by Mark McCann
Nate didn’t’ seem impressed with my idea on how to improve his new tattoo. “Well, write a book and put it on the back of it for me,” he suggested, “then I can just say it’s from that.”
“Oh no, I don’t want to take away your bragging rights like that, come on, man, show some commitment.” I laughed. His smile had yet to return. “Nate, buddy, it’s just a tattoo. Yeah, sure, its forever, but you could cut yourself making dinner later and have a scar from that forever too. I wouldn’t worry too much about it. Move on. And, come on, what happened? You usually run this stuff by me; remember your hairy pottery idea? Look, man, for future reference; if you’re not sure what to do about something, about anything, picture me shaking my head, no.” We were both silent. He sighed dramatically. I squinted like he’d gone too far. “Dude, I’m just kidding, okay, it’s stellar, I…” I stopped myself, figuring it was pointless.
Nate looked unsettled, more unsettled. “You can’t even begin to understand how long my ear hair is,” he said, and I found myself pretending he hadn’t.
“What? I – what? Where the hell, what are you talking about?” I asked as I tried to be in the same room as him.
“What? How is that weird?” he asked, honestly wondering. “I was listening to you and I thought, ‘I’m listening to him,’ and that reminded me of my ears.”
“Yeah, yeah, exactly, you don’t at all see how that’s weird?”
“No, I don’t.”
“Okay, Nate, listen to me, just because your explanation is simple doesn’t mean it makes sense.” I looked at the floor, then him again, “Okay… when I was talking I wasn’t, like, I can only talk about my mouth because that’s what I think about when I begin to talk. How, how, how is it you look confused right now?!”
“There’s way too much… thinking in you, man.”
“Wow, we are perfectly balanced, we should campaign.” He laughed and so did I. “You see it’s that kind of stuff that cancels out any possibility of us having a serious conversation. That’s why I’m just along for the ride when we’re together doing whatever. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I need that too, so, you know, it’s not necessarily a negative thing,” I smiled. “It’s all good, man; when the division is made, I’ll pass a note now and then telling you all about life on the other side of stupid.”
He laughed before he began to mutter an extensive list of profanities; maybe about me, maybe about himself, maybe both. I leaned forward. I wanted to talk about the whole phone call thing we’d gone through last time we were together. Staring at him patiently, it was clear he knew a lot more profanities than I did. It was almost impressive.
I looked down and broke into laughter; there was another piece of paper at my feet. “So where’s the self-portrait going?” I asked. Nate responded with a look of confusion. . I picked up and showed him the piece of paper with a penis drawn on it. He laughed, and shook his head. I held it out toward him, “You shouldn’t leave your tattoos lying around like that. Put it somewhere safe. Do you want some suggestions where you should put it?”
“I’ll show you where to put it,” he said with a lot of effort put into not laughing.
“I know! That’s what I’m afraid of,” I said much louder than I needed to.
Nate was pretending we were back to drawing tattoos, or he may have been drawing a friend for his tattoo. My phone beeped with a text from Katie; it was a picture of her top half and she was naked. I put the phone in my pocket and stood up, “I gotta go, one of the kids barfed on Katie’s shirt.”
Chapter 38 … Oh Boy Oh Boy
I sat in the car, staring at the picture Katie had sent me. I replied with a long spiel about how much I loved her and her picture and really would have loved nothing more than to have gone straight home, but felt it was my responsibility to stop at my parents to make sure everything was copasetic. I ended with ‘I love you, thank you and you are so, so, so hot, GOD, SO HOT.’ We both knew if she sent me anything more than that, I would have dropped my plans, my attention to red lights, and driven straight home. I looked down at my phone, why hadn’t I just phoned her? I shook my head, threw the phone on the passenger seat and started the car.
When I finally arrived at my parents’; the mailbox was empty and there wasn’t a single newspaper on the porch. I didn’t think much of it; my mind had been done in by the mental puzzles Nate had set before me. I let myself in, and suddenly wanted to get back out, but dropped my keys. My first thought was to kick my keys towards the door, then, with a little luck, not something I liked to count on, I’d dive, grab them and roll out the door… had the door not been shut. And so that option fell out of the running. I sulked. I began sifting frantically where I stood, midstream, and the only idea that came to surface was to simply stand my ground and see it through. I was too tired to fight myself or the situation. Since nothing had ever advanced with my dad each time I tried to tackle the subject with him, I figured I may as well have taken my chances there in the trenches. I was having doubts and looked at the door again, and wondered what type of weight and speed one would need to roll through something like that. I hadn’t an ounce of rhythm and still I turned back to face the music. “Hi,” I said mildly, as though she might not notice me, since I was technically standing behind a set of keys.
“Hi honey,” Candy was her cheerful self and she stood and smiled in my direction. I didn’t know how she did it. I didn’t understand how she could make me feel like I was her favourite person in the whole world, even though I came across as an idiot, half frightened, and probably half cruel. It truly confounded me, right then and right there. I had given her a cold, standoffish reception at our every meeting, but she still smiled. She didn’t even seem to be drunk at the moment. She actually probably had every right to be under the impression that I was a little slow. At that moment, as I tried to speak, to be human, and do something as simple as talk to another human, I thought she may very well have been right.
I breathed deeply, trying to regain myself. I tried to be an empty vessel. I tried to be a warrior, or maybe a warrior in an empty vessel, we were talking about a ship, right? Don’t ask me these things in the middle of this crap, I thought. It was obvious my ego was determined to sink me. I was taking on water faster than I could bail it… if it was that type of a vessel.
“Your dad is so… crazy sometimes, isn’t he?” she said in the midst of my turmoil.
“Yeah,” I agreed, “I really don’t know how or what I should be doing with him or, like, any of what’s been happening… with him.” Hey, hey, watch my perfect belly flop, I thought. I tried to remind myself to breathe deeply, and repeat as necessary. Yeah, yeah, I defended myself from myself; then don’t stop breathing deeply. I smiled, but in parts, bending my mouth until it was shaped properly, like I had to mentally form it with a hammer. I wondered briefly about the benefits of being slow over those of being insane. Pending, I thought.
I decided I was neither, and then warned myself not to say the wrong things out loud today. That is not helping, I sternly lectured myself, and then winced; I needed to get out of my head and into the room if I was going to get through this with a shred of dignity, or at least seem like I could feign intelligence.
“You know, we really should sit and talk. I think we should probably clear up a few things. You seem far too tense to just skirt around this anymore, and I don’t care what your father says. Come, come, have a drink with me, honey, I’m pretty sure there’s some beer in the fridge.”
I THINK SHE JUST SAID ‘COME DRINK MY HONEY!’ She was blinking, or no, maybe I was blinking; something was coming and going, along with reason. My entire mind and face blinked, maybe even blanked. My ‘inside my head’ voice was shouting faster than I could understand, and then began to scream. My heart felt like it kept being jerked like a ball tethered to a paddle. Had I sneezed at that same moment, it would have been the end of me.
“Um, so… will you have a beer with me?” she asked patiently.
“Oh, a beer, uh, ye
s, sure honey,” I said back accidentally. She turned toward the kitchen with a giggle. I took off my shoes and picked up my keys. I made like I was about to throw them through the window, but of course didn’t. I collected myself and tried to hold it together by cradling my head in my arms. I put the keys into my pocket, took a deep breath and began the short trek toward the kitchen. Four short steps later seemed a perfect spot to stop. I wanted to set up camp right there in the middle of the room; I’d make the rest of the trip to the kitchen tomorrow. Candy’s face popped out of the kitchen and I didn’t even scream; instead I began to walk like I hadn’t stopped. I even made a face I hadn’t made since I was a child, one that said I was excited about getting where I was going.
Candy sat down beside me, looking apologetic. “You okay, honey?” she asked and patted my hand.
“Uh yeah, I’m probably fine. Do you call everyone honey?”
She giggled and swiped at me, I believed as if to say, oh you, but who knew, it might have meant, fuck you. I just knew I didn’t know.
I twisted the cap off both beer bottles she had set on the table and then drained a fair bit from one. I looked at Candy; she was drinking like she had better catch up. I set the bottle down. She did the same and smiled like we were much younger than we were, and under very different circumstances. There was a part of me taking in more air than the rest, eating or something, with its back to me, getting bigger and braver, until I finally exhaled like I’d had enough.
“I have to ask you something.” She smiled excitedly back; probably happy I had managed to say the entire sentence in the first try. “But,” I continued, “I don’t think I even know exactly what that question is yet.” I looked at our bottles on the table. I thought if we were carpenters we could simply talk about the table we were sitting at. I wondered if my mind really had to explore every nook it came across like that. It was getting way too close to being ridiculous. It was like a child I constantly had to chase after, and I was tiring of it more and more. What would happen when I gave up? How much of a mess would I be in then?
Candy was still smiling at me. It was as if she could see the little dance in my head I was subjecting myself to. “Please, understand,” I said cautiously, “it’s just a fear of the unknown: my fear, your unknown. I – like,” I didn’t know where to go from there. She kept smiling and then, maybe, dusted off her cleavage. Everything in my head stopped… and then started. What the hell was that? Were there crumbs on your breasts? Fine, I thought, you’re a lady, I get it, but why one that’s high maintenance? Plenty of women enjoy being comfortable practically all the time, yet here Candy was – with her boobs right big and right there. “Okay,” I announced, “look – I’m usually not a prude or whatever because I am a guy, but,” I paused; neither of us knew where these words were taking either of us, “Okay, look, I feel like I should get you another bra to go right above the bra you’re wearing.” My hands went up as if even they were saying, there you have it. I shook my head. “It’s crazy and doesn’t make sense. I mean, you haven’t had, like, I’m sure there are trials to becoming a strong, strong woman – I don’t mean extra strong, I’m just repeating myself, it’s a thing I do. I get, when, uncomfortable in awkward, and things with stuff, so, um, yeah. What was I saying? I don’t think I know what – how on earth are you keeping those things in, like, from not coming out, in, not out? They’re just almost out, but they’re not, and that, I guess, confuses me and apparently we need to get past them if we’re going to get on anything else – MOVE ON TO anything else, holy hell.” I nodded down and widened my eyes.
“What, you mean my boobs?” she said eagerly, sounding much too loud and much too excited about it, which was the complete opposite of what I wanted her reaction to be.
I shut my eyes and squished them with my fingers, “Oh, in the fragile name of baby Jesus,” I said. I stopped and looked at her, “It’s just, even now, again they seem… impossible. I mean, what they do or what they don’t do, that’s a lot of… just forget it. Yeah, we’ll forget I said anything, I think that’s a good idea, the best idea. Just let me go back to stuttering about you and my dad.” There was so much room for backpedalling; I thought it best to just abandon the line of thinking altogether.
I put my hand on the table, weakly, like I was being very casual about pressing an imaginary eject button. Excuse me, I thought, I’m just going to be shot through the ceiling rather than continue on with this. I was nearly panicking. Why did I have to ask about her breasts? What was I thinking? Did I mean your boobs? NO, I yelled with my ‘inside my head’ voice. That’s crazy, your boobs? What kind of a word is that anyway? Boobs, it was warping into something strange in my head. Booooouurrrbs. No, no, I meant your… your… I was nodding to your… how were you keeping those… where else could I go with that? What else could I be talking about: feet, testicles?
“Boobs,” I said loudly, having startled myself back into the conversation. “Exactly, yes, I was nodding at your boobs.” I was practically proud of it now. “They are awesome,” I said, “and I love them,” immediately feeling I’d just gone too far. Why, I thought, why couldn’t I have a middle ground, a middle something, everyone else seemed to have something normal, but, no, I’m either nowhere with it or way, way out there past it; just nothing at all or so extreme and intense it hurts one of my eyes like a spear, a spear I threw, and then ran out to catch with my eye.
She couldn’t hear me over her excitement. She opened her top completely like it just couldn’t be hinted at with what the rest of the world would call ‘an explanation.’ And, of course, she could not be subtle about the fine art of overexposure. She took her shirt off and showed me how loops of tape were holding her breasts in just shy of popping out. “Tape,” I exclaimed, “I knew it, well, of course I didn’t know it, but I knew something was up.” I smiled and nodded my head proudly, as though I’d been smart about something and that settled that, which meant the shirt could go back on. I had a joke for that ‘something was up’ statement but caught it before it was let out of my mouth. What was going on in my head? My inner voice obviously had to swallow its own tongue and set its mental little face on fire, an example needed to be made.
As she balled up the tape, I realized I was just sitting there staring at her bare chest. “Put, um, you shit, your shirt, you should, hmm, thanks, um, you know what I mean, that’s… you shouldn’t just show, ah crap,” I looked around the room. Why was I alone at everything I did? Why was no one covering my eyes or throwing a blanket over her? I’d slap her face like it was on fire, I thought, quite suddenly and for no reason at all. Realizing the strange effects breasts had on me, or maybe on men in general, I no longer did thoughts or knowledge knowing. I stupidly smiled, so awkwardly I thought she really should have laughed rather than smile back. I cleared my throat but didn’t know how to ask her to cover herself. I thought I might actually offend her. When does a man say to a woman? Can you put those away? I thought I should just nod my head and say, yeah, that’s what I’m talking about, and just ride it out like that until she got tired of it. But she wouldn’t get tired of it, and we’d have to start making out, wouldn’t we? OH GOD!
My stupid head wasn’t my friend anymore, especially when I heard these words leave my mouth: “I’ve no idea where the lines are drawn in a situation like this, so I’m just going to go ahead and ask anyway… are those your nipples… or are they new too?”
She burst into a deep and loud fit of laughter that made me jump; it was manlier than punching a shark in the face with a whole cowboy, it was.
“Oh honey,” she said, trying hard to return to her delicate self, the feminine form she was just a brief moment ago, “You can’t make me laugh so hard, I’m still sort of working on that.”
The hair on my arms was standing on end. I felt like I had come undone, though I was glad for the shock; as that had numbed my senses and voided a reaction. Otherwise… I was pretty sure I’d have been crying. I would never have thought it possible that anyone co
uld laugh like that, let alone the transsexual sitting next to me. As if that alone wasn’t surreal enough, there had to be a horrific laugh thrown into it all, too. Honestly, as I thought about it, I never would have imagined what would freak me out most about being seated next to a half-naked transsexual would have been how she laughed.
“So that’s, like, they’re big, why, with… um, what? Whoa, hey, keep your shirt back on,” I said. I thought she may hold me up to the light to look for the watermark of a smile I’d just hinted at.
“Hormones then, finally, the augmentation,” she said, wincing, “Yeah, oh, it felt like my chest was on fire for such a long, long time after, it was just awful.”
“Augmentation,” I repeated, unsure of what that meant exactly, or if I wanted to know.
She looked at me smiling, as if to say, you’ll be okay, and then said, “Boob job, honey,” and giggled.
“Right, yeah, I knew that, I just, I like that word, that’s why I said it.”
It could not have been any weirder, something that scared me quite a bit. How was my simple life so this or that… and now those? Smooth and slow sailing from here on out, I thought certainly, blue skies with a chance of showers. Slight showers, my ass, look at this, but the weather will again clear, it has to and life will be as it should. What was I doing? Praying? I shook my head. Had jolly old Saint Nick himself walked in and sat on Candy’s lap and made out with her face, while Moses cheered sucking on a candy cane from atop a pile of manure heaped up on the table, well… it certainly wouldn’t have made it any worse.
Candy was now talking on her phone, while daintily drinking her beer, very much like the woman she was, I thought, minus the naked parts. I was swallowing mine like it being empty meant I could get up and leave. She sprung up and got me another, and just as I set the empty bottle down, there was the next one, open and in front of me. It struck me how her smile was so friendly and honest, the smile of a bare soul, I thought, and laughed nervously to myself.