Sexy Girls Dancing (Xe) — a short story

Xe is sitting/standing beside a door. Leaning. He’s — yeah, it’s awkward. He doesn’t know what the fuck he thinks his story is. This is the gym and not the gym. Not like the weight room. Gymnasium gym. And somebody played some — fuckin’ bass-heavy hypnotic Latin… trap, he guesses you would call this? And um, Alanna and some girls started dancing. And um. Well, he’s just standing here. Cause he’s — cause it’s comfortable. The wall. He’s stretching! That’s it! He’s — doing like some neck straightening thing where you kinda weirdly put your back against a wall to peek around a doorframe so that out the side of your glasses you can see the sexy girls dancing…

Yo. Not, okay, or fair that she moves like that, you know. Also not okay that Train is so fucking corny and still like award-winning? Huh? Like every once in a while someone goes — fuck it, let the D students have it for a change.

A) You are so fucking elitist… as if having knowledge of “SCIENCE!” makes you “POWERFUL!” It’s cool to be smart!!! Why exactly are you halfway in/out of a god-forsaken doorway/life again? Why is being a “D-student” a bad thing if this is what A’s gets you? B through D) …rops. Of. Jupiter? Are you — like throwing C4 in a house made of fucking STRAW and WIND, bro. This little piggy when boo hoo hoo all the way to naked hypocrisy.

SHUT UP. He’s creeping! Can you let him fucking creep in peace?

You’re disgusted by yourself (and so rightfully so), but you’re going to misdirect it at them in like 10 seconds, just you wait.

URG. Why the fuck do they move so SEXY! He hates it. Like, stop. Stop. Oh my god, he can’t even process what’s happening. She’s so tall and yet wields that whole long body like the very notion of “inelegance” was entirely theoretical. Her smiling face and enjoyment are so sincere and sweet, but her body’s sensual appeal (on top of the sheer dentures-falling-out levels of facial beauty) so overwhelms you it’s hard to register anything else. His dick is a purse-size Mentos roll made of steel. Hhhhm. Holy shit, nobody moves like her. The other girls are like — white. In their dancing, he means. Not Alanna. God-fucking damn it, she’s like some — he doesn’t even know! Goop in a lava lamp?! Just flowing and round boobies bouncing and bubble butt jiggling but so fucking slender and fit and precious and luscious and smart and funny and perfect teeth and eyes and lips and ears and wrists and — JESUS FUCKING CHRIST HER LEGS.

Was — did girls like that exist in the Bible? Somehow, he doubts it. Fuckin’ didn’t even exist before the nineteen eighties somehow? Did white girls just not understand that butts were a thing until — oh. Was it racism? Doesn’t even want to know. Almost always, humans being terrible to each other, or more likely dudes, being terrible to everyone else… cause we can. Cause who’s gonna stop us? Also — urge. Our brains fucking torture us with you.

You want that! You want her! She’s the one you want. Look! Look some more! Don’t stop looking! You don’t want to stop looking! You might never see anything this good ever again! Sexy is RARE!

But is it? Isn’t it kind of the least rare thing? Like food used to be rare? Definitely rarer than sex has ever been. But, he guesses, it’s more like beauty is rare. So goddamn — not common. Not the highest levels. The girls around her aren’t her friends. If this wasn’t goofing around at the end of a gym class and her friend-friends were here… well. There would be even more sketchy dudes pretending to clean up or whatever the fuck. Even the teacher must have his legs crossed in his office like — we’re all the same, aren’t we? Aren’t we all, just disgusting? If not, then why does every male comedian’s act at some point involve being a gross ventriloquist puppet for all the dudes in the room? “We want to fuck most of you. Many more of you seem sexually viable to us than most of us do to you, evidently, and this causes tension. I will attempt to relieve it briefly. Please hand over too many dollars.”

Hey, ladies. It seems like there’s barely a handful of us you approve of, and they get ALL the sex, and then you feel terrible because the same dude you like to fuck likes to fuck everyone else. Meanwhile, the rest of us… are trying to make do and would like some credit for that at least.

Make… what?

Okay. More likely, make holes in things that have no business having holes in them. Or trying to put stuff in things that have no business being used for that purpose as the holes are already quite occupied with other necessary functions.

And yet your mind goes, …aren’t you curious?

DO YOU LIKE US YET?!

Fucking Christ, that orange-haired girl makes you want to gouge your fucking eyes out, huh?

KIND OF YEAH. She’s so pretty it’s hard to think. So pretty it’s hard to breathe. Hard to stand. Hard to remember what the fuck these things at the end of your arms are. Right. Hands.

Can we put these on her?

NO. NO, NO, NO, NO, NO. OBVIOUSLY.

Barring her consent, presumably?

Yeah. Like that’s gonna happen. And thus, better off just accepting, no. You ain’t touching that. You will never feel those boobs. You will never know how heavy they are. What they look like. What they feel like against your… nose. Her neck up close. Her eyes moving from one of your pupils to the other like — ‘I love you. I love you so much.’

Yo bro, is your dick hard from love? What was that?! You tryna’ fuck or get married?

HE DOESN’T KNOW! She’s the only one! He can’t even SEE anyone else. She’s just — amazing. Everything. Her eyebrows. Her nose. Her. Just her. Her “her”ness is the definition of everything that otherwise has a word to describe it. If we had no words, if we all lost our memories and had to start from scratch, we’d still know — she’s right. Beyond language, race, culture, creed — like obviously people will have different preferences. His definition of the most beautiful is bound to be different from yours. But even if she’s not your number one, she’s still in your top five. Heck, your top three. They only make these ones one way. And wherever they are, it’s like water in the desert. Fucking Christ, can she stop moving, please? Please. Like it’s hard enough to ignore her overpowering attractiveness when she’s standing still! This is just impossible. She’s so — bouncy?!

Boing-boing?

Seriously, she must work out so much. Or — how does she look like that? What do they feed her? Veal? Soaked in milk and fried in ambergris?

The fuck is “ambergris?”

It’s the stuff that forms around the pointy squid-beaks in a sperm whale’s digestive tract. It was actually a huge mystery for a long time. Used in super expensive perfumes to this day, but kings and queens would eat it on their eggs or something like the world’s fanciest butter. It’s just French for “grey amber.”

Thanks, nerd, well you sure make it “sound” delicious. “Yes, I’ll have the… squidy whale shite?”

How does she get her skin to look like that though? Why don’t they all look like that? Why can’t they all move like that? Some of the girls hold their hands in front of them like sixty-year-olds. Others — oh, he should specify. Only Alanna and two others are technically “Caucasian,” whatever the fuck meaningless term. The other eight aren’t (not that it fucking matters), and there are two girls wearing hijabs on the edge of the circle; looking suspiciously like they’re having the most fun by far, in part because their glee is the least reserved.

Everyone else is… trying to make it work.

It must suck to just know you ain’t got it like that. She’s not even intentionally doing anything. Everyone else is like ‘omg people are watching us dancing!’ Meanwhile, Alanna’s body is just being told what to do by the beat.

And even the beat is like — fuuuuck, look at that one!

Eyes closed. Just vibing. So fucking beddable it makes no sense. Like she couldn’t be awkward, uncool, or in any way something you wanted to stop staring at with all her joints attached backwards. She’d make it work. Make it look purposeful somehow. Make it look easy. Like dancing was something you didn’t have to learn because she never did. Why do most of us fail so hard at moving our bodies not-awkwardly?! Also, how much must it blow to be the one “Non-Caucasian” guy who can’t dance?

EXCUSE YOU? Bro… the casual and increasingly uncomfortable levels of racism are getting LOUD even for you, no? Like, does it suck to be the one Asian guy who can’t do math too, or is that assumption still moronic? What are we doing? Yo, seriously, the shit is this?! Since when have you been this ‘’much’’ of a piece of shit? Are you deteriorating?

Can you leave him alone, please? He’s not — it’s not a racial issue! White people dance bad, Asian people dance bad, lots of people dance badly and it’s fine. Not all of us need to be gliding across ballroom floors with a perfect merengue. And everybody out there, no matter how much natural rhythm they have, is dancing some variety of less-well-than-professional dancers right now, but they’re doing it like nobody’s watching, and that’s how it should be. It’s not necessary to look good doing it if you’re enjoying yourself. The point is that, lots of us “wish” we could just be enjoying ourselves “and” look good doing it, and that’s — like her life. Her whole life is just doing things and looking unspeakably, heart-muscle-rendingly gorgeous as possible doing it, without trying.

That last part is crucial. The others weren’t “trying” to look uncomfortable, they were just worried about looking weird or awkward, so they moved a little more stiffly — and it’s a vicious cycle from there. Then some dick/cunt makes fun of your dance whether because they’re trying to get a laugh or be mean to you, but either way it makes you even more insecure, hence stiffer and eventually we’re all just white and/or Asian half-deaf folks at a wedding, pulling each other up out of chairs to shuffle along to something so overplayed it should be criminal to broadcast it in public, moving like we only vaguely remember what sex is, and none too keen on anything that could get in the way of soup.

…Is… is that it? That still sounded pretty racist by the way. Amazing how you pull it off every time. Why can’t you refer to “individuals,” huh? Why’s it always “groups” with you?

Hmm. You know he honestly doesn’t know. It’s a great question. Maybe he’s obsessed with trying to perceive broad patterns. Always striving to get a peek at “the big picture,” even when there isn’t one. Like now, the big picture is that some girls at his school are having fun. They like this song and being with each other, and that’s all there is to it. This song… that he hates himself for knowing, if only because he resents having already heard a track a thousand times over the course of a few weeks without EVER ONCE PLAYING IT…

“By any chance, have you heard of this ‘Nasty Rabbit’ fellow? He’s all the rage.” YES, WE KNOW. YOU’RE ALL “DISCOVERING” SHIT AT THE EXACT SAME TIME.

Also, how do you not remember that you do complete one-eighties on artists and music genres and then — oh, I FORGOT.

They were telling you about Latin trap EIGHT YEARS AGO. They were telling you about the insane Nigerian club scene in 2005. You people TALKED SHIT. You slept on that shit. Bitch, you better have insomnia now because it’s so annoying watching adult humans have all the self-awareness of — like funny dogs. It’s funny when dogs do it. Not so much when you do it. Have a brain.

Are you… feeling high and mighty for… like being an early adopter? So you’re cool now because you heard of shit first? Congratulations?

He’s not. Just — It’s like we all need more humility. We’re acting like it’s fine. Whatever we do, if everybody’s doing it, it’s fine. And it’s super not.

More like she’s ‘fine’ and you’re super not.

Fuck you. Never mind. Xe is not here right now. The second-best dancers after Alanna are two Chinese exchange students, so he’s just racist. Like he’s Asian and he can’t dance, therefore, “his people” must not be able to.

So are you going to say those Asian girls aren’t hot because you have a whole self-loathing psychology you’re playing out in slow-motion against everyone else?

The thing is, those two girls, in fact, most of them, look like they’re ‘’trying’’ to be sexy. And Alanna never is. She’s just… spunky. Like…

Don’t say it.

Like some actress who sings and dances and is really cute and pretty and everyone likes her because she’s not just freakily good-looking but freakily talented, smart, and witty and makes talk show hosts look even dumber and worse at their jobs than they all already are.

Zing.

It’s like everyone else’s body has ‘parts’ and Alanna’s is one piece. People move their arms, people move their legs, people watch each other and try to imitate their arm and leg movements. Meanwhile, fuckin Astarte over here is liquid. Her shoulders orbit her hips, her hips orbit her waist, her arms are sometimes over her head, sometimes below it, and that’s always the perfectly balanced place for them. She doesn’t watch anyone.

Her eyes are closed. Somebody in the production booth back when the song was recorded dropped a bunch of bowling balls on some hollow tubes, so the beat went fucking funkier than hail on bongos, and then someone who knew it was coming hit the lights so the high windows became the only illumination; in one instant, all the girls switched up their dancing style from hopping around slumber-party popcorn to swaying sensuous undersea plant life. It was fucking… hot. All of them were sexy in that moment. Every single one. Like they all knew what to do. In unison. Girls, man. Hot damn. What he wouldn’t give to be gay.

A bunch of them mouth, “Say cheese, ay!” making kissy faces at each other and looking all so, so fuckable.

This song is about a dude cursed by too many girlfriends. Lol. Sucks to be him.

Well, it probably genuinely does. Too much of a good thing probably applies to literally everything in human existence, including money and pussy. Like we thought there could never be “too much meat,” and look how that worked out.

While tens of millions experience food insecurity in the richest countries on Earth every single day.

Fair. But boring. More interesting is that he can absolutely imagine too much pussy becoming a curse. Like you want to love a girl, but having a girl you’ve never touched before in your bed is like, the only thing that cuts it now. It’s just a rarer experience than that familiar girl you know and love, and you only feel alive in the novelty. You can’t have a normal life because you’re basically an addict now. That’s totally understandable as a curse, even though it’s far rarer than — you know. His situation.

Pussy… drought?

Or P-word starvation. P-word wasteland.

“Water…. I need… vaginal water…”

EW! Or?… yes, ew. You’re not supposed to literally — oh fuck you. Fuck you, brain; you could ruin anything.

Thanks. I try.

But seriously, Xe genuinely doesn’t envy celebrities. He feels bad for them. Rich people’s kids have all the benefits and more, and none of the fucking — horrifying exposure. It looks terrible. You can ball-out while “not” having every single human on the same landmass seemingly wanting a piece of you either metaphorically or physically every moment of every second, and that sounds about a billion dollars better.

How does fame not sound genuinely terrifying to everyone? You go out in public and just necessarily assume you’re probably being spied on? Ehhhhehe!? Our whole species needs to take a good hard look at celebrity “culture” and probably knock it off. Probs a smidge, right? It’s bad for literally everyone involved. Well, except the ones who pimp the celebs. And there are always so many of those. We should get around to, you know, scooping their eyes out with melon ballers one of these days. If you’re human, and you don’t have empathy, you’re not really human, so there you go. Figure it out. Have fun being empty inside.

Nice one. Said one more idiot disciple of some imagined “Ishtar” using his thighs to conceal a boner that may as well be vibrating along to this… sick… beat. She’s just a normal person! These rose-tinted glasses are fucking RED. GET A GRIP.

Why he ‘’is’’ trying to shake it off, thank you! Shake this pesky boner off. Shake women off. Swear them off, if necessary. Try not to swear “at” them in the meantime for all the feelings they make you feel…

And fail.

— but way better to be a simp than a pimp, fundamentally. Unless you have a child’s brain. Pimps are to human beings what chimpanzees are to human beings, namely, not human beings. Especially the ones in suits.

And yet. If that was the only way to have her?

First of all! Subconscious, stop saying “have her” and shit. Ugh. You’re creeping him out.

Yeah, ‘’I’m’’ the creepy one in this situation.

Can — HEY! Can he, please, not just listen to a fairly mesmerizing baseline and instead of trying to figure out what it is about her that makes her so different by staring some more at a human who would be well within their rights to kick his ass, or get her boyfriend to, more likely,

— she’s a foot taller and in better shape. Plus, if she said she’d done martial arts, you’d believe it. That bitch would kick your ass.

Maybe she would!

Do you not understand that a height advantage implies a REACH advantage? Those long legs can kick too?

Why is he thinking of this even?

Feminism? But presumably, if your thoughts were put on display, the entirety of your fellow students would rise as one and slay you. The dudes would disavow you, to save themselves. And the girls, in genuine horror and disgust, would make an example of your “voyeuristic” whatever the fuck gross word you use for spying on people in a way that you would never want to have done to you. Point finale.

Oh my god, you’re not French, shut up.

It’s a language.

Can you just — speaking of language, help him wonder why he understands Spanish so well now? When it was his worst subject in high school? Like did all those classes kick in after a delay?

There’s a weird thing about the way this singer sucks in his breath that’s — kinda, he doesn’t know. Like he’s either literally choked by emotion, affecting a distracting affectation, or might sincerely benefit from an appointment with a respirologist.

RRRRahhhh. ‘This singer.’ Biggest artist in the world, probably, at this point. “Durr, you know, dat one vocawist, de wascawwy wabbit guy!”

Stop saying “durr.” It’s demeaning.

Who is talking down to who here?!

Alanna’s eyes open, looking at the girls around her. She smiles. They all look so good and she’s like their conductor. Are they dancing better now because it’s a more subtle movement, or because they’re starting to unconsciously follow her lead? Maybe it’s easier to be sexy when you’ve got a filled-in answer sheet just shining on the desk right next to you.

Oh god how does she always just know what to do?! She caresses herself with her hands, bending her knees, bobbing and swaying, boobs and hips and mesmerizing thighs all undulating and flowing down down into the ground…

The red red krovvy dripping down down?

No! He meant like “down down in the ocean of sound.”

Oof. Death Cab is arguably even less tasteful a reference than A Clockwork Orange. Someone warn Zooey Deschanel and Ann McGlinn. What is it with artists and beauty?

Huh? He’s ignoring you. Besides, it’s like the beat just plays her body, its favourite instrument. It’s like the music allows her to ignore everyone else, which in turn gives everyone a chance to finally sate some desire to stare inappropriately long. Probably just feeling good and vibing, but her sculpting hands pressing on the cotton of the gym shirt inadvertently emphasize curves that needed absolutely no extra emphasis whatsoever. Some of the girls wear shorter, tighter shorts, while others have more loose basketball shorts. Alanna has the shorter shorts on. Her absurdly wide hips, flat abdomen, taught round thighs, and slim arms are so amazingly obviously apparent from every angle all the time, no matter what she does. She lifts one hand over her head, smiles, and shakes her hair around. His mouth literally drops open. He doubts he’s the only one. Holy fucking shit.

Excuse him while he kisses the sky.

Yo, she glows. She glances briefly up and then gets swallowed by the music again. He nearly drew back from the door, but that would look way sketchier. As far as they’re concerned, he — doesn’t even exist as a human, hopefully. Just set dressing. Or regular dressing. Just an oily sheen peeking out from the salad.

And then you wonder why you’re alone…

Well, hey! He’s not even alone anyway! He has you, the metaphorical piece of shit voice of his subconscious or whatever you’re calling yourself today, to piss him off every single second of every fucking day of his life! Hallelujah. He’s so happy.

Hey, “I’m” not the person who doomed you to being — inadequate, or whatever you’re calling it. I’m just along for the shitty, shitty ride.

And you help a lot. Much appreciated.

Oh, whine on you, fugazi diamond! You’re not even “in the rough.” Your life is pampered all to hell — just a noisy puddle in a rock garden, painfully unsatisfied with existing as anything less than Her Majesty’s personal koi pond! Have some respect for yourself, first of all? Secondly, haven’t you mumbled over the n-word in enough songs to be aware that in general, “You workin’ backwards if you chasin’ a bitch / You stupid? Chase the paper man, they come with the shit.” Meanwhile, absent that, you have no depth, no charisma, no charm, and do shit all to “cultivate” anything like healthy habits or attractive talents. You game. As in — not the sports kind. You’re a “gamer.” Congratulations. Standing there expecting to be given things… The darkest and most absurd part: Deep DEEP down, beneath your denial, and your anger, and your hurt, and your sense of wounded pride, you actually think you’re “entitled” to her! HA! COULD NOT be more hilarious or preposterous if you fucking TRIED, which you know, and that makes the denial even more amazing. Are you entitled to the second planet from the Sun too? The balls. The fucking balls, dude! Think about it. Goddamn.

Fuck you.

No, no, fuck “you.” In fact, you should go fuck “yourself,” because no one else is ever gonna wanna.

The song has an interlude where the dude’s aunt calls him out for banging too many chicks and not settling down. She calls him “coño” at the end, which makes Xe laugh. He realizes he’s never heard this song the whole way through before, and it’s surprisingly… layered? It gets sentimental as Mauvais Lapin explains that he’d like to fall in love, but he can’t because he can’t trust anyone, not even himself.

Then he starts warning, presumably his future love interests, that they’re bound to have their hearts broken. Alanna is mouthing along to the lyrics. Obviously, she knows the words to a song in a foreign language.

As do you?

Well, he can kinda understand, but it’s not like he could sing along. She’s smiling and lip-syncing, riding on invisible eddies of music; the light and the other girls’ bodies around her rising and falling like foam on the roiling sea, while she bobs, swerves, twists, and otherwise gives the appearance that her spine is just an immaculately balanced slinky. The rivulets of soft, clean coppery hair, ever breathtaking, now appear positively molten and incandescent. With both eyes’ lids shut, and both eyebrows in an apologetic expression, hand out like she’s on a surfboard, Alanna melodically and serenely cautions all those present that she’ll break their hearts,

“Ay — no te enamores de mí,” she mouths, “No te enamores de mí. Sorry, yo soy así — ay. No sé por qué soy así,” while someone gets weird with a theremin in the background.

Even outside the Twilight Zone, it was a fairly poignant address. Those like her were a few trillion times more likely to do that to you than any one melodramatic singer, artist, celebrity, or person of influence, regardless of how justifiably popular and incomprehensibly talented they are. The Alannashave broken your heart. Already. They’re doing it right now. All the time. Everywhere. Making you want what you can’t have. Making you buy what you don’t need. Making you look longer than you should. Making you wish your partner looked just a little more like her. Not even sure what about her is so pleasing to your eye. Just knowing you like how you feel when you see her. Making her laugh would probably feel amazing. Then you wonder about that girl you used to know. You wonder about being young again, all the things you understand now, that you didn’t then. Making you feel… longing. Because everyone is. Everyone. It’s the human condition. We long for things we physically can’t have. Things we wouldn’t even like if we got them. We long for status, for money, for sexual gratification, for violence against those who’ve wronged us, else justice in some way that aligns with our beliefs. We long for peace in war, for water in drought, for abundance in scarcity; and then amid abundance we long for self-control, for discipline, for equanimity, and mindfulness.

It is a rare few who can resist longing. And longing after women is… like practically our species’ defining trait! Or maybe more accurately and generally, longing after beauty. Idealizing it. Wherever it is. Obsessing over it. Being unable to be satisfied with anything less after experiencing its intoxication. The tribal beat of her body’s movement in your bloodstream. On the first glimpse, your brain immediately knows you’ll never see her like again. You could comb the beach for centuries, but that one magical spiral shell you spotted in the surf will forever be, just a memory. But you go back. One more time. Just one more. You never know. What could it hurt? Catching a glimpse might make countless hours and days even years… worth it, so. One more time. Just to see. If you’ll ever glimpse that sight again.

Meanwhile, the March Hare insists he can’t be satisfied because he needs a new one and a new one and a new one and a new one…

We’re talking… vaginas? Shiiit. Must be… hmm? Uh…

Yeah. Sounds a smidge… trashy? Cause much as he’d like to, obviously, have sex (or make love to?) all those girls out there in the gym, and all the girls, in the world, probably, on some level, in his heart of hearts… if they were down, also hopefully obviously. “Only” if they wanted to.

Which they never will!

Hey, thanks for stating the obvious, you piece of shit.

You’re so welcome, lil buddy!

But, somehow even deeper than his heart of hearts, within that mute calm that he centrally disports, the childhood self at his nucleus — the nougaty core, where he can occasionally remember stumbling over the mildness of joy, maybe before he even knew sex existed… deep down and deep inland there… there’s still only her. The Sumerians figured out that there wasn’t a “Morning Star” and an “Evening Star,” even if everyone else got fooled. They had it right the first time. There was only ever just the one.

So you “only have eyes for her”? “Points. Laughs.” HAha!

Yeah… but you don’t get it. You don’t know what it means to truly love someone — from afar. Maybe you don’t feel feelings the same way he does. He sincerely cherishes her, in addition to the other things. There’s an extreme to which he’s placed her on a pedestal, yes, but there’s also an extent to which he ‘’sees’’ her more than anyone else, including anyone she’s likely to be interested in. Does that, isn’t that reason enough to continue indulging this sucking vacuum of loneliness in his chest with fantasy?! That’s the closest he’ll ever get to her. The coldest world looking through a portal at warmth and Christmas, family, community, belonging, all these things does she subconsciously represent in his mind. The excitation of sexual arousal is the hook, but the line is a conservative stability that he severely longs for. He wants to control her. To monopolize her beauty. It’s probably even way more common than the love that popular and likeable people describe. This halfway to madness obsession, right? Like popularity is by definition rarer than unpopularity, and thus, love toward the powerful and popular must far exceed the love between the powerful and popular and the powerful and the popular.

Durrr, you mean “real love?” Between “actual humans” who share “genuine connection.” Haha. You are so sad, bro.

Okay!? Let’s turn the tables here. Is that ‘durr’ thing a feigned speech impediment sound, and thus cruelly mocking or otherwise punching down on people whose thoughts are very obviously no less valid than your gross ones, subconscious? They aren’t necessarily as vocally articulate in this language as he is sometimes and therefore…? Yeah. Therefore… nothing. Their thoughts’ validity is taken a priori, because they’re human, and we go from there. You don’t dismiss someone out of hand because they mispronounce something.

HYPOCRITE HORN. RIGHT IN YOUR EAR. “Eardrum hopefully bursts from concentrated shittiness”

Easy! The fuck?

You “constantly” mock your mother for mispronouncing English. You know it’s not helping her to improve. You think it weeweeve da tenshen? It sometimes seriously hurts her feelings, not to mention completely derails what she was trying to discuss in the first place. Her incredible life of survival, hardship, fear, bravery, and sacrifice — for you and your sister — has earned her more than that. But then again, when you mess with the thermostat, you think it’s funny she always says, “Why it not coal?”

“Because it’s not supposed to be cold…it’s the 21st century?” before she leaves mid-sentence to turn it down.

So that being said, what are “you” doing, Inner Voice? Given that you did the same thing you’re shitting on him for?

I honestly… just enjoy shitting on you. Ha! Whatever’s gonna make you doubt and question yourself the hardest. Sucks to be you?

Good. Great. Fuck. Why even be smart in the first place if this is what your brain does to you?

Money or something? Iunno, go ask your Inanna? Wait, why do you assume this is because of intelligence? Umm, lots of smart people aren’t — whatever’s wrong with you…

Unable to arrest autobiographical thought?! Having to listen to you droning on like a vacuum in his ear every single second of his miserable life?!

Yeah. Pretty much. But it might help with creativity or something. There’s usually a silver lining if you look for it. But you’d rather pout, there’s the corner, here’s your hat.

“Creativity,” just sounds like “hopefully money” with extra steps. Like any amount of money could be worth spending your whole life truly wretchedly unhappy, chasing after vaguely positive feelings you don’t even understand, mostly trying desperately to escape the negative ones, hoping you’ll end up close to death or success like life starts getting good after you waste a few years of it with whatever you’re doing, but the longer you stay at it, the more hollow and foolish the trade-off feels. He has no social skills! How’s he expected to get a fun job or have a good life?! Who would want to work, live, or be around/with him?! “I can do math pretty well. But in exchange… was cursed with being unable to do emotions. We’ll start the bidding at seven figures a year?”

What a trade-off! Cool story, bro. You were saying how some people aren’t people because they’re empty inside?

Huh, you know he kinda… like right now he’d rather be… emptier? All these fucking feelings that achieve no purpose and don’t help or serve anyone! Least of all the person experiencing them! Like why even — why does he even exist?!

To be a fucking gross creep? Apparently, Nature needed that?

… literally. Is the sad thing. Sometimes it’s hard to avoid drawing that conclusion. Like he’ll ever be able to fall in love with a normal person now… or experience things in a way that makes sense to his mind. The whole point is, you spend your life convincing yourself of everything, convincing yourself you’re alright with it, convincing yourself you’ve come to terms with the options. And then you see her. Like Prince really needed her to try a (dangerous-as-hell sounding) glass stiletto on seeing Cinderella again. You need glasses, bro? If in doubt, he could have just waited to see literal sparrows and mice making clothes for a chick because even wild woodland critters’ instinctual terror of humans can’t overcome the sheer roaring waves of “aww… she so pretty…” coming off of her.

It’s just inevitable that she eclipses others. All of her gender, the whole of her sex, they live in her shadow whenever she’s around. Like it’s physics. There’s the bright one, and then there’s the stuff around it.

Ha! “We all” would never stand alongside “you,” or, (God forbid!) see the same disgusting shit you do in your sad little mind. You are so weird, so strange, so off-putting. You’re frankly lucky; she will never even “glimpse” or otherwise acknowledge your physical presence as something more than the grass under her foot or the tiny human in her way. And given that fact, maybe cool your jets? Ugh. You give everyone else the willies. You’re so gross! You’re disgusting.

Gee! Appreciated. Great that you pointed that out; she’s taller than him too! You fuckin prick!

Of course, you’d notice that. Hey, don’t get snippy with me, bitch baby. That’s a swan! And you’re not even a duckling; you’re more like a suckling pig. Just a squealing, noisy manlet, always going on AND ON about all the stuff he wants. Did you not say “she must work out constantly” before? Sorry, um, no offence and no body-shaming here, but do… you? She looks so good to you at least in partbecause she puts in lots of effort and must have amazing discipline. You point fingers all day, but “I’m” not the one who made you eat carelessly or else like shit, or get ugly and fat and not have any talents, or whatever’s wrong with you — bet all this rumination is really helping.

Well, it’s not like he was knocking them dead before! Plus, where were you when his self-esteem needed lifting? Probably dumping poison on his soul while recalling every embarrassing and painful memory in succession like the point of someone’s mind is to just make them feel as horrible as possible until they either commit suicide or become a different person. From skinny dweeb to fat, sweaty monster on the hill over a few years; all too easy. You were there, and you didn’t help, so shut your fucking face, subconscious.

You swear too much.

Oh my god, can he just be creepy in peace!

No? Because I’m kinda your conscience-conscience too, and this is fuckin’…

Well, look who’s swearing now!

Fine. You got me. Un pour toi. …You gonna look again? Go on. Have a peek.

He does. He knows he shouldn’t, but without recalling when he decided to, finds that he is again.

That tall girl ‘’is’’ actually a rare kind of pretty though. Like on an evolutionary level. That’s some well-regulated phenotypic expression and no mistake.

Huh? Why you gotta make it clinical? That’s somehow creepier than actual creeping.

Sorry. Can never tell if you’re being a nerdy loser or just a regular loser from moment to moment.

RRrrrrrrrahh! You know she really is wayyy too fricken sexy for life. It makes you want to tear your hair out. Rip your ears off. So pleasing and wonderful in such concentrated amounts that you don’t even know what to do with yourself. Like ladies do with cute babies. “Oh my gosh, you’re so adorable, I just want to die!”

Oh my gosh, you’re so sexy, I just wanna stalk you!

Yeesh!! That’s not what he’s… doing? …oh. Yeah. Fine. But he’s trying to treat it more like… wildlife safari. She’s so foxy and girly and friendly and liked by others because she makes things fun, it’s… almost majestic. ‘You’re why cavemen painted on walls,’ but she literally is. Her moving like that — woof, is a fucking sight to behold. That memory’s not going anywhere.

Seriously amazing rack.

Can’t even express how much it’s not a laughing matter how good those tits are. Unquestionably mushy, squishy, perky, and so fucking ROUND. HOW.

Implants?

Nahhhhh. No way. Confía hermano, those are the real deal. The originals which explain why the fakes look so spherical. Trying to imitate Nature and never quite succeeding because… well, like a toupee. Ask ladies how they feel about toupees over, like, sexy hair. Nuff said.

Nuff of what?

Shit. He’s talked enough shit.

Nothing about that, or this, what you’re doing, is/was funny, cool, or — okay. You suck.

Yup. He needs to leave now. He almost wishes he hadn’t seen any of that. The bouncing, jumping, sexy dancing before was silly somehow. Cute. And then when they all went underwater it got… too…real; hot and heavy. Kay. He needs to jerk off. He’s — oh you can judge him all you want! All you fucking want! But go buy fucking ANYTHING and look at the woman on the box! There’s Alanna! From the amount you see her kind on advertising you would assume they MOSTLY look like that instead of BASICALLY ALMOST NEVER. And when they do they usually move like newborn deer.

Misogyny in three, two, one…

Kay seriously fuck her for doing that.

Blastoff! Every. Fucking. Time. FOR WHAT BRO?! FOR LIVING HER LIFE? YOU WANNA MOVE THE LOCUS OF CONTROL BACK WHERE IT MAKES ANY FUCKING SENSE?

AAAARRRGGG these fucking feelings, man! Are killing him! She’s killing him! Why can’t he be into — like — normal, general, ordinary chicks!? Why’s it gotta be Aphro-fucking-ditee the exact same slut every other limp-dick weasel is secretly choking his chicken to?

“SLUT”… and goddess. In the same sentence. With ease. You uplift and demean her in the same sentence with EASE. NOT EVEN TRYING. Fully unconsciously loving how powerful she is, hating her for it, hating that you have to feel it, and where does that hatred end up? Where it belongs? Gonna take responsibility in one way or another for your own mind, the seat of your soul? Nope. Don’t even consider it. Straight to ripping her down. Every. Fucking. Time. Don’t even have to exert effort. Like a reflex. Your gender… should never ever have been able to live with itself in the first place.

Like anyone doesn’t tell themselves what they want to hear!

You’re going into a public bathroom to silently and secretly masturbate to your imagination… Hope you wanted to hear that.

You know — he really didn’t. Kinda takes the pep out of his step. Actually now seriously regretting leaving. Wishes he could go back. Wishes he could see her again. Wishes he could see her… naked. Once. Or. Yeah. Probs wouldn’t forget. Probs not.

Are you gonna cry?

NO! No… but it does hurt. It does seriously hurt. Knowing that — through, like, well he was gonna say no fault of his own, but that probably isn’t entirely true, so — through a fault that is not entirely his own, he’s always going to be wondering. The Alannas don’t see him. They never will. If whatever you are exist in the eye of the beholder, whatever that means, then as far as her eye is concerned, he was never here, there or anywhere. She probably doesn’t even recognize him. God that hurts. To be an extra. Like your own life is just — happening in someone else’s. And you pine, and burn, and grind yourself into sawdust and ashes over someone who’ll never think you matter because you won’t ever exist. She sees through him. He is not beheld. There is no beholder. He is nothing. That’s all there is to it. Anything to add Subconscious?

Durrr, “oh my gosh it’s so hard for me to accept that I’m not entitled to women’s bodies just because they make me feel feelings I don’t want! I am oppressed! Help me! Somebody please help me get my life on track so I can stop being a general waste of space, calories, and oxygen!”

Fuck you. That wasn’t what he — That’s not what’s causing all this!? …Is it?

Bitch I don’t fucking know?! I’m you! But made ya look.

He hates you.

Yup. Hey, you enjoy your filthy little masturbation session, friend.

Dick.

He closes the stall door and sits down on the bowl with his pants still on. He doesn’t even have to piss or anything, but now wishes he did. He wonders if people will notice if he walks out of a bathroom 15 seconds after entering.

You’re not gonna do… whatever you came in here for?

Ahem. Can’t. Fucking…. boner’s gone. And he kinda has a feeling it’s not coming back. You ruined it. You always do. Anything to add?

Just one thing: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! On second thought: Cry harder, pussy. Try as you might, the only conceivable “bad guy” in this whole revolting situation, literally and figuratively, is you. All of this is on you. Your fault. Every part.

(Sniff.) Kay. He knows. Go away.

What was that?! Oh please cry!! Please cry that would be so perfect!! Guys! Haha! Holy shit he’s really crying! WOW! How? When was the last time? I can’t believe it. You’re actually fogging up your glasses and everything bitch baby! What a sensitive soul! What a heart of gold! Do doves fly out of your ass too John Woo? Yo! The ladies are gonna absolutely love you just as soon as they all get struck blind, deaf, and dumb!

Xe’s head falls in slow motion until it’s being cradled in his hands. He doesn’t remember catching it. He thought it might hit the bathroom floor eventually. He feels the moisture under his glasses with his palms and 10 million volts of pure shame, self-hatred, hurt, and heartbreak arc through him, body and soul, all in less than a millisecond. He clenches his teeth and squeezes his eyelids, refusing to let another drop out. He tells himself to breathe, to keep it together. He’s overreacting.

But… who would choose “this” over emptiness?! Maybe empathy is more trouble than it’s worth? He doesn’t so much “use” it as gets used by it. His good marks and his general intelligence are always there to rationalize that everything else in life that doesn’t involve being “smart” is more or less a waste of time — but, that’s never sounded like a hollower, falser, or more paltry excuse for wasting one’s existence. Does YOLO go… both ways?

lol.

Can you just, please, leave him alone, please?

Sure. You’re crying alone in a bathroom stall that you entered to touch yourself. Maybe consider snipping those genitals off, tossing them in the bowl with a splash, and hitting flush? Just an idea. But whatever you do, have fun in there. Two words before I go though: forever. alone.

Fuck.

#LTT