part bowel movement. At least a three minute project. Unfortunately, I'd left my copy of The Two Towers in my dad's truck, and the only thing in the stall with me was a Wall Street Journal. I picked it up, and out fell a glossy magazine with a scantily clad woman on the cover. Club. I was ready to put the magazine back within the pages of the newspaper. I'd "read" through my father's Playboys, and hadn't found anything interesting aside from the joke section. Slim women with large breasts leaning over cars, or kneeling on beaches didn't do it for me. But the woman on the cover was not like the women in my dad's Playboys. She didn't look like the kind of girl who liked long walks on the beach, and dreamed of curing cancer, or becoming a veterinarian. This wide-hipped, huge nippled goddess had probably dropped out of highschool after her third abortion, and decided that stripping only provided temporary fame, while posing for porn meant that her nineteen year old pussy would live forever.

I flipped the magazine open. I marvelled at the way she squatted to the ground, a whip held tight in her teeth. In the background was a bright red motorcycle, and beneath her was...a huge cock. Sure enough, the next page showed her leaning over the motorcycle, while a guy in a visored helmet and nothing else pointed his cock in the direction of her mammoth ass. My butt clenched. I leaned over and checked the room for a pair of feet. I was alone. I folded the magazine back into the Wall Street Journal, ran it out to my father's truck, and zipped it into my backpack.

original post: http://insafemode.livejournal.com/228152.html