Through the Mirrorball

by Browatzke, Rob

  “Hey, Alex,” Colton said. “How—”

  “Don’t.” Jesse cut Colton off. “He made his choice.”

  Jesse turned his back to me, and Colton, with a sad half smile, did the same. Steven looked at me and sadly shook his head, and then they were off to the bar for drinks. I blinked away the tears.

  “You okay?” Dinah asked me, as her girls cheered the go-go boy who suddenly was on the dance box above us. I was all too aware of his crotch practically level with my face.

  “I’m fine, I just need to go to the bathroom quick.”

  “You don’t need to do that, Alex,” she said. There was no point in denying. She knew exactly why I wanted to disappear.

  “It’ll make things easier.” That was a lie too, one that she didn’t believe, one that I didn’t believe. But a necessary lie, because if it didn’t help, then I was just a messy addict, and that was too real. Addiction. The word stuck in my head. “I’ll be able to celebrate with you.”

  “I just want you here. I don’t need you partying.”

  “Dinah. I have to.”

  Her look was as sad as Colton’s or Steven’s. Why couldn’t they just be mad like Jesse? Mad was easier to handle than disappointed. I couldn’t face that look.

  I fought my way through the crowd to the bathroom, not even waiting until I was in a stall before I had the Baggie out, flicking it to loosen the powder inside. I dipped a key in and pulled out the last of it, luckily a bigger heap than I’d expected. One big sniff later, and this was a burn I liked. Not like tequila, not like tears. Just the white fire rush of cocaine.

  Chapter 12

  When I got back to Dinah’s table, the girls were all dancing, and it was just me and Steven. We sat there, silent in the noise. I watched the crowd, watched the Hatter, watched anything but the guy across the table from me. The guy I had been planning on spending the rest of my life with. The guy who had suffered for me and been betrayed by me, and then made everything worse, That Friday Night.

  “So, where’s Aaron?” The words were out before I could stop them.

  “Alex, let’s not do this.”

  “Just making conversation.”

  “Alex, there is nothing between me and Aaron.”

  I was suddenly on my feet, my mind filled with the flashing images of That Friday Night. Hands. Mouths. Their naked bodies. “Steven, don’t fucking lie to me. I know, Steven. I’m not a fucking retard. Of course there’s something going on between you guys.”

  “Alex, sit down. Don’t you dare make this about you! Can’t you let Dinah have one night?”

  “Oh yeah, I forgot, it’s all about me being selfish, isn’t it? Because my feelings don’t matter.”

  “Oh fuck off, Alex. It’s always all about your feelings.” Steven slammed his beer onto the table and walked away.

  I sat back down, grabbed his beer, and tipped it back. It was cold, and there, and the least he could do. That man I was supposed to spend the rest of my life with. That man I was supposed to love. That man who was supposed to love me. If he could have my ex, I could have his beer. Fair trade, no? Even Steven.

  “What happened, Alex?” Dinah said, appearing from the crowd, shaking her head.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Steven’s leaving. Did you . . .”

  “Oh sure, it’s of course my fault. Steven couldn’t have done anything wrong. Maybe he’s running home to fuck Aaron.”

  “Goddammit, Alex!” Dinah never got mad, not at me, but this was her mad face, and I didn’t like it one bit. “There is nothing going on between Steven and Aaron. Stop making everything about yourself and for one fucking second, try to think of someone else. Stop being such a melodramatic fag!” Her face went white and she raised a hand to her lips to stop the words it was already too late to take back.

  The club seemed to stop, and all I could see was her. “What did you call me?”

  “I didn’t mean it like that, I—”

  “Fuck you, Dinah, fuck you.”

  I pushed past her and into the crowd. “Alex!” she called from behind me, but I ignored her. I ignored her posse of girlfriends flocking back to her from the dance floor. I ignored Jesse and Colton at the bar with Brandon, looking at me, judging me. I ignored the people dancing, I ignored the people laughing. I headed straight toward the Caterpillar, there now, on his stool. I exchanged my money for his drugs, and as the Hatter shot off Wonderland’s new glitter cannon above the dance floor, I left it behind me, left them all behind me.

  I had said it before, but this time I meant it. I was done with Wonderland.

  Chapter 13

  It was called the Hole, and that’s all it was. A trashy, dark, and tiny little bar, blocks away from the glitter and glow of Wonderland. It was filthy, to be honest, and I’d normally never go there. But leaving Wonderland, I couldn’t face the total loneliness of home, and as the warmth of the cocaine filled me, I wanted nothing more than more booze and some cock.

  The Hole had a back room, and there, in the dark, I could bend over for some stranger and have him fuck me senseless. A faceless, nameless fuck, devoid of all meaning, rough and raw and totally self-destructive. Let Dinah have her fun. Let the boys have their dance floor of smooth, hard-bodied, beautiful men. Let Steven have Aaron. None of that mattered. Not to me. Not anymore.

  In the darkness of the Hole, I ordered a double gin and sat in the shadows, watching the men watch me. It was a different kind of watching than at Wonderland. There, it was gods judging gods. Here, we were all fallen. The pretension was stripped away, and we bared ourselves. We were here in the squalor for one thing and one thing only.

  I felt the eyes on me before I saw him, bearded and dark, leaning up against the wall, one hand on his beer, one hand on his bulge. He saw me seeing him, and raised his beer in salute. He wasn’t my type. I didn’t go for face fur, and he had to have a decade on me at least. But he was there, and I could tell he wanted me.

  I walked past him into the bathroom, and felt his eyes follow me. In the stall, I fortified myself with a heaping helping of the Caterpillar’s finest, and looked at myself in the mirror. I loathed what I saw.

  He was standing outside the bathroom when I left, and I had to rub against him to get through the door. His hand grabbed my ass as I passed, his fingers digging in, looking for entry. I headed to the back, looking over my shoulder as I went into the dim, blue-lit room, where strangers screwed in shadows. He followed me in.

  He pushed me up against the wall, his beard rough and ripping at my mouth. The contact was good, hard and savage enough to drive away anything and anyone from my mind. He pushed me to my knees, and I clawed frantically at his belt and zipper, pulling out his thick slab of meat, which was already hard and leaking. “Eat me,” he said, and shoved his dick into my mouth. I gagged before finding my rhythm. His fingers tangled in my hair as he pushed himself into me. I could feel my eyes water as he fucked my face so hard I could barely breathe.

  Suddenly, he pulled me to my feet, and spun me around. He yanked my pants to the ground and his fingers clawed into my ass. His spit on my hole was cold and wet from his beer, and he pushed my face against the brick wall as he pushed his dick inside me. I groaned as he penetrated me. No gentle entry, no slow and steady. He fucked me hard and fast and furious, faster and faster, furiouser and furiouser, his hands on my hips, and suddenly again, he pulled out and I felt him shoot on my back. “Thanks,” he said, and he pulled up his pants and walked away.

  I felt tears on my face, as hot and wet as his load. I could make out the people around me, some who had been watching, go back to their own acts. What did they think of me? Did it matter? Not to me. Not as long as I was flying high and safe on cocaine wings. Nothing could touch me. I pulled up my pants and went back into the main bar, semen dripping past the waistband. There was plenty of time before last call.

  Chapter 14

  I woke up in the loving arms of a massive hangover. The rest of the night was a blur. Through the throb
in my head, vague images floated. Sucking off a leather daddy in the bathroom. Getting cut off and screaming at the bartender. Doing coke in the park on the stumble home. Puking in the middle of the street.

  “Way to keep things classy, Alex,” I told myself. I was wobbly on my feet as I went to the fridge and gulped down water straight from the jug I kept in there for just such emergencies. My stomach lurched, and the sun was bright through the window. The clock read four-thirty. Had I really slept the entire day? What time had I gotten home? It couldn’t have been much past two....

  I looked at my phone, dreading the sent messages I’d find, but luckily, there weren’t any (unless drunk Alex was now covering his tracks so sober Alex wasn’t horrified) (no, if I’d been cut off at the Hole of all places, I hadn’t been coherent enough to think of that). At least I hadn’t drunk-texted Aaron or Steven. In the past few months, that had happened once or twice when the cycle of self-loathing and substance use had hit a special low.

  There were, however, a series of texts from Dinah, apologizing for her fag slip-up. She knew how that word hit me. Even if she’d shortened it to fag, which maybe wasn’t as bad (maybe), it was still faggot. It was still bullies on bicycles, and it was still beer bottles thrown from cars, and it was still Nathan, violent and hate-filled and holding us captive.

  I could still see him lying there, after the gun went off. Thinking he was dead, hoping he was dead. He deserved to die. After all he’d done, all the pain he’d caused. My wonderful life had exploded, and he’d lit the fuse.

  Later, I’d been glad he hadn’t died. When it came out what had happened to him as a kid, that his dad had raped him, that his dad had let friends rape him, I couldn’t help but feel sympathy. Somewhat. But when I thought of what Nathan had cost me, about how it destroyed me and Steven, about how it destroyed me and everyone, I wanted him to rot where he was.

  That’s where Dinah’s fag had sent me . . . back to all those dark places. It was her fault I’d ended up at the Hole. Fuck her. Fuck her precious little Twitten and their precious little straight marriage. It was too early in my hangover for that kind of anger, unless I had a little something left over.

  “What do you think?” I asked Griffin, as he came rubbing against my leg and meowing. “Does Daddy have any coke left?”

  I found my jeans, went through the pockets, sighed that there was nothing. I checked my jacket pockets, but was equally disappointed. Did I need to call the Caterpillar? So early in the day? Maybe I could sleep off the hangover. Then I wouldn’t need the little wake-me-up pick-me-up.

  But it was too late. My thoughts had already gone dark, and when I closed my eyes, I lived it again. The fear when Steven went missing. The confusion of the days that followed. The terror and the violence of that final confrontation with Nathan. And then That Friday Night, the nakedness, the betrayal, the ecstasy and the agony and the jealousy, and then my emotional meltdown at Wonderland.

  Being there last night brought it all back and fresh. I didn’t remember getting there That Friday Night, the pain and the rage of seeing them together was so fresh. But I remembered pounding back shot after shot in seconds. I remembered Brandon’s concern even as he served them to me. I remembered the Caterpillar, passing me a freebie. It gets a bit blurry then, the lines off the table, security asking me to leave, me going all Real Housewife Teresa and flipping the table, punching Brandon as he tried to calm me down. And then I was on the pavement outside just as Jesse and Colton arrived, and when they tried to help, the last of the bile exploded from me.

  “It’s all your fault!” I screamed. “You made everything so sexual, you changed everything! And now . . . and now . . .” I couldn’t tell them what had happened.

  “Alex, chill the fuck out,” Jesse said.

  “We didn’t make you do anything you didn’t want to do.”

  Colton’s words echoed Nathan’s too closely and I threw myself at him, swinging. Jesse pulled me off and tossed me to the ground.

  “You’re fucking whores! You’re both total fucking sluts! I hate you! I hate you both! I wish I’d never met you!”

  That part stood out clear, and then everything went black until I woke up, broken, ashamed, and weighed down with the guilt of it all. I rejected their attempts to reach out. They were gone from my life, all of them. I was done with it all.

  It was just me and Griffin and, maybe once in a while, Dinah.

  Oh, and one more person.

  “Hey, it’s me,” I told the Caterpillar, not even knowing I’d dialed. “Can you pop over?”

  Chapter 15

  Sunday morning brunch at the Duchess was a tradition, and like every Sunday, I crawled out of my hangover, thinking I was late for it, before remembering it was a tradition to which I was no longer invited. The night before was as blurry as the night before that. His name was Chad, I think, and he’d been hot, but he’d wanted a top, and my coke-dick was having none of that. After all, like Jesse always said, two bottoms don’t make a top (but two bottoms do make a top happy). Instead, it had been Sean Cody boys and frantic and furious masturbation until I came down and passed out.

  I lay there in bed, the noonday sun beating through my window. I pulled the pillow over my face, trying to block out the light. My whole body was dried out and sore. Two days of being too dazed, and I was a wreck. Grunting, I sat up and caught my reflection in the mirror on my dresser.

  I didn’t even recognize myself.

  I started to cry.

  At first it was just a trickle, but the harder I stared at the face in the mirror, the more the tears streamed down my face. This had to stop. Maybe I had fucked everything up, but I could still make things right again. Maybe not easily, but I could put my life together again, right? Why should I let Nathan win like this? He had wanted to prove gay people couldn’t get their happy-ever-after. I was proving him right.

  “No more!” The sound of my voice in the quiet apartment startled me (and sent Griffin bolting from the room). “That’s it! I’m really done!”

  I stormed into the living room, opened up the drawer in the coffee table. There was the razor and mirror, coated in powder, half a line still left from last night. It called to me. “Do me,” it said. “Sniff me.” The pain of the hangover would go away, the pain of the feelings would go away. All I had to do was bend down and breathe it in.

  “No!” I picked up the mirror and smashed it to the ground. Griffin peered out at me from his cat condo. Half-crying, half-laughing, I started to clean it up, thinking this was the first step to cleaning everything else up. With Dinah. With Brandon and the twins. With Aaron and Steven. I could make things better. I would make things better.

  A knock at my door broke me from my train of thought. “Alex, you there? Open up.” It was Walter’s voice, hardly high on my list of people to see, but maybe it was a start.

  “Just a second,” I said, dumping the dustpan of broken mirror into the garbage.

  “You okay?”

  The urgency in his voice was almost comical. I was far from okay, but I was going to be. Why was he so worried? Just from the scene I caused at Wonderland Friday? Wiping my face dry from tears, I said as I opened the door, “Yeah, I’m fine, why do you ask?”

  “Well, this,” he said, gesturing at the wall. “I can’t believe someone did it again.”

  “What are you talking about?” I stepped out into the hall and there, sprayed across my door in green paint, was FAGGOT.

  It was a punch in the gut. I grabbed hold of Walter and slumped against the wall. I remembered so clearly coming home to see faggot whore painted in much the same way. That had been Allan, at Nathan’s behest, right after I hooked up with Aaron at White Night. Was this Allan again? Why?

  “Why?” I asked Walter, and started to cry again.

  “You didn’t know?”

  “No, I haven’t been out of my apartment since Friday. When . . . How long . . . ?”

  “It wasn’t there last night when I got home from the gym. Had to hav
e happened overnight.”

  Faggot. Nathan’s voice echoed in my head. It couldn’t be . . . he couldn’t have . . . He was locked up. He was gone. It was over.

  But there it was. Again. Faggot. Faggot. Faggot. Why had I tossed away that coke? I could sure use some of it now.

  “I’m sorry,” Walter said, and I realized he’d been talking the whole time. “Should we call the police?”

  No one ever did anything. At the end of the day, the only person you can count on is yourself. “Why? They’re just going to write a report. There’s no cameras on the building. It’s just vandalism, they’ll say. A mean prank. They won’t do anything.”

  Could it have been Allan? It’s the kind of sick thing that little fuckwad of a twink would do. He’d done it before. But why now? Why after all these months? But the more I stared at the word, the more it seemed exactly the same as the one before. The way it was sprayed there, the same. The hate behind the paint, the same. That twisted little druggie would think it was funny, messing with me after so long.

  But where was he? He wouldn’t be hanging around Wonderland anymore, that’s for sure. Brandon would kill him. Where did all those boys go, when they were done with Brandon and wanting to avoid his raging drama? Wonderland was the club. There was nowhere else like it. Sure, there were places like the Hole, but that wasn’t for kids. They wanted to dance and do their drugs, not cruise and fuck.

  Brandon would know. Even though he hated them all when it was done, he was the kind of guy who would keep track of them. Stalk their Facebooks, and catfish them on Grindr, and do whatever he had to do to make sure they never forgot that they dared mess with Brandon Sweet. Brandon Sweet sure wasn’t sweet, when it was all over.

  Would he tell me? Would he even talk to me? Could I even talk to him? Only one way to find out, I guessed.

  “Alex?”

  “Thanks for checking on me, Walter, I appreciate it. I . . . I gotta go.” I half-smiled at the neighbor I used to call the Walrus and went back inside. Things did indeed change. Hell, he’d known it was Allan who sprayed my door before (faggot whore faggot whore faggot whore), but he’d told me it was Aaron, all for the chance to suck some dick. He’d made amends though, or tried to anyway. And there was something to be said for that.