by AnonYMous
Jealousy.
This, I decided, was a very good sign.
She’d done something with her hair that seemed to indicate that she at least wanted to appear nice for me. She wasn’t dressed as stylishly as she might have been, but then this was a difficult “date” to dress for. She couldn’t go too far or she’d appear presumptuous and she couldn’t not try just in case. I would have given a testicle to know if she was wearing matching underwear. Well maybe not a testicle, a toe maybe.
On her suggestion we ended up in a Mexican restaurant nearby and though I immediately hated the place (the acoustics were awful) I wasn’t going to be churlish.
After all, this was our first outing in months.
I managed to remain quiet while she ordered for us but the moment the food arrived I began to blurt. As the words spewed out of me, something caught my eye proceeding across the table—it was my hand, creeping toward hers. At the moment of contact a gush of emotion surged around inside me as if my bloodstream had suddenly become carbonated. I regarded her email as a bold proposal to start seeing each other again and I wasn’t going to make her wait for an answer any longer than was necessary.
She made no effort to retract her hand but something wasn’t right. This didn’t feel like the homecoming I had hoped for. I began to wonder if her email had just been a last-ditch attempt to see me under any guise. I took a breath and leapt into the void.
“In all the time we were together I never said I …”
I held her eyes, half hoping she’d stop me.
“Well, I’ll say it now.”
There was still time for her to stop me.
“I love you.”
I immediately regretted it.
Her eyelids closed at the key moment so that I found myself looking lovingly at two flesh-covered bumps. And presumably hoping to avoid my desperately cloying look she opened them again only to inspect my chest. The panic-inducing silence that followed was broken by the excruciating sound of her chair scraping the floor. I was listening so hard it was like the screech of feedback from a mic.
She spoke quietly.
“I have to … sorry … it’s not an escape.”
But that’s exactly what it was. I was shown a glimpse of what this was really all about as she twirled out of her seat in the direction of the restroom.
That ass.
I sat there, pretending this was normal for me but it wasn’t. I had never said those words to anyone. Not to my father and certainly not to my mother. I had never uttered those words out loud before. When she returned and settled into her seat I energetically resumed my self-laceration.
“Being without you is like being in prison.”
I wanted to cry, partly because it would lend credence to my performance and partly because it would prove it wasn’t a performance. I yearned to tell her precisely how I had suffered. How many times a day I’d broken down and wailed like a clubbed seal. The inhuman sounds that had emanated from me. The exquisite bottomlessness of my grief. But how could I? It might flatter her but it might also just be pathetic.
She was silent. Sadistically so. A little embarrassed smile played over her lips and it was clear she had decided to sit it out. She’d weather this unexpected onslaught of secondary embarrassment. Surely it would go away if she didn’t acknowledge it. The check arrived. She must have asked for it when she went to the restroom.
So that was her response.
Unable to bear the agonizing mechanics of splitting the bill I placed a twenty on her ten and got up. She looked relieved it was over. We somehow managed to make some sort of uncomfortable small talk while she walked me back across the street to my bike. I offered her a ridiculously ironic fist-bump that she probably felt obliged to match with one of her own. I mounted my bike heroically and cycled in the general direction of the East Village, doing my best to avoid the fur-covered cars and trucks thrown out of focus by my tears. The energy required to continue pedaling seemed to subtract from the sincerity of the emotion but it was important to put distance between myself and the source of my woe. And even at that it seemed tragic to have to increase rather than decrease the space between us. More than one pedestrian looked nervously over his shoulder to see where the whimpering was coming from.
It was two days before she texted.
Bad battery … all’s well … check in soon.
But her need to punish me translated in my mind as confirmation of her love. Of how deeply I must have hurt her. I’d gladly offer myself up for more of the same until she decided I had suffered enough.
No problem … it was lovely seeing you the other night.
ONLINE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU SCREAM
#TheOxygenThiefDiaries
To say that I used to get into a lot of fights is misleading.
Fight is far too collaborative a term.
I just got beaten up.
And though it had been years since I’d been within arm’s length of a fistfight, something instinctive urged me to look across the street just as Forgive-Them-Ron was shaping up like an eighteenth-century street fighter. His arms were raised in what looked like a comical imitation of a boxer as he shifted his weight from left to right, ducking imaginary blows. It took me a moment to realize he had assumed this persona for the benefit of an alarmingly elderly man who was now starting to respond with gyrations of his own. This lurch and sway continued until Forgive-Them swung his right arm diagonally upward to connect his balled fist with the side of the old man’s head. On contact a sound rose collectively from what I could now see was a clutch of spectators already filming the scene on smartphones.
“Oooooooooh.”
Laughing happily and looking relaxed and young, Arrest-Me-Dante was among them with his phone extended in front of him, soaking it all up. The older combatant, bewildered as to where he was or what was happening, continued to mimic someone who had a chance. He stumbled somewhat drunkenly although I don’t think he was drunk. Forgive-Them was more confident now that he was winning.
“I warned you bro, I warned you.”
The next day he turned up in a jacket with a huge floral design on the back. In contrast to his normally somber attire, he looked like he had blossomed overnight.
“A girl I met in a bar wouldn’t talk to me unless I gave her my opinion of this book.”
I turned to see an intense-looking young man with my book held open in his hands.
Another one?
I stifled a yawn.
This was gratifying of course, but he wasn’t going to buy another copy and I couldn’t sell him the second book because he’d only come back to attack me when he read his own attempts at wooing Françoise in it. Plus his insistence that he met the girl in a bar sounded like a trap. Was he hoping I’d correct him and say something about a dating profile? He was just another disciple of Marian’s perfect ass.
A character in search of his author.
“Really?” I said feigning surprise. “And what was your opinion of it?”
“I loved it.”
“Oh really? Did you tell her that?”
“Yeah, but I never heard back from her.”
I didn’t ask him if he’d told her this in the same imaginary bar, I just wanted him to go away. But he just stood there commandeered by the logic-melting promise of a fragrant French pussy and adjacent derriere. Nodding at my latest sign I let him in on a secret. He took a step back, but even as he read it he continued to look this way and that, hoping she was going materialize.
“That’s cool,” he said, as if he understood.
REALITY IS JUST SUCCESSFUL ADVERTISING
#TheOxygenThiefDiaries
Drinnggg Drinnggg Drinnggg Drinnnnnnnnggggggg
It was indescribably wonderful having certain sex arrive at your door once a week in the shape of an unpaid prostitute with a limp. Mind you, I wouldn’t have had to go down on a prostitute, paid or otherwise. But when Ursula told me that in Indra’s culture it was considered degrading to pleasure a woman i
n this way, I realized it might be in my interest to provide her with something he wouldn’t. Plus I loved hearing her bleat and moan like a wounded deer. She had no inhibitions when she orgasmed and I tried my best to be for her what she was for me. A sexual trash can.
Even so, I was beginning to think that for her, the services I provided were more cerebral than carnal. She loved talking to me. This time I was to hear all about the Polish man she described as the love of her life. This guy couldn’t get hard unless he punched and kicked her while calling her a whore and … she hesitated here before continuing … “He also liked to spit on me.”
I winced when I heard this, not because I sympathized, but because it meant my attempts at choke-fucking her must have seemed so vanilla in comparison. Somehow her father found out that the guy had “heavy hands” and made it known he’d happily go to jail for what he might do to him. This was when he left town and broke off all contact. Ten years later she still loved him. He was apparently very good-looking and she would therefore do whatever he wanted as long as what he wanted was her. And knowing that he got off on punching her, she would purposely and repeatedly infuriate him. Turn up late, ask relationship questions during sex, and most successful of all, accuse him of being gay when he begged her for anal sex. In this way she enabled his habit.
After he disappeared she married the first guy who was nice to her. She didn’t think anybody would want a girl with a limp who mistook punches for kisses.
Ursula sucked on my cock so convincingly it was like an extension of herself. It was amazing that she knew to keep altering the rhythms and movements of her mouth, tongue, lips, and hands so that no pattern was discernible. My cock and I were constantly kept guessing.
A prerequisite for any successful narrative.
And because she sucked so beautifully I didn’t need to worry on her behalf. There was no need to convince her she was doing a great job. I didn’t need to fret about whether she was enjoying it. Or whether I would come. I knew she’d deliver. This wouldn’t be just another exercise in frustration. She was like a wizened washerwoman whose every move was dictated by experience. A factory worker so effortlessly capable of performing her allotted task she could allow herself the luxury of thinking about something else. Knowing the eccentricities of the conveyor belt she could give it an occasional slap whenever it shuddered.
“Ooooooohhhhh arggghhh.”
Once the nasty business of making me come was out of the way she couldn’t wait to tell me her news. The Polish pugilist had texted her that he was back in town. Given his sexual eccentricities, Halloween seemed the perfect time for them to reconnect. She arranged to meet him outside the hospital where she worked. This is when she mentioned she was wearing a highly sexualized Goldilocks outfit. And she had also arranged to meet Indra at exactly the same place.
At the same time.
Was she hoping to ignite a brawl? Enjoy the sight of two men fighting over her? When the Pole turned up on a skateboard (a skateboard?) looking not nearly as handsome as she remembered, she told him her father was on his way over to pick her up. This was sufficient to send him skating energetically away just as Indra pulled up in his SUV. He was told the GPS in her car wasn’t working, so she needed a ride to a work party in Williamsburg, which, in reality, was a date with another guy she hoped would be a better long-term option than either of the two men she already had in play.
“Well, the outfit had to go back the next day. I had to get my value out of it,” she said, defending herself against an accusation I hadn’t made.
Or at least not out loud.
She related all this to me wrapped in a towel with her bad leg folded up under her after ingesting my molten soul.
She showed me the outfit on her phone. (She was still wringing the last few drops of value from it.) Standing there in her miniskirted Goldilocks outfit, flanked by children of all races, I suddenly saw the genius of the outfit. For the children and the other nurses it was a fun fancy dress, but for a succession of three adult males—four if you included me—it was cock-stiffening cosplay … with a limp.
Good value indeed.
The disabled permit in the corner of her windshield afforded her an unheard of luxury in the East Village. A parking spot in front of St. Catherine’s Church. This resulted in an instinctive tingling in my balls whenever I passed. While others blessed themselves I readjusted my cock. Such irreligiosity only increased my desire for her.
“Didn’t you say you went to Catholic school?” I said, still flushed with my orgasms. She opened the car door and leaned in close darting her tongue in my ear.
“I did and I can still fit into the uniform.”
WHERE HAVE ALL THE GO-GO DANCERS GONE GONE?
#TheOxygenThiefDiaries
Back on Prince Street I began to notice a group of guys stopping girls, attempting to talk to them.
A cluster of three or four guys, one of whom seemed to be some sort of leader or coach who egged the others on. Because of their proximity to my table I worried that visits and sales might be affected by their antics. If girls were being harassed I wasn’t going to sell them any books and more to the point if anyone was going to do any harassing I wanted it to be me.
So I kept an eye on them.
They huddled together, obviously discussing the merits of passing girls and every now and then one of them detached and ran past his target until he was well ahead of her before turning around and performing a sort of jump-and-plop in front of her. Each guy who broke away from the group in pursuit of a girl employed this same strange piece of choreography. Some girls walked directly past or dodged to the side, hardly breaking their stride, but a surprisingly large number stopped and engaged in conversation. From my position I could read each girl’s face as she was accosted. Polite interest morphed into mild disgust or undisguised delight depending on the success of the presenter.
His cohorts watched intently, turning to each other at various points, exchanging knowing looks. By now, he had either been told to fuck off or he was thumbing his phone. Whatever the result he would return to his buddies for a conspiratorial huddle. I thought at first it was a group of drunken guys out on the town chatting up girls between pubs. But they were much more organized than that. A very stylish girl walked past them. If they hadn’t been there I would have definitely asked her to stop for a photo. But this time a small stubby-looking guy waddled on ahead of her and jumped/stopped in exactly the same way the previous guy had done. The others looked on with interest. They might have been watching a sports event. I only saw them on the weekends from noon until five PM. Never any later. Never any sooner. The girl, who looked very intelligent, blushed as the little gnome took out his phone.
I was intrigued of course.
They were obviously experimenting with ways to meet women and this was something I was always interested in. Also there was an element of competition involved since I was mining the same terrain. After all, if a girl had already been stopped by these assholes I didn’t feel I could insist myself on her for a photo. When one of them was left red-faced after an aborted attempt to talk to a tall, tough-looking, expensively dressed model who swept past my table like a yacht, he looked around desperately for his teammates. His embarrassment beamed outward from him and perhaps because he was happy to see a face that expressed interest rather than more rejection he stopped at my table. I blurted out questions that had been building up in me since I’d first noticed the phenomenon weeks before.
“Oh I can’t really say,” he said, but it was obvious he was dying to talk about it. “We’re not supposed to say.”
“Oh come on, who am I going to tell? You’ve seen me out here, I’m just a street vendor. It’s interesting to me.” I changed tack. “Well okay, how about this. Can you tell me if you got her number?” At this he blossomed.
“Yes,” he said, hardly able to believe it himself.
I looked at him.
A fat fucker really. Certainly not the type of guy who you�
�d think would approach a model in the street. He was obviously lying. Wasn’t he?
“Really?” I said, genuinely surprised. “Well listen, man, tell me what this thing is, because I might want to join. I mean no offense, but if you can get chicks like that then maybe there’s hope for me.”
He paused. Had I insulted him? He looked left and right before leaning in close and whispering behind his hand.
“It’s called Streetmeet.”
Of course it was.
On Streetmeet.com I learned that members were issued with pens housing tiny cameras, enabling them to record conversations for later analysis. I watched one session on their website featuring the leader/coach I recognized from the street, talking to a girl in a bikini top like she was an inattentive child. There were videos from all over the world: London, Chicago, Los Angeles, Paris, Barcelona. This one was from Rio de Janeiro. After he said, “Can I text you? I’d like to invite you out some time,” she gave him her number.
As far as I was concerned the term invite you out already implied expenditure so fuck that. Plus I knew that a phone number meant nothing because even if it was her real number she could still always block you. In a separate video he’s sitting behind a desk wittering on in a clipped English accent trying his best to suggest that just getting a phone number and a promise of a date was the equivalent of getting a cock-bath. Nonsense. You couldn’t afford to congratulate yourself until both balls had been dredged. Until that happened you still couldn’t be sure if she was using you for sex. You’d find yourself owed five orgasms after spending an hour eating her out. This was obviously aimed at sad poor bastards who had never encountered a woman outside of Pornhub.
But it was a huge operation. Global even.
The tutorial kept returning to what they considered to be the most important part of the process: “Perfecting the stop.” This referred to the moment you ran ahead of your quarry and arrived in “a friendly yet masculine way that attracts her attention.” Having arrested her pedestrian progress you could then unleash the rest of your amorous arsenal on her.