Paranoid Flamboyd

I wanted to think that after getting released from jail that the first thing I'd do was to go home and light up a blunt. But I didn't. The cops confiscated my recent purchase and happened to neglect to put everything on the report. I hope they enjoy that pot granola bar because I didn't get so much as a taste. For real though I knew I had a few nugs here and there I could have scrapped together into a decent sized bowl, I just wasn't in the mood. I was, for lack of a better term, scared straight. Figuring out which tie I would wear to my court date seemed much more important than igniting any incriminating chemical imbalance in my body.

All week I refrained from substance abuse. I went to work, came home, maybe jerked off once or twice, went to sleep and then started the whole sober process over again the next day. The experience was like a daily slap in the face from an orthodox catholic tia from Guadalajara. By Thursday I found myself waving my hands in front of my face, tripping out on the trails that didn't follow. By Friday morning while brushing my teeth for the commencement of the double that would consume my day, I found myself positively overwhelmed by the strangest feeling. Clarity of thought. By Saturday night, while putting up chairs upside down on tables, I felt only one thing, crisp, pristine, unforgiving crankiness. Raw, unadulterated, from the core of the last drop of divadome left over from my early twenties, indiscriminate bitchery.

By 12:37am on Sunday morning the last thing I wanted to hear was the heart wrenching buzz of Beto wanting to come up and see me. Late Saturday nights have become our unspoken ritual meeting time, but I couldn't find it in me to speak up and cancel. So I let him up. And in he came with two cups of fungi infused chocolate pudding and a joint to boot.

"I can't party with you anymore," I uttered, my eyelids were heavy with remorse. He knew why. I told him the whole thing on Wednesday night.

"Yes you can," he locked his eyes to mine. "You have until your court date to do whatever you want. After that, then you have to be a good boy." He walked over to my silverware drawer, pulled out a spoon and scooped out a gelatinous dollop of chocolaty goodness and airplaned it into my mouth.

That was the sixth week in a row that Beto and I have welcomed in the dawn together.

These Walls Are Funny

I got locked up the other night. I'm a hardened criminal now. A thug. A hoodlum. Ruffian. Scoundrel if you will. What did I do you ask to be afforded the luxury a full lipped officer V. Hernandez to slap some cuffs on me, pat me down and read me my rights? The unthinkable. The inconceivable. The despicable indeed. You see I had the audacity to drive home, unbeknownst to me with a broken tail light and an 8th of weed (that part was beknownst).

And you know, as I sit here and write about it, I want to get into it, I do. But the details coagulate in my mouth like a filthy paste and my fingers quiver to translate. The worst part wasn't the stale bread, oily peanut butter and dry oranges they called food, it wasn't the shit-smelling foulness that emanated from the other inmates around me and it wasn't the angry lesbian deputy demanding my country of origin from the core of her life long penis envy. No. That shit I've dealt with before and handled with ease.

No. The worst part was that for all the years I've fantasized about it, for all the times I've practiced in the mirror for this one opportunity to floss the smile for that special photographer, my mugshot wasn't nearly as fabulous as it should have been.

Laced

I present to you a picture of my shoes. Why? Because this the first time they've been graced with laces in the last twelve hours. Details at eleven, but for now I'll be getting some much needed sleep.

Idol Hands

So I've been seeing this guy. Only about once a month for the last two months, and today will be the third time we see each other. When we first met I admit I was a little shy, and I think so was he. But he was forthright and asked me how I liked it. So I told him and he nailed it. The next time we saw each other I told him he could go deeper and boy did he. Today I don't know what he'll do with me.

Oh Bruno, when you touch me I quiver only to stifle my wanton desires. Masseur of my heart, the contours of my body belong to your hands, trek them as you wish, every first Monday of the month.

Remember What the Dormouse Said

Last night I went to Beto's place after a grueling shift. I really just wanted to go home and crash but he hooked me with the cutest text "wanna fall down the rabbit hole?" He knows I'm a sucker for hallucinogenic adventures or maybe he just knows I'm a sucker for him. When I arrived he greeted me with a smirk, raised eyebrows and chocolate shake from McDonald's.

"A shake? Really?"

He ignored my snobbery and just clicked his waxy cup against mine and together we sucked down every last earthy drop of the stuff. We stayed in and watched a couple episodes of I love Lucy to wait for the magic to begin. Two episodes in I hadn't felt so much as a tingle and I was getting tired so I pulled out about half a gram to keep us alert, but Beto got all high and mighty about it saying he wanted to feel the affects in their purest form and free from other intrusive substances. I'd forgotten this was his first time and he was excited about it. So I went ahead and did a line myself and wouldn't you know it, five minutes later he walks over to the window and lights up a blunt that was sitting on ashtray. By now I was pretty focused and when that familiar trumpet music sounded the commencement of yet another episode of Lucy, he was coughing out the window and holding the blunt toward me to grab it. So I did the gentlemanly thing and took it... then I took a hit.

Halfway through Lucy trying to concoct a scheme to get into one of Ricky's shows I got up to go to the bathroom. And there with the cool subway tile underneath my black socks I looked at myself in the mirror and I felt as though I hadn't seen my face in forever. I stood at the sink and stared first into my own eyes and then shifted from freckle to blemish to singular follicles of facial hair and wondered when this stuff was gonna kick in. I could see the steam rising from each of my pours as I stood there and just waited... waited... waited...

Behind me the bathroom door stretched at the corners and I felt that it was going to consume me like a wave of white paint. Then suddenly through a sliver of an opening Beto comes in, peering at me through those little black rimmed glasses and when he opened up those pretty lips I heard him say from behind me "what's taking you so long?"

"Oh good its you. I think I got lost." I responded and when I turned to face him I noticed that either he was getting closer and closer to the tile or I was getting closer to the ceiling. I looked at him slowly and fondly wanting only to catch up with his decent toward the tile. But then noticed to my right the rippling of that white door and its incessant desire to envelop me and Beto both. But Beto, my little Beto he didn't seem scared. He only laughed and kept repeating, "no, no its not." How was he reading my thoughts? But I felt that, he must know the truth. Because with him I felt safe. I felt that I could laugh. So I did, right along with him. And before I knew it we were both on the floor surrounded by a valley of shiny, white and black tile and roads of grout that upon closer inspection could use a scrubbing. And the door, the sink, the counter tops and the mirror, they loomed over us both like a canyon. And all we could do was laugh. laugh. laugh. Until it was time to craw out of the bathroom, underneath the crack of the door, only to find myself squinting in the light of a 6 am dawn with Beto at my side... still wondering when I was finally going to feel something.

Lou Give Me a Milk... Chocolate!

So there's this repeat customer. A real McFly type you know what I mean, with glasses and silvery hair all matted to one side of his face. But for real, that's what I liked about him at first. He was genuinely nerdy and still had the balls to flirt with me underneath that nasally voice, with his cute little fingers holding onto his drink. I would even give him discounts every now and then just to hear his voice break when he thanked me. It was fun. Harmless even. But then one day the guy decides to give me this note and I pretty much know what it is you know, so I just put it in my apron, smile and nod and go about my business. Later, later that night when I'm counting tips and what not, I find the note and open it. And in silly ass chicken scratch it says "I like you. Date?" followed by something that resembled a phone number. He might as well have ended it with "please check one: yes or no?" Is this a side affect of med school? Incomprehensible penmanship and the complete loss of the simple human trait known as game? I mean the card was really more funny than charming. And when I got home I just threw it in a drawer and forgot about it.

After a few weeks the guy comes in again or I work again or something and we see each other. I smile and say hi. He looks down at his feet, then shoots a quick look over my shoulders and chirps a little noise that could only translate to "fuck off" and that's it. I give him his change and his drink and a side of a little "what the fuck was that about?" on the house of course. 

Its been going on like that for a while now. I tried being nice at first, its what I know. But this fool didn't let up. He just persisted on being short with me and after a while I allowed myself not to force a smile anymore and let him see that I really didn't give a shit anymore. And I thought I didn't but then I would just see him sitting there by himself sipping on his drink, maybe making mild conversation with other regulars when they'd care to indulge him. But mostly he would just sit there. It nearly broke my heart to witness it. So I thought I'd give him one more chance.

So I sit at his table with him and smirk upon eye contact. I could almost hear the "Party of Five" theme music playing behind me, so I just ask him if we could be cool. And you know what this muthafucker does? He rolls his beady, little eyes and scoffs. Maaan.

"You know what?" I cock my neck at him, "Do you think you're the first customer I haven't called? Do you think you're the last? I mean really dude, this is your time here. This is your drink you're wasting money on. I just work here. So you could either keep coming in and acting all mad because I hurt your feelings or you could laugh about this with me and actually enjoy a drink. It's your call." It didn't even feel good this time, to snap at a customer like that. Its been a while since I went berserk, and I just hoped that this time I wouldn't loose my job over it, I actually like this place. But I committed to the attitude I had just thrust upon him, "Well?"

He straightens in his chair and clears his throat. His little head stretchs forward like a baby bird hungry for regurgitated worms. He licks his lips to prepare for rebuttal and simply states, "I was only hurt that you stopped giving me discounts. Conceited."