So Many Ways to Sleep Badly

by Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore

  We end up at Fuzio—I went to the one at the Embarcadero once with Thea, and it was okay. This one’s pretty good too, except for my bloating stomach, expanding over my belt and under my jacket—I hate my body. I take my jacket off. Afterwards, we walk to Van Ness and Chrissie holds my hand, well my mitten over my hand. It’s the first time in a while when I really feel like I love her, like we have this shared history and I hope maybe one day she’ll get better. When we stop holding hands, Chrissie says her headache is so bad that half her head is numb, and the other half is being hit with a sledgehammer. Rhania has a dream where she can’t take her elephant in the rich elephant park, Yasmine jumps over the fence and hits her head. When Rhania gets back out, her elephant is waiting in a cab. Andee says ever since I moved to London, my hair is all dry and limp, I don’t know what to do—sometimes when I get off the bus, I can’t stop choking from all the fumes. Sounds like LA—you walk outside and there’s only one choice: suicide. These people wake up and they think that’s air. Ralowe says: you slept? Well, I mean—you know. Oh.

  Chrissie calls from Parkersburg, West Virginia. She got a job at Chi-Chiz and there’s a fag who’s the host, plus there are two gay bars there. But actually she sounds okay, isn’t slurring or mumbling all her words, so that’s good. Socket says the way she decides whether to go back to bed is by looking at the bags under her eyes—if they’re worse, she goes back to bed. Today the bags under my eyes are more angular than usual, red mixed in with the dark and I’m scared because I’ve been in bed for the last three hours trying to sleep. First, I was too tired to get up to eat, then I got up to eat, then back in bed, then I was too wired to get out of bed. Tired, wired, tired, wired—just get me a sledgehammer and some mayonnaise!

  I go to 333 Linden on the night before the Folsom Street Fair, just to see what it’s like at the busiest possible time, but there’s hardly anyone there. And how can I still be the youngest person at a sex club—I’m thirty now, it’s been over ten years of going to these terrible places. My home away from home, the apple in my eyes—that’s why they’re dry, it’s not my contacts. Donuts without holes in them—wait, that’s not donuts, unless maybe they’re filled with cream, right cream. But no one’s showing holes or cream, they’re playing a porn video with the guy who bought a house from one of my tricks in Provincetown.

  Outside, there are people waiting to see if there’s anyone inside. This one hot guy is giving Santa Cruz straight boy, ruddy cheeks and long blondish hair and stubble, pants cut off below the knee with a white T-shirt tucked in. He wants to know if it’s worth going inside, I say I’d be glad to suck your cock in the alley, but he says he’s drunk and high, it’ll probably take him a while to get it up. He says are you going to the Power Exchange—I hate the Power Exchange. Doesn’t everyone hate the Power Exchange?

  Benjamin says Friendster’s the answer, so many virtual friends and so little time! Which would you prefer: not breathing, or suffocating? Um, I’ll take an Alka-Seltzer and some stolen art, SweeTarts and a biodegradable toothbrush, thanks. This trick arrives and I think oh no, how do I do this? We’re hugging and I’m trying to obey my own advice: find something hot about it, stay present. After he comes, he falls asleep. I let him rest. When he opens his eyes, he says how do I get you to fuck me now? Gross—why did you have to ruin it? When he pays me, he gives me 147 and says I’ll owe you three bucks. He has three more twenties—why do I let him get away with that?

  Eric still wants to know if I have any crushes; Jonah isn’t gonna call me back. Just as Eric arrives to pick me up, a trick calls from the Ritz-Carlton and I rush over there, feeling the rush in a cab and then walking through the lobby. It’s that high again. The floors of the bathroom are marble, but the room isn’t impressive otherwise.

  I’m watching Maya Deren movies outdoors, and I feel so good because they’re almost making me cry, and then I notice every muscle in my body hurts, feet and jaw and wrists are burning. Maybe it’s the way I’m sitting, but maybe this is what fibromyalgia feels like. That’s what the doctors say I have now. What do I do about it? Well, there’s a hot pool with more chlorine in it than a gas chamber, you can do exercises. Any other options? I’ll send you the bill.

  Chrissie calls from West Virginia to tell me about the ads on TV, images of bathtubs in different chaotic lighting: IF YOU’RE COOKING METH IN YOUR TUB, YOU WILL BE FOUND. At the donut shop, there’s a cop behind the counter, helping himself to various items until he disappears to the back. Ralowe thinks he went into a trap door, but I spot him exiting through the kitchen. The cashier acts like nothing is happening, especially when the speed freak leans over to ask if there’s any trouble. No, the cashier says, come back later.

  Outside, Ralowe wonders about the fashion victims with pants way too short for fall, and way too long for last season’s last season, but it’s 1:50 a.m.—the runways are pouring out of Tenderloin hot spots and Frenchy’s looks packed. There’s some guy outside with a really big face—put your pennies in here and I’ll turn them into rainforests, pirate ships, seascapes, volcanic eruptions, sunsets on beaches, a monsoon, a coral reef, natives in grass skirts, skyscrapers, the Taj Majal with Stonehenge, a safari, women in bikinis, mudslides, the Cathedral of St. Fill-in-the-Blank, the end of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the world’s tallest man in heels, cruise ships in the Bermuda triangle, Art Deco hotels, shells in your ears, a river of tears.

  But back to the fashion victims, did you see the ads in San Francisco Magazine for Gucci babies? Although these models are post-infantile—or permanently infantile, depending on the angle and lighting. Everybody at the Edinburgh Castle has a shag of one sort or another, and of course a Burberry bag, and a striped rag—no, honey, that’s not a rag—that’s my boyfriend! Ralowe says when you work, you feel like you have less time and so you hang out at awful places that make you feel terrible about yourself. He should know; he used to work at Wells Fargo and eat at the steakhouse.

  I’m enjoying the dark window against the green plants in the shower, until I realize that means it’s night out and I haven’t left the house—hello, seasonal depression! In Sara Shelton Mann’s show, there are so many moments of intimacy and violence between men that send me into previews of tears—I shake but don’t pour: Don’t call my eyes naked! Later, my trick in Concord cancels—well, actually he doesn’t cancel until I call to confirm that I’m on my way. He says I was trying to call you, some guests surprised me. Then it’s the wired tired phenomenon, stronger and stranger and faster than a speeding rhinoceros—that’s twenty-seven miles per hour, which isn’t really that fast these days. Get with the times: the new Jaguar R series starts at only $31,230. Sure, a rhinoceros has horns—a Jaguar R series has a mesh grille and larger air intake, not to mention a tiny cat jumping into infinity.

  It’s late at night and I throw some food out the window, into the shell of the demolished building next door—nothing new, except that I look down. I look down at the rats devouring the food—huge white ones and tiny white ones, who ever heard of white rats running wild—is my building a laboratory? Then, of course, the gray ones, large and small too. There are at least twenty huge rats—I mean HUGE—I’m never throwing food down there again, I don’t care how many bags I waste for trash.

  Are those the rats in my ceiling, scurrying around to devour pigeons? I’m not sure it’s okay to leave my windows open any more. I definitely shouldn’t leave food out on the counter. In the morning, the pigeons are back, scouring the same exact area where the rats were last night. I wonder if pigeons eat rat shit. On my way to the bus, the junkie who’s always collapsed against a wall is holding a pigeon by the wings, staring it in the eyes. I’m disgusted, but I rush on the bus and then I’m more disgusted—at myself, for not intervening. I hope she didn’t kill it; people can be so evil. This guy on the bus is giving LA film industry realness, with the black suit, black shirt, black-rimmed glasses and reddish curly hair. He’s holding a Frommer’s guide to Shanghai and talking on his cellphone, the
sentence I catch is: treat him like a big developer. Actually, the suit is charcoal—maybe he’s from New York.

  Benjamin keeps going to after-parties to look for sex. But all she can find is drugs. Lines and lines for lines in the bathroom. On the card table. In the Mercedes. By the pool—it’s just so cool! Benjamin’s not really doing the lines—well, a few every now and then—but that’s just so she can have a fascinating six-hour conversation with some straight boy about art. Ralowe says I wonder if Schwarzenegger will keep making movies if he becomes governor. Advice of the day: you can’t smoke yoga. The BBC at 1 a.m.: crack houses in Nottingham, England, cocaine producers in Putomayo, Colombia, Italian cooking—149 of their cheeses are recognized as rather special. Geometry on the bus: six people talk on their cellphones and six people listen to music on headphones, two people have visible face injuries and my headache begins. Rue sees a mouse scurrying under my bed—so much for my fantasy that they’d left me alone. I go to Golden Era, where everything’s good except the fried onions and why’d I eat that indigestion Buddha bun? Then of course there’s the sweat pouring from my pores underneath my green pants, activating my jock itch loveliness.

  Did I tell you Benjamin’s story from a few weeks ago? This guy on the phone sex line wanted to suck her big black dick through a glory hole. Benjamin went over and the guy didn’t answer the door. Later, on the phone sex line, there he was again—glory hole and all. Benjamin said: didn’t I just go over your house? The guy said: are you transgendered or something? Benjamin thought about it: no, I’m not transgendered, but something?

  The bra providers for the Queen of England are asked on BBC Radio what feminism means to them—it means that there are different bras for different occasions, all here in this store. More important information from National Public Radio: the moons are in alignment for a Cubs–Red Sox World Series. I call Rue to see if she wants to go to the beach, but she cancels on me and then I call ten people. Really, ten—Jaysen, Magdalena, Blake, Ralowe, Karoline, Liz, Rhania, Eric . . . well okay, eight—and not in that order either, in case anyone’s sensitive.

  Waiting for the bus, I can hardly stand up, and the sidewalk is so dirty it’s making me nauseous. Finally the bus arrives—the driver does that trick where he stops extra-early so no one can get on, even though there’s no other bus in sight. But his plan is foiled with a rare moment of bus-rider solidarity, as someone holds the middle door open and we all rush in. The beach is freezing, but there are these amazing chunks of foam blowing out of the ocean like plastic bags. When the sun sets, it’s like a genie going back into the bottle in the fog. I’ve never seen it like that. Afterwards, every part of my body aches—is it because of the cold? I try to cruise in the park by the windmills, but there’s no one there—I don’t understand, that spot is legendary. So much for legends. I go home and sleep for three hours, get up to wait until I’m tired enough to go back to bed. Which happens pretty soon.

  At the bus stop, this boy-girl is staring at me until finally she says you’re so beautiful. Then our eyes meet for too long maybe, and she says yeah, I never see anyone who I’m so impressed by, even the way you’re standing—where do you get your clothes? On the bus, we have a romantic moment together on the plastic seats. I think she’s a straight girl from Quebec. We kiss goodbye and I feel better, for about three minutes until I’m exhausted again. Though I channel full runway for the walk home—the guys outside the building across from Frenchy’s are whistling at me, and yelling to each other in Spanish. Back at my building, I take down the NO TRESPASSING sign.

  On the radio, this guy who was in a coma says: it was not like being in a dream, it was like being awake in a strange new place—a comfortable place to be—it wasn’t until I woke up that I began to realize how sick I was.

  BARBARA

  Julia says: with all these people eating so healthy, pretty soon everyone’s gonna be dying of nothing. Diamanda and I are really getting to be friends, it’s that amazing transition between bluesy almostmoan to the operatic trill where just listening to the flow from low to high and deep to soft is enough to make me cry, except that I don’t, as usual. I just sit in that space and listen to Diamanda’s amazing control over her vocal chords, the piano and me.

  Then I play it again—it’s the sixth or seventh time today, and I’m just listening to the intro, while the rats or pigeons crawl in the ceiling but pause just before “babe”—it’s almost comical until Diamanda brings her voice up and her fingers take the piano forward, and she’s back and forth from hope to longing and are they the same thing? I’m still wearing my jeans from the trick at the Argent who really wore me out, and Diamanda’s saying: “I need your love—more than before.” Should I listen to it one more time?

  The trick from Kentucky who has that huge apartment on Russian Hill calls, and I’m dreading it, but standing on the side of the bed while he slides his ass into me feels very Zen, I’m almost upset when he wants to stop. But the worst part about the heat wave is the sinus headache, stretching around my head until it’s a rubber mask or actually it’s plaster that’s cracking. At the Van Ness and Market bus stop, this guy sits down next to me. Hello officer, he says. I ignore him. Hello officer, he says. I’m not an officer.

  Well, you never know, he says, you never know—I really don’t want to do this but I have to. He takes out his crack pipe and starts smoking. Then he’s yelling at the top of his lungs: I’m gonna fucking KILL you, you fucking faggot! And then, softer: I’ve been approached so many times and I’ve always turned them down, but when someone’s between your legs—what does it matter if they’ve got a cunt, right? He looks me in the eyes: I’m not calling you faggot, I only call straight guys faggot, since the seventies.

  Rue asks me to meet him at Esta Noche because someone’s paying him to make a video of some fashion shoot, and he doesn’t want to drink. I get there at exactly five, like Rue asked. The music is pounding, which is kind of amusing because it’s so bad that it makes it better, and there’s Rue in the back. I kiss her and she tastes like liquor, I say you’ve already started drinking? She says I’ve been here an hour, I just had one drink. I say there’s no way that you’ve been here a whole hour, and only had one drink. Her eyes are glassy and she’s kind of swinging like a doll, she says how did you know?

  At home, I can smell cigarette smoke coming through my kitchen from the apartment next door. My mother leaves a message: I’m wondering about the fires in Southern California, I know that’s not close, but I’m wondering if they’re affecting you in any way. She says it twice. This trick wants me to jerk hard, harder, and all I can think about is how much my hands are going to hurt afterwards. Then he’s rubbing Eros lube all over my body and it feels good, but that shit never comes off—I hope I don’t get a rash. At least he provides Aveda toiletries in the shower, I’m always ready for that rosemary mint shampoo!

  In the morning, it’s freezing and Daylight Savings is over, I’m already worried about getting out of the house before dark. Sure, Daylight Savings ended over a week ago, but now that the heat wave is over, the darkness is really hitting. I’ve started to use a neti pot to clean my sinuses. I pour salt water from one nostril to the other, but sometimes the water gets in my ears—I’m worried that this is going to affect my hearing. Like that one winter when I basically couldn’t hear anything, I thought it was because of the ear candle, but I was doing nasal lavage then too.

  Rue says she’s glad she’s positive, because now she can have so much fun barebacking with tweakers who want to kill themselves afterwards. On Geary, this super-tall tranny is coming towards me, she looks like she’s nodding off but also she’s smiling. People don’t usually smile when they’re nodding off. She holds out her arms and I give her a hug, which feels good. She says are you going to the Castro? Hell no. Halloween and at least I get a trick, in the Upper Haight—the cab driver says I’ve been lucky tonight, no one’s asked me to go to the Castro.

  After my trick I take another cab to the top of the hill
by Buena Vista Park, and then climb the rest of it. Pretty soon, I’m out of breath. At the top, there are the same eight people for over an hour. The only ones who are the least bit interesting are the two guys fucking at the end of the stroll, behind a tree. They’re both in the indeterminate messy middle age area: one of them’s a tweaker on a bunch of AIDS meds, and the other’s a drunk bending over to get fucked. That’s as hot as it gets. Other than that, there’s the huge guy in all white with a big backpack, and the tweaker jerking his limp dick in the shadows. He’s very excited about his limp dick.

  I walk around and around about fifty-seven times, listening to all the commotion in the Castro. The cops were supposedly shutting it down at midnight this year, because last year there were five stabbings and one guy got knifed really badly. But it’s 1 a.m. and it’s still going on. I’m hoping for a riot, straight guys with baseball bats smashing gay store windows, but I don’t hear any glass breaking. Though I’m hundreds of feet up and half a mile away, so who knows?

  There’s all this hay in the park where the bushes used to be, some of it’s in bales—I’m ready to sit on a bale and get my face pumped, but no such luck. Just as I’m about to leave for the seventh time, I see this really hot guy with a baseball cap. I follow him. When I catch up, he’s already got something started with the limp tweaker and some shaggy guy who’s just appeared. There’s a new crowd because I guess it’s getting close to 2 a.m.

  The hot guy’s a tweaker too, but his dick is rock-hard and he smells so clean, like he took a shower five minutes ago, and I’m kind of hugging him while I’m sucking his cock, and he leans over to kind of hug me while he sucks the limp tweaker’s cock. I can’t imagine why, but he’s really into the limp tweaker. I stand up, because it’s getting hard to suck with this guy leaning over me, and he stands up too, gets behind me and I’ve got my pants up, but I’m already thinking about him sliding it in.