charlie ↘↖
I’m late. Posting, I mean. ONLY posting.
It was because of labor. Labor DAY I mean.
Sheesh, get your buns out of the oven and your minds out of the gutter. I think there’s been quite enough baby talk on this blog for a while.
The harder I try to stick to a steady schedule of posting for you, the more life seems determined to jump in and complicated things. Isn’t that always the way it goes? Luckily, when my life is filled with mundane chaos (how’s that for a contradiction), my friends regale me with their own debaucherous tales. So since I’m already running late, I’ll share one of those little nuggets with you.
My friend Charlie has been living la vida single guy since about January. He was happy to find that unlike the island on Lost, it IS possible to leave Girlfriend Island, possibly to never return. A serial monogamist in the past, he’s found himself single for an extended period of time for the first time in his adult life. He’s been enjoying getting his feet wet as he wades back into the dating pool.
Recently, he was lounging in a gal’s bed “after a marathon.” She was looking for something in the drawer in her bedside table, rummaging about, and she then returned to bed. Half asleep, he heard her cell phone buzz beside him, and pulled it out of the nightstand mumbling, “Oh, you’re phone is ring-” Only as he started to hand it over did he realize that her phone was oddly… phallic. The object vibrating in his hand was not at all a phone.. Since there was no recovering from or denying the situation, he asked if it had a name. “Oh, that’s Steve,” she responded.
Charlie took that as his cue to leave. You know what they say, three’s a crowd. Steve was clearly planning on staying around longer than Charlie was - at least until his batteries ran out.
Nerdcore and The End of the World
On New Year’s Eve of 09-10, I decided to go out by myself. There were too many options and too much chaos, and I made the decision to just do what I wanted, on my own, and start the year of Horribella off right.
I ended up - quite intoxicated and inevitably - at my favorite bar, where I made eyes at a young, awkward, hipster in training. His name was Mike, he came to sit with me, digits were exchanged. This might have been the first time I’d actually met a stranger at a bar and ended up going out with him, and over the next few weeks, we chatted online, had dinner/drinks a few times. My roommate took one look at his Rivers glasses and skinny jeans and christened him “Nerdcore.” I finally got him drunk enough to give up the awkwardness and make out with me. We spent a hungover morning/afternoon in bed, geeking out over his new iPhone. Overall, it was nice. It wasn’t fireworks and passion and butterflies, it was just nice. Which was exactly what I needed, a pleasant contrast to the supernova which had been George.
One evening, we’d planned on getting together, but he IMed me and said he was beat and didn’t know if he’d make it to my neighborhood. I suggested I go to his place, and he informed me that I couldn’t. Because he lived with his parents. Now, he’d told me about his place before. He’d said he had a cat, which wasn’t really his, it belonged to his roommate. So I assumed he was kidding now. He wasn’t. By “roommate,” he meant mom. He’d lied, because he thought I’d judge him and be put off if he’d told me the truth from the beginning. He was probably right. Oh, you smart tricksy little nerds!
Anyway, after about a month, I invited him over and to go dancing at The Pill, a favorite weekly hangout. Nerdcore liked to go with me because he knew he’d get in free. I like to go because drinks are cheap. I decided to cook dinner (by that I mean I boiled water), in an effort to be girly and cute. We killed some time until bar o’clock, which is typically around 11. Now, in Boston, public transportation stops running between 12 - 1, so that doesn’t leave much time if you plan on taking it home. At about midnight, Nerdcore mentioned that he should get going so he could catch the train. I said, “Why don’t you just stay at my place?” There’s constantly people crashing at my apartment, which we affectionately refer to as The Home For Wayward Hipsters, and he’d stayed over before for a smoochfest. I’d just kind of assumed we’d have a repeat. I mean, I’d cooked something besides a Lean Cuisine. I feel like that earns me a makeout, at least.
Nerdcore got a look on his puppy dog face. A look that said “I’m about to poop on the carpet. I know it’s wrong, but I’m going to do it anyway.” I sighed. I turned to my friend Charlie, who was hanging with us and whispered “Give me a minute to get dumped,” and turned back to Nerdcore. “What’s the deal?” He suggested we go outside to talk. It was February in Boston. I don’t need to be freezing in addition to getting the break off. I was half in the bag, and they don’t let you wander the sidewalks with drinks in this Puritanical city. No, I was not going outside.
He shifted uncomfortably. “I just, uh, don’t really want a relationship.” I laughed. At this point, I was drinking Le Fin Du Monde, which Charlie has re-named Horribella Juice. The name means “The End of the World,” and it is appropriate. It takes about 1.5 of them to turn me from harmless Bella into the Horrible Beauty on a Trampage. If more than two are consumed, jail and/or a strip club might be in the not so distant future.
I tried to stop Nerdcore from getting an ulcer. “I thought we were just having fun.” Another weight shift. “I just… uh… don’t… I should go…” This poor kid was trying really hard to let me down easy. I could tell he was expecting a scene, or at least a tear. He felt guilty, which made me feel guilty, because I just couldn’t give him what he wanted. I stared at him as he stammered. It was really getting old, and my beer was really getting empty.
“I just don’t want a relationship,” he repeated. I blinked. “Oh. I don’t care, and I’m bored. Bye.”
I turned and went to dance with Charlie. He watched Nerdcore leave, and said it was the most amusing confusion he’s ever witnessed. He wasn’t sure if he’d been the dumper or the dumpee.
Either way, it wasn’t the end of the world.
