I've got desperate desires and unadmirable plans

Darker Shades of Fear

(Installment 14)

I've got desperate desires and unadmirable plans
My tongue will taste of gin and malicious intent
Bring you back to the bar
Get you out of the cold
A sober, straight face gets you out of your clothes

You laugh at every word trying hard to be cute
I almost feel sorry for what I'm gonna do

***

Around two thirty in the morning he decided to quit staring at the blank screen of the idiot box and do something (or someone) with his time. It was still early, and the bars would be full of his type: dirty, pretty, and willing. Somehow, the appeal wasn’t there. He sighed in frustration, knowing that he still wasn’t right.

He was just in a funk – that was all. He needed to get himself out of this alcohol-induced mood swing and back to his usual self. He needed to get back into his routine unpredictability. He was aware of how very contradictory this was, however could not deny the truth in it.

The early hours of the morning (or late hours of the night depending on your perspective) were always the most interesting. Everything seemed so peaceful and quiet, but inside the bars and clubs the party had barely begun. The trash would crawl out from the proverbial gutters and everything that politicians and the like vowed to expel would surface. The dealers, the addicts, the hookers, the queers, and everything else that could be deemed “politically incorrect” made themselves known. The streets would belong to them for a few hours each night before they would be forced back to their respective place of residence and most of them show up to their day job as someone completely different than they were the previous night.

He marveled at it. Their ability to live double lives. The dealers were respected interns or wealthy stockbrokers and the addicts would function in the workplace as if nothing were wrong, the hookers would waitress and the queers would pose straight. He didn’t understand it. He was just Kenny, all the time. He had no shame in what he was. He was a dirty, arrogant little asshole and had no reason to hide it.

It was incredible how deceptive the nighttime was. It was dark and silent and seemingly at rest while beneath the façade of calm sleep something itched to be released. Something that pulsed and nagged sadistically until you either gave in or gave up. It was inexplicably complicated… sort of like him.

He opened the door that was now familiar to him and entered the smoke-filled bar. He inhaled the thick, stained air and reached in his pocket for a cigarette. He lit it and inhaled, then contributed to the grayish fog.

“Look who it is.” the bartender said with a smile as Kenny took his customary seat.

“Did you miss me?” He asked with fake enthusiasm.

“You haven’t been here in four days. I thought you died or something.”

“Isn’t that sweet…”

“Where were you? Uptown?”

“Worse.”

The bartender laughed. “The usual?”

“No.” he replied with a sickness in his tone.

“What’s the matter? Nothing a little gin and tonic won’t cure.”

“Don’t mention gin or whiskey for another two days, okay?”

The bartender smiled knowingly, “Got shitfaced, didn’t ya?”

“Ugh. You have no idea.”

“You okay?”

“Is anyone really ‘okay’?”

He rolled his eyes, “You look like shit.”

“Thank you. I bet that’s what you tell all the pretty boys.” He replied, batting his eyelashes.

He sighed, “Can I get you anything?”

“Cold Vodka and a hot fuck.”

“I can take care of the Vodka, you’ll have to take care of that last part on your own.”

He felt the cold liquid burn his throat as he downed half the glass. He felt slightly dizzy, but it was a good kind of dizzy, the kind that blocked out any unwanted thoughts. Satisfied, he finished the glass and enjoyed the lightheaded feeling the alcohol had given him. Nothing seemed to matter at the moment, no significant thoughts or memories nagging at his mind. He smiled as this complete and total sense of absolute apathy washed over him. Comfortably numb, he defied his prior commitment to himself and ordered a gin.

“I thought you told me not to mention gin or whiskey for another two days.”

“Thanks for remembering – now forget it.”

Something was wrong with Kenny tonight, or so observed the bartender. Well, something had always been wrong with him, but not like this. It was strange and he could find no words to explain this sudden change in his customer.

He set the drink on the table and Kenny downed almost the entire glass in one swig. The liquid scorched his throat and churned in his stomach, but he enjoyed the sickening sensation. It served as some masochistic sign that he was alive. Smiling in a rather unsettling way, he ordered another and did the same. He clenched his eyes shut as the sharp pain spiked in his skull and throat. Satisfied, he lit a cigarette and inhaled the damaging smoke, silently reveling in the painful sensation.

His throat ached unbearably from the constant smoking of cigarettes and the scalding sensation of the alcohol. He wanted to scream in agony but instead smiled and downed another glass.

Maybe twenty minutes to a half an hour later (which might have actually been forever – no one is qualified to say for sure), he caught sight of a pretty looking girl who was half drunk and trying to eye him discreetly, but failing miserably. He approached her with the kind of predatory grin that would have sent sane men running for the proverbial hills. She suppressed a smile and tried to glance carelessly in the opposite direction. He stood inches away from her, placing one hand firmly on the wall beside her head to steady his balance as he leaned toward her to create a claustrophobic atmosphere. His other hand went to the young woman’s chin and turned it toward him without resistance. Their faces were practically touching and all it took was a faux innocent grin from Kenny to close the gap.

He thought she tasted like gin, but it was the taste of his own mouth he was observing. Not that he cared, really. All that mattered was it brought him one step closer to getting laid.

He pulled away, leaving only the slightest distance between them, “Can I buy you a drink?” he asked in a low, seductive tone.

She giggled and nodded, and Kenny took her over to the bar where she ordered a Pina Colada. The bartender rolled his eyes at Kenny who only grinned in reply, an unspoken understanding between them.

By the time she had finished her drink, she was completely trashed and struggling to stay awake. Kenny had carefully been making a series of advances, some blatantly sexual and some more subtle – but either way, she played off them – laughing and smiling. She took the cherry stem and worked it into a knot with her mouth, sticking out her tongue suggestively to display the result to Kenny, who pretended to care. He almost felt sympathetic for her. She was trying so hard, and for what: a desperate lay? He knew perfectly well that he would take her home, screw her senseless and leave once she was asleep. He mentally shrugged off this inclination as she giggled drunkenly and made a comment about his eyes. At this point, he didn’t give a shit because blood wasn’t exactly rushing in the direction of his brain.

“You wanna get out of here?”

She giggled, “I thought you’d never ask.”

Kenny grinned and let her lead him out of the bar and down the street to an apartment complex. They stumbled and staggered over themselves and each other, trying to walk, grope and kiss simultaneously which was a difficult enough task to perform while sober, which they both were not. It took ten minutes to get into the elevator, which was pitiful considering it was only maybe fifteen feet from the entrance. She pressed a button and they began to move, until Kenny managed to find the one that was labeled STOP. The car came to a quick, unexpected halt.

“Did you do that?” She asked, knowing full well he had.

“…Maybe.” He played along, leaning in to kiss her. It was drunken and sloppy, but he didn’t mind. It was fitting under the circumstances.

He took the small initiative of backing her against the wall, no resistance there.

He pressed himself against her, no resistance there.

He ground his hips into hers, no resistance there.

Satisfied after taking all the necessary steps, he grinned evilly and slid a hand up her skirt, which she seemed to enjoy.

This was too easy.

He’d expected at least a little bit of protest, but no. Nothing. He was screwing her, three times in an elevator and she had no qualms about it. Neither did he, per se. For some reason, his thoughts were elsewhere. He really wasn’t at all fazed by what was happening. There was no sense of victory or fulfillment, nothing he could be proud of or brag about. It seemed so juvenile, but it was the truth.

This was just drunken, semi-decent sex. No fun in that. No chase, no thrill, no game, no nothing. Just an absentminded distraction to pass the time. He wasn’t paying the slightest attention to the nameless woman with him. He found it hard to believe that this was sex he didn’t enjoy. That had certainly never happened before.

Perhaps it was his mindset. He was still probably miserable over what had transpired at the Jazz Club earlier. He’d always known he was worthless, but to have it confirmed was enough to spark a reaction from even him.

You’re worthless, his mind said.

You’re pitiful.

Disgusting.

Look at you, fucking in an elevator.

You’re pathetic.

He squeezed his eyes shut and tried to block out the resurfacing self-loathing. His head was cluttered with distorted noise. The sound of his own breathing, the raged gasps of whoever it was he had pinned against the wall, the inability to think logically while fucking, and the pain in his throat all culminated to produce nothing short of perfect chaos as a blaring background symphony as his mind continued to offer insult after insult.

Worthless.

Useless.

Fuck up.

Every word made him push harder, move faster, anything to make this end. He needed this overwhelming ache to ease. He needed to be free of this ulcerous emptiness in his gut, relentlessly gnawing at him from the inside out.

So this is what it feels like to die… he thought as the agony raged. Panic gripped him at the thought, but he was powerless against it. Kenny didn’t want to die here, at least that was what he thought he thought. It wouldn’t have been a bad way to go, with the exception of the fact that his mind was on anything but the sex. He felt as if his insides were ripping apart and his body itself was literally coming undone at the seams.

He screamed, but failed to hear the deafening sound. Between the physical pain and the insanity screaming in his skull he could do nothing. It was impossible to control his thoughts and he wondered idly if this had ever happened before. Well, why not? It didn’t really matter, he decided, because he would never be able to answer that question – nor did he want to.

He was never more certain that he had lost his mind.

The scream from the woman he’d forgotten he was screwing pulled him out of his half-dazed semi-consciousness and back into the present with a mental jolt. His thoughts abruptly ceased, leaving his mind completely silent. The pain was numbed completely, enabling him to focus on the current situation.

Grinning at this sudden seizure of control, he forcefully ground his hips into hers and enjoyed both the dominance and physical satisfaction.

When the elevator finally opened, Kenny stepped out and lit a cigarette between his smiling lips without bothering to glance back.