Buy the Ticket, Take the Ride. Brian Sweany

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СКАЧАТЬ Shiny, metallic moons ending in gold tassels that crowned the smoothest, most perfectly rounded breasts I’d ever seen. They became the standard by which all breasts were compared for the rest of my life.

      I took the belly dancer to my bedroom and had my way with her.

      When Dad told me he was phasing out his vinyls to make way for a cassette collection—a collection that, in continuing the Fitzpatrick musical tradition of sucking balls, would be dominated by compilations of movie and television theme songs—I took a box cutter to the front sleeve of Exotic Music of the Belly Dancer. I was very careful to separate the image from the cardboard corrugation. For being folded and refolded into my wallet on multiple occasions over the last five years, my girl has held up pretty well. I hold on to her for emergency situations, like today.

      The sink and toilet are to my left, a washer and dryer tucked in a closet to my right. Bright white crown moldings and baseboards trim walls of barn red. I reach for some toilet paper and undo my pants. Taking my erection in my hands, I look at my belly dancer.

      Thanks to Mary, I’m pretty well primed, but I try to hold on as long as I can. I hover over the toilet, my pelvis thrusting, my pants pulled down to my knees. I close my eyes right when it starts.

      I tuck the belly dancer snuggly back into my wallet. I have to piss so bad I can almost feel it coming out my ocular cavities, but I’m still hard as a rock. I try to push my erection down so I can piss on the back of the toilet seat. A few drops trickle out, but I can’t piss unless my penis is bent well below perpendicular to my body. And I know if I hazard an attempt at anything close to perpendicular, my urine is destined for multiple and varied locales maybe or maybe not in the general vicinity of the toilet.

      I finally decide to sit on the toilet seat backwards. I straddle the seat with my legs while leaning over the back of the toilet. My penis is still hard, touching the inside of the toilet bowl. The cold toilet water gets things going. The clear liquid comes out in multiple streams, like a sprinkler. It burns. It feels toxic, punitive. The bleachy odor of ejaculate hovers in the bathroom. An unmistakable odor of adolescence. Like sweaty polyester athletic uniforms, dirty ashtrays, cheap beer, vomit, and too much Drakkar Noir cologne. Like the inside of a girl.

      I gather myself. With a hand towel I wipe the sweat off my face. Pausing one last time to wipe some errant sperm off the wall above the toilet, I exit the bathroom and head downstairs.

      Hatch is sitting on the family room couch watching a movie on the big screen projection television. Most of the crowd has cleared out. I try to sneak by him into the kitchen.

      “Where the hell you think you’re going?” Hatch asks.

      “Me?” I veer toward the couch, pretending as if this were my intention all along. I sit down. “Just looking for you.”

      Hatch hands me a lukewarm, already opened Natty Light. I force down a swallow of it. I wipe my mouth, looking at the animated image on the projection television. “What are you watching?”

      “Some kind of cartoon.”

      “That’s no ordinary cartoon. That’s Fritz the Cat.”

      “Fritz the what?”

      “Fritz the Cat. It was the first ever X-rated animated film.”

      Hatch scratches his head. “Well, that explains a lot. I thought the dope was just making me see things. So this cartoon has a lot of psychedelic colors?”

      “Yep.”

      “And the occasional cow, pig, cat, or crow with enormous tits getting fucked by, what’s his name again?”

      “Yep, a lot of big-breasted farm animals getting fucked by Fritz.”

      “And a lot of them smoking weed?”

      “Lots of weed smoking.”

      “Okay, then…” Hatch pauses. He stares at the television. An effeminate crow shouts an expletive onscreen. Hatch sips his beer, sits it down on the coffee table. “But it still freaks me out.”

      I force out one of those fake laughs, the kind you do when you’re thankful full frontal nudity, even the animated feline kind, can distract your buddy enough that he doesn’t remember to ask you—

      “How’d it go with Mary, stud man?”

      I play dumb. “What do you mean?”

      “Don’t be a jackass.” Hatch punches me in the shoulder. “How was she?”

      “Relax, dude.” I pull a long white cigarette out of my back pocket. I light it with the still-burning ember of a butt nesting in an ashtray on the coffee table. “We just watched a movie.”

      Hatch opens his mouth, speechless, but not for long, I suspect. He stands with his hands on his hips. “You’ve gotta be fist fucking me!”

      “Nope.” I hold in a long drag of smoke. Man, I was one lame piece of shit.

      Hatch points at me. “Man, you’re one lame piece of shit.”

      “She’s just not my type.”

      “Since when is drunk, hot, and naked not your type?”

      He has a point. “I don’t know. I guess since…well, I don’t know.”

      “Since Laura maybe?”

      Her name breaks the tenuous peace. “Listen, shithead.” I lurch up from the couch, so sudden and awkward the top of my head smacks the bottom of Hatch’s chin on the way up. “Leave her out of this!”

      Hatch staggers back onto the couch. I hover over him, fists clenched, face reddening. He rubs his chin. “Jesus Christ, Fitzy. I’m just fucking with you.”

      I relax my shoulders, the color already fading from my face. As always, this is the extent to which we argue, never beyond this point. I extend my hand to help him up. Hatch accepts the gesture.

      “Sorry, buddy.” I pat him on the back. “Got any of that pot left?”

      Hatch straightens his shirt. “Hello, remember me? I’m your best friend, Hatch, son of an alcoholic marine who’d whip my fucking ass if he ever found that shit on me.”

      “So you’re not high right now?”

      “I didn’t say that, did I? Yours truly is fucked up as a football bat.” Hatch motions to the backdoor. “Hockey team is out back lighting up.”

      For whatever reason, our hockey team always has the best pot. I step aside, offering Hatch a path to the backdoor. “Ladies first, then.”

      Hatch shakes his head, waves me off. “No, thanks. You go ahead. I need to come down off this buzz a little.”

      “You sure?”

      “Yeah. I’m going to watch the rest of this movie, try to get my feet back under me.”

      Hatch eyes the door to the upstairs bedroom as he says this. I pretend not to notice, but I know what he’s thinking. “Suit yourself.”

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