Price Breaks and Heartaches
A journal of retail and failed romance
Chapter Ten
Still Not Quite What They’re Looking For
part six
That night I threw all my dirty magazines away and swore to myself I would never masturbate again.
That vow lasted less than fifteen hours but sadly by the time my resolve broke the trash collectors had already hauled away my bevy of top heavy trollops. I tried to use my imagination instead but my every impure thought and fantasy always gave way to memories of Tallulah.
And it may sound weird but I just couldn’t bring myself to get off while thinking of our sweet mumblings and hot fumblings. It felt to me that if I did that I would be admitting she was gone forever and part of me still expected her to come back.
So instead of wasting tissues I ended up wasting fuel, I drove by Tallulah’s house at three AM, then on thew way back stopped at a gas station so I could buy a copy of Penthouse magazine.
The next morning I awoke with a nice healthy dose of Catholic guilt and self-loathing. I threw the magazine away and swore never to play with myself again.
As you can imagine my second vow worked out as well as the first.
*
It was five days and four vows of celibacy later when my brother Phil walked into my room without knocking, “You still mad at me?”
“It’s more of a seething rage,” I said.
“OK then.” He sat down on my unmade bed, avoiding the crustier parts of my sheets more by luck than design, “I got an idea for you.”
I rolled my eyes, “For the last time, you cannot put one of my kidneys ‘on reserve’”
“No not that, this is something different,” my brother explained as he began to go through my record collection. A glimpse of the soundtrack to Howard The Duck stunned him into momentary silence, “I’m going to a party over a Dukie’s place tonight.”
“So?” I said.
“It’s gonna have beer, and girls and a live band,” Phil said.
“And?”
“And his parents are outta town so it could get pretty wild if you know what I mean,” he started flipping through my records again. If he noticed how crinkled the sleeve to my copy of Vanity’s solo album was he didn’t mention it, “You do understand what I mean right?”
“You want me to buy you condoms is that it?” I sighed with resignation, “No worries I’ve actually got a bit of a stockpile now.”
“You dumbass!” Phil punched my bed in frustration, “I want you. To. Come. To. The. Party.”
I couldn’t believe my ears, “With you?”
“With. Me,” Phil got up, “we’re gonna leave in about an hour.”
“Wait,” I said. The distrust I felt was a natural thing. My brother and I had been trying to destroy each other physically and psychologically since our teens, “If I wanted to be publicly humiliated I’d try stand up again.”
“Look, I just want you to stop feeling sorry for yourself. You know, go out there and get a little action.”
“Phil... I’m touched.”
“You need to ease up on the touching a little,” he put his arm around me, “come on man. These girls are all seniors in high school, or at least old enough to be seniors.”
Suddenly I began to feel uncomfortable, “Woah. Wait. I’m twenty-one years old. Won’t it be a little creepy for me to be there?”
“That’s the best part of it! You’re an older guy to these girls. You got a car and you’re going to college. They won’t know any better.”
“But...”
“If there’s grass on the field you can play. Hey remember when you were a senior in high school and I was a freshman? I banged like two of the girls you graduated with.”
“And there’s that seething hatred again...”
“Dude. Mom said you’re back playing Dungeons & Dragons. You were almost normal for a while there. You need to get back on the horse...”
“I understand.”
“And by horse I mean pussy.”
“I know!” I began to look around my room, wondering what I might have to wear. If I was going to do this right I would have to make sure I looked every inch the mature older man. “Do you know if Mom did my laundry yet?”
“I dunno...” my brother said, “let me check. HEY MA!!!!!!”
There was no denying that trolling for high school chicks was a pretty sleazy thing to do.
But it was so sleazy it just might work.
